correct
style in trousers, spats, and white waistcoats has thought better of it.
Gave it up in order to get some experience of desert islands and punting
in company with the aforesaid Missing Link. Experience disastrous and
not likely to be repeated. Has since taken to stamp-collecting and
ping-pong."

Then, among the usual notices of "Lost, stolen, or strayed," appeared
the following:

"Pages from the Black Book still missing. Greatest loss of all--the old
flag of the school. It waves over the school no longer. We have doffed
the cap and bells, and gone into sackcloth and ashes. Our heart is
heavy. We can smile no longer. We can only whistle one tune--the Dead
March. Our heart will continue heavy. Our noble frontispiece will never
beam again. Our lips will continue to warble the same melancholy tune
until the old flag once more waves over Garside!"

Stripped of its note of bombast, this last paragraph echoed pretty
accurately the feeling of the Garsiders at the loss of their flag. Their
pride had been more sorely wounded even than it had been by the affair
at the sand-pit. They had been flouted and dishonoured, and, though no
proof was forthcoming, they felt sure that this insult had been placed
upon them by their rivals--at St. Bede's.

Paul, meantime, had seen nothing of Hibbert since the day when his
confession had been interrupted by Mr. Weevil. Frequently he recalled
that strange scene--the boy's eerie-looking, pain-drawn face, the sad
eyes fixed on his, the earnest voice, with its suppressed note of
fear--as he began to unfold to him the secret that weighed upon his
heart and conscience. It seemed so real, yet so unreal. The face looking
up into his seemed real enough. It was the words he could not make sure
of. Hibbert must have been wandering.

At any rate, he had not sent for him since the afternoon he had spoken
such strange words, and that was nearly a week since.

"Of course, he was wandering, poor little chap, and has forgotten all
about it by this time. I shall have a good laugh with him about it when
he gets on his legs again," he told himself.

It was the sixth day after the accident on the river that Paul was
informed by Bax that a visitor wished to see him in the visitors' room.
A visitor! Who could it be? Paul had very few visitors to see him.

"Ah, it's Mr. Moncrief; come at last in answer to my letter!" he
thought, as he made his way to the room.

He was doomed to disappointment, howeve