"Oh, dear! Troubles never seem to come singly," sighed Nellie.

"What do you mean!" demanded Tom, quickly. "Is something wrong here?"

"Indeed there is, Tom!" answered Grace. And then, with a look at her
older sister, who had turned her face away, she continued: "I think it
is a shame! If it was not that it would make it look as if Nellie were
guilty, we would pack up at once and leave this place."

"Why, what do you mean?" came from both of the Rovers.

"Oh, Grace, perhaps you had better not tell them," cried Nellie, with
almost a sob.

"Nellie!" And now Tom caught the girl tightly in his arms. "What has
happened?"

"I-- I-- can't tell!" sobbed the girl. "Grace will tell you."

"I don't suppose it is necessary to go into all the details," said
Grace, "but the long and short of it is, that Nellie is suspected of
stealing a four-hundred-dollar diamond ring."

"What!" ejaculated Tom.

"It was this way, Tom," pursued Grace. "One of the teachers here, a
Miss Harrow, who assists the seminary management by keeping some of
the books, had a diamond ring said to be worth four hundred dollars
placed in her possession by a Miss Parsons, another teacher. It seems