"Doesn't Frazier help you?" he asked.
"Not much. He's generally busy reading, writing, or dozing, and he's impatient of my stupidity, I suppose. Everything seems so easy to him," answered Pops.
"Yes, I never heard such finished recitations. 'Old Scad' just sits there and nods approval, and seldom asks a question." ("Old Scad" was the irreverent title given to a gray-headed lieutenant of artillery by a previous class, and plebes rarely fail to adopt such nicknames.) "Benny's 'maxing' right along just now," continued Connell.
"Do you think he'll be head of the class?" asked Pops.
Connell pondered a moment before replying. "He might, because he's just as fluent in French; but I'll bet my hopes of graduation against the corporal chevrons you're bound to wear next June that if he's head in January he'll never get there again."
"Why, Con? What do you mean?"
"Simply this: Frazier is a sort of fireworks fellow. He's going up with a flash and a roar, but he'll burn out by the time we get into analytical. He isn't a stayer. Mr. Otis was telling me last night that there were cases where fellows who stood head in the plebe January dropped out of sight by the end of the third year. As for Frazier, he'll get found on demerit if he isn't careful. He's smoking cigarettes again. Don't let him light one in the room."
"Oh, he doesn't so long as I am there. Of course if I get reported as orderly for tobacco smoke in quarters he'll be man enough to take it off my shoulders."
Connell was silent a moment, then he spoke: "I don't want to wrong Frazier, but I'm inclined to think that the less you build on his doing the manly thing at his own expense the safer you'll be."
And that evening, as Geordie returned to his room, all in a glow from the brisk walk, he found a party of plebes just breaking up and scattering to their quarters. Benny had been "entertaining," and the air was full of cigarette smoke. Vigorous fanning with the door and with towels swept much of the smoke out through the open window, but the aroma of the heavy, drug-scented cloud hovered over the occupants' heads.