ed to mind the unflagging
manner in which Oliver had worked at his paper that morning, covering
sheet upon sheet with his answers, and scarcely drawing in until time
was up. It didn't look like losing, this.

He threw himself back in his chair in sheer misery. "I would sooner
have done the thing myself," groaned he to himself, "than Oliver." Then
suddenly he added, "But it's not true! I'm certain of it! He couldn't
do it! I'll never believe it of him!"

Poor Wraysford! It was easier to say the generous words than feel them.

Pembury looked in presently with a face far more serious and overcast
than he usually wore.

"I say, Wray," said he, in troubled tones, "I'm regularly floored by all
this. Do you believe it?"

"No, I don't," replied Wraysford, but so sadly and hesitatingly that had
he at once confessed he did, he could not have expressed his meaning
more plainly.

"I'd give anything to be sure it was all false," said Pembury, "and so
would a lot of the fellows. As for that fool Simon--"

"Bah!" exclaimed Wraysford, fiercely, "the fellow ought to be kicked
round the school."

"He's getting on that way already, I fancy," said Pembury. "I was
saying I'd think nothing at all about it if what he says was the only
thing to go by, but--well, you saw what a state Greenfield got into
about it?"

"Maybe he was just in a sudden rage with the fellow for thinking of such
a thing," said Wraysford.

"It looked like something more than rage," said Pembury, dismally,
"something a good deal more."

Wraysford said nothing, but fidgeted in his chair. A long silence
followed, each busy with his own thoughts and both yearning for any sign
of hope. "I don't see what good it could have done him if he did take
the paper. He'd have no time to cram it up yesterday. He was out with
you, wasn't he, all the afternoon?"

"No," said Wraysford, not looking up, "he had a headache and stayed in."

Pembury gave a low whistle of dismay.

"I say, Wray," said he, presently, "it really does look bad, don't you
think so yourself?"

"I don't know what to think," said Wraysford, with a groan; "I'm quite
bewildered."

"It's no use pretending not to see what's as plain as daylight," said
Pembury, as he turned and hobbled away.

The Fifth meanwhile had been holding a sort of court-martial on the
affair.

Simon was made to repeat his story once more, and stuck to it too, in
spite of all the browbeating he got.

"What make