by E. F. Benson
So there was an uncomfortable silence when David entered, the sarcastic intention of which was not lost on him, for there was no mistaking the chilliness of his reception. Bags, it is true, greeted him with a “Hullo, Blazes,” but otherwise nothing was said. Then trouble gently began to accumulate, like the quiet piling up of thunder-clouds, with Old Testament allusions.
“I say, Jesse must have been a fine old chap,” said somebody. “He had such lots of sons.”
“Oh, did he?” asked somebody else politely. “How many?”
“‘Bout ten. But the elder ones didn’t seem to matter much.”
There was a dead silence, and David gathered himself up within himself. Then conversation began again, with rustling of the leaves of Bibles, to refresh memories.
“I suppose Jesse was a Jew.”
“Oh, rather. That’s why Bags is so keen about his kids. I say, it’s sausages to-morrow, isn’t it?”
“Yes; Bags and Jesse and the kids won’t have any breakfast. Bad luck.”
David looked up, and caught Bags’s mild eye, which was gleaming with sympathetic martyrdom. Then the attack became more direct.
“I say, Da — I mean, Blazes — I hope you had a good blow-out to-night.”
David had got a certain fighting-light in his eye, which Bags altogether lacked. He replied briskly:
“Yes, thanks,” he said. “But why?”
“Oh, I didn’t know. As there are sausages for breakfast—” and a subdued giggle went round.
David opened the lid of his desk.
“I say, Mullins,” he remarked to the last speaker, “if you don’t know, you’d better find out. I’ll ask you about it when we go up to dormitory.”
“Right oh,” said Mullins, strong in the consciousness of numbers to back him; “but lots of chaps will tell you.”
“Then I’ll ask them all,” said David. “Two at a time, if they funk.”
His heart quaked, but the essence of courage is not that your heart should not quake, but that nobody else should know that it does.
“Jesse had younger sons as well,” said somebody else, while Mullins was thinking about this. “There was one who was ruddy. I should think it was beastly to be ruddy.”
“Oh, yes. He was an awful corker, and kept sheep. Don’t suppose he could keep wickets or anything like that. Probably he couldn’t hold the simplest catch, either. But I expect he could spoon them up himself, all right. Old Jesse would like that. He would probably say ‘Well played.’”
“I say, what was the name of the kid!” asked a voice in tones of the intensest interest.
David had been rummaging in his desk in a meaningless manner, not in order to find anything, but to have something to do to cover his self-consciousness. But when this direct question was asked his hand closed firmly on a tight, solid classical dictionary, and he waited for the answer.
“I think he was called David,” said Mullins, who had plucked up again after David’s threat, which had silenced him for the time. “Yes, David, I think,” he repeated.
“Oh, do you!” said David, and before Mullins had time to guard, the classical dictionary, discharged with low trajectory, hit him violently on the nose, which proceeded to bleed.
“And if anybody else wants to talk about David, that’s what he’ll get. Chuck it up here, Bags.”
Bags gave a shriek of exultation, as he returned the dictionary.
“Jolly good shot,” he said. “Bang on the proboscis.”
Though David had followed that excellent maxim of war, “If in an inferior position, attack,” he probably would have thought twice, had he not completely lost his temper before attacking, for almost everybody but Bags seemed to have coalesced against him, and he was taking on rather a large order. But the very suddenness and savageness of the attack certainly surprised the hosts of the enemy for a moment, and the gore-streaked Mullins retired to comfort his nose amid dead silence. But David’s cause was an unpopular one, and he knew it. The Eagles match was won, except for him, and no one was level-headed enough to reflect that it would have been much more decisively lost without him. Under the circumstances, though he had silenced Mullins altogether (for Mullins certainly would not want to be hurt again, and David in his present mood did not care two straws whether he himself was hurt or not), he knew that he must expect a disagreeable evening.
David would have supplied that night an excellent concrete example to any philosopher who wished to study the unstable nature of popularity. During that exquisite hour when he was tying up and confusing the Eagles side with his “wily” bowling there was no bounds to his popularity, and in one moment, by the insufficient closing of his hand, he had forfeited it all. Bags alone was faithful, and though that shot with the classical dictionary had silenced one of his tormentors, it had been a great mistake. For any one who had lost the match so palpably as he had done must expect to have sarcastic remarks made, and if David had only taken them with the meekness that their justice demanded there would probably soon have been a truce to his punishment. But meekness, unfortunately, was one of those Christian qualities which he was totally devoid of, and, though his summary hard-cornered answer to Mullins had been successful enough, he found that, even if it had been possible to continue making violent assaults on everybody, he had not the heart to do so, so chilly and dispiriting was the general attitude towards him. Stone, for instance, though he had congratulated David on his bowling directly after the match, was swayed by popular feeling, and when, on going up to dormitory, David offered him one of his supper biscuits, which was highly sought after, Stone said “No thanks,” in a tone that would have chilled a salamander. No one definitely cut him, and there were no more direct allusions to the son of Jesse, for the portent of Mullins’s nose was a danger-signal which it would have been folly to disregard; but if he spoke, he was answered in polite monosyllables, and if he joined a chattering group, the chatter ceased until he went away again. No one but Bags came to sit on his bed, and though he made pretence of being particularly communicative and cheerful, he jested with a hollow heart.
Next morning was Sunday, and, in lieu of early school, the boys were allowed to spend the hour before breakfast at the bathing-place. But when David asked Stone to come and bathe with him Stone replied that he was engaged to Mullins, and it was bitter to see Ferrers lend Mullins his towel (though after he had finished with it himself) and find that Mullins, fat, stupid Mullins, was regarded not only as an injured person, which anybody could see who looked at his face, but an unjustly injured person. And in the middle of David’s bathe, who should appear but the Archdeacon himself! It is true that he went to the far end of the bathing-place, which was known as the masters’ bathing-place, where the Head himself sometimes swam fiercely about; but the stout apparition of his father, clad in a striped jersey, cut off at the knees and shoulders, standing on the header-board was a distracting affair. Even the loyal Bags, who had followed David down to keep him company (for Bags was not allowed to bathe, having a weak heart), even Bags gazed in dismay at that squat, square form, and said “Lor’.” Simultaneously somebody behind David remarked:
“Anyhow, he takes his gaiters off.”
David felt too desolate to resent this; also he was watching his father, almost praying that he should take a neat header. But a loud, flat smack was heard as he fell into the water.
And Ferrers said to Mullins:
“I say, can your pater take belly-floppers?” Then Mullins (with a watchful eye on David) as he dried himself with Ferrers’s towel, began to whistle “Once in royal David’s city.” Other boys began to whistle it too. It was all deplorable.
The day had begun badly and continued badly. David offered to share his hymn-book with the boy who sat next him in chapel, who appeared not to see what he did. He asked Stone to come for a walk with him after chapel, and again Stone was engaged to Mullins. But all the time Bags was waiting like a dog to divert and console his master if only his master would allow him, eager
ly braving the unpleasantness of alliance with the unpopular side, and though, twenty-four hours ago, David would have scouted the idea of Bags consoling him, he turned to him eagerly now, and even allowed him to have the Monarch’s travelling-carriage in his pocket at dinner. And though all the slights and sneers which surrounded them were of the general nature of chaff, they were of the species of chaff which is meant to hurt. As Bags had once acutely remarked, you can hit a fellow over the head just to show you like him, but you can do the very same thing in an opposite spirit, and it was this spirit just now that animated these small boys. It was “a rag,” no doubt, but a rag with a sting in it, for David was paying the penalty of having been popular, as well as of having disappointed his admirers.
But an eye, wholly unsuspected, was watching the situation. The Head was perfectly aware that David had lost the match against Eagles (though he had so nearly won it); he was aware also what manner of impression David’s father would make on his irreverent school, and when all day he saw David no longer the centre of groups that were making rather more noise than was necessary, but either alone, or with Bags, he took counsel with himself and stroked his grey beard for several minutes. Then he went across to the museum, where the first form were sitting under Mr. Dutton, about the time that the Catechism would be finished and the third missionary journey embarked on. There, having excused Mr. Dutton, he suddenly addressed David.
“Blaize,” he said, “though it is Sunday, and we are in school, I must just congratulate you on your bowling performance yesterday. I have watched a good deal of cricket at Helmsworth for the last twenty years, and it was by far the finest piece of bowling I can remember. The school ought to be proud of you. Now, for our work. Antioch! Stone, where is Antioch?”
There was no getting round this. Stone, Ferrers, David, and Bags walked arm-in-arm to chapel together. And Mullins’s nose suddenly became the subject of unkind and universal comment.
CHAPTER V
DAVID returned from the station on Monday morning, where he had been permitted to go, in order to see his father off, in extremely good spirits, with his straw hat, trimmed with the school eleven colours, well back on his head, his hands in his pockets, where one caressed five distinct shillings, the other the travelling-carriage of the Monarch, while fragments of cheerful tunes came piercingly forth from the aperture caused by his broken tooth. The shape of this orifice no doubt had something to do with the deafening quality of his whistle, which went through the head of the hearer like the chirping of a canary in a circumscribed room, and when deeds of infamy, such as illicit feasts, were going on in the bushes at the far end of the second-club field, he was often suitably bribed to keep watch at the railings nearest the school buildings, for his whistle carried that distance quite easily. There was therefore, when his melodies were heard, time to remove all traces of debauch before Dubs or any other incarnation of danger could arrive. So desirable, indeed, was the gift of a really resonant whistle that Ferrers had at one time begun operations on one of his own front teeth with the file on his nail-scissors in order ‘ to get a similar configuration, but increasing tenderness had made him desist before he had got far.
David was conscious of a great many things that made for cheerfulness. His father, to begin with, had put himself gloriously right with the school, and had, very wisely, left in the hour of supreme popularity, so that there was no fear of his forfeiting, by gaiters or Christian names or flat headers at the bathing-place, or any such tragic follies, the esteem he had won. For, greatly daring, as it seemed to the boys, he had asked the Head to grant an extra half-holiday, and the announcement that it would be given this afternoon, “in honour of his visit,” had duly appeared on the school notice-board. It was supposed by some one who had seen his flat header that the phrase “in honour of his visit” must mark a sarcastic intention on the part of the Head, but whether that was so or not there was no doubt about the half-holiday, which was all that mattered. Even David, when quite respectfully appealed to, had no clear idea as to why his father’s visit was an honour, but supposed it must have something to do with the books he wrote, which were printed by the Clarendon Press at Oxford. In any case, he felt quite certain now that all the errors of which his father had been guilty would be pardoned and forgotten, and that he would never hear any more of his hat or his gaiters, of his excruciating performance at the cricket-nets, of his belly-floppers into the bathing-place, of his betrayal of his own son’s Christian name, or finally of the disastrous discourse he had unfortunately delivered at school-chapel on Sunday evening. For the moment, as he remembered that, David’s whistle ceased, and he clutched at the five shillings and the Monarch’s travelling-carriage for comfort. It had been too awful: not only had he talked the most dreadful rot about the joy and peace of the chapel services (same as last year, only worse) under the influence of which all troubles and anxiety melted away, but he had gone on and on and on in a manner quite unparalleled. For forty stricken minutes he had detained them (Stone said forty-two), which beat all known records by at least nine minutes, and it was no wonder that the boy next David had written “AND NOW” in capital letters on the fly-leaf of his hymn-book and passed it to him.... But that was all over; he had made the most honourable amends, and David knew that his father would be considered a credit to him. Indeed that “he was a first-rate old buffer” was quite a moderate estimate of him, and one given by the most critical.
There were other satisfactory points about him also. He had asked that David should be allowed to see him off at the station, so that he could have a further talk with him. This meant missing half an hour (or more, if he lingered on his way back, as he was doing) of repetition of Latin prose. David had not been certain, at starting, that he would not sooner do prose repetition than have more “jaw”; but the “jaw,” when it came, was of the most delightful kind. Not only was he certainly to go to Marchester in September, but, after consultation with the Head, it had been settled that he was to go there next week to try for one of the scholarships, a wholly lovely adventure. Apparently — this was news to David — his work had shown great improvement during this last term; it showed signs of perception and taste, and, though greatly wanting in accuracy, which, the Archdeacon reminded him, could always he attained by the industrious and painstaking, it might prove up to scholarship-level. David did not attend much to these generalities: the point was that he would go to Marchester for a three-days’ examination next week.
Finally, as a cause of happiness, his father had on the platform presented him with the five shillings that now he clutched in his pocket, to commemorate his having got into the school eleven. That presentation had been so sheer a surprise that David could have fallen flat on his face with astonishment. He would have expected, if the fatal topic of cricket was to occur again, to be reminded that it was only a game, and to be bidden to take thought of it just as such and no more; but to be tipped on such a scale had not entered into his most sanguine calculations. Then the train had come in, and David submitted to be kissed publicly without shying, even though a small vendor of papers, with whom he had slight differences before this, ceased shouting “Dily Mile,” and squeaked “Kiss me, ducky,” in perfectly audible tones. He could be dealt with after the train had gone....
So his father waved his shovel-hat from the window and David his straw hat from the platform, after which he twitched off the paper vendor’s cap and rubbed his face upwards with it, and hit him on the hands so that he dropped all his papers and strolled back to school again in the highest spirits. And not only were his spirits high, but, for the first time in his life, he was conscious of how happy he was, instead of just being happy. This morning he seemed to stand away from himself and envy the boy (only it was himself) who was going to try for a Marchester scholarship next week, and was certainly going there in September, and had five shillings and two stag-beetles in his pocket, and was in the school eleven. Child though he was, consciousness of self had come to him: he knew that his head w
as full of delightful plans, that his limbs were taut and strong, that he was set in the enchanted garden of the world. He said, “By Gosh!” and saluted the discovery by kicking an empty tobacco-tin that lay in the road with such firm accuracy that it flew with a whirring, gonglike sound over the fence of the house where the assistant masters of the school lodged, and David thought it wise to go swiftly away, and not look behind.
He dropped to a sober pace again after putting a corner between himself and the masters’ house into the garden of which the empty tin had so pleasantly flown, and from mere happiness made a quantity of good resolutions, one of which he immediately put into effect by not going into the tobacco-shop where he had originally intended to buy a packet of cigarettes as a present for the Smoking Club. Just now the solid satisfaction of life rendered unnecessary such minor adjuncts, and, since he did not like smoking, it was convenient that it happened to be contrary to school rules. There were such hosts of things pleasant and not against school rules, that he wished, by way of a thank-offering for them, to resolve on a virtuous life. He really would get up at the sound of the first hell in the morning for the future, he would not smoke any more, he would not look up the answers to sums before he wrestled with them, nor copy out on his shirt-cuff the principal rivers of Russia. They were there now in fact, and in this sudden access of being good because he was happy, he stopped then and there, and, with a piece of india-rubber, expunged the Volga and the Vistula and the Don and the Dnieper. And, as if to reward him, just as he got to the school-gate eleven o’clock sounded, which meant that Latin prose repetition was over, and since to-day was a half-holiday, there was only one more hour of school, and that was English literature, the one lesson of the week which he actively enjoyed, and, though the Head usually took it, was not in the least terrifying. He asked but few questions, or sometimes there were no questions at all, but he would read to them a poem, with explanations of difficult words or sentences, so that any one could understand it, and then perhaps shut the book and repeat it very slowly in his deep, smooth voice, so that the magic of beautiful words wove its spell round David’s wondering mind.