“Don’t be profane,” said Bags. “You’re going to be confirmed.”
David wrinkled up his nose.
“Right oh,” said David. “Lord, do you remember the catechism classes at Helmsworth?”
David finished his father’s letter and tore it up.
“Grown-up people seem to think that we think the same way as they do,” he said. “That’s such rot. We might just as well expect them to think the same way as us. They’ve forgotten about being fourteen, and we never knew about being forty or fifty. Do you remember my pater’s sermon, too, about the chapel being the centre of school life, just because the cathedral is the centre of his? I think he’s forgotten a lot about being a boy.”
Bags had a certain persistency about him.
“Cribbing,” he remarked, “I don’t see why it’s any worse to get full marks for a thing by cribbing than to avoid an impot by cribbing. Either you crib or you don’t. If you crib, why not crib it all? I don’t see that Plugs is a bit worse than you. Blazes, why don’t you tell Maddox all about it? You’re such pals with him, though you are his fag.”
“My word, you do have rum notions,” he said. “It would be sneaking; Maddox always whacks fellows if he finds they crib!”
“But just confidentially,” said Bags.
“Simply imposh!” said David briefly.