School Stories by P. G. Wodehouse

Author:P. G. Wodehouse
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: Humorous stories, Schools -- Fiction
Publisher: Standard Ebooks
Published: 2020-02-20T21:37:48+00:00

VI

By spe­cial re­quest the Doc­tor dropped Char­teris within a hun­dred yards of Merevale’s door.

“Good night,” he said. “I don’t sup­pose you will value my ad­vice at all, but you may have it for what it is worth. I re­com­mend you stop this sort of game. Next time some­thing will hap­pen.”

“By Jove, yes,” said Char­teris, climb­ing pain­fully down from the dog­cart, “I’ll take that ad­vice. I’m a re­formed char­ac­ter from this day on­wards. This sort of thing isn’t good enough. Hullo, there’s the bell for lockup. Good night, Doc­tor, and thanks most aw­fully for the lift. It was fright­fully kind of you.”

“Don’t men­tion it,” said Dr. Adam­son, “it is al­ways a priv­ilege to be in your com­pany. When are you com­ing to tea with me again?”

“Whenever you’ll have me. I must get leave, though, this time.”

“Yes. By the way, how’s Gra­ham? It is Gra­ham, isn’t it? The fel­low who broke his col­lar­bone?”

“Oh, he’s get­ting on splen­didly. Still in a sling, but it’s al­most well again now. But I must be off. Good night.”

“Good night. Come to tea next Monday.”

“Right,” said Char­teris; “thanks aw­fully.”

He hobbled in at Merevale’s gate, and went up to his study. The Babe was in there talk­ing to Welch.

“Hullo,” said the Babe, “here’s Char­teris.”

“What’s left of him,” said Char­teris.

“How did it go off?”

“Don’t, please.”

“Did you win?” asked Welch.

“No. Se­cond. By a yard. Oh, Lord, I am dead.”

“Hot race?”

“Rather. It wasn’t that, though. I had to sprint all the way to the sta­tion, and missed my train by ten seconds at the end of it all.”

“Then how did you get here?”

“That was the one stroke of luck I’ve had this af­ter­noon. I star­ted to walk back, and after I’d gone about a quarter of a mile, Adam­son caught me up in his dog­cart. I sug­ges­ted that it would be a Chris­tian act on his part to give me a lift, and he did. I shall re­mem­ber Adam­son in my will.”

“Tell us what happened.”

“I’ll tell thee everything I can,” said Char­teris. “There’s little to re­late. I saw an aged, aged man a-sit­ting on a gate. Where do you want me to be­gin?”

“At the be­gin­ning. Don’t rot.”

“I was born,” began Char­teris, “of poor but hon­est par­ents, who sent me to school at an early age in or­der that I might ac­quire a grasp of the Greek and Latin lan­guages, now ob­sol­ete. I—”

“How did you lose?” en­quired the Babe.

“The other man beat me. If he hadn’t, I should have won hands down. Oh, I say, guess who I met at Rut­ton.”

“Not a beak?”

“No. Al­most as bad, though. The Bar­gee man who paced me from Stapleton. Man who crocked Tony.”

“Great Scott!” cried the Babe. “Did he re­cog­nize you?”

“Rather. We had a very pleas­ant con­ver­sa­tion.”

“If he re­ports you,” began the Babe.

“Who’s that?”

Char­teris looked up. Tony Gra­ham had entered the study.

“Hullo, Tony! Adam­son told me to re­mem­ber him to you.”

“So you’ve got back?”

Char­teris con­firmed the hasty guess.

“But what are you talk­ing about, Babe?” said Tony. “Who’s go­ing to be re­por­ted, and who’s go­ing to re­port?”

The Babe briefly ex­plained the situ­ation.

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