when another darted out of
the darkness beside me, an' brought me a fearful lick on the head. I
staggered back into the main drive an' had a sort o' confused idea of
running feet an' loud voices, an' then came another welt an' over I went.
They must have dragged me up above the water level, an' I ought to thank
them for that, I s'pose.'

'An' you couldn't recognise either of them?' asked Mrs. Haddon.

'No, I haven't the slightest notion who it was hit me, an' the figure of
the other was just visible an' no more. I could swear to nothing except
this.' He touched his head and smiled.

'The cowardly wretches!' cried Mrs. Haddon, her bosom swelling with
indignation.

'They're all that,' said Harry, 'but this is something to be grateful
for. Can't you see what it means? It means that everyone is ready to
believe Frank's story now, an' a broken head's worth having at that
price, ain't it?'

'You're a good fellow, Harry,' said the little widow softly. 'Do you
think they might let Frank go now?

'No, worse luck, not without further evidence; but the company'll
probably go in for a big hunt, an' that may be the saving of him.'

This latter piece of news gave Dick further cause for agitation, and his
mother's distress grew with his deepening melancholy. She was alarmed for
his health, and had been trying ever since the return from Yarraman to
induce him to drink copious draughts of her favorite specific, camomile
tea, but without success; the boy knew of no ailment and could imagine
none that would not be preferable to camomile tea taken in large doses.

On the following morning at about eleven o'clock a visitor called upon
Mr. Joel Ham at the school, a slightly-built skinny man in a drab suit.
He carried a small parcel, and this he opened on the master's desk as he
talked in a slow sleepy way, the sleepiness accented by his inability to
lift his eyelids like other people, so that they hung drowsily, almost
veiling the eyes. After a few minutes Joel stepped forward and addressed
the Fifth Class:

'Boys, attend! Each of you take off his left boot.'

The boys stared incredulously.

'Your left boots,' repeated the master. 'This gentleman is--eh--a
chiropodist, and eh--come, come!' Joel Ham slashed the desk: the boys
hastened to remove their left boots, handed them to the stranger, and
watched him curiously as he examined them at the desk. The astonished
scholars could see little, but the man in drab had two plaster cast