The one or two things he could do well, and for which anybody respected him--as, for instance, football--he had deliberately shut himself off from, leaving his authority to depend only on the very qualities he had least cause to be proud of.
It was easy enough to say that Brinkman and Dangle cut even a poorer figure over this wretched business than he.

But who troubled their heads about Brinkman and Dangle?
The former had already been snuffed out hopelessly, and dared not show his face.

Dangle, as everybody knew, had a personal grudge against Rollitt, and was unhampered by scruples as to how he scored.

But he--Clapperton--he had always tried to pose as a decent sort of fellow, with some kind of interest in the good of the School and some sort of notion about common honour and decency.

Ugh! this was what had come of it! As he lay awake that night, the sound of the laughter round the notice boards and the "Ain't you glad ?" of the juniors dinned in his ears, sometimes infuriating, sometimes humiliating him; but in either case mockingly reminding him that Clapperton's greatest enemy in Fellsgarth was the captain of the Modern side.
Next morning brought no news of the missing boy, and a vague feeling of anxiety spread through the School.