“Because I did not choose, if you want to know,” replied Oliver, shortly.
“Oh! I beg your pardon,” replied Simon, rather taken aback by this brusque answer.
This was not satisfactory. Had the offender been a Guinea-pig, one could have understood the thing; but when it was a Sixth Form fellow—a good match in every respect, as well as a rival—the Fifth were offended at their man for drawing back as he had done.
“I suppose you will fight him?” said Ricketts, in a voice which implied that there was no doubt about it.
“Do you?” replied Oliver, briefly.
The boy’s manner was certainly not winsome, and, when once put out, it was evident he took no trouble to conceal the fact. He refused to answer any further questions on the subject, and presently quitted the room, leaving more than half his class-fellows convinced that, after all, he was a coward.
An angry discussion followed his departure.
“He ought to be made to fight, whether he likes or not,” said Braddy the bully.
“Some one ought to pay Loman out,” suggested Ricketts, “if Greenfield doesn’t.”
“A nice name we shall get, all of us,” said Bullinger, “when it gets abroad all over the school.”