what I was saying just now. I suddenly remembered that I didn't
particularly want anybody but you to hear what I was going to say, so
I had to invent any rot that I could think of."
"But now," said Jimmy Silver, sinking his voice to a melodramatic
whisper, "the villagers have left us to continue their revels on the
green, our wicked uncle has gone to London, his sinister retainer,
Jasper Murgleshaw, is washing his hands in the scullery sink,
and--_we are alone!_"
"Don't be an ass," pleaded Kennedy.
"Tell me your dreadful tale. Conceal nothing. Spare me not. In fact,
say on."
"I've had a talk with the chap who was sentry that night," began
Kennedy.
"Astounding revelations by our special correspondent," murmured
Silver.
"You might listen."
"I _am_ listening. Why don't you begin? All this hesitation
strikes me as suspicious. Get on with your shady story."
"You remember the sentry was upset--"
"Very upset."
"Somebody collared him from behind, and upset him into the ditch. They
went in together, and the other man sat on his head."
"A touching picture. Proceed, friend."
"They rolled about a bit, and this sentry chap swears he scratched the
man. It was just after that that the man sat on his head. Jones says
he was a big chap, strong and heavy."
"He was in a position to judge, anyhow."
"Of course, he didn't mean to scratch him. He was rather keen on
having that understood. But his fingers came up against the fellow's
cheek as he was falling. So you see we've only got to look for a man
with a scratch on his cheek. It was the right cheek, Jones was almost
certain. I don't see what you're laughing at."
"I wish you wouldn't spring these good things of yours on me
suddenly," gurgled Jimmy Silver, rolling about the wooden floor of the
tent. "You ought to give a chap some warning. Look here," he added,
imperatively, "swear you'll take me with you when you go on your tour
through camp examining everybody's right cheek to see if it's got a
scratch on it."
Kennedy began to feel the glow and pride of the successful
sleuth-hound leaking out of him. This aspect of the case had not
occurred to him. The fact that the sentry had scratched his
assailant's right cheek, added to the other indubitable fact that
Walton, of Kay's, was even now walking abroad with a scratch on his
right cheek, had seemed to him conclusive. He had forgotten that there
might be others. Still, it was worth while just to question him. He
questioned him at Cove Reservoir next day.
"Hullo, Walton," he said, with a friendly carelessness which would not
have deceived a prattling infant, "nasty scratch you've got on your
cheek. How did you get it?"
"Perry did it when we were ragging a few days ago," replied Walton,
eyeing him distrustfully.
"Oh," said Kennedy.
"Silly fool," said Walton.
"Talking about me?" inquired Kennedy politely.
"No," replied Walton, with the suavity of a Chesterfield, "Perry."
They parted, Kennedy with the idea that Walton was his man still more
deeply rooted, Walton with an uncomfortable feeling that Kennedy knew
too much, and that, though he had undoubtedly scored off him for the
moment, a time (as Jimmy Silver was fond of observing with a satanic
laugh) would come, and then--!
He felt that it behoved him to be wary.
VIII
A NIGHT ADVENTURE--THE DETHRONEMENT OF FENN
One of the things which make life on this planet more or less
agreeable is the speed with which alarums, excursions, excitement, and
rows generally, blow over. A nine-days' wonder has to be a big
business to last out its full time nowadays. As a rule the third day
sees the end of it, and the public rushes whooping after some other
hare that has been started for its benefit. The guard-tent row, as far
as the bulk of camp was concerned, lasted exactly two days; at the end
of which period it was generally agreed that all that could be said on
the subject had been said, and that it was now a back number. Nobody,
except possibly the authorities, wanted to find out the authors of the
raid, and even Private Jones had ceased to talk about it--this owing
to the unsympathetic attitude of his tent.
"Jones," the corporal had observed, as the ex-sentry's narrative of
his misfortunes reached a finish for the third time since
_reveille_ that morning, "if you can't manage to switch off that
infernal chestnut of yours, I'll make you wash up all day and sit on
your head all night."
So Jones had withdrawn his yarn from circulation. Kennedy's interest in
detective work waned after his interview with Walton. He was quite sure
that Walton had been one of the band, but it was not his business to
find out; even had he found out, he would have done nothing. It was
more for his own private satisfaction than for the furtherance of
justice that he wished to track the offenders down. But he did not
look on the affair, as Jimmy Silver did, as rather sporting; he had
a tender feeling for the good name of the school, and he felt that
it was not likely to make Eckleton popular with the other schools
that went to camp if they got the reputation of practical jokers.
Practical jokers are seldom popular until they have been dead a
hundred years or so.
As for Walton and his colleagues, to complete the list of those who
were interested in this matter of the midnight raid, they lay
remarkably low after their successful foray. They imagined that
Kennedy was spying on their every movement. In which they were quite
wrong, for Kennedy was doing nothing of the kind. Camp does not allow
a great deal of leisure for the minding of other people's businesses.
But this reflection did not occur to Walton, and he regarded Kennedy,
whenever chance or his duties brought him into the neighbourhood of
that worthy's tent, with a suspicion which increased whenever the
latter looked at him.
On the night before camp broke up, a second incident of a sensational
kind occurred, which, but for the fact that they never heard of it,
would have given the schools a good deal to talk about. It happened
that Kennedy was on sentry-go that night. The manner of sentry-go is
thus. At seven in the evening the guard falls in, and patrols the
fringe of the camp in relays till seven in the morning. A guard
consists of a sergeant, a corporal, and ten men. They are on duty for
two hours at a time, with intervals of four hours between each spell,
in which intervals they sleep the sleep of tired men in the
guard-tent, unless, as happened on the occasion previously described,
some miscreant takes it upon himself to loose the ropes. The ground to
be patrolled by the sentries is divided into three parts, each of
which is entrusted to one man.
Kennedy was one of the ten privates, and his first spell of sentry-go
began at eleven o'clock.
On this night there was no moon. It was as black as pitch. It is
always unpleasant to be on sentry-go on such a night. The mind
wanders, in spite of all effort to check it, through a long series of
all the ghastly stories one has ever read. There is one in particular
of Conan Doyle's about a mummy that came to life and chased people on
lonely roads--but enough! However courageous one may be, it is
difficult not to speculate on the possible horrors which may spring
out on one from the darkness. That feeling that there is somebody--or
something--just behind one can only be experienced in all its force by
a sentry on an inky night at camp. And the thought that, of all the
hundreds there, he and two others are the only ones awake, puts a sort
of finishing touch to the unpleasantness of the situation.
Kennedy was not a particularly imaginative youth, but he looked
forward with no little eagerness to the time when he should be
relieved. It would be a relief in two senses of the word. His beat
included that side of the camp which faces the road to Aldershot.
Between camp and this road is a ditch and a wood. After he had been on
duty for an hour this wood began to suggest a variety of
possibilities, all grim. The ditch, too, was not without associations.
It was into this that Private Jones had been hurled on a certain
memorable occasion. Such a thing was not likely to happen again in the
same week, and, even if it did, Kennedy flattered himself that he
would have more to say in the matter than Private Jones had had; but
nevertheless he kept a careful eye in that direction whenever his beat
took him along the ditch.
It was about half-past twelve, and he had entered upon the last
section of his two hours, when Kennedy distinctly heard footsteps in
the wood. He had heard so many mysterious sounds since his patrol
began at eleven o'clock that at first he was inclined to attribute
this to imagination. But a crackle of dead branches and the sound of
soft breathing convinced him that this was the real thing for once,
and that, as a sentry of the Public Schools' Camp on duty, it behoved
him to challenge the unknown.
He stopped and waited, peering into the darkness in a futile endeavour
to catch a glimpse of his man. But the night was too black for the
keenest eye to penetrate it. A slight thud put him on the right track.
It showed him two things; first, that the unknown had dropped into the
ditch, and, secondly, that he was a camp man returning to his tent
after an illegal prowl about the town at lights-out. Nobody save one
belonging to the camp would have cause to cross the ditch.
Besides, the man walked warily, as one not ignorant of the danger of
sentries. The unknown had crawled out of the ditch now. As luck would
have it he had chosen a spot immediately opposite to where Kennedy
stood. Now that he was nearer Kennedy could see the vague outline of
him.
"Who goes there?" he said.
From an instinctive regard for the other's feelings he did not shout
the question in the regulation manner. He knew how he would feel
himself if he were out of camp at half-past twelve, and the voice of
the sentry were to rip suddenly through the silence _fortissimo_.
As it was, his question was quite loud enough to electrify the person
to whom it was addressed. The unknown started so violently that he
nearly leapt into the air. Kennedy was barely two yards from him when
he spoke.
The next moment this fact was brought home to him in a very practical
manner. The unknown, sighting the sentry, perhaps more clearly against
the dim whiteness of the tents than Kennedy could sight him against
the dark wood, dashed in with a rapidity which showed that he knew
something of the art of boxing. Kennedy dropped his rifle and flung up
his arm. He was altogether too late. A sudden blaze of light, and he
was on the ground, sick and dizzy, a feeling he had often experienced
before in a slighter degree, when sparring in the Eckleton gymnasium
with the boxing instructor.
The immediate effect of a flush hit in the regions about the jaw is to
make the victim lose for the moment all interest in life. Kennedy lay
where he had fallen for nearly half a minute before he fully realised
what it was that had happened to him. When he did realise the
situation, he leapt to his feet, feeling sick and shaky, and staggered
about in all directions in a manner which suggested that he fancied
his assailant would be waiting politely until he had recovered. As was
only natural, that wily person had vanished, and was by this time
doing a quick change into garments of the night. Kennedy had the
satisfaction of knowing--for what it was worth--that his adversary was
in one of those tents, but to place him with any greater accuracy was
impossible.
So he gave up the search, found his rifle, and resumed his patrol. And
at one o'clock his successor relieved him.
On the following day camp broke up.
* * * * *
Kennedy always enjoyed going home, but, as he travelled back to
Eckleton on the last day of these summer holidays, he could not help
feeling that there was a great deal to be said for term. He felt
particularly cheerful. He had the carriage to himself, and he had also
plenty to read and eat. The train was travelling at forty miles an
hour. And there were all the pleasures of a first night after the
holidays to look forward to, when you dashed from one friend's study
to another's, comparing notes, and explaining--five or six of you at a
time--what a good time you had had in the holidays. This was always a
pleasant ceremony at Blackburn's, where all the prefects were intimate
friends, and all good sorts, without that liberal admixture of weeds,
worms, and outsiders which marred the list of prefects in most of the
other houses. Such as Kay's! Kennedy could not restrain a momentary
gloating as he contrasted the state of affairs in Blackburn's with
what existed at Kay's. Then this feeling was merged in one of pity for
Fenn's hard case. How he must hate the beginning of term, thought
Kennedy.
All the well-known stations were flashing by now. In a few minutes he
would be at the junction, and in another half-hour back at
Blackburn's. He began to collect his baggage from the rack.
Nobody he knew was at the junction. This was the late train that he
had come down by. Most of the school had returned earlier in the
afternoon.
He reached Blackburn's at eight o'clock, and went up to his study to
unpack. This was always his first act on coming back to school. He
liked to start the term with all his books in their shelves, and all
his pictures and photographs in their proper places on the first day.
Some of the studies looked like lumber-rooms till near the end of the
first week.
He had filled the shelves, and was arranging the artistic decorations,
when Jimmy Silver came in. Kennedy had been surprised that he had not
met him downstairs, but the matron had answered his inquiry with the
statement that he was talking to Mr Blackburn in the other part of the
house.
"When did you arrive?" asked Silver, after the conclusion of the first
outbreak of holiday talk.
"I've only just come."
"Seen Blackburn yet?"
"No. I was thinking of going up after I had got this place done
properly."
Jimmy Silver ran his eye over the room.
"I haven't started mine yet," he said. "You're such an energetic man.
Now, are all those books in their proper places?"
"Yes," said Kennedy.
"Sure?"
"Yes."
"How about the pictures? Got them up?"
"All but this lot here. Shan't be a second. There you are. How's that
for effect?"
"Not bad. Got all your photographs in their places?"
"Yes."
"Then," said Jimmy Silver, calmly, "you'd better start now to pack
them all up again. And why, my son? Because you are no longer a
Blackburnite. That's what."
Kennedy stared.
"I've just had the whole yarn from Blackburn," continued Jimmy Silver.
"Our dear old pal, Mr Kay, wanting somebody in his house capable of
keeping order, by way of a change, has gone to the Old Man and
borrowed you. So _you're_ head of Kay's now. There's an honour
for you."
IX
THE SENSATIONS OF AN EXILE
"What" shouted Kennedy.
He sprang to his feet as if he had had an electric shock.
Jimmy Silver, having satisfied his passion for the dramatic by the
abruptness with which he had exploded his mine, now felt himself at
liberty to be sympathetic.
"It's quite true," he said. "And that's just how I felt when Blackburn
told me. Blackburn's as sick as anything. Naturally he doesn't see the
point of handing you over to Kay. But the Old Man insisted, so he
caved in. He wanted to see you as soon as you arrived. You'd better go
now. I'll finish your packing."
This was noble of Jimmy, for of all the duties of life he loathed
packing most.
"Thanks awfully," said Kennedy, "but don't you bother. I'll do it when
I get back. But what's it all about? What made Kay want a man? Why
won't Fenn do? And why me?"
"Well, it's easy to see why they chose you. They reflected that you'd
had the advantage of being in Blackburn's with me, and seeing how a
house really should be run. Kay wants a head for his house. Off he
goes to the Old Man. 'Look here,' he says, 'I want somebody shunted
into my happy home, or it'll bust up. And it's no good trying to put
me off with an inferior article, because I won't have it. It must be
somebody who's been trained from youth up by Silver.' 'Then,' says the
Old Man, reflectively, 'you can't do better than take Kennedy. I
happen to know that Silver has spent years in showing him the straight
and narrow path. You take Kennedy.' 'All right,' says Kay; 'I always
thought Kennedy a bit of an ass myself, but if he's studied under
Silver he ought to know how to manage a house. I'll take him. Advise
our Mr Blackburn to that effect, and ask him to deliver the goods at
his earliest convenience. Adoo, mess-mate, adoo!' And there you
are--that's how it was."
"But what's wrong with Fenn?"
"My dear chap! Remember last term. Didn't Fenn have a regular scrap
with Kay, and get shoved into extra for it? And didn't he wreck the
concert in the most sportsmanlike way with that encore of his? Think
the Old Man is going to take that grinning? Not much! Fenn made a
ripping fifty against Kent in the holidays--I saw him do it--but they
don't count that. It's a wonder they didn't ask him to leave. Of
course, I think it's jolly rough on Fenn, but I don't see that you can
blame them. Not the Old Man, at any rate. He couldn't do anything
else. It's all Kay's fault that all this has happened, of course. I'm
awfully sorry for you having to go into that beastly hole, but from
Kay's point of view it's a jolly sound move. You may reform the
place."
"I doubt it."
"So do I--very much. I didn't say you would--I said you might. I
wonder if Kay means to give you a free hand. It all depends on that."
"Yes. If he's going to interfere with me as he used to with Fenn,
he'll want to bring in another head to improve on me."
"Rather a good idea, that," said Jimmy Silver, laughing, as he always
did when any humorous possibilities suggested themselves to him. "If
he brings in somebody to improve on you, and then somebody else to
improve on him, and then another chap to improve on him, he ought to
have a decent house in half-a-dozen years or so."
"The worst of it is," said Kennedy, "that I've got to go to Kay's as a
sort of rival to Fenn. I shouldn't mind so much if it wasn't for that.
I wonder how he'll take it! Do you think he knows about it yet? He
didn't enjoy being head, but that's no reason why he shouldn't cut up
rough at being shoved back to second prefect. It's a beastly
situation."
"Beastly," agreed Jimmy Silver. "Look here," he added, after a pause,
"there's no reason, you know, why this should make any difference. To
us, I mean. What I mean to say is, I don't see why we shouldn't see
each other just as often, and so on, simply because you are in another
house, and all that sort of thing. You know what I mean."
He spoke shamefacedly, as was his habit whenever he was serious. He
liked Kennedy better than anyone he knew, and hated to show his
feelings. Anything remotely connected with sentiment made him
uncomfortable.
"Of course," said Kennedy, awkwardly.
"You'll want a refuge," said Silver, in his normal manner, "now that
you're going to see wild life in Kay's. Don't forget that I'm always
at home in my study in the afternoons--admission on presentation of a
visiting-card."
"All right," said Kennedy, "I'll remember. I suppose I'd better go and
see Blackburn now."
Mr Blackburn was in his study. He was obviously disgusted and
irritated by what had happened. Loyalty to the headmaster, and an
appreciation of his position as a member of the staff led him to try
and conceal his feelings as much as possible in his interview with
Kennedy, but the latter understood as plainly as if his house-master
had burst into a flow of abuse and complaint. There had always been an
excellent understanding--indeed, a friendship--between Kennedy and Mr
Blackburn, and the master was just as sorry to lose his second prefect
as the latter was to go.
"Well, Kennedy," he said, pleasantly. "I hope you had a good time in
the holidays. I suppose Silver has told you the melancholy news--that
you are to desert us this term? It is a great pity. We shall all be
very sorry to lose you. I don't look forward to seeing you bowl us all
out in the house-matches next summer," he added, with a smile, "though
we shall expect a few full-pitches to leg, for the sake of old times."
He meant well, but the picture he conjured up almost made Kennedy
break down. Nothing up to the present had made him realise the
completeness of his exile so keenly as this remark of Mr Blackburn's
about his bowling against the side for which he had taken so many
wickets in the past. It was a painful thought.
"I am afraid you won't have quite such a pleasant time in Mr Kay's as
you have had here," resumed the house-master. "Of course, I know that,
strictly speaking, I ought not to talk like this about another
master's house; but you can scarcely be unaware of the reasons that
have led to this change. You must know that you are being sent to pull
Mr Kay's house together. This is strictly between ourselves, of
course. I think you have a difficult task before you, but I don't
fancy that you will find it too much for you. And mind you come here
as often as you please. I am sure Silver and the others will be glad
to see you. Goodbye, Kennedy. I think you ought to be getting across
now to Mr Kay's. I told him that you would be there before half-past
nine. Good night."
"Good night, sir," said Kennedy.
He wandered out into the house dining-room. Somehow, though Kay's was
only next door, he could not get rid of the feeling that he was about
to start on a long journey, and would never see his old house again.
And in a sense this was so. He would probably visit Blackburn's
tomorrow afternoon, but it would not be the same. Jimmy Silver would
greet him like a brother, and he would brew in the same study in which
he had always brewed, and sit in the same chair; but it would not be
the same. He would be an outsider, a visitor, a stranger within the
gates, and--worst of all--a Kayite. Nothing could alter that.
The walk of the dining-room were covered with photographs of the house
cricket and football teams for the last fifteen years. Looking at
them, he felt more than ever how entirely his school life had been
bound up in his house. From his first day at Eckleton he had been
taught the simple creed of the Blackburnite, that Eckleton was the
finest school in the three kingdoms, and that Blackburn's was the
finest house in the finest school.
Under the gas-bracket by the door hung the first photograph in which
he appeared, the cricket team of four years ago. He had just got the
last place in front of Challis on the strength of a tremendous catch
for the house second in a scratch game two days before the
house-matches began. It had been a glaring fluke, but it had impressed
Denny, the head of the house, who happened to see it, and had won him
his place.
He walked round the room, looking at each photograph in turn. It
seemed incredible that he had no longer any right to an interest in
the success of Blackburn's. He could have endured leaving all this
when his time at school was up, for that would have been the natural
result of the passing of years. But to be transplanted abruptly and
with a wrench from his native soil was too much. He went upstairs to
pack, suffering from as severe an attack of the blues as any youth of
eighteen had experienced since blues were first invented.
Jimmy Silver hovered round, while he packed, with expressions of
sympathy and bitter remarks concerning Mr Kay and his wicked works,
and, when the operation was concluded, helped Kennedy carry his box
over to his new house with the air of one seeing a friend off to the
parts beyond the equator.
It was ten o'clock by the time the front door of Kay's closed upon its
new head. Kennedy went to the matron's sanctum to be instructed in the
geography of the house. The matron, a severe lady, whose faith in
human nature had been terribly shaken by five years of office in
Kay's, showed him his dormitory and study with a lack of geniality
which added a deeper tinge of azure to Kennedy's blues. "So you've
come to live here, have you?" her manner seemed to say; "well, I pity
you, that's all. A nice time _you're_ going to have."
Kennedy spent the half-hour before going to bed in unpacking his box
for the second time, and arranging his books and photographs in the
study which had been Wayburn's. He had nothing to find fault with in
the study. It was as large as the one he had owned at Blackburn's,
and, like it, looked out over the school grounds.