The Pothunters Part 17

'Does it as if he enjoyed it, doesn't he? Well, if we don't want to spoil Merevale's appet.i.te by coming in at half-time, we might be moving.' They moved accordingly.

The Sports were to begin at two o'clock with a series of hundred-yards races, which commenced with the 'under twelve' (Cameron of Prater's a warm man for this, said those who had means of knowing), and culminated at about a quarter past with the open event, for which Welch was a certainty. By a quarter to the hour the places round the ropes were filled, and more visitors were constantly streaming in at the two entrances to the School grounds, while in the centre of the ring the band of the local police force--the military being unavailable owing to exigencies of distance--were seating themselves with the grim determination of those who know that they are going to play the soldiers' chorus out of _Faust_. The band at the Sports had played the soldiers' chorus out of _Faust_ every year for decades past, and will in all probability play it for decades to come.

The Sports at St Austin's were always looked forward to by everyone with the keenest interest, and when the day arrived, were as regularly voted slow. In all school sports there are too many foregone conclusions. In the present instance everybody knew, and none better than the compet.i.tors themselves, that Welch would win the quarter and hundred. The high jump was an equal certainty for a boy named Reece in Halliday's House. Jackson, unless he were quite out of form, would win the long jump, and the majority of the other events had already been decided. The gem of the afternoon would be the mile, for not even the shrewdest judge of form could say whether Jim would beat Drake, or Drake Jim. Both had done equally good times in practice, and both were known to be in the best of training. The adherents of Jim pointed to the fact that he had won the half off Drake--by a narrow margin, true, but still he had won it. The other side argued that a half-mile is no criterion for a mile, and that if Drake had timed his sprint better he would probably have won, for he had finished up far more strongly than his opponent. And so on the subject of the mile, public opinion was for once divided.

The field was nearly full by this time. The only clear s.p.a.ce outside the ropes was where the Headmaster stood to greet and talk about the weather to such parents and guardians and other celebrities as might pa.s.s. This habit of his did not greatly affect the unattached members of the School, those whose parents lived in distant parts of the world and were not present on Sports Day, but to St Jones Brown (for instance) of the Lower Third, towing Mr Brown, senior, round the ring, it was a nervous ordeal to have to stand by while his father and the Head exchanged polite commonplaces. He could not help feeling that there was _just a chance_ (horrible thought) that the Head, searching for something to say, might seize upon that little matter of broken bounds or shaky examination papers as a subject for discussion.

He was generally obliged, when the interview was over, to conduct his parent to the shop by way of pulling his system together again, the latter, of course, paying.

At intervals round the ropes Old Austinian number one was meeting Old Austinian number two (whom he emphatically detested, and had hoped to avoid), and was conversing with him in a nervous manner, the clearness of his replies being greatly handicapped by a feeling, which grew with the minutes, that he would never be able to get rid of him and go in search of Old Austinian number three, his bosom friend.

At other intervals, present Austinians of tender years were manoeuvring half-companies of sisters, aunts, and mothers, and trying without much success to pretend that they did not belong to them. A pretence which came down heavily when one of the aunts addressed them as 'Willie' or 'Phil', and wanted to know audibly if 'that boy who had just pa.s.sed'

(_the_ one person in the School whom they happened to hate and despise) was their best friend. It was a little trying, too, to have to explain in the middle of a crowd that the reason why you were not running in 'that race' (the 'under thirteen' hundred, by Jove, which ought to have been a gift to you, only, etc.) was because you had been ignominiously knocked out in the trial heats.

In short, the afternoon wore on. Welch won the hundred by two yards and the quarter by twenty, and the other events fell in nearly every case to the favourite. The hurdles created something of a surprise--Jackson, who ought to have won, coming down over the last hurdle but two, thereby enabling Dallas to pull off an unexpected victory by a couple of yards. Vaughan's enthusiastic watch made the time a little under sixteen seconds, but the official timekeeper had other views. There were no instances of the timid new boy, at whom previously the world had scoffed, walking away with the most important race of the day.

And then the spectators were roused from a state of coma by the sound of the bell ringing for the mile. Old Austinian number one gratefully seized the opportunity to escape from Old Austinian number two, and lose himself in the crowd. Young Pounceby-Green with equal grat.i.tude left his father talking to the Head, and shot off without ceremony to get a good place at the ropes. In fact, there was a general stir of antic.i.p.ation, and all round the ring paterfamilias was asking his son and heir which was Drake and which Thomson, and settling his gla.s.ses more firmly on the bridge of his nose.

The staff of _The Glow Worm_ conducted Jim to the starting-place, and did their best to relieve his obvious nervousness with light conversation.

'Eh, old chap?' said Jim. He had been saying 'Eh?' to everything throughout the afternoon.

'I said, "Is my hat on straight, and does it suit the colour of my eyes?"' said Charteris.

'Oh, yes. Yes, rather. Ripping,' in a far-off voice.

'And have you a theory of the Universe?'

'Eh, old chap?'

'I said, "Did you want your legs rubbed before you start?" I believe it's an excellent specific for the gout.'

'Gout? What? No, I don't think so, thanks.'

'And you'll write to us sometimes, Jim, and give my love to little Henry, and _always_ wear flannel next your skin, my dear boy?'

said Charteris.

This seemed to strike even Jim as irrelevant.

'Do shut up for goodness sake, Alderman,' he said irritably. 'Why can't you go and rag somebody else?'

'My place is by your side. Go, my son, or else they'll be starting without you. Give us your blazer. And take my tip, the tip of an old runner, and don't pocket your opponent's ball in your own twenty-five.

And come back victorious, or on the s.h.i.+elds of your soldiers. All right, sir (to the starter), he's just making his will. Good-bye Jim.

Buck up, or I'll lynch you after the race.'

Jim answered by m.u.f.fling him in his blazer, and walking to the line.

There were six compet.i.tors in all, each of whom owned a name ranking alphabetically higher than Thomson. Jim, therefore, had the outside berth. Drake had the one next to the inside, which fell to Adamson, the victim of the lost two pounds episode.

Both Drake and Jim got off well at the sound of the pistol, and the pace was warm from the start. Jim evidently had his eye on the inside berth, and, after half a lap had been completed, he got it, Drake falling back. Jim continued to make the running, and led at the end of the first lap by about five yards. Then came Adamson, followed by a batch of three, and finally Drake, taking things exceedingly coolly, a couple of yards behind them. The distance separating him from Jim was little over a dozen yards. A roar of applause greeted the runners as they started on the second lap, and it was significant that while Jim's supporters shouted, 'Well run', those of Drake were fain to subst.i.tute advice for approval, and cry 'Go it'. Drake, however, had not the least intention of 'going it' in the generally accepted meaning of the phrase. A yard or two to the rear meant nothing in the first lap, and he was running quite well enough to satisfy himself, with a nice, springy stride, which he hoped would begin to tell soon.

With the end of the second lap the real business of the race began, for the survival of the fittest had resulted in eliminations and changes of order. Jim still led, but now by only eight or nine yards. Drake had come up to second, and Adamson had dropped to a bad third. Two of the runners had given the race up, and retired, and the last man was a long way behind, and, to all practical purposes, out of the running. There were only three laps, and, as the last lap began, the pace quickened, fast as it had been before. Jim was exerting every particle of his strength. He was not a runner who depended overmuch on his final dash.

He hoped to gain so much ground before Drake made his sprint as to neutralize it when it came. Adamson he did not fear.

And now they were in the last two hundred yards, Jim by this time some thirty yards ahead, but in great straits. Drake had quickened his pace, and gained slowly on him. As they rounded the corner and came into the straight, the cheers were redoubled. It was a great race. Then, fifty yards from the tape, Drake began his final sprint. If he had saved himself before, he made up for it now. The gap dwindled and dwindled.

Neither could improve his pace. It was a question whether there was enough of the race left for Drake to catch his man, or whether he had once more left his sprint till too late. Jim could hear the roars of the spectators, and the frenzied appeals of Merevale's House to him to sprint, but he was already doing his utmost. Everything seemed black to him, a black, surging mist, and in its centre a thin white line, the tape. Could he reach it before Drake? Or would he collapse before he reached it? There were only five more yards to go now, and still he led. Four. Three. Two. Then something white swept past him on the right, the white line quivered, snapped, and vanished, and he pitched blindly forward on to the turf at the track-side. Drake had won by a foot.

[12]

AN INTERESTING INTERVIEW

For the rest of the afternoon Jim had a wretched time. To be beaten after such a race by a foot, and to be beaten by a foot when victory would have cut the Gordian knot of his difficulties once and for all, was enough to embitter anybody's existence. He found it hard to accept the well-meant condolences of casual acquaintances, and still harder to do the right thing and congratulate Drake on his victory, a refinement of self-torture which is by custom expected of the vanquished in every branch of work or sport. But he managed it somehow, and he also managed to appear reasonably gratified when he went up to take his prize for the half-mile. Tony and the others, who knew what his defeat meant to him, kept out of his way, for which he was grateful. After lock-up, however, it was a different matter, but by that time he was more ready for society. Even now there might be some way out of the difficulty. He asked Tony's advice on the subject. Tony was perplexed. The situation was beyond his grip.

'I don't see what you can do, Jim,' he said, 'unless the Rugby chap'll be satisfied with a pound on account. It's a beastly business. Do you think your pater will give you your money all the same as it was such a close finish?'

Jim thought not. In fact, he was certain that he would not, and Tony relapsed into silence as he tried to bring another idea to the surface.

He had not succeeded when Charteris came in.

'Jim,' he said 'you have my sympathy. It was an awfully near thing. But I've got something more solid than sympathy. I will take a seat.'

'Don't rag, Charteris,' said Tony. 'It's much too serious.'

'Who's ragging, you rotter? I say I have something more solid than sympathy, and instead of giving me an opening, as a decent individual would, by saying, "What?" you accuse me of ragging. James, my son, if you will postpone your suicide for two minutes, I will a tale unfold. I have an idea.'

'Well?'

'That's more like it. Now you _are_ talking. We will start at the beginning. First, you want a pound. So do I. Secondly, you want it before next Tuesday. Thirdly, you haven't it on you. How, therefore, are you to get it? As the song hath it, you don't know, they don't know, but--now we come to the point--I _do_ know.'

'Yes?' said Jim and Tony together.

'It is a luminous idea. Why shouldn't we publish a special number of _The Glow Worm_ before the end of term?'

Jim was silent at the brilliance of the scheme. Then doubts began to hara.s.s him.

'Is there time?'

'Time? Yards of it. This is Sat.u.r.day. We start tonight, and keep at it all night, if necessary. We ought to manage it easily before tomorrow morning. On Sunday we jellygraph it--it'll have to be a jellygraphed number this time. On Monday and Tuesday we sell it, and there you are.'

'How are you going to sell it? In the ordinary way at the shop?'

'Yes, I've arranged all that. All we've got to do is to write the thing. As the penalty for your sins you shall take on most of it. I'll do the editorial, Welch is pegging away at the Sports account now, and I waylaid Jackson just before lock-up, and induced him by awful threats to knock off some verses. So we're practically published already.'

'It's grand,' said Jim. 'And it's awfully decent of you chaps to f.a.g yourselves like this for me. I'll start on something now.'

'But can you raise a sovereign on one number?' asked Tony.

'Either that, or I've arranged with the shop to give us a quid down, and take all profits on this and the next number. They're as keen as anything on the taking-all-profits idea, but I've kept that back to be used only in case of necessity. But the point is that Jim gets his sovereign in any case. I must be off to my editorial. So long,' and he went.