discipline. There was, of course, no prep, and the dormitories were
open for packing. Consequently it was not difficult for twelve members
of the lower dormy to creep out when Randall's had settled down to
their gorge and to range themselves along the gym roof. It was
beautifully dark and dry: fortune was helping the cause of Gideon and
the right. Neave and Cullen were to ascend the fire-escape and enter
Randall's two dormies, one taking each. They were to go through the
cubicles, removing the jugs, soaking the beds, and handing out the
empty pitchers to others who passed them quietly down a line of waiting
figures. This seemed the best, the quietest method of transport.
Ultimately all the jugs would be awaiting in Berney's lower dormy the
great moment of Toffee Randall's speech. Martin formed one of the
hidden line and shivered for half-an-hour on the roof of Randall's gym
while he passed jugs carefully along. Never in all his life had he
known a night like this. He was thrilled by the sense of comradeship
in danger and the knowledge that he was working in the company of great
ones, working for the pain and humiliation of Randall's. Never did he
forget the supreme exhilaration of that night attack: the climbing in
the dark, the whispers, the nervous strain, the dread of blundering and
betraying his party, the intolerable waiting. Each movement of the
trees in Randall's garden made him think that the conspirators had been
noticed and that someone was coming.
At length every bed had been duly drenched and forty pitchers had been
silently transferred to Berney's lower dormy. Each member of the
dormitory took two jugs, and four of them had three. Then they waited.
They could see down into the lighted windows of Randall's dining-hall
where the enemy feasted; but the supper was drawing to its end. By the
resounding chorus of "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow" they knew that
Toffee Randall was "up" for the last speech of the evening. When the
singing and cheering were over Randall began his oration. At the same
moment Neave gave the signal. Everyone in Berney's lower dormy cried
aloud, "For Gideon and the Lord," and, as they cried, forty pitchers
crashed on the zinc roof of Randall's gymnasium. No one, not even the
manipulators of three jugs, had failed or been late. There was but one
cry and one crash: and there on the zinc roof lay myriad morsels of
china, glittering in the half light thrown from the windows of either
house. The noise had been terrific, the effect stupendous.
It was in the true spirit of the saga.
A moment later Spots dashed into the room. "What the devil's all that
row?" he roared.
Everyone was peacefully in his cubicle, putting the last touch to his
packing or getting into bed.
"Randall's trying to be funny," suggested Neave.
"But didn't you shout?"
"Well, we helped a bit. That din would have made anyone squeal.
Randall's must have been breaking china for the sake of their dirty
pot. They are swine."
Spots looked baffled. The row had been tremendous, yet here everybody
was calm and quiet. It must have been Randall's, but they were still
at their supper. It was amazing, it was a miracle. To save his face
he returned to his study.
Meanwhile it was ascertained that, after some confusion, Toffee Randall
had continued his speech: then they heard the long-drawn, surging roar
of "Auld Lang Syne." It took Randall's twenty minutes to finish "Auld
Lang Syne."
"The swine," said Neave. He said it often, but he said it beautifully,
with a whining drawl of contempt. "Just wait till they get to their
dormies."
So they waited, and presently the pandemonium began. Randall's were
discovering that not a bed had escaped, not a jug remained. As they
looked out of their windows on to the gym roof they realised the full
meaning of the battle-cry and the crash that had startled them at their
supper.
"Water, water everywhere," cried Cullen in ecstasy as he heard the
tumult rising in the neighbouring house. Randall's, flushed rather
with insolence than the weak claret-cup of their supper, bellowed in
their dormitories and shouted from their windows: after all none but
Berney's could have done the deed. It was sheer joy for Berney's as
they listened: wisely they made no answer and Randall's cried aloud in
vain.
Again Spots came into the lower dormy. "What are Randall's shouting
about?" he asked.
"Joy of life," said Neave. "The swine."
"Well they needn't yell at us."
"They've got no manners, Leopard."
Spots advised his dormy to take no notice of the creatures and again
went out.
Shortly before midnight Mr Randall rang at Mr Berney's front door and
demanded an interview with the master of the house. Berney came down
in his dressing-gown: he was very tired and his eyes ached. He was
promptly informed by his raging neighbour that his house had disgraced
itself, and he listened to a strange story of soaked beds and broken
pitchers. "Must have been your boys," Randall ended fiercely. "The
jugs couldn't be thrown on to my gym except from your dormitories.
There has been an invasion. It's scandalous."
"But what evidence have you?" asked Berney, who hated Randall as only
one housemaster can hate another.
"It's obvious, man, obvious. Jealousy. Footer cup. My boys were at
supper when the crash was heard: and your boys shouted, I heard them.
Besides, would my people soak their beds? I demand an inquiry. I
shall go to Foskett. Your boys shall be kept back a day."
This roused Berney, whose nerves were already strained with fatigue and
worry.
"I entirely decline," he said sharply, "to board my boys for an extra
day to please you. I shall put the matter in the hands of my prefects.
If that doesn't satisfy you, go to Foskett by all means. You won't get
much out of him at this time of night: he's probably more tired than I
am. If my prefects find that my boys----"
"There's no 'if,'" said Randall.
"If they find that we're responsible," Berney continued icily, "the
jugs shall be paid for and the guilty punished. Good-night." And he
led Randall to the door.
Randall was renowned for his temper and his powers of self-expression
in school. But now he was sublimely speechless.
Berney held a nocturnal consultation with his form prefects. They all
smiled as the tale was told. Spots even roared with laughter.
"Er, Leopard," said Berney, "this is--er--a serious matter," and then
he broke down and laughed himself. He and Randall had never hit it
off. Spots told Berney of the suspicious innocence of the lower
dormitory. Moore had been on duty all the evening in the upper room so
that its inhabitants were certainly not guilty. The prefects marched
in a body to the lower dormy. "Look here, you chaps," said Spots,
"it's all up about this jug business. It was done here. Who are the
culprits?"
Simultaneously every boy left his cubicle and said: 'Guilty.' It was a
triumph of organisation. Neave had foreseen that detection was
inevitable and had determined that, up to the very end, the dormy
should display its solidarity.
"Well," said Spots, "you'd better all come down to the pre's room."
So shortly before one o'clock eighteen boys in dressing-gowns, led by
Cullen and Neave in garments of great colour and splendour, went down
to the prefects' common-room. There was just room for all.
Neave had to tell the whole story: he told it simply and well, duly
emphasising the Biblical aspect.
"Berney has left the matter with the prefect," said Moore, who was
suffering tortures from a half-thwarted desire to laugh.
"You'll have to pay for the jugs next term. Randall wants you to be
kept back, but Berney wouldn't hear it. Anyhow, it's been a grave
breach of discipline" (here he saw the impenetrable solemnity of
Neave's face and almost broke down), "grave breach of discipline. Yes.
You're to have four each."
Martin sighed with relief, for he had expected eight. They were taken
to the house gym, where space was ample, and with all four prefects at
work the business was soon over. They were even allowed to keep on
their dressing-gowns. Never had swiping been so farcical or so
inefficient. When they were all back in their cubicles Spots came in.
"I'd have given a great deal," he said, "not to have been a pre
to-night. It seems to me that we have scored off Randall's.
Gentlemen, I congratulate you, and I sincerely hope that no one has
been hurt by our recent ministration."
They assured him that they had not suffered. And then, because they
were all going away very early the next morning, it was decided, with
Spots's permission, to abandon sleep. Gideon had to make a speech and
offer thanks for the public revenge: and stories were told interminably.
Martin, as he lay half asleep, came to the conclusion that life's
burden was exquisite. It wasn't only that the holidays began
to-morrow: the night's achievement had been perfect. There is
something essentially satisfying to human nature in the lavish
destruction of property: with joy we watch the havoc wrought by the
cinema comedian or the pantomime knockabout, and with joy the patron of
fairs smashes the bottles in a rifle-range. Martin revelled in the
thought that forty pitchers lay shattered and shimmering on the zinc
roof below him. And now, more than ever, he felt the pleasures of
comradeship. Randall's had been humiliated: Berney's had triumphed.
It was for him far the most significant fact of his first term that he
had taken part in an enterprise worthy to be recounted for ever in
Berney's. He was proud of his dormy, for it had worked as one man.
Above all, he was proud of Neave, the contriver, the leader of men.
Even now he was saying:
"We've put it across them, the swine."
Then Spots said: "For Gideon and the Lord. It was a great notion. Who
thought of it?"
"Young Leigh gave the name," said Neave.
"Good for you, Leigh," shouted Spots. "You're keeping up the
reputation of the Leopard's den."
Naturally that seemed to Martin the supreme moment of the whole superb
affair.
VI
At one o'clock in the afternoon of December the twentieth a motor car
left Tavistock station and tore fiercely westward until it reached the
excellent village of Cherton Widger. Then it panted up an abrupt hill
and, passing a lodge, ran up a short drive to The Steading, a square
low-roofed house surrounded by irreproachable lawns that sloped away to
the coverts. The chauffeur descended and carried on to the steps a
portmanteau and a corded play-box. Martin, looking uncouthly smart in
a new overcoat (with a strap behind) and a bowler hat, stood rather
nervously by the door. He had come home for the holidays.
In the hall he met his aunt. He kissed her: or rather she kissed him.
His uncle burst out of his study and shook hands with him: his cousin
Margaret, aged fifteen, also appeared and shyly shook hands. It seemed
that his cousin Robert, aged seventeen, would not escape from Rugby
till to-morrow. Everybody began to ask him questions which he
mechanically answered.
"You must have left Elfrey very early," said his aunt.
"About seven."
"And in December too! Had you got to?"
"No; but everybody does."
These well-meaning people did not realise that you do not stay at
school after term has ended. Though you perish with cold and lack of
sleep, the first possible train is the only train. Martin had secured
an hour's sleep, breakfasted at six, and caught his train at seven.
All the way to Exeter he had smoked. About this smoking he had felt
afraid, for here was another new experience: but everyone else in the
carriage had smoked and there was no escape. One of the boys had dealt
in cigars, another produced a pipe which he cleaned extensively and
smoked but little. Martin had kept with the majority to cigarettes and
had laboured to disguise the swift nervous action of the novice beneath
the languid air of the connoisseur. One thing at any rate was certain:
he had not been sick. By the time he reached Exeter he was feeling a
little queer, but with a supreme effort he had staved off a disaster
which would have been fatal to his reputation. And now he was
intensely hungry and found cold chicken and ham a very pleasant
substitute for the 'roast or boiled' with which the board of Berney's
was laden. It was heavenly to sit once more in a comfortable chair in
a fire-warmed room and to have chicken and fresh bread and lemonade.
Martin was an orphan. His guardian, John Berrisford, to whose house he
had just come, was his mother's brother. His father had been most
things to most men, and despite, or possibly because of, his very
considerable ability he had achieved a rich versatility in failure. He
had started by being a captain of industry, or perhaps a sub-lieutenant
would be a more accurate description; but his complete inability to
remain awake in the office between the hours of two and four had put a
sudden end to his commission. On parting from his general he had said:
"It's no use your getting chaps from the varsity to give the show tone.
They won't work till they have had their tea." The general had sworn
and taken his advice.
Richard Leigh then discovered that he had been so damnably well
educated that there was nothing for him to do but think. So he thought
and wrote and went hungry. Now and then, to give his creditors a run
for their money, he became a commission agent or an architect or a
producer of plays. But he never paid very much in the pound. At the
time when he met Joan Berrisford, a young woman of property, he was
once more engaged in thought. She was beginning to feel the need of
permanence in her life and was quickly interested in his work and the
giant despair which he swore was the greatest of his creations.
Virginity bored her: Richard attracted her: possibly her conscience
stung her: for she was suddenly struck by the idea that she might repay
society for her dividends by rescuing for society an artist whom it
didn't want. Nowadays this would seem reasonable enough, because we
don't believe in democracy any longer and shower divine rights on
anyone who chooses to call himself an intelligent minority and make
himself sufficiently objectionable: but at the time when the incident
occurred Joan Berrisford was certainly thinking in advance of her age.
Everybody said she was a fool to pay any attention to the creature, for
she came of the class that thinks every artist has necessarily
something wrong with him. Only her brother John pointed out that
Joan's husband was, primarily, Joan's affair, and then, to her intense
delight, he had added that he didn't care twopence whom she married as
long as the rest of the family hated him.
The marriage was a success. Richard threw off his despair and gave
society some excellent books of which it took no notice. They lived in
Italy, and there Martin was born. When he was only eight his mother
died suddenly and his father came to London. He had been left
comfortably off by his wife, but after her death the old restlessness
returned: he gave up writing and gambled gracefully on the Stock
Exchange--that is to say, he bore his continual losses with an
exquisite nonchalance. Martin used to go to a day school and was
enabled by his brains and some sound teaching to win a good scholarship
at Elfrey. Then in August his father had succumbed to a long illness
and the boy was left to the guardianship of his uncle, John Berrisford,
to whom Richard Leigh had written the following letter:
DEAR JOHN, You are the only one of my relations by blood or marriage
with whom neither Joan nor I ever quarrelled. And so, just because you
left us alone, I can't leave you alone. I want you to be Martin's
guardian, in case this illness should do for me: you have seen
something of him and I know you like him. There is no home in the
world to which I would sooner entrust my son than yours. I have only a
thousand pounds and I want him to be decently educated. You have a
family and I should hate to think that I was burdening you. So you
must just go for the capital: he has a good scholarship at Elfrey and
ought to get one at Oxford. In that case the thousand pounds ought
just to see him through. It's plainly no use investing for fifty
pounds a year. Don't encourage him to be an artist: he can't afford
it. Besides it's a poor life to be a wanderer when you're old, and
that's what he would be without money. If he seems inclined for safety
and the Civil Service, let him take his chance. Anyhow I trust you
absolutely. Yours ever,
RICHARD LEIGH.
So Martin had spent the last three weeks of his summer holiday at The
Steading and thither he had now returned.
John Berrisford was a round, ruddy little man who was too English to be
like Napoleon and too Napoleonic to be like an English squire. In all
matters of theory, especially moral and political, he was fiercely
progressive, in all matters of taste a conservative. He combined
revolutionary fervour with a strong belief in old customs, old cheese,
and old wine. He ran a small estate on which he gave his labourers a
twenty-shilling minimum, decent cottages, and free beer on festal
occasions, and to the grief of the neighbouring farmers he made it pay.
Sport of all kinds attracted him, and on Saturdays in the autumn and
winter he would bring down partridges and pheasants with remarkable
certainty, but he was sufficiently logical not to cap his battues by
going to church on the following day. He made friends with everybody
and was criticised by the squires for being a rebel and by the rebels,
of whom the village had two, for being a squire. This amused him
intensely and his first answer to all criticism was a drink. Then he
would start out magnificently to justify his position. "I get the best
of everything," he said, and meant it.
Martin, of course, missed his father's companionship: they had lived on
very intimate terms and the customary limitations of the parental
relationship had been broken through. But it is the privilege of youth
to forget easily, and it was fortunate for Martin that almost directly
after his father's death he should have been plunged into a new world,
a world whose thronging cares and pleasures gave few moments for
reflection. By the time he had returned to The Steading his
personality had so grown and developed that he was freed from painful
memories and able to enjoy his holidays.
The Berrisfords were people of sound sense, and seeing what manner of
boy he was made no effort to entertain him. Robert, the son at Rugby,
was seventeen and a prefect, so that Martin was afraid of him and kept
aloof: of Margaret, as a girl, he was naturally shy. He preferred to
wander alone in the fields and coverts, now marking the ways of bird
and beast, now plotting out his future and building up strange
fantasies of thought. Ever since he had been a tiny boy he had played
with himself a game of imagination in which he fused his personality
with that of a mysterious hero called Daniel. Always when he got into
bed he would become Daniel until he fell asleep and in imagination he
would go through great adventures and sufferings and triumphs. Daniel
was very strong and brave and perfect: perhaps Martin had been
influenced by Henty's heroes. Daniel's life varied with Martin's own
vicissitudes. When Martin read Ballantyne, Daniel was the son of a
trapper and wrought wonderful deeds among the Esquimaux and Redskins on
the shores of Hudson's Bay: when Martin was under his father's
influence he abandoned trapping and came home to write wonderful books
about grizzly bears: when Martin's thoughts were centred on his
preparatory school, Daniel had laboured at the verbs in [Greek: -_mi_]
and been the finest athlete in the land. At Elfrey, Daniel had
suffered an eclipse, as always happened when Martin had anything very
much to think about: at Berney's he had either been tired enough to
fall asleep immediately or else he had had something on his mind,
to-morrow's repetition, an order of Leopard's, or a game of football.
And, besides, Martin had reflected that such methods of amusement as
the 'Daniel game' were childish and quite incompatible with the dignity
of a Public School boy. But at The Steading the temptation to restore
Daniel to life became very urgent and Martin at length swallowed his
scruples. While he lay in his bed or wandered in the woods he would
become Daniel once more, a Daniel at Elfrey, a prodigious Daniel, who
surpassed all records in popularity, played stand-off half for the
school at the age of fourteen, endured the most tremendous swipings
without a moan or a movement, and was irresistible at every game he
took up.
Mrs Berrisford was somewhat distressed by Martin's solitary walks and
quiet ways and made several efforts to draw him from his shell. But
she made the mistake of trying to base the conversation on his
experiences at school and the result was not encouraging.
"And who is your form master?" she began one evening.
"Chap called Vickers."
"Is he nice?"
"Oh, he's all right. Bit of a terror sometimes."
"Does he go for you?"
"Not for me very much."
A pause. "And what's Mr Berney like? Do you get on with him?"
"Oh, he's all right."
"Do you like the house?"
"Yes; it's quite all right."
"Have you any special friends?"
"No one in particular. I like most of the chaps."
"How do you get on with football?"
"Fairly well."
And then she gave it up. Without being openly rude Martin had made it
plain that he was not to be bolted from his earth of modified optimism.
When Martin had gone to bed John Berrisford pointed out to his wife
that she had taken the wrong line. "Martin is just old enough and wise
enough to be thoroughly self-conscious," he said. "He resents
questions about school because he thinks you're regarding him as a
schoolboy and playing down to him. Talk to him about Botticelli or
Free Trade or Beerbohm Tree."
"What nonsense," said Mrs Berrisford. "He's only fourteen. It's just
shyness."
But on the following morning she took her husband's advice and found
that, as usual, he was right.
There was a good collection of books in the house and Martin was
allowed to pick and choose. John Berrisford suffered some anxiety from
the problem of free choice: he was not concerned about the boy's
morality; because he knew that no power in the world can alter human
nature. So when he noticed that Martin took down _Tom Jones_ and read
only a portion of it, and later on paid great heed to _The Sentimental
Journey_, he had the good sense to say nothing at all. What worried
him was the fear that Martin would read many really good things before
he was able to appreciate them and might thus be prevented or
prejudiced from reading them in after life. For instance, when Martin
struggled with Robert Louis Stevenson and called him dull, his uncle
knew well enough what was wrong. On the other hand, he dreaded
dictating a course of reading or advising the boy in any way, for he
knew the value of spontaneous selection and remembered the vivid
loathing which he himself had felt for 'advised' books and the infinite
lure of the forbidden fruit. So he discreetly held his peace, hoping
that Martin would be able to return to Stevenson without prejudice.
A few days before the end of the holidays the whole family went up to
town to see the theatres. Martin was old enough to appreciate the
pantomime and would have sat there till three in the morning readily.
He was bored by the interminable ballet and the garish medley of
flashing lights and countless colours which most of the audience liked
so much, but the comedians and the more humorous scenic effects he
found perfect. Besides, as a Public School boy and grown-up person, he
had to admire Robinson Crusoe when, in gleaming fur-trimmed tights, he,
or rather she, so irresistibly sang:
"Somebody wants me surely,
Some heart bleeds for mine."
No less fascinating was the comedienne with her: 'Cupid got a Bull that
Time,' and the comic man's triumph: 'There are Lots of Funny Things
about a Clothes-Line.'
At last the end came and Martin went to meet the special to Elfrey. He
was afraid that his uncle and aunt were making a great mistake in
proposing to see him off. He wondered whether it was done, whether you
could possibly appear on the platform surrounded by relations. As
usual his fears were not justified and he found the station full of
mothers and sisters. Everything went well, and as they walked through
the crowd Martin noticed a group of bloods with Leopard in their midst.
Spots saw him and greeted him quite effusively. It was a tremendous
moment, and afforded Martin a fine thrill of pride.
"Who was that?" asked his aunt.
"Oh, that was Leopard. He's a pre at Berney's. An awful blood, and
ripping too."
Somehow or other he had never informed the Berrisfords that he did
menial work or wrote Greek prose for another.
Then he came across Cullen and Neave, resplendent with white spats and
yellow canes. They too were ready to greet him, almost as if he were
one of their chosen circle.
"Got a seat?" said Neave.
"No."