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"ROW HARD"
227

"To keep warm."

"Look here, Parsons!" exclaimed the instructor. "You may think this is a joke, but——"

"No, sir; It's no joke. I was exercising to keep warm. Arm exercising you know, and my elbow banged your door—I didn't know I was so close."

"I see. Well, are you warm now?"

"Oh, yes, sir." Indeed Tom was in a veritable rosy glow.

"But what was the necessity of getting cold?" went on Mr. Simond, and Tom became aware that others were listening to the talk, for he could hear doors down the hall cautiously opened, and faint snickers of laughter here and there.

Tom was in a quandary. He did not want to tell the real object of coming up stairs as he had, for it would only make trouble for Sid.

And yet if he kept silent he would be put down for having tried to play some prank on his own account. Still if Sid had "gotten away" with whatever he had attempted, and it seemed so, for no sound came from the neighborhood of the room he had entered—in that case Tom could not bring him into the game.

"I guess I've got to take my medicine," thought Tom.

"Well?" demanded Mr. Simond in a cold voice.

"I—I just came up here for a—for a walk, explained Tom. "I—er—I couldn't sleep, and——"