Mike at Wrykyn (3 page)

“Jackson.
He’s in Donaldson’s.”

“I
know. A stout fellow. So you’re the newest make of Jackson, latest model, with
all the modern improvements? Are there any more of you?”

“Not
brothers,” said Mike.

“Pity.
You can’t quite raise a team, then? Are you a sort of young Compton, too?”

“I
played a bit at my last school. Only a kids’ school, you know,” added Mike
modestly.

“Make
any runs? What was your best score?”

“Hundred
and twenty-three,” said Mike awkwardly. “It was only against kids, you know.”
He was in terror lest he should seem to be bragging.

“That’s
pretty useful. Any more centuries?”

“Yes,”
said Mike, shuffling.

“How
many?”

“Seven
altogether. You know, it was really awfully rotten bowling. And I was a good
bit bigger than most of the chaps there. And my father always has a pro down in
the Easter holidays, which gave me a bit of an advantage.”

“All
the same, seven centuries isn’t so dusty against any bowling. We shall want
some batting in the house this term. Look here, I was just going to have some
tea. You come along, too.”

“Oh,
thanks awfully,” said Mike. “My brother and Firby-Smith have gone to a place
called Cook’s.”

“The
old Gazeka? I didn’t know he lived in your part of the world. He’s head of
Wain’s.”

“Yes, I
know,” said Mike. “Why is he called Gazeka?” he asked after a pause.

“Don’t
you think he looks like one? What did you think of him?”

“I
didn’t speak to him much,” said Mike cautiously. It is always delicate work
answering a question like this unless one has some sort of an inkling as to the
views of the questioner.

“He’s
all right,” said Wyatt, answering for himself. “He’s got a habit of talking to
one as if he were a prince of the blood, but that’s his misfortune. We all have
our troubles. That’s his. Let’s go in here. It’s too far to sweat to Cooks.”

It was
about a mile from the teashop to the school. Mike’s first impression on
arriving at the school grounds was of his smallness and insignificance.
Everything looked so big—the buildings, the grounds, everything. He felt out of
the picture. He was glad that he had met Wyatt. To make his entrance into this
strange land alone would have been more of an ordeal than he would have cared
to face.

“That’s
Wain’s,” said Wyatt, pointing to one of half a dozen large houses which lined
the road on the south side of the cricket field. Mike followed his finger, and
took in the size of his new home.

“I say,
it’s jolly big,” he said. “How many fellows are there in it?”

“Thirty-one
this term, I believe.”

“That’s
more than there were at King-Hall’s.”

“What’s
King-Hall’s?”

“The
prep. school I was at. At Emsworth.”

Emsworth
seemed very remote and unreal to him as he spoke.

They
skirted the cricket field, walking along the path that divided the two
terraces. The Wrykyn playing-fields were formed of a series of huge steps, cut
out of the hill. At the top of the hill came the school. On the first terrace
was a sort of informal practice ground, where, though no games were played on
it, there was a good deal of punting and drop-kicking in the winter and
fielding-practice in the summer. The next terrace was the biggest of all, and
formed the first eleven cricket ground, a beautiful piece of turf, a shade too
narrow for its length, bounded on the terrace side by a sharply sloping bank,
some fifteen feet deep, and on the other by the precipice leading to the next
terrace. At the far end of the ground stood the pavilion, and beside it a
little ivy-covered rabbit-hutch for the scorers. Old Wrykynians always claimed
that it was the prettiest school ground in England. It certainly had the finest
view. From the veranda of the pavilion you could look over three counties.

Wain’s
house wore an empty and desolate appearance. There were signs of activity,
however, inside; and a smell of soap and warm water told of preparations
recently completed.

Wyatt
took Mike into the matron’s room, a small room opening out of the main passage.

“This
is Jackson,” he said. “Which dormitory is he
in,
Miss Payne?”

The
matron consulted a paper.

“He’s
in yours, Wyatt.”

“Good
business. Who’s in the other bed? There are going to be three of us, aren’t
there?”

“Fereira
was to have slept there, but we have just heard that he is not coming back this
term. He has had to go on a sea voyage for his health.”

“Seems
queer anyone actually taking the trouble to keep Fereira in the world,” said
Wyatt. “Come along, Jackson, and I’ll show you the room.”

They
went along the passage, and up a flight of stairs.

“Here
you are,” said Wyatt.

It was
a fair-sized room. The window, heavily barred, looked out over a large garden.

“I used
to sleep here alone last term,” said Wyatt, “but the house is so full now
they’ve turned it into a dormitory.”

“I say,
I wish these bars weren’t here. It would be rather a rag to get out of the
window on to that wall at night, and hop down into the garden and explore,”
said Mike.

Wyatt
looked at him curiously, and moved to the window. “I’m not going to let you do
it, of course,” he said, because you’d go getting caught, and dropped on, which
isn’t good for one in one’s first term; but just to amuse you—”

He
jerked at the middle bar, and the next moment he was standing with it in his
hand, and the way to the garden was clear.

“By
Jove!” said Mike.

“That’s
simply an object-lesson, you know,” said Wyatt, replacing the bar, and pushing
the screws back into their putty. “I get out at night myself because I think my
health needs it. Besides, it’s my last term, anyhow, so it doesn’t matter what
I do. But if I find you trying to get out in the small hours, there’ll be
trouble. See?”

“All
right,” said Mike, reluctantly. “But I wish you’d let me.”

“Not if
I know it. Promise you won’t try it on.”

“All
right. But, I say, what do you do out there?”

“I
shoot at cats with an air-pistol, the beauty of which is that even if you hit
them it doesn’t hurt—simply keeps them bright and interested in life; and if
you miss you’ve had all the fun anyhow. Have you ever shot at a rocketing cat?
Finest mark you can have. Society’s latest craze. Buy a pistol and see life.”

“I wish
you’d let me come.”

“I
daresay you do. Not a chance, however. Now, if you like, I’ll take you over the
rest of the school. You’ll have to see it sooner or later, so you may as well
get it over at once.”

CHAPTER
IV

AT THE NETS

THERE are few better
things in life than a public school summer term. The winter term is good,
especially towards the end, and there are points, though not many, about the
Easter term: but it is in the summer that one really appreciates public school
life. The freedom of it, after the restrictions of even the most easy-going
preparatory school, is intoxicating. The change is almost as great as that from
public school to ‘Varsity.

For
Mike the path was made particularly easy. The only drawback to going to a big
school for the first time is the fact that one is made to feel so very small
and inconspicuous. New boys who have been leading lights at their prep. schools
feel it acutely for the first week. At one time it was the custom, if we may
believe writers of a generation or so back, for boys to take quite an
embarrassing interest in the newcomer. He was asked a rain of questions, and
was, generally, in the very centre of the stage. Nowadays an absolute lack of
interest is the fashion. A new boy arrives, and there he is, one of a crowd.

Mike
was saved this salutary treatment to a large extent, at first by virtue of the
greatness of his family, and, later, by his own performances on the cricket
field. His three elder brothers were objects of veneration to most Wrykynians,
and Mike got a certain amount of reflected glory from them. The brother of
first-class cricketers has a dignity of his own. Then Bob was a help. He was on
the verge of the cricket team and had been the school full-back for two seasons.
Mike found that people came up and spoke to him, anxious to know if he were
Jackson’s brother; and became friendly when he replied in the affirmative. Influential
relations are a help in every stage of life.

It was
Wyatt who gave him his first chance at cricket. There were nets on the first
afternoon of term for all old colours of the three teams and a dozen or so of
those most likely to fill the vacant places. Wyatt was there, of course. He had
got his first eleven cap in the previous season as a mighty hitter and a fair
slow bowler. Mike met him crossing the field with his cricket bag.

“Hullo,
where are you off to?” asked Wyatt. “Coming to watch the nets?”

Mike
had no particular programme for the afternoon. Junior cricket had not begun, and
it was a little difficult to know how to fill in the time.

“I tell
you what,” said Wyatt, “nip into the house and shove on some things, and I’ll
try and get Burgess to let you have a knock later on.”

This
suited Mike admirably. A quarter of an hour later he was sitting at the back of
the first eleven net, watching the practice.

Burgess,
the captain of the Wrykyn team, made no pretence of being a bat. He was the
school fast bowler and concentrated his energies on that department of the
game. He sometimes took ten minutes at the wicket after everybody else had had
an innings, but it was to bowl that he came to the nets.

He was
bowling now to one of the old colours whose name Mike did not know. Wyatt and
one of the professionals were the other two bowlers. Two nets away
Firby-Smith, who had changed his pince-nez for a pair of huge spectacles, was
performing rather ineffectively against some very bad bowling. Mike fixed his
attention on the first eleven man.

He was
evidently a good bat. There was style and power in his batting. He had a way of
gliding Burgess’s fastest to leg which Mike admired greatly. He was succeeded
at the end of a quarter of an hour by another eleven man, and then Bob
appeared.

It was
soon made evident, that this was not Bob’s day. Nobody is at his best on the
first day of term; but Bob was worse than he had any right to be. He scratched
forward at nearly everything, and when Burgess, who had been resting, took up
the ball again, he had each stump uprooted in a regular series in seven balls.
Once he skied one of Wyatt’s slows over the net behind the wicket; and Mike,
jumping up, caught him neatly.

“Thanks,”
said Bob austerely, as Mike returned the ball to him. He seemed depressed.

Towards
the end of the afternoon, Wyatt went up to Burgess.

“Burgess,”
he said, “see that kid sitting behind the net?”

“With
the naked eye,” said Burgess. “Why?”

“He’s
just come to Wain’s. He’s Bob Jackson’s brother, and I’ve a sort of idea that
he’s a bit of a bat. I told him I’d ask you if he could have a knock. Why not
send him in at the end net? There’s nobody there now.”

Burgess’s
amiability off the field equalled his ruthlessness when bowling.

“All
right,” he said. “Only if you think that I’m going to sweat to bowl to him,
you’re making a fatal error.”

“You needn’t
do a thing. Just sit and watch. I rather fancy this kid’s something special.”

Mike put on Wyatt’s pads
and gloves, borrowed his bat, and walked round into the net.

“Not in
a funk, are you?” asked Wyatt, as he passed.

Mike
grinned. The fact was that he had far too good an opinion of himself to be
nervous. An entirely modest person seldom makes a good batsman. Batting is one
of those things which demand first and foremost a thorough belief in oneself.
It need not be aggressive, but it must be there.

Wyatt
and the professional were the bowlers. Mike had seen enough of Wyatt’s bowling
to know that it was merely ordinary “slow tosh,” and the professional did not
look as difficult as Saunders. The first half-dozen balls he played carefully.
He was on trial, and he meant to take no risks. Then the professional
over-pitched one slightly on the off. Mike jumped out, and got the full face of
the bat on to it. The ball hit one of the ropes of the net, and nearly broke
it.

“How’s
that?” said Wyatt, with the smile of an impresario on the first night of a
successful play.

“Not
bad,” admitted Burgess.

A few
moments later he was still more complimentary. He got up and took a ball
himself.

Mike
braced himself up as Burgess began his run. This time he was more than a trifle
nervous. The bowling he had had so far had been tame. This would be the real
ordeal.