The Gold Bat

  X

  BEING A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS

  On the evening following O'Hara's adventure in the vaults, Barry andM'Todd were in their study, getting out the tea-things. Most Wrykiniansbrewed in the winter and Easter terms, when the days were short andlock-up early. In the summer term there were other things to do--nets,which lasted till a quarter to seven (when lock-up was), and thebaths--and brewing practically ceased. But just now it was at its height,and every evening, at a quarter past five, there might be heard in thehouses the sizzling of the succulent sausage and other rare delicacies.As a rule, one or two studies would club together to brew, instead ofpreparing solitary banquets. This was found both more convivial andmore economical. At Seymour's, studies numbers five, six, and seven hadalways combined from time immemorial, and Barry, on obtaining studysix, had carried on the tradition. In study five were Drummond and hisfriend De Bertini. In study seven, which was a smaller room and onlycapable of holding one person with any comfort, one James RupertLeather-Twigg (that was his singular name, as Mr Gilbert has it) hadtaken up his abode. The name of Leather-Twigg having proved, at anearly date in his career, too great a mouthful for Wrykyn, he was knownto his friends and acquaintances by the euphonious title ofShoeblossom. The charm about the genial Shoeblossom was that you couldnever tell what he was going to do next. All that you could rely onwith any certainty was that it would be something which would have beenbetter left undone.

  It was just five o'clock when Barry and M'Todd started to get thingsready. They were not high enough up in the school to have fags, so thatthey had to do this for themselves.

  Barry was still in football clothes. He had been out running andpassing with the first fifteen. M'Todd, whose idea of exercise waswinding up a watch, had been spending his time since school ceased inthe study with a book. He was in his ordinary clothes. It was thereforefortunate that, when he upset the kettle (he nearly always did at someperiod of the evening's business), the contents spread themselves overBarry, and not over himself. Football clothes will stand any amount ofwater, whereas M'Todd's "Youth's winter suiting at forty-two shillingsand sixpence" might have been injured. Barry, however, did not lookupon the episode in this philosophical light. He spoke to himeloquently for a while, and then sent him downstairs to fetch morewater. While he was away, Drummond and De Bertini came in.

  "Hullo," said Drummond, "tea ready?"

  "Not much," replied Barry, bitterly, "not likely to be, either, at thisrate. We'd just got the kettle going when that ass M'Todd plungedagainst the table and upset the lot over my bags. Lucky the beastlystuff wasn't boiling. I'm soaked."

  "While we wait--the sausages--Yes?--a good idea--M'Todd, he isdownstairs--but to wait? No, no. Let us. Shall we? Is it not so? Yes?"observed Bertie, lucidly.

  "Now construe," said Barry, looking at the linguist with a bewilderedexpression. It was a source of no little inconvenience to his friendsthat De Bertini was so very fixed in his determination to speakEnglish. He was a trier all the way, was De Bertini. You rarely caughthim helping out his remarks with the language of his native land. Itwas English or nothing with him. To most of his circle it might as wellhave been Zulu.

  Drummond, either through natural genius or because he spent more timewith him, was generally able to act as interpreter. Occasionally therewould come a linguistic effort by which even he freely confessedhimself baffled, and then they would pass on unsatisfied. But, as arule, he was equal to the emergency. He was so now.

  "What Bertie means," he explained, "is that it's no good us waiting forM'Todd to come back. He never could fill a kettle in less than tenminutes, and even then he's certain to spill it coming upstairs andhave to go back again. Let's get on with the sausages."

  The pan had just been placed on the fire when M'Todd returned with thewater. He tripped over the mat as he entered, and spilt about half apint into one of his football boots, which stood inside the door, butthe accident was comparatively trivial, and excited no remark.

  "I wonder where that slacker Shoeblossom has got to," said Barry. "Henever turns up in time to do any work. He seems to regard himself as abeastly guest. I wish we could finish the sausages before he comes. Itwould be a sell for him."

  "Not much chance of that," said Drummond, who was kneeling before thefire and keeping an excited eye on the spluttering pan, "_you_see. He'll come just as we've finished cooking them. I believe the manwaits outside with his ear to the keyhole. Hullo! Stand by with theplate. They'll be done in half a jiffy."

  Just as the last sausage was deposited in safety on the plate, the dooropened, and Shoeblossom, looking as if he had not brushed his hairsince early childhood, sidled in with an attempt at an easy nonchalancewhich was rendered quite impossible by the hopeless state of hisconscience.

  "Ah," he said, "brewing, I see. Can I be of any use?"

  "We've finished years ago," said Barry.

  "Ages ago," said M'Todd.

  A look of intense alarm appeared on Shoeblossom's classical features.

  "You've not finished, really?"

  "We've finished cooking everything," said Drummond. "We haven't beguntea yet. Now, are you happy?"

  Shoeblossom was. So happy that he felt he must do something tocelebrate the occasion. He felt like a successful general. There mustbe _something_ he could do to show that he regarded the situationwith approval. He looked round the study. Ha! Happy thought--thefrying-pan. That useful culinary instrument was lying in the fender,still bearing its cargo of fat, and beside it--a sight to stir theblood and make the heart beat faster--were the sausages, piled up ontheir plate.

  Shoeblossom stooped. He seized the frying-pan. He gave it one twirl inthe air. Then, before any one could stop him, he had turned it upsidedown over the fire. As has been already remarked, you could neverpredict exactly what James Rupert Leather-Twigg would be up to next.

  When anything goes out of the frying-pan into the fire, it is usuallyproductive of interesting by-products. The maxim applies to fat. Thefat was in the fire with a vengeance. A great sheet of flame rushed outand up. Shoeblossom leaped back with a readiness highly creditable inone who was not a professional acrobat. The covering of the mantelpiececaught fire. The flames went roaring up the chimney.

  Drummond, cool while everything else was so hot, without a word movedto the mantelpiece to beat out the fire with a football shirt. Bertiewas talking rapidly to himself in French. Nobody could understand whathe was saying, which was possibly fortunate.

  By the time Drummond had extinguished the mantelpiece, Barry had alsodone good work by knocking the fire into the grate with the poker.M'Todd, who had been standing up till now in the far corner of theroom, gaping vaguely at things in general, now came into action.Probably it was force of habit that suggested to him that the time hadcome to upset the kettle. At any rate, upset it he did--most of it overthe glowing, blazing mass in the grate, the rest over Barry. One of thelargest and most detestable smells the study had ever had to endureinstantly assailed their nostrils. The fire in the study was out now,but in the chimney it still blazed merrily.

  "Go up on to the roof and heave water down," said Drummond, thestrategist. "You can get out from Milton's dormitory window. And takecare not to chuck it down the wrong chimney."

  Barry was starting for the door to carry out these excellentinstructions, when it flew open.

  "Pah! What have you boys been doing? What an abominable smell. Pah!"said a muffled voice. It was Mr Seymour. Most of his face was concealedin a large handkerchief, but by the look of his eyes, which appearedabove, he did not seem pleased. He took in the situation at a glance.Fires in the house were not rarities. One facetious sportsman had oncemade a rule of setting the senior day-room chimney on fire every term.He had since left (by request), but fires still occurred.

  "Is the chimney on fire?"

  "Yes, sir," said Drummond.

  "Go and find Herbert, and tell him to take some water on to the roofand throw it down." Herbert was the boot and knife cleaner atSeymour's.


  Barry went. Soon afterwards a splash of water in the grate announcedthat the intrepid Herbert was hard at it. Another followed, andanother. Then there was a pause. Mr Seymour thought he would look up tosee if the fire was out. He stooped and peered into the darkness, and,even as he gazed, splash came the contents of the fourth pail, togetherwith some soot with which they had formed a travelling acquaintance onthe way down. Mr Seymour staggered back, grimy and dripping. There wasdead silence in the study. Shoeblossom's face might have been seenworking convulsively.

  The silence was broken by a hollow, sepulchral voice with a strongCockney accent.

  "Did yer see any water come down then, sir?" said the voice.

  Shoeblossom collapsed into a chair, and began to sob feebly.

  * * * * *

  "--disgraceful ... scandalous ... get _up_, Leather-Twigg ... not tobe trusted ... _babies_ ... three hundred lines, Leather-Twigg ...abominable ... surprised ... ought to be ashamed of yourselves ..._double_, Leather-Twigg ... not fit to have studies ... atrocious ...--"

  Such were the main heads of Mr Seymour's speech on the situation as hedabbed desperately at the soot on his face with his handkerchief.Shoeblossom stood and gurgled throughout. Not even the thought of sixhundred lines could quench that dauntless spirit.

  "Finally," perorated Mr Seymour, as he was leaving the room, "as youare evidently not to be trusted with rooms of your own, I forbid you toenter them till further notice. It is disgraceful that such a thingshould happen. Do you hear, Barry? And you, Drummond? You are not toenter your studies again till I give you leave. Move your books down tothe senior day-room tonight."

  And Mr Seymour stalked off to clean himself.

  "Anyhow," said Shoeblossom, as his footsteps died away, "we saved thesausages."

  It is this indomitable gift of looking on the bright side that makes usEnglishmen what we are.