This put an end to the threatening trouble for the time, and the boys followed along in his wake, Hicksley some distance behind the other three and muttering threats under his breath.
“Isn’t he a pippin?” said Bobby, in a low voice, so that Mr. Carrier could not hear.
“Looks to me like something that the cat brought in,” grumbled Fred, whose rumpled feathers took some time for smoothing.
“He’s going around looking for trouble,” observed Skeets; “and that kind is sure to find it before very long.”
“No decent fellow will want to have anything to do with him,” remarked Fred.
“Except perhaps Bill Bronson and Jack Jinks,” amended Bobby. “He’ll be just nuts for them.”
“I said decent fellow,” repeated Fred.
They soon reached the main assembly room into which the boys were streaming from all directions.
Dr. Raymond and the rest of the teaching staff were seated on a platform in the front of the room. When the gathering had subsided into silence, the principal rose and gave the boys a little informal talk about the duties of the coming term and the spirit in which he hoped they would go about their work. He dwelt especially on the incentives offered them to become members of the “Sword and Star,” the main society of the school, and as he mentioned the name of the society, the boys who were members jumped to their feet and gave the society yell:
“One, two, three—boom!