Chapter 4

The whole field had turned to stare at me, every face full of contempt and fury.

President Caldwell stood on the platform, microphone in hand, his voice carrying across the entire field.

"Thomas Fox cheated on the civil-service exam and bribed a rival, destroying the fairness of the process and violating school rules in the gravest way."

"After deliberation, the school has decided to expel Thomas Fox and to contact the Department of Labor to revoke his exam placement!"

The field erupted in thunderous applause and cheering.

"Good riddance. Scum like that deserves it!"

"Finally, the vermin's dealt with!"

I stood dead center on the platform like a criminal there for everyone to judge.

My girlfriend, Daisy Pruitt, was shoving her way through the crowd, and something in me stirred.

Was she coming to speak up for me, to comfort me?

But she reached me with disgust written all over her face.

"Thomas, let's break up."

I froze.

"Daisy, you believe them just like that? You'd condemn me without asking me a single thing?"

Daisy curled her lip, not bothering to hide her scorn.

"The president said so himself. Why wouldn't I believe it?"

"Your family's just ranchers out in the highlands with a few sheep. A little money and you think you can pull strings over everyone?"

"You're finished now, disgraced. Of course I'm not staying with you."

A few sheep? I almost laughed out loud.

My family ran more than three thousand head of cattle and over five thousand sheep. I'd just always kept it quiet and never mentioned it to her.

I never imagined that in her eyes I was nothing but some ordinary rancher with a handful of sheep.

Lowell Henson walked over, slid an arm around Daisy's waist, and looked at me, smug.

"You lost, Thomas. I'm about to get my guaranteed grad-school spot, then a teaching post here at the school. My future's wide open."

"Daisy's better off with me. That's the smart choice."

Daisy leaned into Lowell's arms, all coy, and the way she looked at me was the way you'd look at a pile of garbage.

I laughed, bitter. To think I'd poured my whole heart into her, given her anything she wanted.

And she turned out to be this kind of woman, one who despised the poor, chased the rich, and couldn't tell right from wrong.

Suddenly I was grateful I'd never told Daisy the truth about my family. Otherwise I'd never have seen what she really was.

The students' insults grew uglier, and rotten eggs, wilted vegetables, and water bottles rained down on me from every direction.

I was covered in filth, and the pain came thick and stinging along with it.

I clenched my fists, on the verge of striking back.

A sharp shout rang out from the entrance to the field.

"Stop, stop right now!"

Vice President Abbott strode out in front, several officials in formal suits behind him.

The vice president stepped onto the platform, took the microphone, and spoke up.

"Everyone, standing beside me is the director from the Department of Labor in charge of this civil-service exam interview."

"I heard someone reported that Thomas Fox cheated on the exam, so I brought him here to review the matter on the spot!"

The president and the student advisor went pale in an instant. The president rushed forward at once, fawning.

"Director Sullivan, you've come at just the right time!"

"Thomas Fox really did cheat on the exam. We were just about to expel him. Please, enforce the law fairly and revoke his placement!"

The student advisor chimed in.

"Director, we've already got solid evidence."

Everyone waited for the labor director to nod, waited to watch me get stamped into the ground for good.

But the director frowned, and the more he heard them out, the colder his face grew.

"So what you're telling me is that you want to revoke a hero's civil-service placement?"

The whole field went silent in a heartbeat. Nobody knew what to make of it.

A hero? What hero?

"Don't any of you watch the news? This morning, the official outlets already reported Thomas Fox's heroic deeds."

"We were on our way to the school to present Thomas Fox with a commendation banner for his bravery, to honor what he did."

"And here you are, ready to expel him and strip his exam placement without hearing a single fact?"