The next day the Black Duck was laid up for the winter in Berry's boat house, and the boys, after a parting swim and run on the beach, said good-by to Seawall and turned their faces toward Queen's School.
CHAPTER XI. THE HAZERS' WATERLOO.
It was the second day after Queen's opened for the fall term. The students, separated for the summer months, had met like brothers and clasped hands. Everywhere were heard greetings.
"Glad to see you again, old pard. What were you doing all summer?"
That was the favorite form of address, and when a group met they all talked together as fast as their tongues could rattle. The boys had been scattered at mountain, seashore, lake and forest. Some had had the great trip across the ocean to foreign countries. Others had been at their dull little homes on the farms, but they all had something to tell. Some of the faces were missing. A few boys had dropped out. Two had been drowned in a boating accident on one of the mountain lakes; but all of our old friends put in their appearance. There was Wee Willie Patterson, as diminutive as ever; Tommy Brown, long and skinny, but brown as a berry from tramping in the hills; David Powers, fresh from the big ocean liner; and last, but by no means least in this story, Chip Dixon and his own particular crowd.
These first days and nights were not prolific of deep study. Experiences had to be recounted and books were in the background. Our friends changed their headquarters to the more pretentious Honeywell Hall, but fortune did not bring them all in one entry. Jimmy and Lewis had rooms in the third entry on the second floor. Frank, David and the Codfish, were roommates the same as before. It would have been difficult indeed to have separated Frank and David, and under no circumstances would the Codfish have allowed himself to be detached from this company.
Bit by bit David got the whole story of the doings at Seawall during the summer. "I wish I had been with you instead of at the other side of the world," he said. "I was lonesome a good deal of the time, thinking what a ripping time you fellows were having around the old shore."
"And we were lonesome for you, too," said Frank. "We missed you. It would have been complete if you had been an officer in the Queen's Transportation Company. But there's another year coming."