Eric Williams and Charles Wildney, your punishment will be public expulsion, for which you will prepare this very evening.

I am unwilling that for a single day either of you--especially the elder of you--should linger, so as possibly to contaminate others with the danger of so pernicious an example." Such a sentence was wholly unexpected; it took boys and masters equally by surprise.

The announcement of it caused an uneasy sensation, which was evident to all present, though no one spoke a word; but Dr.Rowlands took no notice of it, and only said to the culprits-- "You may return to your seats." The two boys found their way back instinctively, they hardly knew how.
They seemed confounded and thunderstruck by their sentence, and the painful accessories of its publicity.

Eric leaned over the desk with his head resting on a book, too stunned even to think; and Wildney looked straight before him with his eyes fixed in a stupid and unobserved stare.
Form by form the school dispersed, and the moment he was liberated Eric sprang away from the boys, who would have spoken to him, and rushed wildly to his study, where he locked the door.

In a moment, however, he re-opened it, for he heard Wildney's step, and, after admitting him, locked it once more.
Without a word Wildney, who looked very pale, flung his arms round Eric's neck, and, unable to bear up any longer, burst into a flood of tears.