What on earth had happened! The six couldn't seem to get it through their heads. Could it be possible that this girl, the belle of West Point, the beauty over whom half the cadets were wild, the daughter of a famous judge, was sympathizing with a few, poor, miserable plebes in an effort to upset West Point? And that she had actually offered to help them in a trick, the boldness of which was enough to make the boldest hesitate? Good stars! The world must be coming to an end! No wonder the amazed plebes gasped and stared, and then stared and gasped, unable to believe that they stood on the same earth as half a minute previously.
Mark and his companion, who understood their perplexity entirely, and who seemed to have gotten amazingly in sympathy during a brief afternoon's conversation, stood and regarded them meanwhile with considerable amusement.
Well, it must be true! Mark said so, and the girl heard him and seemed to say "yes" with her laughing blue eyes.
That was the conviction which finally forced itself upon the incredulous and befuddled six, and with it came a dim, undefined consciousness of the fact that possibly they were not doing the very politest thing in the world in staring at their "angel."
First to realize it was Texas, last of all to whom one would have looked for any species of gallantry.
Texas sprang forward and seized the girl's fair white hand in his own mighty paw.
"Hi, Miss Fuller!" he cried, "I'm glad to have you join! Whoop!"
Which broke the ice.