The White Feather | Page 5

Brigade, he had, nevertheless, a
tolerably large following. A first fifteen man, even in a bad year, can
generally find boys anxious to be seen about with him.
That Sheen should have been amongst these surprised one or two

people, notably Mr Seymour, who, being games' master had come a
good deal into contact with Stanning, and had not been favourably
impressed. The fact was that the keynote of Sheen's character was a
fear of giving offence. Within limits this is not a reprehensible trait in a
person's character, but Sheen overdid it, and it frequently complicated
his affairs. There come times when one has to choose which of two
people one shall offend. By acting in one way, we offend A. By acting
in the opposite way, we annoy B. Sheen had found himself faced by
this problem when he began to be friendly with Drummond. Their
acquaintance, begun over a game of fives, had progressed. Sheen
admired Drummond, as the type of what he would have liked to have
been, if he could have managed it. And Drummond felt interested in
Sheen because nobody knew much about him. He was, in a way,
mysterious. Also, he played the piano really well; and Drummond at
that time would have courted anybody who could play for his benefit
"Mumblin' Mose", and didn't mind obliging with unlimited encores.
So the two struck up an alliance, and as Drummond hated Stanning
only a shade less than Stanning hated him, Sheen was under the painful
necessity of choosing between them. He chose Drummond. Whereby
he undoubtedly did wisely.
Sheen sat with his Thucydides over the gas-stove, and tried to interest
himself in the doings of the Athenian expedition at Syracuse. His brain
felt heavy and flabby. He realised dimly that this was because he took
too little exercise, and he made a resolution to diminish his hours of
work per diem by one, and to devote that one to fives. He would
mention it to Drummond when he came in. He would probably come in
to tea. The board was spread in anticipation of a visit from him. Herbert,
the boot-boy, had been despatched to the town earlier in the afternoon,
and had returned with certain food-stuffs which were now stacked in an
appetising heap on the table.
Sheen was just making something more or less like sense out of an
involved passage of Nikias' speech, in which that eminent general
himself seemed to have only a hazy idea of what he was talking about,
when the door opened.
He looked up, expecting to see Drummond, but it was Stanning. He felt
instantly that "warm shooting" sensation from which David
Copperfield suffered in moments of embarrassment. Since the advent

of Drummond he had avoided Stanning, and he could not see him
without feeling uncomfortable. As they were both in the sixth form,
and sat within a couple of yards of one another every day, it will be
realised that he was frequently uncomfortable.
"Great Scott!" said Stanning, "swotting?"
Sheen glanced almost guiltily at his Thucydides. Still, it was something
of a relief that the other had not opened the conversation with an
indictment of Drummond.
"You see," he said apologetically, "I'm in for the Gotford."
"So am I. What's the good of swotting, though? I'm not going to do a
stroke."
As Stanning was the only one of his rivals of whom he had any real
fear, Sheen might have replied with justice that, if that was the case, the
more he swotted the better. But he said nothing. He looked at the stove,
and dog's-eared the Thucydides.
"What a worm you are, always staying in!" said Stanning.
"I caught a cold watching the match yesterday."
"You're as flabby as--" Stanning looked round for a simile, "as a
dough-nut. Why don't you take some exercise?"
"I'm going to play fives, I think. I do need some exercise."
"Fives? Why don't you play footer?"
"I haven't time. I want to work."
"What rot. I'm not doing a stroke."
Stanning seemed to derive a spiritual pride from this admission.
"Tell you what, then," said Stanning, "I'll play you tomorrow after
school."
Sheen looked a shade more uncomfortable, but he made an effort, and
declined the invitation.
"I shall probably be playing Drummond," he said.
"Oh, all right," said Stanning. "I don't care. Play whom you like."
There was a pause.
"As a matter of fact," resumed Stanning, "what I came here for was to
tell you about last night. I got out, and went to Mitchell's. Why didn't
you come? Didn't you get my note? I sent a kid with it."
Mitchell was a young gentleman of rich but honest parents, who had
left the school at Christmas. He was in his father's office, and lived in