He turned down the light and went out. His footsteps died out down the passage. "Damn!" said Gordon. "_In excelsis gloria_," said Davenport. "And it was a rotten crib, too," said Gordon. By next morning the story was all round the school. "You will be birched for certain," was Tester's cheerful comment, "and serve you right for getting caught." "I sha'n't be such a fool again," growled Caruthers. And certainly he profited by his experience. A year later the House Tutor came into his study when he was preparing Vergil with the aid of Dr Giles' text. He put a piece of blotting-paper over the crib, and chatted for a few minutes quite easily about the chances of the Eleven _v._ Tonford. But when we are in trouble, there are few of us who can see so far ahead as to feel thankful at the thought that we have learnt something that will be a help to us in the future. Gordon was thoroughly fed up. But it was not his game to show his feelings. He went about laughing as though nothing had happened at all; he treated the whole thing as a colossal joke. Sydenham was, however, very nervous, and showed it. Gordon ragged him mercilessly. "My good man, what the hell does it matter? Chief's not much of a bircher, and don't gas about disgrace, and such muck. This isn't a St Winifred's sort of school. It will only mean a bad report." In School that day Gordon was in great form. By the end of the morning he had accumulated in all three hundred lines from various sources for ragging. "That man, Caruthers, is some fellow," said Ferguson to Simonds at lunch. "He looks as if he enjoyed being in rows." "Perhaps he does," was the answer. "He is certainly always doing his best to get into them. But he is in for a birching this time." But Simonds was wrong. The Chief was too utterly fed up to do anything; moreover, he saw that a birching would do Gordon no good. He would only boast about it. It was not until a week later that Gordon was called up before the Chief. "Caruthers, I want to know where you got hold of that crib." As a matter of fact he had obtained it by means of Rudd, who had a large stock of such articles, and let them out on loan for the term. It was a paying business. Gordon, of course, could not divulge this. "I got it in the holidays, sir." The Chief was surprised and shocked at this. He could quite easily understood that a boy should buy a crib at some second-hand bookshop in the town, during term time, when surrounded with the general atmosphere of Public School dishonesty; but it did seem unnatural that a boy, while living in the clean surroundings of his home, should be scheming to cheat his fellows and masters. The Chief said as much; Gordon did not quite follow him. Besides everyone cribbed.