'Absolutely.'
'Mulliner,' said the bishop, 'leave me. I have one or two matters on which I wish to meditate.'
He dressed hastily, his numbed fingers fumbling with his gaiters. It all came back to him now. Yes, he could remember putting the hat on the statue's head. It had seemed a good thing to do at the time, and he had done it. How little we guess at the moment how far-reaching our most trivial actions may be!
The headmaster was over at the school, instructing the Sixth Form in Greek Composition: and he was obliged to wait, chafing, until twelve-thirty, when the bell rang for the half-way halt in the day's work. He stood at the study window, watching with ill-controlled impatience, and presently the headmaster appeared, walking heavily like one on whose mind there is a weight.
'Well?' cried the bishop, as he entered the study.
The headmaster doffed his cap and gown, and sank limply into a chair.
'I cannot conceive,' he groaned, 'what madness had me in its grip last night.'
The bishop was shaken, but he could not countenance such an attitude as this.
'I do not understand you, Headmaster,' he said stiffly. 'It was our simple duty, as a protest against the undue exaltation of one whom we both know to have been a most unpleasant school-mate, to paint that statue.'
'And I suppose it was your duty to leave your hat on its head?'