“I know what he would come for,” retorted Paul, “and I’d come with him too. Guess!”
“Shan’t guess. Shall I, Padger?”
“May as well,” suggested Padger.
“He’d come,” cried Paul, not waiting for the Tadpole to guess—“he’d come a mile to see you hung. So would I—there!”
It was some time before the meeting got back to the subject of admitting the public. But it was finally agreed that, though the public were not to be invited, the door should be left open, and any one (“presenting his card,” young Bilbury suggested) might come in, with the exception of Loman, Mr Rastle, Tom Braddy, and the school cat.
For the next few days the Guinea-pigs and Tadpoles were busy, learning their parts, practising their songs, arranging all the details of their dramatic performance, and so on; and Mr Rastle had to “pot” one or two more of them, and detain one or two others, before he could get anything like the ordinary work of the class done. All this the young vocal, instrumental, and dramatic enthusiasts bore patiently, devoting so many extra ounces of dynamite to Mr Rastle’s promised blow-up for each offence.
At last the festival day arrived. Stephen, on whom, somehow, all the work had devolved, while the talking and discussion of knotty points had fallen on his two brother officers, looked quite pale and anxious on the eventful morning.
“Well, young ’un,” said Oliver, “I suppose Wray and I are to be allowed to come and see the fun to-night.”
“Yes,” said Stephen, with considerable misgivings about the “fun.”
“All serene; we’ll be there, won’t we, Wray? Not the first Guinea-pig kick-up we’ve been witness to, either.”