Chapter Twenty Seven.
How the “Martha” comes home to her bereaved friends.
Pledge did well to sleep sweetly and enjoy his triumph while it lasted, for the battle which raged over the soul of George Heathcote was by no means ended yet.
“I say, Georgie,” said Dick, next day, as the “Firm” took a Sunday afternoon stroll along the cliffs. “Where on earth did you get to yesterday? You never turned up at football practice, and skulked all the evening.”
Georgie coloured. His conscience had already smitten him for detaching himself from his leader at a time of danger like the present; still more, for deserting him for a fellow like Pledge.
One result of Dick’s sovereignty had been that the “Firm” had contracted a habit of telling the truth to one another on all occasions. It was found to be the shortest cut to friendship, and a vast saving of time and trouble.
Georgie, therefore, however much his inclination, as moulded by Pledge, may have led him to prevaricate, replied, “I was in Pledge’s study.”
Dick whistled, rather a dismayed whistle.
“I thought you were out of that,” he said.
“So did I; but, I don’t know, Dick. He’s got to know all about our row, and if I don’t be civil to him he’ll let out on us.”
“How does he know? Who’s told him?”
“I never did,” said Coote.
“I can’t fancy how he heard. But he knows all about it, and he as good as says he’ll spoil our chance for the ‘Sociables’ if I don’t fag for him.”
“Beastly cad!” murmured Dick.
“He says, you know,” pursued George, “that it was all a spite of Mansfield’s against him—that making me Swinstead’s fag. They knew it would make him resign. It is rather low, isn’t it, to humbug me about just for the sake of spiting someone else?”
“It’s all a lie, Georgie. Pledge is one of the biggest cads in Templeton. I heard lots of people say so. Webster said so. He says he’d no more let a boy of his go near Pledge than he’d fly; and Webster’s not particular.”
“And I heard Cartwright say,” said Coote, by way of assisting the discussion, “that Pledge has done his best to make a cad of you, and nearly succeeded.”
“He said that?” said Georgie, hotly; “like his cheek! Has he done so, Dick?”
“Not much,” said Dick, frankly.
“I don’t feel myself a cad,” said poor Heathcote.
“Perhaps fellows can’t always tell, themselves,” said Coote.
There was a pause after this, and the “Firm” walked on for some distance in silence. Then Dick said:
“You’ll have to jack him up, Georgie, that’s all about it.”
“But I tell you he’ll let out on us,” pleaded Georgie, “and really I’ve only said I’ll fag now and then for him.”
“Can’t help, Georgie; We don’t want to have you made a cad of. It would smash up our ‘Firm,’ wouldn’t it, Coote?”
“Rather,” said Coote.
“Besides,” said Dick, “he’s such a cad, no one would believe him if he did tell of us. My father would shut him up. He’ll be down, you know, on Tuesday.”
Heathcote breathed hard. But when it came to a question of choosing between Pledge and the “Firm,” it needed no very desperate inward battle to decide.
“What had I better do?” he asked.
“Cut him,” said Dick.
“But suppose I’ve promised him?”
“That’s a nuisance. Never mind, we’re all in it, so we’ll send him a letter from the ‘Firm’ and tell him you cry off. It’s a bad job, of course, but it can’t be helped, and we’ll back you up, won’t we, Coote?”
“I should rather say so,” replied the genial junior partner.
So, that quiet Sunday afternoon, in an unpretentious and unsentimental way, a very good stroke of work was done, not only for the soul of Georgie Heathcote, but for Templeton generally.
The “Firm” were by no means elated at their decision, for they had yet to learn what revenge the senior would take upon them. Still, the effort and the common peril knit them together in bonds of closer brotherhood, and enabled them to face the future, if not cheerily, at least, with grim determination.
Pledge was considerably astounded that evening, just as he was speculating on the reason of Heathcote’s non-appearance, to see Coote’s round head suddenly thrust in at the door, and a small billet tossed on to the table.
Pledge was getting used to small billets by this time, and was rather tired of them. Coote, as he knew, was Cartwright’s fag; he therefore concluded that Cartwright was the writer of the note, and that being so, he pitched the paper unopened into the empty fireplace with a sneer.
He waited for another half-hour, and still Heathcote did not appear. Pledge didn’t like it, and began to grow concerned. Was it possible, after all, he had made too sure of his young friend?
Partly to pass the time, and partly with the vague idea that might throw some light on the matter, he had the curiosity to pick the neglected billet out of the hearth and open it.
His face went through a strange series of emotions as he read its extraordinary contents:—
Our Dear Pledge,—We think you will like to hear that Heathcote can’t fag for you. He doesn’t believe he really promised, but must be excused. We’ve made him do it because we don’t want him to be made a cad. He is very sorry, and hopes you won’t be a cad and let out about the row we are in. Excuse this short letter, and, with kind regards, believe us, our dear Pledge, your affectionate young friends, B. Richardson, G. Heathcote, A.D. Coote. Sunday afternoon.
This masterpiece of conciliatory firmness, which had cost the “Firm” an hour’s painful labour to concoct, brought out the angry spots on Pledge’s cheeks and forced some bad language from his lips.
The letter he had received from Mansfield a week ago had been nothing to this. Mansfield and he were equals, and a reverse at Mansfield’s hands was at least an ordinary misfortune of war.
But to be coolly flouted, and to have all the work of a term upset by three wretched youngsters, who called themselves his affectionate young friends, was a drop too much in the bucket of the “spider’s” humiliation.
He stared at the letter in a stupid way, like one bewildered. Even its quaint phrases and artless attempts at conciliation failed to raise a sneer on his lips. Something told him it was the hardest hit yet, and that out of the mouths of these honest babes and sucklings his confusion had reached its climax.
If Richardson, Heathcote, and Coote snapped their fingers at him in the face of all Templeton, who else would care a fig about him?
The one grain of comfort was in the possession of the secret of Mr Webster’s pencil, to which Pledge clung as his last and winning card.
How to make the most of it was the important question Pledge decided not to be impatient. Wednesday was to be the great election for the “Sociables,” and, if our heroes’ names appeared on the list, as rumour already said they would, his blow would tell best if held over till then.
So he sat down, and acknowledged the “Firm’s” note as follows:—
My Dear Richardson, Heathcote, and Coote,—Pray do as you like. Promises are never made to be kept by “Select Sociables” of your high character. I do not understand what you mean about your row. What row are you in? Are you in a row? You don’t call that little matter that I am expecting to talk to the “Sociables” about on Wednesday a row, do you? Please give my kind regards to Georgie Heathcote, and tell him he will need to beg hard before I trouble him to lay my cloth. No doubt he has given you many interesting stories of the miserable week he spent with me last holidays in London. I’m not surprised at his turning against me after that. I hope I shall not have to tell anyone some of the stories he has told me of Richardson and Coote. Excuse this long letter, and believe me, my dear young jail-birds, your “affectionate” P. Pledge.
This bitter effusion was read next morning by the “Firm” as they walked down to the “Tub.” Its full sting did not come out till after three or four careful perusals, and then the “Firm” looked blankly at one another with lengthened faces.
“I couldn’t believe any fellow could be such a cad,” said Dick.
“It’s jolly awkward!” said Heathcote. “You know he was awfully civil to me in London, and it does seem low to be cutting him now.”
“Civil, be hanged!” said Dick. “He tried to get hold of you to make a cad of you, that’s what he did; and you were precious near being one, too, when you came back, weren’t you?”
“Was I?” asked the humble Georgie.
“Rather,” said Coote; “everybody said so.”
“Well, of course,” said Georgie, “if that’s what he was driving at, it doesn’t matter so much.”
“Except that it makes him all the bigger a cad.”
“What on earth shall we do about the other thing?” asked Georgie.
“The row? We must cheek it, that’s all. If he does us over the ‘Sociable’ election, we can’t be helped.”
“And suppose he gets us transported?”
“Can’t do it, I tell you; my father will be up here, you know.”
There was a pause, and the “Firm” walked on. Then Georgie said:—
“I say, what does he mean about the stories I told about you and Coote. I never told any stories, that I remember. I never had any to tell.”
“Ah, I was wondering what that meant,” said Dick. “He speaks as if you’d been blabbing all sorts of things.”
“I really don’t think I ever did,” said Heathcote, ransacking his memory. “I may have said once I thought Coote was rather an ass, but that was all.”
“What made you tell him that?” said Coote.
“He asked me if I didn’t think so,” said Georgie, apologetically, “and of course I was bound to say what I thought.”
“Rather,” said Coote.
“But he’s telling crams about you, Dick,” said Georgie; “I’m quite sure of that. He used to try and make out you were a sneak and a prig; and perhaps I believed him once or twice, but that was while I was a cad, you know.”
“Oh, yes, that’s all right!” said Dick, putting his arm in that of his friend.
Pledge would have had very little consolation out of this short discussion, and if for the next two days he sat up in his study expecting that every footstep belonged to the “Firm” on its way to capitulate, he must have been sorely disappointed. Capitulation was the one consideration which had never once entered the heads of the honest fraternity.
That afternoon the town of Templeton was startled by an incident, which had it come to the ears of our heroes, as they sat and groaned over their “Select Dialogues of the Dead,” would have effectually driven every letter of the Greek alphabet out of their heads for the time being.
The event was nothing else but the arrival in port of the collier brig, Hail! Columbia with a cargo of coals from the Tyne, and mirabile dictu! with the Martha lying comfortably, bottom upwards, safe and sound, on her deck.
The collier, according to the account of the skipper, had been running across the head of the bay on the 5th of June last, in half a cap of wind from the shore, when it sighted the Martha drifting empty out to sea. Having sent one of his men after her to capture her, and being convinced by the absence of oars or tackle that she must have drifted from her moorings empty, he took her on board; and, as he was bound to deliver his cargo by a certain day, and the wind being against his putting into Templeton, he stowed his prize comfortably away amidships, where she had been ever since, awaiting his next call at Templeton.
With the free-and-easy business ways of his craft, he had neglected to send any letter or message announcing the safety of the Martha to her afflicted friends; and having been detained in this place and that by stress of weather or business, he had now, after more than three months’ absence, his first opportunity of restoring the lost property to its rightful owner.
If the simple fishermen of Templeton had been inclined to believe in miracles, the strange reappearance of the missing Martha at this particular time must have savoured of something of the sort. But being matter-of-fact folk, they contented themselves with lounging round the boat as she lay once more on the beach, staring at her, and wondering between their whiffs what the solicitors and judges would say now.
The skipper of the Hail! Columbia had neither the time nor the patience to discover who just now was the lawful owner of the boat. Some said Tom White; some said Tom White’s partners; some said the pawnbroker.
The master disposed the problem off his mind very simply by setting down the Martha on the beach, and letting those who chose to claim her settle their squabble among themselves.
The news of the return of the prodigal was not long in spreading; and by the time the Templeton boys came down for their afternoon bathe it was common property.
Our heroes heard it in the water, from Raggles, and immediately landed and dressed. They scarcely exchanged a word till they stood at the side of the Martha, where she lay in almost the same spot where two of them had seen her three-and-a-half months ago. Then Dick said:—
“Think of her turning up at last!”
“I half guessed she would,” said Georgie, “though I never expected it. I say, this settles our row, doesn’t it?”
“Pretty well. But of course Tom White may catch it for pawning the boat. He collared the money, you know.”
“Ah, but that’s not got much to do with us,” said Heathcote.
“Well,” said Dick, “we ought to back him right up, while we are at it. Besides, you know, we may still get into a row for letting her go, though she has turned up.”
Altogether the “Firm” were not very sure how far their position was improved by the recovery of the Martha. If Pledge, or any one, chose to tell tales, or if they themselves, in order to extricate Tom White, had to tell tales of themselves, all might yet go wrong. The one good thing, they decided, was that Mr Richardson, when he came to-morrow, would be saved the expense of buying at least one new boat for somebody.
Our heroes, as in duty bound, were at the station to meet the 3:5 train, and give the worthy paterfamilias a reception.
“Hullo, father,” cried Dick, as if he had only parted with his parent five minutes ago, “they’ve found her, I say. Do you see that two-masted collier in the harbour? She picked her up, the day after we slipped her. Isn’t it jolly?”
Mr Richardson certainly looked surprised, and a trifle relieved; but the matter did not yet occur to him in a “jolly” light.
“It’s a good thing she has come back,” said he; “and now, as I have a great deal to do, I’ll say good-bye for the present. I have sent a note to Doctor Winter, to ask him to let you breakfast with me at the ‘George,’ in the morning.”
“Thanks, awfully, sir,” said Coote, beaming all over.
Mr Richardson laughed.
“I’m afraid I only mentioned Basil in my note,” said he, “but I daresay we shall be able to have a meal together later in the day. Good-bye.”
“Rather cool cheek of you, Coote,” said Dick, as the “Firm” returned to the school, “cadging my father that way for breakfast.”
“Very sorry,” said Coote, humbly. “I thought we were all in it, that’s all.”
The evening passed anxiously for the boys, and no less so for poor Mr Richardson, who was buffeted about from pillar to post, from lawyer to lawyer, from boatman to pawnbroker, in his honest efforts to extricate his son from his scrape.
The recovery of the Martha, he found, made very little improvement in his prospects. For now she had come back, everybody seemed to be calculating the amount of money she would have brought in had she remained at Templeton during the busy season. This loss was estimated at several times the value of the boat, and the high-principled prosecutors would hear no suggestion of withdrawing the case until each one of them—partners, pawnbroker, and all—had been refunded the entire sum.
Then, when that was done, the lawyers pulled their bills out of their desks, and hinted that some one would have to settle them; and as neither the partners, nor the pawnbroker, nor Tom White, saw their way to doing so, Mr Richardson had to draw his own inferences and settle them himself. Then, when all seemed settled, the police recollected that they had had considerable trouble in looking after the case. They had made several journeys, and spent several hours on the beach looking out for the supposed thief. They had also had charge of Tom White for a fortnight; and what with postages, telegrams, and office fees, they were decidedly out of pocket over the whole business.
The long-suffering father put them in pocket, and after subscribing to several local charities, and consoling the reporters of the Templeton Observer and other such outsiders, he retired, jaded, but comforted, to the “George,” feeling that if his mission had been successful, it had cost him an amount of generosity which he could hardly have believed was in him.
When Dick, “with shining morning face,” presented himself next morning for breakfast, he little imagined how much of his father’s money was at that moment scattered about in Templeton.
“Huzza! father,” said he, when his parent presented himself in the coffee-room. “Such a game! Cresswell says he’ll give us his study this evening, so our ‘Firm’s’ going to give you a spread. Coote and Georgie are out ordering the tucker now—kidneys and tea-cake. I asked Winter when I went for my exeat if we might have you, and he said, ‘Yes; he’d be very glad.’ Mind you come. It’ll be a stunning spread, and Georgie and Coote are sure to pick out good things. I wish mother could come too.”
In the face of this hospitable outburst, Mr Richardson could hardly expatiate on the cost and anxiety of his mission to Templeton. A calmer moment must do for that. Meanwhile he delighted his son’s heart by accepting his invitation on the spot.
He allowed Dick and his two friends, if it fitted in with school rules, to be present in the Court to hear the end of Tom White’s case—a permission they were not slow to avail themselves of, although this time they occupied a modest seat at the back, and attempted no public manifestations of encouragement to the prisoner in court.
The case ended very simply. When it was called on, and Tom, as friendly as ever, was ushered into the box, no one appeared to accuse him, and the magistrates, rightly concluding this to mean that the prosecution had retired, dismissed the case accordingly.
Tom said, “Thank’ee, sir,” and looked quite bewildered on being told he might walk out of court a free man.
Our heroes, who had already got outside before he reached the door, deemed it their duty to complete their efforts in his favour by congratulating him on his escape.
“Jolly glad we are, Tom White,” said Dick, as the worthy mariner came towards them. “It was hard lines for you, and it wasn’t all your fault. It’s my father got you off, you know.”
“Thank’ee, young gentleman. It’s very hard on a hard-working mariner not to have his living. If you could spare a trifle and tell the gentlemen, I’d thank you kindly.”
“We haven’t got any tin to spare now,” said Dick, who knew that the resources of the “Firm” had been well-nigh exhausted in preparation for the spread in Cresswell’s study that evening; “but we won’t forget. Good-bye, old man. Jolly glad you’ve got out at last!”