A Surprising Suggestion
- It's not until the next day that Reynie figures out what the message means: Mr. B is encouraging them to cheat in order to become Messengers faster.
- The others can't believe Mr. B would instruct them to do such a thing, but they manage to confirm it via Morse code.
- That night they begin "cheating practice" to help Kate and Constance perform better on the exams in hopes of getting one of them into a Messenger slot ASAP.
- The cheating seems to work—the boys continue to get top marks, and with the cheating help, Constance and Kate improve steadily.
- Meanwhile they continue to investigate and search for clues.
- When they hear that one of the oldest Messengers at the Institute, Charlie Peters, is graduating, they make a plan to talk with him. Graduates are typically ushered out in silence, not allowed to interact with other students as they leave the island, so Kate creates a distraction by pretending to fall and injure herself as S.Q. is escorting Charlie out.
- While S.Q. is distracted, Reynie and Sticky try to ask Charlie questions about his work as a Messenger, but Charlie only replies, "I can't say. […] I really can't" (17.85-87).
- Reynie feels like there's something curious about Charlie's response, but he isn't sure at the moment what it is. He'll have to think on it.