Mr. Salmon, who was the house-master over that section of Deepwater College in which the chums led a more or less care-free existence, was the best of good sorts, but hopeless as a disciplinarian. To begin with, he was partly deaf, and disrespectful juniors took advantage of the weakness in season and out of season. His own form, the sixth, to which all four of the Study 9 boys belonged, also contrived to have an easy time of it while he was in charge. So that if he observed a certain uneasiness on the part of the sharers of the Black Star secret, he might have ascribed it to post-holiday skittishness—at any rate, he said nothing about it, and the four of them hastened into conference immediately studies were over, and lent ear to the wise sayings of the eccentric genius, Septimus Patch.
"To begin with," said Patch, in his best Dear-Watson manner, "there's precious little beyond these footprints, in the shape of clues, but to a trained eye like mine those slight, almost meaningless marks have a story to tell. They are to me as an open book, and—"
"Cut out the cackle," said Jack Symonds brusquely, "and return to the washing. Get on with it."
"Examine this footprint closely," invited Patch, "and tell me what you see."
"A footprint, of course," said Jack. "In other words, a depression in the earth, caused by the yielding of the soil under a boot, which causes it to assume the shape—"
"Ass!" said Septimus cuttingly. "I mean, do you observe anything peculiar about it?"
"No. Why?"
"You see that snake-like mark across the place where the sole has rested?"
"We're not blind, professor. What of it?"
"Well, that's where the bootlace was stamped into the earth under the foot. You see that! Now, that means that the fellow had his boot unlaced."