“Well, what do you think of it?” he asked. “It staggers me,” answered Ray slowly. “Who could have taken them? Where have they gone?” “To Park College,” said Edwards. My heart leaped at these words. Vague suspicions that had been haunting my mind for days past now suddenly became confirmed. “How do you know the cannons are there?” questioned Ray as he started and turned around. “Isn’t it clear enough?” responded Edwards. “Remember that threatening letter, and the ‘positive stand’ they said they had determined to take in the matter. Who would take the cannons but the Park men? If you want further proof, do as I did an hour ago――follow the deep wheel tracks down to the dock by the boathouse, and then ask old Jerry Bunce about the steam tug which he saw coming down from Berkeley night before last.” “Oh, it is all too clear now,” I burst out. “Everything is explained――the letter, and those two fellows whom I frightened away from the cannons the night of the mass meeting. They were undoubtedly a reconnoitering party from Berkeley――and then that fellow who stared me out of face on the piazza of the Wyman House――he must have been one of them, and overheard my words to Slade about the bruise on my forehead.” There was a silence in the group for a few seconds. Attracted by our words the greater part of the crowd had by this time gathered closely about us. From a noisy, clamorous indignation meeting the crowd gradually shaped itself into a council of war, of which we formed the center. Of this council, Clinton Edwards was one of the ruling spirits. No student in Belmont possessed more college feeling or was more vigorously patriotic than Edwards. He was an active leader in all that concerned the best interests of the students. Another prominent member of our group was Percy Randall, fully as patriotic a student as Edwards, but more reckless. Randall was a jolly scamp, nearly always in some scrape or other, very generally liked and admired on account of his dashing, happy go lucky manner, and the chosen head of a select set of mischief makers that kept the college constantly guessing what would happen next. At a moment like this Randall was in his element, and the contemptible trick that the Park men had played upon us made the fellows only too eager to accept a leadership like his. “Of all the mean, dastardly, cowardly pieces of work this is the worst,” he exclaimed. “Just think of it, fellows; like a lot of pusillanimous sneaks they steal over here by night, in vacation time, while we are away, and drag off our cannons. Oh, I wish a few of us had been here. It would have taken only about fifteen or twenty of us to have cleaned out half their college.” “They wouldn’t have come had there been any of us here. Even proctor Murray was on his vacation,” said Edwards. “It was a mean piece of work, but they planned it well, and here we are without our cannons.”