accused. "If you
fellows stand by him, I am done for."

"We'll have to be given time to think it over."

"No, that is wrong, for you'll be forced to make some explanation as
soon as you get into camp."

"We'll simply tell the truth."

"That will ruin me!"

"Which cannot be helped. The truth is the only thing that will stand
in a case like this."

"All right. There's no show for me."

Bascomb turned about in a blind way, and Reynolds caught him by the
arm, asking:

"Where are you going? What are you going to do?"

"I don't know," was the hopeless reply. "It doesn't make any
difference where I go or what I do now!"

The most of the boys moved toward camp again, leaving Reynolds talking
earnestly with Bascomb. Before the camp was reached, Reynolds came
running and panting after them.

"Bascomb has gone crazy!" he cried. "He said he was going to kill
himself, and he broke away from me and ran into the woods! It is
terrible!"

CHAPTER XLVII.

ALIVE!

"I don't know but suicide is his easiest way out of this scrape," said
Hodge.

"It is the only way he can escape hanging!" came from Fred Davis, who
seemed to be aroused to a point of relentless hatred for Bascomb.

"Merciful goodness!" came faintly from Reynolds, who seemed to be
weakening. "What a dreadful affair this is! I'd give anything in my
power to give if I were well out of it!"

"An' ye'd be gittin' out chape at thot, me hearty," declared Barney
Mulloy.

"If I'd ever dreamed what would come of it, horses couldn't have
dragged me into the affair!" almost whimpered Reynolds.

"An' now ye're in it, it won't do yez nivver a bit av good to whoine,
me b'y."

"All you can do is brace up and face it out," said Hodge. "That's what
the rest of us will have to do. It's likely we'll all be fired from
the academy for our shares in the business."

"I wouldn't mind that if it would bring Merriwell back all right,"
asserted Reynolds, and there was a sincere sound in his voice.

"We'd all take our medicine without a murmur if it would restore him to
life. He was the whitest boy that ever breathed!"

"I think you're right," admitted Rupert. "I don't like him, but I
presume that was my fault. Perhaps I was jealous because he was so
popular. He never did me a mean turn."

"Och! an' he nivver did anybody thot!" quickly put in Barney. "It wur
ivver a good turn, av it wur anything at all, at all."

And so, talking of Frank's virtues