He dismissed them with many compliments by the high Lodge-gate in the split-oak park palings and they stood still; even Stalky, who had played second, not to say a dumb, fiddle, regarding McTurk as one from another world. The two gla.s.ses of strong home-brewed had brought a melancholy upon the boy, for, slowly strolling with his hands in his pockets, he crooned:--"Oh, Paddy dear, and did ye hear the news that"s goin" round?"
Under other circ.u.mstances Stalky and Beetle would have fallen upon him, for that song was barred utterly--anathema--the sin of witchcraft. But seeing what he had wrought, they danced round him in silence, waiting till it pleased him to touch earth.
The tea-bell rang when they were still half a mile from College. McTurk shivered and came out of dreams. The glory of his holiday estate had left him. He was a Colleger of the College, speaking English once more.
"Turkey, it was immense!" said Stalky, generously. "I didn"t know you had it in you. You"ve got us a hut for the rest of the term, where we simply _can"t_ be collared. Fids! Fids! Oh, Fids! I gloat! Hear me gloat!"
They spun wildly on their heels, jodeling after the accepted manner of a "gloat," which is not unremotely allied to the primitive man"s song of triumph, and dropped down the hill by the path from the gasometer just in time to meet their house-master, who had spent the afternoon watching their abandoned hut in the "wuzzy."
Unluckily, all Mr. Prout"s imagination leaned to the darker side of life, and he looked on those young-eyed cherubims most sourly. Boys that he understood attended house-matches and could be accounted for at any moment. But he had heard McTurk openly deride cricket--even house-matches; Beetle"s views on the honor of the house he knew were incendiary; and he could never tell when the soft and smiling Stalky was laughing at him. Consequently--since human nature is what it is--those boys had been doing wrong somewhere. He hoped it was nothing very serious, but...
"_Ti-ra-ra-la-i-tu_! I gloat! Hear me!" Stalky, still on his heels, whirled like a dancing dervish to the dining-hall.
"_Ti-ra-la-la-i-tu_! I gloat! Hear me!" Beetle spun behind him with outstretched arms.
"_Ti-ra-la-la-i-tu_! I gloat! Hear me!" McTurk"s voice cracked.
Now was there or was there not a distinct flavor of beer as they shot past Mr. Prout?
He was unlucky in that his conscience as a house-master impelled him to consult his a.s.sociates. Had he taken his pipe and his troubles to little Hartopp"s rooms he would, perhaps, have been saved confusion, for Hartopp believed in boys, and knew something about them. His fate led him to King, a fellow house-master, no friend of his, but a zealous hater of Stalky & Co.
"Ah-haa!" said King, rubbing his hands when the tale was told. "Curious!
Now _my_ house never dream of doing these things."
"But you see I"ve no proof, exactly."
"Proof? With the egregious Beetle! As if one wanted it! I suppose it is not impossible for the Sergeant to supply it? Foxy is considered at least a match for any evasive boy in my house. Of course they were smoking and drinking somewhere. That type of boy always does. They think it manly."
"But they"ve no following in the school, and they are distinctly--er brutal to their juniors," said Prout, who had from a distance seen Beetle return, with interest, his b.u.t.terfly-net to a tearful f.a.g.
"Ah! They consider themselves superior to ordinary delights.
Self-sufficient little animals! There"s something in McTurk"s Hibernian sneer that would make me a little annoyed. And they are so careful to avoid all overt acts, too. It"s sheer calculated insolence. I am strongly opposed, as you know, to interfering with another man"s house; but they need a lesson, Prout. They need a sharp lesson, if only to bring down their over-weening self-conceit. Were I you, I should devote myself for a week to their little performances. Boys of that order--and I may flatter myself, but I think I know boys--don"t join the Bug-hunters for love. Tell the Sergeant to keep his eye open; and, of course, in my peregrinations I may casually keep mine open, too."
"_Ti-ra-la-la-i-tu_! I gloat! Hear me!" far down the corridor.
"Disgusting!" said King. "Where do they pick up these obscene noises?
One sharp lesson is what they want."
The boys did not concern themselves with lessons for the next few days.
They had all Colonel Dabney"s estate to play with, and they explored it with the stealth of Red Indians and the accuracy of burglars. They could enter either by the Lodge-gates on the upper road--they were careful to ingratiate themselves with the Lodge-keeper and his wife--drop down into the combe, and return along the cliffs; or they could begin at the combe and climb up into the road.
They were careful not to cross the Colonel"s path--he had served his turn, and they would not out-wear their welcome--nor did they show up on the sky-line when they could move in cover. The shelter of the gorze by the cliff-edge was their chosen retreat. Beetle christened it the Pleasant Isle of Aves, for the peace and the shelter of it; and here, the pipes and tobacco once cache"d in a convenient ledge an arm"s length down the cliff, their position was legally una.s.sailable.
For, observe, Colonel Dabney had not invited them to enter his house.
Therefore, they did not need to ask specific leave to go visiting; and school rules were strict on that point. He had merely thrown open his grounds to them; and, since they were lawful Bug-hunters, their extended bounds ran up to his notice-boards in the combe and his Lodge-gates on the hill.
They were amazed at their own virtue.
"And even if it wasn"t," said Stalky, flat on his back, staring into the blue. "Even suppose we were miles out of bounds, no one could get at us through this wuzzy, unless he knew the tunnel. Isn"t this better than lyin" up just behind the Coll.--in a blue funk every time we had a smoke? Isn"t your Uncle Stalky--?"
"No," said Beetle--he was stretched at the edge of the cliff spitting thoughtfully. "We"ve got to thank Turkey for this. Turkey is the Great Man. Turkey, dear, you"re distressing Heffles."
"Gloomy old a.s.s!" said McTurk, deep in a book.
"They"ve got us under suspicion," said Stalky. "Hoophats _is_ so suspicious somehow; and Foxy always makes every stalk he does a sort of--sort of--"
"Scalp," said Beetle. "Foxy"s a giddy Chingangook."
"Poor Foxy," said Stalky. "He"s goin" to catch us one of these days.
"Said to me in the Gym last night, "I"ve got my eye on you, Mister Corkran. I"m only warning you for your good." Then I said: "Well, you jolly well take it off again, or you"ll get into trouble. I"m only warnin" you for your good." Foxy was wrath."
"Yes, but it"s only fair sport for Foxy," said Beetle. "It"s Hefflelinga that has the evil mind. "Shouldn"t wonder if he thought we got tight."
"I never got squiffy but once--that was in the holidays," said Stalky, reflectively; "an" it made me horrid sick. "Pon my sacred Sam, though, it"s enough to drive a man to drink, havin" an animal like Hoof for house-master."
"If we attended the matches an" yelled, "Well hit, sir," an" stood on one leg an" grinned every time Heffy said, "So ho, my sons. Is it thus?"
an" said, "Yes, sir," an" "No, sir," an" "O, sir," an" "Please, sir,"
like a lot o" filthy fa-ags, Heffy "ud think no end of us," said McTurk with a sneer.
"Too late to begin that."
"It"s all right. The Hefflelinga means well. _But_ he is an a.s.s. _And_ we show him that we think he"s an a.s.s. An" _so_ Heffy don"t love us.
"Told me last night after prayers that he was _in loco parentis_,"
Beetle grunted.
"The deuce he did!" cried Stalky. "That means he"s maturin" something unusual dam" mean. Last time he told me that he gave me three hundred lines for dancin" the cachuca in Number Ten dormitory. _Loco parentis_, by gum! But what"s the odds as long as you"re "appy? _We"re_ all right."
They were, and their very rightness puzzled Prout, King, and the Sergeant. Boys with bad consciences show it. They slink out past the Fives Court in haste, and smile nervously when questioned. They return, disordered, in bare time to save a call-over. They nod and wink and giggle one to the other, scattering at the approach of a master. But Stalky and his allies had long out-lived these manifestations of youth.
They strolled forth unconcernedly, and returned in excellent shape after a light refreshment of strawberries and cream at the Lodge.
The Lodge-keeper had been promoted to keeper, _vice_ the murderous fisherman, and his wife made much of the boys. The man, too, gave them a squirrel, which they presented to the Natural History Society; thereby checkmating little Hartopp, who wished to know what they were doing for Science. Foxy faithfully worked some deep Devon lanes behind a lonely cross-roads inn; and it was curious that Prout and King, members of Common-room seldom friendly, walked together in the same direction--that is to say, northeast.
Now, the Pleasant Isle of Aves lay due southwest. "They"re deep--day-vilish deep," said Stalky. "Why are they drawin" those covers?"
"Me," said Beetle sweetly. "I asked Foxy if he had ever tasted the beer there. That was enough for Foxy, and it cheered him up a little. He and Heffy were sniffin" round our old hut so long I thought they"d like a change."
"Well, it can"t last forever," said Stalky. "Heffy"s bankin" up like a thunder-cloud, an" King goes rubbin" his beastly hands, an" grinnin"
like a hyena. It"s shockin" demoralizin" for King. He"ll burst some day."
That day came a little sooner than they expected--came when the Sergeant, whose duty it was to collect defaulters, did not attend an afternoon call-over.
"Tired of pubs, eh? He"s gone up to the top of the bill with his binoculars to spot us," said Stalky. "Wonder he didn"t think of that before. Did you see old Heffy c.o.c.k his eye at us when we answered our names? Heffy"s in it, too. _Ti-ra-la-la-i-tu_! I gloat! Hear me! Come on!"
"Aves?" said Beetle.
"Of course, but I"m not smokin" _aujourd"hui_. _Parceque je_ jolly well _pense_ that we"ll be _suivi_. We"ll go along the cliffs, slow, an" give Foxy lots of time to parallel us up above."
They strolled towards the swimming-baths, and presently overtook King.