“Now from the other court came the officer who was on duty and broke his way through the cadets. ‘L No. II, will you leave off at once!’ he thundered--for he was a man tall as a tree and had a voice that could be heard from one end of the Academy to the other, and we had a wholesome respect for him. “But Little L neither heard nor saw, but kept on belaboring Long K in the face still more, and with it came again and again that fearful uncanny shriek that thrilled through us all, marrow and bone. “When the officer saw that he took hold himself, gripped the little fellow by both shoulders, and by main force tore him away from Long K. “As soon as he stood upon his feet, however, Little L rolled up the whites of his eyes, fell his full length to the earth, and writhed on the ground in a convulsion. “We had never yet seen anything like it, and were shocked and stared at it in absolute terror. “But the officer, who had been bending down over him, now straightened himself: ‘The lad certainly has a most serious convulsion,’ said he. ‘Forward, two take hold of his feet’--he himself lifted him under the arms--over to the infirmary!’ “And so they bore Little L over to the infirmary. “While they were carrying him there we went up to Big L to learn just what had happened, and from Big L and the other two who had been with Long K we then heard the whole story. “Long K was standing there like a whipped dog and wiping the blood from his nose, and had it not been for this nothing would have saved him from receiving another murderous thrashing. But now all turned silently away from him, no one ever spoke another word to him; he made himself a social outcast.” The top of the table resounded as the old colonel struck it with his fist. “How long the others kept him in Coventry,” said he, “I know not. I sat in class with him for a whole year longer and spoke never a single word more to him. We entered the army at the same time as ensigns; I did not give him my hand at parting; do not know whether he has become an officer; have never looked for his name in the army register; don’t know whether he has fallen in one of the wars, whether he still lives or is dead--for me he was no more, is no more---the only thing I regret is that the person ever came into my life at all and that I can not root out the remembrance of him, forever, like a weed one flings into the oven! “The next morning came bad news from the infirmary. Little L was lying unconscious in a burning, nervous fever. In the afternoon his older brother was called in, but the little fellow no longer recognized him. “And in the evening, as we all sat at supper in the big common dining-hall, a rumor came--like a great black bird with muffled beat of wings it passed through the hall--that Little L was dead.