“To assist in establishing all available facts. And you furnished some information, which surely bore directly upon the question at issue.”
“I know—it seemed to,” Sam admitted dismally. “That’s the hardest part, so far as I’m concerned.”
“I understand your position,” the principal told him, not unkindly.
Sam took thought for a moment. “Well, sir, there’s another side to the case—what’s the Trojan to do, that is. And—and—was he given a mark on that Latin paper?”
“A mark of zero.”
“Afterward—yes. But was there a mark to begin with?”
“Yes,” said the principal. He opened his desk, took out three or four sheets of paper, closely written in a hand Sam recognized as the Trojan’s. “All the papers were marked at once, as it happened. Walker was given an eighty-two. That was canceled, of course, after the investigation, and is out of the reckoning.”
“I don’t think it should be, sir,” Sam argued. “It’s important. If the Trojan had been doing any crooked work, he’d have turned in a better paper. He usually has had eighty-five or more in examinations.”
The principal consulted a record-book.
“Quite true,” he admitted. “Let’s see! Here’s an eighty-seven—that was a test; he fell just under eighty-five in the next one, but picked up again at mid-year’s. Then I find an eighty-six and next an eighty-seven.”