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"I'm
afraid you won't like this, or think much of us, Williams," he said.
"But never mind. It'll only last a day or two, and the fellows are not
so bad as they seem; except that Barker. I'm sorry you've come across
him, but it can't be helped."
It was the first kind word he had had since the morning, and after his
troubles kindness melted him. He felt half inclined to cry, and for a
few moments could say nothing in reply to Russell's soothing words. But
the boy's friendliness went far to comfort him, and at last, shaking
hands with him, he said--
"Do let me speak to you sometimes, while I am a new boy, Russell."
"O yes," said Russell, laughing, "as much as ever you like. And as
Barker hates me pretty much as he seems inclined to hate you, we are in
the same box. Good bye."
So Eric left the field, and wandered home, like Calchas in the Iliad,
"Sorrowful by the side of the sounding sea." Already the purple mantle
had fallen from his ideal of schoolboy life. He got home later than they
expected, and found his parents waiting for him.


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