“We’ll see,” he remarked coldly.
“You bet we’ll see,” agreed Dud, a strange recklessness taking possession of him. Somehow this morning Star didn’t look nearly so formidable, perhaps because his eyes were still heavy with sleep or because the flaming red bath-robe in which he was enveloped was so palpable an affront to good taste. Star stared an instant in perplexed surprise and then deliberately turned his gaze away from Dud’s pugnacious countenance, indicating contempt and scorn and several other things that riled Dud still further. From the cubicles holding the tubs came the rush and splash of water and the voices of the bathers. No healthy boy ever bathed silently, and the four in the tubs were, judging from the sounds, remarkably robust! Jimmy was chanting a football pæan at the top of his lungs, another boy was singing something remarkably tuneless and repetitional and the other two were exchanging badinage across the partition at the tops of their voices.
After a moment one of the doors opened, a very pink-hued youth emerged and it was the turn of one of the interested trio. Oddly enough the latter showed a strange disinclination to avail himself of his prerogative. Instead he offered in a whisper to let one of the others precede him. But the reply was a shake of the head, the boy not even removing his fascinated gaze from Dud.
There was nothing for it but to go then, and the youth went, disappearing behind the door most reluctantly. Star moved impatiently from one foot to the other. “You fellows in there, get a move on,” he advised loudly. “We’ve been waiting here ten minutes.”
“Keep on waiting, old chap,” replied Jimmy, interrupting his song. “Don’t know who you are, but you’re an awful fibber. I say, Dud, are you there?”
“Yes,” growled Dud.
“Hand me a piece of soap from the stand, will you?”
Dud wanted to say no, but thought better of it and ungraciously crossed the washroom and secured a cake of soap. “Catch,” he called.
“Stop it!” squealed Jimmy. “Don’t chuck! Here, pass it in.” The door opened a bit and Jimmy’s face appeared in the slit. “Squeeze in,” he whispered. “I’m through.”