The Manor Wodehouse Col ection

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  The Little Warrior

  The Swoop

  William Tell Told Again

  Mike: A Public School Story

  Jill the Reckless

  The Politeness of Princes & Other School Stories

  The Man Upstairs & Other Stories

  The Coming of Bill

  A Man of Means: A Series of Six Stories

  The Gem Collector

  The Adventures of Sally

  The Clicking of Cuthbert

  A Damsel in Distress

  Jeeves in the Springtime & Other Stories

  The Pothunters

  My Man Jeeves

  The Girl on the Boat

  Mike & Psmith

  The White Feather

  The Man With Two Left Feet & Other Stories

  Piccadilly Jim

  Psmith in the City

  Right Ho, Jeeves

  Uneasy Money

  A Prefect’s Uncle

  Psmith Journalist

  The Prince and Betty

  Something New

  The Gold Bat & Other Stories

  Head of Kay’s

  The Intrusion of Jimmy

  The Little Nugget

  Love Among the Chickens

  Tales of St. Austin’s

  Indiscretions of Archie

  Jeeves, Emsworth and Others

  The White Feather

  P. G. Wodehouse

  The Manor Wodehouse Collection

  Tark Classic Fiction

  an imprint of

  MANOR

  Rockville, Maryland

  2008

  Th

  e White Feather by Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, in its current format, copyright © Arc Manor 2008. Th

  is book, in whole or in part, may not be copied or reproduced in its current format by any means, electronic, mechanical or otherwise without the permission of the publisher.

  Th

  e original text has been reformatted for clarity and to fi t this edition.

  Arc Manor, Arc Manor Classic Reprints, Manor Classics, TARK Classic Fiction, Th e and the Arc

  Manor logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Arc Manor Publishers, Rockville, Maryland.

  All other trademarks are properties of their respective owners.

  Th

  is book is presented as is, without any warranties (implied or otherwise) as to the accuracy of the production, text or translation. Th

  e publisher does not take responsibility for any typesetting, format-

  ting, translation or other errors which may have occurred during the production of this book.

  ISBN: 978-1-60450-067-7

  Published by TARK Classic Fiction

  An Imprint of Arc Manor

  P. O. Box 10339

  Rockville, MD 20849-0339

  www.ArcManor.com

  Printed in the United States of America/United Kingdom

  To:

  MY BROTHER

  DICK

  Please Visit

  www.ManorWodehouse.com

  for a complete list of titles available in our

  Manor Wodehouse Collection

  The time of this story is a year and a term later

  than that of The Gold Bat. The history of Wrykyn

  in between these two books is dealt with in a num-

  ber of short stories, some of them brainy in the ex-

  treme, which have appeared in various magazines.

  I wanted Messrs Black to publish these, but they

  were light on their feet and kept away – a painful

  exhibition of the White Feather.

  P. G. WODEHOUSE

  Contents

  Expert Opinions

  

  Sheen at Home

  

  Sheen Receives Visitors and Advice

  

  The Better Part of Valour

  

  The White Feather

  

  Albert Redivivus

  

  Mr Joe Bevan

  

  A Naval Battle and its Consequences

  

  Sheen Begins Hwis Education

  

  Sheen’s Progress

  

  A Small Incident

  

  Dunstable and Linton Go Up the River

  

  Deus Ex Machina

  

  A Skirmish

  

  The Rout at Ripton

  

  Drummond Goes Into Retirement

  

  Seymour’s One Success

  

  Mr Bevan Makes a Suggestion

  

  Paving the Way

  

  Sheen Goes to Aldershot

  

  A Good Start

  

  A Good Finish

  

  A Surprise for Seymour’s

  

  Bruce Explains

  

  Chapter 

  Expert Opinions

  “With apologies to gent opposite,” said Clowes, “I must say I don’t

  think much of the team.”

  “Don’t apologise to me,” said Allardyce disgustedly, as he fi lled

  the teapot, “I think they’re rotten.”

  “Th

  ey ought to have got into form by now, too,” said Trevor. “It’s

  not as if this was the fi rst game of the term.”

  “First game!” Allardyce laughed shortly. “Why, we’ve only got a

  couple of club matches and the return match with Ripton to end the

  season. It is about time they got into form, as you say.”

  Clowes stared pensively into the fi re.

  “Th

  ey struck me,” he said, “as the sort of team who’d get into

  form somewhere in the middle of the cricket season.”

  “Th

  at’s about it,” said Allardyce. “Try those biscuits, Trevor.

  Th

  ey’re about the only good thing left in the place.”

  “School isn’t what it was?” inquired Trevor, plunging a hand into

  the tin that stood on the fl oor beside him.

  “No,” said Allardyce, “not only in footer but in everything. Th

  e

  place seems absolutely rotten. It’s bad enough losing all our matches,

  or nearly all. Did you hear that Ripton took thirty-seven points off

  us last term? And we only just managed to beat Greenburgh by a try

  to nil.”

  “We got thirty points last year,” he went on. “Th

  irty-three, and

  forty-two the year before. Why, we’ve always simply walked them.

  It’s an understood thing that we smash them. And this year they

  held us all the time, and it was only a fl uke that we scored at all.

  Th

  eir back miskicked, and let Barry in.”

  9

  P. G. WODEHOUSE

  “Barry struck me as the best of the outsides today,” said Clowes.

  “He’s heavier than he was, and faster.”

  “He’s all right,” agreed Allardyce. “If only the centres would

  feed him, we might do something occasionally. But did you ever see

  such a pair of rotters?”

  “Th

  e man who was marking me certainly didn’t seem particu-

  larly brilliant. I don’t even know his name. He didn’t do anything at

  footer in my time,” said Trevor.

  “He’s a chap called Attell. He wasn’t here with you. He came

  after the summer holidays. I believe he was sacked from somewhere.

  He’s no good, but there’s nobody else. Colours have been simply a

  gift this year to anyone who can do a thing. Only Barry and myself

  left from last year’s team. I never saw such a clearance as there was

  after the summer term.”

  “Where are the boys of the Old Brigade?” sighed Clowes.

  “I don’t know. I wish they were here,” said Allardyce.

  Trevor and Clowes had come down, after the Easter term had

  been in progress for a fortnight, to play for an Oxford A team against

  the school. Th

  e match had resulted in an absurdly easy victory for

  the visitors by over forty points. Clowes had scored fi ve tries off his

  own bat, and Trevor, if he had not fed his wing so conscientiously,

  would probably have scored an equal number. As it was, he had got

  through twice, and also dropped a goal. Th

  e two were now having a

  late tea with Allardyce in his study. Allardyce had succeeded Trevor

  as Captain of Football at Wrykyn, and had found the post anything

  but a sinecure.

  For Wrykyn had fallen for the time being on evil days. It was

  experiencing the reaction which so often takes place in a school in

  the year following a season of exceptional athletic prosperity. With

  Trevor as captain of football, both t

he Ripton matches had been won,

  and also three out of the four other school matches. In cricket the

  eleven had had an even fi ner record, winning all their school match-

  es, and likewise beating the M.C.C. and Old Wrykinians. It was

  too early to prophesy concerning the fortunes of next term’s cricket

  team, but, if they were going to resemble the fi fteen, Wrykyn was

  doomed to the worst athletic year it had experienced for a decade.

  “It’s a bit of a come-down after last season, isn’t it?” resumed

  Allardyce, returning to his sorrows. It was a relief to him to discuss

  his painful case without restraint.

  10

  THE WHITE FEATHER

  “We were a fi ne team last year,” agreed Clowes, “and especial-

  ly strong on the left wing. By the way, I see you’ve moved Barry

  across.”

  “Yes. Attell can’t pass much, but he passes better from right to

  left than from left to right; so, Barry being our scoring man, I shifted

  him across. Th

  e chap on the other wing, Stanning, isn’t bad at times.

  Do you remember him? He’s in Appleby’s. Th

  en Drummond’s use-

  ful at half.”

  “Jolly useful,” said Trevor. “I thought he would be. I recom-

  mended you last year to keep your eye on him.”

  “Decent chap, Drummond,” said Clowes.

  “About the only one there is left in the place,” observed Al-

  lardyce gloomily.

  “Our genial host,” said Clowes, sawing at the cake, “appears to

  have that tired feeling. He seems to have lost that joie de vivre of his, what?”

  “It must be pretty sickening,” said Trevor sympathetically. “I’m

  glad I wasn’t captain in a bad year.”

  “Th

  e rummy thing is that the worse they are, the more side

  they stick on. You see chaps who wouldn’t have been in the third

  in a good year walking about in fi rst fi fteen blazers, and fi rst fi fteen

  scarves, and fi rst fi fteen stockings, and sweaters with fi rst fi fteen

  colours round the edges. I wonder they don’t tattoo their faces with

  fi rst fi fteen colours.”

  “It would improve some of them,” said Clowes.

  Allardyce resumed his melancholy remarks. “But, as I was say-

  ing, it’s not only that the footer’s rotten. Th

  at you can’t help, I sup-

  pose. It’s the general beastliness of things that I bar. Rows with the

  town, for instance. We’ve been having them on and off ever since

  you left. And it’ll be worse now, because there’s an election coming

  off soon. Are you fellows stopping for the night in the town? If so, I

  should advise you to look out for yourselves.”

  “Th

  anks,” said Clowes. “I shouldn’t like to see Trevor sand-

  bagged. Nor indeed, should I – for choice – care to be sand-bagged

  myself. But, as it happens, the good Donaldson is putting us up, so

  we escape the perils of the town.

  “Everybody seems so beastly slack now,” continued Allardyce.

  “It’s considered the thing. You’re looked on as an awful blood if you

  say you haven’t done a stroke of work for a week. I shouldn’t mind

  11

  P. G. WODEHOUSE

  that so much if they were some good at anything. But they can’t do

  a thing. Th

  e footer’s rotten, the gymnasium six is made up of kids

  an inch high – we shall probably be about ninetieth at the Public

  Schools’ Competition – and there isn’t any one who can play rac-

  quets for nuts. Th

  e only thing that Wrykyn’ll do this year is to get

  the Light-Weights at Aldershot. Drummond ought to manage that.

  He won the Feathers last time. He’s nearly a stone heavier now, and

  awfully good. But he’s the only man we shall send up, I expect. Now

  that O’Hara and Moriarty are both gone, he’s the only chap we have

  who’s up to Aldershot form. And nobody else’ll take the trouble to

  practice. Th

  ey’re all too slack.”

  “In fact,” said Clowes, getting up, “as was only to be expected,

  the school started going to the dogs directly I left. We shall have to

  be pushing on now, Allardyce. We promised to look in on Seymour

  before we went to bed. Friend let us away.”

  “Good night,” said Allardyce.

  “What you want,” said Clowes solemnly, “is a liver pill. You

  are looking on life too gloomily. Take a pill. Let there be no stint.

  Take two. Th

  en we shall hear your merry laugh ringing through

  the old cloisters once more. Buck up and be a bright and happy lad,

  Allardyce.”

  “Take more than a pill to make me that,” growled that soured

  footballer.

  Mr Seymour’s views on the school resembled those of Allardyce.

  Wrykyn, in his opinion, was suff ering from a reaction.

  “It’s always the same,” he said, “after a very good year. Boys

  leave, and it’s hard to fi ll their places. I must say I did not expect

  quite such a clearing out after the summer. We have had bad luck in

  that way. Maurice, for instance, and Robinson both ought to have

  had another year at school. It was quite unexpected, their leaving.

  Th

  ey would have made all the diff erence to the forwards. You must

  have somebody to lead the pack who has had a little experience of

  fi rst fi fteen matches.”

  “But even then” said Clowes, “they oughtn’t to be so rank as they

  were this afternoon. Th

  ey seemed such slackers.”

  “I’m afraid that’s the failing of the school just now,” agreed Mr

  Seymour. “Th

  ey don’t play themselves out. Th

  ey don’t put just that

  last ounce into their work which makes all the diff erence.”

  12

  THE WHITE FEATHER

  Clowes thought of saying that, to judge by appearances, they

  did not put in even the fi rst ounce; but refrained. However low an

  opinion a games’ master may have – and even express – of his team,

  he does not like people to agree too cordially with his criticisms.

  “Allardyce seems rather sick about it,” said Trevor.

  “I am sorry for Allardyce. It is always unpleasant to be the only

  survivor of an exceptionally good team. He can’t forget last year’s matches, and suff ers continual disappointments because the present

  team does not play up to the same form.”

  “He was saying something about rows with the town,” said

  Trevor, after a pause.

  “Yes, there has certainly been some unpleasantness lately. It is

  the penalty we pay for being on the outskirts of a town. Four years

  out of fi ve nothing happens. But in the fi fth, when the school has

  got a little out of hand—”

  “Oh, then it really has got out of hand?” asked Clowes.

  “Between ourselves, yes,” admitted Mr Seymour.

  “What sort of rows?” asked Trevor.

  Mr Seymour couldn’t explain exactly. Nothing, as it were, defi -

  nite – as yet. No actual complaints so far. But still – well, trouble

  – yes, trouble.

  “For instance,” he said, “a boy in my house, Linton – you re-

  member him? – is moving in society at this moment with a swollen

  lip and minus a front tooth. Of course, I know nothing about it,

  but I fancy he got into trouble in the town. Th

  at is merely a straw

  which shows how the wind is blowing, but if you lived on the spot

  you would see more what I mean. Th

  ere is trouble in the air. And

  now that this election is coming on, I should not wonder if things

  came to a head. I can’t remember a single election in Wrykyn when

  there was not disorder in the town. And if the school is going to join

  in, as it probably will, I shall not be sorry when the holidays come. I

  know the headmaster is only waiting for an excuse to put the town

  out of bounds.’

  “But the kids have always had a few rows on with that school in

  the High Street – what’s it’s name – St Something?” said Clowes.

  “Jude’s,” supplied Trevor.

  “St Jude’s!” said Mr Seymour. “Have they? I didn’t know that.”

  “Oh yes. I don’t know how it started, but it’s been going on for

 

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