“Anybody seen young—oh, here you are. What’s all this about Jimmy Wyatt? They’re saying he’s been sacked, or some rot.”
“So he has—at least, he’s got to leave.”
“What? When?”
“He’s left already. He isn’t coming to school again.”
Burgess’ first thought, as befitted a good cricket captain, was for his team.
“And the Ripton match on Saturday!”
Nobody seemed to have anything except silent sympathy at his command.
“Dash the man! Silly ass! What did he want to do it for! Poor old Jimmy, though!” he added after a pause. “What bad luck for him!”
“Beastly,” agreed Mike.
“All the same,” continued Burgess, with a return to the austere manner of the captain of cricket, “he might have chucked playing the goat till after the Ripton match. Look here, young Jackson, you’ll turn out for fielding with the first this afternoon. You’ll play on Saturday.”
“All right,” said Mike, without enthusiasm. The Wyatt disaster was too recent for him to feel much pleasure at playing against Ripton vice his friend, withdrawn.
Bob was the next to interview him. They met in the cloisters.
“Hullo, Mike!” said Bob. “I say, what’s all this about Wyatt?”
“Wain caught him getting back into the dorm last night after Neville-Smith’s, and he’s taken him away from the school.”
“What’s he going to do? Going into that bank straight away?”
“Yes. You know, that’s the part he hates most. He’d have been leaving anyhow in a fortnight, you see; only it’s awful rot for a chap like Wyatt to have to go and froust in a bank for the rest of his life.”
“He’ll find it rather a change, I expect. I suppose you won’t be seeing him before he goes?”
“I shouldn’t think so. Not unless he comes to the dorm. during the night. He’s sleeping over in Wain’s part of the house, but I shouldn’t be surprised if he nipped out after Wain has gone to bed. Hope he does, anyway.”
“I should like to say good-bye. But I don’t suppose it’ll be possible.”
They separated in the direction of their respective form-rooms. Mike felt bitter and disappointed at the way the news had been received. Wyatt was his best friend, his pal; and it offended him that the school should take the tidings of his departure as they had done. Most of them who had come to him for information had expressed a sort of sympathy with the absent hero of his story, but the chief sensation seemed to be one of pleasurable excitement at the fact that something big had happened to break the monotony of school routine. They treated the thing much as they would have treated the announcement that a record score had been made in first-class cricket. The school was not so much regretful as comfortably thrilled. And Burgess had actually cursed before sympathizing. Mike felt resentful towards Burgess. As a matter of fact, the cricket captain wrote a letter to Wyatt during preparation that night which would have satisfied even Mike’s sense of what was fit. But Mike had no opportunity of learning this.
There was, however, one exception to the general rule, one member of the school who did not treat the episode as if it were merely an interesting and impersonal item of sensational news. Neville-Smith heard of what had happened towards the end of the interval, and rushed off instantly in search of Mike. He was too late to catch him before he went to his form-room, so he waited for him at half-past twelve, when the bell rang for the end of morning school.
“I say, Jackson, is this true about old Wyatt?”
Mike nodded.
“What happened?”
Mike related the story for the sixteenth time. It was a melancholy pleasure to have found a listener who heard the tale in the right spirit. There was no doubt about Neville-Smith’s interest and sympathy. He was silent for a moment after Mike had finished.
“It was all my fault,” he said at length. “If it hadn’t been for me, this wouldn’t have happened. What a fool I was to ask him to my place! I might have known he would be caught.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Mike.
“It was absolutely my fault.”
Mike was not equal to the task of soothing Neville-Smith’s wounded conscience. He did not attempt it. They walked on without further conversation till they reached Wain’s gate, where Mike left him. Neville-Smith proceeded on his way, plunged in meditation.
The result of which meditation was that Burgess got a second shock before the day was out. Bob; going over to the nets rather late in the afternoon, came upon the captain of cricket standing apart from his fellow men with an expression on his face that spoke of mental upheavals on a vast scale.
“What’s up?” asked Bob.
“Nothing much,” said Burgess, with a forced and grisly calm. “Only that, as far as I can see, we shall play Ripton on Saturday with a sort of second eleven. You don’t happen to have got sacked or anything, by the way, do you?”
“What’s happened now?”
“Neville-Smith. In extra on Saturday. That’s all. Only our first- and second-change bowlers out of the team for the Ripton match in one day. I suppose by tomorrow half the others’ll have gone, and we shall take the field on Saturday with a scratch side of kids from the Junior School.”
“Neville-Smith! Why, what’s he been doing?”
“Apparently he gave a sort of supper to celebrate his getting his first, and it was while coming back from that that Wyatt got collared. Well, I’m blowed if Neville-Smith doesn’t toddle off to the Old Man after school today and tell him the whole yarn! Said it was all his fault. What rot! Sort of thing that might have happened to anyone. If Wyatt hadn’t gone to him, he’d probably have gone out somewhere else.”
“And the Old Man shoved him in extra?”
“Next two Saturdays.”
“Are Ripton strong this year?” asked Bob, for lack of anything better to say.
“Very, from all accounts. They whacked the M.C.C. Jolly hot team of M.C.C. too. Stronger than the one we drew with.”
“Oh, well, you never know what’s going to happen at cricket. I may hold a catch for a change.”
Burgess grunted.
Bob went on his way to the nets. Mike was just putting on his pads.
“I say, Mike,” said Bob. “I wanted to see you. It’s about Wyatt. I’ve thought of something.”
“What’s that?”
“A way of getting him out of that bank. If it comes off, that’s to say.”
“By Jove, he’d jump at anything. What’s the idea?”
“Why shouldn’t he get a job of sorts out in the Argentine? There ought to be heaps of sound jobs going there for a chap like Wyatt. He’s a jolly good shot, to start with. I shouldn’t wonder if it wasn’t rather a score to be able to shoot out there. And he can ride, I know.”
“By Jove, I’ll write to father tonight. He must be able to work it, I should think. He never chucked the show altogether, did he?”
Mike, as most other boys of his age would have been, was profoundly ignorant as to the details by which his father’s money had been, or was being, made. He only knew vaguely that the source of revenue had something to do with the Argentine. His brother Joe had been born in Buenos Aires; and once, three years ago, his father had gone over there for a visit, presumably on business. All these things seemed to show that Mr. Jackson senior was a useful man to have about if you wanted a job in that Eldorado, the Argentine Republic.
As a matter of fact, Mike’s father owned vast tracts of land up country, where countless sheep lived and had their being. He had long retired from active superintendence of his estate. Like Mr. Spenlow, he had a partner, a stout fellow with the work-taint highly developed, who asked nothing better than to be left in charge. So Mr. Jackson had returned to the home of his fathers, glad to be there again. But he still had a decided voice in the ordering of affairs on the ranches, and Mike was going to the fountainhead of things when he wrote to his father that night, putting forward Wyatt’s clai
ms to attention and ability to perform any sort of job with which he might be presented.
The reflection that he had done all that could be done tended to console him for the non-appearance of Wyatt either that night or next morning—a non-appearance which was due to the simple fact that he passed that night in a bed in Mr. Wain’s dressing-room, the door of which that cautious pedagogue, who believed in taking no chances, locked from the outside on retiring to rest.
CHAPTER XXVII
THE RIPTON MATCH
MIKE got an answer from his father on the morning of the Ripton match. A letter from Wyatt also lay on his plate when he came down to breakfast.
Mr. Jackson’s letter was short, but to the point. He said he would go and see Wyatt early in the next week. He added that being expelled from a public school was not the only qualification for success as a sheep-farmer, but that, if Mike’s friend added to this a general intelligence and amiability, and a skill for picking off cats with an air-pistol and bull’s-eyes with a Lee-Enfield, there was no reason why something should not be done for him. In any case he would buy him a lunch, so that Wyatt would extract at least some profit from his visit. He said that he hoped something could be managed. It was a pity that a boy accustomed to shoot cats should be condemned for the rest of his life to shoot nothing more exciting than his cuffs.
Wyatt’s letter was longer. It might have been published under the title “My First Day in a Bank, by a Beginner.” His advent had apparently caused little sensation. He had first had a brief conversation with the manager, which had run as follows:
“Mr. Wyatt?”
“Yes, sir.”
“H’m… Sportsman?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Cricketer?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Play rugger?”
“Yes, sir.”
“H’m…. Racquets?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Everything?”
“Yes, sir.”
“H’m…. Well, you won’t get any more of it now.”
After which a Mr. Blenkinsop had led him up to a vast ledger, in which he was to inscribe the addresses of all outgoing letters. These letters he would then stamp, and subsequently take in bundles to the post office. Once a week he would be required to buy stamps. “If I were one of those Napoleons of Finance,” wrote Wyatt, “I should cook the accounts, I suppose, and embezzle stamps to an incredible amount. But it doesn’t seem in my line. I’m afraid I wasn’t cut out for a business career. Still, I have stamped this letter at the expense of the office, and entered it up under the heading ‘Sundries,’ which is a sort of start. Look out for an article in the Wrykynian, ‘Hints for Young Criminals, by J. Wyatt, champion catch-as-catch-can stamp-stealer of the British Isles.’ So long. I suppose you are playing against Ripton. now that the world of commerce has found that it can’t get on without me. Mind you make a century, and then perhaps Burgess’ll give you your first after all. There were twelve colours given three years ago, because one chap left at half-term and the man who played instead of him came off against Ripton.”
This had occurred to Mike independently. The Ripton match was a special event, and the man who performed any outstanding feat against that school was treated as a sort of Horatius. Honours were heaped upon him. If he could only make a century! Or even fifty. Even twenty, if it got the school out of a tight place. He was as nervous on the Saturday morning as he had been on the morning of the M.C.C. match. It was Victory or Westminster Abbey now. To do only averagely well, to be among the ruck, would be as useless as not playing at all, as far as his chance of his first was concerned.
It was evident to those who woke early on the Saturday morning that this Ripton match was not likely to end in a draw. During the Friday rain had fallen almost incessantly in a steady drizzle. It had stopped late at night; and at six in the morning there was every prospect of another hot day. There was that feeling in the air which shows that the sun is trying to get through the clouds. The sky was a dull grey at breakfast-time, except where a flush of deeper colour gave a hint of the sun. It was a day on which to win the toss, and go in first. At eleven-thirty, when the match was timed to begin, the wicket would be too wet to be difficult. Runs would come easily till the sun came out and began to dry the ground. When that happened there would be trouble for the side that was batting.
Burgess, inspecting the wicket with Mr. Spence during the quarter to eleven interval, was not slow to recognize this fact.
“I should win the toss today, if I were you, Burgess,” said Mr. Spence.
“Just what I was thinking, sir.”
“That wicket’s going to get nasty after lunch, if the sun comes out. A regular Laker wicket it’s going to be.”
“I wish we had Laker,” said Burgess. “Or even Wyatt. It would just suit him, this.”
Mr. Spence, as a member of the staff, was not going to be drawn into discussing Wyatt and his premature departure, so he diverted the conversation on to the subject of the general aspect of the school’s attack.
“Who will go on first with you, Burgess?”
“Who do you think, sir? Ellerby? It might be his wicket.”
Ellerby bowled medium inclining to slow. On a pitch that suited him he was apt to turn from leg and get people out caught at the wicket or short slip.
“Certainly, Ellerby. This end, I think. The other’s yours, though I’m afraid you’ll have a poor time bowling fast today. Even with plenty of sawdust I doubt if it will be possible to get a decent foothold till after lunch.”
“I must win the toss,” said Burgess. “It’s a nuisance too, about our batting. Marsh will probably be dead out of form after being in the Infirmary so long. If he’d had a chance of getting a bit of practice yesterday, it might have been all right.”
“That rain will have a lot to answer for if we lose. On a dry, hard wicket I’m certain we should beat them four times out of six. I was talking to a man who played against them for the Nomads. He said that on a true wicket there was not a great deal of sting in their bowling, but that they’ve got a slow leg-break man who might be dangerous on a day like this. A boy called de Freece. I don’t know of him. He wasn’t in the team last year.”
“I know the chap. He played wing-three for them at rugger against us this year on their ground. He was crocked when they came here. He’s a pretty useful chap all round, I believe. Plays racquets for them too.”
“Well, my friend said he had one very dangerous ball, of the chinaman type. Looks as if it were going away, and comes in instead.”
“I don’t think a lot of that,” said Burgess ruefully. “One consolation is, though, that that sort of ball is easier to watch on a slow wicket. I must tell the fellows to look out for it.”
“I should. And, above all, win the toss.”
Burgess and Maclaine, the Ripton captain, were old acquaintances. They had been at the same preparatory school, and they had played against one another at rugger and cricket for two years now.
“We’ll go in first, Mac,” said Burgess, as they met on the pavilion steps after they had changed.
“It’s awfully good of you to suggest it,” said Maclaine, “but I think we’ll toss. It’s a hobby of mine. You call.”
“Heads.”
“Tails it is. I ought to have warned you that you hadn’t a chance. I’ve lost the toss five times running, so I was bound to win today.”
“You’ll put us in, I suppose?”
“Yes-after us.”
“Oh, well, we shan’t have long to wait for our knock, that’s a comfort. Buck up and send someone in, and let’s get at you.”
And Burgess went off to tell the groundsman to have plenty of sawdust ready, as he would want the field paved with it.
The policy of the Ripton team was obvious from the first over. They meant to force the game. Already the sun was beginning to peep through the haze. For about an hour run-getting ought to be a tolerably simple process; but after that hour singles would be a
s valuable as threes and boundaries an almost unheard-of luxury.
So Ripton went in to hit.
The policy proved successful for a time, as it generally does. Burgess, who relied on a run that was a series of tiger-like leaps culminating in a spring that suggested that he meant to lower the long jump record, found himself badly handicapped by the state of the ground. In spite of frequent libations of sawdust, he was compelled to tread cautiously, and this robbed his bowling of much of its pace. The score mounted rapidly. Twenty came in ten minutes. At thirty-five the first wicket fell, run out.
At sixty, Ellerby, who had found the pitch too soft for him and had been expensive, gave place to Grant. Grant bowled what were supposed to be slow leg-breaks, but which did not always break. The change worked. Maclaine, after hitting the first two balls to the boundary, skied the third to Bob Jackson in the deep, and Bob, for whom constant practice had robbed this sort of catch of its terrors, held it.
A yorker from Burgess disposed of the next man before he could settle down; but the score, seventy-four for three wickets, was large enough in view of the fact that the pitch was already becoming more difficult, and was certain to get worse, to make Ripton feel that the advantage was with them. Another hour of play remained before lunch. The deterioration of the wicket would be slow during that period. The sun, which was now shining brightly, would put in its deadliest work from two o’clock onwards. Maclaine’s instructions to his men were to go on hitting.
A too liberal interpretation of the meaning of the verb “to hit” led to the departure of two more Riptonians in the course of the next two overs. There is a certain type of school batsman who considers that to force the game means to swipe blindly at every ball on the chance of taking it half-volley. This policy sometimes leads to a boundary or two, as it did on this occasion, but it means that wickets will fall, as also happened now. Seventy-four for three became eighty-six for five. Burgess began to look happier.