Crashaw put the tips of his fingers
together, and Mr. Forman watched him warily, waiting for his cue. If
this was to be a case for prayer, Mr. Forman was ready, with a clean
white handkerchief to kneel upon.

"In some sense, perhaps," returned Challis. "I haven't seen him for some
months."

"Cannot you see the necessity of his attending school?" asked Crashaw,
this time with an insinuating suavity; he believed that Challis was
coming round.

"Oh!" Challis sighed with a note of expostulation. "Oh! the thing's
grotesque, ridiculous."

"If that's so," put in Mr. Forman, who had been struck by a brilliant
idea, "why not bring the child here, and let the Reverend Mr. Crashaw,
or myself, put a few general questions to 'im?"

"Ye-es," hesitated Crashaw, "that might be done; but, of course, the
decision does not rest with us."

"It rests with the Local Authority," mused Challis. He was running over
three or four names of members of that body who were known to him.

"Certainly," said Crashaw, "the Local Education Authority alone has the
right to prosecute, but----" He did not state his antithesis. They had
come to the crux which Crashaw had wished to avoid. He had no influence
with the committee of the L.E.A., and Challis's recommendation would
have much weight. Crashaw intended that Victor Stott should attend
school, but he had bungled his preliminaries; he had rested on his own
authority, and forgotten that Challis had little respect for that
influence. Conciliation was the only card to play now.

"If I brought him, he wouldn't answer your questions," sighed Challis.
"He's very difficult to deal with."

"Is he, indeed?" sympathised Mr. Forman. "I've 'ardly seen 'im myself;
not to speak to, that is."

"He might come with his mother," suggested Crashaw.

Challis shook his head. "By the way, it is the mother whom you would
proceed against?" he asked.

"The parent is responsible," said Mr. Forman. "She will be brought
before a magistrate and fined for the first offence."

"I shan't fine her if she comes before me," replied Challis.

Crashaw smiled. He meant to avoid that eventuality.

The little meeting lapsed into a brief silence. There seemed to be
nothing more to say.

"Well," said Crashaw, at last, with a rising inflexion that had a
conciliatory, encouraging, now-my-little-man kind of air, "We-ll, of
course, no one wishes to proceed to extremes. I think, Mr. Challis, I
think I may say that you are the per