Fisher major's discovery put the finishing touch to the discomfiture of
the Modern seniors.
And the manner in which they came by the news of it by no means tended
to salve the wound which it inflicted.
The shop committee was so convulsed by the intelligence which Fisher
minor brought, that they then and there promised themselves the pleasure
of conveying the good news to Rollitt's accusers in person. They
accordingly adjourned in a body to the Modern side.
"Won't Clapperton grin!" said Percy. "I say, you chaps, we may as well
let him have it one at a time. Then he'll hear it nine times over, do
you see? I'll go first."
The idea seemed a good one, but risky. Cottle calculated that after
about the fourth time Clapperton would be a little riled. He therefore
modestly proposed to follow Percy. Cash and Lickford competed smartly
for the third place, the former being successful. Ramshaw, having to
come fifth, had decided misgivings as to the fun of the thing; while the
Classic juniors declined to play unless all the others remained on the
spot ready to back up in case of emergency.
It was also decided that, for precautionary reasons, the key of
Clapperton's door should be removed for the time being, lest he should
try to lock the good news out; and that an interval of two minutes
should be allowed to elapse between each messenger's announcement.
Little dreaming of the exquisite torture being prepared for him,
Clapperton sat in his study engaged in the farce of preparation.
He had plenty to think of besides lessons. Things had all gone wrong
with him. Dangle and he had fought. Brinkman, after his thrashing by
Corder, no longer counted. Fullerton had rebelled, and was taking boys
over every day to the enemy. Corder had successfully defied his--
Clapperton's--authority, and the juniors snapped their fingers at him.
And yet Clapperton had come up this term determined to lay himself out
for his side, and be the most popular prefect in Fellsgarth!
His one comfort was that the Classics were under a cloud too. One of
their number was a runaway thief; and a stigma rested on their side
worse than any that attached to the Moderns.
He was trying to make the most of this questionable consolation when the
door opened, and Percy bounced in.
"I say, Clapperton; Fisher's found the money. Rollitt's not a thief.
Ain't you glad? Hurray!"
And, without waiting, he retired as suddenly as he had come.
Clapperton gaped at the door by which he had gone in amazement. He had
never calculated on this. This was the worst thing yet. It showed
Yorke had been right, and that he and Dangle--
The door opened again, and Cottle ran in. "Hurray, Clapperton! The
money's found. Rollitt's no thief. Ain't you glad?" And he, too,
vanished.
There must be something in it. What a fool he would look to all
Fellsgarth! Perhaps it was only a plot, though, to shield Rollitt.
Perhaps--
The door once more swung open, and in jumped Cash.
"Clapperton, I say--Hooray! That money's been found. Rollitt's no
thief. Ain't you glad?"
Hullo! At this rate he would get to know the news. How they would crow
on the other side! He wondered if Fisher major had done it on purp--
Again there was a scuffle of feet at the door, and Lickford stepped in.
"Oh! Clapperton," he said. "Hooray, Clapperton! The money's turned
up, and Rollitt's no thief. Ain't you glad?--and, oh, I say,
Clapperton--hooray!"
"Come here," said Clapperton, sternly.
But, oh dear no; Lickford was pressed, and couldn't stay.
"The young asses!" growled Clapperton. "Why can't they keep their
precious news to themselves? If they'd tried, they couldn't have made
bigger nuisances of themselves. I suppose, now, Yorke will--"
The door swung open again, and Ramshaw, hanging on to the handle, swung
in with it.
"Hooray, Clapperton! Rollitt's no thief. That money's turned up.
Ain't you glad? I am--good evening."
This final greeting was cut short by a ruler which Clapperton sent
flying at the messenger's head. Ramshaw dodged in time, and the ruler
flew out into the passage, where it was promptly captured by Fisher
minor, whose turn came next.
"Thank goodness that's the end of the young cads!" growled Clapperton.
"They've done it on purpose; and I'll pay them out for it. That ass,
Fisher major, he's bound to--"
Here there came a modest tap at the door, and Fisher minor peeped in,
apologetically.
"Well, what do you want? You've no business on this side; go to your
own house."
"All right, Clapperton," said Fisher, speaking with unwonted rapidity.
"I only thought you'd like to know my brother's found the money.
Hurray! Rollitt's no thief; ain't you glad?--Yeow!"
This last exclamation was in response to a grab from the enraged
Clapperton, which, though it failed to catch the messenger, clawed his
face.
"I've had enough of this," said the senior. "I don't care--. Hullo!
where's my key?"
The key was not to be seen. He looked out into the passage; it was not
there. No one else was in sight.
He returned viciously to his seat at the table, and began to read again.
The door had opened, and Ashby, on tip-toe, was in the room before the
senior noticed the fresh intrusion.
"Rollitt's no thief; ain't you glad? The money's found. Hurray,
Clapperton!--done it!" exclaimed Ashby, all in one breath, dancing out
of the room in conscious pride at his exploit.
"All very well," said D'Arcy, whose turn came next; "how am I to do it?"
"No shirking," said Wally; "I come after you."
"Look here," said D'Arcy; "if you chaps give me a leg-up, I'll let him
have it through his window. I can reach round from this passage window
to his if you hang on to my legs."
"Good dodge," said Wally, admiringly, "but we'd better turn the key on
the door first. If he came out and spotted us holding you, we might
have to drop you."
So the key was quietly put in the lock and turned; and D'Arcy, firmly
held by the heels, wriggled himself out of the window, and, with the aid
of a pipe, pulled himself up, with his face to the window of
Clapperton's study.
That worthy was beginning to congratulate himself that he would be
spared a further repetition of the uncomfortable news that night, when a
sudden, loud voice at one of the open lattice panes almost startled him
out of his skin.
"Oh, Clapperton! Ain't you glad? Rollitt's no thief. The money's
found. Good evening--have you used our soap? Haul in, you chaps!
Sharp!"
The persecuted senior, after the first surprise, made a frantic rush,
first at the window, and then, finding the bird flown, at the door. The
latter was locked. He could hear a scuffling and scrambling in the
lobby outside, followed by a stampede; after which dead silence
prevailed, save for the vicious kicking of the imprisoned hero at his
own door.
"Whew!" said Wally, fanning himself when the juniors were safe back in
Percy's study. "That was a squeak, if you like. How on earth am I to
do it?"
"Better let him off," suggested some one.
Wally resented the suggestion as an insult.
"Not likely," said he. "I'll do it. I don't care, if you all back up."
And in a minute, when the sound of the kicking had ceased, and
Clapperton had apparently retired once more to his work, he crept out
into the lobby, followed stealthily by the whole band.
As they passed the head of the stairs, whose voice should they hear
below, inquiring of a middle-boy if Clapperton was in the house, but the
doctor's?
"Yes, sir; shall I tell him you want him?" said the boy.
"No, I'll go up to his room," said the head-master.
"Whew!" said Wally, "what a go! and the door's locked on the outside!"
"I'll go and turn it quietly," said Percy, "if you back up in case he
flies out."
But the precaution was not needed. Percy, who luckily had just taken
off his boots, slipped up silently to the door, and the others from
their lurking-place saw him quietly turn the key and then walk back,
evidently unheard by the prisoner within.
He passed the stair-head just before the doctor came up, and to their
great relief ran into the arms of his friends unchallenged.
The doctor, indeed, was too pre-occupied to dream that, as he went to
Clapperton's study, nine small heads were craning out of a door at the
end of the passage, watching his every step.
"I say," whispered Ashby, in tones of horror, "suppose Clap thinks it's
one of us, and goes for him!"
"My eye, what a go!" ejaculated Cash.
They saw the stately figure stand a moment at the door and turn the
handle.
Next moment he reeled back with an exclamation of amazement, nearly
felled to the ground by a bulky dictionary hurled at his head!
The nine lurkers fairly embraced one another in horror at the sight of
this awful outrage; and when, a moment after, they saw the doctor gather
himself together and return to the charge, this time closing the door
behind him, they did not envy the unlucky Clapperton the awkward five
minutes in store for him.
How the two arranged matters no one could say. But as no sounds of
violence issued, and the doctor did not summon any one to fetch his
cane, they concluded Clapperton had offered a sufficiently humble
apology for his mistake.
"Hold on, now," said Wally, after three minutes had passed; "I'll try it
now--it's my only chance. You Classic kids be ready to cut home with me
as soon as I come back."
So, starting at a run like one who had come a long distance and expected
to find the senior alone, he dashed unceremoniously into Clapperton's
study, of course not appearing to notice the distinguished company
present, crying--
"I say, Clapperton. Hooray! The money's found. Rollitt's no thief.
Ain't you glad! Oh, the doctor! I beg your pardon, sir."
The next moment he, D'Arcy, Ashby, and Fisher minor were descending the
stairs three steps at a time on the way back to Mr Wakefield's as fast
as their legs would carry them, and with all the righteous satisfaction
of men who had done their duty at all costs.
"I reckon," said Wally, "he pretty well knows about it now--and if he
don't, the doctor will rub it in."
The unfortunate Clapperton, indeed, required no one to "rub in" the fact
that he had made a mess of things.
The doctor did not attempt to do it. He merely carried the news of the
finding of the money, and desired Clapperton, as the head of the house,
to make it known as widely as possible.
"I say nothing now of the cruel wrong which has been inflicted by hasty
suspicion on Rollitt. That shadow is still on the School. But the
worst shadow, that a Fellsgarth boy was a thief, is happily removed, and
I wish every boy in this house to hear of it at the earliest possible
moment."
And the doctor went, leaving Clapperton to gulp down the bitter pill as
best he could.
Why should he have the job to do? He had not been the first to start
the suspicions. Dangle had done that--Dangle, with whom he had fought.
Why should not Dangle be called upon to put it right? Unluckily, Dangle
was not the captain of Forder's. He was not as responsible in starting
the rumour as Clapperton, in his position, had been in adopting it.
It was more than he could bring himself to, to summon the house and
announce the news publicly. If Dangle and Brinkman had been with him
still, the three of them together might have brazened it out. But his
colleagues were sulking in their own quarters, and whatever had to be
done must be done singlehanded.
He therefore sat down in no very happy frame of mind and wrote out the
following curt notice for the house-boards.--
"Notice.
"The head-master wishes it to be known that the Club money supposed to
be missing has been found by the treasurer.
"Geo. Clapperton."
This ungracious document he copied out three times, and taking advantage
of every one being in his study for preparation, affixed with his own
hand on the notice boards at the house-door and on each landing.
"There!" said he, with a sneer of disgust, as he returned to his own
room, "let them make the most of that."
An hour later the dormitory bell sounded, and he could hear the
scuffling of feet on the lobby outside, and the clamour of voices as
boys hustled one another in front of the boards. Evidently the majority
regarded the announcement in a jocular manner; and when a distant shout
of laughter came up from the passage below, and down from the landing
above, it was clear that Forders did not take the matter very much to
heart.
"It was ridiculous, when you come to think of it," soliloquised
Clapperton, "that a blundering ass like Fisher major should have brought
the School into such a precious mess."
The noise gradually died away as fellows one by one dropped of to bed.
Clapperton waited till they were gone before he followed. As he passed
the notice board he glanced at the document which had lately cost him so
much pain. It was still there; but not as he left it. A sentence had
been squeezed in between his own words and his signature at the bottom
of the sheet, which, as it was a fair imitation of his back-sloped
handwriting, had all the appearance of forming part of his manifesto.
Clapperton gasped with fury as he read the amended notice:--
"Notice.
"The head-master wishes it to be known that, the Club money supposed to
be missing has been found by the treasurer, and that I am a beast and a
sneak to have accused Rollitt of stealing it.
"Geo. Clapperton."
He tore the paper from the board, and stamped on it in his rage. Then
he went downstairs to look at the notice on the school-door. It read
precisely like the other, the imitation being perhaps better. He stayed
only to tear this down, and proceeded to the other landing, where the
same insult confronted him.
Who the author might be he was free to guess.
As he lay awake that night, tossing and turning, he racked his brain to
devise some retribution.
And yet, his more sensible self told him, hadn't he been leading up to
this all the term? What had he done to make the fellows respect, much
more like, him? He had bullied, and swaggered, and set himself against
the good of the School. The fellows who followed him only did so in the
hope of getting something--either fun or advantage--out of the
agitation. They didn't care twopence about Clapperton, and were ready
enough to drop him as soon as ever it suited their turn. The one or two
things he could do well, and for which anybody respected him--as, for
instance, football--he had deliberately shut himself off from, leaving
his authority to depend only on the very qualities he had least cause to
be proud of.
It was easy enough to say that Brinkman and Dangle cut even a poorer
figure over this wretched business than he. But who troubled their
heads about Brinkman and Dangle? The former had already been snuffed
out hopelessly, and dared not show his face. Dangle, as everybody knew,
had a personal grudge against Rollitt, and was unhampered by scruples as
to how he scored. But he--Clapperton--he had always tried to pose as a
decent sort of fellow, with some kind of interest in the good of the
School and some sort of notion about common honour and decency. Ugh!
this was what had come of it! As he lay awake that night, the sound of
the laughter round the notice boards and the "Ain't you glad?" of the
juniors dinned in his ears, sometimes infuriating, sometimes humiliating
him; but in either case mockingly reminding him that Clapperton's
greatest enemy in Fellsgarth was the captain of the Modern side.
Next morning brought no news of the missing boy, and a vague feeling of
anxiety spread through the School. Boys remembered how proud and
sensitive Rollitt had been, and how dreadful was the accusation against
him. Suppose he had done something desperate? He had cared little
enough for danger when all went well. Would he be likely to care more,
now that the School was in league against him, pointing to him as a
thief, and hounding him out of its society?
All sorts of dreadful possibilities occurred both to masters and boys;
and all the while a feeling of fierce resentment was growing against the
fellows whose accusations had been the cause of all the mischief.
Dangle, as he crossed the Green to class, was hooted all the way.
Brinkman was followed about with derisive cheers, and cries of "Look
out! Corder's coming"; and Clapperton, when he appeared, was silently
cut. Fellows went out of the way to avoid him; and the chair on either
side of him was left vacant in Hall.
"Did you hear," said Ramshaw to his neighbour at the prefects' table at
dinner-time, "that they've begun to drag the lake to-day?"
A grim silence greeted the question. Fellows tried to go on with their
meal. But somehow Ramshaw had destroyed every one's appetite.
"Nonsense!" said Yorke. "He took food with him. You forget that."
"That looks as if he'd gone off the beaten track somewhere," said
Fullerton.
"It does--and Hawk's Pike is as likely a place as any other," said
Yorke.
"Whew! there was frost on it the other night," some one said. "I wish
the doctor would let us go out and look for him. We've a much better
chance of finding him than police and guides."
Here the signal was given to rise, and every one dispersed. Yorke
stayed--one of the last. As he went out he caught sight of a solitary
figure walking moodily ahead, with hands dug in pockets and head down,
the picture of dejection.
Yorke could hardly recognise in this back view his old rival and enemy,
Clapperton. Yet he it was. A few weeks ago, and he always marched to
and from his house in the boisterous company of friends and admirers.
Now he was left alone.
A flush of something like shame mounted to the captain's cheeks. He had
no love for this fellow. He owed him little gratitude. And yet the
sight of him thus solitary, cut off from the stream, stirred him.
Did he not try, in his humble way, to follow in the footsteps of One Who
said, "Love your enemies, do good to them that hate you"? And was not
this an opportunity for putting that faith of his to the test of
practice?
He quickened his pace, and overtook Clapperton. The Modern senior
wheeled round half-savagely.
"Clapperton," said the captain, "we've been enemies all this term. I've
thought harshly of you, and you've thought harshly of me. Why shouldn't
we be friends?"
"What!" almost growled Clapperton; "are you making a fool of me?"
"No--but we've tried hating one another long enough. Let's try being
friends for a change."
They stood facing one another; the one serene, honest, inviting; the
other dejected and doubting. But as their eyes met the fires kindled
again in Clapperton's face, and the cloud swept off his brow. He pulled
his hand from his pocket and held it out.
"Done with you, Yorke. You're the last fellow in Fellsgarth I expected
to call friend just now."