But he could not, and so left the room as soon as it was possible to escape, and retired disconsolately to his own study. As for the Fifth, Pembury's advice prevailed with them. There were a few who were still disposed to take their revenge on Oliver in a more marked manner than by merely cutting him; but a dread of the tongue of the editor of the _Dominican_, as well as a conviction of the uselessness of such procedure, constrained them to give way and fall in with the general resolution. One boy only was intractable. That was Simon. It was not in the poet's nature to agree to cut anybody. When the class dispersed he took it into his gifted head to march direct to Oliver's study. Oliver was there, writing a letter. "Oh, I say, you know," began Simon, nervously, but smiling most affably, "all the fellows are going to cut you, you know, Greenfield. About that paper, you know, the time I met you coming out of the Doctor's study. But _I_ won't cut you, you know. We'll hush it all up, you know, Greenfield; upon my word we will. But the fellows think--" "That will do!" said Oliver, angrily. "Oh, but you know, Greenfield--" "Look here, if you don't get out of my study," said Oliver, rising to his feet, "I'll--" Before he could finish his sentence the poet, who after all was one of the best-intentioned jackasses in Saint Dominic's, had vanished. CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE. LOMAN IN LUCK. While we have been talking of Oliver and Wraysford, and of the manner in which the results of the Nightingale examination affected them and the class to which they belonged, the reader will hardly have forgotten that there was another whose interest in that result was fully as serious and fully as painful. Loman had been counting on gaining the scholarship to a dead certainty. From the moment when it occurred to him he would be able to free himself of his money difficulties with Cripps by winning it, he had dismissed, or seemed to dismiss, all further anxiety from his mind. He never doubted that he in the Sixth could easily beat the two boys in the Fifth; and though, as we have seen, he now and then felt a sneaking misgiving on the subject, it never seriously disturbed his confidence. Now, however, he was utterly floored. He did not need to wait for the announcement of the results to be certain he had not won, for he had known his fate the moment his eyes glanced down the questions on the paper on the morning of examination. At his last interview with Cripps that memorable Saturday afternoon, he had promised confidently to call at the Cockchafer next Thursday with the news of the result, as a further guarantee for the payment of the thirty pounds, never doubting what that result would be. How was he to face this interview now?