that horrid beast the landlord?"

"Yes; he was an old school-servant, and there's no harm in him that I
know of."

But Eric only "phewed" again two or three times, and thought of Montagu.

Suddenly Wildney clutched him by the arm, and pulled him into the deep
shadow of a porch, whispering in a low tone, "Look!"

Under a lamp-post directly opposite them, stood Mr Rose. He had heard
voices and footsteps a moment before, and, puzzled at their sudden
cessation in the noiseless street, he was looking round.

"We must run for it," whispered Wildney hastily, as Mr Rose approached
the porch; and the two boys took to their heels, and scampered away as
hard as they could, Eric helping on Wildney by taking his hand, and
neither of them looking behind. They heard Mr Rose following them at
first, but soon distanced him, and reached a place where two roads met,
either of which would lead to the school.

"We won't go by the road; I know a short cut by the fields. What fun!"
said Wildney, laughing.

"What an audacious little monkey you are; you know all sorts of dodges,"
said Eric.

They had no time to talk, but with a speed winged by fear got to the
school, sprang on the buttress beneath the window, effected their
entrance, and vanished after replacing the bar--Eric to his study, and
Wildney to his dormitory.

"Here's a go!" said the latter, as they ran up stairs. "I've smashed
one of the beer bottles in getting through the window, and my trousers
are deluged with the stuff."

They had hardly separated when Mr Rose's step was heard on the stairs.
He was just returning from a dinner-party, when the sight of two boys
and the sound of their voices startled him in the street, and their
sudden disappearance made him sure that they were Roslyn boys,
particularly when they began to run. He strongly suspected that he
recognised Wildney as one of them, and therefore made straight for his
dormitory, which he entered, just as that worthy had thrust the
beer-stained trousers under his bed. Mr Rose walked up quietly to his
bedside, and observed that he was not asleep, and that he still had half
his clothes on. He was going away when he saw a little bit of the
trousers protruding under the mattress, and giving a pull, out they came
wringing wet with the streams of beer. He could not tell at first what
this imported, but a fragment of the bottle fell out of the pocket with
a crash on the floor, and he then discovered. Taking no