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thatdoesn’t happen. But we also must try to get your property back. Now show me where you are sleeping this year.’
    The boys led Mr McCaffrey back up to their dorm where he made them stand by the door while he searched for the phone. When he couldn’t find it, he took his own mobile out and asked Alan what his number was, and then dialled it.
    ‘Ssssh,’ he went. The trio strained their ears to try to hear anything. And sure enough, there was a muffled ‘ dring dring; dring dring ’ sound coming from somewhere under the bed.
    Mr McCaffrey laughed. ‘You just need to look a bit harder, boys. It seems like the great Headmaster Sherlock has solved another mystery.’
    He turned and left, chuckling to himself as he wandered down the corridor.
    Eoin ducked under the bed, but still couldn’t see any sign of a phone. Alan joined him and at once noticed what had changed.
    ‘That’s weird,’ he said. ‘I was down under here the first night and noticed this trapdoor, but it was sealed shut. Look how the varnish has cracked around it. Someone has opened it recently.’

Chapter 12
    . . . . . . . . .
    A LAN tried to work his fingers around the edges of the trapdoor, but it remained tightly shut.
    ‘You can probably push it open from the other side,’ he said. ‘That must be where the thief’s been coming from.’
    ‘Let’s move the leg of the bed on top of it,’ suggested Eoin. ‘That would slow him down a fair bit, whoever he is.’
    ‘Our phones are still down there though – we need to get them back.’
    ‘OK, I wonder does Mr Finn know anything about secret passageways?’
    They wandered down to the staff common room and knocked on the door. Mr Carey answered it, listened to their request and told them to wait outside. Boys never got to cross the threshold of that room.
    ‘What can I do to help you?’ asked Mr Finn.
    ‘Sir, remember you said you were writing about the school’s history? Well, have you ever heard of a secret passage?’ asked Eoin.
    ‘Well … not really,’ Mr Finn answered cautiously. ‘Why do you ask?’
    ‘I think someone has been getting into our room through a trapdoor in the floor – and they’ve been stealing mobile phones!’ answered Eoin.
    ‘That’s very interesting,’ the old teacher replied. ‘I heard rumours about such a passage back when I was a student here, but no-one I know had ever found it and it doesn’t appear on the original plans for the college, which I have been examining recently. You must show me this trapdoor.’
    The boys brought Mr Finn upstairs and lifted the bed off the mysterious doorway cut into the wooden floor.
    ‘Very wise. I’d keep that bed on top of it until we get to the bottom of this.’
    He checked where the room was in the building and spent some time looking up and down the corridor outside.
    ‘Very mysterious,’ he said. ‘I will have to study this further. Don’t mention it to any other pupils. We don’t want them going off on a hunt for the culprit or his hiding place.’
    Eoin was annoyed to lose his mobile, but Dylan let him text his mum to tell her, so she wouldn’t worry when he didn’t answer. With the schoolwork piling onand rugby training eating into every spare hour, he soon forgot about it. He was an unused replacement for the Js’ next two friendlies and was starting to feel a bit rusty.
    ‘I wish Carey would allow me to play with you guys,’ he told Rory in the dorm one evening. ‘I won’t be much use in an emergency if I haven’t played a game for weeks. I’ve had less than ten minutes on the pitch all season!’
    ‘I’ll ask him can you turn out on Saturday morning – we’re going down to play Rostipp in Tipperary and you could visit your folks,’ Rory replied.
    ‘Do you think he’d let me?’ Eoin wondered, ‘The Js don’t have a game and I’d love to get out of the school – and those training sessions – even for a day,.’
    Rory was a skilled talker and Mr Carey proved more co-operative