by both.

It was not until he reached the schoolhouse that the evidences of
last night's outrage for a time distracted his mind from his singular
interview. He was struck with the workmanlike manner in which the locks
had been restored, and the care that had evidently been taken to remove
the more obvious and brutal traces of burglary. This somewhat staggered
his theory that Seth Davis was the perpetrator; mechanical skill and
thoughtfulness were not among the lout's characteristics. But he was
still more disconcerted on pushing back his chair to find a small
india-rubber tobacco pouch lying beneath it. The master instantly
recognized it: he had seen it a hundred times before--it was Uncle
Ben's. It was not there when he had closed the room yesterday afternoon.
Either Uncle Ben had been there last night, or had anticipated him this
morning. But in the latter case he would scarcely have overlooked his
fallen property--that, in the darkness of the night, might have readily
escaped detection. His brow darkened with a sudden conviction that
it was Uncle Ben who was the real and only offender, and that his
simplicity of the previous night was part of his deception. A sickening
sense that he had been again duped--but why or to what purpose he hardly
dared to think--overcame him. Who among these strange people could he
ever again trust? After the fashion of more elevated individuals, he had
accepted the respect and kindness of those he believed his inferiors as
a natural tribute to his own superiority; any change in THEIR feelings
must therefore be hypocrisy or disloyalty; it never occurred to him that
HE might have fallen below their standard.

The arrival of the children and the resumption of his duties for a time
diverted him. But although the morning's exercise restored the master's
self-confidence, it cannot be said to have improved his judgment.
Disdaining to question Rupert Filgee, as the possible confidant of Uncle
Ben, he answered the curious inquiries of the children as to the broken
doorlock with the remark that it was a matter that he should have to
bring before the Trustees of the Board, and by the time that school was
over and the pupils dismissed he had quite resolved upon this formal
disposition of it. In spite of Cressy's warning--rather because of
it--in the new attitude he had taken towards her and her friends, he
lingered in the school-house until late. He had occupied himself
in drawing up a statement of