Acton's Feud Part 34

They did. I believe I am doing Grim no injustice when I say he looks less a poet, and acts up to his looks, than any junior in St. Amory's.

Two nights after the receipt of this fateful letter Grim was industriously practising Ranjitsinghi's famous glance at a snug, quiet net, when Miss Varley, accompanied by Miss Cornelia Langton, her governess, went past the nets. Miss Langton told Hilda afterwards that she ought not to speak to hard-working cricketers and distract them in their game. Hilda, I don't think, minded this little wigging, and Grim never went without a friendly nod as he turned from cutting Wilson into the nets, if Miss Hilda Elsie Varley went by.

CHAPTER XXVII

CONCERNING TODD AND COTTON

Knowing Acton's pride--his overwhelming pride--I never expected to see him back at St. Amory's. I expected that he would almost have moved heaven and earth and got himself taken off the school books and gone to complete his education somewhere else rather than come back to the old place where he had had such a signal thrashing. But, of course, he knew jolly well that we four had our tongues tied, and that the knowledge of his defeat was, so to speak, strictly private property; and that is why, I am pretty sure, he turned up again.

He strolled up and down the High, arm-in-arm with Worcester, in high good humour, on the day we returned; but when I turned the corner and came upon him _vis-a-vis_ he gave me a long, level, steady look of hatred, which told me that he had nursed his wrath to keep it warm. His look made me thoughtful. Young Jack Bourne, too, came sailing along--a breezy miniature copy of Phil, his brother--but when he caught sight of his former patron he blushed like a girl and scuttled into the first available yard.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HE GAVE ME A LONG, STEADY LOOK OF HATRED.]

He was not particularly anxious to meet Acton, for Phil, in the holidays, had given Jack a pretty correct inkling of Acton's character, and he began to see--in fact, he did see--that Raffles and the shooting and the billiards, and the hocus pocus of "hedging on Grape Shot," and the trip to London, etc., was only one involved, elaborate plot to strike at Phil. Jack now fully realized that he had played a very innocent fly to Acton's consummate spider, and he now, when there wasn't any very pressing necessity, determined to give the spider's parlour a very wide berth indeed. Acton saw Jack's little manoeuvre, and smiled gently. He was genuinely fond of Jack, but young Bourne had served his purpose; and now, thought Acton, philosophically, "Jack looks upon me as a monster of iniquity, and he won't cultivate my acquaintance." And Phil? Well, Phil regarded the incident as "closed," and paid no heed to his enemy's bitter looks, but divided his attention between his books and cricket, keeping, perhaps unnecessarily, a bright outlook upon Master Jack.

Todd had come back to St. Amory's in a very different frame of mind from that in which he had returned after the Perry fiasco. His three weeks'

holiday had been no end enjoyable; and now, besides a coin or two in his pocket, he had a clean, crisp note in his purse. As he stepped out of the train at the station, the burly figure of Jim Cotton hove in sight, and an eleven-inch palm clapped Gus on the back.

"Hallo! old man. How goes it?"

"Oh!" said Gus, coughing; "I'm all right, Jim, and your biceps seem in their usual working order."

"They are, Gus. I've got a cab out here; we'll go on together."

"Rather! I must find some one to see to the traps, though."

"I've commandeered young Grim," said Jim, "and he'll see to them."

"Provident beggar! Here you are, Grim. Put mine into Taylor's cart, and here's a shilling for you."

Grim, who felt rather injured at being lagged by Cotton so early in the term, just at the moment, too, when he had caught sight of Wilson staggering along with a heavy hat-box, etc., seized Jim's and Gus's effects. Todd's modest _douceur_, however, took off the rough edge of his displeasure.

After tea, Cotton and Todd strolled about, and finally came to anchor behind the nets, where some of the Sixth were already at practice.

"Phil Bourne's good for a hundred at Lord's," said Jim, critically, watching Phil's clean, crisp cutting with interest.

"There's Acton out, too."

"Raw," said Jim. "Biffen's beauty has never been taught to hold his bat, that is evident. Footer is more his line, I take it."

"Are you going to have a try for the eleven, Jim, this year?"

"I'll see how things shape. If Phil Bourne gives me the hint that I have a chance, I'll take it, of course."

"Will he give Acton the hint, think you?"

"I shouldn't say so," said Jim, as Acton's stumps waltzed out of the ground for the fourth time. "He can't play slows for toffee."

"Rum affair about the footer cap," said Gus.

"Rather so. But I believe Phil Bourne is as straight as a die. I'm not so sure of Acton, though. I fancy there's something to be explained about the cap. By the way, Gus, are you going to loaf about this term as usual? Taylor's house side really does want bigger fellows than it's got."

"No!" said Gus. "I'm no good at cricket, nor croquet, nor any other game; nor do I really care a song about them. All the same, I'm not going to loaf."

"What is the idea?" said Jim, curiously.

"I'm going to have a shot for the history medal, and I mean to crawl up into the first three in the Fifth."

"And you'll do 'em, Toddy," said Jim, admiringly. "You're not quite such an a.s.s as you once were."

"Well, I'll work evenly and regularly, and, perhaps, pull off one or other of them."

"I go, you know, at midsummer. Then I'm to cram somewhere for the Army.

Taylor's been advising a treble dose of mathematics, and I think I'll oblige him this time."

"Taylor's not half a bad fellow," said Gus.

"Oh, you're a monomaniac on that subject, Gus! Once you felt ill if you met Taylor or Corker on your pavement."

Jim Cotton was right. Gus was now a vastly different fellow from the shiftless, lazy, elusive Gus of old; he worked evenly and steadily onward, and, in consequence, his name danced delightfully near the top of the weekly form-lists of the Fifth Form. He, however, did not sap everlastingly, but on half holidays lounged luxuriantly on the school benches, watching the cricket going on in the bright sunshine, or he would take his rod and have an afternoon among the perch in the Lodestone, that apology for a stream. Fishing was Gus's ideal of athleticism; the exercise was gentle, and you sometimes had half a dozen perch for your trouble. Gus argued there was nothing to show for an eight hours' f.a.g at cricket in a broiling sun.

CHAPTER XXVIII

ACTON'S LAST MOVE

Phil's unpopularity had somewhat abated, for his victory in the rackets had given him a good leg up in the estimation of his fellows; but still there was the uneasy feeling that in the matter of the "footer" cap his conduct was shady, or at least dubious.

I was awfully sorry to see this, for I myself was leaving at midsummer, and in my own mind I had always looked upon Phil to take up the captaincy. He would have made, in my opinion, the _beau ideal_ of a captain, for he was a gentleman, a scholar, and an athlete. But the other monitors, or at least many of them, did not look upon Phil with enthusiasm, and his election for the captaincy did not now seem the sure thing it had done a few months before.

At St. Amory's the monitors elect a captain, and Corker confirms the appointment if he thinks their choice suitable, but he insists that he must be well up in the Sixth, and not a mere athlete.

Now, Phil's ambition was to be Captain of St. Amory's, as his father had been before him, and when the home authorities finally decided that I was to go to Cambridge in the Michaelmas term; Phil hoped and desired to step into my shoes. He had one great lever to move the fellows in his favour, he was much the best cricketer in the school and deservedly Captain of the Eleven, and, besides that, was one of the best all-round fellows in Sixth Form work. But Phil did not in the least hint that the captaincy was his soul's desire; he determined to merit it, and then leave the matter in the hands of the school. So, from the very beginning of the term, he read hard and played hard, and he left his mark on the cla.s.s lists and the scoring-board in very unmistakable fashion.

And now Acton came like an evil genius on the scene. In a word, he had determined that if he could in any way baulk poor Phil's ambition, he would. If by his means he could put Phil out of the running for the captaincy it should be done. If he could succeed, this success would make up and to spare for his two former defeats. Therefore, warily and cautiously, he set to work.

Acton himself was not much of a cricketer; the game was not, as it were, second nature to him, as it was to Phil, but he was a very smart field--cover was his position--and he could slog heavily, and often with success. He threw himself heartily into the game, and crept rapidly up the ladder of improvement, until Biffen's whispered that their shining light stood a good chance of getting into the Eleven. "That is," said Biffen's crowd, "if Bourne will run straight and give a good man his flannels. But after the 'footer' fraud, what can one expect?" I heard of this, and straightway told Phil.

"Oh, they need not fear. If Acton deserves his flannels, he will get them. I've nothing whatever against his cricket."

Acton learned this, and instantly his new-found zeal for cricket slackened considerably.