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misfortune. Lost lambs. Sheep that have

gone astray. Divided, we fall, together we may worry through. Have you

seen Professor Radium yet? I should say Mr. Outwood. What do you think

of him?”

 

“He doesn’t seem a bad sort of chap. Bit off his nut. Jawed about

apses and things.”

 

“And thereby,” said Psmith, “hangs a tale. I’ve been making inquiries

of a stout sportsman in a sort of Salvation Army uniform, whom I met

in the grounds—he’s the school sergeant or something, quite a solid

man—and I hear that Comrade Outwood’s an archaeological cove. Goes

about the country beating up old ruins and fossils and things. There’s

an Archaeological Society in the school, run by him. It goes out on

half-holidays, prowling about, and is allowed to break bounds and

generally steep itself to the eyebrows in reckless devilry. And,

mark you, laddie, if you belong to the Archaeological Society you

get off cricket. To get off cricket,” said Psmith, dusting his right

trouser-leg, “was the dream of my youth and the aspiration of my riper

years. A noble game, but a bit too thick for me. At Eton I used to have

to field out at the nets till the soles of my boots wore through. I

suppose you are a blood at the game? Play for the school against

Loamshire, and so on.”

 

“I’m not going to play here, at any rate,” said Mike.

 

He had made up his mind on this point in the train. There is a certain

fascination about making the very worst of a bad job. Achilles knew

his business when he sat in his tent. The determination not to play

cricket for Sedleigh as he could not play for Wrykyn gave Mike a sort

of pleasure. To stand by with folded arms and a sombre frown, as it

were, was one way of treating the situation, and one not without its

meed of comfort.

 

Psmith approved the resolve.

 

“Stout fellow,” he said. “‘Tis well. You and I, hand in hand, will

search the countryside for ruined abbeys. We will snare the elusive

fossil together. Above all, we will go out of bounds. We shall thus

improve our minds, and have a jolly good time as well. I shouldn’t

wonder if one mightn’t borrow a gun from some friendly native, and do

a bit of rabbit-shooting here and there. From what I saw of Comrade

Outwood during our brief interview, I shouldn’t think he was one of

the lynx-eyed contingent. With tact we ought to be able to slip away

from the merry throng of fossil-chasers, and do a bit on our own

account.”

 

“Good idea,” said Mike. “We will. A chap at Wrykyn, called Wyatt, used

to break out at night and shoot at cats with an air-pistol.”

 

“It would take a lot to make me do that. I am all against anything

that interferes with my sleep. But rabbits in the daytime is a scheme.

We’ll nose about for a gun at the earliest opp. Meanwhile we’d better

go up to Comrade Outwood, and get our names shoved down for the

Society.”

 

“I vote we get some tea first somewhere.”

 

“Then let’s beat up a study. I suppose they have studies here. Let’s

go and look.”

 

They went upstairs. On the first floor there was a passage with doors

on either side. Psmith opened the first of these.

 

“This’ll do us well,” he said.

 

It was a biggish room, looking out over the school grounds. There were

a couple of deal tables, two empty bookcases, and a looking-glass,

hung on a nail.

 

“Might have been made for us,” said Psmith approvingly.

 

“I suppose it belongs to some rotter.”

 

“Not now.”

 

“You aren’t going to collar it!”

 

“That,” said Psmith, looking at himself earnestly in the mirror, and

straightening his tie, “is the exact programme. We must stake out our

claims. This is practical Socialism.”

 

“But the real owner’s bound to turn up some time or other.”

 

“His misfortune, not ours. You can’t expect two master-minds like us

to pig it in that room downstairs. There are moments when one wants to

be alone. It is imperative that we have a place to retire to after a

fatiguing day. And now, if you want to be really useful, come and help

me fetch up my box from downstairs. It’s got an Etna and various

things in it.”

CHAPTER XXXIII

STAKING OUT A CLAIM

 

Psmith, in the matter of decorating a study and preparing tea in it,

was rather a critic than an executant. He was full of ideas, but he

preferred to allow Mike to carry them out. It was he who suggested

that the wooden bar which ran across the window was unnecessary, but

it was Mike who wrenched it from its place. Similarly, it was Mike who

abstracted the key from the door of the next study, though the idea

was Psmith’s.

 

“Privacy,” said Psmith, as he watched Mike light the Etna, “is what we

chiefly need in this age of publicity. If you leave a study door

unlocked in these strenuous times, the first thing you know is,

somebody comes right in, sits down, and begins to talk about himself.

I think with a little care we ought to be able to make this room quite

decently comfortable. That putrid calendar must come down, though.

Do you think you could make a long arm, and haul it off the parent

tin-tack? Thanks. We make progress. We make progress.”

 

“We shall jolly well make it out of the window,” said Mike, spooning

up tea from a paper bag with a postcard, “if a sort of young

Hackenschmidt turns up and claims the study. What are you going to do

about it?”

 

“Don’t let us worry about it. I have a presentiment that he will be an

insignificant-looking little weed. How are you getting on with the

evening meal?”

 

“Just ready. What would you give to be at Eton now? I’d give something

to be at Wrykyn.”

 

“These school reports,” said Psmith sympathetically, “are the very

dickens. Many a bright young lad has been soured by them. Hullo.

What’s this, I wonder.”

 

A heavy body had plunged against the door, evidently without a

suspicion that there would be any resistance. A rattling at the handle

followed, and a voice outside said, “Dash the door!”

 

“Hackenschmidt!” said Mike.

 

“The weed,” said Psmith. “You couldn’t make a long arm, could you, and

turn the key? We had better give this merchant audience. Remind me

later to go on with my remarks on school reports. I had several bright

things to say on the subject.”

 

Mike unlocked the door, and flung it open. Framed in the entrance was

a smallish, freckled boy, wearing a bowler hat and carrying a bag. On

his face was an expression of mingled wrath and astonishment.

 

Psmith rose courteously from his chair, and moved forward with slow

stateliness to do the honours.

 

“What the dickens,” inquired the newcomer, “are you doing here?”

 

[Illustration: “WHAT THE DICKENS ARE YOU DOING HERE?”]

 

“We were having a little tea,” said Psmith, “to restore our tissues

after our journey. Come in and join us. We keep open house, we

Psmiths. Let me introduce you to Comrade Jackson. A stout fellow.

Homely in appearance, perhaps, but one of us. I am Psmith. Your own

name will doubtless come up in the course of general chit-chat over

the tea-cups.”

 

“My name’s Spiller, and this is my study.”

 

Psmith leaned against the mantelpiece, put up his eyeglass, and

harangued Spiller in a philosophical vein.

 

“Of all sad words of tongue or pen,” said he, “the saddest are these:

‘It might have been.’ Too late! That is the bitter cry. If you had

torn yourself from the bosom of the Spiller family by an earlier

train, all might have been well. But no. Your father held your hand

and said huskily, ‘Edwin, don’t leave us!’ Your mother clung to you

weeping, and said, ‘Edwin, stay!’ Your sisters–-”

 

“I want to know what–-”

 

“Your sisters froze on to your knees like little octopuses (or

octopi), and screamed, ‘Don’t go, Edwin!’ And so,” said Psmith, deeply

affected by his recital, “you stayed on till the later train; and, on

arrival, you find strange faces in the familiar room, a people that

know not Spiller.” Psmith went to the table, and cheered himself with

a sip of tea. Spiller’s sad case had moved him greatly.

 

The victim of Fate seemed in no way consoled.

 

“It’s beastly cheek, that’s what I call it. Are you new chaps?”

 

“The very latest thing,” said Psmith.

 

“Well, it’s beastly cheek.”

 

Mike’s outlook on life was of the solid, practical order. He went

straight to the root of the matter.

 

“What are you going to do about it?” he asked.

 

Spiller evaded the question.

 

“It’s beastly cheek,” he repeated. “You can’t go about the place

bagging studies.”

 

“But we do,” said Psmith. “In this life, Comrade Spiller, we must be

prepared for every emergency. We must distinguish between the unusual

and the impossible. It is unusual for people to go about the place

bagging studies, so you have rashly ordered your life on the

assumption that it is impossible. Error! Ah, Spiller, Spiller, let

this be a lesson to you.”

 

“Look here, I tell you what it–-”

 

“I was in a motor with a man once. I said to him: ‘What would happen

if you trod on that pedal thing instead of that other pedal thing?’ He

said, ‘I couldn’t. One’s the foot-brake, and the other’s the

accelerator.’ ‘But suppose you did?’ I said. ‘I wouldn’t,’ he said.

‘Now we’ll let her rip.’ So he stamped on the accelerator. Only it

turned out to be the foot-brake after all, and we stopped dead, and

skidded into a ditch. The advice I give to every young man starting

life is: ‘Never confuse the unusual and the impossible.’ Take the

present case. If you had only realised the possibility of somebody

some day collaring your study, you might have thought out dozens of

sound schemes for dealing with the matter. As it is, you are

unprepared. The thing comes on you as a surprise. The cry goes round:

‘Spiller has been taken unawares. He cannot cope with the situation.’”

 

“Can’t I! I’ll–-”

 

“What are you going to do about it?” said Mike.

 

“All I know is, I’m going to have it. It was Simpson’s last term, and

Simpson’s left, and I’m next on the house list, so, of course, it’s my

study.”

 

“But what steps,” said Psmith, “are you going to take? Spiller, the

man of Logic, we know. But what of Spiller, the Man of Action? How

do you intend to set about it? Force is useless. I was saying to

Comrade Jackson before you came in, that I didn’t mind betting you

were an insignificant-looking little weed. And you are an

insignificant-looking little weed.”

 

“We’ll see what Outwood says about it.”

 

“Not an unsound scheme. By no means a scaly project. Comrade Jackson

and myself were about to interview him upon another point. We may as

well all go together.”

 

The trio made their way to the Presence, Spiller pink and determined,

Mike sullen, Psmith particularly debonair. He hummed lightly as he

walked, and now and then pointed out to Spiller objects of interest by

the wayside.

 

Mr. Outwood received them with the motherly warmth which was evidently

the leading characteristic of his normal manner.

 

“Ah, Spiller,” he said. “And Smith, and Jackson. I am glad to see that

you have

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