“’Scuse me,” begged Dan, hastily.  “There’s Laura Bentley beckoning to me.”

He hastened over to the girl’s side.  There were tiny drops in the corners of Laura’s eyes that looked like suppressed tears.

“Dan,” she said, coming straight to the point, “we have heard, of course.  What a silly charge!  See here, you pals of Dick’s are going to walk home with him from school this noon?”

“Surest thing that ever happened in the world,” declared Dalzell, fervently.

“Just so,” nodded Laura.  “Well, if you won’t think it strange or forward, six of us girls want to walk along with you boys.  That will be a hint that the freshman class, if not the whole H.S., passes a vote of confidence in Dick Prescott, the most straightforward fellow in the class or the school.”

“Bully for you, Miss Bentley!” glowed Dan.  “We shall be looking for you young ladies when school lets out.”

When the outside bell rang for reassembling, such a guard of honor had chosen to gather around Dick, and march in with him, that it looked more like a triumphal procession.

“I feel better,” sighed the boy, contentedly to himself, as he dropped into his seat.  “What a bully thing a little confidence is!”

When school let out, Dick & Co., each partner escorting one of the freshman girls, strolled down the street.  A good many more of the students chose to drop in behind them.  Dick could say nothing, but his heart swelled with pride.

“The way to get famous and respected, nowadays, is to steal something, and to get found out,” sneered Fred Ripley, bitterly, to Clara Deane.

Straight to his own door did some two score in all of the Gridley H.S. students escort Dick Prescott.

“Three cheers for Dick!” proposed some one.

“And for Dick and Co.!” shouted another voice.

The cheers were given with gusto.  So much noise was made, in fact, that Mrs. Prescott came to open the door.

Something in his mother’s face—–­a look of dread and alarm—–­spoiled the cheering for Dick.  As soon as he could he got inside the house.

Little did the young freshman suspect the ordeal that awaited him here.

CHAPTER VIII

ONLY A “SUSPENDED” FRESHMAN NOW

“What’s wrong mother?   Have you heard-----” the boy began, as
soon as the door was closed.

“Yes, Richard.”

“But, mother, I am inno-----”

“Oh, Dick, of course you are!  But this fearful suspicion is enough to kill one who loves you.  Come!  Your father is in the store.  Dr. Thornton is upstairs.  He and—–­and—–­a policeman.

“Policeman!” gasped Dick, paling instantly.   “Do they mean to-----”

“I don’t know just what they mean, Dick I’m too dazed to guess,” replied his mother.  “But come upstairs.”

As Dick entered their little parlor he was dimly aware that the High School principal was in the room.  But the boy’s whole gaze was centered on a quiet little man—–­Hemingway, the plain clothes man from the police station.