Part 13

“He read ‘Eric, or Little by Little,’” said McTurk; “so we gave him ‘St. Winifred’s, or the World of School.’ They spent all their spare time stealing at St. Winifred’s, when they weren’t praying or getting drunk at pubs. Well, that was only a week ago, and the Head’s a little bit shy of us. He called it constructive deviltry. Stalky invented it all.”

“Not the least good having a row with a master unless you can make an ass of him,” said Stalky, extended at ease on the hearth-rug. “If Mason didn’t know Number Five--well, he’s learnt, that’s all. Now, my dearly beloved ’earers”--Stalky curled his legs under him and addressed the company--“we’ve got that strong’, perseverin’ man King on our hands. He went miles out of his way to provoke a conflict.” (Here Stalky snapped down the black silk domino and assumed the air of a judge.) “He has oppressed Beetle, McTurk, and me, privatim et seriatim, one by one, as he could catch us. But now, he has insulted Number Five up in the music-room, and in the presence of these--these ossifers of the Ninety-third, wot look like hairdressers. Binjimin, we must make him cry ‘Capivi!’”

Stalky’s reading did not include Browning or Ruskin.

“And, besides,” said McTurk, “he’s a Philistine, a basket-hanger. He wears a tartan tie. Ruskin says that any man who wears a tartan tie will, without doubt, be damned everlastingly.”

“Bravo, McTurk,” said Tertius; “I thought he was only a beast.”

“He’s that, too, of course, but he’s worse. He has a china basket with blue ribbons and a pink kitten on it, hung up in his window to grow musk in. You know when I got all that old oak carvin’ out of Bideford Church, when they were restoring it (Ruskin says that any man who’ll restore a church is an unmitigated sweep), and stuck it up here with glue? Well, King came in and wanted to know whether we’d done it with a fret-saw! Yah! He is the King of basket-hangers!”

Down went McTurk’s inky thumb over an imaginary arena full of bleeding Kings. “Placetne, child of a generous race!” he cried to Beetle.

“Well,” began Beetle, doubtfully, “he comes from Balliol, but I’m going to give the beast a chance. You see I can always make him hop with some more poetry. He can’t report me to the Head, because it makes him ridiculous. (Stalky’s quite right.) But he shall have his chance.”

Beetle opened the book on the table, ran his finger down a page, and began at random:

“Or who in Moscow toward the Czar With the demurest of footfalls, Over the Kremlin’s pavement white With serpentine and syenite, Steps with five other generals--”

“That’s no good. Try another,” said Stalky.

“Hold on a shake; I know what’s coming.” McTurk was reading over Beetle’s shoulder.

“That simultaneously take snuff, For each to have pretext enough And kerchiefwise unfold his sash, Which--softness’ self--is yet the stuff

(Gummy! What a sentence!)

To hold fast where a steel chain snaps And leave the grand white neck no gash.

(Full stop.)”

“’Don’t understand a word of it,” said Stalky.

“More fool you! Construe,” said McTurk. “Those six bargees scragged the Czar, and left no evidence. Actum est with King.”

“He gave me that book, too,” said Beetle, licking his lips:

“There’s a great text in Galatians, Once you trip on it entails Twenty-nine distinct damnations, One sure if another fails.”

Then irrelevantly:

“Setebos! Setebos! and Setebos! Thinketh he liveth in the cold of the moon.”

“He’s just come in from dinner,” said Dick Four, looking through the window. “Manders minor is with him.”

“’Safest place for Manders minor just now,” said Beetle.

“Then you chaps had better clear out,” said Stalky politely to the visitors. “’Tisn’t fair to mix you up in a study row. Besides, we can’t afford to have evidence.”

“Are you going to begin at once?’ said Aladdin.

“Immediately, if not sooner,” said Stalky, and turned out the gas. “Strong, perseverin’ man--King. Make him cry ‘Capivi.’ G’way, Binjimin.”

The company retreated to their own neat and spacious study with expectant souls.