The White Feather | Page 8

passing rottenly
today. We shall have another forty points taken off us when we play
Ripton. By the way, I didn't know you were a pal of Linton's."
"I'm not," said Sheen.
"Well, he seemed pretty much at home just now."
"I can't understand it. I'm certain I never asked him to tea. Or Dunstable
either. Yet they came in as if I had. I didn't like to hurt their feelings by
telling them."
Drummond stared.
"What, they came without being asked! Heavens! man, you must buck
up a bit and keep awake, or you'll have an awful time. Of course those
two chaps were simply trying it on. I had an idea it might be that when
I came in. Why did you let them? Why didn't you scrag them?"
"Oh, I don't know," said Sheen uncomfortably.
"But, look here, it's rot. You must keep your end up in a place like this,
or everybody in the house'll be ragging you. Chaps will, naturally, play
the goat if you let them. Has this ever happened before?"
Sheen admitted reluctantly that it had. He was beginning to see things.
It is never pleasant to feel one has been bluffed.

"Once last term," he said, "Smith, a chap in Day's, came to tea like that.
I couldn't very well do anything."
"And Dunstable is in Day's. They compared notes. I wonder you
haven't had the whole school dropping in on you, lining up in long
queues down the passage. Look here, Sheen, you really must pull
yourself together. I'm not ragging. You'll have a beastly time if you're
so feeble. I hope you won't be sick with me for saying it, but I can't
help that. It's all for your own good. And it's really pure slackness that's
the cause of it all."
"I hate hurting people's feelings," said Sheen.
"Oh, rot. As if anybody here had any feelings. Besides, it doesn't hurt a
chap's feelings being told to get out, when he knows he's no business in
a place."
"Oh, all right," said Sheen shortly.
"Glad you see it," said Drummond. "Well, I'm off. Wonder if there's
anybody in that bath."
He reappeared a few moments later. During his absence Sheen
overheard certain shrill protestations which were apparently being
uttered in the neighbourhood of the bathroom door.
"There was," he said, putting his head into the study and grinning
cheerfully at Sheen. "There was young Renford, who had no earthly
business to be there. I've just looked in to point the moral. Suppose
you'd have let him bag all the hot water, which ought to have come to
his elders and betters, for fear of hurting his feelings; and gone without
your bath. I went on my theory that nobody at Wrykyn, least of all a
fag, has any feelings. I turfed him out without a touch of remorse. You
get much the best results my way. So long."
And the head disappeared; and shortly afterwards there came from
across the passage muffled but cheerful sounds of splashing.

IV
THE BETTER PART OF VALOUR
The borough of Wrykyn had been a little unfortunate--or fortunate,
according to the point of view--in the matter of elections. The latter
point of view was that of the younger and more irresponsible section of
the community, which liked elections because they were exciting. The
former was that of the tradespeople, who disliked them because they

got their windows broken.
Wrykyn had passed through an election and its attendant festivities in
the previous year, when Sir Eustace Briggs, the mayor of the town, had
been returned by a comfortable majority. Since then ill-health had
caused that gentleman to resign his seat, and the place was once more
in a state of unrest. This time the school was deeply interested in the
matter. The previous election had not stirred them. They did not care
whether Sir Eustace Briggs defeated Mr Saul Pedder, or whether Mr
Saul Pedder wiped the political floor with Sir Eustace Briggs. Mr
Pedder was an energetic Radical; but owing to the fact that Wrykyn had
always returned a Conservative member, and did not see its way to a
change as yet, his energy had done him very little good. The school had
looked on him as a sportsman, and read his speeches in the local paper
with amusement; but they were not interested. Now, however, things
were changed. The Conservative candidate, Sir William Bruce, was one
of themselves--an Old Wrykinian, a governor of the school, a man who
always watched school-matches, and the donor of the Bruce Challenge
Cup for the school mile. In fine, one of the best. He was also the father
of Jack Bruce, a day-boy on the engineering side. The school would
have liked to have made a popular hero