about nine o'clock in the evening
`` It came to me straight enough , though I do n't feel at liberty to tell you who told me . '' All six members of Dick & Co. were present . The scene of the meeting was Dick Prescott 's own room at his home over the bookstore kept by his parents . The hour was about nine o'clock in the evening . It was Friday evening of the first week of the new school year . The fellows had dropped in to talk over the coming football season , because the week had been one of mysterious unrest in the football squad at Gridley High School . Just what the trouble was , where it lay or how it had started was puzzling the whole High School student body .