sweetly. "It was awfully nice of you to give us the tickets. Wasn't it, Speedy?"
Speedy said nothing.
"By the looks of your clothes you must have gotten into trouble somewhere, as usual," offered Pop tartly, having noticed for the first time the tattered condition of Harold's garments.
"Perhaps Swift had an encounter with thugs also," observed Carter oilily.
"Don't worry," snapped Speedy. "If any of those roughnecks get in my way, they better watch their step. They or anybody connected with them."
"I bet you're a holy terror," agreed Carter with a sarcastic smile. He picked up his hat. "Well, I must be running along. Important business tonight. I'll send my doctor friend up, Mr. Dillon."
"I'll be all right," grumbled Pop.
With a very special good night for Jane, Carter left them.
"I hate that fellow," Speedy cried vehemently as soon as the front door had slammed shut.
"Oh, you're impossible, Harold," said Jane. "He's a perfect gentleman. And you didn't even thank him for the tickets. I'm ashamed of you."
"I'm sorry he gave us the tickets," Speedy replied hotly. "If we hadn't gone to Coney Island I might have been here to help Pop with that thug. Say, I wouldn't put it past that Carter to have deliberately framed it to get us away from here so as to put something over on Pop."
"Nonsense," sniffed Pop. "You've been reading
