“I dunno. Let’s not stand here any longer; let’s walk up the street. I’ve got to move; I can’t keep still.” They were on the point of moving when they saw Chipper Cooper hurrying toward them almost at a run. “Wait!” called the approaching boy. “Where you fellows going?” And then, as he joined them, he asked in a low tone, “Heard anything this morning?” “I should say we had,” answered Billy. After which he hastily told Cooper what they had learned from Dr. Grindle. “Oh, my Jinks!” muttered Chipper, aghast. “I was hoping Roy’d be all right this morning. I was hoping he’d explain to his folks—tell them he had a fall or something to account for the bumps he got.” “You were hoping he’d lie,” said Billy, with a short, bitter laugh. “We had to lie to the doctor when he cornered us. You can see what the business forces us into—lies! It makes me sick to think of it.” “I’ve worried all night,” sighed Cooper dolefully. “Kept waking up every ten minutes, it seemed, thinking about that scrap and Roy. What was it the doctor said that he said?” “Just two words, ‘two spades.’ Of course he meant the two aces of spades in that crooked pack.” “That seems to indicate that he’s coming round, don’t it? He remembered something.” “And when he cuc-comes round,” said Springer, “he’ll be liable to tell the whole business.” They were walking up the street toward the Methodist Church, the bell of which had ceased to sound the first call from the steeple. In less than an hour the church-goers would be hurrying along that street. As they approached the church the sexton, who lived across the way a short distance beyond, came out and hobbled toward home, leaning on his cane. “Where will we go?” asked Springer. “Hadn’t we bub-better take a walk outside the village?” “I’m not going far,” said Piper. “I mean to hang around so that I won’t miss any news about Roy. It will be half an hour now before people begin to come to church. Let’s go into the old sheds out behind it.” In one of those sheds at the rear of the church they were hidden from the view of any one who might pass upon the street. “Wish I hadn’t ever got to playing in that game,” confessed Chipper, who on this morning showed no signs of his usual light-hearted ways and flippancy in conversation. “I reckon we all feel the same about that,” said Piper; “but it’s no use to cry. We shouldn’t be thinking so much of ourselves. What if Roy is permanently hurt? What if he never comes round right?” “Shu-Shultz will be to blame for that.” “Principally; but it wouldn’t have happened if Shultz and Osgood hadn’t found fellows enough to make up a game, so you see, in a way, we’re to blame, too.” “But if Roy does come round all right and tells everything, we’re all in the soup,” groaned Cooper. “Oh, I’ll catch it at home! My father will be furious if he finds out that I ever played cards for money. You know we’re not rich—far from it.”