Wildney meanwhile was just beginning the next verse, when he was interrupted by a general cry of “cave, cave.”  In an instant the room was in confusion; some one dashed the candles upon the floor, the table was overturned with a mighty crash, and plates, glasses, and bottles rushed on to the ground in shivers.  Nearly every one bolted for the door, which led through the passage into the street; and in their headlong flight and selfishness, they stumbled over each other, and prevented all egress, several being knocked down and bruised in the crush.  Others made for the tap-room; but, as they opened the door leading into it, there stood Mr. Ready and Mr. Gordon! and as it was impossible to pass without being seen, they made no further attempt at escape.  All this was the work of a minute.  Entering the back parlor, the two masters quickly took down the names of full half the boys who, in the suddenness of the surprise, had been unable to make their exit.

And Eric?

The instant that the candles were knocked over, he felt Wildney seize his hand, and whisper, “This way all serene;” following, he groped his way in the dark to the end of the room, where Wildney, shoving aside a green baize curtain, noiselessly opened a door, which at once let them into a little garden.  There they both crouched down, under a lilac tree beside the house, and listened intently.

There was no need for this precaution; their door remained unsuspected, and in five minutes the coast was clear.  Creeping into the house again, they whistled, and Billy coming in, told them that the masters had gone, and all was safe.

“Glad ye’re not twigged, gen’lmen,” he said; “but there’ll be a pretty sight of damage for all this glass and plates.”

“Shut up with your glass and plates,” said Wildney.  “Here, Eric, we must cut for it again.”

It was the dusk of a winter evening when they got out from the close room into the open air, and they had to consider which way they would choose to avoid discovery.  They happened to choose the wrong, but escaped by dint of hard running, and Wildney’s old short cut.  As they ran they passed several boys (who having been caught, were walking home leisurely), and managed to get back undiscovered, when they both answered their names quite innocently at the roll-call, immediately after lock up.

“What lucky dogs you are to get off,” said many boys to them.

“Yes, it’s precious lucky for me,” said Wildney.  “If I’d been caught at this kind of thing a second time, I should have got something worse than a swishing.”

“Well, it’s all through you I escaped,” said Eric, “you knowing little scamp.”

“I’m glad of it, Eric,” said Wildney in his fascinating way, “since it is all through me you went.  It’s rather too hazardous though; we must manage better another time.”