by W. W. Jacobs
A faint whisper said, "Nineteen."
The Dean started. "Nineteen! Oh, dear me, dear me! this is worse thanI thought--far worse. I am afraid, Mr. Carter, I shall have to write toyour father."
Guttural with emotion, Mr. Carter gasped: "I mean to work--indeed I do."
Again the Dean frantically searched on his desk to discover the subjectin which Mr. Carter had failed; again was unsuccessful. Deep thoughtravelled his brow. His fingers drummed indecision on the table. It was atelling picture of one struggling between duty and kindliness--masterlyas the result of long practice.
"Mr. Carter," the Dean summed up, "I will consider your case more fullyto-night. Against my better judgment I may perhaps decide not on thisoccasion to communicate with your father. But remember this. At the veryoutset of your career you have strained to breaking-point the confidenceof your teachers. Only by stupendous efforts on your part can thatconfidence be restored. These failures, believe me, will dog you fromnow until you are qualified--nay, will dog your whole professionalcareer. That will do."
In a convulsion of relief and of agitation beneath this appallingprospect the dogged man quavered thanks; stumbled from the room.
III.
George laughed. "Same old dressing-down," he said. "Don't you ever alterthe formula?"
"It's very effective," the Dean replied. "That's the sixth this morning.Unfortunately I couldn't remember in what subject that boy had failed;so he didn't get the best part--the part about that being the onesubject of all others which, if failed in, predicted ruin."
"It was biology in my case," George told him. "I trembled with funk."
"I think most of you do. It's fortunate that all you men when you firstcome up are afraid of your fathers. It gives us a certain amount of holdover you. If the thing were done properly, both at the 'Varsities andthe hospitals, there would be a system of marks and reports just as atschools. You are only boys when you first come up, and you should betreated as boys; instead, you are left free and irresponsible. It ruinsdozens of men every year."
"Perhaps that's why I'm here now," George responded. "You know I gotploughed?"
The Dean told George how sorry he had been to hear it. He questioned:"Bad luck, I suppose? I thought it was a sitter for you this time."
"Yes, rotten luck."
"It's unfortunate, you know. You would have got a house appointment. I'mafraid you will miss that mow. There will be a crowd of very hot menup with you in October, junior to you, who will get the vacancies. Whatwill you do?"
George shrugged and laughed.
The Dean frowned; interpreted the shrug. "Well, you should care," hesaid. "You ought to be looking around you. Won't your uncle help you tobuy a partnership?"
"We are on worse terms than ever after this failure. Not he."
"And you're not trying to be on good terms, I suppose?"
"Not I."
"You are a remarkably silly young man. You want balance, Leicester, youwant balance. It would be the making of you to have some serious purposein life. You will run against something of the kind soon--you'll getengaged, perhaps, and then you'll regret your happy-go-lucky ways." Hefumbled amongst a pile of correspondence and drew out a letter. "Now,look here, I was thinking of you only a few moments ago. Here's a letterfrom a man who--who--where is it?--Ah, yes--If you could raise 400pounds by the time you are qualified I could put you on to a splendidthing."
"Not the remotest chance," said George. "The serious purpose must wait.I--"
The Dean waved a hand that asked silence; consulted the letter. "This isfrom a man in practice at a place called Runnygate--one of these risingseaside resorts--Hampshire--great friend of mine. He's got money, andhe's going to chuck it--doesn't suit his wife. I told him I'd find apurchaser if he would leave it with me. Merely nominal--only 400pounds. He says that in a year or so there'll be a small fortune in thepractice, because a company is taking the place over to develop it. Youshall have first refusal. Come now, pull yourself together, Leicester."
George laughed. He stood up. "Thanks, I refuse now. What on earth's thegood?"
"Rubbish," said the Dean. "Think over that serious interest in life. Younever know your luck."
George moved to the door. "I know my luck all right," he laughed. "Nevermind, I'm not grumbling with it."
CHAPTER V.
Upon Life: And May Be Missed.
In the ante-room, as it were, of a very short chapter, we must makeready to receive our heroine. She is about to spring dazzling upon ourpages; will be our close companion through some moving scenes. We mustcollect ourselves, brush our hair, arrange our dress, prepare our nicestmanner.
And as in ante-rooms there are commonly papers laid about to beguile thetedium, and as the faint rustle of our heroine's petticoats is warningthat George's assertion that he knew his luck is immediately to bedisproved, let us make a tiny little paper on the folly of such astatement.
For of his luck man has no glimmer of prescience. Day by day werattle the box, throw the dice; but of how these will fall we have noknowledge. We only hope with the gambler's feverishness; and it is thisvery hazard that keeps us crowding and pushing to hold our place atthe tables where fortune spins. Grow we sick of the game, sour with ourluck, weary of the hazard, and relinquish we our place at the table, weare pushed back and out--elbowed, thrown, trampled.
We are all treasure-seekers set on a treasure-island in a boundless sea.Cruelly marooned we are--flung ashore without appeal, and here deserteduntil the ship that disembarked us suddenly swoops and the press-gangsnatches us again aboard--again without heed to our desire. Whence theship brought us we do not know, and whither it will carry us we do notknow; there is none to prick a return voyage disclosing the ultimatehaven, though pilots there be who pretend to the knowledge--we cannottest them.
But the marooners, when they land us, give us wherewith to occupy ourthoughts. This is a treasure-island. Each man of us they land with apick; the inhabitants tell us of the treasure, and, being acclimatised,we set to work to dig and delve. Some work in shafts already sunk, someseek to break new ground, but what the pick will next turn up no oneknows.
And it is this uncertainty, this hazard, that keeps us hammer, hammer,hammering; that keeps us, some from brooding against the marooners,their wanton desertion of us, our ultimate fate at their hands; othersfrom making ready against the return voyage as entreated by the pilots.
Certainly, when the pick strikes a pocket, we turn to carousing; ceasecocking a timid eye at the horizon.
And now our heroine is beckoning.
CHAPTER VI.
Magnificent Arrival Of A Heroine.
I.
Until three o'clock George sat in an operating theatre. An unimportantcase was in process: occasionally, through the group of dressers,surgeons and nurses who filled the floor, George caught a glimpse of thesubject. He watched moodily, too occupied with his thoughts--three moremonths of dependency--to take greater interest.
One other student was present. Peacefully he slumbered by George's sideuntil the ring of a dropped forceps awakened him. Noting the cause,"Clumsy beast," said this Mr. Franklyn; and to George: "Come on,Leicester; my slumber is broken. Let's go for a stroll up West."
In Oxford Street a pretty waitress in a tea-shop drew Mr. Franklyn'seye; a drop of rain whacked his nose. He winked the eye; wiped the nose."Tea," said he; "it is going to rain."
He addressed the pretty waitress: "I have no wish to seem inquisitive,but which table do you attend?"
The girl jerked her chin: "What's that to you?"
"So much," Mr. Franklyn earnestly told her, "that, until I know, here,beautiful but inconvenient, in the doorway I stand."
"Well, all of 'em." She whisked away.
"You're badly snubbed, Franklyn," George said. "This rain is nothing."
A summer shower crashed down as he spoke; a mob of shoppers, breathlessfor shelter, drove them inwards.
"George," said Mr. Franklyn, seating himself, "your base mind thinks
Ihave designs on this girl. I grieve at so distorted a fancy. The childsays prettily that she attends 'all of 'em.' It is a gross case ofoverwork into which I feel it my duty more closely to inquire."
George laughed. "Do you always spend your afternoons like this?"
"As a rule, yes. I have been fifteen years at St. Peter's awaiting thatday when through pure ennui the examiners will pass me. It will be a sadwrench to leave the dear old home." He continued, a tinge of melancholyin his voice: "You know, I am the last of the old brigade. The medicalstudent no longer riots. His name is no longer a byword; he is a rabbit.Alone, undismayed, I uphold the old traditions. I am, so to speak,one of the old aristocracy. Beneath the snug characteristics of thelatter-day student--his sweet abhorrence of a rag, his nasty delightin plays which he calls 'hot-stuff,' his cigarettes and hischess-playing--beneath these my head, like Henley's, is bloody butunbowed. Forgive a tear."
The shower ceased; the tea was finished; the pretty waitress wascoyly singeing her modesty in the attractive candle of Mr. Franklyn'ssuggestions. George left them at the game; strolled aimlessly towardsthe Marble Arch; beyond it; to the right, and so into a quiet square.
Here comes my heroine.
II.
The hansom, as George walked, was coming towards him--smartly, witha jingle of bells; skimming the kerb. As it reached him (recall thatshower) the horse slipped, stumbled, came on its knees.
Down came the shafts; out shot the girl.
The doors were wide; the impetus took her in her stride. One tiny footdabbed at the platform's edge; the other twinkled--patent leather andsilver buckle--at the step, missed it, plunged with a giant stride forthe pavement.
"Mercy!" she cried, and came like a shower of roses swirling intoGeorge's arms.
Completely he caught her. About his legs whipped her skirts; against himpressed her panting bosom; his arms--the action was instinctive--lockedaround her; the adorable perfume of her came on him like breeze from aviolet bed; her very cheek brushed his lips--since the first kiss it wasthe nearest thing possible to a kiss.
She twisted backwards. Modesty chased alarm across her face--caught,battled, overcame it; flamed triumphant.
Fright at her accident drove her pale; shame at the manner of herdescent--leg to the knee and an indelicacy of petticoats--agitated shehad glimpsed it as she leapt--flushed her crimson from the line of herdress about her throat to the wave of her hair upon her brow.
She twisted back. "Oh, what must you think of me?" she gasped.
He simply could not say.
CHAPTER VII.
Moving Passages With A Heroine.
I.
George could not say.
His senses were washed aswim by this torrent of beauty poured unexpectedthrough eyes to brain. It surged the centres to violent commotion, onejostling another in a whirlpool of conflict. Out of the tumult alarmflashed down the wires to his heart--set it banging; flashed in wildmessage to his tongue--locked it.
The driver in our brains is an intolerable fellow in sudden crisis. Heloses his head; distracted he pulls the levers, and, behold, in a momentthe thing is irrevocably done; we are a coward legging it down thestreet, a murderer with bloody hand, a liar with false words suddenlypumped.
A moment later the driver is calm and aghast at the ruin he hascontrived. Why, before God, did he pull the leg lever?--the armlever?--the tongue lever? In an instant's action he has accomplishedcalamity; where sunshine laughed now darkness heaps; where the prospectsmiled disaster now comes rolling up in thunder.
These are your crises. Again, as now with George, the driver becomestemporarily idiot--stands us oafishly silent, or perhaps jerks out somestupid words; remembers when too late the quip that would havefetched the laugh, the thrust that would have sped the wound. He is anintolerable fellow.
"Oh, what must you think of me?"
That pause followed while the driver in George's brain stood gapinglyinactive; and then came laughter to him like a draught of champagne. Forthe girl put up her firm, round chin and laughed with a clear pipe ofglee--a laugh to call a laugh as surely as a lark's note will set ahedge in song; and it called the laugh in George.
He said: "I am thinking the nicest things of you. But have you droppedfrom the skies?"
"From a _cab_," she protested.
She turned to the road; back to George in dismay, for the catapult, itsbullet shot, had bolted up the street--was gone from view.
"Oh!--I _was_ in a cab?" she implored.
George said: "It _looked_ like a cab. But a fairy-car, I think."
A pucker of her brows darkened the quick mirth that came to her eyes.She cried: "Oh, don't joke. She will be killed."
"You were not alone?"
"No--oh, no! What has happened to her?"
"We had better follow."
She corrected his number. "Yes, I had better. Thank you so much for yourhelp." She took a step; faltered upon it with a little exclamation ofpain; put a white tooth on her lip.
"You have hurt your foot?" George said.
"My ankle, I think. Oh dear!" and then again she laughed.
It came even then to George that certainly she would have made herfortune were she to set up a gloom-exorcising bureau--waiting at the endof a telephone wire ready to rush with that laugh to banish the imps ofmelancholy. Never had he heard so infectious a note of mirth.
"Oh, what must you think of me?" she ended. "I simply cannot helplaughing, you know--and yet, oh dear!"
She put the tips of the fingers of a hand against her lower lip, gazedvery anxiously up the road, and then again she gave that clear pipe oflaughter.
"I can't help it," she told him imploringly. "I simply cannot helplaughing. It is funny, you know. She was scolding me--"
"_Scolding_!" George exclaimed.
That beauty should be scolded!
"Scolding--yes. Oh, I'm only a--well, scolding me, and I was wishing,_wishing_ I could escape. And then suddenly out I shot. And then I lookaround and she's--" A wave of her hand expressed a disappearance thatwas by magic agency.
"But, _scolding_?" George said. "Need you trouble? She will be allright."
"Oh, I must. I live with her."
"Will she trouble about you?"
"I think she will return for me. Please, _please_ go--would youmind?--to the corner, and see if there has been an accident."
From that direction a bicyclist approached. George hailed. "Is there acab accident round the corner?"
The youth stared; called "Rats!"; passed.
George interpreted: "It means No. Do you think if you were to take myarm you could walk to the turning?"
Quite naturally she slipped a white glove around his elbow. The contactthrilled him. "No nice girl, you know, would do this," she said, "with aperfect stranger."
George bent his arm a little, the better to feel the pressure of thosewhite fingers. "I am not really perfect," he told her.
She took his mood. "Nor I really nice," she joined. "In fact, I'mhorrible--they tell me. But I think it is wise to follow, don't you?"
"Profoundly wise. Who says you are horrible?"
She gave no answer. Glancing, he saw trouble shade her eyes, tremble herlips.
That beauty should know distress!
Very slightly he raised his forearm so that the lock of his elbow felther hand. He had no fine words. This George was no hero with exquisiteways. He was a most average young man, and nothing could he find butmost painfully average words.
"I say, what's up?" he asked.
She spoke defiantly; but some stupid something that she hated yet couldnot repress trembled her lips, robbed her tone of its banter. "What'sup?" she said. "Why, _you_ would say something was up if you'd just beenshot plump out of a cab, wouldn't you?"
"Yes, but you were laughing a minute ago." He looked down at her,but she turned her face. "Now, now, I believe--" He did not name histhought.
She looked up. Her pretty face was red. He saw little flutters ofeyelids, flutters round the
eyes, flutters at the mouth. "Oh," she said,"oh, yes, and I don't know why. I'm--I believe--" She tried to laugh,but the little flutterings clouded the smile like soft, dark wingsflickering upon a sunbeam.
"I believe--it's ridiculous to a perfect--imperfect--stranger--I believeI'm nearly--crying."
And this inept George could only return: "I say--oh, I say, can I helpyou?"
She stopped; from his arm withdrew her hand. "Please--I think you hadbetter go. Please go. Oh, I shall hate myself for behaving like this."
So unhappy she was that George immediately planned her a backdoor ofexcuse. "But you have no occasion to blame yourself," he told her."You've had an adventure--naturally you're shaken a bit."
She was relieved to think he had misunderstood her agitation. "Yes, anadventure," she said, "that's it. And I haven't had an adventure foryears, so naturally--But, please, I think you had better go. If my--myfriend saw me with you like this she would be angry--oh, very angry."
"But why? She saw you fall. She saw me save you."
"You don't understand. She is not exactly my friend; she is my--myemployer. I'm a mother's-help."
The mirth that never lay deep beneath those blue eyes of hers wassparkling up now; the soft, dark wings were fluttering no longer.
She continued: "A mother's-help. Doesn't that sound wretched? I'mterribly slow at learning the mother's-help rules, but I'm positiveof this rule--mothers' helps may not shoot out of cabs and leave themother; it's such little help--you must see that?"