The big room was full. Every form room, always occupied at morning
preparation, was emptied of its contents, for all had been convened, by
special proclamation, to the large schoolroom, now to become, for the
time being, a species of hall of justice. So, even as at prayer time,
arranged in the rows of lockers according to dormitories, the whole
three hundred and fifty or so of boys chattered in a continuous and
undertoned buzz--restrained, but not silenced, by the prefectorial
calls:
"Quiet there!"
"You, Jones. I've spoken to you before already."
"Brown, come to me afterwards in the fourth form room."
"Now, then, that bottom row. Stop that shoving about! D'you hear?"
And so on.
Yes, the excitement was intense. There had not been such a row on, said
some one, since that in which Thurston's gang had been caught smoking.
They had set up a kind of divan in a dry ditch, which, being
unexpectedly raided, they, and their pipes and tobacco, had been seized
in close conjunction the one with the other--and Thurston and five other
big fellows had been flogged. Or, said others, since a far worse case
of another kind, wherein some fifteen fellows of all ages had been
swished. And now all sorts of wild rumours began to go round. All the
fellows in the small room at the end of Williams's dormitory were going
to be swished--so extensive was the order sent to the gardener for the
manufacture of birch rods, declared some, who affected to be in the
know. But the centre light of all the excitement and conjecture was
Haviland. He was not a prefect now, and therefore could,
constitutionally, be swished. But--would he take it? That was the
point--would he take it? Some opined that he would not--others that he
would have to.
"Silence! Ss-silence there!" roared the prefects, with a force and
unanimity that hushed the room in a minute. For it meant that the
Doctor was coming in.
You might have heard a pin drop in that hitherto buzzing assemblage as
the Headmaster ascended to the big desk in the middle and signed for the
door to be shut. Then it was seen that there stood before him of
culprits exactly one dozen, of whom all but two were in varying stages
of funk.
The Doctor, you see, acting upon his usual thorough and whole-hearted
method, had wasted no time in elaborate investigations. He had simply
sent for Haviland and taxed him with what was charged, and Haviland,
disdaining to prevaricate or make excuses, had owned his whole share in
the alleged misdoing, and rather more, for he had endeavoured to shield
Anthony by declaring that the Zulu boy had been entirely influenced by
him; nor would it have helped him any way to have denied the matter, for
the Doctor meanwhile had ordered the search of every box in the
dormitory, and there in Haviland's box was the coil of cord, and in that
of Anthony the blood-stained weapon. Further, with the same
thoroughness, he had chosen to consider the whole room as in a degree
implicated.
Now, confronting the whole school, speaking in his most awe-inspiring
tones, the Doctor commenced his harangue. He dwelt on the complaints
that had been coming in for some time past of serious depredations in
the game preserves of the neighbouring landowners, and how such were
entirely detrimental to the credit of the school, as also to its
interests in another way, for the time had now arrived when it had
become a grave question whether the reasonable liberty which had always
been its privilege should not be withdrawn. Here a stir of sensation
went through the listeners, who began to think that this rare
excitement, even to those not the most active participants in it, had
its unpleasant side.
Fortunately, though protracted, detection had overtaken the offenders,
he declared--the principal offenders--as sooner or later it invariably
and surely did, let them be certain of that, and, with detection,
chastisement immediate and condign.
"It should be a matter of shame and grief to all of us," he went on,
"that one who for so long has held a position of responsibility and
trust should be the ringleader in these occasions of disorder and grave
offence--leading astray not only his younger schoolfellows, but also one
whom the humane and civilising spirit of a noble and self-sacrificing
organisation has rescued from a life of barbarism and degradation, and
sent here, where every opportunity is placed in his way to become a
credit to that organisation, and a shining light in the noble endeavours
to rescue from heathenism his barbarous fellow countrymen. I refer to
Anthony, upon whom, I trust, the punishment I am about to inflict will
act as a salutary warning and prove the turning-point in his school
life. The other boys in the room I hold in a lesser degree to be
participants in the grave scandal--I will not say breach of rules,
because obviously such an offence as to get outside the school walls
surreptitiously at night is one that no rule need be definitely
formulated to cover."
Here two or three of the smaller boys implicated began to snivel. The
whole lot would be swished, of course, they thought, and, indeed, such
was the opinion of the whole school. It was precious hard lines, for
they had no more hand in the affair than anybody else in the room; but
such was the Doctor's way.
"As for you, Haviland," he continued, "it is simply lamentable how you
have time after time betrayed your trust and shirked your
responsibilities--in short, gone from bad to worse. I had hoped you
would have taken warning when I was obliged to suspend you from your
office, and have behaved in such wise as to justify me in shortly
reinstating you; but, so far from this, you seem to have become utterly
reckless and abandoned. You are nearly grown up now, and should be
setting an example; but, instead of that, you are using the influence
which your age and strength give you in the eyes of your schoolfellows,
to lead your juniors into mischief and wrong-doing. It is clear,
therefore, that there is no further place for you among us. Yet I am
reluctant, very reluctant, to proceed to such an extreme measure as your
public expulsion--"
Now the excitement had reached its height. Haviland was going to be
swished, not expelled, decided the spectators, but--would he take it?
Haviland standing there, his lips compressed, a set frown on his brow,
was of the same opinion, except that he himself, and he only, held the
answer to the question. He would not take it--no, decidedly not. They
might expel him and welcome, he did not care, he was past caring; but
submit to the indignity of a flogging at his age he would not.
"Therefore," continued the Doctor, "I shall take time to consider so
grave and painful a matter; and, meanwhile, you will be withdrawn from
all intercourse or contact with the rest of the school. Anthony I
shall, of course, soundly flog. I shall also flog Smithson minor and
Mcmurdo; and, as for the other boys in the dormitory, on this occasion I
shall confine myself to severely warning them."
There was a sort of audible sensation among the listeners, but it was
nothing to what followed. For now Haviland lifted up his voice:--
"Please, sir, Smithson and Mcmurdo had no more to do with it than the
man in the moon."
The Doctor frowned as he gazed sternly at the speaker.
"Keep silence," he said, in a curt tone. Haviland obeyed. He had made
his protest in the name of fair play. He was not concerned to take any
further risks. But those who saw--those who heard--was ever such a
thing witnessed before at Saint Kirwin's? The Doctor--the awful, the
dreaded Doctor--expostulated with, and that before the whole school!
Why did not the very heavens fall?
The public floggings at Saint Kirwin's were public in the sense that
they could be heard by all but seen by none, for they took place in a
small room adjoining the big schoolroom, and the audience were able to
estimate how each of the victims "took it." In the present instance,
Smithson and Mcmurdo got off with a comparatively slight infliction,
and, beyond a smothered yelp or two, "took it" well. But when it came
to Anthony's turn, they wondered if it was going on for ever. He
received, in fact, a most relentless swishing, but for all the sound
that escaped him--whether of cry or groan--he might just as well not be
undergoing chastisement at all. The school was lost in admiration of
his pluck and endurance; and, afterwards, when he emerged, showing no
sign of pain, but scowling savagely, and muttering in his own tongue--
the word having been given to dismiss--he broke forth:--
"What they do to Haviland?"
"Well done, Cetchy! Well done, old chap! You did take it well.
Biggest swishing Nick ever gave. He'd have stopped if you'd yelled
out," were some of the congratulations showered upon him. But of them
he took no notice whatever.
"D--n! What they do to Haviland?" he repeated, stamping his foot, and
scowling savagely.
"I'm afraid he'll be expelled, Cetchy," said some one. The others
thought so too.
"What's expelled? Sent away?"
"That'll be it."
The Zulu boy made no answer. He gazed from one to the other, and then
his eyes began to fill, and great tears, which the most savage flogging
ever administered within the walls of Saint Kirwin's had failed to wring
from him, rolled down his cheeks. "Haviland sent away! perhaps not even
allowed to bid him good-bye. No, that was too much."
"Never mind, Cetchy, old chap. Perhaps it won't come to that, after
all," were some of the well-meant attempts to console him. But he would
have none of it, and turned away, sorrowful and speechless.
The while, in many a group, recent events were being volubly discussed.
"I always hated Haviland," declared one youngster emphatically. "He was
such a brute when he was a prefect. But I like him now, since he
cheeked Nick. He _is_ a plucky beggar."
"Now then, get along to your places--sharp, d'you hear?" commanded two
or three prefects, breaking up such groups--for it was preparation time.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Haviland, after a day and a half of solitary confinement--retirement
would perhaps be a better word, for he was not under lock and key--had
reached the stage of sullen resignation. Of course he would be
expelled.
There was no hope, and now that it had come to this, and he had had time
to think, he felt that he would give anything for another chance. Then
his heart hardened. The Doctor had driven him into it, had simply
persecuted him with an unrelenting spite: and his thoughts were bitter
and black and revengeful. In the midst of which a sound of firm
footsteps was heard outside, and the door opened, admitting--the Doctor.
A hard resentful scowl came upon the young fellow's face, and he gazed
sullenly before him.
"Haviland, you are to go home immediately."
"Of course," thought Haviland to himself. "Now for it! I am to be shot
out, and the old brute's going to preach me a humbugging canting sermon
first."
But there was no sternness in the Doctor's voice as he went on. It was
solemn, almost affectionate.
"I am sorry to say I have received bad news, I fear very bad news, but--
we must hope for the best."
"What, sir?" shouted Haviland, springing to his feet. "Who is it?
Who?"
"Your father."
Haviland's face went deadly white. He staggered forward, and in his
agony of grief seized the headmaster--the terrible headmaster--by the
coat sleeve.
"Is he--is he--?"
"Alive, yes. But, my poor boy, you must go to him at once. Everything
is arranged for you to catch the earliest train for London, and you have
just a quarter of an hour to get ready in."
"Tell me, sir, what have you heard?" besought Haviland piteously.
Dr Bowen, like many hot-tempered men, was at bottom soft-hearted, and
now he could hardly control his voice to reply, so deeply was he
affected. For the telegram which he had received was to the effect that
Haviland's father had met with a street accident, and was not expected
to live till night. If his son arrived in time to see him again, it was
all that could be hoped.
"Remember, Haviland," he said, after conveying this as feelingly as
possible, "that, after all, while there is life there is hope, however
small. Go now and get ready. In view of this great grief which has
been sent you I will say nothing of what is past, except that when you
return to us next term, I am sure you will redeem what is past and start
afresh."
The latter was intended to convey that, under the great sorrow which had
fallen upon him, Haviland might consider the past overlooked, and that
although he was going home now, it was not under expulsion.