"Oh, come _on_!" exclaimed Phipps, and led Thomas away.

"That kid," said Gorrick to Spencer, "wants his head smacked, badly."

"That's just what I say," agreed Spencer, with the eagerness of a
great mind which has found another that thinks alike with itself.

Spencer was the first of the trio ready to enter the water. His
movements were wary and deliberate. There was nothing of the
professional diver about Spencer. First he stood on the edge and
rubbed his arms, regarding the green water beneath with suspicion and
dislike. Then, crouching down, he inserted three toes of his left
foot, drew them back sharply, and said "Oo!" Then he stood up again.
His next move was to slap his chest and dance a few steps, after which
he put his right foot into the water, again remarked "Oo!" and resumed
Position I.

"Thought you said it was warm," he shouted to Gorrick.

"So it is; hot as anything. Come on in."

And Spencer came on in. Not because he wanted to--for, by rights,
there were some twelve more movements to be gone through before he
should finally creep in at the shallow end--but because a cold hand,
placed suddenly on the small of his back, urged him forward. Down he
went, with the water fizzing and bubbling all over and all round him.
He swallowed a good deal of it, but there was still plenty left; and
what there was was colder than one would have believed possible.

He came to the surface after what seemed to him a quarter of an hour,