by Hugh Walpole
At any rate he was glad that people were going to be pleasant to him on this last day of the term. The stout Miss Madder, Dormer, Clinton — they all seemed to be sorry that he was going, in spite of all the trouble that he had made. He did not think of Perrin....
Then he suddenly remembered Birkland. He would go and say good-by to him.
He climbed the steep stairs and found the little man busily packing. The floor was covered with packing cases, books lay about in piles, and the air was full of dust.
“Hullo!” said Traill, coughing in the doorway, “what’s all this?”
“Hullo!” said Birkland, looking up. “I’m glad you’ve come. I was coming round to see you, if you hadn’t. I’m off for good.”
“Off for good!” Traill stared in astonishment.
“Well, for good or bad. The things that have happened this term have finally screwed me up to a last attempt. One more struggle before I die — nothing can be worse than this — I gave notice last week.”
“What are you going to do?” asked Traill.
“I don’t know — it’s mad enough, I expect. But I’ve saved a tiny hit of money that will keep me for a time. I shall have a shot at anything. Nothing can he as bad as this — nothing!”
He stood up, looking grim and scant enough in his shirt-sleeves with dust on his cheeks and his hair on end.
“Well, I’m damned!” said Traill. “Well, after all, I’m on the same game. I don’t know what I’m going to do either. We’re both in the same box.”
“Oh!” said Birkland, “you’ve got youth and a beautiful lady to help you. I’m alone, and most of the spirit’s knocked out of me after twenty years of this; but I’m going to have a shot — so wish me luck!”
“Why, of course I do,” said Traill, coming up to him. “We’ll do it together — we’ll see heaps of each other.”
“Ah! heaps!” said Birkland, shaking his head. “No, I’m too dry and dusty a stick by this time for young fellows like you. No, I’m better alone. But I’ll come and see you one day.”
“You were quite right,” said Traill suddenly, “in what you said about the place the evening at the beginning of the term when I came in to see you. You were quite right.”
“Poor boy,” said Birkland, looking at him affectionately, “you had a hard dose of it. Perhaps it was all for the best, really. It drove you out. If I’d been treated to that kind of row at the beginning, I mightn’t have been here twenty years. And, after all, you met Miss Desart here.”
“Yes,” said Traill, “that makes it worth it fifty times over.”
“And now,” went on Birkland grimly, “this afternoon you shall see the closing scene of our pageant. You shall see our glory, our tradition. You will hear the head of our body state his satisfaction with the term’s work, proclaim his delight at the friendly spirit that pervades the school, allude, through the great Sir Marmaduke Boniface, maker of strawberry jam, to our ancient and honorable tradition in which we all, from the eldest to the youngest, have our humble share.” He spread his arms. “Oh! the mockery of it! To get out of it! — to get out of it! And now, at last, after twenty years, I’m going. If it hadn’t been for you, Traill, I believe I’d be here still. Well, perhaps it’s to breaking stones on a road that I’m going... at any rate, it won’t be this.”
And so here, too, Sir Marmaduke Boniface is remembered and has his influence.
III.
But with all these fine spirits, with all this stir and friendly feeling, with all this preparation for a great event, Mr. Perrin had little to do. This morning had, in no way, been for him a reconciling or a triumph at approaching freedom. After some three or four hours’ troubled and confused sleep he awoke to the humiliating, maddening consciousness that he had again, now for the second time, missed his chance.
This one thing that he had thought he could do he had missed once more; not even at this last, blind vengeance was he any good.
To-morrow it would be too late; Traill, his enemy, would be gone, they would all be gone, and he would return, next term, the same insignificant creature at whom they had all laughed for so long; and then it would be worse than ever, because Traill would have escaped him, and in the distant ages it would be told how once there had been a young man, straight from the University, who had flung him to the ground and trampled on him, and beaten him, in all probability, with his own umbrella....
Ah, no! it was not to be borne — the thing must be done; there must be no missing of an opportunity this third time.
He heard the Repetition that morning with a vacant mind. Somerset-Walpole knew nothing about it, but for once in his life he suffered no punishment. Perrin thought afterwards that Garden Minimus had looked at him as though he would like to speak to him, but he could not think of Garden Minimus now — there were other more important things to think about.
Of course it must be done that night — there was only one night left. Afterwards he thought that he would go down to the sea and drown himself. He had heard that drowning was rather pleasant.
His mind was busy, all that morning, with the things that everyone would say afterwards. He wished very much that he could stay behind in some way that he might hear what they said. At any rate, they would be able to laugh at him no longer; he would appear to all of them as something terrible, portentous, awful... that, at any rate, was a satisfaction. Miss Desart, of course, would be sorry. That was a pity, because he did not wish to hurt Miss Desart; but, in the end, it would be all for the best, because she was much too good for a man like Traill and would only be unhappy if she married him.
What a scene there would be when they found Traill in bed with his throat cut! — no, they would not laugh at him again!
He spoke to nobody that morning; but, when Repetition was over, he went back to his room and sat there, quite still, in his chair, looking in front of him, with the door closed.
And then Traill came up and spoke to him just as he was on his way up to the school for the speeches.
He smiled and said, “Oh! I say, Perrin, do let us make it all up — now that term is over, and I’m not coming back. I do hate to think that we should not part friends — it’s all been my stupid fault, and I am so very sorry.”
But Perrin did not stop, nor answer. He walked straight up the path with his eyes looking neither to the left nor the right. After all, you couldn’t shake hands with a man whose throat you were going to cut in the evening. He heard Traill’s exasperated “Oh! very well,” and then he passed into Big School.
He stepped into the hall as unobtrusively as possible. The boys were always there first, and it was their way to cheer the masters as they came in. If you were very popular, they cheered you loudly; if you were unpopular, they cheered you not at all. Perrin had no illusions about his popularity, and the silence on his entrance did not therefore surprise him, but matters were not improved by the roar of cheering that greeted Traill. Ah, well! they would never cheer him again.
The boys were placed in rows down the room according to their forms, and the masters sat where they pleased. Perrin stationed himself in a corner by the wall at the back; he fastened his eyes on the platform and kept them there until the end of the ceremonies — no one noticed him — no one spoke to him — not for him were their songs and festivals.
The raised platform at the end of the hall was surrounded with flowers, and ranged against the wall, seated on hard, uncertain chairs were the Governing Body, or as many of the Governing Body as had spared time to come.
These were for the most part large, serious, elderly gentlemen, with stout bodies, and shining, beady eyes; their immovability implied that they considered that the business would be sooner over were they passive and as nonexistent as possible — they all wore a considerable amount of watch-chain.
In front of them was a long, black table, and on this were ranged the prizes — a number of impossibly shiny volumes that might have been biscuit-tins, for all the reading that they seemed to contain. Bes
ide them in a wooden armchair was seated a little man like a sparrow, in patent leather boots and a high, white collar, whose smile was intermittent, but regular.
This was Sir Arthur Spalding, who had been asked to give away the prizes, because ten other gentlemen had been invited and refused. On the other side of the table the Rev. Moy-Thompson tried to express geniality and authority by the curves of his fingers and the bend of his head; he stroked his beard at intervals. In the front rows the ladies were seated: Mrs. Comber, large and smiling, in purple; Mrs. Moy-Thompson, endeavoring to escape her husband’s eye, but drawn thither continually as though by a magnet; the Misses Madder, Mrs. Dormer, Isabel, and many parents.
The proceedings opened with a speech from the Rev. Moy-Thompson. He alluded, of course, in the first place to Sir Marmaduke Boniface, “our founder, hero, and example”; then by delicate stages to Sir Arthur Spalding, whose patent leather boots simply shone with delight at the pleasant things that were said. This preface over, he dilated on the successes of the term. K. Somers had been made a Commissioner of Police in Orang-Mazu-Za (cheers); W. Binnors had been fifteenth in an examination that had something to do with Tropical Diseases (more cheers); M. Watson had received the College Essay Prize at St. Catherine’s College, Cambridge; and C. Duffield had obtained a second class in the first part of the Previous Examination at the same university (frantic cheering, because Duffield had been last year’s captain of the Rugby football.) All this, Mr. Moy-Thompson said, was exceedingly encouraging, and they could not help reflecting that Sir Marmaduke Boniface, were he conscious of these successes, would be extremely pleased (cheers). Passing on to the present term, he was delighted to be able to say that never, in all his long period as headmaster, could he remember a more equable and energetic term (cheers). As a term it had been marked perhaps by no events of special magnitude, but rather by the cordial friendliness of all those concerned. Masters and boys, they had all worked together with a will. It was a familiar saying that “a nation was blessed that had no history” — well, that applied to such a term as the one just concluded (cheers). If he might allude once more to their excellent Founder, he was quite sure that Sir Marmaduke Boniface was precisely the kind of man to rejoice in this spirit of friendship (cheers). He must here allude for a moment to his staff. Surely a headmaster had never been surrounded with so pleasant a body of men — men who understood exactly the kind of esprit de corps necessary if a school’s work were to be properly carried on; men who put aside all private feelings for the one great purpose of making Moffatt’s a great school — that was, he truly believed, the one aim and object of every man and boy in Moffatt’s — they might be sure that was the one and only aim and object that he ever kept before him. He had nothing more to do but introduce Sir Arthur Spalding, who would give away the prizes.
Mr. Moy-Thompson sat down, hot and inspired, amidst a burst of frantic cheering and clapping, but was suddenly chilled by the consciousness of Mr. Perrin’s eyes glaring at him in the strangest manner across the room. He shifted his chair a little to the left, so that a boy’s head intervened. The Governing Body at the conclusion of his speech moved their heads to the right, then to the left, smiled once, and resumed their immovability.
Sir Arthur Spalding was nervous, but found courage to say that he believed in our public schools — that was the thing that made men of us — he should never forget what he himself owed to Harrow. He should like to say one thing to the boys — that they were not to think that winning prizes was everything. We couldn’t all win prizes; let those who failed to obtain them remember that “slow and steady wins the race.” It wasn’t always the boys who won prizes who got on best afterwards. No — um — ah — he never used to win prizes at school himself. It wasn’t always the boys — here he pulled himself up and remembered that he had said it before. There was something else that he’d wanted to say, but he’d quite forgotten what it was. Here he was conscious of Mr. Perrin’s eyes and thought that he’d never seen anything so discouraging. He did not seem to be able to escape them. What a dangerous-looking man!
So he hurriedly concluded. Just one word he’d like to leave them from our great poet Tennyson — ! He looked for the little piece of paper on which he had written the verse. He could not find it; he searched his pockets — no — where had he put it? Lady Spalding, in the third row, suffered horrible agonies. He recovered himself and was vague. He would advise them all to read Tennyson, a fine poet, a very fine poet — yes — and now he would give away the prizes.
IV.
Meanwhile, Mr. Perrin up to the commencement of Mr. Moy-Thompson’s speech, had been merely conscious that a period of waiting had, so to speak, “to be put in.” He was not aware, in the very least, that his eyes were causing both Sir Arthur Spalding and Mr. Moy-Thompson acute discomfort; he was not aware that boys were looking at him, watching him with eager curiosity and nudging one another, speculatively. He was not aware that Isabel’s eyes were upon him, eyes of pity “because he looked so queer, as though he had a headache.”
He stood there, beside the small round-eyed boys of the First and Second Forms, staring in front of him, without moving. The first words of Moy-Thompson’s speech fell upon his ears unconsciously. It did not matter what they said, it did not matter what they thought, the case at issue was between himself and Traill and he faced that with an irritated impatience at these tiresome hours that kept him from his eager realization.
He began slowly to understand the things that Moy-Thompson was saying. And suddenly it was as though he had, morally and mentally, taken himself, forcibly, out of one room into another — out of a room in which there was only Traill’s figure, gray, shadowy, by the door, otherwise dark, obscured by a clinging mist... a dangerous place... into a place that had for its furniture tangible things, things like this speech that Moy-Thompson was making, things that had to do with no especial figure, but rather with a vast, intolerable condition, with a system.
What was he saying?... How dare he? Perrin moved impatiently in his place. He looked at the row of faces raised to the platform, the silly, stupid faces. That Mrs. Thompson in her thin black dress with her bony neck; that silly, cheerful Mrs. Comber in her bulging, flaming garments; that Lady Spalding, so stiff and sharp, as though she were of any importance to anyone — all of them listening to these things that Moy-Thompson was saying, and believing them, believing these... Lies!
Traill was almost forgotten as Perrin stepped a little forward from the wall in order that he might hear better. The sight of Moy-Thompson’s face up there on the platform smiling, so complacent, patriarchal with that white beard wagging at the end of it, brought the blood to his head. He clenched his thin hands. What were the other men doing that they could stand there and listen to these lies? Why did they not step forward and tell the truth to all those stupid women and those fat governors, to the little man with the shining boots on the platform? They knew that these thing were lies. Had not this term been hell, had it not been slow torture for them all, had not that man with the white beard full knowledge of these lies that he was telling? What was his private quarrel with Traill as compared with this monstrous injustice? He was pale now, with a long red mark against the white of his cheek. He had stepped right away from the wall and the small boys of the First and Second Forms were watching him.
It came upon him suddenly, like a flash from the lightning of heaven, that it was for him to escape these things. He had suffered more than the others, he knew better than they the things that were done in this place! Something was going round in his head like a red-hot wire, but he remembered, even at that confused moment, that scene a few days before in the common room, when they had all been so nearly stirred to revolt by Birkland. What if he were to break the bonds?... What rot! what rot! what rot! He could have shouted it to the roof— “Lies! Lies! Lies!”
There was a little stir and rustle as Moy-Thompson finished his speech — ladies’ dresses moved against the chairs, boots slipped along the floor —
and then a burst of cheering and clapping. Perrin rubbed his hands against one another — they were hot and dry and something rather like a bobbin on a latch went up and down in his throat — his eyes were burning. He moved a little further from the wall and a little nearer to the central gangway between the blocks of boys.
And now Sir Arthur Spalding stood nervously behind the glittering copies of “Tennyson’s Poems,” Sir Robert Ball’s “Wonders of the Heavens,” “The Works of Spencer,” and other volumes of our admirable classics. They began with the bottom of the school, and a small fat boy with a crimson face, boots that creaked like a badly-oiled door and were shaped like Chinese boats, staggered up to the platform. A lady, prominent for her size and large picture hat moved eagerly in her chair, clapped vehemently with her white gloves and so proclaimed herself a mother.
Sir Arthur Spalding had every intention of making a pleasant speech to each prizewinner— “something that they could remember afterwards, you know” — and began to say something to the small and red-faced boy, but was startled by the sound of eager, anticipatory breathing close to his ear. Turning round, he discovered that three more small boys were waiting anxiously for their turn and that others were coming up the room. He therefore hurried along with “Here you are, my boy. Remember that prizes aren’t everything in life — hope you’ll read it — delightful book.”
Mr. Perrin watched these boys passing up and down with eager eyes. He must wait — now was not the time, but soon there would be another speech to thank the absurd man with the boots for giving the prizes away. To his excited fancy it seemed to him now that the rest of the staff were looking at him as though they knew what he was going to do. They must have felt as indignant as he did at those lies that this man had been telling them. But those governors should know the truth for once at any rate and in a way that they should not forget... strangely, in the back of his mind he wished that his mother could be present....
