"What did you want to say that for? My father is as good as yours. I'll give it to Sheldon for talking back to me."

"You started it," growled Merritt. "You're always picking on the new fellows."

"So are you," snapped Herring. "You're a regular bully. Never mind, though. There is something crooked about Sheldon or his family and I'm going to find it. I don't a.s.sociate with tramp berry pickers and the rest of the boys won't when I find out things."

"d.i.c.k Percival goes with him," muttered Merritt, pointing to where the rich man's son and Jack Sheldon were walking together arm in arm.

"Percival is a swell and his father is richer than yours and a lot more----"

"A lot more what?" snarled Herring, clenching his fist.

"Respectable!" snapped Merritt, hastily retreating.

"Don't mind what a fellow like Herring says, Jack," said d.i.c.k Percival, kindly, putting his arm in the new boy's. "No one of any account pays any attention to him. A fellow that can show the nerve you can has nothing to fear from Pete Herring."

"I am not afraid of him, d.i.c.k," Jack answered, "but----" and then he stopped and went on in silence.

"It's all right," said d.i.c.k, at length. "A boy that stands as high as you do in your cla.s.ses need not be afraid of Pete Herring's condemnation. I believe I shall have to hustle or you will be up to me before I know it."

"That's what I'm here for, to get ahead as fast as I can," laughed the other, who in his examination that morning had showed that he was by no means a backward scholar.

The first day of the new term was spent mostly in getting things into shape for the days that were to come and the regular routine was not as strictly observed as it would be later, new boys being tried out, new methods experimented upon and everything being made ready for the fall and winter.

There were several new boys in addition to Jack Sheldon and one or two of these were as advanced as he was but the greater part went into the lower cla.s.ses and would make the material of which the Academy would be composed at a later period, Dr. Wise taking them under his particular care and forming their characters for the future as he put it.

In the course of two or three days the machinery of the school was running as smoothly as if it had been in operation for a month, the boys knowing what was expected of them and the professors keeping them rigidly to their work and attending to their own duties with unflagging zeal.

Jack took an interest in his work and was stimulated by knowing that much was expected of him and that there were others who desired to overtake him in his studies, this very emulation helping him to do his best.

The greater part of the boys were his friends and he gave little attention to those who were not, keeping on good terms with them while not having much to do with them.

As far as he was concerned, however, the boys knew no more of him at the end of the week than they had known at the beginning and many of them decided that it was as well to let him remain a mystery until he chose to further enlighten them.

Without being churlish or obstinate, Jack was reserved and all they knew, which could have been obtained outside as well as from him was that he lived in another county, some ten miles distant, that he was the only child of a worthy widow and that he was paying for his schooling out of money that he had earned or would earn from his own efforts in one line or another.

"At any rate if he does have to earn the money to carry him through,"

said Billy Manners to a number of the boys one afternoon when school was over for the day, "he is not mean and contributes what he can to the legitimate fun of the Hilltops and does not waste his coin on foolish things. If he is poor he is not a miser and if he has to work for his schooling that is his business. If d.i.c.k Percival, the acknowledged head of the school in studies as well as in athletics, can a.s.sociate with him and be proud of his company, the rest of us have nothing to say and I, for my part, certainly have not."

"Neither has any decent fellow among the Hilltops," added Harry, enthusiastically, and the majority echoed his sentiment, the few that remained silent and indulged in black looks being un.o.bserved amid the general acceptance of the new scholar.

CHAPTER IV

ANOTHER ATTEMPTED HAZING

Herring and Merritt and others like them were not satisfied to accept Jack Sheldon on the same footing as had Percival and the better cla.s.s of boys at the Academy.

Herring had been used to doing about as he pleased with the new boys and any interference seemed like a curtailing of his rights as he looked at it, and he greatly resented it.

"We'll see if that new berry picking chap can get the best of us, Ern,"

he said to Merritt when he was alone with a few of his cronies after Harry d.i.c.kson's declaration that Jack was good enough for any of them to a.s.sociate with.

"He won't do it, Pete," replied Merritt.

"There's no use in doing anything in the dormitories," remarked Zenas Holt, one of the party.

"No, that makes too much noise," muttered another of the party all being interested in the scheme which they knew Herring must be concocting to get the best of Jack.

"No, everybody hazes new fellows in the dormitories," growled Herring.

"He'll be watching for us and then he has made a lot of new friends and they will go to his help."

"We want to catch him alone," suggested Merritt.

"That's the talk," added Holt.

"Just what I was thinking of," said Herring, "and if you fellows will stop talking so much, I'll tell you how we can fix it."

These boys were just the sort to attack another with the odds against him and never had a notion that there was anything cowardly in that way of accomplishing their ends.

As a matter of fact, Herring was afraid of Percival, who was his equal in size and strength as well as in athletic qualities and a good boxer to boot, and therefore did not wish to have the latter about when they set out to haze Jack.

"There are other ways of doing the thing besides getting up a row in the dormitories," he said.

"Sure!" added Merritt. "We don't want the profs. coming in on us to spoil the fun."

"Nor to have to lick Percival and a lot of other fools that have taken up with the new chap," observed Holt.

"H'm! you'd lick d.i.c.k Percival, I don't think!" sneered Merritt, who never lost a chance to jeer any one, his own a.s.sociates included. "I'd like to see you do it."

"Shut up!" snarled Herring. "How can we talk the thing over if you're always putting in your oar?"

"You aren't wearing a lot of medals yourself for keeping your mouth shut, Pete," retorted Merritt.

"Who's getting this thing up?" snarled the other. "Me or you? Did you start it?"

"No, but you can't get along without me, all the same, so don't be so fresh and breezy."

"If you fellows are going to squabble there'll be nothing done at all,"

put in Holt impatiently.

"It ain't me that's squabbling, it's Ern Merritt," growled the leader of the bullies, angrily. "If he don't want to go into this thing he needn't, but there's no use in doing so much talking."

"Who's doing the most of it?" laughed Merritt.

"Shut up!" said the rest of the boys, who wanted to hear what Herring had to propose.

"There are other places besides the dormitories to work in," said Herring. "There's the woods and the road and a lot of other places. He won't be with the other fellows all the time."