The second boy wore a well-cut Eton suit, and sat in the smoking
compartment of a padded corridor carriage, with a silk-lined overcoat
beside him and a silver-mounted suit-case in the rack above. He was not
smoking, nor was he reading; but he sat on a great pile of papers and
magazines, and stared straight in front of him--that is to say, straight
at me.
His stare, though constant and unrelenting, was not in the least
offensive--it had no curiosity in it: he had obviously been
contemplating the cushions before I intruded, and since I had chosen to
occupy his field of vision he contemplated me.
I had no speaking acquaintance with the boy; but he bore the features of
his family, and his initials were on the suit-case above. So I knew him
for the only son of a man who had once shown me civility, the youngest
and least extravagantly wealthy of three rich brothers. Since one of
these brothers had never married and now was not likely to, it lay
beyond guessing what wealth the boy would inherit some day.
He was by no means ill-looking, and quite certainly no fool. His face
carried the stamp of his father's ability. It puzzled me what he could
be doing with that pile of papers and magazines; or why, having burdened
himself with them, he should choose to sit and stare instead of reading
them. For his station lay but a twenty minutes' run below mine, and it
was impossible that in the time he could have glanced through the half
of them.
He had been staring at me, or through me, maybe for half an hour, when
our train slowed down and came to a standstill above the steep valley
between Bodmin Road and Doublebois. After a couple of minutes' wait,
the boy rose and went to the window in the corridor to see what was
happening; and I took this opportunity to glance across at the papers
scattered on the vacant seat. They included three or four sixpenny and
threepenny magazines; a large illustrated paper (_Black and White_, I
think); half a dozen penny weeklies--_Tit-bits_, _Answers_, _Pearson's
Weekly_, _Cassell's Saturday Journal_; I forget what others: halfpenny
papers in a heap--all kinds of _Cuts_, _Snippets_, _Siftings_, _Echoes_,
_Snapshots_, and _Side-lights_; _Pars about People_, _Christian
Sweepings_, _Our Happy Fireside_, and _The Masher_. Many lay face
downward, coyly hiding their titles but disclosing such headlines as
"Facts about the Flag," "Books which have influenced the Bishop of
London," "He gave 'em Fits!" "Our Unique Competition," "Mr. Cecil
Rhodes: a Powerful Personality," "What becomes of old Stage Scenery."
In the midst of my survey the train began to move forward again, and the
boy came back to his seat.
"It's only some platelayers on the viaduct," he explained. "They held
up their flag against us. I suppose they were just finishing a job."
"Nasty place to leave the rails," said I, glancing over the parapet upon
the green tree-tops fifty feet below us."
"I was thinking that," said he, and a queer tremor in his young voice
made me glance at him sharply. Then suddenly I understood--or thought I
did.
"You, at any rate, are pretty well insured," said I.
"Twenty thousand pounds, and a little over: the coupons cost four and
twopence altogether, and then at the end of the journey you can use up
all the reading."
"Wonderful!" I kept a serious face. "And I suppose all this time you've
been staring at me, amazed by the recklessness of your elders."
He flushed slightly. "Have I been staring? I beg your pardon, I'm
sure: it's a trick I have. I begin thinking of things, and then--"
"Thinking, I suppose, of how it would feel to be in a collision, or what
it would be like to leap such a parapet as that and find ourselves
dropping--dropping--into space? But you shouldn't, really. It isn't
healthy in a boy like you: and if you'll listen to one who has known
what nerves are, it may too easily grow to mean something worse."
"But it isn't that--exactly," he protested; "though of course all that
comes into it. I'm not a--a funk, sir! I was thinking more of the
--of what would come _afterwards_, you know."
"Oh dear!" I groaned to myself. "It's worse than ever: here's a little
prig worrying about his soul. I shouldn't advise you to trouble about
that, either," I said aloud.
"But I don't _trouble_ about it." He hesitated, and stumbled into a
burst of confidence. "You see, I'm no good at games--athletics and that
sort of thing--"
Again he stopped, and I nodded to encourage him.
"And I'm no swell at schoolwork, either. I went to school late, and
after home it all seems so _young_--if you understand?"
I thought I did. With his polite grown-up manner I could understand his
isolation among the urchins, the masters, and all the interests of
an ordinary school.
"But my father--you know him, don't you?--he's disappointed about it.
He'd like me to bring home prizes or cups. I don't think he'd mind what
it was, so long as he could be proud about it. Of course he never
_says_ anything: but a fellow gets to know."
"I daresay you're right," I said. "But what has this to do with
insuring yourself for twenty thousand pounds?"
"Well, you see, I'm to go into the Bank some day: and I expect my father
thinks I shall be just as big a duffer at that. I know he does.
But I'm not, if he'd only trust me a bit. So now if we were to smash
up--collide, go off the rails, run over a bridge, or something of that
sort--just think how he'd feel when he found out I'd cleared twenty
thousand by it!"
"So that's what you were picturing to yourself?"
He nodded. "That, and the smash, and all. I kept saying, 'Now--if it
comes this moment?' And I wondered a little how it would take _you_
suddenly: whether you'd start up or fall forward--and if you would say
anything."
"You are a cheerful companion!"
He grinned politely. "And afterwards--just before the train stopped I
had a splendid idea. I began making my will. You see, I know
something about investments. I read about them every day."
"In the _Boy's Own Paper?_"
"We take in the _Standard_ in our school library, and I have it all to
myself unless there's a war on. I've heard my father say often that
it's a very reliable paper, and so it is, for I've tried it for two
years now. So if I left a will telling just how the twenty thousand
ought to be invested, it would open my father's eyes more than ever."
"My dear sir," said I, "don't be in a hurry. Serve out your time among
the barbarians at school, and I'll promise you in time your father's
respectful astonishment."
These were my two boys; and you may wonder why I always think of them
together. I do, though: and, what is more, I find that together they
help to explain to me my country's greatness.