“I sent you to your college yesterday evening; did you go straight home?”
“No, sir.”
“How was that, Mr. Brown?”
Tom made no answer, and the proctor looked at him steadily for a few seconds, and then repeated.
“How was that?”
“Well, sir,” said Tom, “I don't mean to say I was going straight to college, but I should have been in long before you sent, only I fell in with the mob again, and then there was a cry that you were coming. And so-” He paused.
“Well,” said the proctor, with a grim sort of curl about the corners of his mouth.
“Why, I ran away, and turned into the first place which was open, and stopped till the streets were quiet.”
“A public house, I suppose.”
“Yes, sir; 'The Choughs.'”