Chapter XX: Prisoners

“Well, what do you think will be the next move?” asked Jack, as he trudged along beside his chum as they came from the gymnasium.

“I don’t know, I’m sure. It’s up to them now, and we can only saw wood, and see what happens.”

“Do you think they’ll punish us?” asked George Abbot.

“Oh, there you go again!” cried Bert Wilson. “Can’t you do anything but ask questions, Why?”

“Of course I can, but I want to know what’s going to happen to us.”

“There can’t much more happen than has happened already,” said Lew Bentfield, grimly.

“That’s right,” agreed Tom.

“They will probably suspend us until we give in,” come from Jack.

“What of it?” asked Tom.

“Nothing, only if we’re suspended we can’t go to any lectures or recitations, and we’ll fall behind in our work, and be conditioned when this thing is over. That means we may lose a year.”

“Nonsense!” exclaimed Tom. “Besides, we agreed to stick this thing out.”

“Oh, I’m not going to back out!” cried Jack quickly. “Don’t imagine that for a second. Only this is a serious matter.”

“I know it,” admitted Tom, quietly. “And it’s a serious matter to be treated as we have been treated in class nearly every day by Professor Skeel. I’m tired of being bullyragged. This strike is for principle, not for any material advantage.

“But, anyhow, if they do suspend us it can’t last for long. Why, nearly every Freshman is in with us. That is, all but those who don’t like Latin, and they’re mighty scarce.

“Now practically the whole Freshman class of a college can’t be suspended for any great length of time, and the ban will soon be raised.”

“You mean we’ll win?” asked Bert Wilson.

“Of course we will!” declared Tom stoutly, “and the lessons we miss, if we are suspended, we can easily make up. But I don’t believe Merry will suspend us.”

There were various opinions about this, and the talk became general as the boys separated, going their different ways. Tom and a group of his particular chums went to his room.

“We ought to do something to celebrate this strike,” declared Jack, when there was a lull in the talk.

“That’s right!” cried Tom. “I’m for something to eat. I’m going to give a little dinner here to as many as we can crowd in. Let’s get busy, Jack.”

“A spread!” cried Tom’s chum. “Where are the eats to come from?”

“Oh, I’ll sneak out and get ’em as soon as it’s dark enough. You can work it so as to get some stuff from our worthy matron; can’t you?”

“I guess so.”

“Then leave the rest to me, and ask as many fellows of our particular crowd as you can squeeze into the room. Pack ’em in like sardines. The more the merrier. We’ll make this a record spread.”

“Jove, a spread just after you’ve organized a strike!” exclaimed Bert Wilson, admiringly. “Say, you do do things, Tom Fairfield.”

“Oh, what’s the use sitting around like a bump on a log?” asked our hero. “Now we’ll go to supper, and mind, every fellow is to stow away in his pockets anything not in a liquid form that he can. Bring it to the feast, for I can’t lug in any too much all by my lonesome.”

“I’ll go with you,” volunteered several eagerly.

“No, if two of us go out together it will create suspicions, and all eyes are on us now, as Napoleon said to his soldiers in Egypt, or was it in South Africa? Anyhow, I’ll sneak out as soon as it’s dark enough, and get what I can.”

There was a subdued air of expectancy at the Freshman supper that night, and many whispers ran around. It was noticed, too, that many of the lads had unusually large appetites, but they did not seem to be eating as much as they asked for. There were sly motions which some of the waiters could not understand, for they were caused when the diners slipped food into their pockets.

“Assemble in my room one at a time, as soon after the signal ‘lights out’ as possible,” explained Tom, when the meal was over. It was a rule that the boys must have their rooms in darkness after 9:30 o’clock, unless special permission for studying was obtained. “Don’t go in bunches,” advised our hero, “but a few at a time. I’m off to town.”

Watching his chance, Tom managed to elude a monitor, though, truth to tell, so amazing had the strike seemed to all the college authorities, that they were dazed, and really did not keep as close a watch over the Freshmen as usual.

Tom was in town, buying a lot of indigestible, but toothsome, dainties, dear to the palates of himself and his chums, when most unexpectedly, he met Bruce Bennington coming out of a pawnshop.

“Why, Bennington!” exclaimed Tom. “Oh, how are you?” and he quickly tried to change his first astonished tone, which had said, as plainly as anything: “What are you doing in such a place?”

“Oh, hello, Fairfield,” greeted the Senior, after a first start of surprise. Then, in a cool voice, he added: “I suppose it looks rather odd, to see me coming out of this place, but the truth of the matter is----”

“Not at all!” interrupted Tom, determined to make amends for his seeming surprise. “I’ve done the same thing when I’m temporarily embarrassed. Besides, for all I know you may have been making a psychological study of the pawnbroker, eh?”

“Oh, of course,” laughed Bruce uneasily. “But say, youngster, you fellows are making names for yourselves. Jove! We Freshmen never went on a strike. You’ve got us beaten a mile, even if we did drive a cow up on Merry’s doorstep. But a strike! Never!”

“Maybe you hadn’t any need,” spoke Tom. “Was Skeel as bad in your time as he is now?”

“Worse, if anything. And he’s a----” Bruce hesitated. “Well, I’ll not say it,” he concluded. “What’s up, anyhow?”

“Oh, I’m going to give a little spread.”

“Oh, I say now! That’s adding insult to injury, as the Irishman said when the parrot called him names after biting him. You Freshies are laying it on rather thick.”

“Might as well get all we can while it’s coming our way,” explained Tom. “No telling what may happen to-morrow.”

“No, that’s so. Well, I wish I was a Freshman again,” and, with something like a sigh of regret, the Senior passed on.

“There’s something wrong with him,” mused Tom, as he caught a car that would take him near the school. “And I wonder why, with all the money he is supposed to have, that he had to go to a pawn shop? Why didn’t he come to me, or some of the college boys? Too proud, I guess.”

There was snow on the ground and the weather, though cold, bore a promise of more as Tom cautiously made his way by a roundabout course over the campus and to a side door.

“Well, you’re all here, I see,” he remarked as he entered his room, and saw a crowd of congenial lads assembled there. The door communicating with the apartment of Bert Wilson, which portal was seldom unlocked, had been opened, making a fairly large apartment in which to have a forbidden spread.

“Make out all right?” asked Jack.

“Sure, I’ve got a choice assortment of grub. Let’s set the beds,” for they were to serve as tables, covered with large squares of newspapers for table cloths.

“I’ve got the windows and keyholes covered,” explained Jack, pointing to blankets tacked over the glass.

“Good! Now let the merry feast go on, and joy be loosed. For we’ll eat to-day and starve to-morrow.”

“Starve to-morrow?” gasped George Abbot. “What do you mean, Tom?”

“Nothing. I was just getting poetical, that’s all. You needn’t stare at the sandwiches and olives, George, my boy; they are substantial, if my poetry isn’t, and they won’t disappear. Come on, fellows, get busy.”

The feast was soon under way, and though the boys could have had nearly everything displayed on the “bed” at their regular meal, they all agreed that the viands tasted ever so much better served in the forbidden manner that they were.

“Pass those pickles, Jed, my boy!” commanded Tom to a lanky Freshman.

“And keep that mustard moving,” ordered Jack. “Those frankfurters are prime, Tom.”

“I thought you’d like ’em,” remarked our hero.

“Put some more on to cook,” pleaded Jack.

“Sure,” assented Bert Wilson, who presided at the “stove.”

This was an arrangement of wires, ingeniously made by Tom, so that it fitted over the gas, and on which a saucepan could be set over the flame. In this pan the sausages were simmering.

Bert put in some more, and stood anxiously watching them, fork in hand, while George buttered rolls, and passed them around.

“I propose a toast!” exclaimed Frank Carter, rising, a bottle of ginger ale in one hand, and a big piece of chocolate cake in the other.

“Hush! Not so loud!” cautioned Jack.

“Well, then, a silent toast to our host, Tom Fairfield!” went on Frank.

“Tiger!” whispered Jack, waving his Frankfurter fork in the air.

“Thanks, one and all,” replied Tom, bowing. “I will----”

“Hark!” suddenly cautioned Jack.

The boys were silent on the instant.

“I hear footsteps,” whispered Bert.

There was no doubt but that some one was out in the corridor, but as silence replaced the rather noiseless celebration of the feast, the footsteps could be heard retreating.

“A spy sent to make a report,” was Tom’s opinion. “Well, we can’t be any worse off than we are. Keep things going, fellows,” and the spread proceeded.

Meanwhile a curious scene was being enacted in the study of Doctor Meredith. All the members of the faculty were present, and were being addressed by Professor Skeel.

“I think it is due _me_, as an instructor in this school, that this class be punished,” he said.

“According to your own account they have been already--with extra lessons,” remarked jolly Professor Hammond.

“That was for other breaches of discipline,” declared Professor Skeel. “They have not been adequately punished for sending me the anonymous letter, nor for this strike. I think an example should be made of them.”

“Well, perhaps something should be done,” admitted Professor Hammond. “But I should favor a mild lesson, and then--a change of programme for the future.”

“And I demand a severe lesson, and a firm hand in the future!” insisted Professor Skeel. “Unless the Freshmen are punished I shall at once resign, and the punishment I demand is the plan I first mentioned. Is it to be done, Doctor Meredith?”

“Ah--er--ahem!” stammered the mild head master. “I dislike exceedingly to take such a step, but, I suppose something should be done.”

“It _must_ be done!” demanded Professor Skeel.

“Very well then,” sighed Doctor Meredith. “But it is a very strange state of affairs. However,” he added more brightly, “I will have some additional matter for my paper on a strike in school,” and he seemed quite delighted.

The faculty meeting broke up. So, too, in due time did the feast in Tom’s room. The boys sneaked to their respective apartments. And, rather strange to say, none of them was detected. But they did not know that a special order had come from the head master to Monitor Blackford, in charge of Opus Manor.

“Humph! It was all too easy,” said Jack, as he and Tom were ready to turn in at nearly midnight.

“What was?”

“This spread. Aside from that sneaking footstep we heard we were not disturbed once. I’m afraid it’s the calm before the storm. And it may be a bad one. But we’ll weather it.”

“Of course we will,” declared Jack. “Say, talk about a storm,” he added, as he peered from the window, from which the blanket had been removed, “it’s snowing to beat the band.”

“Good,” answered Tom. “We can get up a sleighing party to-morrow, if we can’t go to Latin class.”

When the Freshmen filed down to breakfast the next morning there was a look of surprise on every face as they glanced at the table. For at each place was a glass of water, and on each plate two slices of bread.

“What’s this?”

“Is it April Fool?”

“Who thought of this joke?”

These were only a few of the remarks and questions.

“I say!” called Tom to Mr. Blackford, who came into the room, a quizzical look on his face. “Where is our breakfast?”

“On the table.”

“Is that all?”

“That’s all. Orders from Doctor Meredith.”

“Oh, I see. He’s trying to starve us into submission. I’ll not stand for that!” cried Tom. “Fellows, come on!” he added. “We’ll go to town to a restaurant!”

He moved to the front door.

“You can’t go out, Mr. Fairfield,” said the monitor firmly.

“Why not, I’d like to know.”

“Because you, and all the others, in fact all the Freshmen in this dormitory, are prisoners!”

“Prisoners!” cried a score of voices.

“That’s it,” went on Mr. Blackford. “You are to stay locked in this building, on a diet of bread and water, until you give in!”