artin interviewed Granny after prayers. There had
been a rag in the prep. A mouse had escaped from Granny's desk and had
been the target of many marksmen. The air had been positively black
with hurtling dictionaries. The mouse of course escaped and the
missiles struck human flesh, compelling recrimination and redress.

"The mouse came out of your desk," said Martin.

"Please, I didn't put it there," whined Granny.

"I don't care. You must have known it was there when you got your
books out."

"It may have been asleep," suggested Granny with sudden brilliance.

"Rot!"

"Well, I read in a book that mice sleep fourteen hours out of
twenty-four. Anyhow I didn't notice it. It's got to put in its
fourteen hours some time."

"The fact remains," said Martin, "that you're responsible for the
contents of your desk."

"If another chap puts a mouse in your desk, I don't see----"

Martin was tired of the squalid haggling. But what was he to do? On
his own theories, he ought to give Granny the benefit of the doubt and
let him go. That was plainly the idealist's course. But there was
Rayner's advice: should he yield to the claim of expediency and try it?
Suddenly the impudent whine of Granny's voice became intolerable and he
determined to be stern.

But the subsequent swiping was, as Granny told the workroom, sketchy
and amateurish.

Presently Dickinson knocked at Martin's study.

"Please," he said, "I put that mouse in Gransby-Williams' desk."

Martin, who was just beginning to repent of his fall from idealism,
turned upon him in despair. "Why the deuce didn't you own up at once?"
he demanded.

"You never asked who did it."

"I did."

"Well, I couldn't hear. There was such a row going on."

That was a stinging retort for Martin: he was certainly getting the
worst of it. And Granny was in a strong position, a painfully strong
position. Fortunately, however, Martin acted wisely: he was faithful
to the new policy, forswore his ideals, and swiped Dickinson.
Moreover, his second effort was more thorough, and Dickinson
sorrowfully maintained that this talk about sketchy and amateurish
methods was a delusion: the blighter, he said, was an artist.

On the next day Granny, the martyr, organised a meeting of protest.
Rayner, hearing of it, asked Martin for an explanation.

"That's capital," he said when he had heard the story. "You've been
thoroughly unjust, and now you can go on damping Granny with a f