, and hanging to his hair.

"I can study better so," he said, and holding on for dear life.

One or two boys glanced in. "Come out of this hole," they cried. "No
need to study for to-morrow. Gee whiz! just think of Moose Island, Joe."

No answer.

"Joe!" They ran in and shook his shoulders. "Moose Island!" they
screamed, and the excitement with which the whole school was charged was
echoing it through the length of the dormitory.

"Go away," cried Joel at them, "or I'll fire something at you," as they
swarmed around his chair.

"Fire your old grammar," suggested one, trying to twitch away his book;
and another pulled the chair out from under him.

Joel sprawled a moment on the floor; then he sprang up, hanging to his
book, and faced them. "I'm not going. Clear out." And in a moment the
room was as still as if an invasion had never taken place. In their
astonishment they forgot to utter a word.

And in ten minutes the news was all over the playground and in all the
corridors, "Joe Pepper isn't going to Moose Island."

If they had said that the corner stone of the dormitory was shaky, the
amazement would not have been so great in some quarters; and the story
was not believed until they had it from Joe himself. Then amazement
changed to grief. Not to have Joe Pepper along, was to do away with half
the fun.

Percy ran up to him in the greatest excitement just before supper. "What
is it, Joe?" he cried. "The fellows are trying to say that you're not
going to Moose Island." He was red with running, and panted dreadfully.
"And Van is giving it to Red Hiller for telling such a whopper."

"Well, he needn't," said Joel, "for it's perfectly true. I'm not going."

Percy tried to speak; but what with running, and his astonishment, his
tongue flapped up idly against the roof of his mouth.

"Dr. Marks won't let me," said Joel, not mincing matters. "I've got to
study; so there's an end of it." But when Davie came in, a woe begone
figure, for Mr. Harrow had kept his promise, then was Joel's hardest
time. And he clenched his brown hands to keep the tears back then, for
David gave way to such a flood in the bitterness of his grief to go
without Joel, that for a time, Joel was in danger of utterly losing his
own self-control.

"I'm confounded glad." It was Jenk who said it to his small following;
and hearing it, Tom Beresford blazed at him. "If you weren't quite so
small, I'd knock you down."

"Well, I am glad,"--Jenk put