might have got into a frightful row. Were you nearly caught?"
"Jolly nearly."
"It was you who rang the bell, wasn't it?"
"Yes, it was. But for goodness sake don't go gassing about it, or somebody will get to hear who oughtn't to, and I shall be sacked."
"All right. But, I say, you are a chap!"
"What's the matter now?"
"I mean about Sammy, you know. It's a jolly good score off old Downing. He'll be frightfully, sick."
"Sammy!" cried Mike. "My good man, you don't think I did that, do you? What absolute rot! I never touched the poor brute."
"Oh, all right," said Jellicoe. "But I wasn't going to tell any one, of course."
"What do you mean?"
"You are a chap!" giggled Jellicoe.
Mike walked to chapel rather thoughtfully.
CHAPTER XLVII
MR. DOWNING ON THE SCENT
There was just one moment, the moment in which, on going down to the junior day-room of his house to quell an unseemly disturbance, he was boisterously greeted by a vermilion bull terrier, when Mr. Downing was seized with a hideous fear lest he had lost his senses. Glaring down at the crimson animal that was pawing at his knees, he clutched at his reason for one second as a drowning man clutches at a lifebelt
Then the happy laughter of the young onlookers reassured him.
"Who" he shouted, "WHO has done this?"
"Please, sir, we don't know," shrilled the chorus.
"Please, sir, he came in like that."
"Please, sir, we were sitting here when he suddenly ran in, all red."
