Tales of St. Austins | Page 3

rot,' said Scott, complainingly, 'you must have some exercise
or you'll go getting fat. Think what a blow it would be to your family,
Pillingshot, if you lost your figure. Buck up. If you're back here in a
quarter of an hour you shall have another ice. A large ice, Pillingshot,
price sixpence. Think of it.'
The word ice, as has been remarked before, touched chords in
Pillingshot's nature to which he never turned a deaf ear. Within the
prescribed quarter of an hour he was back again, changed.
'Here's the ice,' said Scott, 'I've been keeping it warm for you. Shovel it
down. I want to be starting for the nets. Quicker, man, quicker! Don't
roll it round your tongue as if it was port. Go for it. Finished? That's
right. Come on.'
Pillingshot had not finished, but Scott so evidently believed that he had,
that it would have been unkind to have mentioned the fact. He followed
the smiter to the nets.
If Pillingshot had passed the earlier part of the afternoon in a sedentary
fashion, he made up for it now. Scott was in rare form, and Pillingshot
noticed with no small interest that, while he invariably hit Mr Yorke's
deliveries a quarter of a mile or so, he never hit two balls in succession
in the same direction. As soon as the panting fieldsman had sprinted to
one side of the football ground and returned the ball, there was a
beautiful, musical _plonk_, and the ball soared to the very opposite
quarter of the field. It was a fine exhibition of hitting, but Pillingshot

felt that he would have enjoyed it more if he could have watched it
from a deck-chair.
'You're coming on as a deep field, young Pillingshot,' said Scott, as he
took off his pads. 'You've got a knack of stopping them with your
stomach, which the best first-class fields never have. You ought to give
lessons at it. Now we'll go and have some tea.'
If Pillingshot had had a more intimate acquaintance with the classics,
he would have observed at this point, '_Timeo Danaos_', and made a
last dash for liberty in the direction of the shop. But he was deceived by
the specious nature of Scott's remark. Visions rose before his eyes of
sitting back in one of Scott's armchairs, watching a fag toasting muffins,
which he would eventually dispatch with languid enjoyment. So he
followed Scott to his study. The classical parallel to his situation is the
well-known case of the oysters. They, too, were eager for the treat.
They had reached the study, and Pillingshot was about to fling himself,
with a sigh of relief, into the most comfortable chair, when Scott
unmasked his batteries.
'Oh, by the way,' he said, with a coolness which to Pillingshot appeared
simply brazen, 'I'm afraid my fag won't be here today. The young
crock's gone and got mumps, or the plague, or something. So would
you mind just lighting that stove? It'll be rather warm, but that won't
matter. There are some muffins in the cupboard. You might weigh in
with them. You'll find the toasting-fork on the wall somewhere. It's
hanging up. Got it? Good man. Fire away.'
And Scott collected five cushions, two chairs, and a tin of mixed
biscuits, and made himself comfortable. Pillingshot, with feelings too
deep for words (in the then limited state of his vocabulary), did as he
was requested. There was something remarkable about the way Scott
could always get people to do things for him. He seemed to take
everything for granted. If he had had occasion to hire an assassin to
make away with the German Emperor, he would have said, 'Oh, I say,
you might run over to Germany and kill the Kaiser, will you, there's a
good chap? Don't be long.' And he would have taken a seat and waited,
without the least doubt in his mind that the thing would be carried
through as desired.
Pillingshot had just finished toasting the muffins, when the door
opened, and Venables, of Merevale's, came in.

'I thought I heard you say something about tea this afternoon, Scott,'
said Venables. 'I just looked in on the chance. Good Heavens, man!
Fancy muffins at this time of year! Do you happen to know what the
thermometer is in the shade?'
'Take a seat,' said Scott. 'I attribute my entire success in life to the fact
that I never find it too hot to eat muffins. Do you know Pillingshot?
One of the hottest fieldsmen in the School. At least, he was just now.
He's probably cooled off since then. Venables--Pillingshot, and vice
versa. Buck up with the tea, Pillingshot. What, ready? Good man. Now
we might almost begin.'
'Beastly thing that accident of young Brown's, wasn't