et
at it."

"Well," said Trimble, rather brutally, "I hope it's all right, for your
sake. Fellows who keep guys must take the consequences. It would have
been much safer if you'd kept it under your bed."

"You may keep the next," growled I. "I've done with it."

Considering the probable condition of the luckless effigy at that
moment, nobody was inclined to contradict me; and the Philosophers
relapsed into gloomy silence, and eventually fell asleep.

I was probably the last to reach that blissful stage. For hours I lay
awake, a prey to the most dismal reflections. To do myself justice, my
own peril afflicted me at the time--perhaps because I did not realise
it--less than Tempest's. Whether he had blown up the guy or not, things
would be sure to look black against him, and my recollection of the
episode of Hector's death told me he would come out of it badly. How,
if he had done it, he had contrived to get at the explosives, I could
not fathom. I was sure, even with his grudge against Jarman, he was not
the sort of fellow to take a revenge that was either mean or dastardly;
and yet--and yet--and yet--

When with one accord we woke next morning it needed no special
intimation to be aware that something had happened at Low Heath.
Masters and school attendants were talking in groups in the quadrangle.
Boys were flitting across in the direction of the gymnasium; and seniors
in twos and threes were deferring their morning dip and hovering about
in serious confabulation.

"Something up?" said Trimble, with ill-concealed artlessness. "I wonder
what it is?"

"Looks like a row of some sort," said Langrish. "What are all the chaps
going across to the gym. for, I wonder?"

"Let's go and see," said Coxhead.

"We needn't all go together," said Warminster, significantly. So one by
one, casually, and at studied distances from our comrades, the
Philosophers dropped into the crowd and made for the scene of last
night's accident.

I felt terribly nervous. Suppose some one had been killed, or suppose
the gymnasium had been burnt, and suspicion fell on any one, what a fix
it would be!

In my distress I met Dicky Brown, full of news.

"Hullo, Jones, I say, have you heard? Some chap's been trying to blow
up the gym. in the night, and there's a row and a half on. The front
door is smashed, and the floor all knocked to bits. Come and have a
look."

"Any one killed or hurt?"

"I've not heard. Didn't you hear t