I saw no more of Clara. Mr Coningham came to bid me good-bye, and spoke very kindly. Mr Forest would have got a nurse for me, but Charley begged so earnestly to be allowed to return the service I had done for him that he yielded.
I was in great pain for more than a week. Charley’s attentions were unremitting. In fact he nursed me more like a woman than a boy; and made me think with some contrition how poor my ministrations had been. Even after the worst was over, if I but moved, he was at my bedside in a moment. Certainly no nurse could have surpassed him. I could bear no one to touch me but him: from any one else I dreaded torture; and my medicine was administered to the very moment by my own old watch, which had been brought to do its duty at least respectably.
One afternoon, finding me tolerably comfortable, he said, ‘Shall I read something to you, Wilfrid?’
He never called me Willie, as most of my friends did.
‘I should like it,’ I answered.
‘What shall I read?’ he asked.
‘Hadn’t you something in your head,’ I rejoined, ‘when you proposed it?’
‘Well, I had; but I don’t know if you would like it.’
‘What did you think of, then?’
‘I thought of a chapter in the New Testament.’
‘How could you think I should not like that?’
‘Because I never saw you say your prayers.’
‘That is quite true. But you don’t think I never say my prayers, although you never see me do it?’
The fact was, my uncle, amongst his other peculiarities, did not approve of teaching children to say their prayers. But he did not therefore leave me without instruction in the matter of praying—either the idlest or the most availing of human actions. He would say, ‘When you want anything, ask for it, Willie; and if it is worth your having, you will have it. But don’t fancy you are doing God any service by praying to him. He likes you to pray to him because he loves you, and wants you to love him. And whatever you do, don’t go saying a lot of words you don’t mean. If you think you ought to pray, say your Lord’s Prayer, and have done with it.’ I had no theory myself on the matter; but when I was in misery on the wild mountains, I had indeed prayed to God; and had even gone so far as to hope, when I got what I prayed for, that he had heard my prayer.
Charley made no reply.
‘It seems to me better that sort of thing shouldn’t be seen, Charley,’ I persisted.
‘Perhaps, Wilfrid; but I was taught to say my prayers regularly.’ ‘I don’t think much of that either,’ I answered. ‘But I’ve said a good many prayers since I’ve been here, Charley. I can’t say I’m sure it’s of any use, but I can’t help trying after something—I don’t know what—something I want, and don’t know how to get.’
‘But it’s only the prayer of faith that’s heard—do you believe, Wilfrid?’
‘I don’t know. I daren’t say I don’t. I wish I could say I do. But I dare say things will be considered.’
‘Wouldn’t it be grand if it was true, Wilfrid?’
‘What, Charley?’
‘That God actually let his creatures see him—and—all that came of it, you know?’
‘It would be grand indeed! But supposing it true, how could we be expected to believe it like them that saw him with their own eyes?Icouldn’t be required to believe just as if I could have no doubt about it. It wouldn’t be fair. Only—perhaps we haven’t got the clew by the right end.’
‘Perhaps not. But sometimes I hate the whole thing. And then again I feel as if Imustread all about it; not that I care for it exactly, but because a body must do something—because—I don’t know how to say it—because of the misery, you know.’
‘I don’t know that I do know—quite. But now you have started the subject, I thought that was great nonsense Mr Forest was talking about the authority of the Church the other day.’
‘Well,Ithought so, too. I don’t see what right they have to say so and so, if they didn’t hear him speak. As to what he meant, they may be right or they may be wrong. If theyhavethe gift of the Spirit, as they say—how am I to tell they have? All impostors claim it as well as the true men. If I had ever so little of the same gift myself, I suppose I could tell; but they say no one has till he believes—so they may be all humbugs for anything I can possibly tell; or they may be all true men, and yet I may fancy them all humbugs, and can’t help it.’
I was quite as much astonished to hear Charley talk in this style as some readers will be doubtful whether a boy could have talked such good sense. I said nothing, and a silence followed.
‘Would you like me to read to you, then?’ he asked.
‘Yes, I should; for, do you know, after all, I don’t think there’s anything like the New Testament.’
‘Anything like it!’ he repeated. ‘I should think not! Only I wish I did know what it all meant. I wish I could talk to my father as I would to Jesus Christ if I sawhim. But if I could talk to my father, he wouldn’t understand me. He would speak to me as if I were the very scum of the universe for daring to have a doubt of whathetold me.’
‘But he doesn’t meanhimself,’ I said.
‘Well, who told him?’
‘The Bible.’
‘And who told the Bible?’
‘God, of course.’
‘But how am I to know that? I only know that they say so. Do you know, Wilfrid—Idon’tbelieve my father is quite sure himself, and that is what makes him in such a rage with anybody who doesn’t think as he does. He’s afraid it mayn’t be true after all.’
I had never had a father to talk to, but I thought something must be wrong when a boycouldn’ttalk to his father. My uncle was a better father than that came to.
Another pause followed, during which Charley searched for a chapter to fit the mood. I will not say what chapter he found, for, after all, I doubt if we had any real notion of what it meant. I know, however, that there were words in it which found their way to my conscience; and, let men of science or philosophy say what they will, the rousing of a man’s conscience is the greatest event in his existence. In such a matter, the consciousness of the man himself is the sole witness. A Chinese can expose many of the absurdities and inconsistencies of the English: it is their own Shakspere who must bear witness to their sins and faults, as well as their truths and characteristics.
After this we had many conversations about such things, one of which I shall attempt to report by-and-by. Of course, in any such attempt all that can be done is to put the effect into fresh conversational form. What I have just written must at least be more orderly than what passed between us; but the spirit is much the same, and mere fact is of consequence only as it affects truth.
The best immediate result of my illness was that I learned to love Charley Osborne dearly. We renewed an affection resembling from afar that of Shakspere for his nameless friend; we anticipated that informingIn Memoriam. Lest I be accused of infinite arrogance, let me remind my reader that the sun is reflected in a dewdrop as in the ocean.
One night I had a strange dream, which is perhaps worth telling for theinvolution of its consciousness.I thought I was awake in my bed, and Charley asleep in his. I laylooking into the room. It began to waver and change. The night-lightenlarged and receded; and the walls trembled and waved. The light hadgot behind them, and shone through them.
‘Charley! Charley!’ I cried; for I was frightened.
‘I heard him move: but before he reached me, I was lying on a lawn, surrounded by trees, with the moon shining through them from behind. The next moment Charley was by my side.
‘Isn’t it prime?’ he said. ‘It’s all over.’
‘What do you mean, Charley?’ I asked.
‘I mean that we’re both dead now. It’s not so very bad—is it?’
‘Nonsense, Charley!’ I returned; ‘I’m not dead. I’m as wide alive as ever I was. Look here.’
So saying, I sprung to my feet, and drew myself up before him.
‘Where’s your worst pain?’ said Charley, with a curious expression in his tone.
‘Here,’ I answered. ‘No; it’s not; it’s in my back. No, it isn’t. It’s nowhere. I haven’t got any pain.’
Charley laughed a low laugh, which sounded as sweet as strange. It was to the laughter of the world ‘as moonlight is to sunlight,’ but not ‘as water is to wine,’ for what it had lost in sound it had gained in smile.
‘Tell me now you’re not dead!’ he exclaimed triumphantly.
‘But,’ I insisted, ‘don’t you see I’m alive?Youmay be dead for anything I know—but Iam not—I know that.’
‘You’re just as dead as I am,’ he said. ‘Look here.’
A little way off, in an open plot by itself, stood a little white rose tree, half mingled with the moonlight. Charley went up to it, stepped on the topmost twig, and stood: the bush did not even bend under him.
‘Very well,’ I answered. ‘You are dead, I confess. But now, look you here.’
I went to a red rose-bush which stood at some distance, blanched in the moon, set my foot on the top of it, and made as if I would ascend, expecting to crush it, roses and all, to the ground. But behold! I was standing on my red rose opposite Charley on his white.
‘I told you so,’ he cried, across the moonlight, and his voice sounded as if it came from the moon far away.
‘Oh Charley!’ I cried, ‘I’m so frightened!’
‘What are you frightened at?’
‘At you. You’re dead, you know.’
‘It is a good thing, Wilfrid,’ he rejoined, in a tone of some reproach, ‘that I am not frightened at you for the same reason; for what would happen then?’
‘I don’t know. I suppose you would go away and leave me alone in this ghostly light.’
‘If I were frightened at you as you are at me, we should not be able to see each other at all. If you take courage the light will grow.’
‘Don’t leave me, Charley,’ I cried, and flung myself from my tree towards his. I found myself floating, half reclined on the air. We met midway each in the other’s arms.
‘I don’t know where I am, Charley.’
‘That is my father’s rectory.’
He pointed to the house, which I had not yet observed. It lay quite dark in the moonlight, for not a window shone from within.
‘Don’t leave me, Charley.’
‘Leave you! I should think not, Wilfrid. I have been long enough without you already.’
‘Have you been long dead, then, Charley?’
‘Not very long. Yes, a long time. But, indeed, I don’t know. We don’t count time as we used to count it.—I want to go and see my father. It is long since I sawhim, anyhow. Will you come?’
‘If you think I might—if you wish it,’ I said, for I had no great desire to see Mr Osborne. ‘Perhaps he won’t care to see me.’
‘Perhaps not,’ said Charley, with another low silvery laugh. ‘Come along.’
We glided over the grass. A window stood a little open on the second floor. We floated up, entered, and stood by the bedside of Charley’s father. He lay in a sound sleep.
‘Father! father!’ said Charley, whispering in his ear as he lay—‘it’s all right. You need not be troubled about me any more.’
Mr Osborne turned on his pillow.
‘He’s dreaming about us now,’ said Charley. ‘He sees us both standing by his bed.’
But the next moment Mr Osborne sat up, stretched out his arms towards us with the open palms outwards, as if pushing us away from him, and cried,
‘Depart from me, all evil-doers. O Lord! do I not hate them that hate thee?’
He followed with other yet more awful words which I never could recall. I only remember the feeling of horror and amazement they left behind. I turned to Charley. He had disappeared, and I found myself lying in the bed beside Mr Osborne. I gave a great cry of dismay—when there was Charley again beside me, saying,
‘What’s the matter, Wilfrid? Wake up. My father’s not here.’
I did wake, but until I had felt in the bed I could not satisfy myself that Mr Osborne was indeed not there.
‘You’ve been talking in your sleep. I could hardly get you waked,’ said Charley, who stood there in his shirt.
‘Oh Charley!’ I cried, ‘I’ve had such a dream!’
‘What was it, Wilfrid?’
‘Oh! I can’t talk about it yet,’ I answered.
I never did tell him that dream; for even then I was often uneasy about him—he was so sensitive. The affections of my friend were as hoops of steel; his feelings a breath would ripple. Oh, my Charley! if ever we meet in that land so vaguely shadowed in my dream, will you not know that I loved you heartily well? Shall I not hasten’ to lay bare my heart before you—the priest of its confessional? Oh, Charley! when the truth is known, the false will fly asunder as the Autumn leaves in the wind; but the true, whatever their faults, will only draw together the more tenderly that they have sinned against each other.
Before the Winter arrived, I was well, and Charley had recovered from the fatigue of watching me. One holiday, he and I set out alone to accomplish a scheme we had cherished from the first appearance of the frost. How it arose I hardly remember; I think it came of some remark Mr Forest had made concerning the difference between the streams of Switzerland and England—those in the former country being emptiest, those in the latter fullest in the Winter. It was—when the frost should have bound up the sources of the beck which ran almost by our door, and it was no longer a stream, but a rope of ice—to take that rope for our guide, and follow it as far as we could towards the secret recesses of its Summer birth.
Along the banks of the stream, we followed it up and up, meeting a varied loveliness which it would take the soul of a Wordsworth or a Ruskin to comprehend or express. To my poor faculty the splendour of the ice-crystals remains the one memorial thing. In those lonely water-courses the sun was gloriously busy, with none to praise him except Charley and me.
Where the banks were difficult we went down into the frozen bed, and there had story above story of piled-up loveliness, with opal and diamond cellars below. Spikes and stars crystalline radiated and refracted and reflected marvellously. But we did not reach the primary source of the stream by miles; we were stopped by a precipitous rock, down the face of which one half of the stream fell, while the other crept out of its foot, from a little cavernous opening about four feet high. Charley was a few yards ahead of me, and ran stooping into the cavern. I followed. But when I had gone as far as I dared for the darkness and the down-sloping roof, and saw nothing of him, I grew dismayed, and called him. There was no answer. With a thrill of horror my dream returned upon me. I got on my hands and knees and crept forward. A short way further the floor sank—only a little, I believe, but from the darkness I took the descent for an abyss into which Charley had fallen. I gave a shriek of despair, and scrambled out of the cave howling. In a moment he was by my side. He had only crept behind a projection for a trick. His remorse was extreme. He begged my pardon in the most agonized manner.
‘Never mind, Charley,’ I said; ‘you didn’t mean it.’
‘Yes, I did mean it,’ he returned. ‘The temptation came, and I yielded; only I did not know how dreadful it would be to you.’
‘Of course not. You wouldn’t have done it if you had.’
‘How am I to know that, Wilfrid? I might have done it. Isn’t it frightful that a body may go on and on till a thing is done, and then wish he hadn’t done it? I am a despicable creature. Do you know, Wilfrid, I once shot a little bird—for no good, but just to shoot at something. It wasn’t that I didn’t think of it—don’t say that. I did think of it. I knew it was wrong. When I had levelled my gun, I thought of it quite plainly, and yet drew the trigger. It dropped, a heap of ruffled feathers. I shall never get that little bird out of my head. And the worst of it is that to all eternity I can never make any atonement.’
‘But God will forgive you, Charley.’
‘What do I care for that,’ he rejoined, almost fiercely, ‘when the little bird cannot forgive me?—I would go on my knees to the little bird, if I could, to beg its pardon and tell it-what a brute I was, and it might shoot me if it would, and I should say “Thank you.”’
He laughed almost hysterically, and the tears ran down his face.
I have said little about my uncle’s teaching, lest I should bore my readers. But there it came in, and therefore here it must come in. My uncle had, by no positive instruction, but by occasional observations, not one of which I can recall, generated in me a strong hope that the life of the lower animals was terminated at their death no more than our own. The man who believes that thought is the result of brain, and not the growth of an unknown seed whose soil is the brain, may well sneer at this, for he is to himself but a peck of dust that has to be eaten by the devouring jaws of Time; but I cannot see how the man who believes in soul at all, can say that the spirit of a man lives, and that the spirit of his horse dies. I do not profess to believe anything forcertain suremyself, but I do think that he who, if from merely philosophical considerations, believes the one, ought to believe the other as well. Much more must the theosophist believe it. But I had never felt the need of the doctrine until I beheld the misery of Charley over the memory of the dead sparrow. Surely that sparrow fell not to the ground without the Father’s knowledge.
‘Charley! how do you know,’ I said, ‘that you can never beg the bird’s pardon? If God made the bird, do you fancy with your gun you could destroy the making of his hand? If he said, “Let there be,” do you suppose you could say, “There shall not be”?’ (Mr Forest had read that chapter of first things at morning prayers.) ‘I fancy myself that for God to put a bird all in the power of a silly thoughtless boy—’
‘Not thoughtless! not thoughtless! There is the misery!’ said Charley.
But I went on—
‘—would be worse than for you to shoot it.’
A great glow of something I dare not attempt to define grew upon Charley’s face. It was like what I saw on it when Clara laid her hand on his. But presently it died out again, and he sighed—
‘If therewerea God—that is, if I were sure there was a God, Wilfrid!’
I could not answer. How could I?Ihad never seen God, as the old story says Moses did on the clouded mountain. All I could return was,
‘Suppose there should be a God, Charley!—Mightn’t there be a God!’
‘I don’t know,’ he returned. ‘How shouldIknow whether theremightbe a God?’
‘Butmaythere not be amight be?’ I rejoined.
‘There may be. How should I say the other thing?’ said Charley.
I do not mean this was exactly what he or I said. Unable to recall the words themselves, I put the sense of the thing in as clear a shape as I can.
We were seated upon a stone in the bed of the stream, off which the sun had melted the ice. The bank rose above us, but not far. I thought I heard a footstep. I jumped up, but saw no one. I ran a good way up the stream to a place where I could climb the bank; but then saw no one. The footstep, real or imagined, broke our conversation at that point, and we did not resume it. All that followed was—
‘If I were the sparrow, Charley, I would not only forgive you, but haunt you for ever out of gratitude that you were sorry you had killed me.’
‘Then youdoforgive me for frightening you?’ he said eagerly.
Very likely Charley and I resembled each other too much to be the best possible companions for each other. There was, however, this difference between us—that he had been bored with religion and I had not. In other words, food had been forced upon him, which had only been laid before me.
We rose and went home. A few minutes after our entrance, Mr Forest came in—looking strange, I thought. The conviction crossed my mind that it was his footstep we had heard over our heads as we sat in the channel of the frozen stream. I have reason to think that he followed us for a chance of listening. Something had set him on the watch—most likely the fact that we were so much together, and did not care for the society of the rest of our schoolfellows. From that time, certainly, he regarded Charley and myself with a suspicious gloom. We felt it, but beyond talking to each other about it, and conjecturing its cause, we could do nothing. It made Charley very unhappy at times, deepening the shadow which brooded over his mind; for his moral skin was as sensitive to changes in the moral atmosphere as the most sensitive of plants to those in the physical. But unhealthy conditions in the smallest communities cannot last long without generating vapours which result in some kind of outburst.
The other boys, naturally enough, were displeased with us for holding so much together. They attributed it to some fancy of superiority, whereas there was nothing in it beyond the simplest preference for each other’s society. We were alike enough to understand each other, and unlike enough to interest and aid each other. Besides, we did not care much for the sports in which boys usually explode their superfluous energy. I preferred a walk and a talk with Charley to anything else.
I may here mention that these talks had nearly cured me of castle-building. To spin yarns for Charley’s delectation would have been absurd. He cared for nothing but the truth. And yet he could never assure himself that anything was true. The more likely a thing looked to be true, the more anxious was he that it should be unassailable; and his fertile mind would in as many moments throw a score of objections at it, looking after each with eager eyes as if pleading for a refutation. It was the very love of what was good that generated in him doubt and anxiety.
When our schoolfellows perceived that Mr Forest also was dissatisfied with us, their displeasure grew to indignation; and we did not endure its manifestations without a feeling of reflex defiance.
One Spring morning we had got up early and sauntered out together. I remember perfectly what our talk was about. Charley had started the question: ‘How could it be just to harden Pharaoh’s heart and then punish him for what came of it?’ I who had been brought up without any superstitious reverence for the Bible, suggested that the narrator of the story might be accountable for the contradiction, and simply that it was not true that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart. Strange to say, Charley was rather shocked at this. He had as yet received the dogma of the infallibility of the Bible without thinking enough about it to question it. Nor did it now occur to him what a small affair it was to find a book fallible, compared with finding the God of whom the book spoke fallible upon its testimony—for such was surely the dilemma. Men have been able to exist without a Bible: if there be a God it must be in and through Him that all men live; only if he be not true, then in Him, and not in the first Adam, all men die.
We were talking away about this, no doubt after a sufficiently crude manner, as we approached the house, unaware that we had lingered too long. The boys were coming out from breakfast for a game before school.
Amongst them was one of the name of Home, who considered himself superior, from his connection with the Scotch Homes. He was a big, strong, pale-faced, handsome boy, with the least bit of a sneer always hovering upon his upper lip. Charley was half a head shorter than he, and I was half a head shorter than Charley. As we passed him, he said aloud, addressing the boy next him—
‘There they go—a pair of sneaks!’
Charley turned upon him at once, his face in a glow.
‘Home,’ he said, ‘no gentleman would say so.’
‘And why not?’ said Home, turning and striding up to Charley in a magnificent manner.
‘Because there is no ground for the assertion,’ said Charley.
‘Then you mean to say I am a liar?’
‘I mean to say,’ returned Charley, with more promptitude than I could have expected of him, ‘that if you are a gentleman, you will be sorry for it.’
‘There is my apology, then!’ said Home, and struck Charley a blow on the head which laid him on the ground. I believe he repented it the moment he had done it.
I caught one glimpse of the blood pouring over the transparent blue-veined skin, and rushed at Home in a transport of fury.
I never was brave one step beyond being able to do what must be done and bear what must be borne; and now it was not courage that inspired me, but a righteous wrath.
I did my best, got a good many hard blows, and planted not one in return, for I had never fought in my life. I do believe Home spared me, conscious of wrong. Meantime some of them had lifted Charley and carried him into the house.
Before I was thoroughly mauled, which must have been the final result, for I would not give in, the master appeared, and in a voice such as I had never heard from him before, ordered us all into the school-room.
‘Fighting like bullies!’ he said. ‘I thought my pupils were gentlemen at least!’
Perhaps dimly aware that he had himself given some occasion to this outbreak, and imagining in his heart a show of justice, he seized Home by the collar, and gave him a terrible cut with the riding-whip which he had caught up in his anger. Home cried out, and the same moment Charley appeared, pale as death.
‘Oh, sir!’ he said, laying his hand on the master’s arm appealingly, ‘I was to blame too.’
‘I don’t doubt it,’ returned Mr Forest. ‘I shall settle with you presently. Get away!’
‘Now, sir,’ he continued, turning to me—and held the whip suspended, as if waiting a word from me to goad him on. He looked something else than a gentleman himself just then. It was a sudden outbreak of the beast in him. ‘Will you tell me why you punish me, sir, if you please? What have I done?’ I said.
His answer was such a stinging blow that for a moment I was bewildered, and everything reeled about me. But I did not cry out—I know that, for I asked two of the fellows after.
‘You prate about justice!’ he said. ‘I will let you know what justice means—to you at least.’
And down came a second cut as bad as the first. My blood was up.
‘If this is justice, then thereisno God,’ I said.
He stood aghast. I went on.
‘If there be a God—’
‘Ifthere be a God!’ he shrieked, and sprang towards me.
I did not move a step.
‘I hope there is,’ I said, as he seized me again; ‘for you are unjust.’
I remember only a fierce succession of blows. With Voltaire and the French revolution present to his mind in all their horror, he had been nourishing in his house a toad of the same spawn! He had been remiss, but would now compel those whom his neglect had injured to pay off his arrears! A most orthodox conclusion! but it did me little harm: it did not make me think that God was unjust, for my uncle, not Mr Forest, was my type of Christian. The harm it did was of another sort—and to Charley, not to me.
Of course, while under the hands of the executioner, I could not observe what was going on around me. When I began to awake from the absorption of my pain and indignation, I found myself in my room. I had been ordered thither, and had mechanically obeyed. I was on my bed, staring at the door, at which I had become aware of a gentle tapping.
‘Come in,’ I said; and Charley—who, although it was his room as much as mine, never entered when he thought I was there without knocking at the door—appeared, with the face of a dead man. Sore as I was, I jumped up.
‘The brute has not been thrashingyou, Charley!’ I cried, in a wrath that gave me the strength of a giant. With that terrible bruise above his temple from Home’s fist, none but a devil could have dared to lay hands upon him!
‘No, Wilfrid,’ he answered; ‘no such honour for me! I am disgraced for ever!’
He hid his wan face in his thin hands.
‘What do you mean, Charley?’ I said. ‘You cannot have told a lie!’
‘No, Wilfrid. But it doesn’t matter now. I don’t care for myself any more.’
‘Then, Charley, whathaveyou done?’
‘You are always so kind, Wilfrid!’ he returned, with a hopelessness which seemed almost coldness.
‘Charley,’ I said, ‘if you don’t tell me what has happened—’
‘Happened!’ he cried. ‘Hasn’t that man been lashing at you like a dog, and Ididn’trush at him, and if I couldn’t fight, being a milksop, then bite and kick and scratch, and take my share of it? O God!’ he cried, in agony, ‘if I had but a chance again! But nobody ever has more than one chance in this world. He may damn me now when he likes: I don’t care!’
‘Charley! Charley!’ I cried; ‘you’re as bad as Mr Forest. Are you to say such things about God, when you know nothing of him? He may be as good a God, after all, as even we should like him to be.’
‘But Mr Forest is a clergyman.’
‘And God was the God of Abraham before ever there was a clergyman to take his name in vain,’ I cried; for I was half mad with the man who had thus wounded my Charley. ‘Iam content with you, Charley. You are my best and only friend. That is all nonsense about attacking Forest. What could you have done, you know? Don’t talk such rubbish.’
‘I might have taken my share with you,’ said Charley, and again buried his face in his hands.
‘Come, Charley,’ I said, and at the moment a fresh wave of manhood swept through my soul; ‘you and I will take our share together a hundred times yet. I have done my part now; yours will come next.’
‘But to think of not sharing your disgrace, Wilfrid!’
‘Disgrace!’ I said, drawing myself up, ‘where was that?’
‘You’ve been beaten,’ he said.
‘Every stripe was a badge of honour,’ I said, ‘for I neither deserved it nor cried out against it. I feel no disgrace.’
‘Well, I’ve missed the honour,’ said Charley; ‘but that’s nothing, so you have it. But not to share your disgrace would have been mean. And it’s all one; for I thought it was disgrace, and I did not share it. I am a coward for ever, Wilfrid.’
‘Nonsense! He never gave you a chance.Inever thought of striking back: how shouldyou?’
‘I will be your slave, Wilfrid! You aresogood, and I amsounworthy.’
He put his arms round me, laid his head on my shoulder, and sobbed. I did what more I could to comfort him, and gradually he grew calm. At length he whispered in my ear—
‘After all, Wilfrid, I do believe I was horror-struck, and itwasn’tcowardice pure and simple.’
‘I haven’t a doubt of it,’ I said. ‘I love you more than ever.’
‘Oh, Wilfrid! I should have gone mad by this time but for you. Will you be my friend whatever happens?—Even if I should be a coward after all?’
‘Indeed I will, Charley.—What do you think Forest will do next?’
We resolved not to go down until we were sent for; and then to be perfectly quiet, not speaking to any one unless we were spoken to; and at dinner we carried out our resolution.
When bed-time came, we went as usual to make our bow to Mr Forest.
‘Cumbermede,’ he said sternly, ‘you sleep in No. 5 until further orders.’
‘Very well, sir,’ I said, and went, but lingered long enough to hear the fate of Charley.
‘Home,’ said Mr Forest, ‘you go to No. 3.’
That was our room.
‘Home,’ I said, having lingered on the stairs until he appeared, ‘you don’t bear me a grudge, do you?’
‘It was my fault,’ said Home. ‘I had no right to pitch into you. Only you’re such a cool beggar! But, by Jove! I didn’t think Forest would have been so unfair. If you forgive me, I’ll forgive you.’
‘If I hadn’t stood up to you, I couldn’t,’ I returned. ‘I knew I hadn’t a chance. Besides, I hadn’t any breakfast.’
‘I was a brute,’ said Home.
‘Oh, I don’t mind for myself; but there’s Osborne! I wonder you could hithim.’
‘He shouldn’t have jawed me,’ said Home.
‘But you did first.’
We had reached the door of the room which had been Home’s and was now to be mine, and went in together.
‘Didn’t you now?’ I insisted.
‘Well, I did; I confess I did. And it was very plucky of him.’
‘Tell him that, Home,’ I said. ‘For God’s sake tell him that. It will comfort him. You must be kind to him, Home. We’re not so bad as Forest takes us for.’
‘I will,’ said Home.
And he kept his word.
We were never allowed to share the same room again, and school was not what it had been to either of us.
Within a few weeks Charley’s father, to our common dismay, suddenly appeared, and the next morning took him away. What he said to Charley I do not know. He did not take the least notice of me, and I believe would have prevented Charley from saying good-bye to me. But just as they were going Charley left his father’s side, and came up to me with a flush on his face and a flash in his eye that made him look more manly and handsome than I had ever seen him, and shook hands with me, saying—
‘It’s all right—isn’t it, Wilfrid?’
‘Itisall right, Charley, come what will,’ I answered.
‘Good-bye then, Wilfrid.’
‘Good-bye, Charley.’
And so we parted.
I do not care to say one word more about the school. I continued there for another year and a half. Partly in misery, partly in growing eagerness after knowledge, I gave myself to my studies with more diligence. Mr Forest began to be pleased with me, and I have no doubt plumed himself on the vigorous measures by which he had nipped the bud of my infidelity. For my part I drew no nearer to him, for I could not respect or trust him after his injustice. I did my work for its own sake, uninfluenced by any desire to please him. There was, in fact, no true relation between us any more.
I communicated nothing of what had happened to my uncle, because Mr Forest’s custom was to read every letter before it left the house. But I longed for the day when I could tell the whole story to the great, simple-hearted man.
Before my return to England, I found that familiarity with the sights and sounds of a more magnificent nature had removed my past life to a great distance. What had interested my childhood had strangely dwindled, yet gathered a new interest from its far-off and forsaken look. So much did my past wear to me now the look of something read in a story, that I am haunted with a doubt whether I may not have communicated too much of this appearance to my description of it, although I have kept as true as my recollections would enable me. The outlines must be correct: if the colouring be unreal, it is because of the haze which hangs about the memories of the time.
The revisiting of old scenes is like walking into a mausoleum. Everything is a monument of something dead and gone. For we die daily. Happy those who daily come to life as well!
I returned with a clear conscience, for not only had I as yet escaped corruption, but for the greater part of the time at least I had worked well. If Mr Forest’s letter which I carried to my uncle contained any hint intended to my disadvantage, it certainly fell dead on his mind; for he treated me with a consideration and respect which at once charmed and humbled me.
One day as we were walking together over the fields, I told him the whole story of the loss of the weapon at Moldwarp Hall. Up to the time of my leaving for Switzerland I had shrunk from any reference to the subject, so painful was it to me, and so convinced was I that his sympathy would be confined to a compassionate smile and a few words of condolence.
But glancing at his face now and then as I told the tale, I discovered more of interest in the play of his features than I had expected; and when he learned that it was absolutely gone from me, his face flushed with what seemed anger. For some moments after I had finished he was silent. At length he said,
‘It is a strange story, Wilfrid, my boy. There must be some explanation of it, however.’
He then questioned me about Mr Close, for suspicion pointed in his direction. I was in great hopes he would follow my narrative with what he knew of the sword, but he was still silent, and I could not question him, for I had long suspected that its history had to do with the secret which he wanted me to keep from myself.
The very day of my arrival I went up to my grandmother’s room, which I found just as she had left it. There stood her easy-chair, there her bed, there the old bureau. The room looked far less mysterious now that she was not there; but it looked painfully deserted. One thing alone was still as it were enveloped in its ancient atmosphere—the bureau. I tried to open it—with some trembling, I confess; but only the drawers below were unlocked, and in them I found nothing but garments of old-fashioned stuffs, which I dared not touch.
But the day of childish romance was over, and life itself was too strong and fresh to allow me to brood on the past for more than an occasional half-hour. My thoughts were full of Oxford, whither my uncle had resolved I should go; and I worked hard in preparation.
‘I have not much money to spare, my boy,’ he said; ‘but I have insured my life for a sum sufficient to provide for your aunt, if she should survive me; and after her death it will come to you. Of course the old house and the park, which have been in the family for more years than I can tell, will be yours at my death. A good part of the farm was once ours too, but not for these many years. I could not recommend you to keep on the farm; but I confess I should be sorry if you were to part with our own little place, although I do not doubt you might get a good sum for it from Sir Giles, to whose park it would be a desirable addition. I believe at one time, the refusal to part with our poor little vineyard of Naboth was cause of great offence, even of open feud between the great family at the Hall and the yeomen who were your ancestors; but poor men may be as unwilling as rich to break one strand of the cord that binds them to the past. But of course when you come into the property, you will do as you see fit with your own.’
‘You don’t think, uncle, I would sell this house, or the field it stands in, for all the Moldwarp estate? I too have my share of pride in the family, although as yet I know nothing of its history.’
‘Surely, Wilfrid, the feeling for one’s own people who have gone before is not necessarily pride!’
‘It doesn’t much matter what you call it, uncle.’
‘Yes, it does, my boy. Either you call it by the right name or by the wrong name. If your feelingispride, then I am not objecting to the name, but the thing. If your feeling is not pride, why call a good thing by a bad name? But to return to our subject: my hope is that, if I give you a good education, you will make your own way. You might, you know, let the park, as we call it, for a term of years.’
‘I shouldn’t mind letting the park,’ I answered, ‘for a little while; but nothing should ever make me let the dear old house. What should I do if I wanted it to die in?’
The old man smiled, evidently not ill-pleased.
‘What do you say to the bar?’ he asked.
‘I would rather not,’ I answered.
‘Would you prefer the Church?’ he asked, eyeing me a little doubtfully.
‘No, certainly, uncle,’ I answered. ‘I should want to be surer of a good many things before I dared teach them to other people.’
‘I am glad of that, my boy. The fear did cross my mind for a moment that you might be inclined to take to the Church as a profession, which seems to me the worst kind of infidelity. A thousand times rather would I have you doubtful about what is to me the highest truth, than regarding it with the indifference of those who see in it only the prospect of a social position and livelihood. Have you any plan of your own?’
‘I have heard,’ I answered, circuitously, ‘that many barristers have to support themselves by literary work, for years before their own profession begin to show them favour. I should prefer going in for the writing at once.’
‘It must be a hard struggle either way,’ he replied; ‘but I should not leave you without something to fall back upon. Tell me what makes you think you could be an author?’
‘I am afraid it is presumptuous,’ I answered, ‘but as often as I think of what I am to do, that is the first thing that occurs to me. I suppose,’ I added, laughing, ‘that the favour with which my school-fellows at Mr Elder’s used to receive my stories is to blame for it. I used to tell them by the hour together.’
‘Well,’ said my uncle, ‘that proves, at least, that, if you had anything to say, you might be able to say it; but I am afraid it proves nothing more.’
‘Nothing more, I admit. I only mentioned it to account for the notion.’
‘I quite understand you, my boy. Meantime, the best thing in any case will be Oxford. I will do what I can to make it an easier life for you than I found it.’
Having heard nothing of Charley Osborne since he left Mr Forest’s, I went one day, very soon after my return, to call on Mr Elder, partly in the hope of learning something about him. I found Mrs Elder unchanged, but could not help fancying a difference in Mr Elder’s behaviour, which, after finding I could draw nothing from him concerning Charley, I attributed to Mr Osborne’s evil report, and returned foiled and vexed. I told my uncle, with some circumstance, the whole story: explaining how, although unable to combat the doubts which occasioned Charley’s unhappiness, I had yet always hung to the side of believing.
‘You did right to do no more, my boy,’ said my uncle; ‘and it is clear you have been misunderstood—and ill-used besides. But every wrong will be set right some day.’
My aunt showed me now far more consideration—I do not say—than she hadfeltbefore. A curious kind of respect mingled with her kindness, which seemed a slighter form of the observance with which she constantly regarded my uncle.
My study was pretty hard and continuous. I had no tutor to direct me or take any of the responsibility off me.
I walked to the Hall one morning to see Mrs Wilson. She was kind, but more stiff even than before. From her I learned two things of interest. The first, which beyond measure delighted me, was, that Charley was at Oxford—had been there for a year. The second was that Clara was at school in London. Mrs Wilson shut her mouth very primly after answering my question concerning her; and I went no further in that direction. I took no trouble to ask her concerning the relationship of which Mr Coningham had spoken. I knew already from my uncle that it was a fact, but Mrs Wilson did not behave in such a manner as to render me inclined to broach the subject. If she wished it to remain a secret from me, she should be allowed to imagine it such.