The New Boys at Oakdale

Charley was sitting on a big chair, his bandaged ankle resting on cushions piled in another chair, when Ned Osgood came to see him at noon the following day. Ned had visited him...

Jack Nelson sprang up from the bench, his face pale, his eyes flashing with anger. Osgood had stopped abruptly on his way to first, realizing that the double play sent Oakdale b...

Never had a morning session at school seemed so wretchedly long to Billy Piper. The hands of the old clock on the wall behind Professor Richardson’s desk actually seemed to stan...

Distracted, scarcely realizing what he did, with that terrible cry from Hooker’s lips still ringing in his ears, Charley Shultz turned from the old quarry and limped away as fas...

Aghast, his heart in his throat, Charley Shultz stared at the face outside the window. Only the upper part of the body of his unwelcome visitor could be seen, and that, clothed...

“Hide! hide!” urged Shultz. “Don’t leave me! Oh, don’t leave me now! Let him go! Get into these bushes and he won’t see you!” Grasping Ned’s coat, the pleading fellow sought to...

There was a moment of stunned and breathless silence as the young gamesters stared at the fifth ace thus exposed to view—the ace of spades. This silence was broken by Hooker, wh...

Looking careworn and old, Professor Richardson called the first session to order on Monday morning. The scholars and the two assistant instructors were assembled in the big main...

In the midst of troublesome dreams, Ned Osgood, half-awake, fancied he heard hail beating against the windows of his sitting room. Fully awake at last, he lifted his head from t...

In moments like this the baseball fan of any age goes wild with frenzy; especially is this true of the enthusiastic schoolboy fan who has watched his team fight an uphill game a...

As he ran, the terrible fear that had clung to him grew to gigantic proportions. Panting and gasping, he exerted every effort in that first burst of speed. The sound of his flyi...

After shivering for more than half an hour beneath a tree across the street from Mrs. Chester’s home, Sleuth Piper finally decided to make a move. Since seeking the hiding shelt...

For a double reason they did not call to Hooker; not only was it unlikely that he would heed them, but the men on the Barville road would doubtless hear their cries. So Osgood,...

Osgood’s manner during the tedious homeward jaunt would not have led any one unaware of what had taken place to fancy that there had been the slightest unpleasantness. He was po...

As the game progressed Piper found himself losing steadily, and, what was most annoying, almost always he was beaten by Shultz, who himself was having bad luck and growling over...

“I fuf-fuf-fail to see it,” snapped Springer in sudden anger. “We weren’t to blame for what happened. We were only juj-just playing a little quiet, friendly game of poker, and——”

All night long, when he slept at all, Billy Piper played poker in his dreams, tossing and muttering and clawing at the bedding with his hands. But there were several protracted...

Shultz sullenly watched his teammates giving the losers a complimentary cheer; he could not take his cue from Osgood and join with the slightest pretense of rejoicing in this ch...

After a time Osgood and Nelson became separated from the rest of the searchers. They had come to a little opening where the moonlight shone upon a small pile of cord-wood that h...

Practice that night was a failure; no one seemed to enter into it with heart or enthusiasm. The ball was batted and thrown around listlessly, and Nelson’s efforts to wake the fe...

Under the western shoulder of Turkey Hill the shadows were deep and heavy, and, the path being dim and faint from rare use, it was necessary for the party to proceed slowly. The...

Much to his disappointment, Billy Piper was not permitted to see Roy Hooker. At the door Roy’s mother, who was plainly in a deeply distressed and anxious state of mind, told him...

Oakdale started the game by hammering Ollie Leach, the Wyndham pitcher, for three runs in the first inning. Indeed, it seemed that they would drive the schoolboy twirler from th...

Charley Shultz sneered openly, with his full red upper lip curved high and exposing his broad teeth, as the delighted Oakdale players congratulated their comrade who had made th...

Osgood and Shultz arrived at the academy barely in time to escape tardy marks. As they slid into their seats neither of them glanced toward Piper, who had an eye turned upon the...

In the midst of the woods Shultz stopped to rest, seating himself upon a log against which he had stumbled. The clouds having dispersed, the moon was silvering the tree-tops abo...

At a loss for words, Nelson was silent. He was still unable to comprehend Osgood’s motive for this confession. Perhaps Osgood himself did not know what had led him to make it, b...

Only for Osgood’s sustaining arm, Shultz would have collapsed completely. Ned helped him to a chair, where he sat staring in dumb amazement and doubt at Roy Hooker. It was a mar...