“Yes, sir.” “How did it happen?” “I can’t think. He must have tripped. The doctor says he is not to be asked any questions and that he is to be kept quite quiet for the next few days.” “Quite so. I suppose you will be going round there, so you can let us know how he is getting on.” “Yes, sir.” The boy went back to his seat. The class had been listening intently. The master looked up and caught sight of my face. “Why, Rank, you have turned quite pale.” Everybody looked at me in surprise. The lack of friendliness between Lionel Holland and myself was generally known, and it certainly astonished them that I should have turned pale out of sympathy for him. He came back to school in about a fortnight looking none the worse for his accident. He was as confident as before and as irritating to me as ever. I heard him explaining the incident in the playground afterwards. “I’ll swear,” he was saying, “that something caught me just above the ankle. I don’t see how I could possibly have tripped otherwise.” “What could it have been?” asked Grainger, the boy who had been timing him. “I can’t think, I am sure, but I’m certain something tripped me up all the same.” “I expect you turned giddy,” said a member of the Lower Fourth. “Giddy? Never was less giddy in my life;” and Holland turned a withering glance upon the small boy that made him retire into the background. He had a way of twisting the arms of small boys, and holding their elbows while he brought his knee sharply into contact with a soft but sensitive part of their bodies, besides many other little devices for making them wish it were possible to grow up suddenly into a strong man with a strong fist. I have always resented cruelty for cruelty’s sake, and petty tormenting with no object in view has invariably impressed me as being supremely silly. It is quite another matter when one is obliged to take a strong step in support of a logical line of action. The end must justify the means. The Jesuits are quite right. All around, Nature teaches us the lesson. An infinite amount of apparent evil is being done that good may come, and even if the end be not a particularly elevated one that surely is a man’s own affair; especially if he be prepared to pay the penalty of supporting his own opinion with action which is against the moral sense of society in general. Sibella’s solicitude during Lionel Holland’s illness was an ample revenge for the latter had he known it. It tortured me. At one time I calculated my chances in a stand-up fight with him supposing I should train for the event. I decided after careful thought that the odds would be against me, and I had no intention of fighting for honour’s sake with the prospect of leaving him more triumphant and complacent than ever. Chapter III