“I know he had, and I don’t mind telling you now that I thought so at the time, and, still more surprising, he came to recognise it himself. It’s the only time I’ve ever known Nick concede anything. You ought to go and see him one of these days. He’d be delighted.”
“I should like to. But, I say, Mr Sefton, I should burst out laughing in his face, because I should always be thinking of the day I marched up solemnly behind him in chapel.”
“We’ve often shouted over that. Williams never could forget it. By the way, Williams has taken orders now. Fancy, Williams a parson. He’s gone in for a parish and matrimony. He’d like to see you too. Who’s that?” he broke off. “Come in, can’t you! Oh, it’s you, Clay? Here. Sit down.”
“I thought I’d find Haviland here,” said the other master, who though of peppery habit in school could be genial enough outside.
And then they got on to all sorts of old reminiscences, of which the episode of the ghost in Hangman’s Wood was the one which caused the two masters to laugh until their sides ached.
“Fancy Cetchy turning out a king!” said Mr Clay, at last. “We ought to have a sort of Zulu royal arms stuck up over the gate here.”
“Tell him about how nearly Cetchy came to having your head chopped off, Haviland,” said Mr Sefton.
“He’d have done it, too, and worse, if I hadn’t been who I am. No, really, that was the most extraordinary thing that could have happened. We had given ourselves up, entirely, Oakley and I.”
“I should think so,” rapped out Mr Sefton. “They didn’t call Cetchy ‘Haviland’s Chum’ here to no purpose. Eh?”
“Well, you’ve had some rum experiences since you left us, Haviland,” said Clay. “And here I and Sefton have been planted, grinding the mill, year in year out—same old grind—all that time. What d’you suppose will be the end of a fellow like Cetchy?”