Loman went his way to his study, feeling that the mask was pretty nearly off his face at last, and that Saint Dominic's knew him almost as he really was. Yet did they know all? As Loman passed Greenfield's study he stopped and peeped in at the door. The owner was sitting in his armchair, with his feet upon the mantelpiece, laughing over a volume of _Pickwick_ till the tears came. And yet the crime Oliver was suspected of was theft and lying? Was it not strange--must it not have struck Loman as strange, in all his misery, that any one under such a cloud as Greenfield could think of laughing, while _he_, under a cloud surely no greater, felt the most miserable boy alive! CHAPTER TWENTY NINE. A QUEER PRIZE-DAY. The long Christmas term crawled slowly on unsatisfactorily to everybody. It was unsatisfactory to Loman, who, after the football match, discovered that what little popularity or influence he ever had was finally gone. It was unsatisfactory to Wraysford, who, not knowing whether to be ashamed of himself or wroth with his old friend, settled down to be miserable for the rest of the term. It was unsatisfactory to the Fifth, who felt the luck was against them, and that the cloud overhead seemed to have stuck there for good. It was unsatisfactory to Stephen, who raged and fretted twenty times a day on his brother's behalf, and got no nearer putting him right than when he began. And undoubtedly it must have been unsatisfactory to Oliver, a banished man, forgetting almost the use of tongue and ears, and, except his brother, not being able to reckon on a single friend at Saint Dominic's outside the glorious community of the Guinea-pigs. In fact, the only section in the school to whom the term was satisfactory, was these last-named young gentlemen and their sworn foes, the Tadpoles. Now, at last, they had a clear issue before them--Greenfield senior, was he a hero or was he a blackguard? There was no mistaking sides there. There was no unpleasant possibility of having to make common cause and proclaim an armistice. No! on the question of Greenfield senior, Guinea-pigs and Tadpoles had something to fight about from morning till night, and therefore _they_, at any rate, were happy! "Jellicott," said Dr Senior one day, as the masters met for five minutes' talk in the head master's study, "Greenfield in the Fifth is not well, I'm afraid. I never see him out in the playground." "Really?" said Mr Jellicott. "I'm so rarely out there that I haven't noticed. I believe, however, he is quite well." "I hope he is not overworking," said the Doctor. "He has done so very well this term that it would be a pity if he spoiled his chance by knocking himself up." "Greenfield senior," put in Mr Rastle, "appears to be unpopular just at present; at least, so I gather from what I have heard. I don't know what crime he has committed, but the tribunal of his class have been very severe on him, I fancy." The Doctor laughed.