All dwellers in and about London are, alas! too well acquainted
with the never-to-be-enough-hated change which we have to undergo
once, at least, in every spring. As each succeeding winter wears
away, the same thing happens to us.
For some time we do not trust the fair lengthening days, and
cannot believe that the dirty pair of sparrows who live opposite
our window are really making love and going to build,
notwithstanding all their twittering. But morning after morning
rises fresh and gentle; there is no longer any vice in the air;
we drop our over-coats; we rejoice in the green shoots which the
privet hedge is making in the square garden, and hail the
returning tender-pointed leaves of the plane-trees as friends; we
go out of our way to walk through Covent Garden Market to see the
ever-brightening show of flowers from the happy country.
This state of things goes on sometimes for a few days only,
sometimes for weeks, till we make sure that we are safe for this
spring at any rate. Don't we wish we may get it! Sooner or later,
but sure--sure as Christmas bills or the income-tax, or anything,
if there be anything, surer than these--comes the morning when we
are suddenly conscious as soon as we rise that there is something
the matter. We do not feel comfortable in our clothes; nothing
tastes quite as it should at breakfast; though the day looks
bright enough, there is a fierce dusty taste about it as we look
out through windows, which no instinct now prompts us to throw
open, as it has done every day for the last month.
But it is only when we open our doors and issue into the street,
that the hateful reality comes right home to us. All moisture,
and softness, and pleasantness has gone clean out of the air
since last night; we seem to inhale yards of horse hair instead
of satin; our skins dry up; our eyes, and hair, and whiskers, and
clothes are soon filled with loathsome dust, and our nostrils
with the reek of the great city. We glance at the weather-cock on
the nearest steeple, and see that it points N.E. And so long as
the change lasts, we carry about with us a feeling of anger and
impatience, as though we personally were being ill-treated. We
could have borne with it well enough in November; it would have
been natural, and all in the days work in March; but now, when
Rotten Row is beginning to be crowded, when long lines of
pleasure vans are leaving town on Monday mornings for Hampton
Court or the poor remains of dear Epping Forest, when the
exhibitions are open, or about to open, when the religious public
is up, or on its way up, for May meetings, when the Thames is
already sending up faint warnings of what we may expect as soon
as his dirty old life's blood shall have been thoroughly warmed
up, and the "Ship", and "Trafalgar", and the "Star and Garter"
are in full swing at the antagonistic poles of the cockney
system, we do feel that this blight which has come over us and
everything is an insult, and that while it lasts, as there is
nobody who can be made particularly responsible for it, we are
justified in going about in general disgust, and ready to quarrel
with anybody we may meet on the smallest pretext.
This sort of east-windy state is perhaps the best physical
analogy for that mental one in which our hero now found himself.
The real crises was over; he had managed to pass through the eye
of the storm, and drift for the present at least into the skirts
of it, where he lay rolling under bare poles, comparatively safe,
but without any power as yet to get the ship well in hand, and
make her obey her helm. The storm might break over him again at
any minute, and would find him almost as helpless as ever.
For he could not follow Drysdale's advice at once, and break off
his visits to "The Choughs" altogether. He went back again after
a day or two, but only for short visits; he never stayed behind
now after the other men left the bar, and avoided interviews with
Patty alone as diligently as he had sought them before. She was
puzzled at his change of manner, and not being able to account
for it, was piqued, and ready to revenge herself, and pay him out
in the hundred little ways which the least practiced of her sex
know how to employ for the discipline of any of the inferior or
trousered half of the creation. If she had been really in love
with him, it would have been a different matter; but she was not.
In the last six weeks she had certainly often had visions of the
pleasures of being a lady and keeping servants, and riding in a
carriage like the squires' and rectors' wives and daughters about
her home. She had a liking, even a sentiment for him, which might
very well have grown into something dangerous before long; but as
yet it was not more than skin deep. Of late, indeed, she had been
much more frightened than attracted by the conduct of her
admirer, and really felt it a relief, notwithstanding her pique,
when he retired into the elder brother sort of state. But she
would have been more than woman if she had not resented the
change; and so very soon the pangs of jealousy were added to his
other troubles. Other men were beginning to frequent "The
Choughs" regularly. Drysdale, besides dividing with Tom the
prestige of being an original discoverer, was by far the largest
customer. St. Cloud came, and brought Chanter with him, to whom
Patty was actually civil, not because she liked him at all, but
because she saw that it made Tom furious. Though he could not fix
on any one man in particular, he felt that mankind in general
were gaining on him. In his better moments, indeed, he often
wished that she would take the matter into her own hands and
throw him over for good and all; but keep away from the place
altogether he could not, and often when he fancied himself on the
point of doing it, a pretty toss of her head, or a kind look of
her eyes would scatter all his good resolutions to the four
winds.
And so the days dragged on, and he dragged on through them; hot
fits of conceit alternating in him with cold fits of despondency
and mawkishness and discontent with everything and everybody,
which were all the more intolerable from their entire
strangeness. Instead of seeing the bright side of all things, he
seemed to be looking at creation through yellow spectacles, and
saw faults and blemishes in all his acquaintance, which had been
till now invisible.
But the more he was inclined to depreciate all other men, the
more he felt there was one to whom he had been grossly unjust.
And, as he recalled all that had passed, he began to do justice
to the man who had not flinched from warning him and braving him,
who he felt had been watching over him, and trying to guide him
straight, when he had lost all power or will to keep straight
himself.
From this time the dread increased on him lest any of the other
men should find out his quarrel with Hardy. Their utter ignorance
of it encouraged him in the hope that it might all pass off like
a bad dream. While it remained a matter between them alone, he
felt that all might come straight, though he could not think how.
He began to loiter by the entrance of the passage which led to
Hardy's rooms; sometimes he would find something to say to his
scout or bed-maker which took him into the back outside Hardy's
window, glancing at it sideways as he stood giving his orders.
There it was, wide open, generally--he hardly knew whether he
hoped to catch a glimpse of the owner, but he did hope that Hardy
might hear his voice. He watched him in chapel and hall
furtively, but constantly, and was always fancying what he was
doing and thinking about. Was it as painful an effort to Hardy,
he wondered, as to him to go on speaking, as if nothing had
happened, when they met at the boats, as they did now again
almost daily (for Diogenes was bent on training some of the
torpids for next year), and yet never to look one another in the
face; to live together as usual during part of every day, and yet
to feel all the time that a great wall had risen between them,
more hopelessly dividing them for the time than thousands of
miles of ocean or continent?
Amongst other distractions which Tom tried at this crisis of his
life, was reading. For three or four days running, he really
worked hard--very hard, if we were to reckon by the number of
hours he spent in his own rooms over his books with his oak
sported--hard, even though we should only reckon by results. For,
though scarcely an hour passed that he was not balancing on the
hind legs of his chair with a vacant look in his eyes, and
thinking of anything but Greek roots or Latin constructions, yet
on the whole he managed to get through a good deal, and one
evening, for the first time since his quarrel with Hardy, felt a
sensation of real comfort--it hardly amounted to pleasure--as he
closed his Sophocles some hour or so after hall, having just
finished the last of the Greek plays which he meant to take in
for his first examination. He leaned back in his chair and sat
for a few minutes, letting his thoughts follow their own bent.
They soon took to going wrong, and he jumped up in fear lest he
should be drifting back into the black stormy sea, in the trough
of which he had been laboring so lately, and which he felt he was
by no means clear of yet. At first he caught up his cap and gown
as though he were going out. There was a wine party at one of his
acquaintance's rooms; or he could go and smoke a cigar in the
pool room, or at any one of a dozen other places. On second
thoughts, however, he threw his academicals back on to the sofa
and went to his book-case. The reading had paid so well that
evening that he resolved to go on with it. He had no particular
object in selecting one book more than another, and so took down
carelessly the first that came to hand.
It happened to be a volume of Plato, and opened of its own accord
at the "Apology." He glanced at a few lines. What a flood of
memories they called up! This was almost the last book he had
read at school; and teacher, and friends, and lofty oak-shelved
library stood out before him at once. Then the blunders that he
himself and others had made rushed through his mind, and he
almost burst into a laugh as he wheeled his chair round to the
window, and began reading where he had opened, encouraging every
thought of the old times when he first read that marvellous
defense, and throwing himself back into them with all his might.
And still, as he read, forgotten words of wise comment, and
strange thoughts of wonder and longing, came back to him. The
great truth which he had been led to the brink of in those early
days rose in all its awe and all its attractiveness before him.
He leaned back in his chair, and gave himself up to his thought;
and how strangely that thought bore on the struggle which had
been raging in him of late; how an answer seemed to be trembling
to come out of it to all the cries, now defiant, now plaintive,
which had gone up out of his heart in this time of trouble! For
his thought was of that spirit, distinct from himself, and yet
communing with his inmost soul, always dwelling in him, knowing
him better than he knew himself, never misleading him, always
leading him to light and truth, of which the old philosopher
spoke. "The old heathen, Socrates, did actually believe
that--there can be no question about it;" he thought, "Has not
the testimony of the best men through these two thousand years
borne witness that he was right--that he did not believe a lie?
That was what we were told. Surely I don't mistake! Were we not
told, too, or did I dream it, that what was true for him was true
for every man--for me? That there is a spirit dwelling in me,
striving with me, ready to lead me into all truth if I will
submit to his guidance?"
"Ay! submit, submit, there's the rub! Give yourself up to his
guidance! Throw up the reins, and say you've made a mess of it.
Well, why not? Haven't I made a mess of it? Am I fit to hold the
reins?"
"Not I"--he got up and began walking about his rooms--"I give it
up."
"Give it up!" he went on presently; "yes, but to whom? Not to the
daemon spirit, whatever it was, who took up abode in the old
Athenian--at least, so he said, and so I believe. No, no! Two
thousand years and all that they have seen have not passed over
the world to leave us just where he was left. We want no daemons
or spirits. And yet the old heathen was guided right, and what
can a man want more? and who ever wanted guidance more than I
now--here--in this room--at this minute? I give up the reins; who
will take them?" And so there came on him one of those seasons
when a man's thoughts cannot be followed in words. A sense of awe
came on him, and over him, and wrapped him round; awe at a
presence of which he was becoming suddenly conscious, into which
he seemed to have wandered, and yet which he felt must have been
there around him, in his own heart and soul, though he knew it
not. There was hope and longing in his heart, mingling with the
fear of that presence, but withal the old reckless and daring
feeling which he knew so well, still bubbling up untamed,
untamable it seemed to him.
The room stifled him now; so he threw on his cap and gown, and
hurried down into the quadrangle. It was very quiet; probably
there was not a dozen men in college. He walked across to the
low, dark entrance of the passage which led to Hardy's rooms, and
there paused. Was he there by chance, or was he guided there?
Yes, this was the right way for him, he had no doubt now as to
that; down the dark passage and into the room he knew so
well--and what then? He took a short turn or two before the
entrance. How could he be sure that Hardy was alone? And, if not,
to go in would be worse than useless. If he were alone, what
should he say? After all, _must_ he go in there? was there no way
but that?
The college clock struck a quarter to seven. It was his usual
time for "The Choughs;" the house would be quiet now; was there
not one looking out for him there who would be grieved if he did
not come? After all, might not that be his way, for this night at
least? He might bring pleasure to one human being by going there
at once. That he knew; what else could he be sure of?
At this moment he heard Hardy's door open and a voice saying
"Good-night," and the next Grey came out of the passage, and was
passing close to him.
"Join yourself to him." The impulse came so strongly into Tom's
mind this time, that it was like a voice speaking him. He yielded
to it, and, stepping to Grey's side, wished him good-evening. The
other returned his salute in his shy way, and was hurrying on,
but Tom kept by him.
"Have you been reading with Hardy?"
"Yes."
"How is he? I have not seen anything of him for some time."
"Oh, very well, I think," said Grey, glancing sideways at his
questioner, and adding, after a moment, "I have wondered rather
not to see you there of late."
"Are you going to your school?" said Tom, breaking away from the
subject.
"Yes, and I am rather late; I must make haste on; good night."
"Will you let me go with you to-night? It would be a real
kindness. Indeed," he added, as he saw how embarrassing his
proposal was to Grey, "I will do whatever you tell me--you don't
know how grateful I should be to you. Do let me go--just for
to-night. Try me once."
Grey hesitated, turned his head sharply once or twice as they
walked on together, and then said with something like a sigh--
"I don't know, I'm sure. Did you ever teach in a night school?"
"No, but I have taught in the Sunday-school at home sometimes.
Indeed, I will do whatever you tell me."
"Oh! but this is not at all like a Sunday-school. They are a very
rough, wild lot."
"The rougher the better," said Tom; "I shall know how to manage
them then."
"But you must not really be rough with them."
"No, I won't; I didn't mean that," said Tom, hastily, for he saw
his mistake at once. "I shall take it as a great favor, if you
will let me go with you to-night. You won't repent it, I'm sure."
Grey did not seem at all sure of this, but saw no means of
getting rid of his companion, and so they walked on together and
turned down a long, narrow court in the lowest part of the town.
At the doors of the houses laboring men, mostly Irish, lounged or
stood about, smoking and talking to one another, or to the women
who leant out of the windows, or passed to and fro on their
various errands of business or pleasure. A group of half-grown
lads were playing at pitch-farthing at the farther end, and all
over the court were scattered children of all ages, ragged and
noisy little creatures most of them, on whom paternal and
maternal admonitions and cuffs were constantly being expended, and
to all appearances in vain.
At the sight of Grey a shout arose amongst the smaller boys, of
"Here's the teacher!" and they crowded around him and Tom as they
went up the court. Several of the men gave him a half-surly
half-respectful nod, as he passed along, wishing them good
evening. The rest merely stared at him and his companion. They
stopped at a door which Grey opened, and led the way into the
passage of an old tumble-down cottage, on the ground floor of
which were two low rooms which served for the school-rooms.
A hard-featured, middle-aged woman, who kept the house, was
waiting, and said to Grey, "Mr. Jones told me to say, sir, he
would not be here to night, as he has got a bad fever case--so
you was to take only the lower classes, sir, he said; and the
policeman would be near to keep out the big boys if you wanted
him. Shall I go and tell him to step round, sir?"
Grey looked embarrassed for a moment, and then said, "No, never
mind; you can go;" and then turning to Tom, added, "Jones is the
curate; he won't be here to-night; and some of the bigger boys
are very noisy and troublesome, and only come to make a noise.
However, if they come we must do our best."
Meantime, the crowd of small ragged urchins had filled the room,
and were swarming on to the benches and squabbling for the
copy-books which were laid out on the thin desks. Grey set to
work to get them into order, and soon the smallest were draughted
off into the inner room with slates and spelling-books, and the
bigger ones, some dozen in number, settled to their writing. Tom
seconded him so readily, and seemed so much at home, that Grey
felt quite relieved.
"You seem to get on capitally," he said; "I will go into the
inner room to the little ones, and you stay and take these. There
are the class-books when they have done their copies," and so
went off into the inner room and closed the door.
Tom set himself to work with a will, and as he bent over one
after another of the pupils, and guided the small grubby hands
which clutched the inky pens with cramped fingers, and went
spluttering and blotching along the lines of the copy-books, felt
the yellow scales dropping from his eyes, and more warmth coming
back into his heart than he had known there for many a day.
All went on well inside, notwithstanding a few small out-breaks
between the scholars, but every now and then mud was thrown
against the window, and noises outside and in the passages
threatened some interruption. At last, when the writing was
finished, the copy-books cleared away, and the class-books
distributed, the door opened, and two or three big boys of
fifteen or sixteen lounged in, with their hands in their pockets
and their caps on. There was an insolent look about them which
set Tom's back up at once; however, he kept his temper, made them
take their caps off, and, as they said they wanted to read with
the rest, let them take their places on the benches.
But now came the tug of war. He could not keep his eyes on the
whole lot at once, and, no sooner did he fix his attention on the
stammering reader for the time being and try to help him, than
anarchy broke out all round him. Small stones and shot were
thrown about, and cries arose from the smaller fry, "Please, sir,
he's been and poured some ink down my back,"
"He's stole my book,
sir,"
"He's gone and stuck a pin in my leg." The evil-doers were
so cunning that it was impossible to catch them; but as he was
hastily turning in his own mind what to do, a cry arose, and one
of the benches went suddenly over backwards on to the floor,
carrying with it its whole freight of boys, except two of the
bigger ones, who were the evident authors of the mishap.
Tom sprang at the one nearest him, seized him by the collar,
hauled him into the passage, and sent him out of the street-door
with a sound kick; and then rushing back, caught hold of the
second, who went down on his back and clung round Tom's legs,
shouting for help to his remaining companions, and struggling and
swearing. It was all the work of a moment, and now the door
opened, and Grey appeared from the inner room. Tom left off
hauling his prize towards the passage, and felt and looked very
foolish.
"This fellow, and another whom I have turned out, upset that form
with all the little boys on it," he said, apologetically.
"It's a lie, t'wasn't me," roared the captive, to whom Tom
administered a sound box on the ear, while the small boys,
rubbing different parts of their bodies, chorused, "'twas him,
teacher, 'twas him," and heaped further charges of pinching,
pin-sticking, and other atrocities on him.
Grey astonished Tom by his firmness. "Don't strike him again," he
said. "Now, go out at once, or I will send for your father." The
fellow got up, and, after standing a moment and considering his
chance of successful resistance to physical force in the person
of Tom, and moral in that of Grey, slunk out. "You must go, too,
Murphy," went on Grey to another of the intruders.
"Oh, your honor let me bide. I'll be as quiet as a mouse,"
pleaded the Irish boy; and Tom would have given in, but Grey was
unyielding.
"You were turned out last week, and Mr. Jones said you were not
to come back for a fortnight."
"Well, good night to your honor," said Murphy, and took himself
off.
"The rest may stop," said Grey. "You had better take the inner
room now; I will stay here."
"I'm very sorry," said Tom.
"You couldn't help it; no one can manage those two. Murphy is
quite different, but I should have spoiled him if I had let him
stay now."
The remaining half hour passed off quietly. Tom retired into the
inner room, and took up Grey's lesson, which he had been reading
to the boys from a large Bible with pictures. Out of
consideration for their natural and acquired restlessness, the
little fellows, who were all between eight and eleven years old,
were only kept sitting at their pothooks and spelling for the
first half hour or so, and then were allowed to crowd round the
teacher, who read and talked to them, and showed them the
pictures. Tom found the Bible open at the story of the prodigal
son, and read it out to them as they clustered round his knees.
Some of the outside ones fidgeted about a little, but those close
round him listened with ears, and eyes, and bated breath; and two
little blue-eyed boys, without shoes--their ragged clothes
concealed by long pinafores which their widowed mother had put on
clean to send them to school--leaned against him and looked up in
his face, and his heart warmed to the touch and the look.
"Please, teacher, read it again," they said when he finished; so
he read it again and sighed when Grey came in and lighted a
candle (for the room was getting dark) and said it was time for
prayers.
A few collects, and the Lord's Prayer, in which all the young
voices joined, drowning for a minute the noises from the court
outside, finished the evening's schooling. The children trooped
out, and Grey went to speak to the woman who kept the house. Tom,
left to himself, felt strangely happy, and, for something to do,
took the snuffers and commenced a crusade against a large family
of bugs, who, taking advantage of the quiet, came cruising out of
a crack in the otherwise neatly papered wall. Some dozen had
fallen on his spear when Grey reappeared, and was much horrified
at the sight. He called the woman and told her to have the hole
carefully fumigated and mended.
"I thought we had killed them all long ago," he said; "but the
place is tumbling down."
"It looks well enough," said Tom.
"Yes, we have it kept as tidy as possible. It ought to be at
least a little better than what the children see at home." And so
they left the school and court and walked up to college.
"Where are you going?" Tom said, as they entered the gate.
"To Hardy's rooms; will you come?"
"No, not to-night," said Tom; "I know that you want to be
reading; I should only interrupt."
"Well, good night, then," said Grey, and went on, leaving Tom
standing in the porch. On the way up from the school he had
almost made up his mind to go to Hardy's rooms that night. He
longed and yet feared to do so; and, on the whole, was not sorry
for an excuse. Their first meeting must be alone, and it would be
a very embarrassing one, for him at any rate. Grey, he hoped,
would tell Hardy of his visit to the school, and that would show
that he was coming round, and make the meeting easier. His talk
with Grey, too, had removed one great cause of uneasiness from
his mind. It was now quite clear that he had no suspicion of the
quarrel, and, if Hardy had not told him, no one else could know
of it.
Altogether, he strolled into the quadrangle a happier and sounder
man than he had been since his first visit to "The Choughs", and
looked up and answered with his old look and voice when he heard
his name called from one of the first-floor windows.
The hailer was Drysdale, who was leaning out in lounging coat and
velvet cap, and enjoying a cigar as usual, in the midst of the
flowers of his hanging garden.
"You've heard the good news, I suppose?"
"No, what do you mean?"
"Why, Blake has got the Latin verse."
"Hurrah! I'm so glad."
"Come up and have a weed."
Tom ran up the staircase and into Drysdale's rooms, and was
leaning out of the window at his side in another minute.
"What does he get by it?" he said, "do you know?"
"No; some books bound in Russia, I dare say, with the Oxford
arms, and 'Dominus illuminatio mea,' on the back."
"No money?"
"Not much--perhaps a ten'ner," answered Drysdale, "but no end of
[Greek text] kudoz, I suppose."
"It makes it look well for his first, don't you think? But I wish
he had got some money for it. I often feel very uncomfortable
about that bill, don't you?"
"Not I, what's the good? It's nothing when you are used to it.
Besides, it don't fall due for another six weeks."
"But if Blake can't meet it then?" said Tom.
"Well, it will be vacation, and I'll trouble greasy Benjamin to
catch me then."
"But you don't mean to say you won't pay it?" said Tom in horror.
"Pay it! You may trust Benjamin for that. He'll pull round his
little usuries somehow."
"Only we have promised to pay on a certain day, you know."
"Oh, of course, that's the form. That only means that he can't
pinch us sooner."
"I do hope, though, Drysdale, that it will be paid on the day,"
said Tom, who could not quite swallow the notion of forfeiting
his word, even though it were only a promise to pay to a
scoundrel.
"All right. You've nothing to do with it, remember. He won't
bother you. Besides, you can plead infancy, if the worst comes to
the worst. There's such a queer old bird gone to your friend
Hardy's rooms."
The mention of Hardy broke the disagreeable train of thought
into which Tom was falling, and he listened eagerly as Drysdale
went on.
"It was about half an hour ago. I was looking out here, and saw
an old fellow come hobbling into quad on two sticks, in a shady
blue uniform coat and white trousers. The kind of old boy you
read about in books, you know. Commodore Trunnion, or Uncle Toby,
or one of that sort. Well, I watched him backing and filling
about the quad, and trying one staircase and another; but there
was nobody about. So down I trotted and went up to him for fun,
and to see what he was after. It was as good as a play, if you
could have seen it. I was ass enough to take off my cap and make
a low bow as I came up to him, and he pulled off his uniform cap
in return, and we stood there bowing to one another. He was a
thorough old gentleman, and I felt rather foolish for fear that
he should see that I expected a lark when I came out. But I don't
think he had an idea of it, and only set my capping him down to
the wonderful good manners of the college. So we got quite thick,
and I piloted him across to Hardy's staircase in the back quad. I
wanted him to come up and quench, but he declined, with many
apologies. I'm sure he is a character."
"He must be Hardy's father," said Tom.
"I shouldn't wonder. But is his father in the navy?"
"He is a retired captain."
"Then no doubt you're right. What shall we do? Have a hand at
picquet. Some men will be here directly. Only for love."
Tom declined the proffered game, and went off soon after to his
own rooms, a happier man than he had been since his first night
at "The Choughs."