"I—I—was thinking who could have done it, papa," she answered, in a frightened whisper. "I mean that dreadful thing last night. If the boys all deny it—why, perhaps they are really not guilty. It—it was so very easy for a stranger, coming by chance through the plantation, to have picked up the pistol that Smart dropped, and fired it off without thought of harm. Without thought of harm, papa." How pleadingly, yearningly the last words were spoken, Dr. Brabazon's own heart told him. He answered cheerfully, although it was heating with pain. "Emma, I see what you are thinking of. But it could not have been. It was one of the boys beyond doubt, for he wore the college cap. Why do you let these fancies trouble you? Run home, child; run home." CHAPTER V. Mother Butter's Lodgings. The term had begun, as the Head Master expressed it, ungraciously. The mysterious and disagreeable accident to James Talbot was leading to endless discussion and dissension. The first desk utterly repudiated the notion that it could have been one of them, and tacitly, if not directly, accused the second; the second desk threw back the insinuation with all the insolence they dared to use. Lamb was one of these, and his name got mentioned (failing somebody else to fix it on) in connection with the charge. The suggestion spread, although Brown minor, rather a crony of Lamb's, was ready to testify that Lamb had never stirred out of the hall that night after chapel; and did testify to it, in fact, with some confirmatory words of unnecessary strength. Lamb, a tall, thin fellow, was in a terrible rage; could not have been in a worse had he been guilty. Gall, the senior boy, said little; not having returned at the time, he did not consider it was his province to interfere; but Loftus, smarting personally under the affair, made himself exceedingly busy. And it was a very unusual thing for Loftus to do. The boys, at their evening studies, sat at the low table in the well-lighted hall—a long table on trestles that ran down the middle of it, with benches around. They were ostensibly preparing their lessons for the morrow; in reality were discussing and bickering among themselves in an undertone. You heard the bell ring for them in the last chapter, when they were in the plantation with Sir Simon Orville. Mr. Long sat at his desk in a remote corner, paying no attention. Great in science, he always had his near-sighted spectacles buried in some abstruse book, and his ears also. "Look here," spoke Loftus minor, who was burning to get at the offender quite as hotly as his brother Bertie, "when my uncle says he'll give a gold watch, why, he _will_ give it; there's no sham; so if any of you fellows do know about this, just go in and earn it. It'll be a shame to let a watch go begging."