.

Battle.
On the road he passed Miss Brewster--for the Alder school boasted two teachers!--and under her kindly, rather faded smile he felt a great desire to stop and take her into his confidence; ask her what Betty Neal had been doing all these months.

Instead, he touched Grey Molly with the spurs, and she answered like a watch-spring uncurling beneath him.

The rush of wind against his face raised his spirits to a singing pitch, and when he flung from the saddle before the school he shouted: "Oh, Betty!" Up the sharply angling steps in a bound, and at the door: "Oh, Betty!" His voice filled the room with a thick, dull echo, and there was Betty behind her desk looking up at him agape; and beside her stood Blondy Hansen, big, good looking, and equally startled.

Fear made the glance of Vic Gregg swerve--to where little Tommy Aiken scribbled an arithmetic problem on the blackboard--afterschool work for whispering in class, or some equally heinous crime.