"I didn't exactly say that, sir."
"Yes, you did!" blurted Warren. "He did say it, sir, and he has been trying to get up this fight! It is no use denying it. It began because Rexworth turned him and some more out of the study he shares with Charlton. They say enough unkind things about him," he added. "There was a bit of a bother, and Elgert got knocked over, and he challenged Rexworth to fight him after school to-day. Rexworth, would not do it, and he said that if a fight was forced upon him it should be wherever he chanced to be at that moment. Elgert came here and began sneering and saying unkind things, and then Rexworth struck him, and that is all the truth. I know that I ought to have tried to stop it, but we and the Fifth don't get on well, and so—and so——"
"Because of class rivalry you allowed your companion to fight. It is not right, Warren! Monitors should try to enforce the rules, not to break them. Elgert, you will do me two hundred lines, and be good enough to remember that if I consider any boy fit to become a scholar here it is not for you to make such statements as you appear to have done."
"I only said what my father told me!" sulkily answered Elgert; and the Head frowned.
"What you and your father may say in private is no concern of mine, Elgert," he replied coldly; "what you repeat in public here is another matter, with which I have to do! Do your imposition and bring it to me before class to-morrow, and mind that I have no more of this. You other lads, I will overlook this in your case this time, seeing that it appears that violent provocation was given; but, mind, there must be no more fighting in the playground boundaries! See that I am obeyed!" And the Head turned away.
"Don't think that we have finished yet!" said Horace Elgert, looking darkly at Ralph. "I will have my revenge for this, as sure as you are standing there!" and, with that he went.
And the three Fourth-Form boys went indoors; while the rest of the lads, who had scattered, came back eagerly discussing what punishment the offenders would receive.
And the general verdict was, "It served Elgert right, and that he had no business to have spoken as he had done!"
"But suppose it is right?" queried one lad. "You know, there is something queer about it!"
"Something very queer," said another; "but that story is all nonsense! My dad knows Mr. St. Clive very well, and he told him all the story and how there was plenty of money in Mr. Rexworth's possession. Besides, any one with eyes can see that Rexworth is a gentleman, even if he has some strange ways through living abroad. Elgert is too fond of thinking he is all the world and every one else dirt beneath his feet. It serves him jolly well right!"