of sleeping nights, that beast must lie awake, devising more ways
of being unutterably fresh. But now he's contaminating his bunkie,
Mr. Ellis."

"Evil company always did work havoc with good manners," nodded Dick.
"So Mr. Ellis has gone bad, has he?"

"Do you know," continued Furlong severely, "that three mornings
ago, when Jessup, of our class, was dressing at forty horsepower
so he wouldn't miss reveille formation, that he stepped into two
shoes full of soft soap, and had to go out sloshing into line
in that shape, just because he couldn't spare the time to take
his shoes off and empty them?

"Yes," nodded Prescott. "We suspected Haverford, of the first
class, of that, because Jessup, on guard, challenged Haverford
when Haverford was trying to run the guard after taps."

"Haverford nothing," retorted Furlong. "He's above such jobs.
No, sir! This afternoon Jessup ran plumb into Mr. Ellis when
that little beast bunkie of the other beast, Mr. Briggs, was just
in the act of dropping soft soap into the shoes that Aldrich will
wear to dress parade today.

"Where on earth did Mr. Ellis get hold of soft soap?" demanded
Prescott, raising himself on one elbow.

"You're entirely missing the problem, old ramrod!" grunted Furlong
wrathfully. "The question is, how can we possibly soak such habits
out of Mr. Ellis and Mr. Briggs?"