other Ripton centre scored. At the end of twenty minutes the Wrykyn
line had been crossed five times, and each of the tries had been
converted.
"_Can't_ you fellows get that ball in the scrum?" demanded
Allardyce plaintively, as the team began for the fifth time the old
familiar walk to the half-way line. "Pack tight, and get the first
shove."
The result of this address was to increase the Ripton lead by four
points. In his anxiety to get the ball, one of the Wrykyn forwards
started heeling before it was in, and the referee promptly gave a free
kick to Ripton for "foot up". As this event took place within easy
reach of the Wrykyn goal, and immediately in front of the same, Keith
had no difficulty in bringing off the penalty.
By half-time the crowd in the road, hoarse with laughter, had exhausted
all their adjectives and were repeating themselves. The Ripton score
was six goals, a penalty goal, and two tries to nil, and the Wrykyn
team was a demoralised rabble.
The fact that the rate of scoring slackened somewhat after the interval
may be attributed to the disinclination of the Riptonians to exert
themselves unduly. They ceased playing in the stern and scientific
spirit in which they had started; and, instead of adhering to an
orthodox game, began to enjoy themselves. The forwards no longer heeled
like a machine. They broke through ambitiously, and tried to score on
their own account. When the outsides got as far as the back, they did
not pass. They tried to drop goals. In this way only twenty-two points
were scored after half-time. Allardyce and Drummond battled on nobly,
but with their pack hopelessly outclassed it was impossible for them to
do anything of material use. Barry, on the wing, tackled his man
whenever the latter got the ball, but, as a rule, the centres did not
pass, but attacked by themselves. At last, by way of a fitting
conclusion to the rout, the Ripton back, catching a high punt, ran
instead of kicking, and, to the huge delight of the town contingent,
scored. With this incident the visiting team drained the last dregs of
the bitter cup. Humiliation could go no further. Almost immediately
afterwards the referee blew his whistle for "No side".
"Three cheers for Wrykyn," said Keith.
To the fifteen victims it sounded ironical.
XVI
DRUMMOND GOES INTO RETIREMENT
The return journey of a school team after a crushing defeat in a
foreign match is never a very exhilarating business. Those members of
the side who have not yet received their colours are wondering which of
them is to be sacrificed to popular indignation and "chucked": the
rest, who have managed to get their caps, are feeling that even now
two-thirds of the school will be saying that they are not worth a place
in the third fifteen; while the captain, brooding apart, is becoming
soured at the thought that Posterity will forget what little good he
may have done, and remember only that it was in his year that the
school got so many points taken off them by So-and-So. Conversation
does not ripple and sparkle during these home-comings. The Wrykyn team
made the journey in almost unbroken silence. They were all stiff and
sore, and their feelings were such as to unfit them for talking to
people.
The school took the thing very philosophically - a bad sign. When a
school is in a healthy, normal condition, it should be stirred up by a
bad defeat by another school, like a disturbed wasps' nest. Wrykyn made
one or two remarks about people who could not play footer for toffee,
and then let the thing drop.
Sheen was too busy with his work and his boxing to have much leisure
for mourning over this latest example of the present inefficiency of
the school. The examination for the Gotford was to come off in two
days, and the inter-house boxing was fixed for the following Wednesday.
In five days, therefore, he would get his chance of retrieving his lost
place in the school. He was certain that he could, at any rate make a
very good show against anyone in the school, even Drummond. Joe Bevan
was delighted with his progress, and quoted Shakespeare volubly in his
admiration. Jack Bruce and Francis added their tribute, and the knife
and boot boy paid him the neatest compliment of all by refusing
point-blank to have any more dealings with him whatsoever. His
professional duties, explained the knife and boot boy, did not include
being punched in the heye by blokes, and he did not intend to be put
upon.
"You'll do all right," said Jack Bruce, as they were motoring home, "if
they'll let you go in for it all. But how do you know they will? Have
they chosen the men yet?"
"Not yet. They don't do it till the day before. But there won't be any
difficulty about that. Drummond will let me have a shot if he thinks
I'm good enough."
"Oh, you're good enough," said Bruce.
And when, on Monday evening, Francis, on receipt of no fewer than four
blows in a single round - a record, shook him by the hand and said that
if ever he happened to want a leetle darg that was a perfect bag of
tricks and had got a pedigree, mind you, he, Francis, would be proud to
supply that animal, Sheen felt that the moment had come to approach
Drummond on the subject of the house boxing. It would be a little
awkward at first, and conversation would probably run somewhat stiffly;
but all would be well once he had explained himself.
But things had been happening in his absence which complicated the
situation. Allardyce was having tea with Drummond, who had been
stopping in with a sore throat. He had come principally to make
arrangements for the match between his house and Seymour's in the
semi-final round of the competition.
"You're looking bad," he said, taking a seat.
"I'm feeling bad," said Drummond. For the past few days he had been
very much out of sorts. He put it down to a chill caught after the
Ripton match. He had never mustered up sufficient courage to sponge
himself with cold water after soaking in a hot bath, and he
occasionally suffered for it.
"What's up?" inquired Allardyce.
"Oh, I don't know. Sort of beastly feeling. Sore throat. Nothing much.
Only it makes you feel rather rotten."
Allardyce looked interested.
"I say," he said, "it looks as if - I wonder. I hope you haven't."
"What?"
"Mumps. It sounds jolly like it."
"Mumps! Of course I've not. Why should I?"
Allardyce produced a letter from his pocket. "I got this from Keith,
the Ripton captain, this morning. You know they've had a lot of the
thing there. Oh, didn't you? That was why they had such a bad team
out."
"Bad team!" murmured Drummond.
"Well, I mean not their best team. They had four of their men down with
mumps. Here's what Keith says. Listen. Bit about hoping we got back all
right, and so on, first. Then he says - here it is, 'Another of our
fellows has got the mumps. One of the forwards; rather a long man who
was good out of touch. He developed it a couple of days after the
match. It's lucky that all our card games are over. We beat John's,
Oxford, last Wednesday, and that finished the card. But it'll rather
rot up the House matches. We should have walked the cup, but there's no
knowing what will happen now. I hope none of your lot caught the mumps
from Browning during the game. It's quite likely, of course. Browning
ought not to have been playing, but I had no notion that there was
anything wrong with him. He never said he felt bad.' You've got it,
Drummond. That's what's the matter with you."
"Oh, rot," said Drummond. "It's only a chill."
But the school doctor, who had looked in at the house to dose a small
Seymourite who had indulged too heartily in the pleasures of the table,
had other views, and before lockup Drummond was hurried off to the
infirmary.
Sheen went to Drummond's study after preparation had begun, and was
surprised to find him out. Not being on speaking terms with a single
member of the house, he was always out-of-date as regarded items of
school news. As a rule he had to wait until Jack Bruce told him before
learning of any occurrence of interest. He had no notion that mumps was
the cause of Drummond's absence, and he sat and waited patiently for
him in his study till the bell rang for prayers. The only possible
explanation that occurred to him was that Drummond was in somebody
else's study, and he could not put his theory to the test by going and
looking. It was only when Drummond did not put in an appearance at
prayers that Sheen began to suspect that something might have happened.
It was maddening not to be able to make inquiries. He had almost
decided to go and ask Linton, and risk whatever might be the
consequences of such a step, when he remembered that the matron must
know. He went to her, and was told that Drummond was in the infirmary.
He could not help seeing that this made his position a great deal more
difficult. In ten minutes he could have explained matters to Drummond
if he had found him in his study. But it would be a more difficult task
to put the thing clearly in a letter.
Meanwhile, it was bed-time, and he soon found his hands too full with
his dormitory to enable him to think out the phrasing of that letter.
The dormitory, which was recruited entirely from the junior day-room,
had heard of Drummond's departure with rejoicings. They liked Drummond,
but he was a good deal too fond of the iron hand for their tastes. A
night with Sheen in charge should prove a welcome change.
A deafening uproar was going on when Sheen arrived, and as he came into
the room somebody turned the gas out. He found some matches on the chest
of drawers, and lit it again just in time to see a sportive youth tearing
the clothes off his bed and piling them on the floor. A month before he
would not have known how to grapple with such a situation, but his
evenings with Joe Bevan had given him the habit of making up his mind
and acting rapidly. Drummond was wont to keep a swagger-stick by his
bedside for the better observance of law and order. Sheen possessed
himself of this swagger-stick, and reasoned with the sportive youth.
The rest of the dormitory looked on in interested silence. It was a
critical moment, and on his handling of it depended Sheen's victory or
defeat. If he did not keep his head he was lost. A dormitory is
merciless to a prefect whose weakness they have discovered.
Sheen kept his head. In a quiet, pleasant voice, fingering the
swagger-stick, as he spoke, in an absent manner, he requested his young
friend to re-make the bed - rapidly and completely. For the space of
five minutes no sound broke the silence except the rustle of sheets and
blankets. At the end of that period the bed looked as good as new.
"Thanks," said Sheen gratefully. "That's very kind of you."
He turned to the rest of the dormitory.
"Don't let me detain you," he said politely. "Get into bed as soon as
you like."
The dormitory got into bed sooner than they liked. For some reason the
colossal rag they had planned had fizzled out. They were thoughtful as
they crept between the sheets. Could these things be?
* * * * *
After much deliberation Sheen sent his letter to Drummond on the
following day. It was not a long letter, but it was carefully worded.
It explained that he had taken up boxing of late, and ended with a
request that he might be allowed to act as Drummond's understudy in the
House competitions.
It was late that evening when the infirmary attendant came over with
the answer.
Like the original letter, the answer was brief.
"Dear Sheen," wrote Drummond, "thanks for the offer. I am afraid I
can't accept it. We must have the best man. Linton is going to box for
the House in the Light-Weights."
XVII
SEYMOUR'S ONE SUCCESS
This polite epistle, it may be mentioned, was a revised version of the
one which Drummond originally wrote in reply to Sheen's request. His
first impulse had been to answer in the four brief words, "Don't be a
fool"; for Sheen's letter had struck him as nothing more than a
contemptible piece of posing, and he had all the hatred for poses which
is a characteristic of the plain and straightforward type of mind. It
seemed to him that Sheen, as he expressed it to himself, was trying to
"do the boy hero". In the school library, which had been stocked during
the dark ages, when that type of story was popular, there were numerous
school stories in which the hero retrieved a rocky reputation by
thrashing the bully, displaying in the encounter an intuitive but
overwhelming skill with his fists. Drummond could not help feeling that
Sheen must have been reading one of these stories. It was all very fine
and noble of him to want to show that he was No Coward After All, like
Leo Cholmondeley or whatever his beastly name was, in _The Lads of
St. Ethelberta's_ or some such piffling book; but, thought Drummond
in his cold, practical way, what about the house? If Sheen thought that
Seymour's was going to chuck away all chance of winning one of the
inter-house events, simply in order to give him an opportunity of doing
the Young Hero, the sooner he got rid of that sort of idea, the better.
If he wanted to do the Leo Cholmondeley business, let him go and chuck
a kid into the river, and jump in and save him. But he wasn't going to
have the house let in for twenty Sheens.
Such were the meditations of Drummond when the infirmary attendant
brought Sheen's letter to him; and he seized pencil and paper and
wrote, "Don't be a fool". But pity succeeded contempt, and he tore up
the writing. After all, however much he had deserved it, the man had
had a bad time. It was no use jumping on him. And at one time they had
been pals. Might as well do the thing politely.
All of which reflections would have been prevented had Sheen thought of
mentioning the simple fact that it was Joe Bevan who had given him the
lessons to which he referred in his letter. But he had decided not to
do so, wishing to avoid long explanations. And there was, he felt, a
chance that the letter might come into other hands than those of
Drummond. So he had preserved silence on that point, thereby wrecking
his entire scheme.
It struck him that he might go to Linton, explain his position, and ask
him to withdraw in his favour, but there were difficulties in the way
of that course. There is a great deal of red tape about the athletic
arrangements of a house at a public school. When once an order has gone
forth, it is difficult to get it repealed. Linton had been chosen to
represent the house in the Light-Weights, and he would carry out
orders. Only illness would prevent him appearing in the ring.
Sheen made up his mind not to try to take his place, and went through
the days a victim to gloom, which was caused by other things besides
his disappointment respecting the boxing competition. The Gotford
examination was over now, and he was not satisfied with his
performance. Though he did not know it, his dissatisfaction was due
principally to the fact that, owing to his isolation, he had been
unable to compare notes after the examinations with the others. Doing
an examination without comparing notes subsequently with one's rivals,
is like playing golf against a bogey. The imaginary rival against whom
one pits oneself never makes a mistake. Our own "howlers" stand out in
all their horrid nakedness; but we do not realise that our rivals have
probably made others far worse. In this way Sheen plumbed the depths of
depression. The Gotford was a purely Classical examination, with the
exception of one paper, a General Knowledge paper; and it was in this
that Sheen fancied he had failed so miserably. His Greek and Latin
verse were always good; his prose, he felt, was not altogether beyond
the pale; but in the General Knowledge paper he had come down heavily.
As a matter of fact, if he had only known, the paper was an
exceptionally hard one, and there was not a single candidate for the
scholarship who felt satisfied with his treatment of it. It was to
questions ten, eleven, and thirteen of this paper that Cardew, of the
School House, who had entered for the scholarship for the sole reason
that competitors got excused two clear days of ordinary school-work,
wrote the following answer:
See "Encylopaedia Britannica," _Times_ edition.
If they really wanted to know, he said subsequently, that was the
authority to go to. He himself would probably misinform them
altogether.
In addition to the Gotford and the House Boxing, the House Fives now
came on, and the authorities of Seymour's were in no small perplexity.
They met together in Rigby's study to discuss the matter. Their
difficulty was this. There was only one inmate of Seymour's who had a
chance of carrying off the House Fives Cup. And that was Sheen. The
house was asking itself what was to be done about it.
"You see," said Rigby, "you can look at it in two ways, whichever you
like. We ought certainly to send in our best man for the pot, whatever
sort of chap he is. But then, come to think of it, Sheen can't very
well be said to belong to the house at all. When a man's been cut dead
during the whole term, he can't be looked on as one of the house very
well. See what I mean?"
"Of course he can't," said Mill, who was second in command at
Seymour's. Mill's attitude towards his fellow men was one of incessant
hostility. He seemed to bear a grudge against the entire race.
Rigby resumed. He was a pacific person, and hated anything resembling
rows in the house. He had been sorry for Sheen, and would have been
glad to give him a chance of setting himself on his legs again.
"You see." he said, "this is what I mean. We either recognise Sheen's
existence or we don't. Follow? We can't get him to win this Cup for us,
and then, when he has done it, go on cutting him and treating him as if
he didn't belong to the house at all. I know he let the house down
awfully badly in that business, but still, if he lifts the Fives Cup,
that'll square the thing. If he does anything to give the house a
leg-up, he must be treated as if he'd never let it down at all."
"Of course," said Barry. "I vote we send him in for the Fives."
"What rot!" said Mill. "It isn't as if none of the rest of us played
fives."
"We aren't as good as Sheen," said Barry.
"I don't care. I call it rot letting a chap like him represent the
house at anything. If he were the best fives-player in the world I
wouldn't let him play for the house."
Rigby was impressed by his vehemence. He hesitated.
"After all, Barry," he said, "I don't know. Perhaps it might - you see,
he did - well, I really think we'd better have somebody else. The house
has got its knife into Sheen too much just at present to want him as a
representative. There'd only be sickness, don't you think? Who else is
there?"
So it came about that Menzies was chosen to uphold the house in the
Fives Courts. Sheen was not surprised. But it was not pleasant. He was
certainly having bad luck in his attempts to do something for the
house. Perhaps if he won the Gotford they might show a little
enthusiasm. The Gotford always caused a good deal of interest in the
school. It was the best thing of its kind in existence at Wrykyn, and
even the most abandoned loafers liked to feel that their house had won
it. It was just possible, thought Sheen, that a brilliant win might
change the feelings of Seymour's towards him. He did not care for the
applause of the multitude more than a boy should, but he preferred it
very decidedly to the cut direct.
Things went badly for Seymour's. Never in the history of the house, or,
at any rate, in the comparatively recent history of the house, had
there been such a slump in athletic trophies. To begin with, they were
soundly beaten in the semi-final for the House football cup by
Allardyce's lot. With Drummond away, there was none to mark the captain
of the School team at half, and Allardyce had raced through in a manner
that must have compensated him to a certain extent for the poor time he
had had in first fifteen matches. The game had ended in a Seymourite
defeat by nineteen points to five.
Nor had the Boxing left the house in a better position. Linton fought
pluckily in the Light-Weights, but went down before Stanning, after
beating a representative of Templar's. Mill did not show up well in the
Heavy-Weights, and was defeated in his first bout. Seymour's were
reduced to telling themselves how different it all would have been if
Drummond had been there.
Sheen watched the Light-Weight contests, and nearly danced with
irritation. He felt that he could have eaten Stanning. The man was
quick with his left, but he couldn't _box_. He hadn't a notion of
side-stepping, and the upper-cut appeared to be entirely outside his
range. He would like to see him tackle Francis.
Sheen thought bitterly of Drummond. Why on earth couldn't he have given
him a chance. It was maddening.
The Fives carried on the story. Menzies was swamped by a Day's man. He
might just as well have stayed away altogether. The star of Seymour's
was very low on the horizon.
And then the house scored its one success. The headmaster announced it
in the Hall after prayers in his dry, unemotional way.
"I have received the list of marks," he said, "from the examiners for
the Gotford Scholarship." He paused. Sheen felt a sudden calm triumph
flood over him. Somehow, intuitively, he knew that he had won. He
waited without excitement for the next words.
"Out of a possible thousand marks, Sheen, who wins the scholarship,
obtained seven hundred and one, Stanning six hundred and four,
Wilson...."
Sheen walked out of the Hall in the unique position of a Gotford winner
with only one friend to congratulate him. Jack Bruce was the one. The
other six hundred and thirty-three members of the school made no
demonstration.
There was a pleasant custom at Seymour's of applauding at tea any
Seymourite who had won distinction, and so shed a reflected glory on
the house. The head of the house would observe, "Well played,
So-and-So!" and the rest of the house would express their emotion in
the way that seemed best to them, to the subsequent exultation of the
local crockery merchant, who had generally to supply at least a dozen
fresh cups and plates to the house after one of these occasions. When
it was for getting his first eleven or first fifteen cap that the lucky
man was being cheered, the total of breakages sometimes ran into the
twenties.
Rigby, good, easy man, was a little doubtful as to what course to
pursue in the circumstances. Should he give the signal? After all, the
fellow _had_ won the Gotford. It was a score for the house, and
they wanted all the scores they could get in these lean years. Perhaps,
then, he had better.
"Well played, Sheen," said he.
There was a dead silence. A giggle from the fags' table showed that the
comedy of the situation was not lost on the young mind.
The head of the house looked troubled. This was awfully awkward.
"Well played, Sheen," he said again.
"Don't mention it, Rigby," said the winner of the Gotford politely,
looking up from his plate.
XVIII
MR BEVAN MAKES A SUGGESTION
When one has been working hard with a single end in view, the arrival
and departure of the supreme moment is apt to leave a feeling of
emptiness, as if life had been drained of all its interest, and left
nothing sufficiently exciting to make it worth doing. Horatius, as he
followed his plough on a warm day over the corn land which his
gratified country bestowed on him for his masterly handling of the
traffic on the bridge, must sometimes have felt it was a little tame.
The feeling is far more acute when one has been unexpectedly baulked in
one's desire for action. Sheen, for the first few days after he
received Drummond's brief note, felt that it was useless for him to try
to do anything. The Fates were against him. In stories, as Mr Anstey
has pointed out, the hero is never long without his chance of
retrieving his reputation. A mad bull comes into the school grounds,
and he alone (the hero, not the bull) is calm. Or there is a fire, and
whose is that pale and gesticulating form at the upper window? The
bully's, of course. And who is that climbing nimbly up the Virginia
creeper? Why, the hero. Who else? Three hearty cheers for the plucky
hero.
But in real life opportunities of distinguishing oneself are less
frequent.
Sheen continued his visits to the "Blue Boar", but more because he
shrank from telling Joe Bevan that all his trouble had been for
nothing, than because he had any definite object in view. It was bitter
to listen to the eulogies of the pugilist, when all the while he knew
that, as far as any immediate results were concerned, it did not really
matter whether he boxed well or feebly. Some day, perhaps, as Mr Bevan
was fond of pointing out when he approached the subject of
disadvantages of boxing, he might meet a hooligan when he was crossing
a field with his sister; but he found that but small consolation. He
was in the position of one who wants a small sum of ready money, and is
told that, in a few years, he may come into a fortune. By the time he
got a chance of proving himself a man with his hands, he would be an
Old Wrykinian. He was leaving at the end of the summer term.
Jack Bruce was sympathetic, and talked more freely than was his wont.
"I can't understand it," he said. "Drummond always seemed a good sort.
I should have thought he would have sent you in for the house like a
shot. Are you sure you put it plainly in your letter? What did you
say?"
Sheen repeated the main points of his letter.
"Did you tell him who had been teaching you?"
"No. I just said I'd been boxing lately."
"Pity," said Jack Bruce. "If you'd mentioned that it was Joe who'd been
training you, he would probably have been much more for it. You see, he
couldn't know whether you were any good or not from your letter. But if
you'd told him that Joe Bevan and Hunt both thought you good, he'd have
seen there was something in it."
"It never occurred to me. Like a fool, I was counting on the thing so
much that it didn't strike me there would be any real difficulty in
getting him to see my point. Especially when he got mumps and couldn't
go in himself. Well, it can't be helped now."
And the conversation turned to the prospects of Jack Bruce's father in
the forthcoming election, the polling for which had just begun.
"I'm busy now," said Bruce. "I'm not sure that I shall be able to do
much sparring with you for a bit."
"My dear chap, don't let me - "
"Oh, it's all right, really. Taking you to the 'Blue Boar' doesn't land
me out of my way at all. Most of the work lies round in this direction.
I call at cottages, and lug oldest inhabitants to the poll. It's rare
sport."
"Does your pater know?"
"Oh, yes. He rots me about it like anything, but, all the same, I
believe he's really rather bucked because I've roped in quite a dozen
voters who wouldn't have stirred a yard if I hadn't turned up. That's
where we're scoring. Pedder hasn't got a car yet, and these old rotters
round here aren't going to move out of their chairs to go for a ride in
an ordinary cart. But they chuck away their crutches and hop into a
motor like one o'clock."
"It must be rather a rag," said Sheen.
The car drew up at the door of the "Blue Boar". Sheen got out and ran
upstairs to the gymnasium. Joe Bevan was sparring a round with Francis.
He watched them while he changed, but without the enthusiasm of which
he had been conscious on previous occasions. The solid cleverness of
Joe Bevan, and the quickness and cunning of the bantam-weight, were as
much in evidence as before, but somehow the glamour and romance which
had surrounded them were gone. He no longer watched eagerly to pick up
the slightest hint from these experts. He felt no more interest than he
would have felt in watching a game of lawn tennis. He _had_ been
keen. Since his disappointment with regard to the House Boxing he had
become indifferent.
Joe Bevan noticed this before he had been boxing with him a minute.
"Hullo, sir," he said, "what's this? Tired today? Not feeling well? You
aren't boxing like yourself, not at all you aren't. There's no weight
behind 'em. You're tapping. What's the matter with your feet, too? You
aren't getting about as quickly as I should like to see. What have you
been doing to yourself?"
"Nothing that I know of," said Sheen. "I'm sorry I'm so rotten. Let's
have another try."
The second try proved as unsatisfactory as the first. He was listless,
and his leads and counters lacked conviction.
Joe Bevan, who identified himself with his pupils with that
thoroughness which is the hall-mark of the first-class boxing
instructor, looked so pained at his sudden loss of form, that Sheen
could not resist the temptation to confide in him. After all, he must
tell him some time.
"The fact is," he said, as they sat on the balcony overlooking the
river, waiting for Jack Bruce to return with his car, "I've had a bit
of a sickener."
"I thought you'd got sick of it," said Mr Bevan. "Well, have a bit of a
rest."
"I don't mean that I'm tired of boxing," Sheen hastened to explain.
"After all the trouble you've taken with me, it would be a bit thick if
I chucked it just as I was beginning to get on. It isn't that. But you
know how keen I was on boxing for the house?"
Joe Bevan nodded.
"Did you get beat?"
"They wouldn't let me go in," said Sheen.
"But, bless me! you'd have made babies of them. What was the instructor
doing? Couldn't he see that you were good?"
"I didn't get a chance of showing what I could do." He explained the
difficulties of the situation.
Mr Bevan nodded his head thoughtfully.
"So naturally," concluded Sheen, "the thing has put me out a bit. It's
beastly having nothing to work for. I'm at a loose end. Up till now,
I've always had the thought of the House Competition to keep me going.
But now - well, you see how it is. It's like running to catch a train,
and then finding suddenly that you've got plenty of time. There doesn't
seem any point in going on running."
"Why not Aldershot, sir? said Mr Bevan.
"What!" cried Sheen.
The absolute novelty of the idea, and the gorgeous possibilities of it,
made him tingle from head to foot. Aldershot! Why hadn't he thought of
it before! The House Competition suddenly lost its importance in his
eyes. It was a trivial affair, after all, compared with Aldershot, that
Mecca of the public-school boxer.
Then the glow began to fade. Doubts crept in. He might have learned a
good deal from Joe Bevan, but had he learned enough to be able to hold
his own with the best boxers of all the public schools in the country?
And if he had the skill to win, had he the heart? Joe Bevan had said
that he would not disgrace himself again, and he felt that the chances
were against his doing so, but there was the terrible possibility. He
had stood up to Francis and the others, and he had taken their blows
without flinching; but in these encounters there was always at the back
of his mind the comforting feeling that there was a limit to the amount
of punishment he would receive. If Francis happened to drive him into a
corner where he could neither attack, nor defend himself against
attack, he did not use his advantage to the full. He indicated rather
than used it. A couple of blows, and he moved out into the open again.
But in the Public Schools Competition at Aldershot there would be no
quarter. There would be nothing but deadly earnest. If he allowed
himself to be manoeuvred into an awkward position, only his own skill,
or the call of time, could extricate him from it.
In a word, at the "Blue Boar" he sparred. At Aldershot he would have to
fight. Was he capable of fighting?
Then there was another difficulty. How was he to get himself appointed
as the Wrykyn light-weight representative? Now that Drummond was unable
to box, Stanning would go down, as the winner of the School
Competition. These things were worked by an automatic process. Sheen
felt that he could beat Stanning, but he had no means of publishing
this fact to the school. He could not challenge him to a trial of
skill. That sort of thing was not done.
He explained this to Joe Bevan.
"Well, it's a pity," said Joe regretfully. "It's a pity."
At this moment Jack Bruce appeared.
"What's a pity, Joe?" he asked.
"Joe wants me to go to Aldershot as a light-weight," explained Sheen,
"and I was just saying that I couldn't, because of Stanning."
"What about Stanning?"
"He won the School Competition, you see, so they're bound to send him
down."
"Half a minute," said Jack Bruce. "I never thought of Aldershot for you
before. It's a jolly good idea. I believe you'd have a chance. And it's
all right about Stanning. He's not going down. Haven't you heard?"
"I don't hear anything. Why isn't he going down?"
"He's knocked up one of his wrists. So he says."
"How do you mean - so he says?" asked Sheen.
"I believe he funks it."
"Why? What makes you think that?"
"Oh, I don't know. It's only my opinion. Still, it's a little queer.
Stanning says he crocked his left wrist in the final of the House
Competition."
"Well, what's wrong with that? Why shouldn't he have done so?"
Sheen objected strongly to Stanning, but he had the elements of justice
in him, and he was not going to condemn him on insufficient evidence,
particularly of a crime of which he himself had been guilty.
"Of course he may have done," said Bruce. "But it's a bit fishy that he
should have been playing fives all right two days running just after
the competition."
"He might have crocked himself then."
"Then why didn't he say so?"
A question which Sheen found himself unable to answer.
"Then there's nothing to prevent you fighting, sir," said Joe Bevan,
who had been listening attentively to the conversation.
"Do you really think I've got a chance?"
"I do, sir."
"Of course you have," said Jack Bruce. "You're quite as good as
Drummond was, last time I saw him box."
"Then I'll have a shot at it," said Sheen.
"Good for you, sir," cried Joe Bevan.
"Though it'll be a bit of a job getting leave," said Sheen. "How would
you start about it, Bruce?"
"You'd better ask Spence. He's the man to go to."
"That's all right. I'm rather a pal of Spence's."
"Ask him tonight after prep.," suggested Bruce.
"And then you can come here regular," said Joe Bevan, "and we'll train
you till you're that fit you could eat bricks, and you'll make babies
of them up at Aldershot."
XIX
PAVING THE WAY
Bruce had been perfectly correct in his suspicions. Stanning's wrist
was no more sprained than his ankle. The advisability of manufacturing
an injury had come home to him very vividly on the Saturday morning
following the Ripton match, when he had read the brief report of that
painful episode in that week's number of the _Field_ in the school
library. In the list of the Ripton team appeared the name R. Peteiro.
He had heard a great deal about the dusky Riptonian when Drummond had
beaten him in the Feather-Weights the year before. Drummond had
returned from Aldershot on that occasion cheerful, but in an extremely
battered condition. His appearance as he limped about the field on
Sports Day had been heroic, and, in addition, a fine advertisement for
the punishing powers of the Ripton champion. It is true that at least
one of his injuries had been the work of a Pauline whom he had met in
the opening bout; but the great majority were presents from Ripton, and
Drummond had described the dusky one, in no uncertain terms, as a holy
terror.
These things had sunk into Stanning's mind. It had been generally
understood at Wrykyn that Peteiro had left school at Christmas. When
Stanning, through his study of the _Field_, discovered that the
redoubtable boxer had been one of the team against which he had played
at Ripton, and realised that, owing to Drummond's illness, it would
fall to him, if he won the House Competition, to meet this man of wrath
at Aldershot, he resolved on the instant that the most persuasive of
wild horses should not draw him to that military centre on the day of
the Public Schools Competition. The difficulty was that he particularly
wished to win the House Cup. Then it occurred to him that he could
combine the two things - win the competition and get injured while doing
so.
Accordingly, two days after the House Boxing he was observed to issue
from Appleby's with his left arm slung in a first fifteen scarf. He was
too astute to injure his right wrist. What happens to one's left wrist
at school is one's own private business. When one injures one's right
arm, and so incapacitates oneself for form work, the authorities begin
to make awkward investigations.
Mr Spence, who looked after the school's efforts to win medals at
Aldershot, was the most disappointed person in the place. He was an
enthusiastic boxer - he had represented Cambridge in the Middle-Weights
in his day - and with no small trouble had succeeded in making boxing a
going concern at Wrykyn. Years of failure had ended, the Easter before,
in a huge triumph, when O'Hara, of Dexter's and Drummond had won silver
medals, and Moriarty, of Dexter's, a bronze. If only somebody could win
a medal this year, the tradition would be established, and would not
soon die out. Unfortunately, there was not a great deal of boxing
talent in the school just now. The rule that the winner at his weight
in the House Competitions should represent the school at Aldershot only
applied if the winner were fairly proficient. Mr Spence exercised his
discretion. It was no use sending down novices to be massacred. This
year Drummond and Stanning were the only Wrykinians up to Aldershot
form. Drummond would have been almost a certainty for a silver medal,
and Stanning would probably have been a runner-up. And here they were,
both injured; Wrykyn would not have a single representative at the
Queen's Avenue Gymnasium. It would be a set-back to the cult of boxing
at the school.
Mr Spence was pondering over this unfortunate state of things when
Sheen was shown in.
"Can I speak to you for a minute, sir?" said Sheen.
"Certainly, Sheen. Take one of those cig - I mean, sit down. What is
it?"
Sheen had decided how to open the interview before knocking at the
door. He came to the point at once.
"Do you think I could go down to Aldershot, sir?" he asked.
Mr Spence looked surprised.
"Go down? You mean - ? Do you want to watch the competition? Really, I
don't know if the headmaster - "
"I mean, can I box?"
Mr Spence's look of surprise became more marked.
"Box?" he said. "But surely - I didn't know you were a boxer, Sheen."
"I've only taken it up lately."
"But you didn't enter for the House Competitions, did you? What weight
are you?"
"Just under ten stone."
"A light-weight. Why, Linton boxed for your house in the Light-Weights
surely?"
"Yes sir. They wouldn't let me go in."
"You hurt yourself?"
"No, sir."
"Then why wouldn't they let you go in?"
"Drummond thought Linton was better. He didn't know I boxed."
"But - this is very curious. I don't understand it at all. You see, if
you were not up to House form, you would hardly - At Aldershot, you see,
you would meet the best boxers of all the public schools."