e pay off the score now?

Loman saw him, and changed colour. He evidently guessed what was
passing through his enemy's mind, for a quick flush came to his face and
an angry scowl to his brow.

Oliver for one moment slackened pace. Then suddenly there came upon him
a vision of Stephen's appealing face as he interceded that afternoon for
the boy who had done him such mischief, and that vision settled the
thing.

Hurriedly resuming his walk, Oliver passed Loman with averted eyes, and
went on his way.

"Well?" said Stephen, in the midst of undressing, as his brother entered
the dormitory.

"He wasn't there. I'll see him in the morning," said Oliver.
"Good-night, Stee."

"Good-night, Noll, old man! I say, you are a brick to me!" and as the
boy spoke there was a tremble in his voice which went straight to his
brother's heart.

"You are a brick to me!" A pretty "brick" he had been, letting the
youngster drift anywhere--into bad company, into bad ways, without
holding out a hand to warn him; and in the end coming to his help only
by accident, and serving him by undertaking a task which would quite
possibly result in his expulsion from the school.

A brick, indeed! Oliver went off to his own bed that night more
dispirited and dissatisfied with himself than he had ever felt before.
And all through his dreams his brother's troubled face looked up at him,
and the trembling voice repeated, again and again, "You are a brick to
me--a brick to me!"

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.

THE NIGHTINGALE EXAMINATION.

The next morning early, before breakfast, Oliver joined the Doctor in
his study, and made a clean breast to him there and then of Stephen's
delinquencies. He had evidently taken the right step in doing so, for,
hearing it all thus frankly confessed by the elder brother, Dr Senior
was disposed to take a much more lenient view of the case than he would
had the information come to him through any other channel.

But at its best the offence was a grave one, and Oliver more than once
felt anxious at the sight of the head master's long face during the
narrative. However, when it was all over his fears were at once
dispelled by the doctor saying, "Well, Greenfield, you've done a very
proper thing in telling me all this; it is a straightforward as well as
a brotherly act. Your brother seems to have been very foolish, but I
have no doubt he has got a lesson. You had better send him to me after
morning service."

And