"Stop this instantly!" commanded the Professor. "I'll not have such goings on. Stacy, will you come down out of that tree?"
"I will not."
"I command you to come down."
"Command him. Don't command me. How can I come down when Ned Rector is using the axe? He might chop me in two."
"Stacy!"
"Professor!"
"Ned, put away that axe. We can't have anything like this."
"But he smeared my face with mud after I had saved him from the 'gators," protested Ned.
"He—he jumped on me. I had to stop him," answered the boy up the tree.
The Professor motioned to Ned to go away, which Rector did rather unwillingly.