_ CHAPTER TWENTY NINE. SOMETHING UNPLEASANT
The examination-days were not looked forward to with joy by Dr Bewley's pupils; and, sad to say, Morris's days were liked least. In fact, his was the only joyous countenance upon the morning after he had prepared the theatre, when he glanced round at the heavy expressions that pervaded the breakfast-tables. But possibly the most severe face in the room that morning was the Doctor's, as he paid his customary visit, and he took it with him afterwards into the theatre, which he entered punctually at ten o'clock, when the boys were all assembled in their places, while the masters were all at their desks, ready under Morris's leadership to sit out the examination, using their eyes, and making perfectly certain that no pupil whispered a question, furtively passed a piece of paper to another, or dipped down into his desk in search of a so-called helping "crib."
To use the schoolboy phrase popular at Plymborough--"What was up?"
The Doctor rose deliberately upon his throne-like place at the end of the theatre, coughed sonorously, settled his plump chin in his very stiff white cravat, and then gazed frowningly through his spectacles at the assembled pupils.
There was silence for quite a couple of minutes, and every boy present felt that the Doctor was singling him out and was about to speak to him about the committal of some fault, while internally he asked himself what it could be.
At last the great brain-ruler put an end to the suspense by addressing his pupils collectively; and every individual but one drew a breath of relief.
"Young gentlemen," he said, "in my long career of tuition of the boys who have been entrusted to my charge it has been my great desire to inculcate honour."
The three masters glanced at each other, making suggestive grimaces as if questioning what was to come, and at the same time expressing ignorance.
"Now, I regret very much to have to tell you that this morning I have been made aware of a most dishonourable act committed by one of my pupils. I have received by post what I can only term a very degrading letter, which I am sorry to say I fully believe to have been written by some one present. Who that is I do not know, and I tell you all that I would rather not know until the culprit allows his better feelings to obtain the mastery, and comes to me privately and says, 'Dr Bewley, I was guilty of that act of folly; but now I bitterly repent, and am here humbly to ask your forgiveness and at the same time that of my fellow-pupil whom I have maligned.' Now, young gentlemen, it gives me pain to address you all for one boy's sin, and I have only this to say, that you whose consciences are clear can let it pass away like a cloud; to him who has this black speck upon his conscience I only say I am waiting; come to me when the examination is done.--Mr Morris, it is ten minutes past ten. At one o'clock your examination is over, and the studies are at an end for the day.--Now, my dear boys, I wish you all success, and I trust that you will show Mr Morris that his mathematical efforts on your behalf have not been in vain."
There was an end to the painful silence half a minute later, as the Doctor closed the door after him, not loudly, but it seemed to echo among the great beams of the building, while it was long before his slow, heavy step died away upon the gravel path outside.
"Now, young gentlemen," said Morris sharply, "our Principal's address is not to interfere with my examination. You have your papers. Pro--"
There was a pause.
"--Ceed!" shouted Mr Morris.
There was the scratching of pens upon papers, but upon very few; most of the boys taking their pens and putting them down again, to rest their elbows on the desks and their chins upon their thumbs, as they fixed their eyes upon the column-like pile of questions printed quite close to the left side of the sheets of foolscap, while the three masters at the two ends and in the middle of the theatre seated themselves, book in hand, ready to hold up high before their faces so that they could conveniently peer over the top and make certain that there were not any more culprits than one within reach of their piercing eyes.
Mr Morris, to pass his three hours gently and pleasantly, opened a very old copy, by Blankborough, upon logarithms; Monsieur Brohanne had armed himself with a heavy tome of _La Grande Encyclopedie_, with a bookmark therein at the page dealing with the ancient _langue d'oc_; while Mr Rampson, also linguistical, opened a sickly-looking vellum volume, horribly mildewy and stained, and made as if to read a very brown page of Greek whose characters looked like so many tiny creases and shrinkings in a piece of dry skin.
Only one boy spoke, and that was Glyn Severn, and he to himself; but at the same time he had caught Singh's eye as he sat some distance from him, and, placing his sheet of foolscap by his side, he raised his blotting-pad so that his companion could see a great blotch of ink thereon which seemed as if it had been roughly made by a brush that had been dipped in ink.
This done, he laid the pad back in its place, twisted the fold towards him, and taking a bright, new two-bladed knife that had been purchased with the proceeds of the Colonel's cheque, he opened the large blade and carefully passed it along the fold, setting free one half-sheet of the absorbent paper. This he folded and put in his pocket; but the ink had gone through to the next half-sheet, and this he also separated, treating it as he did the first. This left two half-sheets, with the possibility of their slipping about and away from the rest. So, after pocketing his knife, he opened the remainder where they were folded, and refolded the pad inside out, so as to leave the two cut half-sheets in the middle.
"That nasty nuisance of a cat!" he muttered to himself. "It must have come along smelling after poor little Burton's white mice, and smudged my paper like this. Ah," he continued, to himself, "I have promised the poor little chap that I'll lick Master Slegge, and--Hullo! What's this? What does old Morris mean by giving me half-used paper, and the other fellows new?"
His hands had been busy redoubling and smoothing the fold over the now prisoned half-sheets, and he was about to hold up his hand as a sign to the nearest master that he wanted to speak; but he let it fall again upon the desk, and sat gazing down at some indistinctly seen lines upon the blotting-paper, which looked as if a letter had been inserted wet within the pad and hastily blotted.
He could barely read a word, but somehow his curiosity was aroused, and he turned the leaf over, to find that the newly written letter had been placed in contact with the other side, the lines looking far blacker there, but seen like a page of printing type the reverse way on, so that he could not read a word.
Glyn closed the leaf again and tried to read once more, but with very little success; but for some reason or another his interest was more deeply excited, and he doubled two more leaves over so as to hide the writing, drew forward the foolscap paper to place it once more on the blotting-pad, and then began to read hard at the first section, trying the while to forget all about the freshly blotted letter, but in vain.
For two questions very different from Mr Morris's kept on appealing to him, neither of them algebraic or dealing with Euclid. One was, "How came that letter to be blotted on my pad?" and, "Who was it that wrote it?"
There was no answer; but the boy felt that he knew enough about one of Mr Morris's questions to begin to write the answer, and over this he had been busy for about ten minutes when another question flashed across his brain: "Was this the letter of which the Doctor spoke?" _