“We have been to the Head and we’ve told him that the only fellow we mean to have as captain is Rouse. The Head won’t listen to us. We’ve tried to make him understand that nobody else will stand for election or take on the job, and that whilst Rouse is here nobody else would ever be elected. Rouse was made for the job. Even I, who can’t play footer, can comprehend a simple fact like that. But the Head can’t. He won’t budge from his first decision. And now that he’s seen you all out here he’s sent us to tell you what his answer is.” He paused to look round them soberly, and still there was no move. “His answer is this. He has a son. His son is at Wilton. He says that if we will not elect a captain he will elect one for us, so he’s writing to-night to Wilton and his son is going to leave and come here. When he arrives he—the Head’s own son—will be appointed captain of footer, and I’m to tell you that the first thing he will do will be to teach us how to obey.” He stopped and stood for a moment staring out upon them dully. Then he moved and they understood that he was done. For an incalculable space of time the school stood rooted to the spot, incredulous, stiff, mute with stupefaction. Then in one psychological second the whole vast crowd had shifted into sudden movement and was spreading, fan-like, forward and outwards. There came a swelling roar of indignation. The deputation was suddenly swallowed up, and as they disappeared the crowd began to find voice, elbowing this way and that, in a fever of desperation, whilst over their heads there broke the storm-cloud of rebellion. CHAPTER XI THE HOLD For just one minute Rouse had stood at his window staring like one transfixed into the night, his head a little to one side as if in hopes of catching the gist of Pointon’s words. This had been hopeless. The distance was too great and the breeze was blowing away from Morley’s. In the growing dusk it had even been difficult to distinguish the crowd of waiting boys outside the Head’s room sufficiently clearly to gather from the sight how things were going. One sign alone gave him his cue. It was the silence. He had hoped forlornly for an outburst of fanatical cheering. That would have meant that the day was won, that his selection stood, that the coming year, in spite of these troublous opening days, would not, after all, be lean. No sound whatever came. The hush was ominous. For just that minute he stood, a lonely figure, at his open study window. Then the answer reached him in a way that was unmistakable.