CHAPTER III.
The Cock of the Walk.
'I say, Duffy, there's an awful row among the fellows at school; Taylor and Curtis are like raging bulls over this new fellow, and they say it's all the pater's fault.'
The brother and sister were sitting at their lessons in the little room known as the study, as they sat when this story opened. Several weeks, however, had elapsed since that time, and Florence, having her own cares and interests to think of, had well-nigh forgotten how she had been appealed to in the matter of the new boy.
'What are you talking about, Len?' she asked, after a pause, during which she had been muttering over a French verb, with her hand covering the page, by way of testing whether she knew her lesson.
'That's like a girl!' answered her brother tartly. 'I have told you more than once or twice about that new boy at Torrington's, and now you ask me what I am talking about.'
'Oh, well, I didn't know he was so interesting as all that. You told me a week or two ago that you had sent him to Coventry and settled him, and so of course I thought it was all over,' said the young lady, propping her chin in her hands and looking across at her brother.
'But if a fellow won't be settled, what are you to do? I want you to tell me that, Duffy.'