Chapter V: Book II: Travail (2)

The heart of the Sailor began to thump violently. And there came something soft and large in his throat.

"How tall are you, Sailor? Six foot?" The eye of an expert traversed the finely turned form.

"Thereabouts."

"What's your fighting weight in the buff?"

"Dunno."

"Ought to know to a bounce. But it don't matter. You'll thicken. How old next birthday?"

"Nineteen."

"That's a good age. Wish I was. I'm one and twenty."

The Sailor thought he looked more.

"I'm a lot more in some things," said Ginger. "But at football I shall not be one and twenty until the middle o' Janawerry."

The Sailor was a little out of his depth. There was a subtlety about Ginger that went far beyond anything he had ever met. Even Klondyke, great man as he was, seemed a mere child by comparison with this forcible thinker.

"Nineteen is just the age," said Ginger, "to learn to chuck yerself about. But I dare say you know how to do that, having follered the sea."

"I can climb a bit," the Sailor admitted with great modesty.

"Can yer jump?"

The Sailor could jump a bit too.

"Could you throw yerself at the ball like a rattlesnake if you see it fizzing for the fur corner o' the net?"

The Sailor's modesty could not hazard an opinion on a matter of such technical complexity.

"I expect so," said Ginger, with a condescension that was most agreeable. "You are just the build for a goalkeeper. If it's fine tomorrow dinner-hour, we'll put you through your paces on Cox's Piece. I'm thinkin', Enery, you and me will soon be out after that four quid. Anyhow, I'll answer for Mr. W. H."

With the air of a Bismarck, Mr. W. H. Jukes, _alias_ Ginger, resumed an extremely concentrated perusal of the evening's news.

VI

That night the repose of the Sailor was rather disturbed. For one thing he was unused to sleeping on dry land; for another Ginger took up a lot of the bed, and as he slept next the wall, the Sailor's position on the outer verge was decidedly perilous. Also when Ginger lay on his back, which he did about two, he was a snorer. Therefore the Sailor had to adjust himself to circumstances before he could begin to repose at all.

Even when slumber had really set in, which was not until after three, he had to wriggle his lean form into the famous but very tight jersey of the Blackhampton Rovers, the historic blue and chocolate. But what a moment it was when he came proudly on to the field in the midst of the heroes of his early dreams, coolly buttoning his goalkeeping gloves, and pretending not to be aware that thousands were massed tier upon tier around the amphitheater craning their necks to get a glimpse of him, and shouting themselves hoarse with their cries of battle!

It was odd that his first game with his beloved Rovers should be against the doughtiest of their foes, the world-famous Villa. And it seemed at first that the occasion would be too much for him. But Ginger was there, ruddy and insouciant, also in a magnificent new jersey. Ginger was playing full back, and just as the match was about to begin he turned round to the goalkeeper and said, "Now, Sailor, pull up your socks, old friend." But the queer thing was, the voice did not belong to Ginger, it was the voice of Klondyke. Then confusion came. It was not Ginger, it was Klondyke himself who was playing full back, Klondyke the noblest hero of them all. So much was the Sailor astonished by the discovery that he fell out of bed, without disturbing Ginger who was in occupation of three parts of it and snoring like a traction engine.

Next day, the dinner-hour being fine, the Sailor made his debut as a football player on Cox's Piece in the presence of a critical assembly. A number of the choicest spirits of the neighborhood, some in work, some out of it, but one and all fired with real enthusiasm for a noble game, gathered with a football about a quarter past twelve. This was a stalwart company, but as soon as Ginger appeared on the scene he took sole command of it. There were those who could kick a football as well as he, there were those who were older, bigger, stronger, but by sheer pressure of character in that assembly Ginger's word was law.

"Parkins," said Ginger, "you can't keep goal. Come out of it, Parkins. Here's a chap as can."

While the crestfallen and unwilling Parkins deferred to the master mind, a wave of solemn curiosity passed through the cognoscenti of Cox's Piece. The Sailor was seen to doff his wonderful fur cap, which alone was a guaranty of untold possibilities in its wearer, to roll up solemnly the sleeves of his tattered blue seaman's jersey, and to take his place in the goal which had been formed by two heaps of coats.

"He's a sailor," said Ginger, for the general information. But the statement was entirely superfluous. It was clear to the humblest intelligence that he was a sailor and nothing else, but Ginger knew the value of such an announcement. To a landsman--and these were landsmen all--a sailor is a sailor. Strange glories are woven round his visionary brow. He is a being apart. Things are permitted to him in speech and deed that would excite criticism in an ordinary mortal. For instance, the first shot at goal, which Ginger took himself by divine right, and quite an easy one, by design, for a real goalkeeper to parry, the Sailor missed altogether. Had he been aught but a sailor his reputation as far as Cox's Piece was concerned would have been gone forever.

"Ain't got his sea legs yet." Ginger's coolness and impressiveness were extraordinary. "Been eight year at sea. Round the world nine times. Wrecked twice. Seed the serpent off the coast o' Madagascar. Give me the ball, Igson. Wait till he gets his eye in an' you'll see."

Ginger's second shot at goal was easier than his first, and the Sailor, to the gratification of his mentor, was able to mobilize in time to stop it.

"What did I tell yer?" said Ginger. "You'll see what he can do when he gets his sea legs."

Within a week the Sailor was the unofficial hero of Cox's Piece. Ginger, of course, was the only authentic one. But he was too great a man ever to be visited by a suspicion of jealousy. Jealousy is a second rate passion, and whatever Ginger was he was not second rate. Besides the Sailor's remarkable success on Cox's Piece increased the prestige of his discoverer.

The Sailor took to goalkeeping as a duck takes to water. The truth was he was a goalkeeper born, as a poet is born or a soldier or a musician. His slender body was hung on wires, his muscles were toughened into steel and whipcord by long years of hard and perilous training. Then his eye, keen and clear as a hawk's, was quick and true. Also he was active as a cat, and with very little practice was able to compass that _tour de force_ of the goalkeeper's art, the trick of flinging himself full length upon the ground in order to parry a swift shot at short range.

Ginger was a wonderfully shrewd judge of men. And this faculty had never shown itself more clearly than in seeing a born goalkeeper in the Sailor even before that young man had made his debut on Cox's Piece. The brilliant form of his protege was a personal triumph for Ginger. His reputation for omniscience was more firmly established than ever. In little more than a fortnight the Sailor was able to keep goal not merely to the admiration of Cox's Piece, his fame had begun to spread.

It was not that Henry Harper, even in these critical days, was wholly absorbed in the business of learning to play football. Of vast importance to his progress in the world, as in Ginger's opinion that art was, there was still time and opportunity for the Sailor to think of other things.

He was much impressed by Ginger's perusal of the evening's news, which always took place after supper. At the same time he was troubled. Ginger took it for granted that Enery could read a newspaper. He treated that as a matter of course, perhaps for the reason that he had seen the Sailor sign his name, laboriously it was true, in the time-book of Antcliff and Jackson, Limited. But Ginger, with all his shrewdness, made a bad mistake. He little guessed that the Sailor's signature stood for the sum of his learning. He little guessed when he flung the _Evening Mercury_ across to the Sailor after he had done with it himself, and the Sailor thanked him with that odd politeness which rather puzzled him, and became absorbed in the paper's perusal, that the young man could hardly read a word.

On the evening this first happened the Sailor had intended no deceit. He was so straight by nature that he could not have set himself deliberately to take in anybody. The deception came about without any will of his to deceive at all; and he was soon having to maintain a false impression which he had not intended to create. All the same, he would have been mortally ashamed to let the cat out of his bag. He well knew that it would have been a crushing blow to that terrible thing, the pride of Ginger.

The young man wrestling behind the _Evening Mercury_ with the simplest words it contained, and able to make very little of them in the way of sense because they so seldom came together, reflected ruefully that he ought at all costs to have borne in mind Klondyke's advice. "Stick to the reading and writing, old friend. That's your line of country. You'll get more out of those than ever you'll get out of the sea." Bitterly he regretted now that he had not set store by those inspired words. He began to see clearly that you could not hope to cut much ice ashore unless you were a man of education.

He was able to write his name, and that was all. Also he knew his alphabet and could count up to a hundred if you gave him plenty of time. There were also a few words he knew at sight, and thirty, perhaps, short ones, and the easiest in the terribly difficult English language, that he could spell with an effort. This was the sum of his knowledge, and the whole of it was due to Klondyke, who had given many a half-hour of his leisure to imparting it in the cold and damp misery of the half-deck with no more than a sputter of candle by which to do it.

Sailor had clung desperately to all the scraps of learning which Klondyke had given him, but when his friend left the ship he had not had the grit to plow the hard furrow of knowledge for himself. Somehow he had not been able to stick it. He needed the inspiration of Klondyke's voice and presence, of Klondyke's humor and friendliness. He could hardly bring himself to open the Bible his friend had given him, and when he tried to read the _Brooklyn Eagle_ he couldn't see it for tears.

Now he had left the sea for good, he knew a bitter price would be exacted for his weakness. To begin with it would be impossible to tell Ginger the truth. Ginger was the kind of man who would look down on him if once he knew his secret. Besides it was a grievous handicap ashore never to have been to school. Moreover the Sailor was so honest that any kind of deception hurt him.

"Read that yarn about Kitchener and the Gippy?"

"No," said the miserable Sailor.

"Better. Page three. Bottom. Damn good. What?"

"Yep," said the Sailor, wishing to commit the act of hari-kari. He must find a way out. The longer the pretense was kept up the worse it would be. But it was impossible to tell Ginger that he couldn't even find the yarn of Kitchener and the Gippy, let alone attempt to read it.

VII

Ginger was a wonderful chap, but his nature was hard. He had little of Klondyke's far-sighted sympathy, which in circumstances of ever growing difficulty would have been an enormous help to the Sailor.

Henry Harper had felt no shame when he told the dismal truth to Klondyke that he could neither read nor write. But he would rather have his tongue cut out than tell that particular truth to Ginger. Still the game of make-believe must not go on. It made the young man horribly uncomfortable to be driven to play it after supper every night. Something must be done if the esteem, perhaps the friendship, of Ginger was not to be forfeited.

The Sailor was no fool. Therefore he set his wits very seriously to work to grasp the nettle without exposing his ignorance more than was absolutely necessary. He spent anxious hours, not only during the day, but in the watches of the night, trying to find a way out.

One Saturday evening he sat in a frame of mind bordering upon ecstasy. At the instance of Ginger, who was the captain and treasurer of the club, the chairman of the committee, and also one of its vice-presidents, the Sailor had been invited that afternoon to keep goal for the Isle of Dogs Albion. The Sailor had done so. Ginger had shaken hands with him impressively after the match, and had solemnly told him that he had won it for his side, which was truly the case. And the fact was frankly admitted by the rest of the team.

"Mark my words," said Ginger to his peers, "that feller's young at present, but he plays for England when he gets a bit more powder in his hold."

This was talking, but no member of the Isle of Dogs Albion was so misguided as to argue the matter. Ginger's word was the law of nations. Besides, the Sailor was a goalkeeping genius; his form that afternoon could not have been surpassed by Robinson of Chelsea.

That evening as the Sailor sat gazing, chin on hands, into the fire, while Ginger read out the results of the afternoon's matches, he began to think to a purpose.

"Sunderland hasn't half put it acrost the Arsenal. Villa and Wolves a draw."

"Ginger," said the Sailor wistfully, "if you had been to sea for near seven year an' you had forgot a bit o' what you knowed at school, what would you do about it?"

"Do about what? 'Otspur hasn't half punctured Liverpool, I don't think."

"Do about learnin' what you've forgot?"

"Come again, pardner. I'm not Old Moore. Manchester City and Birmingham no goals half time."

"Do about learnin' a bit o' figurin' what you ought to ha' knowed afore you went to sea?"

"Do you think I'm Datas?" The flash of scorn seared the soul of Henry Harper like the live end of an electric wire. "It's a silly juggins question. How the hell should I know?"

No, Ginger was not helpful.

But tonight the Sailor was in the seventh heaven, he was walking on air, therefore with a courage not his as a rule he would not own defeat.

"Suppose you'd almost forgot how to read the news. What'd you do about it?"

"Do about it? Why, I'd pleadin' well go and drown meself."

The Sailor drew in his breath in a little gasp. But the matter was so tragic that he must go on. And it was no more than Klondyke had foreseen.

"Perhaps there's someone as would learn me," said the Sailor half to himself. And then his pluck gave out.

Silence fell for twenty minutes. Ginger smoked Log Cabin and read the evening's news, while the Sailor continued to stare in the fire. Then Ginger flung across the _Evening Mercury_ with, as the Sailor fancied, a slight touch of contempt. But Henry Harper had not the heart to take up the paper tonight. He must never take it up again until he had learned to read it!

In the meantime Ginger reflected.

"Sailor," he said, looking at the fire-lit figure, with vibrations of depth and power in his voice, "you'll go far. That's my opinion, an' I don't talk out o' the back o' my neck as a general rule. You'll go far."

This conveyed nothing to the Sailor.

"I'm tellin' yer," said Ginger. Rising with his freckled face shining and his deep mind fired by ambition, he took from a drawer in the supper table a sheet of writing-paper, an envelope, and a blotter which a philanthropic insurance company had presented to the landlady, an ancient ink bottle and a prehistoric pen from the chimneypiece, cleared a space by piling saucers upon plates and cups on the top of them, and then sat down to compose the following letter:

DEAR DINK,

I write these few lines hoping you are well as they leave me at present. A chap has just joined our club as I think you ought to know about. He's a sailor, and his goal-keeping is marvelous. None of our chaps has seen anything like it. Thought you might like to know this as the Hotspurs is after him. Two of their directors came to see him play this afternoon, and from what I hear they are going to make him an offer. But from what he tells me he would rather play for the Rovers than anybody as he is Blackhampton born, and though he's been nine times round the world and wrecked twice, he thinks there's no town like it. At present he is young and green, being took to sea as quite a kid, but I honestly think your directors ought to know about him, as he will be snapped up at once. I can arrange to bring him over to Blackhampton any Saturday for your club to look at if they care to give us both a trial with the Rovers' second team. We would both come for our expenses, railway fares, and one day's wages, but he won't come without me as we lodge together and play for the same club. You can take it from me he's a Nonesuch.

Yours truly,
W. H. JUKES.

P. S.--This season I am in pretty fair form myself at right full back. W. H. J.

Ginger wrote this letter with great pains in a very clear and masterful hand. He addressed it to Mr. D. Dawson (Blackhampton Rovers F.C.), 12 Curzon Street, Blackhampton. Then, without saying a word to the Nonesuch, he went out to post it at the end of the street. Having done this, thinking hard, he made his way to the little alien hairdresser in the High Road, who had the honor of his patronage, and sternly ordered "a hair cut, and see that you go close with the lawn mower."

Meanwhile the Sailor sat by the fire. Presently the room was invaded by Mrs. Sparks, the landlady. She was a fatigued and faded creature, but honest, discreet, and thoroughly respectable in Ginger's opinion, and in that of his fellow lodger there could be no higher. Besides it was no secret that Mrs. Sparks had seen better days. She was the widow of a mariner, who had borne a gallant part in the bombardment of Alexandria, although his country and hers appeared rather to have overlooked the fact.

The Sailor was a little afraid of Mrs. Sparks. She was to his mind a lady, and overawed by her sex in general, the young man was rather embarrassed by her air of austerity. She never spoke without choosing her words, also the order in which to place them; and Ginger, who was frankly and cynically contemptuous in private discourse of Mrs. Sparks' sex, was always careful to address her as "Ma'am," a fact which as far as the Sailor was concerned amply vouched for her status.

At ordinary times the Sailor would not have dared to speak to his landlady unless she had first spoken to him. But tonight he was in a state of excitement. By some curious means the events of the afternoon had translated him. A tiny bud of ambition was breaking its filaments in his brain.

While Mrs. Sparks, weary and sallow of countenance, was clearing the table, a compelling force made the Sailor remove his chin from his hands and cease gazing into the fire.

"Beggin' pardon, m'm," he said, with the odd, almost cringing humbleness which always inspired him in his passages with even the least considerable of Mrs. Sparks' sex, "would you mind if I ask you a question?"

The landlady was a little surprised. Her lodgers were not in the habit of taking her into their confidence. But in spite of a bleak exterior she was less formidable than she looked, and this the Sailor had felt to be the case. In his tone, moreover, was a note to touch the heart of any woman.

"Not at all," said Mrs. Sparks genteelly.

"If you had been seven year at sea," said the young man, enfolding her with his deep eyes, "an' you had forgot your figurin', what would you do about it?"

Mrs. Sparks was so completely at a loss that the Sailor felt it to be his duty to make himself a little clearer.

"Suppose, m'm, you had forgot all yer knowed of your writin' and readin' while you was at sea, what 'u'd you do about _that_?"

Mrs. Sparks shook her head. It was a ladylike expression of hopeless defeat.

The Sailor grew desperate.

"See here, m'm." He took up the _Evening Mercury_ with a fierceness which immensely surprised Mrs. Sparks; he looked so gentle that he didn't seem to have it in him. "It's like this year. I can't read a word o' this pleadin' paper. Beg parding, lady." Her face had hardened at such a term of the sea. The voice of the young man died suddenly as if thoroughly ashamed of its own vehemence.

However the vehemence had done the trick.

"I would learn," said the landlady curtly.

"Yep," said the Sailor, with the blush of a girl, "it's what I want to."

"Then why not?"

"Dunno how, m'm," he said helplessly.

"Why not go to a school?"

"Can't while I'm at work, m'm."

"There are schools you can go to at night."

Mrs. Sparks swept up the crumbs, whisked away the table cloth, replaced it with a cheerful looking red one, and retired with a look which the Sailor took for disdain.

No, he ought never to have let the cat out of the bag. It would have been better to have bitten off his tongue. But after all it was only Mrs. Sparks ... although Mrs. Sparks was Mrs. Sparks. He must be very careful how he let on to people about his shameful ignorance.

He was a fool to worry about it. "It's nothing to be ashamed of, old friend," Klondyke had said, but the world was not made up of Klondykes. It was something to be ashamed of if you looked at it as Mrs. Sparks and Ginger did. He felt, as far as they were concerned, he would never live it down. Once more he looked into the fire in order to resume the captaincy of his soul. But it was no use. Fix his will as he might, the famous blue and chocolate jerseys of the Blackhampton Rovers had yielded permanently to Mrs. Sparks with a look of scorn in her face.

He got up and in sudden despair took his cap off the peg behind the door. No longer could he stay in the room with his shame. More space, more air was needed. As he flung open the outer door, a gust of damp fog came in; and with it came the squat, powerful, slightly bow-legged figure of Ginger, looking more than ever like a man of destiny now he had had his hair cut.

"Where goin'?"

"Walk," said the Sailor miserably.

"Nice night for a walk. Rum one you are." Had the Sailor's promise as a goalkeeper been less remarkable Ginger would have been tempted to rebuke such irresponsible behavior. As it was he was content merely to place it on record.

"Well if you must, you must," said Ginger magisterially, closing the door.

VIII

At five minutes past six on Tuesday evening, when Ginger came home from work, a letter was waiting for him on the sitting-room chimneypiece. The first thing he noticed was that it bore the Blackhampton postmark, but being a very cool and sure hand, he did not open it at once. He preferred to fulfil the first and obvious duty of a self-respecting citizen of "cleaning himself up" at the scullery sink with water from the pump, and of sitting down to a dish of tripe and fried onions, always a favorite with him, and particularly on Tuesday when the tripe was fresh, while the Sailor, looking rather forlorn, poured out the tea. Ginger chose to do all this with astounding sang-froid before opening Dinkie Dawson's letter.

He read slowly, with unruffled countenance. Then with a noncommittal air, he threw the letter carelessly across the table to the Sailor, who had to retrieve it from the slop basin which fortunately was empty.

"Read it," said Ginger, his face a mask, his tone ice cold, without a trace of emotion.

The Sailor blushed vividly.

"Read it, yer fool," said Ginger. The pitiless autocrat was now striking through the tone of detachment.

Hopelessly confused, the Sailor turned the letter the right side up. But he didn't attempt to read. He knew it was no use. There was not a line he could understand, yet he was forced to hold it before his eyes.

"What do you think o' that, young feller, my lad?"

Stern triumph was striking now through Ginger's almost terrible detachment. "What do you think on it, eh?"

The Sailor was not able to think anything of it at the moment.

"None so dusty--what?" Ginger fairly glowed with a sense of victory.

"Yep," said the Sailor feebly.

"About fixes it--what?"

"Yep," said the Sailor.

He gave back the letter to Ginger with nervous guilt, neither knowing why it was none so dusty nor what it was that it fixed.

"Yer silly perisher. Don't yer see what it means?"

The Sailor nodded feebly.

"Very well, then, why don't yer say so?"

There was the light of contempt in the truculent eyes of Ginger. The Sailor simply could not meet them.

"Blymy"--the scorn of Ginger was withering--"if you hadn't been nine times round the world afore the mast, I should say you was just a guy--I should straight. Don't you understand what Dinkie Dawson says?"

The Sailor's stammer might be taken for, "Yep."

"Very well, then," said Ginger, so savagely that he had to read the _Evening Mercury_ in order to calm himself.

The Sailor began to wish he was dead. And then suddenly Ginger laid down the paper.

"This touch is goin' to cost you money, young Mister Man," he said, magniloquently.

The Sailor's face was haggard.

"You'll have to lay out thirty bob on a new suit of clothes to start with."

The Sailor nodded.

"Of course, you can get a suit for less, but myself I'm all for quality."

The Sailor nodded.

"If you'll take my advice, young feller, you'll go to Dago and Rogers and get one o' them blue suitings as they shows in the winder, neat but not gaudy, cut in the West End style. I'm thinkin' o' gettin' one meself; you simply can't help lookin' a gentleman in one o' them, with a spotted tie and a double turnover collar."

"Yep," said the Sailor, to whom all this was as intelligible as a play of Sophocles.

"You'll also want a nice neat Gladstone."

"Yep," said the Sailor abjectly.

"Brown paper parcel and your boots tied on by string at the end o' it won't do in this scene, young feller."

"No," said the Sailor.

"Got to dress the shop winder a bit in this act." A strange inner light was beginning to gleam in the eyes of Ginger. "Nice new Gladstone, pair o' nice wide knickers cut saucy round the knee, and a set o' new laces in your boots. And I'm thinking one o' those all-wool white sweaters you can get at Tallow's might turn out a good investment."

The Sailor nodded feebly.

"Never spile the ship for a ha'porth o' tar. Allus dress the part. Never stint a coat o' paint for Mrs. Jarley's Waxworks."

The Sailor nodded.

"You've got to learn to knock the public silly," concluded Ginger, with a ferocity almost frightening, "if you are ever goin' to cut any ice on this bleedin' planet."

Utterly nonplussed, the Sailor went early to bed with his shame.

IX

In the opinion of Cox's Piece, "lift" was not the word for the bearing of Ginger on the morrow at the mid-day gathering. It was pardonable, no doubt; Ginger was Ginger, a being apart. Twopenny Sturgess wouldn't half have had it dusted out of him. It wouldn't have been stood from Gogo, or Hogan, or Foxey Green, but with Ginger it was different. It was realized in a way that was almost sinister by the cognoscenti of Cox's Piece that if there was such a thing existing in the world, Ginger was really and truly It.

Nevertheless, Pouncer Rogers was so unwise as to put into words the unspoken thought that was in every mind when he told Ginger bluntly to his face "that he'd believe it when he seed it."

"Yer call me a liar," said Ginger, drawing himself up to his full height of five feet six inches with remarkable dignity.

"I said I'd believe it when I seed it," said the heroic Pouncer.

"Sailor here read the letter," said Ginger, underplaying from the sheer strength of his hand. "Didn't you, Sailor boy? _You_ read Dinkie Dawson's letter?"

"Yep," said the miserable Sailor.

"An' didn't he say a day's wages and railway fares both ways?"

The answer of the Sailor was understood to be in the affirmative.

"First class, o' course," said Pouncer, with a deliberate wink at Gogo and Twopenny.

Ginger's hand was so full that he could afford to treat the observation on its merits.

"_Third_ class, Pouncer. It was _third_, Sailor boy?" The appeal to Sailor boy had a superb touch of condescension. Pouncer would cheerfully have given a week's wages for the privilege of slaying Ginger.

"Yep--third," muttered the miserable one.

"Ginger Jukes," said the defiant Pouncer, "if you want my 'pinion, you don't know Dinkie Dawson at all. That's my 'pinion."

"Your opinion was not _ast_, young Pouncer." Ginger's air was that of a Napoleon. "An' when anyone pleadin' well _asts_ it, Pouncer, you can give it. Perhaps you'll say that Sailor didn't read Dinkie's letter?"

"So he says," sneered Pouncer.

The Sailor winced, but the cognoscenti were much too busy to notice him.

"You are never goin' to call _him_ a liar," said Ginger.

"I call him nothing."

"You had better not," said Ginger, who noticed that Pouncer was drawing in his horns a bit. "_I_ can afford to take your lip, young Pouncer Rogers. I'm used to it an' you are no class, anyway, but if you call the Sailor here a liar, he'll have to put it acrost you. Won't you, Sailor boy?"

No reply from the Sailor.

"I call him nothing," said Pouncer, coming back a bit at this rather unexpected silence on the part of the Sailor. "But I simply says he pleadin' well didn't read no pleadin' letter from Dinkie Dawson, that's all I simply says."

"Young Pouncer," said Ginger, "you have called the Sailor a liar." He turned to his protege with the anxious air of an extraordinarily polite Samaritan. "I'll hold your coat, Sailor boy. You've took too much already from the likes o' him. Give me your coat. You are bound to put it acrost him now."

Ginger looked around magisterially; the cognoscenti concurred as one. Already the Sailor's coat was in Ginger's hand. In the next moment he had rolled up the sleeves of the Sailor's blue jersey, remarking as he did so, "If ever I see a chap on his bended knees a-lookin' for trouble, it's this here young Pouncer. Sailor boy, if you'll be ruled by me, you won't half give him his gruel."

"It's more than you can, Ginger Jukes," said Pouncer, with ill-timed and unworthy defiance.

Ginger was aware of that fact. In the first place, fighting was not his long suit. He had too much intellect to love so vulgar a pastime merely for its own sake. Not only was it violent and dangerous, but it seldom meant anything in particular when you were through with it. All the same, it had its uses. Pouncer had been getting above himself for some little time now. If he didn't soon receive a proper licking from somebody, the hegemony of Cox's Piece might cease to be a sinecure.

"His left's fairly useful," whispered Ginger, as he brought his man up to the scratch. "But that's all he's got. Now mind you punch a hole right through him."

It was a rather disappointing scrap. But for this it would be unfair to blame either Pouncer or the Sailor. The fiasco was due to the unexpected, unwarranted, thoroughly ill-timed, and almost unprecedented behavior of the Metropolitan Police, who in the person of a certain Constable Y28 promptly moved on the combatants while they were sparring for position. He was obviously a young constable who had not quite shaken down into his duties.

"It'll have to be a draw," announced Ginger a little lower down the road, while Constable Y28 stood watching the ebb and flow of the cognoscenti. But it may have been that Ginger's verdict was governed less by a consideration of the attitude of Constable Y28, than by the fact that Pouncer's ring-craft appeared to have improved considerably since Ginger had last seen it in action. For obvious reasons, it would not do for the Sailor to meet his Waterloo just then.

"Young Pouncer," said Ginger, as a final and dramatic parting shot, "you've called the Sailor a liar, but all the same, we can neither on us play next Saturday for the Isle of Dogs Albion. An' if on Saturday mornin' you take the trouble to roll up at the station about five minutes to seven, you will flaming well see the reason."

"Seein' ain't always believin," said Pouncer.

In spite, however, of that unchallengeable statement, Cox's Piece was well represented at the up platform to London Bridge at five minutes to seven, or thereabouts, on the morning of Saturday, November 3. These enthusiasts, touched with scepticism as they were, deserved well of fate. It was not that they sympathized with Pouncer Rogers in his ignoble point of view; they believed that for the first time in its brief and rather checkered history, the Isle of Dogs Albion F.C. was coming into its own.

An impressive sight met the faithful who were present on the up platform to London Bridge at a few minutes to seven on the morning of Saturday. Then it was that Ginger and the Sailor were seen in the booking-hall taking their tickets for Blackhampton. Each carried a brand-new and decidedly elegant Gladstone bag, brilliant of hue and affirming its ownership in bold and clear letters; W.H.J.--H.H. Moreover, both Ginger and the Sailor wore a brand-new cap of black and white tweed, a brand-new overcoat with velvet collar, a brand-new blue suit, undoubted masterpieces of Jago and Brown, 25 The Arcade, and at Finsbury Circus, the whole surmounted by lustrous boots, spotted necktie and spotless double collar. The effect was heightened by a previous evening's haircut and a close matutinal shave.

Those of the faithful who had assembled on the up platform to wish _bon voyage_ to their club mates on their journey to High Olympus were rather staggered by the sight of them. Had the goalkeeper and the right full back of the Isle of Dogs Albion been going forth to play for the first team of the Villa itself, they could not have dressed the part more superbly. Such stage management, its inception due to the genius of Ginger, its execution, the fruit of the Sailor's fabulous wealth, filled their friends with awe. The unworthy doubt cast by Pouncer upon Ginger's _bona fides_ brought its own Nemesis. Pouncer was so completely overthrown by the spectacular appearance on the up platform that he sneaked out of the station _via_ alternate doors of the refreshment buffet, an illegal crossing of the main line, and a final exit by the booking-hall of the down platform.

Seated in a third smoker, on the way to his natal city of Blackhampton, upon which he had not set eyes for seven long and incredible years, the emotions of Henry Harper were very complex. He was in a dream. He had been made to realize by the Force seated opposite smoking Log Cabin and reading _Pearson's Weekly_, that romance had come at last into a mean and hopeless life--into a life which had never looked for such things to happen.

The Sailor knew now the ordeal before him. He was to be tried as a goalkeeper by the great and famous Blackhampton Rovers, the gods of his youth. The fact was very hard to believe, but according to the relentless Force to the wheel of whose chariot he was tied such was the case. And there was his new gear to prove it.

When they got past Luton, they had the compartment to themselves. It was then that the Force, _alias_ Ginger, laid _Pearson's Weekly_ aside and admonished the Sailor out of the store of his wisdom.

"First thing you bear in mind, young feller, is your name's Cucumber. That's the hallmark o' class. It's the coolest player what takes the kitty. Did you ever see Jock Norton o' the Villa?"

The Sailor did not remember having done so.

"It don't matter," said Ginger. "This afternoon you'll see me. I've formed myself on Jock Norton o' the Villa. There's no better model for a young and risin' player. But as I say, Cucumber's your docket. That's my first an' my last word to you, young feller. It's Cucumber what'll put the half Nelson on the kermittee. And, o' course, everythink else yer leave to me. Understand?"

The Sailor did his best to do so.

"Everythink I tells yer, you'll do. Everythink I says, you'll stand by. What I says you've said, you've pleadin' well said, young feller, an' don't forget it."

The Sailor was not likely to forget. The look in the eyes of Ginger, slightly flecked with green in a good light--why they should have assumed that color is part of the eternal paradox--sent little chills down the Sailor's spine.

They steamed into the Central Station of the famous but murky city of Blackhampton at half-past twelve. The Sailor was still in a dream, but of so vivid a hue that he was fairly trembling with excitement. And the first person he saw, who actually opened the door of their compartment, was a certain grim railway policeman, who, on Henry Harper's last appearance at Blackhampton Central Station, had led him outside by the ear and cuffed him soundly for having ventured to appear in it. The final words of this stern official had been, "If ever you come in here again, you'll see what I'll do."

Well, Henry Harper had come in again, and he was now seeing what the policeman did. He felt subconsciously that fate was laughing at this obsequious figure in uniform opening the door of a third smoker for a new goalkeeper, who had come specially from London to be tried by the Rovers.

Ginger considered it an economy of time, also the part of policy, to have a light repast at the refreshment buffet. While they were in the act of consuming egg sandwiches, bananas, and a pint of bitter--they were good to play on--the throng around the buffet was swollen by three or four smart individuals not quite so well dressed as themselves perhaps, but each carrying a handbag which if not so new as theirs was very similar in shape, design, and general importance.

There was a little commotion near the beer engine. "Play up, Rovers," cried an enthusiast in a chocolate and blue necktie. The quick ear of Ginger caught the sound; his eye envisaged the cause of it. He gave the Sailor a nudge so shrewd and sudden as to involve disaster to his pint of bitter.

"There's Dink," he said, in a thrilling whisper.

One less than Ginger would have waited for the situation to evolve. He would have been modestly content for the famous and redoubtable Dinkie Dawson, already an idol of the public and the press, to confer notice upon those whose reputations were in the womb of time. But that was not Ginger's way.

"Come on, Sailor boy, I'll introjuice yer. But mind--Cucumber. And leave the lip ter me."

The Sailor didn't feel like being introduced to anybody just then, certainly not to Dinkie Dawson, or the Prince of Wales, or Lord Salisbury, or anyone of equal eminence. In spite of new clothes and a Gladstone bag, he knew his limit. But the relentless Force to the wheel of whose chariot he was tied, the amazing Ginger, sauntered up to the beer engine and struck Dinkie Dawson a blow on the shoulder.

"Hullo, Ginge," said the great man. Moreover he spoke with the large geniality of one who has really arrived.

"Hullo, Dink." Cucumber was not the word for Ginger. "Where are ye playin'?"

"At Durbee agen the Countee."

"Mind yer put it acrost 'em," said Ginger, in the ready and agreeable tone of the man of the world. "Let me introjuice Mr. Enery Arper. Mr. Dinkie Dawson."

"'Ow do," said Dinkie. But it was not the tone he had used to Ginger. There was inquiry, condescension, keep-your-distance and quite a lot of other things in it. Ginger, whom Dinkie knew and liked, had described Mr. Enery Arper as a Nonesuch, but Dinkie, who was himself a Nonesuch of a very authentic breed, was not all inclined to make concessions to a Nonesuch in embryo.

Mr. Harper's shyness was so intense that it might easily have been mistaken for Lift. But Ginger, wary and alert, stepped into the breach with his accustomed gallantry.

"I told yer in my letter he had been a sailor," whispered Ginger in the great man's ear. "He's sailed eight years afore the mast. Three times wrecked. Seed the serpent. Gee, what that chap's done an' seen--it fair makes you dizzy. Not that you would think it to look at him, would yer?"

"No, I wouldn't," said Dinkie, who measured men by one standard only. "But what about his goalkeeping? Can he keep goal or can't he? There's a big chance for a chap as can really _keep_ goal. But he must be class."

"He's class," said Ginger--coolly.

"Can he clear well?"

"He's a daisy, I tell yer."

"That's got to be seen," said Dinkie. "But he looks green to me. An' I tell you this, Ginger Jukes, it's not a bit o' use anybody trying to lumber a green un on to a club like the Rovers."

"I know that," said Ginger urbanely. "But you'll see--if he keeps his thatch. By the way, Dink, you didn't say in your letter whether the Rovers had a vacancy for a right full back."

"We've got Mullins and Pretyman, the best pair o' backs in England."

Ginger knew that perfectly well, but he did not allow it to defeat him.

"There's as good fish in the sea as ever come out of it," said he.

"I don't know about that," said Dinkie Dawson coldly.

It was clear that Ginger Jukes did not realize where he was or what he was up against.

X

Ginger and the Sailor drove to the ground of the Blackhampton Rovers on the roof of a two-horse bus. It was a long way from the Central Station, but they had time in hand; the match did not begin until half-past two, and it was only a little after one at present. As together they made what both felt to be as fateful a journey as they would ever take in the whole course of their lives, their emotions were many and conflicting.

"There y'are, young feller." Ginger pointed to a hoarding on which a chocolate and blue poster was displayed. In spite of his religion of Cucumber, the thrill in his voice was perceptible. "There's a bill of the match."

"Who are we p-playin'?" stammered the Sailor, half choked by a sudden rush of emotion that threatened to unman him.

"Can't yer read?"

"No," gasped the Sailor.

"No?" gasped Ginger.

"I--I mean, I can't see very well."

"_Can't see!_"

Ginger nearly fell off the bus.

"Not at this distance, I--I mean."

"Blymy." For a moment Ginger was done. Then he said with a ferocity ruthless and terrible, "Young feller, you've pleadin' well _got_ to see this afternoon. You've got to keep yer eyes skinned or ... or I'll scrag yer. Understand? If you let me down or you let Dinkie make a mark on us, you'll see what I'll do." There was something deadly now in the freckled skin and the green eyes. Ginger might have been a large reptile from the Island of San Pedro.

The Sailor felt horribly nervous, and the demeanor of Ginger did not console him. The fact was, Ginger was horribly nervous too. It was the moment of his life, the hour to which vaulting ambition had long looked forward. Before this damp, dismal November afternoon was three hours older would be decided the one really pregnant problem of Ginger's universe, namely and to wit, could he contrive to get his foot on the ladder that leads to fame and fortune? If courage and resolution and an insight into the ways of men could bring this thing to pass there was reason for Ginger to be of good faith. But--and the But was a big one--none knew better than Ginger that many are called and few are chosen, that the world is full of gifted and ambitious people who have never quite managed to "deliver the goods," that life is hell for the under dog, and that it is given to no man to measure the exact distance between the cup and the lip.

The ground of the Blackhampton Rovers Football Club came into view as the bus dived into a muddy and narrow lane. It then crossed the bridge of the West Norton and Bagsworth canal, and there before the thrilled eyes of the Sailor was the faded flag of chocolate and blue flying over the enormous corrugated iron roof of the grand stand. But there were not many people about at present. It was not yet two o'clock, moreover the spectators were likely to be few, so dismal was the afternoon, and of such little importance the match, which was a mere affair of the second team.

Ginger, with all his formidable courage, was devoutly thankful that such was the case. It was well that the prestige of the Blackhampton Rovers was not at stake. For he knew that he was taking a terrible risk. The Sailor was young and untried, his experience of the game was slight, and had been gained in poor company. Even the second team of the august Blackhampton Rovers was quite a different matter from the first team of the Isle of Dogs Albion. They were up against class and had better look out!

This was the thought in Ginger's mind as he entered the ground of the famous club, with the Sailor at his heels, and haughtily said, "Player," in response to a demand for entrance money on the part of the man at the gate. Ginger was a little overawed by his surroundings already in spite of a fixed determination not to be overawed by anything.

As for the Sailor, following upon the heels of Ginger and speaking not a word, he was as one in a dream. Yes, this was the ground of the Rovers right enough. There was the flag over the pavilion. God in heaven, what things he had seen, what things he had known since he looked on it last! Somehow the sight of that torn and faded banner of chocolate and blue brought a sudden gush of tears to his eyes. And in a queer way, he felt a better man for shedding them. There at the end of the ground by the farther goal, in the shadow of the legend, Blackhampton Empire Twice Nightly, painted in immense letters on a giant hoarding, was the tree out of which young Arris fell and was pinched by a rozzer on the never-to-be-forgotten day when the Villa came to play the Rovers in that immortal cup tie it had been the glory of his youth to witness. And now ... and now! It was too much! Henry Harper could not believe that he was about to wear the chocolate and blue himself, that he was about to tread the turf of this historic field which had not so much as one blade of grass upon it.

"Young feller." The face of Ginger was pale, his voice was hoarse. "Don't forget what I've told yer. Remember Cucumber. Stick tight to your thatch. There's a lot at stake for both on us. This has got to mean two quid a week for you and me."

The Sailor did not reply. But an odd look came into his deep eyes. Could Ginger have read them, and it was well he could not, those eyes would have accused him of sacrilege. It was not with thoughts like these that Henry Harper defiled the classic battleground, the sacred earth of High Olympus.

XI

In the Rovers' dressing-room the reception of Ginger and the Sailor was cool. Their look of newness, of their bags and overcoats in particular, at once aroused feelings of hostility. They implied greenness and swank; and in athletic circles these carry heavy penalties. Greenness is a grave misdemeanor, swank a deadly sin. Fortunately Ginger was far too wise to talk. He contented himself with a civil passing of the time of day. One less a warrior might have been a little cowed by the glances at his bag and his overcoat. But Ginger was not. He did not care two straws for the opinion of his fellow hirelings. It was his business to impress the club committee.

As for the Sailor, he was not in a condition to understand what was taking place around him. Cucumber might be his name, but his brain was like a ball of fire.

One of the immortal chocolate and blue shirts was handed to him, but when the time came to put it on he stood holding it in his hand.

"Into it, yer fool," said his mentor, in a fierce whisper. It would not be wise to attract by a display of eccentricity the notice of nine pairs of eyes.

With a start, the Sailor came back to the present and thrust his head into the shirt. His thoughts were with young Arris. He, too, had had a dream of playing for the Rovers. If only young Arris could see him now!

The "gate" was small, the afternoon unpleasant, the match by no means a good one. The result did not matter to the Rovers, whose reputation was known wherever football was played. In the view of the ruling powers of that old and famous club, who sat in the center of the grandstand, the object of this rather scratch game was not glory but the discovery of new talent. But small as the audience was, it contained a personage of vast consequence, who sat like Olympian Zeus enthroned on high with his satellites around him.

He was a majestic figure whose importance could be seen at a glance. His expansive fur coat, his superb contour, his spats, his red face, the flower in his buttonhole, and the large cigar with a band round it stuck in the side of his mouth, were a guaranty of status, apart from any consideration of supreme capacity. Mr. Augustus Higginbottom was the chairman of the club.

"Who have we got keepin' goal?" said Olympian Zeus, as he fixed a pair of gold-rimmed eyeglasses on his nose and looked at his card. "Arper, I see. Who the 'ell's Arper?"

"On trial, Gus." Three or four anxiously officious satellites hastened to enlighten the chairman.

"I rather like the look o' Arper." It was as Plato might have spoken had he ever worn a fur coat and had a large cigar with a band round it tucked in the side of his mouth, and had he placed his services at the disposal of the committee of the Blackhampton Rovers Football Club in order to enable it to distinguish the false from the true.

"Make and shape there," said Mr. Higginbottom. "Light on his pins. Gets down to the ball."