On the next day the sky was again clear, and Wolcott as soon as his first recitation was over put on his snowshoes and started out for an experimental tramp, in preparation for the expedition of the Snowshoe Club in the afternoon. Being out of practice, and quite well aware that he presented a not altogether graceful figure, he took a cross-cut over the garden fences to an outlying field. As he passed the boarding-house where Laughlin waited on table, he glanced up at the kitchen window, and beheld the broad chest and massive face fronting a dish pan, and the big hands working with cloth and plates. The captain nodded cordially, but Wolcott hardly returned the greeting.
Dish washing! That was certainly the limit. A school captain washing dishes! Shovelling snow, tending furnaces, could be forgiven; but dish washing, never!
That same afternoon Marchmont and Whitely were amusing themselves in Stone’s room; that is, Whitely and Stone were pretending to study, while Marchmont, who was above such pretences, was twirling Stone’s geometry on the point of a pencil.
“Did you fellows know that Rogers isn’t coming back?”
Stone looked up from his work. “Let that book alone, can’t you!” he exclaimed, as he snatched the geometry from Marchmont’s pencil. “Drill holes in your own books!—How do you know that?”
“Jack Butler had a letter from him this morning. He’s gone abroad with his family.”
“Too bad,” said Whitely. “Ted was a blamed nice fellow. There’ll have to be a new class president elected to take his place. I suppose they’ll just move up the vice.”
“Laughlin!” sneered Marchmont. “Is that jay always going to carry us round in his pocket? I think it’s about time we struck for a decent man!”
“Butler would make a good president, wouldn’t he?” remarked Stone. “I wish he had some one to back him.”
“Why shouldn’t he have some one to back him?” demanded Whitely, starting up. “And why shouldn’t we have some voice in naming the officers of the class? Laughlin got the football captaincy away from Butler; it’s right that But should be president. Let’s put him in!”
The trio made a hasty count of the forces to be relied on. “How about Poole?” asked Whitely.
“Oh, he’s for Laughlin, sure,” answered Stone.