Page:The Works of H G Wells Volume 8.djvu/34

 silly sort of straw hat and a large pink face (all covered over with self-satisfaction), and he went to the National School with a green baize bag—a contemptible thing to do. They called him names and threw stones at him, and when he replied by threatenings ("Look 'ere, young Art Kipth, you better thtoppit!") they were moved to attack and put him to flight.

And after that they broke the head of Ann Pornick's doll, so that she went home weeping loudly—a wicked and endearing proceeding. Sid was whacked, but, as he explained, he wore a newspaper tactically adjusted during the transaction, and really it didn't hurt him at all And Mrs. Pornick put her head out of the shop door suddenly, and threatened Kipps as he passed.

§ 2

"Cavendish Academy," the school that had won the limited choice of Kipps' vanished mother, was established in a battered private house in the part of Hastings remotest from the sea; it was called an Academy for Young Gentlemen, and many of the young gentlemen had parents in "India" and other unverifiable places. Others were the sons of credulous widows anxious, as Kipps' mother had been, to get something a little "superior" to a board-school education as cheaply as possible, and others again were sent to demonstrate the dignity of their parents and guardians. And of course there were boys from France.

Its "principal" was a lean long creature of indif-