That night was the first of sorrow among the jubilant King’s. By some accident of under-floor drafts the cat did not vex the dormitory beneath which she lay, but the next one to the right; stealing on the air rather as a pale-blue sensation than as any poignant offense. But the mere adumbration of an odor is enough for the sensitive nose and clean tongue of youth. Decency demands that we draw several carbolized sheets over what the dormitory said to Mr. King and what Mr. King replied. He was genuinely proud of his house and fastidious in all that concerned their well-being. He came; he sniffed; he said things. Next morning a boy in that dormitory confided to his bosom friend, a fag of Macrea’s, that there was trouble in their midst which King would fain keep secret. But Macrea’s boy had also a bosom friend in Prout’s, a shock-headed fag of malignant disposition, who, when he had wormed out the secret, told--told it in a high-pitched treble that rang along the corridor like a bat’s squeak. “An’--an’ they’ve been calling us ‘stinkers’ all this week. Why, Harland minor says they simply can’t sleep in his dormitory for the stink. Come on!” “With one shout and with one cry” Prout’s juniors hurled themselves into the war, and through the interval between first and second lesson some fifty twelve-year-olds were embroiled on the gravel outside King’s windows to a tune whose _leit-motif_ was the word “stinker.” “Hark to the minute-gun at sea!” said Stalky. They were in their study collecting books for second lesson--Latin, with King. “I thought his azure brow was a bit cloudy at prayers. ‘She is comin’, sister Mary. She is--’” “If they make such a row now, what _will_ they do when she really begins to look up an’ take notice?” “Well, no vulgar repartee, Beetle. All we want is to keep out of this row like gentlemen.” “’Tis but a little faded flower.’ Where’s my Horace? Look here, I don’t understand what she means by stinkin’ out Rattray’s dormitory first. We holed in under White’s, didn’t we?” asked McTurk, with a wrinkled brow. “Skittish little thing. She’s rompin’ about all over the place, I suppose.” “My Aunt! King’ll be a cheerful customer at second lesson. I haven’t prepared my Horace one little bit, either,” said Beetle. “Come on!” They were outside the form-room door now. It was within five minutes of the bell, and King might arrive at any moment. Turkey elbowed into a cohort of scuffling fags, cut out Thornton tertius (he that had been Harland’s bosom friend), and bade him tell his tale. It was a simple one, interrupted by tears. Many of King’s house had already battered him for libel. “Oh, it’s nothing,” McTurk cried. “He says that King’s house stinks. That’s all.” “Stale!” Stalky shouted. “We knew that years ago, only we didn’t choose to run about shoutin’ ‘stinker.’ We’ve got some manners, if they haven’t. Catch a fag, Turkey, and make sure of it.” Turkey’s long arm closed on a hurried and anxious ornament of the Lower Second.