There were half a dozen of the boys walking together down the avenue that afternoon, Shorty in their midst. They were plying him with questions and conjectures. No, he was not going to the Lawrences', he said. He would never, probably, go there again. No, he hadn't been around among the engine-houses. He didn't at all believe in Snipe's guilt, and wouldn't believe he was hiding on that account. How did he account for Seymour's pencil? He couldn't account for it. All he could say was, that he'd bet anything he owned that Snipe wasn't a thief, and some day they'd find it out, and find out who was. It so happened that Briggs had gone on ahead with Hoover, the two lads with their heads close together in eager conference, but at Eighteenth Street he held back and stood waiting for the little knot of excited boys. Bertram and Joy were of the lot, tall young fellows on whose upper lips the down was sprouting and who on Sundays went to church in their first tophats. They were the elders, the senate of the school, and at sight of Briggs they muttered malediction and cautioned silence. "Say, Shorty!" cried the pachyderm, as Pop had named him, "twice last week I went to your house and asked for you, and the man said you weren't home. You were up in your room with Snipe Lawton, and I know it. I watched, and saw you come out with him half an hour later. What you 'fraid of? Think I was policeman with a search-warrant?" The little fellow's blue eyes blazed up, but Bertram grabbed him and Joy turned savagely on the leering tormentor. "Shut up! you sneaking whelp!" he cried, "or I'll smash you here and now!" And glaring and red-faced in his wrath, Joy looked fully capable of doing it. "Why, what have I done?" sneered Briggs. "He's the fellow that stood by the thief that's been robbing us right and left, and didn't dare let his own classmate come up in his room." "You used to ring the bell and bolt up there the moment the door was opened, you cad!" answered Joy, "just as you did at my house and others until orders had to be given not to let you in. Get out of the way! No one in this party wants to be seen in the same street with you." "Oh, all right," snarled Briggs. "If you want to run with thieves and pickpockets you're welcome. I don't."