BUDDENBROOKS
pupil, who had come off with honour, comparatively speaking. He was conscious that all his schoolmates, not excepting Hans Hermann Kilian, had the same view. Yet he felt at the same time somewhat nauseated. Pale, trembling, too exhausted to think about what had happened, he closed his eyes and sank back in lethargy.
Dr. Mantelsack, however, went on with the lesson. He came to the verses that were to have been prepared for today, and called up Petersen. Petersen rose, fresh, lively, sanguine, in a stout attitude, ready for the fray. Yet to-day, even to-day, was destined to see his fall. Yes, the lesson hour was not to pass without a catastrophe far worse than that which had befallen the hapless, short-sighted Mumme.
Petersen translated, glancing now and then at the other page of his book, which should have had nothing on it. He did it quite cleverly: he acted as though something there distracted him—a speck of dust, perhaps, which he brushed with his hand or tried to blow away. And yet—there followed the catastrophe.
Dr. Mantelsack made a sudden violent movement, which was responded to on Petersen’s part by a similar movement. And in the same moment the master left his seat, dashed headlong down from his platform, and approached Petersen with long, impetuous strides.
“You have a crib in your book,” he said as he came up.
“A crib—I—no,” stammered Petersen. He was a charming lad, with a great wave of blond hair on his forehead and lovely blue eyes which now flickered in a frightened way.
“You have no crib in your book?”
“A crib, Herr Doctor? No, really, I haven’t. You are mistaken. You are accusing me falsely.” Petersen betrayed himself by the unnatural correctness of his language, which he used in order to intimidate the master. “I am not deceiving you,” he repeated, in the greatness of his need. “I have always been honourable, my whole life long.”
But Dr. Mantelsack was all too certain of the painful fact.
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