"Bosh! You never did a mean thing in your life, kid." "But I have now," smiled the lad wanly. "They say there always has to be a first time. I didn't start out to do it, though. Still, that doesn't help matters much, for it's ended that way." "Going to let me in on it?" asked Paul, hoping to make the confession easier. "Yes, I came over on purpose to tell you, Kip. It's the queerest mix-up you ever heard of. It's worried me no end. Sometimes, it's seemed as if I was going nutty." "Fire ahead! Tell a man, can't you?" "Well, you see a while ago my father sent me to deposit some money in the bank for him--a hundred-dollar bill. I put the envelope in my pocket, carefully as could be. I remember perfectly doing it. I didn't go anywhere but straight down town, either. Well, anyhow, when I got to the bank the money was gone! It wasn't in my pocket; it wasn't anywhere about me." He stopped an instant. "You can imagine how I felt. My father had cautioned me not to lose that money on my life. I hadn't the nerve to tell him. Somehow I thought that if I could just smooth the matter over for a little while the envelope with the money in it would turn up. I was certain I couldn't have lost it." Again he paused. "At first I thought I'll sell a Liberty bond I had and put my hundred in the bank to dad's credit. Then I happened to think that my father had the bond locked up in his safe-deposit box and that I couldn't get at it without telling him. I didn't know what to do. I simply hadn't the courage to go home and tell the truth. You wouldn't like to face your father and tell him you'd lost a cool hundred of his cash for him. Besides, I was sure it wasn't lost. I felt morally certain I had somehow misplaced that envelope and that it would come to light. I hunted all day, though, through my pockets and everywhere I could think of and it didn't appear. I began to get scared. What was I going to do? When the bank statement came in my father would see right off that the money had not been deposited. And anyway, even if he didn't, it was only square to tell him what I'd done. I was casting round for a way out when that noon Mel called me and asked me if I'd do an errand for him on the way home. He wanted me to stop at the bank as I passed and put in some _March Hare_ money. It was a hundred dollars and it seemed to drop right out of the sky into my hands. I decided to deposit it to my father's credit and trust to finding the sum I'd lost to square up the school accounts." A light of understanding began to break in on Paul. He waited. "I guess you know what's coming," Donald murmured. "No, I don't." "Well, somebody does," declared the boy wretchedly. "That's what's got me fussed. I chance to know how the _March Hare_ books stood. Somebody's made good that money I took--made it good without saying a word about it." Donald, studying his friend's face, saw a gleam of satisfaction pass over it.