"Now, what have I let myself in for?" demanded Reade.
"You gave your word you'd tell me, if you could, Tom," Dick went on, "and no one else can tell me nearly as well as you can. What I want to know is this: What happened to you, that night a few weeks ago, when you broke a bottle under my window, and then started down the street as fast as you could go with a crowd of Gridley folks behind you?"
"You promised!" chorused the other four boys.
"Well, if that isn't a low-down way to dig out of me what is purely my own business!" exclaimed Tom Reade, with a scowl.
Nevertheless Tom, like the other members of Dick & Co., had a high idea of the sacredness of his word, so, after a sigh, he went on:
"When I ran away from your window, Dick, with that pack of people behind me, I dashed into a full-fledged scrape that was none of mine. You know that Mr. Ritchie, whom some of the Central Grammar boys plague so fearfully, just because he always gets so mad and makes such threats against all boys in general?
"Well, it seems that, while I was helping Timmy Finbrink out of his difficulties, and afterwards tried to fool you with the fake window-breaking, some of the Central fellows had been down at Ritchie's playing tick-tack on one of his front windows. Tick-tack is a stupid game, and it got me into a mess that night.
"It seems that Mr. Ritchie had already been bothered that evening before the Central fellows began, and he had telephoned to a friend down the street who had two college boys visiting him. So the friend and the two college fellows went out, on their way to Mr. Ritchie's. Then he heard the tapping on his window again, and Mr. Ritchie ran out through the front door. The fellows who had been doing the trick had just time to drop behind a flower bed.
"I had shaken off the crowd that started after me from Main Street, and had turned the corner down that side street. As luck would have it, I had just passed the Ritchie gate when Mr. Ritchie opened his front door. He thought I was the offender, and started after me, yelling to me to stop. Just for the exercise I kept on running, though not so fast, for I wanted to see how far Mr. Ritchie would chase me. And then I ran straight into the friend and the two college boys.
"Those college boys tried to collar me. I was foolish enough to stop and tackle. I had one of them on his back, and was doing nicely with the other, when the two men joined in. I was down and being held hard, while Mr. Ritchie was threatening to have me sent to jail for life—-for something I hadn't done, mind you!