Seeing that obedience would be the best policy Don hurried along, glad of the opportunity to walk briskly and keep his blood in circulation. They skirted the shore for a distance of a mile or more and then the two men turned abruptly toward the water. Just before they reached the edge of the lake they came to a dense tangle of brush and creepers, and cleverly concealed under this natural bower Don was astonished to find a low boathouse.
Leaving him in charge of Dan, who kept an iron grip on his arm, Dennings unlocked the door of the hidden boathouse and dragged out a round-bottomed rowboat. Dan pushed the boy into it and followed, and Dennings, after putting out the lantern, took his place at the oars. Under Dennings’ expert guidance, the boat headed for the opposite shore.
The snow continued to drift down over the boat and the three men in it. They were at the lower end of the body of water, a part that Don was not familiar with, and it took them less than a half hour to gain the shore upon which the school stood. Don wondered if they were going to take him directly to the school, but as he could see no reasonable excuse for doing that he gave the problem up. When they had reached the other side they got out and Dennings led the way along the shore in the direction of the school.
They followed the shore for a distance of three quarters of a mile and the outline of Clanhammer Hall loomed before them. They were making straight for the old building. In an instant some inkling of the truth came to him, and when at last they stood on the stone steps and Morton Dennings took a key from his pocket, his guess became a certainty. They were indeed going to enter Clanhammer Hall.
“Well,” reflected Don grimly as the door was swung open. “We fellows agreed to break into Clanhammer Hall tonight, but it looks as if I would be the only one to get in, after all. All I hope is that I can break out of it once I get in.”
Dennings pushed him through the open doorway, into the blackness of the school and stepped in himself, followed by Dan. The door was closed and locked and then Dennings again took his arm.
“Now I guess we have you where you won’t break out in a hurry,” he said. And then he turned and whistled loudly into the darkness.
16. Vench Learns Something
Jim and Terry noted with some astonishment that Don failed to attend any of his classes that morning. They were aware of the fact that he contemplated going to the major and asking for a change in his schedule, but why he had not appeared during the course of the first class they did not know. As the second and the third class came and Don had not appeared, they found themselves growing anxious.
After the third period Jim ran up to their room, to see if Don had become ill, but he was not there. His hat and overcoat were both gone, a circumstance which caused some lively speculation. He was not there at dinnertime, and after their last period Jim and Terry hunted up the major and asked him about Don.