They continued talking
and joking noisily, until the car stopped at the entrance of the park.
Bob and Frank pushed out ahead of all the other passengers. Roger was
pushing out after them when the conductor laid his hand on his shoulder.
"Don't crowd, don't crowd; plenty of time, young man."
This expostulation came too late, for Roger in his impatience to get
out, unheeding of what he was doing, caught one of his skates in the
scarf of the crippled boy, who had been sitting next to him. He gave his
skate strap a rude pull, knocking the boy rather roughly, and stepping
on a lady's toes.
[Illustration: "_It wasn't my fault, was it_?"]
"Bother take it!" he exclaimed impatiently, and giving the scarf another
jerk, ruder than before, he succeeded in disentangling it; then he
rushed out, hurried over to the boys who awaited him on the pavement,
where they stood stamping their feet and whistling. Roger made no reply
to the crippled boy, who said to him gently:--
"It wasn't my fault, was it?"
"That hunchback caught his scarf in my skate. I thought it never would
come out," he exclaimed. "It's kept me all this time!"
"Hush, Roger," interrupted Frank in a low tone of voice.
The boy was just behind them; he had evidently heard what had been said,
for his pale face turned scarlet, and lingering behind to see which path
the boys intended taking, he walked off in the opposite direction, and
they soon lost sight of him.
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