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Dick Prescott's Fourth Year at West Point, a fiction by H. Irving Hancock |
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Chapter 13. The Figures In The Dark |
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_ CHAPTER XIII. THE FIGURES IN THE DARK And Dick? The reader will hardly need to be told that this spirited young cadet was suffering his unmerited disgrace as keenly as ever. More keenly, in fact, for every day that the silence continued it seemed to add to the weight of the burden that bound him down. Yet Greg asked no questions, for he felt that it would be safer not to do so. He had just barely told Prescott of the purpose of the coming class meeting, which the latter cadet had already guessed for himself, however. "I suppose I'll have a few loyal friends at that meeting?" asked Dick, with a sad smile. "Just as many friends as ever," asserted Holmes stoutly. "I'm mighty grateful for that," nodded Dick. "But what I seem to need is more friends than ever." "We'll find them for you, if there's any way to do it," promised Holmes, and there the talk dropped. "If the class goes against me again, and harder than before, I'm certain I shall have to see Lieutenant Denton once more and tell him that I can't stand it any longer," Dick told himself. The class meeting was to be held on a Monday evening. On the night of the Saturday before, when scores of cadets were over at Cullum Hall at a merry "hop," Prescott slipped out of barracks by himself in Greg's absence. Almost unconsciously Prescott's steps turned in the direction of Trophy Point. In the darkness he stood before Battle Monument, on which are inscribed the names of the West Point graduates who have fallen in battles. "Will my name ever be there, or have any chance to be there?" wondered Dick, a big lump rising in his throat. A tear stood in either eye, but he brushed them aside as unworthy of a soldier. Was he ever going to be a soldier, he wondered. "I don't know that I'm really ready to be killed in battle," thought Dick grimly. "It would be enough to know that my name is to be on the roll of graduates of the Military Academy, and afterwards on the rolls of the Army as an officer who had served with credit wherever he had been placed. But the fates seem against even that much. Hang it all, what was it that Lieutenant Denton said about faith and right, and faith being as much the soldier's duty as honor? I guess he was never placed in just such a fix as mine!" For, slowly, all of Dick's iron-clad resolution to "stick it out" was wearing away. It was becoming plainer to him, every day, that he could not stay in the Army if he were always to live in Coventry as far as his brother officers were concerned. "I wonder what the fellows will do at the meeting next Monday night?" Dick pondered, as he turned and strolled back by another road. "If the fellows could only realize how unjust they are without meaning to be! But I can't make them see that. I'll have to resign, of course, but I promised Lieutenant Denton to talk it over with him before doing anything of the sort, and I'll keep my word." Very absent minded did the young cadet become in the midst of his perplexed musings. He heard the sound of martial music and unconsciously his feet moved in quicker time. It was as though he were marching, led on by he knew not what. Straight toward the music he moved, with the tread of a soldier responding to the drums. Then, at last, when he was almost upon the building, Prescott came to himself and stopped abruptly. "Cullum Hall!" he muttered, with a harsh laugh. "The night of the cadet hop. My classmates are in there, free-hearted and happy, and taking their lessons in the social graces---while I am on the outside, the social outcast of the class!" Yet, as there were no cadets in sight, out at this north end of the handsome building, Prescott presently moved forward, nearer. "The old, old story of the beggar on the outside! The man on the outside, looking in!" muttered Dick with increasing bitterness. "Yet I may as well look, since there is none to see me or deny me." Around the north end Dick passed, just as the brilliant music of the Military Academy orchestra was drawing to its close. In his misery the young cadet leaned against the face of the building, behind an angle in the wall. As he stood there Dick saw the figure of a man flit, by him. The stranger was dressed in citizen's clothes. There was nothing suspicions in that, since there is no law to prevent citizens from visiting the Military Academy. But there was something stealthy about this stranger's movements. "It is a wonder he didn't see me," mused Dick. "He went by within eight feet of me." Dick was about to make his presence known by stepping out into sight, when the stranger halted. "Perhaps it may be as well not to show myself just yet," flashed through Prescott's mind. "If the fellow is up to any mischief probably I can prevent it." A cold, biting breeze swept up from the Hudson River below. It was chilling in the extreme, here at the top of the bluff, but Dick, in his misery, had been proof against weather. Not so with the stranger. He stamped his feet and struck his hands against his sides. Then, after some moments, as though angry at some one within Cullum Hall, the stranger wheeled and shook one clenched fist at the windows overhead. "Whom has that fellow a grouch against?" Dick wondered in spite of himself. Just an instant later he heard a quick step coming around the north end of the building. A cadet was coming, beyond a doubt, and very likely to meet this impatient or angry stranger. Prescott had too much honor to play the eavesdropper. He was just about to step out when the newcomer turned the corner, coming on straight past where Prescott stood in the deep shadow. The newcomer was a cadet, and that cadet was Mr. Jordan. "Well, my good fellow, have I kept you waiting long?" demanded Jordan, just the second after he had stepped past Dick without seeing the latter. "You could a jumped faster," growled the stranger. "With all I know against you, Jordan, it will pay you to nurse my good feeling a little harder." "Why, what's the matter with you now?" demanded Jordan more seriously. Somehow, Dick could not pull himself away just then. "Have you brought me some of that money you owe me?" demanded the stranger gruffly. "Now, you know I can't, before graduation day," pleaded Jordan whiningly. "And I know that, when graduation day comes, you'll tell me that every dollar you had in the world had to go into uniforms," snapped the stranger. "I'll tell you what I do know about you, Jordan, my boy. I know that if you don't find the money, turn it over and get back my note, you'll never graduate! Cadets can't borrow money on their notes; it's against the regulations. If it was known that you had borrowed five hundred dollars of me already, and that you were defaulting on principal and interest, too-----" "It wasn't five hundred," broke in Jordan nervously. "It was just two hundred and fifty dollars." "The note says five hundred," retorted the stranger tersely, with a shrug of his shoulders. And there's interest on it, too. And you haven't paid a dollar. You told me you could get the money from home." "I---I thought I could, at that," stammered Cadet Jordan. "But I wrote my father, and he said he was near bankruptcy-----" "Near bankruptcy?" almost screamed the stranger. "You young swindler. You told me your father was a wealthy man!" "Sh!" begged Jordan tremulously. "Not so loud! Some one will hear you." "I don't care who hears me," retorted the stranger in an ugly tone. "You've been swindling me right along, it seems. Now, you'll hand me some money to-night, and all of the balance by next Wednesday, or I'll go straight to the superintendent. Then you'll lose your nice little berth here. You putting on airs, and yet you told me how you had rebuked and paid back another cadet for doing the same breezy thing." Dick, his cheeks burning with the shame of having allowed himself to listen to so much, was on the very point of slipping away around the north end of Cullum Hall. But this last remark gripped him, holding him feverishly to the spot. "Prescott, I believe you said the fellow's name was," went on the stranger. "Yes," admitted Jordan. "And I put it all over him in a way that should make anyone else afraid of having me for an enemy!" Dick's heart gave a great, almost strangling bound. Then it was quiet again, and his ears seemed preternaturally keen. So sharp was his hearing, in fact, that he heard a sound that did not reach the ears of the other cadet or the latter's companion. It was someone else coming. With all the stealth in the world Dick now managed to slip around the end of the building and toward the front. A cadet had stepped out as though seeking a breath of cool air between dances. Dick darted forward on tiptoe until he recognized the oncoming one. It was Douglass, president of the first class. "Mr. Douglass!" whispered Dick, stopping squarely before his successor in class honors. Douglass, without looking at his appealing fellow classman, or opening his lips to answer, stepped around Prescott. But Dick caught his unwilling comrade firmly by the arm. "Douglass," he whispered, "in the name of justice, listen to me just an instant---a swift instant, too! I think the chance has come to clear me of the load of dislike and contempt with which I am regarded here. This appeal is between man and man! Jordan is around the corner, telling a stranger how he trapped me and got me into disgrace with the class. As a matter of cadet justice and honor, I beg you to go softly to the corner and hear what is being said. Do not let Jordan suspect that you are near. What he is saying will clear me. Go, and go softly, I beg you, as a matter of justice from one man to another!" All the time that Dick had held his arm Douglass had stood there, not seeking to snatch himself free. Nor did he utter a word. The class president stood there, like a statue, looking straight past Prescott, as though he did not know that such a being existed anywhere in the world. Now, with despair tugging at his heart, Prescott released his hold. Cadet Douglass moved forward again. Dick stood watching his brother cadet with a feeling of despair until he saw that Douglass was moving softly. Dick saw him go quietly around the corner of the building. Now, Dick was at his heels, stealthy as any Indian could have been, until he looked around the corner and saw that Cadet Douglass had slipped into the same shadow that Dick himself had occupied until a moment before. "Now, if that pair yonder will only go on talking about me for sixty seconds!" thought Dick in a frenzy. Again he flew toward the front of the building. There was just one other cadet outside---Durville, the man whom he had been obliged to report for a tremendously grave breach of discipline. But Dick Prescott's courage was up now. He raced forward, fairly gripping Durville and holding him tight. "Durville, listen to me for just a moment," begged Dick. "I know you don't like me, but you're a man of honor. Jordan is on the east side of this building, and I believe he is confessing a plot that he put into successful operation against me. Douglass is already there listening. Will you slip there softly, and listen, too? I don't ask this as a matter of friendship, but of honor! Will you go---and softly?" Slowly Durville turned and looked into Prescott's eyes. Then he did not speak, but he nodded. "Thank you, Durville! Be quick---and stealthy! Let me guide you." Class President Douglass stood in the shadow. He heard Jordan's own tongue telling the stranger the familiar story of how he, Jordan, had been reported for indolence in the bridge construction work. "I had to get square," Jordan was continuing, just as Dick piloted Durville within hearing. "And you think you did it slickly, I suppose?" jeered the stranger. Though Jordan did not seem to suspect it, the stranger was seeking this information as another blackmailing club to hold over Jordan's head. "Slick?" queried Jordan, with a sneer. "Well, it wasn't altogether that. There was a good bit of luck in the whole job, too, but Prescott is in Coventry, and there he'll stick, too. He'll be away from here inside of two or three days more." "How did you manage to do it?" asked the stranger, concealing his anxiety to have Jordan tell the story. _ |
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