'Not returned!'
'No. Nobody knows where he is. You were probably the last to see him. What happened when you and he started for the long run this afternoon? You lost sight of the rest, did you not?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Well?'
'And Thomson dropped out.'
'Ah.' This from the Headmaster.
'Yes, sir. He said he couldn't go any farther. He told me to go on. And, of course, I did, as it was a race. I advised him to go back to the House and change. He looked regularly done up. I think he ran too hard in the mile yesterday.'
The Head spoke.
'I thought that some such thing must have happened. Where was it that he dropped out, Welch?'
'It was just as we came to a long ploughed field, sir, by the side of a big wood.'