CHAPTER IV
Torpids
"Again we rush across the slush,
A pack of breathless faces,
And charge and fall, and see the ball
Fly whizzing through the bases."
The remainder of the term slipped away without farther accident or incident. Apart from the preparation of work, John saw little of Scaife or Egerton. The Fifth nodded to him in a friendly fashion when he passed them in the street, and, greater kindness on their part, left him alone. Possibly, Lawrence had said a word to Lovell. Such leisure as John enjoyed (a new boy at Harrow has not much) he spent with the devoted Fluff. Desmond and Scaife walked together on Sunday afternoons. But the fact that Desmond seemed to be vanishing out of his horizon made no difference to John's ever-increasing affection for him. Very humbly, he worshipped at a distance. On clear, dry days Fluff and he would climb to the top of the wall of the squash racquet-courts to see Scaife and Desmond play a single. They were extraordinarily well-matched in strength, activity, and skill. John noticed, however, that the Demon lost his temper when he lost a game, whereas Cæsar only laughed. Somehow John divined that the Demon was making the effort of his life to secure Desmond's friendship. And Cæsar had ideals, standards to which the Demon pretended to attain. Good, simple John made sure that Cæsar would elevate the Demon to his plane, that evil would be exorcised by good. Only in his dreams did the Demon have the advantage.
Just before the end of the term, Cæsar said to him—
"After all, I'm jolly glad I'm coming into your House, because the old Demon is such a ripper; and he and I have been talking things over. He's as mad keen as I am about games, and although the Manorites have not played in a cock-house match at cricket or footer for years, still there is a chance for us at Torpids next term. You'll play, Verney. You've improved a lot, so the Demon says, and he'll be captain. Then there are the sports. If only Dirty Dick could be knocked on the head, the Manor might jump to the front again."
"It will," said John.
When the School reassembled after Christmas, Desmond entered the Manor, and found himself with Scaife in a two-room. A civil note from the man of millions had arranged this. To John was given a two-room, also, with the Duffer as stable companion. Fluff remained in No. 15. The Duffer had got his remove from the Top Shell into John's form. Scaife and Desmond were elevated into the Upper Remove. It followed, therefore, that Scaife and Desmond prepared work in their own room, the Caterpillar joining the Duffer and John. Thus it will be seen that, although Desmond had become a Manorite, he was, practically speaking, out of John's orbit.
The Caterpillar had now been three years in the school, and he governed himself accordingly. He put on a "barmaid"[14] collar and spent much time on the top step of the boys' entrance to the Manor. No mere two-year-old presumed to occupy this sacred spot. Had he dared to do so, the Caterpillar would have made things very sultry for him. Also, he informed the Duffer and John that, by virtue of his position, he proposed to prepare no work at all. Each "con" was divided into two equal parts: the Duffer "mugged" up one; John the other. Then the Caterpillar would be summoned, and glean the harvest. The Duffer had a crib or two, but the Caterpillar forbade their use.
"You kids," said he, "ought not to use 'Bohns.' Besides, it's dangerous."
The Caterpillar's deportment and coolness filled John and the Duffer with respect and admiration. The master in charge of the Lower Remove happened to be short-sighted. The Caterpillar took shameful advantage of this. At repetitions, for instance, he would read Horace's odes off a torn-out page concealed in the palm of his hand, or—if practicable—pin the page on to the master's desk.
He had genius for extricating himself (and others) out of what boys call tight places. One anecdote, well known to the Lower School and repeated as proof of the Caterpillar's masterly methods, may serve to illustrate the sort of influence Egerton wielded. When he was in the Fourth, his form met in the Old Schools in a room not far from that august chamber used by the Head Master and Upper Sixth. One day, the master in charge of the form happened to be late. The small boys in the passage celebrated his absence with dance and song. When the belated man arrived, a monitor awaited him. The Head Master presented his compliments to Mr. A—— and wished to learn the names of the boys who had created such a scandalous disturbance. Mr. A—— invited the roysterers to give up their names under penalties of extra school. Hateful necessity! Silence succeeded. A—— grew irate. The monitor tried to conceal a smile.
"Any boy who was making any noise at all—stand up."
The Caterpillar rose slowly, long and thin, spick and span.
"If you please, sir," said he, "I was whispering!"
A——'s sense of humour was tickled.
"My compliments to the Head Master," said he, "and please tell him that I find, on careful inquiry, that Egerton was—whispering."
A shout of laughter from Olympus proclaimed that the message had been delivered. The Caterpillar had saved the situation.
John became a disciple of this accomplished young gentleman and tried to imitate him. For Egerton represented, faithfully enough, traditions to which John bowed the knee. Upon any point of schoolboy honour his authority ruled supreme. He told the truth among his peers; he loathed obscenity; he disliked and condemned bad language.
"The best men don't swear much," he would say. "It's doosid bad form. I allow myself a 'damn' or two, nothing more. My great-grandfather, who was one of the Regency lot, was known as Cursing Egerton, but nowadays we leave that sort of thing to bargees."
Quite unconsciously, John assimilated the Caterpillar's axioms.
"We're not sent here at enormous expense to learn only Latin and Greek. At Harrow and Eton one is licked into shape for the big things: diplomacy, politics, the Services. One is taught manners, what? I'm not a marrying sort of man, but if I do have sons I shall send 'em here, even if I have to pinch a bit."
This was the side of Egerton which appealed so strongly to John. The Caterpillar was an Harrovian to the core, like the Duffer and Cæsar Desmond. He deplored the increasing predominance of sons of very rich men. And he anathematized Harrovian fathers who were persuaded by Etonian wives to send their sons to the Plain instead of to the Hill. That some of the famous Harrow families, who owed so much to the School, should forsake it, seemed to Egerton the unpardonable sin.
During this term, regretfully must it be recorded that John scamped his "prep" and "ragged" in form whenever a suitable chance presented itself. The Duffer and he bribed a "Chaw"[15] to throw gravel against the windows of the room where the boys were supposed to be mastering the problems of Euclid and algebra. The "tique"[16] master had been Third Wrangler, but he couldn't tackle his Division properly. Upon this occasion the "chaw" created such a disturbance that (on audacious demand) leave was granted to the Duffer and John to capture the offender. The young rascals pursued the "chaw" as far as the Metropolitan Station, and presented that conscientious youth with another sixpence. Then it occurred to John that it might be expedient to capture some bogus prisoner; so by means of talk, sugared with chocolates, they persuaded a little girl to impersonate the thrower of gravel. The little girl, carefully coached in her part, was led to the Wrangler, but stage-fright made her burst into tears at the critical moment. Somehow or other the truth leaked out; the Duffer and John were sent up to the Head Master and "swished." Each collected a few twigs of the birch, carefully preserved to this day.
Meantime, the Torpid house-matches were coming on, and the School agreed, wonderingly, that Dirty Dick's had a chance of being cock-house. The fact that the Manor has lost caste brought about this possibility. Boys just under fifteen found room at the Manor when other houses were full. All the Manorites in the Shell and Removes were fellows who had come to Harrow rather over than under fourteen years of age.
And when the list of the Torpid Eleven was posted, didn't John's heart boil with pride when he read his own name at the bottom of it?
The Manor won the first and the second of the matches. Then came the semi-final, with Damer's. When the teams met in the playing-fields the difference in the size of the players was remarked. Damer's Torpids were small boys, not much bigger than John or the Duffer. But they had behind them that stupendous force which is fashioned out of pride, esprit de corps, self-confidence begotten of long-continued success, and, strongest of all, the conviction that every man-Jack would fight till he dropped for the honour and glory of the crack house at Harrow. Not a boy in Damer's team was Scaife's equal as a player, but in Scaife's strength lay the weakness of the Manorites. They relied upon one player; Damer's pinned faith to eleven.
As it happened to be a fine day, the School turned out in force to witness the match. Most of the masters were present, and some ladies. Rutford, however, had business elsewhere. The School commented upon his absence with sly smiles and shrugs of the shoulder. Some of the Manorites were indifferent; the better sort raged. The Caterpillar appeared upon the ground in a faultless overcoat, carrying a large bag of lemons. His straw hat was cocked at a slight angle.
"One is really uncommonly obliged to Dirty Dick for staying away," he told everybody. "Speaking personally, the mere sight of him is very upsetting to me. Keen as one feels about this match, one can't deny that there is not room in a footer field for Dirty Dick and a self-respecting person."
None the less, the absence of their house-master had a bad effect upon the Torpids. Damer, you may be sure, had come down, prepared to cheer louder than any boy in his house; Damer, it was whispered, had been known to shed tears when his house suffered defeat; Damer, in fine, inspired ardours—a passion of endeavour.
Scaife won the toss and kicked off.
For the first five minutes nothing of interest happened. Damer's played collectively; the Manorites rather waited upon the individual. When Scaife's chance came, so it was predicted, he would go through the Damer's centre as irresistibly as a Russian battleship cuts through a fleet of fishing-smacks.
Rutford being absent, Dumbleton, the butler, stood well to the fore. He never missed a house-match, and no one could guess, looking at his wooden countenance, how the game was going; for he accepted either defeat or victory with a dignified self-restraint. A smart bit of work provoked a bland, "Well played, sir, very well played, sir!" uttered in the same respectful tone in which he requested Lovell, let us say, to go to Mr. Rutford's study after prayers. The fags believed that "Dumber," who had begun his career as boot-boy at the Manor in the glorious days of old, had given notice to leave when he learned that Dirty Dick was about to assume command; but had been prevailed upon to stay by the promise of an enormous salary. Nothing disturbed his equanimity. On the previous Saturday evening, John had heated the wrong end of the poker in No. 15, knowing that Dumber's duty constrained him to march round the House after "lights out," to rake out any fires that might be still burning. Snug under his counterpane, the practical joker awaited, chuckling, a choleric word from the impassive and impeccable butler. How did Dumber divine that the poker was unduly hot and black with soot underneath? Who can answer that question? The fact remains that he seized John's best Sunday trousers which were laid out on a chair, and holding the poker with these, accomplished his task without remark or smile. The trousers had to be sent to the tailor's to be cleaned.
Not far from Dumber stood a group of small boys, including the unhappy Fluff—unhappy because he was not playing, despite arduous training (entirely to please John) and systematic coaching. His failure meant further separation from John, whom, it will be remembered, he would have been allowed to call by his Christian name, had he been included amongst the Torpids. Of late, Fluff had not seen much of John, and in his dark hours he allowed his thoughts to linger, not unpleasantly sometimes, upon premature death and John's subsequent remorse.
Meantime, Scaife and Desmond were playing a furious game which must have proved successful had it not been for the admirable steadiness of the enemy. Lawrence watched their efforts with compressed lips and frowning brows. He knew—who better?—that his cracks were tearing themselves to tatters; but his protests were drowned by the shrill cheers of the fags.
"Rutfords—Rutfor-r-r-r-r-ds! Go it, old Demon!—Jolly well played, Cæsar!—Sky him![17]—Well skied, sir!—Ah-h-h-h! Well given—well taken!"
The last, long-drawn-out exclamation proclaimed that "Yards"[18] had been given to Scaife right in front of Damer's base. Damer's retreated; Scaife, with heaving chest, balanced the big ball between the tips of his fingers.
"Oh-h-h-h-h!"
Scaife had missed an easy shot. Lawrence could see that the boy was trembling with disappointment and mortification. Barbed arrows from Damer's small boys pierced Manorite hearts.
"Jolly well boshed, Scaife!—Good, kind, old Demon!—Thank you, Scaife!—" and like derisive approbation rolled from lip to lip. The Caterpillar turned to Lovell.
"Showing temper, ain't he?"
"Yes," said Lovell.
"Clever chap," said the Caterpillar, reflectively; "but one is reminded that a stream can't rise higher than its source. Not mine that—the governor's! Cæsar is facing the chaff with a grin."
The game began again. But soon it became evident that Scaife had lost, not only his temper, but his head. He rushed here and there with so little judgment that the odds amongst the sporting fellows went to six to four against the Manor. At the beginning of the game they were six to four the other way. And, inevitably, Scaife's wild and furious efforts unbalanced Desmond's play. Both boys were out of their proper places to the confusion of the rest of the team. Within half an hour Damer's had scored two bases to nothing.
The Caterpillar distributed halves of lemons. Lawrence went up to Scaife. The captain of the Torpids was standing apart, not far from Desmond, who was sucking a lemon with a puzzled expression. Gallant, sweet-tempered, and always hopeful, Cæsar could not understand his friend's passion of rage and resentment. With the tact of his race, however, he held aloof, smiling feebly, because he had sworn to himself not to frown. Had he looked to his right, he would have seen John, also sucking a lemon, but understudying his idol's nonchalant attitude and smile. John was sensible of an overpowering desire to fling himself upon the ground and howl. Instead he sucked his lemon, stared at Desmond, and smiled—valiantly.
"Scaife," said Lawrence, gravely, "you're not playing the game."
Scaife scowled. "I only know I've half killed myself," he muttered.
Lawrence continued in the same steady voice, "Yes; because you missed an easy base which has happened to me and every other player scores of times. Come here, Desmond."
Desmond joined them. Lawrence's face brightened when he saw hopeful eyes and a gallant smile.
"You don't despair?"
"We'll knock 'em into smithereens yet."
"That's the Harrow spirit, but temper your determination to win with a little common sense. You've overdone it, both of you. Take my tip: they'll play up like blazes. Defend your own base; and then, when they're spent, trample on 'em."
"Thank you," said Desmond.
Scaife nodded sulkily.
None the less he had too great respect for Lawrence's ability and experience as a captain to disregard his advice. After the kick-off, Damer's did play up, and the Manor had to defend its base against sustained and fierce attack. Again and again a third base was almost kicked, again and again superior weight prevailed in the scrimmages. Within ten minutes Damer's were gasping and weary. And then, the ball was forced out of the scrimmage and kicked to the top side, Desmond's place in the field. Comparatively fresh, seeing the glorious opportunity, grasping it, hugging it, Cæsar swooped on the ball. He had the heels of any boy on the opposite side. Down the field he sped, faster and faster, amid the roars of the School, roars which came to his ears like the deep booming of breakers upon a lee shore. To many of those watching him, the sight of that graceful figure, that shining, ardent face, revealing the promise which youth and beauty always offer to a delighted world, became an ineffaceable memory. Damer turned to the Head of his house.
"And Desmond ought to be one of us," he groaned.
And now Cæsar had passed all forwards. If he keeps his wits a base is certain. The full back alone lies between him and triumph. But this is the moment, the psychological moment, when one tiny mistake will prove irrevocable. The Head of Damer's whispers as much to Damer, who smiles sadly.
"His father's son will not blunder now," he replies.
Nor does he. The mistake—for mistake there must be on one side or t'other—is made by Damer's back. As the ball rolls halfway between them, the back hesitates and falters.
One base to two—and eighteen minutes to play!
The second base was kicked by Scaife five minutes later.
By this time the School knew that they were looking on at a cock-house match, not a semi-final. It was the wealth of Dives against the widow's mite that the winner of this match would defeat easily either of the two remaining houses. And not a man or boy on the ground could name with any conviction the better eleven. The betting languished at evens.
Moreover, both sides were playing "canny," risking nothing, nursing their energies for the last furious five minutes. Damer began to fidget; than he dropped out of the front rank of spectators. He couldn't stand still to see his boys win—or lose. He paced up and down behind the fags, who winked at each other.
"Damer's got the needle," they whispered.
Dumbleton, however, stood still; a graven image of High Life below Stairs.
"What do you think, Dumber?" asked Fluff.
"I think, my lord," replied Dumber, solemnly, "that every minute improves our chance, but if it goes on much longer," he added phlegmatically, "I shall fall down dead. My 'eart's weak, my lord."
This was an ancient joke delivered by Dumber as if it were brand-new, and received by the fags in a like spirit.
"Bless you, you've got no heart, Dumber. It's turned into tummy long ago," or, in scathing accents, "It's not your heart that's out of whack, Dumber, but your blithering old headpiece. What a pity you can't buy a new one!" and so on and so forth.
Very soon, however, this chaff ceased. Excitement began to shake the spectators. They felt it up and down their spinal columns; it formed itself into lumps in their throats; it gave one or two cramp in the calves of their legs; it reddened many cheeks and whitened as many more. The Caterpillar pulled out his watch.
"Three and a half minutes," he announced in a voice which fell like the crack of doom upon the silent crowd. If they could have cheered or chaffed! But the absolute equality of the last desperate struggle prevented any demonstration. The ball was worried through a scrimmage, escaped to the right, slid out to the left, only to be returned whence it came. It seemed as if both sides were unable to kick it, and when kicked it seemed to refuse to move as if weighted by the ever-increasing burden of suspense....
"Now—now's your chance!" yelled the Manorites. To their flaming senses the ball appeared to be lying, a huge blurred sphere, upon the muddy grass; and the Elevens were stupidly staring at it. The Saints be praised! Some fellow can move. Who is it? The players, big and little, are so daubed with mud from head to foot as to be unrecognizable. Ah-h-h! It's young Verney.
"Good kid! Well played—I say, well played, well pla-a-a-a-yed!"
Our John has, it seems, distinguished himself. He has charged valiantly into the captain of Damer's at the moment when that illustrious chief is about to kick the ball to a trusted lieutenant on the left. He succeeds in kicking the ball into John's face. John goes over backwards; but the ball falls just in front of the Duffer.
"Kick it, Duffer—kick it, you old ass!"
The Duffer kicks it most accurately, kicks it well out to the top side. Now, can Desmond repeat his amazing performance? Yes—No—he can't. The conditions are no longer the same. Half a dozen fellows are between him and the Damer base.
Alas! The Manor is about to receive a second object-lesson upon the fatuity of trusting to individuals. Confident in Cæsar's ability to take the ball at least within kicking distance of the base, they have rushed forward, leaving unguarded their own citadel. Cæsar, going too fast, misjudges the distance between himself and the back. A second later the ball is well on its way to the Manor's base. The back awaits it, coolly enough; knowing that Damer's forwards are offside. Then he kicks the sodden, slippery ball—hard. An exclamation of horror bursts from the Manorites. Their back has kicked the ball straight into the hands of the Damerite captain, the steadiest player on the ground.
"Yards!"
The chief collects himself for a decisive effort, and then despatches the ball straight and true for the target.
It passed between the posts within forty-five seconds of time.