"I knocked him down," Dave admitted coolly.
"Well, that's about the proper thing to do," declared another bystander. "The Ripley kid has no kick coming to him. Move on, young feller!"
Fred started, glaring angrily at the speaker. But half a dozen pressed forward about him. Ripley's face went white with rage when he found himself being edged off the sidewalk into the gutter.
"Get back, there, you, and leave me alone!" he ordered, hoarsely.
A laugh from the crowd was the first answer. Then some one gave the junior a shove that sent him spinning out into the street.
Ripley darted by the crowd now, his caution and his dread of too much of a scene coming to his aid. Besides, some one had just called out, banteringly:
"Why not take him to the horse trough?"
That decided Fred on quick retreat. Ducked, deservedly, by a crowd on Main Street, Ripley could never regain real standing in the High School, and he knew that.
As soon as they could Dick and Dave walked on to "The Blade" office. Here Darrin took a chair in the corner, occasionally glancing almost enviously at Prescott, as the latter, seated at a reporter's table, slowly wrote the few little local items that he had picked up during the afternoon. When Dick had finished he handed his "copy" to Mr. Pollock, and the chums left the office.
"Dick, old fellow," hinted Dave, confidentially, "I'm afraid I ought to give you a tip, even though it does make me feel something like a spy."