LITMIR.BIZ

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is such an awfully cruel thing, don't you know."

      "No homesickness here, Polly," answered Dave. "I guess we are just tired out, that's all. We've done a lot of traveling since we left Oak Hall."

      "So I understand. Wasn't it dreadful that Jasniff and Merwell should prove such villains!" went on the girlish student. "Weren't you really afraid to--er--to touch them?"

      "Not much!" cried Phil. "I am only sorry Merwell got away."

      "But you got the diamonds, I heard?" put in Sam Day, who was another of the chums.

      "We did."

      At that moment came musical sounds from another room near by--the sounds of somebody strumming on a guitar.

      "Hello, there's Luke Watson!" cried Roger. "Hi, come in with that guitar and give us a tune, Luke!" he called out.

      "Thought I might cheer you up," said Luke, appearing. "How would you like me to play 'The Girl I Left Behind Me,' or something like that?"

      "Make it 'Oh, Those Eyes So Tender!'" suggested Buster.

      "Or else that beautiful ditty called, 'He Loved, But Had to Leave Her,'" suggested Shadow. "Say, that puts me in mind of a story," he went on. "This is true, too, though you may not believe it. A young man went to call on his best girl and took a bouquet of flowers along. The bouquet was done up in several thicknesses of tissue paper. Some of his friends who were jokers got hold of that bouquet and fixed it up for him. He gave it to the girl, and when she took off the tissue paper what do you suppose she found? A bunch of celery and some soup greens! He was so fussed up he didn't know what to say, and he got out in a hurry."

      "Hurrah for the chaps who fixed up the bouquet!" cried Phil. "But start up, Luke. Something in which we can all join."

      "But not too loud," cautioned Roger. "Old Haskers might not like----"

      "Oh, hang old Haskers!" interrupted Phil. "He can't----"

      "Sh-sh!" came from Dave, suddenly, and silence fell on the group of boys. All turned towards the doorway leading to the hall. There, on the threshold, stood the instructor just mentioned, Mr. Job Haskers.

      CHAPTER VI

      PHIL SHOWS HIS STUBBORNNESS

      Not one of the boys knew how to act or what to say. All wondered if Job Haskers had heard his name mentioned.

      If the ill-natured instructor had heard, he made no mention of it. He looked sharply about the apartment and waved his hand to Luke.

      "Watson, how many times have I told you that you make too much noise with your musical instruments?" he said, harshly. "You disturb the students who wish to study."

      "I thought this was the recreation hour, Mr. Haskers," answered the lad, who loved to play the guitar and banjo.

      "True, but I think we get altogether too much of your music," growled the instructor. He turned to Dave, Roger, and Phil. "So you are back at last. It is high time, if you wish to go on with your regular classes."

      "We told Doctor Clay that we would make up what we have missed, Mr. Haskers," answered Dave, in a gentle tone, for he knew how easy it was to start a quarrel with the man before him. As Phil had once said, Job Haskers was always walking around "with a chip on his shoulder."

      "And how soon will you make up the lessons in my class?" demanded the instructor.

      "I think I can do it inside of ten days or two weeks."

      "That won't suit me, Porter. You'll have to do better. I'll give each of you just a week--one week, understand? If you can't make the lessons up in that time I'll have to drop you to the next lower class."

      "Oh, Mr. Haskers!" burst out Roger. He knew what that meant only too well. They would not have a chance to graduate that coming June.

      "I'll not argue the point, Morr. I'll give you a week, starting to-morrow. When you come to the classroom I will show you just what you have to make up." Job Haskers looked around the room. "Now, then, remember, I want less noise here." And so speaking, he turned on his heel and walked away.

      For a moment there was silence, as the boys looked at each other and listened to the sounds of Mr. Haskers's retreating footsteps. Then Phil made a face and punched one of the bed pillows, savagely.

      "Now, wouldn't that make a saint turn in his grave?" he remarked. "Isn't he the real, kind, generous soul!"

      "He ought to be ducked in the river!" was Buster's comment. "Why, how can anybody make up the lessons you've missed in a week? It's absurd! Say, do you know what I'd do if I were you? I'd complain to the doctor."

      "So would I," added Sam Day. "Two weeks would be short enough."

      "I'll not complain to the doctor," returned Phil. "But I know what I will do," he added, quickly, as though struck by a sudden idea.

      "What?" came from several.

      "Never mind what. But I'll wager he'll give us more time."

      "I guess I know what you think of doing," said Dave. "But take my advice and don't, Phil."

      "Humph! I'll see about it, Dave. He isn't going to run such a thing as this up my back without a kick," grumbled the shipowner's son.

      "Well, wait first and see if he doesn't change his mind, or if we can't get through in the week," cautioned Dave.

      "What was Phil going to do?" questioned Luke, strumming lowly over the strings of his guitar.

      "Oh, don't let's talk about it," cried Dave, before Roger could speak. He did not wish the Mrs. Breen affair to become public property. "Tell us about the wild man, and all the other things that have happened here since we went away."

      "And you tell us all about Cave Island and those stolen jewels," said Buster.

      Thereafter the conversation became general, Dave and his chums telling of their quest of the Carwith diamonds, and the other students relating the particulars of a feast they had had in one of the dormitories, and of various efforts made to catch the so-called wild man.

      "I don't believe he is what one would call a wild man," said Ben Basswood, Dave's old chum from home, who had just come in from some experiments in the school laboratory. "He is simple-minded and very shy. He gets excited once in a while, like when he threw those mud-balls."

      "Well, you ought to know," remarked Buster. "Ben is the only fellow here who has talked to the man," he explained.

      "When was that, Ben?" questioned Dave.

      "That was when the man first appeared," answered the Crumville lad. "I didn't find out until yesterday that he was the wild man, and then it was because of that blue chalk he uses. I met him in the woods when I was out during that last snow, looking for rabbits with my shotgun. I came across him, sitting on a rock, looking at an old newspaper. He had some of the blue chalk in his hand and had marked a circle with a cross on the rock. He asked me where I was going, and told me to look out and not shoot a star, and then he asked me if I used chalk for powder, and said he could supply a superior brand of chalk cheap. I thought at first that he was merely joking, but I didn't like the look in his eyes, and then I made up my mind he was not right in his head, and I left him. When I came back that way, an hour later, he was gone, and I have never seen him since."

      "Where was this, Ben?"

      "Up in the woods, where the brook branches off by the two big rocks."

      "I know the spot!" cried Roger. "Say, maybe he hangs out around there."

      "No, we hunted around there yesterday, but he wasn't to be seen. I don't believe he has any settled place of abode, but just roams

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