CHAPTER XIII.
A RETROSPECT—AND A FLUTTERING OF HEARTS.
Comethup Willis had passed his sixteenth birthday, and could afford to smile, with something of complacency, at the thought of that small and trembling boy who, eight long years before, had parted from the captain at the school gate on a certain summer evening. Yet, looking back over the years themselves, though they had been long in the going, the span of them seemed not so great after all. Comethup thought, with a comfortable sigh of content, what happy years they had been; what a wonderful time of close, strong friendships, and boyish vows of faithfulness; what days of work and play, and strong and vigorous life; what nights of perfect, dreamless sleep!
It had indeed been a happy time; he wondered, in his grateful heart, if ever boy had been so blessed before. The school had been a good and healthy one—a place where a boy was taught to work hard and to play harder; and Comethup, in the atmosphere of it, had grown into a tall, straight-limbed lad, with a strength about him which his dreamy face and slow, quiet smile belied.
He sat on a seat in the playground, with his head leaning against the trunk of a tree, and dreamily watched the boys at play, and thought about the eight years that had slipped so peacefully by. To-morrow was to be his last day at school; to-morrow the captain was coming, quite early in the morning, and they were going away together in the evening. The captain always came early on great match days; and to-morrow was a great match day, and Comethup was to play for the school for the last time.
Comethup thought of the captain with tenderness; remembered his many visits to the school, and the keen delight he had taken in his young friend’s progress. Was it not the captain who had been present on that memorable occasion when Comethup Willis made his first century? That was two years ago, before the boy had shown signs of growing to his present height. It is a matter for doubt as to which of them—the captain or Comethup—trembled the most on that occasion. It had been one of those disastrous days, from the schoolboy’s standpoint, when luck had gone clean against them; when unfeeling rivals had bowled balls and manipulated catches in a manner which appeared to leave no hope of victory. Comethup had gone in last but one, and it was the first great match he had played in. He remembered now, as though it were yesterday, how he had seemed to see a crowd of faces in a great square about him, and here and there a little patch of colour from a lady’s dress; remembered, too, how he had passed the captain on his way to the wicket, and of how the captain, in a trembling voice, had whispered to him huskily to save the day. As he bent over his bat for a moment he murmured a prayer—for which he may surely be forgiven—that God would let him save the day and please the captain.
His heart leaped a little, even now, at the thought of that day; at the thought of how he managed to get most of the bowling, while the other batsmen “kept his end up”; of the cheering, frantic crowd of boys as he hit as he had never hit before—as one inspired, indeed—while the score crept steadily up on the board; of the wild tumult when the hit was made which assured them of victory; of the carrying out of his bat, while a score of youngsters struggled for the honour of bearing him shoulder-high to the tent. He remembered it all perfectly, and smiled at the recollection; smiled, too, to think how the captain had marched proudly in front while the boy was carried along; and of how, when he grasped Comethup’s hand, there had been tears in the little gentleman’s eyes.
In everything that had happened in his school life the captain seemed to have taken a prominent place. There was scarcely a boy in the great school who did not know him—scarcely one, indeed, with whose name he was not familiar. Nearly every half-holiday had seen his erect figure turn in at the gates, and his quick eyes, under the gray eyebrows, look about in search for Comethup. On summer days, when the cricket field was dotted with white fingers and the pleasant click of bat against ball was heard in the drowsy afternoon, the captain was there, and never a stroke, good or bad, escaped him; on winter days, when the snow was deep and boys were blowing on cold fingers, and the sharp cries and shouts of the sliders cut keenly through the frosty air, there was the captain again, buttoned to the chin, clapping his gloved hands furiously, and laughing with the best of them. He had become, in time, quite an institution, and may be said to have again considerably renewed his youth, in that place where youth was monarch of all.