Outside, a patch of sticking plaster over one eye and one arm in a sling, and looking rather mean and ashamed, young Brackett dropped his glance as Dave appeared.
“Come in, won’t you?” invited the young aviator, quite heartily.
“No, I don’t think I’d better,” replied his visitor, in a low tone. “See here, Dashaway, I’ve got my senses back, and I don’t want you or anybody else to think I’m some cheap cad.”
“Certainly not,” responded Dave. “What’s the trouble?”
“I’ve come to give you this money,” explained Brackett, extending his hand. “As soon as I got enough over being scared to feel ashamed of myself, I slipped away from that confounded Vernon. He’s always getting me into trouble.”
“What do you run with him for, then?” questioned Dave, gently. “See here,” he added, placing his hand in a friendly way on the boy’s shoulder; “you may be headstrong and foolish at times, but that man doesn’t belong in your class.”
“You’re just right,” began Brackett, in a spirited way, and then, as if he feared to go farther into the subject, he added in a moody, dissatisfied tone: “Never mind about that. I’ve come to pay you back the twenty dollars you gave to the man down at the greenhouses. I went to pay him myself, but you had gotten ahead of me. I can’t let you stand for one cent of damage I did, and if there’s any other expense——”
“None at all,” Dave hastened to say. “See here, you’ve shown me you are the right sort. I don’t like that man Vernon, and down at heart I don’t think you do, either.”
“It don’t matter whether I do or not,” muttered the boy. “I don’t dare to break away from him till—well till—I feel I’m safe out of his clutches.”
“If you are in any foolish trouble——” began Dave.