Conclusion
One evening about a week after these events Dick and Dave were
sitting in the former's room chatting, when Greg Holmes and Dan
Dalzell, apparently in great good humor, broke in upon them.
"When do you go to West Point, Dick?" queried Greg.
"I'm ordered to report to the adjutant there on the first of March,"
Prescott replied.
"Mind my running up there with you?" demanded Greg.
"Why, I'd be tickled to pieces, if you can afford the trip, Greg."
"Oh, I guess I can," laughed the other boy. "Dad is going to
pay my freight bill."
"See here, you fellows, you can't have been reading the newspapers
much, since you two were appointed," broke in Dan Dalzell.
"What have we missed?" challenged Dave.
"Why, didn't you know a thing about Senator Frayne and his
appointments?" went on Dan Dalzell. "The Senator doesn't appoint
from a single district. He appoints at large from the whole state.
Senator Frayne announced, a while ago, two appointments-at-large, one
for West Point, the other for Annapolis."
"And we went up to the state capital yesterday," rattled on Greg.
"We went through the examinations. The winners weren't named
until this morning. You'll find it in the evening papers, later
to-day. I go to West Point, and Dan goes to Annapolis."
"What?" yelled Dick, leaping as high as he could jump.
"Tell it to us again!" begged Darrin huskily.
"Oh, it's all a fact, straight and right enough," Greg assured
them happily.
Then and there the four chums executed a war dance. It seemed
too wonderful to believe.
"But isn't Gridley the whole show?" demanded Dave presently.
"Four cadetships in the same year to one little city!"
"Well, we had to win 'em from other comers," retorted Greg. "And
none of us are out of the woods yet. We've got to pass at West
Point and at Annapolis.
"This is great!" quivered young Prescott. "But wouldn't it be
grand if only Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton had gotten in line,
too, and gone along into the service with us? Then all of the
old Dick & Co. would have been enrolled under the battle flag."
"But you know what Tom told us," put in Darrin. "He said he wouldn't
live at West Point, and he wouldn't be caught dead at Annapolis.
Tom is all for becoming a great civil engineer---a builder of
railroads and all that sort of thing."
"Well, Harry Hazelton is just as bad," said Greg. "He's all for
doing engineer stunts in the wilderness, too."
"Here they come now," announced Dan Dalzell.
Tom and Harry were heartily glad, of course, to hear of the luck
that had befallen Greg and Dan.
"We were just wishing that you two had fallen into the same kind
of luck, and that you were going into uniform with us," declared
Dick.
Reade glared at Prescott.
"Humph!" muttered Tom. "I thought you were a friend of mine!"
"I judge it's a mighty good thing we don't all hunger for the
same careers," laughed Harry. "For instance, all young fellows
can't go into the United Service. There aren't jobs enough to
go around. The United States Army is just about big enough to
find with a good magnifying glass. As for the Navy-----"
"Be careful," warned Darrin touchily.
"As for the Navy," continued Hazelton, "Congress has a lot of
officers trained and then seems to think that one new battleship
every other year or so ought to keep the country patient."
"You fellows are going to be downright happy, I know," resumed
Tom. "But so are Harry and I. We finish out our High School
work, and then our chance is ahead of us."
"To _find_?" queried Dave.
"No, sir! We've _got_ it," retorted Tom. "It came to us only
recently, and Harry and I have been keeping a bit quiet, but now
it is time to tell the news---just in the circle of Dick & Co."
By dint of great hustling, and backed by recommendations from
the local civil engineer, Reade and Hazelton had secured a chance,
beginning in the coming July, to join as rodmen the engineering
party that was laying a new railroad over the Rockies, in Colorado.
Just before the first of March, Dick Prescott and Greg Holmes
slipped quietly away, and reported at West Point.
But what further happened to Dick and Greg---and there was a lot
of it---must be reserved for the volumes of the new West Point
series.
The first volume will appear under the title, "_Dick Prescott's
First Year at West Point; Or, Two Chums in the Cadet Gray_."
Later on Dave Darrin and Dan Dalzell left Gridley and home for
Annapolis. Their adventures will be followed up in the new Annapolis
series.
The first volume in this series will be entitled: "_Dave Darrin's
First Year at Annapolis; Or, Two Plebes at the Naval Academy_."
Nor did Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton fail of some very extraordinary
adventures in their chosen career of engineering. Their career
led them into some of the wild spots of the earth. It will all
be told in the Young Engineer series.
The first volume in this series will appear shortly under the
caption: "_The Young Engineers in Colorado; Or, at Railroad Building
in Earnest_."
How about the other Gridley folks whose acquaintance has been
so enjoyable? Fred Ripley? Well, as to Fred---when we first
made his acquaintance, he was anything but an agreeable fellow,
but he learned his lesson in time, and, under the wholesome influence
of Dick & Co., but especially of Dick Prescott himself, Fred had
become a different boy. Such is the effect of good example.
As to the rest, many of them are bound to appear again, as we
follow the fortunes of our Gridley boys through the tales of West
Point, the annals of Annapolis and the doings of the Young Engineer
Boys.
So here we will leave them all for the moment, soon to renew the
acquaintance of all who had any future share in the lives or thoughts
of the six splendid young Americans who were once known to their
classmates as Dick & Co.
THE END