“Let me first tell you that all at Spook Hall jogs on in the same easy way, and I am still under your sweet mother’s kind charge, though I am spending Sunday, to-day, at home with father, so I can send no message from your mother, and, in fact, my letter to you is a secret known only to the writer, Silly Sam, and the recipient. “Now to Sam’s letter. He begs me to say to you that he is in the employ of Merchant Clemmons, and that the other day, when asleep in the little room adjoining the office, Mr. Clemmons came in, accompanied by a young man whom he had met at his door. “Sam did not make his presence known, and through the door, he being back in the dark, he saw that the young man presented a very seedy, dissipated look, but had a very defiant air. “Then, as near as I could get it from Sam, the young man demanded money from the merchant, and was refused. “Then he told him that he would go to the Naval Academy, where he had been a cadet, and make a clean breast of it to the commandant that his son, Scott Clemmons, had led him into a plot against _you_. “Scott had paid him well for his services, said services being to persecute you in any way in his power, to cause you demerit marks, and that Scott Clemmons had arranged a plan by which you should be found with a gold fifty-dollar coin, which he, Clemmons, had pretended was stolen from him. “The plot did not turn out a success, as you had thwarted him in some way, and he had been dismissed from the academy. “To keep him quiet and accept his dismissal, Scott Clemmons had paid him well, and he had all the proofs of what he said, and knew that it was the intention of Scott Clemmons to get you dismissed from the academy by some foul means, notwithstanding that you had saved his life, for he treated you with the bitterest venom. “Then, Sam says, the visitor, who gave his name as Barney Breslin, boldly demanded two thousand dollars from Merchant Clemmons, or he would go to the commandant and give proof of Scott’s villainy and have him dismissed in disgrace. “Sam says that Mr. Clemmons was deeply moved, when convinced that the young man told the truth, and told him that he would give him the money, and more, on condition that he should give into his hands all proofs and then leave the country. “This the young man promised to do, and when Mr. Clemmons sent to the bank for the money, he handed over to him a bundle of papers, letters, which Scott Clemmons had written, and other documents, which the merchant seemed glad to get. “Such is Sam’s story, and you now know what a foe you have in Scott Clemmons, and can govern yourself accordingly, Mark.” Such was the letter, and Bemis Perry listened to every word of it with the deepest attention. “Now, Perry, you have the facts.” “Yes, and you asked my advice?”