He was therefore unable to explain the cause of my strange behavior, for I had carefully refrained from mentioning to Pepper the fact that Some One had turned out to be Another's.
I treated Pepper shabbily.

I couldn't resist playing on his tenderer feelings.

He was a boy bubbling over with sympathy for anyone in any kind of trouble.

Our intimacy since Binny Wallace's death had been uninterrupted; but now I moved in a sphere apart, not to be profaned by the step of an outsider.
I no longer joined the boys on the playground at recess.

I stayed at my desk reading some lugubrious volume--usually The Mysteries of Udolpho, by the amiable Mrs.Radcliffe.A translation of The Sorrows of Werter fell into my hands at this period, and if I could have committed suicide without killing myself, I should certainly have done so.
On half-holidays, instead of fraternizing with Pepper and the rest of our clique, I would wander off alone to Grave Point.
Grave Point--the place where Binny Wallace's body came ashore--was a narrow strip of land running out into the river.