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CHAPTER XVIII - A VAIN QUEST
After all he had gone through that night, it disturbed Fenn very
little to find on the following morning that the professional
cracksman had gone off with one of the cups in his study. Certainly,
it was not as bad as it might have been, for he had only abstracted
one out of the half dozen that decorated the room. Fenn was a fine
runner, and had won the "sprint" events at the sports for two years
now.
The news of the burglary at Kay's soon spread about the school. Mr Kay
mentioned it to Mr Mulholland, and Mr Mulholland discussed it at lunch
with the prefects of his house. The juniors of Kay's were among the
last to hear of it, but when they did, they made the most of it, to
the disgust of the School House fags, to whom the episode seemed in
the nature of an infringement of copyright. Several spirited
by-battles took place that day owing to this, and at the lower end of
the table of Kay's dining-room at tea that evening there could be seen
many swollen countenances. All, however, wore pleased smiles. They had
proved to the School House their right to have a burglary of their own
if they liked. It was the first occasion since Kennedy had become head
of the house that Kay's had united in a common and patriotic cause.
Directly afternoon school was over that day, Fenn started for the
town. The only thing that caused him any anxiety now was the fear lest
the cap which he had left in the house in the High Street might rise
up as evidence against him later on. Except for that, he was safe. The
headmaster had evidently not remembered his absence from the festive
board, or he would have spoken to him on the subject before now. If he
could but recover the lost cap, all would be right with the world.
Give him back that cap, and he would turn over a new leaf with a
rapidity and emphasis which would lower the world's record for that
performance. He would be a reformed character. He would even go to the
extent of calling a truce with Mr Kay, climbing down to Kennedy, and
offering him his services in his attempt to lick the house into shape.
As a matter of fact, he had had this idea before. Jimmy Silver, who
was in the position--common at school--of being very friendly with two
people who were not on speaking terms, had been at him on the topic.
"It's rot," James had said, with perfect truth, "to see two chaps like
you making idiots of themselves over a house like Kay's. And it's all
your fault, too," he had added frankly. "You know jolly well you
aren't playing the game. You ought to be backing Kennedy up all the
time. Instead of which, you go about trying to look like a Christian
martyr--"
"I don't," said Fenn, indignantly.
"Well, like a stuffed frog, then--it's all the same to me. It's
perfect rot. If I'm walking with Kennedy, you stalk past as if we'd
both got the plague or something. And if I'm with you, Kennedy
suddenly remembers an appointment, and dashes off at a gallop in the
opposite direction. If I had to award the bronze medal for drivelling
lunacy in this place, you would get it by a narrow margin, and Kennedy
would be _proxime_, and honourably mentioned. Silly idiots!"
"Don't stop, Jimmy. Keep it up," said Fenn, settling himself in his
chair. The dialogue was taking place in Silver's study.
"My dear chap, you didn't think I'd finished, surely! I was only
trying to find some description that would suit you. But it's no good.
I can't. Look here, take my advice--the advice," he added, in the
melodramatic voice he was in the habit of using whenever he wished to
conceal the fact that he was speaking seriously, "of an old man who
wishes ye both well. Go to Kennedy, fling yourself on his chest, and
say, 'We have done those things which we ought not to have done--' No.
As you were! Compn'y, 'shun! Say 'J. Silver says that I am a rotter. I
am a worm. I have made an ass of myself. But I will be good. Shake,
pard!' That's what you've got to do. Come in."
And in had come Kennedy. The attractions of Kay's were small, and he
usually looked in on Jimmy Silver in the afternoons.
"Oh, sorry," he said, as he saw Fenn. "I thought you were alone,
Jimmy."
"I was just going," said Fenn, politely.
"Oh, don't let me disturb you," protested Kennedy, with winning
courtesy.
"Not at all," said Fenn.
"Oh, if you really were--"
"Oh, yes, really."
"Get out, then," growled Jimmy, who had been listening in speechless
disgust to the beautifully polite conversation just recorded. "I'll
forward that bronze medal to you, Fenn."
And as the door closed he had turned to rend Kennedy as he had rent
Fenn; while Fenn walked back to Kay's feeling that there was a good
deal in what Jimmy had said.
So that when he went down town that afternoon in search of his cap, he
pondered as he walked over the advisability of making a fresh start.
It would not be a bad idea. But first he must concentrate his energies
on recovering what he had lost.
He found the house in the High Street without a great deal of
difficulty, for he had marked the spot carefully as far as that had
been possible in the fog.
The door was opened to him, not by the old man with whom he had
exchanged amenities on the previous night, but by a short, thick
fellow, who looked exactly like a picture of a loafer from the pages
of a comic journal. He eyed Fenn with what might have been meant for
an inquiring look. To Fenn it seemed merely menacing.
"Wodyer want?" he asked, abruptly.
Eckleton was not a great distance from London, and, as a consequence,
many of London's choicest blackguards migrated there from time to
time. During the hopping season, and while the local races were on,
one might meet with two Cockney twangs for every country accent.
"I want to see the old gentleman who lives here," said Fenn.
"Wot old gentleman?"
"I'm afraid I don't know his name. Is this a home for old gentlemen?
If you'll bring out all you've got, I'll find my one."
"Wodyer want see the old gentleman for?"
"To ask for my cap. I left it here last night."
"Oh, yer left it 'ere last night! Well, yer cawn't see 'im."
"Not from here, no," agreed Fenn. "Being only eyes, you see," he
quoted happily, "my wision's limited. But if you wouldn't mind moving
out of the way--"
"Yer cawn't see 'im. Blimey, 'ow much more of it, I should like to
know. Gerroutovit, cawn't yer! You and yer caps."
And he added a searching expletive by way of concluding the sentence
fittingly. After which he slipped back and slammed the door, leaving
Fenn waiting outside like the Peri at the gate of Paradise.
His resemblance to the Peri ceased after the first quarter of a
minute. That lady, we read, took her expulsion lying down. Fenn was
more vigorous. He seized the knocker, and banged lustily on the door.
He had given up all hope of getting back the cap. All he wanted was to
get the doorkeeper out into the open again, when he would proceed to
show him, to the best of his ability, what was what. It would not be
the first time he had taken on a gentleman of the same class and a
similar type of conversation.
But the man refused to be drawn. For all the reply Fenn's knocking
produced, the house might have been empty. At last, having tired his
wrist and collected a small crowd of Young Eckleton, who looked as if
they expected him to proceed to further efforts for their amusement,
he gave it up, and retired down the High Street with what dignity he
could command--which, as he was followed for the first fifty yards by
the silent but obviously expectant youths, was not a great deal.
They left him, disappointed, near the Town Hall, and Fenn continued on
his way alone. The window of the grocer's shop, with its tins of
preserved apricots and pots of jam, recalled to his mind what he had
forgotten, that the food at Kay's, though it might be wholesome (which
he doubted), was undeniably plain, and, secondly, that he had run out
of jam. Now that he was here he might as well supply that deficiency.
Now it chanced that Master Wren, of Kay's, was down town--without
leave, as was his habit--on an errand of a very similar nature. Walton
had found that he, like Fenn, lacked those luxuries of life which are
so much more necessary than necessities, and, being unable to go
himself, owing to the unfortunate accident of being kept in by his
form-master, had asked Wren to go for him. Wren's visit to the
grocer's was just ending when Fenn's began.
They met in the doorway.
Wren looked embarrassed, and nearly dropped a pot of honey, which he
secured low down after the manner of a catch in the slips. Fenn, on
the other hand, took no notice of his fellow-Kayite, but walked on
into the shop and began to inspect the tins of biscuits which were
stacked on the floor by the counter.
Content of CHAPTER XVIII - A VAIN QUEST [P G Wodehouse's novel: Head of Kay's]
_
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