There were some clothes lying there, neatly folded. The professor picked them up.
There, with the seals still unbroken, lay the missing package!
CHAPTER XXIV
A PUZZLING CASE
Professor Raymond picked the package up and examined it carefully. There was no sign of tampering with the seals. It was in precisely the same condition as when he had received it.
“Well,” he said, as he looked coldly and accusingly at Fred, “what have you got to say?”
Fred was looking at the package with wide open and horrified eyes. He groped for words in his bewilderment, but his tongue seemed unable to utter them. The silence grew painful.
“Why,” he managed to stammer, at last, “I don’t know what to say. I hadn’t any idea that there was anything in the locker, except my clothes.”
“How could it have got there unless you put it there?” pursued the professor.
“I don’t know,” replied Fred, his head still whirling, “unless some one else put it there by mistake, thinking it was his own locker. I certainly never saw the package before. That is,” as he looked at it more closely, “I think I did see it once.”