I didn't like to hear Smith talk like this. For one thing, it sounded as if he must be a great deal less foolish than I was, which nobody likes to admit; and for another thing, it seemed wrong and unreasonable, unless for a very good cause, to persist in believing nothing good about anybody else.
"I say," said I, "what are you going to do these holidays?"
"Stay here," said he. "Are you going home?"
"What!" I exclaimed. "Stay here for four weeks with the old Hen? Why ever, Jack?"
"Don't know--but that's what I've got to do. Are you going home?"
"I suppose so," said I, with an inward groan. "But, Jack, what _will_ you do with yourself?"
"Much as usual, I expect. Sha'n't get much practice in talking till you come back!" added he, with a low laugh.
"Jack, why don't you go home?" I exclaimed. "Are you in a row there, or what? You never tell me a word about it."
"Look-out, I hear some one moving!" cried Smith, and next moment he was back in his bed.
I was vexed. For I half guessed this alarm had been only an excuse for not talking about home, and I didn't like being silenced in that way. Altogether that night I was a good deal put out with Smith, and when presently he whispered across "Good-night," I pretended to be asleep, and did not answer.
But I was not asleep, and could not sleep. I worked myself first into a rage, then into an injured state, and finally into a miserable condition over my friend Smith.
Why should he keep secrets from me, when I kept none from him? No, when I came to think over it, I did not keep a single secret from him! Did he think I was not to be trusted, or was too selfish to care? He might have known me better by this time. It was true I had told him my secrets without his asking for them; in fact, all along he had not seemed nearly as anxious as I had been for this friendship of ours. My conscience stung me at this last reflection; and there came upon me all of a sudden a sense of the utter desolation of this awful place without a single friend! No, I determined it should take more than a little pique to make me cast away my only friend. And with the thought, though it must have been far on in the night, I slipped from my bed and crawled to his.
He was fast asleep, but at the first touch of my hand he started up and said, "What's the row?"