[Illustration: "'WON'T YOU SHAKE HANDS?'"]
And so there were here. Mr. Jennings, cadet private, Company A, of the furlough class, but kept back a few days on account of an accumulation of demerit, and said to be in danger of deficiency in mathematics, was very loud in his condemnation of the proceedings, now that Woods and most of the class were gone, and there was no Glenn to overawe him. The new First Class officers did not like Jennings, but did not know him as thoroughly as did their predecessors. Frazier, however, was the only member of the new yearling class who was at all sarcastic about the reconciliation; but Benny was in bitter mood just now. Few of the departing cadets, graduates or leave men, had troubled themselves to say a cordial word to him. Few of his class-mates had expressed regret at his having fallen from the head of the class, and fewer still at his failure to win chevrons. No boy at the Point marched into camp that lovely June morning with such a jealous demon of disappointment gnawing at his heart as did Benny Frazier. It boded ill for himself, for his friends, and for any new cadets who fell into his clutches; for the boy who so loudly and persistently announced the year before that nothing on earth could induce him to say or do a thing to worry a Fourth Class man was become the very terror of the plebes.
For two weeks, of course, the opportunities were few. The new First and Third classes were sent into camp as the new-comers arrived and were brought before their examiners. The evening the order was given to pack up and store in the trunk-rooms everything not to be taken to camp Pops was busily at work, while Benny, being room orderly, and solely responsible, was smoking cigarette after cigarette, and "chaffing the corporal," as he called it. There came a sudden knock at the door; Benny hurled the stump into a corner, and sprang to the middle of the floor aghast. Such a thing as inspection the last night in barracks had not occurred to him as a possibility, and this time he, not Pops, would have to bear the punishment. He was trembling with excitement and fear, when a drum-boy orderly poked in his head and said Mr. Graham was wanted at the commandant's office at once. Instantly Benny broke forth in angry abuse of the drummer, whom he accused of purposely imitating an officer's knock, and threatened him with all manner of vengeance. The drum-boy, instead of being abashed, looked Mr. Frazier straight in the face, and replied: