“What do you want?” asked Jerry Koswell.  Flockley was sitting by the table, reading.

“Flockley, what did you do with those letters you got from Filbury for us?” demanded Dick, striding into the room.

“Letters?” asked the dude carelessly.  “Oh, I put them on the table in Tom and Sam’s room.”

“When?”

“This morning.”

“They weren’t there after dinner,” said Sam.

“Nor after supper, either,” added Tom.

“Look here, do you accuse me of stealing your letters?” demanded Flockley, rising as if in anger.

“No; but we want to know where they are,” answered Tom.

“I told you what I did with them.  I wouldn’t have touched the letters, only Filbury asked me to do the favor.  If they are not on the table maybe the wind swept them to the floor.  Did you look?”

“No.”

“Then you had better.”

“You might have spoken about them, Flockley,” said Dick coldly.  “Any other student would have done so.”

“Or you could have handed us the letters at lunch,” added Sam.

“I am not your hired man!” cried Dudd Flockley.  “Next time I’ll not touch the letters at all!” And then he dropped back into his chair and pretended to read again.

“If we don’t find the letters you’ll hear from us again,” said Dick.  And then he and his brothers retired.

They entered the room occupied by Sam and Tom and lit up.  The notes were not on the table.

“Here they are!” cried Sam, and picked them up from the floor, under the edge of Tom’s bed.  They looked rather mussed up, and all of the Rovers wondered if Flockley had opened and read them.

“I don’t think he’d be any too good to do it,” muttered Tom as he opened the note addressed to himself.

It was from Nellie, and rather cool in tone.  It said all were called home on account of the case at court, but did not give any particulars.  At the bottom was mentioned the time of departure from Hope and also from Ashton.  The notes from Dora and Grace contained about the same information, and Grace added that she wanted Sam to write to her.

“If we had had these letters this afternoon we might have gone to Hope instead of nutting,” said Tom bitterly.

“They must have expected to see us, either there or at the depot,” said Sam.  “Otherwise they wouldn’t have been so particular about mentioning the time of departure from both places.”

“Yes, I guess they expected to see us, or hear from us,” said Dick, and breathed a deep sigh.

“Well, they did see us—­when we were with Miss Sanderson and her friends.”

“What must they have thought—­if they imagined we had received the letters?” groaned Tom.

“They thought we cut ’em dead,” replied Sam.  “Isn’t this the worst ever?  And all on Flockley’s account!  I’d like to punch his nose!”

“I’d like to be sure of one thing,” said Dick, a hard tone stealing into his voice.  “Did Flockley just happen to be in Ashton when the girls got there, or did he open and read these letters and then go on purpose, with Koswell and Larkspur?”