“Eh?  Oh, why, who else would it be?  Shut up and let me get this piffle.”

But a half-hour later, when Clint closed his Latin book and glanced across, Amy was leaning back in his chair, his hands behind his head and a deep frown on his forehead.  “All through?” asked Clint enviously.

“Through?” Amy evidently came back with an effort.  “No, I wish I were.  I was—­thinking.”

When nine o’clock sounded Clint sighed with relief and closed his book.  Amy got up and walked to the window and threw himself on the seat.  “Look here,” he said finally, “Dreer oughtn’t to be allowed to get away with that cute little stunt of his.”

“No, but how—­”

“I’ve been thinking.”  Amy thrust his hands into his pockets and a slow smile spread over his face.  “Penny can’t touch him, but that doesn’t say I can’t.  I haven’t any scholarship to lose.”

“But you can’t go and knock Dreer down for what he did to someone else,” objected Clint.

“Why can’t I, if I want to?”

“But—­but they’d expel you or—­or something.”

“I wonder!  Well, maybe they would.  Yes, I guess so.  Consequently, I’ll knock him down on my own account—­ostensibly, Clint, ostensibly.”

“Don’t be an ass,” begged the other.  “You can’t do that.”

Amy doubled a capable-looking fist and viewed it thoughtfully.  “I think I can,” he responded grimly.

“Oh, you know what I mean, Clint.  You haven’t any quarrel with Dreer.”

“I told him that the next time he talked rot about how much better Claflin is than Brimfield I’d lick him.  I gave him fair warning, and he knows I’ll do it, too.”

“All right, but he hasn’t said anything like that, has he?”

“Not that I know of, but”—­Amy’s smile deepened—­“something tells me he’s going to!  Come on over here where I won’t have to shout at you.”  Amy patted the window-seat.  “That door isn’t so awfully thick, I’m thinking.”

Clint obeyed, and for the next ten minutes Amy explained and Clint demurred, objected and, finally, yielded.  In such manner was the plot to avenge Penny Durkin’s wrongs hatched.

Two days later Harmon Dreer, looking for mail in Main Hall, came across a notice from the post office apprising him that there was a registered parcel there which would be delivered to him on presentation of this notice and satisfactory identification.  Harmon frowned at the slip of paper a moment, stuffed it into his pocket and sought his nine-o’clock recitation.  A half-hour later, however, having nothing to do until ten, he started off toward the village.  He was half-way down the drive toward the east gate before he became visible from the window of Thursby’s room on the front of Torrence.  Amy, who had been seated at the window for half an hour, at once arose, crossed the hall and put his head in at the door of Number 14.

“Got him,” he announced placidly.

Clint, who had cut a recitation to remain within call, and had been salving his conscience by studying his French, jumped up and seized his cap.