Mr Rebble stepped up into the loft, closely followed by Mr Hasnip, who
stared from one to the other with a peculiar smile upon his lip.
"Fighting, eh?" said Mr Rebble. "Disgraceful! Why, Dicksee and Dean
have been fighting too, and--yes--Mercer."
"Yes, sir," cried little Wilson. "Mercer and Dicksee had theirs first,
then Burr major and Burr junior. Bill Dean hasn't been fighting. It
was only that Burr junior gave him a wipe."
I felt as if I were the chief offender, and as I heard these words, I
longed not to deliver wipes, but to have a good wash.
"Disgraceful!" exclaimed Mr Rebble. "Who began it? You, I suppose,
Burr."
My first instinct was to disclaim this excitedly, but I thought it would
be cowardly, so I held my tongue, leaving it to Burr major to answer.
To my surprise, though, he remained silent, and little Wilson squeaked
out,--
"No, sir, please, sir, it wasn't Burr junior, sir. Eely Burr sent for
Burr and Mercer to come and be licked; but," added the boy, with a
malicious grin, "he hasn't licked them yet."
"Disgraceful! disgraceful!" cried Mr Rebble. "Well, the Doctor will
decide what is to be done. Quick, boys, the dinner bell will.--Ah,
there it goes!"
There was a hurried rush off at this, the boys being only too glad to
get beyond hearing of the usher's scolding, and we who were left
hurriedly scrambled on our jackets in a shamefaced way.
"This matter will have to be thoroughly investigated," said Mr Rebble;
"but be quick now and make yourselves presentable. I shudder at what
the Doctor would say if he saw you all in this condition. Come,
Hasnip."
They both descended like pantomime demons through the trap, and we
followed, Burr major going first, with his brow knit and his bruised
face looking sulky and sour, while Dicksee turned to give Tom Mercer a
savagely vindictive look which was not pleasant to see.
"Won't you shake hands?" I said, as my adversary was about to descend.
He gave me a quick look, but made no answer. Hodson however, spoke as
we reached the stable.
"Why, Burr," he said, "I didn't know that you could fight like that."
"No," I said, "and I did not know either."
Then we hurried in and ran up to our room, where I was glad to get soap
and towel to my bruised face.
"Oh, you are lucky, Tom!" I panted, as I hurriedly bent over the basin,
fully expecting to be reported for coming up to the dormitory out of
hours. "Why, you don't show a bit."
"Nor you neither," he replied.
"Oh!" I gasped, as I looked in the glass.
"Well, not so very much," he said.
"But--but I don't hardly know myself," I said despondently. "What a
face!"
"Well, it does look rather like a muffin," he cried.
"Ah, you may laugh," I said. "My eyes are just like they were when I
was stung by a bee, and my lip's cut inside, and this tooth is loose,
and--Oh dear, it's all growing worse!"
"Yes, it's sure to go on getting worse for a day or two, and then it
will begin to get better. Ready?"
"Ready! No," I cried, as I listened to his poor consolation. "I'm
getting horrid. I daren't go down."
"You must--you must. Come and face it out before you get worse."
"But I don't seem to have got a face," I cried, glaring out of two slits
at my reflection in the glass. "It's just as if some one had been
sitting on it for a week. Oh, you ugly brute!"
"So are you."
"I meant myself, of course, Tom."
"Never mind, never mind. Hooray! hooray!" he cried, dancing round the
room and snapping his fingers; "we've licked 'em--we've licked 'em! and
you're cock of the school. Hooray! hooray!"
"But I half wish I hadn't won now," I said.
"You will not to-morrow. Oh dear! poor old Eely! didn't he squirm! Oh,
I say! I wish I had given it to old Dicksee ten times as much."
I couldn't help laughing, but it hurt horribly, and I was serious again
directly.
"I say," I said painfully, "old Lom did teach us well!"
"Teach us! It was splendid. I feel as if I could go down and fight the
Doctor."
"Do you?" I said dolefully. "I feel as if he is going to fight us."
"Not he; come on. You can't afford to be afraid of anything now."
"Hadn't I better stop?" I suggested, with another look in the glass.
"No; you must come. If you don't, the Doctor is sure to send for you,
and that will make it worse. I say!"
"Well?"
"People who fight used to take the spoils of the vanquished. I wish I
could have taken old Dicksee's four-bladed knife, with the lancet and
corkscrew to it, and you could have taken old Eely's watch."
"I don't want his watch," I said snappishly.
"I do, and I'd have changed with you. Come on."
We ran down-stairs, and, feeling very nervous, hurried to the
schoolroom, from whose open windows came the clatter of knives and
forks.
Fortunately for us, we had to enter at the opposite end to where the
Doctor would be seated, nominally taking his meal with us, and of course
the ushers knew that we must be late, so with heads bent down we hurried
in, conscious that every eye was upon us, and that the temporary
cessation of the rattle on the plates was due to the boys leaving off
eating to stare at our injuries.
I saw both Mr Rebble and Mr Hasnip look up and frown as they caught
sight of my damaged face, and I was congratulating myself on escaping
the Doctor's eye, when he looked up, frowned, and went on with his
lunch.
"It's all right," whispered Mercer, scuffling into his place beside me,
the boys around, to my great surprise, seeming to look at my marks with
quite respectful eyes, and evidently as a conqueror's honours or
laurels, when there was a sharp tapping on the table from the Doctor's
knife-handle.