stealing," he would have it, "whether you take it off a tree or out of
a basket. You're a thief, Dudley; so am I. Anybody else say a
piece?"

The thermometer was at that point where morals become slack. We all
had a piece; but we were all of us shocked at Dan, and told him so.
It did not agitate him in the least.

To Dan I could speak my inmost thoughts, knowing he would understand
me, and sometimes from him I received assistance and sometimes
confusion. The yearly examination was approaching. My father and
mother said nothing, but I knew how anxiously each of them awaited the
result; my father, to see how much I had accomplished; my mother, how
much I had endeavoured. I had worked hard, but was doubtful, knowing
that prizes depend less upon what you know than upon what you can make
others believe you know; which applies to prizes beyond those of
school.

"Are you going in for anything, Dan?" I asked him. We were discussing
the subject, crossing Primrose Hill, one bright June morning.

I knew the question absurd. I asked it of him because I wanted him to
ask it of me.

"They're not giving away anything I particularly want," murmured Dan,
in his lazy drawl: looked at from that point of view, school prizes
are, it must be confessed, not worth their cost.

"You're sweating yourself, young 'un, of course?" he asked next, as I
expected.