Mr Deane bore all very patiently, though, and a reproachful word or two about inattention and condensation of thought upon study was all that escaped him.
At last, to Vince’s horror, things came to a kind of climax, for Mike suddenly looked across the table at the tutor, and said quickly:—
“I say, Mr Deane!”
The tutor looked up at once.
“I want to ask you a question in—in—something—”
“Mathematics?” suggested the tutor.
“N–no,” said Mike: “I think it must be in law or social economy. I don’t know, though, what you would call it.”
“Well: let me hear.”
“Suppose anybody discovered a great store of smuggled goods, hidden in a—some place. Whom would it belong to?”
“To the people who put it there, of course.” Vince’s eyes almost blazed as he turned them upon the questioner.