THE FORUM
"Meeting of the Fifth in the Forum."
The whisper had travelled from form to form, and, as invariably
happened, conjecture was busy as to what the meeting of the Fifth could
be for.
"It's a breach-of-promise case they've got on!" said Freddy Plunger
confidentially to half a dozen members of the Third who had been
discussing the event.
"Breach of promise?" repeated Baldry. "None of your gammon, Freddy!"
"Fact! Haven't you heard? One of the freshers has been making desperate
love to the matron--giving her his portrait, with his love, and that
sort of thing. You wouldn't wonder at it from an old stager like you,
Baldry, or Sedgeley; but from a fresher--well, it's awful, isn't it?
What's the school coming to--that's what I should like to know?"
Harry Moncrief blushed to the roots of his hair as the boys standing
round Plunger turned to him and tittered.
"What are the damages?"
"A broken topper, a pair of plaids, a white waistcoat, and spats over
patents."
More titters, and more glances in the direction of Harry. He knew well
enough that this reference on Plunger's part was meant for him to the
costume with which he had adorned himself on his coming to Garside.
"Plunger's been crowing it over me ever since I came here. I shall have
to take it out of him," he thought.
The outburst of laughter that followed did not mend matters. So he
hastened away, in no pleasant mood, without any regard to whither he
was going. He came to a stop when he reached the cricketing-shed, in the
playing-fields adjoining the school. It was this shed which was known as
"The Forum." Here it was that the meeting of the Fifth was to be held.
Harry stopped and regarded it with some interest.
"Stan will be at the meeting, I suppose, and Paul Percival. Wouldn't I
like to know what it's all about!"
He had an uncomfortable feeling that things weren't going quite smoothly
with his cousin and Paul Percival. Bit by bit the glamour with which he
had viewed the school was wearing off. He no longer regarded it through
rose-coloured glasses. Plunger had lorded it over him and made fun of
him; his cousin and Paul, whom he had expected to find on the same
footing as himself, might have been in a different world, so great was
the difference between the upper and lower forms.
The dormitory, to which he had looked forward with still greater
pleasure, had proved a delusion and a snare. Often, in the bitterness of
his experience in the dormitory, had he wished himself back in his warm
and comfortable bed at home. He did not see--did not understand that the
trials upon which he was entering were just those which were moulding
him for the future. They were to test and try him, as they had tested
and tried many others before him.
Some of you who read this may be going through the same experience as
Harry Moncrief. Remember, rough as the experience may be, it goes to
make the man in you, and it depends upon you whether you come from these
trials dross or pure gold.
By the side of the shed where Harry was standing there was a window,
thick with dust. Harry tried to look through the window, but, failing in
this, his forefinger went idly to work on the dust. Bit by bit he traced
out a face and head, almost without knowing it, for he had been thinking
of the meeting that was to take place in the shed rather than of his
sketch.
"My, it isn't at all bad!" he cried, standing back a pace and admiring
his handiwork when he had finished it. "If I'd really tried, I couldn't
have done it so well. Perhaps the nose doesn't stick up enough, but it's
got the right cut about it."
Harry was about to rub out the sketch, when he paused, as though
reluctant to rub out such a masterpiece.
"'Pon my word, it's rather good! I wonder if anybody would know who it's
meant for? I don't suppose anybody will. I've a jolly good mind to leave
it!"
He pronounced the last words with emphasis, turned on his heels, and
walked away.
Now it so happened that after Plunger and his companions had enjoyed
their laugh at the expense of Harry, their attention went back again to
the one absorbing topic of conversation--the meeting of the Fifth.
"Shouldn't I like to be there!" said Plunger, his curiosity growing as
the time for the meeting advanced. "I would like to know what's in the
wind! Is it about the Black Book, I wonder?"
"What's that to do with the Fifth any more than the rest of us?"
remarked Sedgeley.
"Oh, the Fifth always put a lot of side on, and like to cock it over
us!" retorted Plunger.
"You'll be just the same, Freddy, when you're sent up--if ever you are
sent up," remarked Baldry. "Sour grapes!"
"Shut up, Baldhead!" retorted Plunger hotly. "I never want to get
amongst the Fifth bounders. It's that keeps me back. I could have got up
in the Fourth at last exam., only I said to myself: 'No; it takes me one
form nearer the Fifth bounders.'" He paused for a moment, then added:
"All the same, I would like to know what they're going to gas about in
the Forum. P'r'aps it's about us--p'r'aps they mean sitting on us a lot
more than they do now."
"P'r'aps!" repeated Sedgeley and Baldry reflectively.
"I--I've a good mind to try. Why should the Fifth have it all to
themselves? If--if I could only steal a march on them!"
"If you only could, Freddy!" remarked Sedgeley encouragingly.
For the next few minutes there was some whispering together, and the end
of it was that Plunger and his companions strolled in the same direction
as that Harry Moncrief had strolled in a quarter of an hour or so
before.
On arriving at the shed, they reconnoitred around it, uncertain as to
whether or not anybody was within.
Sedgeley happened by chance to look through--or tried to look
through--the window on which Harry had left a specimen of his handiwork.
His attention was at once arrested. He regarded the face seriously for a
moment; then he broke into a shout of laughter.
"What are you playing the silly goat for?" demanded Plunger wrathfully
from somewhere in the rear of the shed.
"Come here, Baldry, Bember, Viner!" exclaimed Sedgeley, vainly
endeavouring to stifle his laughter.
The three came hurrying up, followed by Plunger, in a violent state of
agitation.
"You'll spoil all, you braying ass, you laughing hyena, you giddy----"
Then he paused, as Baldry, Bember, and Viner, after a glance at the
pane, burst into laughter also. "What is it, you laughing
lunatics--what----"
Plunger said no more. His jaw dropped, as, following their gaze, he
gazed in turn on the window-pane.
"Jolly good likeness, isn't it, Baldry?" Sedgeley at length managed to
remark.
"My!" cried Baldry, with his hand on his side, as though he'd got a
stitch in it. "Hold me up!"
"I--I don't see what there's to laugh at," Plunger at length remarked,
with a face as red as a turkey-cock's.
"What, don't you see it, Freddy?"
"See what?"
"The likeness--oh, my side! Don't you know that nose--that hair. I
should know 'em anywhere."
Now, Plunger had a very characteristic nose--it was a combative nose,
and a decided pug. So was the nose on the window-pane. Plunger's hair,
too, was peculiar to Plunger. It was wiry, stubborn hair, with a tuft in
front which resembled the comb of a turkey-cock. The same peculiarity
was seen in the head on the window. And Plunger's eyebrows had a way of
mounting to his head, as though they were anxious to get on terms of
friendship with the tuft above. The same eccentricity was noticeable in
the eyebrows on the window-pane.
"No. I don't know 'em--not a bit. Who do you say they're meant for?"
came in jerks from Plunger.
"Who--who? Oh, dear, oh, dear! Why, they're meant for you, Freddy! It's
awfully funny, isn't it? I didn't know that your face was so comical!"
Plunger shrugged his shoulders, and affected indifference. He wasn't a
bit like that caricature. It was only Sedgeley pretended to see the
likeness, and made the other fellows see it with his eyes. At the same
time he put out his hand to rub out the sketch. Sedgeley stopped him.
"If it isn't meant for you, Freddy, we may as well see who it is meant
for."
"Just as you like," answered Plunger, in his most indifferent tone.
Having assured themselves that there was no one inside, three of the
conspirators--Sedgeley, Baldry, and Plunger--entered the shed. A quarter
of an hour elapsed, then the door opened; but, instead of the three
figures that entered, only two came out--Sedgeley and Baldry. All was
silent within. Plunger had disappeared as completely as though he had
dropped through the earth.
"All serene?" queried Bember, as the two made their appearance.
"All serene!" came the answer.
* * * * *
At seven o'clock the Fifth Form began to put in an appearance at the
shed. Arbery and Leveson were two of the first. They lit a candle, and
stuck it in a tin candle-stick. Then they rolled out one of the boxes
that were piled up at the back, placed it lengthwise, so as to form a
rostrum, and covered it with a baize cloth. On the top of this they
placed a wooden mallet, used for knocking in the stumps in the
cricketing season.
"Sounds all right," said Leveson, giving the mallet a flourish over his
head, and bringing it down sharply on top of the box. "Order--order for
the chair!"
Down it came a second time.
"Friends, Romans, and Countrymen----"
"Drop the cackle, Levy," shouted Arbery, "and give me a hand."
He was pulling out some of the boxes, and Leveson lent him a hand to
arrange them as seats. It so happened that in one of the most
dilapidated of these boxes, which had rested for weeks in the darkest
corner of the shed, Frederick Plunger, Esq. was reposing. It had been
selected as the most suitable hiding-place by the conspirators. It was
large and commodious, and there were so many cracks and crannies in the
worm-eaten, dilapidated lid that there was ample breathing space within.
In this safe hiding-place Plunger had flattered himself that he would be
able to know all that passed at the meeting of the Fifth. He had not
calculated on the box being shifted from its dusty, cob-webbed corner.
But more by chance than design Arbery laid profane hands on it, and
dragging it out with the rest, turned it over and over, something after
the style of a porter with the luggage at a railway terminus in the busy
season.
Bumpety--bumpety! It seemed to Plunger, so far as he had any sensation
at all, that he was performing the part of a human catherine-wheel.
"My!" he gasped. "What are the asses doing with the box? I shall be most
frightfully sick if they don't stop it."
Bumpety--bumpety--bumpety!
"Oh, oh! What an idiot I was to get inside this coffin; it'll be the
death of me!"
Arbery and Leveson gave another jerk to the box even as Plunger was
groaning within.
"It--it--it's worse than being on the Great Wheel, or on a pleasure boat
when there's a sea on. Oh, my--oh dear! When are the silly fellows going
to stop it?" he moaned.
At last they did stop it, almost beneath the identical window on which
Moncrief minor had traced Plunger's noble features.
"That's about the ticket, isn't it, Arbery? My, it's hot work! Didn't
think that old box was so heavy. You'd fancy it was stuffed with lead
instead of broken bats and rubbish of that sort. Phew!"
Leveson wiped his forehead with his handkerchief.
"Yes; that's the thing. It'll give an extra seat or two, if they're
wanted."
"My word! They're going to sit on me," groaned Plunger. His groans were
cut short by a loud outburst of laughter from Arbery.
"What's the lunatic laughing at now?" thought Plunger.
"Hold me up, Levy!" Arbery in rising from the box had caught sight of
the caricature of Plunger on the window, and burst into a fit of
laughter. "Do you see it--do you see who it's meant for?"
Leveson, for answer, likewise broke into a peal of laughter.
"The other lunatic's going it now," Plunger muttered to himself. "Seems
to me I've hopped into an asylum instead of a box. There's a screw loose
in one of 'em. My! Aren't they going it. Wish I could get a peep out of
this beastly timber yard. I'd like to see what they're grinning at. Hark
at 'em. They're off again."
At last Leveson stopped.
"See it," he cried. "Who could help it? Jolly good, isn't it? Like the
young bounder to a T--the same nose, the same coarse wiry thatch, the
same eyebrows running away from the forehead into the middle of next
week."
The perspiration began to ooze from Plunger. He had an uneasy feeling as
to whom they were referring.
"Young bounder!" he repeated. "Coarse, wiry thatch, eyebrows running
away from the forehead. Leveson thinks that awfully smart, I s'pose?
Still it--it--must be a bit like."
Plunger had the additional pleasure of hearing more laughter at his
expense as other scholars of the Fifth entered, and added their
criticisms to Leveson's. Plunger's ears tingled as they had never
tingled before, for never before had he heard himself so freely
criticised. In addition to the not very flattering remarks "the bounders
of the Fifth" had to pass on his features, Plunger had to listen to
terse descriptions of himself as "that ass, Plunger," "a mixed pickle,"
"a queer egg," "conceited young biped," and so on.
Plunger made remarks of his own as these pleasant criticisms reached his
ears. They were scarcely less vigorous than those descriptive of
himself, and were fairly divided between "those bounders of the Fifth"
and "the fellow who had scratched things" on the window. But
unfortunately Plunger's eloquence was wasted, as neither the "bounders
of the Fifth" nor "the fellow who scratched things on the window" had
the advantage of hearing it. His attention was soon turned from himself,
however, to the proceedings that were taking place in the shed.
There were about twenty in the Fifth. Nineteen put in an appearance.
Hasluck, as head of the Form, took up his place at the rostrum, while
most of the others sat on the boxes which had been arranged for their
convenience by Arbery and Leveson, who were known as M.C.'s--masters of
ceremonies--of the Form.
"All here?" asked Hasluck, after bringing down his mallet on the box
before him.
"All--except Moncrief," answered Leveson.
The absence of Moncrief had been noticed with some surprise by the Form,
by none more than Newall.
"Is he coming, does any one know? If so, we'll wait a little longer."
"No; he isn't coming," answered Paul. "He wanted to; but I persuaded him
to stop away."
"You persuaded him to stop away," cried Newall. "Why, it's because of
him we've come here."
"Excuse me," answered Paul politely. "It's because of me. At any rate,
it's for the Form to decide."
"Percival called the Form together. It's for Percival to explain," said
Hasluck.
"I'll explain as well as I can," said Paul, taking a step forward, and
glancing round at the faces bent eagerly forward to hear him. "There was
a slight shindy, as you all know, on the first day of term, between
Newall and Stanley Moncrief."
"Shindy!" interrupted Newall with a scornful sniff. "Is that all you
call it?"
"Call it by what name you please; I don't mind," proceeded Paul calmly.
"Newall baited Moncrief's cousin unmercifully, and Moncrief did what any
other fellow in the Form worth his salt would have done--interfered. I
tried to get between him and Newall to stop the quarrel. You know what
happened--Newall was struck."
"Yes, Newall was struck," repeated Newall grimly.
"Yes; but after all Moncrief had a good deal the worst of it. He passed
the night in Dormitory X--ten times worse punishment than anything
Newall got; so he more than wiped out the blow he gave in anger to
Newall."
"Oh, stop this humbug," interrupted Newall angrily. "You can see what
Percival's up to. He's trying to white-wash Moncrief, who's too big a
funk to come here to defend himself."
There were murmurs of assent from some of those present, who resented
Moncrief's absence, and who were not favourably inclined to a tame
ending of the quarrel. The more thoughtful section remained silent.
"It would have been better, I think, for Moncrief to have been here,"
said Hasluck. And this view was received with applause.
"If there's any blame for that," said Paul quickly, "blame me. As I've
said, I persuaded him to stay away. With Moncrief here and Newall here,
it would have been like two barrels of gunpowder. Just a spark,
and--phwitt! bang--where should we all have been? There'd have been
nothing left of us."
This time Paul carried his audience with him. They were well aware that
Moncrief was hasty in temper, and that Newall was no less fiery. So they
smiled at Paul's description of what might probably have happened if the
two had been present.
"Besides, as I've already pointed out to Newall," continued Paul, "if
there's a quarrel at all, it lies between me and him."
"Stuff--gammon--more humbug!" interrupted Newall angrily.
"That's what you think," said Paul, confronting him steadily for a
moment. "After all, you only count as one. That's why I've called the
Form, who count a good deal more, so that they could give their opinion.
Whatever their opinion is, I'll stand to it."
"You will!" cried Newall. "That's all I want. I know well enough they
won't let Moncrief wriggle out of it."
"How do you make out that the quarrel has shifted from Moncrief to you,
Percival?" demanded Hasluck. "I can't quite see it."
More murmurs of assent.
"I think you will when I've finished," said Paul confidently. "Newall
doesn't see it, naturally, but I think you will. This is how things
stand. Newall made me believe that he was sorry for the quarrel that had
taken place between him and Moncrief. On that I tried to do the right
thing. I got Moncrief to go up to him and offer him his hand. I was
never more disgusted in my life. Newall pretended not to see it, and
said insulting things, which I need not repeat. What I say is, that when
he refused to take Moncrief's hand, he insulted me more than he insulted
Moncrief; for it was I who brought Moncrief to him, and it was through
me Moncrief offered him his hand. That is the first point I wish the
Form to decide."
Paul spoke so earnestly that he carried the Form with him. It appealed
to their sense of chivalry. Percival had tried to make peace between
Newall and Moncrief. Failing that, he had turned the quarrel from his
friend's shoulders to his own.
First one, then the other, supported Paul, and though there was a small
minority against him, there was no question as to the majority.
"We think Percival right," said Hasluck--an announcement which was
received with cheers.
"That only means that the quarrel is between me and Percival," said
Newall grimly. "I've no objection. I'm not going to kick against the
decision of the Form." Then, turning to Paul: "You've got to pay me back
the blow I had from Moncrief. P'raps the Form 'll decide when it's to
be."
"You mean fighting?"
"What else should I mean?"
"I don't. We don't want to waste our energies that way when there's a
much better way and better work to do."
"Trying to crawl out of it again," came in a sneering aside from
Parfitt. "Was there ever such a wriggler?"
"Let's hear the better way," said Hasluck; and there were many others in
the Form, in spite of the sneering remark of Parfitt, who were equally
anxious to hear what "the better way" could be.
"There's a shadow resting upon the school--resting upon every one of
us," said Paul solemnly.
"What shadow are you talking about?" asked Hasluck.
"The leaves from the Black Book--the stolen papers from Mr. Weevil's
desk," said Paul. "Until the thief is found out, suspicion rests upon
every boy in the Form--upon every boy in the school. What I suggest is,
that we leave off fighting till we've found out who the thief is. I
don't want to preach, but I think that will be a great deal more to our
honour and the honour of our school."
Paul paused. "If Parfitt has anything to accuse me of, now will be his
time," he thought.
He had not to wait long. Parfitt did speak, but scarcely in the way he
had anticipated.
"Honour of the school!" he cried. "Anybody would think that Percival's
the only one who cares for it. Let him take care of his own honour
first, and the honour of the school will take care of itself."
Parfitt's pointed remark was loudly applauded. Paul saw that he was
likely to be defeated unless he could make a stronger appeal to the
sympathies of the Form.
"I don't know that my honour's questioned," he answered promptly. "Who
questions it?"
"I do," retorted Parfitt.
"And I," added Newall.
Before Paul could answer, there was a knock on the door of the shed. It
so startled Devey--a heavy, thick-set boy--that he over-balanced himself,
and came with a crash on the box in which Plunger was hidden. Plunger
had been so interested in the proceedings of the Fifth that he had
lifted the lid in the slightest possible degree so that he might the
better hear what was going on. When Devey came crashing on the box,
Plunger thought for the moment that his head had gone from his
shoulders. And then as Devey, not quite recovered from his fall,
continued to sit upon the lid, he thought he would be suffocated.
Meanwhile Leveson went to the door, and demanded: "Who's there?"
"A Beetle," came the answer.
"A Beetle! What does he want?"
"He's got a challenge for the Fifth."
"A challenge for the Fifth! Oh, very kind of him!" Then, turning to
Hasluck, "Shall I let him in?"
"Rather. Let's hear what the sport is."
Thereupon Leveson opened the door. Three boys were standing without--two
of them belonging to the school, and the third, who stood between them,
one of the much-despised Beetles--in other words, a pupil of the rival
school at St. Bede's.