“You?” demanded Dick.  “Why, I thought you’d be at the ball!”

“Did you think I could be happy all the evening, wondering how you were coming on with your great wish?” asked Laura quietly.  “Say, oh, Dick!  How did you come out?”

CHAPTER XXI

Gridley Seniors Whoop It Up

“Oh, so many, so many congratulations, Dick!” came the response to Prescott’s eagerly imparted information.

“And so you missed the dance just because you could sympathize with some one else’s worry?” demanded Dick.  “But say!  The evening is still young, as dances go.  Couldn’t you get dressed in a little while?  Then we could both go and celebrate my good luck.”

“I’m dressed,” came the demure answer.

“What?   Oh---well, now, that’s nice of you-----”

“I have been expecting this good news,” laughed Laura.  “And so I’ve been dressed all evening, on the chance.”

“And you’ll go to the class ball if I come around quickly?”

“It would be mean of you not to come and take me, Dick!”

“I’ll have to change,” declared Dick.  “But that never takes a boy long.  Won’t I be around to your house in short order, though!”

Dick rang off and started to bound upstairs, but a new ting-ling sounded on the ’phone bell.

“Here’s another party been trying to get you,” announced central.  “Go ahead.”

“Hullo, Dick,” sounded a low, pleased voice.  “I hope you’ve called up Laura.”

“Just rang off, Dave.”

“Then you know that the girls didn’t go to the class ball to-night, but just dressed and waited on the chance of hearing from us.  I’m on the jump to dress, but I’ll meet you there, Dick.”

Dick took only time to explain the change in his night’s plans to his parents.  Then he bounded off upstairs, but soon came down again, looking a bit dandyish in his best, and very happy into the bargain.

When Dick arrived at Dr. Bentley’s home an automobile stood in front of the house.  Dick recognized it, however, as the doctor’s machine with the doctor’s man at the lever.

The instant that Prescott put his finger on the bell button Laura herself opened the door.  She was radiant of face and exquisite in ball costume as she threw open the door and stood framed there, the light behind her.

“Oh, I’m so glad, Dick, so glad!” came her ready greeting.  “Come in.  I’m all ready but the wrap, but father and mother wish to be among the first to congratulate you.”

In the doctor’s office stood Dr. and Mrs. Bentley.  They greeted Dick cordially and expressed delight over his success.

“But this is only the first ditch taken, you know,” spoke Prescott soberly, though in military phrase.  “I have my chance now; that is all.  I have more than four years of hard fight facing me before I am sure that the Army can be my career.”