The speaker was a tall, handsome lad, a plebe at the West Point Military Academy. At the moment he was gazing inquiringly out of the tent door at a small orderly.
The boy handed him an envelope, and the other glanced at it.
"Cadet Mark Mallory, West Point, N. Y.," was the address.
"I guess that's for me," he said. "Thank you. Hello in there, Texas! Here's a letter from Wicks Merritt."
This last remark was addressed to another cadet in the tent. "Texas," officially known as Jeremiah Powers, a tall, rather stoop-shouldered youth, with a bronzed skin and a pair of shining gray eyes, appeared in the doorway1 and watched his friend with interest while he read.
[Pg 8]"What does he say, Mark?" he inquired, when the latter finished.
"Lots," responded Mark. "Lots that'll interest our crowd. They ought to be through sprucing up by this time, so bring 'em over here and I'll read it."
"Sprucing up" is West Point for the morning house-cleaning in the summer camp. A half hour is allowed to it immediately after breakfast, and it is followed by "the A. M. inspection2."
In response to Mark's suggestion, Texas slipped over to the tent in back of theirs in "B Company" Street, and called its three occupants. They came over and joined those in Mark's tent; and then Mark took out the letter he had just received.
"I've got something here," said he, "that I think ought to interest all of us. I guess I'll have time to read it before inspection. We are a secret society, aren't we?"
"That's what we are," assented3 the other six.
"But what's that got to do with it?" added Texas.
"And we've banded ourselves together for the purpose of preventing the yearlings from hazing4 us?" continued Mark, without noticing his friend's inquiry5. "Well, it seems that they've been doing about the same thing down at Annapolis, too. This is from Wicks Merritt, a second class cadet up here, who's home on furlough this summer. He took a trip to Annapolis, and this is what he[Pg 9] says. Listen very dutifully now, and don't get impatient:
"Dear Mallory: I have heard a lot about you since the last time I wrote. Several of the fellows have written to me, and they haven't been able to mention anything but you. They tell me you are kicking up a fine old fuss in West Point during my absence. They say that you won't let anybody haze6 you. They say that you've gotten a lot of plebes around you to back you up, and that the yearlings are half wild in consequence.
"I don't know what to make of you. You always were an extraordinary genius, and I suppose you have to do things in your own sweet way, whether it's rescuing ferryboats or sailboats or express trains, or else locking us yearlings in ice houses. I cannot imagine what will be the end of the matter. I am sure the yearlings will never give in.
"I'm told that when they tried to lick you into submission7 you did up Billy Williams, the best fighter in the class. Also that Bull Harris, whom I warned you against as being a sneaky fellow, tried to get you dismissed by skinning you on demerits, but that you circumvented8 that. Also that you and your friends have made it hot for him ever since, upon which fact I congratulate you.
"I don't know what the yearlings will do next, but I imagine that they're 'stalled.' Since you've started, I suppose the best thing for you to do is to keep up the good work and not let them rest. But for Heaven's sake, don't let any of them see this! They'd cut me for aiding and abetting9 a plebe rebellion. You are certainly the boldest plebe that every struck West Point; nobody in our class ever dared to do what you've done.
"It seems, though, that you have imitators, or else that[Pg 10] you are imitating somebody. Down here at Annapolis this year pretty much the same state of affairs is going on just now. There's a plebe down here by the name of Clif Faraday (I've met him, and I told him about you), and he's raising the very old boy with the third class fellows. It seems that he outwitted them in all their hazing schemes, and has got them guessing at what he'll do next, which is about as B. J. as anything you ever did, I imagine. It looks as if plebes both at West Point and here would get off with almost no hazing this year. And it's all on account of you, too.
"Genius knows no precedent10, they say. Farewell.
"Your friend,
"Wicks Merritt.
"P. S.—They tell me you've saved the life of Judge Fuller's daughter. Just take a word of advice—make the most of your opportunity! She's the prettiest girl around the place, and the nicest, too, and she has half the corps11 wild over her. If you can make friends with her, I think the yearlings would stop hazing you at her command."
Mark finished the reading of the letter and gazed at his comrades, smiling.
"You see," he said, "our fame has spread even to Annapolis. Gentlemen, I propose three cheers for our crowd!"
"An' three fo' Clif Faraday!" cried Texas.
"Only don't give any of them," added Mark, "for somebody might hear us."
There was a moment's pause after that, broken by a protest from one of the Seven, Joseph Smith, of Indian[Pg 11]apolis, popularly known as "Indian," a fat, gullible12 youth, who was the laughingstock of the post.
"I tell you," said he, his round eyes swelling13 with indignation, "I don't think what Clif Faraday did was a bit more B. J. than some of our tricks!" (B. J. is West Point dialect for "fresh.")
"That's what I say, too, b'gee!" chimed in another, a handsome, merry-eyed chap with a happy faculty14 of putting every one in a good humor when he laughed. "Just look at how Mark shut two of 'em up in an ice house. Or look at how, when they took Indian off to the observatory15 to haze him, b'gee, we made 'em think the place was afire and had 'em all scared to death, and the fire battalion16 turning out besides. Now, b'gee, I want to know where you can beat that!"
And his sentiment was echoed with approval by the remainder of those present. The seven had by this time scattered17 themselves about the tent in picturesque18 and characteristic attitudes, listening to the discussion carried on by the excitable Master Dewey.
First of all and foremost was the grave and learned "Parson," the Boston geologist19. The Parson was stretched on his back in one corner with nothing but his long, bony shanks visible. Somehow or other Parson Stanard always managed to keep those legs of his with[Pg 12] their covering of pale green socks the most conspicuous20 thing about him.
Sitting erect21 and stately on the locker22, was Master Chauncey, the "dude" of the party. A few weeks of West Point had already worked wonders with Chauncey; his aristocratic friends on Fifth Avenue would scarcely have known him. In the first place, he, with the rest of the plebes, were compelled to walk, whenever they went abroad, with "head erect, chest out, eyes to the front, little fingers on the seams of the trousers, palms outward." Try this and you will find, as Chauncey was finding, that it is hard to do that and at the same time keep up the correct London "stoop." Chauncey had been obliged to leave his cane23 and monocle behind him also, and a few days later, when plebe fatigue24 uniforms were donned, his imported clothes and high collar went by the board, too.
But Chauncey still clung to his accent, "bah Jove;" and was still known to the seven as "the man with a tutor and a hyphen"—his name being Mount-Bonsall, if you please—and to the rest of the corps as the dude who most did up six yearlings.
The corner opposite the Parson's contained the dozing25 figure of Methusalem Zebediah Chelvers, the "farmer" from Kansas, popularly known as "Sleepy."
Sleepy never did anything or said anything unless he had to; the seven had known him for weeks now, and[Pg 13] knew no more about him than at the start. Sleepy was still sleepy, and that was all.
The other members of this bold and desperate secret "anti-hazing" society were Dewey, the prize story-teller of the party, "b'gee;" Indian, the "prize pig;" Texas, a wild and woolly cowboy just from the plains, with a right arm that had paralyzed four cadets in as many minutes, and, last of all, Mark Mallory, the leader.
"Just look at the things we've done, b'gee!" continued Dewey. "Look at the times they've tried to haze us and we've outwitted them! See how we had the nerve to yank 'em out of bed the other night, b'gee. Or, if that isn't enough, just think of Bull Harris."
This last remark was greeted with a chuckle26 of laughter from the seven, in which even Sleepy found sufficient energy to join. And, indeed, the recollection was enough to make one laugh.
As readers of the first books in this series, "Off for West Point" and "A Cadet's Honor," know, Bull Harris was the sworn enemy of the seven, and of Mark in particular. He never had ceased plotting in his mean, cowardly way to get Mark into trouble, and it was the joy of the plebes' lives to outwit him. On the day previous they had succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Given a bloodhound that had been sent out from a neighboring village to trail a burglar who had stepped into a barrel of[Pg 14] pitch, the seven had put pitch on Bull Harris' shoe and started the dog after him during the evening's dress parade. The dog had chewed Bull's trousers to ribbons, had broken up the parade, had made Bull the laughingstock of the place and earned him the deathless nickname of "Bull, the Burglar." Naturally, Bull was wild with rage, and the seven with hilarity27.
They were still chuckling28 over it and the general discomfiture29 of the yearling class and their own future prospects30 as triumphant31 plebes, when inspection put an end to the discussion and scattered the crowd.
"But just you keep in mind," was Dewey's parting declaration, "that we're the B. J.-est plebes that ever were, are, will be or can be. And, b'gee, we're going to show it every day, too!"
Which the Parson punctuated32 with a solemn "Yea, by Zeus!"
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1
doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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inspection
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| n.检查，审查，检阅 | |
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assented
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| 同意，赞成( assent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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hazing
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| n.受辱，被欺侮v.（使）笼罩在薄雾中( haze的现在分词 )；戏弄，欺凌（新生等，有时作为加入美国大学生联谊会的条件） | |
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inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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haze
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| n.霾，烟雾；懵懂，迷糊；vi.(over)变模糊 | |
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7
submission
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| n.服从，投降；温顺，谦虚；提出 | |
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circumvented
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| v.设法克服或避免（某事物），回避( circumvent的过去式和过去分词 )；绕过，绕行，绕道旅行 | |
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abetting
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| v.教唆（犯罪）( abet的现在分词 )；煽动；怂恿；支持 | |
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precedent
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| n.先例，前例；惯例；adj.在前的，在先的 | |
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corps
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| n.(通信等兵种的)部队；(同类作的)一组 | |
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gullible
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| adj.易受骗的；轻信的 | |
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swelling
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| n.肿胀 | |
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faculty
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| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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observatory
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| n.天文台，气象台，瞭望台，观测台 | |
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battalion
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| n.营；部队；大队(的人) | |
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scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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geologist
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| n.地质学家 | |
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conspicuous
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| adj.明眼的，惹人注目的；炫耀的，摆阔气的 | |
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erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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locker
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| n.更衣箱，储物柜，冷藏室，上锁的人 | |
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cane
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| n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的 | |
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fatigue
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| n.疲劳，劳累 | |
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dozing
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| v.打瞌睡,假寐 n.瞌睡 | |
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chuckle
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| vi.／n.轻声笑，咯咯笑 | |
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hilarity
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| n.欢乐；热闹 | |
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chuckling
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| 轻声地笑( chuckle的现在分词 ) | |
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discomfiture
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| n.崩溃；大败；挫败；困惑 | |
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prospects
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| n.希望，前途(恒为复数) | |
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triumphant
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| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
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punctuated
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| v.（在文字中）加标点符号，加标点( punctuate的过去式和过去分词 )；不时打断某事物 | |
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