do when I was a little knickerbockered boy) for the whole chain of
governesses who had once taken charge of me. I enumerated them by
their nicknames: "Tooby and Dinky and Soaky and Miss Smith."
Trapping myself in this mistake, I actually blushed as I knelt
there. I realised that I must be more up to date. So I prayed for
Penny, Freedham, Stanley, Bickerton, and Banana-Skin, but I drew up
abruptly at Carpet Slippers. I couldn't forgive him. I felt I ought
to, but I couldn't. There, on my knees, I thought it all out; and at
last light broke upon me. To forgive didn't necessarily mean to
forgo the punishment. Yes, I would forgive him and pray for him, but
his punishment would go on just the same.

After this satisfactory compromise I got back into bed, happy at
being spiritually solvent, and repeating: "O God, don't make me wake
in the Old Locker Room; I wish I had someone to talk to."

And almost immediately, as if my prayers were to be answered, I
heard the noise of feet running towards my door. It opened, and
Bickerton, taking no notice of me, walked to the middle of the room,
struck a match, and lit the gas. Returning quickly, he said to
someone else who was approaching: "Oh, there you are. I've lit the
gas. Bring him and get him to bed. Put him beside the other ass for
company." I sat up in my excitement, and with a thrill--first of
elation and then of dismay--saw Stanley enter, bearing a boy, who,
with arms and legs hanging limply downwards, was apparently
lifeless: his fair head was a contrast with Stanley's dark blue
sleeve on which it rested, and his brown eyes, wide open, were
shining in the gas like glass.

Sec.4

In committee that morning Stanley and his colleagues had decided
that Doe had deliberately asked for a Prefects' Whacking, and must
therefore be given an extra severe dose. He should be summoned to
judgment after games. So, just as Doe, who was standing bare-chested
in the changing room, had pushed his head into his vest, a voice,
shouting to him by name, obliged him to withdraw it that he might
see his questioner. It was Pennybet, acting as Nuncius from the
prefects.

"You're in for it, Edgar Doe," said this graceful person, leisurely
taking a seat and watching Doe dress. "I'm Cardinal Pennybet, papal
legate from His Holiness Stanley the Great. Bickerton had the sauce
to send for me and to describe me as a ringleader in all your
abominations. I represented to him that he was a liar, and had