The Willoughby Captains - Reed Talbot Baines (книги бесплатно без регистрации TXT) 📗

And next moment he was gone.

Riddell continued to pace the room, half stupefied with bewilderment and misery.

“For goodness’ sake, don’t tell any one!” The cry rang in his ears till it drove him nearly mad.

Poor Wyndham! What must his state of mind be? What must it have been all this time, with that miserable secret lurking there and poisoning his whole life? And yet the chance had been given him, and he had clung to the secret still, and in the face of discovery had no other cry than this, “For goodness’ sake, don’t tell any one!”

That evening, so jubilant all over Willoughby, was one of the most wretched Riddell ever spent.

Chapter Twenty Six

An Explosion of “SkyRockets.”

Parson, Bosher, King, and the other Parrett’s juniors were in bad spirits. It was not so much the Rockshire match that was preying on the brotherhood, grievous as that blow had been. Nor were they at the present suffering under any particular infliction, or smarting under any special sense of injustice. Their healths and digestions were all tolerably good, and the mutual friendship in which they had been wont to rejoice showed no signs of immediate dissolution.

The fact was, they didn’t know exactly what was the matter with themselves. They could not pretend that it was remorse for the little amount of work they had done during the term, for they stoutly denied that they had done little. On the contrary, they insisted that they were being crammed to a shameful extent.

Nor was their conscience reproaching them for their past transgressions. Of course, they could not help admitting that they had occasionally got into rows lately, but, as every one knew, it was never their fault. It had always been owing to some accident or piece of bad luck, and it was quite enough to get punished for it, without being expected to reproach themselves for it.

No. When they came to think of it they didn’t see that they had anything to reproach themselves with. On the whole, they were more to be pitied than blamed. They invariably meant well, but they never got any credit for their good intentions, while they were everlastingly getting into trouble on account of their ill-luck!

The fact of the matter was, these virtuous young gentlemen were suffering from that most painful of maladies — dulness.

They had nothing to do — that is, they had nothing to do but work and play cricket. The latter was all very well, but even cricket, when it means three practices a day presided over by a strict senior, gets to be a little wearisome.

As for the work — they groaned as they thought of it. It hadn’t been so bad at the beginning of the term, when Bosher’s crib to the Caesar and Wakefield’s key to Colenso’s arithmetic had lent them their genial aid. But ever since Mr Parrett, in the vindictiveness of his heart, had suddenly started Eutropius in the place of Caesar, and Todhunter in the place of Colenso, life had barely been worth living.

It was this last grievance which was the special topic of discussion at an informal tea-party held, about a week after the Rockshire match, in Parson’s study.

The company solaced their wounded feelings with unlimited bloater-paste and red-currant jam, and under the soothing influence of these condiments, aided by the watery contents of Parson’s teapot, their sorrows found relief in words.

“I bet anything he pitched on Eutropius,” said Parson, with his cup to his lips, “because he knows nobody ever wrote a crib to him.”

“I don’t suppose any one could make him out enough,” said King. “It’s awful rot.”

“Yes, and Ashley says it’s awfully bad Latin.”

Parson laughed satirically.

“Jolly lot they care what sort of Latin it is as long as they can do us over it.”

“I believe,” said Bosher, “Gilks has a key to Todhunter.”

“He has? Young Telson had better collar it, then,” said King, whose opinions on the laws of property as regarded cribs were lax.

“Bah! What’s the use of bothering?” cried Parson, pouring himself out his eighth cup of tea. “If he pulls me up for not doing the beastly things I shall tell him they’re too hard, straight out.”

“Tell him it’s jolly gross conduct,” cried a voice at the door, followed immediately by Telson, who, contrary to all rules, had slipped across to pay a friendly visit.

He was welcomed with the usual rejoicing, and duly installed at the festive board.

“It’s all right if I am caught,” said he. “Gilks sent me a message to Wibberly, and I just dropped in here on the way. I say, who’s going to lick, you or Welch’s?”

“Welch’s!” exclaimed the company, in general contempt. “It’s like their cheek to challenge us. We mean to give them a lesson.”

“Mind you do,” said Telson, “or it’ll be jolly rough on Parrett’s. No end of a poor show you made at the Rockshire.”

“Look here, Telson,” said Parson, gravely, “suppose we don’t talk about that. We were just wondering if Gilks had got a key to Todhunter somewhere.”

Telson laughed.

“Wonder if he hadn’t! He’s got more cribs than school books, I think.”

“I say,” said King, most persuasively, “could you collar it, do you think, old man!”

“Eh? No,” said Telson; “I draw the line at that sort of thing, you know.”

“Well, then,” said King, evidently in a state of desperate mental agitation, “could you ever find out the answer for Number 13 in Exercise 8, and let me know it in the morning? I’d be awfully obliged.”

Telson said he would see, whereat King was most profuse in his gratitude, and Telson received several other commissions of a similar nature.

These little matters of business being satisfactorily settled, the company proceeded to the discussion of more general topics.

“Fearful slow term this,” said Parson, with a yawn.

“Yes,” said Telson, spreading a piece of bread with about a quarter-of-an-inch layer of jam; “we’re somehow done out of everything this term.”

“Yes. We can’t go out on the river; we can’t go into town; we can’t go and have a lark in Welch’s; you can’t come over to see us—”

“No; that’s a howling shame!” said Telson.

“We can’t do anything, in fact,” continued Parson (now at cup Number 9). “Why, we haven’t had a spree for weeks.”

“You seemed to think my diary was a spree,” said Bosher, meekly.

There was a general laugh at this.

“By the way, have you got it here?”

“No fear! I’ll take good care you don’t see it again, you cads!”

“Eh? By the way, that reminds me we never paid Bosher out for being a Radical, you fellows,” said Parson.

“Oh, no — oh, yes, you did!” cried Bosher. “I apologise, you fellows. I’ll let you see the diary, you know, some day. Really, I’m not a Radical.”

Fortunately for Bosher, the political excitement at Willoughby had quite worn away, so that no one now felt it his duty to execute the sentence of the law upon him and, after being made to apologise on his knees to each of the company in turn, he was solemnly let off.

“You see,” said Parson, returning to the point, “we’ve been up before Parrett twice this term; that’s the mischief. We might have chanced a spree of some sort, only if we get pulled up again he may expel us.”

There was some force in this argument, and it was generally agreed it would be better for Willoughby that the risk of a calamity like this should not be incurred.

“Fact is,” said Telson, cutting another slice of bread, “Willoughby’s going to the dogs as hard as it can. The seniors in our house are down on you if you do anything. I even got pulled up the other day for having a duel with young Payne with elastics. Awful spree it was! We gave one another six yards, and six shots each. I got on to his face four times, and once on his ear, and he only hit me twice. One of mine was right in his eye, and there was a shindy made, and I got sixty lines from Fairbairn.”