Years of Plenty Part 4

Berney's always objected to Randall's. This animosity might have been accounted for by the mere fact of neighbourship, but there was more in it than that. As was Athens to Sparta, so was Berney's house to Randall's. Berney's stood always for an easy-going tolerance and, though, for instance, it was not a particularly well-dressed house, it left its nuts in peace. In all its pursuits it was either brilliant or ineffectual, and, if it did anything at all, it did it beautifully: both in games and work it was a house of individuals. A typical batsman from Berney's would make three divine, soul-satisfying cuts and be caught in attempting an impossible fourth: Berney's was never thorough and never took defeat to heart.

Randall's, on the other hand, had no nuts and suspected with Draconian severity the faintest traces of nuttishness. The average member of the house was tall and lumpy and sallow, badly dressed and with no grease to his hair. It was a standing joke with the school that Randall's youths owed their yellow faces not only to general unhealthiness, but also to a dislike of soap and water. They trained like professionals and made tin G.o.ds of their challenge cups. They worked always with a dull, sickening energy: they never had a decent three-quarter among them, but won their matches by working the touch-line and scoring from forward rushes. Yet undoubtedly, despite all their ignorance of the way things should be done, they achieved results.

Of course Berney's hated Randall's bitterly and for ever. But towards the end of term relations became more strained than was usual. To begin with, Randall's had defeated Berney's by thirty-five points to three in the first round of the footer pot. Once Spots had romped away, but for the rest of the match the heavy Randallite scrum had kept the ball close and pushed their light opponents all over the field.

And Randall's juniors had crowed over their triumph, had hailed every fresh try with much shouting and throwing up of caps (it was generally held that gentlemen showed their joy by reasonable yelling and that only a low soccer crowd would hurl their caps into the air), and behaved as offensively as could be expected. Now Randall's prepared to win the final as though the future of the world rested on their efforts, while Berney's jeered from study windows or the house yard.

So Randall's sulked and refused to send back b.a.l.l.s which were kicked over into their yard, and Berney's had to scale walls secretly to recover their property. Nor did they always succeed. But the actual cause of open hostilities was the affair of Gideon.

Gideon's real name was Edward Spencer Lewis-Murray. Some reader of Mr Eden Phillpotts had called him Gideon because he was dark and had a large nose. Whether or not he was a Jew is immaterial. Certainly he not only went to school chapel, but consumed ham in large quant.i.ties.

One day he had been ragged about his nose and straightway he marched to the tuck-shop, ordered an unparalleled amount of ham and pork sausages (for he was wealthy) and devoured the entire feast before a large a.s.sembly. His capacity was enormous, and he thus gained two ends at once: he demonstrated his loathing of Jewish practices and established an undoubted record in consumption.

His nose, however, was certainly large, and the name of Gideon clung to him: but he took his ragging sensibly, and, while remaining a b.u.t.t, he became, in a way, popular. So when, a few days before the end of term, he was shamefully mishandled by some members of Randall's the Berneyites were furious and Gideon became temporarily a martyr and a hero. He had kicked a football into Randall's yard: then, having shouted "Thank you" in vain, he had climbed over the wall to look for it. Shouts of "Gideon," "Berney's Yiddisher," "Jew-beak," "Back to Joppa you dirty Jew-ew," and lastly a great roar of "Stone the dirty Semite" had been heard. And Gideon had not returned. He had, it turned out, been ceremoniously stoned--that is to say, he had been lashed to a pillar in Randall's house gym, and pounded with footb.a.l.l.s thrown hard from a distance of five yards. Then he had been stripped and thoroughly washed in cold water: they had, he said, made jokes about Jordan and total immersion. He reappeared just before tea, raging and very battered. All through the meal his nose bled profusely and it was a sign of the times that no one made jokes, the old, inevitable jokes, about Gideon's 'konk.'

Berney's discussed the affair with animation. Jew or no Jew, Gideon was of Berney's and as such he deserved respectful treatment. The workroom seethed with wrath and Gideon revelled in hospitalities. .h.i.therto undreamed of. Even Cullen and Neave stooped from their heights and actually led the wail of sympathy.

"The swine," said Neave. "Forty of 'em lamming into one poor devil."

"Jaundiced Bible-bangers," said Cullen. "I suppose they're praying now for that mangy pot."

It was a traditional jest that Randall's had house prayers before cup matches to invoke heavenly aid for their team.

"Let's hope Smith puts it across them."

There was a chorus of approval.

"My sainted aunt," Neave went on. "Can't we do something?"

"What?"

"Can't we avenge our Gideon?"

It was then that Martin, standing timidly on the outskirts of the crowd and drinking in every word of the great ones, remarked boldly:

"For Gideon and the Lord."

He raised a roar of laughter. The school had been working at Judges that term in divinity and the story of Gideon was familiar to all.

Martin's allusion to the Israelites' act of revenge was distinctly opportune. The ringing of the prep bell abruptly ended the conversation.

On the following day Randall's put it across Smith's, scoring twenty-eight points to nil. Again the victory was due to forward rushes.

"Not a decent movement in the match," said Spots angrily to Martin.

"It's scandalous that the pot can be won by a pack of well-drilled louts."

Randall's began to stink in the nostrils of the whole school, for their elation at their successes was always characteristic. They revelled with a serious, unconvincing revelry. Other houses always celebrated the occasion by demanding and obtaining ices (in mid-December) at the school tuck-shop: it was a tradition and a n.o.ble one. Randall's gorged themselves with lumps of bread and ham.

Martin happened to walk back to Berney's just behind Cullen and Neave.

He would not have spoken to them had they not turned and addressed him.

It was condescension, and he appreciated it.

"Hullo," said Cullen. "What about old Gideon?"

"I don't know," answered Martin. "Can't anything be done."

"Possibly. Do you remember what you said last night?"

"For Gideon and the Lord?"

"Yes."

"What about it?"

"We'll let you know in dormy to-night."

"Good. That's ripping."

Proceedings in the lower dormy that evening were unusual. Silence was called and then Neave read from the book of Judges:

"And the three companies blew the trumpets, and brake the pitchers, and held the torches in their left hands, and the trumpets in their right hands to blow withal: and they cried, The sword of the Lord, and of Gideon."

Then he continued: "That, my brethren, is the text. And what is its lesson for us here in a community such as ours?" There was a laugh, for he was beautifully constructing a lay sermon on Foskett's lines.

"Only to avenge our Gideon very mightily with pitchers. To-morrow night, as you may know, is the last night of term and our brothers next door" (Cries of "Swine" and counter-cries of "Order") "will hold a supper to celebrate their triumph in the playing-field. Now it is a good tradition of the Public Schools and a byword among clean-living Englishmen" (Laughter, for it was sheer Foskett) "that we do pa.s.s the last night of term in what my form master would call--thorubos. A Greek word, O Stinkers of the Modern Side. My brothers, it is up to us to infect Randall's with thorubos or disorder. (Cheers and a voice, "What about pitchers?")."

"Ah, my young friend, you hit the nail on its head. As everybody knows, to get on to Randall's gym is as easy as falling downstairs.

From there you can get to the fire ladders and up to Randall's dormies.

To-morrow night it is proposed to invade the dormies while the whole house gorges below and listens to slush about their pestilential pots.

Meanwhile we snitch their water jugs and empty the water on their little beds. Then we bring the jugs back here and wait. The windows on this side of the dormy look out on the zinc roof of Randall's gym: beyond is the dining-room, where the swine will be guzzling. With windows open we can easily hear what's going on. When old Toffee Randall gets up to propose his blighted house" (Neave had in his excitement sunk from the level of the lay sermon) "I move that we chuck all the empty jugs on that zinc roof and shout: 'For Gideon and the Lord.' There ought to be row enough to raise h.e.l.l. You know what those roofs are ... and there will be forty pitchers. They won't have the least notion what the row is till they get upstairs and see their beds. They'll think it's a private rag of our own, but they'll learn in due time. Now don't anyone say a word. We've got to keep this to our dormy or the pre's are bound to find out."

The hurried arrival of Spots, followed by the extinction of the lights, put an end to further devising of conspiracy. For a long time Martin lay awake, gazing at the ceiling and turning restlessly from side to side. Excitement, that terrible mingling of sheer joy and sheer terror, gripped him, almost physically: as he thought of the splendours and the perils of to-morrow night he felt as he had felt before when he was walking down the study pa.s.sage to the prefects' common-room and listening to Spots's following tread. What, he wondered, would be the end of it all? There would be a row, inevitably. They might even be kept back a day: that would be wretched. But swiping? He could endure that for the glory of sharing in a rag, a colossal rag with Neave and Cullen as leaders. Besides he hated Randall's, hated them so bitterly that the prospect of soaking their beds and smashing their pitchers was heavenly even at the cost of swipings innumerable. Nowhere is group feeling more obvious and more powerful than in the world of youth. In a single term Martin had become so pa.s.sionately one of Berney's that his hatred of Randall's and their smudgy type of success made him quiver with anger. He didn't care a straw for Gideon's nose: n.o.body really cared for Gideon's sufferings. They were all linked by the single bond of hatred.

It was Randall's that mattered ... the swine.

Naturally the last night of term was not distinguished for its discipline. There was, of course, no prep, and the dormitories were open for packing. Consequently it was not difficult for twelve members of the lower dormy to creep out when Randall's had settled down to their gorge and to range themselves along the gym roof. It was beautifully dark and dry: fortune was helping the cause of Gideon and the right. Neave and Cullen were to ascend the fire-escape and enter Randall's two dormies, one taking each. They were to go through the cubicles, removing the jugs, soaking the beds, and handing out the empty pitchers to others who pa.s.sed them quietly down a line of waiting figures. This seemed the best, the quietest method of transport.

Ultimately all the jugs would be awaiting in Berney's lower dormy the great moment of Toffee Randall's speech. Martin formed one of the hidden line and shivered for half-an-hour on the roof of Randall's gym while he pa.s.sed jugs carefully along. Never in all his life had he known a night like this. He was thrilled by the sense of comradeship in danger and the knowledge that he was working in the company of great ones, working for the pain and humiliation of Randall's. Never did he forget the supreme exhilaration of that night attack: the climbing in the dark, the whispers, the nervous strain, the dread of blundering and betraying his party, the intolerable waiting. Each movement of the trees in Randall's garden made him think that the conspirators had been noticed and that someone was coming.

At length every bed had been duly drenched and forty pitchers had been silently transferred to Berney's lower dormy. Each member of the dormitory took two jugs, and four of them had three. Then they waited.

They could see down into the lighted windows of Randall's dining-hall where the enemy feasted; but the supper was drawing to its end. By the resounding chorus of "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow" they knew that Toffee Randall was "up" for the last speech of the evening. When the singing and cheering were over Randall began his oration. At the same moment Neave gave the signal. Everyone in Berney's lower dormy cried aloud, "For Gideon and the Lord," and, as they cried, forty pitchers crashed on the zinc roof of Randall's gymnasium. No one, not even the manipulators of three jugs, had failed or been late. There was but one cry and one crash: and there on the zinc roof lay myriad morsels of china, glittering in the half light thrown from the windows of either house. The noise had been terrific, the effect stupendous.

It was in the true spirit of the saga.

A moment later Spots dashed into the room. "What the devil's all that row?" he roared.

Everyone was peacefully in his cubicle, putting the last touch to his packing or getting into bed.

"Randall's trying to be funny," suggested Neave.

"But didn't you shout?"

"Well, we helped a bit. That din would have made anyone squeal.

Randall's must have been breaking china for the sake of their dirty pot. They are swine."