It was by no means a common occurrence for the best of the scholars to win a hundred credit marks in a week, for in order to do it, it was necessary that they should be perfect in everything. If their standing and deportment as students were all they desired them to be, they ran the risk of falling behind in their record as soldiers. If they handled their muskets a little too quickly or too slowly while their company was going through the manual of arms, if they forgot that the guide was left when marching in platoon front, and allowed themselves to fall half an inch out of line, or if they turned their heads on dress-parade to watch the band while it “rounded off,” they were sure to be reported and to lose some of their hard-earned credit marks.
Don Gordon worked early and late, and his average for the first three weeks was ninety—Bert following close behind with eighty-eight. Jones and Enoch Williams did not do as well, and Lester was out of the race almost before it was begun. Enoch made a gallant struggle, and would have succeeded in winning the required number of marks if Jones had only let him alone; but at the end of the third week the latter gave up trying.
“It’s no use, Williams,” said he. “I’ve made a bad showing, thanks to the partiality of the instructors, who don’t intend to let a fellow win on his merits. I have made just a hundred and forty altogether, and if I could make a clean score during the next two weeks, my average would be sixty-eight—seven points too low. Now what are you going to do?”
“You can’t possibly make seventy-five, can you?” said Enoch, after he had performed a little problem in mental arithmetic. “Well, if you’ve got to stay behind, I’ll stay too. How about that picnic? Lester hasn’t been near me in a long time. He and his crowd seem to hang together pretty well, and I shouldn’t wonder if they had got their plans all laid.”
“Let’s hunt him up and have a talk with him,” said Jones. “We have made him mad, and perhaps we shall have hard work to get him good-natured again.”
“I don’t care if he never gets good-natured again,” answered Enoch. “I have long been of the opinion that we ought to throw that fellow overboard. We shall certainly see trouble through him if we do not.”
“We’ll see trouble if we do,” said Jones, earnestly. “I have studied him pretty closely, and I have found out that there is no honor in him. We’ve gone too far to drop him now. If we should attempt it, he’d blow on us as sure as the world.”
Jones struck pretty close to the mark when he said this, for Lester had already set his wits to work to conjure up some plan to keep the boys who would not side with him at the academy while he and the rest were off on their cruise. He had decided that when the proper time came he would make an effort to induce Enoch to go with him, and if he refused, he (Lester) would take care to see that he didn’t go at all. He would contrive some way to let the superintendent know what he and Jones and their crowd intended to do.
“Brigham is no sailor, and there’s where the trouble is coming in,” said Enoch.