Page:Walpole - Fortitude.djvu/58

 disgust, that the eager boy with the piping voice sat down also.

“I say,” said the piping boy, “don't you like school awfully?”

“No, I hate it,” said Peter.

“Oh, I say! What's your name?”

“Peter.”

“Peter! Oh! but your other name. The fellows will rag you most awfully if you tell them your Christian name.”

“Westcott, then.”

“Mine's Cheeseman. I'm going to like everybody here and get on. I say, shall we be chums?”

“No.”

"Oh, I say! Why not?”

“Because I don't like you.”

"Oh, I say!”

“In another minute I'll break your neck.”

“Oh! I say!” The piping boy sprang up from the play-box and stood away. “All right, you needn't be ratty about it! I'll tell the fellows you said your name was Peter! They'll give it you.”

And the piping boy moved down the passage whistling casually.

After this, silence, and only all the greatcoats swaying a little in the draught and bulging out and then thinning again as though there were two persons inside them, Peter sat quite motionless for a long time with his face in his hands. He was very tired and very cold and very hungry.

A crowd advanced towards him—five or six boys, and one large fat boy was holding the piping one by the ear.

"Oh, I say! Let me go! Let me go! I'll do your boots up, really I will. I'll do whatever you like! Oh! I say! There's a new boy. He says his name is Peter!”

So did the wretched piping one endeavour to divert attention from his own person. The fat boy, accompanied by a complacent satellite, approached Peter.

"Hullo, you. What's your name?”

“Westcott.”

“’Tisn't. It's Peter.”

“Peter Westcott.”