Page:Walpole - Fortitude.djvu/89

 There was no word spoken, and he closed the door behind him.

That same night he walked, before chapel, with Bobby to the top of the playing fields. The night was dark and heavy, with no moon nor stars—but there was a cool wind that touched his cheek.

“Well, I've been a pretty good failure, Bobby, You've stuck to me like a brick. I shall never forget it But you know never in all my life have I been as happy as I was this afternoon. The devils! I'll have 'em under next year.”

“That's not the way—” Bobby tried timorously to explain.

“Oh, yes, it is. Anyhow it's my way. I wonder what there is about me that makes people hate me so.”

“People don't.”

“Yes, they do. At home, here—it's all the same. I'm always having to fight about something, always coming up against things.”

“I suppose it's your destiny,” said Bobby. “You always say it's to teach you pluck.”

“That's what an old chap I knew in Cornwall said. But why can't I be let alone? How I loved that bit last year when the fellows liked me—only the decent things never last.”

“It'll be all right later,” Bobby answered, thinking that he had never seen anything finer than the way Peter had taken that afternoon. “In a way,” he went on, “you fellows are lucky to get a chance of standing up against that sort of thing; it's damned good practice. Nobody ever thinks I'm worth while.”

“Well,” said Peter, throwing a clod of dark, scented earth into the air and losing sight of it in the black wall about him—“Here's to next year's battle!”