Sinister Street

"Give up going for a bit," advised the priest.

Michael jumped up from the chair and walked over to the bay-window, through which came a discordant sound of children playing in the street outside.

"It's impossible to be serious with you. I suppose you're fed up with people like me," Michael complained. "I know I'm moody and irritating, but I've got a lot to grumble about. I don't seem to have any natural inclination for any profession. I'm not a musical genius like my young sister. That's pretty galling, you know, really. After all, girls can get along better than boys without any special gifts, and she simply s.h.i.+nes compared with me. I have no father. I've no idea who I was, where I came from, what I'm going to be. I keep on trying to be optimistic and think everything is good and beautiful, and then almost at once it turns out bad and ugly."

"Has your religion really turned out bad and ugly?" asked the priest gently.

"Not right through, but here and there, yes."

"The religion itself or the people who profess it?" Mr. Viner persisted.

"Doesn't it amount to the same thing ultimately?" Michael parried. "But leave out religion for the moment, and consider this war. The only justification for such a war is the moral effect it has on the nations engaged. Now, I ask you, do you sincerely believe there has been a trace of any purifying influence since we started waving Union Jacks last September? It's no good; we simply have not got it in us to stand defeat or victory. At any rate, if the Boers win, it will mean the preservation of something. Whereas if we win, we shall just destroy everything."

"Michael, what do you think is the important thing for this country at this moment?" Mr. Viner asked.

"Well, I suppose I still think it is that the people--the great ma.s.s of the nation, that is--should be happier and better. No, I don't think that's it at all. I think the important thing is that the people should be able to use the power that's coming to them in bigger lumps every day. I'd like to think it wasn't, I'd like to believe that democracy always will be as it always has been--a self-made failure. But against my own will I can't help believing that this time democracy is going to carry everything before it. And this war is going to hurry it on. Of course it is. The ma.s.ses will learn their power. They'll learn that generals can make fools of themselves, that officers can be done without, that professional soldiers can be cowards, but that simply by paying we can still win. And where's the money coming from? Why, from the cla.s.s that tried to be clever and bluff the people out of their power by staging this war. Well, do you mean to tell me that it's good for a democracy, this sudden realization of their omnipotence? Look here, you think I'm an excitable young fool, but I tell you I've been pitching my ideals at a blank wall like so many empty bottles and----"

"Were they empty?" asked Mr. Viner. "Are you sure they were empty? May they not have been cruses of ointment the more precious for being broken?"

"Well, I wish I could keep one for myself," Michael said.

"My dear boy, you'll never be able to do that. You'll always be too prodigal of your ideals. I should have no qualms about your future, whatever you did meanwhile. And, do you know, I don't think I have many qualms about this England of ours, however badly

I'm glad you recognize that the people are coming into their own. I wish that _you_ were glad, but you will be one day. The Catholic religion must be a popular religion. The Sabbath was made for man, you know.

Catholicism is G.o.d's method of throwing bottles at a blank wall--but not empty bottles, Michael. On the whole, I would sooner that now you were a reactionary than a Dantonist. Your present att.i.tude of mind at any rate gives you the opportunity of going forward, instead of going back; there will be plenty of ideals to take the places of those you destroy, however priceless. And the tragedy of age is not having any more bottles to throw."

During these words that came soothingly from Mr. Viner's firm lips Michael had settled himself down again in the arm-chair and lighted his pipe.

"Come, now," said the priest, "you and I have muddled through our discussion long enough, let's gossip for a change. What's Mark Chator doing?"

"I haven't seen much of him this term. He's still going to take orders.

I find old Chator's eternal simplicity and goodness rather wearing.

Life's pretty easy for him. I wish I could get as much out of it as easily," Michael answered.

"Well, I can't make any comment on that last remark of yours without plunging into plat.i.tudes that would make you terribly contemptuous of my struggles to avoid them. But don't despise the Chators of this world."

"Oh, I don't. I envy them. Well, I must go. Thanks awfully for putting up with me again."

Michael picked up his cap and hurried home. When he reached Carlington Road, he was inclined to tell his mother that, if she liked, he would go and visit Lord Saxby before he sailed; but when it came to the point he felt too shy to reopen the subject, and decided to let the proposal drop.

He was surprized to find that it was much easier to write to Mrs. Ross about her husband than he thought it would be. Whether this long and stormy day (he could scarcely believe that he had only read the news about Captain Ross that morning) had purged him of all complexities of emotion, he did not know; but certainly the letter was easy enough.

64 CARLINGTON ROAD.

_My dear Mrs. Ross,_

_I can't tell you the sadness of to-day. I've thought about you most tremendously, and I think you must be gloriously proud of him.

I felt angry at first, but now I feel all right. You've always been so stunning to me, and I've never thanked you. I do want to see you soon. I shall never forget saying good-bye to Captain Ross. Mother asked me to go and say good-bye to Lord Saxby. I don't suppose you ever met him. He's a sort of cousin of ours. But I did not want to spoil the memory of that day at Southampton. I haven't seen poor old Alan yet. He'll be in despair. I'm longing to see him to-morrow. This is a rotten letter, but I can't write down what I feel. I wish Stella had known Captain Ross. She would have been able to express her feelings._

_With all my love,_

_Your affectionate_

_Michael._

In bed that night Michael thought what a beast he had made of himself that day, and flung the blankets feverishly away from his burnt-out self. Figures of well-loved people kept trooping through the darkness, and he longed to converse with them, inspired by the limitless eloquence of the night-time. All that he would say to Mr. Viner, to Mrs.

Ross, to Alan, even to good old Chator, splashed the dark with fiery sentences. He longed to be with Stella in a cool woodland. He almost got up to go down and pour his soul out upon his mother's breast; but the fever of fatigue mocked his impulse and he fell tossing into sleep.

Chapter XII: _Alan_

Michael left the house early next day that he might make sure of seeing Alan for a moment before Prayers. A snowy aggregation of c.u.mulus sustained the empyrean upon the volume of its mighty curve and swell.

The road before him stretched s.h.i.+ning in a radiant drench of azure puddles. It was a full-bosomed morning of immense peace.

Michael rather dreaded to see Alan appear in oppressive black, and felt that anything like a costume would embarra.s.s their meeting. But just before the second bell he came quickly up the steps dressed in his ordinary clothes, and Michael in the surging corridor gripped his arm for a moment, saying he would wait for him in the 'quarter.'

"Is your mater fearfully cut up?" he asked when they had met and were strolling together along the 'gravel.'

"I think she was," said Alan. "She's going up to Cobble Place this morning to see Aunt Maud."

"I wrote to her last night," said Michael.

"I spent nearly all yesterday in writing to her," said Alan. "I couldn't think of anything to say. Could you?"

"No, I couldn't think of very much," Michael agreed. "It seemed so unnecessary."

"I know," Alan said. "I'd really rather have come to school."

"I wish you had. I made an awful fool of myself in the morning. I got in a wax with Abercrombie and the chaps, and said I'd never play football again."

"Whatever for?"

"Oh, because I didn't think they appreciated what it meant for a chap like your Uncle Kenneth to be killed."

"Do you mean they said something rotten?" asked Alan, flus.h.i.+ng.

"I don't think you would have thought it rotten. In fact, I think the whole row was my fault. But they seemed to take everything for granted.

That's what made me so wild."

"Look here, we can't start a conversation like this just before school.

Are you going home to dinner?" Alan asked.

"No, I'll have dinner down in the Tuck," said Michael, "and we can go for a walk afterwards, if you like. It's the first really decent day we've had this year."

So after a lunch of buns, cheese-cakes, fruit pastilles, and vanilla biscuits, eaten in the noisy half-light of the Tuckshop, accompanied by the usual storm of pellets, Michael and Alan set out to grapple with the situation Michael had by his own hasty behaviour created.