“There!” he exclaimed at last. “Now run and tell Clark all about it.”
“Telltale! Telltale!” chorused the others, as Freeman, exhausted by his ineffectual struggles, and dripping wet, picked up his cap and books, and hurried off. He looked at no one that he met, but all the same he was keenly conscious of the curious glances at his flushed face and dripping clothes as he went.
When he reached home he found no one there but his twin sister, Edith.
“Why, Ray!” she exclaimed, “what is the matter? How did you get so wet? But don’t stop to tell me,” she added hastily; “run right up stairs, and get on dry clothes first, and I’ll have some hot drink ready when you come down.”
She knew the danger of a chill for the delicate boy, and had the hot drink ready, and made him take it before she would let him tell her a word of what had happened. Indeed, he did not want to tell her at all, but these two had always shared each other’s joys and sorrows, so Edith soon knew the whole story, all except Crawford’s name. That Freeman would not tell for all her urging. She was so indignant, and scolded so long about it all, that her brother at last half forgot his own indignation in laughing at hers.
“I think it’s too shameful for anything, and the boy ought to be suspended—I don’t care who he is!” she declared, her blue eyes flashing. “Ray, I think you ought to let Mr. Horton know about it, just so that this fellow will not dare to treat any other boy as he has treated you.”
“No, no, Edith, they sha’n’t have any grounds for calling me telltale,” Freeman answered, his thin face flushing as he heard again, in imagination, the taunting cry of “telltale,” that seemed still ringing in his ears. “Say, Edith,” he went on, “mind you don’t let mother know anything about this. She’d worry over it, and imagine me suffering all sorts of persecutions, and it isn’t likely that that fellow will trouble me any more, now that he’s had his ‘revenge,’ as he calls it.”
“But, Ray,” said his sister, “we can’t help mother’s knowing. You can’t wear those clothes again until they’ve been cleaned and pressed. They’ll have to be sent away for that, and mother must know about it.”
“Yes, and pay the bill,” groaned the boy. “I tell you, Edith, it’s awful hard on a big fellow like me to be just a bill of expense to mother, instead of being at work, helping her, as I feel I ought to be.”
“But she doesn’t feel that you ought to be,” said Edith. “You know it almost breaks her heart because she can’t send you to college, and I don’t think anything would induce her to let you leave school until you graduate.”