“Does he know why he likes you?”
“Hasn’t the ghost of an idea. It worries him at times. Makes him want to try and get all over me.”
“Does he—at all?”
“Lots,” said Peter. “I fag at the blessed Cadet Corps simply because I like him. At rugger he’s rather a god, you know. And he’s a clean chap.”
“He’s clean.”
“Oh, he’s clean. It’s catching,” said Peter, and seemed to reflect. “And in a sort of way lately old Troop’s taken to swatting. It’s pathetic.” Then with a shade of anxiety, “I don’t think for a moment he twigged you were pulling his leg.”
Oswald came to the thing that was really troubling him. “Allowing for his class,” said Oswald, “that young man is growing up to an outlook upon the world about as broad and high as the outlook of a bricklayer’s labourer.”
Peter reflected impartially, and Oswald noted incidentally what a good profile the boy was developing.
“A Clean, Serious bricklayer’s labourer,” said Peter, weighing his adjectives carefully.
“But he may go into Parliament, or have to handle a big business,” said Oswald.