"But—mayn't circumstances be too strong for you?"
This again he considered. "Circumstances are strong," he admitted. "But then, if one's a fool, so are a good many other people. There's always that chance, you see."
He spoke as gently as if he had been speaking to a child, but Louie suddenly found herself wondering whether he had accepted the inevitable after all. This hardly sounded like it. She spoke quietly.
"Nobody thinks you're a fool just because you failed—at least I don't."
"Failed?" he repeated, as if puzzled.... "Oh, you mean the examination! Of course I ought never to have gone in for it. (Oh dear, another bump—I'm afraid you find me hopeless.)"
"Not have gone in for it? Why?"
The lion's eyes looked at her in surprise.
"Why? Why, because I failed." He seemed to consider it an entirely conclusive answer.
"But you'll surely try again?" said Louie.
"Eh? 'Try,' did you say?... Oh, the men who have to try are no good. For that matter it's always the duffers who try the hardest. I admit they pull it off, but then things are arranged so that the duffers can pull them off—have to be, I suppose. But the men who aren't duffers——"