clothes gave him a certain uniformity with his fellows, yet left him as
unlike them as all things else could conspire to make him. The long hair
that hung untrimmed over his face seemed a black emphasis for the cameo
delicacy of his features, lending them a wan note of pathos. On his
thin temples, bluish veins traced the hall-mark of an over-sensitive
nature, and eyes that were deep pools of somberness gazed out with the
dreamer's unrest.

Occasionally, he shot a furtively terrified glance across the aisle
where another boy with a mop of red hair, a freckled face and a mouth
that seemed overcrowded with teeth, made faces at him and conveyed in
eloquent gestures threats of future violence. At these menacing
pantomimes, the slighter lad trembled under his bulging coat, and he sat
as one under sentence.

Had any means of escape offered itself, Paul Burton would have embraced
it without thought of the honors of war. He had no wish to stand upon
the order of his going. He earnestly desired to go at once. But under
what semblance of excuse could he cover his retreat? Suddenly his
necessity fathered a crafty subterfuge. The bucket of drinking water
stood near his desk--and it was well-nigh empty. Becoming violently
thirsty, he sought permission to carry it to the spring for refilling,
and his heart leaped hopefully when the tired-eyed teacher indifferently
nodded her assent. He meant to carry the pail to the spring. He even
meant to fill it for the sake of technical obedience. Later, some one
else could go out and fetch it back.

Paul's object would be served when once he was safe from the stored-up
wrath of the Marquess kid. As he carried the empty bucket down the
aisle, he felt upon him the derisive gaze of a pair of blue eyes