She finally turned away, and Mr. Galloway set himself to revolve the perplexing narrative. The more he thought, the less he was nearer doing so; like the bishop, he could make neither top nor tail of it. “It is entirely beyond belief!” he remarked to Arthur Channing; “unless Ketch took out the wrong keys!”
“And if he took out the wrong keys, how could he have locked the south door?” interrupted Roland Yorke. “I’d lay anybody five shillings that those mischievous scamps of college boys were at the bottom of it; I taxed Gerald with it, and he flew out at me for my pains. But the seniors may not have been in it. You should have heard the bell clank out last night, Mr. Galloway!”
“I suppose it brought out a few,” was Mr. Galloway’s rejoinder.
“It did that,” said Arthur Channing. “Myself for one. When I saw the bishop emerge from the college doors, I could scarcely believe my sight.”
“I’d have given half-a-crown to see him!” cried Roland Yorke. “If there’s any fun going on, it is sure to be my fate to miss it. Cator was at my house, having a cigar with me; and, though we heard the bell, we did not disturb ourselves to see what it might mean.”
“What is your opinion of last night’s work, Arthur?” asked Mr. Galloway, returning to the point.
Arthur’s opinion was a very decided one, but he did not choose to say so. The meeting with the college boys at their stealthy post in the cloisters, when he and Hamish were passing through at dusk, a few nights before, coupled with the hints then thrown out of the “serving out” of Ketch, could leave little doubt as to the culprits. Arthur returned an answer, couched in general terms.
“Could it have been the college boys, think you?” debated Mr. Galloway.
“Not being a college boy, I cannot speak positively, sir,” he said, laughing. “Gaunt knows nothing of it. I met him as I was going home to breakfast from my early hour’s work here, and he told me he did not. There would have been no harm done, after all, but for the accident to Jenkins.”
“One of you gentlemen can just step in to see Jenkins in the course of the day, and reassure him that he is not wanted,” said Mr. Galloway. “I know how necessary it is to keep the mind tranquil in any fear of brain affection.”