"Sure—with Old Hawkeye on the job!" responded the younger voice in a chaffing way. "Well, we might as well go up to the Hall and report on what we've found."
"You mean what we haven't found!" retorted the other voice disgustedly.
The girls shrank back against the boathouse as two shadows detached themselves from the farther side of it and went off in the direction of the Hall.
Jessie began to giggle, and her merriment was contagious.
"Of all the idiots, we are the worst!" laughed Jo. "They are detectives or policemen or something or other on that order, and we took them for burglars!"
"That was the sheriff from Laurelton and his helper," Gladys explained. "My father knows the sheriff. His name is Ebenezer Crabb and Dad told me once he's so stupid he wouldn't know a crook if he saw one."
"That looks fine for our chance of catching the thieves," remarked Sadie, as they started toward the Hall again.
"Meanwhile everybody in the school is suspected of playing practical jokes," said Doris with a discontented shrug of her shoulders. "I declare, I'm beginning to feel guilty about it myself!"
"Anyway, there's one bit of luck for us," remarked Nan. "And that is that we didn't get here until after the robbery was committed."
"Yes," said Jo, looking very innocent. "We, at least, are above suspicion!"