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"Oh, Jonathan, you can sing, and no mistake." "Five six seven mistakes," John answered. The boys laughed. John told Fluff what the hero had said to him, and showed the piece of gold. "What ho! The Creameries! Come on, Esmé." At the Creameries several boys congratulated John, and the Caterpillar said "You astonished us, Jonathan; 'pon my soul you did. Have a 'dringer' with me? And Fluff too?
It's gambling if I bet you a 'dringer' that you won't make ten runs in a house-match; it's gambling if I raffle a picture and you take a sixpenny ticket. Are you going to give up that sort of gambling?" "No; but " "What would Warde say to our co-operative system of work eh? You're not prepared to go the whole hog? You want to pick and choose. Good! But give me the same right, that's all.
Then, finding these repeated gibes growing stale, he resorted to meaner methods. He upset ink on John's books, or kicked them from under his arm as he was going up to the New Schools. He put a "dringer" into the pocket of John's "bluer." He pinched him unmercifully if he found himself next to John in form, knowing that John would not betray him. When occasion offered he kicked John.
John polished off his "dringer," listening to the chaff, but his thoughts were with Desmond. He had an intuition that Desmond would have something to say to him. As soon as possible he returned to the Manor. There he found his room empty. John shut the door and sat down, looking about him half-absently.
And then John was led to the bootmaker's, and there measured for his first pair of patent-leathers. The Caterpillar was so exhausted by these labours that a protracted visit to the Creameries became imperative. "You've always looked like a gentleman," said the Caterpillar, after his "dringer," "and it's a comfort to me to think that now you'll be dressed like one."
A "Dringer" is composed of the following ingredients: a layer of strawberries is secreted in sugar and cream at the bottom of a clean jam-pot; and this receives a decent covering of strawberry ice, which brings the surface of the dringer and the top edge of the jam-pot into the same plane. The whole may be bought for sixpence. A "Bluer" is the blue-flannel jacket worn in the playing fields.
He had stayed on to play at Lord's, and when he left Trieve would become the Head of the House a prospect very pleasing to the turbulent Fifth. About the middle of June John suffered a parlous blow. He was never so happy as when he was sitting in Scaife's room, cheek by jowl with Desmond, sharing, perhaps, a "dringer," poring over the same dictionary.
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