out in bewilderment.

"It's the end of the world!" came, in a hollow voice, through the
keyhole. "The end of the world!"

"Mercy on me! It's an earthquake, that's what it is!" burst from the
befuddled teacher, and then as the bed was jerked high in the air once
more, he rolled over in the blankets and slid down to the lower end,
where one foot got caught between the brass bars.

"Get out of the building, Mr. Haskers!" came a cry through the keyhole.
"It is going to shake to the ground!"

"Yes! yes! It must be an earthquake!" groaned the bewildered pedagogue.
"Oh, will I ever get out alive, I wonder!"

The top of the bedstead was bobbing up and down, like a ship on an angry
ocean. In the darkness Job Haskers was completely bewildered, and he
firmly believed that an earthquake had struck Oak Hall and that the
building was in danger of collapsing. With a cry of fright he tumbled
out on the floor, and threw the covers, in which he was wound up, aside.
He tried to find the door, but the top of the bedstead was now in the
way.

"The fire escape--it is the only way out!" he muttered to himself, and
as the boys continued to jerk the bedstead around, he ran to the window
and threw out a rope, fastened to a ring in the floor. Then out of the
window he bounced and slid down the rope with a speed that blistered his
hands.

"He has gone out of the window!" cried Roger, who had his eye glued to
the keyhole. "Wait a minute, fellows!"

"Quick! We must take away the cord," said Dave, and in a trice the door
of the bedroom was unlocked, the bed shoved into place, and the cord
removed. Then the students scampered away, turning down the light as
before.

Once on the ground Job Haskers lost no time in getting away from the
building. Each instant he expected another quake that would bring that
noble pile of bricks, stone, and mortar to the ground. But the quake did
not come.

"Queer!" he murmured, presently. "Didn't anybody else feel that awful
shock?"

"Hi, you, throw up your hands, or I'll fill ye full o' buckshot!"

The cry came from behind him, and it caused Job Haskers to leap with a
new fear. He turned, and in the gloom of the night saw a man approaching
with a gun pointed full at him.

"Don't--don't sho--shoot me!" he gasped.

"Up with yer hands!" came from the man. "I cotches ye that time, didn't
I? Now, wot are ye, a ghost, a burglar, or a student on a lark?"

"Wh--who are yo--you?" stammered Job Haskers. "Did yo