“Sure there is,” Larry agreed. Then, to keep Purdick from running off on one of his bitter streaks: “Where is your sister now, Purdy?” “She’s in Elsmere. You know they have a sort of an apprentice course there; a girl can work in the kitchen and have certain hours in the Domestic Economy classes. And that’s another thing: Allie’s been having just about as hard a time as I had before you took me in. You never said there were any strings tied to that scholarship money. There weren’t any, were there?” “Not a single string.” “Well, of course, I split it with Allie right away. That was one of the things that made me take it without making you tell me more about it.” “Um,” said Larry. “Then you’ll have to go to work this summer to earn some more.” “That’s all right; I expected to do that, anyway.” “What kind of a job?” Purdick shrugged his shoulders. “Beggars mustn’t be choosers; and little beggars have to take what’s handed out to them. I haven’t the muscle to tackle any real man-sized job. I suppose it will be office drudgery of some kind――if I’m lucky enough to land anything.” Larry had a swift and rather discomforting picture of the small one hived in some city office building and running an adding machine, or something of that sort, through the hot months. “You ought to have a real vacation, Purdy; some job that would keep you outdoors every minute in the day,” he said. “Fat chance!” Purdick returned, with a hard little laugh. “None of the outdoor jobs wants a sawed-off like me.” Then, after a pause: “Don’t you sweat about me, Larry. You’ve done enough for me, as it is. Let’s go to supper.” And he slid down from his place on the wall. They had tramped along in comradely silence for possibly half of the long mile lying between the county bridge and the university grounds when they crossed a ramshackly little wooden span over a creek emptying into the river a few hundred yards to their left. The flimsy structure shook under them as they walked across it, and Purdick made gibing comment. “Isn’t that just like the loose ends that are let go in all public works!” he criticised. “Here is a fine, hard-surfaced highway, the main county outlet to the north, with a concrete bridge over the river that probably cost the taxpayers thousands of dollars, and right here they’ve left that old wooden trap that a man wouldn’t dare drive a ‘Henry’ over faster than a cow could walk!” Larry turned and looked the “trap” over with a mechanical eye. It was all that Purdick had said it was. “I’d hate to put a loaded truck on it,” he remarked; and then they walked on. They had gone perhaps a couple of hundred yards beyond the creek and its ramshackle bridge when they heard the distant honk of an automobile horn. The machine was coming along the pike behind them, and they could see that it was being driven at a good clip. Moreover, it was approaching the wooden span without showing any signs of slackening the speed.