"That doesn't seem to justify your charge, does it?"
"Why—why——" stammered the professor. "At first blush perhaps it doesn't, but, don't you see, it shows that he had found the way to my room, and the fact that he was idling away his time in Page's room beneath ever since, is proof enough that he was waiting his chance to go up again.
"I'm sure he got the paper, for I have taken a glance at the answers given by him and his particular crew of friends, and I find that every one of them passed perfect papers, and, without cheating, not more than one of them could have answered more than one problem."
"You see, Merriwell," said the dean, "the circumstances point very unhappily——"
"I know they do, sir," said Frank, "and I feel miserable about it, but there's an explanation of how I and my friends have passed perfect papers, that I'm perfectly willing to state."
"Do so, then."
Frank thereupon related Page's joke just as it happened. He told all about the conversation he had overheard between Babbitt and Instructor Frost, and then described how he had got his friends together and led them in studying up the subject.
"It may be that you call that cheating," he concluded, "but you must understand that none of us knew what problems the professor was to put upon the paper.
"We only knew the general subject which he had chosen for the examination, and we set to work to make ourselves solid on that subject, and it seems that we did so."
"Why, yes," responded the dean, with a queer smile. "I must say that if your story is correct, the professor has nothing to complain of. He wanted to compel you to work up on points that you were weak on, and it seems you did so.