e receptacle, when
something fell from the pocket of one of the garments with a clatter to
the floor. It was a pistol!

With a face as white and teeth as chattering as if I had seen a ghost, I
instinctively pounced upon the tell-tale weapon, and whisked it, with a
shudder, into my own pocket. Then, with decidedly impaired energy, I
punched the bundle back into its place, slammed down the lid, and
returned to the schoolroom just in time to regain my place before Dr
Plummer made his entry.

"You'll give yourself heart-disease if you rush up and down stairs like
that," said Tempest as I handed him the book. "You look fishier than
ever."

"Latin grammar, juniors," announced the doctor. "Close books. Jones,
stand up and decline _gradus_."

I declined, and fell. The excitements of the past six hours had
demoralised me altogether. I could not remember who or what _gradus_
was--whether it was an active noun or a feminine verb or a plural
conjunction, or what. In vain the faithful Dicky prompted me from
behind and Graham minor from the side. As they both prompted at the
same time, and each suggested different things, I only floundered
deeper. I felt myself smiling vacantly first at one, then at the other,
then at the doctor. I moved one hand feebly behind me in token of my
despairing gratitude to Dicky, and the other I laid convulsively on the
collar of Graham's coat. It was all of no avail, and finally, when I
had almost reached the stage of laughing aloud, my mother wit came to my
rescue and I sat down.

This was the beginning of a tragedy of errors. With the ghost of Hector
haunting us, none of us, except the Dux, who always kept his head, could
do anything. The doctor's favours were lavishly and impartially
distributed. Watkins, the "baby" of the class, made an ingenious
calculation that if all the "lines" which were doled out as the result
of that morning's work were to be extended in one unbroken length, they
would reach exactly from Plummer's desk to the late Hector's kennel.
Hector again! Every one's thoughts veered round to the unlucky
quadruped and the storm that was brewing over his mangled remains.

Morning school passed, however, without any further official
announcement on the subject. When class was dismissed half an hour
earlier than usual, it was tacitly understood that this was in
consequence of the obsequies of the late lamented, which were attended
by the Plummer family and the errand