'll listen to
your sermon."

"It isn't to be a sermon. You should know I am not the kind of a
fellow to preach."

"That's so. Don't mind me. Drive ahead."

"First, I want to ask how it is you happened to let yourself be put
back in recitations?"

"Oh, Old Gunn just put me back--that's all."

"But you are fully as good a scholar as I am, and you could have gone
ahead into the first section if you had braced up."

"Perhaps so."

"I know it. You do not study."

"What's the use of boning all the time! I wasn't cut out for it."

"That's the only way to get ahead here."

"I don't care much about getting ahead. All I want is to pull through
and graduate. Then I can go to college if I wish. These fellows who
get the idea that they must dig, dig, dig here, just as they say they
do at West Point, give me a pain. What is there to dig for? We're not
working for commissions in the army."

"From your point of view, you put up a very good argument," admitted
Frank; "but there's another side. It surely must be some satisfaction
to graduate well up in your class, if not at the head. And then, the
more a fellow learns here, the easier he will find the work after
entering college."

"Work? Pshaw! There are not many fellows in colleges who are
compelled to bone. I hate work! I thought you were the kind of a
fellow who liked a little fun?"

"Well, you know I am. Haven't I always been in for sport?"

"But you're getting to be a regular plodder. You don't do a thing
lately to keep your blood circulating."

"I am afraid you do too much that is contrary to rules, old man. For
instance, where is it that you go so often nights, and stay till near
morning?"

"I go out for a little sport," replied Bart, with a grim smile.

CHAPTER II.

A GHASTLY SUBJECT.

"But you know the consequences if you are caught," said Frank,
warningly.

"Of course I do," nodded Bart, "but you must acknowledge there is not
much danger that I shall be caught, as long as I make up a good dummy
to leave in my place on the bed."

"Still, you may be."

"That's right, and there's where part of the sport comes in, as you
ought to know, for you are quite a fellow to take chances yourself,
Merriwell."

"That's right," admitted Frank. "It's in my blood, and I can't help
it. Anything with a spice of risk or danger attracts and fascinates
me."

"You are not in the habit of hesitating or being easily scared when
there is som