practice day, and, much to his mortification,
nobody took the slightest notice of his absence.

"You see," said Felgate, "if only one or two of you stand steady, they
can't compel you to play. It's ridiculous."

Next day, accordingly, three fellows stayed away; who, as they were the
three premier louts in Railsford's, were never missed or inquired after.
But when the next day the number swelled to five, and included Simson,
who at least knew one end of a bat from the other, and had once tipped a
ball to leg for two, the matter was no longer to be overlooked. The
captain's attention was called to the fact that one fellow in the Fifth,
three in the Shell, and one Baby, besides Felgate, were not down on the
ground.

"Fetch them, then," said Ainger, "and tell them to look sharp, or
they'll catch it."

Wake was the envoy this time, and duly delivered his message to the
deserters, whom, rather suspiciously, as it seemed to him, he found
together.

"You'd better go, you youngsters," said. Felgate, with a sneer; "you'll
have to do it sooner or later--you'd better cave in at once."

"I'm hanged if I go," said Munger.

"I fancy that's a safe fixture, whether you go or not," drily observed
Wake. "Look sharp, are you coming or not?"

"I'm not coming, I tell you," said Munger.

"No more am I," said Simson.

"No more am I," said each of the others.

"Are you coming, Felgate?" demanded Wake.

This was an irreverent question for a Fifth-form boy to ask a prefect,
and Felgate naturally rebuked it.

"It's no business of yours, and you'd better not be impudent, I can tell
you. As it happens, I've got some work to do, and can't come. Cut
away, you needn't stay."

Wake departed cheerfully, and announced that the whole thing was a "put-
up job," as Arthur would have called it, and that Felgate was at the
bottom of it. Whereupon Ainger's face grew dark, and he walked, bat in
hand, to the house. The mutineers, with the exception of Felgate, who,
with the usual prudence of a professional "patriot," had retired to his
study, were loafing about the common room just where Wake had
interviewed them.

"What's the meaning of all this?" demanded the captain; "what do you
mean by not turning up to cricket and sending word you weren't coming
when Wake came for you?"

It was much easier defying Ainger in his absence than in his presence,
and now that he stood there and confronted them, the delinquents did not
quite feel the