So Jan came back to a very early position of his, only trailing the accumulated grievances of a year and a half; and by the third and last night of the fair he had the whole collection to brood upon, in gigantic array, in proportion the more colossal and grotesque because he could not and would not speak of them to a soul. And there was that fool Chips, jawing away as usual to anybody who would listen, about anything and everything except the sports. “I shall be jolly glad when that beastly old fair moves on,” quoth Chips after an interval of “Over the Garden Wall.” Jan agreed so heartily that he could scarcely hold his tongue. “I don’t know that I shall,” said the new boy in Crabtree’s corner. “It sounds rather jolly when you’re dropping off.” Jan could have pulled every stitch off the little brute’s bed. But the remark was very properly ignored. “I suppose you know,” said Bingley, “that two fellows were once bunked for going to it?” “Going to what?” asked Chips. “This very fair.” “They must’ve been fools!” said Jan, raising his voice at last. “I thought you were asleep?” cried the new boy, who had no sense. “You keep your thoughts to yourself,” growled Jan, “or I’ll come and show you whether I am or not.” “They were fools,” assented Bingley, “but they were rather sportsmen too. They got out of one of the hill houses at night, and came down in disguise, in bowlers and false beards! But they were spotted right enough, and they’d got to go.” “And serve them jolly well right!” said Jan, cantankerously. “I don’t call it such a crime, Tiger.” “Who’s talking about crimes? You’ve got ’em on the brain, Bingley.” “I thought you said they deserved to be bunked?” “So they did—for going and getting cobbed.” “Oh, I see! You’d’ve looked every master in the face, I suppose, without being recognised?” “I wouldn’t’ve made them look twice at me, by sticking on a false beard,” snorted Jan, stung by the tone he had been the first to employ. Chips understood his mood, and liked him too much to join in the discussion. But Bingley had been longer in the school than either of them, and he was not going to knuckle under in a minute. “It’s a pity you weren’t here, Tiger,” said he, “to show them how to do it.” “It’s a thing any fool could do if he tried,” returned Jan. “I’d back myself to get out of this house in five minutes.” “Not you, old chap!” said Chips, making an unfortunate entry into the discussion after all. “I would so,” declared Jan hot-headedly. “I’d do it to-morrow if the fair wasn’t going away.” Bingley began to jeer. “I like that, when you jolly well know it is going!” “I’ll go to-night, if you say much more, you fool!” Jan’s springs twanged and wheezed as he sat bolt upright in his bed. “You know you won’t be such a silly idiot,” said Chips, in an earnest voice. “Of course he does!” jeered Bingley. “Nobody knows it quite so well.”