Browne’s friend too, stepping in this cold-blooded way into his place. Sadgrove was put up to construe, so there was no opportunity for further conversation, had we desired it.

I wasn’t surprised that Potter avoided me in the playground after school. He guessed, I supposed, what I had to say to him, and had the decency to be ashamed of himself. However, I was determined to have it out, and that evening, after preparation, went up to his study. He was there, and looked guilty enough when he saw me.

“Look here, Potter,” I began, trying to be friendly in spite of all. I got no further, for Potter, without a word, walked out of the door, leaving me standing alone in the middle of his study.

I had seen the working of a guilty conscience once or twice before at Draven’s, but never knew it to work in quite so strange a manner as it did with Potter that evening.

There was nothing for it but to give him up as a bad job, and go to bed. Which I did; and awoke next morning in a forgiving mood.

It was always a scramble at breakfast on Saturdays at Draven’s to see who could get nearest to the ham, for we sickened of the cold mutton they gave us on other days. This morning, to my gratification, I was “well up.” That is, there were only two fellows before me, so that at any rate I was good for a fair, straight slice from the middle.

“Huzza!” said I, crowding up to Williams, who was next above me. “I’ve never had anything but knuckle all this—”

Williams faced round as he heard my voice; and then, without waiting to hear the end of my sentence, got up and took a seat at the lower end of the table.

“Poor beggar’s out of sorts,” said I to myself. “Another of his bilious attacks, I suppose,” I added, moving up to his seat and addressing the proud occupant of the carver’s chair. This fellow was Harrison, whom, next to Browne, we counted the oiliest fellow at Draven’s. He could sing, and make puns, and though a long way behind Browne, was a popular, jovial companion.

He appeared not to hear my remark, but, hitching his chair a little away, began deliberately to carve a slice of ham.

He took a long time about it, and I watched him patiently till he was done. It was a prime ham, I could see, and, ashamed as I am to confess it, it made me feel amiable to all the world to find it was so.

“If they were all like this—” I began.

“There’s room here, Harrison, old man,” Williams called up the table.

Whereupon Harrison, plate in hand, went down to keep Williams company, leaving me for the first time in my life “top-hammer.”

Somehow I did not enjoy the dignity quite as much as I should have expected. I was sorry Harrison had gone, for I wanted to speak to him about Potter, and I could not help fancying, from his unusual manner, that he was put out about something, and I thought he might have told me about it instead of chumming up to Williams. However, I was hungry, and took my slice of ham and passed the dish along to the fellow next me, who sat below the two empty chairs up which I had risen.

It was rather a solitary meal, and I was glad when it was over and the bell rang for first school. There at least I should have the society of the sympathetic Sadgrove, who, as I knew, felt as sore as I did about Potters behaviour.

But, to my mortification as well as perplexity, Sadgrove I found, had cleared out his desk and removed his goods and chattels to a seat on the row behind mine, where he appeared to have met with a cordial welcome from his new neighbours.

I could not make it out. He always told me he liked his desk better than any, and would not change it even for Browne’s. And here he was, for no apparent reason, on a lower form, at a smaller desk, and in—well, less select society.

As I sat in my place that morning, with an empty desk on each side of me, it began slowly to dawn on my mind that something was wrong somewhere.

The proceedings of Odger junior, Potter, Sadgrove, Williams, and Harrison, taken singly, were not of much importance, but taken as a whole I did not like them. I might be wrong. There might be no intention to cut me, and I could not think of anything I had done or said which would account for it. I would try, at any rate, to get to the bottom of it before I was many hours older.

So I went in search of my cousin, who was a few months my senior, and a particular chum of Williams.

“I say, Arthur, what did Williams cut me dead for this morning?”

Arthur looked uncomfortable and said—

“How should I know?”

“You do know,” said I, “and I want to know why.”

He coloured up, and made as though he would leave room. But my blood was up, and I stepped across door.

“Tell me this,” I said. “Have these fellows cut on purpose or no?”

“However should—”

“You do know. Are they cutting me or no?”

He flushed up again, and then said hurriedly—

“Yes, we are!”

Story 1.

Chapter Two.

I am Beaten.

“Yes, we are.”

The reader may think it strange when I tell him that my first sensation on receiving this momentous announcement was one of almost amusement, I knew it was a mistake, and that I had done nothing to merit the sentence which had been passed upon me. Draven’s had put itself in the wrong, and I had pride enough to determine that I of all people was not going out of my way to put it right.

So I took my cousin’s announcement coolly, and refrained from demanding any further explanations.

“Oh!” I said, with something like a sneer, and walked off; leaving him, so I flattered myself, rather snubbed.

I was boycotted!

There was something a trifle flattering in the situation. Brave men before my time had been boycotted. I had read their stories, and sympathised with them, and hated (as I hate still) the miscreants who, in the name of “patriotism” had acted the sneak’s and coward’s part to ruin them. Now I was going to taste something of their hardships at the hands of my “patriotic” schoolfellows; and my spirit rose as I resolved to hold up my head with the bravest of them.

Forewarned is forearmed; and when I went into school that afternoon I gave no one a chance of avoiding me. I spread myself out as comfortably as possible at my place, and shifted some of the papers and books which crowded my own desk into the vacant desks on either side of me, first ejecting rather ostentatiously a few papers and notebooks which had been left in them by their late owners.

I was conscious of one or two glances directed my way across the room; but these only added to my pleasure as I emptied Sadgrove’s inkpot into my own, and proceeded cheerfully to cut my initials on Williams’s desk. When I was put up to construe, I managed to get through my passage without any sign of trepidation; and when at last the class was dismissed, I took the wind out of the sails of my boycotters by remaining some minutes later than any one else, completing the decoration of my new quarters.

It was easy enough in the playground that afternoon to keep clear of my fellow human beings; and I had, as I persuaded myself, a jolly hour in the gymnasium all by myself. Fellows looked in at the door now and then, but did not disturb my peace; and it was rather gratifying than otherwise to feel that as long as I chose to occupy the place every one else would have to wait outside.

“After all,” thought I, as I went to bed that night, “boycotting isn’t as bad as people make it out. I’ve had all I wanted to-day. No one has annoyed me or injured me. I can do pretty much as I like; in fact, I do more than I ever used to be able to do. If any one is loser by it all, it’s the other fellows, and not me. I rather enjoy it.

“Still,” I could not help reflecting; as I turned over and went to sleep, “I think Harrison