Page:Dave Porter in the Gold Fields.djvu/27

Rh jewels were recovered and the thieves were caught. But, at the last minute, Link Merwell managed to escape.

When Dave Porter returned again to Oak Hall he found himself considered a great hero. But he bore himself modestly, and settled down to hard work, for he wished to graduate with honors. His old enemies were now out of the way and for this he was thankful.

But trouble for Dave was not yet at an end. One of the teachers at Oak Hall was Job Haskers, a learned man, but one who did not like boys. Why Haskers had ever become an instructor was a mystery. He was harsh, unsympathetic, and dictatorial, and nearly all the students hated him. He knew the branches he taught, but that was all the good that could be said of him.

Trouble came almost from the start, that term, and not only Dave, but nearly all of his chums were involved. A wild man—who afterwards proved to be related to Nat Poole, the son of a miserly money-lender of Crumville—tried to blow up a neighboring hotel, and the boys were thought to be guilty. In terror, some of them feared arrest and fled, as related in "Dave Porter and the Runaways." Dave went after the runaways, and after escaping a fearful flood, made them come back to school and face the music. The youth had a clew against Job Haskers, and in the end