"From all I hear," remarked the rainmaker, "you're learning the soldier business fully as rapidly as you need to." "There's a lot more I want to know, sir, and it can't be learned when a man is marked 'hospital' or 'quarters,' sir," Hal returned. "Thank you for marking me 'duty.'" "There's a real soldier, or I'm too green to be an officer," thought Lieutenant Gross, as his eyes followed Hal, who, erect and full of spring, was striding from the room. On the third day after his return to duty Hal was warned for the guard. The following morning he turned out to be inspected with the new guard. As he was not assigned to the first relief, Hal seated himself inside the guard house, picking up one of the books that rested on a table there and began reading. Presently the other soldiers sauntered outside, and Soldier Hal was left there alone. "Overton!" Hal laid down his book, rising and stepping over to a cell door to find Dowley's eyes glaring at him balefully. "You sneak, you're responsible for getting me into all this trouble!" hissed the soldier in arrest. "Dowley, you know very well that the rules forbid a member of the guard from talking with a prisoner, except when the talk is strictly in the line of duty." With that Soldier Hal turned and went back to his book. "You could have gotten out of that place in Mason City when I told you to," went on Dowley hoarsely. "Then all that followed would never have happened." Hal went on reading. "Say, Hooper," muttered Dowley aloud to the man in another cell, "as a fresh kid ain't that fellow the end of the world?" "He's a boot-lick," jeered Hooper. "He just sneaks around the officers, telling 'em lies so as to get things easier for himself," broke in Corporal Minturn from still another cell. For these three, unlike the ordinary run of guard-house prisoners, had been placed in separate confinement. Hal read on, though the color mounted to his cheeks. "You dirty dog!" cried Dowley hoarsely. "Lying sneak!" from Bill Hooper. "Two-cent boot-lick!" was Corporal Minturn's contribution. Hal laid down his book, rose and stepped over to where he could look at the three, one after another. "If you men don't hold your tongues," he warned coolly, "I shall have to report you to the corporal of the guard for abusive talk. I don't want to do that, either." "Oh, my, a little bit of authority!" sneered Corporal Minturn. "Tin general!" taunted Dowley. "Go and boot-lick some more!" urged Bill Hooper. "Corporal of the guard!" summoned Soldier Hal. Corporal Sykes entered promptly. "Corporal, these men in solitary are amusing themselves by heaping insults upon me. I don't report them, Corporal, on account of personal feeling, for they're down on their luck, and they hold me responsible for it, as in a measure, of course, I am. But I don't want to get on the record for laxity while on guard." "Quite right, Overton," nodded Corporal Sykes. Then, turning to the three "solitaries," he demanded: