CHAPTER I.

LOVE AT A SCHOOL

A procession of schoolboys having to meet a procession of schoolgirls on

the Sunday's dead march, called a walk, round the park, could hardly go

by without dropping to a hum in its chatter, and the shot of incurious

half-eyes the petticoated creatures--all so much of a swarm unless you

stare at them like lanterns. The boys cast glance because it relieved

their heaviness; things were lumpish and gloomy that day of the week. The

girls, who sped their peep of inquisition before the moment of transit,

let it be seen that they had minds occupied with thoughts of their own.

Our gallant fellows forgot the intrusion of the foreign as soon as it had

passed. A sarcastic discharge was jerked by chance at the usher and the

governess--at the old game, it seemed; or why did they keep steering

columns to meet? There was no fun in meeting; it would never be happening

every other Sunday, and oftener, by sheer toss-penny accident. They were

moved like pieces for the pleasure of these two.

Sometimes the meeting occurred twice during the stupid march-out, when it

became so nearly vexatious to boys almost biliously oppressed by the

tedium of a day merely allowing them to shove the legs along, ironically

naming it animal excise, that some among them pronounced the sham

variation of monotony to be a bothering nuisance if it was going to

happen every Sunday, though Sunday required diversions. They hated the

absurdity in this meeting and meeting; for they were obliged to

anticipate it, as a part of their ignominious weekly performance; and

they could not avoid reflecting on it, as a thing done over again: it had

them in front and in rear; and it was a kind of broadside mirror,

flashing at them the exact opposite of themselves in an identically

similar situation, that forced a resemblance.

Touching the old game, Cuper's fold was a healthy school, owing to the

good lead of the head boy, Matey Weyburn, a lad with a heart for games to

bring renown, and no thought about girls. His emulation, the fellows

fancied, was for getting the school into a journal of the Sports. He used

to read one sent him by a sporting officer of his name, and talk

enviously of public schools, printed whatever they did--a privilege and

dignity of which, they had unrivalled enjoyment in the past, days, when

wealth was more jealously exclusive; and he was always prompting for

challenges and saving up to pay expenses; and the fellows were to laugh

at kicks and learn the art of self-defence--train to rejoice in whipcord

muscles. The son of a tradesman, if a boy fell under the imputation, was

worthy of honour with him, let the fellow but show grip and toughness. He

loathed a skulker, and his face was known for any boy who would own to

fatigue or confess himself beaten. "Go to bed," was one of his terrible

stings. Matey was good at lessons, too--liked them; liked Latin and

Greek; would help a poor stumbler.

Where he did such good work was in sharpening the fellows to excel. He

kept them to the grindstone, so that they had no time for rusty brooding;

and it was fit done by exhortations off a pedestal, like St. Paul at the

Athenians, it breathed out of him every day of the week. He carried a

light for followers. Whatever he demanded of them, he himself did it

easily. He would say to boys, "You're going to be men," meaning something

better than women. There was a notion that Matey despised girls.

Consequently, never much esteemed, they were in disfavour. The old game

was mentioned only because of a tradition of an usher and governess

leering sick eyes until they slunk away round a corner and married, and

set up a school for themselves--an emasculate ending. Comment on it came

of a design to show that the whole game had been examined dismissed as

uninteresting and profitless.

One of the boys alluded in Matey's presence to their general view upon

the part played by womankind on the stage, confident of a backing; and he

had it, in a way: their noble chief whisked the subject, as not worth a

discussion; but he turned to a younger chap, who said he detested girls,

and asked him how about a sister at home; and the youngster coloured, and

Matey took him and spun him round, with a friendly tap on the shoulder.

Odd remarks at intervals caused it to be suspected that he had ideas

concerning girls. They were high as his head above the school; and there

they were left, with Algebra and Homer, for they were not of a sort to

inflame; until the boys noticed how he gave up speaking, and fell to hard

looking, though she was dark enough to get herself named Browny. In the

absence of a fair girl of equal height to set beside her, Browny shone.

She had a nice mouth, ready for a smile at the corners, or so it was

before Matey let her see that she was his mark. Now she kept her mouth

asleep and her eyes half down, up to the moment of her nearing to pass,

when the girl opened on him, as if lifting her eyelids from sleep to the

window, a full side--look, like a throb, and no disguise--no slyness or

boldness either, not a bit of languishing. You might think her heart came

quietly out.

The look was like the fall of light on the hills from the first of

morning. It lasted half a minute, and left a ruffle for a good half-hour.

Even the younger fellows, without knowing what affected them, were moved

by the new picture of a girl, as if it had been a frontispiece of a

romantic story some day to be read. She looked compelled to look, but

consenting and unashamed; at home in submission; just the look that wins

observant boys, shrewd as dogs to read by signs, if they are interested

in the persons. They read Browny's meaning: that Matey had only to come

and snatch her; he was her master, and she was a brave girl, ready to go

all over the world with him; had taken to him as he to her, shot for

shot. Her taking to the pick of the school was a capital proof that she

was of the right sort. To be sure, she could not much help herself.

Some of the boys regretted her not being fair. But, as they felt, and

sought to explain, in the manner of the wag of a tail, with elbows and

eyebrows to one another's understanding, fair girls could never have let

fly such look; fair girls are softer, woollier, and when they mean to

look serious, overdo it by craping solemn; or they pinafore a jigging

eagerness, or hoist propriety on a chubby flaxen grin; or else they dart

an eye, or they mince and prim and pout, and are sigh-away and

dying-ducky, given to girls' tricks. Browny, after all, was the girl for

Matey.

She won a victory right away and out of hand, on behalf of her

cloud-and-moon sisters, as against the sunny-meadowy; for slanting

intermediates are not espied of boys in anything: conquered by Browny;

they went over to her colour, equal to arguing, that Venus at her

mightiest must have been dark, or she would not have stood a comparison

with the forest Goddess of the Crescent, swanning it through a lake--on

the leap for run of the chase--watching the dart, with her humming bow at

breast. The fair are simple sugary thing's, prone to fat, like broad-sops

in milk; but the others are milky nuts, good to bite, Lacedaemonian

virgins, hard to beat, putting us on our mettle; and they are for heroes,

and they can be brave. So these boys felt, conquered by Browny. A

sneaking native taste for the forsaken side, known to renegades, hauled

at them if her image waned during the week; and it waned a little, but

Sunday restored and stamped it.

By a sudden turn the whole upper-school had fallen to thinking of girls,

and the meeting on the Sunday was a prospect. One of the day-boarders had

a sister in the seminary of Miss Vincent. He was plied to obtain

information concerning Browny's name and her parents. He had it pat to

hand in answer. No parents came to see her; an aunt came now and then.

Her aunt's name was not wanted. Browny's name was Aminta Farrell.

Farrell might pass; Aminta was debated. This female Christian name had a

foreign twang; it gave dissatisfaction. Boy after boy had a try at it,

with the same effect: you could not speak the name without a pursing of

the month and a puckering of the nose, beastly to see, as one little

fellow reminded them on a day when Matey was in more than common favour,

topping a pitch of rapture, for clean bowling, first ball, middle stump

on the kick, the best bat of the other eleven in a match; and, says this

youngster, drawling, soon after the cheers and claps had subsided to

business, "Aminta."

He made it funny by saying it as if to himself and the ground, in a

subdued way, while he swung his leg on a half-circle, like a skater,

hands in pockets. He was a sly young rascal, innocently precocious

enough, and he meant no disrespect either to Browny or to Matey; but he

had to run for it, his delivery of the name being so like what was in the

breasts of the senior fellows, as to the inferiority of any Aminta to old

Matey, that he set them laughing; and Browny was on the field, to reprove

them, left of the tea-booth, with her school-mates, part of her head

under a scarlet parasol.

A girl with such a name as Aminta might not be exactly up to the standard

of old Matey, still, if he thought her so and she had spirit, the school

was bound to subscribe; and that look of hers warranted her for taking

her share in the story, like the brigand's wife loading gnus for him

while he knocks over the foremost carabineer on the mountain-ledge below,

who drops on his back with a hellish expression.

Browny was then clearly seen all round, instead of only front-face, as on

the Sunday in the park, when fellows could not spy backward after

passing. The pleasure they had in seeing her all round involved no fresh

stores of observation, for none could tell how she tied her back-hair,

which was the question put to them by a cynic of a boy, said to be queasy

with excess of sisters. They could tell that she was tall for a girl, or

tallish--not a maypole. She drank a cup of tea, and ate a slice of

bread-and-butter; no cake.

She appeared undisturbed when Matey, wearing his holiday white ducks, and

all aglow, entered the booth. She was not expected to faint, only she

stood for the foreign Aminta more than for their familiar Browny in his

presence. Not a sign of the look which had fired the school did she throw

at him. Change the colour and you might compare her to a lobster fixed on

end, with a chin and no eyes. Matey talked to Miss Vincent up to the

instant of his running to bat. She would have liked to guess how he knew

she had a brother on the medical staff of one of the regiments in India:

she asked him twice, and his cheeks were redder than cricket in the sun.

He said he read all the reports from India, and asked her whether she did

not admire Lord Ormont, our general of cavalry, whose charge at the head

of fifteen hundred horse in the last great battle shattered the enemy's

right wing, and gave us the victory--rolled him up and stretched him out

like a carpet for dusting. Miss Vincent exclaimed that it was really

strange, now, he should speak of Lord Ormont, for she had been speaking

of him herself in morning to one of her young ladies, whose mind was bent

on his heroic deeds. Matey turned his face to the group of young ladies,

quite pleased that one of them loved his hero; and he met a smile here

and there--not from Miss Aminta Farrell. She was a complete

disappointment to the boys that day. "Aminta" was mouthed at any

allusions to her.

So, she not being a match for Matey, they let her drop. The flush that

had swept across the school withered to a dry recollection, except when

on one of their Sunday afternoons she fanned the desert. Lord Ormont

became the subject of inquiry and conversation; and for his own sake--not

altogether to gratify Matey. The Saturday autumn evening's walk home,

after the race out to tea at a distant village, too late in the year for

cricket, too early for regular football, suited Matey, going at long

strides, for the story of his hero's adventures; and it was nicer than

talk about girls, and puzzling. Here lay a clear field; for he had the

right to speak of a cavalry officer: his father died of wounds in the

service, and Matey naturally intended to join the Dragoons; if he could

get enough money to pay for mess, he said, laughing. Lord Ormont was his

pattern of a warrior. We had in him a lord who cast off luxury to live

like a Spartan when under arms, with a passion to serve his country and

sustain the glory of our military annals. He revived respect for the

noble class in the hearts of Englishmen. He was as good an authority on

horseflesh as any Englishman alive; the best for the management of

cavalry: there never was a better cavalry leader. The boys had come to

know that Browny admired Lord Ormont, so they saw a double reason why

Matey should; and walking home at his grand swing in the October dusk,

their school hero drew their national hero closer to them.

Every fellow present was dead against the usher, Mr. Shalders, when he

took advantage of a pause to strike in with his "Murat!"

He harped on Murat whenever he had a chance. Now he did it for the

purpose of casting eclipse upon Major-General Lord Ormont, the son and

grandson of English earls; for he was an earl by his title, and Murat was

the son of an innkeeper. Shalders had to admit that Murat might have

served in the stables when a boy. Honour to Murat, of course, for

climbing the peaks! Shalders, too, might interest him in military affairs

and Murat; he did no harm, and could be amusing. It rather added to his

amount of dignity. It was rather absurd, at the same time, for an English

usher to be spouting and glowing about a French general, who had been a

stable-boy and became a king, with his Murat this, Murat that, and hurrah

Murat in red and white and green uniform, tunic and breeches, and a

chimney-afire of feathers; and how the giant he was charged at the head

of ten thousand horse, all going like a cataract under a rainbow over the

rocks, right into the middle of the enemy and through; and he a spark

ahead, and the enemy streaming on all sides flat away, as you see puffed

smoke and flame of a bonfire. That was fun to set boys jigging. No wonder

how in Russia the Cossacks feared him, and scampered from the shadow of

his plumes--were clouds flying off his breath! That was a fine warm

picture for the boys on late autumn or early winter evenings, Shalders

warming his back at the grate, describing bivouacs in the snow. They

liked well enough to hear him when he was not opposing Matey and Lord

Ormont. He perked on his toes, and fetched his hand from behind him to

flourish it when his Murat came out. The speaking of his name clapped him

on horseback--the only horseback he ever knew. He was as fond of giving

out the name Murat as you see in old engravings of tobacco-shops men

enjoying the emission of their whiff of smoke.

Matey was not inclined to class Lord Ormont alongside Murat, a first-rate

horseman and an eagle-eye, as Shalders rightly said; and Matey agreed

that forty thousand cavalry under your orders is a toss above fifteen

hundred; but the claim for a Frenchman of a superlative merit to swallow

and make nothing of the mention of our best cavalry generals irritated

him to call Murat a mountebank.

Shalders retorted, that Lord Ormont was a reprobate.

Matey hoped he would some day write us an essay on the morale of

illustrious generals of cavalry; and Shalders told him he did not advance

his case by talking nonsense.

Each then repeated to the boys a famous exploit of his hero. Their

verdict was favourable to Lord Ormont. Our English General learnt riding

before he was ten years old, on the Pampas, where you ride all day, and

cook your steak for your dinner between your seat and your saddle. He

rode with his father and his uncle, Muncastle, the famous traveller, into

Paraguay. He saw fighting before he was twelve. Before he was twenty he

was learning outpost duty in the Austrian frontier cavalry. He served in

the Peninsula, served in Canada, served in India, volunteered for any

chance of distinction. No need to say much of his mastering the picked

Indian swordsmen in single combat: he knew their trick, and was quick to

save his reins when they made a dash threatening the headstroke--about

the same as disabling sails in old naval engagements.

That was the part for the officer; we are speaking of the General. For

that matter, he had as keen an eye for the field and the moment for his

arm to strike as any Murat. One world have liked to see Murat matched

against the sabre of a wily Rajpoot! As to campaigns and strategy, Lord

Ormont's head was a map. What of Murat and Lord Ormont horse to horse and

sword to sword? Come, imagine that, if you are for comparisons. And if

Lord Ormont never headed a lot of thousands, it does not prove he was

unable. Lord Ormont was as big as Murat. More, he was a Christian to his

horses. How about Murat in that respect? Lord Ormont cared for his men:

did Murat so particularly much? And he was as cunning fronting odds, and

a thunderbolt at the charge. Why speak of him in the past? He is an

English lord, a lord by birth, and he is alive; things may be expected of

him to-morrow or next day.

Shalders here cut Matey short by meanly objecting to that.

"Men are mortal," he said, with a lot of pretended stuff, deploring our

human condition in the elegy strain; and he fell to reckoning the English

hero's age--as that he, Lord Ormont, had been a name in the world for the

last twenty-five years or more. The noble lord could be no chicken. We

are justified in calculating, by the course of nature, that his term of

activity is approaching, or has approached, or, in fact, has drawn to its

close.

"If your estimate, sir, approaches to correctness," rejoined

Matey--tellingly, his comrades thought.

"Sixty, as you may learn some day, is a serious age, Matthew Weyburn."

Matey said he should be happy to reach it with half the honours Lord

Ormont had won.

"Excepting the duels," Shalders had the impudence to say.

"If the cause is a good one!" cried Matey.

"The cause, or Lord Ormont has been maligned, was reprehensible in the

extremest degree." Shalders cockhorsed on his heels to his toes and back

with a bang.

"What was the cause, if you please, sir?" a boy, probably naughty,

inquired; and as Shalders did not vouchsafe a reply, the bigger boys

knew.

They revelled in the devilish halo of skirts on the whirl encircling Lord

Ormont's laurelled head.

That was a spark in their blood struck from a dislike of the tone assumed

by Mr. Shalders to sustain his argument; with his "men are mortal," and

talk of a true living champion as "no chicken," and the wordy drawl over

"justification for calculating the approach of a close to a term of

activity"--in the case of a proved hero!

Guardians of boys should make sure that the boys are on their side before

they raise the standard of virtue. Nor ought they to summon morality for

support of a polemic. Matey Weyburn's object of worship rode superior to

a morality puffing its phrasy trumpet. And, somehow, the sacrifice of an

enormous number of women to Lord Ormont's glory seemed natural; the very

thing that should be, in the case of a first-rate military hero and

commander--Scipio notwithstanding. It brightens his flame, and it is

agreeable to them. That is how they come to distinction: they have no

other chance; they are only women; they are mad to be singed, and they

rush pelf-mall, all for the honour of the candle.

Shortly after this discussion Matey was heard informing some of the

bigger fellows he could tell them positively that Lord Ormont's age was

under fifty-four--the prime of manhood, and a jolly long way off death!

The greater credit to him, therefore, if he bad been a name in the world

for anything like the period Shalders insinuated, "to get himself out of

a sad quandary." Matey sounded the queer word so as to fix it sticking to

the usher, calling him Mr. Peter Bell Shalders, at which the boys roared,

and there was a question or two about names, which belonged to verses,

for people caring to read poems.

To the joy of the school he displayed a greater knowledge of Murat than

Shalders had: named the different places in Europe where Lord Ormont and

Murat were both springing to the saddle at the same time--one a Marshal,

the other a lieutenant; one a king, to be off his throne any day, the

other a born English nobleman, seated firm as fate. And he accused Murat

of carelessness of his horses, ingratitude to his benefactor, circussy

style. Shalders went so far as to defend Murat for attending to the

affairs of his kingdom, instead of galloping over hedges and ditches to

swell Napoleon's ranks in distress. Matey listened to him there; he

became grave; he nodded like a man saying, "I suppose we must examine it

in earnest." The school was damped to hear him calling it a nice

question. Still, he said he thought he should have gone; and that settled

it.

The boys inclined to speak contemptuously of Shalders. Matey world not

let them; he contrasted Shalders with the other ushers, who had no

enthusiasms. He said enthusiasms were salt to a man; and he liked

Shalders for spelling at his battles and thinking he understood them, and

admiring Murat, and leading Virgil and parts of Lucan for his recreation.

He said he liked the French because they could be splendidly

enthusiastic. He almost lost his English flavour when he spoke in

downright approval of a small French fellow, coming from Orthez, near the

Pyrenees, for senselessly dashing and kicking at a couple of English who

jeered to hear Orthez named--a place trampled under Wellington's heels,

on his march across conquered France. The foreign little cockerel was a

clever lad, learning English fast, and anxious to show he had got hold of

the English trick of not knowing when he was beaten. His French vanity

insisted on his engaging the two, though one of them stood aside, and the

other let him drive his nose all the compass round at a poker fist. What

was worse, Matey examined these two, in the interests of fair play, as if

he doubted.

Little Emile Grenat set matters right with his boast to vindicate his

country against double the number, and Matey praised him, though he knew

Emile had been floored without effort by the extension of a single fist.

He would not hear the French abused; he said they were chivalrous, they

were fine fellows, topping the world in some things; his father had

fought them and learnt to respect them. Perhaps his father had learnt to

respect Jews, for there was a boy named Abner, he protected, who smelt

Jewish; he said they ran us Gentiles hard, and carried big guns.

Only a reputation like Matey's could have kept his leadership from a

challenge. Joseph Masner, formerly a rival, went about hinting and

shrugging; all to no purpose, you find boys born to be chiefs. On the day

of the snow-fight Matey won the toss, and chose J. Masner first pick; and

Masner, aged seventeen and some months, big as a navvy, lumbered across

to him and took his directions, proud to stand in the front centre, at

the head of the attack, and bear the brunt--just what he was fit for,

Matey gave no offence by choosing, half-way down the list, his little

French friend, whom he stationed beside himself, rather off his

battle-front, as at point at cricket, not quite so far removed. Two boys

at his heels piled ammunition. The sides met midway of a marshy ground,

where a couple of flat and shelving banks, formed for a broad new road,

good for ten abreast--counting a step of the slopes--ran transverse; and

the order of the game was to clear the bank and drive the enemy on to the

frozen ditch-water. Miss Vincent heard in the morning from the sister of

little Collett of the great engagement coming off; she was moved by

curiosity, and so the young ladies of her establishment beheld the young

gentlemen of Mr. Cuper's in furious division, and Matey's sore aim and

hard fling, equal to a slinger's, relieving J. Masner of a foremost

assailant with a spanker on the nob. They may have fancied him clever for

selecting a position rather comfortable, as things went, until they had

sight of him with his little French ally and two others, ammunition boys

to rear, descending one bank and scaling another right into the flank of

the enemy, when his old tower of a Masner was being heavily pressed by

numbers. Then came a fight hand to hand, but the enemy stood in a clamp;

not to split like a nut between crackers, they gave way and rolled,

backing in lumps from bank to ditch.

The battle was over before the young ladies knew. They wondered to see

Matey shuffling on his coat and hopping along at easy bounds to pay his

respects to Miss Vincent, near whom was Browny; and this time he and

Browny talked together. He then introduced little Emile to her. She spoke

of Napoleon at Brienne, and complimented Matey. He said he was cavalry,

not artillery, that day. They talked to hear one another's voices. By

constantly appealing to Miss Vincent he made their conversation together

seem as under her conduct; and she took a slide on some French phrases

with little Emile. Her young ladies looked shrinking and envious to see

the fellows wet to the skin, laughing, wrestling, linking arms; and some,

who were clown-faced with a wipe of scarlet, getting friends to rub their

cheeks with snow, all of them happy as larks in air, a big tea steaming

for them at the school. Those girls had a leap and a fail of the heart,

glad to hug themselves in their dry clothes, and not so warm as the

dripping boys were, nor so madly fond of their dress-circle seats to look

on at a play they were not allowed even to desire to share. They looked

on at blows given and taken in good temper, hardship sharpening jollity.

The thought of the difference between themselves and the boys must have

been something like the tight band--call it corset--over the chest,

trying to lift and stretch for draughts of air. But Browny's feeling

naturally was, that all this advantage for the boys came of Matey

Weyburn's lead.

Miss Vincent with her young ladies walked off in couples, orderly chicks,

the usual Sunday march of their every day. The school was coolish to

them; one of the fellows hummed bars of some hymn tune, rather faster

than church. And next day there was a murmur of letters passing between

Matey and Browny regularly, little Collett for postman. Anybody might

have guessed it, but the report spread a feeling that girls are not the

entirely artificial beings or flat targets we suppose. The school began

to brood, like air deadening on oven-heat. Winter is hen-mother to the

idea of love in schools, if the idea has fairly entered. Various girls of

different colours were selected by boys for animated correspondence, that

never existed and was vigorously prosecuted, with efforts to repress

contempt of them in courtship for their affections. They found their part

of it by no means difficult when they imagined the lines without the

words, or, better still, the letter without the lines. A holy

satisfaction belonged to the sealed thing; the breaking of the seal and

inspection of the contents imposed perplexity on that sentiment. They

thought of certain possible sentences Matey and Browny would exchange;

but the plain, conceivable, almost visible, outside of the letter had a

stronger spell for them than the visionary inside. This fancied

contemplation of the love-letter was reversed in them at once by the

startling news of Miss Vincent's discovery and seizure of the sealed

thing, and her examination of the burden it contained. Then their thirst

was for drama--to see, to drink every wonderful syllable those lovers had

written.

Miss Vincent's hand was upon one of Matey's letters. She had come across

the sister of little Collett, Selina her name was, carrying it. She saw

nothing of the others. Aminta was not the girl to let her. Nor did Mr.

Cuper dare demand from Matey a sight or restitution of the young lady's

half of the correspondence. He preached heavily at Matey; deplored that

the boy he most trusted, etc.--the school could have repeated it without

hearing. We know the master's lecture in tones--it sings up to sing down,

and touches nobody. As soon as he dropped to natural talk, and spoke of

his responsibility and Miss Vincent's, Matey gave the word of a man of

honour that he would not seek to communicate farther with Miss Farrell at

the school.

Now there was a regular thunder-hash among the boys on the rare occasions

when they met the girls. All that Matey and Browny were forbidden to

write they looked--much like what it had been before the discovery; and

they dragged the boys back from promised instant events. It was,

nevertheless, a heaving picture, like the sea in the background of a

marine piece at the theatre, which rouses anticipations of storm, and

shows readiness. Browny's full eyebrow sat on her dark eye like a cloud

of winter noons over the vanishing sun. Matey was the prisoner gazing at

light of a barred window and measuring the strength of the bars. She

looked unhappy, but looked unbeaten more. Her look at him fed the school

on thoughts of what love really is, when it is not fished out of books

and poetry. For though she was pale, starved and pale, they could see she

was never the one to be sighing; and as for him, he looked ground dower

all to edge. However much they puzzled over things, she made them feel

they were sure, as to her, that she drove straight and meant blood, the

life or death of it: all her own, if need be, and confidence in the

captain she had chosen. She could have been imagined saying, There is a

storm, but I am ready to embark with you this minute.

That sign of courage in real danger ennobled her among girls. The name

Browny was put aside for a respectful Aminta. Big and bright events to

come out in the world were hinted, from the love of such a couple. The

boys were not ashamed to speak the very word love. How he does love that

girl! Well, and how she loves him! She did, but the boys had to be seeing

her look at Matey if they were to put the girl on some balanced equality

with a fellow she was compelled to love. It seemed to them that he gave,

and that she was a creature carried to him, like driftwood along the

current of the flood, given, in spite of herself. When they saw those

eyes of hers they were impressed with an idea of her as a voluntary giver

too; pretty well the half to the bargain; and it confused their notion of

feminine inferiority. They resolved to think her an exceptional girl,

which, in truth, they could easily do, for none but an exceptional girl

could win Matey to love her.

Since nothing appeared likely to happen at the school, they speculated

upon what would occur out in the world, and were assisted to conjecture,

by a rumour, telling of Aminta Farrell's aunt as a resident at Dover.

Those were days when the benevolently international M. de Porquet had

begun to act as interpreter to English schools in the portico of the

French language; and under his guidance it was asked, in contempt of the

answer, Combien de postes d'ici a Douvres? But, accepting the rumour as a

piece of information, the answer became important. Ici was twenty miles

to the north-west of London. How long would it take Matey to reach

Donvres? Or at which of the combien did he intend to waylay and away with

Aminta? The boys went about pounding at the interrogative French phrase

in due sincerity, behind the burlesque of traveller bothering coachman.

Matey's designs could be finessed only by a knowledge of his character:

that he was not the fellow to give up the girl he had taken to; and

impediments might multiply, but he would bear them down. Three days

before the break-up of the school another rumour came tearing through it:

Aminta's aunt had withdrawn her from Miss Vincent's. And now rose the

question, two-dozen-mouthed, Did Matey know her address at Douvres? His

face grew stringy and his voice harder, and his eyes ready to burst from

a smother of fire. All the same, he did his work: he was the good old

fellow at games, considerate in school affairs, kind to the youngsters;

he was heard to laugh. He liked best the company of his little French

friend from Orthez, over whose shoulder his hand was laid sometimes as

they strolled and chatted in two languages. He really went a long way to

make French fellows popular, and the boys were sorry that little Emile

was off to finish his foreign education in Germany. His English was

pretty good, thanks to Matey. He went away, promising to remember Old

England, saying he was French first, and a Briton next. He had lots of

plunk; which accounted for Matey's choice of him as a friend among the

juniors.