for she could not bear to meet Tom again, only begging in a
whisper to Ethel, "that, if dear Tom had not done it, she would come and
tell her."

"I am afraid there is no hope of that!" sighed Ethel, as the door closed
on Mary.

"After all," said Flora, "he has not said anything. If he has only done
it, and not confessed, that is not so bad--it is only the usual fashion
of boys."

"Has he been asked? Did he deny it?" said Ethel, looking in Norman's
face, as if she hardly ventured to put the question, and she only
received sorrowful signs as answers. At the same moment Dr. May called
him. No one spoke. Margaret rested her head on the sofa, and looked
very mournful, Richard stood by the fire without moving limb or feature,
Flora worked fast, and Ethel leaned back on an arm-chair, biting the end
of a paper-knife.

The doctor and Norman came back together. "I have sent him up to bed,"
said Dr. May. "I must take him to Harrison to-morrow morning. It is a
terrible business!"

"Has he confessed it?" said Margaret.

"I can hardly call such a thing a confession--I wormed it out bit by
bit--I could not tell whether he was telling truth or not, till I called
Norman in."

"But he has not said anything more untrue--"

"Yes, he has though!" said Dr. May indignantly. "He said Ned Anderson
put the paper there, and had been taking up the ink with it--'twas
his doing--then when I came to cross-examine him I found that though
Anderson did take up the ink, it was Tom himself who knocked it down--I
never heard anything like it--I never could have believed it!"

"It must all be Ned Anderson's doing!" cried Flora. "They are enough to
spoil anybody."

"I am afraid they have done him a great deal of harm," said Norman.

"And what have you been about all the time?" exclaimed the doctor, too
keenly grieved to be just. "I should have thought that with you at the
head of the school, the child might have been kept out of mischief; but
there have you been going your own way, and leaving him to be ruined by
the very worst set of boys!"

Norman's colour rose with the extreme pain this unjust accusation caused
him, and his voice, though low, was not without irritation, "I have
tried. I have not done as much as I ought, perhaps, but--"

"No, I think not, indeed!" interrupted his father. "Sending a boy there,
brought up as he had been, without the least tendency to deceit--"

Here no one could see Norman's burning cheeks, and brow bent d