"Then Gaspard also. He's a swimmer, and you, Rawlings."
All came to the front. All? No. Rawlings seemed to be deaf. Sturton had recognised him standing at the back of the crowd, and at the summons Rawlings had sidled away. In the distance, coming towards him at a fast pace, he espied a group of fellows bearing the ladder for which Clive had shouted. In a second he seized upon the opportunity and turned away. But Sturton knew his man, and summoned him again in a voice there was no denying.
"Rawlings," he called. "I shouted for you. You're either deaf and did not hear, or—coming?"
There was no way out of it. The lordly youth who had made matters so disagreeable both at home and at the school for Clive and his friends turned with as good a grace as he could summon, and pushed his way through the crowd.
"Did you call?" he asked lamely.
"Did he call?" echoed one of the prefects satirically, a chum of Sturton's, one, too, who had taken Rawlings' measure long ago. "Every man in the school heard your name."
"But you," interjected Barrold, a puny Sixth Form fellow, who made up for lack of inches by inordinate go and good spirits.
"Perhaps he didn't though," broke in Bagshaw, the scribe of Ranleigh, the scholar who was most often to be seen arm in arm with Harvey. Everyone knew that Bagshaw was the prince of good fellows, always anxious to save a row. They knew, too, that footer and cricket and swimming were forbidden to him. And yet Bagshaw pushed himself forward.
"Here, Sturton," he said brusquely, "let me come. I'm always put in the background. Rawlings is a strong chap and can help to manage the ladder."
And thus the incident was passed over. In the heat and excitement of the moment, too, there was every opportunity for fellows to forget it. Few, indeed, had overheard the satirical words uttered by Barrold and the other prefect. Still fewer had noticed the flush which came to Rawlings' face to hide the pallor with which it had been covered a moment before. And none were witness of the mutterings he gave vent to as he turned to meet the bearers of the ladder. But Sturton knew, the delicate Bagshaw also, that Rawlings had funked. Hugh Seymour learned of it, too, on the morrow.