Page:Dave Porter and his Rivals.djvu/311

Rh the three lads on the platform saw Link Merwell peer anxiously out of a window at them. Then, as the last car rolled by, they beheld Nick Jasniff in the doorway. He shook his fist at them.

"Just wait, Dave Porter!" he yelled, defiantly. "Just wait, that's all!" And then the train disappeared swiftly from view.

"Wonder if they are running away from the academy?" came from Phil.

"It looks like it to me," answered Dave. "I guess they are pretty badly scared. Maybe they know that Doctor Montgomery had turned against them."

"Well, if they only stay away it won't be so bad," said the senator's son.

"I might telegraph ahead and have them held," said Dave. "But I guess it isn't worth while."

"Do you know what I think? " said Phil. "I think they were at that Mrs. Slater's house the night we called, and what we said scared them." And in this surmise Phil was correct.

An hour later found the three chums down on the river, where they were met by the other members of the hockey team. A great crowd was assembling, and in the number were Vera Rockwell, Mary Feversham, and a number of other people they knew.

The boys from Oak Hall had come in sleighs and on skates, and they had brought their horns,