“I wish we could help him. If he’s got in with a bad crowd we ought to help save him. Poor old Sid, I wish——”
At that moment the door opened, and the chum whose troubles they were discussing walked in. He had heard what Tom had said, and a dull red flushed up under his brown skin.
“Were you fellows talking about me?” he asked hotly.
“We were just saying,” began Phil, “that we couldn’t——”
“I wish you fellows would mind your own business!” blurted out Sid. “I guess I can look after myself!” and he crossed the room and gazed moodily out of a window, into the darkness of the night, while the tick of the fussy little alarm clock seemed to echo and re-echo through the apartment.
[CHAPTER XV]
AN UNEXPECTED DEFENSE
There wasn’t much said in the room of the chums after Sid had “gone off the handle,” as Tom expressed it later. In fact there was not much that could be said. Phil shrugged his shoulders and glanced at Tom in a significant manner, and the captain of the nine shook his head discouragedly. Matters were getting worse, he thought, and he began to fear for the effect of Sid’s trouble on the second baseman’s ability as a player. But what could be done?