CHAPTER V.
A TRANSFER OF THE MORTGAGE.
When Will reached home Ted met him at the gate with a cry of surprise and commiseration.
"What in the world have you been doing to your face?" he questioned.
"Thrashing Baizley!" said Will, tersely.
Ted's exclamations had brought Mrs. Carter to the door in time to hear Will's reply. She was alarmed at the sight of Will's swollen and discolored features; and her alarm made her angry.
"I'm ashamed of you, Willie," she cried, "stooping to brawl with a low fellow like that. It serves you right if you have got hurt. Come, run in and get your face bathed in hot water. Why, it's dreadful! Go right up stairs and get me the arnica, Teddie!"
As Mrs. Carter bathed the swollen face in hot water, Ted standing by with the arnica bottle, Will managed to get out a somewhat grimly jocose account of the affray. Ted, of course, was jubilant. From time to time he sprang up and shouted. At length, clapping Will on the back, so violently that his mother spilled the hot water, he cried: