taneously.

"You let go of me, Sam Day!" came in the voice of Nat Poole. "I didn't
do anything! Let me go!"

"You come along with me, Nat Poole," answered Sam, sternly. "Just look
how that hand is burnt!" And in his anger Sam gave the other boy a smart
box on the ear.

"Oh! Don't, please don't."

"You'll yell worse than that when we are through with you," answered
Sam.

"You bet he will," said Buster Beggs. "I got a hot cinder in my right
eye."

"Don't, please don't!" shrieked Nat Poole. He was a coward at heart, and
the attitude of those around filled him with sudden terror. "I didn't do
it, I tell you."

"Then who did?" demanded Dave.

"Oh, I--I can't tell you. I--I----"

"Yes, you can tell," said Shadow, and gave Poole's ear a twist. The
story-teller of the school had gotten some hot ashes in his mouth, which
had put him in anything but a gentle humor.

"It was Link Merwell. He put the crackers under the fire and let the
fuses stick up," said Poole.

"You're a fine sort to blab!" sneered Merwell. "Since you're willing to
tell so much, I'll tell something too. He bought the fire-crackers."

"Is that true, Poole?" questioned Roger.

"Ye--yes, but I--I didn't know----"

"He knew what I was going to do with them," broke in Link Merwell. "It
was only a joke."

"So is that a joke, Merwell," answered Roger, and hauling off he boxed
the tall youth's right ear. "If you want to make anything out of it, do
so. Look at my hands and neck. You went too far."

Merwell's face blazed and he looked as if he wished to annihilate the
senator's son.

"Humph! I suppose you think you can do as you please, with your own
crowd around you," he muttered. "You don't know how to take a joke."

"I can take a joke as well as anybody, but not such a perilous trick as
that."

"It's on a par with the joke of the fellow who put gunpowder in a poor
Irishman's pipe," broke in Shadow. "It put the Irishman's eyes out. I
don't see any fun in that."

"I think we ought to give them both a good licking!" cried a boy named
Jason, and without more ado he took his wooden sword and gave Poole a
whack across the back. Then he turned and whacked Merwell.

It was a signal for a general use of the wooden swords and stuffed
clubs, and in a moment the two unlucky students were surrounded, and
blows fell thick and fast. Poole yelled like a wild Indian, but Merwell
set his teeth and said nothing, only striking back with his fists when
he got