For the next three seconds you could have heard a cannonball drop. Andthat was equivalent, in the senior day-room at Seymour's, to a deadsilence. Barry stood in the middle of the room leaning on the stick onwhich he supported life, now that his ankle had been injured, andturned red and white in regular rotation, as the magnificence of thenews came home to him.

　　Then the small voice of Linton was heard.

　　"That'll be six d. I'll trouble you for, young Sammy," said Linton. Forhe had betted an even sixpence with Master Samuel Menzies that Barrywould get his first fifteen cap this term, and Barry had got it.

　　A great shout went up from every corner of the room. Barry was one ofthe most popular members of the house, and every one had been sorry forhim when his sprained ankle had apparently put him out of the runningfor the last cap.

　　"Good old Barry," said Drummond, delightedly. Barry thanked him in adazed way.

　　Every one crowded in to shake his hand. Barry thanked then all in adazed way.

　　And then the senior day-room, in spite of the fact that Milton hadreturned, gave itself up to celebrating the occasion with one of themost deafening uproars that had ever been heard even in that factory ofnoise. A babel of voices discussed the match of the afternoon, eachtrying to outshout the other. In one corner Linton was beating wildlyon a biscuit-tin with part of a broken chair. Shoeblossom was busy inthe opposite corner executing an intricate step-dance on somebodyelse's box. M'Todd had got hold of the red-hot poker, and was burninghis initials in huge letters on the seat of a chair. Every one, inshort, was enjoying himself, and it was not until an advanced hour thatcomparative quiet was restored. It was a great evening for Barry, thebest he had ever experienced.

　　Clowes did not learn the news till he saw it on the notice-board, onthe following Monday. When he saw it he whistled softly.

　　"I see you've given Barry his first," he said to Trevor, when they met.

　　"Rather sensational.""Milton and Allardyce both thought he deserved it. If he'd been playinginstead of Rand-Brown, they wouldn't have scored at all probably, andwe should have got one more try.""That's all right," said Clowes. "He deserves it right enough, and I'mjolly glad you've given it him. But things will begin to move now,don't you think? The League ought to have a word to say about thebusiness. It'll be a facer for them.""Do you remember," asked Trevor, "saying that you thought it must beRand-Brown who wrote those letters?""Yes. Well?""Well, Milton had an idea that it was Rand-Brown who ragged his study.""What made him think that?"Trevor related the Shoeblossom incident.

　　Clowes became quite excited.

　　"Then Rand-Brown must be the man," he said. "Why don't you go andtackle him? Probably he's got the bat in his study.""It's not in his study," said Trevor, "because I looked everywhere forit, and got him to turn out his pockets, too. And yet I'll swear heknows something about it. One thing struck me as a bit suspicious. Iwent straight into his study and showed him that last letter--about thebat, you know, and accused him of writing it. Now, if he hadn't been inthe business somehow, he wouldn't have understood what was meant bytheir saying 'the bat you lost'. It might have been an ordinarycricket-bat for all he knew. But he offered to let me search the study.

　　It didn't strike me as rum till afterwards. Then it seemed fishy. Whatdo you think?"Clowes thought so too, but admitted that he did not see of what use thesuspicion was going to be. Whether Rand-Brown knew anything about theaffair or not, it was quite certain that the bat was not with him.

　　O'Hara, meanwhile, had decided that the time had come for him to resumehis detective duties. Moriarty agreed with him, and they resolved thatthat night they would patronise the vault instead of the gymnasium, andtake a holiday as far as their boxing was concerned. There was plentyof time before the Aldershot competition.

　　Lock-up was still at six, so at a quarter to that hour they slippeddown into the vault, and took up their position.

　　A quarter of an hour passed. The lock-up bell sounded faintly. Moriartybegan to grow tired.

　　"Is it worth it?" he said, "an' wouldn't they have come before, if theymeant to come?""We'll give them another quarter of an hour," said O'Hara. "After that--""Sh!" whispered Moriarty.

　　The door had opened. They could see a figure dimly outlined in thesemi-darkness. Footsteps passed down into the vault, and there came asound as if the unknown had cannoned into a chair, followed by a sharpintake of breath, expressive of pain. A scraping sound, and a flash oflight, and part of the vault was lit by a candle. O'Hara caught aglimpse of the unknown's face as he rose from lighting the candle, butit was not enough to enable him to recognise him. The candle wasstanding on a chair, and the light it gave was too feeble to reach theface of any one not on a level with it.

　　The unknown began to drag chairs out into the neighbourhood of thelight. O'Hara counted six.

　　The sixth chair had scarcely been placed in position when the dooropened again. Six other figures appeared in the opening one after theother, and bolted into the vault like rabbits into a burrow. The lastof them closed the door after them.

　　O'Hara nudged Moriarty, and Moriarty nudged O'Hara; but neither made asound. They were not likely to be seen--the blackness of the vault wastoo Egyptian for that--but they were so near to the chairs that theleast whisper must have been heard. Not a word had proceeded from theoccupants of the chairs so far. If O'Hara's suspicion was correct, andthis was really the League holding a meeting, their methods were moresecret than those of any other secret society in existence. Even theNihilists probably exchanged a few remarks from time to time, when theymet together to plot. But these men of mystery never opened their lips.

　　It puzzled O'Hara.

　　The light of the candle was obscured for a moment, and a sound ofpuffing came from the darkness.

　　O'Hara nudged Moriarty again.

　　"Smoking!" said the nudge.

　　Moriarty nudged O'Hara.

　　"Smoking it is!" was the meaning of the movement.

　　A strong smell of tobacco showed that the diagnosis had been a trueone. Each of the figures in turn lit his pipe at the candle, and satback, still in silence. It could not have been very pleasant, smo............