"It is disgusting," agreed Fletcher. "And inspection makes a fellow sick! Why, think of those stuck-up corporals calling a fellow down for having a little dust on his old gun, or for not being just as prim and starchy as they are! It’s too much! They want a chap to be all the time brushing and cleaning and doing such foolishness."
"If I’ve got to do it, I’m going to raise a howl at the let-up on Merriwell," said Scudder.
"Of course," piped Jim, "they’ll say it was because he’s on the eleven, and he doesn’t have time enough to practise and drill, too. But we know how he got onto the eleven, and——"
"We won’t stand for it!" cried Fletcher, jumping up and striding about the room.
"Still," said Scudder, "no one has suggested what we can do."
This trio were three of young Merriwell’s most persistent and most obnoxious plebe enemies. Two days after the football-game with White Academy they had learned that Dick was excused from drill, being required to appear only at inspection, and it made them very wroth. Then they gathered in Fletcher’s room to talk it over.
Both Scudder and Watson were roommates of Merriwell, who, after the rule of the academy, had been placed in a "cock-loft" room with three companions. Of these companions, Hugh Douglass was the only one who had shown an inclination of friendliness toward Dick.
Watson was a sly fellow, and he had very little to say in the presence of Merriwell. At times he even pretended to be Dick’s friend; but Dick was able to read him like an open book, with the result that Watson’s hypocritical blandishments were taken for exactly what they were worth.
Scudder was also sneaky, and, on first entering Fardale, he had sought to gain favor with the yearlings by playing spy for them. As a result, he had been forced into an encounter with Dick, and had been soundly thrashed. This made him the persistent and scheming foe of the successful young plebe.
It made no difference to Uric that Merriwell had also thrashed Big Bob Singleton, the champion boxer of the school, and that Singleton had seemed to think all the more of Dick because of this feat. Uric desired to "get even." And now he suddenly exclaimed: