"It isn't Willy's fault, and you know it, Uncle Jack, though we all know how good you've been; but he's had more bad luck and—and—injustice than any cadet in the corps. Lots of his classmates told me so."
"Yes," says Uncle Jack, musingly. "That is what your blessed mother, yonder, wrote me when I went up last winter, the time Billy submitted that explanation to the commandant with its pleasing reference to the fox that had lost its tail—you doubtless recall the incident—and came within an ace of dismissal in consequence."
"I don't care!" interrupts Miss Nan, with flashing eyes. "Will had provocation enough to say much worse things; Jimmy Frazer wrote me so, and said the whole class was sticking up for him."
"I do not remember having had the honor of meeting Jimmy Frazer," remarks Uncle Jack, with an aggravating drawl that is peculiar to him. "Possibly he was one of the young gentlemen who didn't call, owing to some temporary impediment in the way of light prison——"
"Yes; and all because he took Will's part, as I believe," is the impetuous reply. "Oh! I'll be so thankful when they're out of it all."
"So will they, no doubt. 'Sticking up'—wasn't that Mr. Frazer's expression?—for Bill seems to have been an expensive luxury all round. Wonder if sticking up is something they continue when they get to their regiments? Billy has two or three weeks yet in which to ruin his chances of ever reaching one, and he has exhibited astonishing aptitude for tripping himself up thus far."
"Uncle Jack! How can you speak so of Willy, when he is so devoted to you? When he gets to his regiment there won't be any Lieutenant Lee to nag and worry him night and day. He's the cause of all the trouble."
"That so?" drawls Uncle Jack. "I didn't happen to meet Mr. Lee, either,—he was away on leave; but as Bill and your mother had some such views, I looked into things a bit. It appears to be a matter of record that my enterprising nephew had more demerit before the advent of Mr. Lee than since. As for 'extras' and confinements, his stock was always big enough to bear the market down to bottom prices."
The boat is once more under way, and a lull in the chat close at hand induces Uncle Jack to look about him. The younger of the two men lately standing with the dark-eyed girl has quietly withdrawn, and is now shouldering his way to a point out of ear-shot. There he calmly turns and waits; his glance again resting upon her whose side he has so suddenly quitted. She has followed him with her eyes until he stops; then with heightened color resumes a low-toned chat with her father. Uncle Jack is a keen observer, and his next words are inaudible except to his niece.
"Nan, my child, I apprehend that remarks upon the characteristics of the officers at the Point had best be confined to the bosom of the family. We may be in their very midst."