“Yes, but not brutality.”
“You have evidently been misinformed as to the character of my discipline. It is firm, but parental.”
“Dr. Musgrave,” retorted August Locke, with a disgust which he could not conceal, “you forget that I was a former pupil of yours. Of all the abominable tyrants to be found in English schools, I think you carry off the palm.”
“I had hoped, Mr. Locke—I remember you now—that your maturer judgment would have enabled you to understand the reason of my occasional severity. My own conscience justifies me in what I have done.”
“Then you have a peculiar conscience; that is all I have to say.”
“If this boy—as I can hardly believe—represents Bell’s guardian, I will describe to him the flagrant acts of disobedience of which his ward has been guilty. Surely he will not justify a pupil in running away from his school!”
“Under the circumstances I do, sir.”
“I trust you will leave Bell here till the end of the term, four weeks hence.”
Vivian Bell looked alarmed.
“I must decline to do so, Dr. Musgrave.”