"No damage done except to Sammy's feelings."
"They surely didn't get much money?"
"Oh, no! Their total clean-up wasn't a hundred dollars; but they lugged off Sammy's books."
June felt herself falling, and grasped weakly at her lover's arm, for she saw it all. "Come!" she said, and dragged him up to her own cabin, then on to the Wag-boys' door. They were all there, sprawled about and smoking.
"You did this!" she said, shakingly. "You did it for me!"
"Did what?" they asked in chorus, looking at her blankly.
"Oh, we know," said Harry Hope. "You've given me a chance—and I'll make good!" His own voice sounded strange in his ears.
There was an instant's awkward pause, and then the Scrap Iron Kid said, simply, "You'd better!" and the others nodded.
Llewellyn spoke up, saying, "Reddy is our regular chef; but I'd like to have you see me cook a goose." Then he drew from his inside pocket what seemed to be a leaf torn from a ledger, and, unfolding it, he struck a match, then lighted it.
"I suppose I ought to be a man and face the music," Hope managed to stutter, "but I'm going to cheat the ends of justice for June's sake. I'm much obliged to you."