Having finished and signed, Dave next picked up a bit of exercise paper and began to figure.
"What are you doing, old chap?" asked Dan sympathetically.
"My head is in too much of a whirl for me to trust myself to any mental arithmetic," Darrin answered. "I have been figuring how much further I have to go. First offense of having tobacco in possession calls for twenty-five demerits. That brings the total up to one hundred and forty-five. Dave, I have a lease of life here amounting to fifty-four more demerits in this term. The fifty-fifth signs my ticket home!
"The next trick of this kind attempted," cried Dalzell, his face glowing with anger, "must sign, instead, the home ticket of the rascal who is at the bottom of all this!"
"But how?" demanded Dave blankly. "He has been entirely too slick to allow himself to be caught."
CHAPTER XIII
MIDSHIPMAN FARLEY'S ABOUT-FACE
The gloom that now hung over Dave Darrin was the thickest, the blackest that he had ever encountered in his short life.
He was fully convinced, of course, that his troubles were the work of some determined and unscrupulous enemy or enemies.
Yet he was equally convinced that he was not likely to catch the plotter against his happiness. He and Dan had already done all that seemed to be in their power.