“What do you know?” asked Phil as soon as they were alone.
“Know? What did I tell you, man? Darn them for the four-flushing hypocrites that they are. An hour ago Palmer came trotting back quite calmly with his crew.
“‘The bunch got away on us, across the Line,’ he whimpered.
“A put-up game from start to finish! Oh, don’t let me talk about it, Phil. It makes me positively crazy. For ten cents I’d go and shoot up the town.”
Phil tried to get Jim to sit down and eat, but it was useless, for Jim kept walking Mrs. Clunie’s dining-room like something in a cage.
Knowing the danger of the mood, Phil kept a wise silence and, much as he disliked it, he had to leave his angry chum and get along to his work.
At the smithy, things were little better. Sol Hanson had, in a roundabout way, gathered that Smiler had been abused, and, in some inexplicable manner, had arrived at the truth, that Brenchfield was responsible for it. Sol was vowing vengeance in no uncertain tones.
“What you know about it, Phil?”
“Guess he’s just been in a scrap with some other kids,” answered Phil in an off-hand way.