MR. POCKLINGTON'S
SO Pip and Pipette went to school, and life in its entirety lay at their
feet.
Hitherto the social circle in which they moved had been limited on the
male side to Father, Mr. Evans, and Mr. Pipes, together with the
milkman, the lamplighter, and a few more nodding acquaintances; and on
the female to Tattie Fowler, Cook, and a long line of housemaids. The
children could neither read nor write; the fact that they possessed
immortal souls was practically unrevealed to them; and their religious
exercises were limited to a single stereotyped prayer, imparted by Cook,
and perfunctorily delivered night and morning by the children, at the
bidding of the housemaid in charge, to a mysterious Power whose sole
function, so far as they could gather, was to keep an eye upon them
during their attendant's frequent nights-out, and to report
delinquencies (by some occult means) on her return.
Of the ordinary usages of polite society they knew little or nothing. To
Pip and Pipette etiquette and deportment were summed up in the
following nursery laws, as amended by the Kitchen:--
I. Girls, owing to some mysterious infirmity which is never
apparent, and for which they are not responsible, must be
helped first to everything.
II. A boy must on no account punch a girl, even though she is
older and bigger than himself. (For reason, see I.)
III. A girl must not scratch a boy. Not that the boy matters,
but it is unladylike.
IV. Real men do not play with dolls. (However, you may pretend
to be a doctor, and administer medicine, without loss of
dignity.)
V. Real ladies do not climb the trees in the garden in the
Square. (But you can get over this difficulty by pretending to
be a boy or a monkey for half an hour.)
VI. Girls never have dirty hands--only boys. (For solution of
this difficulty see note on V.)
VII. You must _never_ tell tales. Girls must be specially
careful about this, not because they are more prone to do so,
but because boys think they are.
VIII. Real men never kiss girls, but they may sometimes permit
girls to kiss them.
IX. You must eat up your bread-and-butter before you have any
cake. (This rule holds good, they found out later, all through
life.)
X. Do not blow upon your tea to cool it: this is very vulgar.
Pour it into your saucer instead.
Clearly it was high time they went to school, and Father, who had had
vague thoughts for some time about "procuring a tutor" for Pip, finally
made up his mind, and despatched both children one morning in the
brougham to Mr. Pocklington's.
The school was a comfortable-looking building, standing inside high
walls in a secluded corner of Regent's Park. On the gate shone a large
brass plate bearing the inscription--
WENTWORTH HOUSE SCHOOL
AND
KINDERGARTEN.
MR. POCKLINGTON.
THE MISSES POCKLINGTON.
The children could not read this, but Mr. Evans, who accompanied them in
the brougham on the first morning, kindly consented to do so, his
efforts to pronounce the word "Kindergarten" (an enterprise upon which
he embarked before realising that he might with perfect safety have left
it out altogether) pleasantly beguiling the time until the gate was
opened by a boy in buttons.
Pip and Pipette found themselves in a cheerful-looking hall, larger and
brighter than that at home, and stood staring with solemn eyes at the
unwonted objects around them. From a room on their right came a subdued
hum, and upstairs they could hear juvenile voices singing in chorus.
They were put to wait in a small room.
Presently the door opened, and an old gentleman with white whiskers and
a black velveteen jacket trotted in. Mr. Evans bowed respectfully.
"The doctor's compliments, sir, and I was to inquire what time the young
lady and gentleman was to be sent for?" he said.
"Our morning hours," replied Mr. Pocklington with a precise air, "are
from nine-thirty till twelve-thirty. At twelve-thirty we take exercise
in the playground. Should the weather be inclement we adjourn to the
Gymnasium. Luncheon is served at one-thirty, and we resume our studies
at two-thirty. We desist from our labours at four."
Mr. Evans having made a dignified exit, the children, for the first time
in their lives, found themselves alone in the world, and suddenly
realised that the world was very big and they were very small. Pipette
was at once handed over to a lady called Miss Arabella, while Pip was
escorted by Mr. Pocklington to the changing-room, where he was given a
peg for his coat, a peg for his cap, a locker for his boots, and a
wash-hand basin for his ablutions (everything carefully labelled and
numbered), and was otherwise universally equipped for the battle of
life. Then he was taken into Mr. Pocklington's private sitting-room,
whence, after a brief but all too adequate inquiry into his attainments,
he was unhesitatingly relegated to the lowest class in the school, where
he found Pipette already installed at the bottom of the bottom bench.
Here we will leave them for a time, dumbly gazing at the opening page of
a new reading-book, whereon appears the presentment of what they have
hitherto regarded as a donkey, but which three large printed letters at
the foot of the page inform them must henceforth be called an A-S-S.
Mr. Pocklington had been intended by nature for an old maid. He was an
elderly faddist of a rather tiresome type, with theories upon every
possible subject, from cellular underclothing to the higher education of
women. He was a widower, and was assisted in the management of the
school by his three daughters--Miss Mary, Miss Arabella, and Miss
Amelia.
The daily routine of Wentworth House School was marked by an Old-World
precision and formality which adults might have found a trifle irksome;
but it did the children no particular harm beyond making them slightly
priggish in their manners, and no particular good beyond instilling into
them a few habits of order and method.
The day began at twenty minutes past nine with "whistle-in." The
"monitor" for the week--a patriarch of ten or eleven--appeared at the
side door, which gave on to the playground, and blew a resonant blast on
a silver whistle. Followed a scramble in the dressing-rooms, while boys
and girls changed their boots for slippers. At three minutes to the
half-hour the monitor, having hung the whistle on its proper peg and
armed him-(or her-) self with a dinner-bell, clanged out a summons to
"line up." Thereupon the pupils of Wentworth House School formed a
double _queue_ along the passage, the eldest boy with the eldest girl,
and so on,--Mr. Pocklington believed in mingling the sexes thoroughly:
it taught girls not to whisper and giggle, and gave boys ease of manner
in the presence of females,--and at the stroke of nine-thirty, to the
accompaniment of an ear-splitting fantasia on the bell, the animals
marched arm-in-arm into the ark (as represented by the large
schoolroom), where Noah (Mr. Pocklington), supported by Shem, Ham, and
Japheth (Amazonian Miss Mary, shy and retiring Miss Arabella, and
pretty and frivolous Miss Amelia) stood ready to take roll-call.
Roll-call at Wentworth House was an all-embracing function. Besides
answering their names, pupils were required to state whether they
required "lunch" at the interval, and to announce the name of any
library books that they might be borrowing or returning. Parental
petitions and ultimatums were also delivered at this time. As might have
been expected in such an establishment, all communications had to be
couched in elegant and suitable phraseology of Mr. Pocklington's own
composition. Consequently roll-call was a somewhat protracted function.
As a rule the performance consisted of a series of conversations of the
following type:--
_Mr. Pocklington._ Reginald!
_A high squeaky Voice._ Present, sir. I wish to take a glass of
milk during the interval, and I am returning "The Young
Carthaginian," thanking you for the loan-of-the-same.
Or--
_Mr. Pocklington._ Beatrice!
_A rather breathless little Voice._ Present, sir. I wish to take
a glass of milk _and_ a bun [_very emphatic this_] durin' the
interval, and I propose, with your permission, to borrow this
copy of "Carrots Just a Little Boy"; and, please, I've got a
note from mum--I mean I am the bearer of a letter from my
mother asking for you to be so kind as to--to excuse my not
havin' done all my home work, 'cos I forgot--
_Mr. Pocklington._ Beatrice!
_The R. B. L. V._ I mean 'cos I _neglected_ [there was no such
word as "forget" in Mr. Pocklington's curriculum] to take the
book home. And, please, mum--my mother would have written to you
by post last night, only she forg--neglected to do it till it
was too late.
And Beatrice, having unburdened herself of a task which has been
clouding her small horizon ever since breakfast, sits down with a sigh
of intense relief.
On the first morning after their arrival, Mr. Pocklington, having called
out the last name and registered the last glass of milk, drew the
attention of the school to Pip and Pipette.
"You have to welcome two fresh companions this morning," he said. "I
will enter their names on the register, and will then read them aloud to
you, in order that you may know how to address your new friends."
Turning to Pip, Mr. Pocklington asked his name.
"Pip."
"No, no," said Mr. Pocklington testily. "Your first baptismal name,
boy!"
Pip, to whom the existence of baptismal names was now revealed for the
first time, merely turned extremely red and shook his head.
"We do not countenance childish nicknames here," said Mr. Pocklington
grandly. "What is your Christian name, boy?"
Pip, to whom Christian and baptismal names were an equal mystery,
continued to sit mute, glaring the while in a most disconcerting fashion
at poor Miss Arabella, who happened to sit opposite to him.
Mr. Pocklington turned impatiently to Pipette.
"What is your brother's name?"
"Please, it's just Pip," replied Pipette plaintively, groping for Pip's
hand under the desk. "He hasn't got any other name, I don't fink."
"Perhaps it is Philip," suggested pretty Miss Amelia. "I believe"--with
a little blush--"that 'Pip' is occasionally used as an abbreviation for
that name. Is your name Philip, little boy?" she asked, leaning forward
to Pip, with a glance which he would have valued considerably more if he
had been ten years older.
"I don't know," said Pip.
"I think it must be Philip," said Miss Amelia, turning to her father.
So Pip was inscribed on the roll as Philip, which, as it happened, _was_
his real name. (By the way, his surname was Wilmot.)
"Now, _your_ first baptismal name, little girl?" said Mr. Pocklington
briskly, turning to Pipette.
"Please, it's Pipette," she replied apprehensively.
Her fears were not ungrounded. The school began to titter.
"Pipette? My dear, that is a quite impossible name. A pipette is a small
glass instrument employed in practical chemistry. Surely you have some
proper baptismal name! Perhaps you can suggest a solution again," he
added, turning to Miss Amelia.
No, Miss Amelia could offer no suggestion. Her forte, it appeared, was
gentlemen's names. As a matter of fact, Pipette's name, as ascertained
by reference to Father by post that night, was Dorothea, and she had
been laughingly christened "Pipette" by her mother, because her father,
when summoned from the laboratory to view his newly born daughter, had
arrived holding a pipette in his hand.
So Pip and Pipette, much to their surprise and indignation, found
themselves addressed as Philip and Dorothea respectively, and as such
joined in the pursuit of knowledge in company with a motley crew of
Arthurs, Reginalds, Ermyntrudes, Winifreds, and the like. Surnames were
not employed in the school. If two children possessed the same Christian
name they were distinguished by the addition of any other sub-title they
happened to possess. Three unfortunate youths, for instance, were
addressed respectively as John Augustus, John William, and John Evelyn.
Things at Wentworth House School move in a stereotyped circle, and Pip
and Pipette soon became familiar with the curriculum. There were three
classes, they found. The First Class, the veterans, nearly old enough to
go to a preparatory school, dwelt in a stuffy apartment called "The
Study." Their learning was profound, for they were taught a mysterious
language called Latin, and another, even more mysterious, called
"Alzeber" (or something like that). The Second Class, conducted by Miss
Mary--formidable, but a good sort--in a corner of the schoolroom, did
not fly so high. They studied history and geography, and were addicted
to a fearsome form of parlour-game called "Mentalarithmetic," which
involved much shrieking of answers to highly impossible questions about
equally dividing seventeen apples among five boys.
Pip and Pipette occupied a humble position in the Third Class, where
they soon developed a fervent admiration for pretty Miss Amelia, who was
always smiling, always daintily dressed, and charmingly inaccurate and
casual.
On Thursday afternoons the whole school assembled in the Music Room.
Here faded Miss Arabella thumped mechanically on the piano, while the
pupils of Wentworth House School chanted an inexplicable and
interminable ditty entitled "Doh-ray-me-fah." The words of this canticle
were printed on a canvas sheet upon the wall, and the method of
inculcation was somewhat peculiar. Mr. Pocklington, taking his stand
beside the sheet, would lay the tip of his little white wand upon the
word "Doh" printed at the bottom. Miss Arabella would strike a note upon
the piano, and the school would reproduce the same with no uncertain
sound, sustaining it by one prolonged howl until the white wand slid up
to "Ray," an example which the vocalists would attempt to follow to the
best of their ability, and with varying degrees of success. Having
rallied and concentrated his forces on "Ray," Mr. Pocklington would
advance to "Me," and then to "Fah," the effects achieved by the elder
male choristers, whose voices were reaching the cracking stage, as the
scale approached the topmost "Doh," being as surprising as they were
various.
The hour always concluded with a sort of musical steeplechase. The white
wand would skip incontinently from Doh to Fah, and from Me to Soh, the
singers following after--faint yet pursuing. At the end of three
minutes, the field having tailed out, so to speak, every note in the
gamut was being sung, _fortissimo_, by at least one member of the
choir, and the total effect was more suggestive of a home for lost dogs
than an academy for the sons and daughters of gentlemen.
Our friends enjoyed this diversion hugely. Pipette, who could carol like
a lark, hopped from note to note with an agility only equalled by that
of the white wand itself. Pip, who had no music in his soul, adopted a
different method of procedure. Selecting a note well within his compass,
he would stick to it with characteristic thoroughness and a gradually
blackening countenance, until a final flourish from the white wand
intimated to all and sundry that this nuisance must now cease.
Pip and Pipette were also submitted to a rather farcical ordeal which
Mr. Pocklington called his "common-sense test." Shortly after their
arrival they were called into the Study, where Mr. Pocklington, after a
little homily on the danger of judging by appearances and the
fallaciousness of giving preference to quantity rather than quality,
produced a threepenny-bit and a penny, and commanded his auditors to
take their choice. Pipette unhesitatingly picked the threepenny-bit, and
was commended for her acumen. Pip, when it came to his turn, selected
the penny, and after being soundly rated for his stupidity was cast
forth from the Study and bidden to learn sense. A week later he was
again put to the test, and again chose the penny, repeating his
performance with stolid regularity when given a further opportunity of
redeeming his character the following week. After that the affair
developed into a kind of round game, Mr. Pocklington producing the two
coins from time to time and Pip invariably selecting the penny,--a
proceeding which gave his preceptor unlimited opportunities for tiresome
little lectures to the school in general, and Pip in particular, on the
subjects mentioned above.
Finally, after the entertainment had been repeated week by week for some
time, Pipette, whose loyal little soul chafed at the sycophantic giggles
of the other boys and girls when Pip was being scarified by Mr.
Pocklington, boldly broached the matter to her brother.
"Pip, why don't you take the fripenny-bit? If you did he'd stop bein' so
howwid to you."
Pip regarded his sister's small eager face with cold scorn.
"If once I took the threepenny-bit," he replied, "he'd stop offerin' the
money altogether. Why, I've made eightpence since I came here. Silly
kid!"
This was the last occasion in their lives on which Pipette ever
questioned the wisdom of her beloved brother's actions.
Both children made friends rapidly. Pip, indeed, soon after his arrival,
received a proposal of marriage, which, ever ready to oblige a lady, he
accepted forthwith. But he was reckoning without Pipette. That jealous
little person, finding one day that Pip had suddenly deserted her, and
was at that moment actually sharing his morning bun with his fiancee in
the boot-room, incontinently burst in upon the lovers, and after a brief
but decisive interview despatched her rival howling from the room,
remaining herself to share the bun with the newly restored Pip, who, to
be quite frank, had been finding the role of a Romeo, however passive,
rather exacting.
Isabel Dinting, the disappointed lady, was inconsolable for a day or
two, but she eventually recovered her spirits, and lived to heap coals
of fire on Pip's head, as you shall hear.
One of the most curious and characteristic institutions at Wentworth
House School was Mr. Pocklington's system of "Task-Tickets." Every boy
and girl on entering the school received ten little tablets about the
size of visiting-cards, inscribed with his or her name, and numbered
from one to ten consecutively. If a pupil failed in a lesson or broke a
rule, one of his Task-Tickets was impounded, and was not restored until
the faulty lesson was perfected or a specified imposition performed.
Periodically there would be an "inspection," and many a small head
whose owner was discovered to be short of tickets would be hung in shame
that day. Only such confirmed reprobates as Thomas Oates, the bad boy of
the school (whom Mr. Pocklington in his more jocular moments addressed
as "Titus," much to his hearers' mystification), could endure the stigma
of being perpetually without a full complement. Thomas indeed once
electrified the school by announcing to Miss Mary, when asked for a
ticket in default of an unlearned lesson, that _all_ his tickets were in
pawn already, and that, until he had redeemed one of the same, he would
be unable to oblige her. Mr. Pocklington and the majority of his staff
were horror-struck at such iniquity; but Miss Mary, in whom was
concentrated most of the common sense of the family, instituted a search
in Master Thomas's desk, with the result that she triumphantly fished
out no less than five tickets. All of which goes to prove that Thomas
Oates, like a good many of us, preferred notoriety, even as a
malefactor, to respectable oblivion.
The Task-Ticket system presented another feature of interest. Besides
their regulation ten ordinary tickets, Mr. Pocklington's pupils were
entitled to acquire "Special Task-Tickets." If you weeded the garden,
or filled some ink-pots, or wrote a specially neat copy, you were
presented with a Task-Ticket marked "Special" in red ink in one
corner. Next time a breakdown in work or the infraction of a rule
brought you within the sphere of operations of Mr. Pocklington's penal
code, exemption from punishment could be purchased by payment of one
or more of your Special Task-Tickets. This scheme was attractive in
several ways. Good children--chiefly little girls, it must be
admitted--accumulated these treasures assiduously for the mere joy of
possession, the trifling fact that their owners were far too virtuous
to be likely ever to have need of them being more than counterbalanced
by the comfortable glow of satisfaction with which the existence of
such a moral bank-balance suffused their rather self-righteous little
bosoms. Wicked children, on the other hand, would laboriously collect
tickets against a rainy day, and, having accumulated a sufficient
store to pay for the consequences, would indulge in a prolonged orgy
of sin until the last ticket was gone. Thomas Oates once found ten
Special Task-Tickets in an old desk, and having straightway filled a
like number of buttoned boots in the girls' dressing-room with
soap-and-water, proffered the same in compensation. However, the
possession of so much hoarded virtue in such a proclaimed reprobate
roused the suspicions of the authorities. Inquiries were set on foot,
the fraud was discovered, and Thomas was only saved from expulsion
from Wentworth House School by the intercession of pretty Miss Amelia,
who cherished a weakness for all renegades of the opposite sex.
Pip's tear-stained ex-fiancee, Isabel Dinting, anxious to drive away the
depression resultant upon her unfortunate attachment, allowed herself to
become badly bitten with the ticket-collecting mania. Her own ten
ordinary tickets invariably presented a full muster, and all her soul
was set upon the acquisition of Specials. These, by the way, were
transferable, and consequently Isabel's friends were requested to bestir
themselves, and by extra acts of virtue earn something to contribute to
her store. Pip himself assisted her. One day he caught and expelled from
the classroom a troublesome bumblebee, and, much to his surprise, was
awarded a Special Task-Ticket by the grateful Miss Amelia. He promptly
handed over the gift to Isabel, whose gratification knew no bounds.
Touched by his adorer's thanks, Pip decided in his quiet way to help her
further. Next morning the schoolroom suffered from a positive inundation
of bumblebees, and the services rendered by Pip in removing them were
rewarded by more Specials, all of which were duly handed over to the now
greatly consoled Isabel. When, however, the phenomenon occurred again
on the following morning, Miss Mary, who did not share her sister's
romantic belief in the integrity of the male sex, became suspicious, and
insisted on searching Pip's desk. An incautiously handled paper bag
emitted a perfect cascade of moribund bumblebees, and Pip's ingenious
device for obliging a lady stood revealed. After that he made no more
contributions to the supply.
Mention has already been made of that arch-ruffian Master Thomas Oates.
With him Pip waged war from the day that he entered the school.
Hostilities commenced immediately. Thomas dared Pip to place his hand in
a can of almost boiling water in the dressing-room. Pip did so, and kept
it there unwinkingly for the space of a full minute. Next day his hand
was skinless, and Father had to dress it for him in splendidly
conspicuous bandages. Pip retaliated by initiating a breath-holding
contest, in which his opponent was not only worsted, but admitted his
defeat by an involuntary and sonorous gurgle right in the middle of one
of Mr. Pocklington's customary harangues on nothing in particular in the
large schoolroom. He was promptly scarified for his unseemly conduct and
fined three Task-Tickets.
One afternoon, to the curiosity of all and the trepidation of some,
"Whistle-in" sounded at two-fifteen instead of two-twenty-five.
Evidently something momentous was about to occur.
All his pupils being seated, and the roll having been called, Mr.
Pocklington, with an air of portentous solemnity, explained the reason
for which they were assembled and met together. It was nothing very
dreadful after all, but the seriousness with which the subject was
treated by their preceptor impressed the children with a hazy feeling
that they were assisting at a murder trial.
Some person or persons unknown, it appeared, had invaded the Study, and
had embellished the features of a bust of Julius Caesar, which stood on
the mantelpiece, with some assorted coloured chalks, which further
investigation proved to have been stolen from the chalk-box by the
blackboard. Mr. Pocklington, who was not blessed with a sense of humour,
sought to drive home the enormity of this offence by ocular
demonstration. He rang the bell; and after a short but impressive pause
the door of the schoolroom was thrown open by the pageboy, and the
butler staggered majestically in, carrying Julius Caesar on a tea-tray.
That empire-builder's "make-up" could hardly be called a becoming one. A
red nose gave him a bibulous appearance, his blue chin suggested late
rising and the absence of a razor, and a highly unsymmetrical
moustache, executed in mauve chalk, stood out in vivid contrast to his
blackened right eye. It says much for the impression which Mr.
Pocklington's introductory harangue had produced that not a child in the
room so much as smiled.
The perspiring butler having set down his alcoholic-looking burden upon
a small table and withdrawn, attended by his satellite,--the only person
present, by the way, who appeared inclined to regard the situation with
levity,--Mr. Pocklington once more addressed his cowering audience.
"I will now ask the perpetrator of this outrage," he thundered, "to
stand up, that I may punish him as he deserves."
The little girls all shivered with apprehension, but one or two little
boys looked slightly amused. They were not very old or experienced, but
they were not green enough to join gratuitously in a game of "Dilly,
Dilly, come and be killed!"
Mr. Pocklington played his next card.
"I may add," he continued, "that a boy was seen to leave the Study in a
surreptitious manner shortly after this offence must have been
committed. No one has entered the Study since. That boy, therefore, must
be the culprit. If he does not immediately respond to the dictates of
his conscience and stand up in his place--I shall expose him! Now,
please!"
There was a death-like silence, suddenly broken by piercing shrieks from
one Gwendoline Harvey, aged seven, for whose infant nerves the strain
had proved too great.
"Please, it wasn't me," she wailed, "and--and--and I've lost my hankey!"
Tender-hearted Miss Arabella supplied the deficiency, and led her out,
still sobbing. The inquisition was resumed.
"I shall give the culprit one more minute," announced Mr. Pocklington in
the tones of a Grand Inquisitor.
There was another tense silence. The inmates of Wentworth House School
breathed hard, looked straight before them, and waited with their small
mouths wide open. One or two little girls--and small boys, for that
matter--gripped the benches convulsively, and with difficulty refrained
from screaming.
"The minute has elapsed," proclaimed the Grand Inquisitor. "Philip,
stand up!"
"Ah!" A long, shuddering sigh, partly of relief and partly of
apprehension, ran round the room. Pipette turned deathly pale. Pip rose
slowly to his feet, staring intently in his disconcerting way at the
besotted features of Julius Caesar.
"Philip," said Mr. Pocklington, "you were seen coming out of the Study
at one-twenty. What have you to say?"
Pip had nothing to say, but transferred his gaze to Mr. Pocklington. As
a matter of fact he had not entered the Study. He had spent some time,
it was true, in the passage outside the door, but that was because he
was waiting for Thomas Oates, having arranged to meet him there for five
minutes, for the purpose of adjusting a small difference on a matter of
a purely personal character, calling for plenty of elbow-room and
freedom from publicity. Tommy Oates had not appeared, and Pip had been
late for luncheon in consequence.
"Do you confess to this outrage?" inquired Mr. Pocklington, coming
suddenly to the point.
Pip collected himself. Then as common politeness seemed to demand some
sort of reply, he said, "No."
Another slight shudder passed round the room.
"Do you know anything about the matter?"
Pip was about to reply with another negative, when it suddenly flashed
across his mind that as he stood outside the Study waiting for Master
Oates he had experienced considerable difficulty in getting rid of
Isabel Dinting, who had hovered around him in a highly flattering but
most embarrassing fashion just when he wished to compose and
concentrate his faculties for his coming interview with Tommy. What was
she doing there? What could her business have been? In plain truth she
had come to avert a possible battle between Pip and Tommy, but this
never occurred to Pip: he had not thought it possible that any one
should take such a close interest in his movements. Anyhow this was no
concern of his. Accordingly he said, "No" a second time.
Then came another question.
"Do you deny having been in the Study?"
"Yes."
"But you were seen coming from the passage leading to the Study door."
No answer.
"Do you admit that you were in that passage?"
"Yes." (Sensation.)
"Philip," said Mr. Pocklington, "that passage leads only to the Study.
What other motive can have taken you there?"
No answer. It is difficult on the spur of the moment to frame a
plausible excuse for having in cold blood arranged a sanguinary
encounter outside your Principal's study door.
"Do you decline to answer?"
Again no reply from Pip. Another pause. Mr. Pocklington, now as excited
as a terrier halfway down a rabbit-hole, with difficulty refrained from
pronouncing sentence on the spot. However, he restrained himself so far
as to remember to sum up.
"Appearances are against you, Philip," he began. "You were seen leaving
the--the scene of the outrage in a suspicious manner shortly after that
outrage was committed. You decline to state what business took you
there. No one else visited the spot during the time under
consideration--at least--by the way, _did_ you see any one else while
you--during that period?"
This chance shot hit Pip hard. That Isabel Dinting should have painted
Julius Caesar's nose red seemed almost beyond the bounds of human
probability. Still she undoubtedly _had_ been there, and with Mr.
Pocklington in his present state the sudden revelation of such a fact
would probably cause a perfect eruption. Pip hesitated.
"Was any one else there?" reiterated Mr. Pocklington.
Pip was essentially a truthful boy, and the idea of saying, "No" never
occurred to him. Accordingly he said nothing, as before.
The eruption immediately took place.
"Philip," thundered Mr. Pocklington, "I have asked you two questions.
You have answered neither of them. Do you decline to do so?"
A very long pause this time. Then--"Yes," said Pip briefly.
"In that case," replied Mr. Pocklington, metaphorically assuming the
black cap, "I must pronounce you guilty. Still, I would rather you
confessed than were convicted. I will give you one more minute."
Sixty palpitating seconds passed. Forty juvenile hearts bumped
tumultuously, and Pip still stood up, a very straight, very silent, and
not undignified little figure.
"Have you anything further to say?" inquired Mr. Pocklington at last,
now almost convinced that he was the Lord Chief Justice himself.
Pip shook his head. He seldom wasted words.
"Then I pronounce you guilty. You have committed an offence against
decency and good taste that I have never known paralleled in the history
of this school. Your punishment"--the children held their breath--"must
be a matter for consideration. Meanwhile--"
Mr. Pocklington paused, and frowned at Isabel Dinting, who was groping
for something in her desk.
"Meanwhile," he continued, having suddenly decided to keep Pip in
durance vile until a punishment could be devised in keeping with his
crime, "you will be incarcerated--Well, Isabel?"
Isabel Dinting was standing up in her place, with her small countenance
flushed and apprehensive, but bravely waving one hand in the air to
attract attention. In the other she grasped a rather grubby and bulgy
envelope.
"Please, _may_ I speak to Pi--Philip?" she gasped.
Mr. Pocklington was too surprised to be pedantic.
"To Philip? Why, my child?"
"Because--well, because I've got somefing to give him."
"This is hardly the time for an exchange of gifts," remarked Mr.
Pocklington severely.
"But _may_ I?" persisted Isabel, with a boldness which surprised
herself.
"I cannot imagine what your gift can be, but if it has any bearing on
the present deplorable case, I should be only too thankful to permit--"
But long before this homily was completed Isabel had slipped out of her
seat and was standing by Pip's side, whispering excitedly into his ear
and endeavouring to thrust the grubby envelope into his hands.
"Take them," she panted. "There's thirty-five of them. Give him them
_all_, _now_, and he'll let you off."
Poor little Isabel! Surely under all the broad heavens there was no
crime that could not be atoned for by the surrender of thirty-five
laboriously acquired Special Task-Tickets!
Pip smiled at her. He was a plain-looking little boy, but he possessed
an extraordinarily attractive smile, and Isabel felt utterly,
absolutely, and completely rewarded for her sacrifice.
Meanwhile Mr. Pocklington had come to the conclusion that all this was
highly irregular.
"Bring me that envelope!" he commanded.
Pip handed up the envelope. Mr. Pocklington opened it, and out tumbled
the thirty-five Special Task-Tickets.
"What is all this?" he inquired testily.
"Special Task-Tickets," replied Pip.
"To whom do they belong?"
"Isabel."
"No--they belong to Pip!" screamed that small maiden. "Won't you let him
off if he gives them _all_ to you, please? I've given them to him. I--I
don't mind losin' them."
Isabel's voice quavered suddenly; and then, having conducted her case
unflinchingly past the critical point, she dissolved, woman-like, into
reactionary tears.
There was a long silence now, broken only by Isabel's sobs. Pip stood
still stiffly at attention, facing the grinning effigy of Julius Caesar.
Every child in the room (except Pipette) was lost in admiration of
Isabel's heroic devotion, for all knew how precious was her collection
of tickets to her. Miss Mary smiled genially; Miss Amelia's eyes filled
with sympathetic tears. Even Mr. Pocklington was touched. Hastily he
flung together in his mind a few sentences appropriate to the occasion.
"Unselfishness"--"devotion to a friend"--"a lesson for all"--the rounded
phrases formed themselves upon his tongue. He was ready now.
"I cannot refrain--" he began.
It was true enough, but he got no further; for above the formal tones of
his voice, above the stifled whispering of the school, and above the now
unrestrained lamentations of Isabel Dinting, rose the voice of Master
Thomas Oates, in a howl in which remorse, hysteria, and apprehension
were about equally mingled.
"It was me!" he roared. "Booh--hoo!"
His sinful but sentimental soul, already goaded to excessive discomfort
by the promptings of an officious conscience, had with difficulty
endured the inquisition upon the innocent Pip, and after Isabel's
romantic intervention he could contain himself no longer. Confession
burst spontaneously from his lips.
"It was me!" he repeated, _fortissimo_, knuckling his eyes.
There was a final astonished gasp from the school.
"It was _I_, Thomas," corrected Mr. Pocklington, the ruling passion
strong even at this crisis.
"No it wasn't!" roared Thomas, determined to purge his soul. "It was
_me_! I was in the Study when Pip was outside, and I did it and got out
when he was talking to Isabel, and--and I won't do it again. Aah--ooh!"
* * * * *
Pip became a hero, of course, but bore his honours with indifference.
Isabel expostulated with him.
"It was awful brave of you to say nothin' all the time," she remarked
admiringly.
"There was nothing to say," replied Pip, with truth.
"But you said nothin' when you knew it was Tommy all the time,"
persisted Isabel, anxious to keep her idol on his pedestal.
"I didn't think it was Tommy," said Pip; "I thought it was you."
Isabel's round eyes grew positively owl-like.
"Me? Oh, Pip! How _splendid_ of you!"
In his lifetime Pip inspired three women with love for him--two more
than his proper allowance. Isabel was the first. The others will follow
in due course.