SUSPENDED
Ned didn’t get much studying done, though. Instead, he spent most of
the half-hour remaining before the examination in trying to solve the
mystery of the stolen car and Laurie’s part in the affair. It wasn’t
like Laurie to indulge in a prank so mischievous, and he could scarcely
believe that Laurie had taken part in the escapade. Still, he had the
evidence of his own senses. He had seen Laurie enter by the window;
and, too, he recalled the latter’s stated desire to drive Mr. Wells’s
car. At home in California Laurie was forever begging the wheel away
from his father and was never happier than when steering the big car
along the smooth roads about Santa Lucia. But, if Laurie had taken Mr.
Wells’s roadster, who had been with him? He wished that Laurie hadn’t
told a lie to the Doctor. That, too, was something very unlike Laurie.
Of course, as he had said afterward, the question had been sudden and
unexpected, and he had said the first thing that came into his mind,
but that didn’t excuse the lie.
Ned’s refusal to answer had been made in the effort to shift suspicion
from Laurie to himself, but he wondered now if it would not have been
as well to tell the truth. His self-sacrifice hadn’t helped his brother
much, after all, for Laurie was still suspected of complicity. The
affair would probably end in the suspension of them both, perhaps in
their expulsion. It was all a sorry mess, and Ned hadn’t discovered any
solution of it when ten o’clock came.
Rather to his surprise, he got through the examination, which lasted
until past twelve, very well. Then came dinner, at which neither he
nor Laurie displayed much of the exuberant spirit that possessed their
table companions. After the meal Ned went over to the library for an
hour. When he returned to No. 16 he found Laurie standing at the window
that looked southward toward the distant ball-field, dejection in the
droop of his shoulders. Ned felt very sorry for the other just then,
and he tried to find something to say but couldn’t, though he cleared
his throat twice and got as far as “Hm!” You couldn’t see much of the
baseball game from that window. The diamond was at the far end of the
field, and a corner of the football stand hid most of it. Laurie found
a book and read, and Ned began a letter to his father. Somehow the
afternoon wore away.
Kewpie burst in at a little before five, at once triumphant and
downcast. Hillman’s had won, 11 to 8, but Kewpie Proudtree had not been
allowed to pitch for even a part of an inning, and so his last chance
was gone, and if Pinky called that doing the square thing―― But Laurie
broke in just then. “Can it,” he said gruffly. “You saw the game,
anyhow, and that’s more than I did!”
“That’s right,” said Kewpie, apologetically. “It’s a rotten shame, Nod.
What’s Johnny got on you, anyhow? You can tell me. I won’t say a word.”
“He hasn’t got anything on me,” growled Laurie. “He just thinks he has.
Who pitched?”
“George started, but they got to him in the fourth――no, fifth, and
Nate finished out. Gee, they were three runs ahead of us in the
seventh!”
“Did Elk get in?”
“No, he’s got a sprained wrist or something. Pinky had Simpson, of the
scrubs, catch the last of the ninth. He dropped everything that reached
his hands, though.”
“Elk’s got a sprained wrist, you say? How’d he do it?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it isn’t a wrist. He’s got something wrong,
though, for I heard Dave Brewster talking about it.” After a minute
Kewpie returned to his grievance, and, since Laurie appeared busy with
his own thoughts, he was allowed to unburden himself to his heart’s
content. Ned condoled with him somewhat abstractedly. When he had taken
himself out Laurie broke the silence.
“With Elk out of the game,” he said bitterly, “I’d have had my chance
to-day, and then this had to happen!”
Ned might have reminded Laurie that he had only himself to blame, but
he didn’t. He only said, “I’m sorry, old son.” There was sincerity in
his tone, and Laurie heard it. He made no answer, however. But later,
at supper, their feud was dead, and after supper, in the room, they
talked enough to make up for twenty-four hours of silence. One subject,
though, was not mentioned.
Sunday morning the blow fell. There was another visit to Dr. Hillman’s
study. Both boys were again questioned, but their answers did not
vary from those they had given on Saturday. The Doctor showed genuine
regret when he made known the decision of the faculty. Laurie had
been exonerated from lack of evidence against him, although it was
apparent that the Doctor considered him as deserving of punishment as
Ned. Ned was suspended. That meant that he would not be passed in his
examinations and would have to return next year as a lower-middler
again. He might, as the Doctor reminded him, study during the summer
and so make the upper-middle class during the fall term, however.
As the present term was so nearly at an end, the Doctor continued,
Ned would be permitted to remain at school until Laurie was ready to
accompany him home. The Doctor ended the interview with the suggestion
that it would be a manly act on the part of the twins to reimburse Mr.
Wells for the damage done to his car. Ned opened his mouth as though to
say something then, but he changed his mind and closed it again very
tightly. A minute later they were outside.
“Gosh, Ned, I’m sorry!” said Laurie miserably.
Ned nodded. “Thanks. It’s all right. One of us had to get it.”
“One of us?” repeated Laurie a bit blankly. “Why, yes, I suppose so,
but――”
“Well, you’ve got your baseball to look after, and I haven’t anything.
So it’s better they picked on me, isn’t it?”
“We――ell,” began Laurie. Then he stopped and shook his head in a
puzzled way. Finally, “You’ll stick around until Thursday, won’t you?”
he asked anxiously.
The other nodded. “Might as well,” he said. “I could get out now and
wait for you in New York, but I don’t see any reason why I should spend
all that money just to act haughty.”
The blow having fallen, Ned, who had already discounted it, cheered up
quite remarkably. After all, he told himself, he had saved Laurie, and
last autumn Laurie had saved him from something very close to disgrace,
and so this sacrifice only somewhat evened accounts. He allowed himself
to be persuaded to accompany the others on the Sunday afternoon walk,
only pledging Laurie to say nothing of his suspension. It was not until
Monday noon that the news leaked out, and not until hours after that
that the school began to connect the incident of the wrecked automobile
with Ned’s fate. Even then most of those who knew Ned intimately
refused to believe that there could be any connection between the two
things. Questioned, Ned was very uncommunicative, and by Tuesday even
his closest friends began to waver in their faith.
Laurie went back to the baseball fold on Monday. Kewpie’s report about
Elk was true. Elk was nursing a lame wrist. He had, it seemed, hurt
it in wrestling with his room-mate. It had kept him out of the game
Saturday, and it prevented his doing any catching on Monday; but on
Tuesday the injured wrist appeared as good as ever, and Laurie, who had
been temporarily elevated to the position of first substitute catcher,
again dropped into third place. The Farview game was due on Wednesday,
which was likewise Class day and the final day of the school term. On
Monday Coach Mulford was very easy with the first-string players but
gave the substitutes a hard afternoon’s work. Laurie caught four of the
five innings that the substitutes played against the scrub team. In
the final inning he gave place to Simkins and took that youth’s berth
at first base. Tuesday saw the whole squad hard at work in the final
preparation for the enemy, and no player, from Captain Dave Brewster
down to the least of the substitutes, had a minute’s respite. “You
fellows can rest all you want to after to-morrow,” said the coach. “You
can spend all summer resting if you like. To-day you’re going to work
and work hard.” Even Kewpie, who knew that Fate held nothing for him,
was subjected to almost cruel exertion. He pitched to Laurie until his
arm almost rebelled, and he was made to “dummy pitch” from the mound
and then field the balls that Pinky batted at him and to all sides
of him. And he ran bases, too, and Kewpie considered that the final
indignity and privately thought that the least Pinky could do was to
leave him in peace to his sorrow. But before Tuesday’s practice began
other things of more importance to our story happened. While dressing
Tuesday morning Laurie let fall a remark that led to the clearing away
of mistakes and misconceptions.
“You must have gone to bed with your clothes on the other night,” he
observed. “If you didn’t, you sure made a record!”
Ned stared. “What other night?” he asked.
Laurie floundered. Neither of them had referred to the matter since
Sunday. “Why――well, you know. The night you got in the window,” Laurie
explained apologetically.
“The night _I_ got in the window! Are you crazy?”
“Oh, well,” muttered Laurie, “all right. I didn’t mean to make you
huffy.”
He went on with his dressing, but Ned still stared at him. After a
minute Ned asked: “Look here, old son, what made you say that? About me
getting in the window, I mean.”
“Why, nothing.” Laurie wanted peace in the family. “Nothing at all.”
“You had some reason,” Ned persisted, “so out with it.”
“Well, you were so blamed quick, Ned. You went to the door and then I
heard you get into bed about thirty seconds afterward. It don’t seem to
me that you had time to undress.”
“Let’s get this right,” said Ned with what was evidently forced calm.
“Sit down there a minute, Laurie. Why do you say it was I who came
through the window?”
It was Laurie’s turn to stare. “Why, why because I saw you! I waked up
just as your head came over the sill, you chump!”
“You saw _my_ head come―― Look here, are you in earnest or just trying
to be funny?”
“Seems to me it’s you who are acting the silly ass,” answered Laurie
aggrievedly. “What’s the big idea, anyway?”
“But――but, great Scott, Laurie,” exclaimed Ned excitedly. “I saw _you_
come in the window!”
“Cut the comedy,” grinned Laurie. “I wasn’t out, and you know it.”
“Well, was I, you poor fish? Wasn’t I in bed and asleep when you came
in, as you told Johnny you did?”
“Sure, but―― Say, do you mean to tell me I didn’t see――”
“Of course you didn’t! But――”
“Then who _did_ I see?” asked Laurie a trifle wildly.
“Who did _I_ see?” countered Ned. “You say it wasn’t you――”
“Me! Hang it, I went to bed at ten and wasn’t awake again until I heard
a noise and saw you――well some one coming in that window! Look here, if
it wasn’t you, why didn’t you tell Johnny so?”
“Because I thought it was _you_, you poor prune!”
“What! But I’d said――”
“Sure you had, but I’d seen you with my own eyes, hadn’t I?”
Laurie shook his head weakly. “This is too much for me,” he sighed. “It
wasn’t you and it wasn’t me but it was one of us! I pass!”
“But it wasn’t one of us,” exclaimed Ned. “That’s what I’m getting at.
Don’t you see what happened?” Laurie shook his head.
“Listen, then. We were both asleep, and we each heard the noise and
woke up. Some one came through the window, crossed the room, opened the
door, looked out to see that the coast was clear, went out, and closed
the door after him.”
“But I heard you get into bed!”
“No, you didn’t. You heard me sit up and punch my pillow. I wanted you
to know that you weren’t getting away with it. For that matter I heard
your bed creak and thought you were getting into it.”
“I sat up, too,” said Laurie. “Gee, that’s a queer one! All this time
I thought it was you and could have kicked myself around the block for
yelling ‘No!’ when Johnny asked me that question! Then――then who the
dickens _was_ it, Ned?”
“That,” answered Ned grimly, “is what we’ve got to find out. Just now
it’s up to us to get out of here before we miss our breakfasts!”
“Hang breakfast!” shouted Laurie. “This is better than a hundred
breakfasts! Why――why, it means that you――that you aren’t suspended! It
means――”
“Put your collar on, and make it snappy,” laughed Ned. “We’ve got some
work ahead of us this morning!”
After breakfast they hurried back to No. 16, barred the door against
intruders, especially Kewpie, sat down at opposite sides of the study
table, and faced the problem. They continued to face it until nearly
eleven. They examined the window-sill for clues, and found none. They
leaned out and studied the ivy by means of which the mysterious visitor
had reached the second story, and it told them nothing, or so it seemed
at the moment. As they turned back to the room Ned said idly: “It’s
lucky the fellow didn’t have to get to the third floor, for I don’t
believe he could have made it. That ivy sort of peters out above our
window.”
Laurie nodded uninterestedly and silence ensued, just as silence had
ensued so frequently before in the course of morning. Then, several
minutes later, Ned said suddenly, questioningly:
“Thurston!”
Laurie shook his head. “Not likely. Besides, what reason――”
“Wait a minute. I didn’t tell you. It didn’t seem important. After I’d
settled down again that night I heard the floor up-stairs creak twice.
I wasn’t just certain then, but now I am! Elk Thurston was moving about
up there, Laurie!”
“Well, what if he was? That doesn’t prove――” He stopped and frowned
intently. “Hold on, though, Ned! What about Elk’s wrist?”
“We’ve got it!” cried Ned.
“Yes, maybe. Let’s go slow, though. You don’t happen to know whether
Elk can drive a car, do you?”
“No, but I’ll bet you anything you like that he tried to drive that
one! Look here, our window was open and it was easy to reach. He
couldn’t have made his own without chancing a fall. He trusted to our
being asleep. He――”
“What about the other fellow, though?” asked Laurie. “We didn’t see――”
“No, but maybe he got in first. Maybe it was really he who awoke us.
Come to think of it, you said that when you woke up the fellow’s head
was just coming into sight. Well, in that case there wouldn’t have been
enough noise――”
“By jiminy, that’s so! Bet you that’s what happened. But who―― Say,
maybe the other fellow was Jim Hallock!”
“Just what I was thinking,” agreed Ned. “I don’t see, though, how we
can prove anything against either of them. Look here, son, I guess the
best thing we can do is see Johnny and tell him all about it. After
that it will be up to the faculty. Come on!”
They had to wait some time for an audience, but finally they were
facing the Doctor, and Ned, as spokesman, was saying very earnestly:
“Neither Laurie nor I was out of our room after ten o’clock Friday
night, sir. Somebody did come in our window, though, and woke us up. I
thought it was Laurie and he thought it was me, and that’s why I didn’t
want to answer your question, sir.”
Now, nothing could have been clearer and simpler than that and yet,
when Ned had finished, the principal blinked behind his spectacles,
gazed a moment in silence, and then waved a hand.
“Sit down, boys,” he said. “Now, Edward I think you’d better say that
all over again.”