JACK'S MAIDEN SPEECH
"You really wish me to understand, Brady, that not you alone, but all
the elder boys--day-pupils and boarders alike--desire of your own
free-will to devote your next Saturday's half-holiday to conveying this
poor man's plants from his house at Brickland to the Rookwood sale?"
"Yes, sir, that's what we want to do."
"H'm! Well, the proposal does you credit, and you certainly might employ
your time much worse than in carrying it out. I don't think it would be
right for me to refuse your request. Mr. Anderson, I feel sure, will be
ready to help and advise you, if necessary, but as the idea is your own
I should like you, as far as possible, to carry it out by yourselves."
"Thank you, sir!" said Jack, and withdrew.
It was evening when this dialogue took place. The day-boys had departed
in an irritable frame of mind, on account of various annoyances of which
they had been the victims during the past two days. Bacon had been
tripped up twice by a piece of string, Hughes had found his coat-sleeves
tightly sewn up with packing-thread, and Simmons's pockets had been
crammed with moist, wriggling earthworms.
Knowing this, it may be wondered that they were prevailed on to agree to
Jack's scheme for the coming Saturday. But our hero was wily, and he
worded his suggestion so carefully that they did not for a moment
imagine that their enemies the boarders were at all connected with the
plan, which seemed to offer scope for fun and adventure of a new
description. Was not Saturday Jack's regular day of release? Of course
this was to be an "out-of-school" affair altogether. So they imagined.
"Now then, you fellows!" cried Jack, bursting into the school-room like
a frolicsome whirlwind, "who said I wouldn't get leave? West and I have
settled it all most comfortably, patted each other on the head, and so
forth. Let you go? Why, he'd like nothing better than to let you go for
good and all!"
"So you've let the whole lot of us in for it, young man?" said
Trevelyan, looking amused.
"Why, nobody asked to be left out," returned Jack.
This was quite true, and there was no more to be said. Hallett had taken
kindly to the idea to begin with, and set the fashion by doing so. One
or two lazy lads would not have been sorry in their hearts if Mr. West
had vetoed the scheme, but they had not the courage to refuse to join in
it.
"Now to business!" Jack continued. "We must send Mr. Thompson himself
word of our intentions; let's write a proper, tradesman-like letter!
Vickers, you're the fluent, flowery one. Bottle up your metaphors and
give us a page of business-like fluency! Here's some paper."
After a good deal of discussion the following letter was composed:--
_To Mr J. Thompson Nurseryman._
_Dr Sir/_
_Having heard of yr intention to dispose of yr stock-in-hand
(Plants) we have pleasure in proposing to undertake transport of
same (carriage free) on Saty next ensuing between 2 and 4 p.m. from
yr house to Rookwood Elmridge Middleshire for sale advd to be held
there at 6 p.m. Safety of goods guarantd. Unless we hear to contry
we shall presume this meets yr views and take action accordly._
_Yrs etc._
_(Signed) T. Vickers_
_N. Hallett_
_J. Brady &c._
_pro) Students of Brincliffe Elmridge._
"If that isn't business-like, I don't know what is!" exclaimed Cadbury,
when it was read through. "If ink was a shilling a drop, you couldn't
have been more chary of it. There's not an 'a', 'an', or 'the'
throughout, nor a comma, nor an adjective, and the contractions are
masterly. We're all born commercial clerks, that's what we are!"
"Ethel and Lucy have undertaken the necessary barrow-borrowing,"
remarked Jack, casually. "We sha'n't want more than six or eight
wheel-barrows, and that pair can get anything if it goes together. Lucy
represents the dauntless cheek, and Ethel the irresistible charm. What
more is required?"
"What do you mean, Brady? We won't have the day-boys sticking their
fingers into this pie!" cried Escombe Trevelyan.
"We couldn't do the job alone," said Jack quietly. "It would take us
twice as long."
A loud murmur of disapprobation ran through the room.
Jack turned rather pale, and pinched the edge of the table nervously.
His eyes wandered from face to face. All were vexed, all displeased.
Then, with a sudden impulse he sprang to his feet, and spoke his
mind--rapidly, earnestly.
"Look here, I can't understand it! What makes you all so beastly
to the day-boys--to my pals? You began it, not they! They came to
Brincliffe without the least idea of any unfriendly feeling, and you
hated them before you'd seen them or heard their names. Is that
fair--straight--English? If it were, I'd wish to be French or German.
Where's the fun in this constant worrying of each other? As boarders,
it's your place to put out a hand first, and I think I can promise that
the day-boys will shake it. Bah! I know I can never talk you round; it's
no good attempting to. I'm not in a comic mood, and can't make you
laugh, like Cadbury, and I haven't Vickers's gift of the gab. But wasn't
last Friday's lesson enough? Wasn't the sight of that knife--"
[Illustration]
"Hush!" came from many mouths.
"Oh, we want to forget it! Yes, we don't want to talk about it, I know.
But I've got to this once. If there had been an accident--to
Armitage--it wouldn't have been wholly the March Hare's fault. It was
those who first started the quarrel between boarders and day-boys, those
who put the notion of ill-feeling into his silly little head. I see
you're thinking of the swimming-baths, and Toppin's dive. Now I happen
to know, and Toppin can bear me out, that the kid asked to be pushed,
and that Armitage would have saved him next moment if the March Hare
hadn't jumped in and hindered things. And everyone of you who have
listened and nodded to the March Hare's tale have added coal to the fire
you might have quenched in a moment. And--and--and--and--" poor Jack was
shaking and stammering with excitement, "what--what if it had--ended
in--"
But there he sat down, leaving his sentence unfinished.
Cadbury was the first to reply, and that was not at once. Slowly he
ruled a long, thick, black line in his exercise-book, then, pushing his
chair away from the table, tilted it back, and spoke:
"Well, I don't know what anyone else thinks, but I'll tell you what I
do. Brady's last sentence was certainly not fluent, and I shouldn't
care to have to analyse it. As for the jokes in it, they were about as
plentiful as wasps in January. All that's true enough. Still,
nevertheless, speaking for my humble self, he thrust home. You did,
Jack, you beggar! You'd no business to, but you actually had the
impudence to make me feel ashamed of myself. And, of course, I don't
know what you others will say, but I vote we bury the hatchet in old
Thompson's biggest flower-pot. Who's with me?"
"I am!"
"I am!"
"And I!"
"Of course it's quite right to forgive," drawled Green, with a curl of
the lip. "I'm more than willing."
Jack ground his teeth, but Hallett saved him the trouble of replying.
"No, no; if we do the thing at all, we'll do it properly. Don't let's
have any half-measures--kindly-forgivings, and all the rest of it! If
anyone starts forgiving me, I'll lick him! We won't forgive anyone, not
even ourselves. We'll go straight ahead on a new tack, and forget
everything that's happened. If our friends the enemy look askance at us
at first (and we needn't be surprised if they do), that mustn't affect
us. Remember this: Scores are Settled. That's our motto; there is to be
no more paying off. Chaff them if you like--I fancy they'd think there
was something fishy if we didn't--but no tricks, if you please."
"What if they start them on us, Hallett?" enquired Grey, in the tone of
one who merely seeks information. Hallett frowned slightly.
"Hadn't thought of that. Of course if they insist on picking a quarrel
in that way--"
"But I'm nearly sure they won't," cried Jack.
"I caught Lucy pasting the leaves of my _Delectus_ together," murmured
Grey, looking at the ceiling.
"And how many things have you done to them?" retorted Jack desperately,
sighing as he felt the weakness of that argument.
"Vick, will you hand Grey your india-rubber?" put in Cadbury. "There's a
bit of his memory he hasn't rubbed out yet. I did as Hallett told us,
and forgot everything at once. I've even forgotten my translation for
to-morrow--it's gone entirely. Never mind: to obey is our first duty; to
labour for Peace comes only second."
"Labouring for peace--why, Brady, that's been your little task!"
exclaimed Vickers. "And a noble one"--here he put on the "West voice".
"Have you thought of it in that light, my boy? To labour for peace! We
might all do worse. Conceive, for instance, of working for love!"
Jack laughed noisily, and called Vickers "a silly old loony". But he
blushed at the same time. And he went to sleep that night feeling
uncommonly hopeful.
When, in short jerky phrases, he broke to Hannah the plan he had
devised, the maid was so grateful and "took aback", as she said, as to
become for the moment half-hysterical; but soon rallying her common
sense, she sat down and penned a note to her father, to accompany the
young gentlemen's communication. Hannah's spelling, handwriting, and
grammar were all very shaky, but it is a fact that Mr. J. Thompson,
Nurseryman, found her letter a help in throwing light upon the "formal,
business" document.