When the eagerly expected recess came, all the boys, with the exception of a small group, poured out tumultuously into the street, and ranged themselves in two bands in close proximity to the door. The group that remained consisted of the two Lintons, Bert, Frank, and Teter, the latter three constituting a sort of body-guard for poor timorous little Paul, who shrank in terror from the ordeal, the nature of which in truth he did not fully understand. Having consulted together for a minute or two, the body-guard then moved out through the door, taking care to keep Paul in the middle. As they emerged into the street, a kind of hum of suppressed excitement rose from the crowd awaiting them, followed immediately by cries of "Hoist him! hoist him!" uttered first by Graham and Wilding, and quickly taken up by their supporters.
Pale with fright, Paul cowered close to Teter, while Bert and Frank stood in front of him, and their supporters quickly encircled them. Then came the struggle. Graham and Wilding and their party bore down upon Paul's defenders, and sought to break their way through them to reach their intended victim. Of course, no blows were struck. The boys all knew better than to do that; but pushing, hauling, wrestling, very much after the fashion of football players in a maul, the one party strove to seize Paul, who indeed offered no more resistance than an ordinary football, and the other to prevent his being carried off. For some minutes the issue was uncertain, although the hoisting party considerably outnumbered the anti-hoisting party. More than once did Graham and Wilding force their way into the centre of Paul's defenders, and almost have him in their grasp, only to be thrust away again by the faithful trio that stood about him like the three of whom Macaulay's ringing ballad tells:
"How well Horatius kept the bridge,
In the brave days of old."
Shouting, struggling, swaying to and fro, the contest went on, much to the amusement of a crowd of spectators, among which the tall, blue-coated form of a policeman loomed up prominently, although he deigned not to interfere. At length the weight of superior numbers began to tell, and despite all their efforts the anti-hoisting party were borne slowly but surely toward the fence, upon which some of the boys had already taken their positions, ready to have Paul handed up to them. The case was looking desperate, and Teter, heated and wearied with his exertions, had just said, in his deepest tones, to Bert and Frank, "Come, boys, all together, try it once more," when suddenly a silence fell upon the noisy mob, and their arms, a moment before locked in tense struggling, fell limply to their sides; for there, standing between them and the fence, his keen, dark face lighted with a curious smile, and holding his hand above his head by way of a shield from the hot sun, stood Dr. Johnston!
A genuine ghost at midnight could hardly have startled the boys more. Absorbed in their struggle, they had not seen the doctor until they were fairly upon him. For aught they knew he had been a spectator of the proceedings from the outset. What would he think of them? Rod Graham and Dick Wilding, slaves to a guilty conscience, slunk into the rear of their party, while Bert, and Frank, and Teter, glad of the unexpected relief, wiped their brows and arranged their disordered clothing, as they awaited the doctor's utterance. It soon came.
"I desire an explanation of this unseemly disturbance. The school will follow me immediately into the schoolroom," said he, somewhat sternly; and turning upon his heel went back to his desk, the boys following at a respectful distance.
When all had been seated, and the room was quiet, Dr. Johnston asked:
"Will the leaders in the proceedings outside come to my desk?"
There was a moment's pause, and then Teter rose from his seat, Bert immediately imitating him, and the two walked slowly down to the open space before the master's desk.
Having waited a minute, and no one else appearing, the doctor leaned forward and said to his nephew: