The Soul of a Child Part 23

Once he dared even give utterance to some such speculation in his father's hearing, but was promptly put down with a stern:

"If the teacher puts another boy above you, he has probably some very good reason for doing so, and you had better feel thankful for being where you are in the cla.s.s."

"Humph," said his mother. "You forget, Carl, that the father of that boy is one of the richest bankers in the city."

This was a way of looking at it which had never occurred to Keith. He was pretty contented, on the whole, and like all the rest, he placed the most implicit trust in the teacher's justice. From the very start, he had a feeling that Dally kept a special eye on him, and yet he was rarely spoken to except when questions were pa.s.sed around. Even then the teacher was rather apt to leave Keith alone to such an extent that the boy now and then began to think himself disliked. Always, however, when he got to this point, some little incident would occur that restored his faith both in himself and in the teacher.

There could be no doubt that he knew his lessons as well as any one in the cla.s.s, if not better, and he shone still more when Dally appealed to the natural intelligence of the boys by straying far away from the beaten and dusty path of the text books. Whenever he had stirred them by some excursion of this kind and began to ask questions in order to find out how far they had followed him, Keith's right hand was sure to shoot excitedly upwards in order to get him the coveted chance of answering.

And it seemed as if he could answer almost every question asked except a few that went so far beyond the bounds laid down for the cla.s.s that the teacher deemed it fair to warn them that inability to answer would be no shame. That was the kind of questions Dally generally reserved for Keith, and when Keith couldn't answer, it didn't console him very much that no one else could. Once, when his hand went up as usual and, to his astonishment, he obtained the permission to answer, Keith, to his still greater astonishment, suddenly discovered that he had no answer to give.

"I thought so," said Dally with a broad grin on his good-humoured face.

"Do you know what a fuzzy-wuzz is, Wellander?"

Keith shook his head, his face crimson with chagrin and humiliation as the whole cla.s.s burst into antic.i.p.atory laughter.

"That's a chap who wants to do all of it all the time," explained Dally.

Keith did not quite see the point, but he kept his right arm a little more in check for a while after that, until one day the lesson was forgotten and history repeated itself.

"Now Keith is fuzzy-wuzzying again," said Dally, and Keith thought he would sink through the floor. His mind was quite made up never to ask permission to answer another question again, but that same afternoon, during the lesson in Swedish history, Dally dropped all questioning and asked Keith to explain to the cla.s.s the main factors leading up to the Wars of Reformation--which Keith spent twenty minutes in doing while all the rest of the cla.s.s had to sit still listening to him.

IV

Keith could not remain isolated to the same extent as in the earlier schools. Inevitable community sprang from similarity of s.e.x and age alone. In the same direction worked the system of teaching which called for the united attention of the entire cla.s.s during every moment of the lesson. It was impossible to form a part of the cla.s.s without being in contact with all its other members. The boy who read aloud or answered a question became subjected to the criticism or admiration of all the rest. Rivalry in any field of study was just as likely to arise between two boys at different ends of the room as between those sitting side by side. The spirit of Dally tended to a.s.sist this fusion of personalities in every way, and the boy who kept apart was sure sooner or later to run foul of his good-humoured but well-aimed sallies. His att.i.tude implied no tyranny, and he strove for no deadening conformity. On the contrary, he always spoke of a strongly marked individuality as the object of all education, but he tried to develop it by fearless contact with others rather than by jealous withdrawal.

Keith for the first time found himself part of a society, and he liked it because the teacher's insistence on scholarly achievement as the only standard of comparison gave him a chance to hold his own among a group of boys, most of whom counted themselves his superiors in every other respect. He was small and poor, of humble origin, without influential connections, without worldly advantages of any kind, but when mind was pitched against mind, he felt second to none--except in mathematics, where he could compete neither with Davidson, the Jewish banker's son who was _primus_, or with that gawky, c.u.mbersome Anderson whose dullness in every other respect always kept him near the bottom of the cla.s.s. For this reason Keith differed from most of the others by liking school better during the lessons than at any other time.

There were games in the schoolyard during the pauses, and some of these were played in large groups or by teams. This occurred particularly when echoes from some war abroad caused the whole school to divide into rival armies for the staging of regular battles, as during his second year, when all had to be Turks or Russians. But Keith didn't like battles except in books, and mostly the pauses broke up the cla.s.s communities into small coteries or pairs. And the moment this happened, Keith found himself outside. He belonged to no special group. His appearance in the yard raised no delighted hails. He had no chum of his very own with whom to exchange secrets or lay plans for common adventures. And but for Dally, he would probably have spent most of his free time in the cla.s.sroom.

It was worse when the big pause came at eleven and every one went home for lunch, or when three o'clock brought school to a close for the day.

Going to school alone was an experience shared by all, but on leaving it, the hurrying horde of youngsters, exuberant with freedom as so many colts, broke into little groups of two or three that had homes in the same neighbourhood. Now and then Keith would join a couple of other boys headed for the old City like himself, and they would not refuse his company, but there always was something between him and them that precluded real fellowship, and so he trudged his way homeward, alone most of the time. Then he was also sure of reaching home in the shortest possible time, so that his mother had no chance to become worried over him.

It happen now and then that a larger group was formed for some unusual exploit and that Keith became part of it by chance rather than choice.

Once he accompanied such a group to that part of the harbour where tall-masted fullriggers with foreign flags lay nose by stern in unbroken line along the quay. Strange odours, fragrant or repulsive, filled the air. Jolly, loud-voiced men toiled mightily or lounged like monarchs among piles of casks and bags and boxes. For once Keith lost his usual timidity under such circ.u.mstances and threw himself whole-heartedly into anything the gang suggested. He even ventured to climb the mast of a ship as far as the foretop. When at last reluctantly he turned homeward, he felt like a hero, but when he caught sight of the tear-stained, fretted face of his mother, he knew at once that even such exaltation was not worth the price to be paid for it.

Unfortunately he had made himself popular that afternoon, and the next time a gang formed for a similar purpose, he was asked to join. But he shook his head, and being foolishly truthful by nature, he blurted out an embarra.s.sed:

"My mother won't let me."

The answer was pa.s.sed along. It was repeated in school the next day.

Keith heard echoes of it for weeks. And it added a good deal to the invisible wall that seemed to rise about him wherever he went.

Yet he was not unhappy. There was in his nature a wonderful resiliency that never let his spirits drop beyond a certain point, and that always brought them back to highwater mark at the slightest encouragement.

V

He had discovered the school library. It was to him a marvellous treasure trove. Any book could be taken home, one at a time, after being registered with the teacher acting as librarian for the day. Nor were the books handed out to you arbitrarily. You browsed all by yourself, and picked and picked, and calculated, and went back on your choice a dozen times, until at last you struck a book so fascinating in its promises that all hesitation disappeared.

The father started to object, but was silenced by the explanation that the school authorities wanted the boys to borrow books from the library.

That settled it, for discipline came first and even pleasure must be allowed if required by discipline. Had Keith been less honest or more imaginative in what may be called practical matters, his father's regard for authority might have offered more than one chance at liberties now denied, but this possibility never occurred to him, and so the library remained his one avenue of escape.

The books he chose puzzled and almost shocked the rotatory guardians of his sanctum. Once he picked an enormous volume on Greek mythology, full of pictures and translated pa.s.sages from Homer and the dramatists.

"You don't want that, Wellander," the teacher said, eying him curiously, when Keith presented the book for registration.

"Yes, I do," replied Keith stoutly, but his heart began to quake at the thought that the cherished volume was going to be denied him.

"Do you mean to say that you intend to read it through?" the teacher persisted.

"Yes, I will," said Keith.

There was a long pause during which the teacher seemed to weigh the book in his hand as if wondering whether its very weight would be too much for the undersized little chap in front of him.

"All right," he said at last, "but I suppose that means you will have reading for the rest of this season."

Keith looked at the book more hopefully, and with hope came courage.

"I'll read it in three weeks," he said.

So he did, too, and when he turned in the book, the same teacher happened to be on duty, recognized him, and began to ask questions. When Keith had proved that the whole Olympian hierarchy was duly installed in his acquisitive brain, the teacher said with an amused but friendly smile:

"I think we shall let you have anything you want hereafter. What is it to be this time--philosophy?"

"No, I want another book of exploration," answered Keith, thawing under the smile. "And I want a real good one."

That was his favourite subject, and the book he chose was Speke's "Discovery of the Source of the Nile." Once launched on that memorable journey, he had no thought left for any explorations of his own.

VI

During the fall and spring terms of that first year Keith had no sense of time. Days and weeks and months rolled by so smoothly that their pa.s.sing was unnoticed. It is a question whether at any other period of his life--with one possible exception--he was more completely interested and, for that reason, satisfied.

One day he observed casually that the old trees in the churchyard sported tiny green leaves under a deliciously blue but still rather cold sky. A few days more, and he heard that commencement was at hand.

It was a time of great excitement in school. Who would pa.s.s and who would not? Falling through might mean another year in the same cla.s.s, but beyond all doubt it meant a summer spent at work instead of playing.

It was worse than a disgrace. It was a menace to liberty at the time of the year when liberty meant most.

Being second in the cla.s.s, it never occurred to Keith that he might fail of promotion to a higher grade, but at that end there were possible prizes to consider. The cla.s.s was full of gossip and speculation. Boys who had hardly spoken to each other before broke into heated discussions or formed belated friendships. In one way and another the fever infected Keith and spread from him to his parents, though his father as usual feigned complete indifference. From his mother he learned long before the startling fact was meant to reach his ears, that his father had actually asked a day off at the bank in order to attend the exercises.

This news increased Keith's fear by several degrees. He had no idea what might happen, and it would be unthinkably dreadful to have the father present if anything went wrong. But on the other hand, if ... well, what was there to happen anyhow?

On the morning of the great day, a host of parents and relatives and other interested spectators crowded into the big a.s.sembly hall where places were reserved for them in the rear and along the walls. In the meantime the pupils gathered in their respective cla.s.s-rooms, and from there they marched by twos to the hall, the lowest grade leading. Every boy was in his best clothes, and every one showed his nervousness in his own peculiar way. Keith laughed hysterically a few times before they started, and then he turned into an automaton that breathed and moved and heard and saw only as part of a gigantic machine. His own individuality seemed to melt and become a mere drop in the all-exclusive individuality of the school.

This mood lasted through the early part of the exercises, the prayer read by the _primus_ of the senior cla.s.s, the hymn singing, the Rector's speech, and so on. Everything came to him as out of a mist, and he was not even sufficiently conscious of himself to look around for a glimpse of his parents. When the distribution of exercises began, the whole atmosphere changed. Until then it had been collective and impersonal.

Now it became intensely personal. Every one wanted to hear. Necks were craned, whispered questions asked. It was as if a sudden breeze had stirred waters which until then had been still as the mirroring surface of a forest pool. Keith's mood changed with the rest, and he grew painfully conscious of himself and his surroundings.