The Gold Bat | Page 5

I've met who breaks them all day long and
well into the night simply for amusement. I've often thought of writing
to the S.P.C.A. about it. I suppose you could call Dexter an animal all
right?"

"O'Hara's right enough, really. A man like Dexter would make any
fellow run amuck. And then O'Hara's an Irishman to start with, which
makes a difference."
There is usually one house in every school of the black sheep sort, and,
if you go to the root of the matter, you will generally find that the fault
is with the master of that house. A house-master who enters into the life
of his house, coaches them in games--if an athlete--or, if not an athlete,
watches the games, umpiring at cricket and refereeing at football, never
finds much difficulty in keeping order. It may be accepted as fact that
the juniors of a house will never be orderly of their own free will, but
disturbances in the junior day-room do not make the house
undisciplined. The prefects are the criterion. If you find them joining in
the general "rags", and even starting private ones on their own account,
then you may safely say that it is time the master of that house retired
from the business, and took to chicken-farming. And that was the state
of things in Dexter's. It was the most lawless of the houses. Mr Dexter
belonged to a type of master almost unknown at a public school--the
usher type. In a private school he might have passed. At Wrykyn he
was out of place. To him the whole duty of a house-master appeared to
be to wage war against his house.
When Dexter's won the final for the cricket cup in the summer term of
two years back, the match lasted four afternoons--four solid afternoons
of glorious, up-and-down cricket. Mr Dexter did not see a single ball of
that match bowled. He was prowling in sequestered lanes and
broken-down barns out of bounds on the off-chance that he might catch
some member of his house smoking there. As if the whole of the house,
from the head to the smallest fag, were not on the field watching Day's
best bats collapse before Henderson's bowling, and Moriarty hit up that
marvellous and unexpected fifty-three at the end of the second innings!
That sort of thing definitely stamps a master.
"What do you want to see O'Hara about?" asked Clowes.
"He's got my little gold bat. I lent it him in the holidays."

A remark which needs a footnote. The bat referred to was made of gold,
and was about an inch long by an eighth broad. It had come into
existence some ten years previously, in the following manner. The
inter-house cricket cup at Wrykyn had originally been a rather
tarnished and unimpressive vessel, whose only merit consisted in the
fact that it was of silver. Ten years ago an Old Wrykinian, suddenly
reflecting that it would not be a bad idea to do something for the school
in a small way, hied him to the nearest jeweller's and purchased another
silver cup, vast withal and cunningly decorated with filigree work, and
standing on a massive ebony plinth, round which were little silver
lozenges just big enough to hold the name of the winning house and the
year of grace. This he presented with his blessing to be competed for by
the dozen houses that made up the school of Wrykyn, and it was
formally established as the house cricket cup. The question now arose:
what was to be done with the other cup? The School House, who
happened to be the holders at the time, suggested disinterestedly that it
should become the property of the house which had won it last. "Not
so," replied the Field Sports Committee, "but far otherwise. We will
have it melted down in a fiery furnace, and thereafter fashioned into
eleven little silver bats. And these little silver bats shall be the guerdon
of the eleven members of the winning team, to have and to hold for the
space of one year, unless, by winning the cup twice in succession, they
gain the right of keeping the bat for yet another year. How is that,
umpire?" And the authorities replied, "O men of infinite resource and
sagacity, verily is it a cold day when you get left behind. Forge ahead."
But, when they had forged ahead, behold! it would not run to eleven
little silver bats, but only to ten little silver bats. Thereupon the
headmaster, a man liberal with his cash, caused an eleventh little bat to
be fashioned--for the captain of the winning team to have and to hold in
the manner aforesaid. And, to single it out from the others, it was
wrought, not of silver,