O’Hara nearly fell off his chair with surprise. That some philanthropist should rag Mill’s study was only to be expected. Mill was one of the worst. A worm without a saving grace. But Trevor! Captain of football! In the first eleven! The thing was unthinkable.
“But who-?” he began.
“That’s just what I want to know,” said Trevor, shortly. He did not enjoy discussing the affair.
“How long have you been at Wrykyn, O’Hara?” said Clowes.
O’Hara made a rapid calculation. His fingers twiddled in the air as he worked out the problem.
“Six years,” he said at last, leaning back exhausted with brain work.
“Then you must remember the League?”
“Remember the League? Rather.”
“Well, it’s been revived.”
O’Hara whistled.
“This’ll liven the old place up,” he said. “I’ve often thought of reviving it meself. An’ so has Moriarty. If it’s anything like the Old League, there’s going to be a sort of Donnybrook before it’s done with. I wonder who’s running it this time.”
“We should like to know that. If you find out, you might tell us.”
“I will.”
“And don’t tell anybody else,” said Trevor. “This business has got to be kept quiet. Keep it dark about my study having been ragged.”
“I won’t tell a soul.”
“Not even Moriarty.”
“Oh, hang it, man,” put in Clowes, “you don’t want to kill the poor bhoy, surely? You must let him tell one person.”
“All right,” said Trevor, “you can tell Moriarty. But nobody else, mind.”
O’Hara promised that Moriarty should receive the news exclusively.
“But why did the League go for ye?”
“They happen to be down on me. It doesn’t matter why. They are.”
“I see,” said O’Hara. “Oh,” he added, “about that bat. The search is being ‘vigorously prosecuted’—that’s a newspaper quotation—”
“Times?” inquired Clowes.
“Wrykyn Patriot,” said O’Hara, pulling out a bundle of letters. He inspected each envelope in turn, and from the fifth extracted a newspaper cutting.
“Read that,” he said.
It was from the local paper, and ran as follows:—
“Hooligan Outrage—A painful sensation has been caused in the town by a deplorable ebullition of local Hooliganism, which has resulted in the wanton disfigurement of the splendid statue of Sir Eustace Briggs which stands in the New Recreation Grounds. Our readers will recollect that the statue was erected to commemorate the return of Sir Eustace as member for the borough of Wrykyn, by an overwhelming majority, at the last election. Last Tuesday some youths of the town, passing through the Recreation Grounds early in the morning, noticed that the face and body of the statue were completely covered with leaves and some black substance, which on examination proved to be tar. They speedily lodged information at the police station. Everything seems to point to party spite as the motive for the outrage. In view of the forth-coming election, such an act is highly significant, and will serve sufficiently to indicate the tactics employed by our opponents. The search for the perpetrator (or perpetrators) of the dastardly act is being vigorously prosecuted, and we learn with satisfaction that the police have already several clues.”
“Clues!” said Clowes, handing back the paper, “that means the bat. That gas about ‘our opponents’ is all a blind to put you off your guard. You wait. There’ll be more painful sensations before you’ve finished with this business.”
“They can’t have found the bat, or why did they not say so?” observed O’Hara.
“Guile,” said Clowes, “pure guile. If I were you, I should escape while I could. Try Callao. There’s no extradition there.
‘On no petition
Is extradition
Allowed in Callao.’
Either of you chaps coming over to school?”
VIII. O’HARA ON THE TRACK
Tuesday mornings at Wrykyn were devoted—up to the quarter to eleven interval—to the study of mathematics. That is to say, instead of going to their form-rooms, the various forms visited the out-of-the-way nooks and dens at the top of the buildings where the mathematical masters were wont to lurk, and spent a pleasant two hours there playing round games or reading fiction under the desk. Mathematics being one of the few branches of school learning which are of any use in after life, nobody ever dreamed of doing any work in that direction, least of all O’Hara. It was a theory of O’Hara’s that he came to school to enjoy himself. To have done any work during a mathematics lesson would have struck him as a positive waste of time, especially as he was in Mr Banks’ class. Mr Banks was a master who simply cried out to be ragged. Everything he did and said seemed to invite the members of his class to amuse themselves, and they amused themselves accordingly. One of the advantages of being under him was that it was possible to predict to a nicety the moment when one would be sent out of the room. This was found very convenient.