CHAPTER VIII
THE FREEDHAM REVELATIONS
§1
The next half-holiday I was walking towards the tuck-shop and gloomily deciding that Doe's wilful estrangement from me was fast being frozen into tacit enmity, when I felt an arm tucked most affectionately into mine. It was done so quietly and quickly that I nearly leapt a yard at the shock. The arm belonged to Doe.
"Ray, you old ass," he began.
Doe, now sixteen, was not so very different from the small fawning creature of three years before. Although the perfect curve of the cheek-line had given place to a perceptible depression beneath the cheek-bone; although the usual marks of a boy's adolescence—the slight pallor, the quick blush of diffidence, the slimness of limb—were all very noticeable in Doe, there was yet much of the original Baby about his appearance. It could be marked in his soft, indeterminate mouth, whose flower-like lips seemed always parted; in his inquiring eyes and unkempt hair; and, at the present moment, in an artless excitement that I had not seen for many a day.
I tried to drag my arm away, but he held it too tight, and proceeded to make the remarkable statement:
"You old ass! Surely you've been sulking long enough."
"Well, I like that," replied I, with an empty laugh. "You drop me, sulk like a pig, and then say it's the other way round—"
"Rot!" he interrupted. "Didn't you deliberately cut me out with Radley?"
"I don't know what you mean," I said, although the hint that I was Radley's favourite always gave me a flush of pleasure.
"And haven't you been hanging on to Penny, just to make me jealous?"
"Never entered my head," I replied promptly, and with truth. "I leave that sort of thing to schoolgirls like you. But it evidently did make you jealous."
"Yes, it did," he admitted with an engaging smile. This softened me; and my affection for him began at once to throb into activity.
"Yes, it did; and now that you've said you're sorry, I feel frightfully lively. Let's go and smash a window or something."
His spirits were infectious, and he dragged me off to the study which his intellectual eminence had recently secured for him. When we arrived there, he tossed me a bag of sweets, which had clearly been bought as a means to sugar the reconciliation, and, dropping into his armchair, stretched his legs in front of him, and said:
"Let's talk as we used to."
I was relieved from the necessity of finding some opening remark by the bursting into the room of "Molés" White.
If you look up the Latin word "Molés" in the dictionary, you will find that it means "a huge, shapeless mass"; and all of us had been very quick to see that this was an excellent description of our junior house-prefect, White. Moles White was as enormous and ugly in his dimensions as he was genial and simple in face. You saw at a glance that he possessed all the traditional kindliness and generosity of the giant. As he crashed into Doe's study, he was swinging some books on the end of a strap.
"Found you, Doe," said he. "Look here, Bramhall's got to make the best house-team it can, which means you must give up slacking at cricket. You'll play at the nets this evening."
"Heavens! Ray," Doe murmured in mock dismay, as he stared out of eyes that sparkled with impudence at White's huge frame, "what on earth is this coming in?"
White smiled meaningly.
"Don't be cheeky now, Doe," he suggested. "No lip, please."
Doe's reply was a laugh, and the question addressed to me:
"I say, Ray, do you think it's an Iguanodon?"
"Well," said White, striding forward and beginning to swing his books ominously, "if you're asking for trouble, you shall have it."
Doe ducked down and raised his right hand to protect his head.
"I never said it, White," he affirmed, giggling. "Really, I didn't. You thought I did. I never called you an Iguanodon—I've too much respect for you."
"Yes, you did. Take your hand away. I'm determined to swing these books on to your head."
"Ray," shouted Doe between his giggles, "take him away. Don't bully, Moles! You great beast! Ray, he's bullying me."
White paused. Bullying, even in fun, was a horrible idea. The books fell limply to his side.
"Be sensible, if you can, Doe. You've got to play this evening."
The change in White's voice prompted Doe to raise his head and look up from under his arm at his attacker.
"Great Scott, Ray," he blurted out. "If it's not an Iguanodon, it's a prehistoric animal of some sort."
"My hat!" exclaimed White. "You young devil! Put that hand down while I smite you over the head with these books." And he made as though to execute his threat. Doe accordingly retired still further down into his chair, and placed his elbow to ward off the swinging books.
"I didn't say it, White, you liar! Shut up, will you? You might hurt me seriously. Go away. I hate you! Oh, hang it!"—(this was when the books struck him on the elbow),—"it hurts, Moles. Leave off, while I rub my elbow."
The gentle giant responded to this reasonable request; the books dropped; and Doe, looking reproachfully at his executioner, set about massaging his elbow.
"Ray," he said, when the operation was complete, "is there any known means of removing this nightmare?"
Immediately his uplifted arm was seized in White's huge paw. Doe's eyes were sparkling, his cheeks red, and his hair tumbled. His right arm being now held, he laughed more loudly and nervously and raised his left.
"By Jove, White," he cried, "if you rouse my ire, I'll get up and lick you. Let go of my hand—it's not yours. Oh, shut up, you great swine! Hang it, Ray"—(this with a shriek, half of laughter, half of anticipation)—"he's got my left hand as well—O, White, I'm sorry."
White held both his victim's wrists in one hand. Too honourable to take advantage of this, he swung his books at a distance and said:
"You've got to play at the nets, do you hear?"
My friend simulated anger. Struggling to get free, he ejaculated:
"I'll not be ordered about by an Iguanodon. I'm not that sort of man. O, White, I said I was—he, he, ha!—sorry. I didn't mean to be rude. I didn't see it in that light—"
"Whack" came the books gently on his back.
"Oh, please, Moles White, please stop. There's a dear old Iguanodon. Ow—Ow—Ow!"
By this time Doe was much out of breath, and his sentences were short and broken: "It doesn't hurt. It's lovely! Ray, don't stand there grinning like this chimpanzee, White."
Suddenly at an upward swing the slender strap broke, and the books crashed through the window.
"Damn!" said White.
Doe, flushed and dishevelled, picked himself out of his chair.
"That's what comes of bullying, Moles White. I'll pay for it. It was my beastly fault!"
"No, you won't," said White.
"Don't presume to contradict me, Moles White, or I'll lick you! I have stated that I'll pay for it."
"No," White decided. "We'll split the difference and go shags."
I felt the old fellow was not displeased at this compromise, for his purse had its limitations. He withdrew from the scene and left us to our confidential chat.
When he had gone, there set in a reaction from the excited liveliness of his visit. Doe looked sadly through the broken pane and said:
"Isn't Moles a corking old thing? The sort of chap who's naturally good, and couldn't be anything else if he tried."
Something wistful in the words caused me to see a vision of the gravel-path sweeping to the doorway of the baths.
"I say, Doe," I began, "have you ever felt that you'd like to be—something different from the ordinary run?"
Doe swung round on me.
"Have I ever? Why, you know, Rupert, that I'm the most ambitious person in the world. And, by Jove! I believe I might have done something great—"
"Might have done!" interrupted I, surprised that he should have decided at sixteen that his life was earmarked for a failure. "You'll probably live quite ten years more, so there's still time."
Doe turned again and sent his gaze through the broken window, replying in a little while:
"Oh, I've lived long enough to know that I'm the sort that's destined to make a mess of his life. I—oh, hang it, you wouldn't understand..."
Evidently in Doe, as in me, his manhood had come down the corridor of the future and met his childhood face to face. One minute before this he was an irresponsible baby "cheeking" Moles White; now he was the germinal man, borne down with the weight of life. He paused for me to plead my understanding, and invite his confidence. But an awkwardness held me dumb, and he was obliged to continue:
"I wish you could understand, because—Do you know, Rupert, why I made it up with you this afternoon?" He came away from the window and sat in a chair opposite me. "It was because I was glowing with a new resolution. It was the rippingest feeling in the world. I—I had just decided to cut with Freedham."
Up to this point I had been looking into his face, but now I turned away. Instinctively I felt that, if he were going to, speak of his transactions with Freedham, he would be abashed by my gaze. He rested his elbows on his knees, and began to tie knot after knot in a piece of string.
"Freedham's an extraordinary creature," he proceeded. "He first got hold of me when I was at the Nursery. He would get me in a dark corner, and alternately pet and bully me. I remember his once holding me in a frightful grip and saying: 'You're so—' (I'm only telling you what he said, Rupert)—'You're so pretty that I'd love to see you cry.' He's that type, you know."
For a while Doe, whose cheeks and neck were crimson, knotted his string in silence.
"Then he used to give me money to encourage me to like him, and dash it, Ray! I do like him. He's got such weird, majestic ideas that are different from anyone else's,—and he attracts me. His great theory is that Life is Sensation, and there must be no sensation—a law, or no law—which he has not experienced. I believed him to be right (as I do still, in part) and we—we tried everything together. We—we got drunk on a beastly occasion in his room. We didn't like it, but we pushed on, so as to find out what the sensation was. And then—oh! I wish I'd never started telling you all this—"
He tied a knot with such viciousness that few would have had the patience to untie it.
"Go on, old chap," I said encouragingly. I was proud of playing the sympathetic confidant; but, less natural than that, a certain abnormality in the conversation had stimulated me; I was excited to hear more.
"Well, he told me that years before he had wanted to see what taking drugs was like, and he had been taking them ever since. He was mad keen on the subject and had read De Quincey and those people from beginning to end. I've tried them with him.... There are not many things we haven't done together."
Doe tossed the string away.
"I know I might have done well in cricket, but Freedham used to say that excelling in games was good enough for Kipling's 'flannelled fools' and 'muddied oafs.' We thought we were superior, chosen people, who would excel in mysticism and intellectualism."
As he said it, Doe looked up and smiled at me, while I sat, amazed to discover how far he, with his finer mind, had outstripped me in the realms of thought. I had no idea what mysticism was.
"And I still think," he pursued, "that Freedham's got hold of the Truth, only perverted; just as he himself is a perversion. Life is what feeling you get out of it; and the highest types of feeling are mystical and intellectual. I only knew yesterday what a perversion he really was. I saw something that I'd never seen before—he had a sort of paroxysm—like a bad rigor; something to do with the drug-habit, I s'pose—"
A powerful desire came over me to say: "I knew all about his fits years ago," but it melted before the memory of a far-away promise. At this point, too, I became perfectly sure that, although Doe's sudden self-revelation was an intense and genuine outburst, yet he was sufficiently his lovable self to feel pride in his easy use of technical terms like paroxysm and rigor.
"It frightened me," continued he. "It's only cowardice that's made me cut with him. I know my motives are all rotten, but no matter; I was gloriously happy half-an-hour ago, when I had made the resolution. And now I'm melancholy. That's why I'm talking about being a great man. You must be melancholy to feel great."
As he said the words, Doe leapt to his feet and unconsciously struck his breast with a fine action.
"And I sometimes know I could be great. I feel it surging in me. But I shall only dream it all. I haven't the cold, calculating power of Penny, for instance. He's the only one of us who'll set the Thames on fire. At present, Rupert, I've but one goal; and that is to win the Horace Prize before I leave. If I can do that, I'll believe again in my power to make something of my life."
§2
I fear I'm a very ignoble character, for this conversation, instead of filling me with pain at Doe's deviations, only gave me a selfish elation in the thought that I had utterly routed my shadowy rival, Freedham, and won back my brilliant twin, who could talk thus familiarly about mysticism. And now there only remained the very concrete Fillet to be driven in disorder from the field.
CHAPTER IX
WATERLOO OPENS
§1
And here begins the record of my Waterloo with Fillet.
One June morning of the following year all we Bramhallites were assembled in the Preparation Room for our weekly issue of "Bank" or pocket-money; we were awaiting the arrival of Fillet, our house-master, with his jingling cash-box. Soon he would enter and, having elaborately enthroned himself at his desk, proceed to ask each of us how much "Bank" he required, and to deliberate, when the sum was proposed, whether the boy's account would stand so large a draft. The boy would argue with glowing force that it would stand that and more; and Fillet would put the opposing case with irritating contumacy.
This morning he was late; the corridors nowhere echoed the rattle of his cash-box. So it occurred to me to entertain the crowd with a little imitation of Fillet. Seating myself at his desk, I frowned at a nervous junior, and addressed him thus:
"N-now, my boy, how much b-b-bank do you want? Shilling? B-b-bank won't stand it. T-take sixpence. Sixpence not enough? Take ninepence and run away."
The Bramhallites enjoyed my impersonation.
"N-now, Moles—White, I mean—how much b-b-bank do you want? Two shillings? B-bank won't stand it. Take three halfpence—take it, Moles, and toddle away."
There were roars of laughter, and a grin from White like the smile of a brontosaurus.
"N-now, Doe, you don't want any this week—you've come to pay in some, I suppose. You—oh, damn!"
This whispered oath, accompanied by a dismayed stare at the door, turned the heads of all in that direction. Fillet, in his carpet slippers, had come round the corner and was an interested critic of my little imitation.
Very red, I vacated the seat to its owner and stepped down among the boys. Without a word he took it in my stead, placed his cash-box on the desk, and opened his book.
"N-now, White, how much b-b-bank do you want?"
Having heard this before, several boys tittered. Out of nervousness I tittered too, and cursed myself as I did so. Fillet looked at me as though he would have liked to repeat the flogging he had given me many years before. But the blushing boy in front of him was now seventeen, and taller than he.
When the last account had been duly debited, the Bramhallites dispersed to their classes. Throughout that day the incident was a painful recollection for me. I felt I could beat Fillet with cleaner weapons than an exploiting of his affliction: and the more I thought of it, the more I decided that I must go and apologise to him. The sentence to be used crystallised in my mind: "Please, sir, I came to say I was sorry I was imitating you this morning."
With this little offering I walked in the fall of the evening upstairs to his study. My knock eliciting a "C-come in," I entered and began:
"Please, sir, I came to say—" I got no further, for, with a sour look, he interrupted testily:
"Run away, b-boy, run away."
This rejection of my apology I had never contemplated, and it was with a sinking heart that I persisted:
"Please, sir, I wanted to—"
"Run away, boy. I'm accustomed to dealing with gentlemen."
At once my attitude of submission was changed at Fillet's clumsy touch into one of hot defiance.
"Indeed, sir," I retorted. "I'm not always so fortunate." I went quickly out and managed to slam the door. Blood up, I muttered:
"Brute! Beast! Swine! Devil!"
§2
Moles White, who was now the house-captain, was occupied two afternoons later in discussing with the bloods of Bramhall the composition of the House Swimming Four for the Inter-house relay races.
"Erasmus House have a splendid Four," he said. "We've only got three so far: there's myself and Cully and Johnson."
"And a precious rotten three too," said Doe.
"Well," grumbled White, "there's nobody else in the House who can swim a stroke; a good many think they can."
"Not so sure," whispered Doe, obscurely. "Come along with me. No, Moles alone." And he dragged White towards the baths.
Within that beloved building I was trying to see how many lengths I could swim. It was rather late, and I had the water to myself. I was doing my sixth length when I saw entering the baths the ungainly carcass of White with the graceful form of Doe hanging affectionately on his arm. The latter was explaining that no one knew how well I could swim, as I had once nearly fainted when extending myself to the utmost and had gone easy ever since. "But Rupert can really swim at ninety miles an hour," he concluded.
So White called: "Come here, Ray."
"When you say 'please,'" shouted I, swimming about.
Doe thereupon took the matter in hand and addressed me:
"Now, Ray, I want you to swim your best. Here's a little kiddy friend of mine I've brought to see you. Mr. Ray, this is Master Moles."
White ignored his companion's playfulness and asked me:
"Can you swim sixty yards?"
I hurled about five pints of water at him to show that I detected the insult.
"You old Moles!" said Doe. "Serves you right. Why, he's just finished swimming about seventy thousand yards."
"Well, sheer off and let's see you do it," ordered White.
I accordingly swam my fastest to the deep end and back.
"My word!" gasped White. "I didn't know you could swim like that."
Doe laughed in his face.
"You loon! He could swim before you were born."
Moles seized Doe by the throat and pretended to push him into the water, but characteristically saved him from falling by placing an arm round his waist.
"Apologise," he hissed, "or I'll drop you."
"Moles," replied Doe reproachfully. "At once let me go; or I'll push you in." I rendered my friend immediate assistance by filling White's shoes with water.
"Shut up that!" said he, quickly releasing Doe, who retired from the baths shouting: "Moles, you ugly old elephant, Ray could give you eighty yards in a hundred, and beat you."
This last impertinence suggested an idea to White. He arranged that Cully, Johnson, he, and I should have a private race, "in camera," as he put. The event came off the following day, and I won it with some yards to spare. My three defeated opponents were generous in their praise.
"Golly!" said Johnson. "I thought we'd be last for the Swimming Cup. But snakes alive! we'll get in the semi-final."
"Why, man," declared Cully. "I see us in the final with Erasmus."
"Final be damned!" said White. "Train like navvies and we'll lift the Cup!"
§3
Never did human boy have three more sporting associates in a swimming four than I had in White, Cully, and Johnson. Because I was a year younger than they it was their pleasure to call me the "Baby of the Team," and to take a pride in my successes. They would, in order to pace me, take half-a-length's start in a two-lengths' practice race, and make me strain every nerve to beat them. Or they would time me with their watches over the sixty yards, and, all arriving at different conclusions as to my figures, agree only in the fact that I was establishing records. Once, when according to a stop-watch I really did set up a record, Cully, forgetting his dignity as a prefect in his enthusiasm as a Bramhallite, cried "Alleluia! alleluia!" and hurled Johnson's hat into the air, so that it fell into the water.
The members of Erasmus' Four were at first incredulous.
"Heard of Bramhall's find?" said they. "They've discovered a young torpedo in Ray. He's quite good and they'll probably get into the final. But we needn't be afraid. They've a weak string in Johnson, while we haven't a weakness anywhere. However, we'll take no risks." And so they started a savagely severe system of training.
Meantime White constituted himself my medical adviser, and some such dialogue as this would take place every morning:
"Now, Ray, got any pain under the heart?"
"No."
"Do you feel anything like a stomach-ache?"
"Only when I see your face."
"Look here, I'd knock your face through your head, if I didn't want your services so badly. Are you at all stiff?"
"Yes, bored stiff with your conversation."
It was true that there had been no trace of the faintness which had attacked me a year before. Had there been, I should have kept quiet about it, for, in that time of excitement, I would willingly have shortened my life by ten years, if I could have made certain of securing the Cup for Bramhall. Only one thing marred this period of my great ascendency; Radley, Bramhall's junior house-master, never gave me a word of praise or flattery.
That wound to my self-love festered stingingly. I persisted in letting my thoughts dwell on it. I would frame sentences with which Radley would express his surprise at my transcendent powers, such as: "Ray, you're a find for the house"; "I'm glad Bramhall possesses you, and no other house"; "I don't think I've ever seen a faster boy-swimmer"; "You're the best swimmer in the school by a long way." I would turn any conversation with him on to the subject of the race, and suffer a few seconds' acute suspense, while I waited for his compliment. I would depreciate my own swimming to him, feeling in my despair that a murmured contradiction would suffice: but this method I gave up, owing to the horror I experienced lest he should agree.
And, when he mercilessly refused to gratify me, I would wander away and review all the occasions on which he had seen me swim, recalling how I then acquitted myself; or I would laboriously enumerate all the people who must have told him in high terms of my performances. A growing annoyance with him pricked me into a defiant determination, so that I reiterated to myself: "I'll do it. I'll win it. I swear I will!"
Bramhall passed easily into the final. Erasmus, too, romped home in their first and second rounds. So on the eve of the great race it was known throughout Bramhall that the house must be prepared to measure itself against Erasmus' famous four.
Betting showed Erasmus as firm favourites, the school critics looking askance at Johnson, our weakest man. Only the Bramhallites laid nervous half-crowns on the house, and hoped a mighty hope. That excellent fellow, White, displayed his unfortunate features glowing with an expression that was almost beautiful.
As the day of the race led me, steadily and without pity, to the time of ordeal, I sickened so from nerves that I could scarcely swallow food; and what I did swallow I couldn't taste. I was glad when at five o'clock something definite could be done like going to the baths, selecting a cabin, and beginning to undress. Four minutes were scarcely sufficient for me to undo my braces, such was the trembling of my hand. I longed for the moments to pass, so that the time to dive in could come; every delay ruffled me; I wished the whole thing were over. It didn't lessen my suffering to watch the gallery filling with excited boys, and to see the crowd on the ground-floor make way for Salome himself, followed by Fillet and Radley as representatives of Bramhall, and Upton as house-master of Erasmus. Perspiration beaded my forehead. My heart fluttered, and I began to fear some failure in that quarter. At one moment, when I was in extremis, I would willingly have exchanged positions with the humblest of the onlookers: at another I caught a faint gleam of hope in the thought that the end of the world might yet come before I was asked to do anything publicly. And I conceived of happier boys who had died young.
The baths were prepared for the event. Across the water, thirty feet from the diving-station, a large beam was fixed, which the competitors must reach and touch, before turning round and swimming back to the starting point. More boys were allowed to crowd into the gallery and the cabins. Very conspicuous was the expansive white waistcoat of old Dr. Chapman, who was busy backing Erasmus when talking to the boys of Erasmus, and Bramhall when questioned by Bramhallites. Fillet, as master of Bramhall; Upton, as master of Erasmus; and Jerry Brisket, as a neutral, were appointed judges.
White gathered the Bramhall four into his cabin and arranged with sanguine comments that we should swim in this order:
1. Himself—to give us a good start.
2. Johnson—to lose as little as possible of the fine lead established.
3. Ray—to make the position absolutely certain.
4. Cully—to maintain the twenty-yards' lead secured by Ray.
"See, Ray," he said to me, after he had dismissed the others, "you swim third—last but one."
"Ye—es," I stuttered.
"Nervous?" he inquired softly.
I smiled and made a grimace. "Beastly."
He gripped my hand in his powerful fist and whispered: "Rot! you are certain to do everything for us. My heart is set on winning this and staggering the school."
I smiled again. "You're a ripping chap, and I'm sorry if I've ever cheeked you."
Sudden cheering told us that the great Erasmus four had emerged from their cabins. They were as fine a little company of Saxon boys as ever school could show; comely, tall, and fair-skinned. On the left side of the diving-boards they took up their pre-arranged positions: Atwood, first; Southwell Primus, behind him; Lancelot, third (and therefore my opponent); and then Southwell Secundus. And all four had tied on their heads the black and white polo-caps of the school. Upton looked with satisfaction upon his house's representatives; while Dr. Chapman, standing near, exclaimed: "Fine young shoots of yours, Uppy. I tell you, this is England's best generation. Dammit, there are three things old England has learnt to make: ships, and poetry, and boys."
Now, amid less resounding but still enthusiastic applause, the Bramhall four assumed positions on the right. White stood on the diving-mat; behind him, Johnson, frowning; next myself; and lastly Cully. We were of very varying heights, from White, whose huge proportions exaggerated the difference, to little thick-set Cully, who was the shortest of all. And only these two wore the polo-cap. So both fours stood before the multitude, inviting comparison: Erasmus, a team; Bramhall, a scratch lot.
Behind me Cully observed the contrast, and, striving with courage to belie his agitation, murmured: "Look at Erasmus. Did you ever see such a measly lot? If we can't beat that crew, Ray, my boy, we must be duffers," to emphasise which remark he tickled me under both armpits, so that, nearly jumping out of my skin, I fell forward on to Johnson, who fell forward on to White, who, having nobody to fall forward on to, fell prematurely into the water. This extra item was loudly "encored," and White scrambled back to his place and bowed his acknowledgments.
Salome, as starter, thereupon addressed the competitors.
"Ee, bless me, my men, I shall say 'Are you ready? Go!'"
His words were like a bell for silence. Upton and Fillet eyed the swimmers narrowly.
"Are you ready? Go!"
And then a calamity supervened. While Atwood dived with the grace of a swallow, White, well—White missed his dive; he leapt into the air, his great arms and legs appeared to hang limply down, and his body struck the water with a splash that set the whole surface in a turmoil. "Moles has gone a belly-flopper," shouted the crowd, as it wept with laughter. "Good old Moles, 'a huge, shapeless mass!'" I was too nervous to laugh, and wished that I had trousers on, for my limbs were trembling so noticeably that I felt everybody must be studying them. Johnson swore. Cully said: "Bang goes the Cup!" But White rose and started furiously to recover the lost ground, thrashing the water with his limbs. Bravely done! How the building cheered, as his long arms swung distances behind them! But he failed. Atwood, swimming with coolness, kept and increased the advantage; and, accompanied by a din from his housemates and an all-embracing smile from Upton, touched the rope beneath the diving-mat full two yards in front. Over his head dived Southwell Primus, while Johnson, in an agony, yelled to White to hurry his shapeless stumps. Moles, with a last tremendous stretch, touched the rope, and Johnson plunged splendidly to his work. I took up my position on the mat and helped White to flounder out.
"Ray," were his first words, "it's up to you now. I'm awfully sorry I muddled it, but you'll make it good. I know you will—you must. I shall weep if we go down."
"I'll try," I said.
Meanwhile Johnson, as is often the case with the weakest man, outstripped the most hazardous faith. To the joy of Bramhall he matched Southwell Primus with a yard for his yard. But, even so, his pace couldn't eat up the lost ground; and the Erasmus man touched home still two yards in front of the Bramhallite. In flew Lancelot, my opponent; and, with the coming of Johnson, it would be my turn. The Bramhallites, in a burst of new hope, shouted sarcastically: "Go it, Lancelot. Ray's coming. He's just coming." I got the spring in my toes, watched carefully to see Johnson touch the rope beneath me, and then, to the greatest shout of our supporters, dived into the beloved element.
They told me (but probably it was in their enthusiasm) that it was the best and longest racing-dive I had ever done; that, remaining almost parallel to the surface, I just pierced the water as a knife pierces cheese. All I know is that at the grasp of the cool water every symptom of nerves left me: and, with my face beneath the surface, and the water rushing past my ears, half shutting out a frenzied uproar, I raced confidently for the beam. The position of Lancelot I cared not to know. My one aim was to cover the sixty yards in record time; and, so doing, to pass him. On I shot, feeling that my arms were devouring the course; and, some five strokes sooner than I expected, became conscious that I was near the beam. In an overarm reach I scraped it with my finger-tips. Swinging round, I swam madly back. Extending myself to the utmost, I felt as if every stroke was swifter than its predecessor. Now my breath grew shorter and my limbs began to stiffen; but all this proved a source of speed, for, in a spirit of defiance of nature, I whipped arms and legs into even faster movement; it was my brain against my body. Then there came into view the rope, which I touched with a reach. Making no attempt to grasp it, for I seemed to be travelling too rapidly, I saw the atmosphere darken with the shadow of Cully passing over my head, and crashed head-first into the end of the baths. Not stunned, for the cold water refreshed me, I turned immediately to see if I had really got home before Lancelot. He was still in the water, three yards from the rope.
§4
That moment, while many hands helped me out of the water; while the building echoed with cheers and whistles; while White, too happy to speak, beamed upon the world; while fists hammered me on the back; while Cully, splendidly swimming, made the victory sure; I experienced such a happiness as would not be outweighed by years of subsequent misery. Though my limbs were so stiff that it was pain to move them, they glowed with diffused happiness; though my heart was fluttering at an alarming pace, it beat also with the electric pulsations of joy: though my breath was too disturbed for speech, yet my mind framed the words: "I've done it, I've done it"; though my head ached with the blow it had received, it was also bursting with a delight too great to hold. I had never done anything for the house before, and now I had won for its shelf the Swimming Cup.
They helped me to my cabin, and, as I sat there, I composed the tale of success that I would send to my mother. Then I stood up to dress, and, in my excitement, put on my shirt before my vest. There was a confusion of cheers within and without the building; and Upton, Fillet, and Jerry Brisket, the judges, were to be seen in animated debate, while many others stood round and listened. Dazed, faint, and unconscious of the passage of momentous events, I took no notice of them, but drank deeply of victory. It exhilarated me to reconstruct the whole story, beginning with my early stage-fright and ending with the triumphant climax, when I crashed into the end of the baths.
I was indulging the glorious retrospect when there broke upon my reverie a sullen youth who said:
"Well, Ray, we haven't won it after all."
There was a hitch in my understanding, and I asked:
"What d'you mean?"
"You were disqualified."
"I!" It was almost a hair-whitening shock. "I! What? Why? What for?"
"They say you dived before Johnson touched the rope. Nobody believes you did."
So then; I had lost the cup for Bramhall. The lie! Too old to vent suffering in tears, I showed it in a panting chest, a trembling lip, and a dry, wide-eyed stare at my informant. Backed by a disorder outside, he repeated: "Nobody believes you did."
All happiness died out of my ken. Conscious only of aching limbs, a fluttering heart, uneven breath, and a bursting head, I cried:
"I didn't. I didn't. Who said so?"
"Fillet—Carpet Slippers."
"The liar! The liar!" I muttered; and, with a sudden attack of something like cramp down my left side, I fell into a sitting position, and thence into a huddled and fainting heap upon the floor.
CHAPTER X
WATERLOO CONTINUES: THE CHARGE AT THE END OF THE DAY
§1
While I was recovering there fell the first thunderdrops of mutiny. A youth at the back of the gallery, on intercepting the flying message that Fillet had demanded my disqualification and Jerry Brisket had ended by supporting him, roared out a threatening "No!" Maybe, had he not done so, there would never have been the great Bramhall riot. But many other boys, catching the contagion of his defiance, cried out "No!" The crowd, recently so excited, was easily flushed by the new turn of events, and shouted in unison "No!" Isolated voices called out "Cheat!" "Liar!" Dr. Chapman, as tactless as he was kindly, declared to those about him that Fillet's judgment was at fault, and thus helped to increase the uproar. The disaffection spread to the Erasmus men, who said openly: "We don't want the beastly cup. Bramhall won it fair and square."
And then came the report that I, on receiving the news, had fainted. This, by provoking deeper sympathy with the hero and greater execration of the villain, acted like paraffin oil on the flames. Before the masters realised that anything more than disappointment was abroad, rebellion looked them in the face.
Salome saw it and knew that, if his short but brilliant record as headmaster was not to be abruptly destroyed, he must rise to prompt and statesmanlike action. His first step was to summon all the prefects in the building and say:
"Ee, bless me, my men, clear the baths."
The prefects quickly emptied the building of all boys; but outside the door they could do no more than link arms like the City Police and keep back a turbulent mob. Then Salome, accompanied by Fillet, Upton, and Radley, passed with dignity through his pupils. He was received in an ominous silence.
Now, behind this revolt there was a hidden hand; and it was the hand of Pennybet. To effect a coup d'état and to control and move blind forces were, we know, the particular hobbies of Pennybet. Here this evening he found blind disorder and rebellion, which, if they were not to die out feebly and expose the rebels to punishment, must be guided and controlled. So he flattered himself he would take over the reins of mutiny, and hold them in such a clandestine manner that none should recognise whose was the masterhand. He would cross swords with Salome. As he said to me the following day: "I ran that riot, Rupert, and I never enjoyed anything so much in my life."
His method outside the baths was to keep himself in the background and to whisper to boys, at various points on the circumference of the vast and gathering mob, battle orders, which he knew would be quickly circulated. They were really his own composition, but, like a good general keeping open his means of retreat, he attributed them to some visionary people, who, in the event of failure, could bear the brunt of the insurrection.
"Some of the chaps are talking about a real organised revolt. How corking!"
"The idea seems to be that it's no good doing anything, unless it's done on a large scale. I shall stick by the others and see what they do."
"You're to pass the word, they say, to keep massed. I suppose their game is that small bodies can be dispersed, but we can't be touched if we're all caked together. You'd better pass that on and explain it."
"There are to be no dam black-legs. I've just heard that any who slink off will be mobbed."
"What are we waiting for? Can't say. Depends who's managing this shindy. You can be sure somebody's organising it, and we'll do what the others do. Toss that along."
Really, Penny didn't know what his great crowd was waiting for. He had not had time to formulate a plan, but had contented himself with keeping his forces together. And, while, closely compacted, they swayed about, unconscious that they were the plaything of one cool and remarkable boy, he hit upon the scheme of an offensive. He decided that it would be futile to fight here, where all the school-prefects were concentrated; it would be better to transfer the attack to the courtyard of Bramhall House, where only the Bramhall prefects would have to be reckoned with. To stay here was to attempt a frontal attack. No, he would retreat as a feint, and outflank the school-prefects by a surprise movement in the direction of Bramhall.
"Have you heard?" he said. "We're all to disperse and meet again in five minutes in Bramhall courtyard. I wonder what's in the wind."
Penny knew that not a single boy would fail to arrive at the advertised station, if only to see what was in the wind; and as the crowd disintegrated and the prefects strolled away, thinking the mutiny had petered out, he murmured to himself: "A crowd's an easy thing for a man to handle."
§2
So it was that there was silence everywhere when, returning to consciousness, I found myself in the empty baths with Dr. Chapman looking down upon me.
"One day we must thoroughly overhaul you, young man," he said. "There may be a weakness at your heart. How're you feeling now?"
"Oh, all right, thanks."
"Bit disappointed, I suppose?"
"Rather!"
"Frightfully so?"
I didn't answer. His words filled my throat with a lump.
"Would blub, if you could, but can't, eh?"
The question nearly brought the tears welling into my eyes. He watched them swell, and said:
"As a doctor, I should tell you to try and blub, but, as an old public-schoolboy, I should say 'Try not to.' Do which you like, old man. Both are right. I'll not stay to see."
And, without looking round, he withdrew from the building.
About ten minutes later I found myself in the deserted playing fields. Knowing nothing of any breaches of the peace, I crossed the road and passed through the gateway into the courtyard of Bramhall House. Immediately a great roar of cheers went up, I was seized by excited hands, raised on to the shoulders of several boys, and carried through a shouting multitude to the boys' entrance, where I was deposited on the steps.
Probably not a soul knew that Salome was looking down from the window of Fillet's study and watching the effect of my arrival. As soon as the theatre of hostilities had changed from the baths to Bramhall House, he, too, had crossed the road and entered unobserved by Fillet's private doorway. He knew well enough that of all the outposts in his schools' system of discipline Bramhall was the weakest held. The house was under the sway of an ineffective master with a stinging tongue; and trouble would have stirred long ago had it not been for the heavy hand of the junior house-master, Radley, whom Salome's predecessor had placed there to strengthen the position. And insubordination had been not uncommon since the accession of the too genial White to the captaincy.
In justice to White I must say that, if he had been present this evening, he would have done his best to quell the disturbance. But the decision of the judges had no sooner reached him than he had disappeared from the sight of men. As a matter of fact his great heart was breaking in the privacy of the science buildings. The only other house-prefects were, strangely enough, the redoubtable Cully and Johnson, who had sought consolation by retiring together to a café in the town. So, when Salome arrived at Fillet's study, there were no prefects available to disband the rebels. What was he to do? It would be quite inexpedient for a master to venture himself into the field of fire. If he suffered indignity, severe punishment would be necessary, and that might provoke further defiance. Then again, an alien prefect from another house would have little hope of success on Bramhall territory. Truly Salome was out in a storm.
Hardly had they placed me on the steps, very surprised and gratified, before Pennybet roared out:
"Was it true that you cheated, as Fillet tried to make out?"
"No!" I cried.
If I had been a nobler youth, I should have assumed that Fillet acted conscientiously from a mistake. But I believed, and wanted to believe, that his had been a piece of deliberate revenge; that, recalling my imitation of his affliction, he had determined to rob me of my triumph. So, being a vindictive young animal, I declared to the mob what I conceived to be the truth. And all of them agreed, while many began to hoot.
"Now, I've been sent by some boys at the back," said Penny, "to tell you that what you've got to do is to go up to Fillet's room and tender him a mock-apology for losing the Cup for his house. We're to cheer ironically and hoot down here, and make a hell of a noise. Then if he says 'Are those young devils cheering you or hooting me?' you're to say 'They're doing both, sir.' It's a good scheme, whoever invented it, because he can't touch you for civilly apologising and then for telling the truth when you are asked a question."
The idea fired me. Aye, it would be good to attack in a last charge and beat old Fillet, while I had all his house in fighting array behind me. It would be good that he, who had rejected my serious apology, should be obliged to hear my contemptuous one, backed by the tumult and hooting of half the school. Never had I thought that my decisive victory, for which I had waited years, would assume these splendid proportions.
Into the house I went, flushed and determined, and quite unaware that by invading Fillet's study I should walk into the arms of the head master himself. Up the stairs I rushed, but, as I set foot upon the first landing, Radley, coming out of his room, stood in the way of my further ascent.
"Come in here a minute," he said.
"Sir, I can't—"
He seized me by the right wrist and swung me almost brutally into his room. I was a muscular stripling, and he meant me to feel his strength. Suddenly disconcerted, I heard the door slam, and found that Radley was face to face with me. My breast went up and down with uncontrollable temper, while my wrist, all red and white with the marks of powerful fingers, felt as if it were broken.
"Where were you going?" he demanded, his hard mouth set.
"To Mr. Fillet's study," I snapped, purposely omitting the "sir."
"What for?"
"To apologise for losing the Swimming Cup."
"In a spirit of sincerity or one of scoffing?"
It was with no desire for veracity, but as a challenge to fight, that I replied: "One of scoffing."
"Good." Radley's grey eyes unveiled some of their gentleness, "you can tell the truth still. Now, Ray, the shock of your disappointment has deprived you of reason, or you, of all people, would see that this tomfoolery outside is unsportsmanlike in the extreme."
"But, sir," I ventured, surprised and rather pleased to hear myself mannerly again, "every boy declares I didn't dive too soon."
"But unfortunately, Ray," replied Radley, also pleased, "every boy was not appointed a judge, and your housemaster was. Now, do you think that the judge's decision can be overruled by a mere counting of the heads that disagree with him? I put it to you; undo the damage you've done in associating yourself with this exhibition outside—at this moment you wield more influence than any other boy in the school—go out and establish order."
"Sir, I can't, sir. I'm their sort of deputy."
"Ray, there's a wave of rebellion outside, and you're nothing more important than the foam on the crest of the wave. Look here, you're a magnificent swimmer, the best in the school by a long way"—thus came the word of praise for which I had hungered so long—"well, a good swimmer will go out and breast the wave."
As he said it, he laid his hand gently upon my shoulder, and I felt, as I did once before, that in his peculiar sacramental touch there was something given by him and taken by me.
"But, sir," I said, desiring to justify myself, "I couldn't help thinking that Mr. Fillet did it on purpose to pay me out."
Radley frowned. "You mustn't say such things. But, were it so, any fool can be resentful, while it takes a big man to sacrifice himself and his petty quarrels for the good of great numbers. You will do it to save the school from hurt. I have always believed you big enough for these things."
My answer must have showed Radley how sadly I was less than his estimate of me.
"But, sir, if I turn back now they'll say I funked."
"Exactly; then go out and face their abuse. Go out and get hurt. I'm determined your life shall be big, so begin now by learning to stand buffeting. Besides, Ray, does it matter to a strong swimmer if the wave beats against him?"
I answered nothing, but gazed out of the window. And Radley shot another appeal—a less lofty one, but it flew home. Arrows pierce deeper, if they don't soar too high.
"Ray, they'll say you funked your master, if you don't go up to Mr. Fillet's study; I shall say you funked the boys, if you don't go out to them. You must choose between their contempt and mine."
I looked down at my boots.
"Which would you rather have, their contempt or mine?"
"Theirs, sir."
Radley was quite moved when I answered him thus; and it was a little while before he proceeded:
"I might have stopped your access to Mr. Fillet's study by telling you that the head master was waiting for you there. But I wanted you to stop from your own high motives, and not from fear. Come along now; we'll go together."
We ascended the stairs to the study and entered. Salome at once raised his long figure from his seat and, pointing at my tie, said:
"Ee, bless me, my man, you're very slovenly; put your tie straight."
I blushed and did so.
Then he turned to Radley.
"Did you find him in the right disposition?"
"Yes, sir."
It would not have been I if at this "Yes, sir" of Radley's my mind had not run up an irrelevant alley, in which I found myself wondering that Radley, who was always called "sir," should ever have to call anyone else "sir." Perhaps I was staring dreamily into vacancy, for Salome said:
"Bless me, I'm very glad to hear that his disposition is all right. But is the boy a fool? Why does he stand staring into vacancy like a brainless nincompoop?"
I turned redder than ever and wondered at whom to look so as to avoid vacancy, and what to do with my hands. Nervously I used the right hand to button up my coat, and then put it out of mischief in my pocket.
"Good God, man!" cried the Head. "Take that hand out of your pocket!"
I took it quickly out and unbuttoned one coat-button: then, for lack of something to do with the hand, did the button up again. I decided to keep the miserable member fingering the button. To make matters worse Salome rested his eyes like a searchlight on the hand. At last he looked distressingly straight at my face.
"Ray," he asked, "are you a perfect fool?"
"No, sir," I said, and grinned.
The Head turned to my housemaster for his testimony.
"Mr. Fillet, is the boy a fool?"
"One couldn't call him a fool," replied Fillet, obviously intending the conclusion: "One might, however, call him a knave."
The Head turned to Radley.
"Mr. Radley, is he a fool?"
"He's anything but a fool, sir; and he's still less of a knave," said Radley, angry and caring only to repudiate Fillet's innuendo.
"Ray," Salome was again staring me out of countenance. "Do you ever do any work?"
"Yes, sir," I said brightly. It was kind of him to ask questions to which I could honestly answer in the affirmative. I did occasionally do some work.
"Mr. Fillet?" queried Salome, desiring the housemaster to have his say.
"I suppose there are idler boys," announced Fillet grudgingly; and it was open to anyone to hear in his words the further meaning; "but, on the other hand, there are many more studious and more deserving." The fact is, the little man was irritated that Radley should have tried to contradict him before the Head.
"Mr. Radley?" pursued Salome, as though he were bored with the evidence, but realised that everyone must be allowed his turn to speak.
"Ray has always worked well for me," Radley promptly answered, and we all knew he meant it as a second stab for Fillet.
Salome once more fixed me with his disconcerting stare.
"Ray," he asked, "have you any glimmerings of moral courage?"
"I don't know, sir," said I, wondering where the conversation was leading.
The Head, apparently tired out by this catechising, contented himself with turning his face in the direction of Fillet for his endorsement or denial.
"He's as bold as they make 'em," said Fillet; and this time the double meaning was as clear as before: "the boy is utterly shameless."
The Head turned to Radley, who answered with a snap:
"Yes, he's plenty of courage; and what's better, he's easily shamed."
"Bless me, are you any good whatever at games?" continued the weary catechist.
"I can swim a bit, but I'm not much good at anything else."
"As he says, he swims a bit," corroborated Fillet. "But I don't know what else he can do."
"He's the best swimmer in the school," snapped Radley, "and will one day be the best bowler."
"Well, bless me, my man, have you any position or influence with your schoolfellows?"
"I don't know, sir."
"Hm!" sneered Fillet, whose temper was gone. "He has his confederates."
"Yes," said Radley, "he has a very loyal following."
I think it pleased the drowsy Head to see two of his masters boxing over the body of one of his boys.
"Well, well," he said, "I'm glad, Ray, to hear you give such a good account of yourself. We are satisfied, I may say, with your prowess in the baths this evening—you did your best, sir, you did your best—and we are satisfied with the attitude you have taken up in regard to this nonsensical business outside—"
"But, sir," I began, deprecatingly.
"God bless me, my man, don't interrupt! I tell you, we are satisfied. We don't sigh for the moon; and we're not talking of your shortcomings. We haven't time, bless me, we haven't time. We're only talking of your virtues, which won't occupy many minutes. We are satisfied that you're not altogether a fool—that you do some work—that you have some moral courage—that you're an athlete—and—what else was the matter, with him, Mr. Radley?—oh, that you have some position with your schoolfellows. We make you a house-prefect, sir, a house-prefect."
Staggered beyond measure, I suppose I showed it in my face, for Salome continued:
"Ee, my man, take off that ridiculous expression. I congratulate you, sir—congratulate you."
And I mechanically shook hands with him. Then Radley gripped my fingers and nearly broke the knuckle-bones. Fillet also formally proffered his hand, and I pressed it quite heartily. It was no good gloating over a man when he was down.
After this ceremony all waited for Salome to clinch proceedings, which he did as offensively as possible by saying:
"Ee, bless me, my man, don't stand there idling all day. Go out at once and establish order."
I went slowly down the stairs to the entrance, and, facing the crowd, was greeted with a fire of questions: "Did you do it?" "What did he say?" "How did he take it?" "Didn't you do it?"
"No," I said, and there was a temporary silence.
"Why not? Why not?"
"Because it wasn't the thing."
While no more eloquence came to my lips, plenty flowed from those of the boys before me. For a moment their execration seemed likely to turn upon me. At last I made myself heard.
"You see," I shouted, "only cads dispute the decision of the referee."
"Yes, but there are exceptions to every rule," said Penny's voice.
And here I sipped the sweets of authority.
"Well, there isn't going to be any exception in this case," I said.
The crowd detected something humorous in my high-handed sentence and laughed sarcastically. So, giving up all attempts to be persuasive, I said bluntly:
"Look here, Salome's upstairs, and he's made me a prefect and sent me down to establish order."
There were elements of greatness in Pennybet. He willingly acknowledged that the coup d'état was not his but Salome's, and the riot must inevitably crumble away. So he made a point of leading the cheers that greeted my announcement, and, coming forward, was the first to congratulate me. His example was extensively followed, while he looked on approvingly, as though it had all been his doing, and chirruped every now and then: "This is the jolliest day I've spent at Kensingtowe."