Читать книгу The Master of Man - Hall Sir Caine - Страница 4

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We were in full school after breakfast, when the Principal came from his private room with his high, quick, birdlike step and almost leapt up to his desk to speak to us. He was a rather small, slight man, of middle age, with pale face and nervous gestures, liable to alternate bouts of a somewhat ineffectual playfulness and gusts of ungovernable temper. It was easy to see that he was in his angry mood that morning. He looked round the school for a moment over the silver rims of his spectacles, and then said,

"Boys, before you go to your classes for the day I have something to tell you. One of you has brought disgrace upon King William's, and I must know which of you it is."

Then followed the "degrading story." The facts of it had just been brought to his notice by the Inspector of Police for Castletown. He had no intention of entering into details. They were too shameful. Briefly, one of our boys, a senior boy apparently, had lately made a practice of escaping from his house after hours, and had so far forfeited his self-respect as to go walking in the dark roads with a young girl—a servant girl, he was ashamed to say, from the home of the High Bailiff. He had been seen repeatedly, and although not identified, he had been recognised by his cap as belonging to the College. Last night two young townsmen had set out to waylay him. There had been a fight, in which our boy had apparently used a weapon, probably a stick. The result was that one of the young townsmen was now in hospital, still insensible, the other was seriously injured about the face. Probably a pair of young blackguards who had intervened from base motives of their own and therefore deserved no pity. But none the less the conduct of the King William's boy had been disgraceful. It must be punished, no matter who he was, or how high he might stand in the school.

"I tell you plainly, boys, I don't know who he is. Neither do the police—the townsmen never having heard his name and the girl refusing to speak."

But he had a suspicion—a very strong suspicion, based upon an unmistakable fact. He might have called the boy he suspected to his room and dealt with him privately. But a matter like this, known to the public authorities and affecting the honour and welfare of the college, was not to be hushed up. In fact the police had made it a condition of their foregoing proceedings in the Courts that an open inquiry should be made here. He had undertaken to make it, and he must make it now.

"Therefore, I give the boy who has been guilty of this degrading conduct the opportunity of voluntary confession—of revealing himself to the whole school, and asking pardon of his Principal, his masters and his fellow-pupils for the disgrace he has brought on them. Who is it?"

None of us stirred, spoke or made sign. The Principal was rapidly losing his temper.

"Boys," he said, "there is something I have not told you. According to the police the disgraceful incident occurred between nine and nine-thirty last night, and it is known to the house-master of one of your houses that one boy, and one only, who had been out without permission, came in after that hour. I now give that boy another chance. Who is he?"

Still no one spoke or stirred. The Principal bit his lip, and again looked down the line of our desks over the upper rims of his spectacles.

"Does nobody speak? Must I call a name? Is it possible that any King William's boy can ask for the double shame of being guilty and being found out?"

Even yet there was no sign from the boys, and no sound except their audible breathing through the nose.

"Very well. So be it. I've given that boy his chance. Now he must take the consequences."

With that the Principal stepped down from his desk, turned his blazing eyes towards the desks of the fifth form and said,

"Stowell, step forward."

We gasped. Stowell was the head boy of the school and an immense and universal favourite. Through the mists of years some of us can see him still, as he heaved up from his seat that morning and walked slowly across the open floor in front to where the Principal was standing. A big, well-grown boy, narrowly bordering on eighteen, dark-haired, with broad forehead, large dark eyes, fine features, and, even in those boyish days, a singular air of distinction. There was no surprise in his face, and not a particle of shame, but there was a look of defiance which raised to boiling point the Principal's simmering anger.

"Stowell," he said, "you will not deny that you were out after hours last night?"

"No, Sir."

"Then it was you who were guilty of this disgraceful conduct?"

Stowell seemed to be about to speak, and then with a proud look to check himself, and to close his mouth as with a snap.

"It was you, wasn't it?"

Stowell straightened himself up and answered, "So you say, Sir."

"I say? Speak for yourself. You've a tongue in your head, haven't you?"

"Perhaps I have, Sir."

"Then it was you?"

Stowell made no answer.

"Why don't you answer me? Answer, Sir! It was you," said the Principal.

And then Stowell, with a little toss of the head and a slight curl of the lip, replied,

"If you say it was, what is the use of my saying anything, Sir?"

The last remnant of the Principal's patience left him. His eyes flamed and his nostrils quivered. A cane, seldom used, was lying along the ledge of his desk. He turned to it, snatched it up, and brought it down in two or three rapid sweeps on Stowell's back, and (as afterwards appeared) his bare neck also.

It was all over in a flash. We gasped again. There was a moment of breathless silence. All eyes were on Stowell. He was face to face with the Principal, standing, in his larger proportions, a good two inches above him, ghastly white and trembling with passion. For a moment we thought anything might happen. Then Stowell appeared to recover his self-control. He made another little toss of the head, another curl of the lip and a shrug of the shoulders.

"Now go back to your study, Sir," said the Principal, between gusts of breath, "and stay there until you are told to leave it."

Stowell was in no hurry, but he turned after a moment and walked out, with a strong step, almost a haughty one.

"Boys, go to your classes," said the Principal, in a hoarse voice, and then he went out, too, but more hurriedly.

Something had gone wrong, wretchedly wrong, we scarcely knew what—that was our confused impression as we trooped off to the class-rooms, a dejected lot of lads, half furious, half afraid.

II

At seven o'clock that night Stowell was still confined to his study, a little, bare room, containing an iron bedstead, a deal washstand, a table, one chair, a trunk, some books on a hanging bookshelf, and a small rug before an iron fender. It was November and the day had been cold. Jamieson (the Principal's valet) had smuggled up some coal and lit a little fire for him. Mrs. Gale (the Principal's housekeeper), bringing his curtailed luncheon, had seen the long red wheal which the cane had left across the back of his neck, and insisted on cooling it with some lotion and bandaging it with linen. He was sitting alone in the half-darkness of his little room, crouching over the fire, gloomy, morose, fierce and with a burning sense of outraged justice. The door opened and another boy came into the room. It was Alick Gell, his special chum, a lad of his own age, but fair-haired, blue-eyed, and with rather feminine features. In a thick voice that was like a sob half-choked in his throat, he said,

"Vic, I can't stand this any longer."

"Oh, it's you, is it? I thought you'd come."

"Of course you didn't do that disgraceful thing, as they call it, but you've got to know who did. It was I."

Stowell did not answer. He had neither turned nor looked up, and Gell, standing behind him, tugged at his shoulders and said again,

"Don't you hear me? It was I."

"I know."

"You know? How do you know? When did you know? Did you know this morning?"

"I knew last night."

Going into town he had seen Gell on the opposite side of the road. Yes, it was true enough he was out after hours. The Principal himself had sent him! Early in the day he had told him that after "prep" he was to go to the station for something.

"Good Lord! Then he must have forgotten all about it!"

"He had no business to forget."

"Why didn't you tell him?"

"Not I—not likely!"

"But being out after hours wasn't anything. It wasn't knocking those blackguards about. Why didn't you deny that anyway?"

"Oh, shut up, Alick."

Again Gell tugged at his shoulders and said,

"But why didn't you?"

"If you must know, I'll tell you—because they would have had you for it next."

Mrs. Gale had found the big window of the lavatory open at a quarter-past nine, and when she sent Jamieson down he saw Gell closing it.

"Do you mean that.... that to save me, you allowed yourself to...."

"Shut up, I tell you!"

There was silence for a moment and then Gell began to cry openly, and to pour out a torrent of self-reproaches. He was a coward; a wretched, miserable, contemptible coward—that's what he was and he had always known it. He would never forgive himself—never! But perhaps he had not been thinking of saving his own skin only.

"That was little Bessie Collister."

"I know."

If he had stood up to the confounded thing and confessed, and given her away, after she had been plucky and refused to speak, and his father had heard of it.... her father also.... her stepfather....

"Dan Baldromma, you know what he is, Vic?"

"Oh, yes, there would have been the devil to pay all round."

"Wouldn't there?"

"The College, too! Dan would have had something to say to old Peacock (nickname for the Principal) on that subject also."

Yes, that was what Gell had thought, and it was the reason (one of the reasons) why he had stood silent when the Principal challenged them. Nobody knew anything except the girl. The Police didn't know; the Principal didn't know. If he kept quiet the inquiry would end in nothing and there would be no harm done to anybody—except the town ruffians, and they deserved all they got. How was he to guess that somebody else was out after hours, and that to save him from being exposed, perhaps expelled, his own chum, like the brick he was and always had been....

"Hold your tongue, you fool!"

Gell made for the door. "Look here," he said, "I'm going to tell the Principal that if you were out last night it was on an errand for him—that can't hurt anybody."

"No, you're not."

"Yes, I am—certainly I am."

"If you do, I'll never speak to you again—on my soul, never."

"But he's certain to remember it sooner or later."

"Let him."

"And when he does, what's he to think of himself?"

"That's his affair, isn't it? Leave him alone."

Gell's voice rose to a cry. "No, I will not leave him alone. And since you won't let me say that about you, I'll tell him about myself. Yes, I will, and nobody shall prevent me! I don't care what happens about father, or anybody else, now. I can't stand this any longer. I can't and I won't."

"Alick! Alick Gell! Old fellow...."

But the door had been slammed to and Gell was gone.

III

The Principal was in his Library, a well-carpeted room, warmed by a large fire and lighted by a red-shaded lamp. His half-yearly examination had just finished and his desk was piled high with examination papers, but he could not settle himself to his work on them. He was harking back to the event of the morning, and was not too pleased with himself. He had lost his temper again; he had inflicted a degrading punishment on a senior boy, and to protect the good name of the school he had allowed himself to be intimidated by the police into a foolish and ineffectual public inquiry.

"Wretched! Wretched! Wretched!" he thought, rising for the twentieth time from his chair before the fire and pacing the room in a disorder.

He thought of Stowell with a riot of mingled anger and affection. He had always liked that boy—-a fine lad, with good heart and brain in spite of obvious limitations. He had shown the boy some indulgence, too, and this was how he had repaid him! Defying him in the face of the whole school! Provoking him with his prevarication, the proud curl of his lip and his damnable iteration: "If you say so, Sir...." It had been maddening. Any master in the world might have lost his temper.

Of course the boy was guilty! But then he was no sneak or coward. Good gracious, no, that was the last thing anybody would say about him. Quite the contrary! Only too apt to take the blame of bad things on himself when he might make others equally responsible. That was one reason the under-masters liked him and the boys worshipped him. Then why, in the name of goodness, hadn't he spoken out, made some defence, given some explanation? After all the first offence was nothing worse than being out after hours for a little foolish sweethearting. The Principal saw Stowell making a clean breast of everything, and himself administering a severe admonition and then fighting it all out with the police for school and scholar. But that was impossible now—quite impossible!

"Wretched! Wretched! Wretched!"

He thought of the boy's father—the senior judge or Deemster of the island, and easily the first man in it. One of the trustees of the college also, to whom serious matters were always mentioned. This had become a serious matter. Even if nothing worse happened to that young blackguard in the hospital the police might insist on expulsion. If so, what would be the absolute evidence against the boy? Only that he had been out of school when the disgraceful incident had happened! The Deemster, who was cool and clear-headed, might say the boy could have been out on some other errand. Or perhaps that some other boy might have been out at the same time.

But that couldn't be! Good heavens, no! Stowell wasn't a fool. If he had been innocent, why on earth should he have taken his degrading punishment lying down? No, no, he had been guilty enough. He had admitted that he was out after hours, and, having nothing else to say even about that (why or by whose permission), he had tried to carry the whole thing off with a sort of silent braggadocio.

"Wretched! Wretched! Wretched!"

The Principal had at length settled himself at his desk, and was taking up some of the examination papers, when he uncovered a small white packet. Obviously a chemist's packet, sealed with red wax and tied with blue string. Not having seen it before he picked it up, and looked at it. It was addressed to himself, and was marked "By Passenger Train—to be called for."

The Principal felt his thin hair rising from his scalp. Something he had forgotten had come back upon him with the force and suddenness of a blow. Off and on for a week he had suffered from nervous headaches. Somebody had recommended an American patent medicine and he had written to Douglas for it. The Douglas chemist had replied that it was coming by the afternoon steamer, and he would send it on to Castletown by the last train. The letter had arrived when he was in class, and Jamieson the valet, being out of reach, he had asked Stowell, who was at hand, to go to the Station for the parcel after preparation and leave it on his Library table. And then the headache had passed off, and in the pressure of the examination he had forgotten the whole matter!

The Principal got up again. His limbs felt rigid, and he had the sickening sensation of his body shrinking into insignificance. At that moment there came a knocking at his door. He could not answer at first and the knocking was repeated.

"Come in then," he said, and Gell entered, his face flooded with tears.

He knew the boy as one who was nearly always in trouble, and his first impulse was to drive him out.

"Why do you come here? Go to your house-master, or to your head, or...."

"It's about Stowell himself, Sir. He's innocent," said Gell.

"Innocent?"

"Yes, Sir—it was I," said Gell. And then came a flood of words, blurted out like water from an inverted bottle. It was true that he was with the girl last night, but it was a lie that he had made a practice of walking out with her. She came from the north of the island, a farm near his home, and he hadn't known she was living in Castletown until he met her in the town yesterday afternoon. They were on the Darby Haven Road, just beyond the college cricket ground, about nine o'clock, when the blackguards dropped out on them from the Hango Hill ruins and started to rag him. It was true he smashed them and he would do it again, and worse next time, but it was another lie that he had done it with a stick. They had the stick, and it was just when he was knocking out one of them that the other aimed a blow at him which fell on his chum instead and tumbled him over insensible. The girl had gone off screaming before that, and seeing the police coming up he had leapt into the cricket ground and got back into school by the lavatory window.

"But why, boy .... why .... why didn't you say all this in school this morning?"

"I was afraid, Sir," said Gell, and then came the explanation he had given to Stowell. He had been afraid his father would get to know, and the girl's father, too—that was to say her step-father. Her step-father was a tenant of his own father's; they were always at cross purposes, and he had thought if the girl got into any trouble at the High Bailiff's and it came out that he had been the cause of it, her step-father....

"Who is he? What's his name?"

"Dan Collister—but they call him Baldromma after the farm, Sir."

"That wind-bag and agitator who is always in the newspapers?"

"Yes, Sir."

"But, good heavens, boy, don't you see what you've done for me?—allowed me to punish an innocent person?"

"Yes, I know," said Gell, and then, through another gust of sobs, came further explanations. It had all been over before he had had time to think. The Principal had said that nobody knew, and he had thought he had only to hold his tongue and nothing would be found out. But if he had known that Stowell knew, and that he had been out himself....

"And did he know?"

"Yes, Sir. He saw me with Bessie Collister as he was going to the station and he thought he couldn't get out of this himself without letting me in for it."

"Do you mean to tell me that he took that punishment to .... to save you from being discovered?"

Gell hesitated for a moment, then choked down his sobs, and said with a defiant cry:

"Yes, he did—to save me, and the school, and .... and you, too, Sir."

The Principal staggered back a step, and then said: "Leave me, boy, leave me."

He did not go to bed that night, or to school next day, or the day after, or the day after that. On the fourth day he wrote a long letter to the Deemster, telling him with absolute truthfulness what had happened, and concluding:

"That is all, your Honour, but to me it is everything. I have not only punished an innocent boy, but one who, in taking his punishment, was doing an act of divine unselfishness. I am humiliated in my own eyes. I feel like a little man in the presence of your son. I can never look into his face again.

"My first impulse was to resign my post, but on second thoughts I have determined to leave the issue to your decision. If I am to remain as head of your school you must take your boy away. If he is to stay I must go. Which is it to be?"