“Suppose you do it yourself, Frank. Place everything in your pockets on my desk here, please.” With a smile Frank started to obey. Of course, every eye followed each of his movements, and Lanky Wallace, who happened to be just behind Lef, wondered why the fellow gripped his desk and partly arose, as his lips kept forming unuttered words, and he trembled all over. Suddenly Frank’s smile faded. He had a troubled look on his face as he slowly drew something out, took one swift glance at it, and then handed it up to the professor. “It’s the paper!” “Oh, he had it after all!” “How did it ever happen? I don’t believe he ever took it!” “Isn’t it dreadful, girls?” this last from Emily Dodsworth, who had often tried to interest Frank Allen in her own simpering self, but without success. Frank stood there, looking straight up into the eyes of the principal. “This is indeed the missing examination paper. The unknown party to whom we are so heavily indebted certainly told the truth when he said it would be found in your pocket, Frank. Are you willing to answer me one question?” “I will answer as many as you ask me, sir,” replied the boy, without quailing. “Have you ever seen this paper before, Frank?” “I give you my word for it, sir, that I never set eyes on it until I drew it out of my pocket just now. I don’t know how it got there, unless some fellow put it there for fun, or to injure me.” A few smiled disdainfully. They were the ones who had always been envious of Frank Allen’s popularity in the school, and rejoiced to see him even temporarily under a cloud. But there were ten to one who looked terribly stunned, and found it hard to realize that the boy they had all admired as a shining example of honesty and candor could even be accused of so despicable a thing as this, the smallest, meanest cheat of which any student could be guilty. “I wish to state right here, Frank, that I believe you are speaking the exact truth,” said the professor, with one of his rare smiles; “and I’m going to explain just what I mean by that, if you will all sit back in your seats and listen.” The silence became profound. Even Lef had drawn within his shell, so to speak, at this unexpected remark from the Head, as if he might have been a cautious old tortoise. He scented trouble from afar, and was preparing to put on an innocent look. When Lef was really on his guard, it would require a keen eye indeed to detect guilt in his face. He could stare any one in the countenance and lie out of any hole deliberately and vehemently. “In the first place,” went on the principal, “I have always set it down as an absolute fact that in nine cases out of ten an anonymous communication is the work of a sneak, a coward, and generally a criminal, who wants to throw dust in the eyes of possible pursuers, so as to effect his own escape. Either that, or else it is his intention to ruin the reputation of the party he accuses.