“Oh, what is it, Joe?” David flew up to a sitting posture in the middle of his bed.
“It isn't Joe. Get up as quick as you can.”
David, with a dreadful feeling at his heart, tumbled out of bed. “Isn't Joe!” he found time to say, with a glance in the darkness over toward Joel's bed.
“Hurry up, don't stop to talk.” The voice was Tom Beresford's. “Get on your clothes.”
Meantime he was scuffing around. “Where in time are your shoes?” But David already had those articles, and was pulling them on with hasty fingers. “Oh, tell me,” he couldn't help crying; but “Hurry up!” was all he got for his pains. And at last, after what seemed an age to Tom, David was piloted out into the hall, with many adjurations to “go softly,” down the long flight of stairs. Here he came to a dead stop. “I can't go another single step, Tom,” he said firmly, “unless you tell me what you want me for. And where is Joel?” he gasped.
“Oh, bother! in another minute you'd have been outside, and then it would be safe to tell you,” said Tom. “Well, if you will have it, Dave, Joe's finishing up that business with Jenk, and you're the only one that can stop it. Now don't keel over.”
David clung to the door, which Tom had managed to open softly, and for a minute it looked as if Beresford would have his hands full without in the least benefiting Joel. But suddenly he straightened up. “Oh, tell me where he is,” he cried, in a manner and voice exactly like Polly when she had anything that must be done set before her. And clear ahead of his guide when Tom whispered, “Down in the pine grove,” sped Davie on the very wings of the wind.
“Gracious! Joel is nothing to Dave as a sprinter,” said Tom to himself, as his long legs got him over the ground in the rear.
The two boys hugged the shadow of the tall trees and dashed across the lawn to the shrubbery beyond. Then it was but a breathing space, and a few good leaps to the depths of the pine grove. In the midst of this were two figures, busily engaged in the cheerful occupation of fisticuffing each other till the stronger might win.
“Joel!” called David hoarsely, his breath nearly spent as he dashed up.