Billy Bunter of Greyfriars School and Billy Bunter's ... (19 page)

CHAPTER XXXVII

ALL RIGHT FOR BUNTER!

BILLY BUNTER never knew how he did it!
Perhaps, somewhere under Billy Bunter’s layers of fat, there was a spot of
pluck—genuine old British pluck!
He did not stop to think.
Had he done so, perhaps he never would have done it at all! For there was no
doubt that the hapless fat Owl was in a funk—the bluest of funks! The mere
sight of Nosey Jenkins scared him. The mere thought of coming near the ruffian,
within reach of his cudgel, made him quake. Bunter was the man to run from
danger, real or imaginary. To run into danger was not in his line at all.
Yet he did it.
Clamped on the branch over the footpath, directly above the startling scene
below, the Owl of the Remove blinked down in terror, almost paralysed by what
he saw. He couldn’t help Quelch—he couldn’t try to help him—one lick of the
footpad’s cudgel would knock him out if he jumped down and tried it on. He
couldn’t—!
But, as that cudgel went up, over the helpless and unprotected “nut” of Mr.
Quelch, Bunter, whether he could or not, suddenly did!
There was a sudden rustle in the leafy branches, as Bunter, for a split second,
hung by his fat hands—and dropped.
He dropped right on Nosey Jenkins.
What happened, Nosey did not know. It was so entirely unexpected and unlooked-for.
One moment, Nosey Jenkins was pinning Mr. Quelch down, with the stick uplifted
to crack his “nut”—the next, something extremely heavy and very solid squashed
him down in the grass beside Quelch: landing on him with the effect of a
particularly powerful steam-hammer!
Nosey crumpled and sprawled under that solid weight. He gave a faint moan as he
collapsed. He wriggled, gurgling, in the grass. He was winded to the wide.
There was hardly a breath left in Nosey. He was dazed, dizzy, half-stunned, and
wholly winded—and he wriggled in helpless anguish. Nosey, at the moment, had
only one desire and object in life, which was, to get his wind again—if he
could. He felt as if he couldn’t.
Bunter rolled in the grass.
Mr. Quelch sat up.
He was as surprised at Nosey. For the moment, he did not know what had saved
him, any more than Nosey knew what had reduced him to a gurgling, gibbering
wreck.
Then he saw Bunter.
He staggered to his feet, grabbing up his walking-stick as he did so, in case
it should be wanted. But it was not wanted. Nosey was
hors de combat
. Nosey
had no eyes for him—no thought for him—no thought for anything but getting his
wind.
Mr. Quelch gave him one look. Then he gazed at Bunter. He gazed at him in
amazement and wonder.
Bunter sat up, in his turn.
He was breathless, he was dizzy, he was bewildered: he gasped and spluttered,
and grabbed at the spectacles that had slid down his little fat nose.
“Bunter!” ejaculated Mr. Quelch.
“Oooooh!” gasped Bunter.
Quelch gazed at him. Then he glanced upward. He realised that Bunter must have
dropped from the branch above. It really was amazing.
“Bunter! You—you were in that tree—!”
“Oh! No!” gasped Bunter. He set his spectacles straight, and blinked at his
form-master, remembering the soot.  “Oh! No, sir! I—I wasn’t—I—I—I mean I—I
wasn’t up to anything, sir! I—I—I like climbing trees, sir!”
He scrambled to his feet, with a terrified blink at the sprawling, gurgling,
helpless Nosey. But even Bunter could see that Nosey was no longer dangerous.
Moreover on his feet, with his walking-stick in his hand, Mr. Quelch was much
more than a match for Nosey. Bunter was reassured.
He could not quite understand the expression on Mr. Quelch’s countenance. He
blinked very uneasily at Quelch. The soot was on his fat conscience—still, he
realised that Quelch could not possibly know anything about the bag of soot,
parked in the fork of the branch above. Still, you never could tell, with a
beak! Quelch might suspect that he had been hidden in that tree for some
nefarious purpose! It would be like him!
“You have been of very material assistance to me, Bunter.” To Bunter’s relief,
Quelch’s voice was very mild. He was not barking at a fellow, as usual. “Of
very material assistance indeed. Bunter.”
“I—I—I wasn’t afraid of that brute, sir. I—I couldn’t let him cosh you with
that stick—I—I mean. I—I couldn’t let him crack your nut, sir—so I—I jumped
down on him, sir—I—I couldn’t do anything else—I—mean, I——I wasn’t afraid—oh,
lor’!”
Mr. Quelch smiled.
That Bunter had been frightened out of his fat wits was evident. But that
really made it all the more to his credit that he had somehow screwed his
courage up to the sticking-point, and weighed in to his form-master’s rescue.
Mr. Quelch knew that he had had a narrow escape from serious damage. He knew
that he owed it to Bunter. And this was the member of his form whom he had
decided, after deep consideration, to recommend his parent to take away from
Greyfriars, in a letter accompanying the worst report ever! He had been unable
to think of a single item to Bunter’s credit that could be put into that
report! He was able to think of one now!
What his form-master was thinking, as he gazed at him. Billy Bunter did not
know. But the smile that glimmered on the crusty countenance rather reassured
him.
“You have acted with courage, Bunter,” said Mr. Quelch, at last.
“Oh!” gasped Bunter. Evidently Quelch wasn’t waxy!
“I am very much obliged to you, Bunter.”
“Oh!” repeated Bunter, blankly. He wondered dizzily whether this could really
be Quelch speaking!
“I shall certainly refer to this incident, which is much to your credit, in
your term’s report, Bunter.”
“Oh!” gasped Bunter, again.
“And most certainly I shall not advise your father, Bunter, to take you away
from the school.”
“Oh!” gasped Bunter, for the fourth time.
“I trust, Bunter, that, in your general conduct, you will endeavour to justify
the better opinion I have formed of you!”
“Oh! Yes, sir!”
“And now,” said Mr. Quelch, “please go to Courtfield, as quickly as you can, to
the police-station, report what has occurred, and request them to send a
constable here to take this man into custody.”
Bill Bunter rolled off to Courtfield in quite high spirits. Nosey Jenkins
recovered his wind before the constable arrived from Courtfield. But as a
grim-faced schoolmaster was standing over him, with a walking-stick ready for
action, he had no choice but to remain where he was, until the constable
arrived. After which, Mr. Quelch, in a thoughtful mood, resumed his walk to Highcliffe.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

THE REWARD OF VALOUR!

“I SAY, you fellows!”
“Hallo, hallo, hallo!”
“It’s all right, you chaps—!”
“Right as rain!” agreed Bob Cherry. “Why didn’t you roll over and see us beat
Highcliffe, Bunter?”
“Eh! Did you beat them?” asked Bunter.
“Fifteen runs—!” said Harry Wharton.
“That all?” asked Bunter. “Bit different from that if you’d played me, I
fancy.”
“More than a bit, I think,” agreed the captain of the Remove, laughing.
 “Jolly good game,” said Bob. “Highcliffe were in great form. But we pulled it
off. Quelch saw the finish—.”
“Oh! You’ve seen Quelch?” asked Bunter. “Did he tell you that I saved his life
this afternoon?”
“Eh”
“What?”
“Which?”
“Didn’t he tell you? Well, I think he might have mentioned it,” said Bunter,
with a grunt. “After all, it’s not the sort of thing that happens every day, is
it?”
“Nunno! Not quite!” gasped Bob Cherry. “What are you burbling about now,
fathead?”
“Oh! I happened to save his life, that’s all,” said Bunter, carelessly—quite as
if life-saving was the kind of thing he did in leisure moments, without
attaching any great importance thereto.
“That’s Bunter’s latest,” explained Skinner. “You fellows haven’t heard! It’s
his best so far—.”
“Oh, really, Skinner——,”
“I guess it lays over anything he’s spilt before,” agreed Fisher T. Fish.
‘Oh, really, Fishy—.”
“Has anything happened to Quelch?” asked Bob. “He looked much the same as usual
when he turned up at Highcliffe.”
“He wouldn’t have turned up, if I hadn’t saved his life,” said Bunter, “I’ve
told these fellows. I’m not the fellow to swank, I hope. Still, when a fellow
rushes into danger, and faces up to a desperate villain armed to the teeth—.”
“Ha, ha, ha!”
Harry Wharton and Co. had found Bunter in the Rag when they came in. Other
fellows were there, apparently in a state of merriment. Now the returned
cricketers joined in the merriment. Bunter’s latest seemed, as Skinner
expressed it, his best so far!
“Oh, cackle!” said Bunter, disdainfully. “I can tell you, that it’s all right for
me now! Quelch ain’t down on me now I’ve shaved his wife—I mean, saved his
life. He’s going to give me a jolly good report. He’s going to ask my pater, as
a special favour, to keep me on at Greyfriars. He said so.”
“I can hear him saying it!” grinned Peter Todd.
“You’d have heard him, if you’d been there,” said Bunter. “He put his hand on
my shoulder, and said ‘Gallant lad!’”
“Quelch did?” shrieked Bob.
“Yes—his very words! Putting his hand on my shoulder, he said ‘Gallant lad! If
only the other boys in my form were more like you!’”
“Oh, my hat!”
“He said ‘Greyfriars cannot afford to lose you, Bunter!’”
“Go it!” chuckled Smithy. “Let’s hear some more.”
“I’m telling you exactly what Quelch said—!”
“Ha, ha, ha!”
“The exactfulness is not terrific, my esteemed fat Bunter,” chuckled Hurree
Jamset Ram Singh.
“But how did you save his life?” asked Johnny Bull. “Did you turn away suddenly
when be was just going to see your features—or what?”
“Yah! You see, you fellows, that man with the boko—the man the bobby was
after—got Quelch in the wood on the common,” explained Bunter. “Well, I was
there! He sprang on Quelch like a tiger, and I sprang on him like a—a—a—,”
“Like a hippopotamus?” asked Peter Todd.
“Ha, ha, ha!”
“Like a lion!” hooted Bunter. “I sprang on him like a lion, and bore him—.”
“Now we’re gettin’ the facts,” remarked the Bounder. “Bunter would naturally
bore
anybody.”
“That’s so,” agreed Bob. “He’s boring us now, if you come to that. What
happened after you bored him, Bunter?”
“Not bored—bore!” roared Bunter. “I bore him to the earth. Not bored, you silly
ass! Bore him to the earth in a grip of iron. Heedless of his knife, I pinned
him to the earth—he had a knife about a foot long, sharp as a razor. Did I
care?”
“You wouldn’t!” chuckled Nugent.
“Ha, ha, ha!”
“Well, I didn’t!” said Bunter, disdainfully. “I simply took no notice of it. I
sprang on him and seized him, and bore him to the earth, just in time to keep
him from cracking Quelch’s nut with his bludgeon—. He had a tremendous big
bludgeon, with a huge knob on the end—it missed me by the fraction of an inch
as I sprang. If it had hit me, it would have knocked my brains out.”
“If any!” remarked Peter Todd.
“But the misfulness is as good as the milefulness.” said Hurree Jamset Ram Singh,
“and the esteemed Bunter lives to tell the tale.”
“It was a jolly narrow escape,” said Bunter. “I felt the wind of the bullet—I
mean the bludgeon—as it barely missed. He was holding Quelch down—.”
“Holding Quelch down!” yelled Bob.
“Yes, he had him down, holding him in a grip of—of steel—.”
“Some desperado!” said Bob, “with a knife in one hand, and a bludgeon in the
other, he was holding Quelch down—what hand did he use for that, Bunty?”
“Must have called in at the Labour Exchange, and taken on an extra hand!”
suggested Skinner.
“Ha, ha, ha!”
“Handy sort of chap, anyhow,” said Bob. “Go it, Bunter! This is getting
curiouser and curiouser, as Alice said in Wonderland.”
“I—I mean—!” Bunter stammered. Bunter never could tell a plain, unvarnished tale.
Often he overdid the details. “I—I mean—the—the fact is—.”
“Never mind the facts,” said Bob. “Facts aren’t in your line, old fat bean.
Keep to the story.”
“Ha, ha, ha!”
“If you fellows don’t believe me—!” roared Bunter, indignantly.
“Believe you! Oh, scissors!”
“Well, I did it!” snorted Bunter. “I got the villain, and saved Quelch’s
life—.”
“The only one he had, too!” said Bob. “Good work!”
“Yah! I jolly well did it! Like
Othello,
alone I did it! See?”
“Oh, crumbs! Do you mean
Coriolanus
?” asked Harry Wharton.
“No, I don’t mean
Coriolanus
—I mean
Othello
,” retorted Bunter.
“You can’t teach me Milton, Wharton.”
“Milton!” gurgled Bob. “Wasn’t it Shakespeare?”
“No, it wasn’t! Anyhow, alone I did it! And when that desperate ruffian lay
senseless at my feet, Quelch put his hand on my head—.”
“As well as your shoulder?”
“I mean, on my shoulder, and said—. Oh, crikey!”
Bunter broke off with that ejaculation, as he discerned a lean and angular
figure in the doorway of the Rag, looking in.
All the juniors looked round at Mr. Quelch. They wondered what had brought
their form-master to the Rag—and whether he had caught any of Billy Bunter’s
thrilling tale of derring-do. If he had, they expected to hear the thunder
roll.
But the Remove master’s expression was quite placable.
“Bunter!” His voice was kindly in tone.
“Oh! Yes, sir!” gasped Bunter.
Mr. Quelch walked in. He had a box—rather a large cardboard box—in his hand. To
the general astonishment, he gave Bunter a kindly smile.
“Bunter, I have brought you this small gift, not as a reward, of course, for
your courageous act this afternoon, but as a token of my good opinion.”
“Oh! Thank you, sir!” gasped Bunter.
Mr. Quelch glanced round at the staring juniors. They were wondering, dizzily,
whether there might be a word of truth—just one word!—in the startling tale
related by the fat Owl.
“Has—has—has Bunter done anything, sir?” gasped Bob.
“Certainly he has,” said Mr. Quelch. “I was attacked this afternoon by a
dangerous tramp, and Bunter, who by a fortunate chance had climbed a tree on
the spot, jumped down, falling on the man’s head, and temporarily disabling
him. I am very much obliged to Bunter.”
And Mr. Quelch, with an uncommonly gracious smile to the fattest member of his
form, walked out of the Rag.
Bunter was left with the box in his fat hands, blinking.
“Well, my only summer bonnet!” said Bob. “Wonders will never cease! I’ll bet
you never told Quelch why you were up that tree, you fat villain!”
“Ha, ha, ha!”
“Quelch didn’t mention that the tramp had a knife a foot long,” remarked
Skinner.
“Well, he was a bit flurried, naturally,” said Bunter. “I daresay he never
noticed it. I was cool, of course—as cool as a cowcurnber—I mean, as cow as a
cool-cumber—I—I mean—. I say, you fellows. I wonder what’s in this box!”
Billy Bunter was not long in ascertaining what was in the box. It was packed.
to the brim, with toffees. Bunter blinked at it. He beamed at it. He grabbed at
the contents, and transferred a considerable quantity of the same to the
largest mouth in the Remove.
“I say, you fellows.” His voice was a little muffled. “I say, these toffees are
prime! I say, Quelch is no fool! He knows how to treat a fellow who saved his
life! I say, these toffees are topping.”
“Ha, ha, ha!”
Evidently Quelch had guessed the kind of gift that Bunter would appreciate!
Bunter gobbled and beamed.
“I say, you fellows, have some of these toffees! There’s
lots—and lots—and lots! I say, Quelch ain’t such a beast —ooogh—grooogh——. He
ain’t such a beast as you fellows think—. Grooogh! Ooogh! Wooogh!” Bunter
choked, and coughed, and recovered. “Urrrggh! I say, they’re ripping! Have
some, you fellows.”
And the fellows chuckled and had some.
It was a happy and sticky Owl. The toffees were good—and almost as good as the
toffees was the knowledge that Quelch had relented, and that the Remove was not
going to lose its brightest ornament: that next term the happy Owl would still
be Billy Bunter of Greyfriars School!