Aspinall was not absent three minutes altogether, but the interval
seemed interminable.
Our heroes, as they sat huddled together, pale, defiant, but bewildered,
dividing the attention of the meeting with their accuser, thought it a
century. More than once Dick, boiling over, started to his feet and
attempted to speak, but every time Mansfield quietly suppressed him, and
told him to wait till the proper time came.
Coote was once more racked by doubts as to whether he had really taken
the pencil after all. He was morally certain he had not, but Coote was
a youth always open to conviction.
The door opened at last, and Aspinall appeared ushering in the
bookseller, who looked like a man who suspected a trap and was prepared
to defend himself at the first sign of attack.
He had received a note in the morning from Pledge--of whom he had seen
or heard nothing since his visit to the shop a fortnight ago--asking him
to be sure to call at the school at 4:30 on a matter of business.
When Aspinall summoned him, he concluded it was to go to Pledge's study.
But when, instead of that, he found himself suddenly ushered into a
congregation of the whole school, it was small wonder if he felt
bewildered and sniffed treachery.
"Mr Webster," said Mansfield, "Pledge, here, has just been publicly
accusing three boys of theft. He says they have robbed you, and we want
you to hear his statement and tell us if it is true. Please repeat what
you have to say, Pledge, in Mr Webster's hearing."
The stationer, with inquiring face, turned to Pledge, who, despite some
vague doubts which were beginning to disturb his confidence, smiled
affably and said--
"Oh, sorry to bring you up, Mr Webster, just at your busy time, but I
was telling my friends here about that little affair of the pencil-case,
you know, which was stolen from you; and as they don't seem inclined to
believe me, I thought the best thing would be for you to tell them about
it yourself."
The countenance of the bookseller underwent a marvellous transformation
as the speech proceeded. When Pledge had ceased, he exclaimed--
"Pencil-case! Why, bless you, Mr Pledge, I found that a fortnight
ago!"
This announcement was the signal for a howl such as Templeton had rarely
heard. The pent-up scorn of an afternoon broke out against the accuser
as he stood there, pale and stupefied, staring at Webster.
It was all Mansfield could do to restore order. The gust had to blow
itself more than half out before even he was heeded.
"Look here, you fellows," said he, "don't let us lose our heads. We
want to hear the rights and wrongs of the case fairly. Hadn't you
better wait till that's done before you turn the place into a bear-
garden?"
The rebuke told, and the meeting relapsed into silence.
"You never told me that," snarled Pledge. "You've been fooling me."
"You never asked me. Mr Richardson knew; he was in the shop just after
I found it."
"Of course he was," sneered Pledge.
"He needn't have been, if that's what you mean. He'd nothing to do with
it. Bless you, it's an old story now; I'd almost forgotten it."
"You forgot, too, that you asked me to recover it for you; and you let
me go on while all the time you had it."
"You offered to get it back. I never asked you. You said you had an
interest in the young gentlemen."
"And you never thought it worth while to tell me the thing had turned
up?"
"I told Mr Richardson, and said I was sorry for the fright he and his
two friends had had. It never struck me you'd go on bothering about it,
or I'd have told you. Fact of the matter is, I've never seen you from
that day to this."
"Is that all you want to say?" said Mansfield, turning to Pledge.
"I can only say this," said Pledge: "that I never saw three boys imitate
guilt better. If they hadn't done it, I should like to ask them why
they quaked in their shoes whenever they met me, and why they sent me a
round robin, asking me not to tell about them?"
"I can tell you that!" shouted Dick, springing up.
"You needn't wait, Mr Webster," said Mansfield. "Thank you for coming
up."
"Thank you, gentlemen," said the tradesman.
"I'm sorry to be mixed up in the matter. Mr Pledge can go somewhere
else for his books. Good day, gentlemen."
"Good day," said several voices.
When order was restored, Dick was discovered, red in the face, mounted
on a form, propped up on either side by his faithful allies.
"I can tell him that," he cried, "and all of you, too. We thought he
knew about another row of ours--about Tom White's boat, you know. It
was us let her go; at least I did, and Georgie was there, too, and
Coote's been in it since he came up. Tom White robbed us coming back
from Grandcourt, and we were awfully wild, and were cads enough to slip
his boat on the beach. There's been a regular row, and we expected to
be transported. We backed Tom White up all we could, and tried to get
him off. I told the magistrate it was us did it, and he said I'd put
him in a jolly fix. Pledge was always talking to us about the police,
and the county gaol, and that sort of thing, and we made sure he'd found
out all about it, and was going to do us over it. We never guessed he
was running his head against that pencil business, or we could easily
have put him right. We're awfully sorry about the boat, you know. My
governor came down and squared most of the fellows, and it's all right
now, and Tom's got let off. Pledge has got a spite against all our
'Firm,' because we're not going to let Georgie be made a cad of by him,
and we told him so; didn't we, you chaps?"
"Yes, we did," shouted the "chaps."
"Yes, he thought," continued Dick, warming up, "he'd make Georgie go and
fag for him again, by threatening him about this row; but we backed
Georgie up, and wouldn't let him; and then he promised to show us up at
the 'Sociables,' and so he has."
Dick's oration was too much for the feelings of his audience. They
laughed and cheered at every sentence; and when finally he subsided
between his two supporters, quite short of breath, and wondering at the
length of his own speech, they forgot the Captain's rebuke, and finished
their howl against Pledge to the bitter end.
"Does Pledge want to ask any more questions?" asked Mansfield.
Pledge laughed bitterly.
"No, thank you; I'm not quite clever enough for them."
"Perhaps you are right," said the Captain, drily. "And if you have
nothing more to say, perhaps you would like to go."
Pledge hesitated a moment, amid the howls which followed the Captain's
words. Then he coolly rose, and ascended the platform. His face was
flushed, and his eyes uneasy; but otherwise impudence befriended him,
and he stood there to all appearances neither humiliated nor dismayed.
"Gentlemen," he began; but a fresh storm arose, and drowned his voice.