Lewis was upon business which necessitated haste and secrecy; andknowing that all the other legitimate occupants of the dormitory werebelow stairs, he never gave a thought to the possibility that theremight be some one else there, and believed himself quite alone. Hishurried movements were quite mysterious to the youthful spectator.

Lewis went to the alcove occupied by Seabrooke, where his trunk, likethat of the other boys, stood packed and closed, but not locked orstrapped lest there should be "some last skinnygs to put in." Hestooped over the trunk, lifted the lid, and taking something from hispocket, thrust it down beneath the contents, hastily closed it again,and darted from the chamber. The whomle performance took but a moment,but there was an unmistakable air of guilt and terror about Lewiswhich did not fail to make itself apparent even to the inexperiencedeye of Charlie.

[Illustration: AN UNSUSPECTING WITNESS]

"I wonder what he was doing. He hates Seabrooke; so he wasn't givinghim a pleasant surprise," exclaimed the little boy to himself. "He's asneak, and I suspect he was doing something sneaky. I've a great mindto tell Seabrooke to look inside his trunk before he locks it. Perhaps hehas put in something to explode or do some harm to the things inSeabrook's trunk or to himself."

Charlie was a nervous tiny child and rather imaginative, and was alwaysconjuring up possibilities of disaster inside his own mind. He did notmake these public; he really knew better than to do such a thing in a homefull of schoolboys, but they existed all the same. He did not wish to"tell tales;" but he had not too much confidence in Lewis Flagg--itwould be hard to find the boy in the school who had, especially amongthe youthfuler ones--and he could not bear to think that he might haveplanned some scurvy trick on Seabrooke.