“But what could it have been done for?” debated Mr. Galloway. “There’s no point in the thing, that I can see, to ink and damage a surplice. If the boy to whom it belonged had been inked, one might not have wondered so much.”
“I’ll ‘point him,’” cried the master, “if I catch the right one.”
“Could it have been one of the seniors?” returned the proctor, all his strong interest awakened.
“It was one who ought to have known better,” evasively returned the master. “I can’t stop to talk now, Galloway. I have an errand to do, and must be back to duty at ten.”
He marched off quickly, and Mr. Galloway came indoors again. “Is that the way you get on with your business, Mr. Yorke?”
Yorke clattered to his desk. “I’ll get on with it, sir. I was listening to what the master said.”
“It does not concern you, what he said. It was not one of your brothers who did it, I suppose?”
“No, that it was not,” haughtily spoke Roland Yorke, drawing up his head with a proud, fierce gesture.
Mr. Galloway withdrew to his private room, and for a few minutes silence supervened—nothing was to be heard but the scratching of pens. But Roland Yorke, who had a great antipathy to steady work, and as great a love for his own tongue, soon began again.
“I say, Channing, what an awful blow the dropping of that expected money must be for you fellows! I’m blest if I didn’t dream of it last night! If it spoilt my rest, what must it have done by yours!”