Mike at Wrykyn (18 page)

He read
it during school, under the desk; and ceased to wonder. Bob had had cause to
look worried. For the thousand and first time in her career of crime Marjory
had been and done it! With a strong hand she had shaken the cat out of the bag,
and exhibited it plainly to all whom it might concern.

There
was a curious absence of construction about the letter. Most authors of
sensational matter nurse their bomb-shell, lead up to it, and display it to the
best advantage. Marjory dropped hers into the body of the letter, and let it
take its chance with the other news-items.

“Dear Bob [the
letter ran],

“I hope you are quite well. I am quite well. Phyllis has a cold.
Ella cheeked Mademoiselle yesterday, and had to write out ‘Little Girls must be
polite and obedient’ a hundred times in French. She was jolly sick about it. I
told her it served her right. Joe made eighty-three against Lancashire. Reggie
made a duck. Have you got your first? If you have, it will be all through Mike.
Uncle John told Father that Mike pretended to hurt his wrist so that you could
play instead of him for the school, and Father said it was very sporting of
Mike but nobody must tell you because it wouldn’t be fair if you got your first
for you to know that you owed it to Mike and I wasn’t supposed to hear but I
did because I was in the room only they didn’t know I was (we were playing
hide-and-seek and I was hiding) so I’m writing to tell you,

“From your affectionate sister

“Marjory.”

There
followed a P.S.

“I’ll tell you what you ought to do. I’ve been reading a jolly good
book called ‘The Boys of Dormitory Two,’ and the hero’s an awfully nice boy
named Lionel Tremayne, and his friend Jack Langdale saves his life when a beast
of a boatman who’s really employed by Lionel’s cousin who wants the money that
Lionel’s going to have when he grows up stuns him and leaves him on the beach
to drown. Well, Lionel is going to play for the school against Loam-shire, and
it’s
the
match of the season, but he goes to the headmaster and says he
wants Jack to play instead of him. Why don’t you do that?

“M.

“P. P. S.—This has been a frightful fag to write.”

For the
life of him Mike could not help giggling as he pictured what Bob’s expression
must have been when his brother read this document. But the humorous side of
the thing did not appeal to him for long. What should he say to Bob? What would
Bob say to him? Dash it all, it made him look such an awful
ass!
Anyhow,
Bob couldn’t do much. In fact he didn’t see that he could do anything. The team
was filled up, and Burgess was not likely to alter it. Besides, why should he
alter it? Probably he would have given Bob his colours anyhow. Still, it was
beastly awkward. Marjory meant well, but she had put her foot right in it.
Girls oughtn’t to meddle with these things. No girl ought to be taught to write
till she came of age. And Uncle John had behaved in many respects like the
Complete Rotter. If he was going to let out things like that, he might at least
have whispered them, or looked behind the curtains to see that the place
wasn’t chock-full of female kids. Confound Uncle John!

Throughout
the dinner-hour Mike kept out of Bob’s way. But in a small community like a
school it is impossible to avoid a man for ever. They met at the nets.

“Well?”
said Bob.

“How do
you mean?” said Mike.

“Did
you read it?”

“Yes.”

“Well,
is it all rot, or did you—you know what I mean— sham a crocked wrist?”

“Yes,”
said Mike, “I did.”

Bob
stared gloomily at his toes.

“I mean,”
he said at last, apparently putting the finishing touch to some train of
thought, “I know I ought to be grateful, and all that. I suppose I am. I mean
it was jolly good of you— Dash it all,” he broke off hotly, as if the putting
his position into words had suddenly showed him how inglorious it was, “what
did you want to do it for? What was the idea? What right have you got to go
about playing Providence over me? Dash it all, it’s like giving a fellow money
without consulting him.”

“I
didn’t think you’d ever know. You wouldn’t have if only that ass Uncle John
hadn’t let it out.”

“How
did he get to know? Why did you tell him?”

“He got
it out of me. I couldn’t choke him off. He came down when you were away at
Geddington, and would insist on having a look at my arm, and naturally he
spotted right away there was nothing the matter with it. So it came out; that’s
how it was.”

Bob
scratched thoughtfully at the turf with a spike of his boot.

“Of
course, it was awfully decent—”

Then
again the monstrous nature of the affair came home to him.

“But
what did you do it for? Why should you ruin your own chances to give me a look
in?”

“Oh, I
don’t know…. You know, you did
me
a jolly good turn.”

“I
don’t remember. When?”

“That
Firby-Smith business.”

“What
about it?”

“Well,
you got me out of a jolly bad hole.”

“Oh,
rot! And do you mean to tell me it was simply because of that—?”

Mike
appeared to him in a totally new light. He stared at him as if he were some
strange creature hitherto unknown to the human race. Mike shuffled uneasily
beneath the scrutiny.

“Anyhow,
it’s all over now,” Mike said, “so I don’t see what’s the point of talking
about it.”

“I’m
hanged if it is. You don’t think I’m going to sit tight and take my first as if
nothing had happened?”

“What
can you do? The list’s up. Are you going to the Old Man to ask him if I can
play, like Lionel Tremayne?”

The
hopelessness of the situation came over Bob like a wave. He looked helplessly
at Mike.

“Besides,”
added Mike, “I shall get in next year all right. Half a second, I just want to
speak to Wyatt about something.”

He
sidled off.

“Well,
anyhow,” said Bob to himself, “I must see Burgess about it.”

CHAPTER
XXII

WYATT IS REMINDED OF AN ENGAGEMENT

THERE are situations in
life which are beyond one. The sensible man realizes this, and slides out of
such situations, admitting himself beaten. Others try to grapple with them, but
it never does any good. When affairs get into a real tangle, it is best to sit
still and let them straighten themselves out. Or, if one does not do that,
simply to think no more about them. This is Philosophy. The true philosopher is
the man who says “All right,” and goes to sleep in his arm-chair. One’s
attitude towards Life’s Little Difficulties should be that of the gentleman in
the fable, who sat down on an acorn one day, and happened to doze. The warmth
of his body caused the acorn to germinate, and it grew so rapidly that, when
he awoke, he found himself sitting in the fork of an oak, sixty feet from the
ground. He thought he would go home, but, finding this impossible, he altered
his plans. “Well, well,” he said, “if I cannot compel circumstances to my will,
I can at least adapt my will to circumstances. I decide to remain here.” Which
he did, and had a not unpleasant time. The oak lacked some of the comforts of
home, but the air was splendid and the view excellent.

Today’s
Great Thought for Young Readers. Imitate this man.

Bob
should have done so, but he had not the necessary amount of philosophy. He
still clung to the idea that he and Burgess, in council, might find some way of
making things right for everybody. Though, at the moment, he did not see how
eleven caps were to be divided amongst twelve candidates in such a way that
each should have one.

And
Burgess, consulted on the point, confessed to the same inability to solve the
problem. It took Bob at least a quarter of an hour to get the facts of the case
into the captain’s head, but at last Burgess grasped the idea of the thing. At
which period he remarked that it was a rum business.

“Very
rum,” Bob agreed. “Still, what you say doesn’t help us out much, seeing that
the point is, what’s to be done?”

“Why do
anything?”

Burgess
was a philosopher, and took the line of least resistance, like the man in the
oak-tree.

“But I
must do something,” said Bob. “Can’t you see how rotten it is for me?”

“I
don’t see why. It’s not your fault. Very sporting of your brother and all that,
of course, though I’m blowed if I’d have done it myself; but why should you do
anything? You’re all right. Your brother stood out of the team to let you in
it, and here you are, in it. What’s he got to grumble about?”

“He’s
not grumbling. It’s me.”

“What’s
the matter with you? Don’t you want your first?”

“Not
like this. Can’t you see what a rotten position it is for me?”

“Don’t
you worry. You simply keep on saying you’re all right. Besides, what do you
want me to do? Alter the list?”

But for
the thought of those unspeakable outsiders, Lionel Treymayne and his
headmaster, Bob might have answered this question in the affirmative: but he
had the public school boy’s terror of seeming to pose or do anything
theatrical. He would have done a good deal to put matters right, but he could
not
do the self-sacrificing young hero business. It would not be in the
picture. These things, if they are to be done at school, have to be carried
through stealthily, after Mike’s fashion.

“I
suppose you can’t very well, now it’s up. Tell you what, though, I don’t see
why I shouldn’t stand out of the team for the Ripton match. I could easily fake
up some excuse.”

“I do.
I don’t know if it’s occurred to you, but the idea is rather to win the Ripton
match, if possible. So that I’m a lot keen on putting the best team into the
field. Sorry if it upsets your arrangements in any way.”

“You
know perfectly well Mike’s every bit as good as me.”

“He
isn’t so keen.”

“What
do you mean?”

“Fielding.
He’s a young slacker.”

When
Burgess had once labelled a man as that, he did not readily let the idea out of
his mind.

“Slacker?
What rot! He’s as keen as anything.”

“Anyhow,
his keenness isn’t enough to make him turn out for house-fielding. If you
really want to know, that’s why you’ve got your first instead of him. You
sweated away, and improved your fielding twenty per cent; and I happened to be
talking to Firby-Smith and found that young Mike had been shirking his, so out
he went. A bad field’s bad enough, but a slack field wants skinning.”

“Smith
oughtn’t to have told you.”

“Well,
he did tell me. So you see how it is. There won’t be any changes from the team
I’ve put up on the board.”

“Oh,
all right,” said Bob. “I was afraid you mightn’t be able to do anything. So
long.”

“Mind
the step,” said Burgess.

At about the time when
this conversation was in progress, Wyatt, crossing the cricket field towards
the school shop in search of something fizzy that might correct a burning
thirst acquired at the nets, espied on the horizon a suit of cricket flannels
surmounted by a huge, expansive grin. As the distance between them lessened, he
discovered that inside the flannels was Neville-Smith’s body and behind the grin
the rest of Neville-Smith’s face. Their visit to the nets not having coincided
in point of time, as the Greek exercise books say, Wyatt had not seen his
friend since the list of the team had been posted on the board, so he proceeded
to congratulate him on his colours.

“Thanks,”
said Neville-Smith, with a brilliant display of front teeth.

“Feeling
good?”

“Not
the word for it. I feel like—I don’t know what.”

“I’ll
tell you what you look like, if that’s any good to you. That slight smile of
yours will meet behind, if you don’t look out, and then the top of your head’ll
come off.”

“I
don’t care. I’ve got my first, whatever happens. Little Willie’s going to buy a
nice new cap and a pretty striped jacket all for his own self! I say, thanks
for reminding me. Not that you did, but supposing you had. At any rate, I
remember what it was I wanted to say to you. You know what I was saying to you
about the bust-up I meant to have at home in honour of my getting my first, if
I did, which I have—well anyhow it’s tonight. You can roll up, can’t you?”

“Delighted.
Anything for a free feed in these hard times. What time did you say it was?”

“Eleven.
Make it a bit earlier, if you like.”

“No,
eleven’ll do me all right.”

“How
are you going to get out?”

“‘Stone
walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage.’ That’s what the man said who
wrote the libretto for the last set of Latin Verses we had to do. I shall
manage it.”