“Well, let him, then,” said Ray. “He brought it on himself. If he was foolish enough to bet, he must suffer the consequences, and if he _will_ make foolish speeches, as he did tonight, he must stand the result of that, too. He can’t blame me. I haven’t time to bother with him――which reminds me that I have to prepare for a recitation in astronomy tomorrow, and I must get about it at once or I won’t be in bed before midnight.” He looked at his watch as we walked out of the room. “Phew!” he exclaimed. “It is half past nine――I’m off――you will hear from me later――good night.” And Ray walked hastily away toward Warburton Hall, the handsome new dormitory in which his apartments were located. As I parted company from Tony Larcom, my first intention was to go immediately to my room, but the air being balmy and inviting, I walked leisurely down the wide pathway toward the gate. Once there, I seated myself by one of the old cannons, and gave myself up to the pleasant influences of the quiet night. I was thinking over the incidents of the meeting, its interesting results, and how they would affect our baseball prospects. Then I fell to contrasting the noise and excitement of an hour before with the silence that now reigned over the peaceful campus. A sense of drowsiness came over me as I pursued these contemplations, a drowsiness that gradually increased until my head sank down, and at last, stretching myself out at full length, I fell asleep. How long I lay so I do not know, but I was suddenly aroused by the sound of low voices close beside me. I lay still indifferently, thinking that it must be a couple of students enjoying the night air like myself. The low whisper and the general tinge of mystery with which they moved about, however, aroused my suspicions. Thinking some mischief was brewing, and that it would be fun to startle them, I roused up and exclaimed, “Hello! who’s there?” The results far surpassed my expectations. There was a quick exclamation of alarm, a sharp scuffling of feet, a black shadow shot past me, and then I felt a terrible, crushing blow on the side of my head, which rolled me over and over into the pathway, where I lay stunned and bewildered. CHAPTER IV LEN HOWARD AGAIN For several moments I lay still, struggling to collect my thoughts. Then, pressing my hand to my head to relieve the numb, sickening sensation produced by the blow, I sat up and stared about me in the darkness. The next instant a dark figure not ten feet before me scrambled up from the grass and dashed out of the gate. I was too much shaken up to think of pursuit, so I sat still, listening attentively to the rapidly receding footsteps. From the sound of these I felt confident that there were but two persons; and they were certainly badly frightened, for they lost no time in covering ground, and were in a few seconds far down the road, out of earshot.