Mr. Weevil's mind had gone back to that night. He knew well enough to whom Paul was referring thus delicately as his friend—Zuker.
"Percival is right in every particular, but"—he broke off, as though suddenly recalling something—"there is one thing I ought to say. Fancying I heard a noise in Dormitory X that night, I paid it a visit, but found nobody there, except Moncrief, and he seemed fast asleep."
Parfitt, who had been looking glum, brightened up at this again.
"Seemed, sir," repeated Stanley, with a smile; "but I was just about as wide awake as I am now, and Percival was—under the bed."
There was a titter of laughter at this piece of information. The ghost of a smile played across the stern face of Mr. Weevil.
"I think Percival has made it perfectly clear as to where he was that night. You see that he is perfectly innocent of the charge brought against him by Parfitt; so we are thrown back into precisely the position we were in before. We have still to find out who is the real culprit—who it was opened my desk that night. As Parfitt has failed in his purpose, let us put our heads together and see if we can get a little nearer the truth. I will try to reconstruct the case for you, as the French say. Who was the culprit? What was his motive? His motive was to get possession of certain pieces of paper in my desk which gave valuable information for a prize competition which was taking place amongst the seniors—the prize, that is to say, to be given by Admiral Talbot for the best essay on 'The Invasion of Great Britain.' He did not want the Black Book. That would give him no assistance in his essay; but what he wanted was to throw suspicion on a certain boy—also a competitor for the prize—who was absent from his dormitory that night. He did this by removing the leaf, amongst others, which referred to the boy himself and the detention of his friend in the Punishment Dormitory. Am I clear?"
The Form were following Mr. Weevil so closely that they could only murmur an assent.
"I have told you about the anonymous letter," continued Mr. Weevil, "and the conclusion I had arrived at by the help of Mr. Travers. You have seen that that conclusion is correct, for Parfitt has himself admitted it. So much is clear. Now follow me a little farther. Not long after receiving this anonymous letter, some of the competitors began to send in their essays for the Talbot prize. Among others was one from Parfitt."
A profound silence fell on the room as the master once more pronounced that name. Every eye was turned to Parfitt, who was still doing his best to put on a bold face.
"It was a remarkably clever piece of work and would assuredly have won the prize. It was too clever, in fact. It contained information which astonished me—information which could not be obtained from the school library. It was information, in fact, such as I myself had obtained after special research, and which had been embodied in the notes that had been stolen from my desk."