Vice Versa; or, A Lesson to Fathers, F. Anstey [ebook reader online free .TXT] 📗

Show him the letter—lay bare all those follies of[Pg 140] Dick's, the burden of which he might have to bear himself very shortly—never! Besides, what would be the use of it? It would be no argument in favour of sending him home—rather the reverse—so Paul was obliged to say, "Excuse me, Dr. Grimstone, it is—ah—of a private nature. I don't feel at liberty to show it to anyone."

"Then, sir," said the Doctor, with some reason, "if you can't tell me who or what it is that requires your presence at home, and decline to show me the letter which would presumably give me some idea on the subject, how do you expect that I am to listen to such a preposterous demand—eh? Just tell me that!"

Once more would Paul have given worlds for the firmness and presence of mind to state his case clearly and effectively; and he could hardly have had a better opportunity, for schoolmasters cannot always be playing the tyrant, and the Doctor was, in spite of his attempts to be stern, secretly more amused than angry at what seemed a peculiarly precocious piece of effrontery.

But Paul felt the dismal absurdity of his position. Nothing he had said, nothing he could say, short of the truth, would avail him, and the truth was precisely what he felt most unable to tell. He hung his head resignedly, and held his tongue in confusion.

"Pooh!" said the Doctor at last; "let me have no more of this tomfoolery, Bultitude. It's getting to be a positive nuisance. Don't come to me with any more of these ridiculous stories, or some day I shall be annoyed. There, go away, and be contented where you are, and try to behave like other people."

"'Contented!'" muttered Paul, when out of hearing, as he went upstairs and through the empty schoolroom into the playground. "'Behave like other people!' Ah, yes, I suppose I shall have to come to that in time. But that letter—— Everything upside down—— Bangle asked to meet a common clown! That fellow Duke letting me in for gold-mines and tramways! It's[Pg 141] all worse than I ever dreamed of; and I must stay here and be 'contented!' It's—it's perfectly damnable!"

All through that morning his thoughts ran in the same doleful groove, until the time for work came to an end, and he found himself in the playground, and free to indulge his melancholy for a few minutes in solitude; for the others were still loitering about in the schoolroom, and a glass outhouse originally intended for a conservatory, but now devoted to boots and slates, and the books liberally besmeared with gilt, and telling of the exploits of boy-heroes so beloved of boys.

Mr. Bultitude, only too delighted to get away from them for a little while, was leaning against the parallel bars in dull despondency, when he heard a rustling in the laurel hedge which cut off the house garden from the gravelled playground, and looking up, saw Dulcie slip through the shrubs and come towards him with an air of determination in her proud little face.

She looked prettier and daintier than ever in her grey hat and warm fur tippet; but of course Paul was not of the age or in the mood to be much affected by such things—he turned his head pettishly away.

"It's no use doing that, Dick," she said: "I'm tired of sulking. I shan't sulk any more till I have an explanation."

Paul made the sound generally written "Pshaw!"

"You ought to tell me everything. I will know it. Oh, Dick, you might tell me! I always told you anything you wanted to know; and I let mamma think it was I broke the clock-shade last term, and you know you did it. And I want to know something so very badly!"

"It's no use coming to me, you know," said Paul. "I can't do anything for you."

"Yes, you can; you know you can!" said Dulcie impulsively. "You can tell me what was in that letter you had at breakfast—and you shall too!"

"What an inquisitive little girl you are," said Paul[Pg 142] sententiously. "It's not nice for little girls to be so inquisitive—it doesn't look well."

"I knew it!" cried Dulcie; "you don't want to tell me—because—because it's from that other horrid girl you like better than me. And you promised to belong to me for ever and ever, and now it's all over! Say it isn't! Oh, Dick, promise to give the other girl up. I'm sure she's not a nice girl. She's written you an unkind letter; now hasn't she?"

"Upon my word," said Paul, "this is very forward; at your age too. Why, my Barbara——"

"Your Barbara! you dare to call her that? Oh, I knew I was right; I will see that letter now. Give it me this instant!" said Dulcie imperiously; and Paul really felt almost afraid of her.

"No, no," he said, retreating a step or two, "it's all a mistake; there's nothing to get into such a passion about—there isn't indeed! And—don't cry—you're really a pretty little girl. I only wish I could tell you everything; but you'd never believe me!"

"Oh, yes, I would, Dick!" protested Dulcie, only too willing to be convinced of her boy-lover's constancy; "I'll believe anything, if you'll only tell me. And I'm sorry I was so angry. Sit down by me and tell me from the very beginning. I promise not to interrupt."

Paul thought for a moment. After all, why shouldn't he? It was much pleasanter to tell his sorrows to her little ear and hear her childish wonder and pity than face her terrible father—he had tried that. And then she might tell her mother; and so his story might reach the Doctor's ears after all, without further effort on his part.

"Well," he said at last, "I think you're a good-natured little girl; you won't laugh. Perhaps I will tell you!"

So he sat down on the bench by the wall, and Dulcie, quite happy again now at this proof of good faith, nestled up against him confidingly, waiting for his first words with parted lips and eager sparkling eyes.

[Pg 143]

"Not many days ago," began Paul, "I was somebody very different from——"

"Oh, indeed," said a jarring, sneering voice close by; "was you?" And he looked up and saw Tipping standing over him with a plainly hostile intent.

"Go away, Tipping," said Dulcie; "we don't want you. Dick is telling me a secret."

"He's very fond of telling, I know," retorted Tipping. "If you knew what a sneak he was you'd have nothing to do with him, Dulcie. I could tell you things about him that——"

"He's not a sneak," said Dulcie. "Are you, Dick? Why don't you go, Tipping. Never mind what he says, Dick; go on as if he wasn't there. I don't care what he says!"

It was a most unpleasant situation for Mr. Bultitude, but he did not like to offend Tipping. "I—I think—some other time, perhaps," he said nervously. "Not now."

"Ah, you're afraid to say what you were going to say now I'm here," said the amiable Tipping, nettled by Dulcie's little air of haughty disdain. "You're a coward; you know you are. You pretend to think such a lot of Dulcie here, but you daren't fight!"

"Fight!" said Mr. Bultitude. "Eh, what for?"

"Why, for her, of course. You can't care much about her if you daren't fight for her. I want to show her who's the best man of the two!"

"I don't want to be shown," wailed poor Dulcie piteously, clinging to the reluctant Paul; "I know. Don't fight with him, Dick. I say you're not to."

"Certainly not!" said Mr. Bultitude with great decision. "I shouldn't think of such a thing!" and he rose from the bench and was about to walk away, when Tipping suddenly pulled off his coat and began to make sundry demonstrations of a martial nature, such as dancing aggressively towards his rival and clenching his fists.

[Pg 144]

By this time most of the other boys had come down into the playground, and were looking on with great interest. There was an element of romance in this promised combat which gave it additional attractions. It was like one of the struggles between knightly champions in the Waverley novels. Several of them would have fought till they couldn't see out of their eyes if it would have given them the least chance of obtaining favour in Dulcie's sight, and they all envied Dick, who was the only boy that was not unmercifully snubbed by their capricious little princess.

Paul alone was blind to the splendour of his privileges. He examined Tipping carefully, as the latter was still assuming a hostile attitude and chanting a sort of war-cry supposed to be an infallible incentive to strife.

"Yah, you're afraid!" he sang very offensively. "I wouldn't be a funk!"

"Pooh!" said Paul at last; "go away, sir, go away!"

"Go away, eh?" jeered Tipping. "Who are you to tell me to go away? Go away yourself!"

"Certainly," said Paul, only too happy to oblige. But he found himself prevented by a ring of excited backers.

"Don't funk it, Dick!" cried some, forgetting recent ill-feeling in the necessity for partisanship. "Go in and settle him as you did that last time. I'll second you. You can do it!"

"Don't hit each other in the face," pleaded Dulcie, who had got upon a bench and was looking down into the ring—not, if the truth must be told, without a certain pleasurable excitement in the feeling that it was all about her.

And now Mr. Bultitude discovered that he was seriously expected to fight this great hulking boy, and that the sole reason for any disagreement was an utterly unfounded jealousy respecting this little girl Dulcie. He had not a grain of chivalry in his disposition—chivalry being an eminently unpractical virtue—and naturally he saw no advantage in letting himself be[Pg 145] mauled for the sake of a child younger than his own daughter.

Dulcie's appeal enraged Tipping, who took it as addressed solely to himself. "You ought to be glad to stick up for her," he said between his teeth. "I'll mash you for this—see if I don't!"

Paul thought he saw his way clear to disabuse Tipping of his mistaken idea. "Are you proposing," he asked politely, "to—to 'mash' me on account of that little girl there on the seat?"

"You'll soon see," growled Tipping. "Shut your head, and come on!"

"No, but I want to know," persisted Mr. Bultitude. "Because," he said with a sickly attempt at jocularity which delighted none, "you see, I don't want to be mashed. I'm not a potato. If I understand you aright, you want to fight me because you think me likely to interfere with your claim to that little girl's—ah—affections?"

"That's it," said Tipping gruffly; "so you'd better waste no more words about it, and come on."

"But I don't care about coming on," protested Paul earnestly. "It's all a mistake. I've no doubt she's a very nice little girl, but I assure you, my good boy, I've no desire to stand in your way for one instant. She's nothing to me—nothing at all! I give her up to you. Take her, young fellow, with my blessing! There, now, that's all settled comfortably—eh?"

He was just looking round with a self-satisfied and relieved air, when he began to be aware that his act of frank unselfishness was not as much appreciated as it deserved. Tipping, indeed, looked baffled and irresolute for one moment, but a low murmur of disgust arose from the bystanders, and even Jolland declared that it was "too beastly mean."

As for Dulcie, she had been looking on incredulously at her champion's unaccountable tardiness in coming to the point. But this public repudiation was too much for her. She gave a little low wail as she heard the[Pg 146] shameless words of recantation, and then, without a word, jumped lightly down from her bench and ran away to hide herself somewhere and cry.

Even Paul, though he knew that he had done nothing but what was strictly right, and had acted purely in self-protection, felt unaccountably ashamed of himself as he saw this effect of his speech. But it was too late now.

"Accelerated by ignominious shovings—nay, as it is written, by smitings, twitchings, spurnings à posteriori not to be named."—French Revolution.

"This letter being so excellently ignorant will breed no terror in the youth."—Twelfth Night.

Mr. Bultitude had meant to achieve a double stroke of diplomacy—to undeceive Dulcie and conciliate the lovesick Tipping. But whatever his success may have been in the former respect, the latter object failed conspicuously.

"You shan't get off by a shabby trick like that," said Tipping, exasperated by the sight of Dulcie's emotion; "you've made her cry now, and you shall smart for