"Hi!" said Penny dreamily.

"Hi," returned Clint.

"Warm, isn't it?"

"Yes, great."

"I thought I'd study a little, but I guess I was almost asleep."

"Day-dreaming," suggested Clint. There was a moment's silence, during which an odd idea occurred to Clint. He didn't much care to walk by himself, and he didn't know where to look for Amy or any of the other fellows who might care to join him. Why not, then, ask Penny Durkin?

Before he had thoroughly weighed the merits of the scheme he found himself making the suggestion.

"Come on for a walk, Durkin," he said. "Bring your old book along if you like. We'll find a place in the woods and, as Amy says, commune with Nature."

Penny looked first surprised and then pleased, and, "I'd love to," he said. So they set off together around the corner of Torrence and past the little brick building which held the heating plant and made off across the field. The sun was gloriously warm and the air was like that of a June day, and after the first minute or two of progress they discovered that they had no inclination toward hurrying, that, in short, they felt decidedly lazy and drowsy, and that the sooner they reached that place in the woods where they were to commune with Nature the pleasanter it would be.

Conversation was fitful. Penny spoke hesitantly of Clint's good work in yesterday's game, ventured a vague prediction that Brimfield would win from Claflin on Sat.u.r.day and then seemed to fall asleep. Clint made no effort to arouse him and presently they climbed over the stone wall that divided the school property from the woodland and made their way through the trees until they were half-way up the slope. There, in the lee of an outcropping grey ledge of weathered granite, they subsided on a bed of leaves with sighs of contentment. Through the nearer trees and above the more distant ones, they could see the further side of the field and the sunlit buildings.

"I reckon," said Clint, propping his shoulders against a convenient surface of the ledge, "this is the place we were looking for. Now, bring on your Nature and we'll commune."

"I used to come up here when I was a First Former," said Penny. "Two or three of us kids would sneak stuff from dining hall and build a fire back of this rock and picnic. One day we went off and forgot about the fire and that night someone looked over and saw a blaze and they had to fight it for almost an hour with brooms and buckets of water. We had a fine time! Everyone turned out. We never told what we knew about it, though!" And Penny smiled reminiscently.

"You're in the sixth form this year, aren't you?" asked Clint.

"Yes, this is my last year."

"And you've been here five already!" Clint marvelled. "My, that's a long time, isn't it? You'll feel queer, won't you, when you don't come back next Fall?"

Penny nodded soberly. "It'll be--funny," he agreed. "I don't suppose you'll quite understand it, Thayer, but--well, this school is more like a real home than any other place I know. You see, my mother died a long while ago; I was just a toddler then; and my father married again. Then, when I was eleven, he died and now I live with my stepmother and her brother. He's not a bad sort of man, Uncle Steve. I just call him uncle, of course. But my stepmother never liked me much, and then, besides, father didn't leave much money when he died and she sort of feels that she can't afford to pay my education. I've always had to fight to get back here every year. Uncle Steve helped me some, but he's kind of scared of ma and doesn't dare say much. That's why school seems like home. When I go back to Parkerstown it's more like going on a visit than going home. And after this year it's going to seem funny, unless I go to college."

"But you are going, aren't you?" asked Clint anxiously.

"If I can. Mr. Fernald says he's hoping to get me a scholarship that will pretty nearly see me through my freshman year, but there's nothing certain about it, because there are always a lot of folks after those scholarships and there aren't very many of them. I guess that's about the only way I'll manage it."

"I do hope you get it," said Clint with genuine sympathy. "I suppose you couldn't--couldn't find any way to work through, Durkin."

"I've thought of that. I don't know. I've done pretty well here, buying and selling all kinds of things. You wouldn't think there'd be much money in it, would you? But since my second year I've done a lot of it and made nearly enough each year to pay my tuition. That's the only way I've been able to stay. I guess ma argued that I'd cost her less at school, making most of the money myself, than I would at home. Fellows sometimes call me a 'Yankee' and a 'Shylock' and things like that because I try to get all the money I can for a thing. But I've never cheated anyone; and--and I've really needed the money. But I don't believe a fellow could do that in college. There might be another way, though. I've heard of fellows making a lot of money in college."

"Seems to me," said Clint, "it's your step-mother's duty to look after you and pay for your schooling. It's your father's money she's using, isn't it?"

"Yes, but there's not a great deal of it, I suppose. I never knew how much he did leave. And ma's fond of nice things and it costs a good deal to live, I guess. Oh, if I can get that scholarship I'll be all right.

You see, though, don't you, why I didn't want to sc.r.a.p with Dreer? It might have just queered everything for me."

"Yes, I see," a.s.serted Clint. "You did the right thing. You'd have been mighty silly to risk it, Durkin. What about playing? You--you play pretty well, don't you? Couldn't you make any money that way?"

"No." Penny shook his head. "I don't play well enough. You see, I've kept thinking that some day I'd be able to get instruction, but I never have yet; except a few lessons a fellow in Parkerstown gave me one Summer. I just sc.r.a.pe; that's all."

"I've always thought," fibbed Clint stoutly, "that you played finely!"

"I've always thought I could if I'd had instruction," replied Penny wistfully. "I sort of love it. Maybe some day--" His voice dwindled into silence, and for several minutes the two boys, each busy with their separate thoughts, stared through the bare branches up to the blue afternoon sky. They were aroused from their dreaming by the sound of voices and rustling of leaves under the feet of the speakers. Clint, peering around, saw Harmon Dreer, and another boy whom he didn't know by sight, climbing the slope toward them.

CHAPTER XXII

DREER LOOKS ON

"There's Dreer now," said Clint softly.

"And Beaufort," added Penny.

"Who's he?"

"He lives the other side of the village. His father owned a lot of land around here and made heaps of money selling it off. They call him 'Babe'

Beaufort; this fellow, I mean, not his father; probably because he's so big."

"He looks like a walrus," commented Clint. Further confidences were impossible, for the approaching couple were now within earshot and had caught sight of the boys by the rock. Dreer spoke to Beaufort softly and the latter turned a quick, curious look toward the boys under the ledge.

Then, without speaking, they pa.s.sed on up the hill and out of sight amongst the trees. Penny gave a sigh of relief.

"He's a sc.r.a.pper, and I thought maybe Dreer would try to start something," said Penny.

"Who is? Beaufort?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "No, he won't!" exclaimed Clint, jumping to his feet]

"Yes, he's a sort of village bully. He's been in trouble two or three times. His father has so much money 'Babe' thinks he's the whole thing in Brimfield. He and Hatherton Williams had a row in front of the post-office a couple of years ago and it took the whole police force to separate them."

"What does the Brimfield police force consist of?" asked Clint with a laugh. "One constable with a tin star?"

"Two," replied Penny, smiling. "We were sorry the cops b.u.t.ted in, for Williams would have given him a fine licking, I guess. He's just the sort of chap Dreer would naturally take up with."

"Listen!" commanded Clint. "They're coming back, I guess."

Someone was certainly approaching down the hill. Penny frowned.

"If it is they," said Clint anxiously, "don't have any words with them, Durkin."

"Not me," replied Penny resolutely. "Can't afford to."

Just then Dreer and his friend came into sight. Clint watched hopefully.

They were headed straight down the slope and he was just going to lean his head back against the rock again when Beaufort suddenly hunched his shoulders and turned angrily toward Clint and Penny. "Here!" he shouted. "What did you do that for?"

"Do what?" asked Clint in genuine surprise as Beaufort and Dreer, the latter a good pace behind, strode toward them through the trees.

"You know what," replied "Babe" Beaufort with an ugly scowl that increased his resemblance to a ferocious walrus. "You shied a stone at me!" His eyes, however, fixed themselves on Penny.

"Shied a stone!" exclaimed Clint incredulously. "Why, we haven't moved.

Besides, there aren't any stones around here. And we couldn't have thrown one through the trees if we'd tried."