“What did you say?” inquired Will.

“Why, that’s as plain as the nose on your face,” responded Peter John glibly.  “I said that vengeance was a low-down, mean, spiteful attempt to pay back.  ‘Vengeance is mine and I will repay,’ saith the Lord.”

“Oh, you’ll get more than ‘A’ on that,” said Will in the extremity of his delight, as he was compelled to go to the window and gaze out into the night.  “You’ll get at least A square.”

“No, I won’t.  They don’t give that.  ‘A’ is the highest mark they give.  But I think I got everything right.  How did you answer that question about what Christian tenet the Greeks believed in?” he added, glancing at the copy of the questions which he held in his hands.

“How did you answer it, Peter John?” inquired Foster quickly.

“I answered it that they believed in the immorality of the soul.”

“In the what?” demanded Foster soberly.

“In the immorality of the soul.”

“You meant immortality of the soul, didn’t you?”

“Y-e-s, I suppose I did,” assented Peter John somewhat ruefully.  “But old Splinter will understand,” he added quickly.  “Splinter will know I just left out a ‘t’, and he won’t count that against me.”

“No, a little thing like a ‘t’ doesn’t count for much, not any more than a decimal point.  It doesn’t make any difference whether a decimal point is placed before or after a figure, you know.  It’s only a little thing anyway.”

“Yes,” assented Peter John, failing to perceive what Foster was saying.  “Then there was one other question that was dead easy,” he added.

“Which one was that?”

“The one about the animals.”

“Let me see, what was that question?” said Foster thoughtfully.

“Why, don’t you remember?  It was ’Name six animals that were common among the Greeks’.”

“Oh, yes; I recall it now; but I don’t think I had it right.  I could think of but four.”

“Pooh!  Easiest question of the whole lot.”

“What was the answer?”

“Easy!  Dead easy!  I just said, ’Six dogs’.”

The laughter that rang out in the room might have been heard across the campus; but Peter John was only slightly ruffled, and said: 

“Oh, well, you fellows may laugh if you want to, but you’ll find out when you see my marks.”

“They’ll put you in Splinter’s place as soon as you graduate,” suggested Foster when at last he regained control of himself.

“I wish they would,” responded Will heartily.

“Splinter” was the term by which the Winthrop boys were accustomed to speak of Professor Hanson, who was in charge of their Greek work.  The title did not appear in the college catalog, it was true; but it was the only one by which he was known among the irreverent students.  He was an elderly man, whose sensitive nature had suffered for many years from the inadequate preparation of successive classes,