“I can’t say,” replied the proctor. “I guess it won’t amount to much. I wouldn’t try it again, though, Ordway. They’re rather strict here about being out of hall after hours. Probably you can give a good explanation.”
“Oh, yes, I can,” said Hugh. “Only,” he added under his breath, “I’m switched if I’m going to!”
“I’m sorry, fellows,” said Cathcart again, regretfully. “You know I have to do it, though. Good night.”
“Good night,” said Hugh. “Duty is duty, eh, what?”
“Good night,” returned Bert morosely. “It doesn’t seem to me, Wallace, that you need to be so confounded snoopy, though! Of course you’re a proctor, and all that, but a fellow doesn’t have to go out of his way to look for trouble!”
“I didn’t go out of my way, Bert,” replied Cathcart quietly. “I was awake and heard steps on the stairs and then heard the door pushed open. It was my place to see who was coming up.”
“Then, if you saw him,” said Bert crossly, “what was the good of coming down here and making all this fuss?”
“I saw only his back, and the light was dim. I couldn’t be certain whether it was you or Ordway.”
“Oh!” Bert shot a glance at Hugh, now sitting up in bed and hugging his knees. “Then—then perhaps it will interest you, Wallace, to learn that it wasn’t Ordway, after all! It happened to be me, old man. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!” And Bert viewed the other truculently.