He gave a nervous little cough, and advancing towards the head-master's table, laid thereon the cipher note, at the same time remarking, "If you please, sir, we know who screwed up little--hem! Mr.Grice's door, or, at all events, we think we do." So sudden and unexpected was this announcement that it caused the doctor to half rise from his chair, while Oaks and Allingford turned and gazed at the speaker in open-mouthed astonishment.

They none of them expected for a moment that the three youngsters had come for any more important purpose than to solicit orders for new caps or "journey-money," and this confession came like a thunderbolt from a clear sky.
"What!" exclaimed the head-master, taking the scrap of paper, and glancing alternately from the mystic word to the boy's face--"what on earth is this?
Explain yourself." It would be unnecessary to attempt a verbatim report of Diggory's evidence; in doing so we should but be repeating facts with which the reader is already acquainted.

Let it suffice to say that, with many haltings and stumbles, he gave a full account of his finding the first cipher, translating the same, attending the secret meeting, and, lastly, discovering on the previous day the brief note which he had just produced.
The telling of the tale occupied some considerable time, for the doctor had many questions to ask; and when it came to the account of the conversation which had taken place under the pavilion, his face visibly darkened.
"My eye," remarked Diggory, an hour later, "I wouldn't go through that again for something! I swear that by the time I'd finished the perspiration was running down my back in a regular stream." "Well," said the doctor, turning to Jack Vance and Mugford, when their companion had finished speaking, "and what have you two got to say ?" "Only the same as Trevanock, sir; we--we found it out together." "Then, in the first place, why didn't you tell me all this before ?" "We were afraid to, sir," faltered Jack Vance; "and we thought it would be sneaking." "Dear, dear," exclaimed the head-master impatiently, "when will you boys see things in a proper light?
You think it wrong to tell tales, and yet quite right that innocent people should suffer for things done by these miserable cowards!" "No, sir," answered Diggory: "we've come now to try to get Oaks out of a scrape; though we--were afraid--" "Afraid of what ?" "Nothing, sir." "Afraid of telling more tales, I suppose.

Well, well; the question now is whether the same boys are guilty of having screwed up Mr.Grice's door.

Why they should have done such a thing I don't understand, nor do I see how it is to be brought home to them simply by means of this exceedingly brief note." There was a silence.