"Old Smith and I," said Dunster, "were at a private school together.
I'd no idea I should find him here."
"It was a wonderfully stirring sight when we met," said Psmith; "not
unlike the meeting of Ulysses and the hound Argos, of whom you have
doubtless read in the course of your dabblings in the classics. I was
Ulysses; Dunster gave a life-like representation of the faithful
dawg."
"You still jaw as much as ever, I notice," said the animal delineator,
fondling the beginnings of his moustache.
"More," sighed Psmith, "more. Is anything irritating you?" he added,
eyeing the other's manoeuvres with interest.
"You needn't be a funny ass, man," said Dunster, pained; "heaps of
people tell me I ought to have it waxed."
"What it really wants is top-dressing with guano. Hullo! another man
out. Adair's bowling better to-day than he did yesterday."
"I heard about yesterday," said Dunster. "It must have been a rag!
Couldn't we work off some other rag on somebody before I go? I shall
be stopping here till Monday in the village. Well hit, sir - Adair's
bowling is perfectly simple if you go out to it."
"Comrade Dunster went out to it first ball," said Psmith to Mike.
"Oh! chuck it, man; the sun was in my eyes. I hear Adair's got a match
on with the M.C.C. at last."
"Has he?" said Psmith; "I hadn't heard. Archaeology claims so
much of my time that I have little leisure for listening to cricket
chit-chat."
"What was it Jellicoe wanted?" asked Mike; "was it anything
important?"
"He seemed to think so - he kept telling me to tell you to go and see
him."
"I fear Comrade Jellicoe is a bit of a weak-minded blitherer - - "
"Did you ever hear of a rag we worked off on Jellicoe once?" asked
Dunster. "The man has absolutely no sense of humour - can't see when
he's being rotted. Well it was like this - Hullo! We're all out - I
shall have to be going out to field again, I suppose, dash it! I'll
tell you when I see you again."
"I shall count the minutes," said Psmith.
Mike stretched himself; the sun was very soothing after his two hours
in the detention-room; he felt disinclined for exertion.
"I don't suppose it's anything special about Jellicoe, do you?" he
said. "I mean, it'll keep till tea-time; it's no catch having to sweat
across to the house now."
"Don't dream of moving," said Psmith. "I have several rather profound
observations on life to make and I can't make them without an
audience. Soliloquy is a knack. Hamlet had got it, but probably only
after years of patient practice. Personally, I need some one to listen
when I talk. I like to feel that I am doing good. You stay where you
are - don't interrupt too much."
Mike tilted his hat over his eyes and abandoned Jellicoe.
It was not until the lock-up bell rang that he remembered him. He went
over to the house and made his way to the dormitory, where he found
the injured one in a parlous state, not so much physical as mental.
The doctor had seen his ankle and reported that it would be on the
active list in a couple of days. It was Jellicoe's mind that needed
attention now.
Mike found him in a condition bordering on collapse.
"I say, you might have come before!" said Jellicoe.
"What's up? I didn't know there was such a hurry about it - what did
you want?"
"It's no good now," said Jellicoe gloomily; "it's too late, I shall
get sacked."
"What on earth are you talking about? What's the row?"
"It's about that money."
"What about it?"
"I had to pay it to a man to-day, or he said he'd write to the
Head - then of course I should get sacked. I was going to take the
money to him this afternoon, only I got crocked, so I couldn't move.
I wanted to get hold of you to ask you to take it for me - it's too
late now!"
Mike's face fell. "Oh, hang it!" he said, "I'm awfully sorry. I'd no
idea it was anything like that - what a fool I was! Dunster did say he
thought it was something important, only like an ass I thought it
would do if I came over at lock-up."
"It doesn't matter," said Jellicoe miserably; "it can't be helped."
"Yes, it can," said Mike. "I know what I'll do - it's all right. I'll
get out of the house after lights-out."
Jellicoe sat up. "You can't! You'd get sacked if you were caught."
"Who would catch me? There was a chap at Wrykyn I knew who used to
break out every night nearly and go and pot at cats with an air-pistol;
it's as easy as anything."
The toad-under-the-harrow expression began to fade from Jellicoe's
face. "I say, do you think you could, really?"
"Of course I can! It'll be rather a rag."
"I say, it's frightfully decent of you."
"What absolute rot!"
"But, look here, are you certain - - "
"I shall be all right. Where do you want me to go?"
"It's a place about a mile or two from here, called Lower Borlock."
"Lower Borlock?"
"Yes, do you know it?"
"Rather! I've been playing cricket for them all the term."
"I say, have you? Do you know a man called Barley?"
"Barley? Rather - he runs the 'White Boar'."
"He's the chap I owe the money to."
"Old Barley!"
Mike knew the landlord of the "White Boar" well; he was the wag of the
village team. Every village team, for some mysterious reason, has its
comic man. In the Lower Borlock eleven Mr. Barley filled the post. He
was a large, stout man, with a red and cheerful face, who looked
exactly like the jovial inn-keeper of melodrama. He was the last man
Mike would have expected to do the "money by Monday-week or I write to
the headmaster" business.
But he reflected that he had only seen him in his leisure moments,
when he might naturally be expected to unbend and be full of the milk
of human kindness. Probably in business hours he was quite different.
After all, pleasure is one thing and business another.
Besides, five pounds is a large sum of money, and if Jellicoe owed it,
there was nothing strange in Mr. Barley's doing everything he could to
recover it.
He wondered a little what Jellicoe could have been doing to run up a
bill as big as that, but it did not occur to him to ask, which was
unfortunate, as it might have saved him a good deal of inconvenience.
It seemed to him that it was none of his business to inquire into
Jellicoe's private affairs. He took the envelope containing the money
without question.
"I shall bike there, I think," he said, "if I can get into the shed."
The school's bicycles were stored in a shed by the pavilion.
"You can manage that," said Jellicoe; "it's locked up at night, but I
had a key made to fit it last summer, because I used to go out in the
early morning sometimes before it was opened."
"Got it on you?"
"Smith's got it."
"I'll get it from him."
"I say!"
"Well?"
"Don't tell Smith why you want it, will you? I don't want anybody to
know - if a thing once starts getting about it's all over the place in
no time."
"All right, I won't tell him."
"I say, thanks most awfully! I don't know what I should have done,
I - - "
"Oh, chuck it!" said Mike.
CHAPTER XLIV
AND FULFILS IT
Mike started on his ride to Lower Borlock with mixed feelings. It is
pleasant to be out on a fine night in summer, but the pleasure is to a
certain extent modified when one feels that to be detected will mean
expulsion.
Mike did not want to be expelled, for many reasons. Now that he had
grown used to the place he was enjoying himself at Sedleigh to a
certain extent. He still harboured a feeling of resentment against the
school in general and Adair in particular, but it was pleasant in
Outwood's now that he had got to know some of the members of the
house, and he liked playing cricket for Lower Borlock; also, he was
fairly certain that his father would not let him go to Cambridge if he
were expelled from Sedleigh. Mr. Jackson was easy-going with his
family, but occasionally his foot came down like a steam-hammer, as
witness the Wrykyn school report affair.
So Mike pedalled along rapidly, being wishful to get the job done
without delay.
Psmith had yielded up the key, but his inquiries as to why it was
needed had been embarrassing. Mike's statement that he wanted to get
up early and have a ride had been received by Psmith, with whom early
rising was not a hobby, with honest amazement and a flood of advice
and warning on the subject.
"One of the Georges," said Psmith, "I forget which, once said that a
certain number of hours' sleep a day - I cannot recall for the moment
how many - made a man something, which for the time being has slipped
my memory. However, there you are. I've given you the main idea of the
thing; and a German doctor says that early rising causes insanity.
Still, if you're bent on it - - " After which he had handed over the
key.
Mike wished he could have taken Psmith into his confidence. Probably
he would have volunteered to come, too; Mike would have been glad of a
companion.
It did not take him long to reach Lower Borlock. The "White Boar"
stood at the far end of the village, by the cricket field. He rode
past the church - standing out black and mysterious against the light
sky - and the rows of silent cottages, until he came to the inn.
The place was shut, of course, and all the lights were out - it was
some time past eleven.
The advantage an inn has over a private house, from the point of view
of the person who wants to get into it when it has been locked up, is
that a nocturnal visit is not so unexpected in the case of the former.
Preparations have been made to meet such an emergency. Where with a
private house you would probably have to wander round heaving rocks
and end by climbing up a water-spout, when you want to get into an inn
you simply ring the night-bell, which, communicating with the boots'
room, has that hard-worked menial up and doing in no time.
After Mike had waited for a few minutes there was a rattling of chains
and a shooting of bolts and the door opened.
"Yes, sir?" said the boots, appearing in his shirt-sleeves. "Why,
'ullo! Mr. Jackson, sir!"
Mike was well known to all dwellers in Lower Borlock, his scores being
the chief topic of conversation when the day's labours were over.
"I want to see Mr. Barley, Jack."
"He's bin in bed this half-hour back, Mr. Jackson."
"I must see him. Can you get him down?"
The boots looked doubtful. "Roust the guv'nor outer bed?" he said.
Mike quite admitted the gravity of the task. The landlord of the
"White Boar" was one of those men who need a beauty sleep.
"I wish you would - it's a thing that can't wait. I've got some money
to give to him."
"Oh, if it's _that_ - " said the boots.
Five minutes later mine host appeared in person, looking more than
usually portly in a check dressing-gown and red bedroom slippers of
the _Dreadnought_ type.
"You can pop off, Jack."
Exit boots to his slumbers once more.
"Well, Mr. Jackson, what's it all about?"
"Jellicoe asked me to come and bring you the money."
"The money? What money?"
"What he owes you; the five pounds, of course."
"The five - " Mr. Barley stared open-mouthed at Mike for a moment;
then he broke into a roar of laughter which shook the sporting prints
on the wall and drew barks from dogs in some distant part of the
house. He staggered about laughing and coughing till Mike began to
expect a fit of some kind. Then he collapsed into a chair, which
creaked under him, and wiped his eyes.
"Oh dear!" he said, "oh dear! the five pounds!"
Mike was not always abreast of the rustic idea of humour, and
now he felt particularly fogged. For the life of him he could
not see what there was to amuse any one so much in the fact that
a person who owed five pounds was ready to pay it back. It was an
occasion for rejoicing, perhaps, but rather for a solemn, thankful,
eyes-raised-to-heaven kind of rejoicing.
"What's up?" he asked.
"Five pounds!"
"You might tell us the joke."
Mr. Barley opened the letter, read it, and had another attack; when
this was finished he handed the letter to Mike, who was waiting
patiently by, hoping for light, and requested him to read it.
"Dear, dear!" chuckled Mr. Barley, "five pounds! They may teach you
young gentlemen to talk Latin and Greek and what not at your school,
but it 'ud do a lot more good if they'd teach you how many beans make
five; it 'ud do a lot more good if they'd teach you to come in when it
rained, it 'ud do - - "
Mike was reading the letter.
"DEAR MR. BARLEY," it ran. - "I send the £5, which I could not get
before. I hope it is in time, because I don't want you to write to
the headmaster. I am sorry Jane and John ate your wife's hat and
the chicken and broke the vase."
There was some more to the same effect; it was signed "T. G.
Jellicoe."
"What on earth's it all about?" said Mike, finishing this curious
document.
Mr. Barley slapped his leg. "Why, Mr. Jellicoe keeps two dogs here; I
keep 'em for him till the young gentlemen go home for their holidays.
Aberdeen terriers, they are, and as sharp as mustard. Mischief! I
believe you, but, love us! they don't do no harm! Bite up an old shoe
sometimes and such sort of things. The other day, last Wednesday it
were, about 'ar parse five, Jane - she's the worst of the two, always
up to it, she is - she got hold of my old hat and had it in bits before
you could say knife. John upset a china vase in one of the bedrooms
chasing a mouse, and they got on the coffee-room table and ate half a
cold chicken what had been left there. So I says to myself, 'I'll have
a game with Mr. Jellicoe over this,' and I sits down and writes off
saying the little dogs have eaten a valuable hat and a chicken and
what not, and the damage'll be five pounds, and will he kindly remit
same by Saturday night at the latest or I write to his headmaster.
Love us!" Mr. Barley slapped his thigh, "he took it all in, every
word - and here's the five pounds in cash in this envelope here! I
haven't had such a laugh since we got old Tom Raxley out of bed at
twelve of a winter's night by telling him his house was a-fire."
It is not always easy to appreciate a joke of the practical order if
one has been made even merely part victim of it. Mike, as he reflected
that he had been dragged out of his house in the middle of the night,
in contravention of all school rules and discipline, simply in order
to satisfy Mr. Barley's sense of humour, was more inclined to be
abusive than mirthful. Running risks is all very well when they are
necessary, or if one chooses to run them for one's own amusement, but
to be placed in a dangerous position, a position imperilling one's
chance of going to the 'Varsity, is another matter altogether.
But it is impossible to abuse the Barley type of man. Barley's
enjoyment of the whole thing was so honest and child-like. Probably it
had given him the happiest quarter of an hour he had known for years,
since, in fact, the affair of old Tom Raxley. It would have been cruel
to damp the man.
So Mike laughed perfunctorily, took back the envelope with the five
pounds, accepted a stone ginger beer and a plateful of biscuits, and
rode off on his return journey.
* * * * *
Mention has been made above of the difference which exists between
getting into an inn after lock-up and into a private house. Mike was
to find this out for himself.
His first act on arriving at Sedleigh was to replace his bicycle in
the shed. This he accomplished with success. It was pitch-dark in the
shed, and as he wheeled his machine in, his foot touched something on
the floor. Without waiting to discover what this might be, he leaned
his bicycle against the wall, went out, and locked the door, after
which he ran across to Outwood's.
Fortune had favoured his undertaking by decreeing that a stout
drain-pipe should pass up the wall within a few inches of his and
Psmith's study. On the first day of term, it may be remembered he
had wrenched away the wooden bar which bisected the window-frame,
thus rendering exit and entrance almost as simple as they had been
for Wyatt during Mike's first term at Wrykyn.
He proceeded to scale this water-pipe.
He had got about half-way up when a voice from somewhere below cried,
"Who's that?"
CHAPTER XLV
PURSUIT
These things are Life's Little Difficulties. One can never tell
precisely how one will act in a sudden emergency. The right thing for
Mike to have done at this crisis was to have ignored the voice,
carried on up the water-pipe, and through the study window, and gone
to bed. It was extremely unlikely that anybody could have recognised
him at night against the dark background of the house. The position
then would have been that somebody in Mr. Outwood's house had been
seen breaking in after lights-out; but it would have been very
difficult for the authorities to have narrowed the search down any
further than that. There were thirty-four boys in Outwood's, of whom
about fourteen were much the same size and build as Mike.
The suddenness, however, of the call caused Mike to lose his head. He
made the strategic error of sliding rapidly down the pipe, and
running.
There were two gates to Mr. Outwood's front garden. The carriage drive
ran in a semicircle, of which the house was the centre. It was from
the right-hand gate, nearest to Mr. Downing's house, that the voice
had come, and, as Mike came to the ground, he saw a stout figure
galloping towards him from that direction. He bolted like a rabbit for
the other gate. As he did so, his pursuer again gave tongue.
"Oo-oo-oo yer!" was the exact remark.
Whereby Mike recognised him as the school sergeant.
"Oo-oo-oo yer!" was that militant gentleman's habitual way of
beginning a conversation.
With this knowledge, Mike felt easier in his mind. Sergeant Collard
was a man of many fine qualities, (notably a talent for what he was
wont to call "spott'n," a mysterious gift which he exercised on the
rifle range), but he could not run. There had been a time in his hot
youth when he had sprinted like an untamed mustang in pursuit of
volatile Pathans in Indian hill wars, but Time, increasing his girth,
had taken from him the taste for such exercise. When he moved now it
was at a stately walk. The fact that he ran to-night showed how the
excitement of the chase had entered into his blood.
"Oo-oo-oo yer!" he shouted again, as Mike, passing through the gate,
turned into the road that led to the school. Mike's attentive ear
noted that the bright speech was a shade more puffily delivered this
time. He began to feel that this was not such bad fun after all. He
would have liked to be in bed, but, if that was out of the question,
this was certainly the next best thing.
He ran on, taking things easily, with the sergeant panting in his
wake, till he reached the entrance to the school grounds. He dashed in
and took cover behind a tree.
Presently the sergeant turned the corner, going badly and evidently
cured of a good deal of the fever of the chase. Mike heard him toil on
for a few yards and then stop. A sound of panting was borne to him.
Then the sound of footsteps returning, this time at a walk. They
passed the gate and went on down the road.
The pursuer had given the thing up.
Mike waited for several minutes behind his tree. His programme now was
simple. He would give Sergeant Collard about half an hour, in case the
latter took it into his head to "guard home" by waiting at the gate.
Then he would trot softly back, shoot up the water-pipe once more, and
so to bed. It had just struck a quarter to something - twelve, he
supposed - on the school clock. He would wait till a quarter past.
Meanwhile, there was nothing to be gained from lurking behind a tree.
He left his cover, and started to stroll in the direction of the
pavilion. Having arrived there, he sat on the steps, looking out on to
the cricket field.
His thoughts were miles away, at Wrykyn, when he was recalled to
Sedleigh by the sound of somebody running. Focussing his gaze, he saw
a dim figure moving rapidly across the cricket field straight for him.
His first impression, that he had been seen and followed, disappeared
as the runner, instead of making for the pavilion, turned aside, and
stopped at the door of the bicycle shed. Like Mike, he was evidently
possessed of a key, for Mike heard it grate in the lock. At this point
he left the pavilion and hailed his fellow rambler by night in a
cautious undertone.
The other appeared startled.
"Who the dickens is that?" he asked. "Is that you, Jackson?"
Mike recognised Adair's voice. The last person he would have expected
to meet at midnight obviously on the point of going for a bicycle
ride.
"What are you doing out here, Jackson?"
"What are you, if it comes to that?"
Adair was lighting his lamp.
"I'm going for the doctor. One of the chaps in our house is bad."
"Oh!"
"What are you doing out here?"
"Just been for a stroll."
"Hadn't you better be getting back?"
"Plenty of time."
"I suppose you think you're doing something tremendously brave and
dashing?"
"Hadn't you better be going to the doctor?"
"If you want to know what I think - - "
"I don't. So long."
Mike turned away, whistling between his teeth. After a moment's pause,
Adair rode off. Mike saw his light pass across the field and through
the gate. The school clock struck the quarter.
It seemed to Mike that Sergeant Collard, even if he had started to
wait for him at the house, would not keep up the vigil for more than
half an hour. He would be safe now in trying for home again.
He walked in that direction.
Now it happened that Mr. Downing, aroused from his first sleep by the
news, conveyed to him by Adair, that MacPhee, one of the junior
members of Adair's dormitory, was groaning and exhibiting other
symptoms of acute illness, was disturbed in his mind. Most
housemasters feel uneasy in the event of illness in their houses, and
Mr. Downing was apt to get jumpy beyond the ordinary on such
occasions. All that was wrong with MacPhee, as a matter of fact, was a
very fair stomach-ache, the direct and legitimate result of eating six
buns, half a cocoa-nut, three doughnuts, two ices, an apple, and a
pound of cherries, and washing the lot down with tea. But Mr. Downing
saw in his attack the beginnings of some deadly scourge which would
sweep through and decimate the house. He had despatched Adair for the
doctor, and, after spending a few minutes prowling restlessly about
his room, was now standing at his front gate, waiting for Adair's
return.
It came about, therefore, that Mike, sprinting lightly in the
direction of home and safety, had his already shaken nerves further
maltreated by being hailed, at a range of about two yards, with a cry
of "Is that you, Adair?" The next moment Mr. Downing emerged from his
gate.
Mike stood not upon the order of his going. He was off like an
arrow - a flying figure of Guilt. Mr. Downing, after the first
surprise, seemed to grasp the situation. Ejaculating at intervals
the words, "Who is that? Stop! Who is that? Stop!" he dashed after
the much-enduring Wrykynian at an extremely creditable rate of
speed. Mr. Downing was by way of being a sprinter. He had won
handicap events at College sports at Oxford, and, if Mike had
not got such a good start, the race might have been over in the
first fifty yards. As it was, that victim of Fate, going well,
kept ahead. At the entrance to the school grounds he led by a
dozen yards. The procession passed into the field, Mike heading
as before for the pavilion.
As they raced across the soft turf, an idea occurred to Mike which he
was accustomed in after years to attribute to genius, the one flash of
it which had ever illumined his life.
It was this.
One of Mr. Downing's first acts, on starting the Fire Brigade at
Sedleigh, had been to institute an alarm bell. It had been rubbed into
the school officially - in speeches from the daïs - by the headmaster,
and unofficially - in earnest private conversations - by Mr. Downing,
that at the sound of this bell, at whatever hour of day or night,
every member of the school must leave his house in the quickest
possible way, and make for the open. The bell might mean that the
school was on fire, or it might mean that one of the houses was on
fire. In any case, the school had its orders - to get out into the open
at once.
Nor must it be supposed that the school was without practice at this
feat. Every now and then a notice would be found posted up on the
board to the effect that there would be fire drill during the dinner
hour that day. Sometimes the performance was bright and interesting,
as on the occasion when Mr. Downing, marshalling the brigade at his
front gate, had said, "My house is supposed to be on fire. Now let's
do a record!" which the Brigade, headed by Stone and Robinson,
obligingly did. They fastened the hose to the hydrant, smashed a
window on the ground floor (Mr. Downing having retired for a moment to
talk with the headmaster), and poured a stream of water into the room.
When Mr. Downing was at liberty to turn his attention to the matter,
he found that the room selected was his private study, most of the
light furniture of which was floating on a miniature lake. That
episode had rather discouraged his passion for realism, and fire drill
since then had taken the form, for the most part, of "practising
escaping." This was done by means of canvas shoots, kept in the
dormitories. At the sound of the bell the prefect of the dormitory
would heave one end of the shoot out of window, the other end being
fastened to the sill. He would then go down it himself, using his
elbows as a brake. Then the second man would follow his example, and
these two, standing below, would hold the end of the shoot so that the
rest of the dormitory could fly rapidly down it without injury, except
to their digestions.
After the first novelty of the thing had worn off, the school
had taken a rooted dislike to fire drill. It was a matter for
self-congratulation among them that Mr. Downing had never been
able to induce the headmaster to allow the alarm bell to be sounded
for fire drill at night. The headmaster, a man who had his views on
the amount of sleep necessary for the growing boy, had drawn the line
at night operations. "Sufficient unto the day" had been the gist of
his reply. If the alarm bell were to ring at night when there was no
fire, the school might mistake a genuine alarm of fire for a bogus
one, and refuse to hurry themselves.
So Mr. Downing had had to be content with day drill.
The alarm bell hung in the archway leading into the school grounds.
The end of the rope, when not in use, was fastened to a hook half-way
up the wall.
Mike, as he raced over the cricket field, made up his mind in a flash
that his only chance of getting out of this tangle was to shake his
pursuer off for a space of time long enough to enable him to get to
the rope and tug it. Then the school would come out. He would mix with
them, and in the subsequent confusion get back to bed unnoticed.
The task was easier than it would have seemed at the beginning of the
chase. Mr. Downing, owing to the two facts that he was not in the
strictest training, and that it is only an Alfred Shrubb who can run
for any length of time at top speed shouting "Who is that? Stop! Who
is that? Stop!" was beginning to feel distressed. There were bellows
to mend in the Downing camp. Mike perceived this, and forced the pace.
He rounded the pavilion ten yards to the good. Then, heading for the
gate, he put all he knew into one last sprint. Mr. Downing was not
equal to the effort. He worked gamely for a few strides, then fell
behind. When Mike reached the gate, a good forty yards separated them.
As far as Mike could judge - he was not in a condition to make nice
calculations - he had about four seconds in which to get busy with that
bell rope.
Probably nobody has ever crammed more energetic work into four seconds
than he did then.
The night was as still as only an English summer night can be, and the
first clang of the clapper sounded like a million iron girders falling
from a height on to a sheet of tin. He tugged away furiously, with an
eye on the now rapidly advancing and loudly shouting figure of the
housemaster.
And from the darkened house beyond there came a gradually swelling
hum, as if a vast hive of bees had been disturbed.
The school was awake.
CHAPTER XLVI
THE DECORATION OF SAMMY
Smith leaned against the mantelpiece in the senior day-room at
Outwood's - since Mike's innings against Downing's the Lost Lambs had
been received as brothers by that centre of disorder, so that even
Spiller was compelled to look on the hatchet as buried - and gave his
views on the events of the preceding night, or, rather, of that
morning, for it was nearer one than twelve when peace had once more
fallen on the school.
"Nothing that happens in this luny-bin," said Psmith, "has power to
surprise me now. There was a time when I might have thought it a
little unusual to have to leave the house through a canvas shoot at
one o'clock in the morning, but I suppose it's quite the regular thing
here. Old school tradition, &c. Men leave the school, and find that
they've got so accustomed to jumping out of window that they look on
it as a sort of affectation to go out by the door. I suppose none of
you merchants can give me any idea when the next knockabout
entertainment of this kind is likely to take place?"
"I wonder who rang that bell!" said Stone. "Jolly sporting idea."
"I believe it was Downing himself. If it was, I hope he's satisfied."
Jellicoe, who was appearing in society supported by a stick, looked
meaningly at Mike, and giggled, receiving in answer a stony stare.
Mike had informed Jellicoe of the details of his interview with Mr.
Barley at the "White Boar," and Jellicoe, after a momentary splutter
of wrath against the practical joker, was now in a particularly
light-hearted mood. He hobbled about, giggling at nothing and at
peace with all the world.
"It was a stirring scene," said Psmith. "The agility with which
Comrade Jellicoe boosted himself down the shoot was a triumph of mind
over matter. He seemed to forget his ankle. It was the nearest thing
to a Boneless Acrobatic Wonder that I have ever seen."
"I was in a beastly funk, I can tell you."
Stone gurgled.
"So was I," he said, "for a bit. Then, when I saw that it was all a
rag, I began to look about for ways of doing the thing really well. I
emptied about six jugs of water on a gang of kids under my window."
"I rushed into Downing's, and ragged some of the beds," said Robinson.
"It was an invigorating time," said Psmith. "A sort of pageant. I was
particularly struck with the way some of the bright lads caught hold
of the idea. There was no skimping. Some of the kids, to my certain
knowledge, went down the shoot a dozen times. There's nothing like
doing a thing thoroughly. I saw them come down, rush upstairs, and be
saved again, time after time. The thing became chronic with them. I
should say Comrade Downing ought to be satisfied with the high state
of efficiency to which he has brought us. At any rate I hope - - "
There was a sound of hurried footsteps outside the door, and Sharpe, a
member of the senior day-room, burst excitedly in. He seemed amused.
"I say, have you chaps seen Sammy?"
"Seen who?" said Stone. "Sammy? Why?"
"You'll know in a second. He's just outside. Here, Sammy, Sammy,
Sammy! Sam! Sam!"
A bark and a patter of feet outside.
"Come on, Sammy. Good dog."
There was a moment's silence. Then a great yell of laughter burst
forth. Even Psmith's massive calm was shattered. As for Jellicoe, he
sobbed in a corner.
Sammy's beautiful white coat was almost entirely concealed by a thick
covering of bright red paint. His head, with the exception of the
ears, was untouched, and his serious, friendly eyes seemed to
emphasise the weirdness of his appearance. He stood in the doorway,
barking and wagging his tail, plainly puzzled at his reception. He was
a popular dog, and was always well received when he visited any of the
houses, but he had never before met with enthusiasm like this.
"Good old Sammy!"
"What on earth's been happening to him?"
"Who did it?"
Sharpe, the introducer, had no views on the matter.
"I found him outside Downing's, with a crowd round him. Everybody
seems to have seen him. I wonder who on earth has gone and mucked him
up like that!"
Mike was the first to show any sympathy for the maltreated animal.
"Poor old Sammy," he said, kneeling on the floor beside the victim,
and scratching him under the ear. "What a beastly shame! It'll take
hours to wash all that off him, and he'll hate it."
"It seems to me," said Psmith, regarding Sammy dispassionately through
his eyeglass, "that it's not a case for mere washing. They'll either
have to skin him bodily, or leave the thing to time. Time, the Great
Healer. In a year or two he'll fade to a delicate pink. I don't see
why you shouldn't have a pink bull-terrier. It would lend a touch of
distinction to the place. Crowds would come in excursion trains to see
him. By charging a small fee you might make him self-supporting. I
think I'll suggest it to Comrade Downing."
"There'll be a row about this," said Stone.
"Rows are rather sport when you're not mixed up in them," said
Robinson, philosophically. "There'll be another if we don't start off
for chapel soon. It's a quarter to."
There was a general move. Mike was the last to leave the room. As he
was going, Jellicoe stopped him. Jellicoe was staying in that Sunday,
owing to his ankle.
"I say," said Jellicoe, "I just wanted to thank you again about
that - - "
"Oh, that's all right."
"No, but it really was awfully decent of you. You might have got into
a frightful row. Were you nearly caught?"
"Jolly nearly."
"It _was_ you who rang the bell, wasn't it?"
"Yes, it was. But for goodness sake don't go gassing about it, or
somebody will get to hear who oughtn't to, and I shall be sacked."
"All right. But, I say, you _are_ a chap!"
"What's the matter now?"
"I mean about Sammy, you know. It's a jolly good score off old
Downing. He'll be frightfully sick."
"Sammy!" cried Mike. "My good man, you don't think I did that, do you?
What absolute rot! I never touched the poor brute."
"Oh, all right," said Jellicoe. "But I wasn't going to tell any one,
of course."
"What do you mean?"
"You _are_ a chap!" giggled Jellicoe.
Mike walked to chapel rather thoughtfully.
CHAPTER XLVII
MR. DOWNING ON THE SCENT
There was just one moment, the moment in which, on going down to the
junior day-room of his house to quell an unseemly disturbance, he was
boisterously greeted by a vermilion bull terrier, when Mr. Downing was
seized with a hideous fear lest he had lost his senses. Glaring down
at the crimson animal that was pawing at his knees, he clutched at his
reason for one second as a drowning man clutches at a lifebelt.
Then the happy laughter of the young onlookers reassured him.
"Who - " he shouted, "WHO has done this?"
[Illustration: "WHO - " HE SHOUTED, "WHO HAS DONE THIS?"]
"Please, sir, we don't know," shrilled the chorus.
"Please, sir, he came in like that."
"Please, sir, we were sitting here when he suddenly ran in, all red."
A voice from the crowd: "Look at old Sammy!"
The situation was impossible. There was nothing to be done. He could
not find out by verbal inquiry who had painted the dog. The
possibility of Sammy being painted red during the night had never
occurred to Mr. Downing, and now that the thing had happened he had no
scheme of action. As Psmith would have said, he had confused the
unusual with the impossible, and the result was that he was taken by
surprise.
While he was pondering on this the situation was rendered still more
difficult by Sammy, who, taking advantage of the door being open,
escaped and rushed into the road, thus publishing his condition to all
and sundry. You can hush up a painted dog while it confines itself to
your own premises, but once it has mixed with the great public this
becomes out of the question. Sammy's state advanced from a private
trouble into a row. Mr. Downing's next move was in the same direction
that Sammy had taken, only, instead of running about the road, he went
straight to the headmaster.
The Head, who had had to leave his house in the small hours in his
pyjamas and a dressing-gown, was not in the best of tempers. He had a
cold in the head, and also a rooted conviction that Mr. Downing, in
spite of his strict orders, had rung the bell himself on the previous
night in order to test the efficiency of the school in saving
themselves in the event of fire. He received the housemaster frostily,
but thawed as the latter related the events which had led up to the
ringing of the bell.
"Dear me!" he said, deeply interested. "One of the boys at the school,
you think?"
"I am certain of it," said Mr. Downing.
"Was he wearing a school cap?"
"He was bare-headed. A boy who breaks out of his house at night would
hardly run the risk of wearing a distinguishing cap."
"No, no, I suppose not. A big boy, you say?"
"Very big."
"You did not see his face?"
"It was dark and he never looked back - he was in front of me all the
time."
"Dear me!"
"There is another matter - - "
"Yes?"
"This boy, whoever he was, had done something before he rang the
bell - he had painted my dog Sampson red."
The headmaster's eyes protruded from their sockets. "He - he - _what_,
Mr. Downing?"
"He painted my dog red - bright red." Mr. Downing was too angry to see
anything humorous in the incident. Since the previous night he had
been wounded in his tenderest feelings. His Fire Brigade system had
been most shamefully abused by being turned into a mere instrument in
the hands of a malefactor for escaping justice, and his dog had been
held up to ridicule to all the world. He did not want to smile, he
wanted revenge.
The headmaster, on the other hand, did want to smile. It was not his
dog, he could look on the affair with an unbiased eye, and to him
there was something ludicrous in a white dog suddenly appearing as a
red dog.
"It is a scandalous thing!" said Mr. Downing.
"Quite so! Quite so!" said the headmaster hastily. "I shall punish the
boy who did it most severely. I will speak to the school in the Hall
after chapel."
Which he did, but without result. A cordial invitation to the criminal
to come forward and be executed was received in wooden silence by the
school, with the exception of Johnson III., of Outwood's, who,
suddenly reminded of Sammy's appearance by the headmaster's words,
broke into a wild screech of laughter, and was instantly awarded two
hundred lines.
The school filed out of the Hall to their various lunches, and Mr.
Downing was left with the conviction that, if he wanted the criminal
discovered, he would have to discover him for himself.
The great thing in affairs of this kind is to get a good start, and
Fate, feeling perhaps that it had been a little hard upon Mr. Downing,
gave him a most magnificent start. Instead of having to hunt for a
needle in a haystack, he found himself in a moment in the position of
being set to find it in a mere truss of straw.