The school was already streaming off the ground on its way back to dinner in the houses; but many remained, and some turned back, to give batsmen and bowler the reception they deserved. More articulate praises pursued them to the dressing-room. These ran like water off Jan’s back as he sat stolidly changing his shoes; for in those days the players dispersed to luncheon in the houses also. He explained his apparent ungraciousness by some further mention of “a splitting head.” But as a matter of fact he had every one of his wits about him, and his most immediate anxiety was to avoid Evan, whom he saw obviously waiting to waylay him. He made a point of writing out the order of going in before leaving the pavilion. It was the same order as before, except that Jan promoted the last two men and wrote his own name last of all. “I’ll turn up if I can,” he announced as he tacked himself on to Charles Cave, of all people, to Evan’s final discomfiture. “But let’s hope I shan’t be wanted; unless it’s a case of watching the other fellow make the winning hit, I shall be as much use in my study as on the pitch.” Evan heard this as he walked as near them as he very well could. The narrow street was a running river of men and boys with glistening foreheads, who hugged the shadows and shrank ungratefully from the first hot sunshine of the term. Charles Cave, stalking indolently next the wall, said he hoped Jan was going up to the 'Varsity, as they wanted bowlers there, and a man who could bowl like that would stand a good chance of his Blue at either Oxford or Cambridge. Jan replied that he was afraid he was not going to either, but to the Colonies, a scheme which the other seemed to consider so deplorable that Evan dropped out of earshot from a feeling that the conversation was beginning to take a private turn. And sure enough, after a pause, it took one that surprised Jan himself almost as much as it did Charles Cave. “Beggars can’t be choosers,” said Jan with apparent deliberation, but in reality on as sudden an impulse as ever dictated spoken words. “You see, you don’t know what it is to be a beggar, Cave!” “I don’t, I’m glad to say.” “Well, I do, and it’s rather awkward when you’re captain of the Eleven.” “It must be.” “It is, Cave, and if you could lend me a fiver I’d promise to pay you back before the end of the term.” The calm speech was so extraordinarily calm, the tone so matter-of-fact and every-day, that after a second’s amazement the Old Boy could only assume that Jan’s splitting head had already affected the mind within. That charitable construction did not prevent Charles Cave from refusing the monstrous request with equal coolness and promptitude; and an utterly unabashed reception of the rebuff only confirmed his conclusion. “After all, why should you?” asked Jan, with a strange chuckle. “But I shall have to raise it somewhere, and I daresay you won’t tell anybody that I tried you first.”