Читать книгу Eric, or Little by Little - Frederic W. Farrar - Страница 7

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Take us the foxes, the little foxes that spoil our vines; for our vines have tender grapes. —Cant. ii. 15.

THE second term at school is generally the great test of the strength of a boy's principles and resolutions. During the first term the novelty, the loneliness, the dread of unknown punishments, the respect for authorities, the desire to measure himself with his companions—all tend to keep him right and diligent. But many of these incentives are removed after the first brush of novelty, and many a lad who has given good promise at first, turns out, after a short probation, idle or vicious, or indifferent.

But there was little comparative danger for Eric, so long as he continued to be a home-boarder, which was for another half-year. On the contrary, he was anxious to support in his new remove the prestige of having been head-boy; and as he still continued under Mr Gordon, he really wished to turn over a new leaf in his conduct towards him, and recover, if possible, his lost esteem.

His popularity was a fatal snare. He enjoyed and was very proud of it, and was half inclined to be angry with Russell for not fully sharing his feelings; but Russell had a far larger experience of school-life than his new friend, and dreaded with all his heart lest "he should follow a multitude to do evil."

The "cribbing," which had astonished and pained Eric at first, was more flagrant than even in the Upper-Fourth, and assumed a chronic form. In all the Repetition lessons one of the boys used to write out in a large hand the passage to be learnt by heart, and dexterously pin it to the front of Mr Gordon's desk. There any boy who chose could read it off with little danger of detection, and, as before, the only boys who refused to avail themselves of this trickery were Eric, Russell, and Owen.

Eric did not yield to it; never once did he suffer his eyes to glance at the paper when his turn to repeat came round. But although this was the case, he never spoke against the practice to the other boys, even when he lost places by it. Nay more, he would laugh when any one told him how he had escaped "skewing" (i.e. being turned) by reading it off; and he even went so far as to allow them to suppose that he wouldn't himself object to take advantage of the master's unsuspicious confidence.

"I say, Williams," said Duncan, one morning as they strolled into the school-yard, "do you know your Repetition?"

"No," said Eric, "not very well; I haven't given more than ten minutes to it."

"Oh, well, never mind it now; come and have a game at racquets. Russell and Montagu have taken the court."

"But I shall skew."

"Oh no, you needn't, you know. I'll take care to pin it upon the desk near you."

"Well, I don't much care. At any rate I'll chance it." And off the boys ran to the racquet-court, Eric intending to occupy the last quarter of an hour before school-time in learning his lesson. Russell and he stood the other two, and they were very well matched. They had finished two splendid games, and each side had been victorious in turn, when Duncan, in the highest spirits, shouted, "Now, Russell, for the conqueror."

"Get some one else in my place," said Russell; "I don't know my Repetition, and must cut and learn it."

"Oh, bother the Repetition," said Montagu, "somebody's sure to write it out in school, and old Gordon'll never see."

"You forget, Montagu, I don't deign to crib. It isn't fair."

"Oh ay, I forgot. Well, after all, you're quite right; I only wish I was as good."

"What a capital fellow he is," continued Montagu, leaning on his racquet and looking after him, as Russell left the court. "But I say, Williams, you're not going too, are you?"

"I think I must, I don't know half my lesson."

"Oh no, I don't go; there's Llewellyn; he'll take Russell's place, and we must have the conquering game."

Again Eric yielded; and when the clock struck, he ran into school, hot, vexed with himself and certain to break down, just as Russell strolled in, whispering, "I've had lots of time to get up the Horace, and know it pat."

Still he clung to the little thistledown of hope that he should have plenty of time to cram it before the form were called up. But another temptation waited him. No sooner was he seated than Graham whispered, "Williams, it's your turn to write out the Horace; I did last time, you know."

Poor Eric! He was reaping the fruits of his desire to keep up popularity, which had prevented him from expressing a manly disapproval of the general cheating. Everybody seemed to assume now that he at any rate didn't think much of it, and he had never claimed his real right up to that time of asserting his innocence. But this was a step farther than he had ever gone before. He drew back—

"My turn, what do you mean?"

"Why, you know as well as I do that we all write it out by turns."

"Do you mean to say Owen or Russell ever wrote it out?"

"Of course not; you wouldn't expect the saints to be guilty of such a thing, would you?"

"I'd rather not, Graham," he said, getting very red.

"Well, that is cowardly," answered Graham angrily; "then I suppose I must do it myself."

"Here, I'll do it," said Eric suddenly; "shy us the paper."

His conscience smote him bitterly. In his silly dread of giving offence, he was doing what he heartily despised, and he felt most uncomfortable.

"There," he said, pushing the paper from him in a pet; "I've written it, and I'll have nothing more to do with it."

Just as he finished, they were called up, and Barker, taking the paper, succeeded in pinning it as usual on the front of the desk. Eric had never seen it done so carelessly and clumsily before, and firmly believed, what was indeed a fact, that Barker had done it badly on purpose, in the hope that it might be discovered, and so Eric be got once more into a scrape. He was in an agony of apprehension, and when put on, was totally unable to say a word of his Repetition. But far as he had yielded, he would not cheat like the rest; in this respect, at any rate, he would not give up his claim to chivalrous and stainless honour; he kept his eyes resolutely turned away from the guilty paper, and even refused to repeat the words which were prompted in his ear by the boys on each side. Mr Gordon, after waiting a moment, said—

"Why, sir, you know nothing about it; you can't have looked at it. Go to the bottom, and write it out five times."

"Write it out," thought Eric; "this is retribution, I suppose," and, covered with shame and vexation, he took his place below the malicious Barker at the bottom of the form.

It happened that during the lesson the fire began to smoke, and Mr Gordon told Owen to open the window for a moment. No sooner was this done than the mischievous whiff of sea-air which entered the room began to trifle and coquet with the pendulous half-sheet pinned in front of the desk, causing thereby an unwonted little pattering crepitation. In alarm, Duncan thoughtlessly pulled out the pin, and immediately the paper floated gracefully over Russell's head, as he sat at the top of the form, and, after one or two gyrations, fluttered down in the centre of the room.

"Bring me that piece of paper," said Mr Gordon, full of vague suspicion.

Several boys moved uneasily, and Eric looked nervously round.

"Did you hear? fetch me that half-sheet of paper."

A boy picked it up, and handed it to him. Mr Gordon held it for a full minute in his hands without a word, while vexation, deep disgust, and rising anger, struggled in his countenance. At last, he suddenly turned full on Eric, whose writing he recognised, and broke out—

"So, sir! a second time caught in gross deceit. I should not have thought it possible. Your face and manners belie you. You have lost my confidence for ever. I despise you."

"Indeed, sir," said the penitent Eric, "I never meant—"

"Silence—you are detected, as cheats always will be. I shall report you to Dr Rowlands."

The next boy was put on, and broke down. The same with the next, and the next, and the next; Montagu, Graham, Llewellyn, Duncan, Barker, all hopeless failures; only two boys had said it right—Russell and Owen.

Mr Gordon's face grew blacker and blacker. The deep undisguised pain which the discovery caused him was swallowed up in unbounded indignation. "Deceitful, dishonourable boys," he exclaimed, "henceforth my treatment of you shall be very different. The whole form, except Russell and Owen, shall have an extra lesson every half-holiday; not one of the rest of you will I trust again. I took you for gentlemen. I was mistaken. Go." And so saying, he motioned them to their seats with imperious disdain.

They went, looking sheepish and ashamed. Eric, deeply vexed, kept twisting and untwisting a bit of paper, without raising his eyes, and even Barker thoroughly repented his short-sighted treachery; the rest were silent and miserable.

At twelve o'clock two boys lingered in the room to speak to Mr Gordon; they were Eric Williams and Edwin Russell, but they were full of very different feelings.

Eric stepped to the desk first. Mr Gordon looked up.

"You! Williams, I wonder that you have the audacity to speak to me. Go—I have nothing to say to you."

"But, sir, I want to tell you that—"

"Your guilt is only too clear, Williams. You will hear more of this. Go, I tell you."

Eric's passion overcame him; he stamped furiously on the ground, and burst out, "I will speak, sir; you have been unjust to me for a long time, but I will not be—"

Mr Gordon's cane fell sharply across the boy's back; he stopped, glared for a moment, and then saying, "Very well, sir! I shall tell Dr Rowlands that you strike before you hear me," he angrily left the room, and slammed the door violently behind him.

Before Mr Gordon had time to recover from his astonishment, Russell stood by him.

"Well, my boy," said the master, softening in a moment, and laying his hand gently on Russell's head, "what have you to say? You cannot tell how I rejoice, amid the vexation and disgust that this has caused me, to find that you at least are honourable. But I knew, Edwin, that I could trust you."

"Oh, sir, I come to speak for Eric—for Williams."

Mr Gordon's brow darkened again and the storm gathered, as he interrupted vehemently, "Not a word, Russell; not a word. This is the second time that he has wilfully deceived me; and this time he has involved others too in his base deceit."

"Indeed, sir, you wrong him. I can't think how he came to write the paper, but I know that he did not and would not use it. Didn't you see yourself, sir, how he turned his head quite another way when he broke down?"

"It is very kind of you, Edwin, to defend him," said Mr Gordon coldly, "but at present, at any rate, I must not hear you. Leave me; I feel deeply vexed, and must have time to think over this disgraceful affair."

Russell went away disconsolate, and met his friend striding up and down the passage, waiting for Dr Rowlands to come out of the library.

"Oh, Eric," he said, "how came you to write that paper?"

"Why, Russell, I did feel very much ashamed, and I would have explained it, and said so; but that Gordon spites me so. It is such a shame; I don't feel now as if I cared one bit."

"I am sorry you don't get on with him; but remember you have given him in this case good cause to suspect. You never crib, Eric, I know, so I can't help being sorry that you wrote the paper."

"But then Graham asked me to do it, and called me cowardly because I refused at first."

"Ah, Eric," said Russell, "they will ask you to do worse things if you yield so easily. I wouldn't say anything to Dr Rowlands about it, if I were you."

Eric took the advice, and, full of mortification, went home. He gave his father a true and manly account of the whole occurrence, and that afternoon Mr Williams wrote a note of apology and explanation to Mr Gordon. Next time the form went up, Mr Gordon said, in his most freezing tone, "Williams, at present I shall take no further notice of your offence beyond including you in the extra lesson every half-holiday."

From that day forward Eric felt that he was marked and suspected, and the feeling worked on him with the worst effects. He grew more careless in work, and more trifling and indifferent in manner. Several boys now got above him in form whom he had easily surpassed before, and his energies were for a time entirely directed to keeping that supremacy in the games which he had won by his activity and strength.

It was a Sunday afternoon, toward the end of the summer term, and the boys were sauntering about in the green playground, or lying on the banks reading and chatting. Eric was with a little knot of his chief friends, enjoying the sea-breeze as they sat on the grass. At last the bell of the school chapel began to ring, and they went in to the afternoon service. Eric usually sat with Duncan and Llewellyn, immediately behind the benches allotted to chance visitors. The bench in front of them happened on this afternoon to be occupied by some rather odd people, viz, an old man with long white hair,—and two ladies remarkably stout, who were dressed with much juvenility, although past middle age. Their appearance immediately attracted notice, and no sooner had they taken their seats than Duncan and Llewellyn began to titter. The ladies' bonnets, which were of white, trimmed with long green leaves and flowers, just peered over the top of the boys' pew, and excited much amusement; particularly when Duncan, in his irresistible sense of the ludicrous, began to adorn them with little bits of paper. But Eric had not yet learnt to disregard the solemnity of the place, and the sacred act in which they were engaged. He tried to look away and attend to the service, and for a time he partially succeeded, although, seated as he was between the two triflers, who were perpetually telegraphing to each other their jokes, he found it a difficult task, and secretly he began to be much tickled.

At last the sermon commenced, and Llewellyn, who had imprisoned a grasshopper in a paper cage, suddenly let it hop out. The first hop took it to the top of the pew; the second perched it on the shoulder of the stoutest lady. Duncan and Llewellyn tittered louder, and even Eric could not resist a smile. But when the lady, feeling some irritation on her shoulder, raised her hand, and the grasshopper took a frightened leap into the centre of the green foliage which enwreathed her bonnet, none of the three could stand it, and they burst into fits of laughter, which they tried in vain to conceal by bending down their heads and cramming their fists into their mouths. Eric, having once given way, enjoyed the joke uncontrollably, and the lady made matters worse by her uneasy attempts to dislodge the unknown intruder, and discover the cause of the tittering, which she could not help hearing. At last all three began to laugh so violently that several heads were turned in their direction, and Dr Rowlands's stern eye caught sight of their levity. He stopped short in his sermon, and for one instant transfixed them with his indignant glance. Quiet was instantly restored, and alarm reduced them to the most perfect order, although the grasshopper still sat imperturbable among the artificial flowers. Meanwhile the stout lady had discovered that for some unknown reason she had been causing considerable amusement, and attributing it to intentional ridicule, looked round, justly hurt. Eric, with real shame, observed the pained uneasiness of her manner, and bitterly repented his share in the transaction.

Next morning Dr Rowlands, in full academicals, sailed into the fourth-form room. His entrance was the signal for every boy to rise, and after a word or two to Mr Gordon, he motioned them to be seated. Eric's heart sank within him.

"Williams, Duncan, and LLewellyn, stand out!" said the Doctor. The boys, with downcast eyes and burning cheeks, stood before him.

"I was sorry to notice," said he, "your shameful conduct in chapel yesterday afternoon. As far as I could observe, you were making yourselves merry in that sacred place with the personal defects of others. The lessons you receive here must be futile indeed if they do not teach you the duty of reverence to God, and courtesy to man. It gives me special pain, Williams, to have observed that you, too, a boy high in your remove, were guilty of this most culpable levity. You will all come to me at twelve o'clock in the library."

At twelve o'clock they each received a flogging.

The pain inflicted was not great, and Duncan and Llewellyn, who had got into similar trouble before, cared very little for it, and went out laughing to tell the number of swishes they had received to a little crowd of boys who were lingering outside the library door. But not so Eric. It was his first flogging, and he felt it deeply. To his proud spirit the disgrace was intolerable. At that moment he hated Dr Rowlands, he hated Mr Gordon, he hated his school-fellows, he hated everybody. He had been flogged; the thought haunted him; he, Eric Williams, had been forced to receive this most degrading corporal punishment. He pushed fiercely through the knot of boys, and strode as quickly as he could along the playground, angry and impenitent.

At the gate Russell met him. Eric felt the meeting inopportune; he was ashamed to meet his friend, ashamed to speak to him, envious of him, and jealous of his better reputation. He wanted to pass him by without notice, but Russell would not suffer this. He came up to him and took his arm affectionately. The slightest allusion to his late disgrace would have made Eric flame out into a passion; but Russell was too kind to allude to it then. He talked as if nothing had happened, and tried to turn his friend's thoughts to more pleasant subjects. Eric appreciated his kindness, but he was still sullen and fretful, and it was not until they parted that his better feelings won the day. But when Russell said to him, "Good-bye, Eric, and don't be down in the mouth," it was too much for him, and seizing Edwin's hand, he wrung it hard, and exclaimed impetuously—

"How I wish I was like you, Edwin! If all my friends were like you, I should never get into these rows."

"Nay, Eric," said Russell, "it's I who ought to envy you; you are no end cleverer and stronger, and you can't think how glad I am that we are friends."

They parted by Mr Williams's door, and Russell walked home sad and thoughtful; but Eric, barely answering his brother's greeting, rushed up to his room, and, flinging himself on his bed, brooded alone over the remembrance of his disgrace. Still nursing a fierce resentment, he felt something hard at his heart, and, as he prayed neither for help nor forgiveness, it was pride and rebellion, not penitence, that made him miserable.