believe you were beginning your new life in a spirit of captiousness and
rebellion. I'll have no mutineers in my camp. I'll establish a spirit of
trustful happiness and unmurmuring content in this school, if I have to
flog every boy in it as long as I can stand over him! As for you,
Richard Bultitude, I have no words to express my pain and disgust at the
heartless irreverence with which you persist in mimicking and
burlesquing a fond and excellent parent. Unless I perceive, sir, in a
very short time a due sense of your error and a lively repentance, my
disapproval will take a very practical form."
Mr. Bultitude fell back into his seat with a gasp. It was hard to be
accused of caricaturing one's own self, particularly when conscious of
entire innocence in that respect, but even this was slight in comparison
with the discovery that he had been so blindly deceiving himself!
The Doctor evidently had failed to penetrate his disguise, and the
dreaded scene of elaborate explanation must be gone through after all.
The boys (with the exception of Kiffin) still found exquisite enjoyment
in this extraordinary and original exhibition, and waited eagerly for
further experiment on the Doctor's patience.
They were soon gratified. If there was one thing Paul detested more than
another, it was the smell of peppermint--no less than three office boys
had been discharged by him because, as he alleged, they made the clerks'
room reek with it,--and now the subtle searching odour of the hated
confection was gradually stealing into the compartment and influencing
its atmosphere.
He looked at Coggs, who sat on the seat opposite to him, and saw his
cheeks and lips moving in slow and appreciative absorption of something.
Coggs was clearly the culprit.
"Do you encourage your boys to make common nuisances of themselves in a
public place, may I ask, Dr. Grimstone?" he inquired, fuming.
"Some scarcely seem to require encouragement, Bultitude," said the
Doctor pointedly: "what is the matter now?"
"If he takes it medicinally," said Paul, "he should choose some other
time and place to treat his complaint. If he has a depraved liking for
the abominable stuff, for Heaven's sake make him refrain from it on
occasions when it is a serious annoyance to others!"
"Will you explain? Who and what are you talking about?"
"That boy opposite," said Paul, pointing the finger of denunciation at
the astonished Coggs; "he's sucking an infernal peppermint lozenge
strong enough to throw the train off the rails!"
"Is what Bultitude tells me true, Coggs?" demanded the Doctor in an
awful voice.
Coggs, after making several attempts to bolt the offending lozenge, and
turning scarlet meanwhile with confusion and coughing, stammered huskily
something to the effect that he had "bought the lozenges at a
chemist's," which he seemed to consider, for some reason, a mitigating
circumstance.
"Have you any more of this pernicious stuff about you?" said the Doctor.
Very slowly and reluctantly Coggs brought out of one pocket after
another three or four neat little white packets, made up with that
lavish expenditure of time, string, and sealing-wax, by which the
struggling chemist seeks to reconcile the public mind to a charge of two
hundred and fifty per cent. on cost price, and handed them to Dr.
Grimstone, who solemnly unfastened them one by one, glanced at their
contents with infinite disgust, and flung them out of window.
Then he turned to Paul with a look of more favour than he had yet shown
him. "Bultitude," he said, "I am obliged to you. A severe cold in the
head has rendered me incapable of detecting this insidious act of
insubordination and self-indulgence, on which I shall have more to say
on another occasion. Your moral courage and promptness in denouncing the
evil thing are much to your credit."
"Not at all," said Paul, "not at all, my dear sir. I mentioned it
because I--ah--happen to be peculiarly sensitive on the subject and----"
Here he broke off with a sharp yell, and began to rub his ankle. "One of
these young savages has just given me a severe kick; it's that fellow
over there, with the blue necktie. I have given him no provocation, and
he attacks me in this brutal manner, sir; I appeal to you for
protection!"
"So, Coker" (Coker wore a blue necktie), said the Doctor, "you emulate
the wild ass in more qualities than those of stupidity and stubbornness,
do you? You lash out with your hind legs at an inoffensive
school-fellow, with all the viciousness of a kangaroo, eh? Write out all
you find in Buffon's Natural History upon those two animals a dozen
times, and bring it to me by to-morrow evening. If I am to stable wild
asses, sir, they shall be broken in!"
Six pairs of sulky glowering eyes were fixed upon the unconscious Paul
for the rest of the journey; indignant protests and dark vows of
vengeance were muttered under cover of the friendly roar and rattle of
tunnels. But the object of them heard nothing; his composure was
returning once more in the sunshine of Dr. Grimstone's approbation, and
he almost decided on declaring himself in the station fly.
And now at last the train was grinding along discordantly with the
brakes on, and, after a little preliminary jolting and banging over the
points, drew up at a long lighted platform, where melancholy porters
paced up and down, croaking "Market Rodwell!" like so many Solomon
Eagles predicting woe.
Paul got out with the others, and walked forward to the guard's van,
where he stood shivering in the raw night air by a small heap of
portmanteaux and white clamped boxes.
"I should like to tell him all about it now," he thought, "if he wasn't
so busy. I'll get him to go in a cab alone with me, and get it over
before we reach the house."
Dr. Grimstone certainly did not seem in a very receptive mood for
confidences just then. No flys were to be seen, which he took as a
personal outrage, and visited upon the station-master in hot
indignation.
"It's scandalous, I tell you," he was saying: "scandalous! No cabs to
meet the train. My school reassembles to-day, and here I find no
arrangements made for their accommodation! Not even an omnibus! I shall
write to the manager and report this. Let some one go for a fly
immediately. Boys, go into the waiting room till I come to you.
Stay--there are too many for one fly. Coker, Coggs, and, let me see,
yes, Bultitude, you all know your way. Walk on and tell Mrs. Grimstone
we are coming."
Paul Bultitude was perhaps more relieved than disappointed by this
postponement of a disagreeable interview, though, if he had seen Coker
dig Coggs in the side with a chuckle of exultant triumph, he might have
had misgivings as to the prudence of trusting himself alone with them.
As it was he almost determined to trust the pair with his secret. "They
will be valuable witnesses," he said to himself, "that, whoever else I
may be, I am not Dick."
So he went on briskly ahead over a covered bridge and down some
break-neck wooden steps, and passed through the wicket out upon the
railed-in space, where the cabs and omnibuses should have been, but
which was now a blank spectral waste with a white ground-fog lurking
round its borders.
Here he was joined by his companions, who, after a little whispering,
came up one on either side and put an arm through each of his.
"Well," said Paul, thinking to banter them agreeably; "here you are,
young men, eh? Holidays all over now! Work while you're young, and
then---- Gad, you're walking me off my legs. Stop; I'm not as young as I
used to be----"
"Grim can't see us here, can he, Coker?" said Coggs when they had
cleared the gates and palings.
"Not he!" said Coker.
"Very well, then. Now then, young Bultitude, you used to be a decent
fellow enough last term, though you _were_ coxy. So, before we go any
further--what do you mean by this sort of thing?"
"Because," put in Coker, "if you aren't quite right in your head,
through your old governor acting like a brute all the holidays, as you
said he does, just say so, and we won't be hard on you."
"I--he--always an excellent father," stammered Paul. "What am I to
explain?"
"Why, what did you go and sneak of _him_ for bringing tuck back to
school for, eh?" demanded Coker.
"Yes, and sing out when he hacked your shin?" added Coggs; "and tell
Grimstone that new fellow was blubbing? Where's the joke in all that,
eh? Where's the joke?"
"You don't suppose I was bound to sit calmly down and allow you to suck
your villainous peppermints under my very nose, do you?" said Mr.
Bultitude. "Why shouldn't I complain if a boy annoys me by sniffing, or
kicks me on the ankle? Just tell me that? Suppose my neighbour has a
noisy dog or a smoky chimney, am I not to venture to tell him of it? Is
he to----"
But his arguments, convincing as they promised to be, were brought to a
sudden and premature close by Coker, who slipped behind him and
administered a sharp jog below his back, which jarred his spine and
caused him infinite agony.
"You little brute!" cried Paul, "I could have you up for assault for
that!"
But upon this Coggs did the very same thing only harder. "Last term
you'd have shown fight for much less, Bultitude," they both observed
severely, as some justification for repeating the process.
"Now, perhaps, you'll drop it for the future," said Coker. "Look here!
we'll give you one more chance. This sneaking dodge is all very well for
Chawner. Chawner could do that sort of thing without getting sat upon,
because he's a big fellow; but we're not going to stand it from you.
Will you promise on your sacred word of honour, now, to be a decent sort
of chap again, as you were last term?"
But Mr. Bultitude, though he longed for peace and quietness, dreaded
doing or saying anything to favour the impression that he was the
schoolboy he unluckily appeared to be, and he had not skill and tact
enough to dissemble and assume a familiar genial tone of equality with
these rough boys.
"You don't understand," he protested feebly. "If I could only tell
you----"
"We don't want any fine language, you know," said the relentless Coggs.
"Yes or no. Will you promise to be your old self again?"
"I only wish I could," said poor Mr. Bultitude--"but I can't!"
"Very well, then," said Coggs firmly, "we must try the torture. Coker,
will you screw the back of his hand, while I show him how they make
barley-sugar?"
And he gave Paul an interesting illustration of the latter branch of
industry by twisting his right arm round and round till he nearly
wrenched it out of the socket, while Coker seized his left hand and
pounded it vigorously with the first joint of his forefinger, causing
the unfortunate Paul to yell for mercy.
At last he could bear no more, and breaking away from his tormentors
with a violent effort, he ran frantically down the silent road towards a
house which he knew from former visits to be Dr. Grimstone's.
He was but languidly pursued, and, as the distance was short, he soon
gained a gate on the stuccoed posts of which he could read "Crichton
House" by the light of a neighbouring gas-lamp.
"This is a nice way," he thought, as he reached it breathless and
trembling, "for a father to visit his son's school!"
He had hoped to reach sanctuary before the other two could overtake him;
but he soon discovered that the gate was shut fast, and all his efforts
would not bring him within reach of the bell-handle--he was too short.
So he sat down on the doorstep in resigned despair, and waited for his
enemies. Behind the gate was a large many-windowed house, with steps
leading up to a portico. In the playground to his right the school
gymnasium, a great gallows-like erection, loomed black and grim through
the mist, the night wind favouring the ghastliness of its appearance by
swaying the ropes till they creaked and moaned weirdly on the hooks, and
the metal stirrups clinked and clashed against one another in irregular
cadence.
He had no time to observe more, as Coker and Coggs joined him, and, on
finding he had not rung the bell, seized the occasion to pummel him at
their leisure before announcing their arrival.
Then the gate was opened, and the three--the revengeful pair assuming an
air of lamb-like inoffensiveness--entered the hall and were met by Mrs.
Grimstone.
"Why, here you are!" she said, with an air of surprise, and kissing them
with real kindness. "How cold you look! So you actually had to walk. No
cabs as usual. You poor boys! come in and warm yourselves. You'll find
all your old friends in the schoolroom."
Mr. Bultitude submitted to be kissed with some reluctance, inwardly
hoping that Dr. Grimstone might never hear of it.
Mrs. Grimstone, it may be said here, was a stout, fair woman, not in the
least intellectual or imposing, but with a warm heart, and a way of
talking to and about boys that secured her the confidence of mothers
more effectually, perhaps, than the most polished conversation and
irreproachable deportment could have done.
She did not reserve her motherliness for the reception room either, as
some schoolmasters' wives have a tendency to do, and the smallest boy
felt less homesick when he saw her.
She opened a green baize outer door, and the door beyond it, and led
them into a long high room, with desks and forms placed against the
walls, and a writing table, and line of brown-stained tables down the
middle. Opposite the windows there was a curious structure of shelves
partitioned into lockers, and filled with rows of shabby schoolbooks.
The room had been originally intended for a drawing-room, as was evident
from the inevitable white and gold wall-paper and the tarnished gilt
beading round the doors and window shutters; the mantelpiece, too, was
of white marble, and the gaselier fitted with dingy crystal lustres.
But sad-coloured maps hung on the ink-splashed walls, and a clock with a
blank idiotic face (it is not every clock that possesses a decently
intelligent expression) ticked over the gilt pier-glass. The boards were
uncarpeted, and stained with patches of ink of all sizes and ages; while
the atmosphere, in spite of the blazing fire, had a scholastic blending
of soap and water, ink and slate-pencil in its composition, which
produced a chill and depressing effect.
On the forms opposite the fire some ten or twelve boys were sitting, a
few comparing notes as to their holiday experiences with some approach
to vivacity. The rest, with hands in pockets and feet stretched towards
the blaze, seemed lost in melancholy abstraction.
"There!" said Mrs. Grimstone cheerfully, "you'll have plenty to talk to
one another about. I'll send Tom in to see you presently!" And she left
them with a reassuring nod, though the prospect of Tom's company did not
perhaps elate them as much as it was intended to do.
Mr. Bultitude felt much as if he had suddenly been dropped down a
bear-pit, and, avoiding welcome and observation as well as he could, got
away into a corner, from which he observed his new companions with
uneasy apprehension.
"I say," said one boy, resuming the interrupted conversation, "did you
go to Drury Lane? Wasn't it stunning! That goose, you know, and the lion
in the forest, and all the wooden animals lumbering in out of the toy
Noah's Ark!"
"Why couldn't you come to our party on Twelfth-night?" asked another.
"We had great larks. I wish you'd been there!"
"I had to go to young Skidmore's instead," said a pale, spiteful-looking
boy, with fair hair carefully parted in the middle. "It was like his
cheek to ask me, but I thought I'd go, you know, just to see what it was
like."
"What was it like?" asked one or two near him languidly.
"Oh, awfully slow! They've a poky little house in Brompton somewhere,
and there was no dancing, only boshy games and a conjurer, without any
presents. And, oh! I say, at supper there was a big cake on the table,
and no one was allowed to cut it, because it was hired. They're so poor,
you know. Skidmore's pater is only a clerk, and you should see his
sisters!"
"Why, are they pretty?"
"Pretty! they're just like young Skidmore--only uglier; and just fancy,
his mother asked me 'if I was Skidmore's favourite companion, and if he
helped me in my studies?'"
The unfortunate Skidmore, when he returned, soon found reason to regret
his rash hospitality, for he never heard the last of the cake (which
had, as it happened, been paid for in the usual manner) during the rest
of the term.
There was a slight laugh at the enormity of Mrs. Skidmore's presumption,
and then a long pause, after which some one asked suddenly, "Does any
one know whether Chawner really has left this time?"
"I hope so," said a big, heavy boy, and his hope seemed echoed with a
general fervour. "He's been going to leave every term for the last year,
but I believe he really has done it this time. He wrote and told me he
wasn't coming back."
"Thank goodness!" said several, with an evident relief, and some one was
just observing that they had had enough of the sneaking business, when a
fly was heard to drive up, and the bell rang, whereupon everyone
abandoned his easy attitude, and seemed to brace himself up for a trying
encounter.
"Look out--here's Grimstone!" they whispered under their breaths, as
voices and footsteps were heard in the hall outside.
Presently the door of the schoolroom opened, and another boy entered the
room. Dr. Grimstone, it appeared, had not been the occupant of the fly,
after all. The new-comer was a tall, narrow-shouldered, stooping fellow,
with a sallow, unwholesome complexion, thin lips, and small sunken
brown eyes. His cheeks were creased with a dimpling subsmile, half
uneasy, half malicious, and his tread was mincing and catlike.
"Well, you fellows?" he said.
All rose at once, and shook hands effusively. "Why, Chawner!" they
cried, "how are you, old fellow? We thought you weren't coming back!"
There was a heartiness in their manner somewhat at variance with their
recent expressions of opinion; but they had doubtless excellent reasons
for any inconsistency.
"Well," said Chawner, in a low, soft voice, which had a suggestion of
feminine spitefulness, "I was going to leave, but I thought you'd be
getting into mischief here without me to watch over you. Appleton, and
Lench, and Coker want looking after badly, I know. So, you see, I've
come back after all."
He laughed with a little malevolent cackle as he spoke, and the three
boys named laughed too, though with no great heartiness, and shifting
the while uneasily on their seats.
After this sally the conversation languished until Tom Grimstone's
appearance. He strolled in with a semi-professional air, and shook hands
with affability.
Tom was a short, flabby, sandy-haired youth, not particularly beloved of
his comrades, and his first remark was, "I say, you chaps, have you done
your holiday task? Pa says he shall keep everyone in who hasn't. I've
done mine;" which, as a contribution to the general liveliness, was a
distinct failure.
Needless to say, the work imposed as a holiday occupation had been first
deferred, then forgotten, then remembered too late, and recklessly
defied with the confidence begotten in a home atmosphere.
Amidst a general silence Chawner happened to see Mr. Bultitude in his
corner, and crossed over to him. "Why, there's Dicky Bultitude there all
the time, and he never came to shake hands! Aren't you going to speak to
me?"
Paul growled something indistinctly, feeling strangely uncomfortable
and confused.
"What's the matter with him?" asked Chawner. "Does anyone know? Has he
lost his tongue?"
"He hadn't lost it coming down in the train," said Coker: "I wish he
had. I tell you what, you fellows--He--here's Grim at last! I'll tell
you all about it up in the bedroom."
And Dr. Grimstone really did arrive at this point, much to Paul's
relief, and looked in to give a grip of the hand and a few words to
those of the boys he had not seen.
Biddlecomb, Tipping, and the rest, came in with him, and the schoolroom
soon filled with others arriving by later trains, amongst the later
comers being the two house-masters, Mr. Blinkhorn and Mr. Tinkler; and
there followed a season of bustle and conversation, which lasted until
the Doctor touched a small hand-bell, and ordered them to sit down round
the tables while supper was brought in.
Mr. Bultitude was not sorry to hear the word "supper." He was faint and
dispirited, and although he had dined not very long since, thought that
perhaps a little cold beef and beer, or some warmed-up trifle, might
give him courage to tell his misfortunes before bedtime.
Of one thing he felt certain. Nothing should induce him to trust his
person in a bedroom with any of those violent and vindictive boys;
whether he succeeded in declaring himself that night or not, he would at
least insist on a separate bedroom. Meantime he looked forward to supper
as likely to restore geniality and confidence.
But the supper announced so imposingly proved to consist of nothing more
than two plates piled with small pieces of thinly-buttered bread, which
a page handed round together with tumblers of water; and Paul, in his
disappointment, refused this refreshment with more firmness than
politeness, as Dr. Grimstone observed.
"You got into trouble last term, Bultitude," he said sternly, "on
account of this same fastidious daintiness. Your excellent father has
informed me of your waste and gluttony at his own bountifully spread
table. Don't let me have occasion to reprove you for this again."
Mr. Bultitude, feeling the necessity of propitiating him, hastened to
take the two largest squares of bread and butter on the plate. They were
moist and thick, and he had considerable difficulty in disposing of
them, besides the gratification of hearing himself described as a "pig"
by his neighbours, who reproved him with a refreshing candour.
"I must get away from here," he thought, ruefully. "Dick seems very
unpopular. I wish I didn't feel so low-spirited and unwell. Why can't I
carry it off easily as--as a kind of joke? How hard these forms are, and
how those infernal boys did jog my back!"
Bedtime came at length. The boys filed, one by one, out of the room, and
the Doctor stood by the door to shake hands with them as they passed.
Mr. Bultitude lingered until the others had gone, for he had made up his
mind to seize this opportunity to open the Doctor's eyes to the mistake
he was making. But he felt unaccountably nervous; the diplomatic and
well-chosen introduction he had carefully prepared had left him at the
critical moment; all power of thought was gone with it, and he went
tremblingly up to the schoolmaster, feeling hopelessly at the mercy of
anything that chose to come out of his mouth.
"Dr. Grimstone," he began; "before retiring I--I must insist--I mean I
must request---- What I wish to say is----"
"I see," said the Doctor, catching him up sharply. "You wish to
apologise for your extraordinary behaviour in the railway carriage?
Well, though you made some amends afterwards, an apology is very right
and proper. Say no more about it."
"It's not that," said Paul hopelessly; "I wanted to explain----"
"Your conduct with regard to the bread and butter? If it was simply
want of appetite, of course there is no more to be said. But I have an
abhorrence of----"
"Quite right," said Paul, recovering himself; "I hate waste myself, but
there is something I must tell you before----"
"If it concerns that disgraceful conduct of Coker's," said the Doctor,
"you may speak on. I shall have to consider his case to-morrow. Has any
similar case of disobedience come to your knowledge? If so, I expect you
to disclose it to me. You have found some other boy with sweetmeats in
his possession?"
"Good Heavens, sir!" said Mr. Bultitude, losing his temper; "I haven't
been searching the whole school for sweetmeats! I have other things to
occupy my mind, sir. And, once for all, I demand to be heard! Dr.
Grimstone, there are, ahem, domestic secrets that can only be alluded to
in the strictest privacy. I see that one of your assistants is writing
at his table there. Cannot we go where there will be less risk of
interruption? You have a study, I suppose?"
"Yes, sir," said the Doctor with terrible grimness, "I have a study--and
I have a cane. I can convince you of both facts, if you wish it. If you
insult me again by this brazen buffoonery, I will! Be off to your
dormitory, sir, before you provoke me to punish you. Not another word!
Go!"
And, incredible as it may appear to all who have never been in his
position, Mr. Bultitude went. It was almost an abdication, it was
treachery to his true self; he knew the vital importance of firmness at
this crisis. But nevertheless his courage gave way all at once, and he
crawled up the bare, uncarpeted stairs without any further protest!