“Hullo!” gasped Pepper. For the instant he could say no more.
“I suspected it from the start,” fairly hissed the bully of Putnam Hall. “Just wait, that’s all! If I don’t square up you can shoot me!” And away he went, giving the door the hardest kind of a bang after him.
“Now our cake is dough,” came from Stuffer.
“Sure an’ I’d like to know what he’ll be after doin’,” came curiously from Emerald.
“I wonder if he’ll have the nerve to call Captain Putnam?” mused Andy.
“No,” answered Jack, promptly. “He won’t report this, for if he did he knows we would tell on him too. He’ll try to get square some other way.”
“To bed, all of you!” cried Pepper. “Don’t forget how he slammed that door. Some of the teachers may be along before we know it.”
The remains of the feast were cleared away and the room put in order. Then the cadets went to sleep, and slumbered soundly until the bell awoke them in the morning.
It was not until the boys entered the mess-hall that they saw Dan Baxter again. The bully of the school looked like a thundercloud, and so did Reff Ritter, Coulter, and Paxton.
“They have it in for us, that is dead certain,” whispered Andy to Pepper.
“Yes, we’ll have to keep our eyes peeled for them,” was the reply.
“Ditmore, stop your talking!” came sternly from Josiah Crabtree.
“You talk altogether too much at meals,” went on the sour-looking teacher.
“If you say another word I’ll send you from the table,” stormed Josiah Crabtree, and after that Pepper said no more.
That morning everything seemed to go wrong in the classroom. Many lessons were missed and several teachers were out of humor. Josiah Crabtree stormed around, and finally told both Pepper and Jack that they would have to stay in after school in the afternoon.
“Mr. Crabtree, I do not think I am to blame in this,” said Jack. “I understood you to say we were to take up pages 180 and 181 in the history only.”
“I said 180 to 184,” snapped the teacher.
“He did not,” murmured Pepper under his breath.
“You are growing very negligent in your studies,” went on the teacher, tartly. “I shall not stand for it.”
“Snow, did you speak?” thundered Crabtree.
“Then you may remain in after school also.”
“Thank you for nothing,” growled Andy, but this time under his breath.