e
others did the same. Their eyes followed his to the turret. There was
the old flag flying from the top!

Plunger turned pale; then a sickly hue went over his face as he looked
from the flag to the parcel in his hand.

CHAPTER XLI

FRIENDS IN COUNCIL

Plunger's bewilderment was shared by his companions as they saw the old
flag fluttering on the turret. What had happened? How on earth had it
got there? Newall's hand went out to Plunger's ear.

"Thought you said you'd got the flag, ass?"

"Oh, oh, oh! Le' go my ear!" roared Plunger, as he gazed first on the
turret, then on the mysterious parcel in his hand. He firmly believed
that the Mystic Brethren had given the flag into his care, that it was
inside the parcel when he had set out from the shed, but that by some
magical influence it had managed to transfer itself from the parcel to
the turret. Yet there was something still inside the parcel without a
doubt. What was that something?

"Yes, bounder!" exclaimed Parfitt, helping himself to the other ear.
"Got the flag--that's what you told us! Presented to you in honour of
your initiation! What's your game, blockhead?"

"Oh, oh, oh! Le' go my ear! That flag up there must be a beastly fraud,
or there must be two of 'em! Le' go my ear, will you!"

Plunger began to think that the sympathetic attention he had received at
the hands of the enemy was only to be equalled by the polite attention
of his friends.

"Didn't you say you'd got the flag in that parcel, Plunger?" asked
Stanley, in a quieter tone, because he detested bullying himself, and
did not like it practised on others.

"Yes, I did, Moncrief!" persisted Plunger. "That's a twin up there, or
an imitation, or something of the sort. Get Hasluck and Leveson, and
I'll prove it to you."

"We're not going to wait for Hasluck or Leveson! You've gammoned us
enough! Give it up!"

Newall snatched the parcel from Plunger's hand. It was carefully bound
round with cord. Too impatient to untie it, Newall severed the cord with
his knife. As he did so a small bundle of "swishers"--long sticks, such
as were used by the boys of St. Bede's for "beating the bounds"--fell
from the cloth. They were bound round in turn with a sheet of white
paper, and on this paper was written in a bold hand:

"Your dull ass will only go with beating. You've provided the ass. We've
provided the swishers. We deliver both safely into your hands. Times to
be called by the Gargoyle--Lev