 CHAPTER 43-45 Mike receives a commission. There is only one thing to be said in favor of detention on a fine summer's afternoon, and that is that it is very pleasant to come out of. The sun never seems so bright or the turf so green as during the first five minutes after one has come out of the detention room. One feels as if one were entering a new and very delightful world. There is also a touch of the Rip Van Winkle feeling. Everything seems to have gone on and left one behind. Mike, as he walked to the cricket field, felt very much behind the times. Arriving on the field he found the old boys batting. He stopped and watched in over of the dares. The fifth ball bowled a man. Mike made his way towards the pavilion. Before he got there he heard his name called, and turning found Smith seated under a tree with the bright-blazered dunster. Return of the exile, said Smith, a joyful occasion tinged with melancholy. Have a cherry, take one or two. These little acts of unremembered kindness are what one needs after a couple of hours in extra pupil room. Restore your tissues, comrade Jackson, and when you have finished those apply again. Is your name Jackson, inquired Dunster, because Jellico wants to see you. Alas, poor Jellico, said Smith, he is now prone on his bed in the dormitory. There a sheer hulk glies poor Tom Jellico, the darling of the crew, faithful below he did his duty, but comrade Dunster has broached him too. I have just been hearing the melancholy details. Old Smith and I, said Dunster, were at a private school together. I had no idea I should find him here. It was a wonderfully stirring sight when we met, said Smith, not unlike the meeting of Ulysses and the hound Argus, of whom you have doubtless read in the course of your dabblings in the classics. I was Ulysses, Dunster gave a lifelike representation of the faithful dog. You still jaw as much as ever, I noticed, said the animal delineator, fondling the beginnings of his mustache. More, sighed Smith, more. Is anything irritating you, he added, eyeing the others maneuvers with interest? You needn't be a funny ass, man, said Dunster, pained. Heaps of people tell me I ought to have it waxed. What it really wants is top dressing with guano. Hello! Another man out. A dares bowling better today than he did yesterday. I heard about yesterday, said Dunster, it must have been a rag. Couldn't we work off some other rag on somebody before I go? I shall be stopping here till Monday in the village. Well, hit, sir. A dares bowling is perfectly simple if you go out to it. Comrade Dunster went out to it first ball, said Smith to Mike. Oh, chuck it, man, the sun was in my eyes. I hear a dares got a match on with the MCC at last. Has he? said Smith. I hadn't heard. Archaeology claims so much of my time that I have little leisure for listening to cricket chit-chat. What was it Jelico wanted? asked Mike. Was it anything important? He seemed to think so. He kept telling me to tell you to go and see him. A fear-comrade Jelico is a bit of a weak-minded blitherer. Did you ever hear of a rag we worked off on Jelico once, asked Dunster? The man has absolutely no sense of humor, can't see when he's being rotted. Well it was like this. Hello! We're all out. I shall have to be going out to field again, I suppose. Dash it. I'll tell you when I see you again. I shall count the minute, said Smith. Mike stretched himself. The sun was very soothing after his two hours in the detention room. He felt disinclined for exertion. I don't suppose it's anything special about Jelico, do you, he said. I mean, it'll keep till tea time. It's no catch having to sweat across to the house now. What dream of moving, said Smith, I have several rather profound observations on life to make, and I can't make them without an audience. Soliloquy is a knack. Hamlet had got it, but probably only after years of patient practice. Personally, I need someone to listen when I talk. I like to feel that I am doing good. You stay where you are, don't interrupt too much. Mike tilted his hat over his eyes and abandoned Jelico. It was not until the lock-up bell rang that he remembered him. He went over to the house and made his way to the dormitory, where he found the injured one in a parlous state, not so much physical as mental. The doctor had seen his ankle and reported that it would be on the active list in a couple of days. It was Jelico's mind that needed attention now. Mike found him in a condition bordering on collapse. I say, you might have come before, said Jelico. What's up? I didn't know there was such a hurry about it. What did you want? It's no good now, said Jelico, gloomily. It's too late. I shall get sacked. What on earth are you talking about? What's the row? It's about that money. What about it? I had to pay it to a man today, or he said he'd write to the head. Then, of course, I should get sacked. I was going to take the money to him this afternoon, only I got crocked, so I couldn't move. I wanted to get hold of you to ask you to take it for me. It's too late now. Mike's face fell. Oh, hang it, he said. I'm awfully sorry. I had no idea it was anything like that, what a fool I was. Dunster did say he thought it was something important, only like an ass I thought it would do if I came over at lock-up. It doesn't matter, said Jelico miserably. It can't be helped. Yes it can, said Mike. I know what I'll do. It's all right. I'll get out of the house after lights out. Jelico set up. You can't. You'd get sacked if you were caught. Who would catch me? There was a chap at Rickon I knew who used to break out every night nearly and go and pot it cats with an air pistol. It's as easy as anything. The toad under the harrow expression began to fade from Jelico's face. I say, do you think you could, really? Of course I can. It'll be rather a rag. I say it's frightfully decent of you. What absolute rot. But look here, are you certain? I shall be all right. Where do you want me to go? It's a place about a mile or two from here called Lower Borlach. Lower Borlach? Yes, do you know it? Rather, I've been playing cricket for them all the term. I say, have you? Do you know a man called Barley? Barley? Rather, he runs the White Boar. He's the chap I owe the money to. Old Barley? Might knew the landlord of the White Boar well. He was the wag of the village team. Every village team, for some mysterious reason, has its comic man. In the Lower Borlach 11, Mr. Barley filled the post. He was a large, stout man with a red and cheerful face who looked exactly like the jovial innkeeper of melodrama. He was the last man Mike would have expected to do the money by Monday week or a right to the headmaster business. But he reflected that he had only seen him in his leisure moments when he might naturally be expected to unbend and be full of the milk of human kindness. Probably in business hours he was quite different. After all, pleasure is one thing and business another. Besides, five pounds is a large sum of money, and if Jellico owed it, there was nothing strange in Mr. Barley's doing everything he could to recover it. He wondered a little what Jellico could have been doing to run up a bill as big as that, but it did not occur to him to ask, which was unfortunate, as it might have saved him a good deal of inconvenience. It seemed to him that it was none of his business to inquire into Jellico's private affairs. He took the envelope containing the money without question. I shall bike there, I think, he said, if I can get into the shed. The school's bicycles were stored in a shed by the pavilion. You can manage that, said Jellico. It's locked up at night, but I had a key made to fit it last summer because I used to go out in the early morning sometimes before it was opened. Got it on you? Smith's got it. I'll get it from him. I say, well, don't tell Smith why you want it, will you? I don't want anybody to know. If a thing once starts getting about, it's all over the place in no time. All right, I won't tell him. I say, thanks most awfully. I don't know what I should have done, I—oh, chuck it, said Mike. Chapter forty-four. And fulfills it. Mike started on his ride to Lower Borlaque with mixed feelings. It is pleasant to be out on a fine night in summer, but the pleasure is to a certain extent modified when one feels that to be detected will mean expulsion. Mike did not want to be expelled for many reasons. Now that he had grown used to the place, he was enjoying himself, sadly, to a certain extent. He still harbored a feeling of resentment against the school in general, and a dare in particular, but it was pleasant and outwards now that he had got to know some of the members of the house, and he liked playing cricket for Lower Borlaque. Also he was fairly certain that his father would not let him go to Cambridge if he were expelled from Sedley. Mr. Jackson was easy going with his family, but occasionally his foot came down like a steam hammer, as witnessed the Rickon School Report Affair. So Mike peddled along rapidly, being wishful to get the job done without delay. Smith had yielded up the key, but his inquiries as to why it was needed had been embarrassing. Mike's statement that he wanted to get up early and have a ride had been received by Smith, with whom early rising was not a hobby, with honest amazement and a flood of advice and warning on the subject. One of the Georges, said Smith, I forget which, once said, that a certain number of hours sleep a day, I cannot recall for the moment how many, made a man something, which for the time being has slipped my memory. However, there you are. I've given you the main idea of the thing, and a German doctor says that early rising causes insanity. Still, if you're bent on it, after which he had handed over the key. Mike wished he could have taken Smith into his confidence. Probably he would have volunteered to come too. Mike would have been glad of a companion. It did not take him long to reach Lower Borlock. The white boar stood at the far end of the village by the cricket field. He rode past the church, standing out black and mysterious against the light sky and the rows of silent cottages until he came to the inn. The place was shot, of course, and all the lights were out. It was some time past eleven. The advantage an inn has over a private house, from the point of view of the person who wants to get into it when it has been locked up, is that a nocturnal visit is not so unexpected in the case of the former. Friends have been made to meet such an emergency, where with a private house you would probably have to wander round heaving rocks and end by climbing up a waterspout. When you want to get into an inn, you simply ring the night bell, which, communicating with the boot's room, has that hard work menial up and doing in no time. After Mike had waited for a few minutes, there was a rattling of chains and a shooting of bolts in the door open. Yes, sir, said the boots, appearing in his shirt sleeves. Why, hello, Mr. Jackson, sir. Mike was well known to all dwellers in Lower Borlock, his scores being the chief topic of conversation when the day's labors were over. I want to see Mr. Barley, Jack. He's been in bed this half hour back, Mr. Jackson. I must see him. Can you get him down? The boots looked doubtful. Roused the governor out of bed, he said. Mike quite admitted the gravity of the task. The landlord of the White Boar was one of those men who need a beauty sleep. I wish you would. It's a thing that can't wait. I've got some money to give to him. Oh, if it's that, said the boots. Five minutes later, my host appeared in person, looking more than usually portly in a check-dressing gown and red bedroom slippers of the dreadnought type. You can pop off, Jack. Exit boots to his slumbers once more. Well, Mr. Jackson, what's it all about? Jellico asked me to come and bring you the money. The money? What money? What he owes you. The five pounds, of course. The five—Mr. Barley stared open-mouthed at Mike for a moment. Then he broke into a roar of laughter which shook the sporting prince on the wall and drew barks from dogs in some distant part of the house. He staggered about, laughing and coughing, till Mike began to expect a fit of some kind. Then he collapsed into a chair which creaked under him and wiped his eyes. Oh, dear! He said, oh, dear, the five pounds! Mike was not always abreast of the rustic idea of humor, and now he felt particularly fogged. For the life of him he could not see what there was to amuse anyone so much in the fact that a person who owed five pounds was ready to pay it back. It was an occasion for rejoicing, perhaps, but rather for a solemn, thankful eyes raised to heaven kind of rejoicing. What's up? He asked. Five pounds? You might tell us the joke. Mr. Barley opened the letter, read it, and had another attack. When this was finished, he handed the letter to Mike, who was waiting patiently by, hoping for light, and requested him to read it. Dear, dear! Chuckled Mr. Barley, five pounds! They may teach you young gentlemen to talk Latin and Greek and what not at your school, but it'd do a lot more good if they'd teach you how many beans make five. It'd do a lot more good if they'd teach you to come in when it rained. It'd do—Mike was reading the letter. Dear Mr. Barley, it ran, I send the five pounds, which I could not get before. I hope it is in time because I don't want you to write to the headmaster. I am sorry Jane and John ate your wife's hat and the chicken and broke the vase. There was some more to the same effect. It was signed T.G. Jellico. What on earth's it all about, said Mike, finishing this curious document? Mr. Barley slapped his leg. Mr. Jellico keeps two dogs here. I keep them for him till the young gentlemen go home for their holidays. Aberdeen terriers they are, and as sharp as mustard. Mischief? I believe you, but love us. They don't do no harm. Bite up an old shoe sometimes and such sort of things. The other day, last Wednesday at work, about our parse five, Jane, she's the worst of the two, always up to what she is, she got hold of my old hat and had it in bits before you could say knife. John upset a china vase in one of the bedrooms chasing a mouse, and they got on the coffee room table and ate half a cold chicken, what had been left there. So I says to myself, I'll have a game with Mr. Jellico over this, and I sits down and writes off, saying the little dogs have eaten a valuable hat and the chicken and whatnot, and the damage will be five pounds. And will he kindly remit same by Saturday night at the latest, or I write to his headmaster. Love us. Mr. Barley slapped his thigh. He took it all in every word. And here's the five pounds in cash in this envelope here. I haven't had such a laugh since we got old Tom Raxley out of bed at 12 of winter's night by telling him his house was a fire. It is not always easy to appreciate a joke of the practical order if one has been made even merely part victim of it. Mike, as he reflected that he had been dragged out of his house in the middle of the night in contravention of all school rules and discipline, simply in order to satisfy Mr. Barley's sense of humor was more inclined to be abusive than mirthful. Running risk is all very well when they are necessary, or if one chooses to run them for one's own amusement. But to be placed in a dangerous position, a position imperiling one's chance of going to the varsity is another matter altogether. But it is impossible to abuse the Barley type of man, Barley's enjoyment of the whole thing was so honest and childlike. Probably it had given him the happiest quarter of an hour he had known for years, since, in fact, the affair of old Tom Raxley. It would have been cruel to damp the man. So Mike laughed perfunctorily, took back the envelope with the five pounds, accepted a stone ginger beer and a plate full of biscuits, and rode off on his return journey. Mention has been made above of the difference which exists between getting into an inn after lockup and into a private house. Mike was to find this out for himself. His first act on arriving at Sedley was to replace his bicycle in the shed. This he accomplished with success. It was pitch dark in the shed, and as he wheeled his machine in, his foot touched something on the floor. Without waiting to discover what this might be, he leaned his bicycle against the wall, went out, and locked the door, after which he ran across to outwards. Fortune had favored his undertaking by decreeing that a stout drain pipe should pass up the wall within a few inches of his and Smith's study. On the first day of term, it may be remembered, he had wrenched away the wooden bar, which bisected the window frame, thus rendering accident entrance almost as simple as they had been for Wyatt during Mike's first term at Ricken. He proceeded to scale this water pipe. He had got about halfway up when a voice from somewhere below cried, who's that? Chapter 45, Pursuit. These things are life's little difficulties. One can never tell precisely how one will act in a sudden emergency. The right thing for Mike to have done at this crisis was to have ignored the voice, carried on up the water pipe, and through the study window and gone to bed. It was extremely unlikely that anybody could have recognized him at night against the dark background of the house. The position then would have been that somebody in Mr. Outwood's house had been seen breaking in after lights out. But it would have been very difficult for the authorities to have narrowed the search down any further than that. There were 34 boys in Outwoods, of whom about 14 were much the same size and build as Mike. The suddenness, however, of the call caused Mike to lose his head. He made the strategic error of sliding rapidly down the pipe and running. There were two gates to Mr. Outwood's front garden. The carriage-drive ran in a semi-circle, of which the house was the center. It was from the right-hand gate nearest to Mr. Downing's house that the boys had come. And as Mike came to the ground, he saw a stout figure galloping towards him from that direction. He bolted like a rabbit for the other gate. As he did so, his pursuer again gave tongue. O, o, o, yer! was the exact remark. Whereby Mike recognized him as the school sergeant. O, o, o, yer! was that militant gentleman's habitual way of beginning a conversation. With this knowledge, Mike felt easier in his mind. Sergeant Collard was a man of many fine qualities, notably a talent for what he was want to call spotten, a mysterious gift which he exercised on the rifle range. But he could not run. There had been a time in his hot youth when he had sprinted like an untamed Mustang in pursuit of volatile pathens in Indian Hill wars, but time increasing his girth had taken from him the taste for such exercise. When he moved now it was at a stately walk. The fact that he ran to-night showed how the excitement of the chase had entered into his blood. O, o, o, yer! he shouted again, as Mike, passing through the gate, turned into the road that led to the school. Mike's attentive ear noted that the bright speech was a shade more puffily delivered this time. He began to feel that this was not such bad fun after all. He would have liked to be in bed, but if that was out of the question this was certainly the next best thing. He ran on, taking things easily, with the sergeant panting in his wake till he reached the entrance to the school grounds. He dashed in and took cover behind a tree. Presently the sergeant turned to the corner, going badly and evidently cured of a good deal of the fever of the chase. Mike heard him toil on for a few yards and then stop. A sound of panting was born to him. Then the sound of footsteps returning, this time at a walk. They passed the gate and went on down the road. The pursuer had given the thing up. Mike waited for several minutes behind his tree. His program now was simple. He would give a sergeant collard about half an hour in case the ladder took it into his head to guard home by waiting at the gate. Then he would trot softly back, shoot up the water pipe once more and so to bed. It had just struck a quarter to something, 12 he supposed on the school clock. He would wait till a quarter passed. Meanwhile, there was nothing to be gained from lurking behind a tree. He left his cover and started to stroll in the direction of the pavilion. Having arrived there, he sat on the steps looking out onto the cricket field. His thoughts were miles away at Ricken when he was recalled to steadily by the sound of somebody running. Focusing his gaze, he saw a dim figure moving rapidly across the cricket field straight for him. His first impression that he had been seen and followed disappeared as the runner, instead of making for the pavilion, turned aside and stopped at the door of the bicycle shed. Like Mike, he was evidently possessed of a key for Mike heard it great in the lock. At this point, he left the pavilion and hailed his fellow rambler by night in a cautious undertone. The other appeared startled. Who the dickens is that? He asked. Is that you, Jackson? Mike recognized Adair's voice, the last person he would have expected to meet at midnight, obviously, on the point of going for a bicycle ride. What are you doing out here, Jackson? What are you, if it comes to that? Adair was lighting his lamp. I'm going for the doctor. One of the chaps in our house is bad. Oh, what are you doing out here? Just been for a stroll. Hadn't you better be getting back? Plenty of time. I suppose you think you're doing something tremendously brave and dashing. Hadn't you better be going to the doctor? If you want to know what I think, I don't, so long. Mike turned away, whistling between his teeth. After a moment's pause, Adair rode off. Mike saw his light pass across the field and through the gate. The school clock struck the quarter. It seemed to Mike that Sergeant Collard, even if he had started to wait for him at the house, would not keep up the vigil for more than half an hour. He would be safe now in trying for home again. He walked in that direction. Now it happened that Mr. Downing, aroused from his first sleep by the news, conveyed to him by Adair that McPhee, one of the junior members of Adair's dormitory, was groaning and exhibiting other symptoms of acute illness, was disturbed in his mind. Most housemasters feel uneasy in the event of illness in their houses and Mr. Downing was apt to get jumpy beyond the ordinary on such occasions. All that was wrong with McPhee, as a matter of fact, was a very fair stomach ache. The direct and legitimate result of eating six buns, half a coconut, three donuts, two ices, an apple and a pound of cherries and washing the lot down with tea. But Mr. Downing saw in his attack the beginnings of some deadly scourge which would sweep through and decimate the house. He had dispatched Adair for the doctor and after spending a few minutes prowling restlessly about his room, was now standing at his front gate waiting for Adair's return. It came about, therefore, that Mike, sprinting lightly in the direction of home and safety, had his already shaken nerves further maltreated by being hailed at a range of about two yards with a cry of, is that you, Adair? The next moment Mr. Downing emerged from his gate. Mike stood not upon the order of his going. He was off like an arrow, a flying figure of guilt. Mr. Downing, after the first surprise, seemed to grasp the situation, ejaculating at intervals the words, who is that, stop, who is that, stop. He dashed after the much enduring Rikinian at an extremely creditable rate of speed. Mr. Downing was by way of being a sprinter. He had won handicap events at college sports at Oxford. And if Mike had not got such a good start, the race might have been over in the first 50 yards. As it was, that victim of fate going well kept ahead. At the entrance to the school grounds, he led by a dozen yards. The procession passed into the field, Mike heading as before for the pavilion. As they raced across the soft turf, an idea occurred to Mike, which he was accustomed in after years to attribute to genius, the one flash of it which had ever illumined his life. It was this. One of Mr. Downing's first acts on starting the fire brigade at Sedley had been to institute an alarm bell. It had been rubbed into the school officially in speeches from the dais by the headmaster and unofficially in earnest private conversations by Mr. Downing that at the sound of this bell at whatever hour of day or night, every member of the school must leave his house in the quickest possible way and make for the open. The bell might mean that the school was on fire or it might mean that one of the houses was on fire. In any case, the school had its orders to get out into the open at once. Nor must it be supposed that the school was without practice at this feat. Every now and then a notice would be found posted up on the board to the effect that there would be a fire drill during the dinner hour that day. Sometimes the performance was bright and interesting as on the occasion when Mr. Downing, marshalling the brigade at his front gate, had said, my house is supposed to be on fire. Now let's do a record. Which the brigade headed by Stone and Robinson obligingly did? They fastened the hose to the hydrant, smashed a window on the ground floor, Mr. Downing having retired for a moment to talk with the headmaster, and poured a stream of water into the room. When Mr. Downing was at liberty to turn his attention to the matter, he found that the room selected was his private study, most of the light furniture of which was floating on a miniature lake. That episode had rather discouraged his passion for realism and fire drill since then had taken the form for the most part of practicing escaping. This was done by means of canvas chutes kept in the dormitories. At the sound of the bell, the prefect of the dormitory would heave one end of the chute out of window, the other end being fastened to the sill. He would then go down it himself using his elbows as a break. Then the second man would follow his example, and these two standing below would hold the end of the chute so that the rest of the dormitory could fly rapidly down it without injury except to their digestions. After the first novelty of the thing had worn off, the school had taken a rooted dislike to fire drill. It was a matter for self-congratulation among them that Mr. Downing had never been able to induce the headmaster to allow the alarm bell to be sounded for fire drill at night. The headmaster, a man who had his views on the amount of sleep necessary for the growing boy, had drawn the line at night operations. Sufficient unto the day had been the gist of his reply. If the alarm bell were to ring at night when there was no fire, the school might mistake a genuine alarm of fire for a bogus one and refuse to hurry themselves. So Mr. Downing had had to be content with day drill. The alarm bell hung in the archway leading into the school grounds. The end of the rope, when not in use, was fastened to a hook halfway up the wall. Mike, as he raced over the cricket field, made up his mind in a flash that his only chance of getting out of this tangle was to shake his pursuer off for a space of time long enough to enable him to get to the rope and tug it. Then the school would come out. He would mix with them and in the subsequent confusion get back to bed unnoticed. The task was easier than it would have seemed at the beginning of the chase. Mr. Downing, owing to the two facts that he was not in the strictest training and that it is only an Alfred shrub who can run for any length of time at top speed shouting, who is that? Stop. Who is that? Stop. Was beginning to feel distressed. There were bellows to mend in the Downing camp. Mike perceived this and forced the pace. He rounded the pavilion 10 yards to the good. Then heading for the gate, he put all he knew into one last sprint. Mr. Downing was not equal to the effort. He worked gamely for a few strides, then fell behind. When Mike reached the gate, a good 40 yards separated them. As far as Mike could judge, he was not in a condition to make nice calculations. He had about four seconds in which to get busy with that bell rope. Probably nobody has ever crammed more energetic work into four seconds than he did then. The night was as still as only an English summer night can be and the first clang of the clapper sounded like a million iron girders falling from a height onto a sheet of tin. He tugged away furiously with an eye on the now rapidly advancing and loudly shouting figure of the housemaster. And from the darkened house beyond, there came a gradually swelling hum as if a vast hive of bees had been disturbed. The school was awake. End of section 16. Chapters 46 through 48 of Mike. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Mike, A Public School Story by P.G. Woodhouse. Chapter 46, The Decoration of Sammy. Smith leaned against the mantelpiece in the senior day room at Outwoods since Mike's innings against downings. The lost lambs had been received as brothers by that center of disorder so that even Spiller was compelled to look on the hatchet as buried and gave his views on the events of the preceding night or rather of that morning, for it was nearer one than 12 when peace had once more fallen on the school. Nothing that happens in this loony bin, said Smith, has power to surprise me now. There was a time when I might have thought it a little unusual to have to leave the house through a canvas chute at one o'clock in the morning, but I suppose it's quite the regular thing here, old school tradition and sea. Men leave the school and find that they've got so accustomed to jumping out of window that they look on it as a sort of affectation to go out by the door. I suppose none of you merchants can give me any idea when the next knock about entertainment of this kind is likely to take place. I wonder who rang that bell, said Stone, jolly sporting idea. I believe it was Downing himself. If it was, I hope he's satisfied. Jellico, who was appearing in society supported by a stick, looked meaningly at Mike and giggled, receiving in answer a stony stare. Mike had informed Jellico of the details of his interview with Mr. Barley at the White Boar and Jellico, after a momentary splutter of wrath against the practical joker, was now in a particularly light-hearted mood. He hobbled about giggling at nothing and at peace with all the world. It was a stirring scene, said Smith, the agility with which Comrade Jellico boosted himself down the chute was a triumph of mind over matter. He seemed to forget his ankle. It was the nearest thing to a boneless acrobatic wonder that I have ever seen. I was in a beastly funk, I can tell you. Stone gurgled. So was I, he said, for a bit. Then, when I saw that it was all a rag, I began to look about for ways of doing the thing really well. I emptied about six jugs of water on a gang of kids under my window. I rushed into Downing's and ragged some of the beds, said Robinson. It was an invigorating time, said Smith, a sort of pageant. I was particularly struck with the way some of the bright lads caught hold of the idea. There was no skimping. Some of the kids, to my certain knowledge, went down the chute a dozen times. There's nothing like doing a thing thoroughly. I saw them come down, rush upstairs, and be saved again, time after time. The thing became chronic with them. I should say Comrade Downing ought to be satisfied with the high state of efficiency to which he has brought us. At any rate, I hope there was a sound of hurried footsteps outside the door and sharp a member of the senior day room burst excitedly in. He seemed amused. I say, have you chapped seen Sammy? Seen who, said Stone? Sammy, why? You'll know in a second. He's just outside. Here, Sammy, Sammy, Sammy, Sam, Sam. A bark and a patter of feet outside. Come on, Sammy, good dog. There was a moment's silence. Then a great yell of laughter burst forth. Even Smith's massive calm was shattered. As for Jellico, he sobbed in a corner. Sammy's beautiful white coat was almost entirely concealed by a thick covering of bright red paint. His head, with the exception of the ears, was untouched, and his serious friendly eyes seemed to emphasize the weirdness of his appearance. He stood in the doorway, barking and wagging his tail, plainly puzzled at his reception. He was a popular dog and was always well received when he visited any of the houses, but he had never before met with enthusiasm like this. Good old Sammy, what on earth's been happening to him? Who did it? Sharp, the introducer, had no views on the matter. I found him outside downings with a crowd round him. Everybody seems to have seen him. I wonder who on earth has gone and mucked him up like that. Mike was the first to show any sympathy for the maltreated animal. Poor old Sammy, he said, kneeling on the floor beside the victim and scratching him under the ear. What a beastly shame. It'll take hours to wash all that off him, and he'll hate it. It seems to me, said Smith, regarding Sammy dispassionately through his eyeglass, that it's not a case for mere washing. They'll either have to skin him bodily or leave the thing to time, time the great healer. In a year or two, he'll fade to a delicate pink. I don't see why you shouldn't have a pink bull terrier. It would lend a touch of distinction to the place. Crowds would come in excursion trains to see him. By charging a small fee, you might make himself supporting. I think I'll suggest it to Comrade Downing. There'll be a row about this, said Stone. Rows are rather sport when you're not mixed up in them, said Robinson philosophically. There'll be another if we don't start off for chapel soon, it's a quarter two. There was a general move. Mike was the last to leave the room. As he was going, Jellico stopped him. Jellico was staying in that Sunday owing to his ankle. I say, said Jellico, I just wanted to thank you again about that. Oh, that's all right. No, but it really was awfully decent of you. You might have got into a frightful row. Were you nearly caught? Jolly nearly. It was you who rang the bell, wasn't it? Yes, it was, but for goodness' sake, don't go gassing about it, or somebody will get to hear who oughtn't to, and I shall be sacked. All right, but I say you are a chap. What's the matter, Nano? I mean about Sammy, you know. It's a jolly good score off old Downing. He'll be frightfully sick. Sammy, cried Mike, my good man, you don't think I did that, do you? What absolute rot, I never touched the poor brute. Oh, all right, said Jellico, but I wasn't going to tell anyone, of course. What do you mean? You are a chap, giggled Jellico. Mike walked to Chapel, rather thoughtfully. Chapter 47, Mr. Downing on the scent. There was just one moment, the moment in which on going down to the junior day room of his house to quell at unseemly disturbance, he was boisterously greeted by a vermilion bowl terrier. When Mr. Downing was seized with the hideous fear as best he had lost his senses, glaring down at the crimson animal that was pawing at his knees, he clutched at his reason for one second as a drowning man clutches at a life belt. Then the happy laughter of the young onlookers reassured him. Who, he shouted, who has done this? Please, sir, we don't know, shrilled the chorus. Please, sir, he came in like that. Please, sir, we were sitting here when he suddenly ran in, all red. The voice from the crowd, look at old Sammy. The situation was impossible. There was nothing to be done. He could not find out by verbal inquiry who had painted the dog. The possibility of Sammy being painted red during the night had never occurred to Mr. Downing. And now that the thing had happened, he had no scheme of action. As Smith would have said, he had confused the unusual with the impossible and the result was that he was taken by surprise. While he was pondering on this, the situation was rendered still more difficult by Sammy, who, taking advantage of the door being open, escaped and rushed into the road, thus publishing his condition to all in sundry. You can hush up a painted dog while it confines itself to your own premises, but once it is mixed with the great public, this becomes out of the question. Sammy's state advanced from a private trouble into a row. Mr. Downing's next move was in the same direction that Sammy had taken, only instead of running about the road, he went straight to the headmaster. The head, who had had to leave his house in the small hours in his pajamas and a dressing gown, was not in the best of tempers. He had a cold in the head and also a rooted conviction that Mr. Downing, in spite of his strict orders, had rung the bell himself on the previous night in order to test the efficiency of the school in saving themselves in the event of fire. He received the housemaster frostily, but thought as the latter related the events which had led up to the ringing of the bell. Dear me, he said, deeply interested, one of the boys at the school, you think? I am certain of it, said Mr. Downing. Was he wearing a school cap? He was bare-headed. A boy who breaks out of his house at night would hardly run the risk of wearing a distinguishing cap. No, no, I suppose not. A big boy, you say, very big. You did not see his face? It was dark and he never looked back. He was in front of me all the time. Dear me, there is another matter, yes? This boy, whoever he was, had done something before he rang the bell. He had painted my dog Sampson red. The headmaster's eyes protruded from their sockets. He, he, what, Mr. Downing? He painted my dog red, bright red. Mr. Downing was too angry to see anything humorous in the incident. Since the previous night, he had been wounded in his tenderest feelings. His fire brigade system had been most shamefully abused by being turned into a mere instrument in the hands of a malefactor for escaping justice. And his dog had been held up to ridicule to all the world. He did not want to smile. He wanted revenge. The headmaster, on the other hand, did want to smile. It was not his dog. He could look on the affair with an unbiased eye. And to him, there was something ludicrous in a white dog suddenly appearing as a red dog. It is a scandalous thing, said Mr. Downing. Quite so, quite so, said the headmaster hastily. I shall punish the boy who did it most severely. I will speak to the school in the hall after chapel. Which he did, but without result. A cordial invitation to the criminal to come forward and be executed was received in wooden silence by the school with the exception of Johnson III of Outwoods who suddenly reminded of Sammy's appearance by the headmaster's words, broke into a wild screech of laughter and was instantly awarded 200 Lines. The school filed out of the hall to their various lunches and Mr. Downing was left with the conviction that if he wanted the criminal discovered he would have to discover him for himself. The great thing in affairs of this kind is to get a good start. And fate, feeling perhaps that it had been a little hard upon Mr. Downing, gave him a most magnificent start. Instead of having to hunt for a needle in a haystack, he found himself in a moment in the position of being set to find it in a mere truss of straw. It was Mr. Outwood who helped him. Sergeant Collard had way-laid the archeological expert on his way to Chapel and informed him that at close on 12 the night before he had observed a youth unidentified attempting to get into his house via the water pipe. Mr. Outwood, whose thoughts were occupied with abses and plinths, not to mention cromlex at the time, thanked the sergeant with absent-minded politeness and passed on. Later he remembered the fact that proposed some reflections on the subject of burglars in medieval England and passed it on to Mr. Downing as they walked back to lunch. Then the boy was in your house, exclaimed Mr. Downing. Not actually in, as far as I understand, I gather from the sergeant that he interrupted him before. I mean he must have been one of the boys in your house. But what was he doing out at that hour? He had broken out. Impossible, I think. Oh yes, quite impossible. I went round the dormitories as usual at 11 o'clock last night and all the boys were asleep, all of them. Mr. Downing was not listening. He was in a state of suppressed excitement and exaltation, which made it hard for him to attend to his colleagues' slow utterances. He had a clue. Now that the search had narrowed itself down to Outwood's house, the rest was comparatively easy. Perhaps Sergeant Collard had actually recognized the boy. On reflection he dismissed this as unlikely, for the sergeant would scarcely have kept a thing like that to himself, but he might very well have seen more of him than he, Downing, had seen. It was only with an effort that he could keep himself from rushing to the sergeant then and there and leaving the house lunch to look after itself. He resolved to go the moment that meal was at an end. Sunday lunch at a public school house is probably one of the longest functions in existence. It drags its slow length along like a languid snake, but it finishes in time. In due course, Mr. Downing, after sitting still and eyeing with acute dislike, everybody who asked for a second helping found himself at liberty. Regardless of the claims of digestion, he rushed forth on the trail. Sergeant Collard lived with his wife and a family of unknown dimensions in the lodge at the school front gate. Dinner was just over when Mr. Downing arrived as a blind man could have told. The sergeant received his visitor with dignity, ejecting the family who were torpid after roast beef and resented having to move in order to ensure privacy. Having requested his host to smoke, which the latter was about to do unasked, Mr. Downing stated his case. Mr. Outwood, he said, tells me that last night, the sergeant, she saw a boy endeavoring to enter his house. The sergeant blew a cloud of smoke. Ooh, your, he said, I did, sir, spotted him, I did. Feefully good at spotting, I am, sir. Duke of Connaught, he used to say, here comes Sergeant Collard, he used to say. He's feefully good at spotting. What did you do? Do, ooh, ooh, I shouts, ooh, your, your, young monkey, what you're doing there? Yes, but he was off in a flash and I doubles after him prompt. But you didn't catch him? No, sir, admitted the sergeant reluctantly. Did you catch sight of his face, sergeant? No, sir, he was doubling away in the opposite direction. Did you notice anything at all about his appearance? He was a long, young chap, sir, with a pair of legs on him. Feefully fast, he runs, sir, ooh, ooh, ooh, feefully. You noticed nothing else. He wasn't wearing no cap of any sort, sir, ah. Bear-edded, sir, added the sergeant, rubbing the point in. It was undoubtedly the same boy, undoubtedly. I wish you could have caught a glimpse of his face, sergeant. So do I, sir. You would not be able to recognize him again if you saw him, you think. Ooh, ooh, ooh, wouldn't go so far as to say that, sir, because, you see, I'm feefully good at spotting, but it was a dark night. Mr. Downing rose to go. Well, he said, the search is now considerably narrowed down, considerably. It is certain that the boy was one of the boys in Mr. Outwood's house. Young monkeys interjected the sergeant helpfully. Good afternoon, sergeant. Good afternoon to you, sir. Pray did not move, sergeant. The sergeant had not shown the slightest inclination of doing anything of the kind. I will find my way out. Very hot today, is it not? Feefully warm, sir. Weather's going to break, working up for thunder. I hope not. The school plays the MCC on Wednesday, and it would be a pity if rain were to spoil our first fixture with them. Good afternoon. And Mr. Downing went out into the baking sunlight while sergeant Collard, having requested Mrs. Collard to take the children out for a walk at once, and furthermore to give young Ernie a clip side of the head if he persisted in making so much noise, put a handkerchief over his face, rested his feet on the table, and slept the sleep of the just. Chapter 48, The Sleuth Hound. For the Dr. Watson's of this world, as opposed to the Sherlock Holmes's, success in the province of detective work must always be, to a very large extent, the result of luck. Sherlock Holmes can extract a clue from a wisp of straw or a flake of cigar ash, but Dr. Watson has got to have it taken out for him and dusted and exhibited clearly with a label attached. The average man is a Dr. Watson. We are one to scoff in a patronizing manner at that humble follower of the great investigator, but as a matter of fact, we should have been just as dull ourselves. We should not even have risen to the modest level of a Scotland yard bungler. We should simply have hung around saying, my dear Holmes how, and all the rest of it, just as a downtrodden medico did. It is not often that the ordinary person has any need to see what he can do in the way of detection. He gets along very comfortably in the humdrum round of life without having to measure footprints and smile quiet tight-lipped smiles. But if ever the emergence he does arise, he thinks naturally of Sherlock Holmes and his methods. Mr. Downing had read all the Holmes stories with great attention and had thought many times what an incompetent ass Dr. Watson was. But now that he had started to handle his own first case, he was compelled to admit that there was a good deal to be said in extenuation of Watson's inability to unravel tangles. It certainly was uncommonly hard, he thought, as he paced the cricket field after leaving Sergeant Collard, to detect anybody unless you knew who had really done the crime. As he brooded over the case in hand, his sympathy for Dr. Watson increased with every minute and he began to feel a certain resentment against Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It was all very well for Sir Arthur to be so shrewd and infallible about tracing a mystery to its source, but he knew perfectly well who had done the thing before he started. Now that he began really to look into this matter of the alarm bell and the painting of Sammy, the conviction was creeping over him that the problem was more difficult than a casual observer might imagine. He had got as far as finding that his quarry of the previous night was a boy in Mr. Outwood's house, but how was he to get any farther? That was the thing. There were, of course, only a limited number of boys in Mr. Outwood's house as tall as the one he had pursued, but even if there had been only one other, it would have complicated matters. If you go to a boy and say, either you or Jones were out of your house last night at 12 o'clock, the boy does not reply, sir, I cannot tell a lie. I was out of my house last night at 12 o'clock. He simply assumes the animated expression of a stuffed fish and leaves the next move to you. It is practically stalemate. All these things passed through Mr. Downing's mind as he walked up and down the cricket field that afternoon. What he wanted was a clue, but it is so hard for the novice to tell what is a clue and what isn't. Probably, if he only knew, there were clues lying all over the place, shouting to him to pick them up. What with the oppressive heat of the day and the fatigue of hard thinking, Mr. Downing was working up for a brainstorm when fate once more intervened, this time in the shape of Wriglet, a junior member of his house. Wriglet slunk up in the shame-faced way peculiar to some boys, even when they have done nothing wrong, and having capped Mr. Downing with the air of one who has been caught in the act of doing something particularly shady, requested that he might be allowed to fetch his bicycle from the shed. Your bicycle, snapped Mr. Downing, much thinking had made him irritable. What do you want with your bicycle? Wriglet shuffled, stood first on his left foot, then on his right, blushed, and finally remarked as if it were not so much a sound reason as a sort of feeble excuse for the low and blaggardly fact that he wanted his bicycle, that he had got leave for tea that afternoon. Then Mr. Downing remembered. Wriglet had an aunt resident about three miles from the school, whom he was accustomed to visit occasionally on Sunday afternoons during the term. He felt for his bunch of keys and made his way to the shed, Wriglet shambling behind at an interval of two yards. Mr. Downing unlocked the door, and there on the floor was the clue, a clue that even Dr. Watson could not have overlooked. Mr. Downing saw it, but did not immediately recognize it for what it was. What he saw at first was not a clue, but just a mess. He had a tidy soul and abhorred messes, and this was a particularly messy mess. The greater part of the flooring in the neighborhood of the door was a sea of red paint. The tin from which it had flowed was lying on its side in the middle of the shed. The air was full of the pungent scent. Pa! said Mr. Downing. Then suddenly, beneath the disguise of the mess, he saw the clue, a footmark, no less, a crimson footmark on the gray concrete. Wriglet, who had been waiting patiently two yards away, now coughed plaintively. The sound recalled Mr. Downing to mundane matters. Get your bicycle, Wriglet, he said, and be careful where you tread. Somebody has upset a pot of paint on the floor. Wriglet, walking delicately through dry places, extracted his bicycle from the rack and presently departed to gladden the heart of his aunt, leaving Mr. Downing, his brain fizzing with the enthusiasm of the detective, to lock the door and resume his perambulation of the cricket field. Give Dr. Watson a fair start and he is a demon at the game. Mr. Downing's brain was now working with a rapidity and clearness which a professional sleuth might have envied. Paint, red paint, obviously the same paint with which Sammy had been decorated, a footmark, whose footmark? Plainly that of the criminal who had done the deed of decoration, yikes. There were two things, however, to be considered. Your careful detective must consider everything. In the first place, the paint might have been upset by the ground man. It was the ground man's paint. He had been giving a fresh coating to the woodwork in front of the pavilion scoring box at the conclusion of yesterday's match, a labor of love which was a direct outcome of the enthusiasm for work which Adair had instilled into him. In that case, the footmark might be his. Note one, interview the ground man on this point. In the second place, Adair might have upset the tin and trodden in its contents when he went to get his bicycle in order to fetch the doctor for the suffering McPhee. This was the more probable of the two contingencies, for it would have been dark in the shed when Adair went into it. Note two, interview Adair as to whether he found on returning to the house that there was paint on his boots. Things were moving. He resolved to take Adair first. He could get the ground man's address from him. Passing by the trees under whose shade Mike and Smith and Dunster had watched the match on the previous day, he came upon the head of his house in a deck chair reading a book. A summer Sunday afternoon is the time for reading in deck chairs. Oh, Adair, he said, no, don't get up. I merely wish to ask you if you found any paint on your boots when you returned to the house last night. Paint, sir? Adair was plainly puzzled. His book had been interesting and had driven the Sammy incident out of his head. I see somebody has spilt some paint on the floor of the bicycle shed. You did not do that, I suppose, when you went to fetch your bicycle? No, sir. It has spilt all over the floor. I wondered whether you had happened to tread in it, but you say you found no paint on your boots this morning? No, sir. My bicycle is always quite near the door of the shed. I didn't go into the shed at all. I see. Quite so. Thank you, Adair. Oh, by the way, Adair, where does Markby live? I forget the name of his cottage, sir, but I could show you in a second. It's one of those cottages just past the school gates on the right as you turn out into the road. There are three in a row, his is the first you come to. There's a barn just before you get to them. Thank you, I shall be able to find them. I should like to speak to Markby for a moment on a small matter. A sharp walk took him to the cottages Adair had mentioned. He wrapped at the door of the first, and the ground man came out in his shirt sleeves, blinking as if he had just woke up, as was indeed the case. Oh, Markby, sir, you remember that you were painting the scoring box in the pavilion last night after the match? Yes, sir. It wanted a lick of paint bad. The young gentleman will scramble about and get through the window. Makes it look shabby, sir. So I thought I'd better give it a coating so as to look ship-shaped when the marrow bone come down. Just so, an excellent idea. Tell me, Markby, what did you do with the pot of paint when you had finished? Put it in the bicycle shed, sir. On the floor? On the floor, sir? No, on the shelf at the far end, with a can of whitening what I used for marking out the wicket, sir. Of course, yes, quite so, just as I thought. Do you want it, sir? No, thank you, Markby, no thank you. The fact is, somebody who had no business to do so has moved the pot of paint from the shelf to the floor with the result that it has been kicked over and spilt. You had better get some more tomorrow. Thank you, Markby. That is all I wish to know. Mr. Downing walked back to the school thoroughly excited. He was hot on the scent now. The only other possible theories had been tested and successfully exploded. The thing had become simple to a degree. All he had to do was to go to Mr. Outwood's house. The idea of searching a fellow master's house did not appear to him at all a delicate task. Somehow one grew unconsciously to feel that Mr. Outwood did not really exist as a man capable of resenting liberties. Find the paint-splashed boot, ascertain its owner, and denounce him to the headmaster. Picture, blue fire and God saved the king by the full strength of the company. There could be no doubt that a paint-splashed boot must be in Mr. Outwood's house somewhere. A boy cannot tread in a pool of paint without showing some signs of having done so. It was Sunday, too, so that the boot would not yet have been cleaned. Yikes, also tally-hole. This really was beginning to be something like business. Regardless of the heat, the sleuth hound hurried across to Outwood's as fast as he could walk. End of section 17. Chapters 49 through 51 of Mike. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Mike, a public school story by P. G. Woodhouse. Chapter 49, a check. The only two members of the house, not out in the grounds when he arrived, were Mike and Smith. They were standing on the gravel drive in front of the boy's entrance. Mike had a deck chair in one hand and a book in the other. Smith, for even the greatest minds will sometimes unbend, was playing Diabolo. That is to say he was trying without success to raise the spool from the ground. There's a kid in France, said Mike disparagingly, as the bobbin rolled off the string for the fourth time, who can do it 3,700 and something times. Smith smoothed the crease out of his waistcoat and tried again. He had just succeeded in getting the thing to spin when Mr. Downing arrived. The sound of his footsteps disturbed Smith and brought the effort to nothing. Enough of this spoolery, said he, flinging the sticks through the open window of the senior day room. I was an ass ever to try it. The philosophical mind needs complete repose in its hours of leisure. Hello? He stared after the sleuth hound who had just entered the house. What the dickens, said Mike, does he mean by barging in as if he'd bought the place. Comrade Downing looks pleased with himself. What brings him round in this direction, I wonder? Still, no matter. The few articles which he may sneak from our study are of inconsiderable value. He is welcome to them. Do you feel inclined to wait a while till I have fetched a chair and a book? I'll be going on. I shall be under the trees at the far end of the ground. Tis well, I will be with you in about two ticks. Mike walked on towards the field and Smith, strolling upstairs to fetch his novel, found Mr. Downing standing in the passage with the air of one who has lost his bearings. A warm afternoon, sir, murmured Smith courteously as he passed. Sir, Smith, sir, I, er, wish to go round the dormitories. It was Smith's guiding rule in life never to be surprised at anything, so he merely inclined his head gracefully and said nothing. I should be glad if you would fetch the keys and show me where the rooms are. With acute pleasure, sir, said Smith, or shall I fetch Mr. Outwood, sir? Do as I tell you, Smith, snapped Mr. Downing. Smith said no more, but went down to the matron's room. The matron being out, he abstracted the bunch of keys from her table and rejoined the master. Shall I lead the way, sir? He asked. Mr. Downing nodded. Here, sir, said Smith, opening a door, we have barn's dormitory, an airy room constructed on the soundest hygienic principles. Each boy, I understand, has quite a considerable number of cubic feet of air all to himself. It is Mr. Outwood's boast that no boy has ever asked for a cubic foot of air in vain. He argues justly, he broke off abruptly and began to watch the others maneuvers in silence. Mr. Downing was peering rapidly beneath each bed in turn. Are you looking for barn's, sir? inquired Smith politely. I think he's out in the field. Mr. Downing rose, having examined the last bed, crimson in the face with the exercise. Show me the next dormitory, Smith, he said, panting slightly. This, said Smith, opening the next door and sinking his voice to an odd whisper, is where I sleep. Mr. Downing glanced swiftly beneath the three beds. Excuse me, sir, said Smith, but are we chasing anything? Be good enough, Smith, said Mr. Downing with disparity to keep your remarks to yourself. I was only wondering, sir, shall I show you the next in order? Certainly. They moved on up the passage, drawing blank at the last dormitory Mr. Downing paused baffled. Smith waited patiently by, an idea struck the master. The study, Smith, he cried. Aha, said Smith, I beg your pardon, sir, the observation escaped me unawares. The frenzy of the chase is beginning to enter into my blood. Here we have Mr. Downing stopped short. Is this impertinence studied, Smith? Ferguson's study, sir? No, sir, that's further down the passage. This is barned. Mr. Downing looked at him closely. Smith's face was wooden in its gravity. The master snorted suspiciously, then moved on. Whose is this, he asked, wrapping a door? This, sir, is mine and Jackson's. What, have you a study? You are low down in the school for it. I think, sir, that Mr. Outwood gave it us rather as a testimonial to our general worth than to our proficiency in schoolwork. Mr. Downing raked the room with a keen eye. The absence of bars from the window attracted his attention. Have you no bars to your windows here, such as there are in my house? There appears to be no bars, sir, said Smith, putting up his eyeglass. Mr. Downing was leaning out of the window. A lovely view, is it not, sir, said Smith? The trees, the fields, the distant hills? Mr. Downing suddenly started. His eye had been caught by the water pipe at the side of the window. The boy whom Sergeant Collard had seen climbing the pipe must have been making for this study. He spun round and met Smith's blandly inquiring gaze. He looked at Smith carefully for a moment. No, the boy he had chased last night had not been Smith. That exquisite figure and general appearance were unmistakable, even in the dusk. Whom did you say you shared this study with, Smith? Jackson, sir, the cricketer. Never mind about his cricket, Smith, said Mr. Downing with irritation. No, sir. He is the only other occupant of the room? Yes, sir. Nobody else comes into it? If they do, they go out extremely quickly, sir. Ah, thank you, Smith. Not at all, sir. Mr. Downing pondered. Jackson, the boy bore him a grudge. The boy was precisely the sort of boy to revenge himself by painting the dog Sammy and Ged Zooks, the boy whom he had pursued last night had been just about Jackson's size and build. Mr. Downing was as firmly convinced at that moment that Mike had been the hand to wield the paintbrush as he had ever been of anything in his life. Smith, he said excitedly. On the spot, sir, said Smith affably. Where are Jackson's boots? There are moments when the giddy excitement of being right on the trail causes the amateur, or a Watsonian, detective to be incautious. Such a moment came to Mr. Downing, then. If he had been wise, he would have achieved his object, the getting a glimpse of Mike's boots by a devious and snaky route. As it was, he rushed straight on. His boots, sir? He has them on. I noticed them as he went out just now. Where is the pair he wore yesterday? Where are the boots of yesteryear, murmured Smith to himself? I should say at a venture, sir, that they would be in the basket downstairs. Edmund, our genial knife and boot boy, collects them, I believe, at early dawn. Would they have been cleaned yet? If I know Edmund, sir, no. Smith, said Mr. Downing, trembling with excitement, go and bring that basket to me here. Smith's brain was working rapidly as he went downstairs. What exactly was at the back of the sleuth's mind prompting these maneuvers he did not know, but that there was something, and that that something was directed in a hostile manner against Mike, probably in connection with last night's wild happenings, he was certain. Smith had noticed, on leaving his bed at the sound of the alarm bell, that he and Jelico were alone in the room. That might mean that Mike had gone out through the door when the bell sounded, or it might mean that he had been out all the time. It began to look as if the ladder solution were the correct one. He staggered back with the basket, painfully conscious, the while, that it was creasing his waistcoat, and dumped it down on the study floor. Mr. Downing stooped eagerly over it. Smith leaned against the wall and straightened out the damaged garment. We have here, sir, he said, a fair selection of our various bootings. Mr. Downing looked up. You dropped none of the boots on your way up, Smith. Not one, sir, it was a fine performance. Mr. Downing uttered a grunt of satisfaction and bent once more to his task. Boots flew about the room. Mr. Downing knelt on the floor beside the basket and dug like a terrier at a rat-hole. At last he made a dive and was an exclamation of triumph froze to his feet. In his hand he held a boot. Put those back again, Smith, he said. The exitonian, wearing an expression such as a martyr might have worn on being told off for the stake, began to pick up the scattered footgear, whistling softly the tune of, I do all the dirty work, as he did so. That's the lot, sir, he said, rising. Ah, now come across with me to the headmaster's house. Leave the basket here. You can carry it back when you return. Shall I put back that boot, sir? Certainly not. I shall take this with me, of course. Shall I carry it, sir? Mr. Downing reflected. Yes, Smith, he said, I think it would be best. It occurred to him that the spectacle of a housemaster wandering abroad on the public highway, carrying a dirty boot, might be a trifle undignified. You never knew whom you might meet on Sunday afternoon. Smith took the boot and, doing so, understood what before had puzzled him. Across the toe of the boot was a broad splash of red paint. He knew nothing, of course, of the upset tin in the bicycle shed, but when a housemaster's dog has been painted red in the night, and when, on the following day, the housemaster goes about in search of a paint-splashed boot, one puts two and two together. Smith looked at the name inside the boot. It was Brown, bootmaker, Bridge North. Bridge North was only a few miles from his own home in Mike's. Undoubtedly, it was Mike's boot. Can you tell me whose boot that is, asked Mr. Downing. Smith looked at it again. No, sir, I can't say the little taps familiar to me. Come with me, then. Mr. Downing left the room. After a moment, Smith followed him. The headmaster was in his garden. Thither, Mr. Downing made his way, the bootbearing Smith in close attendance. The head listened to the amateur detective's statement with interest. Indeed, he said, when Mr. Downing had finished. Indeed, dear me, it certainly seems, it is a curiously well-connected thread of evidence. You are certain that there was red paint on this boot you discovered in Mr. Outwood's house. I have it with me. I brought it on purpose to show to you. Smith, sir, you have the boot? Ah, said the headmaster, putting on a pair of pompsnay. Now, let me look at this, you say, is that just so, just so, just... Mr. Downing, it may be that I have not examined this boot with sufficient care, but can you point out to me exactly where this paint is that you speak of? Mr. Downing stood staring at the boot with a wild, fixed stare. Of any suspicion of paint, red or otherwise, it was absolutely and entirely innocent. Chapter 50, The Destroyer of Evidence. The boot became the center of attraction, the sinister of all eyes. Mr. Downing fixed it with the piercing stare of one who feels that his brain is tottering. The headmaster looked at it with a mildly puzzled expression. Smith, putting up his eyeglass, gazed at it with a sort of affectionate interest, as if he were waiting for it to do a trick of some kind. Mr. Downing was the first to break the silence. There was paint on this boot, he said vehemently. I tell you, there was a splash of red paint across the toe. Smith will bear me out in this. Smith, you saw the paint on this boot? Paint, sir? What? Do you mean to tell me that you did not see it? No, sir, there was no paint on this boot. This is foolery. I saw it with my own eyes. It was a broad splash right across the toe. The headmaster interposed. You must have made a mistake, Mr. Downing. There was certainly no trace of paint on this boot. These momentary optical delusions are, I fancy, not uncommon. Any doctor will tell you. I had an aunt, sir, said Smith Chattely, who was remarkably subject. It is absurd. I cannot have been mistaken, said Mr. Downing. I am positively certain that the toe of this boot was red when I found it. It is undoubtedly black now, Mr. Downing. A sort of chameleon boot, murmured Smith. The goaded housemaster turned on him. What did you say, Smith? Did I speak, sir, said Smith, with the start of one coming suddenly out of a trance? Mr. Downing looked searchingly at him. You had better be careful, Smith. Yes, sir. I strongly suspect you of having something to do with this. Really, Mr. Downing, said the headmaster. That is surely improbable. Smith could scarcely have cleaned the boot on his way to my house. On one occasion, I inadvertently spilt some paint on a shoe of my own. I can assure you that it does not brush off. It needs a very systematic cleaning before all traces are removed. Exactly, sir, said Smith. My theory, if I may. Certainly, Smith. Smith bowed courteously and proceeded. My theory, sir, is that Mr. Downing was deceived by the light and shade effects on the toe of the boot. The afternoon sun streaming in through the window must have shown on the boot in such a manner as to give it a momentary and fictitious aspect of redness. If Mr. Downing recollects, he did not look long at the boot. The picture on the retina of the eye consequently had not time to fade. I remember thinking myself at the moment that the boot appeared to have a certain reddish tint. The mistake? Bah, said Mr. Downing shortly. Well, really, said the housemaster, it seems to me that that is the only explanation that will square with the fact. A boot that is really smeared with red paint does not become black of itself in the course of a few minutes. You are very right, sir, said Smith with benevolent approval. May I go now, sir? I am in the middle of a singularly impressive passage of Cicero's speech, the Seneca Tute. I am sorry that you should leave your preparation till Sunday, Smith. It is a habit of which I altogether disapprove. I am reading it, sir, said Smith with simple dignity, for pleasure. Shall I take the boot with me, sir? If Mr. Downing does not want it, the housemaster passed the fraudulent piece of evidence to Smith without a word, and the latter, having included both masters in a kindly smile, left the garden. Pedestrians, who had the good fortune to be passing along the road between the housemaster's house and Mr. Outwoods at that moment, saw what, if they had but known it, was a most unusual sight, the spectacle of Smith running. Smith's usual mode of progression was a dignified walk. He believed in the contemplative style rather than the hustling. On this occasion, however, reckless of possible injuries to the crease of his trousers, he raced down the road, and turning in at Outwoods' gate, bounded upstairs like a highly trained professional athlete. On arriving at the study, his first act was to remove a boot from the top of the pile in the basket, place it in the small cupboard under the bookshelf, and lock the cupboard. Then he flung himself into a chair and panted. Brain, he said to himself approvingly, is what one chiefly needs in matters of this kind. Without brain, where are we? In the soup every time. The next development will be when Comrade Downing thinks it over and is struck with the brilliant idea that it's just possible that the boot he gave me to carry and the boot I did carry were not one boot, but two boots. Meanwhile, he dragged up another chair for his feet and picked up his novel. He had not been reading long when there was a footstep in the passage and Mr. Downing appeared. The possibility, in fact, the probability of Smith having substituted another boot for the one with the incriminating splash of paint on it, had occurred to him almost immediately on leaving the headmaster's garden. Smith and Mike, he reflected, were friends. Smith's impulse would be to do all that lay in his power to shield Mike. Feeling aggrieved with himself that he had not thought of this before, he, too, hurried over to Outwoods. Mr. Downing was brisk and peremptory. I wish to look at these boots again, he said. Smith, with a sigh, laid down his novel and rose to assist him. Sit down, Smith, said the housemaster. I can manage without your help. Smith sat down again, carefully tucking up the knees of his trousers and watched him with silent interest through his eyeglass. The scrutiny irritated Mr. Downing. Put that thing away, Smith, he said. That thing, sir? Yes, that ridiculous glass, put it away. Why, sir? Why, because I tell you to do so. I guessed that that was the reason, sir, said Smith, replacing the eyeglass in his waistcoat pocket. He rested his elbows on his knees and his chin on his hands and resumed his contemplative inspection of the boot expert, who, after fidgeting for a few moments, lodged another complaint. Don't sit there staring at me, Smith. I was interested in what you were doing, sir. Never mind, don't stare at me in that idiotic way. May I read, sir? Asked Smith patiently. Yes, read if you like. Thank you, sir. Smith took up his book again and Mr. Downing now thoroughly irritated, pursued his investigations in the boot basket. He went through it twice, but each time without success. After the second search, he stood up and looked wildly round the room. He was as certain as he could be of anything that the missing piece of evidence was somewhere in the study. It was no use asking Smith point blank where it was for Smith's ability to parry dangerous questions with evasive answers was quite out of the common. His eye roamed about the room. There was very little cover there, even for so small a fugitive as a number nine boot. The floor could be acquitted on site of harboring the quarry. Then he caught sight of the cupboard and something seemed to tell him that there was the place to look. Smith, he said. Smith had been reading placidly all the while. Yes, sir. What is in this cupboard? That cupboard, sir? Yes, this cupboard. Mr. Downing wrapped the door irritably. Just a few odd trifles, sir. We did not often use it. A ball of string perhaps, possibly an old notebook, nothing of value or interest. Open it. I think you will find that it is locked, sir. Unlock it. But where is the key, sir? Have you not got the key? If the key is not in the lock, sir, you may depend upon it that it will take a long search to find it. Where did you see it last? It was in the lock yesterday morning. Jackson might have taken it. Where is Jackson? Out in the field somewhere, sir. Mr. Downing thought for a moment. I don't believe a word of it, he said shortly. I have my reasons for thinking that you are deliberately keeping the contents of that cupboard from me. I shall break open the door. Smith got up. I'm afraid you mustn't do that, sir. Mr. Downing stared, amazed. Are you aware whom you are talking to, Smith? He inquired acidly. Yes, sir. And I know it's not Mr. Outwood to whom that cupboard happens to belong. If you wish to break it open, you must get his permission. He is the sole lessy and proprietor of that cupboard. I am only the acting manager. Mr. Downing paused. He also reflected. Mr. Outwood, in the general rule, did not count much in the scheme of things, but possibly there were limits to the treating of him as if he did not exist. To enter his house without his permission and search it to a certain extent was all very well, but when it came to breaking up his furniture, perhaps, on the other hand, there was the maddening thought that if he left the study in search of Mr. Outwood in order to obtain his sanction for the house-breaking work which he proposed to carry through, Smith would be alone in the room, and he knew that if Smith were left alone in the room, he would instantly remove the boot to some other hiding place. He thoroughly disbelieved the story of the lost key. He was perfectly convinced that the missing boot was in the cupboard. He stood chewing these thoughts for a while, Smith, in the meantime, standing in a graceful attitude in front of the cupboard, staring into vacancy. Then he was seized with a happy idea. Why should he leave the room at all? If he sent Smith, then he himself could wait and make certain that the cupboard was not tampered with. Smith, he said, go and find Mr. Outwood and ask him to be good enough to come here for a moment. Chapter 51, mainly about boots. Be quick, Smith, he said, as the latter stood looking at him without making any movement in the direction of the door. Quick, sir, said Smith meditatively, as if he had been asked to conundrum. Go and find Mr. Outwood at once. Smith still made no move. Do you intend to disobey me, Smith? Mr. Downing's voice was steely. Yes, sir. What? Yes, sir. There was one of those you could have heard of pin drop silences. Smith was staring reflectively at the ceiling. Mr. Downing was looking as if at any moment he might say, thwarted to me face, ha-ha, and by a very stripling. It was Smith, however, who resumed the conversation. His manner was almost too respectful, which made it all the more a pity that what he said did not keep up the standard of desolity. I take my stand, he said, on a technical point. I say to myself, Mr. Downing is a man I admire as a human being and respect as a master. In disimpertonance as doing you no good, Smith, Smith waved a hand deprecatingly. If you will let me explain, sir. I was about to say that in any other place but Mr. Outwood's house, your word would be law. I would fly to do your bidding. If you pressed a button, I would do the rest. But in Mr. Outwood's house, I cannot do anything except what pleases me or what is ordered by Mr. Outwood. I ought to have remembered that before. One cannot, he continued, as who should say, let us be reasonable. One cannot, to take a parallel case, imagine the colonel commanding the garrison at a naval station going on board a battleship and ordering the crew to splice the jibboom spanker. It might be an admirable thing for the empire that the jibboom spanker should be spliced at that particular juncture, but the crew would naturally decline to move in the matter until the order came from the commander of the ship. So in my case, if you will go to Mr. Outwood and explain to him how matters stand and come back and say to me, Smith, Mr. Outwood wishes you to ask him to be good enough to come to this study, then I shall be only too glad to go and find him. You see my difficulty, sir? Go and fetch Mr. Outwood, Smith. I shall not tell you again. Smith flicked a speck of dust from his coat sleeve. Very well, Smith. I can assure you, sir, at any rate, that if there is a boot in that cupboard now, there will be a boot there when you return. Mr. Downing stalked out of the room. But, added Smith pensively to himself as the footsteps died away, I did not promise that it would be the same boot. He took the key from his pocket, unlocked the cupboard and took out the boot. Then he selected from the basket a particularly battered specimen. Placing this in the cupboard, he relocked the door. His next act was to take from the shelf a piece of string. Attaching one end of this to the boot that he had taken from the cupboard, he went to the window. His first act was to fling the cupboard key out into the bushes. Then he turned to the boot. On a level with the sill, the water pipe, up which Mike had started to climb the night before, was fastened to the wall by an iron band. He tied the other end of the string to this and let the boot swing free. He noticed with approval when it had stopped swinging that it was hidden from above by the window sill. He returned to his place at the mantelpiece. As an afterthought, he took another boot from the basket and thrust it up the chimney. A shower of soot fell into the grate, lackening his hand. The bathroom was a few yards down the corridor. He went there and washed off the soot. When he returned, Mr. Downing was in the study and with him Mr. Outwood, the latter looking dazed as if he were not quite equal to the intellectual pressure of the situation. Where have you been, Smith? asked Mr. Downing sharply. I have been washing my hands, sir. Hmm, said Mr. Downing suspiciously. Yes, I saw Smith go into the bathroom, said Mr. Outwood. Smith, I cannot quite understand what it is Mr. Downing wishes me to do. My dear Outwood snapped the sleuth. I thought I had made it perfectly clear. Where is the difficulty? I cannot understand why you should suspect Smith of keeping his boots in a cupboard. And added Mr. Outwood with spirit, catching sight of a good gracious, has the man no sense look on the other's face? Why, he should not do so if he wishes it. Exactly, sir, said Smith approvingly. You have touched the spot. If I must explain again, my dear Outwood, will you kindly give me your attention for a moment? Last night a boy broke out of your house and painted my dog Sampson red. He painted, said Mr. Outwood, round eyed. Why? I don't know why. At any rate, he did. During the escapade, one of his boots was splashed with the paint. It is that boot, which I believe Smith to be concealing in this cupboard. Now do you understand? Mr. Outwood looked amazingly at Smith and Smith shook his head sorrowfully at Mr. Outwood. Smith's expression said as plainly as if he had spoken the words, we must humor him. So with your permission, as Smith declares that he has lost the key, they propose to break open the door of this cupboard. Have you any objection? Mr. Outwood started. Objection? None at all, my dear fellow, none at all. Let me see. What is it you wish to do? This, said Mr. Downing shortly. There was a pair of dumb bells on the floor belonging to Mike. He never used them, but they always managed to get themselves packed with the rest of his belongings on the last day of the holidays. Mr. Downing seized one of these and delivered two rapid blows at the cupboard door. The wood splintered. A third blow smashed the flimsy lock. The cupboard, with any skeletons it might contain, was open for all to view. Mr. Downing uttered a cry of triumph and tore the boot from its resting place. I told you, he said, I told you. I wondered where that boot had got to, said Smith. I'd been looking for it for days. Mr. Downing was examining his find. He looked up with an exclamation of surprise and wrath. This boot has no paint on it, he said, glaring at Smith. This is not the boot. It certainly appears, sir, said Smith sympathetically, to be free from paint. There's a sort of reddish glow just there if you look at it sideways, he added, helpfully. Did you place that boot there, Smith? I must have done. Then when I lost the key, are you satisfied now, Downing? Interrupted Mr. Outwood with asperity, or is there any more furniture you wish to break? The excitement of seeing his household goods smashed with a dumbbell had made the archeological student quite a swashbuckler for the moment. A little more, and one could imagine him giving Mr. Downing a good hard knock. The sleuth hound stood still for a moment baffled, but his brain was working with the rapidity of a buzzsaw. A chance remark of Mr. Outwood set him fizzing off on the trail once more. Mr. Outwood had caught sight of the little pile of soot in the grate. He bent down to inspect it. Dear me, he said, I must remember to have the chimney swept. It should have been done before. Mr. Downing's eye, rolling in a fine frenzy from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven, also focused itself on the pile of soot, and a thrill went through him. Soot in the fireplace, Smith washing his hands. You know my methods, my dear Watson, apply them. Mr. Downing's mind at that moment contained one single thought, and that thought was, what hole for the chimney? He dived forward with a rush, nearly knocking Mr. Outwood off his feet, and thrust an arm up into the unknown. An avalanche of soot fell upon his hand in risk, but he ignored it, for at the same instant his fingers had closed upon what he was seeking. Ah, he said, I thought as much. You were not quite clever enough after all, Smith. No, sir, said Smith patiently. We all make mistakes. You would have done better, Smith, not to have given me all this trouble. You have done yourself no good by it. It's been great fun, though, sir, argued Smith. Fun, Mr. Downing laughed grimly. You may have reason to change your opinion of what constitutes his voice failed as his eye fell on the all-black toe of the boot. He looked up and caught Smith's benevolent gaze. He straightened himself and brushed a bead of perspiration from his face with the back of his hand. Unfortunately, he used the sooty hand, and the result was like some gruesome burlesque of a nigger minstrel. Did you put that boot there, Smith? He asked slowly. Yes, sir. Then what did you mean by putting it there, roared Mr. Downing? Animal spirit, sir, said Smith. What animal spirit, sir? What Mr. Downing would have replied to this, one cannot tell, though one can guess roughly. For just as he was opening his mouth, Mr. Outwood, catching sight of his shirguin-like countenance, intervened. My dear Downing, he said, your face. It is positively covered with soot, positively. You must come and wash it. You are quite black. Really, you present a most curious appearance, most. Let me show you the way to my room. In all times of storm and tribulation, there comes a breaking point, a point where the spirit definitely refuses to battle any longer against the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. Mr. Downing could not bear up against this crowning blow. He went down beneath it. In the language of the ring, he took the count. It was the knockout. Soot, he murmured weakly. Soot. Your face is covered, my dear fellow, quite covered. It certainly has a faintly sooty aspect, sir, said Smith. His voice roused the sufferer to one last flicker of spirit. You will hear more of this, Smith, he said. I say you will hear more of it. Then he allowed Mr. Outwood to lead him out to a place where there were towels, soap, and sponges. When they had gone, Smith went to the window and hauled in the string. He felt a calm afterglow which comes to the general after a successfully conducted battle. It had been trying, of course, for a man of refinement, and it had cut into his afternoon, but on the whole it had been worth it. The problem now was what to do with the painted boot. It would take a lot of cleaning, he saw, even if he could get hold of the necessary implements for cleaning it. And he rather doubted if he would be able to do so. Edmund, the boot boy, worked in some mysterious cell far from the madding crowd at the back of the house. In the boot cupboard downstairs, there would probably be nothing likely to be of any use. His fears were realized. The boot cupboard was empty. It seemed to him that, for the time being, the best thing he could do would be to place the boot in safe hiding until he should have thought out a scheme. Having restored the basket to its proper place, accordingly he went up to the study again and placed the red-toed boot in the chimney at about the same height where Mr. Downing had found the other. Nobody would think of looking there a second time, and it was improbable that Mr. Outwood really would have the chimney swept, as he had said. The odds were that he had forgotten about it already. Smith went to the bathroom to wash his hands again with the feeling that he had done a good day's work. End of section 18.