Ch. 5: The Moral Reformers

There was no disguising the defeat. The victory was to Prout, but they
grudged it not. If he had broken the rules of the game by calling in
the Head, they had had a good run for their money.

The Reverend John sought the earliest opportunity of talking things
over. Members of a bachelor Common-room, of a school where masters'
studies are designedly dotted among studies and form-rooms, can, if
they choose, see a great deal of their charges. Number Five had spent
some cautious years in testing the Reverend John. He was emphatically
a gentleman. He knocked at a study door before entering; he comported
himself as a visitor and not a strayed lictor; he never prosed, and
he never carried over into official life the confidences of idle
hours. Prout was ever an unmitigated nuisance; King came solely as an
avenger of blood; even little Hartopp, talking natural history,
seldom forgot his office; but the Reverend John was a guest desired
and beloved by Number Five.

Behold him, then, in their only arm-chair, a bent briar between his
teeth, chin down in three folds on his clerical collar, and blowing
like an amiable whale, while Number Five discoursed of life as it
appeared to them, and specially of that last interview with the
Head--in the matter of usury.

"One licking once a week would do you an immense amount of good," he
said, twinkling and shaking all over; "and, as you say, you were
entirely in the right."

"Ra-ather, Padre! We could have proved it if he'd let us talk," said
Stalky; "but he didn't. The Head's a downy bird."

"He understands you perfectly. Ho! ho! Well, you worked hard enough
for it."

"But he's awfully fair. He doesn't lick a chap in the morning an'
preach at him in the afternoon," said Beetle.

"He can't; he ain't in Orders, thank goodness," said McTurk. Number
Five held the very strongest views on clerical head-masters, and were
ever ready to meet their pastor in argument.

"Almost all other schools have clerical Heads," said the Reverend John
gently.

"It isn't fair on the chaps," Stalky replied. "Makes 'em sulky. Of
course it's different with you, sir. You belong to the school--same
as we do. I mean ordinary clergymen."

"Well, I am a most ordinary clergyman; and Mr. Hartopp's in Orders,
too."

"Ye--es, but he took 'em after he came to the Coll. We saw him go up
for his exam. That's all right," said Beetle. "But just think if the
Head went and got ordained!"

"What would happen, Beetle?"

"Oh, the Coll. 'ud go to pieces in a year, sir. There's no doubt o'
that."