"I must say, Mary, that your sentiments are astounding. Naturally he looks troubled. He has lost the post it took him four months to secure. I confess, Henry, that I, for my part, was less surprised this morning than when I heard you had obtained your late situation. With the very serious limitations which I learnt from your own lips, however, you could scarcely hope to hold your own in a scholastic avocation. I told you so, in effect, at the time, if you remember. Was it the Greek or the mathematics that caused your downfall?" Harry had not said what it was in his letter. He now explained, with a grim smile as he thought of _Mangnall's Questions_ and _Little Steps to Great Events_. He described Scrafton's brutality in a few words, and in fewer still the scene of the day before. His mother's indignation was even louder than her applause. Uncle Spencer looked horrified at them both. "So it was insubordination!" cried he. "You took the side of the boys against their master and your elder! Really, Henry, there is no more to be said. Your mother's sympathy I consider most misplaced. I tell you frankly that you need expect none from me." "Did I say I expected any, Uncle Spencer?" "That," said Mr. Walthew, "is a remark worthy of your friend Mr. Lowndes, the most impudent fellow I ever met in my life." "He is no longer a friend of mine," said Harry Ringrose. "I am glad to hear it, Henry." "Do you mean that you have quarrelled?" cried Mrs. Ringrose. "For good, mother; you shall hear about it afterwards. I can't forgive a liar, and no more must you. I have bowled Lowndes out in a thundering lie--and told him what I thought of him--that's all." Mrs. Ringrose looked troubled, but inquisitive for particulars. Her brother did not smile, but for an instant his expression ceased to be that of a professional mute. "'Liar' and 'lie,'" said he, "are stronger language than I approve of, Henry; but if anybody deserves such epithets I feel sure it is Mr. Gordon Lowndes. The man impressed me as a falsehood-teller when he came to my house, and I feel sure that the prospectus of this new Crofter Company, which reached me this morning, is nothing but a tissue of untruths from beginning to end. A thoroughly bad man, Henry, a lost and irredeemable sinner, who might have dragged you with him to fire eternal!" "I did not find him thoroughly bad, Uncle Spencer," said his nephew civilly. "On the contrary, I believe there is more good in him than in most of us; but--you can't depend upon him, and there you are." "Yet you would defend him!" exclaimed Mr. Walthew, with a sneer. "Well, well, I have no time to argue with you, Henry; _my_ time is precious, so may I ask how you propose to fill yours now? You have tried and failed for the City; you have tried and failed for the Law; and now you have tried schoolmastering, and failed still more conspicuously. What do you think of trying next?"