Haviland's gloomy prediction proved in so far correct, in that when,
after nearly a weary week of toil during his spare moments, he handed in
his imposition, his insatiable taskmaster insisted on his re-writing two
hundred of the lines. Then with lightened heart he found himself free
to resume his all-engrossing and gloriously healthy pursuit.
There is, or used to be, a superstition that a boy who didn't care for
cricket or football must necessarily be an ass, a loafer, and to be
regarded with some suspicion. Yet in point of fact such by no means
follows, and our friend Haviland was a case in point. He could cover as
many miles of ground in the limited time allowed as any one in the
school, and more than most. He could climb anything, could pick his way
delicately through the most forbidden ground, quartering it exhaustively
every yard, what time his natural enemy the keeper, his suspicions
roused, was on the watch in the very same covert, and return safe and
sound with his pearly treasures--to excite the envy and admiration of
the egg-collecting fraternity; yet though this represented his pet
hobby, he was something of an all-round naturalist, and his wanderings
in field and wood were by no means confined to the nesting season.
He might have liked cricket could he have been always in, but fielding
out he pronounced beastly slow. As for football he declared he couldn't
see any fun in having his nose jammed an inch and a half deep into
liquid mud, with ten or a dozen fellows on top of him trying to jam it
in still deeper: and in the result he always wanted to hit some one when
he got up again. Besides, a game you were obliged to play whether you
wanted to or not, ceased to be a game at all--and during its season
football was compulsory on half-holidays, at any rate for the juniors.
Now, as a prefect, he was exempt, and he appreciated his exemption.
But, his distaste for the _two_ great games notwithstanding, there was
nothing of the loafer or the muff about Haviland. He was always in the
pink of hard training, clear-eyed, clean-skinned, thoroughly sound in
wind and limb.
In the matter of his school work we regret to say that our friend cut a
less creditable figure; for in it indeed he shone in no particular
branch. His sole object was to get through his work as quickly and as
easily as possible, thereby to have more time for his favourite pursuit,
wherefore his ambition soared no higher than a respectable middle of the
fifth form. The ethics of Saint Kirwin's held "cribs" to be perfectly
justifiable--needless to say not from the masters' point of view--and a
large proportion generously availed themselves of such dubious aid,
being of course careful to avoid all the stock catches. Even a certain
amount of cribbing in form was held not to be unlawful, although
perilous; and when the Reverend Joseph Wilmot--an absent and star-gazing
type of master--gravely and impressively warned his Greek Testament form
one Sunday, _a propos_ of some suspiciously technical construing, that
he should, detect in a moment if any one used the English version, the
form was simply dying to roar; the point of the joke being that every
fellow composing it had got his English version concealed beneath his
locker, and was surreptitiously reading up the part where he would be
put on, this having been the practice of the form from time immemorial,
and, we grieve to say, destined to continue so indefinitely.
"Serve 'em right," pronounced Haviland, who was one of the offenders.
"They've no business to make us work on Sundays. It's smashing up the
fourth commandment. So if we take the English in to form with us it
saves us from working, and we get out of smashing the fourth
commandment. See?"
They did see, for a shout of acclamation hailed this young casuist's
special pleading. "Besides," he added, "Old Joe is such an ass. Detect
in a moment if any one used the English! Faugh! As if any one in this
form had ever done anything else?"
It may be thought that by reason of his own delinquencies Haviland's
authority as a prefect would have been partially if not entirely
undermined, yet such was not the case, for under the school code they
were justified, whereas the terrible crime of "sneaking" was as much the
one unpardonable sin at Saint Kirwin's as elsewhere. And in the
enforcement of that authority he was pitiless, hence his unpopularity--
but it answered--and whether he presided over preparation, or in the
dormitory, or elsewhere, order reigned. The spirits of misrule were
laid.
Once indeed an offender thought to round on him. He had unearthed a
smoking case, and the use of tobacco was of course a capital offence.
One of the offenders--three biggish fellows by the way--had said
meaningly:
"If you do anything in this, Haviland, we can hand you up. We saw you
in Needham's Copse only last week, and other places besides."
"All right, Starford. You must go before the next prefects' council,
all three of you. This'll mean a licking I'm afraid, but you'll have an
appeal to the Doctor. You can give me away then if you think it'll do
yourselves any good, but I believe you know Nick better than that."
He was right, except that the headmaster took the matter out of the
prefectorial hands and soundly flogged the culprits himself. But no
word did these utter with regard to any delinquency on the part of him
who was instrumental in bringing them to justice.
Meanwhile the Zulu boy, Anthony, otherwise Mpukuza, was not finding life
at Saint Kirwin's exactly a bed of roses, the more so that Jarnley and a
few other choice spirits were making it their especial business that he
should not. Deprived of the protection of his first and accidental
defender, he was very much at their mercy. Haviland was gated, and
would so remain for some days to come, and so long as they could catch
their victim outside, this rough element promised itself plenty of fun.
There was no fear of the victim himself giving it away, for although
complaining to a prefect was immeasurably less heinous than complaining
to a master, still it was not held justifiable except in very extreme
cases.
"Come down and have a bathe with us, Snowball," cried Jarnley, catching
sight of his intended victim, while proceeding with a group of his
followers to one of the school bathing-places.
"Can you swim, Cetchy?" cried another of the group--that being the Zulu
boy's nickname as the nearest they could get to Cetywayo.
"Swim--eh? Well, I dunno."
"Come along then, and we'll teach you," and grins of malignant delight
went round the group. They anticipated no end of fun. They were going
to duck this somewhat unusual specimen until they nearly drowned him.
Jarnley, in particular, was radiant.
Mpukuza grinned too. There was no escape. They had hedged him about
too completely for that. He might as well accept the situation
good-humouredly. And--he did.
About half a mile from the school buildings there flowed an
insignificant sluggish river, opening here and there into broad deep
pools. One of these, screened off, and fitted with a diving board,
constituted the bathing-place of those who had passed a certain swimming
test, and thus were entitled to disport themselves aquatically when they
listed. It was not a good bathing-place, far from it, for the bottom
was coated thickly with slimy mud. Still, it was the best obtainable
under the circumstances.
Jarnley and Co. unvested in a trice, nor did their intended victim take
any longer.
"Come along, Cetchy," laughed Jarnley, grabbing the other by the scruff
of the neck, and leaping out into deep water with him. "Now I'll teach
you, you black beast," he snarled, between the panting and puffing
extracted by the coldness of the water as they both rose to the surface.
"I'm going to duck you till you're nearly dead. Take that first
though," hitting him a smart smack on the side of the face. Those still
on the bank yelled with delight, and hastened to spring into the water
in order to get their share of the fun.
They got it. The African boy uttered an exclamation of dismay, broke
away from his tormentors, and in a few swift strokes splashed across to
the furthest and deepest side of the pool. This was what they wanted.
With more yells of delight all hands swam in pursuit.
Mpukuza was holding on to a trailing bough, his copper-coloured face
above water, showing every indication of alarm, as his assailants drew
near.
"Now we'll duck him!" yelled Jarnley. "It's jolly deep here."
But as they swooped towards him something strange happened--something
strange and utterly unexpected. The round head and dark scared
countenance had disappeared. So, too, at that moment did Jarnley, but
not before he had found time to utter a yell--a loud yell--indicative of
surprise and scare--drowned the next second in bubble and splash.
What on earth did it mean? That Jarnley was playing the fool, was the
first idea that occurred to the spectators as they swam around or trod
water--the next that he had been seized with cramp. But what about
Cetchy? He too, was under water, and they hadn't gone down together,
for Jarnley hadn't touched him yet.
No--he hadn't. But Mpukuza knew a trick worth two of waiting for that.
These confiding youths had overlooked the possibility that this
descendant of many generations of savage warriors might be far more at
home in the water than they were themselves. But such in fact was the
case. Watching his opportunity, as his would-be tormentors bore down
upon him, the Zulu boy had simply dived, and grabbing Jarnley by both
ankles dragged him under water. And there he held him--and all the
bully's frantic attempts to escape were in vain. The grasp on his
ankles was that of a vice; and when at last it did relax, Jarnley rose
to the surface only to sink again, so exhausted was he. He was in fact
drowning, and but for his intended victim--who rose unruffled, unwinded,
even smiling, and at once seized him and towed him to the bank--he would
actually have lost his life. For the African boy could remain under
water a vast deal longer than they could, and that with the most perfect
ease.
"What's all this about?"
The voice--sharp, clear, rather high-pitched--had the effect of a sort
of electric shock on the streaming and now shivering group gathered
round the gasping and prostrate Jarnley, as it started round, not a
little guiltily, to confront a master.
The aspect of the latter was not reassuring, being decidedly hostile.
With his head thrown back he gazed on the dumb-foundered group with a
stony stare.
"Umph! Bathing before permission has been given?" he said.
"That black beast! I'll kill him," muttered the muddled and confused
Jarnley.
"Eh? What's the fellow saying?" cried the new arrival sharply, who, by
the way, was dressed in clerical black himself, and was now inspired
with the idea that the speaker was suffering from sunstroke, and was off
his head. For all its apprehensiveness, a sickly grin ran round the
group.
"He's talking about Cetchy--er--I mean Anthony, sir," explained some
one.
Now the Reverend Alfred Augustus Sefton was endowed with a vast fund of
humour, but it was of the dry quality, and he was sharp withal. He had
seen more than they knew, and now, looking from one to the other, the
situation suddenly dawned upon him, and it amused him beyond words. But
he was a rigid disciplinarian.
"What have you been doing to him?" he said, fixing the African boy with
his straight glance.
"Doing? Nothing, sir. We play in the water. He try how long he keep
me under. I try how long I keep him under. That all. That all, sir."
And a dazzling stripe of white leaped in a broad grin across the
speaker's face--while all the other boys tittered. Mr Sefton gave a
suspicious choke.
"That all!" he echoed. "But that isn't all," and extracting an envelope
and a pencil from his pocket, he began to take down their names. "No,
that isn't all by any means. Each of you will do four hundred lines for
bathing before permission has been given, except Anthony, who will do
one hundred only because he's a new boy. Now get into your clothes
sharp and go straight back and begin, and if you're not in the big
schoolroom by the time I am, I'll double it."
There was a wholesome straightforwardness about Mr Sefton's methods
that admitted of no argument, and it was a very crestfallen group that
overtook and hurried past that disciplinarian as he made his way along
the field-path, swinging his stick, his head thrown back, and his soft
felt hat very much on the back of it. And on the outskirts of the group
at a respectful distance came Anthony, keen-eyed and quick to dodge more
than one vengeful smack on the head which had been aimed at him--for
these fairplay-loving young Britons must wreak their resentment on
something--and dire and deep were the sinister promises thrown at the
African boy, to be fulfilled when time and opportunity should serve.