“I have already regretted my inability to go further into the matter with you,” Dick replied, pleasantly though firmly.

“And you can give us no explanation whatever of how you came to report Jordan for being beyond the camp limits?”

“All I am able to tell you is that my reporting of Mr. Jordan was a regrettable but military necessity.”

“Is that all we wish to ask, gentlemen?” inquired Durville, turning to his six companions.

“It ought to be,” retorted Brown dryly.

The seven nodded very coldly.  Durville turned on his heel, leading the others away.

“Unless I’m a poor kitchen judge, old ramrod, your goose is cooked,” muttered Greg Holmes mournfully.

“Then it will have to be,” spoke Dick resolutely.

“But you haven’t told even me how you came to be, last night, just where you could fall afoul of Jordan so nicely.”

“Old chum,” cried Dick, turning and resting a hand on Greg’s right arm, “I can discuss that matter no further with you than I did with the class committee.”

“You’re a queer old extremist, anyway, with all your notions of duty and other bugaboos.  This affair has given me the shivers.”

“Then cheer up, Holmesy!” laughed Cadet Captain Prescott.

“Oh, it’s you I’m shivering for,” muttered Greg.

CHAPTER V

THE CADET “SILENCE” FALLS

Six companies of sun-browned, muscular young men marched away to cadet mess hall that evening.

If any of these cadets were more than properly fatigued, none of them betrayed the fact.  Their carriage was erect, their step springy and martial.  In ranks their faces were impassive, but when they filed into the mess hall, seated themselves at table and glanced about, an orderly Babel broke loose.

At all, that is to say, save one table.  That was the table at which Cadet Captain Richard Prescott sat.

Greg was the first to make the discovery.  He turned to Brown with a remark.  Brown glanced at Holmes, nodding slightly.  All the other cadets at that board were eating, their eyes on their plates.

“What’s the matter?” quizzed Holmes.  “You’re ideas moving slowly?”

Again Brown glanced up at his questioner, but that was all.

“How’s the cold lamb, Durville?” questioned Dick.

Durville passed the meat without speaking, nor did he look directly at Prescott.

Dick and Greg exchanged swift glances.  They understood.  The blow had fallen.

The Silence had been given!

Dick felt a hot flush mounting to his temples.  The blood there seemed to sting him.  Then, as suddenly, he went white, clammy perspiration beading his forehead and temples.

This was the verdict of the class—–­of the corps?  He had offended the strict traditions and inner regulations of the cadet corps, and was pronounced unfit for association!