But, I pray you, who is his companion? Is there no young squarer now
that will make a voyage with him to the devil?
Much Ado about Nothing.
Etiam si quis a culpa vacuus in amicitiam ejus inciderat, quotidiano
usu per similisque ceteris efficiebatur.--Sallust.
The changes described in the last chapter were not the only ones which
seriously affected the prosperity of Saint Winifred's School, for the
stall of masters was also partly altered during the last two years, and
the alterations had not been improvements. Mr Paton--who had by this
time manfully resumed his old theological labours, and who, to please
Walter, had often employed him as a willing amanuensis in attempting to
replace the burnt manuscript--had retired from his mastership to a quiet
country living to which he had been presented by Sir Lawrence Power.
Strange as it may seem, Mr Paton chiefly, though of course indirectly,
owed this living to Walter, who had first talked to Sir Lawrence about
Mr Paton, in terms of deep regard. The opportunity, therefore, which
Walter had sought so earnestly, of atoning in some way for the mischief
which he had done to his old master, was amply granted to him; and Mr
Paton never felt more strongly, that even out of the deepest apparent
evils God can bring about undoubted blessings. Saint Winifred's,
however, was the loser by his promotion. The benefit of his impartial
justice and stern discipline, and the weight of his firm and manly
character in the councils of the school, was gone. And Saint Winifred's
had suffered a still greater loss in the departure of Mr Percival, who
had accepted, some months before, the offer of a tutorship in his own
university. Had he continued where he was, his influence, his
well-deserved popularity, his kind, wise, conciliatory manner, the
gratitude which rewarded his ready and self-denying sympathy, would, in
the troubled period which ensued, have been even more useful than his
brilliant scholarship and successful method of teaching a form. These
two masters had left amid the universal regret of the boys and of their
colleagues, and their places had been filled up by younger, less able,
and less experienced men.
And worse than this, Dr Lane, soon after the term began, was taken
seriously ill, and was ordered to the German baths for two months,
during which his work was done by another master, who had not the same
influence. From all which causes, this half-year at Saint Winifreds was
the most turbulent, the most riotous, and the most unhappy, ever known
in that honourable and ancient school.
So little Charlie Evson soon found reason to revise and modify his
opinion, that Saint Winifred's--as he _then_ saw it--was jollier than
even Semlyn itself. His name had been entered in the list of Mr
Percival's house, before it was known that he was going to leave.
Walter liked Mr Percival so much better than he did his own tutor, Mr
Robertson, and had experienced from him so much more kindness, that he
thought it would be an advantage for Charlie to be placed directly under
so wise and kind a friend; and Mr Evson, afraid that his little son
would be quite overshadowed by his elder brother, and that Walter's
influence, which was very transcendent over Charlie's mind, would make
him too dependent on another, and prevent him from developing his own
natural character, was by no means averse to the arrangement. But since
Mr Percival had left, Charlie, with the other boys in the house, was
handed over to the charge of Mr Noel, a new master, who had to win his
way and learn his work, neither of which he succeeded in doing until he
had committed many mistakes.
In this house were Kenrick and Mackworth--Kenrick, as monitor, was in
some measure responsible for the character of the house, and he had
Charlie as one of his fags. At this time, as I have already observed
with sorrow, Kenrick's influence was not only useless for good, but was
even positively bad. There was _no_ other monitor who did not try to be
of some use to his fags; many of the monitors, by quiet kindnesses and
useful hints, by judicious help and unselfish sympathy, were of most
real service to the boys who nominally "fagged" for them, but who, in
point of fact, were required to do nothing except taking an occasional
message, seeing that the study fires did not go out, and carrying up the
tea and breakfast for a week each, in order of rotation. Few Saint
Winifred's boys would have hesitated to admit that they would have been
less happy, and would have had fewer chances in school-life, if they had
not been fags at first, and thereby found friends and protectors in the
boys for whom they fagged. Kenrick, however, did not follow the good
example which had become almost traditional; for, filled as he was with
the spirit of wilful pride, and on bad terms with the order to which he
belonged, he either spoiled his fags by petting and pampering them, and
letting them see his own disregard for duty, or, if they did not take
his fancy, he snubbed and disregarded them--at any rate, did nothing
whatever to help them.
Kenrick was quite willing to have placed Charlie Evson in the first of
these classes, for he was a boy whom it was impossible to see and not to
like. His antagonistic position towards most of his own body, made him
the head of a sort of faction in the school, and he would have been
proud beyond measure to have had any boy like Charlie as one of his
followers. But Kenrick had better reasons for wishing to attach Charlie
to himself. Deeply as he had degenerated, disgraceful as his present
conduct was, Kenrick, in the secret depths of his soul, sighed and pined
for better things; though vice, and folly, and pride had their
attractions for him, he was still sick at heart for the purer atmosphere
which he had left. He looked at Charlie with vague hopes, for through
him he thought that he might yet perhaps, without lowering his pride by
actually seeming to have made any advance, bring about a reconciliation
with his best and earliest friends, bring about a return to his former
and more upright course.
But this was not to be. When a boy goes wrong he strews every step of
his downward career with obstacles against his own return; and he little
dreams how difficult of removal some of these obstacles will be. The
obstacle in this case was another little fag of Kenrick's, named Wilton.
I am sorry to write of that boy. Young in years, he was singularly old
in vice. A more brazen, a more impudent, a more hardened little
scapegrace--in schoolboy language, "a cooler hand"--it would have been
impossible to find. He had early gained the name of Raven from his
artful looks. His manner was a mixture of calm audacity and consummate
self-conceit. Though you knew him to be a thorough scamp, the young imp
would stare you in the face with the effrontery of a man about town. He
was active, sharp, and nice-looking, and there was nothing which he was
either afraid or ashamed to do. He had not a particle of that modesty
which in every good boy is as natural as it is graceful; he could tell a
lie without the slightest hesitation or the faintest blush; nay, while
he was telling it, though _he_ knew that you _knew_ it to be a lie, he
would not abash for an instant the cold glance of his wicked dark eyes.
Yet this boy, like Charlie, was only thirteen years old. And for all
these reasons, Wilton was the idol of all the big bad boys in the
school; and in spite of all these reasons--for the boy had in him the
fascination of a serpent--he was the declared favourite of Kenrick too.
The three boys who gave the tone to Mr Noel's house, were Kenrick,
Mackworth, and Wilton. They formed as it were an electric chain of bad
influence, and as they were severally prominent in the chief divisions
of the school, they had peculiar opportunities for doing harm.
Kenrick's evil example told with extraordinary power through the whole
house, and especially upon the highest boys, who naturally imitated him.
I do not mean to say that Kenrick had sunk so low that wilfully and
consciously he lowered the character of the house, which as monitor he
ought to have improved and raised; but he _did_ so whether with
intention or not; he did so negatively by neglecting all his duties, and
by giving no direct countenance to what was right; he did so positively
by not openly discountenancing, and by actually practising, many things
which he knew to be wrong. The bad work was carried on by Mackworth,
who was the most prominent fifth-form boy in the house. This boy's
ability, and strength of will, and keenness of tongue, gave him immense
authority, and enabled him to carry out almost everything he liked. To
complete the mischief, among the lower boys Wilton reigned supreme; and
as Wilton was prouder of Kenrick's patronage than of anything else, and
by flattery and cajolery could win over Kenrick to nearly anything, the
worst part of the characters of these boys acting and reacting on each
other, leavened the house through and through with all that is least
good, or true, or lovely, or of a good report. The mischief began
before Mr Percival left, but it never could have proceeded half so far,
if Mr Noel's inexperience, and the very kindness which led him to relax
the existing discipline, had not tempted the boys to unwonted
presumption.
Such was the state of things when Charlie entered Mr Noel's house.
Walter knew that Mr Percival's promotion had frustrated the plan he had
formed when he advised his father to put Charlie in that house, but the
step could not now be recalled, nor, indeed, was Walter or any other
monitor aware how bad the state of things had become. For among other
dangerous innovations, Mackworth and Wilton had brought about a kind of
understanding, that the house should to some extent keep to itself,
resent all intrusion into its own precincts, and maintain a profound
silence about its own secrets. Besides all this, Walter bitterly and
sorrowfully felt that for some reason, which he was unable to fathom,
the whole school was just then in an unsatisfactory state, and that
Charlie, for whom his whole heart yearned with brotherly love and pity,
would be exposed to severe temptations in whatever house he should be
placed. He hoped too that, as Charlie would always have the run of his
and of Power's study, it would make little difference to him that he was
under a different house master.
To Mackworth and Wilton the arrival of one or two new boys was a matter
of some importance, but little anxiety. The new boys were necessarily
young, and in the present united state of the house, it was tolerably
certain that they would catch the prevalent spirit, and be quickly
assimilated to the condition of the others. The task of moulding them--
if they were at all difficult to manage--fell to Wilton, and he
certainly accomplished it with astonishing success. A newcomer's
sensibilities were not too quickly shocked. The Noelites, for their own
purposes, behaved very kindly to him at first; they were first-rate
hands at "destroying a boy by means of his best affections," at
"seething a kid in its mother's milk." The bad language, the school
trickeries and deceits, the dodges for breaking rules and escaping
punishments, the agreed-on lies to avoid detection, the suppers, and
brandy, and smoking parties, and false keys to get out after lock-up,
and all the other detestable symptoms of a vitiated and depraved set,
were carefully kept in abeyance at first. The new fellow was treated
very kindly, was sounded and fathomed cautiously, was taught to get up a
strong house feeling by perpetual endeavours to wake in him the _esprit
de corps_, was gently ridiculed if he displayed any good principle, was
tremendously bullied if he showed signs of recalcitrance, was according
to his temperament led, or coaxed, or initiated, or intimidated, into
the condition of wickedness required of him before the house could
continue to go to the devil, as fast as it wished to do, and was doing
before. This was Mackworth's work, and Wilton acted as his Azazel, and
Kenrick did not interfere, though he knew or guessed all that was going
on; he did not interfere, he did not prevent it, he did not even
remonstrate at first, and afterwards he began by acquiescing, he ended
by--yes, the truth must be told--he ended in joining in it all. O
Kenrick, when human beings meet face to face before a certain
judgment-seat, there are some young souls who will have a bill of
indictment against you; the same who may point to Mackworth or to
Wilton, and say, as of old, "The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat."
Five new boys had come this half-year. Four of them had been sounded by
the rest of the house; one of them, named Stone, had come from a large
private school, and was prepared for whatever he might find in more
senses than one. Another, Symes, was a boy ill-trained at home, of no
particular principles, and quite ready to flow with the stream. A
third, Hanley, had come meaning to be good; he had been shocked when he
first heard oaths, and when he was first asked if he would mind telling
any of the regular lies--"crams" the boys called them--in the event of
any master questioning him; but his wounded sensibilities were very
quickly healed, and he had passed with fatal facility from disgust to
indifference, from indifference to toleration. The fourth, Elgood, was
a timid child, for whom no one cared either way, and whom they took care
to frighten into promising to do whatever he was ordered. A terrible
state of things--was it not? But, ah me! it was so once upon a time.
The fifth new boy in Mr Noel's house was Charles Evson; and with this
fifth new boy the devil's agents knew instinctively that they would have
a great deal of trouble. But they meant to bait their hook very
carefully, and they did not at all despair. Their task was made
peculiarly piquant by its very difficulty, and by the fact that Charlie
was one in whom their declared enemy, Walter Evson, was so nearly
concerned. They were determined by fair means or foul to win him over,
and make him their proselyte, until he became as much a child of sin as
they were themselves. But they proceeded to their task with the utmost
caution, and endeavoured to charm Charlie over to their views by showing
him great attention, by trying to make things pleasant for him, by
flattering him with notice, and seeming to welcome him cordially as one
of themselves. Their dissimulation was profound; at first the new boy
found everything quite delightful, and before a week was over had
caught, as they meant him to catch, the spirit of party, and always was
ready to stick up for the Noelites as the best house in the school. So
far so good; but this was only the first step of initiation into these
Eleusinian mysteries.
So Master Wilton--Belial junior, as Henderson always called him--
ingratiated himself into Charlie's favour, and tried, not without
success, to make himself peculiarly agreeable. At first sight, indeed,
Charlie felt an inward repulsion to him. He did not know _why_ he did,
for, so far from there being anything obviously repulsive in Wilton's
look or manners, there were many who thought him the picture of
innocence, and considered his manners quite perfection in their
politeness and good breeding. Charlie therefore instantly conquered his
first feeling of dislike as uncharitable and groundless; and as Wilton
seemed to lay himself out for his friendship, he was oftener with him
during the first fortnight than with any other boy. It was strange to
see the two together, so utterly different were they in every respect,
and so great was the contrast of Charlie's sweet, bright, modest face,
with the indescribable dangerous coolness of Wilton's knowing smile.
"Look," said Henderson to Whalley, as he saw them together one day in
the playground; "there go Ithuriel and Belial junior, very thick at
present."
"Yes; I don't like to see it. I don't hear any good of that fellow
Wilton."
"Good! I should rather think not!"
"Give young Evson a hint, Flip, will you, that Wilton's not a good
friend for him. He looks a nice little fellow, and I don't like to tell
him, because I don't know him."
"Never fear; when Charlie touches him with his spear, or sees him light
on the top of Niphates--one of which things will happen soon enough--
he'll not be slow to discover who he is. If not, I'll tell Walter, and
he shall be Charlie's Uriel."
"Touches him with his spear!--what spear?--top of Niphates!--Uriel!"
said Whalley, with ludicrous astonishment; "here, Power, you're just in
time to help me to put a strait-waistcoat on Flip. He says that when
Wilton lights on the top of Niphates, which he will do soon, young Evson
will discover that he's a scamp. What _does_ it all mean?"
"It only means that Flip and I have been reading the Paradise Lost,"
said Power, laughing, "and at present Flip's mind is a Miltonic
conglomerate." And he proceeded to explain to Whalley that Ithuriel was
one of the Cherubs who guarded Eden--
("Only that in this case Eden guards the cherub," observed Henderson,
parenthetically.)
"--and who, by touching Satan with his spear, made him bound up in his
original state, when he sat like a toad squat at the ear of Eve, and,
moreover, that Uriel had recognised Satan through his mask, when,
lighting on Niphates, his looks became `Alien from heaven, with passions
foul obscured.'"
"Seriously, though," said Henderson, "Uriel must be asleep, or he
wouldn't let his little brother get under Belial's wings."
In fact, Wilton was forced to keep on the mask much longer than he had
ever meant to do. He could find no joint in Charlie's armour. The boy
was so thoroughly manly, so simple-hearted, so trustful and innocent,
that Wilton could make nothing of him. If he tried to indoctrinate
Charlie into the state of morality among the Noelites, either Charlie
did not understand him, or else quite openly expressed his disapproval
and even indignation; and when finally Wilton quite tired out, did throw
off the mask, Charlie shook him away from him, turned with a sickening
sensation from the unbared features of vice, and unfeignedly loathed the
boy who had pretended to be his friend--loathed him all the more because
he had tried to like him, but now saw the snare which was being spread
in his sight.
Every now and then during their early intercourse Charlie had felt a
certain restraint in talking to Wilton; he could not be at ease with him
though he tried. He caught the gleam of the snake through the flowers
that only half concealed his folds. And Wilton, too, had got very tired
of playing a part. He could not help his real wickedness cropping out
now and then, yet whenever it did, Charlie started in such a way that
even Wilton was ashamed; and though generally the shafts of conscience
glanced off from the panoply of steel and ice which cased this boy's
heart, yet during these days they once or twice reached the mark, and
made him smart with long-unwonted anguish. He was conscious that he was
doing the devil's work, and doing it for very poor wages, he felt now
and then Charlie's immense superiority to himself, and, in a mood of
pity, when, as they were standing one day in Mr Noel's private room to
say a lesson, he caught sight of their two selves reflected in the
looking-glass over the mantelpiece, and realised the immense gulf which
separated them--a gulf not of void chaos and flaming space, but the
deeper gulf of warped affections and sinful thoughts--he had felt a
sudden longing to be other than what he was, to have Charlie for a true
friend, to give up trying to make him a bad boy, and to fall at his feet
and ask his pardon. And when he had doggedly failed in his lesson, and
got his customary bad mark, and customary punishment, and received his
customary objurgation, that he was getting worse and worse, and that his
time was utterly wasted--and when he saw the master's face light up with
a pleased expression as Charlie went cheerfully and faultlessly through
his work--a sudden paroxysm of penitence seized Wilton, and, once out of
the room, he left Charlie and ran up the stairs to Kenrick's study, in
which he was allowed to sit whenever he liked. No one was there, and
throwing himself into a chair, Wilton covered his face with both hands,
and burst into passionate tears. A long train of thoughts and memories
passed through his mind--memories of his own headlong fall to what he
was, memories of younger and of innocent days, memories of a father, now
dead, who had often set him on his knee, and prayed, before all other
things, that he might grow up a good and truthful boy, and with no stain
upon his name. But while memory whispered of past innocence, conscience
told him of present guilt; told him that if his father could have
foreseen what he would become, his heart would have broken; told him,
and he knew it, that his name was a proverb and a byeword in the school.
But the prominent and the recurring thought was ever this--"Is it too
late to mend? Is the door shut against me?" For Wilton remembered how
once before his mind was harrowed by fear and guilt as he had listened
to Mr Percival's parting sermon on that sad text--one of the saddest in
all the Holy Book--"_And the door was shut_."
Suddenly he was startled violently from his reverie, for the door _was_
shut with a bang, and Kenrick, entering, flung himself in a chair,
saying, with a vexed expression of voice, "Too late."
It was but a set of verses which Kenrick had written for a prize
exercise, and which he had just sent in too late. He had not lost all
ambition, but he had no real friend now to inspirit or stimulate him, so
that he often procrastinated, and was seldom successful with anything.
But his accidental words fell with awful meaning and strange emphasis on
poor Wilton's ear. Wilton had never heard of the Bath Kol, he knew
nothing of the power that wields the tongue amid the chances of destiny;
but fear made him superstitious, and, forgetting his usual
dissimulation, he looked up at Kenrick aghast, without wiping away the
traces which unwonted tears had left upon his face.
"Why, Raven, boy, what's the matter?" asked Kenrick, looking at him with
astonishment; "much _you_ care for my having a set of iambics too late."
"Oh, is that all?" asked Wilton, still looking frightened.
"All? Yes; and enough, too, for me. But"--stopping suddenly--"why,
Raven, what's the row? You've been crying, by all that's odd! Why, I
didn't know you'd ever shed a tear since you'd been in the cradle.
Raven crying--what a notion! Crocodile tears, eh?"
Wilton was ashamed to have been caught crying, and angry to be laughed
at. He was leaving the room silently and in a pet, when Kenrick caught
him, and, looking at him, said in a kindlier tone--
"Nonsense, Ra; don't mind a little chaff. What's happened? Nothing
serious, I hope?"
But Wilton was angry and miserable just then, and struggled to get free.
He did not venture to tell Kenrick what had really been passing through
his mind. "Let me go," he said, struggling to get free.
"O, go, by all means," said Kenrick, with his pride all on fire in a
moment; "don't suppose that I want you or care for you;" and he turned
his back on Wilton, to whom he had never once spoken harshly before.
The current of Wilton's thoughts was turned; he really loved Kenrick,
who was the only person for whom he had any regard at all. Besides,
Kenrick's support and favour were everything to him just then, and he
stopped irresolutely at the door, unwilling to leave him in anger.
"What do you want? Why don't you go?" asked Kenrick, with his back
still turned.
Wilton came back to the window, and humbly took Kenrick's hand, looking
up at him as though to ask forgiveness.
"How odd you are to-day, Raven," said Kenrick, relenting. "What were
you crying about when I came in?"
"Well, I'll tell you, Ken. I was thinking how much better some fellows
are than I am, and whether it was _too late_ to begin afresh, and
whether the door _was open_ to me still, when you came in, and said,
`Too late,' and banged the door, which I took for an answer to my
thoughts."
They were the first serious words Kenrick had ever heard from Wilton;
but he did not choose to heed them, and only said, after a pause--
"Other fellows better than you? Not a bit of it. Less plucky, perhaps;
greater hypocrites, certainly; but you are the jolliest of them all,
Ra."
And with that silly, silly speech Wilton was reassured; a gratified
smile perched itself upon his lips, and his eyes sparkled with delight;
nor was he soon revisited by any qualms of conscience.