“I’ll be back as quick as I can. Besides, I want to know how he got out. He must be real hungry——” and away she went.
“Come on, Jim,” said Rodney. “You’ll be safe, in our house. I’m glad you didn’t do it, though. Tell you what, if it had been me, I’d ha’ broke loose. How’d you ever manage to do it? Tell us——”
“I will,” said Jim, as he followed his new friend, but a sudden change had come over him.
His step was light and springy, and his face was bright with new hope. He had watched there in the raw, chilly morning until he had grown almost desperate. Not that he had wished himself back in the House of Refuge, but that he had felt very tired, very hungry, and altogether uncertain what to do next, or where to go.
“Mother!” shouted Rodney, with a sort of effort not to shout quite so loud:
“He’s from Randall’s Island! He got away last night, and the cops are after him. Millie’s going to bring him some of Tom’s clothes——”
“Rodney!” she exclaimed. “Why, how did he get here?—~Now, you keep still and let him tell me all about it.”
That was precisely what Rod was very willing to do, and Jim was glad enough to tell them everything.
“O, Rod!” said his mother. “What if it had been you!—His uncle ought to be put there, himself,—and what could his aunt have been thinking of——”
“’Twasn’t her fault,” said Jim, “and the money was really gone. Somebody took it, but I didn’t, and Uncle John may not have been so much to blame. He never liked me anyhow——”