"He thinks so. He is trying a wonderful new discovery of some foreign doctor, and the nurse told me on Sunday he's more than satisfied with the result."
"Hurrah for Dr. Stewart!" cried Dick; "he's a fine fellow. I'll keep a place for him on my visiting-list."
Thus they laughed and chattered, enjoying themselves in an innocent way, and endeavouring to banish the disagreeable incidents of the morning, until it was time for Jim to start for work.
"I may as well walk with you as far as the shop," said Dick, going out with him; "I feel like a fish out of water, not being at school to-day. Won't there be a buzz when the fellows hear the news?"
"Too much for me. I don't think I shall go back."
"What?" Dicky turned and looked his chum full in the face. "Surely you aren't going to show the white feather, old man. Why, that would be just giving the fellows a stick to beat you with."
"It is easy to talk," said Jim, "but I don't want to see sour looks and hear sneering remarks every day. I know what chaps like Simpson will say."
"And I know what they'll say if you don't turn up."
For some distance the two boys walked in silence. Jim was thinking. His chum was right, of course. It would be much braver and more manly to "face the music;" but he shrank, and perhaps naturally, from the ordeal. Besides, he would be leaving in any case at the end of a few weeks, and why should he go out of his way to suffer misery for the sake of a fad?
"Here we are nearly at the shop," cried Dick, stopping suddenly. "You will come in the morning, won't you?"