Which was indeed the case. Mr. Forman was engaged in editing a new edition of the "Bacchae," and was apt to be absent-minded in consequence. So Dunstable, with a glad smile, hove the lines into a cupboard in his study to keep company with the Greek numerals which he had done for Mr. Day, and went out to play fives with Linton.
Linton, curiously enough, had also had a stroke of luck in a rather similar way. He told Dunstable about it as they strolled back to the houses after their game.
"Bit of luck this afternoon," he said. "You remember Appleby setting me a hundred-and-fifty the day before yesterday? Well, I showed them up to-day, and he looked through them and chucked them into the waste-paper basket under his desk. I thought at the time I hadn"t seen him muck them up at all with his pencil, which is his usual game, so after he had gone at the end of school I nipped to the basket and fished them out. They were as good as new, so I saved them up in case I get any more."
Dunstable hastened to tell of his own good fortune. Linton was impressed by the coincidence.
"I tell you what," he said, "we score either way. Because if we never get any more lines----"
Dunstable laughed.
"Yes, I know," Linton went on, "we"re bound to. But even supposing we don"t, what we"ve got in stock needn"t be wasted."
"I don"t see that," said Dunstable. "Going to have "em bound in cloth and published? Or were you thinking of framing them?"
"Why, don"t you see? Sell them, of course. There are dozens of chaps in the school who would be glad of a few hundred lines cheap."
"It wouldn"t work. They"d be spotted."
"Rot. It"s been done before, and n.o.body said anything. A chap in Seymour"s who left last Easter sold all his stock lines by auction on the last day of term. They were Virgil mostly and Greek numerals. They sold like hot cakes. There were about five hundred of them altogether.
And I happen to know that every word of them has been given up and pa.s.sed all right."
"Well, I shall keep mine," said Dunstable. "I am sure to want all the lines in stock that I can get. I used to think Langridge was fairly bad in the way of impots, but Forman takes the biscuit easily. It seems to be a sort of hobby of his. You can"t stop him."
But it was not until the middle of preparation that the great idea flashed upon Dunstable"s mind.
It was the simplicity of the thing that took his breath away. That and its possibilities. This was the idea. Why not start a Lines Trust in the school? An agency for supplying lines at moderate rates to all who desired them? There did not seem to be a single flaw in the scheme. He and Linton between them could turn out enough material in a week to give the Trust a good working capital. And as for the risk of detection when customers came to show up the goods supplied to them, that was very slight. As has been pointed out before, there was practically one handwriting common to the whole school when it came to writing lines. It resembled the movements of a fly that had fallen into an ink-pot, and subsequently taken a little brisk exercise on a sheet of foolscap by way of restoring the circulation. Then, again, the att.i.tude of the master to whom the lines were shown was not likely to be critical. So that everything seemed in favour of Dunstable"s scheme.
Linton, to whom he confided it, was inclined to scoff at first, but when he had had the beauties of the idea explained to him at length, became an enthusiastic supporter of the scheme.
"But," he objected, "it"ll take up all our time. Is it worth it? We can"t spend every afternoon sweating away at impots for other people."
"It"s all right," said Dunstable, "I"ve thought of that. We shall need to pitch in pretty hard for about a week or ten days. That will give us a good big stock, and after that if we turn out a hundred each every day it will be all right. A hundred"s not much f.a.g if you spread them over a day."
Linton admitted that this was sound, and the Locksley Lines Supplying Trust, Ltd., set to work in earnest.
It must not be supposed that the Agency left a great deal to chance.
The writing of lines in advance may seem a very speculative business; but both Dunstable and Linton had had a wide experience of Locksley masters, and the methods of the same when roused, and they were thus enabled to reduce the element of chance to a minimum. They knew, for example, that Mr. Day"s favourite imposition was the Greek numerals, and that in nine cases out of ten that would be what the youth who had dealings with him would need to ask for from the Lines Trust. Mr.
Appleby, on the other hand, invariably set Virgil. The oldest inhabitant had never known him to depart from this custom. For the French masters extracts from the works of Victor Hugo would probably pa.s.s muster.
A week from the date of the above conversation, everyone in the school, with the exception of the prefects and the sixth form, found in his desk on arriving at his form-room a printed slip of paper.
(Spiking, the stationer in the High Street, had printed it.) It was nothing less than the prospectus of the new Trust. It set forth in glowing terms the advantages offered by the agency. Dunstable had written it--he had a certain amount of skill with his pen--and Linton had suggested subtle and captivating additions. The whole presented rather a striking appearance.
The doc.u.ment was headed with the name of the Trust in large letters.
Under this came a number of "scare headlines" such as:
SEE WHAT YOU SAVE!
NO MORE WORRY!
PEACE, PERFECT PEACE!
WHY DO LINES WHEN WE DO THEM FOR YOU?
Then came the real prospectus:
The Locksley Lines Supplying Trust, Ltd. has been inst.i.tuted to meet the growing demand for lines and other impositions. While there are masters at our public schools there will always be lines.
At Locksley the crop of masters has always flourished--and still flourishes--very rankly, and the demand for lines has greatly taxed the powers of those to whom has been a.s.signed the task of supplying them.
It is for the purpose of affording relief to these that the Lines Trust has been formed. It is proposed that all orders for lines shall be supplied out of our vast stock. Our charges are moderate, and vary between threepence and sixpence per hundred lines. The higher charge is made for Greek impositions, which, for obvious reasons, entail a greater degree of labour on our large and efficient staff of writers.
All orders, which will be promptly executed, should be forwarded to Mr. P. A. Dunstable, 6 College Grounds, Locksley, or to Mr. C. J.
Linton, 10 College Grounds, Locksley. _Payment must be inclosed with order, or the latter will not be executed._ Under no conditions will notes of hand or cheques be accepted as legal tender. There is no trust about us except the name.
Come in your thousands. We have lines for all. If the Trust"s stock of lines were to be placed end to end it would reach part of the way to London. "You pay the threepence. We do the rest."
Then a blank s.p.a.ce, after which came a few "unsolicited testimonials":
"Lower Fifth" writes: "I was set two hundred lines of Virgil on Sat.u.r.day last at one o"clock. Having laid in a supply from your agency I was enabled to show them up at five minutes past one.
The master who gave me the commission was unable to restrain his admiration at the rapidity and neatness of my work. You may make what use of this you please."
"Dexter"s House" writes: "Please send me one hundred (100) lines from _Aeneid, Book Two_. Mr. Dexter was so delighted with the last I showed him that he has asked me to do some more."
"Enthusiast" writes: "Thank you for your Greek numerals. Day took them without blinking. So beautifully were they executed that I can hardly believe even now that I did not write them myself."
There could be no doubt about the popularity of the Trust. It caught on instantly.
Nothing else was discussed in the form-rooms at the quarter to eleven interval, and in the houses after lunch it was the sole topic of conversation. Dunstable and Linton were bombarded with questions and witticisms of the near personal sort. To the latter they replied with directness, to the former evasively.
"What"s it all _about?_" someone would ask, fluttering the leaflet before Dunstable"s unmoved face.
"You should read it carefully," Dunstable would reply. "It"s all there."
"But what are you playing at?"
"We tried to make it clear to the meanest intelligence. Sorry you can"t understand it."
While at the same time Linton, in his form-room, would be explaining to excited inquirers that he was sorry, but it was impossible to reply to their query as to who was running the Trust. He was not at liberty to reveal business secrets. Suffice it that there the lines were, waiting to be bought, and he was there to sell them. So that if anybody cared to lay in a stock, large or small, according to taste, would he kindly walk up and deposit the necessary coin?
But here the public showed an unaccountable disinclination to deal. It was gratifying to have acquaintances coming up and saying admiringly: "You are an a.s.s, you know," as if they were paying the highest of compliments--as, indeed, they probably imagined that they were. All this was magnificent, but it was not business. Dunstable and Linton felt that the whole att.i.tude of the public towards the new enterprise was wrong. Locksley seemed to regard the Trust as a huge joke, and its prospectus as a literary _jeu d"esprit_.
In fact, it looked very much as if--from a purely commercial point of view--the great Lines Supplying Trust was going to be what is known in theatrical circles as a frost.
For two whole days the public refused to bite, and Dunstable and Linton, turning over the stacks of lines in their studies, thought gloomily that this world is no place for original enterprise.
Then things began to move.