"Oh, leave it where it is until morning, and the maids will take care of it," Miss Clark suggested; and then the teachers also repaired to their rooms, the watchman went his way, his broad shoulders shaking with silent laughter, and quiet settled down once more upon Hilton's ruffled west wing.

Katherine had remained in the background throughout the entire disturbance, quietly disrobing and getting ready for bed.

Sadie had been so frightened by the startling noises outside, she did not observe--the room being dark--or dream that her roommate was still up and dressed. She supposed that she had come in while she was sleeping and retired without waking her; thus Katherine escaped being questioned or obliged to make any explanations.

But she lay awake some time after the house had settled into stillness, trying to decide what steps she ought to take, knowing what she did about the matter.

She knew it would not be right to allow Jennie to suffer for what she was in no way responsible, even though she had broken rules in being out of her room at so late an hour. But what her duty was regarding reporting the leaders in the "racket," if they obstinately refrained from confessing their offense, she could not readily determine. She finally resolved that she would do her utmost to exonerate Jennie without incriminating anyone else, if possible.

She arose with the first stroke of the rising bell, performed her usual duties with what dispatch she could, and then sought Miss Williams shortly before the breakfast hour.

The teacher greeted her cordially, and inquired with a significant smile:

"Were you frightened nearly out of your senses, with the rest of us last night, Miss Minturn?"

"Oh, no; but perhaps I might have been if I had been asleep. I know something about the affair, Miss Williams, and I have come to talk it over with you," Katherine explained.

"Ah!" and the woman looked both astonished and interested.

"Jennie Wild told you the truth last night," she went on. "She had nothing whatever to do with the 'racket,' even though appearances point strongly the other way."

She then proceeded to tell all that she knew about the matter, but without revealing the names of the ringleaders.

"Well, this certainly does put an entirely different aspect upon the affair," Miss Williams observed, when she concluded. "I am more than glad, too, because my sympathies are with Miss Wild, in spite of her tendency to bubble over now and then. Circ.u.mstantial evidence is not always true evidence, is it?" she added, with a smile. "I was highly indignant with her last night, for I felt sure she was prominent in it--and she certainly was guilty of disobedience."

"Yes; her curiosity surely got the better of her judgment,"

Katherine a.s.sented.

"Well, could you identify those girls, whom you overheard in the hall?" Miss Williams now inquired.

Katherine flushed. She had been dreading this question.

"I did not see anyone," she returned with a faint smile, after a moment of hesitation.

"I see, my dear; you do not wish to 'tell tales,' and I appreciate your position," said her companion, with a wise nod that had nothing of disapproval in it. "Well"--after considering a moment-- "we will say no more about it until Prof. Seabrook has been consulted. Jennie, however, will have reason to be grateful to you for helping her out of what, otherwise, might have proved a very awkward situation."

Miss Williams went at once to the girl and released her from the confinement she had imposed upon her the previous night. She explained how Miss Minturn had come to her rescue, and Jennie, who had for once been thoroughly frightened, vowed she would "never be caught in a sc.r.a.pe of any kind" during the remainder of her course.

Considerable excitement prevailed during the day, and the "midnight escapade" was the one topic of conversation whenever a group of girls came together; but it was not until study hours were over in the afternoon that any active measures to "investigate" the matter were inst.i.tuted. Then Katherine was summoned to the princ.i.p.al's study, where she found the four teachers who had the west wing in charge, and Jennie, a.s.sembled.

Jennie was rigorously catechised, but had very little to tell. She had overheard something of a plot that promised considerable excitement and fun; she had also heard some one whisper, "Monday, at midnight," and her curiosity had been raised to the highest pitch, therefore she had been unable to resist being "in at the finish." She could not tell who were the leaders, for she had neither seen nor heard anyone, having slipped into the closet before the crash came. Being hard pressed, however, she admitted that she thought the soph.o.m.ores were chiefly concerned in the "racket."

Katherine was then requested to relate all that she knew about it, whereupon she repeated what she had already told Miss Williams.

"You have corroborated what Miss Wild has stated, and have also exonerated her from any complicity in the affair," Prof. Seabrook observed, when she concluded. "I judge that it must have been confined entirely to the soph.o.m.ore cla.s.s. Now we must get down to individuals, if possible. Miss Minturn, did you recognize the voices of those two girls whom you overheard in the hall last night?"

"Truth compels me to say that I did," Katherine replied, a hot flush mounting to her brow.

"Their names, if you please," commanded the princ.i.p.al, briefly.

"I beg that you will excuse me from naming them," she pleaded.

"It is plainly your duty to expose them, Miss Minturn. The affair is of too serious a nature to allow sentiment to thwart discipline and the preservation of law and order," returned the gentleman, in an inflexible tone.

"Pardon me," she said, "but I cannot feel it my duty--at least until--"

"That is equivalent to saying that you will not comply with my request," interposed the professor, his eyes beginning to blaze in view of what he regarded as a defiant att.i.tude.

"No, sir; I could not be so disrespectful," Katherine gently replied. "Please allow me to say that I would have taken no action whatever in the matter but for the sake of saving Miss Wild from being unjustly accused."

Jennie flashed her an adoring look as she said this.

"I just wanted to hug you!" she told her afterwards.

"Miss Wild is no doubt properly grateful; all the same you have no right to shield the guilty ones, and I shall hold you to your duty," inflexibly responded Prof. Seabrook.

Katherine saw that he was determined to make her name the culprits, and, for a moment, she was deeply distressed. Then her face suddenly cleared.

"May I suggest that it is the duty of the offenders to confess their own wrongdoing?" she questioned, in a respectful tone; adding: "It certainly is their right to have the opportunity given them, and I would prefer not to rob them of it; while it would release me from a very awkward position if they would do so."

"I think Miss Minturn is right, Prof. Seabrook," Miss Williams here remarked. "I am sure we can all understand how she feels about it, and we know that it would place her under the ban of the whole school if she were to expose the ringleaders without giving them the opportunity, as she says, to volunteer a confession."

Katherine shot a look of grat.i.tude at the speaker, who nodded her sympathy in return.

An uncomfortable silence followed, during which the much-tried girl felt that her princ.i.p.al regarded her as obstinate as well as sentimental, and was more than half inclined not to yield his point, in spite of Miss Williams' espousal of her cause.

"Very well; let it rest here for the present," he at length curtly observed. "You are temporarily excused, Miss Minturn. But if the offenders do not promptly come forward, I shall expect you to tell all you know, later."

Katherine bowed and slipped quietly from the room, but with a choking sensation in her throat, a feeling of injustice pressing heavily upon her heart.

She paused in the hall a moment, after closing the door, trying to calm her perturbed thoughts, when these words from her dear "little book" came to her:

"Let Truth uncover and destroy error in G.o.d's own way, and let human justice wait on the divine." [Footnote: "Science and Health," page 542.]

Then she went on her way, at peace with herself and all the world.

CHAPTER XV.

"HILTON VOLUNTEERS."

After Katherine was dismissed, Jennie was sternly reprimanded for her infraction of rules, cautioned against future disobedience, a penalty imposed upon her, and then told she might go back to her duties.

She moved slowly to the door, stood there a moment irresolute, a thoughtful look on her young face; then deliberately turned and walked straight back to her princ.i.p.al.

"Prof. Seabrook," she began, "I have another confession to make to you, and I'm willing to take any punishment you may think I deserve. I do this because I want you to know the kind of girl Miss Minturn is, for--I think you do not half appreciate her. I've loved her from the first minute I saw her in this room with you, the day she came; she makes everybody love her, and I've often wondered if it is her Christian Science that helps her to be so-- so dear and true. I've tried to make her tell me something about it, but she wouldn't--she always says you told her not to talk about it to the students. I asked her last week to let me go with her to her service on Sunday. But she said no, unless I would get permission from you. But--I did go," Jennie continued, growing scarlet to her brows, yet looking the man unflinchingly in the eyes. "I started out early and was there when she came into the hall, and walked home with her afterwards. She didn't spare me; she told me I had done wrong and read me a lecture about spoiling my record by breaking rules. I want you to know this, because some one may have seen us come out of the Christian Science hall together and might think she took me there; but she never breaks a rule, and she isn't a bit priggish about it, either. She tried her best to make me go back to my room before the 'racket' last night, and I just want you to know that she's true blue, through and through."