[CHAPTER III]
THE BRAND FROM THE BURNING
“Well, you old duffer! I thought you were going to meet me at the station for the eleven o’clock.”
“I really meant to, Roy,” answered Chub Eaton, “but my train was nearly an hour late and I got in just four minutes after you’d gone. How are you? Did you have a good time Christmas?”
“Bully,” answered Roy Porter. “Did you?”
“Oh, swell! I wish you’d been out with me.”
“I wanted to go,” answered Roy gravely, “but my folks were afraid I’d get lost in the smoke. I told them that was hard on Pittsburg, but—”
Roy rolled over backward on Sidney Welch’s bed just in time to avoid the slipper which Chub hurled.
“But they said they knew the place, Chub,” he ended.