The colonel's glass was empty again. I filled it for him, and he took
a long swallow. "Over all this," he went on, "one can laugh now if one
wills; but this much I can say for us, we were not in a laughing mood,
but altogether dismal. A cadet a rascal--to us that was something
incomprehensible. All faces were pale, all speaking was but half aloud.
Ordinarily it was considered the most despicable piece of meanness if
one cadet reported another to the authorities--but when a cadet had done
such a thing as to steal, then he was for us no longer a cadet, and it
was for this reason that the consultation was being held, whether we
ought to report to the captain what Big L had done.

"Long K was the first to speak. He declared that we ought to go at
once to the captain and tell him everything, for at such meanness all
consideration ceases. Now Long K was the biggest and strongest boy
in the company; his words, therefore, made a marked impression, and
besides, we were all of his opinion at bottom.

"No one knew anything to object to this, and so there fell a general
silence. All at once, however, the circle that had formed around the
table opened and Little L, who had till now been flattening himself
against the farthest corner of the room, came forward into the centre.
His arms hung limp at the side of his body, and his face he kept lowered
to the ground; one saw that he wished to say something, but could not
find the courage.

"Long K was again laying down the law. 'L No. II,' said he, 'has no
right to speak here.'

"But this time he was not so fortunate. He had always been hostile to
the two, no one quite knew why, especially Little L. Moreover, he
was not a bit popular, for as such youngsters have once and for all a
tremendously fine instinct, they may have felt that in this long gawk
lay hidden a perfectly mean, cowardly, wretched spirit. He was one of
those who never venture to attack their equals in size, but bully the
smaller and weaker ones.

"At that broke out a whispering on all sides: 'Little L _shall_ speak!
All the more reason for him to speak.'

"As the little fellow, who was still standing there, ever motionless
and rigid, heard how his comrades were taking his part, suddenly the
big tears rolled down his cheeks; he doubled his two little fists and
screwed them into his eyes and sobbed so heart-breakingly that his whole
body shook from top to bottom and he could not utter a word.

"One of them went up