The office was a finely furnished apartment just off the main classroom. Tom knocked on the door.
"Come in," said a cheery voice, and the boy calmly entered to find himself confronted not only by Captain Putnam, but likewise by Josiah Crabtree.
"Ah! Here is the young reprobate now!" cried Crabtree, as rushing up, he grasped Tom by the arm.
"You will kindly let go of my arm, Mr. Crabtree," said Tom steadily.
"You shan't run away again!"
"That's true—now Captain Putnam is here."
"So this is Thomas Rover," said Captain Victor Putnam, with something like a twinkle in his clear eyes. "Rover, I have heard a rather serious report about you and your brother Richard."
"What kind of a report, if I may ask, sir?"
"Mr. Crabtree says you have been impudent to him, and that when he locked you in the guardroom for breaking the rules you attacked him and knocked him down."
"He attacked me first. If anybody attacked you, wouldn't you be apt to knock him down if you could?"