Page:Dick Hamilton's Cadet Days.djvu/273

Rh Someone looked in the reception room. It was Glen.

"I say, Hamilton," he remarked, "the boys are looking all over for you. They want you to lead a procession. We're going to have a grand celebration, burn the uniforms, and break training to celebrate the victory. Hurry up!"

"This is worth losing one's money for," thought Dick, as he took his place at the head of the procession of merry, shouting, laughing cadets. "I'm getting to be popular, I guess."

Indeed, whether it was his victory on the diamond or the loss of his money, it would be hard to say, but, at any rate, more cadets made friends with Dick that night than had done so in his whole previous time at Kentfield.

But though Dick had won the hearts of the baseball nine and their friends, he was still far from being one of the really popular lads in the school. Dutton and his cronies held aloof from him, and many followed their example.

But, unexpectedly, there came a great change in Dick's life, and Dutton was partly responsible for it. Dick and some of his companions were at broadsword exercise on horseback one day, while, on the farther side of the cavalry plain, there was a class drilling in artillery, under the direction of Dutton. Dick was fencing with Lyndon Butler, when suddenly Dutton's steed, frightened by the discharge of a cannon near it, reared, throwing the young major off.