The last speaker was Bull Harris.
They had gotten very near, almost on top of the crouching listeners. Mark clutched his companions and whispered to them: “Not a sound!”
“I can hardly wait for morning to come, to see what happens when that blamed cad isn’t there at reveille. Say, isn’t it great? Just think of their being shut up in jail all night, without a chance of getting out. And they’ll be fired sure as——Good Lord!”
This last exclamation was a perfect scream of terror from Bull. He had started back as if he had seen a ghost; his jaw had dropped, his eyes protruding. The rest were no less pictures of consternation.
With folded arms and a smile upon his lips, standing in their path as real as life, though shadowy in the faint moonlight, was the plebe they had left in the jail down at Highland Falls!
CHAPTER XII.
“REVENGE IS SWEET.”
The amount of alarm which that apparition caused to the yearlings it would be difficult to imagine. The idea of their hated rival escaping had never once flashed over them, and when they saw him it seemed like a visit from another world. It was so sudden that they had no time to think whether that were possible or not.
Except for Bull’s one frightened gasp the four made not one sound. They stood staring, ready to drop from sheer terror. And as for Mallory, he, too, was silent and motionless; he felt that a word would have broken the spell.
There was perhaps half a minute’s wait, and then came another move. There was a waving in the grass behind Mark, and another shadowy form arose silently into view. It was the Parson’s solemn features, and the Parson, too, folded his arms and stared.