While I was recovering there fell the first thunderdrops of mutiny.  A youth at the back of the gallery, on intercepting the flying message that Fillet had demanded my disqualification and Jerry Brisket had ended by supporting him, roared out a threatening “No!” Maybe, had he not done so, there would never have been the great Bramhall riot.  But many other boys, catching the contagion of his defiance, cried out “No!” The crowd, recently so excited, was easily flushed by the new turn of events, and shouted in unison “No!” Isolated voices called out “Cheat!” “Liar!” Dr. Chapman, as tactless as he was kindly, declared to those about him that Fillet’s judgment was at fault, and thus helped to increase the uproar.  The disaffection spread to the Erasmus men, who said openly:  “We don’t want the beastly cup.  Bramhall won it fair and square.”

And then came the report that I, on receiving the news, had fainted.  This, by provoking deeper sympathy with the hero and greater execration of the villain, acted like paraffin oil on the flames.  Before the masters realised that anything more than disappointment was abroad, rebellion looked them in the face.

Salome saw it and knew that, if his short but brilliant record as headmaster was not to be abruptly destroyed, he must rise to prompt and statesmanlike action.  His first step was to summon all the prefects in the building and say: 

“Ee, bless me, my men, clear the baths.”

The prefects quickly emptied the building of all boys; but outside the door they could do no more than link arms like the City Police and keep back a turbulent mob.  Then Salome, accompanied by Fillet, Upton, and Radley, passed with dignity through his pupils.  He was received in an ominous silence.

Now, behind this revolt there was a hidden hand; and it was the hand of Pennybet.  To effect a coup d’etat and to control and move blind forces were, we know, the particular hobbies of Pennybet.  Here this evening he found blind disorder and rebellion, which, if they were not to die out feebly and expose the rebels to punishment, must be guided and controlled.  So he flattered himself he would take over the reins of mutiny, and hold them in such a clandestine manner that none should recognise whose was the masterhand.  He would cross swords with Salome.  As he said to me the following day:  “I ran that riot, Rupert, and I never enjoyed anything so much in my life.”

His method outside the baths was to keep himself in the background and to whisper to boys, at various points on the circumference of the vast and gathering mob, battle orders, which he knew would be quickly circulated.  They were really his own composition, but, like a good general keeping open his means of retreat, he attributed them to some visionary people, who, in the event of failure, could bear the brunt of the insurrection.

“Some of the chaps are talking about a real organised revolt.  How corking!”