Shelled by an Unseen Foe | Page 2

minor rules. As soon as he could get out of the mess, he hurried down past the Adjutant's office, and hastily framing an errand, went in. The room was empty.
Nick hurried over to the barracks to their room. Sitting on the side of his narrow bunk, his hands clenched, his face white, was Zaidos.
"What's the row, old top?" Nick sang out cheerfully as he made a great pretense of picking up his books and stuffing a couple of pencils in the top of his pigskin puttee.
The young Greek shook his head, and Nick realized that it was something indeed very serious with him.
"What is the row, old man?" he said again, coming over and sitting beside his friend. "What has the Adjutant got in for you this time?"
"Nothing," said Zaidos. "He had a cablegram from home. It is pretty bad, Nick . . ." He paused. "My father is sick; fact is, he is dying; and I've got to leave to-night."
"Gosh!" exclaimed Nick. "That's too bad! I'm more than sorry!"
"Yes, it's bad," said Zaidos. "And the queer thing is that I don't seem to feel as sorry about my father dying as I do to think that I don't know him any better. Think of it, Nick, I came over here to school when I was not quite seven. My mother died when I was six, and since that I have seen my father twice; once when he came over here, and the year I went home. And it is not as though there was not plenty of money. I suppose my father is the richest man, or one of the richest men, in Greece. He's just--Oh, I don't know! He never seemed to be like a lot of fathers I have seen. I never could get next to him. And I've been pretty lonely most all my life. I have always planned to go back as soon as I finished school, and get acquainted with my father. I thought if I tried, I could make him like me. I suppose he does well enough, but I wanted to be chummy with him. I thought I could if I tried."
"You bet you could, Nosey!" said Nick, an arm over the bowed shoulder beside him. "You could warm up a wooden Indian, you old live-wire, you! I jolly well know you! You would get under the crust if anyone could! Perhaps it isn't as bad as they think. You go home, and perhaps your father will get better, and you will get to be the best chums in the world. Cheer up, old chap! It will come out all right. Do you really go tonight?"
"Yes, I go to-night. They have got my tickets, and now they are telephoning for my passage."
Nickell-Wheelerson sat thinking hard. Then he rose and bolted for the door.
"Wait!" called Zaidos. "I want you to help me pack, Nick."
But the big English boy had disappeared. In half an hour he returned, looking triumphant. He flung his trim military jacket on the bunk.
"That's done for!" he cried. He jerked a trunk into the middle of the floor and, opening it, commenced to turn out its cluttered contents.
"Come on, Nosey!" he cried. "As our American brothers put it, 'get a move on!' We have about half a day to get packed."
"Are you crazy?" demanded the Greek, staring at him.
"Not crazy, Nosey, dear chappie! Not crazy; merely going home!"
"Home?" repeated Zaidos feebly. "Home?"
"Home!" said Nick jubilantly. "With you! At least on the same steamer. So if they blow us up on the way over, we can soar hand in hand, old chum!"
"Well, when you get through raving, I wish you would tell how you did it."
"I simply reminded the Adjutant that the arrangement was that I was remaining here at my own discretion, as per Pater's written agreement. I said I had decided to go with you, although I had been thinking for a week that I might leave at any time. They mentioned money, and I showed my little roll. There is plenty. So I am going to-night with you. They have telephoned about a stateroom. That's all! I'm going to give all my stuff away. I won't come back."
Nickell-Wheelerson never did come back. But that is another story.
There were a lot of poor marks made that afternoon. With the two most popular fellows in the school going off, there couldn't be much studying. Everybody tried to help, and everybody got in the way and had to be stepped over or pushed over. But time passed, and good-byes were said, and the night on the swift train passed, too; and when they looked back, the following day in New York was a hurried whirl. And then they smelt the unchanging smell of the docks; sea salt and paint and tar.
They