The Gold Bat

by P. G. Wodehouse

  XX

  THE FINDING OF THE BAT

  Trevor waited till the headmaster had gone back to his library, gavehim five minutes to settle down, and then went in.

  The headmaster looked up inquiringly.

  "My essay, sir," said Trevor.

  "Ah, yes. I had forgotten."

  Trevor opened the notebook and began to read what he had written. Hefinished the paragraph which owed its insertion to Clowes, and racedhurriedly on to the next. To his surprise the flippancy passedunnoticed, at any rate, verbally. As a rule the headmaster preferredthat quotations from back numbers of _Punch_ should be kept out ofthe prefects' English Essays. And he generally said as much. But todayhe seemed strangely preoccupied. A split infinitive in paragraph five,which at other times would have made him sit up in his chair stiff withhorror, elicited no remark. The same immunity was accorded to theinsertion (inspired by Clowes, as usual) of a popular catch phrase inthe last few lines. Trevor finished with the feeling that luck hadfavoured him nobly.

  "Yes," said the headmaster, seemingly roused by the silence followingon the conclusion of the essay. "Yes." Then, after a long pause, "Yes,"again.

  Trevor said nothing, but waited for further comment.

  "Yes," said the headmaster once more, "I think that is a veryfair essay. Very fair. It wants a little more--er--not quite somuch--um--yes."

  Trevor made a note in his mind to effect these improvements in futureessays, and was getting up, when the headmaster stopped him.

  "Don't go, Trevor. I wish to speak to you."

  Trevor's first thought was, perhaps naturally, that the bat was going tobe brought into discussion. He was wondering helplessly how he was goingto keep O'Hara and his midnight exploit out of the conversation, whenthe headmaster resumed. "An unpleasant thing has happened, Trevor--"

  "Now we're coming to it," thought Trevor.

  "It appears, Trevor, that a considerable amount of smoking has beengoing on in the school."

  Trevor breathed freely once more. It was only going to be a mereconventional smoking row after all. He listened with more enjoymentas the headmaster, having stopped to turn down the wick of thereading-lamp which stood on the table at his side, and which hadbegun, appropriately enough, to smoke, resumed his discourse.

  "Mr Dexter--"

  Of course, thought Trevor. If there ever was a row in the school,Dexter was bound to be at the bottom of it.

  "Mr Dexter has just been in to see me. He reported six boys. Hediscovered them in the vault beneath the junior block. Two of them wereboys in your house."

  Trevor murmured something wordless, to show that the story interestedhim.

  "You knew nothing of this, of course--"

  "No, sir."

  "No. Of course not. It is difficult for the head of a house to know allthat goes on in that house."

  Was this his beastly sarcasm? Trevor asked himself. But he came to theconclusion that it was not. After all, the head of a house is onlyhuman. He cannot be expected to keep an eye on the private life ofevery member of his house.

  "This must be stopped, Trevor. There is no saying how widespread thepractice has become or may become. What I want you to do is to gostraight back to your house and begin a complete search of thestudies."

  "Tonight, sir?" It seemed too late for such amusement.

  "Tonight. But before you go to your house, call at Mr Seymour's, andtell Milton I should like to see him. And, Trevor."

  "Yes, sir?"

  "You will understand that I am leaving this matter to you to be dealtwith by you. I shall not require you to make any report to me. But ifyou should find tobacco in any boy's room, you must punish him well,Trevor. Punish him well."

  This meant that the culprit must be "touched up" before the houseassembled in the dining-room. Such an event did not often occur. Thelast occasion had been in Paget's first term as head of Donaldson's,when two of the senior day-room had been discovered attempting torevive the ancient and dishonourable custom of bullying. This time,Trevor foresaw, would set up a record in all probability. There mightbe any number of devotees of the weed, and he meant to carry out hisinstructions to the full, and make the criminals more unhappy than theyhad been since the day of their first cigar. Trevor hated the habit ofsmoking at school. He was so intensely keen on the success of the houseand the school at games, that anything which tended to damage the windand eye filled him with loathing. That anybody should dare to smoke ina house which was going to play in the final for the House Football Cupmade him rage internally, and he proposed to make things bad andunrestful for such.

  To smoke at school is to insult the divine weed. When you are obligedto smoke in odd corners, fearing every moment that you will bediscovered, the whole meaning, poetry, romance of a pipe vanishes, andyou become like those lost beings who smoke when they are running tocatch trains. The boy who smokes at school is bound to come to a badend. He will degenerate gradually into a person that plays dominoes inthe smoking-rooms of A.B.C. shops with friends who wear bowler hats andfrock coats.

  Much of this philosophy Trevor expounded to Clowes in energeticlanguage when he returned to Donaldson's after calling at Seymour's todeliver the message for Milton.

  Clowes became quite animated at the prospect of a real row.

  "We shall be able to see the skeletons in their cupboards," heobserved. "Every man has a skeleton in his cupboard, which follows himabout wherever he goes. Which study shall we go to first?"

  "We?" said Trevor.

  "We," repeated Clowes firmly. "I am not going to be left out of thisjaunt. I need bracing up--I'm not strong, you know--and this is justthe thing to do it. Besides, you'll want a bodyguard of some sort, incase the infuriated occupant turns and rends you."

  "I don't see what there is to enjoy in the business," said Trevor,gloomily. "Personally, I bar this kind of thing. By the time we'vefinished, there won't be a chap in the house I'm on speaking termswith."

  "Except me, dearest," said Clowes. "I will never desert you. It's of nouse asking me, for I will never do it. Mr Micawber has his faults, butI will _never_ desert Mr Micawber."

  "You can come if you like," said Trevor; "we'll take the studies inorder. I suppose we needn't look up the prefects?"

  "A prefect is above suspicion. Scratch the prefects."

  "That brings us to Dixon."

  Dixon was a stout youth with spectacles, who was popularly supposed todo twenty-two hours' work a day. It was believed that he put in twohours sleep from eleven to one, and then got up and worked in his studytill breakfast.

  He was working when Clowes and Trevor came in. He dived head foremostinto a huge Liddell and Scott as the door opened. On hearing Trevor'svoice he slowly emerged, and a pair of round and spectacled eyes gazedblankly at the visitors. Trevor briefly explained his errand, but theinterview lost in solemnity owing to the fact that the bare notion ofDixon storing tobacco in his room made Clowes roar with laughter. Also,Dixon stolidly refused to understand what Trevor was talking about, andat the end of ten minutes, finding it hopeless to try and explain, thetwo went. Dixon, with a hazy impression that he had been asked to joinin some sort of round game, and had refused the offer, returned againto his Liddell and Scott, and continued to wrestle with the somewhatobscure utterances of the chorus in AEschylus' _Agamemnon_. Theresults of this fiasco on Trevor and Clowes were widely different.Trevor it depressed horribly. It made him feel savage. Clowes, on theother hand, regarded the whole affair in a spirit of rollicking farce,and refused to see that this was a serious matter, in which the honourof the house was involved.

  The next study was Ruthven's. This fact somewhat toned down theexuberances of Clowes's demeanour. When one particularly dislikes aperson, one has a curious objection to seeming in good spirits in hispresence. One feels that he may take it as a sort of compliment tohimself, or, at any rate, contribute grins of his own, which would behateful. Clowes was as grave as Trevor when they entered the study.

  Ruthven's study was like himself, overd
ressed and rather futile. It ranto little china ornaments in a good deal of profusion. It was more likea drawing-room than a school study.

  "Sorry to disturb you, Ruthven," said Trevor.

  "Oh, come in," said Ruthven, in a tired voice. "Please shut the door;there is a draught. Do you want anything?"

  "We've got to have a look round," said Clowes.

  "Can't you see everything there is?"

  Ruthven hated Clowes as much as Clowes hated him.

  Trevor cut into the conversation again.

  "It's like this, Ruthven," he said. "I'm awfully sorry, but the OldMan's just told me to search the studies in case any of the fellowshave got baccy."

  Ruthven jumped up, pale with consternation.

  "You can't. I won't have you disturbing my study."

  "This is rot," said Trevor, shortly, "I've got to. It's no good makingit more unpleasant for me than it is."

  "But I've no tobacco. I swear I haven't."

  "Then why mind us searching?" said Clowes affably.

  "Come on, Ruthven," said Trevor, "chuck us over the keys. You might aswell."

  "I won't."

  "Don't be an ass, man."

  "We have here," observed Clowes, in his sad, solemn way, "a stout andserviceable poker." He stooped, as he spoke, to pick it up.

  "Leave that poker alone," cried Ruthven.

  Clowes straightened himself.

  "I'll swop it for your keys," he said.

  "Don't be a fool."

  "Very well, then. We will now crack our first crib."

  Ruthven sprang forward, but Clowes, handing him off in football fashionwith his left hand, with his right dashed the poker against the lock ofthe drawer of the table by which he stood.

  The lock broke with a sharp crack. It was not built with an eye to suchonslaught.

  "Neat for a first shot," said Clowes, complacently. "Now for theUmustaphas and shag."

  But as he looked into the drawer he uttered a sudden cry of excitement.He drew something out, and tossed it over to Trevor.

  "Catch, Trevor," he said quietly. "Something that'll interest you."

  Trevor caught it neatly in one hand, and stood staring at it as if hehad never seen anything like it before. And yet he had--often. For whathe had caught was a little golden bat, about an inch long by an eighthof an inch wide.