After I had glanced at my papers, I sat back and stared at my eldest brother, who had been told off to see me safely to school.  At that time I did not like him because he seemed to me unduly insistent on his rights and I could not help wondering at the tactlessness of the grown-up people in choosing him as my travelling companion.  With any one else this journey might have been a joyous affair but there were incidents between us that neither of us would forget, so that I could find nothing better than an awkward politeness with which to meet his strained amiability.  He feigned an intense interest in his magazine while I looked out of window, with one finger in my waistcoat pocket, scratching the comfortable milled edges of my money.  When I saw little farm-houses, forgotten in the green dimples of the Kentish hills, I thought that it would be nice to live there with a room full of story-books, away from the discomforts and difficulties of life.  Like a cat, I wanted to dream somewhere where I would not be trodden on, somewhere where I would be neglected by friends and foes alike.  This was my normal desire, but side by side with my craving for peace I was aware of a new and interesting emotion that suggested the possibility of a life even more agreeable.  The excitement of packing my box with provender like a sailor who was going on a long voyage, the unwonted thrill of having a large sum of money concealed about my person, and above all the imaginative yarns of my elder brother, had fired me with the thought of adventure.  His stories had been filled with an utter contempt for lessons and a superb defiance of the authorities, and had ranged from desperate rabbit-shooting parties on the Yorkshire Wolds to illicit feasts of Eccles cakes and tinned lobster in moonlit dormitories.  I thought that it would be pleasant to experience this romantic kind of life before settling down for good with my dreams.

The train wandered on and my eldest brother and I looked at each other constrainedly.  He had already asked me twice whether I had my ticket, and I realised that he could not think of any other neutral remark that fitted the occasion.  It occurred to me to say that the train was slow, but I remembered with a glow of anger how he had once rubbed a strawberry in my face because I had taken the liberty of offering it to one of his friends, and I held my peace.  I had prayed for his death every night for three weeks after that, and though he was still alive the knowledge of my unconfessed and unrepented wickedness prevented me from being more than conveniently polite, he thought I was a cheeky little toad and I thought he was a bully, so we looked at each other and did not speak.  We were both glad, therefore, when the train pulled up at the station that bore the name of my new school.