oing
to expel them to-day."

Michael turned pale with fury.

"I damned well will go, and when I come back I'll ram you upside down in
the Tuck Shop butter-tub."

Mallock flushed under the ignominy of this threat, and muttered his
conviction that Michael was talking through his hat. Just then Mr.
Kirkham entered the class-room, and Michael immediately went up to him
and asked if he might go and speak to the Headmaster.

Mr. Kirkham stared with amazement, and his voice, which always seemed to
hesitate whether it should come out through his mouth or his nose, on
this occasion never came out at all, but stayed in the roof of Mr.
Kirkham's mouth.

"Can I, sir?" Michael repeated.

"I suppose you can," said Mr. Kirkham.

The class followed Michael's exit with wide eyes; even the phlegmatic
Strang was so deeply moved that he sat upright in his chair and tapped
his head to indicate midsummer madness.

Outside in the echoing corridor, where the plaster casts looked coldly
down, Michael wrestled with his leaping heart, forcing it into
tranquillity so that he could grapple with the situation he had created
for himself. By the Laocoon he paused. Immediately beyond was the sombre
doorway of the Head's room. As he paused on the threshold two ridiculous
thoughts came to him--that Lessing's Laocoon was one of the set books
for the English Literature prize, and that he would rather be struggling
in the coils of that huge stone snake than standing thus invertebrate
before this portentous door.

Then Michael tapped. There was no answer but a dull buzz of voices.
Again Michael tapped and, beating down his heart, turned the handle that
seemed as he held it to swell to pumpkin size in his grasp. Slowly he
pushed the door before him, expecting to hear a bellowed summons to
appear, and wondering whether he could escape unknown to his class-room
if his nerve failed him even now. Then he heard the sound of tears, and
indignation drove him onwards, drove him so urgently that actually he
slammed the great door behind him, and made the intent company aware of
his presence.

"What do _you_ want?" shouted Dr. Brownjohn. "Can't you see I'm busy?"

"I want to speak to you, sir." The words actually seemed to come from
his mouth winged with flames, such a volcano was Michael now.

"I'm busy. Go outside and wait," roared the Headmaster.

Michael paused to regard the scene--the two boys sobbing with painful
regular intake of breath, oblivio