"Goodnight," responded Don, hoping that Gates had not heard the talking.
Apparently he had not, for there was no movement as he walked cautiously down to the second floor. The butler had gone back to his room and no one was in the hall. The young cadet was undecided as to what to do now that he was free.
"I ought to make a good effort to get hold of that cup, now that I am in the house," he reasoned. "But I don't know how to go about it."
He tiptoed along the second floor hall, determined to go to the lower floor and look around down there for the cup. He was not greatly worried about the whole situation for he knew that the colonel was back of him in whatever he did, and even in the event that the Gates family got highhanded about things he was sure that the significant word spoken to them would serve to cool their temper. So he had some degree of comfort in the fact that it would probably come out right in the end. And when he stopped to think of the heavy injustice that George Long had suffered all these years because of the flagrant villainy of these same people he had no scruples against prowling around Gates' house.
A light showed under the door of the room into which the cadets had carried Melvin Gates the night of the accident and Don stopped there, struck by an idea. He moved up close to the door and listened, being rewarded by the murmur of voices inside. Although they were pitched in a low key he was nevertheless able to make out what was being said.
"But you cannot keep that young man a prisoner," he heard Melvin Gates say.
"Well, what am I going to do with him?" his son asked impatiently.
"I do not know, Arthur. You think he was prowling around to find that cup?"
"Oh, of course!" cried the son, wearily. "That cup has cost me more anxiety than anything I ever had anything to do with in my life!"
"That is entirely your own fault, Arthur. If you had not been so dishonest all of your life you wouldn't be in such a fix."
"Don't preach to me, father," snapped the son, angrily.
"It is too bad I didn't preach to you when you were smaller, instead of filling your pockets with money that you didn't have the sense to take care of. Where is the cup now?"
"I threw it in the closet in my study, at the end of the hall," was the answer, which sent a thrill of hope through Don.