Then he related, with relish, the occurrence at Dunstan's tent.

"Humph!" grunted Captain Bates. "You say Mr. Prescott was there?"

"Yes, Captain."

"Then, Topham, you didn't really see very much of what happened, after all," half jeered Captain Bates. "If Prescott was there, the crowd had a plebe on hand, depend on it."

"But I would have seen the plebe."

"Not when you have to contend with a man like Mr. Prescott! If he had a tenth of a second's warning it would be enough for him to roll the plebe out at the back of the tent."

"Now, I think of it," confessed Lieutenant Topham slowly, "I think I did hear a slight sound at the back of the tent."

"You didn't investigate that sound, Mr. Topham?"

"Why, no, sir. I thought I was looking at the whole show."

"Instead of which," chuckled Captain Bates, "you saw only the curtain that had just been rung down, and the author of the piece bowing to the audience."

"Well, I'll be---switched!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mr. Topham, dropping into his chair.

"Mr. Prescott has the reputation of being the cleverest dodger in the yearling cla.s.s," declared the K.C., in a dry voice. "It was Bates who first discovered that quality in Mr. Prescott, but I must admit that he has convinced me. Tomorrow a new cadet corporal will be appointed, and the fact published in orders. The new corporal takes the place of Corporal Ryder, who has been busted (reduced). Mr. Prescott would have been appointed corporal, but for his reputation for dodging out of the biggest sc.r.a.pes of his cla.s.s. So Mr. Dodge is to be the new cadet corporal."

"Oh, you sly old ramrod!" Dunstan was murmuring ecstatically, back in that other tent. "When I think of all the yearlings who've been dropped for hazing in past years! If each cla.s.s had only had a Prescott all of those yearlings would have been saved to the service!"

But d.i.c.k, though he did not know it, had a reputation in the tac. department which had just prevented his attaining to the honor that he desired most---appointment as cadet corporal.

CHAPTER XII

UNDER A FEARFUL CHARGE

Cadet Corporal Dodge took his new appointment as a triumph in revenge. Of late he had been growing even less popular. He determined to be a martinet with the men in ranks under him. He made the mistake that all petty, senseless tyrants do. The great disciplinarian is never needlessly a tyrant.

The summer in camp pa.s.sed quickly after July had gone.

In all, Miss Griffin made four visits to West Point that summer.

Greg became her favored and eager escort, to the disappointment of fifty men who would have been glad to take his place.

Both Cadet Holmes and Mr. Griffin's very pretty sister kept up their att.i.tudes of laughing challenge to each other throughout the summer. It was impossible to see that either had scored a deep impression on the other.

Not even to his chum did Greg confide whether Miss Griffin had caught his heart. Mr. Griffin, her brother, could hardly venture a guess to himself as to whether his sister cared for the tall and manly looking Holmes.

But when Miss Griffin had reached the end of her last summer visit to West Point she told Greg that she would not be there again for some time to come.

"At least," asked Greg, "you'll be here again when the winter hops start?"

"I cannot say," was all the reply Miss Adele Griffin would make.

"In three weeks she goes back to the seminary in Virginia," said Griff, when Greg spoke to him about the matter. "Dell won't see West Point before next summer. Our people are not rich enough to keep Dell traveling all the time."

Whether Greg was crestfallen at the news no one knew. Greg had never believed, anyway, in wearing his heart on his sleeve---"just for other folks to stick pins in it, you know," was his explanation.

There came the day when the furloughed second cla.s.s marched over to camp. Very quickly after that all cla.s.ses were back in cadet barracks, and the charming summer of Mars had given place to the hard fall, winter and spring of the academic grind.

The return to studies found both Greg and d.i.c.k forced to do some extra hard work. Mathematics for this year went "miles ahead"

of anything that the former Gridley boys had encountered in High School. Had they been able to pursue this branch of study in the more leisurely and lenient way of the colleges, both young men might have stood well.

As it was, after the first fortnight Greg went to the "goats,"

or the lowest section in mathematics, while d.i.c.k, not extremely better off, hung only in the section above the goat line.

As the fall hops came on Greg went to about three out of every four.

"A fellow can bone until his brain is nothing but a mess of bone dust," he complained. "d.i.c.k, old chum, you'd better go to hops, too."

d.i.c.k went to only one, in October. He stagged it, whereas Greg often dragged. But Prescott saw no girl there who looked enough like Laura Bentley to interest him. His standing in cla.s.s interested him far more than hops at which a certain Gridley girl could not be present.

Laura had written him that she and Belle might be at a hop early in December.

"I'll wait and look forward to it," decided d.i.c.k. But he said nothing, even to Greg. Holmes was showing an ability to be interested in too many different girls, Prescott decided.

But it may be that Holmes, knowing that Griffin corresponded with his pretty, black-eyed little sister, may have been intentionally furnishing subjects for the news that was despatched to a Virginia seminary.

"Come on, old ramrod," urged Greg one Sat.u.r.day night, as he gave great heed to his dressing. "You'll bone yourself dry, staying here all the time with Smith's conic sections. Drop that dry math. rot and stag it with me over at Cullum tonight. You can take math. up again after chapel tomorrow."

"Thank you," replied Prescott, turning around from the study table at which he was seated. "I don't care much for the social whirl while there's any doubt about the January exams. It would be no pleasure to go over to Cullum. There'll be real satisfaction if I can look forward to better marking this coming week."

d.i.c.k spent his time until taps at the study table. But when he closed the book it was with a sigh of satisfaction.

"If I can only go through a few more nights as easily as I have tonight, I'll soon astound myself by maxing it" (making one of the highest marks), he told himself. "I think I'm beginning to see real light in conic sections, but I'll have the books out again tomorrow afternoon."

"Well?" challenged Holmes gayly, as he entered their room after the hop.

"I believe I'm going to turn over a new leaf and max it some,"

grinned Prescott.

"Don't!" expostulated Greg, with a look of mock alarm.

The daily marks were not posted until the end of the academic week, but Prescott knew, when Monday's recitation in mathematics was over, that he had found new favor in the eyes of Captain Abbott, the instructor. On Tuesday again he was sure that he had landed another high mark.

Greg caught some of the fire of his chum's example, and he, too, began to bone so furiously that he decided to drop the hops for the time.