No answer.
“Do speak, Cripps; say you will; please do!”
Cripps only laughed and went on whistling.
“Oh, what shall I do, what shall I do?” cried the wretched boy. “I shall be ruined if you don’t have some pity—”
“Look here,” said Cripps, curtly, “you’d better stop that noise here, my lad. You can go; do you hear? Look alive.”
It was no use staying further. Loman went What anguish he endured for the next twenty-four hours no one knows. What plans he turned in his head, what wild schemes, what despair, what terrors filled him, only he himself could tell. Every moment he expected the fatal vision of Cripps at Saint Dominic’s, and with it his own certain disgrace and ruin, and, as time went on, his perturbation became so great that he really felt ill with it.
But Cripps did not come that day or the next. The next day was one of mighty excitement in Saint Dominic’s. The result of the examination for the Waterston Exhibition was announced.
Had any other three boys but those actually taking part been the competitors, few outsiders would have felt much interest in the result of an ordinary examination confined to Sixth Form boys. But on this occasion, as we have seen, the general curiosity was aroused. No one expected much of Loman. The school had discovered pretty well by this time that he was an impostor, and their chief surprise had been that he should venture into the list against two such good men as Oliver and Wraysford.
But which of those two was to win? That was the question. Every one but a few had been positive it would be Wraysford, whom they looked upon as the lawful winner of the Nightingale last term, and whom, they were convinced, Oliver was unable to beat by fair means. And yet to these it had been a great astonishment to hear that Oliver had entered for the examination. Unless he was certain of winning he would only do himself harm by it, and confirm the suspicions against him. And yet, if he should win after all—if he was able fairly to beat Wraysford—why should he have gone to the trouble last term of stealing the examination paper and making himself the most unpopular boy in all Saint Dominic’s?
These questions sorely exercised the school, and made them await eagerly the announcement of the result.