MacGuire before bolting the front door studied the situation carefully, and left him there--for the sake of the table. The sunlight next morning was not charitable to Shanley. Where yesterday he had borne the marks of one wreck, he now bore the marks of two--his own on top of the company’s. Up the street Dinkelman’s clothing emporium flaunted a canvas sign announcing unusual bargains in men’s apparel. This seemed to Shanley an unkindly act that could be expressed in no better terms than “rubbing it in.” He gazed at the sign with an aggrieved expression on his face, blinked furiously, and started, with a step that lacked something of assurance, for the railroad yards and the trainmaster’s office. He was by no means confident of the reception that awaited him. If there is one characteristic over and above any other that is common to human nature, it is the faculty, though that’s rather an imposing word, of worrying like sin over something that _may_ happen--but never does. Shanley might just as well have saved himself the mental worry anent the trainmaster’s possible attitude. He did not report to the trainmaster that morning, never saw that gentleman until long, very long afterward. Instead, he reported to Carleton--at the latter’s urgent solicitation in the shape of a grinning call-boy, who intercepted his march of progress toward the station. “Hi, you, there, cherub face!” bawled the urchin politely. “The super wants you--on the hop!” Shanley stopped short, and, resorting to his favorite habit, blinked. “Carleton. Get it? Carleton,” repeated the messenger, evidently by no means sure that he was thoroughly understood; and then, for a parting shot as he sailed gayly up the street: “Gee, but you’re pretty!” Carleton! Shanley had forgotten all about Carleton for the moment. His hand instinctively went into his pocket--and then he groaned. He remembered Carleton. But worst of all, he remembered Carleton’s twenty. There were two courses open to him. He could sneak out of town with all possible modesty and dispatch, or he could face the music. Not that Shanley debated the question--the occasion had never yet arisen when he hadn’t faced the music--he simply experienced the temptation to “crawl,” that was all. “It looks to me,” he ruminated ruefully, “as though I was up against it for fair. Just my luck, just my blasted luck, always the same kind of luck, that’s what. ‘Tain’t my fault neither, is it? I ain’t responsible for that darned wreck--if ‘twasn’t for that I wouldn’t be here. An’ Kelly, Spider he said his name was, if ‘twasn’t for him I wouldn’t be here neither. What the blazes did _I_ have to do with it? I always have to stand for the other cuss. That’s me every time, I guess. An’ that’s logic.”