Chapter Four.
Concerning an Adventure.
Mr Sefton did not immediately repair to the big schoolroom. When he did, however, the half-dozen delinquents were at work on their imposition. He strolled round apparently aimlessly, then peered into the fifth form room, where sat Haviland, writing his.
Haviland was not at first aware of the master’s presence. An ugly frown was on his face, for he was in fact beginning the extra two hundred lines of which we have made mention. It was a half-holiday, and a lovely afternoon, and but for this he would have been out and away over field and down. He felt that he had been treated unfairly, and it was with no amiable expression of countenance that he looked up, and with something of a start became aware of the master’s presence.
“Sit still, Haviland,” said the latter kindly, strolling over to the desks. “Have you nearly done your imposition?”
“I’ve done it quite, sir, but you can always reckon on having to do a third of it over again when it’s for the Doctor,” he added with intense bitterness.
“Look here, you mustn’t talk like that,” rejoined Mr Sefton briskly, but there was a kindliness underlying his sharp tones which the other’s ear was quick to perceive. They were great friends these two, and many an informal chat had they had together. It involved no favouritism either. Let Haviland break any rule, accidentally or not, within Mr Sefton’s jurisdiction, and the imposition entailed was not one line shorter than that set to anybody else under like circumstances, as he had reason to know by experience. Yet that made no difference in his regard for this particular master.
“Well, it’s hard luck all the same, sir,” he now replied. “However, this time I’ve got off cheap with only a couple of hundred over again. But it has done me out of this afternoon.”
Mr Sefton had hoisted himself on to one of the long desks and sat swinging his legs and his stick.