“In three weeks?”
“You are a man who could do it,” said Toby. “And you see what it means. If Coles is elected captain Harley is doomed. If this fellow can keep him out the whole school will follow him, and there will be such a wave of enthusiasm for boxing that we shall knock all the other schools sideways at Aldershot.”
The little man slowly shook his head.
“He would want to pay me,” said he. “He wouldn’t understand. The whole school would know that Bobbie’s father was a pug.”
Toby made an almost angry gesture.
“When Rouse understands that you are the father of a boy at Harley,” said he, “he will understand the honour that you will be doing him.”
The little man stood looking into the distance. Toby spoke again.
“The time’s getting short. I’m going to take Bobbie back. You get along home to bed. You must be tired. Will you meet me in town to-morrow, and I shall be able to give you news of your boy?”
Bobbie looked from one to the other quizzically. The question of his return to Harley seemed to have been decided for him. There was little to be gained by saying again that he would not go back. Besides, it would be different now. The Old Boy who had been on secret service for Harley would be watching over his interests. That inconvenient secret was not now entirely his own. He would not need to worry about his father’s name. If all went well, his father would save Harley from Coles, and Harley would understand when Coles told the secret what great work his father had done.
He looked up. Toby and his father were shaking hands in the ponderous manner of two men making a solemn compact, and the troubled doubting on his father’s face was passing into a sober, trusting smile as Toby spoke to him.