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"Hoist!" shouted Clive, "and stand clear. I'll shove the chassis beneath the engine. Then lower gently. I don't want to have my fingers pinched off, remember that; so slack an inch at a time, and be ready to haul again."

Oh, the triumph of this final achievement! That engine went into position with the docility of a lamb. The chassis framework might have been its intended resting-place from the very commencement. It bedded down on the wooden frame snugly, hugging the timber. The bolt holes matched beautifully with those bored by Clive perhaps a week before, calling shouts of approval from his comrades. And when the hoisting rope was thrown off, and the sheer legs removed, there the engine was in position.

"And the wheels don't even feel the weight. Look. See if they do," cried Clive.

"A bit wobbly, eh?" suggested Hugh grudgingly, pushing the chassis from side to side, when it certainly had what might be described as freedom of movement. "Just a bit, eh? Still, that don't matter. Make her run all the better. But I'm glad she hasn't springs. She'd fairly roll herself over if she had them."

"But the back part's as steady as a rock," reported Clive enthusiastically. "Don't rock. Not a bit. Anyway, she runs forward and backward easily. By George! That's a bother!"

"What? You make a fellow ask such heaps of questions," grumbled Hugh, dismayed himself at the sudden fall in Clive's features.

"We've forgotten something else, and the bally thing's frightfully important."

Hugh gaped; Bert looked somewhat amused. To tell the truth, though glad always to lend a helping hand, he looked upon all this unnecessary work as a species of madness.

"You'll have to sweat at things like this when you're older," he declared. "No one's going to let you live at home and walk about doing nothing. You won't have time for games, and this sort of thing'll keep you from morning to evening – that is, if you take up engineering. Then why not make use of the good times and freedom now and play cricket?"

That had led to a somewhat animated discussion on the subject and seriousness of games as compared with mechanics till Hugh and Bert were within an inch of a struggle. But that was in the past. The plot they had so recently discussed, and the pit they had dug for the downfall of young Rawlings, had drawn the bonds of friendship more closely together. So Bert changed his expression of amusement to one of concern.

"What's the jolly thing?" he asked. "It looks complete – in fact, ripping. There's an engine and wheels and steering gear and frame. What more do you want? Ah! Got it! There's nothing there with which to cool the engine. Well, you two are precious mugs! Just fancy, taking all the sweat to mount an engine and then forgetting such an important matter!"

Clive's eye kindled, while his cheeks reddened. He could afford to pity a chap who showed such tremendous ignorance; only, coming as it did at a moment when he himself was distinctly distressed, the idiotic suggestions of this ignoramus made him angry.

"Hang it!" he growled. "Don't talk such rot! Cooling indeed! Why, even – even Rawlings could tell you that the engine's air-cooled. There's the fan, stupid! staring you right in the face. The thing that's worrying me is the lever for chucking the concern out of gear."

Hugh gripped the side of the chassis as the secret was mentioned. It made him shiver to think that just as every difficulty that could be foreseen had been surmounted another had cropped up.

"And it's a beast," he groaned.

"A teaser," admitted Clive desperately.

"What's a gear lever?" asked Bert, with aggravating coolness and flippancy.

"What's a gear lever!" growled Clive, regarding him with an eye that positively glared.

"What's a mug?" shouted Hugh, ready almost to strike him.

"Someone who forgets that there is such a thing as a gear lever, and then can't or won't explain," came the irritating, maddening answer.

"Look here," began Clive, flushing hotly, and stepping nearer to Bert, "I've troubles enough already. I'll trouble you to – "

"He's punning," shouted Bert, seizing the angry Clive by the shoulders and shaking him. And then, careless of the anger he had aroused, for that was the way with him, he began to cross-examine the two mechanics on the uses and abuses of every class of lever. The meeting, in fact, was in grave danger of a sudden break-up. But a shout from Hugh helped matters wonderfully.

"I've got it!" he bellowed.

"What? The lever or the measles?" asked Bert, still amused and facetious.

"Shut up, you ass! The measles indeed! No, the bally difficulty. I've a way in which to work it."

Clive agreed with the suggestion when it came to be put to him, agreed with ungrudging enthusiasm. "It'll be as easy as walking," he said.

"Or falling," suggested Bert.

"You'll get your head punched yet," growled Clive. "But it's fine, this idea. You see, we start our engine. That's easy enough."

"Well, it may be," from Bert. "I'll believe you."

"Then we take our seats."

"Don't see 'em," came from the critic.

"Ass! You've heard of the box we're going to fix."

"But that's a box. It's not a seat."

"Go on with it, Clive," urged Hugh, looking as if he would willingly slay his brother. "Take no notice of the ass. We start her up, and then get seated."

"On a box."

"Yes," agreed Clive, glaring at Bert, who had again interrupted. "The engine's going. The chain's free-wheeling. We have a lever somewhere."

Hugh pointed out its position with triumph, and the two promptly proceeded to fit the contrivance. But levers are not made in a moment. It was, in fact, noon of the following day before they were ready for an outing.

"You manage the steering, that's agreed?" asked Clive, when the amateur-constructed motor-car had been pushed as far as the road.

"That's it. You control the engine. Don't let her race too much at first. Remember I ain't used to steering. Besides, those front wheels are frightfully groggy. She'll sway at corners, and if we put on the pace I shall be piling the whole bag of tricks up on one of the banks. Bert'll keep cave. There's no police about here to matter. Jimmy, the local constable, 's a real good fellow. He'll see the thing from the right point of view. He knows we're experimenting and'll sympathise."

"Particularly if he's called in at the inquest," gurgled Bert, irrepressible when his chums desired to be so serious.

"Inquest. Eh?" asked Hugh. "What's that?"

"Enquiry held on the bodies of Clive Darrell and Hugh Seymour, late of this parish, killed on the high-road. Died in the execution of their duty'll be the verdict. Great inventors cut off in their prime!"

Bert had to run an instant later. For Clive came at him with a hammer, while Hugh looked distinctly furious. However, the incident quieted down, the inventors took their seats on this chassis of their own making, while Bert, having seen that the coast was clear, listened to the puff of the engine. Hugh gripped the steering gear. True, it was somewhat flimsy, and bent easily from side to side. But nothing can be perfected in a moment, he told himself. It would do for this first experimental run, at any rate.

"Ready?" asked Clive deliberately.

"Let her go."

Clive did. There was a painful clattering of gears. The lever jerked violently, while the engine almost came to a stop. However, a touch of the throttle and ignition levers put that right, while the gear lever behaved itself of a sudden. The chassis bounded forward, very nearly hurling the box which acted as a seat from it. But for the steering wheel Hugh would have been deposited in the gutter. But he clung manfully to the frame, and in a moment was hurtling forward.

"Steady!" he called. "She don't steer so nicely."

She didn't. She – that is, the car – swerved frightfully. Those front wheels had rather the appearance of wheels trying to twist round to look at one another. Then the swivelling axle wasn't altogether a brilliant success. It refused to swivel at inconvenient moments. The heroes of this expedition were within an inch of the ditch lining the road.

"Near as a toucher," cried Clive. "Keep her up."

"Can't! The brute won't steer. She likes the ditch," came the answer.

"Then I'll stop her. Some of those wires want tightening. Then she'll steer."

But that troublesome gear lever was determined to ruin the hopes of both inventors. Perhaps it was because it had been forgotten till the very end and felt neglected. In any case, it refused to disengage, while owing to the awkward fact that the throttle and ignition levers had dropped away and gone adrift, Clive could not control his engine. It raced badly. It snorted as if it felt that it could do as it liked. It sent the swaying car hurtling along like a bullet.

"Look out!" yelled Bert. "The bally thing's pitching like a ship at sea. Stop her!"

"Can't! The brute's got the bit between her teeth badly," shrieked Clive. "I can't quite reach the throttle, and till I do she'll go plugging ahead. She runs like a demon."

"Top hole!" gurgled Hugh, whom it took a lot to frighten. "Ain't she got pace? But she'd be better if she didn't rush so much from side to side. Look out! There's a cart coming our way."

He set his teeth, endeavoured to make his figure adhere to the top of that egg box which did duty as a seat, and braced himself for the encounter. For encounter it seemed there was to be. The wondrous car which he and Clive had called into being romped towards the unsuspecting cart. It waltzed merrily from side to side of the road, seeming to take an uncanny delight in racing within hair's breadth of the ditch on either hand. It mounted the rough footpath with impunity, careless of the law and of possible policemen, its springless axles bending and bumping. It actually appeared to sight that approaching cart itself, and as if filled with fiendish delight at its unaccustomed freedom, and filled with knowledge of the helplessness of its inventors, it sped toward the vehicle, pirouetted before it, skidded badly, removing in the space of a bare five seconds one of the Rector's expensive back tyres, and then, mounting the pathway again with startling abruptness, it pitched its nose into the air, shuddered with positive glee, and having thrown its drivers into the ditch subsided into match-wood and scrap-iron. Those back wheels and their axle, borrowed for this memorable occasion, had the appearance rather of a couple of inverted umbrellas with the sticks tied together. The framework was torn asunder, and only the engine remained in recognisable condition.

As Clive and Hugh picked themselves up from the ditch and surveyed the wreck, with the driver of the cart and Bert giggling beside them, there came a horrid shout from behind them.

"Eh? What's that?" demanded the baker, for he it was who had so wonderfully escaped annihilation.

"Someone in trouble," said Bert. "Calling for help. Let's go."

"You ass!" grinned Hugh, gripping him by the sleeve. "Can't you guess? It's that Rawlings cad. We've bagged him."

"It's someone as is in trouble," exclaimed the worthy baker, not hearing the above. "Wonder if it's that Mr. Rawlings?"

"Young Rawlings?" asked Clive, with a horrible presentiment of coming trouble.

"Mr. Rawlings," came the emphatic answer. "Him who's bought the house. I seed him walking to the path through the spinney. He's been away up to Lunnon."

Clive and his fellow conspirators looked at one another painfully. Then they regarded the wreck of the motor. That was bad enough. Admission must be made to the Rector, and his axle and back wheels brought for inspection. Common honesty demanded that of them. It wouldn't be playing the game to borrow and smash and then hide their guilt in some underhand manner. And here was an addition.

"I'm a-going to see what's up," declared the baker. "You young gents had best come along too."

They couldn't very well hang back, and had perforce to visit the scene of their late labours. And there was the fat Mr. Rawlings, imprisoned in a pit which needed no adhesive clay pudding to hold him. For this London gentleman was of portly structure, and the narrow pit held him as if his fat figure had been poured into it. He could hardly shout. Even breathing was difficult, while his rage and mortification made him dangerously purple. Then, when at length the efforts of the four had released him, and he sat at the side of the pit besmirched with clay from head to foot, his rage was almost appalling.

"You little hounds!" he stuttered. "You did it. Don't tell me you didn't. I know you did. I'll set the police on you. You were trespassing. This is my property. I'll send Albert down to give you a hiding, and he'll be glad to do it. I'll – I'll – " His breath was gone by now, and he sat back gasping. But his anger did not subside, and Clive's prediction of coming evil was speedily realised.

"I shall send you off to school," said his mother. "You ought to have gone long ago. I really do consider your conduct to have been disgraceful."

"A piece of unmitigated mischief, and not of a harmless character," growled the Rector, who was given to choosing long words where possible. "Unmitigated mischief, Bert and Hugh. First you have the temerity to carry out something approaching a theft, a common and nefarious business. Then you implicate a respected neighbour in a catastrophe which might have terminated in his entire and total undoing. Bert, bend over."

Dear! Dear! It was a painful and humiliating week which followed. Young Rawlings up at the house giggled secretly at his father's discomfiture. But he threatened openly when he happened to come across Clive one morning. As for the three conspirators, they were not allowed to see one another, nor to communicate.

"You'll go on Wednesday," said the Rector. "I've written about you."

That was ominous. "We'll catch it hot," said Hugh. "I don't care. I'm jolly glad to be going. A chap ought to go to a big school, not stick always at home. There'll be a workshop. That'll be ripping."

"And cricket. That's better. Wish Clive were coming to the same school. Old Tom tells me he's led a dog's life these last few days."

Clive's existence had been wretched. He was glad, delighted in fact, when the day for departure arrived, and he took his place in the train for Ranleigh.

"That cad travelling too," he said, seeing Rawlings entering a distant carriage. "Glad he's going to some other place than Ranleigh."

He saluted his mother, waved to Old Tom, and sank back on his seat as the train started. If Bert and Hugh were glad to go to a public school, so also was Clive. He had longed to see life outside the village of Potters Camp with an intense longing. And here he was on his way. What would it be like? Was there bullying? Would he have to fag? and what sort of a place was Ranleigh?

CHAPTER III
OFF TO RANLEIGH

Going to school arouses a variety of emotions. In the case of Clive they were decidedly confused and jumbled, happiness, however, at the prospect before him predominating. For residence for a high-spirited lad at home, tied to a somewhat doting mother's apron-strings, is somewhat dull, and hardly conducive to good results, while the absence of a father had not improved matters. Indeed, it may be agreed without debate that the incident of that wonderful motor-car contrived by Clive and Hugh and the ingenious trap they had set for Rawlings had not been entirely mischievous. For here was Clive about to be launched on the schoolboy world, while Hugh and Bert, having listened to a long and verbose lecture from their father, hitherto their tutor at home, had entered a train and gone off likewise.

"What'll this Ranleigh be like?" Clive asked himself again and again. From taking an interest in passing scenery, he soon began to look forward to another stop with eagerness. For at each station there were boys. Some big, some small; some jolly and whistling, others glum and thoughtful. Not that glumness was the order of the whole day. For at one station Clive observed with some amusement one youngster under the escort of a fond father and mother. The lad had much ado to keep the tears back as the train departed, while his mother wept openly into a handkerchief of diminutive proportions. Within a minute, however, there came shouts of laughter from the next carriage into which this hopeful youngster had stepped, and peering in at the next station, Clive found the lad as merry as a cricket. He was beginning to wish that he could join them.

"I say," he began, somewhat lamely, "going to Ranleigh?"

A fat youth, with a greasy, pallid face, pushed his head out of the window and surveyed Clive as if he were an inferior beetle.

"Who on earth are you?" he asked, with some acerbity. "Who invited you to speak? that's what I want to know. Jolly cheek, I call it!"

Clive was taken aback rather considerably. This was not the sort of treatment to which he was accustomed. His gorge rose at it.

"Cheek yourself! Who are you, then?"

It seemed for a moment as if the fat youth would have an apoplectic seizure. His pallid face became suffused a dull purplish red. His neck swelled in fat folds over his collar. If looks could have killed, Clive would certainly have been slain on the spot. But the engine shrieked just then, while someone within the carriage seized the tails of the fat youth, who disappeared precipitately.

"Come in, Trendall," he heard a voice shout. "One would think you were a king, never to be spoken to. But who is he? My word, I got a glimpse of his phiz, and he looked as if he'd hammer you with pleasure."

Another mile on this almost endless journey and the train again panted into a station. Clive hung out of the window, and then became aware of the fact that two individuals were approaching his carriage, while from the one next door the youthful Trendall glared at him. Rawlings was one of those approaching. He descended with majestic step from his own compartment and hailed a porter.

"Hi! Portar!" he called. "Carry these things along heear. Someone's wanted to keep ordar."

Tall for his age, decidedly podgy, and with a cast of countenance which was not too attractive, Rawlings just lacked that brisk, clean appearance belonging to young men who go to our public schools. Despite expensive and well-fitting clothes, an immaculate tie and hat, and socks of most becoming pattern, the fellow did not look a gentleman. His air was pompous. His manner of addressing the porter ludicrous. He stepped up to Clive's compartment, nodded grandly to Trendall, and pulled the door open.

"He-e-ear, portar."

The magnificent one proffered a tip without looking at it, and Clive noticed that the man took it with alacrity.

"All fer me, sir?" he grinned.

"Of course! I'm not a pauper."

Rawlings waved him away magnificently, flopped on to a seat, taking the far corner, arranged his feet on the one opposite, and then began to take close scrutiny of our friend Clive. Meanwhile, another individual had entered the compartment. He was a tall, broad-shouldered, shambling youth, of decidedly foreign appearance, with clothes which spoke of a French provincial city. He stooped a little, was slow and ungainly in his movements, while his powerful shoulders were bent forward. But the face was striking and taking.

"Pardon," he said politely, lifting his hat as he entered. "This is for Ranleigh, is it not so?"

Rawlings regarded him stonily. "The cheek!" he muttered. "Is one to answer every bally foreigner? I'm not a portar!"

He thrust his hands deep into his pockets and glared at the intruder. For the new-comer was an intruder. Rawlings had made his way to this compartment with a view to discussing certain matters with Clive, and letting that young gentleman thoroughly understand who was the master. But that last movement was his undoing for the moment. The fingers deep in one pocket struck upon certain loose cash, and withdrawing the same, Rawlings was at once stricken with a terrible discovery. He had had certain silver coins there before, and twopence in coppers. Those he had intended to present to the porter. But they were still there, while two half-crowns were missing. In fact, in his lordliness he had presented the grinning fellow with five shillings! No wonder the man smirked and touched his hat. That had pleased Rawlings at the time. Now, as the train swung out of the station, he dashed to the window.

"Hi! Hi! Portar!" he bellowed. "Hi! You come back with those half-crowns. It was a mistake."

But the whistle drowned the sound of his voice, while the porter, half hidden behind a barrow, waved a farewell to him. Rawlings threw himself back in his seat with a growl of anger.

"You're going to Ranleigh, aren't you?" he demanded fiercely of Clive.

"Yes."

"Then just you look out for squalls. What dormitory are you in?"

"Don't know," came Clive's sullen answer. This Rawlings was considerably bigger, though little older, but still Clive was not going to be bullied. "How should I?" he demanded. "What's the place like?"

"You'll find out in time. And don't you try any traps there, youngster. See?"

Rawlings was determined to let there be no misunderstanding. He stretched across the carriage and took Clive by the ear.

"None of your caddish games at Ranleigh," he said, "or you'll get something worse than this, by a long way."

Clive beat him off with a well-directed blow on the arm. In fact, with such heat and violence that Rawlings, still enraged at the loss he had so stupidly made when tipping the porter, lost his temper, and it looked as if he would at once take in hand the chastisement of the lad who was such a near neighbour. But the third individual suddenly distracted his attention. Could Rawlings really believe his eyes! This new chap, whoever he might be, a froggy probably, had asked if the train went to Ranleigh, and therefore, obviously, was bound for that destination, and must be a new boy. He was actually stretching himself out across the carriage, with one boot resting against Rawlings's immaculate trousers, while – worse than all – he had a cigarette in his mouth and was setting a match to it. It wasn't the fact of smoking that horrified Rawlings. He had broken that rule himself, and been dreadfully ill, much to his chagrin. But Rawlings was getting up in the school. He was in the lower sixth, would probably be a prefect this term, and such an act was an outrage to his dignity.

"Well, I'm hanged!" he spluttered. "What on earth do you mean by that? Smoking! Here, stop it!"

But the one addressed merely viewed him mildly. His brows went up questioningly, while he stretched himself a little more at his ease, causing Rawlings to remove his immaculate trouser leg with swiftness.

"Do you hear?" he cried threateningly. "What's your name?"

"Richard Feofé."

"Hang the Richard! Feofé, then. Look here! Stop that smoking."

But Feofé still regarded Rawlings mildly, and taking a deep inspiration filled the carriage with smoke.

"You do not like it, then?" he asked. "Monsieur can then get into another carriage."

Rawlings went crimson with rage, and then pallid, while Clive began to enjoy the joke immensely, for long ago he had sized his near neighbour up, and knew him to be nothing more than a purse-proud bully. But for the disparity in their two weights and heights he would have long since openly defied the fellow. But it was better to see someone else do that. And here was a hulking, good-natured Frenchman doing it splendidly.

"Where do you come from? Who's your father?" demanded Rawlings roughly, as if to gain time in which to decide how to act.

Feofé was not to be hurried. He had never been to a school of any sort before, save the local one he attended in France. But he had met boys and youths in plenty. And always this quiet, shambling boy, with his broad shoulders and appearance of hidden power, had won respect without recourse to violence. He took another puff at his cigarette, a habit, by the way, rather more indulged in by boys in France, and regarded the resulting smoke with something approaching affection. His eyes twinkled. He shrugged his massive shoulders.

"Monsieur is somewhat curious," he said, using excellent English. "I am from Lyons. My father, he is a banker. My mother, ah, she is his wife, you understand. Then there is a sister. Susanne, Monsieur, younger by a year than I am. That is the sum of the family, but I will tell you all. There is a dog – yes, two – and a cat, and – "

Rawlings was purple. Beads of perspiration were breaking out on his forehead. Catching a sight of Clive's grinning face he ground his teeth with anger.

"Hang your family!" he shouted at Feofé. "Who wants to hear about Susan?"

Feofé shrugged his shoulders. "You were so very curious," he said. "But I will proceed. We live at Lyons, but sometimes we go to Paris. There I have an aunt and two uncles, Monsieur. Ah! Yes, I must tell you all. The aunt is Susanne also. A pretty name, Monsieur."

Rawlings was on the point of exploding. His dignity had long since gone to the winds. If he dared he would have seized this Feofé by the neck and shaken him. But the young fellow's broad shoulders and smiling, easy assurance warned him that that might be dangerous. But he must assert himself. He must show this Frenchman that he was a superior, and that that must be the light in which he must view him.

"Look here," he said at length, smothering his anger, "no more of your confounded cheek. Susanne's good enough for you, so just remember. You're going to Ranleigh, and it's just as well to tell you that I shall be a prefect. Know what that means?"

Even now he hoped to impress Feofé with his magnificence. But the lad merely raised his brows enquiringly, and shrugged his shoulders still lower against the upholstery of the carriage.

"A prefect. Someone in authority. Well?"

"And to be obeyed. Just chuck that smoking."

"But," began Susanne mildly – we call him Susanne at once, seeing that that name stuck to him forthwith – "but, by the way, what's your name?"

Imagine the impertinence of such a request! A new boy actually having the temerity to coolly ask the name of one who had been three years at the school. Rawlings gasped; he mopped his damp forehead.

"Rawlings," he growled.

"Then, Rawlings, you're a prefect, yes?"

"Not yet," came the somewhat confused answer. "But I shall be this term. It'd be a confounded shame if they passed me over."

"Quite so. A confounded shame. You would be a loss to the other prefects."

Susanne took another appreciative suck at the weed, while Rawlings went hot and cold. Satire went to the depths of his being. This Feofé was covering him with derision.

"Look here," he began threateningly, "it's about time you understood who you are and what I am."

"You're a prefect, yes?" answered Susanne, not the least distressed, his little eyes twinkling, "or will be, at Ranleigh. But you are not one here, in any case. Is it not so? Therefore, Rawlings, get into another carriage if you don't like smoke, and do let us be pleasant."

Never was a man more demoralised than Rawlings. He had made an entry into the carriage with the set purpose of bullying Clive, and of letting that young gentleman see who was to be the master. The commencement of the movement had cost him five precious shillings. That was sore enough. And then, naturally enough, he had addressed himself to this new boy – and had been worsted. It goaded him to madness to see Clive grinning still.

"Well done, Susanne!" called out that worthy, delighted at the turn events had taken. "Rawlings ain't a prefect yet, and in any case we're not at Ranleigh. I say, I'm a new boy too. He lives quite close to me."

He pointed a deprecating finger at Rawlings, and crossed to join Susanne. That young man welcomed him with open arms. The twinkle in his eye brightened, while he eyed Rawlings in a manner which made that individual squirm. In fact, never was the wind taken out of anyone's sails more completely. Susanne had reduced him to silence. Thenceforth Rawlings sat screwed into the corner, regarding the landscape with a face which showed the severest displeasure, while his lips muttered and twisted angrily.

"Wait till I get 'em to Ranleigh, that's all," he was promising himself. "The first thing I do is to kick this Darrell fellow. Then Feofé shall have a turn. I'll get my own back whatever happens."

Clive was no smoker. He was sensible enough to know that it would be harmful to him just as it would be to any other fellow, and for that reason refused the cigarette Susanne offered him. He wedged himself up close to his new chum, and commenced a long and intimate conversation. Meanwhile, other boys entered the train. Some in the next compartment, from which howls of laughter sounded, some in their own. Fellows nodded curtly to Rawlings. The fat Trendall came in at one station to have a chat with him, and found his chum curiously glum and silent. He couldn't understand him at all, nor fathom the movements of the two opposite. For Susanne and Clive regarded Trendall with the smallest interest. According to all the canons of school life they should have looked askance at a fellow who had been at the school a couple of years or so. In Clive's eyes Trendall should have appeared enormous. And, no doubt, had Clive been alone in this adventure, he would have been far less uppish. But Susanne was incorrigible. If he had never been to school before, he was at least not to be frightened by what was before him. To Clive, his easy, calm assurance was refreshing. To Trendall it was inexplicable. Finding conversation lagging he took himself off at the next station, his place being taken by two big fellows, who nodded cheerfully to the occupants of the compartment.

"Hullo, Rawlings!" called one, a very tall, slim young man, on whose upper lip there was a respectable growth of downy hair. "Not dead, then?"

"No," answered that individual sourly.

"New youngsters, eh?" was the second question as the tall fellow turned to Clive and Susanne.

"Yes," answered the former. Susanne took his hat off politely.