od since the afternoon before) than from anything else, quieted
down, and gave up further resistance. Oliver told him, in as few words
as he could, of the distress which his disappearance had caused at Saint
Dominic's and to his parents, and besought him to return quietly,
promising forgiveness for the past, and undertaking that all would be
made right if he would only come home.

Loman listened to all doggedly. "You're humbugging me!" he said. "You
know I stole that paper?"

"Oh, don't talk of that!" cried Oliver. "Do come back!"

"You know--can't you get me something to eat?"

As he said this he sunk down with a groan upon the grass. Oliver
started wildly to rush to the nearest cottage. As he did so, however, a
doubt crossed his mind, and he said, "You'll promise to wait here, will
you?"

"Oh, yes! be quick."

Oliver flew on the wings of the wind towards the village. There was a
cottage a few hundred yards away. As he neared it, he cast one look
back. The wretched boy was on his feet, hurrying away in an opposite
direction.

Another chase ensued, though only a short one. For Loman was in no
condition to hold out long. Oliver half led, half dragged him to
Grandham, where at last he procured food, which the unhappy fugitive
devoured ravenously. Then followed another talk, far more satisfactory
than the last. Restored once more in body and mind, Loman consented
without further demur to accompany Oliver back to Saint Dominic's, but
not before he had unburdened his mind of all that was on it.

Oliver implored him not to do it now, to wait till he got back, and then
to tell all to his father, not to him. But the poor penitent was not to
be put off. Until he had confessed all he would not stir a foot back to
the school.

Then Oliver heard all that sad story with which the reader is now
familiar. How that first act of fraud about the rod had been the
beginning of all this misery. How Cripps had used his advantage to
drive the boy from one wickedness and folly to another--from deceit to
gambling, from gambling to debt, from debt to more deceit, and so on.
How drinking, low company, and vicious habits had followed. How all the
while he was trying to keep up appearances at the school, though he saw
that he was gradually becoming an object of dislike to his fellows. How
he had staked everything--his whole hope of getting free from Cripps--on
the result of the Nightingale examination; and how, when th