replied.

"Why?" said Scaife, very sharply.

"Eh?"

"Why was it worth while?"

John stammered out something about good food and jolly talk.

"Pooh!" said Scaife, contemptuously. "I thought you had brains,
Verney." He glanced at him keenly. "Now, speak out. What's in that
head of yours? You can be cheeky, if you like."

John wondered bow Scaife had divined that he wished to be cheeky. His
mentor had said so much to Fluff and him about the propriety of not
putting on "lift" or "side" in the presence of an older boy, that he
had choked back a retort which occurred to him.

"You're thinking," continued the Demon, in his clear voice, "that I
didn't use my brains just now, but, my blooming innocent, I can assure
you I did. Very much so. I played 'possum. Put that into your little
pipe and smoke it."

At four-o'clock Bill, John noticed Caesar's absence: a fact accounted
for by the presence of a mail-phaeton, which, he knew, belonged to Mr.
Desmond, drawn up--oddly enough--opposite the Manor. What a joke to
think that Caesar was drinking tea with Dirty Dick!

After Bill, having nothing better to do, John and Fluff went for a walk
on the Sudbury road. They had played football before Bill, and each
had realized his own awkwardness and insignificance. Poor Fluff,
almost reduced to tears, with a big black bruise upon his white
forehead, confessed that he preferred peaceful games--like croquet, and
intended to apply for a doctor's certificate of exemption. Demanding
sympathy, he received a slating.

"I play nearly as rotten a game as you do, Fluff," John said; "but
Scaife expects us to be Torpids,[9] so we jolly well have to buck up.
That bruise over your eye has taken off your painted-doll look. Now,
if you're going to blub, you'd better get behind that hedge."

Fluff exploded.

"This is a beastly hole," he cried. "And I loathe it. I'm going to
write to my father and beg him to take me away."

"You ought to be at a girls' school."

"I hate everything and everybody. I thought you were my friend, the
only friend I had."

John was somewhat mollified.

"I am your friend, but not when you talk rot."

"Verney, look here, if you'll be decent to me, I will try to stick it
out. I wish I was like you; I do indeed. I wish I was like Scaife.
Why, I'd sooner be the Duffer, freckles and all, than myself."

John looked down upon the delicately-tinted face, the small, regular,
girlish features, the red, q