FRIEND AND FOE
Paul, unconscious that he was being followed, pressed forward to St.
Bede's. As he drew near a boy came from the gates. Paul recognized him.
It was Murrell, one of the seniors at St. Bede's, who had taken part
with the others in hustling and jibing at him the last time he came in
that direction.
Murrell caught sight of him almost simultaneously, so that it would have
been impossible for Paul to avoid him had he wished.
"Hallo! Turned up again, have you?" cried the youth, coming to a dead
stop in front of Paul. "I thought you'd had enough of these parts the
last time you were here. But p'raps you enjoy ragging. There's no
accounting for tastes--specially the taste of a Gargoyle. Look here, if
I were you I would cut!"
"I don't think you would. If you were me you would stand your ground,
and that's what I mean doing," smiled Paul.
"You're jolly cheeky, Gargoyle! Now, look here, take the advice of one
who wants to do you a good turn--cut! There are a lot of the Bedes
hanging about, and if they happen to get hold of you, there won't be
much left of you, I can tell you! Are you insured?"
"No."
"My stars! I wouldn't like to be standing in your shoes--I really
wouldn't! Tired of life--eh? That's why you're poking your head into the
lion's den--eh?"
"Wrong again--quite wrong. I've come to see one of your fellows who's
been very kind to me--Wyndham."
"Oh, Wyndham! The one you ran away from at the sand-pits?"
Paul winced under the jibe. He had not yet got over that weakness.
Murrell was regarding him curiously. No answer coming from his victim,
he spoke again:
"You want me to fetch Wyndham?"
"If you would be so kind."
"Well, if you don't take the cake--likewise the bun, and the biscuit! A
Gargoyle has the superb cheek to ask a Bede to be his errand-boy! Stands
Scotland where it did? Is the world going round, or is it standing
still? Am I standing on my head or my heels? Now, then--your last
chance! If you don't want to go back in pieces, take it!
Going--going--gone!"
"I don't intend going till I've seen Wyndham," said Paul firmly. "If you
won't do me the favour I ask, I must keep on till I find some one a
little more courteous."
He was about to pass on, when Murrell stopped him with a friendly pat on
the shoulder.
"All right! You needn't get into a wax! You're not such a bad sort of
fellow, after all, for a Gargoyle! Wait here! Shan't be long!"
His tone had suddenly changed, and before Paul could say anything
further he was gone. Paul was so astonished that he could scarcely
believe the evidence of his eyes and ears. In an instant Murrell's
attitude had changed from a threatening to a friendly attitude. Was it
meant to mislead him? Had he no intention of going for Wyndham? Did he
mean instead to acquaint some of the boys who had previously set on him
of his arrival, so that they might carry out the purpose which they had
been forced to relinquish? This view seemed certainly the more probable
of the two, and therefore Paul was very agreeably surprised when, a
couple of minutes later, he saw the well-known figure of Wyndham coming
from the college gates towards him. His handsome face lit up with a
smile as he caught sight of Paul.
"Percival," he said, as his hand went out to him, "I'm so glad to see
you! So was Murrell."
"So was Murrell!" repeated Paul. "You wouldn't say so if you knew the
reception he gave me just now. You're joking?"
"No; I was never more serious in my life. As a Bede, he was bound not to
be over-polite to a Garsider; but he thinks a good deal more of you than
he did, and so do most of us--all through Murrell. Why? Well, he
happened to catch a glimpse of what happened on the river a week or so
ago--came up at the tag-end, but heard all that had happened from some
of the other fellows on the bank. Murrell and many more here are
beginning to think that you are too good for a Gargoyle, though you
didn't cut such a grand figure at the sand-pits. They're beginning to
believe what they wouldn't swallow at the time--that you're one of the
bravest fellows at Garside. To think that I'm the only fellow who knows
how brave! Why don't you let me speak and set you right?"
"No, no, Wyndham! You're very good; but it mustn't be. There are reasons
against it which you will know some day. But there is a way in which you
can serve me."
"What way? If I can help you, be sure I will."
Paul thereupon told him the additional misfortune that had happened at
Garside on the afternoon the boys fell into the river in the loss of the
school flag. Wyndham listened to the story attentively. He did not speak
till Paul had ended.
"You mean to suggest, I suppose, that some of the fellows here took the
flag?"
"To speak frankly, I do; but I know well enough that you've not had a
hand in it."
"Thanks for your good opinion; but I don't know that I deserve it. After
all, why shouldn't I have had a hand in it? The fellows here look upon
you as the enemy, and you look upon us in the same light. Haven't we a
perfect right to get possession of the enemy's flag if we can?"
"Yes; in fair and open battle. But this wasn't in fair and open battle;
it was a theft."
"That's rather a hard word, Percival. It's as good as saying some one
here's a thief!"
Wyndham spoke with greater warmth than Paul had ever heard him speak.
For the first time he saw an angry light in his eye.
"Forgive me, Wyndham! I've hurt your feelings; I can see that I have.
And you are the last in the world I would do that to. I'll withdraw
theft. Let's call it strategy."
The cloud vanished like magic from Wyndham's face.
"That's a very polite and nice way of putting it, Percival," he smiled.
"You're a great deal more considerate of my feelings than I am of yours.
I tell you what"--his face became serious again--"it's done me a lot of
good since I knew you; since I was able to open my heart to you and tell
you about the little brother who was taken from us years back. I've
often wished that I was at Garside to stand by you. It must be very
lonely for you over there."
"No, indeed; it's far from lonely, but sometimes it has been very, very
hard to bear. If Moncrief had only stood by me, and all the rest of the
school had been against me, I would not have minded; but----"
"Ah, do not speak of that! It makes me miserable. It gave me a savage
delight at the time to fight that fellow. It made me a hero here; but
since I've begun to think a little I feel very far from a hero myself.
It would have been far better had I never fought. It has made bad blood
between you and Moncrief; it took from you your best friend, and set
your school against you. It did worse than that; it has widened the
breach between St. Bede's and Garside, and deepened the old feud, which
was beginning to die out. And now that it has been stirred into a flame
again, it will take longer than ever to die out."
He paused for a moment, as though deep in thought. Paul, too, was busy
with his own thoughts. He knew not how to answer him.
"Don't speak against yourself, Wyndham, for it pains me a great deal
more than it pains you. I owe you a lot for the help you gave me on that
night I went to Redmead; but there's one other debt, greater than that
even, of which I have never spoken. Speaking just now of your little
brother has brought it all back to me."
"Speaking of my brother?" repeated Wyndham, with that tremor in his
voice which had fallen so pathetically on Paul's ear when he had first
spoken of the dead boy.
"Your brother Archie. I haven't forgotten the name, you see, and I have
never forgotten--never shall forget--the story. I had never tried to
understand younger boys till then. We bigger boys rarely do, I'm afraid.
We think them only good for cuffing and fagging; so there's never much
sympathy between us. When we pass to the upper forms we only remember
the cuffs and kicks we got in the lower forms, and think it our duty to
pay them back with interest. But your story--the story of your dead
brother--stuck in my memory. I carried it back with me when I returned
to Garside after vac. The first little chap I came across was a
fresher--a poor, weak, lonely little chap, who hadn't a chum in the
school. I thought of your brother. My heart went out to the boy, and I
said to myself: 'By God's help, I'll stand by you; and I'll be your
friend!'"
"That was noble of you!" said Wyndham, clasping Paul's hand in his. "Who
is the little chap? Is he still at Garside?"
"Still at Garside!" repeated Paul, in tones that had died away almost to
a whisper. "He's the little chap I fished out of the river."
"Ah, then, you've nobly redeemed your promise. You saved his life."
"I cannot say. He is still in bed--still very weak; but the link between
us kept me strong when all Garside was against me. Once or twice it
seemed more than I could stand, and I had serious thoughts of throwing
up the sponge and clearing out of Garside. What was there to keep me
there? Then I thought of Hibbert, and the thought made me strong again.
So I kept on, and weathered the storm--or, rather, am still weathering
it. The thought of the little chap kept me to my duty."
Once more there was silence between them. Wyndham had tucked his arm in
Paul's. The two were walking along the road to Cranstead Common. The
bond of sympathy between them had grown stronger and stronger during
those brief moments in which they had bared their hearts to each other.
"About this flag," broke in Wyndham. "Do you know for certain that it's
been taken by some fellow here?"
"No; it's only a suspicion. I may be wrong, but I don't think I am."
"When was it missed?"
"On that afternoon when the accident took place on the river. It was a
half-holiday at both schools. It was waving over the turret when I left
the school; it had gone when I came back."
"That's over a week ago, isn't it?"
"Yes."
"The fellow who took it must have had plenty of pluck. Well, if I can do
anything in fairness to get you your flag back again, I'll do it; but at
present it's as great a mystery to me as to you."
The two shook hands and parted.
Plunger and Harry had crept through a hedge, and witnessed a good deal
of the interview that had taken place between the two, without hearing
anything. When the two passed down the road--Wyndham with his arm linked
in Paul's--Plunger and Harry prepared to follow them; but before they
could move a step they were seized by the legs and thrown to the ground.
"Those Gargoyles!" The words were enough. They were in the hands of the
enemy.