can't do him or you any harm. It may help a little to know that
there's one amongst you fine enough to do what I've described. I've
never seen that boy from the moment the wrecking train reached the scene
of the wreck until tonight, and so I've never spoken to him again. But
as I sat on the platform here awhile ago I looked and saw him. I don't
forget faces very easily, and as you can understand, I wasn't likely to
forget his. As I say, I haven't spoken to him yet, but I'm going to
now."

There was a silence in which a dropped pin would have made a noise like
a crowbar. Half the audience had turned their heads in the direction of
Doctor Proctor's smiling gaze, but all eyes were fixed on his lips. The
breathless silence lengthened. Then the doctor spoke.

"How is your hand, Gilbert?" he asked.

CHAPTER XXII

COACH ROBEY IS PUZZLED

SOME twenty minutes later Don dropped into a chair in Number 6 and
heaved a deep sigh of relief. "Gee," he muttered, "I wouldn't go through
that again for--for a million dollars!"

Tim chuckled as he seated himself beyond the table. "Why not?" he asked
innocently. "I thought everyone treated you very nicely."

A smile flitted across Don's face. "I suppose they did, only--I guess
that was the trouble! I felt like an awful fool, Tim! Look here, what
did he have to go and tell everything he knew for? I was afraid he was
going to and I wanted like anything to sneak out of there, but the place
was so quiet I didn't have the nerve! At first I didn't suspect that he
had seen me. I didn't recognise him until he stood up to speak this
evening. Yesterday I thought he looked sort of familiar, but I couldn't
place him. He--he talks too much!"

"He said some awfully nice things about you, old man."

"He said a lot of nonsense, too! Exaggerated the whole thing, he did.
Why, to listen to him you'd think I saved about a thousand people from
certain death! Well, I didn't. I helped about six or seven folks out of
those cars. They were sort of rattled and didn't seem to know enough to
beat it."

"They weren't in any danger, then?"

"No, not much. All they had to do was crawl out of the way."

"Then they weren't any of them burned, Don?"

"A few were."

"How about the man with the broken arm?"

"Oh, he'd got caught somehow." Don looked up and saw Tim's laugh.
"Well," he added defensively, "he needn't have told about it like that,
right out in front of the whole school, need he?"

"Yo