These discussions were always conducted with more or less noise and hubbub, according to the humor the debaters happened to be in, but now one and all seemed bent on raising a row. They all talked at once, fists were flourished in the air and pretty close to the noses of some of the disputants, and finally the lie was passed, and Rodney Gray and several other students in the lower hall proceeded to "mix up" promiscuously. Dick Graham was not among them. He stood at the head of the stairs, where he could see all that was going on without being seen himself. When the leaders of the opposing sides ceased their arguments and came to blows, and on being separated by their respective friends surged through the door toward the parade, where the matter in dispute could be settled by a fair fight, Dick sprang into life and action and hurried to the commandant's room. "Sounds something like a row below," said the orderly in a careless, indifferent tone. "Who's in for a black eye this time?" "Run in and tell the colonel to come out, or there'll be a riot here before he knows it," replied Dick hastily. "Don't your ears tell you that the fellows are all fighting mad, and that the thing is going to be serious?" Well--yes; there was something of a racket below, but the orderly said he didn't care for that, provided the Southerners would use up all the traitors in the gang. However, he thought it best to go in with the report, in order to save himself from being hauled over the coals for neglect of duty. When the colonel came out of his quarters, buttoning his uniform coat with one hand and settling his cap on his head with the other, he found Dick standing at the top of the stairs with his hands in his pockets, and a face as innocent as a child's. "Graham, I am glad to see that you have nothing to do with this disgraceful performance," said he. "Who? Me, sir?" exclaimed Dick. "I don't fight, sir. I'm neutral, sir. You see Missouri--" But the colonel could not wait to hear Dick say that his State had not yet gone out of the Union. He went down the stairs, along the hall, and through the archway with all haste, and then Dick went, too; but he went down the back-stairs, around the corner of the building, and brought two boys to his side by giving a peculiar whistle. "Everything is all right so far," whispered Dick. "But there's no telling how long the fellows will be able to keep up the farce, now that the colonel has gone down there, so we must be in a hurry." "Did they do it well and without exciting suspicion?" "First rate. Couldn't have done it better. If I hadn't been in the plot I should have thought they were in dead earnest."