Browne had left us suddenly. One day he had been the life and soul of Draven’s, next morning he had been summoned to Draven’s study, and that same evening we saw him drive off to the station in a cab with his portmanteau on the top.
Very few of the fellows knew why he had been expelled. I scarcely knew myself, though I was his greatest chum. On the morning of the day he left, he met me on his way back from Draven’s study.
“I’m expelled, Smither,” he said, with a dismal face.
“Go on,” replied I, taking his arm and scrutinising his face to see where the joke was hidden. But it was no joke.
“I am,” said he hopelessly: “I am to go this evening. It’s my own fault. I’ve been a cad. I was led into it. It’s bad enough; but I’m not such a blackleg as Draven makes out—”
And here for the first time in my life I saw Browne look like breaking down.
He wasn’t going to let me see it, and hurried away before I could find anything to say.
If he hadn’t told me himself, I should have called any one who told me Browne had been a cad—well, I’d better not say what I should have called him. I knew my chum had been a rollicking sort of fellow, who found it hard to say No to anybody who asked anything of him; but that he was a blackleg I, for one, would not believe, for all the Dravens in the world.
Hardly knowing what I did, I walked up to the master’s study door and knocked.
“Come in.” I could tell by the voice that came through the door I should do no good.