“Don’t worry about that. When Old Sixteen gets to spouting Latin or Greek he doesn’t know whether he’s on his head or his feet, and as for a hat—say, forget it and come on. He’ll never mention it again. Peaches knows how to handle him. Peaches is the best Latin lad in the whole school, and once Sixteen finds some one who will listen to his new theory about conjugating irregular verbs, he’ll talk until midnight. Come on!”
“Poor Peaches!” murmured Tom Davis.
“Never mind, Sister,” spoke George Bland, as he linked his arm in that of Joe. “Peaches seen his duty and he done it nobly, as the novels say. When Sixteen gets through with him we’ll blow him to a feed to make it up to him. Come on while the going’s good. He’ll never see us.”
Thus the day—rather an eventful one as it was destined to become—came to an end. The boys filed into the big dining hall, and talk, which had begun to verge around to baseball, could scarcely be heard for the clatter of knives and forks and dishes.
Some time later there came a cautious knock on the door of the room that Tom Davis and Joe Matson shared. The two lads were deep in their books.
“Who’s there?” asked Joe sharply.
“It’s me—Peaches,” was the quick if ungrammatical answer. “The coast is clear—open your oak,” and he rattled the knob of the door.
Tom unlocked and swung wide the portal, and the hero of the Latin engagement entered.
“Quick—anything to drink?” he demanded. “I’m a rag! Say, I never swallowed so much dry Latin in my life. My throat is parched. Don’t tell me that all that ginger ale you smuggled in the other day is gone—don’t you dare do it!”