“I wish he were out of the way,” said Leon, with an anxious frown. “He makes me wild, and I’m afraid some day I can’t stand it any longer and shall pitch into him.”
“I hate fighting as badly as you do, Leon,” said Max candidly; “but there are some fellows that need to be knocked down a few times to make them endurable. The worst of it is, it’s likely to knock yourself down at the same time and land you with the privates again. Winslow is just naturally ugly, and he hates you because he says you laughed at him that first morning you saw him. I don’t wonder; he’s enough to make a crocodile laugh, sometimes.”
By noon, the rumors of Osborn’s disgrace were confirmed, and the question of his probable successor was discussed on all sides. It was the general opinion of the boys that the office would fall to Leon, though Smythe’s narrow, but literal scholarship and slavish adherence to rules made him a possible candidate. Of Winslow, strange to say, there seemed to be no question.
Contrary to Leon’s expectations, Osborn, when he appeared at dinner, seemed in no way cast down by his late experience. On the contrary, he carried it off with his usual gay good-nature, and laughingly offered to bet as to his successor who was not to be appointed until dress-parade, on the following day.
“Whoever ’tis, he ought to be grateful to me for stepping down and out,” he declared with a careless laugh. “I’ve given somebody a chance to go up, and I hope he’ll feel properly obliged to me.”
Late that evening, Leon went to Lieutenant Wilde’s room, to ask a question in regard to his lesson for the next day. As usual when he was there, he lingered for a time, talking of this matter and that, with the perfect good-fellowship which marked all the relations between Lieutenant Wilde and his pupils. When, after half an hour of lively talk, he stepped out into the hall, he was surprised to come upon Winslow who stood a few feet from the door, apparently waiting for someone.
“Hullo, Winslow! what are you up to here?” he asked, for Winslow rarely went into his teacher’s room.
But Winslow made no reply, and Leon went away down the hall, quite unconscious of the threatening glances cast after him by his rival. He thought no more of the meeting until the next morning when he and Harold King were strolling about the grounds, between the early guard-mounting and chapel, as the boys called the simple opening exercises of the school. The two boys had reached the foot of the hill and were just turning to come back, when Winslow abruptly appeared to them.
“What were you doing in Lieutenant Wilde’s room last night, Arnold?” he demanded roughly.
“It’s none of your business,” returned Leon coolly; “but I’d just as soon tell you. I went in to ask him about to-day’s lesson.”