The Rushton Boys at Rally Hall Part 26

"Why," he managed to stammer, at last, "I don't know what to say. I hadn't any idea that there was anything in the locker, except my clothes."

"How could it have got there unless you put it there?" pursued the professor.

"I don't know," replied Fred, his head still whirling, "unless some one else put it there by mistake, thinking it was his own locker. I certainly never saw the package before. That is," as he looked at it more closely, "I think I did see it once."

"Oh, you did, eh?" said Professor Raymond quickly. "And when was that?"

"Two or three days ago," answered Fred. "I was gathering up my books in your office, and I saw you put in your desk a package that looked just like this one."

The professor's heart grew sick within him, as every new item seemed to connect Fred more closely with the theft.

"You knew then that it was in my desk?" he went on. "Did you have any idea of what the package contained?"

"Not then," answered Fred. "But, a little while afterward I was talking with some of the fellows in the gymnasium, and they said it probably held the examination slips for the algebra test."

"Do you remember anything else you said at that time?" asked the cross-examiner.

"No-o," began Fred slowly. "Oh, yes, I remember saying what fun it would be if one were a mind reader and could know just what you were going to ask.

"But, Professor," he broke out, as the significance of all these questions dawned upon him, "you don't think for the minute, do you, that I stole this package from your desk?"

"I hardly know what to think," replied the professor sadly, "but I want you to come right over with me to Doctor Rally's office."

Utterly stunned and overwhelmed by the blow that had fallen upon him, Fred followed the professor. His limbs dragged, as though he were walking in a nightmare. They crossed the campus, and went straight to the room where Doctor Rally awaited them.

He motioned them to chairs, and sat there, stern and implacable as Fate, his eyes seeming to bore Fred through and through, while the professor told of the finding of the papers in Fred's locker, and the explanation, or rather the lack of explanation, that Fred had offered.

"Well, young man," the doctor said, and, although his eyes were flaming, his words were as cold as ice, "you seem to have put the rope around your own neck by your admissions. Have you anything else to say?"

"What can I say?" burst out Fred desperately. "If telling the truth has put the rope around my neck, I can't help it. I didn't take the papers, and don't know a single thing about them. Every single word I've said is true."

"But the papers were found in your locker," returned the inquisitor coldly, "and they couldn't have got there of their own accord. Some one put them there. If you didn't, who did?"

"I don't know," said Fred miserably.

"Have you any enemy in the school, who might have done it?" asked Professor Raymond.

"Not that I know of," answered Fred. "That is----" the thought of Andy flashed across his mind, but he was too generous to give it utterance.

"No," he went on, "I don't think of anybody who could be mean enough to put the thing off on me."

"Is there anything that might have any connection with this matter that you haven't yet told us?" continued his questioner.

"Only one thing," replied Fred, to whom at that moment came the recollection of what he had seen in the moonlight. "I did see a fellow going away from the Hall the other night after twelve o'clock."

"Ah," came from both men, bending forward, and then they questioned him carefully about the size and general appearance of the midnight skulker.

"Why didn't you tell some of us about that at the time?" asked Doctor Rally severely.

"I suppose I ought to have done so," was the answer, "but I was cold and sleepy, and the next day I forgot all about it."

There was a long silence, while Doctor Rally pondered. He broke it at last by saying:

"I want to be entirely just to you, Rushton. I am not ready to condemn you on this evidence, though I will not deny that things look dark for you. I shall look into the matter further, and when I have reached a decision I will let you know. That is all for the present."

He nodded a dismissal, and Fred, picking up his hat, stumbled blindly from the room.

The two men who held his fate in their hands, stared at each other for a long minute without speaking.

"It looks bad," said Doctor Rally, at last, "and I am more sorry than I can tell, that he should be mixed up in such a wretched mess. His parents are the finest kind of people, and his uncle is a particular friend of mine."

"Do you think that he is guilty, then?" asked the professor.

"What else can I think?" said the doctor gloomily. "Everything seems to indicate it. The facts are like so many spokes of a wheel, all leading to the hub, and that hub is Rushton.

"Who knew that the examination papers were in your desk? Rushton. Who had been wis.h.i.+ng he were a mind reader, so that he might know what questions you were going to ask? Rushton. Who saw, or says he saw a mysterious marauder coming from the building at midnight, and yet said nothing to any one about it? Rushton. And, above all, who actually had the missing package in his locker? Rushton.

"Of course, all this is circ.u.mstantial evidence. But sometimes that is the strongest kind. Naturally, he would take the greatest care not to have any witnesses to the theft. The proof seems strong and many a man has been hung on less."

"That is true," admitted the other thoughtfully, "but there are many things, too, to be said on the other side.

"In the first place, there is the boy's character up to this time. He ought to have the full advantage of that, and certainly he has seemed to be one of the most upright and straightforward boys in the entire school. I haven't had a black mark against him, and neither has any of the other teachers.

"Then, too, what motive did he have for taking them? He's very bright, especially in mathematics, for which he has a natural gift. He's always up in the nineties somewhere in his marks. He hadn't the slightest reason to fear the examinations.

"And I can't understand his manner, if he is guilty. When I first spoke to him, instead of being the least bit fl.u.s.tered, he wasn't at all slow in taking me straight to the locker. And when we caught sight of the papers, he was just as much dumfounded as I was myself, more so if anything, because I had had a hint that they were there.

"Why did he tell us about the talk in the gymnasium? He didn't need to say a word about it. Yet he blurted it out without any hesitation.

Either the boy is innocent, or he's one of the finest actors I ever saw."

"What is your theory, then?" asked the doctor. "Do you think that somebody, in his haste to conceal the papers, mistook Rushton's locker for his own?"

"Hardly that," replied Professor Raymond. "The matter was too important for such carelessness. The papers were put there deliberately."

"By whom?"

"By the person who wrote this letter," and the professor took from his pocket the sc.r.a.p of paper he had received that afternoon.

CHAPTER XXV

TO THE RESCUE

The master of Rally Hall and Professor Raymond knitted their brows as they studied the scrawl. There was absolutely no clue, except that it bore the Green Haven postmark on the envelope, and had been mailed that morning.

"One of the boys sent it, without a doubt," went on the professor. "He knew we were familiar with his handwriting and so printed the letter."