There is splendour in storm and flood and tempest, and no man regrets that now and again in life thunder and lightning spoil some chosen holiday. But those long grey days that come in stretches and blot the calendar for weeks on end with the dreary misery of heartless and unbroken skies are only mean and uninspiring, and they have no single use. They are discontented days and they bring with them discontent. The first thunder-burst of a revolution had come to Harley as a vast excitement, and those who had no real part to play in it had stood at their windows watching the threatening majesty of its power unfold. But days had passed, and with them had departed much of a schoolboy’s first intense delight in bold rebellion, so that when the time of cheering and singing had gone, and only grey days empty and wearisome remained, a sulky discontent slowly wrapped Harley in its mantle. All days were grey days. There had been no school Rugger and each week was devoid of interest. Saturdays were not holidays but hollow days. The only interest that had helped to keep Harleyans awake out of school hours had been house friendlies. Now these had gone from their ken. The Head had hit straight and hard.
Directly Coles heard the news he smiled again, for he knew that this blow would provide a first step towards the school’s collapse. For a minute their 153pride would steady them. Members of the Fifteen who were suffering most would set the example, but by degrees fellows would be found in favour of giving in. The call of Rugger in their blood would be too strong. He and his friends would move quietly amongst these wobblers and encourage them in their notions. In this way a reactionary party would begin to grow, snowball fashion, each newcomer persuading some crony of his own to think with him. Then would come Coles’ chance. Fellows would look round for a leader, some bright spirit who could show them a way out of their dilemma that would be in keeping with their dignity. That bright spark would be forthcoming without delay. Coles would be the man of the hour. He was the best drop-kick in the school. He was an old colour. He would be their philosopher.
“Let the Head have his way to this extent,” he would say. “Let Roe be the official captain. It will be too late to print cards with his name on this season, and many outside the school will never know. And I will be secretary. I will guide his hand. I will choose the teams. I will award the colours. We will end the term gloriously. The Head will think he has won, and he will be affable and amenable to reason, but in reality we shall be laughing up our sleeves, for the captain of footer will have to do just what his secretary tells him.”
Coles was very cautious. He did not allow the fact that time for these plans to mature was short to interfere with him. It was not yet half-term and he knew that the school’s collapse once started would come suddenly. When it came he would be ready. But he must not arouse suspicion by attempting to hurry things on their way. He watched from afar, and he kept Roe quiet. Only his friends were subtly busying themselves with intrigue. And whilst Coles watched and waited, that terrible 154listlessness that is the forerunner of a dry-rot was spreading over Harley. Only Morley’s kept up their heads. In Mainwright’s Smythe tried to lead his men in the proud path, but it was too much for one man. Presently, to stand about at corners and kick one’s heels became a habit. Boredom became a plague and the infection spread.
Carr felt it more, perhaps, than any other boy in Seymour’s because he was constantly in Coles’ society and was borne down by the shadow of it. Football would have been his one great relaxation. Rugger would have helped him to throw off the yoke. It would have brought him more into touch with fellows like Rouse and Terence Nicholson, whose very presence filled a room with optimism.
Henry Hope did not desert him, but he clearly considered him a perplexing and unsatisfactory young man, and he seemed to regret his silence over the thing that mattered most; nevertheless, he persevered daily. The fact that he had at least some kind of hold over Coles, if he could only get the opportunity to use it, was, moreover, a considerable comfort to him.
These grey days had their effect too upon Saville, and on one of them he wandered wretchedly into Rouse’s study and stood like a man with a hump on his back before the trio whom he found there.
“Don’t stand there with that weight on your shoulders,” said Rouse. “Take it off and put it down in a corner.”
Saville straightened his back bravely.
“It’s the hump,” said he. “It’s enough to give anyone the hump. Things are rotten bad.”
He paused as if to let this information sink in. The others did not deny it.
Saville sighed. “It’s not so bad for me, or chaps like me. What is so frightful is having to stand by and watch this dry-rot setting in amongst all the 155middle school chaps. It’s like watching a lot of strikers being starved into submission.”
Rouse glanced at him significantly.
“You think they’ll give in?”
The other hesitated. “No. At the moment I can’t think of any particular fellow who’s specially likely to give in, and of course it’s no use just one or two giving in, anyway. But you see what I mean. At this very moment we’re losing. We asked for this fight and it’s going against us. We’re getting more than we’re giving. And that weighs on the chaps’ minds. They’re just crazy to hit back. It was different before. House friendlies were a sort of safety valve. Fellows who were longing for a school match could at least put their hearts and souls into a house game. You saw how they turned out in the hope of seeing Seymour’s play Morley’s. It was pretty nearly pathetic. And in a sense I feel that mine is the responsibility. It was because Betteridge and I wouldn’t play under that yahoo’s captaincy that house Rugger was stopped. And I can tell you I’m precious sorry about it all. We’re being absolutely sat on, and the chaps can see it. Isn’t there any way at all of getting a bit of our own back? Isn’t there anything we can do?”
Rouse made no answer. He had been listening to Saville attentively, and once he had nodded his head in total agreement. Otherwise he had made no move. Now he turned to the two young men who were sitting with him, one upon the table and one upon the window-sill, and looked at them inquiringly. Saville was at a loss. He stared first at Smythe and then at Terence Nicholson, and finally at Rouse. On the face of each he perceived the same significant expression.
“You may think I’m mad,” said he resentfully, “but it’s perfectly true all the same.”
“I know it is, old horse,” said Rouse.
156“Then, dash it all,” repeated Saville, “isn’t there anything we can do?”
Still Rouse made no move. He just looked at Saville steadily.
“There is,” said he. “And Smythe has done it. Take a seat!”
“Where?” demanded Saville, looking mournfully round the study.
“Sit on that box. There’s something we want you to know. The safety valve of which you spoke has, as you say, gone bust. Let there be no panic. Smythe has another up his sleeve. As soon as there are sufficient pennies in the hat he will produce it.” He paused. “We told Smythe to scratch our fixtures for the season. He obeyed except in one respect. He did not scratch the Rainhurst match.”
The effect of these words was remarkable.
Saville rose from his box in the stiff, unnatural manner of a man under the influence of hypnotism. Then he lifted his hand and pointed at Smythe with an extended forefinger:
“You didn’t?”
“No.”
Saville sat back, and for a little while he leaned against the wall with a distant smile, seeming to be recalling some memory of the long ago. At last his lips parted and he spoke in a half whisper:
“The Rainhurst match!”
He leaned forward. The other three were looking at him in appreciation.
Smythe began to explain. “I looked ahead and I saw what things would be like if the worst came true. My idea was that if, in the end, it had to be done, we could scratch that match last of all, but I decided to hang on to the fixture. I said nothing to anyone until a fortnight or so ago, when the Rainhurst secretary wrote and said that he’d heard we’d been scratching a lot of matches, and 157did our fixture with them still stand. Then I consulted Nicholson. And he wanted to ask Rouse. So we all three discussed it and I wrote back.”
“And what did you say?”
“I said,” admitted Smythe, “that we should be there.”
The silence was acute. At last Rouse broke it.
“We realised what you are realising now, old sportsman—the danger of a rot and the value of a safety valve. You ask what we can do to hit back. Well, we voluntarily scratched our fixture list. The Head has gone one better and forbidden house games. We shall go one better still. Our defiant answer will be the playing of the match of the season. The Rainhurst match will come off.”
“How can we do it?”
“It’s not very difficult,” said Terence. “Rainhurst is within cycling distance. There is also quite a good service of trains. On the afternoon of the second Saturday in the second half of term the First Fifteen will simply go to Rainhurst by various secret ways and meet there. The Rainhurst team will be on the field and the game will be played. Then we shall all find separate ways home. The Head will probably never know. Who’s going to miss us?”
“But how about the Rainhurst Head? He’s bound to know what’s the matter here. Won’t he smell a rat?”
“Not,” said Smythe, “unless Roe is on the field, and then we should all smell one. And we can do that without going to Rainhurst.”
Saville considered the matter from every side. At last he looked up again.
“What I mean is, he must know that we’ve scratched all our matches. Won’t he wonder a bit? Supposing he writes to the Head and mentions it?”
“Why should he? When their secretary wrote 158to me the other week he just said he’d heard that we’d scratched some of our matches. Was the Rainhurst match to stand good? He didn’t say anything about the Head asking.”
So at last Saville emitted a hoarse chuckle of delight: “Glory be! What a terrific rag! But it can be improved on. Why not form up in a body outside the school and march there?”
“So soon as there’s any procession,” put in Rouse, “I always cease to take any interest in things. Nothing causes me more suffering than to be called upon to process.”
“Besides,” said Terence, “that would only be asking for trouble. Someone would be expelled.”
“Also it is too far,” observed Smythe. “The idea is to get there in a fit state to play football. We don’t want to rea............