This last question was elicited by the sight of the little bit of crimson ribbon stuck through Rattleton's buttonhole,--an _insignium_ brought from the seat of war. In cheerful compliance with the demand to hear all about it, Jack sat down by the bed, and recounted, as well as he could, all the details of the afternoon's battle. He described Jarvis' splendid run, and how he had scored and at the same time broken his collar-bone in his great plunge for Harvard and glory. As he told of it he thought of Varnum lying alone in the hospital. "Would you like me to read to you?" suggested Jack, when the foot-ball subject had been exhausted. "You bet," assented the patient. "I ain't heard no readin' all day. Mudder can't read; and Sis ain't been here." "Here's a book I brought," said Rattleton, picking up the bright-pictured nursery rhymes. "I don't know whether it's interesting," he added, doubtfully. For a little while he read the classics of _Mother Goose_ in his gentle drawl, until the boy interrupted him. "Say, what sort o' baby's stuff is dat, anyhow? I don't t'ink much o' dat. I'd sooner hear _Dare-Devil Dick_ dan dat." "I am inclined to agree with you," replied Rattleton. "Really, you see, I hadn't read this for so long that I had forgotten just what it was like. Let's have _Dare-Devil Dick_." "I ain't got it now. I give it away. Mr. Varnum, he gi' me a book he said was better, and I guess it is. It's got an A-1 scrapper in it, too, dat could do Dare-Devil Dick wid one hand. He didn't kill so many people, but I t'ink he was a better feller. 'Dere it is at de foot o' de bed." Rattleton took up the book indicated. It was _Westward Ho!_ He sat down again by the bed, and opened the book at a place where there was a mark. Then the two went out from the little squalid room, and sailed away over the Spanish Main with tall Amyas Leigh and his good men of Devon. For over half an hour the little invalid street-arab and the hare-brained Harvardian were both wrapped in the spell of the apostle to the Anglo-Saxon youths. Before Rattleton had finished reading he heard the door open and close, and a rustle of skirts. Looking up he saw, not the old woman, but a rather gaudily-dressed young one. Jack thought he had seen her face before somewhere. That was quite possible, I regret to say. "Hullo, Sis," said the boy. "Me sister," he explained to Rattleton. The young woman looked with surprise at the latter, as he rose to his feet. Her eye glanced at his stick and his bull terrier, and all over his clothes, from his shoes up; then narrowly scrutinized the face of the thoroughly uncomfortable youth. Though the shyest of men, this was the first time he had ever felt very bashful in such a presence. Then she asked, disdainfully, "What's one o' your kind doing here?" Jack colored to his hair. "I--I don't know exactly, myself," he stammered. "You see I came to take the place of my friend who is ill," he explained, apologetically.