It happened that during the lesson the fire began to smoke, and Mr. Gordon told Owen to open the window for a moment.  No sooner was this done than the mischievous whiff of sea air which entered the room began to trifle and coquet with the perdulous half sheet pinned in front of the desk, causing thereby an unwonted little pattering crepitation.  In alarm, Duncan thoughtlessly pulled out the pin, and immediately the paper floated gracefully over Russell’s head, as he sat at the top of the form, and, after one or two gyrations, fluttered down in the centre of the room.

“Bring me that piece of paper,” said Mr. Gordon, full of vague suspicion.

Several boys moved uneasily, and Eric looked nervously around.

“Did you hear? fetch me that half sheet of paper.”

A boy picked it up and handed it to him.  He held it for a full minute in his hands without a word, while vexation, deep disgust, and rising anger struggled in his countenance.  At last, he suddenly turned full on Eric, whose writing he recognized, and broke out,

“So, Sir! a second time caught in gross deceit.  I should not have thought it possible.  Your face and manners belie you.  You have lost my confidence forever.  I despise you.”

“Indeed, Sir,” said the penitent Eric, “I never meant—­”

“Silence—­you are detected, as cheats always will be.  I shall report you to Dr. Rowlands.”

The next boy was put on, and broke down.  The same with the next, and the next, and the next; Montagu, Graham, Llewellyn, Duncan, Barker, all hopeless failures; only two boys had said it right—­Russell and Owen.

Mr. Gordon’s face grew blacker and blacker.  The deep undisguised pain which the discovery caused him was swallowed up in unbounded indignation.  “False-hearted, dishonorable boys,” he exclaimed, “henceforth my treatment of you shall be very different.  The whole form, except Russell and Owen, shall have an extra lesson every half-holiday; not one of the rest of you will I trust again.  I took you for gentlemen.  I was mistaken.  Go.”  And so saying, he waved them to their seats with imperious disdain.

They went, looking sheepish, and ashamed.  Eric, deeply vexed, kept twisting and untwisting a bit of paper, without raising his eyes, and even Barker thoroughly repented his short-sighted treachery; the rest were silent and miserable.

At twelve o’clock two boys lingered in the room to speak to Mr. Gordon; they were Eric Williams and Edwin Russell, but they were full of very different feelings.

Eric stepped to the desk first.  Mr. Gordon looked up.

“You!  Williams, I wonder that you have the audacity to speak to me.  Go—­I have nothing to say to you!”

“But, sir, I want to tell you that—­”

“Your guilt is only too clear, Williams.  You will hear more of this.  Go, I tell you.”

Eric’s passion overcame him; he stamped furiously on the ground, and burst out, “I will speak, sir; you have been unjust to me for a long time, but I will not be—­”