“What is the matter, Mr. Crabtree?” demanded the master of the school, as he dismounted from his horse and strode forward.
“The schoolrooms, sir—and the sitting room and library! All turned topsy-turvy!”
“What!”
“Yes, sir! I just came in from the village—I went on a little business, as you know. When I got back I went to the library for a book—‘The History of Turkey’—and when I got there!” Josiah Crabtree held up his hands mutely. “It is a shame, an outrage, sir! And the classrooms are about as bad!”
“I’ll see about this,” said Captain Putnam, and strode into the school.
“Something is wrong,” said Pepper, after the cadets had broken ranks. “Let’s see what it is!” And he ran off to place his weapon in the gun rack.
Something was indeed wrong, as a hasty glance around the lower floor of the school building revealed. Every book in the library had been thrown on the floor, and to the general heap were added several pictures and maps taken from the walls. Two inkstands from a writing desk had been overturned, one on a table and over a beautiful statue of Justice standing on a pedestal in a corner. The floor rug had been folded up and thrown over a chandelier.
“Who did this?” demanded the master of the school sternly. “Who did this, I say?”
Nobody answered for the reason that nobody knew.
“And the schoolrooms are as bad,” cried Josiah Crabtree. “Never have I seen the equal, sir!”