So saying he placed a pair of horn spectacles on his nose and walked round the line.
“I don't see any one here whose face I ever see before as far as I knows; but bless you, the man as I bought it of might have had hair all over his face, and I be none the wiser looking at him across that counter of mine in the dark.”
“Thank you,” Mr. Porson said; “then it is of no use troubling you further. I have got my book back; but I confess that this affords me but small gratification in comparison to that which I should feel if I could unravel this mystery.”
The discovery of the book reopened the interest in the matter, and nothing else was talked of that evening in the playground.
“Ripon,” Ned said, putting his arm in that of the head boy, “I want to tell you a thing that has been in my mind for the last three weeks; mind, I don't say that there's anything in it, and I hate to think harm of any one. There is another thing; he and I ain't good friends. If it hadn't been for that I should have spoken to you before; but I was afraid that it would look like a piece of dirty spite on my part; but I do think now that as head boy you ought to know, and I want your advice whether I ought to say anything about it or not.”
“What a long winded chap you are, Sankey! What is it all about?”
“Well, you know, Ripon, when we got up that subscription for the cricket things, Mather didn't give anything. He said he had no money.”
“No; and he hadn't any,” Ripon said, “for I had only the day before lent him twopence to buy some string, and he paid me when he got his allowance on Saturday.”
“Well, a day or two after that I came back after tea for a book that I had left behind me, and as I came in at the gate there Mather was standing at the corner talking to Mother Brown. He had his back to the door, and they didn't see me. She was talking loud and angry and I couldn't help hearing what she said.”
“Well, what did she say?” Ripon said rather impatiently.