continued. "And at the first opportunity we have we'll have to lay the
whole case before Colonel Colby. I'm sure when he has verified our
report, and gone into the various merits of the case, he will make a
finding that will be in accordance with----"

"Gee! Spouter can spout even if he is a prisoner," burst out Randy.
"Better get up on a chair, Spouter, and make a regular speech about it,"
he continued, grinning.

"This is a new experience for me," remarked Phil, with a smile. "I never
thought I was going to be put in jail."

"You can hardly call it being put in jail, Phil," answered Jack. "In a
military academy it is quite common for a cadet, when he has broken the
rules and regulations, to be placed in the guardhouse, just the same as
he is placed in the guardhouse in the regular army."

"I thought maybe they'd make us do what they call police duty," said the
boy from Texas. "One fellow told me that while he was in the training
camp he overstepped the regulations and they made him peel potatoes until
he was sick and tired of seeing them."

"Well, they do that too," put in Fred. "You might have to do something
like that if we were at the annual encampment. But while the school
session is on all they do is to lock you up."

The boys found that the long narrow room contained two double beds and
two cots, as well as a couple of bureaus, several stools, and a table. At
one end was a small bathroom and a clothing closet. There were three
small windows in a row, all looking out on the snow-covered fields behind
the school.

"Well, we've got a place to sleep, anyhow," announced Jack. "Although
three of us will have to sleep in one of the beds."

"Not much in the way of covering," remarked Gif, who had been making an
investigation. "Just one thin blanket on each bed. And that radiator is
not letting out heat enough to warm a cat," he added, as he placed his
hand on the one small radiator of which the long bedroom boasted.

"Never mind, we can keep on our uniforms if we want to," declared Randy.
"And who knows but what Colonel Colby may come back at any minute, and
then I'm almost certain that he'll let us go back to our own rooms."

"He will unless old Duke cooks up some dreadful story against us," came
from his brother. "You can bet he'll make out as black a case against us
as he can."

"Yes. But I think Professor Grawson will have something to say too," said
Jack. "And he has always been a very fair-minded man."