“I don’t know their names,” he said.
“Describe them!”
“I don’t think I can, sir.”
Mr. Alsop threw at the incompetent a glance of scorn. “Well, you can send them to me.”
Archer’s look glanced from Mr. Alsop’s angry face to the door of his bedroom, thence to the floor, thence squarely back again to the teacher.
“I’d rather not, sir.”
There was a moment’s silence. Mr. Alsop had shot his bolt; he was not prepared to make an issue of the refusal of a boy to betray his associates. “You can at least tell them that if this thing is repeated, you are likely to get into serious trouble!—You can do that without offending your sense of honor, I hope?” he added, with an accent of sarcasm.
“Yes, sir.”
The teacher turned and retraced his way to his rooms downstairs. Two doors were pushed quietly open as he reached a lower floor. From each emerged a studious boy holding a finger between the leaves of a book. The pair crept to the stair railing, heard the steps descend the last flight, and a door close. Then they scurried for Archer’s room.
“What did he say?” demanded the first eagerly as soon as the door was shut behind him.