Then Red Dog rose and, unfeelingly, brought the scene back to Rome and the deliberations of the Senate.
But this was a detail that did not interest Dink in the least. He had clashed with The Roman and not retreated. He had his first moment of triumph, attested by the admiring glances of the class and the muffled whisper of Straus, saying:
"Gee, you're a peach!"
The session ended with a solemn warning from The Roman.
"One word," he said in his deepest tones, "just one word to the wise. We have journeyed together for two whole terms; there is only one more between you and reassignment. Candor compels me to say that you have acquired not even a flunking knowledge." He turned and raked the awed ranks with the sweep of a pivot gun, and then took up again in cutting, chilling, spaced syllables: "I have, in the course of my experience as a teacher, had to deal with imbeciles, had to deal with mere idiots; but for sheer, determined, monumental asininity I have never met the equal of this aggregation. I trust this morning's painful, disgraceful, disheartening experience may never, never be repeated. You may go."
And Stover, who had brazenly planned to remain and converse, went swiftly out with the rest, little imagining that he whom he had ranked as a deadly, unforgiving foe sat a long while chuckling over the marvelous route Dink had gone, murmuring gratefully to himself:
"Wherever the wind blew him, Cæsar initiated the orators."
VIII
In the hallway the Coffee-colored Angel jabbed him with his elbow, muttering:
"You laughed at me, you miserable Rinky Dink. I'll fix you for that."