"All serene. Why, hullo, I say! Is that you, Dig, old man?"
"Yes, rather! Sit steady; we've got a ladder and ropes, and Marky's
just down there. How are you?"
Arthur rubbed his eyes, and his teeth chattered.
"Pretty cold and stiff, old man. How jolly of you to come! You see,
the mortar or something slipped, and I couldn't get up or down. I
yelled, but you'd gone. At last I managed to get up again, and there
I've stuck. How are we going down now?"
"They've got the ladder up just below us, if you can manage to get down
so far."
Arthur began to move his stiff limbs one by one, by way of judging what
he could do.
Dig, meanwhile, shouted down that he was safe up, and Arthur was all
right.
"Not time for another try at the owls," said the latter, getting one
foot up and trying to rise.
"Owls be hanged," said Dig, helping his friend gingerly to his feet.
"I feel like a poker," said Arthur. "Shouldn't care to run a mile just
now."
"Nobody wants you to. What you've got to do is to dig hold of the ivy
with your hands and let yourself down. I'll go first and take care of
your feet."
"Awfully brickish of you, Dig," said Arthur. "I'm sorry I'm such a
lout. I feel as if my joints want oiling."
"Come on," said Dig.
The descent was slow, and for poor Arthur painful; but, thanks to the
ivy and Dig's steady steering, it was in due time accomplished safely,
and the top of the ladder reached.
"Now, then, one at a time," shouted the farmer.
"He can't go alone," called Dig; "he's too stiff. Won't it bear both of
us?"
The unanimous opinion below was that it would not. Even Dig's weight as
he went up had been as much as they could manage.
Finally Railsford suggested that a rope should be thrown up, which Dig
could tie round Arthur's body, and so support him from above as he came
down.
The plan was a good one, and Arthur contrived by its help to lower
himself down the steps into the arms of his rescuers.
Dig was not long in following; and five minutes later the party was
standing, safe and sound and thankful, on the greensward of the abbey
floor. The farmer insisted on taking them all to his house, and
comforting their souls and bodies with a hot breakfast in front of a
blazing fire. After which he ordered out his trap and drove them
himself up to Grandcourt.
The first getting-up bell was ringing as they drove into the quadrangle,
and at the sound of the wheels half a dozen anxious watchers darted out
to welcome their return. Still more shouted down greetings from the
dormitory window, and Arthur and Dig, had they been in the mood for
lionising, might have had their heads turned by the excitement which
their reappearance seemed to produce. But they were neither of them in
a mood for anything but going to bed. For, after the excitement of the
night and morning, a reaction had set in, and their heads ached and
their bodies were done out. They even resisted Railsford's
recommendation of a hot bath, and took possession of the dormitory and
curled themselves up to sleep, leaving Fate or anyone else to explain
their absence for the next few hours to the authorities below.
As for Railsford, after seeing his young charges stowed away in their
berths, he shook himself together, took his cold bath, and walked over
to breakfast with Grover, none the worse for the fatigues and exposure
of that eventful night.
"Have you seen the doctor yet?" inquired Grover, when the meal was over.
"I suppose not. He was asking for you particularly last night."
"What for, do you know?"
"I don't. I was wondering if you did, for I imagine from his manner it
is something important."
"Oh, I know; I had to report one of my prefects yesterday for gambling.
No doubt it is in connection with that."
"Perhaps. You know it seems a great pity you and Bickers hit it so
badly. Bickers seems to have a preposterous notion in his head that you
are in some way responsible for what happened to him last term. He even
wanted to bring the matter up in the last session of masters in your
absence; and when we stopped it he promised to return to it at the
next."
"Oh, Bickers!" said Railsford scornfully. "I am really tired of him,
Grover. It's the greatest pity he wasn't allowed to say what he had to
say at that meeting. He will never be happy till he has it off his
mind; and it surely wouldn't be necessary for me to take any notice of
his rhodomontades."
"I'm glad you are so little concerned about them. I was afraid they
might be worrying you."
Railsford smiled.
"I've plenty in my own house to do that, thanks. No, all I ask is to
keep the peace with Bickers, and have nothing to do with him. He may
then say anything he likes. Well, I suppose I had better go over to the
doctor's now and report myself."
The doctor received Railsford coldly, and required a full account of the
strange adventures of the preceding night. Railsford felt a little hurt
at his evident want of sympathy in his story, and was beginning to look
out for a chance of escaping, when Doctor Ponsford said--
"I wanted to see you last night about Felgate, your prefect. I had a
very unsatisfactory interview with him. He appears to lack principle,
and, as you said, not to recognise his responsibility in the house. He
tried to shift the blame for this gambling business wholly upon Mills--
who, by the way, I flogged--and could not be brought to see that there
was anything wrong in his conduct or unbecoming in a senior boy. I
think it may be well to remove him next term, either into my house or
Mr Roe's; meanwhile he understands that he does not retain his
prefecture in yours."
"I am thankful for such an arrangement," said Railsford.
"That, however, is only part of what I had to say to you. Before he
left he brought a most extraordinary charge against you which I should
certainly have disregarded, had it not coincided strangely with a
similar charge made elsewhere. I only repeat it to you in order to give
you an opportunity of repudiating it. It had relation to the outrage
which was committed on Mr Bickers last term, for which your house still
lies in disgrace. He stated that you knew more about that mystery than
anyone else at Grandcourt, and, indeed, gave me the impression, from the
language he used, that he actually considers you yourself were the
perpetrator of the outrage. That, of course, is the mere wild talk of a
revengeful ill-doer."
Railsford laughed a short uneasy laugh. Had the doctor worded the
question in slightly different form, it might have been difficult to
answer it as decisively as he could now.
"It is; and if he were here to hear me I would say that it is as
absolutely and wickedly false as emphatically as I say it to you, sir.
I am sorry indeed that you should have thought it necessary to put the
question."
"There is never anything lost," said the doctor drily, "by giving the
calumniated person an opportunity of denying a charge of this sort,
however preposterous. I am myself perfectly satisfied to take your word
that you neither had any part in the affair yourself nor have you any
knowledge as to who the culprits are."
Railsford coloured and bit his lips. The doctor had now put the
question in the very form which he had dreaded. If he could only have
held his peace the matter would be at an end, perhaps never to revive
again. But could he, an honest man, hold his peace?
"Excuse me," said he, in undisguised confusion; "what I said was that
the imputation that I had anything to do with the outrage myself was
utterly and entirely false."
"Which," said the doctor incisively, "is tantamount to admitting that
the imputation that you are sheltering the real culprits is well-
founded."
"At the risk of being grievously misunderstood, Doctor Ponsford,"
replied Railsford slowly and nervously, yet firmly, "I must decline to
answer that question."
"Very well, sir," said the doctor briskly; "this conversation is at an
end--for the present."