“Oh, dear!  Troubles never seem to come singly,” sighed Nellie.

“What do you mean!” demanded Tom, quickly.  “Is something wrong here?”

“Indeed there is, Tom!” answered Grace.  And then, with a look at her older sister, who had turned her face away, she continued:  “I think it is a shame!  If it was not that it would make it look as if Nellie were guilty, we would pack up at once and leave this place.”

“Why, what do you mean?” came from both of the Rovers.

“Oh, Grace, perhaps you had better not tell them,” cried Nellie, with almost a sob.

“Nellie!” And now Tom caught the girl tightly in his arms.  “What has happened?”

“I—­ I—­ can’t tell!” sobbed the girl.  “Grace will tell you.”

“I don’t suppose it is necessary to go into all the details,” said Grace, “but the long and short of it is, that Nellie is suspected of stealing a four-hundred-dollar diamond ring.”

“What!” ejaculated Tom.

“It was this way, Tom,” pursued Grace.  “One of the teachers here, a Miss Harrow, who assists the seminary management by keeping some of the books, had a diamond ring said to be worth four hundred dollars placed in her possession by a Miss Parsons, another teacher.  It seems that Miss Parsons had an eccentric old aunt, who wished to give the seminary some money, and so turned over the ring, to be converted into cash.  This ring Miss Harrow left on her desk in the office.  Nellie went into the office to see the teacher, but finding no one there, came away.  Then Miss Harrow came back a few minutes later, and found the diamond ring gone.  She at once made inquiries, but as she could find nobody who had been in the once after Nellie had left, she called Nellie in and wanted her to tell what had become of the piece of jewelry.”

CHAPTER IV

 A four-hundred-dollar ring

“Did you see this ring, Nellie?.” questioned Tom, after a painful pause.

“Why, yes, it was lying in the middle of a flat-top desk,” responded the girl, wiping her eyes with her handkerchief.

“Didn’t somebody go into the office after you were there?”

“I don’t know, Tom.  In fact, nobody seems to know.”

“I was in the office with another girl about five minutes before Nellie went there,” came from Grace.  “I saw the ring there, too, and I thought it was very foolish to leave it so exposed.  Why, anybody could have run off with it.”

“It certainly was careless,” put in Sam.

“Miss Harrow said she was on the point of putting it in the safe when she was called by ’phone to one of the other buildings.  She had a dispute to settle between some of the hired help, and she did not think of the ring until some time later.  Then, so she says, she rushed back to the office to find it missing.”

“Well, I think it is a shame that she accused Nellie,” said Tom, stoutly and with something of a savage look in his eyes.  “Nellie, if I were you, I wouldn’t stand for it.”