“What were you talking about when you came in?” asked Clowes. “Who’s been slanging Ireland, O’Hara?”
“The man Briggs.”
“What are you going to do about it? Aren’t you going to take any steps?”
“Is it steps?” said O’Hara, warmly, “and haven’t we——”
He stopped.
“Well?”
“Ye know,” he said, seriously, “ye mustn’t let it go any further. I shall get sacked if it’s found out. An’ so will Moriarty, too.”
“Why?” asked Trevor, looking up from the tea-pot he was filling, “what on earth have you been doing?”
“Wouldn’t it be rather a cheery idea,” suggested Clowes, “if you began at the beginning.”
“Well, ye see,” O’Hara began, “it was this way. The first I heard of it was from Dexter. He was trying to score off me as usual, an’ he said, ‘Have ye seen the paper this morning, O’Hara?’ I said, no, I had not. Then he said, ‘Ah,’ he said, ‘ye should look at it. There’s something there that ye’ll find interesting.’ I said, ‘Yes, sir?’ in me respectful way. ‘Yes,’ said he, ‘the Irish members have been making their customary disturbances in the House. Why is it, O’Hara,’ he said, ‘that Irishmen are always thrusting themselves forward and making disturbances for purposes of self-advertisement?’ ‘Why, indeed, sir?’ said I, not knowing what else to say, and after that the conversation ceased.”
“Go on,” said Clowes.
“After breakfast Moriarty came to me with a paper, and showed me what they had been saying about the Irish. There was a letter from the man Briggs on the subject. ‘A very sensible and temperate letter from Sir Eustace Briggs’, they called it, but bedad! if that was a temperate letter, I should like to know what an intemperate one is. Well, we read it through, and Moriarty said to me, ‘Can we let this stay as it is?’ And I said, ‘No. We can’t.’ ‘Well,’ said Moriarty to me, ‘what are we to do about it? I should like to tar and feather the man,’ he said. ‘We can’t do that,’ I said, ‘but why not tar and feather his statue?’ I said. So we thought we would. Ye know where the statue is, I suppose? It’s in the recreation ground just across the river.”
“I know the place,” said Clowes. “Go on. This is ripping. I always knew you were pretty mad, but this sounds as if it were going to beat all previous records.”
“Have ye seen the baths this term,” continued O’Hara, “since they shifted Dexter’s house into them? The beds are in two long rows along each wall. Moriarty’s and mine are the last two at the end farthest from the door.”
“Just under the gallery,” said Trevor. “I see.”
“That’s it. Well, at half-past ten sharp every night Dexter sees that we’re all in, locks the door, and goes off to sleep at the Old Man’s, and we don’t see him again till breakfast. He turns the gas off from outside. At half-past seven the next morning, Smith”—Smith was one of the school porters—“unlocks the door and calls us, and we go over to the Hall to breakfast.”
“Well?”
“Well, directly everybody was asleep last night—it wasn’t till after one, as there was a rag on—Moriarty and I got up, dressed, and climbed up into the gallery. Ye know the gallery windows? They open at the top, an’ it’s rather hard to get out of them. But we managed it, and dropped on to the gravel outside.”
“Long drop,” said Clowes.
“Yes. I hurt myself rather. But it was in a good cause. I dropped first, and while I was on the ground, Moriarty came on top of me. That’s how I got hurt. But it wasn’t much, and we cut across the grounds, and over the fence, and down to the river. It was a fine night, and not very dark, and everything smelt ripping down by the river.”
“Don’t get poetical,” said Clowes. “Stick to the point.”
“We got into the boat-house—”
“How?” asked the practical Trevor, for the boat-house was wont to be locked at one in the morning. “Moriarty had a key that fitted,” explained O’Hara, briefly. “We got in, and launched a boat—a big tub—put in the tar and a couple of brushes—there’s always tar in the boat-house—and rowed across.”