'The very thing,' cried the clown, 'you're just about the right size to
fill up--my! what a pie it's going to be, eh?' And he caught up his
young friend, just as he was, rammed him into the pie, and poured sauce
on him.
But he kicked and howled until the clown grew seriously displeased. 'Why
carn't you lay quiet,' he said angrily, 'like the turkey does? you don't
deserve to be put into such a nice pie!'
'If you make a pie of me,' said Tommy, artfully, 'there'll be nobody to
look on and laugh at you, you know!'
'No more there won't,' said the clown, and allowed him to crawl out,
all over sauce. 'It was a pity,' he declared, 'because he fitted so
nicely, and now they would have to look about for something else;' but
he contrived to make a shift with the contents of the cook's
work-basket, which he poured in--reels, pin-cushions, wax, and all. He
had tried to put the kitchen cat in too, but she scratched his hands and
could not be induced to form the finishing touch to the pie.
How the clown got the paste and rolled it, and made Tommy in a mess with
it, and how the pie was finished at last, would take too long to tell
here; but somehow it was not quite such capital fun as he had
expected--it seemed to want the pantomime music or something; and then
Tommy was always dreading lest the clown should change his mind at the
last minute, and put him in the pie after all.
Even when it was safely in the oven he had another fear lest he should
be made to stay and eat it, for it had such very peculiar things in it
that it could not be at all nice. Fortunately, as soon as it was put
away the clown seemed to weary of it himself.
'Let me and you go and take a walk,' he suggested.
Tommy caught at the proposal, for he was fast becoming afraid of the
clown, and felt really glad to get him out of the house; so he got his
cap, and the clown put on a brown overcoat and a tall hat, under which
his white and red face looked stranger than ever, and they sallied forth
together.
Once Tommy would have thought it a high privilege to be allowed to go
out shopping with a clown; but, if the plain truth must be told, he did
not enjoy himself so very much after all. People seemed to stare at them
so, for one thing, and he felt almost ashamed of his companion, whose
behaviour was outrageously ridiculous. They went to all the family
tradesmen, to whom Tommy was, of course, well known, and the clown
_would_ order the most impossible things, and say they were for Tommy!
Once he even pushed him into a large draper's shop, full of pretty and
contemptuous young ladies, and basely left him to explain his presence
as he could.
But it was worse when they happened to meet an Italian boy with a tray
of plaster images on his head.
'Here's a lark!' said the clown, and elbowed Tommy against him in such a
way that the tray slipped and all the images fell to the ground with a
crash.
It was certainly amusing to see all the pieces rolling about; but, while
Tommy was still laughing, the boy began to howl and denounce him to the
crowd which gathered round them. The crowd declared that it was a shame,
and that Tommy ought to be made to pay for it; and no one said so more
loudly and indignantly than the clown!
Before he could escape he had to give his father's name and address, and
promise that he would pay for the damage, after which he joined the
clown (who had strolled on) with a heavy heart, for he knew that that
business would stop all his pocket-money for years after he was grown
up! He even ventured to reproach his friend: 'I shan't sneak of you, of
course, he said, 'but you know _you_ did it!' The clown's only answer to
this was a reproof for telling wicked stories.
At last they passed a confectioner's, and the clown suddenly remembered
that he was hungry, so they went in, and he borrowed sixpence from
Tommy, which he spent in buns.
He ate them all himself slowly, and was so very quiet and well-behaved
all the time that Tommy hoped he was sobering down. They had gone a
little way from the shop when he found that the clown was eating tarts.
'You might give me one,' said Tommy; and the clown, after looking over
his shoulder, actually gave him all he had left, filling his pocket with
them, in fact.
'I never saw you buy them,' he said wonderingly, which the clown said
was very peculiar; and just then an attendant came up breathlessly.
'You forgot to pay for those tarts,' she said.
The clown replied that he never took pastry. She insisted that they
were gone, and he must have taken them.
'It wasn't me, please,' said the clown; 'it was this little boy done it.
Why, he's got a jam tart in his pocket now. Where's a policeman?'
Tommy was so thunderstruck by this treachery that he could say nothing.
It was only what he might have expected, for had not the clown served
the pantaloon exactly the same the night before? But that did not make
the situation any the funnier now, particularly as the clown made such a
noise that two real policemen came hurrying up.
Tommy did not wait for them. No one held him, and he ran away at the top
of his speed. What a nightmare sort of run it was!--the policemen
chasing him, and the clown urging them on at the top of his voice.
Everybody he passed turned round and ran after him too.
Still he kept ahead. He was surprised to find how fast he could run, and
all at once he remembered that he was running the opposite way from
home. Quick as thought he turned up the first street he came to, hoping
to throw them off the scent and get home by a back way.
For the moment he thought he had got rid of them; but just as he stopped
to take breath, they all came whooping and hallooing round the corner
after him; and he had to scamper on, panting, and sobbing, and
staggering, and almost out of his mind with fright. If he could only
get home first, and tell his mother! But they were gaining on him, and
the clown was leading and roaring with delight as he drew closer and
closer. He came to a point where two roads met. It was round another
corner, and they could not see him. He ran down one, and, to his immense
relief, found they had taken the other. He was saved, for his house was
quite near now.
He tried to hasten, but the pavement was all slushy and slippery, and
his boots felt heavier and heavier, and, to add to his misery, the
pursuers had found out their mistake. As he looked back, he could see
the clown galloping round the corner and hear his yell of discovery.
'Oh, fairy, dear fairy,' he gasped, 'save me this time. I _do_ like your
part best, now!'
She must have heard him and taken pity, for in a second he had reached
his door, and it flew open before him. He was not safe even yet, so he
rushed upstairs to his bedroom, and bounced, just as he was, into his
bed.
'If they come up I'll pretend I'm ill,' he thought, as he covered his
head with the bedclothes.
They _were_ coming up, all of them. There was a great trampling on the
stairs. He heard the clown officiously shouting: 'This way, Mr.
Policeman, sir!' and then a tremendous battering at his door.
He lay there shivering under the blankets.
'Perhaps they'll think the door's locked, and go away,' he tried to
hope, and the battering went on not quite so violently.
'Master Tommy! Master Tommy!' It was Sarah's voice. They had got her to
come up and tempt him out. Well, she _wouldn't_, then!
And then--oh! horror!--the door was thrown open. He sprang out of bed in
an agony.
'Sarah! Sarah! keep them out,' he gasped. 'Don't let them take me away!'
'Lor', Master Tommy! keep who out?' said Sarah, wonderingly.
'The--the clown--and the policemen,' he said. 'I know they're behind the
door.'
'There, there!' said Sarah; 'why, you ain't done dreaming yet. That's
what comes of going out to these late pantomimes. Rub your eyes; it's
nearly eight o'clock.'
Tommy could have hugged her. It was only a dream after all, then. As he
stood there, shivering in his nightgown, the nightmare clown began to
melt away, though even yet some of the adventures he had gone through
seemed too vivid to be quite imaginary.
* * * * *
Singularly enough, his Uncle John actually did call that morning, and to
take him to the Crystal Palace, too; and as there was no butter-slide
for him to fall down on, they were able to go. On the way Tommy told him
all about his unpleasant dream.
'I shall always hate a clown after this, uncle,' he said, as he
concluded.
'My good Tommy,' said his uncle, 'when you are fortunate enough to dream
a dream with a moral in it, don't go and apply it the wrong way up. The
real clown, like a sensible man, keeps his fun for the place where it is
harmless and appreciated, and away from the pantomime conducts himself
like any other respectable person. Now, your _dream_ clown, Tommy----'
'I know,' said Tommy, meekly. 'Should you think the pantomime was good
here, Uncle John?'
_A CANINE ISHMAEL_
(FROM THE NOTES OF A DINER-OUT)
'Tell me,' she said suddenly, with a pretty imperiousness that seemed to
belong to her, 'are you fond of dogs?' How we arrived at the subject I
forget now, but I know she had just been describing how a collie at a
dog-show she had visited lately had suddenly thrown his forepaws round
her neck in a burst of affection--a proceeding which, in my own mind
(although I prudently kept this to myself), I considered less
astonishing than she appeared to do.
For I had had the privilege of taking her in to dinner, and the meal had
not reached a very advanced stage before I had come to the conclusion
that she was the most charming, if not the loveliest, person I had ever
met.
It was fortunate for me that I was honestly able to answer her question
in a satisfactory manner, for, had it been otherwise, I doubt whether
she would have deigned to bestow much more of her conversation upon me.
'Then I wonder,' she said next, meditatively, 'if you would care to
hear about a dog that belonged to--to someone I know very well? Or would
it bore you?'
I am very certain that if she had volunteered to relate the adventures
of Telemachus, or the history of the Thirty Years' War, I should have
accepted the proposal with a quite genuine gratitude. As it was, I made
it sufficiently plain that I should care very much indeed to hear about
that dog.
She paused for a moment to reject an unfortunate _entrée_ (which I
confess to doing my best to console), and then she began her story. I
shall try to set it down as nearly as possible in her own words,
although I cannot hope to convey the peculiar charm and interest that
she gave it for me. It was not, I need hardly say, told all at once, but
was subject to the inevitable interruptions which render a dinner-table
intimacy so piquantly precarious.
'This dog,' she began quietly, without any air of beginning a story,
'this dog was called Pepper. He was not much to look at--rather a rough,
mongrelly kind of animal; and he and a young man had kept house together
for a long time, for the young man was a bachelor and lived in chambers
by himself. He always used to say that he didn't like to get engaged to
anyone, because he was sure it would put Pepper out so fearfully.
However, he met somebody at last who made him forget about Pepper, and
he proposed and was accepted--and then, you know,' she added, as a
little dimple came in her cheek, 'he had to go home and break the news
to the dog.'
She had just got to this point, when, taking advantage of a pause she
made, the man on her other side (who was, I daresay, strictly within his
rights, although I remember at the time considering him a pushing beast)
struck in with some remark which she turned to answer, leaving me
leisure to reflect.
I was feeling vaguely uncomfortable about this story; something, it
would be hard to say what, in her way of mentioning Pepper's owner made
me suspect that he was more than a mere acquaintance of hers.
Was it _she_, then, who was responsible for----? It was no business of
mine, of course; I had never met her in my life till that evening--but I
began to be impatient to hear the rest.
And at last she turned to me again: 'I hope you haven't forgotten that I
was in the middle of a story. You haven't? And you would really like me
to go on? Well, then--oh yes, when Pepper was told, he was naturally a
little annoyed at first. I daresay he considered he ought to have been
consulted previously. But, as soon as he had seen the lady, he withdrew
all opposition--which his master declared was a tremendous load off his
mind, for Pepper was rather a difficult dog, and slow as a rule to take
strangers into his affections, a little snappy and surly, and very
easily hurt or offended. Don't you know dogs who are sensitive like
that? _I_ do, and I'm always so sorry for them--they feel little things
so much, and one never can find out what's the matter, and have it out
with them! Sometimes it's shyness; once I had a dog who was quite
painfully shy--self-consciousness it was really, I suppose, for he
always fancied everybody was looking at him, and often when people were
calling he would come and hide his face in the folds of my dress till
they had gone--it was too ridiculous! But about Pepper. He was devoted
to his new mistress from the very first. I am not sure that she was
quite so struck with him, for he was not at all a lady's dog, and his
manners had been very much neglected. Still, she came quite to like him
in time; and when they were married, Pepper went with them for the
honeymoon.'
'_When they were married!_' I glanced at the card which lay half-hidden
by her plate. Surely _Miss_ So-and-so was written on it?--yes, it was
certainly 'Miss.' It was odd that such a circumstance should have
increased my enjoyment of the story, perhaps--but it undoubtedly did.
'After the honeymoon,' my neighbour continued, 'they came to live in the
new house, which was quite a tiny one, and Pepper was a very important
personage in it indeed. He had his mistress all to himself for the
greater part of most days, as his master had to be away in town; so she
used to talk to him intimately, and tell him more than she would have
thought of confiding to most people. Sometimes, when she thought there
was no fear of callers coming, she would make him play, and this was
quite a new sensation for Pepper, who was a serious-minded animal, and
took very solemn views of life. At first he hadn't the faintest idea
what was expected of him; it must have been rather like trying to romp
with a parish beadle, he was so intensely respectable! But as soon as he
once grasped the notion and understood that no liberty was intended, he
lent himself to it readily enough and learnt to gambol quite creditably.
Then he was made much of in all sorts of ways; she washed him twice a
week with her very own hands--which his master would never have dreamt
of doing--and she was always trying new ribbons on his complexion. That
rather bored him at first, but it ended by making him a little conceited
about his appearance. Altogether he was dearly fond of her, and I don't
believe he had ever been happier in all his life than he was in those
days. Only, unfortunately, it was all too good to last.'
Here I had to pass olives or something to somebody, and the other man,
seeing his chance, and, to do him justice, with no idea that he was
interrupting a story, struck in once more, so that the history of Pepper
had to remain in abeyance for several minutes.
My uneasiness returned. Could there be a mistake about that name-card
after all? Cards _do_ get re-arranged sometimes, and she seemed to know
that young couple so very intimately. I tried to remember whether I had
been introduced to her as a Miss or Mrs. So-and-so, but without success.
There is some fatality which generally distracts one's attention at the
critical moment of introduction, and in this case it was perhaps easily
accounted for. My turn came again, and she took up her tale once more.
'I think when I left off I was saying that Pepper's happiness was too
good to last. And so it was. For his mistress was ill, and, though he
snuffed and scratched and whined at the door of her room for ever so
long, they wouldn't let him in. But he managed to slip in one day
somehow, and jumped up on her lap and licked her hands and face, and
almost went out of his mind with joy at seeing her again. Only (I told
you he was a sensitive dog) it gradually struck him that she was not
_quite_ so pleased to see him as usual--and presently he found out the
reason. There was another animal there, a new pet, which seemed to take
up a good deal of her attention. Of course you guess what that was--but
Pepper had never seen a baby before, and he took it as a personal slight
and was dreadfully offended. He simply walked straight out of the room
and downstairs to the kitchen, where he stayed for days.
'I don't think he enjoyed his sulk much, poor doggie; perhaps he had an
idea that when they saw how much he took it to heart they would send the
baby away. But as time went on and this didn't seem to occur to them,
he decided to come out of the sulks and look over the matter, and he
came back quite prepared to resume the old footing. Only everything was
different. No one seemed to notice that he was in the room now, and his
mistress never invited him to have a game; she even forgot to have him
washed--and one of his peculiarities was that he had no objection to
soap and warm water. The worst of it was, too, that before very long the
baby followed him into the sitting-room, and, do what he could, he
couldn't make the stupid little thing understand that it had no business
there. If you think of it, a baby must strike a dog as a very inferior
little animal: it can't bark (well, yes, it _can_ howl), but it's no
good whatever with rats, and yet everybody makes a tremendous fuss about
it! The baby got all poor Pepper's bows now; and his mistress played
games with it, though Pepper felt he could have done it ever so much
better, but he was never allowed to join in. So he used to lie on a rug
and pretend he didn't mind, though, really, I'm certain he felt it
horribly. I always believe, you know, that people never give dogs half
credit enough for feeling things, don't you?
'Well, at last came the worst indignity of all: Pepper was driven from
his rug--his own particular rug--to make room for the baby; and when he
had got away into a corner to cry quietly, all by himself, that wretched
baby came and crawled after him and pulled his tail!
'He always _had_ been particular about his tail, and never allowed
anybody to touch it but very intimate friends, and even then under
protest, so you can imagine how insulted he felt.
'It was too much for him, and he lost the last scrap of temper he had.
They said he bit the baby, and I'm afraid he did--though not enough
really to hurt it; still, it howled fearfully, of course, and from that
moment it was all over with poor Pepper--he was a ruined dog!
'When his master came home that evening he was told the whole story.
Pepper's mistress said she would be ever so sorry to part with him, but,
after his misbehaviour, she should never know a moment's peace until he
was out of the house--it really wasn't safe for baby!
'And his master was sorry, naturally; but I suppose he was beginning
rather to like the baby himself, and so the end of it was that Pepper
had to go. They did all they could for him; found him a comfortable
home, with a friend who was looking out for a good house-dog, and wasn't
particular about breed, and, after that, they heard nothing of him for a
long while. And, when they did hear, it was rather a bad report: the
friend could do nothing with Pepper at all; he had to tie him up in the
stable, and then he snapped at everyone who came near, and howled all
night--they were really almost afraid of him.
'So when Pepper's mistress heard that, she felt more thankful than ever
that the dog had been sent away, and tried to think no more about him.
She had quite forgotten all about it, when, one day, a new nursemaid,
who had taken the baby out for an airing, came back with a terrible
account of a savage dog which had attacked them, and leaped up at the
perambulator so persistently that it was as much as she could do to
drive it away. And even then Pepper's mistress did not associate the dog
with him; she thought he had been destroyed long ago.
'But the next time the nurse went out with the baby she took a thick
stick with her, in case the dog should come again. And no sooner had she
lifted the perambulator over the step, than the dog _did_ come again,
exactly as if he had been lying in wait for them ever since outside the
gate.
'The nurse was a strong country girl, with plenty of pluck, and as the
dog came leaping and barking about in a very alarming way, she hit him
as hard as she could on his head. The wonder is she did not kill him on
the spot, and, as it was, the blow turned him perfectly giddy and silly
for a time, and he ran round and round in a dazed sort of way--do you
think you could lower that candle-shade just a little? Thanks!' she
broke off suddenly, as I obeyed. 'Well, she was going to strike again,
when her mistress rushed out, just in time to stop her. For, you see,
she had been watching at the window, and although the poor beast was
miserably thin, and rough, and neglected-looking, she knew at once that
it must be Pepper, and that he was not in the least mad or dangerous,
but only trying his best to make his peace with the baby. Very likely
his dignity or his conscience or something wouldn't let him come back
quite at once, you know; and perhaps he thought he had better get the
baby on his side first. And then all at once, his mistress--I heard all
this through her, of course--his mistress suddenly remembered how
devoted Pepper had been to her, and how fond she had once been of him,
and when she saw him standing, stupid and shivering, there, her heart
softened to him, and she went to make it up with him, and tell him that
he was forgiven and should come back and be her dog again, just as in
the old days!----'
Here she broke off for a moment. I did not venture to look at her, but I
thought her voice trembled a little when she spoke again. 'I don't quite
know _why_ I tell you all this. There was a time when I never could bear
the end of it myself,' she said; 'but I have begun, and I will finish
now. Well, Pepper's mistress went towards him, and called him;
but--whether he was still too dizzy to quite understand who she was, or
whether his pride came uppermost again, poor dear! I don't know--but he
gave her just one look (she says she will never forget it--never; it
went straight to her heart), and then he walked very slowly and
deliberately away.
'She couldn't bear it; she followed; she felt she simply _must_ make
him understand how very, very sorry she was for him; but the moment he
heard her he began to run faster and faster, until he was out of reach
and out of sight, and she had to come back. I know she was crying
bitterly by that time.'
'And he never came back again?' I asked, after a silence.
'Never again!' she said softly; 'that was the very last they ever saw or
heard of him. And--and I've always loved every dog since for Pepper's
sake!'
'I'm almost glad he did decline to come back,' I declared; 'it served
his mistress right--she didn't deserve anything else!'
'Ah, I didn't want you to say that!' she protested; 'she never meant to
be so unkind--it was all for the baby's sake!'
I was distinctly astonished, for all her sympathy in telling the story
had seemed to lie in the other direction.
'You don't mean to say,' I cried involuntarily, 'that you can find any
excuses for her? I did not expect _you_ would take the baby's part!'
'But I did,' she confessed, with lowered eyes--'I _did_ take the baby's
part--it was all my doing that Pepper was sent away--I have been sorry
enough for it since!'
It was her own story she had been telling at second-hand after all--and
she was not Miss So-and-so! I had entirely forgotten the existence of
any other members of the party but our two selves, but at the moment of
this discovery--which was doubly painful--I was recalled by a general
rustle to the fact that we were at a dinner-party, and that our hostess
had just given the signal.
As I rose and drew back my chair to allow my neighbour to pass, she
raised her eyes for a moment and said almost meekly:
'I _was_ the baby, you see!'
_MARJORY_
INTRODUCTION
I have thought myself justified in printing the following narrative,
found among the papers of my dead friend, Douglas Cameron, who left me
discretion to deal with them as I saw fit. It was written indeed, as its
opening words imply, rather for his own solace and relief than with the
expectation that it would be read by any other. But, painful and
intimate as it is in parts, I cannot think that any harm will be done by
printing it now, with some necessary alterations in the names of the
characters chiefly concerned.
Before, however, leaving the story to speak for itself, I should like to
state, in justice to my friend, that during the whole of my acquaintance
with him, which began in our college days, I never saw anything to
indicate the morbid timidity and weakness of character that seem to have
marked him as a boy. Reserved he undoubtedly was, with a taste for
solitude that made him shrink from the society of all but a small
circle, and with a sensitive and shy nature which prevented him from
doing himself complete justice; but he was very capable of holding his
own on occasion, and in his disposition, as I knew it, there was no want
of moral courage, nor any trace of effeminacy.
How far he may have unconsciously exaggerated such failings in the
revelation of his earlier self, or what the influence of such an
experience as he relates may have done to strengthen the moral fibre,
are points on which I can express no opinion, any more than I can pledge
myself to the credibility of the supernatural element of his story.
It may be that only in the boy's overwrought imagination, the innocent
Child-spirit came back to complete the work of love and pity she had
begun in life; but I know that he himself believed otherwise, and,
truly, if those who leave us are permitted to return at all, it must be
on some such errand as Marjory's.
Douglas Cameron's life was short, and in it, so far as I am aware, he
met no one who at all replaced his lost ideal. Of this I cannot be
absolutely certain, for he was a reticent man in such matters; but I
think, had it been so, I should have known of it, for we were very close
friends. One would hardly expect, perhaps, that an ordinary man would
remain faithful all his days to the far-off memory of a child-love; but
then Cameron was not quite as other men, nor were his days long in the
land.
And if this ideal of his was never dimmed for him by some grosser, and
less spiritual, passion, who shall say that he may not have been a
better and even a happier man in consequence.
* * * * *
It is not without an effort that I have resolved to break, in the course
of this narrative, the reserve maintained for nearly twenty years. But
the chief reason for silence is removed now that all those are gone who
might have been pained or harmed by what I have to tell, and, though I
shrink still from reviving certain memories that are fraught with pain,
there are others associated therewith which will surely bring
consolation and relief.
I must have been about eleven at the time I am speaking of, and the
change which--for good or ill--comes over most boys' lives had not yet
threatened mine. I had not left home for school, nor did it seem at all
probable then that I should ever do so.
When I read (I was a great reader) of Dotheboys Hall and Salem House--a
combination of which establishments formed my notion of school-life--it
was with no more personal interest than a cripple might feel in perusing
the notice of an impending conscription; for from the battles of
school-life I was fortunately exempted.
I was the only son of a widow, and we led a secluded life in a London
suburb. My mother took charge of my education herself, and, as far as
mere acquirements went, I was certainly not behind other boys of my
age. I owe too much to that loving and careful training, Heaven knows,
to think of casting any reflection upon it here, but my surroundings
were such as almost necessarily to exclude all bracing and hardening
influences.
My mother had few friends; we were content with our own companionship,
and of boys I knew and cared to know nothing; in fact, I regarded a
strange boy with much the same unreasoning aversion as many excellent
women feel for the most ordinary cow.
I was happy to think that I should never be called upon to associate
with them; by-and-by, when I outgrew my mother's teaching, I was to have
a tutor, perhaps even go to college in time, and when I became a man I
was to be a curate and live with my mother in a clematis-covered cottage
in some pleasant village.
She would often dwell on this future with a tender prospective pride;
she spoke of it on the very day that saw it shattered for ever.
For there came a morning when, on going to her with my lessons for the
day, I was gladdened with an unexpected holiday. I little knew
then--though I was to learn it soon enough--that my lessons had been all
holidays, or that on that day they were to end for ever.
My mother had had one or two previous attacks of an illness which seemed
to prostrate her for a short period, and as she soon regained her
ordinary health, I did not think they could be of a serious nature.
So I devoted my holiday cheerfully enough to the illumination of a
text, on the gaudy colouring of which I found myself gazing two days
later with a dull wonder, as at the work of a strange hand in a long
dead past, for the boy who had painted that was a happy boy who had a
mother, and for two endless days I had been alone.
Those days, and many that followed, come back to me now but vaguely. I
passed them mostly in a state of blank bewilderment caused by the double
sense of sameness and strangeness in everything around me; then there
were times when this gave way to a passionate anguish which refused all
attempts at comfort, and times even--but very, very seldom--when I
almost forgot what had happened to me.
Our one servant remained in the house with me, and a friend and
neighbour of my mother's was constant in her endeavours to relieve my
loneliness; but I was impatient of them, I fear, and chiefly anxious to
be left alone to indulge my melancholy unchecked.
I remember how, as autumn began, and leaf after leaf fluttered down from
the trees in our little garden, I watched them fall with a heavier
heart, for they had known my mother, and now they, too, were deserting
me.
This morbid state of mind had lasted quite long enough when my uncle,
who was my guardian, saw fit to put a summary end to it by sending me
to school forthwith; he would have softened the change for me by taking
me to his own home first, but there was illness of some sort there, and
this was out of the question.
I was neither sorry nor glad when I heard of it, for all places were the
same to me just then; only, as the time drew near, I began to regard the
future with a growing dread.
The school was at some distance from London, and my uncle took me down
by rail; but the only fact I remember connected with the journey is that
there was a boy in the carriage with us who cracked walnuts all the way,
and I wondered if he was going to school too, and concluded that he was
not, or he would hardly eat quite so many walnuts.
Later we were passing through some wrought-iron gates, and down an
avenue of young chestnuts, which made a gorgeous autumn canopy of
scarlet, amber, and orange, up to a fine old red-brick house, with a
high-pitched roof, and a cupola in which a big bell hung, tinted a warm
gold by the afternoon sun.
This was my school, and it did not look so very-terrible after all.
There was a big bow-window by the pillared portico, and, looking timidly
in, I saw a girl of about my own age sitting there, absorbed in the book
she was reading, her long brown hair drooping over her cheek and the
hand on which it rested.
She glanced up at the sound of the door-bell, and I felt her eyes
examining me seriously and critically, and then I forgot everything but
the fact that I was about to be introduced to my future schoolmaster,
the Rev. Basil Dering.
This was less of an ordeal than I had expected; he had a strong,
massively-cut, leonine face, free and abundant white hair, streaked with
dark grey, but there was a kind light in his eyes as I looked up at
them, and the firm mouth could smile, I found, pleasantly enough.
Mrs. Dering seemed younger, and was handsome, with a certain stateliness
and decision of manner which put me less at my ease, and I was relieved
to be told I might say good-bye to my uncle, and wander about the
grounds as I liked.
I was not surprised to pass through an empty schoolroom, and to descend
by some steep stairs to a deserted playground, for we had been already
told that the Michaelmas holidays were not over, and that the boys would
not return for some days to come.
It gave me a kind of satisfaction to think of my resemblance, just then,
to my favourite David Copperfield, but I was to have a far pleasanter
companion than poor lugubrious, flute-tootling Mr. Mell, for as I paced
the damp paths paved with a mosaic of russet and yellow leaves, I heard
light footsteps behind me, and turned to find myself face to face with
the girl I had seen at the window.
She stood there breathless for an instant, for she had hurried to
overtake me, and against a background of crimson creepers I saw the
brilliant face, with its soft but fearless brown eyes, small straight
nose, spirited mouth, and crisp wavy golden-brown hair, which I see now
almost as distinctly as I write.
'You're the new boy,' she said at length. 'I've come out to make you
feel more at home. I suppose you don't feel _quite_ at home just yet?'
'Not quite, thank you,' I said, lifting my cap with ceremony, for I had
been taught to be particular about my manners; 'I have never been to
school before, you see, Miss Dering.'
I think she was a little puzzled by so much politeness. 'I know,' she
said softly; 'mother told me about it, and I'm very sorry. And I'm
called Marjory, generally. Shall you like school, do you think?'
'I might,' said I, 'if--if it wasn't for the boys!'
'Boys aren't bad,' she said; 'ours are rather nice, I think. But perhaps
you don't know many?'
'I know one,' I replied.
'How old is _he_?' she wished to know.
'Not very old--about three, I think,' I said. I had never wished till
then that my only male acquaintance had been of less tender years, but I
felt now that he was rather small, and saw that Marjory was of the same
opinion.
'Why, he's only a baby!' she said; 'I thought you meant a _real_ boy.
And is that all the boys you know? Are you fond of games?'
'Some games--very,' said I.
'What's your favourite game?' she demanded.
'Bezique,' I answered, 'or draughts.'
'I meant _out_door games; draughts are indoor games--_is_ indoor games,
I mean--no, _are_ an indoor game--and _that_ doesn't sound grammar! But
haven't you ever played cricket? Not ever, really? I like it dreadfully
myself, only I'm not allowed to play with the boys, and I'm sure I can
bat well enough for the second eleven--Cartwright said I could last
term--and I can bowl round-hand, and it's all no use, just because I was
born a girl! Wouldn't you like a game at something? They haven't taken
in the croquet hoops yet; shall we play at that?'
But again I had to confess my ignorance of what was then the popular
garden game.
'What do you generally do to amuse yourself, then?' she inquired.
'I read, generally, or paint texts or outlines. Sometimes'--(I thought
this accomplishment would surely appeal to her)--'sometimes I do
woolwork!'
'I don't think I would tell the boys that,' she advised rather gravely;
she evidently considered me a very desperate case. 'It's such a pity,
your not knowing any games. Suppose I taught you croquet, now? It would
be something to go on with, and you'll soon learn if you pay attention
and do exactly what I tell you.'
I submitted myself meekly to her direction, and Marjory enjoyed her
office of instructress for a time, until my extreme slowness wore out
her patience, and she began to make little murmurs of disgust, for which
she invariably apologised. 'That's enough for to-day!' she said at last,
'I'll take you again to-morrow. But you really must try and pick up
games, Cameron, or you'll never be liked. Let me see, I wonder if
there's time to teach you a little football. I think I could do that.'
Before she could make any further arrangements the tea-bell rang, but
when I lay down that night in my strange cold bed, hemmed round by other
beds, which were only less formidable than if they had been occupied, I
did not feel so friendless as I might have done, and dreamed all night
that Marjory was teaching me something I understood to be cricket,
which, however, was more like a bloated kind of backgammon.
The next day Marjory was allowed to go out walking with me, and I came
home feeling that I had known her for quite a long time, while her
manner to me had acquired a tone even more protecting than before, and
she began to betray an anxiety as to my school prospects which filled me
with uneasiness.
'I am so afraid the boys won't like the way you talk,' she said on one
occasion.
'I used to be told I spoke very correctly,' I said, verdantly enough.
'But not like boys talk. You see, Cameron, I ought to know, with such a
lot of them about. I tell you what I could do, though--I could teach you
most of their words--only I must run and ask mother first if I may.
Teaching slang isn't the same as using it on my own account, is it?'
Marjory darted off impulsively to ask leave, to return presently with a
slow step and downcast face. 'I mayn't,' she announced. 'Mother says
"Certainly not," so there's an end of that! Still, I think myself it's a
decided pity.'
And more than once that day she would observe, as if to herself, 'I do
wish they had let him come to school in different collars!'
I knew that these remarks, and others of a similar tendency, were
prompted by her interest in my welfare, and I admired her too heartily
already to be offended by them: still, I cannot say they added to my
peace of mind.
And on the last evening of the holidays she said 'Good-night' to me with
some solemnity. 'Everything will be different after this,' she said; 'I
shan't be able to see nearly so much of you, because I'm not allowed to
be much with the boys. But I shall be looking after you all the time,
Cameron, and seeing how you get on. And oh! I do hope you will try to be
a popular kind of boy!'
* * * * *
I'm afraid I must own that this desire of Marjory's was not realised. I
do not know that I tried to be--and I certainly was not--a popular boy.
The other boys, I now know, were by no means bad specimens of the
English schoolboy, as will be evident when I state that, for a time, my
deep mourning was held by them to give me a claim to their forbearance.
But I had an unfortunate tendency to sudden floods of tears (apparently
for no cause whatever, really from some secret spring of association,
such as I remember was touched when I first found myself learning Latin
from the same primer over which my mother and I had puzzled together),
and these outbursts at first aroused my companions' contempt, and
finally their open ridicule.
I could not conceal my shrinking dislike to their society, which was not
calculated to make them more favourably disposed towards me; while my
tastes, my expressions, my ways of looking at things, were all at total
variance with their own standards.
The general disapproval might well have shown itself in a harsher manner
than that of merely ignoring my existence--and it says much for the tone
of the school that it did not; unfortunately, I felt their indifference
almost as keenly as I had dreaded their notice.
From my masters I met with more favour, for I had been thoroughly well
grounded, and found, besides, a temporary distraction in my school-work;
but this was hardly likely to render me more beloved by my fellows, and
so it came to pass that every day saw my isolation more complete.
Something, however, made me anxious to hide this from Marjory's eyes,
and whenever she happened to be looking on at us in the school grounds
or the playing fields, I made dismal attempts to appear on terms of
equality with the rest, and would hang about a group with as much
pretence of belonging to it as I thought at all prudent.
If she had had more opportunities of questioning me, she would have
found me out long before; as it was, the only occasion on which we were
near one another was at the weekly drawing lesson, when, although she
drew less and talked more than the Professor quite approved of, she was
obliged to restrict herself to a conversation which did not admit of
confidences.
But this negative neutral-tinted misery was not to last; I was harmless
enough, but then to some natures nothing is so offensive as
inoffensiveness. My isolation was certain to raise me up an enemy in
time, and he came in the person of one Clarence Ormsby.
He was a sturdy, good-looking fellow, about two years older than myself,
good at games, and, though not brilliant in other respects, rather idle
than dull. He was popular in the school, and I believe his general
disposition was by no means bad; but there must have been some hidden
flaw in his nature which might never have disclosed itself for any other
but me.
For me he had displayed, almost from the first, one of those special
antipathies that want but little excuse to ripen into hatred. My
personal appearance--I had the misfortune to be a decidedly plain
boy--happened to be particularly displeasing to him, and, as he had an
unsparing tongue, he used it to cover me with ridicule, until gradually,
finding that I did not retaliate, he indulged in acts of petty
oppression which, though not strictly bullying, were even more harassing and humiliating. |
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