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Grim had cheerfully compared Miss Hilda to the queenly Juno, and said that if she would give Biffen's her protection, the house would give the other houses "fits" when the housers came round again; then he put in something about her hair, unconsciously cribbed from Ovid; and something about her walk this I tracked to Horace; and wound up the whole farrago by saying he was ready to be her door-mat and to shield her from the furies, etc., which, I think, Grim genuinely evolved out of his own effervescing breast.
The whole school gasped for a fortnight on end as Biffen's annihilated Dover's, Hargen's, Sharpe's, and Merishall's seriatim, and at last faced Corker's house in the final. This was a resurrected house with a vengeance!
Grim came in and commenced to clear away, and the two sallied out. That day, after morning school, Biffen's held a meeting, and thereat Acton was proposed captain by Worcester and seconded by Raven; and Biffen's confirmed Worcester's qualified opinion of their sense by electing him nem. con. From that day Acton threw his heart and soul into the regeneration of Biffen's.
I liked the set shoulders and his even step down the corridor. Surely something must reach Acton now! He walked down the street, turned in at Biffen's yard, and mounted up to Acton's room. He knocked firmly on the partly open door, and when he heard Acton's "Come in," walked solidly in. Acton smiled amiably when he saw his visitor, and, with his half-foreign politeness, drew out a chair.
To him, poor fellow, Reardon seemed supremely blessed. That a struggling man of letters should have been able to marry, and such a wife, was miraculous in Biffen's eyes. A woman's love was to him the unattainable ideal; already thirty-five years old, he had no prospect of ever being rich enough to assure himself a daily dinner; marriage was wildly out of the question.
"All right," said Cotton; "shut up, confound you! I'll take you." "Three quid Biffen's are not cock-house at 'footer." "Done," said Cotton, unwillingly pulling out his note-book; "and straight, Todd, I shall expect you to pay if you lose." "Oh, shut up, Cotton, you cad! I shall pay if I lose, man. What do you want to keep on insulting me like that for?" "Steady, Gus.
W.E. Grim, Esq., explained to a few of his particular chums, Rogers among them, the wonderful shooting he was going to have "up at Acton's place" in Yorkshire, and they listened with visible envy. "Look here, Grimmy, if you tell us next term that you bagged two woodcock with one barrel, we'll boot you all round Biffen's yard so there."
Cotton thereupon said he had had enough, but Gus avariciously tried to reconstruct the positions. He failed dismally, and Cotton laughed sweetly. Now Cotton's laugh would almost make his chum's hair curl, so he retorted pretty sweetly himself, "I say, Jim. I can't get out of my head that awful hammering you fellows got this afternoon. Think Biffen's lot likely to shape well in the House matches?"
Thurston sang "Alice, where art thou?" the fellows telling him between the verses that "She wasn't going to come," "Spoony songs barred," etc., and Rogers carried off the fags' boxing competition with a big rush in the final round, and Biffen's crew howled with delight. Finally the bell rang for Acton's song. Brown rattled through the preliminary bars, and the song commenced.
Todd nursed his astonishment for a full five minutes, whistling occasionally, as at some very fantastic idea. At last he said more seriously: "Aren't you now, Jim, really pulling my leg?" "No, honour bright! Biffen's are really eye-openers." Gus said with infinite slyness: "Look here, I'll bet you evens Biffen's don't pull off the final."
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