THE CHAPEL
On the morrow the school learned the thrilling story of the night.
The boys were filled with wonder at the heroism, only to be cast into
the depths of anxiety by the news from the Infirmary. Finch, though
living, was in a high fever and delirious; doomed, if he ultimately
recovered, the physician said, to do so only after a severe illness.
Deering was threatened with pneumonia. For nearly a week the issues
were not certain. Then at last came the welcome announcement that Tony
was out of danger and by another week would be about. Finch’s malady
had developed into brain fever. It would be weeks before a crisis was
reached; months before recovery could be hoped for.
Clavering and Lawrence told the story of the rescue, and left nothing
to the imagination in their assertion and account of Tony’s heroism. In
the excitement with which the boys listened to the tale and with which
they waited for Tony’s reappearance that they might give him a splendid
ovation, it was practically forgotten—and indeed few knew—why Finch
had started across the Pond that night. The scene in the Rectory study
when Mr. Roylston had appeared, was kept a strict secret, owing to the
Head Master’s explicit injunctions.
One night, shortly after the episode, the first night that any
favorable news had come from the Infirmary, as Doctor Forester was
sitting before his study fire, there came a tap on the door, and in
response to his summons, Mr. Roylston entered.
“Ah, I am glad to see you,” said the Head, who had been waiting, a
little impatiently, for his assistant master to seek this interview.
“Have a cigar?” he added.
“No, thank you,” said Mr. Roylston, seating himself in a
straight-backed chair. “I have come—as soon as I could recover from
the shock of recent events—to tell you what I know—what led me
several nights ago, to bring Finch here.”
“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor, “I want to hear all about it. I have
foreborne to question you, though I realized there was something behind
it which in good time you would explain. Fortunately now, we are
assured that Deering is out of danger. The doctor holds out some small
hope for poor Finch, but it will be a tough pull.”
“Yes, I fear so. I hope, I hope deeply that he will recover. I am
relieved to know that Deering is better.” He paused for a moment,
as though he could scarcely bring himself to say what was on his
mind. “Doctor Forester, I have come to-night not only to give you an
explanation but to make a confession.”
“Yes,” said the Head in a sympathetic tone.
“I have always tried, sir, to do my duty in this school according to my
light.”
“Yes,” said Doctor Forester, “I believe that, my friend.”
“But my light, sir, has often,—always, I fear, been a poor one.”
“Ah,” interposed the older man, “who of us would dare say otherwise? We
all fall short, every one.”
“Possibly—but all are not too proud, as I have been, to acknowledge
it. I have never acknowledged it, sir, until to-night—not even to
myself.” He paused again, to continue presently, as he shaded his
face with his hand, “I will not go into details, but I want to put it
boldly, baldly. I have been hard, hard to the degree of cruelty, on
that poor boy who is lying now in the delirium of a dangerous fever.
God forgive me!... I disapproved, sir, of your taking him here, and
though, even now, I cannot say that I think you were wise in that——”
“Alas, no!” interrupted the Head Master, “not if we are to judge by the
immediate results. But I think I see deeper....”
The master thought a moment in silence. “Yes,” he said at last. “I
think you do. It is having a wider, a deeper effect than I have
realized.... But he, poor boy, has suffered, and I have so often, so
uncharitably, made him suffer; while those, whom I have not liked,
Morris, young Deering, and others, have been kind. It is terrible to
me, sir, now to think of that suffering.”
“Yes, my friend, yes; I think it must be. You have been hard, too hard;
but, thank God, righteousness comes of suffering. I can see, oh, in
so many ways, how poor Finch’s suffering is teaching us all a lesson,
teaching us a truer religion, a sweeter, kinder philosophy of life.”
“As I said,” Mr. Roylston resumed, “I was hard on him, hard on Deering,
whom poor Finch worshiped with passionate adoration. And I accused
Finch of cheating—he had not sometimes been strictly honest—but
on that occasion, I misjudged him—wounded him deeply—he may have
resisted a keen temptation. At any rate, worn-out, half-crazed, quite
desperate, he came to me that night and made a passionate attack on
me. His language was ill-tempered, ill-judged, violent!—but the awful
part of it to me is, that in substance his accusations were justified.
I had been, as he told me, so terribly cruel, hard, mean. I could not
end the scene, unseemly as it was; for my conscience was accusing me
more bitterly, more deeply, more violently than that poor half-crazed
lad.... At last, scarcely knowing what to do, I sought to bring him to
you.... At the very door of this room, he turned and fled. I feared he
meant, as he had practically threatened, to destroy himself. And but
for Deering how nearly he succeeded!”
“Yes, yes,” said the Head Master gently, “I see, I see....”
“And I have,” continued Mr. Roylston, “I have too been hard on
Deering—have not acknowledged in him the qualities—manliness, honor,
unselfishness—which I have known were there. He gladly sprang to the
chance of laying down his life for the poor little abandoned wretch for
whom I could not find a kind word. God forgive me, Doctor, I cannot
forgive myself.”
“God does forgive you, my friend,” said the Head, without looking up.
He had been gazing into the fire, thinking deeply.
Mr. Roylston did not reply to this remark, and for a few moments both
men sat in silence, staring into the fire, absorbed in their thoughts.
It was Doctor Forester at last who spoke again. “It would be easy,
my friend, to assure you that you exaggerate, that you do yourself
injustice; and, in truth, I think you do. But I have no wish to urge
that view upon you; for I believe, to be quite frank, that there is a
poor weaker side to all of us that we never have a chance of conquering
altogether unless we recognize it, and if for a long time we have not
recognized it or have deceived ourselves, nothing is so good for us as
a frank confession. As for the details of the incidents to which you
refer, of course I am in ignorance, and I prefer to be. So far as I
have observed your treatment toward Finch, it merited no criticism; and
as for your attitude toward Deering, I have nothing to say that I did
not say the night we discussed his appointment to the Head Prefectship.
I thought you severe but not unjust. As a matter of fact, if you feel
now that you could wish you had taken another course, I may tell you
that I do not think the fact that Deering is not Head Prefect has in
the least interfered with his popularity or his influence with the
boys. Clavering has made him his right hand man.”
“I am glad of that,” said Mr. Roylston.
“And now, after this rescue of Finch at the risk of his own
life,—undoubtedly he will be the strongest boy in school.”
“I think that I should like to tell him that I do fully forgive
him—that I regret my stand with regard to his appointment.”
“Well,” said the Head Master, “I think that he would like to hear.”
With that Mr. Roylston said good-night. He walked over to the Infirmary
at once and enquired about the two boys. Finch’s condition was still
unsatisfactory, but Deering was very much better—and, yes, he was
quite able to see Mr. Roylston if the master desired.
Tony was still in bed, but he looked splendidly well and bright as he
lay in the cool white cot, which had been pushed near the open log
fire. A nurse had been reading to him. He had had a close call, but now
he was practically himself again and would be going down in a few days.
He was surprised to see Mr. Roylston, but not in the least embarrassed.
He shook hands cordially. The master enquired about his health, made
some perfunctory remarks about the rescue and about the school,
fidgeting and ill at ease, until the nurse took the hint and slipped
away.
“I came,” he said then, as he drew up the chair near the bedside and
took a seat, “not only to enquire about you, as I have been doing
daily, but to have a little talk with you, since I know you are
practically all right again.”
“Yes, sir,” said Tony.
“Do you know, Anthony,” asked Mr. Roylston suddenly, “why it was that
Jacob Finch tried to run away that night?”
“Why, no, sir—I don’t—not altogether, that is. Poor Jake was in a
bad way; things had been getting pretty hard for him for one reason
or another, and he was making them still harder for himself. I did
hear that you caught him cheating in your Latin examination, and I
just supposed that that was the last straw. He’s always been rather
friendly with me, but he was so vicious that night down by the pond,
refusing altogether to tell me why he was cutting out, that I thought
him a little out of his head. But I supposed the cheating was really
responsible.”
“Well,” rejoined Mr. Roylston, after a moment’s reflection, “as a
matter of fact I was altogether mistaken about his cheating in that
particular examination. I believe what he afterwards told me, that he
had not cheated at all; though, as he also acknowledged he had cheated
so often before that I can hardly blame myself for suspecting him.”
“Yes, I know,” said Tony; “I am afraid poor Jake lost all hold
of himself. He was not naturally a cheat or a story-teller,
but—but—well, I try to think he wasn’t altogether responsible.”
“Perhaps not—that night in my room, at all events, he quite lost
control of himself as a result of my accusation, and he told me in a
very bitter language that my attitude toward him had been one of the
chief causes of his unhappiness here at Deal.”
Tony scarcely knew what to say to this, for of course he remembered how
bitterly Finch had always hated Mr. Roylston. The master, however, did
not expect a reply. “I think,” he went on, “that there was a good deal
of justice in what the boy said, though I did not mean to go into that
with you to-night. Among other things he told me that night that he
intensely resented my attitude toward you.”
Tony laughed a little. “Jake showed equally bad judgment whether he
greatly liked or disliked a person.”
“Well,” continued Mr. Roylston, “right or wrong, his remarks have
caused me to think things over very seriously the last few days, and I
have come to the conclusion that in this also Finch was right. I was
hard on you—too hard.”
Tony lay still for a moment, thinking; finally he raised himself a
little and looked at the master intently. “Mr. Roylston,” he said,
“it’s mighty white of you to come and say this to me. In return I want
to tell you just one thing—the one thing I have against you—the rest
has been give and take, and none of it, it seems to me, very serious.
I know I have annoyed you a great many times and that occasionally in
Lower School days I was more or less impertinent, but I did one thing
that I was thoroughly ashamed of and thoroughly sorry for. As for your
soaking me a lot in the old days, as for your preventing me from being
Head Prefect, I’ve borne no grudge. I think you were pretty stiff—I
think honestly you are too stiff as to discipline most of the time—but
I never thought you were unfair or unjust, and I have but one grudge
against you. And that is that when I apologized to you for writing that
thing a year ago you wouldn’t accept my apology really; you wouldn’t
believe I was sorry.”
“Well, I believe so now,” said Mr. Roylston, “and it is to tell you
that particularly that I have come here to-night.”
“I’m mighty glad, sir. That’s all I ever blamed you for, sir,—really.
I have often complained of you in a noisy careless kind of way, as I
have of other masters, but that was all guff. I didn’t any more really
mean those things than I supposed you meant things when you would look
at us sometimes as if we were actually beneath contempt.”
Mr. Roylston reflected a moment. “I am afraid,” he continued, “that on
my side, I do regret a great many things. I have been genuinely lacking
in sympathy more than once. I have often been unnecessarily hard. It
has not been right; and, as you see, I regret it. The more keenly, I
fancy, as my lack of sympathy in this particular case of Finch counted
a great deal in what so nearly meant a tragedy.”
“Well, fortunately, it wasn’t one, sir. The nurse tells me that they
think poor Jake will pull through.”
“Yes, but he will not get back to work again this term; there is no
chance of that.”
“What do you think, sir, will happen to him? what will he do next year?”
“Well, I am beginning to feel as I have never felt before that after
all this the situation will clear itself, will be changed. I fancy he
will stay on at Deal next year, and I begin to think that we will know
how then to help him make good.”
“Really?—well, I wish he could. I’d feel pretty good to know that poor
Jake had made good here. I’m afraid I haven’t helped him very much.”
“Haven’t helped him very much!” exclaimed Mr. Roylston. “Though what
you have done for him may seem not to have counted just now, I feel
very certain that it will appear to count tremendously later.”
“Why, sir—I really didn’t do anything.”
Mr. Roylston smiled. “Well, I must not talk with you any longer.
Good-night, Anthony. I hope you will get down very soon, and I trust
that in the future we will understand one another a little better.”
“I am sure we will, sir. And thank you ever so much for coming up.”
“I fancy,” Mr. Roylston murmured to himself, as he left the room, “I
fancy that hereafter I shall understand all boys a little better.”
On the Sunday of the week that Tony was in the Infirmary, the Doctor
took the opportunity to make some remarks about the boy’s act of
heroism in the course of his sermon in the Chapel.
“Fortunately,” he said, “one of the boys about whom we have been so
anxious the past few days is now quite out of danger and will soon be
amongst us once more, and though the other must still undergo a long
and severe illness the physicians hold out strong hope of his ultimate
recovery.
“Naturally,” he continued, “such a dramatic incident as the rescue of
one boy by another at the risk of his life has brought vividly before
our minds the characters of the two boys principally involved, their
situation and relation to the school. One of these boys as we know
has had the advantages of a normal, happy, healthy boyhood, the other
through misfortune has been deprived of almost all that the first
boy has enjoyed. But the self-forgetful service of the one for the
other, a service that culminated in heroism when he freely risked his
life to save the other’s, has set us all an example of kindliness and
consideration, an example of true religion, of unselfish Christian
service, that we should take to heart....
“There have been criticisms in connection with this affair that Deal
School is only adapted to dealing with and caring for the happy,
healthy, lucky type of boy. I do not think so. Despite much that has
been unfortunate, despite much suffering that has been involved and
still may be involved, despite even the lives that have been risked,
it has been a thing tremendously worth while to the school to have had
that less fortunate, less happy boy amongst us.
“It is a noble and a fine thing to risk one’s life to save the life of
another, and I do not doubt that most, if not all, of our boys would
gladly seize such an opportunity in the same spirit as it was seized by
Anthony Deering and his companions a few nights since. That gladness
to risk life should be a symbol of what is infinitely harder, and
infinitely more needed, I may say, but of which also our friends set
us the example,—the good will and unselfishness to live for others.
A school altogether fails, just as a human life altogether fails, if
at heart and in spirit, it is not dedicated, so far as opportunity
permits, to the service of men. The lesson of this incident is the
lesson that I would we might all learn from the school.”
The Doctor’s sermon was not the kind of a sermon to be much discussed,
but it made a deep impression on the school. For one or two masters
and for several boys it was the inspiration as they knelt later of as
earnest prayer as they had ever offered.
Doctor Forester had been going frequently to the Infirmary to see
Tony, and after the first few days he had continued his confirmation
instructions so that Deering could keep up with the class.
Tony’s first appearance amongst the boys after his convalescence
was in the Chapel at the preparatory service the night before the
confirmation. It was a quiet little service, conducted by the Bishop
and the Head. Again the theme of the address was service—a theme that
in some fashion or other seemed to have flashed in and out of all
Tony’s consciousness and experience for the past year.
As he knelt that night in the dim Chapel and offered up a grateful
thanksgiving that life and health had been spared to him, he resolved
more definitely and consciously than ever before that whatever he did
in the world thereafter he would never live wholly or selfishly for
himself.
And in after years he was to look back on that night, as he looked
back on the night on the beach when he had walked with Mr. Morris, as
another important moment in the process of his coming to himself.