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A Great Emergency and Other Tales by Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
page 24 of 243 (09%)
would not have run away even if I could. My resolution grew
stubborner with every peal of laughter to bear whatever might come
with pluck and good temper. I had been a fool, but I would show that I
was not a coward.

I was very glad that Rupert's influenza kept him at home for a few
days. I told him briefly that I had been bullied, but that it was my
own fault, and I would rather say no more about it. I begged him to
promise that he would not take up my quarrel in any way, but leave me
to fight it out for myself, which he did. When he came back I think he
regretted his promise. Happily he never heard all the ballad, but the
odd verses which the boys sang about the place put him into a fury. It
was a long time before he forgave me, and I doubt if he ever quite
forgave Weston.

I held out as well as I could. I made no complaint, and kept my
temper. I must say that Henrietta behaved uncommonly well to me at
this time.

"After all, you know, Charlie," she said, "you've not done anything
_really wrong or dishonourable_." This was true, and it comforted me.

Except Henrietta, I really had not a friend; for Rupert was angry with
me, and the holding up at school only made me feel worse at home.

At last the joke began to die out, and I was getting on very well, but
for one boy, a heavy-looking fellow with a pasty face, who was always
creeping after me, and asking me to tell him about my father. "Johnson
Minor," we called him. He was a younger brother of Thomas Johnson, the
champion of the code of honour.
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