"I can't say anything till I hear it."
"S-suppose I give Billy a hint?"
The scheme was so alien to a boy's conception of the word "honour," such
a violation of an unwritten code--in fine, such a desperate remedy--that
Jim gasped.
"D-don't look like that!" said Mark sharply. "C-can't you see that I
loathe it--as--you do. If m-mother were alive I'd write to her. But if
I told father, he would come bellowing down, and behave like a bull in a
china shop. There would be a jolly r-r-row then."
"Mark," said Jim, "Archie is big enough to look after himself."
"It's worse than you think," Mark said. "He's meeting this g-g-girl
after lock-up. He gets out of the pantry window. I daresay he's
squared one of the Tobies" (Toby was the generic name for footmen). "And
it's frightfully r-r-risky. If he's nailed, he'll be sacked."
"What a silly old ass!" said Jim.
"He runs these frightful risks--for what? To kiss a girl who bubbles at
the mouth!"
"It's the one who squeaks," Jim amended. "And she's an artful dodger.
She thinks he'll marry her. All right, I'll go with you to Billy after
prayers to-night."
"I'll go alone."
"You won't."
"I will."
"No."
"Yes; yes; yes."
Jim's obstinacy prevailed. After prayers, the boys waited in the
passage. Jim had been swished by the Doctor in the Fourth Form Room,
and his sensations before execution reproduced themselves. Mark seemed
cool and collected.
"Sit down," said Billy. "Open your books."
Mark laid his Thucydides upon the table.
"Bless my soul!" ejaculated Billy. He had pushed up his spectacles
while he was speaking. Now, he polished a pair of pince-nez and popped
them on his nose. Nervousness is contagious.
"We have c-c-come here to t-t-tell you, s-sir, s-s-something which you
ought to know."
The house-master blinked, and glanced at both doors. One communicated
with the passage, the other opened into the drawing-room, where his wife
was playing one of Strauss's waltzes: _Wein, Weib und Gesang_. Whenever
Jim heard this waltz he could conjure up a vision of that square, cosy,
book-lined room, the big desk littered with papers, and behind it the
burly figure of Billy, his eyes blinking interrogation. He let Mark
take his own time.
"Something wrong in the house?" said Billy.
"Yes, sir."
Billy seized a quill pen, and began to bite it.
"Isn't this a serious step for you boys to take?" he asked suddenly.
"Yes, sir."
His gravity became portentous. Perhaps he feared an abominable
revelation.
"You both understand," he coughed nervously, "that I may be compelled to
act on what you choose to tell me; and if what you have to say
implicates--er--others, if others may--er--have to--er--suffer, perhaps
severely," he nodded so emphatically that his pince-nez fell off, "it
may be well for you to--er--in fact--to," he blew his nose violently,
"to bid me--Good night."
"Not yet," said Mark firmly.
Billy's hesitation vanished.
"Go on," he said curtly. "Speak plainly, and conceal nothing."
Mark told his story. He made no mention of the pantry window, nor of
the meetings after lock-up. For the rest, he spoke with a conciseness
and practical common sense which filled Jim with admiration. As he was
concluding, Billy began to smile.
"You are both good fellows, and I'm obliged to you. You must dine with
me. I shall pull a string or two, and our--er--marionettes, mark that
word; it is pat; our marionettes shall dance elsewhere."
"Not Archie?" gasped Mark.
"No. We can't spare Archibald. I undertake to handle him. Silly
fellow, very silly fellow! His father and mother put a better head on
your shoulders, my boy"; he tapped Mark's cheek. "And now open old
Thicksides. Eh, what? you know your lesson? Then let's hear it." Jim
got rather red. "I shan't put you on, Corrance, but Samphire minor and
I will construe for your benefit. Fire away, Samphire minor."
The boys went back to their room to find Archie at full length on the
sofa. His greeting justified Billy's sagacity in keeping Mark to
construe Thucydides. "What a time you fellows have been! I suppose
Billy gave you half a dozen readings. Well, let's have 'em, late though
it is. I must get my remove this half."
So no suspicion was excited.
Within the week Bubble and Squeak mysteriously disappeared, and Samphire
major had an interview with his house-master. What passed was not
revealed at the time, but, later, Archie gave Mark some details, which
are set down with the premiss that a minor canon of Westchester
Cathedral is speaking, not a Fifth Form boy at Harrow.
"Do you remember those girls at Brown's?" he said. "Well, I fell in
love with one of them. What? You knew it? Oh! Oh, indeed! The whole
school knew it? Ah, well, Billy knew it too. Sent for me, and behaved
like a gentleman. Made me blubber like a baby. I give you my word I
never felt quite so cheap. It wasn't what he said, but what he left
unsaid. And I promised him that I would have nothing more to do with
Squeak. He told me a thing or two about her which opened my eyes; she
was a baggage, but pretty, very pretty: an alluring little spider. I
felt at the time I would go through fire and water to her----"
"Not to mention a pantry window," said Mark, grinning.
"You don't mean to say that you knew that too? Well, well, it might have
proved an ugly scrape."
For a year after this incident, the sun shone serenely in the Samphire
firmament. The brothers moved up out of Paradise, into the Second
Fifth, Paradise Lost, and thence into the First Fifth, Paradise
Regained, singing paeans of praise and thanksgiving. This was at the
beginning of Mark's third summer half, the half when Archie made a great
score at Lord's, carrying out his bat for eighty-seven runs in the first
innings; the half, also, when Mark received his "cap,"[#] the night
before the match wherein Billy's became cock house at cricket!
[#] The "cap" is the house cricket-cap, given to members of the house
eleven.
*CHAPTER II*
*BILLY'S *_*v.*_* BASHAN'S*
During this summer half Mark and Jim built some castles, in which, as
you will see, they were not called upon to live. If Fate made men dwell
in the mansions of their dreams how many of us would find ourselves
queerly housed? Mark's castles were military fortresses. He had the
pipeclay in his marrow, whereas Jim saw the Queen's red through his
friend's spectacles. The boys studied the lives of famous captains,
from Miltiades to Wellington, and at tea and breakfast would fight the
world's great battles with such well-seasoned troops as chipped plates
and saucers, a battered salt-cellar and pepper-pot, a glass milk-jug,
and a Britannia metal teapot, which would not pour properly. India, and
in particular the Indian frontier, was their battlefield: the scene of a
strife such as the world has not yet witnessed; a struggle between the
Slav and the Anglo-Saxon for the supremacy of the world. Mark boldly
reached for a marshal's _baton_; Jim modestly contented himself with the
full pay of a general, the Victoria Cross, and a snug little crib in a
good hunting country.
Sometimes Archie deigned to listen to them, but he was not encouraging
in his comments.
"You, a soldier!" he would exclaim, looking at Mark's narrow chest and
skinny arms; "why you'd die of fatigue in your first campaign. I advise
you to be a schoolmaster."
"You have f-f-forgotten" (most boys would have said "you don't know"),
"you have forgotten," Mark replied, "that Alexander was a small man; and
Nelson, and Napoleon, and Wellington."
"Pooh, they were hard as nails."
That same evening Mark said: "I'm g-going to the Gym" (gymnasium) "every
day, till I get hard as nails."
"Not in the summer?" Jim exclaimed.
"Yes; I'll have the place to myself--so much the better."
He worked indefatigably, and Jim was asked to feel his biceps about four
times a day.
About the middle of June Jim made a discovery. High up, on one of the
inside panels of his bedstead, he found the name of a gallant fellow who
had fought gloriously in the Indian Mutiny.
"I'd like to sleep in his bed," said Mark.
"What a rum chap you are!" Jim exclaimed.
"If I sleep in his bed I may d-dream of him," Mark replied.
They changed beds with mutual satisfaction; for Jim's had a trick of
collapsing in the middle of the night.
Later on Jim made another discovery: subjective this time. Mark was
overdoing himself: working mind and muscle too hard. Never was spirit
more willing, nor flesh more weak. One day, a sultry day in the middle
of July, he fainted in school. That night Billy detained Jim after
prayers.
"_Entre nous_, I am uneasy about Samphire minor," he said. "And as two
heads are better than one I've sent for you, his friend and--er--mine.
What do you suggest?"
At that moment Jim would have gone to the rack for Billy. As Jim
suggested nothing, Billy continued: "The case presents difficulties, but
difficulties give an edge to life--don't they?"
"Sometimes," said Jim cautiously; for Billy had a trick of leading
fellows on to make fools of themselves.
"Samphire minor goes too fast at his fences."
Billy knew that any allusion to the hunting-field was not wasted on Jim.
"And the fences," continued Billy thoughtfully, "are rather big for
Samphire minor."
"And he won't ride cunning," added Jim.
"Just so. Thank you, my dear fellow; you follow me, I see. Now
Samphire major, big though he is, takes advantage of the--er--gaps."
"Rather," said Jim.
"Humph!" Billy stroked his ample chin. Jim was reflecting that his
tutor was too heavy for a first-flight man, but that in his day he must
have been a thruster.
"In fine, not to put too fine a point on it, _we_ must interfere."
"Yes," said Jim, swelling visibly.
"We must head him off, throw him out, teach him that valuable lesson,
how to _reculer pour mieux sauter_."
If Billy had a weakness (a _faible_, he would have said), it was in the
use of French, which he spoke perfectly.
"Ye-es," said Jim, not so confidently.
"Now, how would you set about it?"
"I, sir? If you please, sir, I don't see my way, but I'll follow your
lead blindly, sir!"
Billy smiled, and polished his pince-nez.
"We shall move slow. The blind leading the blind. Both of you expect
to be in the Sixth next September? Yes. Suppose--I only say
suppose--suppose you were left--where you are?"
"Oh, sir!"
"Come, come, I thought Paradise Regained was the jolliest form in the
school."
"It is," said Jim, "but----"
"You are rather young and small for the Sixth. Why, God bless me! only
the other day you were fags. Now, if I gave you my word that there
would be no real loss of time, that you would fare farther and better by
taking it easy, what would you say?"
"I say--all right, sir."
"Good boy! Wise boy! Leave the rest to me! I shall see that Samphire
major goes up, which is fitting. The height will give him--er--poise,
not _avoirdupois_, of which he has enough already. Samphire minor will
not complain if you keep him company. Good night. _A propos_--will you
and Samphire minor dine with us next Tuesday? A glass of champagne will
do neither of you any harm."
Next term Mark became less angular, and some colour came into his thin
cheeks. Both Jim and he played football hard in the hope of obtaining a
"fez."[#] Harrow, like Eton and Winchester, has a game of football
peculiarly its own, differing from "socker" in that it is lawful to give
what is called "yards." A boy, for instance, dribbling the ball, may
turn and kick it to one of his own side. If this manoeuvre be executed
neatly, the other boy catches it and yells: "Yards!" Then the opposite
side retires three yards from the spot where the ball was caught, and
the catcher is given a free kick, which at a critical point of the game
may prove of value. In Billy's brute force rather than finesse informed
the play, a fact which had not escaped Mark's notice.
[#] Worn by members of the house football eleven.
"We lose lots of goals," said Mark to Jim, "because we try to rush 'em,
instead of giving 'yards' and taking it coolly. Let's you and I
practise 'yards' till we have it p-pat. Our best players f-foozle
awfully."
Accordingly they bought a football and kicked it secretly and
assiduously, Mark insisting that "yards" should not be given by them in
the ordinary house games till they were masters of a wet, slippery ball.
Then one afternoon, when Billy came down to see how his house was
getting on, both boys gave "yards," in the forefront of the battle. As
they panted up the hill after the game, Archibald, in the school
flannels, asked if they were much the worse for wear. In giving "yards"
where the advantage was greatest, they had been knocked down several
times.
"You fellows played up," said the great man. "If you go on like that, I
may give you a chance next Saturday."
"Thanks awfully," said Mark.
Saturday came, and with it the first of the series of house-matches.
When the list went up on the old landing at the head of the rickety
stairs, and when Mark's and Jim's names were seen, a howl of
remonstrance was heard.
"They'll be getting babies to play next," said many whose names were not
on the list.
Archibald sent for Mark and spoke a sharp word: "They accuse me of
favouring, the silly fools, as if my brother wasn't the last fellow in
the house I'd think of favouring."
"I know that, Archie."
"You see," Archibald explained, "this match with Bashan's doesn't count.
We must give 'em a licking, and afterwards it will be just as easy to
let you drop out, as it was to stick you in."
The school, however, were of opinion that this match might prove a
surprise for Billy's. Bashan's was not a first-class team, but there
were big fellows in it who had the reputation of playing a savage game.
Bashan's, it was said, would sell their souls and bodies to lower
Billy's pride, and Billy's would sell theirs as cheerfully rather than
Bashan's should triumph. Billy's included two members of the school
eleven, Archie and the Lubber; Bashan's had one, but he was reckoned the
finest player of his generation.
The game began. Half the school was present, including Billy, who was
known to miss many things in life, but his house-match--never! Behind
the crowd of boys the austere figure of the Doctor sat erect on his
brown horse.
Archie kicked off. The wind carried the ball to Bashan's top side.
There a lean, long-legged, long-winded Bashanite stopped it, kicked it,
and swooped after it like a lurcher after a rabbit! By virtue of his
speed he shot by Billy's top-side men before they had got into their
stride; in another second he had kicked the ball again--and again. It
rose slowly, sailed over the head of the back--who was not quite
back--and just fell between and through the goal-posts.
Bashan's bellowed itself into a frenzy. Billy's smiled coldly and
critically. Archie had a vacuous expression, as of an ox stricken by a
pole-axe. Mark's eyes were shining.
"We are going to have a f-fight," he said.
Within ten minutes Bashan's had kicked a second goal almost as "flukey"
as the first. Stupor spread like a London fog. Billy's was
demoralised. At times bad luck paralyses mind and muscles. On such
occasions the man of finer clay than his fellows seeks and finds
opportunity. Mark, for instance, rose to and above this emergency. He,
the smallest player on the ground, the one, physically speaking, least
well equipped for the task, thrust himself into the breach between
promise and performance. In the brief interval, after the second goal
had been kicked, he went up to Archie and the Lubber, who were standing
apart, inert and speechless.
"I s-say," stammered Mark, "you must change your tactics."
The Lubber raised his heavy head.
"Shut up, Mark!" said Archibald.
"I won't," said Mark. "These Bashanites haven't a chance if _you_
d-d-do the right thing."
Archie scowled; but the Lubber, who had reason to respect Mark's
abilities as a scholar, growled: "Well, what is the right thing?"
"The Bashanites are like a lot of helots, drunk with success. If we go
canny, they'll play themselves out. Then we can trample on 'em. Don't
attack a victorious enemy! Defence is our game. Pull our fellows
together! Tell 'em to keep c-cool and quiet for ten minutes; close in
the top sides; keep the whole eleven in front of our g-goal; forbid
individual effort till you give the word!"
"By Jove! he's right," said the Lubber. Archie kicked off for the
second time; and the Bashanites fell on the ball, kicked it hard, and
charged furiously. Met by a solid phalanx, hurled back, bruised and
broken--they charged again and again, panting and bellowing; but Billy's
held together. Doubtless Billy himself fathomed the plan of campaign,
for when the fry of his house began to complain, when cries of "_Follow
up! Follow up!_" were heard above the yells of the Bashanites, when
shrill voices screamed, "Now's your chance!" or, in disconsolate wail,
"Why don't you run, you idiot!" or, in still more poignant accents,
"Good Lord! what is the matter with the fools?"--then, above these
heart-breaking cries, boomed a big bass voice:
"Steady, Billy's! Well played! Steady! Steady there!"
Within ten minutes of half-time it was plain that the enemy was
exhausted. Wild eyes, heaving chests, pallid faces confronted a team
full of running and brimful of hope. At the next pause Archie moved
along the line. _Orders to charge_. And didn't Billy's charge? Didn't
every boy's heart thrill to that whispered word? Charge? Aye, with a
yell which must have echoed in the Fourth Form Room, nearly a mile away.
Charge? Yes--with the fury of the Light Brigade at Balaclava! And the
Bashanites bowed down before that charge like the worshippers of Baal
beneath the sword of the Prophet! It was Homeric, worthy, so Billy
said, of the finest traditions of the house.
One goal to two--and half-time.
While Billy's sucked the lemons which the fry hurled at them, Jim found
time to observe to Mark: "I say, so far _we_ haven't scored."
"N-n-not yet," said Mark.
Bashan's kicked off after ends had been changed. They had got their
second wind, and also sound advice from their captain, a man of guile,
who has since been seen and heard at Baba Wali, at Abu Klea, and at
Suakin. The Bashanites herded together, bent on retaining the advantage
of their one goal, not daring to risk it in pursuit of another. Once,
twice, thrice, Billy's swept up the field, to be driven back and back
when within a dozen paces of the Bashanite citadel. And then, at the
fourth essay, Jim's chance came. He had the ball between his legs.
"Kick it, kick it!" screamed Billy's. "_Yards_," whispered Mark. Jim
turned mechanically, kicking the ball into Archie's outstretched hands
as the leading Bashanite rolled him head over heels in the mud.
A silence fell on players and onlookers. Archie took his time, eyeing
anxiously the distance between himself and the goal-posts. Jim shut his
eyes, which in point of fact were nearly closed already. A roar of
applause from Billy's, a despairing groan from Bashan's, proclaimed the
accuracy of the kick.
Two goals all, and twenty minutes to play!
The Lubber sauntered up, sucking a lemon, and stolid as usual.
"Well," said he to Mark, "what'll happen now?"
"Why they'll play up like m-mad, of course. They've everything to gain,
and precious little to lose. We ought to go back to our defensive
tactics. Let 'em p-pump 'emselves out, and then smash 'em."
"Good kid," said the old Lubber; "if your body was half as big as your
brain, you'd be a corker."
He was seen talking to Archie; and Archie was nodding his handsome head,
as if in accord. Before the ball was kicked off, word was passed round
to play on the defensive. These tactics may seem elementary to the
modern player, but five-and-twenty years ago football on both sides of
the Atlantic was go-as-you-please--a succession of wild and
unpremeditated rushes, with much brilliant individual work, but lacking
in strategy and organisation.
Within a few minutes of resuming play, the Lubber stupidly interposed
his ankle between a boot and the ball, forgetting that his skull was the
most invulnerable part of his person, with the result that Billy's lost
his services and weight when they were most needed. Archie, too, was
slightly disabled and more than slightly dismayed. Bashan's pressed
their advantage with vigour.
"It's all right," Mark panted.
Archie had the ball and was away, his side streaming after him. Down
the field he sped, faster and faster. The biggest Bashanite met him
shoulder to shoulder in full career. The Bashanite reeled over
backwards; Archie hardly swerved. On and on strode that glorious figure
in the violet-and-black stripes. Only one more Bashanite stood between
him and the goal; but he, crafty as Ulysses, was quick to perceive what
must be done. The ball rolled between him and the all-conquering
Archie. He rushed forward. Archie crashed into him. The Bashanite
fell, but the ball sailed towards a group of battered gladiators, who,
having abandoned pursuit, were awaiting just such a piece of good
fortune as now befell them.
"Get back!" yelled the fry.
Billy's got back in the nick of time, mad with disappointment. The
Bashanites retreated, cursing. In a minute "Time" would be called. At
this moment Mark darted out of a scrimmage dribbling the ball.
A second later he turned his back upon three big fellows who were within
ten feet of him, knowing that they would meet with irresistible force on
the spot where he was standing, and knowing--who better?---his own
feebleness of bone and sinew. He turned and gave "yards."
Jim looked down.
When Jim looked up a pile of figures lay upon the wet, mud-stained
grass, and the ball was in the hands of a sure and safe player. And
then, as a roar of applause ascended from the throats of everybody on
the ground, the word "Time" fell like a thunderbolt.
The match was over. Bashan's had tied Billy's.
But the eyes of the crowd rested on the pile in front of Bashan's goal.
Three figures rose silently; the fourth lay face down in the mire.
Archie touched his brother lightly.
"You're all right, old chap, aren't you?"
Mark did not answer. His arm was turned outward at a curious angle.
"Back," said Archie, as the two elevens surged forward. "Back!"
He faced them, terror-stricken, and Jim Corrance had never admired him
so much nor liked him so well, because his strong voice trembled and his
keen blue eyes were wet.
"Mark," he cried, kneeling down, "don't you hear me? Don't you hear
me?" His voice broke. "My God!" he exclaimed, "he's dead!"
The face upturned to the chill November skies was of death's colour; the
eyes stared glassily; the livid lips were parted in a grim smile
heart-breaking to see. The two elevens formed a ring around the
brothers and Billy, who had his fingers on Mark's pulse. Beyond this
inner circle was the outer circle of spectators. One boy began to
sneeze, and the silence had become so impressive that his sneeze seemed
a personal affront, an unseemly violation. Archibald was crying as men
cry--silently, with convulsive movements of the limbs.
Just then the school surgeon hurried up. Fortunately he was on the
ground, but had retired with the Lubber to a distant bench, busy in
bandaging that giant's ankle. Kneeling down, he laid his ear to the
small blue-and-white striped chest.
"I can't feel any pulse," Billy growled.
The doctor's head was as that of a graven image.
"Why don't you do something?" Archibald demanded, giving expression to
the unspoken entreaty of three hundred boys.
The surgeon paid no attention; he was listening for that murmur of life
which would justify his doing anything.
"He is coming to," he muttered.
"He is coming to" passed from lip to lip. The school sighed with
relief. The clouds above let fall a few drops of rain.
"A hurdle," commanded the surgeon, "and some coats!"
Billy was the first to pull off his overcoat. The surgeon touched
Mark's body in a dozen places. Mark gasped and gurgled; then he tried to
sit up--and succeeded.
"Back's all right," said the surgeon. "Keep quiet, my boy! You're a
little the worse for wear. There, there, shut your eyes and believe that
we shall hurt you as little as possible. Your arm is broken."
The news spread while the hurdle was being brought. Mark closed his
eyes and lay back. The captain of Bashan's stepped forward.
"May _I_ help to carry the hurdle?" he said.
The biggest swells were proud to carry that hurdle! The school formed
itself into two long lines; and when Mark passed through--pale, but
smiling--some chord was struck, which thrilled into sound.
"_Three cheers for Samphire minor!_"
The brave shout rolled over the playing-fields and up Harrow Hill, past
the Music Schools which recorded it; past the Chapel, where its subtle
vibrations were enshrined; past the Yard, which gave back the glad
acclaim of valour; past the Vaughan Library, startling, perhaps, some
bookworm too intent upon what has been to care greatly for what is and
may be; down the familiar street, where countless generations of ardent
boys had hastened to work or play; on and on till it reached
Billy's--Billy's with its hoary traditions of innumerable battles fought
and won, Billy's shabby and battered, scarred within and without,
Billy's--dear old Billy's--where it became merged but not lost, in the
whole of which every valiant word or deed or thought is an imperishable
part!
*CHAPTER III*
*WHICH CONTAINS A FORTUNE*
At lock-up Billy announced that Mark's injuries, albeit severe, were not
such as to cause his friends serious anxiety. And so, when Archie came
to Jim's room with a face as long as the catalogue of ships in the
_Iliad_, and when the two boys present got up and left hurriedly at his
impatient nod of dismissal, you may believe that Jim's heart began to
thump and his eyes to pop out of his head with interrogation.
"I dropped in to tell you, you could get your 'fez,'" said Archie.
"Oh, thanks awfully. And--and Mark?"
"I bought one for him and sent it in. He got it after his arm was set."