“It’s the fashion to be democratic here,” answered Marchmont, wisely. “And then he’s a football player, and that makes up for almost everything. He oughtn’t to have been captain; there’s where the mistake was made. Of course you’ve got to encourage such fellows, and it’s very creditable in them to try to make something of themselves and all that; but when you come to the important offices, they ought to go to fellows of a better class, who could represent the school decently.”
“Perhaps he was the only candidate.”
“No, there was Butler, who played guard on the other side. He’s an awfully nice fellow, though perhaps not so good a player as that big bruiser. The choice lay between the two, and Laughlin got it.”
“He certainly thinks he’s all right,” remarked Lindsay, a little spitefully. “He’s given me advice, on several occasions, about what I ought to do and not to do here in school.”
“And whom you ought to know, and where you ought to go, and how you ought to amuse yourself, and so on. He’s probably advised you against smoking, and told you always to tell the truth when you report.”
“That’s about it,” confessed Lindsay.
“That reminds me: have I ever shown you my postern gate?”
Lindsay stared blankly. “Postern gate!”
“Yes, my secret entrance. Come here.”
Lindsay followed his companion into a closet, where Marchmont lifted the oilcloth and showed a rectangular outline on the floor where several boards had been sawed through. These boards, which had been fastened together underneath to form a trap door, he lifted, disclosing a square opening between the floor timbers into the closet below.