The next morning he gave me more arguments. It was probably a mistake—the secretary had summoned the wrong parents. Mr. Wheeler was noted for summoning parents and then forgetting why he wanted to see them. This was only a device for frightening new students, and Mr. Wheeler really wouldn’t expect me to show up. Then the car wouldn’t start—for Duff. When I got behind the wheel, it started instantly.

Oddly enough, on that morning he seemed more his old self than he had in weeks. He looked younger and more frail than he had even the previous evening, anything but a boy who could cause trouble in school.

We dropped Franny off and then went on to the high school and were ushered into Mr. Wheeler’s office. After he had greeted us and we were seated, there was silence for several moments while Mr. Wheeler, with a puzzled expression, kept switching his gaze from us to a sheet of paper he held in his hand.

“You are Duffin Caine?” he asked after a while.

“Yes, sir,” Duff said politely. He took off his glasses and polished them with his handkerchief.

“And do you know what is stated in this report submitted to me by your counselor, Mr. Willis?”

“I have a general idea, sir.”

“It states that you assaulted another student, Gerald McCabe. You seemingly hit him hard enough to cause him to lose consciousness for several minutes Do you admit this?”

“I didn’t intend to hurt him, sir.”

“He was taken to Ashland Hospital, where it was determined he had suffered a slight concussion. He was kept in the hospital overnight for observation.”

“He’s going to be all right, isn’t he?” Duff was truly anxious now.

“Apparently so, but his injury could have been much more serious—not that this isn’t serious enough.” Wheeler stared at Duff again. “Did you hit Jerry McCabe with some object in your hand?”

“No, sir. I didn’t even really think I hit him that hard.”

Wheeler turned to me. “Jerry McCabe is a tackle on our football team. He stands six-­four and weighs about two hundred fifty.”

“Then what you say happened is impossible,” I said. “Duff weighs a hundred pounds less than that.”

“It happened all right. There were plenty of witnesses.” Wheeler paused for a moment. “I’m inclined to think it was just a lucky blow—or, from Jerry’s point of view, an unlucky one. Also there’s some evidence that he started the trouble with a remark he made.”

“That doesn’t excuse Duff’s lack of control,” I said.

“I agree,” said Wheeler. “Duff, we don’t like violence of that sort at Cainesville High.”

“Duff has never done anything like this before,” I said, “and I’m sure he never will again.”

“Duff?”

“No, sir,” Duff said. “I’ll never do anything like that again while I’m here at Cainesville High.”