08 The White Feather

shut the door.

The expedition, deprived of its commander-in-chief, paused irresolutely outside. Then it followed its leader’s example.

There was peace in the passage.

XV

THE ROUT AT RIPTON

On the Saturday following this episode, the first fifteen travelled to Ripton to play the return match with that school on its own ground. Of the two Ripton matches, the one played at Wrykyn was always the big event of the football year; but the other came next in importance, and the telegram which was despatched to the school shop at the close of the game was always awaited with anxiety. This year Wrykyn looked forward to the return match with a certain amount of apathy, due partly to the fact that the school was in a slack, unpatriotic state, and partly to the hammering the team had received in the previous term, when the Ripton centre three-quarters had run through and scored with monotonous regularity. “We’re bound to get sat on,” was the general verdict of the school.

Allardyce, while thoroughly agreeing with this opinion, did his best to conceal the fact from the rest of the team. He had certainly done his duty by them. Every day for the past fortnight the forwards and outsides had turned out to run and pass, and on the Saturdays there had been matches with Corpus, Oxford, and the Cambridge Old Wrykinians. In both games the school had been beaten. In fact, it seemed as if they could only perform really well when they had no opponents. To see the three-quarters racing down the field (at practice) and scoring innumerable (imaginary) tries, one was apt to be misled into considering them a fine quartette. But when there was a match, all the beautiful dash and precision of the passing faded away, and the last thing they did was to run straight. Barry was the only one of the four who played the game properly.

But, as regarded condition, there was nothing wrong with the team. Even Trevor could not have made them train harder; and Allardyce in his more sanguine moments had a shadowy hope that the Ripton score might, with care, be kept in the teens.

Barry had bought a Sportsman at the station, and he unfolded it as the train began to move. Searching the left-hand column of the middle page, as we all do when we buy the Sportsman on Saturday—to see how our names look in print, and what sort of a team the enemy has got—he made a remarkable discovery. At the same moment Drummond, on the other side of the carriage, did the same.

“I say,” he said, “they must have had a big clear-out at Ripton. Have you seen the team they’ve got out today?”

“I was just looking at it,” said Barry.

“What’s up with it?” inquired Allardyce. “Let’s have a look.”

“They’ve only got about half their proper team. They’ve got a different back—Grey isn’t playing.”

“Both their centres are, though,” said Drummond.

“More fun for us, Drum., old chap,” said Attell. “I’m going home again. Stop the train.”

Drummond said nothing. He hated Attell most when he tried to be facetious.

“Dunn isn’t playing, nor is Waite,” said Barry, “so they haven’t got either of their proper halves. I say, we might have a chance of doing something today.”

“Of course we shall,” said Allardyce. “You’ve only got to buck up and we’ve got them on toast.”

The atmosphere in the carriage became charged with optimism. It seemed a simple thing to defeat a side which was practically a Ripton “A” team. The centre three-quarters were there still, it was true, but Allardyce and Drummond ought to be able to prevent the halves ever getting the ball out to them. The team looked on those two unknown halves as timid novices, who would lose their heads at the kick-off. As a matter of fact, the system of football teaching at Ripton was so perfect, and the keenness so great, that the second fifteen was nearly as good as the first every year. But the Wrykyn team did not know this, with the exception of Allardyce, who kept his knowledge to himself; and they arrived at Ripton jaunty and confident.

Keith, the Ripton captain, who was one of the centre three-quarters who had made so many holes in the Wrykyn defence in the previous term, met the team at the station, and walked up to the school with them, carrying Allardyce’s bag.

“You seem to have lost a good many men at Christmas,” said Allardyce. “We were reading the Sportsman in the train. Apparently, you’ve only got ten of your last term’s lot. Have they all left?”

The Ripton captain grinned ruefully.

“Not much,” he replied. “They’re all here. All except Dunn. You remember Dunn? Little thick-set chap who played half. He always had his hair quite tidy and parted exactly in the middle all through the game.”

“Oh, yes, I remember Dunn. What’s he doing now?”

“Gone to Coopers Hill. Rot, his not going to the Varsity. He’d have walked into his blue.”

Allardyce agreed. He had marked Dunn in the match of the previous term, and that immaculate sportsman had made things not a little warm for him.

“Where are all the others, then?” he asked. “Where’s that other half of yours? And the rest of the forwards?”

“Mumps,” said Keith.

“What!”

“It’s a fact. Rot, isn’t it? We’ve had a regular bout of it. Twenty fellows got it altogether. Naturally, four of those were in the team. That’s the way things happen. I only wonder the whole scrum didn’t have it.”

“What beastly luck,” said Allardyce. “We had measles like that a couple of years ago in the summer term, and had to play the Incogs and Zingari with a sort of second eleven. We got mopped.”