“I suppose chapel’s pretty good rot,” he said.
“Chapel rot?” said Hughes. “Why, it’s perfectly ripping. Maddox’s uncle was the architect. It’s the finest school-chapel in England, bar Eton perhaps. You’ll see it to-night. You never saw anything so ripping.”
“Oh, sorry,” said David, flushing; “but I didn’t know.”
Hughes paused a moment and looked at him again.
“I say, Blazes, it’s awful sport your coming down like this,” he said. “Do sweat your eyes out over this exam. It would be ripping if you got a scholarship. We’re all working like beans in the house: that’s Maddox’s doing. Work’s quite different, if you take an interest in it, you know. Yes, that path goes down to the bathing-place, and there are nightingales in the trees. Then hall: fuggy spot, we all have dinner there, both out-boarders and in-boarders. See that don there in cap and gown? He takes the fifth form. He’s frightfully polite, and is learning to ride a bicycle. Consequently you always touch your cap to him as he goes wobbling along, and he takes a hand off to return your chaste salute, and falls off. Good rag. There’s his class-room, with the library up above. We’ll just go down there, and I’ll answer to name-calling on my way.”
They turned out of the big court into an asphalted square full of boys. A master was standing on a raised dais at one end, calling out names with extreme deliberation.
“Oh, damn, he’s only just begun,” said Hughes, after listening a moment. “We won’t wait.”
“I say, answer for me, Plugs,” he said. “You owe me one.”
“Right oh! What’s your voice now, Topknot? Treble or bass?”
“‘Bout midway. Something with a crack in it. Thanks, awfully.”
Plugs, whoever Plugs was, saw Hughes’s companion.
“Scholarship-chap from my t’other school. Decent!”
That was an aside, but clearly audible, and David swelled with pride, and tried to look abnormally decent. . . .
They made their way through the crowd that was collecting and dispersing as the roll-call proceeded, and went back down the long, empty passage past the steps leading up to the school library. Even as they approached them there was a clatter of feet on the concrete floor above, and a boy came flying down them four steps to his stride. Beneath one arm he carried a sheaf of books, and his straw hat was in the other hand. “Maddox,” said Hughes quietly, and on the moment Maddox took his last six steps in one leap, and nearly fell over them both.