hat just
jar you some, fellows?"

"There goes William through the window after him! Bully boy, William!
Hope you get a grip on the sneak!" cried Nuthin, who was rubbing his
right shin as though it had been barked when he sprawled over the rope.

"Say, perhaps the boys outside may get him!" gasped another scout, who
must have had the breath squeezed out of his lungs when the balance of
the eager squad fell over him heavily, making a cushion of his body.

"Only hope they do," grumbled Nuthin. "But say, what's that you've
picked up, Paul? Looks mighty like a hat!"

"It is a hat, and fellows, I've got a pretty good notion I've seen it
before," responded the scout leader, as he held the object aloft.

The others crowded around, every eye fastened on the article picked up
by Paul just under the window that had afforded the fugitive a chance to
escape.

"It's Ward's lid, as sure as you live!" declared Bobolink, immediately.

"That's what it is," observed another, with conviction in his tone;
"ain't I had it in my hands more'n once at school? That was Ward in
here, doing these stunts!"

"Well," added Paul, cautiously, "it looks that way; but how do we know?
We didn't see his face, you remember. It might be another fellow wearing
his hat. This might satisfy the trustees that we didn't have anything to
do with the ringing of the bell; but I'd like to have better proof,
fellows."

"What's all that talking going on out there?" demanded Nuthin, who had
seated himself, the better to get at his bruised shin, and ease the pain
by rubbing.

Bobolink drew himself up into the window; and as he did so his hat also
fell off.

"There," declared Paul, quickly, "you see just how it happened to the
fellow with the black face; and he was in too big a hurry just then to
drop down again, so he could get his hat."

"What's all the row about, Bobolink? Have they got the slippery coon?"
asked Philip Towne, a member of the second patrol.

"Peter grabbed our chum as he was running after the shadow," replied the
boy perched on the windowsill. "He's shaking him as if he believed it
was William up to some of his old tricks, and that he rang that bell.
Now the other boys are crowding around trying to pull him off."

"But what about Ward? Has he gotten clean away?" asked a disappointed
one, of the lookout.

"Looks as if they couldn't flag him," came the answer in dejected tones;
"anyhow, I don't see any fellows holdin' a prisoner. Let's g