"I tell you what, Wray," said Oliver one evening about a week after the
match, "I heartily wish this term was over."
"Why, that's just what I heard your young brother say. He is going to
learn the bicycle, he says, in the holidays."
"Oh, it's not the holidays I want," said Oliver. "But somehow things
have gone all wrong. I've been off my luck completely this term."
"Off your luck!--You great discontented, ungrateful bear. Haven't you
got the English prize? Aren't you in the School Eleven? and didn't you
make top score in the match with the Sixth last Saturday? Whatever do
you mean by `off your luck'?"
"Oh, it's not that, you know," said Oliver, pulling a quill pen to bits.
"What I mean is--oh, bother!--a fellow can't explain it."
"So it seems," laughed Wraysford; "but I wish a fellow could, for I've
not a notion what you're driving at."
"Well, I mean I'm not doing much good. There's that young brother of
mine, for instance. What good have I been to him? There have I let him
go and do just what he likes, and not looked after him a bit ever since
he came here."
"And I wager he's got on all the better for not being tied up to your
apron strings. He's a fine honest little chap, is young Greenfield."
"Oh, I dare say; but somehow I don't seem to know as much of him now as
I used to do before he came here."
"That's Loman's fault, I bet you anything," exclaimed Wraysford. "I'm
sure he won't do the kid any good. But Rastle was saying only yesterday
how well Stephen was getting on in class."
"Was he? It's little thanks to me if he is," said Oliver, gloomily.
"And what else have you got to grumble about?" asked his friend.
"Why, you know how I'm out with the Fifth over that affair with Loman.
They all set me down as a coward, and I'm not that."
"Of course you aren't," warmly replied the other. "But, Noll, you told
me a little while ago you didn't care a snap what they thought."
"No more I do, in a way. But it's very uncomfortable."
"Why don't you tell them straight out why you didn't let out at Loman?
They are sure to respect your motive."
"Yes, and set me down as posing as a martyr or a saint! No! I'd sooner
pass as a coward than set up as a saint when I'm not one. Why, Wray, if
you'll believe me, I've been a worse Christian since I began to try to
be one, than I ever was before. I'm for ever losing my temper, and--"
"Shut up that tune, now," interposed Wraysford, hurriedly. "If you are
beginning at that again, I'll go. As if you didn't know you were the
best fellow in the school!"
"I'm not the best, _or_ anything like," said Oliver, warmly; "I hate
your saying so--I wish almost I had never told you anything about it."
"Well, I don't know," said Wraysford, walking to the window and looking
out. "Ever since you told me of it, I've been trying myself in a mild
way to go straight. But it's desperate hard work."
"Desperate hard work even if you try in more than a mild way," said
Oliver.
Both were silent for a little, and then Oliver, hurriedly changing the
subject, said, "And then, to proceed with my growl, I'm certain to come
a howler over the Nightingale."
Wraysford turned from the window with a laugh.
"I suppose you expect me to sympathise with you about that, eh? The
bigger the howler the better for me! I only wish you were a true
prophet, Noll, in that particular."
"Why, of course you'll beat me--and if you don't Loman will. I hear
he's grinding away like nuts."
"Is he, though?" said Wraysford.
"Yes, and he's going to get a `coach' in the holidays too."
"More likely a dog-cart. Anyhow, I dare say he will run us close. But
he's such a shifty fellow, there's no knowing whether he will stay out."
Just at that moment a terrific row came up from below.
"Whatever's up down there?"
"Only the Guinea-pigs and Tadpoles. By the way," said Wraysford,
"they've got a grand `supper,' as they call it, on to-night to celebrate
their cricket match. Suppose we go and see the fun?"
"All right!" said Oliver. "Who won the match?"
"Why, what a question! Do you suppose a match between Guinea-pigs and
Tadpoles _ever_ came to an end? They had a free fight at the end of the
first innings. The Tadpole umpire gave one of his own men `not out'
when he hit his wicket, and they made a personal question of it, and
fell out. Your young brother, I hear, greatly distinguished himself in
the argument."
"Well, it doesn't seem to interfere with their spirits now, to judge of
the row they are making. Just listen!"
By this time they had reached the door of the Fourth Junior room, whence
proceeded a noise such as one often hears in a certain popular
department of the Zoological Gardens. Amid the tumult and hubbub the
two friends had not much difficulty in slipping in unobserved and
seating themselves comfortably in an obscure corner of the festive
apartment, behind a pyramid of piled-up chairs and forms.
The Junior "cricket feast" was an institution in Saint Dominic's, and
was an occasion when any one who had nerves to be excruciated or
ear-drums to be broken took care to keep out of the way. In place of
the usual desks and forms, a long table ran down the room, round which
some fifty or sixty urchins sat, regaling themselves with what was left
of a vast spread of plum-cake, buns, and ginger-beer. How these
banquets were provided was always a mystery to outsiders. Some said a
levy of threepence a head was made; others, that every boy was bound in
honour to contribute something eatable to the feast; and others averred
that every boy had to bring his own bag and bottle, and no more. Be
that as it might, the Guinea-pigs and Tadpoles at present assembled
looked uncommonly tight about the jackets after it all, and not one had
the appearance of actual starvation written on his lineaments.
The animal part of the feast, however, was now over, and the
intellectual was beginning. The tremendous noise which had brought
Oliver and Wraysford on to the scene had indeed been but the applause
which followed the chairman's opening song--a musical effort which was
imperatively encored by a large and enthusiastic audience.
The chairman, by the way, was no other than our friend Bramble, who by
reason of seniority--he had been two years in the Fourth Junior, and
showed no signs of rising higher all his life--claimed to preside on all
such occasions. He sat up at the top end in stately glory, higher than
the rest by the thickness of a Liddell and Scott, which was placed on
his chair to lift him up to the required elevation, blushingly receiving
the applause with which his song was greeted, and modestly volunteering
to sing it again if the fellows liked.
The fellows did like. Mr Bramble mounted once more on to the seat of
his chair, and saying, "Look-out for the chorus!" began one of the
time-honoured Dominican cricket songs. It consisted of about twelve
verses altogether, but three will be quite enough for the reader.
"There was a little lad,
(Well bowled!)
And a little bat he had;
(Well bowled!)
He skipped up to the wicket,
And thought he'd play some cricket,
But he didn't, for he was--
Well bowled!
"He thought he'd make a score
(So bold),
And lead-off with a four
(So bold);
So he walked out to a twister,
But somehow sort of missed her,
And she bailed him, for he was
Too bold.
"Now all ye little boys
(So bold),
Who like to make a noise
(So bold),
Take warning by young Walker,
Keep your bat down to a yorker,
Or, don't you see? you'll be--
Well bowled!"
The virtue of the pathetic ballad was in the chorus, which was usually
not sung, but spoken, and so presented a noble opportunity for variety
of tone and expression, which was greedily seized upon by the riotous
young gentlemen into whose mouths it was entrusted. By the time the sad
adventures of Master Walker had been rehearsed in all their twelve
verses, the meeting was so hoarse that to the two elder boys it seemed
as if the proceedings must necessarily come abruptly to a close for want
of voice.
But no! If the meeting was for the moment incapable of song, speech was
yet possible and behold there arose Master Paul in his place to propose
a toast.
Now Master Paul was a Guinea-pig, and accounted a mighty man in his
tribe. Any one might have supposed that the purpose for which he had
now risen was to propose in complimentary terms the health of his
gallant opponents the Tadpoles. This, however, was far from his
intention. His modesty had another theme. "Ladies and gentlemen," he
began. There were no ladies present, but that didn't matter.
Tremendous cheers greeted this opening. "You all know me; I am one of
yourselves." Paul had borrowed this expression from the speech of a
Radical orator, which had appeared recently in the papers. Every one
knew it was borrowed, for he had asked about twenty of his friends
during the last week whether that wouldn't be "a showy lead-off for his
cricket feast jaw?"
The quotation was, however, now greeted as vociferously as if it had
been strictly original, and shouts of "So you are!"
"Bravo, Paul!" for a while drowned the orator's voice. When silence was
restored his eloquence took a new and unexpected departure. "Jemmy
Welch, I'll punch your head when we get outside, see if I don't!" Jemmy
Welch was a Guinea-pig who had just made a particularly good shot at the
speaker's nose with a piece of plum-cake. "Now, ladies and gentlemen, I
shall not detain you with a speech (loud cheers from all, and `Jolly
good job!' from Bramble). I shall go on speaking just as long as I
choose, Bramble, so now! (Cheers.) I've as much right to speak as you
have. (Applause.) You're only a stuck-up duffer. (Terrific cheers,
and a fight down at the end of the table.) I beg to drink the health of
the Guinea-pigs. (Loud Guinea-pig cheers.) We licked the old Tadpoles
in the match. (`No you didn't!' `That's a cram!' and groans from the
Tadpoles.) I say we did! Your umpire was a cheat--they always are! We
beat you hollow, didn't we, Stee Greenfield?"
"Yes, rather!" shouted Stephen, snatching a piece of cake away from a
Tadpole and shying it to a Guinea-pig.
"That's eight matches we've won," proceeded Paul; "and--all right,
Spicer! I saw you do it this time! See if I don't pay you for it!"
whereat the speaker hurriedly quitted his seat and, amid howls and
yells, proceeded to "pay out" Spicer.
Meanwhile Stephen heard his name suddenly called upon for a song, an
invitation he promptly obeyed. But as the clamour was at the time
deafening, and the attention of the audience was wholly monopolised by
the commercial transactions taking place between Paul and Spicer, the
effect of the performance was somewhat lost. Oliver certainly did see
his young brother mount up on the table, turn very red in the face, open
his mouth and shut it, smile in one part, look sorrowful in another, and
wave his hand above his head in another. But that was the only
intimation he had of a musical performance proceeding. Words and tune
were utterly inaudible by any one except the singer himself--even if
_he_ heard them.
This was getting monotonous, and the two visitors were thinking of
withdrawing, when the door suddenly opened, and a dead silence
prevailed. The new-comer was the dirtiest and most ferocious-looking of
all the boys in the lower school, who rushed into the room breathless,
and in what would have been a white heat had his face been clean enough
to show it. "What do you think?" he gasped, catching hold of the back
of a chair for support; "Tony Pembury's kept me all this while brushing
his clothes! I told him it was cricket feast, but he didn't care! What
do you think of that? Of course, you've finished all the grub; I knew
you would!"
This last plaintive wail of disappointment was drowned in the clamour of
execration which greeted the boy's announcement. Lesser feuds were
instantly forgotten in presence of this great insult. The most sacred
traditions of Guinea-pigs and Tadpoles were being trampled upon by the
tyrants of the upper school! Not even on cricket feast night was a fag
to be let off fagging!
It was enough! The last straw breaks the camel's back, and the young
Dominicans had now reached the point of desperation.
It was long before silence enough could be restored, and then the
redoubtable Spicer yelled out, "Let's strike!"
The cry was taken up with yells of enthusiasm--"Strike! No more
fagging!"
"Any boy who fags after this," screamed Bramble, "will be cut dead!
Those who promise hold up your hands--mind, it's a promise!"
There was no mistaking the temper of the meeting, every hand in the room
was held up.
"Mind now, no giving in!" cried Paul. "Let's stick all together.
Greenfield senior shall _kill_ me before I do anything more for him!"
"Poor fellow!" whispered Oliver, laughing; "what a lot of martyrdoms
he'll have to put up with!"
"And Pembury shall kill me," squealed the last comer, who had comforted
himself with several crusts of plum-cakes and the dregs of about a dozen
bottles of ginger-beer. And every one protested their willingness to
die in the good cause.
At this stage Oliver and Wraysford withdrew unobserved. "I'm afraid
we've been eavesdropping," said Oliver. "Anyhow, I don't mean to take
advantage of what I've heard."
"What a young ruffian your brother is!" said Wraysford; "he looked
tremendously in earnest!"
"Yes, he always is. You'll find he'll keep his word far better than
most of them."
"If he does, I'm afraid Loman will make it unpleasant for him," said
Wraysford.
"Very likely."
"Then you'll have to interfere."
"Why, what a bloodthirsty chap you are, Wray! You are longing for me to
quarrel with Loman. I'll wait till young Stephen asks me to."
"Do you think he will? He's a proud little chap."
Oliver laughed. "It'll serve him right if he does get a lesson. Did
ever you see such a lot of young cannibals as those youngsters? Are you
coming to have supper with me?"
The nine o'clock bell soon rang, and, as usual, Oliver went to his door
and shouted for Paul.
No Paul came.
He shouted again and again, but the fag did not appear. "They mean
business," he said. "What shall I do? Paul!"