"Did you find the Army such easy stuff to use as a doormat, Dan?" queried Greg dryly.
"Oh, it—it—it was the fault of the new rules," retorted Midshipman Dalzell, making a wry face. "You know, Greg, you never could play much football. But the new rules favor the muff style of playing."
Only a few more words could the quartette exchange. There was time, however, for a few minutes of talk before the West Pointers were obliged to leave for their train.
Greg, sighed Dick, if we only had Dave and Dan playing on the same team with us, such a game would be great!
"Oh, well," murmured Greg, "whether Annapolis or West Point lugged off the actual score, the service won, anyway. For the Army and Navy are inseparable units of the service."
It was a very orderly and dignified lot of cadets who filed aboard the cadet section of the train to leave for home. Once the train was well on its way out of Philadelphia, however, the pent-up enthusiasm of the happy sons of the Army broke loose, nor did the tactical officers with them make any effort to restrain the merry enthusiasm.
Some of the cadets went from car to car, in search of more excitement.
Dick Prescott soon became so tired of hero-worship that he slipped along through the rear car a few feet at a time until, at last, unobserved, he managed to make his way out on to the rear platform.
Unobserved, that is, by all save one. Turnback Haynes, who had been watching Dick with a sort of wild fascination, noted Dick's latest move.
The train, which had been traveling at high speed, now slowed down to some twenty-five miles an hour in order to pass over a river.