As they reached the Cottage on the return trip, they saw Mr. Tuttle dancing toward them, wildly waving his arms.
The Senior Master halted his band.
"Fifteen to eleven!" shouted Mr. Tuttle ecstatically. "We win!"
The roar that followed was memorable. Eppie, the confectionery man, picking his teeth in his empty shop at the foot of the hill, threw away his toothpick and went to the kitchen to tell his wife that The Towers had won, and business for the rest of the afternoon would be brisk.
Two minutes later the jubilant invasion began. Dick Harrington was not one of the crowd that rushed, cheering down the hill. He was on probation, and Eppie's was out of bounds.
He stood in the Archway, lonely and miserable.
The team was due back at Hainesburg, the railroad station for The Towers, at eight-thirty. One or two Sixth Formers, flushed and almost incoherent with excitement, had asked the Senior Master for permission to organize a torchlight parade.
"Sure enough! Good idea!" exclaimed the Senior Master. "Go to it! Don't burn yourselves up, don't get lost, don't get in the way of the train and don't all have apoplectic fits as my friend Andrew here is promising to do shortly if some one doesn't put an ice compress on his enthusiasm. But go on. Give 'em a good time."
"Thank you ever so much, sir!" cried Andrew, "and I'll promise to cool off."