“Leave it to me,” Coles had said, and he had left it to Coles willingly.
Standing in the centre of a small group Coles was striving one afternoon to justify this touching confidence. He had spoken at length. Ultimately he looked round the solemn countenances of those about him to judge the effect of his words. Except upon the faces of his two cronies, who, since they were not prominent footballers, were not of great account, he could not see one hopeful sign. For the rest there was a stiffly decorous silence. At last Saville, who, as one of the only two old colours in Seymour’s, had been leaning gracefully against a wall, raised his voice.
“The point at issue is this,” he announced. “You can’t get away from the fact that the Head has insulted our house by thrusting his son on us like this, and we’re very sore. So far we haven’t even had the face to turn out a house team at footer simply because we were afraid that Roe might want to play. Now some misguided idiot—apparently Seymour himself—has gone to Morley in secret and arranged a challenge which Morley’s have accepted, and after that it’s clearly up to us to play. But we don’t want Roe on the side, and we’re not going to have him.”
“Oh, come,” said Coles, plausibly enough. “Be broad-minded about it. You don’t suppose Roe’s very happy about all this, do you? It isn’t a very jolly position for a fellow. I’ve had a few chats with him, and I can tell you he’d far rather not be here. What’s the use of denying ourselves even house Rugger just to spite him out of a game? What’s wrong with playing for the house? Most of us are nearly eating our hearts out for a game.”
“You haven’t got much to grumble about,” said Saville pertly. “You had two games for Morley’s before you came here. And now that I come to think of it, why did you come here? Can you tell us that?”
Coles shrugged his shoulders.
“I’ve never been able to find out. But it’s my personal belief that it was just an idea of the Head’s to break up what he thought was Rouse’s clique.”
“Why didn’t he move Nick, then?”
Coles was unable to reply. He made a little further play with his shoulders.
“I’ll tell you why it was,” said Saville. “It was because, having shoved his confounded son in here, he wanted to build up a strong house side for him to have at his back. And he pounced on you for a start because he thought you might be amenable to reason. A little later on he’ll move someone else in here, so that eventually Rouse will be left with a dud house team, and we in Seymour’s shall have the nucleus of a school Fifteen. He thinks we shall be as pleased as Punch about that and keep on clapping his son on the back every time we see him.”