My answer must have showed Radley how sadly I was less than his estimate of me.

"But, sir, if I turn back now they'll say I funked."

"Exactly; then go out and face their abuse. Go out and get hurt. I'm determined your life shall be big, so begin now by learning to stand buffeting. Besides, Ray, does it matter to a strong swimmer if the wave beats against him?"

I answered nothing, but gazed out of the window. And Radley shot another appeal—a less lofty one, but it flew home. Arrows pierce deeper, if they don't soar too high.

"Ray, they'll say you funked your master, if you don't go up to Mr. Fillet's study; I shall say you funked the boys, if you don't go out to them. You must choose between their contempt and mine."

I looked down at my boots.

"Which would you rather have, their contempt or mine?"

"Theirs, sir."

Radley was quite moved when I answered him thus; and it was a little while before he proceeded:

"I might have stopped your access to Mr. Fillet's study by telling you that the head master was waiting for you there. But I wanted you to stop from your own high motives, and not from fear. Come along now; we'll go together."

We ascended the stairs to the study and entered. Salome at once raised his long figure from his seat and, pointing at my tie, said:

"Ee, bless me, my man, you're very slovenly; put your tie straight."

I blushed and did so.

Then he turned to Radley.

"Did you find him in the right disposition?"

"Yes, sir."

It would not have been I if at this "Yes, sir" of Radley's my mind had not run up an irrelevant alley, in which I found myself wondering that Radley, who was always called "sir," should ever have to call anyone else "sir." Perhaps I was staring dreamily into vacancy, for Salome said:

"Bless me, I'm very glad to hear that his disposition is all right. But is the boy a fool? Why does he stand staring into vacancy like a brainless nincompoop?"

I turned redder than ever and wondered at whom to look so as to avoid vacancy, and what to do with my hands. Nervously I used the right hand to button up my coat, and then put it out of mischief in my pocket.

"Good God, man!" cried the Head. "Take that hand out of your pocket!"

I took it quickly out and unbuttoned one coat-button: then, for lack of something to do with the hand, did the button up again. I decided to keep the miserable member fingering the button. To make matters worse Salome rested his eyes like a searchlight on the hand. At last he looked distressingly straight at my face.

"Ray," he asked, "are you a perfect fool?"

"No, sir," I said, and grinned.

The Head turned to my housemaster for his testimony.

"Mr. Fillet, is the boy a fool?"

"One couldn't call him a fool," replied Fillet, obviously intending the conclusion: "One might, however, call him a knave."

The Head turned to Radley.

"Mr. Radley, is he a fool?"

"He's anything but a fool, sir; and he's still less of a knave," said Radley, angry and caring only to repudiate Fillet's innuendo.

"Ray," Salome was again staring me out of countenance. "Do you ever do any work?"

"Yes, sir," I said brightly. It was kind of him to ask questions to which I could honestly answer in the affirmative. I did occasionally do some work.

"Mr. Fillet?" queried Salome, desiring the housemaster to have his say.

"I suppose there are idler boys," announced Fillet grudgingly; and it was open to anyone to hear in his words the further meaning; "but, on the other hand, there are many more studious and more deserving." The fact is, the little man was irritated that Radley should have tried to contradict him before the Head.

"Mr. Radley?" pursued Salome, as though he were bored with the evidence, but realised that everyone must be allowed his turn to speak.

"Ray has always worked well for me," Radley promptly answered, and we all knew he meant it as a second stab for Fillet.

Salome once more fixed me with his disconcerting stare.

"Ray," he asked, "have you any glimmerings of moral courage?"

"I don't know, sir," said I, wondering where the conversation was leading.

The Head, apparently tired out by this catechising, contented himself with turning his face in the direction of Fillet for his endorsement or denial.

"He's as bold as they make 'em," said Fillet; and this time the double meaning was as clear as before: "the boy is utterly shameless."

The Head turned to Radley, who answered with a snap:

"Yes, he's plenty of courage; and what's better, he's easily shamed."

"Bless me, are you any good whatever at games?" continued the weary catechist.

"I can swim a bit, but I'm not much good at anything else."

"As he says, he swims a bit," corroborated Fillet. "But I don't know what else he can do."

"He's the best swimmer in the school," snapped Radley, "and will one day be the best bowler."

"Well, bless me, my man, have you any position or influence with your schoolfellows?"

"I don't know, sir."

"Hm!" sneered Fillet, whose temper was gone. "He has his confederates."

"Yes," said Radley, "he has a very loyal following."

I think it pleased the drowsy Head to see two of his masters boxing over the body of one of his boys.

"Well, well," he said, "I'm glad, Ray, to hear you give such a good account of yourself. We are satisfied, I may say, with your prowess in the baths this evening—you did your best, sir, you did your best—and we are satisfied with the attitude you have taken up in regard to this nonsensical business outside—"

"But, sir," I began, deprecatingly.

"God bless me, my man, don't interrupt! I tell you, we are satisfied. We don't sigh for the moon; and we're not talking of your shortcomings. We haven't time, bless me, we haven't time. We're only talking of your virtues, which won't occupy many minutes. We are satisfied that you're not altogether a fool—that you do some work—that you have some moral courage—that you're an athlete—and—what else was the matter, with him, Mr. Radley?—oh, that you have some position with your schoolfellows. We make you a house-prefect, sir, a house-prefect."

Staggered beyond measure, I suppose I showed it in my face, for Salome continued:

"Ee, my man, take off that ridiculous expression. I congratulate you, sir—congratulate you."

And I mechanically shook hands with him. Then Radley gripped my fingers and nearly broke the knuckle-bones. Fillet also formally proffered his hand, and I pressed it quite heartily. It was no good gloating over a man when he was down.

After this ceremony all waited for Salome to clinch proceedings, which he did as offensively as possible by saying:

"Ee, bless me, my man, don't stand there idling all day. Go out at once and establish order."

I went slowly down the stairs to the entrance, and, facing the crowd, was greeted with a fire of questions: "Did you do it?" "What did he say?" "How did he take it?" "Didn't you do it?"

"No," I said, and there was a temporary silence.

"Why not? Why not?"

"Because it wasn't the thing."

While no more eloquence came to my lips, plenty flowed from those of the boys before me. For a moment their execration seemed likely to turn upon me. At last I made myself heard.

"You see," I shouted, "only cads dispute the decision of the referee."

"Yes, but there are exceptions to every rule," said Penny's voice.

And here I sipped the sweets of authority.

"Well, there isn't going to be any exception in this case," I said.

The crowd detected something humorous in my high-handed sentence and laughed sarcastically. So, giving up all attempts to be persuasive, I said bluntly:

"Look here, Salome's upstairs, and he's made me a prefect and sent me down to establish order."

There were elements of greatness in Pennybet. He willingly acknowledged that the coup d'etat was not his but Salome's, and the riot must inevitably crumble away. So he made a point of leading the cheers that greeted my announcement, and, coming forward, was the first to congratulate me. His example was extensively followed, while he looked on approvingly, as though it had all been his doing, and chirruped every now and then: "This is the jolliest day I've spent at Kensingtowe."



CHAPTER XI

THE GREAT MATCH

Sec.1

The next year was 1914. It found Pennybet at Sandhurst; Doe brilliantly high in the Sixth Form, and, since he was a classical scholar and a poet, first favourite for the Horace Prize. In the cricket annals of Kensingtowe it was a remarkable year. Throughout the Summer Term victory followed victory. The M.C.C., having heard of Kensingtowe's super-batsmen, sent a strong team against us, which went under, amid cheering that lasted from 6 to 6.30 p.m. The Sportsman spoke of our fast bowler and captain as the "Coming Man." We called him "Honion," partly because his head, being perfectly bald, resembled that vegetable, and partly because he enjoyed the prefix "The Hon." before his name. Yes, I am speaking of the Hon. F. Lancaster, who appeared for a few moments like a new comet in the cricket heavens, just as the thundercloud of war blotted everything out. When the cloud should roll away, that new comet would be no longer there.

As the term drew to its close, and the world to the War, the cricket enthusiasm possessing Kensingtowe focussed itself on the annual fixture, "The School v. The Masters." For eight years the Masters, thanks to their captain, Radley, had won with ease. The previous year their task had been more difficult, for the shadow of "Honion" was already looming. This year that shadow overspread the world.

We had conquered everywhere, and this was our last fixture. We would win: we must win. If Radley could be eliminated from the Masters' team—if, for instance, some arsenic could be placed in his tea—our victory would be a foregone conclusion. It was a question of "Honion" v. Radley. The enthusiasm swelled and burst the boundaries of the school. Local papers took up the subject. London papers, in small-print paragraphs, copied them. Party feeling ran quite high outside the school: Middlesex supporters desired the triumph of the Masters, which would be the triumph of S.T. Radley, their hero; Sussex supporters backed the School, for they knew that "Honion" Lancaster was to come to them. There was no party within the school, the school being solid for "The School."

One day Radley tapped me on the shoulder.

"Why don't you try to get in the Team?" asked he. "You're the best bowler in the Second Eleven."

I grinned, and represented that such a consummation was of all earthly things impossible.

"I don't see why," said he. "The school's batting talent is great, but the bowling's weak."

Ye Gods! Had he ever heard of Honion?

"O, sir," I remonstrated, "but our strength lies in Honion—in Lancaster, I mean."

Radley smiled.

"What other bowler of any class have you?"

It was true. I mentioned Moles White as a fine slow bowler, and could think of no more "star-turns."

"Well, you come," said Radley, "and bowl at my private net every evening. Your leg-breaks are teasers. I was talking to Lancaster this morning, and he says he doesn't know who will be the last man of the Eleven. Why shouldn't it be you?"

So evening after evening I bowled to Radley, who coached me enthusiastically. I think that he was making a fascinating hobby of training his favourite pupil for the Team, much as an owner delights in running a favourite horse for the Derby. And, when one evening I uprooted his leg-stump twice in succession, he said:

"Good. Now we shall see what we shall see."

In the meantime Lancaster had buttonholed Doe.

"You used to be a great cricketer, usedn't you?"

"When I was a boy, Honion," said Doe.

"And you've slacked abominably."

"Thou sayest so, Honion."

"Well, my son, the last place in the Team is vacant. You should be too good for the Second. Practise like fury, and the situation's yours."

Sec.2

"What do you think, Doe?" said I. "Radley's making me sweat to get into the Team."

A momentary pain and jealousy overspread Doe's face. Quickly passing, it gave place to a whimsical glance, as he rejoined:

"What do you think? Honion's doing the same with me."

"Look here, then," said I, as much despairingly as generously, "I'll stand down. You'll be fifty times better than I shall."

"You won't do anything of the sort. Don't you see Radley's running you as a candidate to spite me? No, we'll fight this out, you and I. Shake on it, and good luck to your candidature!"

"You ripping old tragedy hero!" answered I. "Good luck to yours."

Now, all Kensingtowe amused itself speculating who would be the last man. Many names were mentioned, but Ray was not one of them. Bets were made, and the odds were slightly in favour of Doe. The sentiment of the school said that he ought to be played on the strength of the brilliant things he might do.

The match drew nearer, and the secret as to the last man was severely kept, if, indeed, any decision had been come to. But Doe was establishing himself as favourite. Every day a crowd surrounded the Second Eleven net, where he, with his face suffused in colour and his hair glistening with moisture, was striving to create the necessary impression. Honion, as general, surrounded by his staff-officers in their caps and colours, sometimes stood by the net and pulled his chin contemplatively. And, if Doe made a fine off-drive, all the onlookers (and Doe himself) turned and glanced at Honion, as though for a sign from Heaven. But the great man's face betrayed no emotion.

On the day before the match, which was to be a one-day game, Honion might have been seen crossing the field from the pavilion, where a council of war had just concluded. He was approaching the school-buildings, and, like the Pied Piper, had an enormous crowd of small boys at his back. In his hand was the paper which bore the list of the Team.

"Who is it? Who is it?" demanded the crowd.

"Wait and see," said Lancaster, as great captains do.

And at that moment a first spot of rain fell. Honion looked up apprehensively at a clouding sky. "I thought so," said he; and the weighty words were passed from lip to lip.

The multitude swelled as the Captain drew near the notice-boards. Rumour stalked abroad and loudly proclaimed that the lot had fallen upon Doe. That young cricketer was walking with me at the tail of the procession, very nervous but fairly confident. As for me, my heart was fluttering, and there was an emptiness within.

"Come and tell me who it is," I said to Doe. "You'll find me trembling like a frightened sparrow in the study."

With that I left him, and, going to our study, stood gazing out of the window at a sudden shower of rain. To nerve myself for any shock of disappointment I muttered monotonously some old words of Radley's: "Does it matter to a strong swimmer if the wave beats against him? Does it matter—does it matter—" Soon a roar of many voices was heard in the distance. The list was up. I could not tell whether they were cheering in triumph or groaning in dismay. Then someone ran along the corridor and burst in. I remained looking out of the window lest the expression on my friend's face should betray the secret which I longed but dreaded to hear.

"My dear old fellow," said he, "it's—"

It was coming now. What a long time he took to tell it.

"It's you!"

"Good Lord!"

I had swung round on him.

"And I hope you take all the wickets," said he, with a smile of generosity that he wished me to observe.

I couldn't speak, but turned again to look out of the window. The rain was beating heavily against the panes. And Doe said nothing till, being in a chastened mood, he resumed:

"I think you'll always cut me out, Rupert, because you're the solid stuff, while I'm all show. You left me nowhere in Radley's good books, and now in cricket—"

"But you leave me nowhere in brain-work," objected I, feeling that the handsome appreciation, which he had tossed to me, ought to be returned like a tennis ball.

"Oh, yes, of course, there is that," he assented. "And I may yet have won the Horace Prize."

Just then the kindly White, coming to express his sympathy, broke into the study and exclaimed:

"Well, we've boosted you out all right, Doe."

"Why, had I been chosen at one time, then?" asked Doe, seizing upon this little sop to his pride.

"Of course, but look at the rain. It'll be a bowlers' wicket, and the Skipper's done a daring thing. The school's never known it, but Ray's been our difficulty, ever since Radley started booming him."

Doe brought his lips firmly together, and turned on me with a bright smile.

"Radley's won this journey," he said, "but let him know I was the first to congratulate you."

Sec.3

By ten o'clock on the Great Day a huge crowd had assembled, including visitors, parents, old boys, and quite a number of Pressmen. Pennybet arrived, invested with all the sleek majesty that Sandhurst could give him: and, seeking out Doe and myself, he lent us the dignity of his presence.

At about half-past-ten Radley came to the nets for a little practice, and most of us walked up to see what sort of form he was showing. I was feeling a little shy in my Second Eleven colours and convinced that all the ladies were asking why my blazer was different from the others. Pennybet quickly saw that I was sensitive on this point, and, with his cruel humour, began emphasising the little difficulty: "Ray, how comes it that your blazer's unlike the others? It's very noticeable, isn't it?"

"Oh, shut up," urged I, blushing over face and neck and throat.

"All the ladies," continued my torturer, "will notice it and pity you, saying 'Isn't he lovely?'"

I ignored him and devoted my attention to watching Radley, as he took his place at the net, where Honion was bowling. It was clear that he did not underestimate Honion's express deliveries, for he rolled up his sleeve, displaying a massive forearm that alarmed us seriously; re-arranged his rubber bat-handle; placed his bat firmly in the block; and faced Honion.

The silence spoke of the importance of the moment; Lancaster, our captain, was measuring himself with Radley. He took his long run and bowled. Radley, with little apparent effort, drove the ball out of the net-mouth to the far end of the field, and re-commenced attending to his bat-handle.

"Oh, the full-blooded villain!" exclaimed Penny.

Someone handed Honion another ball, and he bowled. Radley hit it with great force into the net on the off side. Our spirits sank. Honion was good; he was great; but he was not great enough for Radley.

The third ball Radley tapped straight to where I was standing, and I fielded it.

"Bowl," said he.

I did not wish to do so, but it was impossible to disobey. And, as I prepared to bowl, the silence became eloquent again. The new man, the eleventh-hour bowler, was measuring himself with Radley. I realised that my first ball teased him. My second laid his leg-stump on the ground. A yell of joy showed to what a height the spirits of the crowd had risen. But mine sank in proportion: I should never bowl him out twice in one day....

The bell rang, and the field was cleared.

All over the ground there was an anticipatory silence, which made the striking of the school-clock sound wonderfully loud. Then an ovation greeted Lancaster, as he led his classic team on to the ground.

The Masters had won the toss, and the two, who were to open the batting, left the pavilion amid applause, and assumed their places at the wicket. Lancaster placed his field, bowled a lightning ball, and splintered an old Oxonian's middle stump.

Here was excitement! Delirious boys prophesied that eight years' defeats would be wiped off the slate by the school's dismissing the Masters for a handful of runs, scoring a great score, and then dismissing them again, so as to win an innings victory. But stay! Who is this coming in first-wicket-down? Not Radley? Yes, by heaven, it is! He has come to see that no rot sets in. Now, Honion, you may well spit on your hands. A laugh trembles its way round the spectators, as Lancaster places his men in the deep field. He is ready to be knocked about.

The first over closes for ten, all off Radley's bat, two fours and a two. The new bowler, White, deals in slows, and the scoring partakes of the nature of the bowling. But the outstanding fact of that over is this: that Radley hit the last ball with terrific force along the ground, and it was so brilliantly fielded and thrown in that it scattered the stumps before Radley, who had started to run, could reach the crease. Suddenly, crisply, half a thousand mouths snapped out the query: "How's that!"

"Out."

With great good-humour Radley continued his run a little way, but in the direction of the pavilion. Boys stood up and clapped frantically, not a few seizing their neighbours and pummelling them with clenched fists on the back. Pennybet, sitting beside Doe, shook hands with him and with a couple of undemonstrative old gentlemen, whom he had never seen before. They seemed a little overawed, as he wrung their hands.

By one o'clock the Masters were out, having compiled the diminutive score of 99. Not once had they been asked to face my bowling. Honion and White shared the wickets between them.

Now the only question was: would the school be able to beat them by an innings, and so crown their glorious season? They had better, for the onlookers would be content with nothing less.

Everyone adjourned for lunch. The noise in the dining halls, which the masters made no attempt to check, was tremendous, since all were offering their forecasts of the result. But this fact was universally accepted: the School Eleven would play carefully till they had scored a hundred runs and so passed the Masters' total, after which they would adopt forcing tactics and lift the score over 300. Then they would declare, and bowl the Masters out for a price under the spare 200 runs. Thus the innings victory would be achieved.

Sec.4

The most effective, the most spectacular, and probably the worst innings of the School Eleven was that played by Moles White. He dragged his elephantine form to the wicket, and, looking round with his genial smile, prepared to enjoy the Masters' bowling. Again and again he lifted the ball high into the air and grinned as master after master dropped the catches. It was a method that could only have been successful in such a match as this, where the field had been taken by a team like the Masters, whose "tail" was quite out of practice and rather stiff in the joints.

Every vigorous hit of White's, even if it soared skyward, was cheered with loud cries of "Good old Moles!" Every time his unpardonable catches were dropped, the acclamations were lost in laughter. And when with a splendid stroke he lifted the score over the Masters' total and into three figures, White enjoyed the triumph of his school career.

By this time there was collected behind the railings that surround Kensingtowe a fine crowd of carters and cabmen, who had "woahed" their horses and were standing on their boxes, enjoying an excellent view. They had no idea what the match was, or who were winning, but every time they heard the boys begin to cheer, they waved their hats, brandished their whips, and cheered and whistled as well. The excellent fellows only knew that the great crowd of young gents was happy, and were benignantly pleased to share their happiness.

White made his fifty and was bowled in attempting the most abominable of blind-swipes. He returned towards the pavilion, so far forgetting himself in his pleasure as to swing about his bat like a tennis-racket. What thunderous applause he received! It was his last term, and his last match. And I am glad that the final picture, which our memory preserves of White alive, shows us the sterling oaf departing after a glorious innings, surrounded by uproarious school-fellows, and smiling as only the righteous can. Grand old boy, may we meet many more like you!

By a quarter to five the School total had reached the astonishing figure of 350. To this I had contributed 4, with which I was very satisfied, as it was four more than I expected. Lancaster declared, and the school by its applause endorsed the decision.

Now, how did the position stand? Stumps were to be drawn at 7.30. To save the innings defeat the Masters must score over 250 in two hours and a half. An impossible achievement—a hundred to one on an innings defeat! But would they all be bowled out in the little time left? With luck, and Honion in form, yes. And luck was with us, and Honion in great form this afternoon. Oh, a thousand to one on an innings defeat!

Sec.5

The School took the field without unnecessary delay, and Radley opened the Masters' innings. They were going to make a fight of it, then. But the School had set its heart on the innings victory, and the team had the moral strength derived from the concentrated determination of six hundred boys. What had the Masters to oppose this? Nothing save Radley and a handful of tarnished Blues.

It is stated that the third innings of the day opened like this: Honion started on a longer run than usual, as if to terrify this Radley fellow. The latter, so an enormous number declared, though I contend they were mistaken, started to run at the same time as the bowler, and, meeting the ball at full-pitch, smote it for six. The jubilant expectations of the crowd, always as sensitive as the Stock Exchange, fluctuated. The second ball was square-cut more quietly for four. The third was driven high over the bowler's head and travelled to the boundary-rope. Honion placed a man at the spot where the ball passed the rope, and sent down a similar delivery. Radley pulled it, as a great laugh went up, to the very spot from which the fieldsman had been removed. Eighteen in four balls! The spirits of the crowd drooped.

Penny, at his place with Doe, began to sulk, saying he was sick of it all, and wished he hadn't come.

"Oh, rot," said Doe, "they haven't put our Rupert, the dark horse, on yet. I'm afraid all that's rotten in me is wanting him to be a failure. I can't help it, and I'm trying to hope he'll come off. If he does, I'll bellow! Over. White's going to bowl now."

The ground apparently favoured the slow bowler, for the first wicket fell to White's second ball. But the victim, sad to tell, was not Radley.

Hush—oh, hush. The head master was coming out to partner Radley! And, considering the silence of respect with which he was greeted, I think Salome scarcely behaved becomingly. He hit an undignified boundary for four.

"Ee, bless me, my man!" whispered the wits.

But Salome, ignorant of this mild flippancy, actually undertook to run a vulgar five for an overthrow: and by like methods succeeded in amassing a score of runs in a dozen minutes.

Meanwhile, Radley, who from the beginning had taken his life in his hands, was flogging the bowling. He and Salome quickly added fifty to the Masters' total.

But Salome's bright young life was destined to be curtailed. A straight, swift ball from Honion he stopped with his instep, and promptly obeyed two laws which operate in such circumstances: the one compelling him to execute a pleasing dance and rub the injured bone; and the other involving his return to the pavilion (l.b.w.) in favour of the succeeding batsman.

At this interesting development Penny bobbed up and down in his seat with glee. "Ee, bless me! Ee, hang me! Ee, curse me!" he chirruped. "He's bust the bone. He'll never walk again. Probably mortification will set in, and he'll have his foot off. Next man in, please. Oh, I never enjoyed anything so much in my life."

The following two wickets were shared by Honion and White, and the score stood at 90 for four, when the school chaplain approached the wicket. This reverend gentleman walked to his place with zealous rapidity, and proceeded to propagate the gospel with some excellent hits to leg. Three such yielded him nine runs, and at the end of the over he found himself facing Honion's bowling. The temporary dismay of the crowd disappeared. Honion, it was conjectured, would soon send the parson indoors to evensong. But the conjecture was faulty. Honion instead was sent for a two, a boundary, and a single.

"Curse me!" grumbled Penny. "It's not in the best taste for the learned divine to play like any godless layman. Has he nothing better to do? Are there no souls to save?"

"No, but there's a match to save," suggested Doe.

There was perhaps some justification for Penny's indignation, when this indecent ecclesiastic scored two fours in succession, and by his beaming face and intermittent giggle showed that he was feeling a very carnal satisfaction in sending ten members of his congregation, one after another, in search of the ball. Ultimately he was caught low down in the slips, having compiled an excellent thirty; and he walked off, hardly concealing a smile.

As he ran up the steps of the pavilion, Upton came down, drawing on his gloves and ready to prove that Erasmus could exhibit very creditable pedagogues, as well as Bramhall. This slender, grey-haired master with the ruddy countenance was much favoured by the ladies. He looked a young and blooming veteran. The boys of Erasmus gave him a cheer (for he was a good man) and prayed that he might not survive the first ball. He did, however, and held his end up in dogged fashion, leaving Radley to develop the score, and only occasionally taking a modest four for himself.

It was about this time that Radley got under a ball and sent a chance whizzing towards me. It flew high, and I shot up my left hand for it. The ball hit me right in the centre of the palm with such force that it stung most painfully, and I had not the least hesitation in dropping it. There were groans of disappointment from the males, execrations from Penny, and murmurs of sympathy and love from the female portion of the crowd. But my sensations were again the opposite to the crowd's. The pain in my hand was exactly the same as when Radley caned me years before on the left hand: and I was reminded of the scene. "Put up your left hand," he had said sarcastically. "You'll need the other for writing your lines." Now I had accidentally put up my left. It was surely because I should need the other for bowling him out. Such strange alleys do my thoughts run along when I am woolgathering in the field.

It must be admitted that Honion was by this time a failure. Radley was doing what he liked with the bowling. By six-thirty the score stood at 180, and the Masters only required 70 to save them from the innings defeat. There was an hour before them, and they had five wickets in hand. But the light was not so good. We might do it yet.

Thirty minutes of that last hour passed, and in them forty runs were scored at a cost of three wickets. So there was half an hour left to play, two wickets in hand, and thirty runs to get.

The ninth man failed at a quarter past seven, leaving the score at 225. It rested, then, with Radley and the last man to make 25 in fifteen minutes and a bad light.

The schoolboy crowd was suffering; and, when Radley smote Honion for a six, the suffering became agony. Some drastic step must be taken.

Suddenly a shrill-voiced boy sang out:

"Put Ray on. Give Ray a chance."

The crowd took it up and roared out its instructions to put Ray on. Bad form, I grant you, but then they scarcely knew what they were doing, for they were in an ecstasy of suspense and excitement. The cry became formidable. "Put Ray on." My face felt as if it had been scorched at the fire. One boy roared out: "Hoo-Ray, hoo-Ray, hoo-blooming-Ray!"

The crowd laughed, and, while many inquired of one another: "What did he say? Do tell me," the majority adopted the cry as a slogan.

"Hoo-Ray, hoo-Ray, hoo-blooming-Ray!"

Our captain deferred to the voice of public opinion.

"Take next over this end, Ray," he said.

The permission was belated enough. When amid terrific applause I faced Radley, there were only fourteen runs to be made and ten minutes to play.

But, then, I had only one wicket to take. The pulsations of my heart were rapid—but dull, deliberate, and heavy as a strong man's fist. I felt as though I had not eaten anything for weeks, nor was ever likely to eat again. Honion shook his head; he saw that I was trembling. Radley smiled encouragingly. White said: "For God's sake, Ray, pull it off." And I murmured: "Right. I'll try." I was surprised at the way my voice shook.

I took a quiet run (though my feet sounded noisily on the turf, owing to the breathless silence) and bowled.

"Wide!"

The crowd laughed, but it was the laugh of despair. My second ball Radley hit for four. My third followed it to the boundary.

"This'll be Ray's last over," said the witty critics. It was. There were only five more runs to be made. The ladies, preparing for departure, drew on their gloves. Sedate gentlemen, who had removed top-hats from perspiring brows, brushed the silk with their sleeves. Within a few minutes the innings victory would be won or lost.

Despair cured me of nerves. I bowled my fourth ball without any excitement. Radley fumbled and missed it. He smiled grimly, twisted his bat round, adjusted the handle, and resumed his position at the block.

Murmurs of "Well bowled" reached me: and so silent was the crowd and so still the evening, that I heard a voice saying to someone: "That was a good ball, wasn't it? Absolutely beat him. In a light like this—"

Now I was trembling, if you like. But it was not nerves. It was confidence that the supreme moment of my schooldays was upon me. I picked up the ball, muttering repeatedly but unconsciously: "O God, make me do it." I turned and faced Radley. As I took my short run, I felt perfectly certain that I should bowl him. And the next thing I remember was seeing my master's leg-bail fall to the ground.

All together, none before and none after the other, every male in the crowd bellowed forth the accumulated excitement of the day:

"OUT!"

Sec.6

Not for half an hour that evening did the cheering cease or the mass of boys begin to disperse. Even then there were little outbreaks of fresh cheering coming from separate groups. A line of day-boys, who had linked arms as, homeward bound, they left the field, droned merrily:

"Now the day is over, Night is drawing nigh, Shadows of the evening Steal across the sky."

And among the dissolving cheers from the distance could occasionally be heard the refrain of "Hoo-Ray, hoo-Ray, hoo-blooming-Ray!"



CHAPTER XII

CASTLES AND BRICK-DUST

Sec.1

It was on the day when those two pistol shots were fired at an Austrian Archduke in the streets of Serajevo that the Masters' match was played out at Kensingtowe. By the early evening the reverberation of the revolver reports had been felt like an earthquake-shock in all the capitals of Europe; and in a failing light the last wicket had fallen at Kensingtowe. So it happened that, while the Emperors of Central Europe were whispering that the Day had come and the slaughter of the youth of Christendom might begin, there was a gathering in Radley's room of those insignificant people whose little doings you have watched at Kensingtowe. They were assembled to drink tea and discuss the match. There were Radley as host; Pennybet, to represent the Old Boys; Doe and I, in fine fettle for the School; and Dr. Chappy, who, having sworn that he was a busy man and couldn't spare the time, sat spilling cigar-ash in the best armchair, and looked like remaining for the rest of the evening.

"Stop quarrelling about the match," said Radley, as he stood with his back to the mantelpiece, "and listen to me. It's a great day, this—a day of triumph. Ray has won the innings victory for the School, and Doe—"

Doe pricked up his ears.

"It's just out—Doe has won the Horace Prize."

At this news there were great congratulations of the poet, who went red with pleasure.

"When you've all finished," said Radley, "I'll read the Prize Poem."

So Radley began faithfully from a manuscript:

"Horace, Odes I, 9. Vides ut Alta Stet. "White is the mountain, fleeced in snows, And the pale trees depress their weighted boughs—"

"Oh, spare us!" interrupted Chappy.

"Not a bit," said Radley. "Hark to this:

"Bring out the mellow wine, the best, The sweet convivial wine, and test Its four-year-old maturity: To Jove commit the rest, Nor question his divine intents For, when he stays the battling elements, The wind shall brood o'er prostrate seas And fail to move the ash's crest Or stir the stilly cypress trees. Be no forecaster of the dawn; Deem it an asset, and be gay— Come, merge to-morrow's misty morn In the resplendence of to-day.

"Youth is the day the field to scour, The time of conquests won, The pause, wherein to hark at trysting hour To the whispered word That is gently heard In the wake of the passing sun—"

"What's it all about?" grumbled Chappy. "And I'm sure 'morn' doesn't rhyme with 'dawn.'" at which Doe went white with pain, and numbered the doctor among the Philistines.

"It's a very distinguished attempt to catch the spirit of Horace's fine ode," answered Radley, and Doe turned red again with pleasure, forgiving Radley all the unkindness he had ever perpetrated, and enrolling him among the Elect.

Now Pennybet liked to be the centre of attraction at friendly little gatherings like this, and had little inclination to sit and listen to people praising those who recently had been nothing but his satellites. So he lit a cigarette and said:

"It's entirely the result of my training that these young people have turned out so well."

"Pennybet," explained Radley, "you're a purblind egotist and will come to a bad end."

"Oh, I don't think so, sir," said Penny, crossing his legs that he might the more comfortably discuss his end with Radley. "I've always managed to do what I've wanted and to come out of it all right."

"Oh, you have, have you?" sneered Chappy.

"Always," answered Penny, unabashed. "It's a favourite saying of my mother's that 'adverse conditions will never conquer her wilful son.'"

"Good God!" cried the doctor, rightly appalled.

"Yes," continued the speaker, delighted to tease the doctor, "for instance, I made up my mind all the time I was here to stick in a low form. It was an easier life, and fun to boss kids like Edgar Doe and Rupert Ray. And I pulled all the strings of the famous Bramhall Riot, as Ray knows. And I just did sufficient work to pass into Sandhurst. And I shall be just satisfactory enough to get my commission. Then I shall do all in my power to provoke a European War, so that there will be a good chance of promotion—"

"There's a type of man," interrupted Radley, "who'd start a prairie fire, if it were the only way to light his pipe."

"Exactly. And I am he."

"Good God!" repeated Chappy.

"And, after peace is declared, I shall settle down to a comfortable life at the club."

"It's a relief," smiled Radley, "that you won't lead a revolution and usurp the throne."

"Too much trouble. I may go into Parliament, which is a comfortable job. On the Tory side, of course, because there you don't have to think."

"You've about fifty years of life," suggested Radley. "And don't you want to do anything constructive in that time?"

"Not in these trousers! I know that, if I were sincere and constructive in my politics, I should be a Socialist. It stands to reason that it can't be right for all the wealth to be in the pockets of the few, and for there to be a distinct and cocky governing class. But, as I want to amass wealth and enjoy the position of the ruling class, I shall be careful not to think out my politics, lest I develop a pernicious Socialism."

"Oh, Lord!" groaned the doctor.

"I think I'm a Socialist," suddenly put in Doe, and Chappy turned to him, dumbfounded to witness the eruption of a second youth. "I've long thought that, when I find my feet in politics, I shall be in the Socialist camp. They may be visionary, but they are idealists. And I think it's up to us public-schoolboys to lead the great mass of uneducated people, who can't articulate their needs. I'd love to be their leader."

"What you're going to be," said Radley, "is an intellectual rebel. When you go up to Oxford in a year or so, you'll pose as most painfully intellectual. You'll be a Socialist in Politics, a Futurist in Art, and a Modernist or Ultramontane in Religion—anything that's a rebellion against the established order. At all costs let us be original and outrageous."

"Hear, hear," whispered Penny.

"Ray has been the strong, silent man so far," said Radley. "Let's hear his Castle in the Air."

"For God's sake—" began Chappy.

"Speech! Speech!" demanded Pennybet.

"Oh, I don't know," demurred I. "I've not many ideas. I generally think I'd like to be a country squire, very popular among the tenants, who'd have my photo on their dressers. And I'd send them all hares and pheasants at Christmas and be interested in their drains—"

I was elaborating this picture, when Penny, feeling that he had made his speech and was not particularly interested in anyone else's, glanced at a gold wrist-watch, and decided that it was time for him to go. He made a peculiarly effective exit, his hat tilted at what he called a "damn-your-eyes" angle. Never again did Doe or I see him, though we heard of his doings. God speed to him, our cocksure Pennybet. Let us always think the best of him.

No sooner had the door clicked than Chappy exploded.

"That high youth ought to have his trousers taken down and be birched. What are we coming to, when boys like him lecture their elders on how to run the world?"

"That question," Radley retorted, "Adam probably asked Eve, when Cain and Abel decided to be Socialists."

"I tell you, these self-opinionated boys want whipping, and so do you, Master Doe, with your damned Fabianism."

"Oh, come, come," objected Radley. "I like them to be gloriously self-confident. Young blood is heady stuff. And there'd be something wrong, if a body full of young blood didn't have a head full of glittering illusions."

"Rot!" proclaimed Chappy.

"I like them to be Socialists and Futurists and everything. If they don't want to put the world to rights, who will?"

"Damned rot!"

"It's nothing of the sort," rejoined Radley, getting annoyed. "They ought to break out at this time. You can't bind up a bud to prevent it bursting into flower."

"If I'd children who burst like that, I'd bind them for you!"

"No, you wouldn't," contradicted Radley, softening again. "You'd expect them to be intolerant of you as old fashioned. You'd withdraw behind your cigar-smoke and your old-fashioned ideas, and leave them to put the world to rights. After all, it's their world."

Sec.2

Now, though you may think this a very uninteresting chapter—a mere dialogue over the tea-cups, I take leave to present it to you as quite the most dramatic and most central of our humble tale. The events that lend it this distinguished character were happening hundreds of miles from Radley's room, in places where more powerful people than Penny or Doe or I were building Castles in the Air. An Emperor was dreaming of a towering, feudal Castle, broad-based upon a conquered Europe and a servile East. Nay, more, he had finished with dreaming. All the materials of this master-mason were ready to the last stone. And, if the two pistol-shots meant anything, they meant that the Emperor had begun to build.

And, since building was the order of the day, there were wise men in the councils of the Free Nations who saw that they must destroy the Emperor's handiwork and build instead a Castle of their own, where Liberty, International Honour, and many other lovely things might find a home. So for all of us self-opinionated boys, it was a matter of hours this summer evening before we should be told to tumble our petty Castles down, and shape from their ruins a brick or two for the Castle of the Free Peoples. Well, we tumbled them down. And the rest of this story, I think, is the story of the bricks that were made from their dust.

Sec.3

Doe and I left Radley and the doctor to their dispute, and retired to our study. It was then that Doe began to blush and say:

"Funny the subject of our ambitions cropped up. Only a few days ago I tried to write a poem about it."

I pleaded for permission to read it.

"You can, if you like," he said, getting very crimson. With trembling hands he extracted a notebook from his pocket and indicated the poem to me. From that moment I saw that he was waiting in an agony of suspense for my approval.

I took it to the window, and, by the half-light of evening, read:

If God were pleased to satisfy My every whim, I'd tell you just the little things I'd ask of Him: A little love—a little love, and that comes first of all, And then a chance, and more than one, to raise up them that fall; Enough, not overmuch, to spend; And discourse that would charm me With one familiar friend; A little music, and, perhaps, a song or two to sing;

And I would ask of God above to grant one other thing: Before old Death can grimly smile And take me unawares, A little time to rest awhile, To think, and say my prayers.

"Gad!" I said. "You're a poet."

I liked the little trifle, not least because I suspected that the "one familiar friend" was myself. Everyone likes to be mentioned in a poem.

Doe beamed with pleasure that I had not spoken harshly of his off-spring.

"Glad you like it," he said.

"There's this," I suggested, "you talk about only wanting 'these little things' out of life. But it seems to me that you want quite a lot."

"A lot! By Jove, Ray," cried Doe excitedly, "it's only when I'm in my unworldly moods that I want so little as that. In my worse moments—that's nine-tenths of the day—I want yards more: Fame and Flattery and Power."

"Funny. Once, outside the baths, I had a sort of longing to—"

"Ray, I only tell you these things," interrupted Doe, now worked up, "but often I feel I've something in me that must come out—something strong—something forceful."

"I don't think I ever felt quite like that," said I, ruminating. "But I did once feel outside the baths—"

"The trouble is," Doe carried on, "that this something in me isn't pure. It's mixed up with the desire for glory. When I told Radley I'd like to be a leader of the people, I knew that one-third was a real desire for their good, and two-thirds a desire for my own glory."

"Yes, but I was going to tell you that once—"

"And I wish it were a pure force. I'd love to pursue an Ideal for its own sake, and without any thought for my own glory. I wonder if I shall ever do a really perfect thing."

"I was going to tell you," I persisted; and, though I knew he measured my temperament as far inferior to Edgar Doe's artistic soul, and would rather have continued his own revelations, yet must I interrupt by telling him of my one moment of aspiration and yearning. Perhaps, I, too, wanted to pour out my mind's little adventures. We're all the same, and like a heart-to-heart talk, so long as it is about ourselves.

I told him, accordingly, of that strange evening outside the baths, when I had felt so overpowering an aspiration towards a vague ideal—an ideal that could not be grasped or seen, but was somehow both great and good.

Sec.4

The last evening of that summer term there was a noisy breaking-up banquet at Bramhall House. And in the morning I went to Radley's room to say a separate good-bye. I was exultant. Next term seemed worlds away: and, meanwhile, eight sunny weeks of holiday stretched before me. My mother and I were off for Switzerland, to whose white heights and blue Genevan lake she loved to take me, for it was my birthplace, and, in her fond way, she would call me her "mountain boy," and tell an old story of a Colonel who had gazed into his grandson's eyes, and said: "Il a dans les yeux un coin du lac." I was dreaming, then, of the Swiss mountain air, and of twin white sails on a lovely lake; and I was visualising, let me admit it, a new well-tailored suit, grey spats, socks of a mauve variety, and other holiday eruptions. So there was no space in my parochial mind for international issues and rumours of wars. Rather I was ridiculously flushed and shining, as I came upon Radley and wished him a happy holiday.

Radley seemed strained, as though he had something ominous to break, and said with a dull and meaning laugh: "I'm sure I hope you have one too."

Observing that he was in one of his harder moods, I at once became awkwardly dumb; and there was a difficult silence, till he asked:

"Have you heard about Herr Reinhardt?"

"Mr. Caesar? No, sir."

"Well, he left to-day for Germany."

"What on earth for?"

"Why, to shoulder a rifle, of course, and fight in the German ranks. Don't you know Germany is mobilising and will be at war with France in about thirty hours?"

"Oh, I read something about it. But what fun!"

Radley looked irritated. In trying to break some strange news he had walked up a blind alley and been met by my blank wall of density. So he took another path.

"Pennybet is in luck, according to his ideas. All Europe plays into his hands. He's got the war he wanted to give him rapid promotion."

"Why, sir, how will Germany affect him?"

"Only in this way," Radley announced, desperately trying to get through my blank wall by exploding a surprise, "that England will be at war with Germany in about three days."

"Oh, what fun! We'll give 'em no end of a thrashing. I hate Germans. Excepting Herr Reinhardt. I hope he has a decent time."

"And White and Lancaster, and all who leave this term, and perhaps even—perhaps others will get commissions at once."

"Why, sir? They're not going to Sandhurst."

"No," sighed Radley, "but they give commissions to all old public-schoolboys, if there's a big war. White and Lancaster will be in the fight before many months."

"Lucky beggars!"

It was this fatuous remark which showed Radley that I had no idea of my own relation to the coming conflict. So he forbore to spring upon me the greatest surprise of all. He just said with a sadness and a strange emphasis:

"Well, good-bye, and the best of luck. Make the most of your holiday. There are great times in front of you."

All the while he said it, he held my hand in a demonstrative way, very unlike the normal Radley. Then he dropped it abruptly and turned away. And I went exuberantly out—so exuberantly that I left my hat upon his table, and was obliged to hasten back for it. When I entered the room again, he was staring out of the window over the empty cricket fields. Though he heard me come, he never once turned round, as I picked up my hat and went out through the door.

And because of that I dared to wonder whether his grey eyes, where the gentleness lay, were not inquiring of the deserted fields: "Have I allowed myself to grow too fond?" He seemed as if braced for suffering.

Farewell, Radley, farewell. After all, does it matter to a strong swimmer if the wave beats against him?



_Now Thames is long and winds its changing way Through wooded reach to dusky ports and gray, Till, wearily, it strikes the Flats of Leigh, An old life, tidal with Eternity.

But Fal is short, full, deep, and very wide, Nor old, nor sleepy, when it meets the tide; Through hills and groves where birds and branches sing It runs its course of sunny wandering, And passes, careless that it soon shall be Lost in the old, gray mists that hide the sea.

Ah, they were good, those up-stream reaches when Ourselves were young and dreamed of being men, But Fal! the tide had touched us even then! One tribal God, we bow to, thou and we, And praise Him, Who ordained our lives should be So early tidal with Eternity._



BOOK II AND THE REST—WAR

Part I: "Rangoon" Nights

CHAPTER I

THE ETERNAL WATERWAY

Sec.1

The most clearly marked moment of my life was when I passed the fat policeman who was standing just inside the great gateway of Devonport Dockyard. I was to embark that morning on a troopship bound for the Dardanelles. As I stepped out of the public thoroughfare, and walking through the gate, saw the fat policeman. I passed out of one period of my life and entered upon another.

The first period that remained outside the tall walls of the dockyard was made up of chapters of boyhood and schooldays; and a gallant last chapter of playing at soldiers. Ah! this last chapter—it had tennis and theatres and girls and kisses: a great patch of life! And I left it all outside the docks.

The second period, on to which I now abruptly set foot, was to be intense, highly-coloured, and scented; a rush of rapidly moving pictures of the blue waters of the Mediterranean, the bleak hills of Mudros, and the exploding shells on the peninsula of Gallipoli.

The fat policeman had a revolver slung over his shoulder, and his businesslike weapon expressed better than anything else that England was at war and taking no risks. He suitably challenged me:

"Your authority to go through, sir?" demanded he.

"That's where I've got you by the winter garments," said I vulgarly; and, diving my hand into my pocket, I drew out my Embarkation Orders. They were heavily marked in red "SECRET," but I judged the policeman to be "in the know," and showed them to him. Properly impressed with the historic document, he turned to a fair-haired young officer who was with me, and asked:

"You the same, sir?"

"Surely," answered my companion, which was a new way he had acquired of saying "yes."

"Right y'are, sir," said the policeman, and we crossed the line.

My fair-haired companion was, of course, Second Lieutenant Edgar Gray Doe; and it was in keeping with the destiny that entwined our lives that we should pass the fat policeman together. And now I had better tell you how it happened.

Sec.2

On August 3, 1914, eleven months before my solemn admission into Devonport Dockyard, I was a young schoolboy on my holidays, playing tennis in a set of mixed doubles. About five o'clock a paper-boy entered the tennis-club grounds with the Evening News. My male opponent, although he was serving, stopped his game for a minute and bought a paper.

"Hang the paper!" called I, indifferent to the fact that the Old World was falling about our ears and England's last day of peace was going down with the afternoon sun. "Your service. Love—fifteen."

"By Jove," he cried, after scanning the paper, "we're in!"

"What do you mean," cried the girls, "have the Germans declared war on us?"

"No. But we've sent an ultimatum to Germany which expires at twelve to-night. That means Britain will be in a state of war with Germany as from midnight." The hand that held the paper trembled with excitement.

"How frightfully thrilling!" said one girl.

"How awful!" whispered the other.

"How ripping!" corrected I. "Crash on with the game. Your service. Love—fifteen."

Five days later it was decided that I should not return to school, but should go at once into the army. So it was that I never finished up in the correct style at Kensingtowe with an emotional last chapel, endless good wishes and a lump in my throat. I just didn't go back.

Instead, an influential friend, who knew the old Colonel of the 2nd Tenth East Cheshires, a territorial battalion of my grandfather's regiment, secured for me and, at my request, for Doe commissions in that unit. His Majesty the King (whom, and whose dominions, might God preserve in this grand moment of peril) had, it seemed, great faith in the loyalty and gallantry of "Our trusty and well-beloved Rupert Ray," as also of "Our trusty and well-beloved Edgar Gray Doe," and was pleased to accept our swords in the defence of his realm.

So one day we two trusty and well-beloved subjects, flushed, very nervous, and clad in the most expensive khaki uniforms that London could provide, took train for the North to interview the Colonel of the 2nd Tenth. He was sitting at a littered writing-table, when we were shown in by a smart orderly. We saw a plump old territorial Colonel, grey-haired, grey-moustached, and kindly in face. His khaki jacket was brightened by the two South African medal ribbons; and we were so sadly fresh to things military as to wonder whether either was the V.C. We saluted with great smartness, and hoped we had made the movement correctly: for really, we knew very little about it. I wasn't sure whether we ought to salute indoors; and Doe, having politely bared his fair head on entering the office, saluted without a cap. I blushed at my bad manners and surreptitiously removed mine. Not knowing what to do with my hands, I put them in my pockets. I knew that, if something didn't happen quickly, I should start giggling. Here in the presence of our new commanding officer I felt as I used to when I stood before the head master.

"Sit down," beamed the C.O.

We sat down, crossed our legs, and tried to appear at our ease, and languid; as became officers.

"How old are you?" the Colonel asked Doe.

Doe hesitated, wondering whether to perjure himself and say "Twenty."

"Eighteen, sir," he admitted, obviously ashamed.

"And you, Ray?"

"Eighteen, sir," said I, feeling Doe's companion in guilt.

"Splendid, perfectly splendid!" replied the Colonel. "Eighteen, by Jove! You've timed your lives wonderfully, my boys. To be eighteen in 1914 is to be the best thing in England. England's wealth used to consist in other things. Nowadays you boys are the richest thing she's got. She's solvent with you, and bankrupt without you. Eighteen, confound it! It's a virtue to be your age, just as it's a crime to be mine. Now, look here"—the Colonel drew up his chair, as if he were going to get to business—"look here. Eighteen years ago you were born for this day. Through the last eighteen years you've been educated for it. Your birth and breeding were given you that you might officer England's youth in this hour. And now you enter upon your inheritance. Just as this is the day in the history of the world so yours is the generation. No other generation has been called to such grand things, and to such crowded, glorious living. Any other generation at your age would be footling around, living a shallow existence in the valleys, or just beginning to climb a slope to higher things. But you"—here the Colonel tapped the writing-table with his forefinger—"you, just because you've timed your lives aright, are going to be transferred straight to the mountain-tops. Well, I'm damned. Eighteen!"

I remember how his enthusiasm radiated from him and kindled a responsive excitement in me. I had entered his room a silly boy with no nobler thought than a thrill in the new adventure on which I had so suddenly embarked. But, as this fatherly old poet, touched by England's need and by the sight of two boys entering his room, so fresh and strong and ready for anything, broke into eloquence, I saw dimly the great ideas he was striving to express. I felt the brilliance of being alive in this big moment; the pride of youth and strength. I felt Aspiration surging in me and speeding up the action of my heart. I think I half hoped it would be my high lot to die on the battlefield. It was just the same glowing sensation that pervaded me one strange evening when, standing outside the baths at Kensingtowe, I first awoke to the joy of conscious life.

"D'you see what I'm driving at?" asked the old Colonel.

"Rather!" answered Doe, with eagerness. Turning towards him as he spoke, I saw by the shining in his brown eyes that the poet in him had answered to the call of the old officer's words. His aspiration as well as mine was inflamed. Doe was feeling great. He was picturing himself, no doubt, leading a forlorn hope into triumph, or fighting a rearguard action and saving the British line. The heroic creature was going to be equal to the great moment and save England dramatically.

Pleased with Doe's ready understanding—my friend always captivated people in the first few minutes—our C.O. warmed still more to his subject. Having put his hands in his pockets and leant back in his chair to survey us the better, he continued:

"What I mean is—had you been eighteen a generation earlier, the British Empire could have treated you as very insignificant fry, whereas to-day she is obliged to come to you boys and say 'You take top place in my aristocracy. You're on top because I must place the whole weight of everything I have upon your shoulders. You're on top because you are the Capitalists, possessing an enormous capital of youth and strength and boldness and endurance. You must give it all to me—to gamble with—for my life. I've nothing to give you in return, except suffering and—'"

The Colonel paused, feeling he had said enough—or too much. We made no murmur of agreement. It would have seemed like applauding in church. Then he proceeded:

"Well, you're coming to my battalion, aren't you?"

"Yes, rather, sir," said Doe.

"Right. You're just the sort of boys that I want. If you're young and bold, your men will follow you anywhere. In this fight it's going to be better to be a young officer, followed and loved because of his youth, than to be an old one, followed and trusted because of his knowledge. Dammit! I wish I could make you see it. But, for God's sake, be enthusiastic. Be enthusiastic over the great crisis, over the responsibility, over your amazingly high calling."

He stopped, and began playing with a pencil; and it was some while before he added, speaking uncomfortably and keeping his eyes upon the pencil:

"Take a pride in your bodies, and hold them in condition. You'll want 'em. There are more ways than one of getting them tainted in the life of temptations you're going to face. I expect you—you grasp my meaning.... But, if only you'll light up your enthusiasm, everything else will be all right."

He raised his eyes and looked at us again, saying:

"Well, good-bye for the present."

We shook hands, saluted, and went out. And, as I shut the door, I heard the old enthusiast call out to someone who must have been in an inner room: "I've two gems of boys there—straight from school. Bless my soul, England'll win through."

Sec.3

But, lack-a-day, here's the trouble with me. My moments of exaltation have always been fleeting. Just as in the old school-days I would leave Radley's room, brimful of lofty resolutions, and fall away almost immediately into littleness again, so now I soon allowed the lamp of enthusiasm, lit by the Colonel, to grow very dim.

It was ridicule of the fine old visionary that destroyed his power. "Hallo, here come two more of the Colonel's blue-eyed boys," laughed the officers of our new battalion the first time we came into their view. And "The old man's mounted his hobby again," said they, after any lecture in which he alluded to Youth and Enthusiasm.

Yet the Colonel was right, and the scoffers wrong. The Colonel was a poet who could listen and hear how the heart of the world was beating; the scoffers were prosaic cattle who scarcely knew that the world had a heart at all. He turned us, if only for a moment, into young knights of high ideals, while they made us sorry, conceited young knaves.

You shall know what knaves we were.

So far from being enthusiastic over parades and field days, we found them most detestably dull and longed for the pleasures that followed the order to dismiss. And after the Dismiss we were utterly happy.

It was happiness to walk the streets in our new uniforms, and to take the salutes of the Tommies, the important boy-scouts, and the military-minded gutter urchins. I longed to go home on leave, so that in company with my mother I could walk through the world saluted at every twenty paces, and thus she should see me in all my glory. And when one day I strolled with her past a Hussar sentry who brought his sword flashing in the sun to the salute, I felt I had seldom experienced anything so satisfying.

I was secretly elated, too, in possessing a soldier servant to wait on me hand and foot—almost to bath me. I spoke with a concealed relish of "my agents," and loved to draw cheques on Cox and Co. I looked forward to Sunday Church Parade, for there I could wear my sword. It was my grandfather's sword, and I'm afraid I thought less of the romance of bearing it in defence of the Britain that he loved and the France where he lay buried than of its flashy appearance and the fine finish it gave to my uniform. I was a strange mixture, for, when the preacher, looking down the old Gothic arches, said: "This historic church has often before filled with armed men," I shivered with the poetry of it; and yet, no sooner had I come out into the modern sunlight and seen the congregation waiting for the soldiers to be marched off, than I must needs be occupied again with the peculiarly dashing figure I was cutting.

Once Doe and I went on a visit to Kensingtowe, partly out of loyalty to the old school, and partly to display ourselves in our new greatness. We wore our field-service caps at the jaunty angle of all right-minded subalterns. Though only unmounted officers, we were dressed in yellow riding-breeches with white leather strappings. Fixed to our heels were the spurs that we had long possessed in secret. They jingled with every step, and the only thing that marred the music of their tinkle was the anxiety lest some officer of the 2nd Tenth should see us thus arrayed. Doe was in field boots, but his pleasure in being seen in this cavalry kit was quite spoiled by his fear of being ridiculed for "swank." Both of us would have liked to take our batmen with us and to say: "Don't trouble, my man will do that for you."

We created a gratifying sensation at Kensingtowe. It was exhilarating to have a friend come up to me and exclaim: "By Jove, Ray, you're no end of a dog now," and to notice that he didn't heed my self-depreciatory answer because he was busy looking into every detail of my uniform. "What devilish fine fellows we are, eh what?" cried our admirers, and we blushed and said "Oh, shut up." We met old Dr. Chappy, who looked us up and down, roared with laughter, and said "Well, I'll be damned!" We were welcomed into Radley's room, and were boys enough to address him as "sir" as though we were still his pupils. He examined our appearance like a big brother proud of two young ones, and said after a silence:

"So this is what it has all come to."

I took a lot of my cronies out to tea in the town, and, as we walked to the shops, stared down the road to see if any Tommies were coming who would salute me in front of my guests. Luck was kind to me. For a large party, marching under an N.C.O., approached us; and the N.C.O. in a voice like the crack of doom cried "Party—eyes RIGHT!" Heads and eyes swung towards me, the N.C.O. saluted briskly, and, when the party had passed us, yelled "Eyes FRONT!" It was one of the most triumphant moments of my career.

Scarcely, however, had this pride-tickling honour been paid to me before there happened as distressing a thing as—oh, it was dreadful! I passed one of your full-blooded regular-army sergeants, and, since he raised his hand towards his face, I apprehended he was about to salute me. Promptly I acknowledged the expected salute, only to discover that the sergeant had raised his hand for no other purpose than to blow his nose with his naked fingers. Believe me, even now, when I think of this blunder, I catch my breath with shame.

What young bucks we were, Doe and I! We bought motor-bicycles and raced over the country-side, Doe, ever a preacher of Life, calling out "This is Life, isn't it?" I remember our bowling along a deserted country road and shouting for a lark: "Sing of joy, sing of bliss, it was never like this, Yip-i-addy-i-ay!" I remember our scorching recklessly down white English highways, with a laugh for every bone-shaking bump, and a heart-thrill for every time we risked our lives tearing through a narrow passage between two War Department motor lorries. I see the figure of Doe standing breathless by his bicycle after a break-neck run, his hair blown into disorder by the wind, and the white dust of England round his eyes and on his cheeks, and saying: "My godfathers, this is Life!" Oh, yes, it was a rosy patch of life and freedom.

Sec.4

But, in our abandonment, we tumbled into more sinister things. It was disillusionment that bowled us down. The evil that we saw in the world and the army smashed our allegiance to the old moral codes. We suddenly lost the old anchors and blew adrift, strange new theories filling our sails. We ceased to think there was any harm in being occasionally "blotto" at night, or in employing the picturesque army word "bloody." Worse than that, we began to believe that vicious things, which in our boyhood had been very secret sins, were universally committed and bragged about.

"It's so, Rupert," said Doe, in a corner of the Officers' ante-room one night before dinner, "I'm an Epicurean. Surely the Body doesn't prompt to pleasure only to be throttled? There's something in what they were saying at Mess yesterday that these things are normal and natural. I mean, human nature is human nature, and you can't alter it. I don't think any man is, or can be, what they call 'pure.' I s'pose every man has done these things, don't you?"

"No, I don't," I answered, conscious of hot cheeks. "We may do them, but there are people I can't imagine it of."

"But, again, there's the question whether War doesn't mean the suspension of all ordinary moral laws. The law that you shan't kill is in abeyance. The instinct of self-preservation has to be suppressed. There's some justification for being an Epicurean for the duration of the war."

"Perhaps so," acknowledged I. "I don't know."

As we left the ante-room and sat down to Mess, Doe announced:

"I've every intention of getting tight to-night."

"Pourquoi pas?" said I. "C'est la guerre!"

"Before I die," continued Doe, who was already flushed with gin and vermouth, "I want to have lived. I want to have touched all the joys and experiences of life. Pass the Chablis. Here's to you, Rupert. Cheerioh!"

"Cheerioh!" toasted I, raising my glass. "Happy days!"

"I'm determined to be able to say, Rupert, whatever happens: 'Never mind, I had a good time while it lasted!'"

"I'm with you," said I, who was now nearly as flushed as he. "Let's be in everything up to the neck."

"Surely," Doe endorsed. "C'est la guerre!"

So with the meat and sweets went the wines of France; with the nuts the sparkling "bubbly"; and in the ante-room Martinis, Benedictines, and Whisky-Macdonalds. Soon the night became noisy, and Doe, encouraged by riotous subalterns, jumped on a table and declaimed a little thickly his prize Horatian Ode:

"Bring out the mellow wine, the best, The sweet, convivial wine, and test Its four-year-old maturity; To Jove commit the rest: Nor question his divine intents, For, when he stays the battling elements The wind shall brood o'er prostrate sea And fail to move the ash's crest Or stir the stilly cypress trees. Be no forecaster of the dawn; Deem it an asset, and be gay— Come, merge to-morrow's misty morn In the resplendence of to-day."

And, after all this, it was an easy step, lightly taken, to the things of night. We set out for the strange streets; and there, in the night air, the precocious young pedant, Edgar Doe, became, despite all the new theories, the shy, simple boy he really was. We would both become shy—shy of each other, and shy of the shameful doorway.

And then the misery of the morning, to be quickly forgotten in the joy of life!

Sec.5

It was now that the Battle of Neuve Chapelle quenched Pennybet. Archibald Pennybet, the boy who left school, determined to conquer the world, and coolly confident of his power to mould circumstances to his own ends, was crushed like an insect beneath the heavy foot of war. He was just put out by a high-explosive shell. It didn't kill him outright, but whipped forty jagged splinters into his body. He was taken to an Advanced Dressing Station, where a chaplain, who told us about his last minutes, found him, swathed in bandages from his head to his heel. On a stretcher that rested on trestles he was lying, conscious, though a little confused by morphia. He saw the chaplain approaching him, and murmured, "Hallo, padre." So numerous were his bandages that the chaplain saw nothing of the boy who was speaking save the lazy Arab eyes and the mouth that had framed impudence for twenty years.

"Hallo, what have you been doing to yourself?" asked the chaplain.

"Oh, only trying conclusions with an H.E., padre." The mouth smiled at the corners.

"What about a cup of tea, now? Could you drink it?"

"I'll—try, padre." The eyes twinkled a little.

So the chaplain brought a mug of stewed tea, and Penny, laughing weakly, said:

"You'll—have to pour it down—for me, padre. I can't move a muscle. These bloody bandages—sorry, padre—these bandages. O God—"

"In pain?" gently inquired the chaplain.

"No. Only a prisoner. I can't move. Pour the tea down."

He gulped a little of the drink, and, dropping the heavily-fringed eyelids, so that he appeared to be asleep, muttered:

"I suppose—I haven't a dog's chance. Find out if—I'm done for. Find out for me, please."

"I asked the doctor before I came to you, old chap."

On hearing this, Penny opened and shut his eyes, and remained so long just breathing that the chaplain wondered if he had lost consciousness. But the eyes unclosed again, and the lips asked:

"Aren't you going to tell me, padre?"

"Yes, I—you won't be a prisoner much longer, old chap."

Not a word said Penny, but stared in wonder at his informant. It was clear that he wanted to live, and to mould the world to his will. There was a long silence, and then he murmured:

"Well, there are lots of others—who've gone through it—and lots more who'll—have to go." And he shut his eyes in weary submission.

The chaplain suggested a prayer with him, and Penny agreed in the half-jesting words: "But you'll—have to do it all for me, just as you poured the tea down. I'm no good at that sort of thing."

And, when the prayer was over, he said with his old haughtiness:

"You know, padre—I was thinking—while you prayed. I suppose I've led a selfish life—seeking my own ends—but, by Jove, I've had my good time—and am ready to pay for it—if I must." His eyes flashed defiantly. "If God puts me through it, I shan't whine."

As the end drew nearer, he turned more and more into a child. After all, he had never come of age. He spoke about his mother, sending her his love, and saying: "I'm afraid, padre, that I led her a life—but I'll bet she'd rather have had me and my plagues than not. Don't you think so?"

He mentioned us with affection as "those two kids," and sent the message that he hoped we at least should come through all right.

And then the lazy eyes closed in their last weariness, the impudent lips parted, and Penny was dead. The War had beaten him. It was too big a circumstance for him to tame.

Sec.6

The night we heard of it, Doe threw himself into a chair and said:

"I'm miserable to-night, Rupert."

"So'm I," said I, looking out of the window over a moonlit sea. "Poor old Penny. I don't know why it makes one feel a cur, but it does, doesn't it?"

"Surely," answered Doe.

For a time we smoked our pipes in silence. I gazed at the long silver pathway that the light of the moon had laid on the sea. Right on the horizon, where the pathway met the sky, a boat with a tall sail stood black against the light. Fancifully I imagined that its dark shape resembled the outline of a man—say, perhaps, the figure of Destiny—walking down the sparkling pathway towards us. I was in the mood to fancy such things. Then Doe from his chair said:

"Old Penny always took the lead with us, didn't he? He's taken it again."

"I don't see what you mean," answered I.

"Oh, it doesn't matter what I mean. I'm depressed to-night."

We spoke of it with the Colonel the next afternoon, when we were having tea in his private room.

"It doesn't seem fair," complained Doe. "He could have done anything with his life," and he added rather tritely: "Penny's story which might have been monumental is now only a sort of broken pillar over a churchyard grave."

"Nonsense," snapped the Colonel. "It was splendid, perfectly splendid." And he arose from his chair and took down from a shelf a little blue volume bearing the title "1914." With a pencil he underlined certain phrases in a sonnet, and handed the book to us. Doe brought his head close to mine, and we leant over the marked page and read the lines together:

"These laid the world away, poured out the red Sweet wine of youth, gave up the years to be Of hope and joy—

Blow, bugles, blow— Nobleness walks in our ways again—"

The Colonel—how like him!—saw the story of Pennybet, not as a broken pillar, but as a graceful, upright column, with a richly foliated capital.

Sec.7

The march of History in these wonderful months brought with it an event that stirred the world. This was the first great landing of the British Forces on the toe of the Gallipoli Peninsula, in their attempt to win a way for the Allied Navy through the Straits of the Dardanelles. On April 25th, 1915, as all the world knows, the men of the 29th Division came up like a sea-breeze out of the sea, and, driving the Turks and Germans from their coastal defences, swept clear for themselves a small tract of breathing room across that extremity of Turkey. Leaping out of their boats, and crashing through a murderous fire, they won a footing on Cape Helles, and planted their feet firmly on the invaded territory.

Three Kensingtonians known to us fell dead in that costly battle. Stanley, who tried me in the Prefects' Room, took seven machine-gun bullets in his body, and died in a lighter as it approached the beach. Lancaster, who in less grand years would undoubtedly have bowled for Oxford and England, lay down on W. Beach and died. And White, the gentle giant—Moles White, who swam so bravely in the Bramhall-Erasmus Race, was knocked out somewhere on the high ground inland.

And, almost immediately after that distant battle of the Helles beaches, in the early days of May, when England was all blossom and bud, our First Line of the Cheshires was landed on Gallipoli to support the 29th Division. The news was all over the regiment in no time. The First Line had gone to the Dardanelles! Had we heard the latest? The First Line were actually on Gallipoli!

Consider what it meant to us. We were the Second Line, whose object was to supply reinforcing drafts to the First Line in whatever country it might be ordered to fight. The First Line—we were proud of the fact—had been the first territorial division to leave England. In September, 1914, it had sailed away, in an imposing convoy of transports escorted by cruisers and destroyers, under orders to garrison Egypt. There it had acted as the Army of Occupation till that April day when the 29th Division laughed at the prophecies of the German experts and stormed from the AEgean Sea the beaches of Cape Helles. Scarcely had the news electrified Egypt before the First Line received its orders to embark for Overseas. And every man of them knew what that meant.

So all we of the 2nd Tenth seemed marked down like branded sheep for the Gallipoli front. The Colonel was full of it. With his elect mind that saw right into the heart of things, he quickly unveiled the poetry and romance of Britain's great enterprise at Gallipoli. He crowded all his young officers into his private room for a lecture on the campaign that was calling them. Having placed them on chairs, on the carpet, on the hearth-rug, and on the fender, he seated himself at his writing-table, like a hen in the midst of its chickens, and began:

"For epic and dramatic interest this Dardanelles business is easily top."

To the Colonel everything that he was enthusiastic about was epic and dramatic and "on top." Just as he told us that our day was the day and our generation the generation, so now he set out to assure us that Gallipoli was the front.

"If you'll only get at the IDEAS behind what's going on at the Helles beaches," he declared, with a rap on the table, "you'll be thrilled, boys."

Then he reminded us that the Dardanelles Straits were the Hellespont of the Ancient world, and the neighbouring AEgean Sea the most mystic of the "wine-dark seas of Greece": he retold stories of Jason and the Argonauts; of "Burning Sappho" in Lesbos; of Achilles in Scyros; of Poseidon sitting upon Samothrace to watch the fight at Troy; and of St. John the Divine at Patmos gazing up into the Heavenly Jerusalem.

As he spoke, we were schoolboys again and listened with wide-open, wistful eyes. From the fender and the hearth-rug, we saw Leander swimming to Hero across the Dardanelles; we saw Darius, the Persian, throwing his bridge over the same narrow passage, only to be defeated at Marathon; and Xerxes, too, bridging the famous straits to carry victory into Greece, till at last his navy went under at Salamis. We saw the pathetic figure of Byron swimming where Leander swam; and, in all, such an array of visions that the lure of the Eternal Waterway gripped us, and we were a-fidget to be there.

"Have eyes to see this idea also," said the Colonel, who was a Tory of Tories. "England dominates Gibraltar and Suez, the doors of the Mediterranean; let her complete her constellation by winning from the Turk the lost star of the Dardanelles, the only other entrance to the Great Sea."

This roused the jingo devil in us, and we burst into applause.

Knowing thereby that he had won his audience, the Colonel beamed with inspiration. He rose, as though so enthralling a subject could only be dealt with standing, and cried:

"See this greater idea. For 500 years the Turk, by occupying Constantinople, has blocked the old Royal Road to India and the East. He is astride the very centre of the highways that should link up the continents. He oppresses and destroys the Arab world, which should be the natural junction of the great trunk railways that, to-morrow, shall join Asia, Africa, and Europe in one splendid spider's web. You are going to move the block from the line, and to join the hands of the continents. Understand, and be enthusiastic. I tell you, this joining of the continents is an unborn babe of history that leapt in the womb the moment the British battleships appeared off Cape Helles."

"By Jove, the Colonel's great!" thought I, as my heart jumped at his magnificent words. "Where are his scoffers to-day? He's come into his own." Lord, how small my little vanities seemed now! A fig for them all! I was going out to build history. The Colonel had one at least who was with him to the death.

"So much for secular interest," continued the Colonel, dropping his voice. "Now, boys, follow me through this. You're not over-religious, I expect, but you're Christians before you're Moslems, and your hands should fly to your swords when I say the Gallipoli campaign is a New Crusade. You're going out to force a passage through the Dardanelles to Constantinople. And Constantinople is a sacred city. It's the only ancient city purely Christian in its origin, having been built by the first Christian Emperor in honour of the Blessed Virgin. Which brings us to the noblest idea of all. In their fight to wrest this city from the Turk, the three great divisions of the Church are united once more. The great Roman branch is represented by the soldiers and ships of France: the great Eastern Orthodox branch by the Russians, who are behind the fight: the great Anglican branch by the British, who can be proud to have started the movement, and to be leading it. Thus Christendom United fights for Constantinople, under the leadership of the British, whose flag is made up of the crosses of the saints. The army opposing the Christians fights under the crescent of Islam.

"It's the Cross against the Crescent again, my lads. By Jove, it's splendid, perfectly splendid! And an English cross, too!

"Thank you, gentlemen; that's all; thank you."

Sec.8

The blossom and buds of our English May became the fruit and flowers of July, and Doe and I, maturing too, entered upon the age for Active Service. There came a day when we were ordered to report for a doctor's examination to see if we were fit for the front.

I shan't forget that testing. All thought we had little to fear from the doctor. The drills and route-marches in sun, wind and rain had tanned our flesh to pink and brown, and lit the lamps of health in our eyes. And the whites of those eyes were blue-white.

But the doctor, a curt major, said "Strip," and took Doe first.

Now, a glance at Doe, when stripped, ought to have satisfied a doctor. His figure, small in the hips, widened to a chest like a Greek statue's; his limbs were slender and rounded; his skin was a baby's. But no, the stolid old doctor carried on, as though Doe were nothing to sing songs about. He tested his eyes, surveyed his teeth, tried his chest, tapping him before and behind, and telling him to say "99" and to cough. All these liberties so amused Doe that he could scarcely manage the "99" or the cough for giggling. And I was doing my best to increase his difficulty by pretending to be in convulsions of smothered laughter.

Then the doctor sounded Doe's heart, and, as he did it, all the laughter went out of my life. I suddenly remembered a scene, wherein I lay in the baths at Kensingtowe, recovering from a faint, and Dr. Chappy looked down upon me and said: "There may be a weakness at your heart." As I remembered it, the first time for years, my heart missed its beats. I saw rapidly succeeding visions of my rejection by the doctor; my farewell to Doe, as he left for romantic Gallipoli; and my return to the undistinguished career of the Medically Unfit. I found myself repeating, after the fashion of younger days (though at this wild-colt period I had done with God): "O God, make him pass me. O God, make him pass me."

"All right, get dressed," the doctor commanded Doe.

"Come here, you," he said to me, brutally.

My eyes, teeth, and chest satisfied him; and then, like a loathly eavesdropper, he listened at my heart. I was afraid my nervousness would cause some irregular action of the detestable organ that would finally down me in his eyes.

"All right, get dressed," he said; and, having put his stethoscope away, he wrote something on two printed Army Forms and sealed them.

"Are we fit, sir?" asked I, in suspense.

"I've written my verdict," he said snappily, looking at me as much as to say: "You aren't asked to converse. This isn't a conversazione"; but, when he caught my gaze, he seemed, to repent of his harshness, and answered gruffly:

"Both perfect."

"Oh, thanks, sir," said I. I could have kissed the old churl.

And so, before July was out, when Doe and I were at our separate homes on a last leave, we received from the Director-General of Movements our Embarkation Orders. Marked "SECRET," the documents informed us that we were to report at Devonport "in service dress uniform," with a view to proceeding to "the Mediterranean." Seemingly we were to take no drafts of men, but travel independently as reinforcements to the First Line at Cape Helles.

My mother turned very white when I showed her the letter. She had heard ugly things about the Gallipoli Peninsula. People were saying that the life of a junior subaltern on Helles was working out to an average of fourteen days; and that, in the heat, the flies and dust were scattering broadcast the germs of dysentery and enteric. And I believe my restless excitement hurt her. But she only said: "I'm so proud of it all," and kissed me.

The last night, however, as she sat in her chair, and I, after walking excitedly about, stood in front of her, she took both my hands and drew me, facing her, against her knees. I know she found it sweet and poignant to have me in that position, for, when I was a very small boy, it had been thus that she had drawn me to tell me stories of my grandfather, Colonel Ray. She had dropped the habit, when I was a shy and undemonstrative schoolboy, but had resumed it happily during the last two years, for, by then, I had learnt in my growing mannishness to delight in half-protectingly, half-childishly stroking and embracing her.

She drew me, then, this last night against her knees and looked lovingly at me. Her yearning heart was in her eyes. Her hands, clasping mine, involuntarily gripped them very tight, as though she were thinking: "I cannot give him up; I cannot let him go."

I smiled down at her, and, as I saw the moisture veil her eyes, I felt that I, too, would like to cry. At last she said:

"If I'm never to see you again, Rupert, I shall yet always be thankful for the nineteen years' happiness you've given me."

"Oh, mother," I said. No more words could I utter, for my eyes were smarting worse than ever. I felt about eight years old.

"If all the rest of my life had to be sorrow," she whispered, no longer concealing the fact that she was breaking down, "the last nineteen years of you, Rupert, have made it all so well worth living. I shall have had more happiness out of it than sorrow. Thank you—for all you've given me."

She let go of my left hand, so as to free her own, with which she might wipe her overflowing eyes. Then she dropped the cambric handkerchief into her lap, and grasped my hand again. As for me, I kept silence, for my mother's thanks were making my breath come in those short, quick gasps, which a man must control if he would prevent them breaking into sobs.

"You see," she explained, "you had his eyes. Your grandfather used to say of you, 'he has that Rupert's eyes.'"

"Mother!" I ejaculated. Only in that last moment did I, thoughtless boy that I was, enter into an understanding of my mother's love for the father I had never seen. In the last evening of nineteen years there was revealed to me all that my mother's young widowhood had meant to her.

"I didn't want to break down," she apologised, drawing me even closer to her, as though appealing for my forgiveness, "but, oh! I couldn't help it. I've never loved you so desperately as I do at this moment."

"Mother," I stuttered, "I've been rotten—more rotten than you know."

"No, my big boy, you've been perfect. I wouldn't have had you different in any way. Everything about you pleased me. And how—how can I give you up?"

"I'll come back to you, mother. I swear I will."

"Oh, but you mustn't allow any thought of me to unnerve you out there, Rupert," she said, quickly releasing my hands, lest it were traitorous to hold me back. "Do everything you are called to do—however dangerous—" The word caused her to sob. "Don't think of me when you've got to fight. No, I don't mean that—" Mother was torn between her emotions. "Rather think of me, and do the—dangerous thing—if it's right—yes, do it—because I want you to, but oh!" she sobbed, "come back to me—come back—come back."

I leant over and, lifting her face up gently with both my hands, kissed her and said:

"Yes, mother."

And then by a sudden effort of her will she seemed to recover. She said smilingly and almost calmly:

"I'm so proud. I think it's wonderful your going out there."

Sec.9

What more is there to tell of that old first period of my life which ended at the gates of Devonport Dockyard? There was a long railway journey with Doe, where half the best of green England, clad in summer dress, swept in panorama past our carriage windows. Perhaps we both watched it pass a little wistfully. Perhaps we thought of bygone holiday-runs, when we had watched the same telegraph lines switchbacking to Falmouth. There was a one-night stay at the Royal Hotel, Devonport; and a walk together in the fresh morning down to the Docks. There was a woman who touched Doe's sleeve and said: "You poor dear lamb," and annoyed him grievously. There was the fat policeman's challenge at the gates. And then we were through.

We had walked a little way, when a boy from the Royal Hotel, whom the policeman suffered to pass, ran up to us like a messenger from a world we had left behind.

"Lieutenant Ray, sir," he called.

I turned round and said "Yes?" inquiringly.

"Here's a telegram, sir, that arrived just after you left."

I took it undismayed, knowing it to be yet another telegram of good wishes. "I'll bet you, you poor dear lamb," I said to Doe, "the words are either 'Good-bye and God-speed,' or 'Cheerioh and a safe return.'"

"Not taking the bet," said Doe. "How else could it be phrased?"

"Well, we'll see," said I, and opened the envelope. The words were:

"I am with you every moment—MOTHER."



CHAPTER II

PADRE MONTY AND MAJOR HARDY COME ABOARD

Sec.1

Doe and I have often looked back on our first glimpse of Padre Monty and wondered why nothing foreshadowed all that he was going to be to us. We had entered the Transport Office on one of the Devonport Quays, to report according to orders. Several other officers were before us, handing in their papers to a Staff Officer. The one in a chaplain's uniform, bearing on his back a weighty Tommy's pack, that made him look like a campaigner from France, was Padre Monty. We could only see his back, but it seemed the back of a young man, spare, lean, and vigorous. His colloquy with the Staff Officer was creating some amusement in his audience.

"Well, padre," the Staff Officer was saying, as he handed back Monty's papers, "I'm at a loss what to do with you."

"The Army always is at a loss what to do with padres," rejoined Monty pleasantly, as he took the papers and placed them in a pocket. "However, you needn't worry, because, having got so far, I'm going on this blooming boat."

"But I've no official intimation of your embarking on the Rangoon."

Padre Monty picked up a square leather case and, moving to the door, said:

"No, but you've ocular demonstration of it."

And he was gone.

When our turn came, the Staff Officer consulted a list of names before him and said:

"The Rangoon. She's at the quay opposite the Great Crane."

The Rangoon, as we drew near, showed herself to be a splendid liner, painted from funnel to keel the uniform dull-black of a transport. All over and about this great black thing scurried and swarmed khaki figures, busy in the work of embarkation. We rushed up the long gangway, and pleaded with the Embarkation Officer for a two-berth cabin to ourselves. The gentleman damned us most heartily, and said: "Take No. 54." We hurried away to the State Rooms and flung our kit triumphantly on to the bunks of Cabin 54.

It was at this moment that a mysterious occupant of Cabin 55, next door, who had been singing "A Life on the Ocean Wave," came to the end of his song and roared: "Steward!"; after which he commenced to whistle "The Death of Nelson." We heard the steps of the steward pass along the alley-way and enter 55.

"Yes, sir?" his voice inquired.

But our neighbour was not to be interrupted in his tune. He whistled it to its last note, and then said:

"I say, steward, I'm sure you're not at all a damnable fellow, so I want you to understand early that you'll get into awful trouble if I'm not looked after properly—-what. There'll be the most deplorable row if I'm not looked after properly."

"Well, I'm hanged!" whispered Doe. "I'm going to see who the merchant is." He disappeared; and was back in ten seconds, muttering, "Good Lord, Rupert, it's a middle-aged major with a monocle; and its kit's marked 'Hardy.'"

And, while we were wondering at such spirits in a major, and in one who was both middle-aged and monocled, two bells sounded from the bows, two more answered like an echo from the boat-deck above, and Major Hardy was heard departing with unbecoming haste down the alley-way.

"What's that mean?" asked Doe.

"Luncheon bell, I s'pose," replied I. "Come along."

We found our way down to the huge dining saloon, which was furnished with thirty separate tables. Looking for a place where we could lunch together, we saw two seats next the padre, whose conversation in the Transport Office had entertained us. We picked a route through the other tables towards him.

"Are these two seats reserved, sir?" I asked.

Padre Monty turned a lean face towards Doe and me, and looked us up and down.

"Yes," he said. "Reserved for you."

I smiled at so flattering a way of putting it, and, sitting down, mumbled: "Thanks awfully."

There were two other people already at the table. One was a long and languid young subaltern, named Jimmy Doon, who declared that he had lost his draft of men (about eighty of them) and felt much happier without them. He thought they were perhaps on another boat.