“Off your luck!—You great discontented, ungrateful bear. Haven’t you got the English prize? Aren’t you in the School Eleven? and didn’t you make top score in the match with the Sixth last Saturday? Whatever do you mean by ‘off your luck’?”
“Oh, it’s not that, you know,” said Oliver, pulling a quill pen to bits. “What I mean is—oh, bother!—a fellow can’t explain it.”
“So it seems,” laughed Wraysford; “but I wish a fellow could, for I’ve not a notion what you’re driving at.”
“Well, I mean I’m not doing much good. There’s that young brother of mine, for instance. What good have I been to him? There have I let him go and do just what he likes, and not looked after him a bit ever since he came here.”
“And I wager he’s got on all the better for not being tied up to your apron strings. He’s a fine honest little chap, is young Greenfield.”
“Oh, I dare say; but somehow I don’t seem to know as much of him now as I used to do before he came here.”
“That’s Loman’s fault, I bet you anything,” exclaimed Wraysford. “I’m sure he won’t do the kid any good. But Rastle was saying only yesterday how well Stephen was getting on in class.”
“Was he? It’s little thanks to me if he is,” said Oliver, gloomily.
“And what else have you got to grumble about?” asked his friend.
“Why, you know how I’m out with the Fifth over that affair with Loman. They all set me down as a coward, and I’m not that.”