"Come on, throw 'em over!" roared Bock. "Roll 'em in the snow!"
"And stuff some snow down their backs!" added Grimes.
"Now then, all together!" cried Jack. "Keep as close as possible! One, two, three!"
Side by side the three chums bounded forward, straight for the line of Pornellites. They came on swiftly and took the enemy by surprise. Jack bumped into Bock, hurling him flat, and Pepper bowled over Grimes. Andy bent low and caught another student by the legs, sending him over into a fourth, and both went flat. Then the three cadets caught a fifth and ran him along the road and into a hollow, where he went into snow up to his waist.
"Stop 'em! Stop 'em!" was the cry, but the Putnam Hall boys could not be stopped. Turning, they delivered a parting shower of snowballs, and then ran on, in the direction of the school.
"I guess the Pornell fellows will remember that for awhile," panted Pepper, when they felt safe.
"And just think of it--three to nine!" chuckled Andy.
"They thought they had us dead to rights," came from Jack. "Well, I guess we showed them a trick or two they won't forget right away."
"Are they following us?" asked the acrobatic youth, looking back.
"I reckon not," replied Pepper, "Must have had enough," and he smiled broadly.
The three cadets were tired out from their long walk and the contest on the road, and when the school was reached all were glad enough to sit down and rest previous to having supper. Andy looked around for Reff Ritter, but that cadet kept himself out of sight.
"I'll see him after supper," said the acrobatic youth.
It was not until nearly bedtime that he got a chance to question the bully. He followed Ritter up to his dormitory, which chanced just then to be unoccupied.
"Reff, I want to talk to you," he said, when the bully was on the point of closing the door in his face.
"What do you want, Andy Snow? I'm not feeling well to-night, and I am tired out from a walk I took to Cedarville."
"I won't keep you long, Reff. I want to ask you about the man you met in Cedarville? What's his name?"
Reff Ritter stopped short and showed that the question took him by surprise.
"Yes, the man you met at the new buildings in Cedarville."
"We saw you, I and Major Ruddy and Pep Ditmore."