Keith rose none too quickly from his seat without looking up.
"Pick up that thing," Lector Booklund shouted at him with the full force of his powerful lungs. "I don't want to touch it again."
Keith remained like a statue, feeling now as if he didn't have a drop of blood left in his whole body.
"Pick it up, I tell you!"
"No," Keith retorted in a strangely self-possessed voice, "you had better pick it up yourself. I didn't throw it on the floor."
In another moment the teacher was beside Keith, burying his hand in the boy's hair. Then he pulled and shook, shook and pulled, until the hand came away with big tufts of hair showing between the fingers.
Again absolute silence reigned for a moment.
"Ugh," blew the teacher, his anger changed to a look of embarrassment. "I am not going to speak another word to you, Wellander, during the rest of the term. Sit down!"
Instead of sitting down, Keith walked over to the torn copy book, picked it up and turned toward Lector Booklund.
"I am going home," he announced almost triumphantly. "You have no right to hit me or pull my hair out by the roots."