pulled up again, and Mike, seeing the name of the station, got up,
opened the door, and hurled a bag out on to the platform in an emphatic
and vindictive manner. Then he got out himself and looked about him.

"For the school, sir?" inquired the solitary porter, bustling up, as if
he hoped by sheer energy to deceive the traveler into thinking that
Sedleigh station was staffed by a great army of porters.

Mike nodded. A somber nod. The nod Napoleon might have given if somebody
had met him in 1812, and said, "So you're back from Moscow, eh?" Mike
was feeling thoroughly jaundiced. The future seemed wholly gloomy. And,
so far from attempting to make the best of things, he had set himself
deliberately to look on the dark side. He thought, for instance, that he
had never seen a more repulsive porter, or one more obviously
incompetent than the man who had attached himself with a firm grasp to
the handle of the bag as he strode off in the direction of the luggage
van. He disliked his voice, his appearance, and the color of his hair.
Also the boots he wore. He hated the station, and the man who took
his ticket.

"Young gents at the school, sir," said the porter, perceiving from
Mike's _distrait_ air that the boy was a stranger to the place, "goes up
in the bus mostly. It's waiting here, sir. Hi, George!"

"I'll walk, thanks," said Mike frigidly.

"It's a goodish step, sir."

"Here you are."

"Thank you, sir. I'll send up your luggage by the bus, sir. Which 'ouse
was it you was going to?"

"Outwood's."

"Right, sir. It's straight on up this road to the school. You can't miss
it, sir."

"Worse luck," said Mike.

He walked off up the road, sorrier for himself than ever. It was such
absolutely rotten luck. About now, instead of being on his way to a
place where they probably ran a Halma team instead of a cricket eleven,
and played hunt-the-slipper in winter, he would be on the point of
arriving at Wrykyn. And as captain of cricket, at that. Which was the
bitter part of it. He had never been in command. For the last two
seasons he had been the star man, going in first, and heading the
averages easily at the end of the season; and the three captains under
whom he had played during his career as a Wrykynian, Burgess, Enderby,
and Henfrey, had always been sportsmen to him. But it was not the same
thing. He had meant to do such a lot for Wrykyn cricket this term. He
had had an entirely new system of coaching in his mind. Now