The Pothunters - P. G. Wodehouse (free ebook novel .txt) 📗

Plunkett⁠—I’ve got the name down somewhere. Yes, Plunkett. I thought so. Punish Plunkett.”

“Plunkett!” said the Head, taken completely by surprise. He, in common with the rest of the world, had imagined Plunkett to be a perfect pattern of what should be. A headmaster, like other judges of character, has his failures.

“Plunkett. Yes, that is the name. Boy with spectacles. Good gracious, Mr. Perceval, don’t tell me the boy gave me a false name.”

“No. His name is Plunkett. Am I to understand that he was trespassing on your land? Surely there is some mistake? The boy’s a School prefect.”

Here it suddenly flashed upon his mind that he had used that expression before in the course of the day, on the occasion when Mr. Thompson first told him of his suspicions in connection with Jim. “Why, Mr. Thompson, the boy’s a School prefect,” had been his exact words. School prefects had been in his eyes above suspicion. It is a bad day for a school when they are not so. Had that day arrived for St. Austin’s? he asked himself.

“He may be a School prefect, Mr. Perceval, but the fact remains that he is a trespasser, and ought from your point of view to be punished for breaking bounds.”

The Head suddenly looked almost cheerful again.

“Of course,” he said, “of course. I thought that there must be an explanation. The rules respecting bounds, Sir Alfred, do not apply to School prefects, only to the rest of the School.”

“Indeed?” said Sir Alfred. His tone should have warned the Head that something more was coming, but it did not. He continued.

“Of course it was very wrong of him to trespass on your land, but I have no doubt that he did it quite unintentionally. I will speak to him, and I think I can guarantee that he will not do it again.”

“Oh,” said his visitor. “That is very gratifying, I am sure. Might I ask, Mr. Perceval, if School prefects at St. Austin’s have any other privileges?”

The Head began to look puzzled. There was something in his visitor’s manner which suggested unpleasant possibilities.

“A few,” he replied. “They have a few technical privileges, which it would be a matter of some little time to explain.”

“It must be very pleasant to be a prefect at St. Austin’s,” said Sir Alfred nastily. “Very pleasant indeed. Might I ask, Mr. Perceval, if the technical privileges to which you refer include⁠—smoking?”

The Head started as if, supposing such a thing possible, someone had pinched him. He did not know what to make of the question. From the expression on his face his visitor did not appear to be perpetrating a joke.

“No,” he said sharply, “they do not include smoking.”

“I merely asked because this was found by my keeper on the boy when he caught him.”

He produced a small silver matchbox. The Head breathed again. The reputation of the School prefect, though shaky, was still able to come up to the scratch.

“A matchbox is scarcely a proof that a boy has been smoking, I think,” said he. “Many boys carry matches for various purposes, I believe. I myself, though a nonsmoker, frequently place a box in my pocket.”

For answer Sir Alfred laid a bloated and exceedingly vulgar-looking plush tobacco pouch on the table beside the matchbox.

“That also,” he observed, “was found in his pocket by my keeper.”

He dived his hand once more into his coat. “And also this,” he said.

And, with the air of a cardplayer who trumps his opponent’s ace, he placed on the pouch a pipe. And, to make the matter, if possible, worse, the pipe was not a new pipe. It was caked within and coloured without, a pipe that had seen long service. The only mitigating circumstance that could possibly have been urged in favour of the accused, namely that of “first offence,” had vanished.

“It is pleasant,” said Sir Alfred with laborious sarcasm, “to find a trespasser doing a thing which has caused the dismissal of several keepers. Smoking in my woods I⁠—will⁠—not⁠—permit. I will not have my property burnt down while I can prevent it. Good evening, Mr. Perceval.” With these words he made a dramatic exit.

For some minutes after he had gone the Head remained where he stood, thinking. Then he went across the room and touched the bell.

“Parker,” he said, when that invaluable officer appeared, “go across to Mr. Ward’s House, and tell him I wish to see Plunkett. Say I wish to see him at once.”

“Yessir.”

After ten minutes had elapsed, Plunkett entered the room, looking nervous.

“Sit down, Plunkett.”

Plunkett collapsed into a seat. His eye had caught sight of the smoking apparatus on the table.

The Head paced the room, something after the fashion of the tiger at the zoo, whose clock strikes lunch.

“Plunkett,” he said, suddenly, “you are a School prefect.”

“Yes, sir,” murmured Plunkett. The fact was undeniable.

“You know the duties of a School prefect?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And yet you deliberately break one of the most important rules of the School. How long have you been in the habit of smoking?”

Plunkett evaded the question.

“My father lets me smoke, sir, when I’m at home.”

(A hasty word in the reader’s ear. If ever you are accused of smoking, please⁠—for my sake, if not for your own⁠—try to refrain from saying that your father lets you do it at home. It is a fatal mistake.)

At this, to employ a metaphor, the champagne of the Head’s wrath, which had been fermenting steadily during his late interview, got the better of the cork of self-control, and he exploded. If the Mutual Friend ever has grandchildren he will probably tell them with bated breath the story of how the Head paced the room, and the legend of the things he said. But it will be some time before he will be able to speak about it with any freedom. At last there was a lull in the storm.

“I am not going to expel you, Plunkett. But you cannot come back after the holidays. I will write to your father to withdraw you.” He pointed to the door. Plunkett departed in level time.

“What did the