After that Mr Wilkins had to write more than twenty autographs that morning. Then he shut himself in his room and did not answer the door.
For three days he did not look at the notice-board in the common room, but on the evening of the fourth day, after the boys were in bed, Mr Carter saw him tiptoeing from the common room.
"Well, Wilkins, what do you think of your life-story?" asked Mr Carter.
"Silly little boys!" answered Mr Wilkins. "If only they showed as much interest in their algebra as they have in the Boat Race. Silly little boys!"
But Mr Carter could see that Mr Wilkins was really happy.
Next day the Headmaster visited the common room and looked through the Form Three Times. After that he had a short talk with Mr Carter and left the common room. Jennings and Darbishire ran up to Mr Carter.
"Sir, please, sir, what did he say?"
"Yes, sir, did he like it, sir?"
"I think so," Mr Carter answered. "He told me that such hobbies keep you out of mischief."
"It's very nice of him to say so," said Jennings.
Mr Carter smiled.
"What's the matter, sir? Have I said something funny?" asked Jennings.
"No, no," said Mr Carter. "I was thinking, of your Form Three Times which kept you out of mischief."
"What do you mean, sir?" asked Darbishire.
Mr Carter thought for a moment. Then he said:
"Well, during the last weeks I've noticed some strange things: smoke in the dark room, fish in a chimney which happened after you had come back from the harbour with a parcel of fish and I put two and two together and understood what it all meant. Then I remember, also, a sudden interest in Latin textbooks. I'm not quite sure what was behind it all, but I know that when we organized a textbook inspection not all the boys of Form Three were happy."
"Yes, sir... I'm very sorry, sir," said Jennings. "I didn't know you knew all that, sir."
"Don't look so sad, boys," said Mr Carter. "I think the Form Three Times is a very good wall newspaper. And what's more - I think it has kept you out of even worse mischief!"
If hobbies keep the children out of mischief, as Mr Pemberton said, it was riot so with Jennings.
His next hobby (after the wall newspaper) was home-made telephone. The idea came to him before school one Monday when he was I looking for his exercise-book in his desk.
"You know what, Darbi," he said to his friend. "If we had a telephone here I could ring up and ask him if he has got it in the staff room."
"Who has got what in the staff room?" asked Darbishire. It was not always easy to understand what Jennings meant.
"My English exercise-book: I can't find it anywhere in my desk. I think Mr Carter took it at the end of the lesson yesterday afternoon."
"I don't see what you are worrying about," said Darbishire. "If you think Mr Carter has got your English exercise-book, why don't you go and ask him?"
"That's what I shall have to do. I only said that if we had a telephone here I could ring Mr Carter up and ask him, and now I'll have to go there myself."
"You must be crazy, Jen, if you think that the Headmaster could let us have a telephone in the classroom."
"I don't mean a real telephone. I mean a home-made telephone," explained Jennings. "I read an article in a magazine last holidays that told you all about it. It's so easy, really. You need two coffee tins. Then join them together with a long piece of string."
"And then what?"
"Well, that's all. You talk into one of the tins and somebody else listens with the help of the other tin."
Darbishire did not believe it. "It will never work in a million years," he said.
"It will," answered Jennings. "The article said so. The sound waves go along the string and make the bottom of the coffee tin vibrate."
"Still we can't do it."
"But why?"
"We haven't got any coffee tins."
"But they don't have to be coffee tins! We can use any old tins."
"Oh, that's not so bad," agreed Darbishire. "Atkinson has a syrup tin."
"That's good."
"I don't think you will hear much through it," said Darbishire. "You see, it's still half-full of syrup. Of course we can wait till he has eaten it..."
"Well, we can't wait. If I have a good idea, I must begin at once. There must be hundreds of empty tins near the school.
Oh, I know! Mr Carter always has round tobacco tins. I'm sure he will give us some empty ones. Let's go to the staff room and ask him."
"It's a pity you haven't got the telephone already," said Darbishire. "Then you could ring Mr Carter from here."
Jennings looked at him. "That's what I said some moments ago, and you said that I was crazy. Well, now I think you are crazy, because if we had a telephone here already, we wouldn't need to ask Mr Carter for tobacco tins."
"No, I didn't mean that. I thought you wanted to ask him about your English exercise-book."
"Oh, that!" said Jennings. He quickly went out of the classroom and along the corridor. Darbishire followed him. When they turned a corner they nearly collided with Binns and Blotwell, the youngest boys in the school.
"Why are you hurrying?" asked Blotwell
"We are going to ask Mr Carter for some empty tins," answered Darbishire.
"Empty tins of what?" asked Binns.
"You are crazy," said Jennings. "What are empty tins usually full of?"
"Nothing."