Chapter Twenty Six.
How the sword of Damocles still hangs over our heroes.
Dear Father,—Please come down here as soon as you can. We’re in a regular row. I’m awfully afraid fifty pounds will not quite cover it.
Please try and come by the next train as the case comes on on Saturday, and there’s not much time. We saw the magistrate yesterday, and made a clean breast. I hope they won’t transport us. He was very jolly helping us find the scent, and gave us a stunning lunch. We ran the big hunt right through, and are pretty sure to get our names on the “Sociables” list. I wish you and mother could have seen the view on the top of Welkin Beacon. The awkward thing is that Tom White may get transported instead of us, and it would be jolly if you could come and get him off. Coote wasn’t in it, but he’s backing us up. How is Tike? I hope they wash him regularly. If I’m not transported, I shall be home in eight weeks and three days and will take him out for walks.
Love to mother, in which all join,—Your affectionate son, Basil.
P.S.—If you come, don’t take Fegan’s cab—he’s a cheat. Old White will drive you cheap. He’s Tom’s father. Georgie sends his love.
The reader may imagine, if he can, the consternation with which Mr and Mrs Richardson read this loving epistle at breakfast on the Friday morning following the great hunt.
They gazed at one another with countenances full of horror and terror, like people suddenly brought face to face with a great calamity. At length Mr Richardson said:—
“Where’s the Bradshaw, Jane?”
“Oh, the train goes in half an hour. You have just time to catch it. Do go quickly. My poor, poor boy!”
The father groaned; and in another five minutes he was on his way to the station.
That morning, while school was in full swing, the porter entered the third class room with a telegram in his hand, which he took straight to the master.
“Richardson,” said the master, “this is for you.”
Dick, who was at the moment engaged in drawing a circle on his Euclid cover with a pencil and a piece of string, much to the admiration of his neighbours, jumped up as if he had been shot, and with perturbed face went up to receive the missive.
He tore it open, and, as he glanced at its contents, his anxious face relaxed into a complacent grin.
“From G. Richardson, London. I shall reach Templeton at 3:5 this afternoon. Meet me, if you can.”
“Huzzah, Georgie!” said he, as he returned to his seat. “Father’s coming down by the 3:5. Let’s all go and meet him.”
The “Firm” said they would, and, accordingly, that afternoon after dinner the trio sallied forth in great spirits and good-humour to give the anxious father a reception.
With the easy memory of youth, they forgot all about the probable object of his visit; or, if they remembered it, it was with a sort of passing feeling of relief that the Tom White “row” was now as good as over—at any rate, as far as they were concerned.
When Mr Richardson, haggard and anxious, descended from the carriage, it was a decided shock to encounter the beaming countenance of his son and hear his light-hearted greeting.
“Hullo, father—jolly you’ve come! Old White’s cab is bagged, but Swisher’s got a good horse to go. Here’s Georgie and Coote—you know.”
The bewildered gentleman greeted his son’s friends kindly, and then, disclaiming all intention of taking anybody’s cab, drew his son aside.
“What is all this, my boy? Your mother and I almost broke our hearts over your letter.”
“Oh, it’s all serene—really, father,” said the boy, a little disturbed by his father’s anxious tones. “We really wouldn’t have sent if the magistrate hadn’t said we’d better—would we, Georgie?”
“No; he said that was our only chance,” replied Georgie.
“If your two friends will take my bag up to the ‘George,’” said Mr Richardson, despairing of getting any lucid information out of the “Firm” as a body, “I should like a walk with you, Basil, on the strand.”
Coote and Georgie departed with the bag, and the father and son being left alone, Dick gave a simple and unvarnished narrative of the legal difficulties in which he and his friends were involved.
Mr Richardson’s heart beat lighter as he heard it. The scrape was bad enough, but it was not as bad as he had imagined, nor was the foolish boy at his side the monster of iniquity his letter had almost implied. They had a long talk, those two, that afternoon as they paced the hard, dry strand at the water’s edge and watched the waves tumbling in from the sea. They talked about far more than Tom White and his boat. Dick’s heart, once opened, poured into his father’s ears the story of all his trials and temptations, and hopes and disappointments, at Templeton.
The narration did him good. It cleared and strengthened his mind wonderfully. It humbled him to discover in how many things he had been wrong, and in how many foolish; and it comforted him to feel that his father understood him and judged him fairly.
It was late in the afternoon when their walk came to an end. Then Mr Richardson said:—
“Now, I suppose you and your friends have decided that I am to give you high tea at the ‘George’—eh?”
“Thanks,” said Dick, who had had a dim prospect of the kind.
“Well, I’ll come up to the school and see if I can get Dr Winter to give you leave.”
“Dr Winter doesn’t know about Tom White’s boat, you know,” said the boy, as they walked up. “I didn’t like to tell him.”
Dr Winter was easily persuaded to allow the “Firm” to spend the evening with Mr Richardson at the “George.”
The small party which assembled that evening at the table of the worthy paterfamilias did not certainly look like one over which hung the shadow of “transportation.” The talk was of “Tubs” and Harriers, of tennis and “Sociables,” of Virgil and Euclid; and as the first shyness of their introduction wore off, the “Firm” settled down to as jovial an evening as they had spent for a long time.
Only once did the shadow of their “row” return, when Mr Richardson, at eight o’clock, said:—
“Now, boys, good-night. I have a solicitor coming here directly.”
“About the trial, father?” asked Dick, with falling countenance.
“Yes, my boy. As the case comes on to-morrow, there is no time to be lost.”
There certainly was not; and Mr Richardson, before he went to bed that night had not only seen a good many persons, but had materially lightened his pockets.
Buying off the law, even in the most straightforward way, is an expensive luxury. The prosecutors, of Tom White, seeing that their victim had an unexpected backer, became very righteous and high-principled indeed. They could not think of withdrawing the case. It was a public duty—painful, of course, but not to be shirked. It pained them very much to bring trouble on any one, particularly an old shipmate; but they owed it to society to see he got his deserts.
They were, of course, wholly unaware of Mr Richardson’s special interest in the matter. Otherwise, they might have been even more virtuous and high-principled than they were. They looked upon him as a benevolent individual, bent on getting the half-witted vagabond out of trouble, and, as such, they knew quite enough of fishing to see that he was in their net.
Their own solicitor, too, knew something about this sort of fishing, and the unfortunate father spent a very unhappy morning floundering about in the net these gentlemen provided for him—extremely doubtful whether, after all, he would not be obliged publicly to incriminate his son, in order to solve the difficulty.
However, by dint of great exertion, he contrived to get the case adjourned for three days more. The prosecutors were, of course, shocked to see the course of the law delayed for even this length of time. It meant expense to them, as well as inconvenience. Of course Mr Richardson had to act up to this broad hint, and promising, further, not to make any attempt to bail their prisoner, he obtained their reluctant consent to a postponement till Wednesday, greatly to the disgust, among other persons, of Duffield and Raggles, who, mindful of their pleasant morning last Saturday, had come down with another five-pennyworth of chocolate creams, to watch the case again.
“Beastly soak it was,” said Raggles that afternoon, to Dick, who, acting on parental orders, had abstained with the “Firm” from visiting the Court. “They say there’s some idiot come all the way from London to stop the case. I’d like to kick him. What business has he to come and spoil our fun?”
“Look here!” said Dick, with a sudden warmth which quite took away the breath of Master Raggles. “Shut up, and hold your row, unless you want to be chucked out of the Quad.”
“What on earth is the row with you?” asked the astounded Raggles.
“Never you mind. Hook it!” retorted Dick.
Raggles departed, not quite sure whether Dick had not had too much “swipes” for dinner, or whether his run after the Harriers yesterday had not been too much for his wits.
Dick felt rather blue that afternoon as he watched the train which carried his father steam out of Templeton station.
He had somehow expected that this visit would settle everything. But instead of doing that, Mr Richardson had left Templeton almost as anxious as when he entered it. Dick couldn’t make it out, and he returned rather dismally to Templeton.
Here, however, he had plenty to distract his attention. The fame of the “Firm’s” exploit on the previous day was still a nine days’ wonder in the Den, and he might, had he been so inclined, have spent the afternoon in discoursing to an admiring audience of his achievement. But he was not so minded. He was more in the humour for a football scrimmage, and as to-day was the first practice day of the season, he strolled off to the fields, and relieved his feelings and recovered his spirits in an hour’s energetic onslaught on the long-suffering ball.
Rather to his surprise, Georgie did not join him in this occupation. That young gentleman, to tell the truth, was very particularly engaged elsewhere.
His proceedings during the last few days had not been unnoticed by his old patron, Pledge.
That senior, after his unceremonious deposition from the monitorship by Mansfield, had been considerably exercised in his mind how to hold up his head with dignity in Templeton.
He was acute enough to see that his chief offence in the eyes of these enemies had been, not open rebellion, or a flagrant breach of rules, but his influence over the juniors with whom he came into contact.
Over George Heathcote’s soul, especially, he saw that a great battle had been waged, and was still waging, in which, somehow or other, the two great parties of Templeton seemed involved.
So far, the battle had gradually gone against Pledge. Just when he had considered the youngster his own, he had been quietly snatched off by Dick, and before he could be recovered, the monitors had stepped in and taken Dick’s side, and left him, Pledge, discomfited, and a laughing-stock to Templeton.
Had they? Pledge chuckled to himself, as he thought of Mr Webster’s pencil, and of the toils in which, as he flattered himself, he still held both Heathcote and Dick. They were sure of their darling little protégés, were they? Not so sure, reflected Pledge, as they think. They might even yet sue for terms, when they found that by a single word he could change the lodgings of the two sweet babes from Templeton to the county jail.
He, therefore, in moderately cheerful spirits, allowed a day or two to pass, avoiding even a further visit to Webster; and then casually waylaid his old fag as he was returning, decidedly depressed in mind, from saying good-bye to Mr Richardson.
“Why, Georgie, old man,” said Pledge, “how festive you look! The change of air from my study to Swinstead’s has done you good. Where have you been all the morning?”
“I’ve just come up from the town,” said Heathcote, wishing he could get away.
“Ah, trying to square somebody up, eh? It’s not quite as easy as one might think; is it?”
Heathcote looked doubtfully up at his old senior’s face, and said nothing.
“It’s a wonder to me, you know,” said Pledge, turning his back and looking out of the window, “that your new angelic friends don’t somehow do it for you. There’s Mansfield, you know. One word from his lips would do the business. Everyone knows he never did anything low.”
“Mansfield never speaks to me,” said Georgie, more for the sake of saying something than because he considered the fact important.
“Really! How ungrateful of him, when you have been the means of enabling him to kick me out of the Sixth. Very ungrateful!”
“I never had anything to do with that,” said Georgie.
“No! You don’t, then, believe a fellow can make use of you without your knowing it. You can’t imagine Mansfield saying to his dear friends, ‘I’d give anything to get at that wicked Pledge, but I daren’t do it straight out. So I must pretend to be deeply interested in that little prig, Heathcote, and much concerned lest he should be corrupted by his wicked senior. That will be a fine excuse for having a slap at Pledge. I’ll take away his fag, and then, of course, he’ll resign, and we shall get rid of him!’”
“I don’t believe he really said that,” said Heathcote, colouring up.
“‘And then,’ he would say, ‘to bribe the youngster over, and keep him from spoiling all and going back to his old senior, we’ll manage to fool him about our precious new Club, and put his name on the list.’”
This was rousing Georgie on a tender point.
“If my name gets on the list, it will be because Dick and Coote and I ran through the hunt; that’s why!” he said, rather fiercely.
“Ha, ha! If they could only humbug everybody as easily as they do you. So you are really going to get into the Club?”
“I’ll try, if our names get on the list.”
“And you think they are sure to elect you? Of course you’ve done nothing to disgrace Templeton, eh?”
The boy’s face fell, and Pledge followed up his hit.
“They’d like you all the better, wouldn’t they, if they heard you and your precious friends are—well, quite a matter of interest to the Templeton police; eh, my boy?”
“We’re not,” stammered Georgie, very red. “You needn’t say anything about that, Pledge.”
“Is it likely? Don’t I owe you too much already for cutting me, and talking of me behind my back, and letting the monitors make a catspaw of you to hurt me? Oh, no! I’ve no interest in telling anybody!”
“Really, Pledge, I never talked of you behind your back, and all that. I didn’t mean to cut you. Please don’t go telling everybody. It’s bad enough as it is.”
Pledge chuckled to himself, and began to get his tea-pot out of his cupboard.
“You see I have to help myself now,” said he.
Georgie’s heart was touched. What with dread of the possible mischief Pledge could do him, and with a certain amount of self-reproach at his desertion, he felt the least he could do would be to fall into his old ways for this one evening.
It was just what Pledge wanted. How he longed that Mansfield and Cresswell and Freckleton could all have been there to see it.
“Mansfield is hardly likely to trouble his head about every errand even such an important personage as you run,” said he, in reply to one feeble protest from the boy. “Call yourself Swinstead’s fag by all means. You can still fag for me. However, it doesn’t matter to me. I can get on well enough without.”
“Oh, yes, I’ll try,” said Georgie.
That was enough. Pledge felt that too much might overdo it. So with this triumph he dismissed his youthful perturbed protégé for the night, and dreamed sweetly of the wrath of his enemies, when they discovered that after all he (Pledge) was master of the situation in spite of them.