e there, of course, and so were the parents
of Dave Darrin and Dan Dalzell, the latter happy in the knowledge
that their boys would soon be home for the brief September leave
from the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis.

"Why, you haven't seen Dave since you youngsters all left home,
have you, Dick?" asked Mr. Darrin.

"No, sir. Greg and I hoped to, this last summer, when the Army
baseball nine went down to Annapolis and defeated the Navy nine,"
Dick replied. "But both Greg and I found ourselves so hard pressed
in our academic work that we didn't dare go, but remained behind
and boned hard at our studies."

"You don't forget the fact that the Army nine did defeat the Navy
nine, do you?" laughed Dan's father.

"No, sir; of course not," smiled Dick. "The Army and Navy teams
exist mainly for the purpose of beating each other. I am glad
to say that the Army manages to win more than its share of games."

"That's because the West Point boys average a little older than
the Annapolis boys," broke in Mrs. Dalzell pleasantly, though
warmly. Even she, as the mother of a midshipman, felt her share
in the rivalry between the nation's two great service schools.

"You will bring Laura and Belle up to some of the hops this winter,
I hope, Mrs. Bentley," Dick begged.

"Oh, she's pledged to take us to West Point, and to Annapolis,"
broke in Belle Meade, smiling. "You don't think we are going
to lose the hops at either Academy while we have friends there,
do you?"

"I should hope not," Dick replied earnestly. Five minutes before
train time Leonard Cameron appeared. He greeted the two cadets
with great cordiality.

"I couldn't help coming to see you off, Prescott," Cameron found
chance to say in an undertone. "Laura is so deeply interested
in your success that I, too, am longing to hear every possible
good word as to your future career. Laura couldn't be more interested
in you if she were truly your sister."

That was the sting that made Dick's going away bitter. Cameron's
manner was so easy and assured that Dick saw the crumbling of one
of his more than half built castles in Spain.

The train carried the two cadets away. The parents of both young
men had seen to it that the cadets went away in a parlor car.
Dick and Greg, after leaving Gridley behind, swung their chairs
around so that, while they looked out of the window, their heads
were close together.

"Cameron had a nerve to show up, didn't hey" dema