believe there will, Page, and if you don't mind following my lead, I'll tell you what subject to grind on."
"Do you mean to say that you're going to cram up on just one part of it?"
"Exactly, and what's more, if you'll agree to it, I'll come over here with my books and we'll grind together. We'll get Browning, Rattleton and Diamond, and one or two others in our crowd, and do the job together."
"It's a bully idea!" exclaimed Page, "if it would only work. Gee! but wouldn't it be just great if we should happen to hit on the topic that old Babbitt has chosen and every one of us write a perfect paper?"
"I can't think of anything that would suit me better," Frank answered.
"Then let's try for it. It's just a chance, but I'm with you, Merriwell."
"All right, then, and you'll remember you're to say nothing about that fireplace, and you're not to open it until after the examination!"
"I'll remember, but you won't forget to tell me what it all means?"
"I'll let you into the whole business after Babbitt has examined the papers."
It was not a very difficult matter for Frank to persuade his closest friends to join him in preparing for the examination by studying hard on one particular topic.
They were so in the habit of following his lead that although they all regarded the effort in the same way that Page did, that is, a gamble, they were willing to take the chances if Merriwell was.
Frank was almost perfectly certain that it was not a gambling chance, because he remembered well enough how he had been faulty in that topic at the spring examination, and if Babbitt was going to try to trip him, that was the subject surely that he would select for his purpose.
Three days was none too long for the boys to refresh their memories on the subject and prepare themselves well on this one topic.
They started in in the middle of the afternoon and worked together under Frank's direction until dinner time.
He proved to be as hard a task master as Babbitt himself could have been. The boys were not exactly surprised at that, for it was natural for Frank to do with all his might whatever he undertook, but they joked him a good deal while at dinner about turning professor.
"That's all right," Frank answered, "you can have your joke. If we come out on this as I expect to, you'll be glad enough that you adopted my plan."
"I must say I rather enjoy it," said Diamond, frankly. "Studying by one's self is dull work, but when there are half a dozen or so grinding away, somehow the time passes more quickly."
In the same way they worked until late that night, and began again early the next morning.
Diamond offered the use of his room as a meeting place, and Puss Parker, who had been let into the scheme, suggested that they come to his room, too. Frank said no.
"We began in Page's room," was the way he put it, "and we might as well work it out there."
"His room is so far out of the way!" grumbled Browning.
"A little walk won't hurt you any," responded Frank. "I'd much rather keep at it there, for I'm used to the room."
So it was agreed that the grinding should continue at Page's, and it did until the day of the examination.
They had other duties to perform, of course, during these days, but the regular work of the college had not entirely begun, so that most of their time could be put in to preparing for their examination.
They allowed none of the other students to interrupt them, and for that matter, most members of the junior class were grinding in much the same fashion.
They had only one caller during the entire period. This was Ford, but he did not find them at work. They were just returning to the room from dinner on the evening before the examination, when they met Ford leaving the house.
"Ah, Page, I was just up to see you."
"Sorry I wasn't in," Page responded. "What was it, something special?"
"Oh, no," answered Ford, a little doubtfully, with a glance at the others in the party; "let it go until some other time."
"If it isn't important, then," said Page, "I wish you would, for we fellows are – "
"Sporting your oak, are you?"
"That's it exactly. We're trying to get up on mathematics and so we don't admit any callers."
"All right, then," said Ford, "I'm doing much the same at my own room. Good luck to you."
Frank did not keep the boys at work late that evening. They had pretty well covered all the ground that he had chosen, and he believed that they would be better able for the test the next morning, so at ten o'clock he ordered them to their rooms, and they obeyed as readily as if they were a crew training under their captain for a race.
At nine o'clock the next morning all the junior class assembled in one of the big rooms of Osborn Hall. Prof. Babbitt was there ahead of them with a number of assistants to look out for keeping the students in order and to prevent any possible attempt at cheating.
The students found their places by means of slips of paper on the top of each desk. Merriwell was a little amused to notice that he was placed far from the friends with whom he usually associated.
"I wonder if Babbitt thinks I would cheat?" he thought.
There was a bundle neatly done up in brown paper on the professor's desk at the head of the room. He stood near it until all the students were in their places, each with a pad of blank paper before him, and a number of sharpened pencils.
Then the professor broke the string with which the bundle was tied, and calling up his assistants, handed them several papers each to distribute.
They were the papers from the printer containing the fatal questions.
CHAPTER V
ONE OF THE MISSING PAPERS
Three or four minutes passed while the assistants were distributing some papers. Then one of them approached the professor and said:
"I need two more for my section, sir."
"Well," said the professor, looking around the room, "if you're short two, somebody must have two to spare."
Nobody said anything.
"Which of you," asked the professor of his assistants, "has two more papers than necessary."
No one answered. Prof. Babbitt looked very savage.
"I counted that bundle of papers just as soon as it came from the printers," he said, sharply, "and there was just the number called for. The printers never make a mistake, and I'm sure they haven't this time."
Still there was silence in the room.
"Gentlemen," said the professor, this time addressing the students, "see if any of you have an extra paper accidentally stuck to the one on your desk; there must be two spare papers here somewhere in the room."
Every student took up his
