"On yer—on yer honour?"
"What next! Of course!" growled Trendall. "As if we were likely to break our word."
"I dunno. I dunno," muttered Tunstall, but so that they could hear. "Honour's a great word with you gents, and me and the likes of me don't understand it. But I should ha' thought that young chaps as wanted a job o' this sort done hadn't—well, five pound then, half within a week, the rest as you say."
A flash of indignant anger in Rawlings' eye, and a sudden heightening of Trendall's colour, had warned him to refrain from further speaking. He nodded to them both and showed them out obsequiously. As for the two who were to pay him for this job, they slunk away from the shop as if they were afraid of their own shadows. That last unmeant thrust on the part of Tunstall had gone home with a vengeance.
"The cheek of the brute," growled Rawlings. "What'd he mean about honour? What business is it of his, anyway? Eh?"
But in their heart of hearts they knew that the thrust was deserved. What honour could they have, indeed, when they were parties to such double dealing? However, a sharp run up to the school made them forget the incident. They were in good time for call-over, and went in to tea as if nothing unusual had happened. By the following morning they had persuaded themselves that their fears had been needlessly aroused, and that their precautions were unnecessary.
"Wish I hadn't been quite so free with that fellow Higgins," Rawlings whispered to Trendall as they went into Chapel. "The chances are the police have found the car and the man, and have decided that it was an easily explained accident. There was the broken steering gear to tell them its cause, and nothing to show that there was another car there or anyone else in the wrecked car, for that matter. I'm sorry about that sov. As to Tunstall, of course, if he don't have to swear an alibi, why, he won't get his money."
But breakfast brought a decided change to the situation. The meal was ended, "knock up" had sounded, this latter being a sharp rap given on the table occupied by the masters up on the dais. It called for silence, while Harvey made the round of the hall, inspecting table linen. Then followed grace as a rule, and immediately after the boys filed out of the Hall in regular order. Now, of a sudden, a familiar figure bounced on to the dais. It was the Headmaster. Dead silence followed, silence in which Rawlings could hear his heart thumping. It palpitated a moment later when the Head began to speak. He stood in the middle of the dais, his head thrown back, his eyes apparently closed, a smile on his face which might have deceived the unwary. But Ranleighans knew that something unpleasant was coming. The acidity of his tones even more than the words told them of his great displeasure.
"There was an accident on the road from Guildford yesterday," he said. "A man was killed. Certain Ranleigh boys were there. They will step forward."
Clive felt as if his legs would not support him. It was all very well to have formed resolutions, but acting up to them was an altogether different matter. He quaked. The severe tones of the Head, his austere manner, his obvious displeasure alarmed him. Clive hesitated. He looked across at Susanne, and saw that young fellow actually grinning. And then he took heart. He clambered over the long form between which and the table he was standing, and marched toward the dais. Susanne was already in motion. Masters followed close behind him, wearing a woebegone expression, while Bert and Hugh brought up the rear, their faces flushed with excitement.