The climax was reached at last when Bennett tripped over an outstretched hockey stick and measured his length on the ground. This rather alarmed the Lower School, the members of which hastened to make themselves scarce. By the time the porter had recovered himself, everybody had vanished, except Geraldine, who hurried to his assistance, and Bruno, who stood watching him from a safe corner.
"I say, I do hope you haven't hurt yourself?" said Geraldine solicitously.
Bennett shook his fist angrily in the direction of the departing children as he rose painfully to his feet.
"Young varmints!" he said. "I'll be even with 'em one day. I mayn't know their names but I knows their faces, and one day I'll make 'em sorry for this outrage. Come you here, you brute, you!" he added, addressing himself to Bruno, as he made another dive at the dog.
But Bruno was not disposed to yield himself up as yet, and another hunt followed. This time, however, Geraldine joined in the chase, and finally managed to catch and hold the dog until Bennett could reach him.
"Thank you, missie," said Bennett, more graciously this time. "I'm much obliged to you, I'm sure. Would you care to come and watch him bathed, now—seeing as you've helped to capture him?"
"Oh, I should love to!" said Geraldine, delighted at the idea of something to do this dull, wet morning. And she followed Bennett out to the washhouse on the farther side of the quadrangle, feeling happier than she had felt for some time. Talking to Bennett, surly as he seemed, would be better than talking to nobody at all.
Bennett, however, was not so surly as his outward manner had led her to believe. Geraldine's opportune aid in capturing Bruno, and her anxious inquiries as to whether he had hurt himself in his fall, had quite won his heart. He opened up to her on the subject of his experiences in war,—Bennett was an ex-soldier and had fought both in South Africa and in France,—and Geraldine was immensely interested in his reminiscences.
"I used to live in Germany a long time ago," she told him shyly. "I have been in France, too, but I don't remember much about it, for I was quite a tiny little thing then. Did you learn to talk French when you were fighting there?"
"I can't say as I did, exactly," said the man, scrubbing Bruno vigorously. "I learnt a word or two, here and there, such as 'Bong Jour' and 'Narpoo' and 'Beaucoup de Vin.' But not so as to be able to converse, so to speak. There was one chap in our company who was a regular nailer at speaking the lingo, but it got him into trouble in the end."