“What’s to do next, Mr. Crabtree?”

“I—er—I don’t know,” stammered the enraged teacher. He gave a shiver. “I am wet to the skin!”

“So am I,” came from Peleg Snuggers.

“I shall take cold.”

“An’ I’ll be after gitting the rheumatism.”

“I am half of a mind to invoke the aid of the law,” went on Josiah Crabtree, stalking around the barn to keep himself warm. “This is preposterous, outrageous, extraordinary!”

“It’s a blessed shame, sir, that’s wot it is.”

“It is strange that Mrs. Green was not aroused.”

“No ’tain’t, sir—she’s a heavy sleeper. She sleeps with an alarm clock on a chair beside her bed, to wake her up in the mornin’.”

“Snuggers, we must get into the school building in some manner.”