“Thanks,” answered Toby, dubiously. “You mean kindly, no doubt, but I guess I’d just as lief some one else got it. Frick has it now and I dare say he will keep it. He will so far as I’m concerned!”
“You don’t seem to have a very high notion of your ability,” laughed Tom. “Don’t be too humble, Tucker, or folks will begin to think the way you talk. And, look here, there’ll be a chance for you on the First next year, for both Curran and Noyes will be gone, and the rest of the lot aren’t very promising. So just you keep going, Tucker.”
“Oh, I’ll keep going all right,” replied Toby sadly. “They won’t let me do anything else. They’re always picking on me.”
“Who?”
“Mr. Burtis and Beech. They sit up together until daylight finding stunts for me to do the next day!”
“Sounds to me,” said Tom thoughtfully, “as if you were better than you make yourself out, old man. Or else you imagine things.”
“Let’s say the last guess is right,” laughed Toby.
They visited two theaters before they found one whose bill promised the sort of entertainment they wanted, and found seats just before the house darkened. During the announcement of coming attractions some one tapped Toby on the shoulder and he looked around in the half-gloom and saw Horace Ramsey seated behind him in company with George Tubb. Horace was evidently pleased when Toby recognized him and spoke to him, but George’s only response to Toby’s whispered greeting was a nod and a scowl.
Going homeward, two hours later, the quartet grew to a round dozen as other Yardley boys joined it, and Arnold observed that maybe it was just as well there were plenty of them as the “town thugs,” as he called them, had been getting “fresh” lately. “Casement and another chap were coming back the other night and got into a fine old scrap with a gang of the toughs,” he explained. “They had to beat it finally. Loring got a beautiful black eye out of it. He says there were four of them against him and the other chap. Hence the retreat.”