Yearling faces in camp were looking very solemn one hot August morning. Cadet Jennings, in arrest, had sought permission to speak to the commandant; had been granted an interview, and had come back with very little of his old confident, even swaggering, manner. He had been in close arrest six days, the object of much sympathy among certain of his class-mates, because it was given out that he was to be made an example of, all on account of suspected participation in the trick that had deprived a plebe, temporarily at least, of his new rifle; which, according to yearling views, he had no business with, anyhow. Several things happened, however, which wiser heads in the corps could not account for at all. First, Jennings had sent for and held some confidential talk with Frazier. Frazier was seen that night in conversation with a drummer-boy in rear of the orderly's tent—"Asking him to get me some cigarettes," explained Benny. Two days later the Honorable Mr. Frazier arrived at the Point, and spent a long afternoon with his son; and saw him again in the visitors' tent that evening. This time Mr. Frazier senior did not favor the officers with accounts of Benny's prowess at the high-school; he even avoided them, especially the superintendent and commandant, both of whom he referred to subsequently as men with very narrow views of life. He spent a day at the Falls below, and took a West Shore train and hurried away.

The last week of August came. The days were hot; the nights so chilly that the guard wore overcoats from the posting of the first relief after tattoo. In the distinguished quartet of occupants of plebe hotel No. 2 of Company B three at least had been marvellously benefited by their experience in camp—"Corporal" Graham, Connell, and Foster. Their clear eyes and brown skin told of the perfection of health and condition; but "Major-General" Frazier looked far from well. He was evidently troubled in mind and body, and utterly out of sorts.

Camp was to be broken on the 29th, and the tents struck, in accordance with the old fashion, at the tap of the drum. The furlough men would return at noon on the 28th. Once more the ranks would be full, and the halls and barracks echoing to the shouts of glad young voices; but meantime a solemn function was going on—a court-martial for the trial of certain members of the corps. Messrs. Ferguson and Folliott of the Third Class had been "hived" absent at inspection after taps. Lieutenant Cross, commander of Company D, who was making a bull's-eye count about 11.30 one moonlit August evening, found these two lambs of his flock astray, and directed Cadet Lieutenant Fish, officer of the day, to inspect for them every half-hour. It was 2 A.M. before they turned up—young idiots—in civil garb and false mustaches. Each had already an overwhelming array of demerit. Each had barely escaped deficiency at the June examination. Each felt confident his cadet days were numbered, and so, courting a little cheap notoriety, they determined to make a name for what used to be termed "recklessness," and "ran it" down to Cranston's Hotel in disguise. Their fate was assured—dismissal—and their trial occupied no time at all. No one recognized them while away from the Point. It was sufficient that they were absent from their tents more than half an hour.

And then Cadet Jennings was called, and, as was the custom in those days, Cadet Jennings had asked a First Class man to act as his counsel, and Cadet Ross was introduced as amicus curiÆ. The court sat in a big vacant room in the old Academic that summer, an object of much interest to swarms of visitors impressed by the sight of a dozen officers solemnly assembled at a long table, clad in the full uniform of their rank. It was also a matter of no little wonderment to certain civil lawyers enjoying a vacation, who looked upon the slow, cumbrous proceedings with sentiments of mingled mirth and derision.

Our good Uncle Sam, when first starting his army a century ago, copied the pompous methods of the soldiers of King George as set forth in the Mutiny Act, and there had been hardly any change in all these years. Lieutenant Breeze, a lively young officer, was judge-advocate of the court, and appeared to be the only man who had a word to say in the premises. Counsel, unlike those in civil courts, rarely opened their mouths. Questions they desired to ask were reduced to writing and propounded by the judge-advocate. Answers were similarly taken down. The court had been in session only an hour over the yearlings' cases when they sent for Mr. Jennings. Presently Graham and others, returning to camp from dancing-lesson, were hailed by the officer of the guard.

"You are wanted at once at the court-room; so is that Major-General tent-mate of yours. Get ready as quick as you can, Mr. Graham. Full dress, with side arms."

Hastening to his tent, Graham found Benny already there, and in ten minutes they were on their way. Benny was very white and scared, Geordie silent. Lieutenant Breeze must have been waiting for them. Graham was summoned in at once. Many a time he had seen courts-martial out on the frontier, and so went promptly to the witness seat and pulled off his right-hand glove. Breeze wasted no time in preliminaries. He knew his man.

"You swear the evidence you shall give in the case now in hearing shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God," he said; and Geordie, standing erect and looking him in the eye, his own hand uplifted, answered,

"I do."

"He'd tell it anyhow," whispered a New York lawyer to a friend. "That boy couldn't lie if he tried."

While the judge-advocate was pencilling a few loose slips of paper, Geordie glanced around him. The sides of the room were well filled with spectators, ladies and gentlemen visiting the neighborhood, and curious to see a military court in session. Major Rawlins, of the Engineers, was president, while two captains and eight lieutenants made up the court. To the left of the judge-advocate, at a little table, sat Mr. Jennings with his counsel. Geordie took the chair to Breeze's right, pulled on his glove again, adjusted his bayonet-scabbard, and sat erect. The first two questions were as to his name, and whether he knew the accused. Then he was told to give, in his own words, the facts connected with the disappearance of his rifle. Few boys could have told the story more tersely.

"What was the number of the new rifle?" asked the judge-advocate, and Geordie gave it. Had he recognized, by voice or in any way, any of his assailants? Not one. Had he been able to ascertain how the rifle was taken, or by whom? He had not. Was there no one of his tent-mates left at the tent the evening the exchange was made? None that he knew of. Where was Cadet Frazier that evening? Geordie didn't know; he did not see him until bedtime. Mr. Jennings was asked if he desired to question the witness, and wisely refrained.

Certain members of the court looked as though they might elicit something; but when the judge-advocate said, in response to a whispered query, "I have all that from another witness; this one knows nothing about it," the court subsided and concluded to wait.

Even as Geordie was wondering if Mr. Breeze meant Frazier, and what Frazier could possibly know, the brief evidence he had given was read over to him, and he was told he could return to camp. The judge-advocate accompanied him to the door, and Geordie heard him say to the orderly:

"I want that drummer Doyle at once. Why is he not here?"

"We can't find him, sir, anywhere," was the answer.

"Well, go again, and tell the drum-major to have him hunted up. He had no business to let him away from barracks."

As Geordie started out into the open air, he caught sight of Benny's woe-begone face. What could have happened to him?

"Detained as a witness before the court-martial," said the officer of the day to whom Frazier was reported absent at dinner roll-call; but Pops found him lying on his bedding when they got back to camp. He didn't want to talk, he said; his head was aching. He was all upset about something, that was evident. No, he didn't want any dinner. Jennings and his counsel had joined the battalion at the mess-hall with unimpaired appetites and confident mien. The plebe it was who seemed all gone to pieces. By parade-time a strange story had come into the camp by way of the visitors' tent. Court had adjourned until the witness Doyle could be found, and Mr. Frazier, whose testimony it was supposed would materially harm the accused, had not harmed his case at all. In brief, Frazier, acting under instructions evidently, tremblingly admitted that he was aware of some joke being played on his tent-mate that night, but refused to answer questions on the ground that answers might incriminate himself. The sensation among the plebes was tremendous. Everybody jumped to one conclusion—Frazier must have taken part in "the robbery," as they now began to call it.

But Mr. Ross came to the rescue. "Wait until you hear the whole story," he said. "It can't be told now, but will be when the excitement has died away and it is safe to tell it."

And so the youngsters had to wait. Connell and Foster seemed to shrink from their class-mate instinctively. It was Graham who simply would not believe that ill of him.

"I can't tell as yet. I've given my word to Ross and Jennings," said Benny, with a wail in his voice. "Don't go back on me, Graham, and you'll never regret it." And, taking the side of "the under dog in the fight," Geordie held out his hand.

The 28th came, and still no tidings of the missing witness. Doyle, the drummer, had vanished, and no one knew whither. The furlough-men came back at mid-day, looking probably for the same tumultuous greeting that had been accorded their predecessors for years back—a charge of the First and Third Classes from camp, and a smashing of Derby hats—but they were marshalled direct to barracks instead, and, completely uniformed and equipped, marched over to join the battalion in style most matter of fact. The plebes spent the last evening in camp listening to the distant music of the hop, and singing, reciting, and dancing for the benefit of the returned Second Class men. Certain celebrities of their number were, with appropriate ceremonies, presented to such Second Class men as preferred "devilment" to dancing, among them "Corporal Pops, the coyote-killer of the Colorado, famous as bear-hunter, scalp-taker, and sign-talker," and for the last time Geordie was on duty entertaining old cadets until the tattoo drums, but no one turned out Benny Frazier. A yearling will not even have fun at the expense of a plebe whose conduct is considered shady, and the belief in the Third Class was general that Frazier, through motives of jealousy, had connived at the "hiving" of his tent-mate's rifle.

And yet when Connell said to Graham, "I was going to room with Foster, but I'd far rather live with you. Do you think we can fix it now? Foster is willing to live with Clawson," he could hardly believe it when Geordie answered:

"I've promised to live with Frazier, and though I'd rather live with you than any man I know, I won't go back on my promise."

Geordie did not tell what he might have told, that on the evening of the 27th, after a long talk with his father, who came at noon and left before parade, Frazier had almost pleadingly said to him: "They're all down on me now, Graham, and if you turn from me I won't have a friend left in the class. If you and I room together, they'll know you don't believe me mean enough to take your gun. Appearances are all against me simply because I can't tell without involving some poor fellows whom dismissal would ruin for life just because they'd taken part in what they meant to be only a joke." And Graham answered that he meant to stand by Frazier until the thing was all cleared up.

There were plebes who came to Geordie and told him he was making a mistake. So did Mr. Otis, but the latter went away all the more convinced that "Corporal Pops" was too pig-headed even for a Scot. It was almost pitiful to see the way Frazier clung to his companion now. It looked to everybody as though the boy were jealously afraid of seeing his friend and protector, so called, talking with anybody else. Time and time again he reminded Pops of the agreement, until at last, annoyed, Geordie turned suddenly upon him and said:

"Look here, Frazier, does nobody keep promises where you come from?"

Then Benny concluded it was time to hold his peace.

In the presence of a thousand spectators on a glorious August day, every tent in camp went down at the tap of the drum, and what an instant before had been a white-roofed city turned into a bustling hive of gray coats, folding, rolling, and cording up the snowy canvas. All baggage had been moved to barracks earlier in the day, and now in full ranks, all four classes present, the companies fell in, and the corporals, who had served all summer long as sergeants, stepped back into the ranks, and the plebes gazed in silent awe upon the grave, dignified young soldier in the white cross-belts and crimson sash who so keenly looked them over before reporting "All present, sir," to Mr. Leonard. The returned furlough-men took their places, as became members of the Second Class, in the front rank. Certain yearlings, much to their disgust, had to fall back to the rear, and as far as faces could be seen at all any one could distinguish which was which. The boys who had spent the summer in camp were brown as autumn berries; they who had spent their summer at home were pallid by contrast.

For the last time in camp adjutant's call sounded on the color-line, and the band had to take station beyond the sentry on Number Two, in order to leave room for the re-enforced battalion.

"Guides posts!" rang out the adjutant's command.

"Keep your eyes to the front, plebe," ordered the red-sashed first sergeant, returning to his station through the gap on the right, when he found two Fourth Class men gazing obliquely at him in mingled awe and admiration.

Clash! went the rifles into the gloved left hands as the battalion presented arms to Colonel Hazzard.

"Take your post, sir," was that eminent soldier's response to Glenn's superb salute. Back to his station on the right fluttered the adjutant's plumes as the companies wheeled into column, tossed the light rifles to the shoulder, and then, to the merriest, blithest of music, strode buoyantly away in the wake of the band, the drum-major boring with his tasselled baton a hole through the heart of the crowd.

Geordie's pulses beat high with every stride. Welcome hard work, hard study, even the long gloomy wintry weeks and months, for plebe camp and palms-of-the-hands-to-the-front were now things of the past.

That night Glenn read the list of sections to which the classes were assigned. Great was the importance of certain Fourth Class men designated in orders as section marchers, and by no means inconsiderable was the jealousy among their class-mates inspired by this purely accidental and temporary gift of authority. The Fourth Class for instruction in mathematics was divided in alphabetical order into eight sections, Cadet Abbott being detailed as marcher of the first, Dillon of the second, Griggs of the third, Kenney of the fourth, and so on down the list. Frazier, who had been very meek for several days, asked Graham if he didn't think it extraordinary that they should be ordered around by a fellow like Dillon?

"Why, I don't believe I've ever heard him speak ten words. What makes them put such galoots in command of sections when there's others, like you, for instance, that know how to handle 'em?"

Pops grinned. He understood what Benny was thinking of.

"It's all part and parcel of the system of teaching fellows like me, as you put it, that obedience is the first thing we have to learn," said he, good-naturedly, and then went busily on with the work of getting the room in the prescribed order.

As plebes they had enjoyed only what is termed "Hobson's choice." They could have either the top or bottom floor on the north front of barracks—the cold, sunless front—and so they found themselves in the third division, or, as it was technically termed, the "Third Div. Cock-loft"; that meant on the top floor of the third division from the east. It took little time to arrange their household affairs. Each cadet had his own alcove or bedroom, separated one from the other by a wooden partition. On the side nearest the wall was a light iron bedstead; on this a single mattress, folded back during the day, and made down only after tattoo. Piled in order on the mattress, folded edges to the front, and vertical, were first the sheets, then pillows, then blankets and "comfortable." On iron hooks in the partition, each in his own alcove, and in the following order from front to rear, the boys hung their overcoats, rubber coats (once called the "plebeskins"), the uniform coats, gray jackets, gray trousers, "such underclothing as may be allowed," and at the rearmost end the clothes-bag for soiled clothing. Against the front post of the partition was the little wooden wash-stand, a bucket of water, with cocoa-nut dipper, on the bottom shelf the white washbowl, inverted, with soap-dish, etc., on top; a slop-bucket on the side opposite the hall; a little mirror in the middle of the mantel-shelf; rifles in the rack near window; dress hats on the shelf thereof; accoutrements and forage-caps hung on the pegs to the right and left of the rack; candle-box in the fireplace (which was neatly whitewashed); nothing on the steam coil or heater; all other clothing in the open-faced set of shelves termed the clothes-press; brushes, combs, shaving materials, collars, cuffs, handkerchiefs, belts, and gloves, each folded or stacked in separate piles on the upper shelf; shirts, etc., on the next below; white trousers, underclothing, etc., on the lowermost, and nothing under it; text-books on the top of the press against the wall, upright, and backs to the front; broom behind the door; chairs, when not in use, against the table; table against the wall opposite the fireplace; shoes aligned at the foot of the bed, toes to the front, and always to be kept neatly dusted; "clocks, pictures, statuettes, etc., not allowed."

Everything was kept in spick-span order, and the orderly board, giving the name of the cadet responsible for the general appearance of things during the week, hung on the pillar of the alcove partition. Each cadet posted his own name in plain block letters over the alcove, over his half of the clothes-press, over his equipments, etc., and on the back of the door his "hours of recitations," to account for his absence from the room at any inspection. For half an hour after breakfast, dinner, or supper, and on Saturday afternoons, cadets could visit in barracks, or go from room to room. At any other time and during call to quarters, day or night, visiting, even to the extent of opening and looking in one's next door neighbor's door, was punishable by demerit and confinement.

When little Dillon came around to give out the first lesson in algebra, as received from their section instructor, Lieutenant Barnes, Pops was all attention, and carefully noted it in his new algebra. Benny wanted to chaff Mr. Dillon by asking him if he supposed he could march a squad as far as the Academic, and was suddenly reminded of his uncertain status by being curtly told to mind his own business. In ten minutes Pops was deep in his work, but Frazier, giving a sniff of contempt on glancing over the pages, tossed his text-book on the table, went to the window and, strumming on the glass, gazed long and wearily out upon the starlit sky. This being a West Point cadet wasn't what it was represented to be by a good deal.