Page:Arthur Stringer--The House of Intrigue.djvu/69

Rh two I actually thought that stir had made him squirrely.

"But I don't want it," I cried out at him. "I won't take it. I'd rather be here with you than in a place like that!"

Bud smiled, even though his eyes were haggard. Then he sobered up again.

"I'd rather see you screwed down in your coffin than ever come into this sort of a place," he told me. "And for the next year or two you can't stay loose this side of the line. It's all paid for and settled, that new berth of yours, I've seen to that. And if you ever thought anything of me you'll take the chance that I'm trying to give you."

"Why do you say that?" I asked, struggling in vain to keep my face straight.

"Because it'll make things easier for me here, knowing I'm trying to square for what I did to you!"

And that, I remembered, was how I came to go up to the Ursuline academy.

It wasn't exactly the same as stir, but, at first, it seemed almost as bad to me. I don't know what kept me from going crazy. When I tried a breakaway, at the end of the third week, they got me back