ke the pater
remove him, or else think of another plan to get rid of him. Don't you
see, Duffy, I must do one or the other?'

'No, I don't see; and you shan't call me Duffy either, if you mean to
help these wretched cads at Torrington's, and I'll never own you for a
brother again!' His sister spoke calmly, but with the utmost scorn and
contempt in her tones, and then laid her head on the table and burst
into tears. 'I'm ashamed of you, I am!' she sobbed through her tears.

Leonard stared at her in silent amazement for a minute or two, and
then said slowly, 'You don't know this scholarship boy, do you?'

She shook her head. 'Of course I don't,' she said, as soon as she
could speak.

'Then what are you crying for? I'd be ashamed to cry for a fellow I'd
never seen; and you a girl too!'

Florence started to her feet as her brother uttered this taunt; and
dashing away her tears, with blazing eyes she exclaimed, 'It is not
for this strange boy I am crying, but for _you_--that you are as much
a cad as Taylor and the rest!' Then, gathering up her books, she
marched out of the room with the air of an offended duchess.

'Ah, you're only a girl!' exclaimed Leonard as she departed; and he
broke into a whistle, but it soon ended in a sigh, when the door
closed and he was left to himself.

'I wonder what girls are made of,' he said, as he slowly opened his
lesson books. 'To think of Duffy flying at me like that! She called me
a cad too, nasty little thing! I won't speak to her for a week, when
we come in here to lessons. I'll give her a taste of Coventry, and see
how she likes it.' And Leonard set himself to master a Latin verb. But
before he had conned it three minutes his thoughts had wandered to his
sister, and from her to Taylor and the lads at school, who expected
him to solve the problem that they had made into a bogey--how to get
rid of the scholarship boy, since all their efforts thus far had
failed.

Before he got to school the next morning he met half a dozen of his
schoolfellows.

'Well, what's the news, Morrison?' asked two or three in a breath.
'You know, of course, Taylor expects you to bring a message from your
father about that fellow to-day.'

'Blessed are they that expect nothing, for they shall never be
disappointed,' said Leonard in a tantalising tone.

'Well, you can cheek us, of course, little Morrison, but it won't do
for Taylor, let me tell you. He don't mean to stand any nonsense. That
fellow's