“There’s the Doctor,” he said; “let me pass.”
All the boys stood up as the master majestically moved over to the fireplace and kicked the logs into a blaze. Then he faced round suddenly, and spoke in his peculiarly clear, decisive tones. “There has been an act of great disobedience perpetrated here during the last twenty-four hours,” he said. “Crawley overheard me speaking on the subject to Mr Barclay, and has probably told you what it is. I had, as you all know, given strict orders that the boat was not to be taken on the river by any of the boys, and this morning it was found outside the boathouse tied to a stake. There is no doubt that one of my boys did this, and the only reparation he can make is to own his fault at once, and take the punishment!”
There was dead silence.
One heart in the room was beating like a sledge-hammer against the Eton jacket that enclosed it, but no one spoke. Only Haggart turned his head, and looked again at the fourth-form boys, and as if they were under a spell, the grey eyes, full of terrified entreaty, were lifted to his. He tried to forget the look. He wished he could make that foolish chap understand that a caning was nothing, after all! All fellows worth their salt got caned at school. Well, after all, he had to take his chance with the others, but he wished he would not keep looking across at him in that beastly way, as if he had the keeping of his conscience!
“Well?” said the Doctor.
But no one spoke.
“I am sorry,” said the Doctor more quietly, “that the boy who did it has not had the courage to own up, but I will give him another chance. I will take every boy’s separate answer, and, after that, the whole school will be kept in the playground until the end of the term, unless the guilty boy will take the punishment on himself.”
Haggart’s face was very anxious as he, too, leant forth to see the fourth-form fellows, but all he could catch a sight of was a smooth, fair head that had drooped very low.
The Doctor, with a disappointed face, turned to the senior class. “It seems hardly necessary to go through the form,” he said. “I think I can count on my senior boys. You, Crawley? You, Brown? You, Haggart?”
“I did it,” said Haggart, in a clear, loud voice, and the Doctor’s outstretched finger fell.