True Blue: Stirring Stories of Naval Academy Life — page 13: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

TRUE BLUE. “Spirit messages, maybe!” joked Clif. “Oh, sah, be keerful!”’ shivered the dusky craven; “dey may be ghost candles!" “Oh, no! They are only Clif uttered a cry of intense astonishment—he had read the first slip: “Miss Bessie Stuart.” “Incredible!” A quiver, dubious but electrifying, crossed his frame as he perused the second: “My Dear Miss Stuart.” “Amazing!” A grim kind of a growl greeted the third: “Friend Bessie.” “Monstrous!” At the fourth Clif Faraday looked daggers—positively dangerous: “Dear Bessie.” He crunched the tormenting fragments in his powertul fist as if he was wringing the neck of some bitter enemy. Clif glared all about him, almost fiercely challenging every shadowy woodland form. He swayed and palpitated amid a raging sea of emotion that threatened to engulf him. For “Miss Bessie Stuart,” “My. Dear Miss Stuart,” “Friend Bessie,” ‘Dear Bessie,” was Clif Faraday's best and particular lady friend. And who had thus dared to make free with her dear name? . *(" ; » *. foal se < » * ¢* ? o— - = ~; ——_ * oe CHAPTER III. FARADAY IN COMMAND! “Mistah Faraday?" “Well, well—I hear you!” Clif spoke a little testily—Clif was wrought up to a tangle of emotions not at all common to his usually well- ~ regulated mind. ; . “I'’se glad yo’ heah me, sah!” answered Harinibal, with injured humility, “for I called yo’ seben—eleben times.” “Inded ?” “Vassir. Yo’ seem ordinated with cogitation, so ‘scuse, Foo ee nae LE a Oe ee