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genius,” he said. “I never saw such a man. Well, what’s the game now? What’s
the idea?”
    “I
think you’d better nip back along the wall and in through the window, and I’ll
go back to the dining-room. Then it’ll be all right if Wain comes and looks
into the dorm. Or, if you like, you might come down too, as if you’d just woke
up and thought you’d heard a row.”
    “That’s
not a bad idea. All right. You dash along then. I’ll get back.”
    Mr.
Wain was still in the dining-room, drinking in the beauties of the summer night
through the open window. He gibbered slightly when Mike reappeared.
    “Jackson!
What do you mean by running about outside the house in this way! I shall
punish you very heavily. I shall certainly report the matter to the headmaster.
I will not have boys rushing about the garden in their pyjamas. You will catch
an exceedingly bad cold. You will do me two hundred lines, Latin and English. Exceedingly
so. I will not have it. Did you not hear me call to you?”
    “Please,
sir, so excited,” said Mike, standing outside with his hands on the sill.
    “You
have no business to be excited. I will not have it. It is exceedingly
impertinent of you.”
    “Please,
sir, may I come in?”
    “Come
in! Of course, come in. Have you no sense boy? You are laying the seeds of a
bad cold. Come in at once.”
    Mike
clambered through the window.
    “I
couldn’t find him, sir. He must have got out of the garden.”
    “Undoubtedly,”
said Mr. Wain. “Undoubtedly so. It was very wrong of you to search for him. You
might have been seriously injured. Exceedingly so.”
    He was
about to say more on the subject when Wyatt strolled into the room. Wyatt wore
the rather dazed expression of one who has been aroused from deep sleep. He
yawned before he spoke.
    “I
thought I heard a noise, sir,” he said.
    He
called Mr. Wain “father” in private, “sir” in public. The presence of Mike made
this a public occasion.
    “Has
there been a burglary?”
    “Yes,”
said Mike, “only he has got away.”
    “Shall
I go out into the garden, and have a look round, sir?” asked Wyatt helpfully.
    The
question stung Mr. Wain into active eruption once more.
    “Under
no circumstances whatever,” he said excitedly. “Stay where you are, James. I
will not have boys running about my garden at night. It is preposterous. Inordinately
so. Both of you go to bed immediately. I shall not speak to you again on this
subject. I must be obeyed instantly. You hear me, Jackson? James, you understand
me? To bed at once. And, if I find you outside your dormitory again tonight,
you will both be punished with extreme severity. I will not have this lax and
reckless behaviour.”
    “But
the burglar, sir?” said Wyatt.
    “We
might catch him, sir,” said Mike.
    Mr.
Wain’s manner changed to a slow and stately sarcasm, in much the same way as a
motor-car changes gear.
    “I was
under the impression,” he said, in the heavy way almost invariably affected by
weak masters in their dealings with the obstreperous, “I was distinctly under
the impression that I had ordered you to retire immediately to your dormitory.
It is possible that you mistook my meaning. In that case I shall be happy to
repeat what I said. It is also in my mind that I threatened to punish you with
the utmost severity if you did not retire at once. In these circumstances,
James — and you, Jackson —you will doubtless see the necessity of complying
with my wishes.”
    They
made it so.

 
     
     
    CHAPTER
VII
     
    IN WHICH MIKE IS DISCUSSED
     
    TREVOR and Clowes, of
Donaldson’s, were sitting in their study a week after the gramophone incident,
preparatory to going on the river. At least Trevor was in the study, getting
tea ready. Clowes was on the windowsill, one leg in the room, the other
outside, hanging over space. He loved to sit in this attitude, watching someone
else work, and giving his views on life to whoever would listen to them. Clowes
was tall, and