and--disappointed. You can go now; you will sleep to-night in the small
spare room, and I will see you to-morrow. Go!"
Haggart moved slowly to the door, and as he turned the handle, he heard
a noise, and then the Doctor's voice, speaking sharply: "What is that?
What are they doing on the fourth form?"
"Harry Parker has a fit, or he's dead, or something," said a scared
voice.
"No, he has only fainted," said Mr Barclay. "Take him to Miss Simpson,
Barclay," said the Doctor. "He is a delicate little fellow."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Wasn't there a fellow called something Curtius, who saved a city once?"
said a first-form boy, in a whisper.
"Yes; he leaped into a gulf."
"Well, that's what Haggart's done," said the boy.
"Rot!" said the other boy, still whispering.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nothing seemed very clear to Haggart's mind as he slowly undressed in
the cold, unused room. His brain was worried and confused. He wished
he could have had the light of the Doctor's clear mind upon it, but, of
course, that was impossible.
"If he _is_ waxy, he's always just," he found himself saying out loud;
and then, just before he went to sleep, "but, at any rate, I can bear it
better."
There is no need to dwell upon the weeks that followed. Haggart took
his punishment bravely enough, but that time was always, in after-life,
a hideous memory to him. To be unloved, untrusted, solitary, and
despised, to be coldly disbelieved or contemptuously contradicted, was
so very hard to bear! But, with a strange and sickening sense of dread,
he found himself longing, most of all, to hear of Harry--to know if he
were sorry, or remorseful, or only thankful to be spared! Then, at
last, in some roundabout way the news came to him.
Harry had been taken ill with brain fever the very day after the
tragedy, and had been sent home; and it gave Haggart his first moment of
conscious happiness to realise that he had perhaps saved the poor, weak,
little, trembling creature from one night of fear and anguish.
The boys were always kind to him in their peculiar way. There seemed to
be a bewildered feeling in their minds of cruelty and injustice, and
they were glad that he had not stuck out to the last and included the
whole school in the punishment; so sticks of liquorice, and jam-tarts,
and even white mice, were secretly conveyed to his desk as tokens of
friendship; but, although Haggart was grateful for the attentions, he
could never quite shake off the longing to make a clean breast of it to
the Doctor, and get his troubled mind set straight.
But one morning before the holidays a thrill went through the whole
school when the Doctor stood silently for a minute after prayers and
then in his peculiarly quiet voice called to Haggart to come forward.
"Boys," he said, "I have had a letter this morning from Harry Parker's
Mother, and she says that he has told her the truth about the boat. He
has been very ill, poor child, and, in his delirium, it haunted him that
Haggart had suffered for his sake. Let him be cleared before you all
from the unjust suspicion. But, Haggart," and he laid his hand very
kindly on the boy's shoulder, "you must remember that the injustice came
from _you_--no one would have doubted you if you had not first accused
yourself! I had my doubts always, but I did not know enough to
understand. You told a lie; nothing can palliate or do away with that!
No _motives_ can make a lie anything but a lie, and a lie is always a
cowardly thing, whether we try to shield ourselves with it or others.
"But the kindness which prompted it, the courage that bore the
punishment so bravely, the silence that has made a false heroism out of
it--these are fine qualities, Haggart, and I hope you will carry them
with you through life."