“Did you speak?” he said.
“Will you—oh, never mind, I'll do it myself,” muttered Ferrers, rising and going into the class-room himself.
Louis had become again so intent upon his study, that he was hardly aware of the return of his school-fellow, nor did he notice the precipitation with which he hurried into his place, and half hid the book he had brought with him, a book that he imagined to be a key to his exercises, but which, in fact, was a counterpart to that taken away from Harrison, though bound exactly like the one Ferrers had gone for, and so nearly the same size as easily to be mistaken for it in the confusion attendant on the abstraction of it.
Just at this moment, Hamilton, Trevannion, and Salisbury, with one or two more of the first class, entered from the playground, and walked directly across to Ferrers.
Alive to all the disgrace of being found by his class-fellows in possession of a key, and unable to return it unobserved, Ferrers, in the first moment of alarm, tried to push it into the desk at which he was writing, but finding it locked, he stood up with as much self-possession as he could assume, and pretending to be looking among his books and papers, managed, unobserved, to pass the obnoxious volume over to Louis' heap of books, laying it half under one of them. Louis was wholly unconscious of the danger so near him, and did not raise his held from his absorbing occupation when the fresh comers approached the desk.
“Ferrers,” said Salisbury, as they came up, “we want your advice on a small matter; come with us into the class-room.”
Accordingly Ferrers obeyed, glad to leave the dangerous spot, and Louis was left in undisturbed possession of the apartment for more than half an hour, at the end of which time the party returned from the inner room laughing, and all walked out of doors. Just as they passed out, Mr. Witworth, the usher, approached Louis, and asked him if he could lend him a pencil. Louis laid his pen down, and began to search his pockets for a pencil he knew should be there, when he was startled by the ejaculation of the master:
“Hey!—what!—This is it, is it? So I have found you out, sir.”
Louis looked up in alarm. “Found me out, sir?” he said, in a terrified tone: “what have I done?”
“Done!” exclaimed Mr. Witworth,—“done, indeed: what are you doing there?”