“Anybody give you a deed to that pond?”
The boys were silent.
“Now look here, boys,” Frank’s voice was stern. “It strikes me you fellows were in a pretty poor business trying to hog half a public pond for yourselves. Now you have six times the opportunities for fun these boys have, and yet you try to spoil their skating. Pretty small I call that!
“As for you boys,” turning to his captives, “you weren’t helping matters any by being mean—now were you? You didn’t think acting that way would make you any more popular did you? By the way you’re Mrs. Casey’s boy, aren’t you? Your mother is a fine woman and she works too hard to have to pay for broken windows, don’t you think so, Son?”
Frank laid his hand on the boy’s shoulder and looked straight into his eyes.
Pat shifted from one foot to the other uneasily.
“Yes, sir,” he mumbled with an effort.
“Well, she isn’t going to have to this time. I will give you a chance to earn the money to pay for it yourself? Want to?”
The boy nodded eagerly. Frank smiled in return.
“Ernest, pass that candy over here and you boys shake hands with Pat and Mike and see to it you treat them white after this! My brother and his friends aren’t as small as they let on, boys,” he added turning to the others.