"There, mine's spinning first!" cried Tom, as he flung his top down, quickly pulling the string away, and thus making the top whirl around very fast. "Let's see if either of you can hit my top with yours." "I can!" said Russ, and he threw his top at Tom's with all his might. Russ didn't hit his playmate's top, but he did hit something else. Up into the air bounced Russ's top, and, the next moment, there was a crash of glass. "Oh!" cried Tom. "You've broken a window!" CHAPTER XIX FLYING A KITE That was just what had happened. When Russ threw his top down so hard, it had bounced up again from the sidewalk, and had gone sailing through the air against one of the lower windows of the apartment house which stood so close to the pavement. And the top went right through the glass. The three little boys were so surprised that they just stood there, looking at the shower of broken glass on the pavement. Then Tom cried: "Oh, we'd better run!" "What for?" asked Russ. "'Cause you broke the window. The lady or the man'll come out an' they'll get a policeman." Russ said nothing for two or three seconds. Laddie, who was just going to bounce down his top, to spin it, still held it in his hand. He didn't want to break a glass. "Come on!" cried Tom in a whisper. "Come on 'fore they catch us!" Russ shook his head. "No," he answered. "I'm not going to run. I'll stay here, and when they come out I'll tell 'em I busted it and my father will pay for it. That's what we always do; don't we, Laddie?" "Yep," answered the smaller boy. "Did you ever break windows before?" asked Tom, who had started to run away, but who came back when he saw that his two friends were not coming with him. "We broke one at Grandma Bell's," said Russ. "But she didn't make us pay for it," said Laddie. "Tom Hardy, the hired man, put a new glass in," went on Russ. "And once we broke a window back home when we were playing ball. I threw the ball, and Laddie didn't grab it, and it went through a candy-store window, but we didn't run." "What did you do?" asked Tom, to whom this seemed something new. He looked up at the place where the window had been smashed. As yet no one had thrust a head out of the window or threatened to send for a policeman. "What did you do?" asked Tom again. "Well, the lady who owned the candy store knew us," answered Russ, "and she knew our father would pay for the glass." "Did he?" "Why, of course he did!" exclaimed Laddie. "But he said we each had to save up and give him back five cents--a penny at a time," added Russ. "That was to help pay for the glass, and make us--make us more careful, I guess he called it. "Anyhow, that's what I'm going to do now. We'll wait, and when somebody comes out I'll tell 'em my father'll pay for the glass my top broke."