r. Our punishment, he
told us, we had deliberately brought on our own heads. Aggravated
insubordination like ours was not to be tolerated in any school. He was
sure we should soon regret and be ashamed of our conduct, if we were not
so already. For his own part he would try to forget the unfortunate
affair, and to think kindly of us both. Mr Ramsbottom would see
Tempest to the station, and the matron would escort me.

"Good-bye, Tempest," said he, holding out his hand.

"Good-bye," said the Dux, not heeding the hand, and walking to the door.

"Good-bye, Jones."

I shook hands. After all, Plummer, I thought, meant to be kind, though
he took an odd way of showing it. I was thankful when the ceremony was
over, and the Dux and I found ourselves with our luggage in the hall
waiting for our cabs.

All at once the old school we were leaving seemed to become dearer than
I had thought.

The hall where we stood was full of the memory of jolly comings and
goings. The field out there seemed to echo with the whizzing of balls
and the war-whoops of combatants. The very schoolroom we had just left,
from which even now came the hum of work in which we were no more to
join, had its pleasant associations of battles fought, friends gained,
difficulties mastered. How I would have liked to run down to get a last
look at the pond, or upstairs for a farewell glance round the dormitory!
But now we were out of it--Dux and I. The place belonged to us no
more. We were outsiders, visitors whose time was up, and whose cabs
were due at the front door at any moment.

And what was it all for?

"If it hadn't been for that beast Hector," said the Dux rather dismally,
"we shouldn't have been out here, Tommy."

He rarely called me by my Christian name. It was always a sign he was
out of sorts.

"I do wish you'd missed him," said I.

"Missed him! What on earth do you mean?"

"Not made such a good shot--that's what I mean."

"Shot! Young Brown, are you crazy?"

"Most likely," said I, beginning to get hot and cold at the same time.
"Why, do you mean to say you didn't, then?"

"Didn't what?"

"Shoot him."

"Shoot him? Me shoot? I no more shot the beast than you did."

The perspiration started to my forehead.

"But the pistol. Dux?"

"What pistol?"

"The one I found in your locker, when I went to get your book, you
know."

"That thing? It's been there all the term. It hasn't even got a
trigger!"

"It's not t