"'Tis in ourselves that we are thus or thus.
Our bodies are gardens to the which our wills are gardeners."
Othello, Act One Scene 3.
As Walter lay awake for a few quiet moments before he sent his thoughts
to rest, he glanced critically, like an Indian gymnosophist, over the
occurrences of the day. He could not but rejoice that the last person
for whom he felt real regard had forgiven him his rash act, and that his
offence had thus finally been absolved on earth as in heaven. He
rejoiced, too, that Mr Percival's kind permission to learn his lessons
in his room would give him far greater advantages and opportunities than
he had hitherto enjoyed. Yet Walter's conscience was not quite at ease.
The last scene had disturbed him. The sobs and shiverings of little
Eden had fallen very reproachfully into his heart. Walter felt that he
might have done far more for him than he had done. He had, indeed, even
throughout his own absorbing troubles, extended to the child a general
protection, but not a special care. It never occurred to him to excuse
himself with the thought that he was "not his brother's keeper." The
truth was that he had found Eden uninteresting, because he had not taken
the pains to be interested in him, and while one voice within his heart
reproved him of neglect and selfishness, another voice seemed to say to
him, in a firm yet kindlier tone, "Now that thou are converted,
strengthen thy brethren."
For indeed as yet Eden's had been a very unhappy lot. Bullied, teased,
and persecuted by the few among whom accident had first thrown him, and
judged to belong to their set by others who on that account considered
him a boy of a bad sort, he was almost friendless at Saint Winifred's.
And the loneliness, the despair of this feeling, weighing upon his
heart, robbed him of all courage to face the difficulties of work, so
that in school as well as out of it, he was always in trouble. He was
for ever clumsily scrawling in his now illegible hand the crooked and
blotted lines of punishment which his seeming ignorance or sluggishness
brought upon him; and although he was always to be seen at detention, he
almost hailed this disgrace as affording him at least some miserable
shadow of occupation, and a refuge, however undesirable, from the
torments of those degraded few to whom his childish tears, his weak
entreaties, his bursts of impotent passion, caused nothing but low
amusement. Out of school his great object always was to hide himself;
anywhere, so as to be beyond the reach of Jones, Harpour, and other
bullies of the same calibre. For this purpose he would conceal himself
for a whole afternoon at a time up in the fir-groves, listlessly
gathering into heaps the red sheddings of their umbrage, and pulling to
pieces their dry and fragrant cones; or, when he feared that these
resorts would be disturbed by some little gang of lounging smokers, he
would choose some lonely place, under the shadow of the mountain cliffs,
and sit for hours together, aimlessly rolling white lumps of quartz over
the shingly banks. Under continued trials like these he became quite
changed. The childish innocence and beauty of countenance, the childish
frankness and gaiety of heart, the childish quickness and intelligence
of understanding, were exchanged for vacant looks, stupid indifference,
and that half-cunning expression which is always induced by craven fear.
Accustomed, too, to be waited upon and helped continually in the home
where his mother, a gay young widow, had petted and spoiled him, he
became slovenly and untidy in dress and habits. He rarely found time or
heart to write home, and even when he did, he so well knew that his
mother was incapable of sympathy or comprehension of his suffering, that
the dirty and ill-spelt scrawl rarely alluded to the one dim
consciousness that brooded over him night and day--that he couldn't
understand life, and only knew that he was a very friendless, unhappy,
unpitied little boy. If he could have found even one to whom to unfold
and communicate his griefs, even one to love him unreservedly, all the
inner beauty and brightness of his character would have blown and
expanded in that genial warmth. He once thought that in Walter he had
found such an one, but when he saw that his dullness bored Walter, and
that his listless manners and untidy habits made him cross, he shrank
back within himself. He was thankful to Walter as a protector, but did
not look upon him as a friend in whom he could implicitly confide. The
flower without sunshine will lose its colour and its perfume. Six weeks
after Arthur Eden, a merry, bright-eyed child, alighted from his
mother's carriage at the old gate of Saint Winifred's school, no casual
stranger would have recognised him again in the pale and moping little
fellow who seemed to be afraid of every one whom he met.
Oh, if we knew how rare, how sweet, how deep human love can be, how
easily, yet how seldom it is gained, how inexpressible the treasure is
when once it _has_ been gained, we should not trample on human hearts as
lightly as most men do! Any one who in that hard time had spoken a few
kindly words to Eden--any one who would have taken him gently for a
short while by the hand, and helped him over the stony places that hurt
his unaccustomed feet--any one who would have suffered, or who would
have invited him, to pour his sorrows into their ears and assist him to
sustain them--might have won, even at that slight cost, the deepest and
most passionate love of that trembling young heart. He might have saved
him from hours of numbing pain, and won the rich reward of a gratitude
well-deserved and generously repaid. There were many boys at Saint
Winifred's gentle-hearted, right-minded, of kindly and manly impulses;
but all of them, except Walter, lost this golden opportunity of
conferring pure happiness by disinterested good deeds. They did not buy
up the occasion, which goes away and burns the priceless books she
offers, if they are not purchased unquestioningly and at once.
And Walter regretfully felt that he was very very nearly too late; so
nearly, that perhaps in a week or two more Eden might have lost
hopelessly, and for ever, all trace of self-respect--might have been
benumbed into mental imbecility by the torpedo-like influence of
helpless grief. Walter felt as if he had been selfishly looking on
while a fellow-creature was fast sinking in the water, and as if it were
only at the last possible moment that he had held out a saving hand.
But, by God's grace, he _did_ hold out the saving hand at last, and it
was grasped firmly, and a dear life was saved. Years after when Arthur
Eden had grown into--but stop, I must not so far anticipate my story.
Suffice it to say, that Walter's kindness to Eden, helped to bring about
long afterwards one of the chief happinesses of his own life.
"Come a stroll, Eden, before third school, and let's have a talk," he
said, as they came out from dinner in hall the next day.
Eden looked up happily, and he was proud to be seen by Walter's side in
the throng of boys, as they passed out, and across the court, and under
the shadow of the arch towards Walter's favourite haunt, the seashore.
Walter never felt weak or unhappy for long together, when the sweetness
of the sea-wind was on his forehead, and the song of the sea waves in
his ear. A run upon the shore in all weathers, if only for five
minutes, was his daily pleasure and resource.
They sat down; the sea flashed before them a mirror of molten gold,
except where the summits of the great mountain of Appenfell threw their
deep broad shadows, which seemed purple by contrast with the brightness
over which they fell. Walter sat, full of healthy enjoyment as he
breathed the pure atmosphere, and felt the delicious wind upon his
glowing cheeks; and Eden was happy to be with him, and to sit quietly by
his side.
"Eden," said Walter, after a few moments, "I'm afraid you've not been
happy lately."
The poor child shook his head, and answered, "No one cares for me here;
every one looks down on me, and is unkind; I've no friends."
"What, don't you count me as a friend, then?"
"Yes, Walter, you're very kind; I'm sure I _couldn't_ have lived here if
it hadn't been for you; but you're so much above me, and--"
Walter would not press him to fill up the omission, he could understand
the rest of the sentence for himself.
"You mustn't think I don't feel how good you've been to me, Walter,"
said the boy, drawing near to him, and taking his hand; "but--"
"Yes, yes," said Walter; "I understand it all. Well, never mind, I
_will_ be a friend to you now."
A tear trembled on Eden's long eyelashes as he looked up quickly into
Walter's face. "Will you, Walter? thank you, I have no other friend
here; and please--"
"Well, what is it?"
"Will you call me Arthur, as they do at home?"
Walter smiled. "Well now," he said, "tell me what they were doing to
you last night?"
"You won't tell them I told you, Walter," he answered, looking round,
with the old look of decrepit fear usurping his face, which had
brightened for the moment.
"No, no," said Walter, impatiently; "why, what a little coward you are,
Eden."
The boy shrank back into himself as if he had received a blow, and
relaxed his grasp of Walter's hand; but Walter, struck with the
sensitive timidity which unkindness had caused, and sorry to have given
him pain in all his troubles, said kindly--
"There, Arty, never mind; I didn't mean it; don't be afraid; tell me
what they did to you. I saw a light in our dormitory as I was coming
back from Percival's, and I saw something dragged through the window.
What was it?"
"That was me," said Eden naively.
"You?"
"Yes; poor me. They let me down by a sheet which they tied round my
waist."
"What, from that high window? I hope they tied you tight."
"Only one knot; I ever so nearly slipped out of it last night, and
that's what frightened me so, Walter."
"How horribly dangerous," said Walter indignantly.
"I know it is horribly dangerous," said Eden, standing up, and
gesticulating violently, in one of those bursts of passion which flashed
out of him now and then, and were the chief amusement of his
persecutors; "and I dream about it all night," he said, bursting into
tears, "and I know, I know that some day I shall slip, or the knot will
come undone, and I shall fall and be smashed to atoms. But what do they
care for that? and I sometimes wish I were dead myself, to have it all
over."
"Hush, Arty, don't talk like that," said Walter, as he felt the little
soiled hand trembling with passion and emotion in his own. "But what on
earth do they let you down for?"
"To go to--but you won't tell?" he said, looking round again. "Oh, I
forgot, you didn't like my saying that. But it's they who have made me
a coward, Walter; indeed it is."
"And no wonder," thought Walter to himself. "But you needn't be afraid
any more," he said aloud; "I promise you that no one shall do anything
to you which they'd be afraid to do to me."
"Then I'm safe," said Eden, joyfully. "Well, they made me go to--to
Dan's."
"Dan's? what, the fisherman's just near the shore."
"Yes; ugh!"
"But don't you know, Arty, that Dan's a brute, and a regular smuggler,
and that if you were caught going there, you'd be sent away?"
"Yes; you can't think, Walter, how I _hate_, and how frightened I am to
go there. There's Dan, and there's that great lout of a wicked son of
his, and they're always drunk, and the hut--ugh! it's so nasty; and last
night Dan seized hold of me with his horrid red hand, and wanted me to
drink some gin, and I shrieked." The very remembrance seemed to make
him shudder.
"Well, then, after that I was nearly caught. I think, Walter, that even
you would be a coward if you had such long long frights. You know that
to get to Dan's, after the gates are locked, the only way is to go over
the railing, and through Dr Lane's garden, and I'm always frightened to
death lest his great dog should be loose, and should catch hold of me.
He did growl last night. And then as I was hurrying back--you know it
was rather moonlight last night, and not very cold--and who should I see
but the Doctor himself walking up and down the garden. I crouched in a
minute behind a thick holly-tree, and I suppose I made a rustle, though
I held my breath, for the Doctor stopped and shook the tree, and said
`shoo,' as though he thought a cat were hidden there. I was half dead
with fright, though I did hope, after all, that he would catch me, and
that I might be sent away from this horrid place. But when he turned
round, I crept away, and made the signal, and they let down the sheet,
and then, as they were hauling me up, I heard voices--I suppose they
must have been yours and Kenrick's; but they thought it was some master,
and doused the glim, and oh! so nearly let me fall; so, Walter, please
don't despise me, or be angry with me because you found me crying and
shivering in bed. The cold made me shiver, and I couldn't help crying;
indeed I couldn't."
"Poor Arty, poor Arty," said Walter, soothingly. "But have they ever
done this before?"
"Yes, once, when you were at the choir-supper, one night."
"They never shall again, I swear," said Walter, frowning, as he thought
how detestably cruel they had been. "But what did they send you for?"
"For no good," said Eden.
"No; I knew it would be for no good, if it was to Dan's that they sent
you."
"Well, Walter, the first time it was for some drink; and the second time
for some more drink," he said, after a little hesitation.
Walter looked serious. "But don't you know, Arty," he said, "that it's
very wrong to get such things for them? If they want to have any
dealings with that beast Dan, who's not fit to speak to, let them go
themselves. Arty, it's very wrong; you mustn't do it."
"But how can I help it?" said the boy, looking frightened and ashamed.
"Oh, must I always be blamed by every one," he said, putting his hands
to his eyes. "It isn't my sin, Walter, it's theirs. They made me."
"_Nobody can ever make anyone else do what's wrong_, Arty."
"Oh, yes; it's all very easy for _you_ to say that, Walter, who can
fight anybody, and who are so strong and good, and whom no one dares
bully, and who are not laughed at, and made a butt of, as I am."
"Look at Power," said Walter, "or look at Dubbs. They came as young as
you, Arty, and as weak as you, but no one ever made _them_ do wrong.
Power somehow looks too noble to be bullied by anyone; they're afraid of
him, I don't know why. But what had Dubbs to protect him? Yet not all
the Harpours in the world would ever make him go to such a place as
Dan's."
Poor Eden felt it hard to be blamed for this; he was not yet strong
enough to learn that the path of duty, however hard and thorny, however
hedged in with difficulties and antagonisms, is always the easiest and
the pleasantest in the end.
"But they'd half kill me, Walter," he said plaintively.
"They'll have much more chance of doing that as it is," said Walter.
"They'd thrash you a little, no doubt, but respect you more for it. And
surely it would be better to bear one thrashing, and not do what's
wrong, than to do it and to go two such journeys out of the window, and
get the thrashings into the bargain? So even on _that_ ground you ought
to refuse. Eh, Arty?"
"Yes, Walter," he said, casting down his eyes.
"Well; next time either Harpour, or any one else, tries to make you do
what's wrong, remember they _can't_ make you, if you don't choose; and
say flatly `_No_!' and stick to it in spite of everything, like a brave
little man, will you?"
"I did say `No!' at first, Walter; but they threatened to frighten me,"
he said. "They knew I daren't hold out."
Yes; there was the secret of it all. Walter saw that they had played on
this child's natural terrors with such refinement of cruelty, that fear
had become the master principle in his mind; they had only to touch that
spring and he obeyed them mechanically like a puppet, and because of his
very fear, was driven to do things that might well cause genuine fear,
till he lived in such a region of increasing fear and dread, that
Walter's only surprise was that he had not been made an idiot already.
Poor child! it was no wonder that he was becoming more stupid, cunning,
untidy, and uninteresting, every day. And all this was going on under
the very eyes of many thoroughly noble boys, and conscientious masters,
and yet they never saw or noticed it, and looked on Eden as an idle and
unprincipled little sloven. O our harsh human judgments! The Priest
and the Levite still pass the wounded man, and the good Samaritans are
rare on this world's highways.
What was Walter to do? He did not know the very name of psychology, but
he did know the unhinging, desolating power of an overmastering spirit
of fear. He knew that fear hath torment, but he had no conception by
what means that demon can be exorcised. Yet he thought, as he raised
his eyes for one instant to heaven in silent supplication, that there
were few devils who would not go out by prayer, and he made a strong
resolve that he would use every endeavour to make up for his past
neglectfulness, and to save this poor unhappy child.
"I'm not blaming you, Arthur," he said, "but I like you, and don't want
to see you go wrong, and be a tool in bad boys' hands. I hope you ask
God to help you, Arthur?"
Eden looked at him, but said nothing. He had been taught but little,
and by example he had been taught _nothing_ of the Awful Far-off Friend
Who is yet so near to every humble spirit, and Who even now had sent His
angel to save this lamb who knew not of His fold.
"Listen to me, Arthur--ah! there I hear the third school-bell, and we
must go in--but listen! I'll be your friend; I want to be your friend.
I'll try and save you from all this persecution. Will you always trust
me?"
Eden's look of gratitude more than repaid him, and Walter added, "And,
Arty, you must not give up your prayers. Ask God to help you, and to
keep you from going wrong, and to make you brave. Won't you, Arty?"
The little boy's heart was full even to breaking with its weight of
happy tears; it was too full to speak. He pressed Walter's hand for one
moment, and walked in by his side, without a word.