CHAPTER XXI
KING OF RANLEIGH
Such a scene had never before been witnessed at Ranleigh. Boys positively became frantic. They cheered and cheered as if they would keep on for ever. As for Bert Seymour, he waved his arms overhead and danced in his excitement, surely an unusual state of affairs with one so noted for sedateness.
And through the noise and the lanes of Ranleighans processed Susanne and his followers. There was a curious air of suppressed excitement and determination about them all. They turned neither to left nor to right, and acknowledged none of the frantic greetings thrown at them. Clive himself marched to the dais hands in pockets, not even deigning to glance at Mr. Axim. The latter's face was indeed a study.
"What's this?" he had asked himself at the commencement of the commotion which had ushered in this strange procession. "Feofé? Ah! One of Darrell's special chums, and, of course, the others close in tow. Members of the Old Firm. Can't help admiring the way they stick to a friend, but it's wasted labour."
The distraction was, in any case, at the very commencement welcome to him. We must be absolutely fair in our dealings with this master, and declare that indignation at the doubt cast on his own shrewdness and at Bert's open criticism of his method of summing up the evidence against Clive Darrell was beginning to give way to something approaching doubt of himself. Had he been absolutely impartial? Had he flown to conclusions, and taken too little heed of Clive's persistent denials and dogged refusal to discuss matters with him?
"Ought to have taken the fellow's nature into account," Mr. Axim was telling himself, for he wasn't at heart an unkindly master, nor even unfair. He was hasty, no doubt, and apt to allow prejudice to control his thoughts and actions. But when all was said and done, Mr. Axim was a Ranleighan, and at Ranleigh they go in for a fine stamp of master. And to the credit of this particular one, let it be stated that he was already discounting the wisdom of his late efforts.
"Supposing I'm wrong, and Clive's innocent? Supposing I've been hasty?" he asked himself. "Pshaw! We never got on well together. Didn't understand one another, I suppose. But that shouldn't make me unfair in my dealings with him. I—I——"
"You've acted like a hasty fool!" Old B. told him bluntly, for Mr. Axim in his agitation was speaking in a loud whisper. "You've been hard on the boy. He's innocent. I'll—hang it, man! I'll back him yet to be King of Ranleigh."
"But—but——"