you? And you'll all excuse me, won't you, while I hurry away
to tog for dress parade?"

Laura's face was almost as white as Dick's had been at noon, as
she gazed after the receding Prescott.

Then Greg, in his bluntest way, tried to put it all straight,
and quickly, at that.

"Oh, is that all?" asked Belle with a sniff of contempt. "Why
couldn't Dick remain and tell us himself? You cadets are certainly
cowards in some things---sometimes!"

But the tears were struggling for a front place in Laura's fine
eyes.

"Is this 'silence' going to affect Dick very much in his career
in the Army?" she asked with emotion.

"Not if his staunchest friends can prevent it," replied Greg almost
fiercely. "And old ramrod has a host of friends in his class,
at that."

"It's too bad they're not in the majority, then," murmured Miss
Meade.

"They will be, in the end," asserted Greg. "We're working things
around to that point. You should have heard the fierce row we put
up at the class meeting last night."