“You won’t tell!”
“No; if it is nothing very bad. Honour bright.”
“Stop a bit, Hurst,” hastily interposed Bywater. “There’s no knowing what he may think ‘very bad.’ Give generals, not particulars. Here the fellow comes, I do believe!”
“It was only a trick we were going to play old Ketch,” whispered Hurst. “Come out quickly; better that he should not hear us, or it may spoil sport for another time. Gently, boys!”
Hurst and the rest stole round the cloisters, and out at the south door. Hamish and Arthur followed, more leisurely, and less silently. Ketch came up.
“Who’s this here, a-haunting the cloisters at this time o’ night? Who be you, I ask?”
“The cloisters are free until they are closed, Ketch,” cried Hamish.
“Nobody haven’t no right to pass through ‘em at this hour, except the clergy theirselves,” grumbled the porter. “We shall have them boys a-playing in ‘em at dark, next.”
“You should close them earlier, if you want to keep them empty,” returned Hamish. “Why don’t you close them at three in the afternoon?”
The porter growled. He knew that he did not dare to close them before dusk, almost dark, and he knew that Hamish knew it too; and therefore he looked upon the remark as a quiet bit of sarcasm. “I wish the dean ‘ud give me leave to shut them boys out of ‘em,” he exclaimed. “It ‘ud be a jovial day for me!”