Free Mike at Wrykyn by P.G. Wodehouse

can’t make it out. Where is everybody?”
    “They
can’t all be late.”
    “Somebody
would have turned up by now. Why, it’s just striking.”
    “Perhaps
he sent another notice round the houses late last night, saying it was on again
all right. I say, what a swindle if he did. Someone might have let us know. I should
have got up an hour later.”
    “So
should I.”
    “Hullo,
here is somebody.”
    It was
the master of the Lower Fifth, Mr. Spence. He walked briskly into the room, as
was his habit. Seeing the obvious void, he stopped in his stride, and hooked
puzzled.
    “Willoughby.
Brown. Are you the only two here? Where is everybody?”
    “Please,
sir, we don’t know. We were just wondering.”
    “Have
you seen nobody?”
    “No,
sir. We were just wondering, sir, if the holiday had been put on again, after
all.”
    “I’ve
heard nothing about it. I should have received some sort of intimation if it
had been.”
    “Yes,
sir.”
    “Do you
mean to say that you have seen nobody, Brown?”
    “Only
about a dozen fellows, sir. The usual lot who come on bikes, sir.”
    “None
of the boarders?”
    “No,
sir. Not a single one.”
    “This
is extraordinary.” Mr. Spence pondered.
    “Well,”
he said, “you two fellows had better go along up to the Hall. I shall go to the
Common Room and make inquiries. Perhaps, as you say, there is a holiday today,
and the notice was not brought to me.”
    Mr.
Spence told himself, as he walked to the Common Room, that this might be a
possible solution of the difficulty. He was not a house-master, and lived by
himself in rooms in the town. It was just conceivable that they might have
forgotten to tell him of the change in the arrangements.
    But in
the Common Room the same perplexity reigned. Half a dozen masters were seated
round the room, and a few more were standing. And they were all very puzzled.
    A brisk
conversation was going on. Several voices hailed Mr. Spence as he entered.
    “Hullo,
Spence. Are you alone in the world too?”
    “Any of
your boys turned up, Spence?”
    “You in
the same condition as we are, Spence? “Mr. Spence seated himself on the table.
    “Haven’t
any of your fellows turned up, either?” he said.
    “When I
accepted the honourable post of Lower Fourth master in this abode of sin,” said
Mr. Seymour, “it was on the distinct understanding that there was going to be a Lower Fourth. Yet I go into my form-room this morning, and what do I
find? Simply Emptiness, and Pickersgill II whistling ‘The Lost Chord’ all flat.
I consider I have been hardly treated.”
    “I have
no complaint to make against Brown and Willoughby, as individuals,” said Mr.
Spence; “but, considered as a form, I call them short measure.”
    “I
confess that I am entirely at a loss,” said Mr. Shields precisely. “I have
never been confronted with a situation like this since I became a
schoolmaster.”
    “It is
most mysterious,” agreed Mr. Wain, plucking at his beard. “Exceedingly so.”
    The
younger masters, notably Mr. Spence and Mr. Seymour, had begun to look on the
thing as a huge jest.
    “We had
better teach ourselves,” said Mr. Seymour. “Spence, do a hundred lines for
laughing in form.”
    The
door burst open.
    “Hullo,
here’s another scholastic Little Bo-Peep,” said Mr. Seymour. “Well, Appleby,
have you lost your sheep, too?”
    “You
don’t mean to tell me—” began Mr. Appleby. “I do,” said Mr. Seymour. “Here we
are, fifteen of us, all good men and true, graduates of our Universities, and,
as far as I can see, if we divide up the boys who have come to school this
morning on fair share-and-share-alike lines, it will work out at about
two-thirds of a boy each. Spence, will you take a third of Pickersgill II?”
    “I want
none of your charity,” said Mr. Spence loftily. “You don’t seem to realize that
I’m the best off of you all. I’ve got two in my form. It’s no good offering me
your Pickersgills. I simply haven’t room for