CHAPTER XIV IN WHICH THE STORM GATHERS
“I guess he has gone off to get his own dinner, and he is going to leaveus starve!” groaned Stuffer. “I’m not going to stand it—no, sir!” And hejumped up from his desk and began to walk around nervously.
“This is certainly a new move,” said Jack.
“I don’t believe Captain Putnam or Mr. Strong would do such a thing,”vouchsafed Bart Conners.
“No, both of them are too considerate,” answered Dale.
“This is the combined work of old Crabtree and Cuddle,” came from Andy.“Cuddle loves to cut a fellow short on grub.”
Jack walked to the door and tried the knob.
“Locked, true enough,” he said.
“But the windows aren’t,” added Pepper. “I could get out of a windowalmost as quick as out of a door,” he went on suggestively.
“Let’s all climb out and make a break for the mess hall,” cried FredCentury. “He has no right to cut us out of our dinner. It’s paid for.”
“So it is!” answered several.
“I’ll climb out if anybody else will,” said Reff Ritter.
“So will I!” said Dale and Coulter in a breath.
“Look here, fellows, if we make a move we ought to have a regularlyappointed leader,” said Dave Kearney. “I move we make Major Ruddy ourleader. He’s the commander of the battalion anyway.”
“Second the motion!” came in a dozen voices.
“What’s the matter with my leading?” demanded Reff Ritter. “I made thesuggestion to climb out of the window, didn’t I?”
“That’s it—make Reff leader,” put in Paxton, quickly.
“He’s just the fellow for the place,” added Coulter, while Sabinenodded.
“No, no, give us Ruddy!” called out a great number of cadets.
“Ruddy! Ruddy!”
“No, give Ritter a show!”
“Might as well put it to a vote,” suggested Dale, when cries were heardfrom all sides. “All in favor of Jack Ruddy for leader raise their righthand.”
Instantly fifteen hands went up.
“Now those in favor of Reff Ritter.”
Eight hands went up. The other cadets present refused to vote at all.
“Major Ruddy has it,” announced Dale. “Is everybody satisfied?”
“Yes!” was the loud cry.
“I suppose we’ll have to be,” grumbled Coulter. “But Ritter would havemade a better leader. He offered to go through the window, and——”
“Never mind chewing it over now,” broke in Pepper. “From now on, letJack do the talking.”
“Boys, are all in favor of leaving this room and going to the messhall?” asked the young major, mounting to the top of a desk and gazingaround him.
“Yes! yes!” was the answer.
“Then let us get out of the windows, form a company on the campus, andmarch into the mess hall in regular soldier style. When we get there,let every fellow take his usual place—and refuse to budge until dinneris served.”
“Hurrah! That’s the talk!” cried Stuffer. “And a full-sized dinner too,with dessert!” he added hastily.
For cadets used to gymnasium practice, it was an easy matter to climbout of the classroom windows to the campus. Once on the green, Jack lostno time in forming the boys into a single company.
“Attention!” he called out. “By column of two, forward march!” And heled the way, the cadets following in pairs, and marching as stiffly asif on dress parade.
It may be that somebody was on the watch, yet the boys were notdisturbed, and soon they filed into the mess hall, where the othercadets were just finishing their midday meal. At one table sat PluxtonCuddle and at another Josiah Crabtree. Both leaped to their feet inamazement.
“How dare you!” gasped Josiah Crabtree. “How dare you!” For the momenthe could think of nothing else to say.
“As it was past the dinner hour the class made up its mind to come inand get something to eat,” said Jack, stiffly, and looking the teacherfull in the face.
“You—you—rascal!” exploded the teacher. “I’ll have you to underst——”
“Excuse me, Mr. Crabtree, I am not a rascal,” interrupted Jack. “I amthe major of the Putnam Hall battalion and the spokesman of our class—sochosen by a vote of the cadets. We decided that we wanted dinner—and weare here to get it.”
“This is mutiny—rebellion!” gasped Pluxton Cuddle.
“You can call it what you please, Mr. Cuddle. We are entitled to ourdinner and we mean to have it.”
“Good for you, Major Ruddy!” came from a pupil from another classroom.
“Crabtree and Cuddle have no right to do you out of your dinners,” addedanother.
“Make them give you what you pay for,” added a third.
The cries increased until it looked as if the demonstration in the messhall would be greater than that which had occurred in the classroom.Pluxton Cuddle called for order, but even as he spoke a hot potato wentsailing through the air and hit him in the shirt front. Then a shower ofbread went up into the air, falling all around both Cuddle and Crabtree.
“Boys! boys!” gasped Josiah Crabtree, and now he turned pale, wonderingwhat would happen next.
“Better give ’em something to eat, sah!” suggested the head waiter, acolored man. “Some of them hungry chaps look wicked, sah!”
“They have all been fed too much, that is the reason,” said PluxtonCuddle. “I don’t mean to-day, I mean in general. However, perhaps itwill be as well, just now, to let them have a—er—a light repast,” hewent on stammeringly, for another hot potato had hit him on theshoulder.
“Boys!” called out Jack. “Stop throwing things. Mr. Crabtree wants tosay something.” For he saw that the teacher wanted to speak to theassemblage.
“I—er—I wish to state,” began Josiah Crabtree, when the cadets settleddown at Jack’s command, “that I—er—I did not intend to make you dowithout your dinner. I was—er—going to—er—let you come to the messhall—er—after the other pupils had finished. But as it is——” he gazedaround somewhat helplessly, “I—er—I think you can stay. The waiters willbring in the dinner.” And he sat down and mopped his perspiring foreheadwith his handkerchief.
“Gosh! I’ll bet it was hard for him to come down!” whispered Dale toPepper.
“He’s getting afraid of the crowd,” returned The Imp. “He was afraidwe’d pass him the stuff on the table without waiting for plates!” AndPepper grinned suggestively.
The cadets had to wait a long time before they were served. MeanwhilePluxton Cuddle consulted with the head waiter and paid a visit to thekitchen. As a result, when the dinner came in, the cadets found the foodboth scanty and exceedingly plain.
“Say, how is a chap to get along on this,” growled Stuffer. “I could eattwice as much!”
“Make the best of it this time,” said Jack. “We can hold a meeting afterschool and decide upon what to do in the future—if things don’t mend.”
The worst of it—to Stuffer’s mind—was that there was nothing but alittle rice pudding for dessert. All of the cadets who had rebelled wentfrom the mess room hungry—and out on the campus they discovered that theother cadets had fared little better.
“It’s Cuddle’s doings,” said one of the other students. “He’s a crank onthe question of eating—thinks a man ought to eat next to nothing to behealthy and clear-minded.”
“Crabtree was willing enough to fall in with his views,” returnedPepper.
“That’s because he wanted to square up with you. Personally, Crabtreelikes to eat as hearty a meal as anybody.”
“I know that.”
“I don’t know what we are coming to, if Captain Putnam or Mr. Strongdon’t come back soon,” said another cadet. “We had a row in ourclassroom too.”
“Neither Crabtree nor Cuddle are fit to manage a school,” said Dale.“They may be good enough teachers, but they nee
d somebody in authorityover them.” And this statement hit the nail squarely on the head.
Reff Ritter was still disturbed, thinking that Crabtree might find outthat he was guilty of throwing the inkwell, and he went around,“sounding” various cadets and getting them to promise not to mention thematter. He was chagrined to think that he had not been chosen leader inthe rebellion, and was half inclined to draw away from Jack’s friendsand form a party of his own.
“Ruddy wants to lead in everything,” he growled to Coulter. “It makes mesick!”
“Well, you can’t afford to go back on him now,” was the answer. “If youdo he may take it in his head to let old Crabtree know about theinkwell, and then——”
“Oh, he can lead if he wants the job so bad,” interrupted the bullyhastily.
At the proper time the bell rang for the afternoon session and all ofthe cadets marched to their various classrooms as if nothing out of theordinary had occurred. Lessons were taken up where they had beendropped, but the boys found it hard to concentrate their minds on whatthey were studying or reciting. All felt that a storm—and a big one atthat—was brewing.
Josiah Crabtree did not come into the classroom occupied by Jack and hischums, and Reff Ritter and his crowd. Instead he sent an under teacher,a meek man who did just what he was told, no more and no less. With thisteacher the boys got along very well.
“Wish we could have him right along,” observed Stuffer.
“If you did have him you wouldn’t make much progress,” answered Jack.“He’s good enough for the lower classes, but that’s all. He doesn’t knowhalf as much as Mr. Strong.”
When the cadets were dismissed for the day they hurried out on thecampus, and here Jack asked all who were interested in what had occurredto attend a meeting at the boathouse. About three-quarters of the cadetsresponded, those holding back being the smaller lads and a few timidones like Mumps.
At this meeting it came out that every class in the school had “caughtit,” either from Josiah Crabtree or Pluxton Cuddle. Sharp words andalmost blows had been exchanged in the classrooms, and every cadet hadsome fault to find with the food served for dinner.
“Cuddle not only wants to cut down the amount, but he wants the meatsand other things cooked in a peculiar way,” said one cadet. “I havealways been used to a good table and I am not going to stand for it.”
“Nor will I!” cried Stuffer. “Our parents pay for good board—and thatmeans three square meals a day.”
“I understand Captain Putnam and Mr. Strong expect to be away for atleast ten days,” said Henry Lee. “I am not going to starve myself forthat length of time, even to please Crabtree and Cuddle.”
“Just what I say!” exclaimed Pepper.
“We are certainly entitled to as good a table as we have been having,”was Jack’s comment.
“Then, if we don’t get it, let’s strike!” cried Andy.