“They didn’t let Clewer off, I’ll swear.”
“Confess — apologize — quick!” said Stalky.
From the floor Sefton made unconditional surrender, more abjectly even than Campbell He would never touch any one again. He would go softly all the days of his life.
“We’ve got to take it, I suppose?” said Stalky. “All right, Sefton. You’re broke? Very good. Shut up, Beetle! But before we let you up, you an’ Campbell will kindly oblige us with ‘Kitty of Coleraine’ — a’ la Clewer.”
“That’s not fair,” said Campbell; “we’ve surrendered.”
“‘Course you have. Now you’re goin’ to do what we tell you — same as Clewer would. If you hadn’t surrendered you’d ha’ been really bullied. Havin’ surrendered — do you follow, Seffy? — you sing odes in honor of the conquerors. Hurry up!”
They dropped into chairs luxuriously. Campbell and Sefton looked at each other, and, neither taking comfort from that view, struck up “Kitty of Coleraine.”
“Vile bad,” said Stalky, as the miserable wailing ended. “If you hadn’t surrendered it would have been our painful duty to buzz books at you for singin’ out o’ tune. Now then.”
He freed them from their bonds, but for several minutes they could not rise. Campbell was first on his feet, smiling uneasily. Sefton staggered to the table, buried his head in his arms, and shook with sobs. There was no shadow of fight in either — only amazement, distress, and shame.
“Ca — can’t he shave clean before tea, please?” said Campbell. “It’s ten minutes to bell.”
Stalky shook his head. He meant to escort the half-shaved one to the meal.
McTurk yawned in his chair and Beetle mopped his face. They were all dripping with excitement and exertion.
“If I knew anything about it, I swear I’d give you a moral lecture,” said Stalky severely.
“Don’t jaw; they’ve surrendered,” said McTurk. “This moral suasion biznai takes it out of a chap.”
“Don’t you see how gentle we’ve been? We might have called Clewer in to look at you,” said Stalky. “‘The bleatin’ of the tiger excites the kid.’ But we didn’t. We’ve only got to tell a few chaps in Coll. about this and you’d be hooted all over the shop. Your life wouldn’t be worth havin’. But we aren’t goin’ to do that, either. We’re strictly moral suasers, Campbell; so, unless you or Seffy split about this, no one will.”
“I swear you’re a brick,” said Campbell. “I suppose I was rather a brute to Clewer.”
“It looked like it,” said Stalky. “But I don’t think Seffy need come into hall with cock-eye whiskers. Horrid bad for the fags if they saw him. He can shave. Ain’t you grateful, Sefton?”
The head did not lift. Sefton was deeply asleep.
“That’s rummy,” said McTurk, as a snore mixed with a sob. “‘Cheek, I think; or else he’s shammin’.”
“No, ‘tisn’t,” said Beetle. “‘When ‘Molly’ Fairburn had attended to me for an hour or so I used to go bung off to sleep on a form sometimes. Poor devil! But he called me a beastly poet, though.”
“Well, come on.” Stalky lowered his voice. “Good-by, Campbell. ‘Member, if you don’t talk, nobody will.”
There should have been a war-dance, but that all three were so utterly tired that they almost went to sleep above the tea-cups in their study, and slept till prep.
“A most extraordinary letter. Are all parents incurably mad? What do you make of it?” said the Head, handing a closely written eight pages to the Reverend John.
“‘The only son of his mother, and she a widow.’ That is the least reasonable sort.” The chaplain read with pursed lips. “If half those charges are true he should be in the sick-house; whereas he is disgustingly well. Certainly he has shaved. I noticed that.”
“Under compulsion, as his mother points out. How delicious! How salutary!”
“You haven’t to answer her. It isn’t often I don’t know what has happened in the school; but this is beyond me.”
“If you asked me I should say seek not to propitiate. When one is forced to take crammers’ pups — ”
“He was perfectly well at extra-tuition — with me — this morning,” said the Head, absently. “Unusually well behaved, too.”
“ — they either educate the school, or the school, as in this case, educates them. I prefer our own methods,” the chaplain concluded.
“You think it was that?” A lift of the Head’s eye-brow.
“I’m sure of it! And nothing excuses his trying to give the College a bad name.”
“That’s the line I mean to take with him,” the Head answered.
The Augurs winked.
A few days later the Reverend John called on Number Five. “Why haven’t we seen you before, Padre?” said they.
“I’ve been watching times and seasons and events and men — and boys,” he replied. “I am pleased with my Tenth Legion. I make them my compliments. Clewer was throwing ink-balls in form this morning, instead of doing his work. He is now doing fifty lines for — unheard-of audacity.”
“You can’t blame us, sir,” said Beetle. “You told us to remove the — er — pressure. That’s the worst of a fag.”
“I’ve known boys five years his senior throw ink-balls, Beetle. To such an one have I given two hundred lines — not so long ago. And now I come to think of it, were those lines ever shown up?”
“Were they, Turkey?’ said Beetle unblushingly.
“Don’t you think Clewer looks a little cleaner, Padre?” Stalky interrupted.
“We’re no end of moral reformers,” said McTurk.
“It was all Stalky, but it was a lark,” said Beetle.
“I have noticed the moral reform in several quarters. Didn’t I tell you you had more influence than any boys in the Coll. if you cared to use it?”
“It’s a trifle exhaustin’ to use frequent — our kind of moral suasion. Besides, you see, it only makes Clewer cheeky.”
“I wasn’t thinking of Clewer; I was thinking of — the other people, Stalky.”
“Oh, we didn’t bother much about the other people,” said McTurk. “Did we?”
“But I did — from the beginning.”
“Then you knew, sir?”
A downward puff of smoke. “Boys educate each other, they say, more than we can or dare. If I had used one half of the moral suasion you may or may not have employed — ”
“With the best motives in the world. Don’t forget our pious motives, Padre,” said McTurk.
“I suppose I should be now languishing in Bideford jail, shouldn’t I? Well, to quote the Head, in a little business which we have agreed to forget, that strikes me as flagrant injustice... What are you laughing at, you young sinners? Isn’t it true? I will not stay to be shouted at. What I looked into this den of iniquity for was to find out if any one cared to come down for a bathe off the Ridge. But I see you won’t.”
“Won’t we, though! Half a shake, Padre Sahib, till we get our towels, and nous sommes avec vous!”
A LITTLE PREP.
Easter term was but a month old when Stettson major, a day-boy, contracted diphtheria, and the Head was very angry. He decreed a new and narrower set of bounds — the infection had been traced to an out-lying farmhouse — urged the prefects severely to lick all trespassers, and promised extra attentions from his own hand. There were no words bad enough for Stettson major, quarantined at his mother’s house, who had lowered the school-average of health. This he said in the gymnasium after prayers. Then he wrote some two hundred letters to as many anxious parents and guardians, and bade the school carry on. The trouble did not spread, but, one night, a dog-cart drove to the Head’s door, and in the morning the Head had gone, leaving all things in charge of Mr. King, senior house-master. The Head often ran up to town, where the school devoutly believed he bribed officials for early proofs of the Army Examination papers; but this absence was unusually prolonged.
“Downy old bird!” said Sta
lky to the allies one wet afternoon in the study. “He must have gone on a bend and been locked up under a false name.”
“What for?” Beetle entered joyously into the libel.
“Forty shillin’s or a month for hackin’ the chucker-out of the Pavvy on the shins. Bates always has a spree when he goes to town. Wish he was back, though. I’m about sick o’ King’s ‘whips an’ scorpions’ an’ lectures on public-school spirit — yah! — and scholarship!”
“‘Crass an’ materialized brutality of the middle-classes — readin’ solely for marks. Not a scholar in the whole school,’” McTurk quoted, pensively boring holes in the mantel-piece with a hot poker.
“That’s rather a sickly way of spending an afternoon. Stinks too. Let’s come out an’ smoke. Here’s a treat.” Stalky held up a long Indian cheroot. “‘Bagged it from my pater last holidays. I’m a bit shy of it though; it’s heftier than a pipe. We’ll smoke it palaver-fashion. Hand it round, eh? Let’s lie up behind the old harrow on the Monkey-farm Road.”
“Out of bounds. Bounds beastly strict these days, too. Besides, we shall cat.” Beetle sniffed the cheroot critically. “It’s a regular Pomposo Stinkadore.”
“You can; I shan’t. What d’you say, Turkey?”
“Oh, may’s well, I s’pose.”
“Chuck on your cap, then. It’s two to one. Beetle, out you come!”
They saw a group of boys by the notice-board in the corridor; little Foxy, the school sergeant, among them.
“More bounds, I expect,” said Stalky. “Hullo, Foxibus, who are you in mournin’ for?” There was a broad band of crape round Foxy’s arm.
“He was in my old regiment,” said Foxy, jerking his head towards the notices, where a newspaper cutting was thumb-tacked between call-over lists.
“By gum!” quoth Stalky, uncovering as he read. “It’s old Duncan — Fat-Sow Duncan — killed on duty at something or other Kotal. ‘Rallyin’ his men with conspicuous gallantry.’ He would, of course. ‘The body was recovered.’ That’s all right. They cut ‘em up sometimes, don’t they, Foxy?”
“Horrid,” said the sergeant briefly.
“Poor old Fat-Sow! I was a fag when he left. How many does that make to us, Foxy?”
“Mr. Duncan, he is the ninth. He come here when he was no bigger than little Grey tertius. My old regiment, too. Yiss, nine to us, Mr. Corkran, up to date.”
The boys went out into the wet, walking swiftly.
“Wonder how it feels — to be shot and all that,” said Stalky, as they splashed down a lane. “Where did it happen, Beetle?”
“Oh, out in India somewhere. We’re always rowin’ there. But look here, Stalky, what is the good o’ sittin’ under a hedge an’ cattin’? It’s be-eastly cold. It’s be-eastly wet, and we’ll be collared as sure as a gun.”
“Shut up! Did you ever know your Uncle Stalky get you into a mess yet?” Like many other leaders, Stalky did not dwell on past defeats. They pushed through a dripping hedge, landed among water-logged clods, and sat down on a rust-coated harrow. The cheroot burned with sputterings of saltpetre. They smoked it gingerly, each passing to the other between dosed forefinger and thumb.
“Good job we hadn’t one apiece, ain’t it?” said Stalky, shivering through set teeth. To prove his words he immediately laid all before them, and they followed his example...
“I told you,” moaned Beetle, sweating clammy drops. “Oh, Stalky, you are a fool!”
“Je cat, tu cat, il cat. Nous cattons!” McTurk handed up his contribution and lay hopelessly on the cold iron.
“Something’s wrong with the beastly thing. I say, Beetle, have you been droppin’ ink on it?”
But Beetle was in no case to answer. Limp and empty, they sprawled across the harrow, the rust marking their ulsters in red squares and the abandoned cheroot-end reeking under their very cold noses. Then — they had heard nothing — the Head himself stood before them — the Head who should have been in town bribing examiners — the Head fantastically attired in old tweeds and a deer-stalker!
“Ah,” he said, fingering his mustache. “Very good. I might have guessed who it was. You will go back to the College and give my compliments to Mr. King and ask him to give you an extra-special licking. You will then do me five hundred lines. I shall be back to-morrow. Five hundred lines by five o’clock to-morrow. You are also gated for a week. This is not exactly the time for breaking bounds. Extra-special, please.”
He disappeared over the hedge as lightly as he had come. There was a murmur of women’s voices in the deep lane.
“Oh, you Prooshan brute!” said McTurk as the voices died away. “Stalky, it’s all your silly fault.”
“Kill him! Kill him!” gasped Beetle.
“I ca-an’t. I’m going to cat again... I don’t mind that, but King’ll gloat over us horrid. Extra-special, ooh!”
Stalky made no answer — not even a soft one. They went to College and received that for which they had been sent. King enjoyed himself most thoroughly, for by virtue of their seniority the boys were exempt from his hand, save under special order. Luckily, he was no expert in the gentle art.
“‘Strange, how desire doth outrun performance,’” said Beetle irreverently, quoting from some Shakespeare play that they were cramming that term. They regained their study and settled down to the imposition.
“You’re quite right, Beetle.” Stalky spoke in silky and propitiating tones. “Now, if the Head had sent us up to a prefect, we’d have got something to remember!”
“Look here,” McTurk began with cold venom, “we aren’t goin’ to row you about this business, because it’s too bad for a row; but we want you to understand you’re jolly well excommunicated, Stalky. You’re a plain ass.”
“How was I to know that the Head ‘ud collar us? What was he doin’ in those ghastly clothes, too?”
“Don’t try to raise a side-issue,” Beetle grunted severely.
“Well, it was all Stettson major’s fault. If he hadn’t gone an’ got diphtheria ‘twouldn’t have happened. But don’t you think it rather rummy — the Head droppin’ on us that way?”
“Shut up! You’re dead!” said Beetle. “We’ve chopped your spurs off your beastly heels. We’ve cocked your shield upside down and — -and I don’t think you ought to be allowed to brew for a month.”
“Oh, stop jawin’ at me. I want — ”
“Stop? Why — why, we’re gated for a week.” McTurk almost howled as the agony of the situation overcame him. “A lickin’ from King, five hundred lines, and a gatin’. D’you expect us to kiss you, Stalky, you beast?”
“Drop rottin’ for a minute. I want to find out about the Head bein’ where he was.”
“Well, you have. You found him quite well and fit. Found him makin’ love to Stettson major’s mother. That was her in the lane — I heard her. And so we were ordered a lickin’ before a day-boy’s mother. Bony old widow, too,” said McTurk. “Anything else you’d like to find out?”
“I don’t care. I swear I’ll get even with him some day,” Stalky growled.
“Looks like it,” said McTurk. “Extra-special, week’s gatin’ and five hundred... and now you’re goin’ to row about it! Help scrag him, Beetle!” Stalky had thrown his Virgil at them.
The Head returned next day without explanation, to find the lines waiting for him and the school a little relaxed under Mr. King’s viceroyalty. Mr. King had been talking at and round and over the boys’ heads, in a lofty and promiscuous style, of public-school spirit and the traditions of ancient seats; for he always improved an occasion. Beyond waking in two hundred and fifty young hearts a lively hatred of all other foundations, he accomplished little — so little, indeed, that when, two days after the Head’s return, he chanced to come across Stalky & Co., gated but ever resourceful, playing marbles in the corridor, he said that he was not surprised — not in the least surprised. This was what he had expected from persons of their morale.
“But there isn’t any rule against
marbles, sir. Very interestin’ game,” said Beetle, his knees white with chalk and dust. Then he received two hundred lines for insolence, besides an order to go to the nearest prefect for judgment and slaughter.
This is what happened behind the closed doors of Flint’s study, and Flint was then Head of the Games: —
“Oh, I say, Flint. King has sent me to you for playin’ marbles in the corridor an’ shoutin’ ‘alley tor’ an’ ‘knuckle down.’”
“What does he suppose I have to do with that?” was the answer.
“Dunno. Well?” Beetle grinned wickedly. “What am I to tell him? He’s rather wrathy about it.”
“If the Head chooses to put a notice in the corridor forbiddin’ marbles, I can do something; but I can’t move on a house-master’s report. He knows that as well as I do.”
The sense of this oracle Beetle conveyed, all unsweetened, to King, who hastened to interview Flint.
Now Flint had been seven and a half years at the College, counting six months with a London crammer, from whose roof he had returned, homesick, to the Head for the final Army polish. There were four or five other seniors who had gone through much the same mill, not to mention boys, rejected by other establishments on account of a certain overwhelmingness, whom the Head had wrought into very fair shape. It was not a Sixth to be handled without gloves, as King found.
“Am I to understand it is your intention to allow board-school games under your study windows, Flint? If so, I can only say — ” He said much, and Flint listened politely.
“Well, sir, if the Head sees fit to call a prefects’ meeting we are bound to take the matter up. But the tradition of the school is that the prefects can’t move in any matter affecting the whole school without the Head’s direct order.”
Much more was then delivered, both sides a little losing their temper.
After tea, at an informal gathering of prefects in his study, Flint related the adventure.
“He’s been playin’ for this for a week, and now he’s got it. You know as well as I do that if he hadn’t been gassing at us the way he has, that young devil Beetle wouldn’t have dreamed of marbles.”
Complete Works of Rudyard Kipling (Illustrated) Page 346