With a swelling heart he turned away, and went towards the bank of the broader stream which ran through the meadows. Dale was with him in a moment,--very sorry for him, because everybody else was at brook-leaping,--the sport that Hugh had loved so well last autumn. Dale passed his arm round Hugh's neck, and asked where they should sit and tell stories,--where they could best hide themselves, so that nobody should come and tease them. Hugh wished to thank his friend for this; but he could not speak directly. They found a pleasant place among the flowering reeds on the bank, where they thought nobody would see them; and having given Holt to understand that they did not want him, they settled themselves for their favourite amusement of story-telling. But Hugh's heart was too full and too sick for even his favourite amusement; and Dale was perhaps too sorry for him to be the most judicious companion he could have at such a time. Dale agreed that the boys were hard and careless; and he added that it was particularly shameful to bring up a boy's other faults when he was in disgrace for one. In the warmth of his zeal, he told how one boy had been laughing at Hugh's conceit about his themes, when he had shown to-day that he could not go half through his syntax; and how he had heard another say that all that did not signify half so much as his being mean about money. Between Hugh's eagerness to hear, and Dale's sympathy, five minutes were not over before Hugh had heard every charge that could be brought against his character, and knew that they were all circulating this very afternoon. In his agony of mind he declared that everybody at Crofton hated him,--that he could never hold up his head there,--that he would ask to be sent home by the coach, and never come near Crofton again. Dale now began to be frightened, and wished he had not said so much. He tried to make light of it; but Hugh seemed disposed to do something decided;--to go to his uncle Shaw's at least, if he could not get home. Dale earnestly protested, against any such idea, and put him in mind how he was respected by everybody for his bravery about the loss of his foot. "Respected?" "Not a bit of it!" cried Hugh. "They none of them remember: they don't care a bit about it." Dale was sure they did. "I tell you they don't. I know they don't. I know it for certain; and I will tell you how I know. There is the very boy that did it,--the very boy that pulled me from the wall--O! If you knew who it was, you _would_ say it was a shame!" Dale involuntarily sat up, and looked back, over the top of the reeds, at the boys who were brook-leaping. "Would you like to know who it was that did it, Dale?" "Yes, if you like to tell; but--And if he treats you ill, after the way you used him, he cannot expect you should consider him so--Besides, I am your best friend; and I always tell you everything!"