“No, ma’am, I didn’t,” said Bob.

“You must tell the truth, Bob,” said Miss Williams. “If you broke it by accident, it could not be helped.”

“I didn’t break it at all. I wasn’t near the table. I wasn’t over a foot inside the room, Miss Williams.”

There was a sniff and a sneer. The word “stuff” was heard all over the room. Miss Williams looked very sharply at Bob. Then she touched the bell, with the words:

“School is dismissed. Bob, you may remain.”

Bob looked pretty glum as the other scholars trooped out. Jed Burr chuckled as he passed him. Little Minnie Grey was in tears. Frank was angry, and he hurried out after Jed to give him a piece of his mind.

Miss Williams sat down at her desk and paid no attention to the lonely scholar left in the room. She knew Bob to be a good boy, but she knew, too, that he was proud and stubborn, and never liked to be censured before the whole school. She hoped that silence and thought would lead Bob to confess, if he had really spilled the ink.

Bob heard the boys in the distance shouting and playing. It made him more gloomy than ever to think how they were planning for the football game that afternoon, and he was shut out from it.

[24]

[24]

Miss Williams went on quietly writing at the desk. Bob got tired looking around the room. He dropped his head upon his arms and tried not to feel mean. Miss Williams thought he was sulking, and did not disturb him. Suddenly Bob raised his head quickly.

“Sit still, dearie,” spoke a strange voice. “Sit still now, or I’ll stick you.”

Bob’s eyes opened to their widest. The door of the storeroom was now open. A woman had come from it. She had stolen up behind the school teacher without being seen or heard by Miss Williams.

As she spoke the words that caused Bob to look up, she grasped the long back hair of the school teacher in one hand. In the other she waved a long sharp-pointed pair of scissors.

Miss Williams tried to turn around, but the woman kept a firm hold on the coils of her hair.

“Why, Mary,” spoke the teacher, turning pale, but trying to act calmly, “how did you come 

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