“It isn’t that, but I won’t, all the same. I’ll just dodge through that hole in the hedge and find some wild strawberries or hazel-nuts, or something.” Seeing it was a frosty day in December Nubby’s statements looked wild. But he went. There was a hole in the hedge, with tree-roots trailing across it, and Nubbs crawled shakily through, like a wounded rabbit, into a place where a board was stuck up saying that people would be prosecuted according to law if they went there. But he didn’t seem to care, though it wasn’t a thing he would have done in cold blood. I saw Mathers grow uneasy in his mind. “Wasn’t the pipe--eh?” “No, no. This tobacco--why, a child could smoke it,” said Steggles. “You know what Nubbs is. It’s only an excuse to turn. He hates football and hates walking.” We kept on again, and I began to feel a slight perspiration on my forehead and a weird sort of feeling everywhere. I had smoked about half the pipe. “I sha’n’t go on with this now because of the match,” I said, hastily knocking out the remaining tobacco and handing his loathsome little clay back to Steggles. “Why!” he said, “blessed if you haven’t gone the same color as Nubbs did! Don’t say you’ve got a sunstroke too?” There was something in the voice of Steggles I didn’t much like, but I hardly felt equal to answering him then. “You’re all right, anyway, aren’t you, Mathers?” he asked. “Of course I am. What the dickens d’ you mean?” “Nothing. Glad you like my baccy. There’s plenty of time for another pipe.” “No there isn’t,” said Mathers. “I very much wish there was.” We walked on a few yards farther. “D’ you drink that rich, brown cod-liver oil, the same as Nubby?” asked Steggles of Mathers, suddenly. Mathers looked at him, and I knew how things were in a moment. For a moment my own sufferings were forgotten before the awful spectacle of the ruin of Mathers. He gave his pipe back quietly, took great gasps of air, mopped his forehead, and rolled his eyes about. Then he said: “I’m not quite happy about Nubbs. You push on, and I’ll overtake you.” “Hanged if you’re not queer too!” exclaimed Steggles. “Whoever would have thought that Three Castles--” “Shut up,” said Mathers, hoarsely. “It was the boi--boiled beef at dinner.” He spoke the words with an awful effort. “So it was,” I said, feebly. “We never could stand it--either of us.” “A steaming glass of hot grog is what you want,” said Steggles, sympathetically. “Go!” gasped Mathers, who really looked horrid now; “go! or I’ll kick you, if it kills me to do it.” “Blessed if you haven’t turned green, Mathers,” said Steggles. “You look as if you’d been buried and dug up again. I don’t say it unkindly, but it’s jolly curious.” At the same moment ting! ting! went a bicycle bell; and there was Milly, looking fine. “You’ll all be late,” she said. We prayed she would hurry on and not observe us too narrowly. Then that beast, Steggles, made her stop.