Page:The fighting scrub, (IA fightingscrub00barb).pdf/166

 "Shut up!" Tom commanded sternly. "No one wants to hear from you. Go ahead, Loring."

So Loring went ahead and gave a perfectly truthful and not at all sensational account of the affair, and Tom viewed Clif accusingly during the narrative and, when it was finished, exclaimed disgustedly: "Of all the tight mouthed, secretive vipers! Loring, I've watched over that guy ever since he came here. I was the first one to befriend him. Without me, he—he wouldn't be anywhere to-day. And look at the way he repays me! Goes out and makes a silly hero of himself saving people from being trampled underfoot by rampageous automobiles and never says a word about it! And he calls that friendship, I suppose!"

"You make me tired, both of you," grumbled Clif. "There wasn't much danger, anyway, and all I did was give a yank to the chair. The fellow in the car would have missed him even if I hadn't touched it. And if you go and tell this to any one else, Tom, I'll make you wish you hadn't!"

"Oh, shut up," said Tom good-naturedly. "You might have known I wouldn't spill it, Clif. Next time you come right home, like a good little boy, and tell daddy all about it."

"There won't be any next time," answered Clif emphatically.

"Not with me," chuckled Loring. "Wattles will never give me another chance to congest traffic. The poor chap had nightmare so badly that night that I had to wake him up twice!"