It was about a mile from the tea-shop to the school. Mike’s first impression on arriving at the school grounds was of his smallness and insignificance. Everything looked so big—the buildings, the grounds, everything. He felt out of the picture. He was glad that he had met Wyatt. To make his entrance into this strange land alone would have been more of an ordeal than he would have cared to face.
“That’s Wain’s,” said Wyatt, pointing to one of half a dozen large houses which lined the road on the south side of the cricket field. Mike followed his finger, and took in the size of his new home.
“I say, it’s jolly big,” he said. “How many fellows are there in it?”
“Thirty-one this term, I believe.”
“That’s more than there were at King-Hall’s.”
“What’s King-Hall’s?”
“The private school I was at. At Emsworth.”
Emsworth seemed very remote and unreal to him as he spoke.
They skirted the cricket field, walking along the path that divided the two terraces. The Wrykyn playing-fields were formed of a series of huge steps, cut out of the hill. At the top of the hill came the school. On the first terrace was a sort of informal practice ground, where, though no games were played on it, there was a good deal of punting and drop-kicking in the winter and fielding-practice in the summer. The next terrace was the biggest of all, and formed the first eleven cricket ground, a beautiful piece of turf, a shade too narrow for its length, bounded on the terrace side by a sharply sloping bank, some fifteen feet deep, and on the other by the precipice leading to the next terrace. At the far end of the ground stood the pavilion, and beside it a little ivy-covered rabbit-hutch for the scorers. Old Wrykynians always claimed that it was the prettiest school ground in England. It certainly had the finest view. From the verandah of the pavilion you could look over three counties.
Wain’s house wore an empty and desolate appearance. There were signs of activity, however, inside; and a smell of soap and warm water told of preparations recently completed.
Wyatt took Mike into the matron’s room, a small room opening out of the main passage.
“This is Jackson,” he said. “Which dormitory is he in, Miss Payne?”
The matron consulted a paper.
“He’s in yours, Wyatt.”
“Good business. Who’s in the other bed? There are going to be three of us, aren’t there?”
“Fereira was to have slept there, but we have just heard that he is not coming back this term. He has had to go on a sea-voyage for his health.”
“Seems queer any one actually taking the trouble to keep Fereira in the world,” said Wyatt. “I’ve often thought of giving him Rough On Rats myself. Come along, Jackson, and I’ll show you the room.”
They went along the passage, and up a flight of stairs.
“Here you are,” said Wyatt.
It was a fair-sized room. The window, heavily barred, looked out over a large garden.
“I used to sleep here alone last term,” said Wyatt, “but the house is so full now they’ve turned it into a dormitory.”
“I say, I wish these bars weren’t here. It would be rather a rag to get out of the window on to that wall at night, and hop down into the garden and explore,” said Mike.
Wyatt looked at him curiously, and moved to the window.
“I’m not going to let you do it, of course,” he said, “because you’d go getting caught, and dropped on, which isn’t good for one in one’s first term; but just to amuse you–-“
He jerked at the middle bar, and the next moment he was standing with it in his hand, and the way to the garden was clear.
“By Jove!” said Mike.
“That’s simply an object-lesson, you know,” said Wyatt, replacing the bar, and pushing the screws back into their putty. “I get out at night myself because I think my health needs it. Besides, it’s my last term, anyhow, so it doesn’t matter what I do. But if I find you trying to cut out in the small hours, there’ll be trouble. See?”
“All right,” said Mike, reluctantly. “But I wish you’d let me.”
“Not if I know it. Promise you won’t try it on.”
“All right. But, I say, what do you do out there?”
“I shoot at cats with an air-pistol, the beauty of which is that even if you hit them it doesn’t hurt—simply keeps them bright and interested in life; and if you miss you’ve had all the fun anyhow. Have you ever shot at a rocketing cat? Finest mark you can have. Society’s latest craze. Buy a pistol and see life.”
“I wish you’d let me come.”
“I daresay you do. Not much, however. Now, if you like, I’ll take you over the rest of the school. You’ll have to see it sooner or later, so you may as well get it over at once.”
CHAPTER IV
AT THE NETS
There are few better things in life than a public school summer term. The winter term is good, especially towards the end, and there are points, though not many, about the Easter term: but it is in the summer that one really appreciates public school life. The freedom of it, after the restrictions of even the most easy-going private school, is intoxicating. The change is almost as great as that from public school to ‘Varsity.
For Mike the path was made particularly easy. The only drawback to going to a big school for the first time is the fact that one is made to feel so very small and inconspicuous. New boys who have been leading lights at their private schools feel it acutely for the first week. At one time it was the custom, if we may believe writers of a generation or so back, for boys to take quite an embarrassing interest in the newcomer. He was asked a rain of questions, and was, generally, in the very centre of the stage. Nowadays an absolute lack of interest is the fashion. A new boy arrives, and there he is, one of a crowd.
Mike was saved this salutary treatment to a large extent, at first by virtue of the greatness of his family, and, later, by his own performances on the cricket field. His three elder brothers were objects of veneration to most Wrykynians, and Mike got a certain amount of reflected glory from them. The brother of first-class cricketers has a dignity of his own. Then Bob was a help. He was on the verge of the cricket team and had been the school full-back for two seasons. Mike found that people came up and spoke to him, anxious to know if he were Jackson’s brother; and became friendly when he replied in the affirmative. Influential relations are a help in every stage of life.
It was Wyatt who gave him his first chance at cricket. There were nets on the first afternoon of term for all old colours of the three teams and a dozen or so of those most likely to fill the vacant places. Wyatt was there, of course. He had got his first eleven cap in the previous season as a mighty hitter and a fair slow bowler. Mike met him crossing the field with his cricket bag.
“Hullo, where are you off to?” asked Wyatt. “Coming to watch the nets?”
Mike had no particular programme for the afternoon. Junior cricket had not begun, and it was a little difficult to know how to fill in the time.
“I tell you what,” said Wyatt, “nip into the house and shove on some things, and I’ll try and get Burgess to let you have a knock later on.”
This suited Mike admirably. A quarter of an hour later he was sitting at the back of the first eleven net, watching the practice.
Burgess, the captain of the Wrykyn team, made no pretence of being a bat. He was the school fast bowler and concentrated his energies on that department of the game. He sometimes took ten minutes at the wicket after everybody else had had an innings, but it was to bowl that he came to the nets.
He was bowling now to one of the old colours whose name Mike did not know. Wyatt and one of the professionals were the other two bowlers. Two nets away Firby-Smith, who had changed his pince-nez for a pair of huge spectacles, was performing rather ineffectively against some very bad bowling. Mike fixed his attention on the first eleven man.