‘You’d better come down and see,’ replied Alice. ‘And the Warden says that anybody good at mountaineering might be useful.’
‘Oh, Martyr’s Memorial stuff,’ translated Kitty. ‘Not for yours truly. Let someone else break their neck.’
There was the sound of hurried footsteps, and Laura appeared. She was even more dishevelled than Alice had been, and her face was wreathed in smiles which gave her, in collaboration with various streaks of grime and the beginnings of a black eye, an appearance as of devil turned chimney-sweep.
‘Good Lord, Dog! Your eye!’ exclaimed Kitty.
‘Ran into the edge of the Common Room door,’ explained Laura, dismissing the incident. ‘I say, girls, somebody must have collected a bevy of Edgar Allans while we were having dinner and — well, you’d better come. The Duchess wants it all taken down, and someone to volunteer to put the bonfire out. Personally, I’ve collected a perfectly good watering-can with which we ought to be able to irrigate a few Seniors as well as the fire, if all good men will come to the aid of the party.’
The noise inside the house had been so considerable that it was some time before the noise outside had attracted attention. In fact, Mrs Bradley said afterwards, it was doubtful, in her view, whether any mere noise, of itself, would have penetrated to ears already half-deafened by the sounds created by forty students, two officials, half a dozen servants, and the persistent rushing of overflowing water and emptying cisterns. It was the bonfire which had caused notice.
Deborah, having raced up the stairs to trace the origin of the water which was coming through the Common Room ceiling, was aware, on the first-floor landing, of another stream of water which had begun to pour out underneath her bathroom door.
The plug was in the waste-pipe, the bath was full, and the water was steadily overflowing at what seemed to be a geometric rate of progression. She pulled out the plug, turned off the taps, and then, swearing fiercely, went along to Mrs Bradley’s bathroom. Here she found the head of the house, with kilted skirts, engaged in mopping up the floor.
‘Was your bath full?’ she demanded.
‘Yes, child. Look in on the students’ bathrooms on this floor, too, will you? And I’ll mop up this one and yours.’
‘The little beasts! The destructive little beasts!’ cried Deborah. Mrs Bradley did not reply. Deborah went to the students’ bathrooms, but these were all in perfect order, so she went back to her own bathroom and began to mop up the water with towels and a bath-sheet, wringing them into the rapidly-emptying bath until the floor was no more than damp.
Then she went into her bedroom and changed her shoes, stockings and skirt. Not until then did she descend to inspect the Common Room. The damp patch was spreading over one corner of the ceiling. It glistened sweatily, and beads of moisture were ready to drop upon the floor. The meeting, however, was in full swing, being addressed by the senior student.
Deborah rang the bell and it was answered by the obliging Lulu, who, with the instinct of her race for the dramatic, was having a terrifying but satisfactory time, as her wide grin and rolling, frenzied eyes testified without the need of verbal evidence.
‘We better use my apron, Mis’ Sub,’ she announced. ‘Sho’ we hasn’t another dry swab in de house wid all dis water. Never knowed anyt’ing like it since Noah and de Flood.’
So saying, she got to work, removing her apron and using it as a swab with great and mostly superfluous energy, and, the water beginning to drip audibly on to the linoleum, the meeting was adjourned, and Lulu pelted away to wring her apron.
The overflow of water in various parts of the house had fused the electric light, which chose this moment to go out. The Common Room was not dark, however, for a lurid gleam, such as the eruption of Vesuvius may have shed upon the doomed cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum, flickered upon the discoloured ceiling and illumined the clean bare walls.
‘Holy smoke, Mis’ Sub!’ gasped Lulu, returning with the apron.
‘I should hardly think so,’ said Deborah.
She went to the window, pulled aside the curtain and looked out. Athelstan was proud of its frontage. It scarcely appeared to full advantage, however, as the repository of a pile of chamber pots built up — or so it seemed to Deborah’s possibly prejudiced and certainly startled intelligence — into a representation of the Grave of a Hundred Heads. Around the pile, but not touching it, a circular bonfire had been made, and dancing like dervishes round the whole erection were about a dozen young men.
‘Interesting, amusing and instructive,’ said Mrs Bradley’s voice in her ear. ‘I wonder what the Principal will say? Or is this also one of the local customs?’
Deborah began to reply, but the Warden had gone. Divining Mrs Bradley’s intention, Deborah went after her, and was in time to see the end of the affair. Mrs Bradley, standing in the front doorway of Athelstan, scanned the dancing figures for a full minute. Then she darted towards the bonfire, seized one of the dervishes by the seat of the trousers, and hauled him forcibly out of the circle. At the same instant the sound of a police whistle cut short the proceedings, and into the silence was projected a throaty, official voice.
‘Now, then, what’s all this?’ it said. The magic words worked with their usual charm. The trousered figures fled — all of them, Mrs Bradley noticed, in the same direction. She retained a fierce grip on her struggling prisoner, and hauled him inside the doorway.
‘For heaven’s sake, Warden, don’t report me! It was only a rag,’ pleaded the victim. ‘I shall be sent down for certain if you report me.’
It was a woman’s voice, but, in the darkness of the passage, it was impossible to see the victim’s face. Students, organized by Deborah and Miss Mathers, were already stamping out and scattering the bonfire, which had almost burnt itself through.
‘Are you an Athelstan student?’ Mrs Bradley demanded.
‘Yes. My name’s Morris.’
‘Well, Miss Morris, you had better assist in taking down that monument,’ said Mrs Bradley, ‘and you must report to me in my study in the morning.’
‘Yes, Warden.’
‘I shall require a full explanation.’
‘Yes, Warden.’
Mrs Bradley released her, and noted that the decontamination squad, as Laura named them afterwards, had been joined by the sturdy figure of her chauffeur George, who was directing operations in the best traditions of an ex-non-commissioned officer.
‘What happened to the police?’ asked Deborah, when, at midnight, she and Mrs Bradley, having made a last tour of inspection of bathrooms and lavatories, were seated before a small coal fire in Mrs Bradley’s sitting-room and were drinking more of Lulu’s coffee and were eating biscuits and cheese.
‘George was the police. He is a most intelligent man,’ responded George’s employer. ‘And now, I do hope you will be able to get some sleep, dear child.’
‘I feel half dead, so I’m sure I shall,’ replied Deborah.
‘Let us light one another to bed, then,’ said Mrs Bradley, picking up one of the candles. Deborah lifted the other and they tiptoed upstairs.
The rising bell was rung at seven o’clock. Breakfast, an informal meal spread over about an hour, began at a quarter to eight. The Warden and Sub-Warden breakfasted in their own sitting-rooms at eight, and by about eight-thirty the majority of the students had finished breakfast and had gone up to make their beds. By ten minutes to nine Miss Morris had not appeared at Mrs Bradley’s door. This did not surprise the Warden; she had her own reasons for being content to wait. She had been out at just after seven to inspect the remains of the bonfire, only to discover that George, aided by the odd-job man, whom he had pressed into service, had cleared up almost all traces of the incident. There might be rumours round the College of the goings-on at Athelstan on the first night of term; there was, Mrs Bradley noted gratefully, no evidence.