ed
hostility. At last he could not speak to the boy without losing his
temper, and so for days at a time he would not speak to him at all. At
such times Keith's state of mind presented a riddle hard to solve. He
posed to himself and others as tremendously gratified at being left
alone and not having to answer any bothersome questions. Inwardly,
however, he was more hurt and offended by that neglect than by any other
rebuke the teacher could have devised.

Such a period of suspended communication had lasted more than a week,
when, at the wane of the term, the inevitable explosion
finally occurred.

XIX

The class had just turned in their copybooks with a Latin exercise
prepared at home. Lector Booklund was standing at his desk with the
whole pile in front of him. Keith's book happened to be on top. The
teacher opened it. He sent a glance at Keith that made the boy squirm.
Then, as his eyes ran down the page, his face turned almost purple.
Suddenly he raised the book over his head and threw it on the floor with
such force that the cover was torn off.

A moment of ominous silence followed. Keith was red up to the roots of
his hair.

"Wellander," the teacher roared.

Keith rose none too quickly from his seat without looking up.

"Pick up that thing," Lector Booklund shouted at him with the full force
of his powerful lungs. "I don't want to touch it again."

Keith remained like a statue, feeling now as if he didn't have a drop of
blood left in his whole body.

"Pick it up, I tell you!"

"No," Keith retorted in a strangely self-possessed voice, "you had
better pick it up yourself. I didn't throw it on the floor."

In another moment the teacher was beside Keith, burying his hand in the
boy's hair. Then he pulled and shook, shook and pulled, until the hand
came away with big tufts of hair showing between the fingers.

Again absolute silence reigned for a moment.

"Ugh," blew the teacher, his anger changed to a look of embarrassment.
"I am not going to speak another word to you, Wellander, during the rest
of the term. Sit down!"

Instead of sitting down, Keith walked over to the torn copy book, picked
it up and turned toward Lector Booklund.

"I am going home," he announced almost triumphantly. "You have no right
to hit me or pull my hair out by the roots."

Before the teacher had recovered from his surprise Keith was outside the
door and on his way home.

He didn't know afterwards how he got there, bu