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."

"Here comes somebody now!" whispered Tom, and surely enough a man,
wearing blue overalls and looking as though he had been cleaning out a
cellar, came from the basement door of the big apartment house.

"Who broke that glass?" he asked, and his voice was rather harsh.

"I--I did--with my top," spoke up Russ, but his voice trembled a little.

"Well, you'll have to pay for it!" went on the janitor, for such he was.
"I've told you boys to keep away from here spinning your tops, and yet
you will come! Now you've got to pay for it!"

"I never spun my top here before," said Russ.

"And I didn't either," added Laddie.

"That's right, Mr. Quinn," put in Tom, who seemed to know the janitor.
"I brought 'em here. It's part my fault."

"Hum!" said the janitor. "This is something new, to have boys own up to
it when they break windows, and not run away. Who did you say was going
to pay for the glass?" he asked. "It'll cost about a dollar. Lucky for
you Mr. Tanzy wasn't at home. It's in his parlor you broke the window,
and he's awful cross."

Russ had thought the janitor himself was cross, at first, but now he did
not think so, for the dusty man smiled.

"I'm going to pay for the glass--I am, and my brother," Russ went on. "I
broke it."

"Have you got the money with you?" asked Mr. Quinn, the janitor.

"No," answered Russ. "I've only five cents. But you can have that, and
my father'll give you the rest when I tell him."