“Didn’t he have every word right?” Bob asked himself. “How could it come in his desk, or rather my desk, which he was using, unless he put it in there?”
Only guessing this, however, Bob was not willing to give the teacher the clew. Besides that, he would not betray a friend. He felt sorry for Tom, and he did not believe he could trust or like him as he had done.
All this Bob had carried in his mind for two days. He did not tell Frank or Sammy about it, but he did not feel very good over the way he was being suspected by the teacher.
“If Tom did take the list,” thought Bob, “and they fasten it on him, he will certainly be expelled. That would be pretty bad for his folks, for he didn’t seem to have been a very bright scholar before.”
Just now, Bob had some new thoughts about the affair. He had put some facts together that had not at first come to his mind. He remembered that Jed Burr had not been at school the day of the spelling test. He remembered, too, that two of Jed’s chums had come out better than they ever had before in the spelling.
Putting this and that together, Bob wondered if it could be possible that Jed had tried to “get even” by getting him into new trouble, just as he had when the bottle of ink in the storeroom was found broken.
If Jed had done this, he must have done it after school, when the teacher and all the scholars were away, and forgetting that Tom was just then using Bob’s desk.
“I won’t speak to Tom about it, not just yet, anyway,” decided Bob. “If he didn’t do it, he will feel bad at my thinking he did. If he was bad enough to do it, he will deny it, of course. It’s some days before the school board meets. I’ll just keep quiet, and see how things turn out. I’ll keep a sharp eye, too, on Jed Burr and his friends.”
Bob was in a better frame of mind by the time the school bell rang. He crossed the playground slowly. Most of the scholars had got into the building. Just coming through the gate, and hurrying along as fast as they could, were Minnie Grey and little crippled Benny Lane.
Minnie had hold of Benny’s arm and was urging him along. The little fellow was using his mended crutch the best he knew how. Minnie wore a red winter cape, for the mornings were beginning to get quite chill. She was hurrying so fast that this fell from her shoulders. She did not stop to pick it up. Instead, she acted as if too frightened to do anything but run and make Benny keep up with her.