As long as it had hung like a black cloud over the term, boys had lacked spirit and encouragement to rally for the good of the school.

House had been divided against house, set against set, captain against captain, and the order and discipline of the school had gone down to a miserable pitch.
Against all these opposing influences the new captain, as we have seen, had struggled gallantly, and not wholly without success; but even his influence could not disperse all the suspicions, and heartburnings, and jealousies that centred round that unlucky race.

Now, however, the clearing up of that mystery, and, still more, the new alliance, rumours of which were spreading fast, between the two captains, opened new hopes for the old school.
There were not a few who at first treated the rumours of the new alliance with sceptical derision, but they had soon cause to discover that it was more than a joke.
Stutter and Wibberly, two of the sceptics, happened to be caught that very afternoon by Bloomfield in the act of "skulking" dinner--that is, of answering to their names at the call-over, and then slipping off unobserved to enjoy a rather more elaborate clandestine meal in their own study.

It was not a very uncommon offence, or perhaps a very terrible one, but it was an offence which monitors were bound to report.
"Where are you off to ?" demanded Bloomfield, encountering these two deserters.
"Oh, it's all right," said Wibberly, "we've been called over.

We're only going to Stutter's study." "Go back at once," said Bloomfield, "and go to the captain after six." Wibberly laughed.
"You're joking surely," said he; "you usen't to mind the extra feeds now and then." "If I shirked my duty once it's no reason I should do it for ever.