became to him living characters; especially was this so with
Foster. He had played with Foster for two years in the Colts and in A-K
sides, but there had never been anything in common between them; their
interests had been far apart; neither stood for anything to the other.
But now, when Gordon found himself frequently dropping into Foster's
study for half-an-hour or so, he realised how many qualities Foster had.
Foster was strong-willed, obstinate almost, quite regardless of
tradition, in his own way slightly a rebel, and a past master in the art
of deceiving masters. There are two ways of making a master look a fool:
one is by introducing processions and coloured mice; the other by bowing
before him, making him think you are hard-working and industrious, and
all the while laughing at him behind his back. Gordon preferred the
former, because he had the love of battle; but Foster held to the second
method, in its way equally effective, and anyone who shook a spear
against authority was sure of sympathy from Gordon.

It was a great sight to see Foster bamboozle Claremont. With the
greatest regularity Foster was ploughed in his con., failed to score in
Latin prose, and knew nothing of his rep. And yet he never got an
imposition. He would point out how hard he worked; he often stayed
behind after school for a few seconds to ask Claremont a point in the
unseen. Such keenness was unusual, and Claremont could not connect it
with the slovenly productions that he had learnt to associate with
the name of Foster. For a long time it was a vast enigma. At
half term Foster's report consisted of one word, typically
Claremontian--"Inscrutable." But manners always win in the end. Foster
showed so much zeal, such an honest willingness to learn, that Claremont
finally classed him as a hard-working, keen, friendly, but amazingly
stupid boy. The Army class, which Foster honoured with his presence,
always did Latin and English with Claremont, and for over two years
Foster sat at the back of Claremont's room, scoring marks by singles
when others scored by tens. Yet his reports were invariably good; he
never had an imposition; he never needed to prepare a line of anything.

"Well, Foster," Claremont used to say, as he returned a prose entirely
besmirched with blue pencil, "I believe you really try, but the result
is most disheartening."

Foster always looked profoundly distressed; and at the end of the hour
he would go up, prose in hand, an