Accompanied by the commandant, Dick went to his apartment. To his surprise his neat bureau was in great disorder, the objects on it being scattered all about.
"Well?" asked Major Rockford.
"Some one—some one must have been in here, sir," said Dick.
"Ha! Do you wish to accuse any one?"
Dick went closer to his bureau. Something on it caught his eye. It was a note written in pencil. It read:
"Dear Hamilton: I am awfully sick this morning. I lost that twenty-five you loaned me. Can you let me have some more? I called but you were out, so I wrote this note here. Please let me have the money.
"Russell Glen."
Then Dick understood. Glen, suffering from the effects of his dissipation the night before, had called at the room after our hero and Paul had left to go to breakfast. In writing the note Glen had, probably unthinkingly, disarranged the things on Dick's bureau, where he wrote and left the missive. Then he had gone away, and, Captain Naylor, on police inspection, had seen the disorder, and reported Dick.
"Do you wish to accuse any one?" went on Major Rockford.
Dick thought rapidly. To tell the true circumstances, and show Glen's note, would mean that the facts of the spread would come out. Glen and his chums would be punished, and Dick might be censured. It would be better to accept the blame for having his room in disorder, rather than incur the displeasure of his comrades by being the means of informing on Glen.
So Dick answered: