"Oh, it will be unbearable if he does not! Do try, Norman, dear."

"Never you mind."

"He'll light up at the last moment," said Ethel, consolingly, to Harry; but she was very uneasy herself, for she had set her heart on his surpassing Harvey Anderson. No more was heard all day. Tom went at dinner-time to see if he could pick up any news; but he was shy, or was too late, and gained no intelligence. Dr. May and Richard talked of going to hear the speeches and viva voce examination in the afternoon--objects of great interest to all Stoneborough men--but just as they came home from a long day's work, Dr. May was summoned to the next town, by an electric telegraph, and, as it was to a bad case, he did not expect to be at home till the mail-train came in at one o'clock at night. Richard begged to go with him, and he consented, unwillingly, to please Margaret, who could not bear to think of his "fending for himself" in the dark on the rail-road.

Very long did the evening seem to the listening sisters. Eight, and no tidings; nine, the boys not come; Tom obliged to go to bed by sheer sleepiness, and Ethel unable to sit still, and causing Flora demurely to wonder at her fidgeting so much, it would be so much better to fix her attention to some employment; while Margaret owned that Flora was right, but watched, and started at each sound, almost as anxiously as Ethel.

It was ten, when there was a sharp pull at the bell, and down flew the sisters; but old James was beforehand, and Harry was exclaiming, "Dux!

James, he is Dux! Hurrah! Flossy, Ethel, Mary! There stands the Dux of Stoneborough! Where's papa?"

"Sent for to Whitford. But oh! Norman, Dux! Is he really?"

"To be sure, but I must tell Margaret," and up he rushed, shouted the news to her, but could not stay for congratulation; broke Tom's slumber by roaring it in his ear, and dashed into the nursery, where nurse for once forgave him for waking the baby. Norman, meanwhile, followed his eager sisters into the drawing-room, putting up his hand as if the light dazzled him, and looking, by no means, as it he had just achieved triumphant success.

Ethel paused in her exultation: "But is it, is it true, Norman?"

"Yes," he said wearily, making his way to his dark corner.

"But what was it for? How is it?"

"I don't know," he answered.

"What's the matter?" said Flora. "Are you tired, Norman, dear, does your head ache?"

"Yes;" and the pain was evidently severe.

"Won't you come to Margaret?" said Ethel, knowing what was the greater suffering; but he did not move, and they forbore to torment him with questions. The next moment Harry came down in an ecstacy, bringing in, from the hall, Norman's beautiful prize books, and showing off their Latin inscription.

"Ah!" said he, looking at his brother, "he is regularly done for.

He ought to turn in at once. That Everard is a famous fellow for an examiner. He said he never had seen such a copy of verses sent up by a school-boy, and could hardly believe June was barely sixteen. Old Hoxton says he is the youngest Dux they have had these fifty years that he has known the school, and Mr. Wilmot said 'twas the most creditable examination he had ever known, and that I might tell papa so. What did possess that ridiculous old landlubber at Whitford, to go and get on the sick-list on this, of all the nights of the year? June, how can you go on sitting there, when you know you ought to be in your berth?"

"I wish he was," said Flora, "but let him have some tea first."

"And tell us more, Harry," said Ethel. "Oh! it is famous! I knew he would come light at last. It is too delightful, if papa was but here!"

"Isn't it? You should have seen how Anderson grinned--he is only fourth--down below Forder, and Cheviot, and Ashe."

"Well, I did not think Norman would have been before Forder and Cheviot.

That is grand."

"It was the verses that did it," said Harry; "they had an hour to do Themistocles on the hearth of Admetus, and there he beat them all to shivers. 'Twas all done smack, smooth, without a scratch, in Alcaics, and Cheviot heard Wilmot saving, 'twas no mere task, but had poetry, and all that sort of thing in it. But I don't know whether that would have done, if he had not come out so strong in the recitation; they put him on in Priam's speech to Achilles, and he said it--Oh it was too bad papa did not hear him! Every one held their breath and listened."

"How you do go on!" muttered Norman; but no one heeded, and Harry continued. "He construed a chorus in Sophocles without a blunder, but what did the business was this, I believe. They asked all manner of out-of-the-way questions--history and geography, what no one expected, and the fellows who read nothing they can help, were thoroughly posed.

Forder had not a word to say, and the others were worse, for Cheviot thought Queen Elizabeth's Earl of Leicester was Simon de Montfort; and didn't know when that battle was, beginning with an E.--was it Evesham, or Edgehill?"

"O Harry, you are as bad yourself?"

"But any one would know Leicester, because of Kenilworth," said Harry; "and I'm not sixth form. If papa had but been there! Every one was asking for him, and wishing it. For Dr. Hoxton called me--they shook hands with me, and wished me joy of it, and told me to tell my father how well Norman had done."

"I suppose you looked so happy, they could not help it," said Flora, smiling at that honest beaming face of joy.

"Ay," said Norman, looking up; "they had something to say to him on his own score, which he has forgotten."

"I should think not," said Harry. "Why, what d'ye think they said? That I had gone on as well as all the Mays, and they trusted I should still, and be a credit to my profession."

"Oh! Harry! why didn't you tell us?"

"Oh! that is grand!" and, as the two elder girls made this exclamation, Mary proceeded to a rapturous embrace. "Get along, Mary, you are throttling one. Mr. Everard inquired for my father and Margaret, and said he'd call to-morrow, and Hoxton and Wilmot kept on wishing he was there."

"I wish he had been!" said Ethel; "he would have taken such delight in it; but, even if he could have gone, he doubted whether it would not have made Norman get on worse from anxiety."

"Well, Cheviot wanted me to send up for him at dinner-time," said Harry; "for as soon as we sat down in the hall, June turned off giddy, and could not stay, and looked so horrid, we thought it was all over with him, and he would not be able to go up at all."

"And Cheviot thought you ought to send for papa!"

"Yes, I knew he would not be in, and so we left him lying down on the bench in the cloister till dinner was over."

"What a place for catching cold!" said Flora.

"So Cheviot said, but I couldn't help it; and when we went to call him afterwards, he was all right. Wasn't it fun, when the names were called over, and May senior at the head! I don't think it will be better when I am a post-captain myself! But Margaret has not heard half yet."

After telling it once in her room, once in the nursery, in whispers like gusts of wind, and once in the pantry, Harry employed himself in writing--"Norman is Dux!" in immense letters, on pieces of paper, which he disposed all over the house, to meet the eyes of his father and Richard on their return.

Ethel's joy was sadly damped by Norman's manner. He hardly spoke--only just came in to wish Margaret good-night, and shrank from her affectionate sayings, departing abruptly to his own room.

"Poor fellow! he is sadly overdone," said she, as he went.

"Oh!" sighed Ethel, nearly ready to cry, "'tis not like what I used to fancy it would be when he came to the head of the school!"

"It will be different to-morrow," said Margaret, trying to console herself as well as Ethel. "Think how he has been on the strain this whole day, and long before, doing so much more than older boys. No wonder he is tired and worn out."

Ethel did not understand what mental fatigue was, for her active, vigorous spirit had never been tasked beyond its powers.

"I hope he will be like himself to-morrow!" said she disconsolately. "I never saw him rough and hasty before. It was even with you, Margaret."

"No, no, Ethel you aren't going to blame your own Norman for unkindness on this of all days in the year. You know how it was; you love him better; just as I do, for not being able to bear to stay in this room, where--"

"Yes," said Ethel, mournfully; "it was a great shame of me! How could I?

Dear Norman! how he does grieve--what love his must have been! But yet, Margaret," she said impatiently, and the hot tears breaking out, "I cannot--cannot bear it! To have him not caring one bit for all of us! I want him to triumph! I can't without him!"

"What, Ethel, you, who said you didn't care for mere distinction and praise? Don't you think dear mamma would say it was safer for him not to be delighted and triumphant?"

"It is very tiresome," said Ethel, nearly convinced, but in a slightly petulant voice.

"And does not one love those two dear boys to-night!" said Margaret.

"Norman not able to rejoice in his victory without her, and Harry in such an ecstacy with Norman's honours. I don't think I ever was so fond of my two brothers."

Ethel smiled, and drew up her head, and said no boys were like them anywhere, and papa would be delighted, and so went to bed happier in her exultation, and in hoping that the holidays would make Norman himself again.