tactfully marshaling at will the boys who were his own age, and
good-naturedly bullying those who were younger.

To the school authorities he presented a problem. His influence was
strong and, they felt, not always good; yet there was not a teacher
on the premises who did not like him. Intellectually they were
forced to own that he was demoralizing. He was, moreover, a
disturber of the social order. But his pranks were, after all, pure
mischief and never malicious or underhanded. With a boy like Bob
Carlton as a roommate and drag anchor the principal argued he could
not go far astray.

And so the first year had passed without mishap, and already the
second was nearing its close. The school board congratulated itself.
Had the faculty known that for most of his scholarship, poor as it
often was, Van Blake was indebted to the sheer will power of Bob
Carlton they might have felt less sanguine. Day after day Bob had
patiently tutored his big chum in order that he might contrive to
scrape through his lessons. It was Bob who did the work and Van who
serenely accepted the fruits of it--accepted it but too frequently
with scant thanks and even with grumbling. Bob, however, doggedly
kept at his self-imposed task. To-day's Latin translation was but an
illustration of the daily program; Bob did the pioneering and Van
came upon the field when the path was cleared of difficulties. And
yet it was a glance of genuine affection that Bob cast at his friend
stretched so comfortably in the big Morris chair with a pillow at
his back.

"There, you lazy villain, I think you'll do!" he declared at last.
"Don't forget about the hostages in the second line; you seem pretty