Mike

“Oh, well—­Well, anyhow, look here, I’ll think it over, and let you know to-morrow.  It’s not the sort of thing to rush through without thinking about it.”

And the matter was left temporarily at that.

CHAPTER XV MIKE CREATES A VACANCY

Burgess walked off the ground feeling that fate was not using him well.

Here was he, a well-meaning youth who wanted to be on good terms with all the world, being jockeyed into slaughtering a kid whose batting he admired and whom personally he liked.  And the worst of it was that he sympathised with Mike.  He knew what it felt like to be run out just when one had got set, and he knew exactly how maddening the Gazeka’s manner would be on such an occasion.  On the other hand, officially he was bound to support the head of Wain’s.  Prefects must stand together or chaos will come.

He thought he would talk it over with somebody.  Bob occurred to him.  It was only fair that Bob should be told, as the nearest of kin.

And here was another grievance against fate.  Bob was a person he did not particularly wish to see just then.  For that morning he had posted up the list of the team to play for the school against Geddington, one of the four schools which Wrykyn met at cricket; and Bob’s name did not appear on that list.  Several things had contributed to that melancholy omission.  In the first place, Geddington, to judge from the weekly reports in the Sportsman and Field, were strong this year at batting.  In the second place, the results of the last few matches, and particularly the M.C.C. match, had given Burgess the idea that Wrykyn was weak at bowling.  It became necessary, therefore, to drop a batsman out of the team in favour of a bowler.  And either Mike or Bob must be the man.

Burgess was as rigidly conscientious as the captain of a school eleven should be.  Bob was one of his best friends, and he would have given much to be able to put him in the team; but he thought the thing over, and put the temptation sturdily behind him.  At batting there was not much to choose between the two, but in fielding there was a great deal.  Mike was good.  Bob was bad.  So out Bob had gone, and Neville-Smith, a fair fast bowler at all times and on his day dangerous, took his place.

These clashings of public duty with private inclination are the drawbacks to the despotic position of captain of cricket at a public school.  It is awkward having to meet your best friend after you have dropped him from the team, and it is difficult to talk to him as if nothing had happened.

Burgess felt very self-conscious as he entered Bob’s study, and was rather glad that he had a topic of conversation ready to hand.

“Busy, Bob?” he asked.

“Hullo,” said Bob, with a cheerfulness rather over-done in his anxiety to show Burgess, the man, that he did not hold him responsible in any way for the distressing acts of Burgess, the captain.  “Take a pew.  Don’t these studies get beastly hot this weather.  There’s some ginger-beer in the cupboard.  Have some?”

“No, thanks.  I say, Bob, look here, I want to see you.”

“Well, you can, can’t you?  This is me, sitting over here.  The tall, dark, handsome chap.”

“It’s awfully awkward, you know,” continued Burgess gloomily; “that ass of a young brother of yours—­Sorry, but he is an ass, though he’s your brother——­”

“Thanks for the ‘though,’ Billy.  You know how to put a thing nicely.  What’s Mike been up to?”

“It’s that old fool the Gazeka.  He came to me frothing with rage, and wanted me to call a prefects’ meeting and touch young Mike up.”

Bob displayed interest and excitement for the first time.

“Prefects’ meeting!  What the dickens is up?  What’s he been doing?  Smith must be drunk.  What’s all the row about?”

Burgess repeated the main facts of the case as he had them from Firby-Smith.

“Personally, I sympathise with the kid,” he added, “Still, the Gazeka is a prefect——­”

Bob gnawed a pen-holder morosely.

“Silly young idiot,” he said.

“Sickening thing being run out,” suggested Burgess.

“Still——­”

“I know.  It’s rather hard to see what to do.  I suppose if the Gazeka insists, one’s bound to support him.”

“I suppose so.”

“Awful rot.  Prefects’ lickings aren’t meant for that sort of thing.  They’re supposed to be for kids who steal buns at the shop or muck about generally.  Not for a chap who curses a fellow who runs him out.  I tell you what, there’s just a chance Firby-Smith won’t press the thing.  He hadn’t had time to get over it when he saw me.  By now he’ll have simmered down a bit.  Look here, you’re a pal of his, aren’t you?  Well, go and ask him to drop the business.  Say you’ll curse your brother and make him apologise, and that I’ll kick him out of the team for the Geddington match.”

It was a difficult moment for Bob.  One cannot help one’s thoughts, and for an instant the idea of going to Geddington with the team, as he would certainly do if Mike did not play, made him waver.  But he recovered himself.