CHAPTER XIII
THE INTERVENING YEARS
Now we may omit a great deal from Godfrey's youthful career. Within afew days he received a letter from his father forwarded to him from thehotel, that was even more unpleasant than the majority of the paternalepistles to which he was accustomed. Mr. Knight, probably from honestconviction and a misreading of the facts of life, was one of thosepersons who are called Pacifists. Although he never carried out thedoctrine in his own small affairs, he believed that nations wereenjoined by divine decree to turn the other cheek and indeed everyportion of their corporate frame to the smiter, and that by so doing,in some mysterious way, they would attain to profound peace andfelicity. Consequently he hated armies, especially as these involvedtaxation, and loathed the trade of soldiering, which he considered oneof licensed murder.
The decision of his son to adopt this career was therefore a bitterblow to him, concerning which he expressed his feelings in the plainestlanguage, ending his epistle by intimating his strong conviction thatGodfrey, having taken the sword, was destined to perish by the sword.Also he pointed out to him that he had turned his back upon God Whowould certainly remember the affront, being, he remarked, "a jealousGod," and lastly that the less they saw of each other in future--herehe was referring to himself, not to the Divinity as the context wouldseem to imply--the better it would be for both of them.
Further there was a postscript about the disgraceful conduct of thewoman, Mrs. Parsons, who, after receiving the shelter of his house formany years, had made a scene and departed, leaving him in the lurch.His injunction was that under no circumstances should he, Godfrey, haveanything more to do with this violent and treacherous female who hadmade him a pretext of quarrel, and, having learned that he had money,doubtless wished to get something out of him.
Godfrey did not answer this letter, nor did his father write to himagain for quite a long while.
For the rest, on the appointed Monday he presented himself at GarrickStreet, and began his course of tuition under the general direction ofthe wise Mr. Scoones, "cramming" as it was called. This, indeed,exactly describes the process, for all knowledge was rejected exceptthat which was likely to obtain marks in the course of an examinationby hide-bound persons appointed to ascertain who were the individualsbest fitted to be appointed to various branches of the Public Service.Anything less calculated to secure the selection of suitable men thansuch a system cannot well be imagined. However, it was that whichcertain nebulous authorities had decreed should prevail, and there wasan end of it, although in effect it involved, and still involves, thefrequent sacrifice of those qualities and characteristics which areessential to a public servant, to others that are quite the reverse.For instance, to a parrot-like memory and the power of acquiring asuperficial acquaintance with much miscellaneous information andremembering the same for, say, six months.
Although he hated the business and thought with longing of his studies,stellar and other, in the Kleindorf observatory, Godfrey was quiteclever enough to collect what was needed. In fact, some three monthslater he passed his examination with ease about half-way up the list,and duly entered Sandhurst.
He found the establishment at Garrick Street just such a place as itsowner had described. In it were many charming but idle young men, oftenwith a certain amount of means, who were going up for the DiplomaticService, the Foreign Office, the Indian Civil, or various branches ofthe army. Of these a large proportion enjoyed life but did little else,and in due course failed in their competitive encounters with theexaminers.
Others were too stupid to succeed, or perhaps their natural talents hadanother bent, while the remainder, by no means the most brilliant, butwith a faculty for passing examinations and without any disturbingoriginality, worked hard and sailed into their desired haven withconsiderable facility, being of the stuff of which most successful menare made. For the rest, there was the opportunity, and if they did notavail themselves of it Scoones' was not to blame. It was, and perhapsstill remains, a most admirable institution of its sort, one, indeed,of which the present chronicler has very grateful recollections.
Among the pupils studying there was a young man named Arthur Thorburn,an orphan, with considerable expectations, who lived with an aunt in afine old house at Queen Anne's Gate. He was a brilliant young man,witty and original, but rash and without perseverance, whom hisguardians wished to enter the Diplomatic Service, a career in which,without doubt, had he ever attained to it, he would have achieved aconsiderable failure. In appearance he was of medium height,round-faced, light-haired, blue-eyed, with a constant and most charmingsmile, in every way a complete contrast to Godfrey. Perhaps this wasthe reason of the curious attachment that the two formed for eachother, unless, indeed, such strong and strange affinities have theirroots in past individual history, which is veiled from mortal eyes. Atany rate, it happened that on Godfrey's first day at Scoones' he satnext to Arthur Thorburn in two classes which he attended. Godfreylistened intently and made notes; Arthur caricatured the lecturer, anart for which he had a native gift, and passed the results round theclass. Godfrey saw the caricature and sniggered, then when the lectureswere over gravely reproved the author, saying that he should not dosuch things.
"Why not?" asked Arthur, opening his blue eyes. "Heaven intended thatstuffy old parrot" (he had drawn this learned man as a dilapidated fowlof that species) "to be caricatured. Observe that his nose is alreadyhalf a beak. Or perhaps it is a beak developing into a nose; it dependswhether he is on the downward or upward path of evolution."
"Because you made me laugh," replied Godfrey, "whereby I lost at leasteighteenpennyworth of information."
"A laugh is worth eighteenpence," suggested Arthur.
"That depends upon how many eighteenpences one possesses. You may havelots, some people are short of them."
"Quite true. I never looked at it in that way before. I am obliged toyou for putting it so plainly," said Arthur with his charming smile.
Such was the beginning of the acquaintance of these two, and in somecases might have been its end. But with them it was not so. Arthurconceived a sincere admiration for Godfrey who could speak like this toa stranger, and at Scoones' and as much as possible outside, hauntedhim like a shadow. Soon it was a regular thing for Godfrey to go todine at the old Georgian house in Queen Anne's Gate upon Sundayevenings, where he became popular with the rather magnificentearly-Victorian aunt who thought that he exercised a good influenceupon her nephew. Sometimes, too, Arthur would accompany Godfrey toHampstead and sit smoking and making furtive caricatures of him andMrs. Parsons, while he worked and she beamed admiration. The occupationsounds dull, but somehow Arthur did not find it so; he said that itrested his overwrought brain.
"Look here, old fellow," said Godfrey at length, "have you anyintention of passing that examination of yours?"
"In the interests of the Diplomatic Service and of the country I thinknot," replied Arthur reflectively. "I feel that it is a case where truealtruism becomes a duty."
"Then what do you mean to do with yourself?"
"Don't know. Live on my money, I suppose, and on that of my respectedaunt after her lamented decease which, although I see no signs of it,she tells me she considers imminent."
"I don't wonder, Arthur, with you hanging about the house. You ought tobe ashamed of yourself. A man is made to work his way through theworld, not to idle."
"Like a beetle boring through wood, not like a butterfly flitting overflowers; that's what you mean, isn't it? Well, butterflies are nicerthan beetles, and some of us like flowers better than dead wood. But, Isay, old chap, do you mean it?"
"I do, and so does your aunt."
"Let us waive my aunt. Like the poor she is always with us, and I,alas! am well acquainted with her views, which are those of a pastepoch. But I am not obstinate; tell me what to do and I'll doit--anything except enter the Diplomatic Service, to lie abroad for thebenefit of my country, in the words of the ancient saying."
"There is no fear of
that, for you would never pass the examination,"said the practical Godfrey. "You see, you are too clever," he added byway of explanation, "and too much occupied with a dozen things of whichexaminers take no account, the merits of the various religious systems,for instance."
"So are you," interrupted Arthur.
"I know I am; I love them. I'd like to talk to you about reincarnationand astronomy, of which I know something, and even astrology and thesurvival of the dead and lots of other things. But I have got to makemy way in the world, and I've no time. You think me a heavy bore and anold fogey because I won't go to parties to which lots of those nicefellows ask me. Do you suppose I shouldn't like the parties and all thelarks afterwards and the jolly actresses and the rest? Of course Ishould, for I'm a man like others. But I tell you I haven't time. I'veflouted my father, and I'm on my honour, so to speak, to justify myselfand get on. So I mean to pass that tomfool examination and to cram downa lot of stuff in order to do so, which is of no more use to me thanthough I had swallowed so much brown paper. Fool-stuff, pulped by foolsto be the food of fools--that's what it is. And now I'm going to shovesome spoonfuls of it down my throat, so light your pipe, and please bequiet."
"One moment more of your precious time," interrupted Arthur. "What isthe exact career that you propose to adorn? Something foreign, Ithink--Indian Civil Service?"
"No, as I have told you a dozen times, Indian Army."
"The army has points--possibly in the future it might give a man anopportunity of departing from the world in a fashion that is generally,if in error, considered to be decent. India, too, has still morepoints, for there anyone with intelligence might study the beginningsof civilisation, which, perhaps, are also its end. My friend, I, too,will enter the Indian Army, that is if I can pass the examination.Provide me at once with the necessary books and, Mrs. Parsons, begood-hearted enough to bring some of your excellent coffee, breweddouble strong. Do not imagine, young man, who ought, by the way, tohave been born fifty years earlier and married my aunt, that you arethe only one who can face and conquer facts, even those advanced bythat most accursed of empty-headed bores, the man or the maniac calledEuclid."
So the pair of them studied together, and by dint of private tuition inthe evening, for at Scoones' where his talent for caricature was toomuch for him, Arthur would do little or nothing, Godfrey dragged hisfriend through the examination, the last but one in the list. Even thena miracle intervened to save him. Arthur's Euclid was hopeless. Hehated the whole business of squares and angles and parallelograms withsuch intensity that it made him mentally and morally sick. To his, asto some other minds, it was utter nonsense devised by a semi-lunaticfor the bewilderment of mankind, and adopted by other lunatics as anappropriate form of torture of the young.
At length, in despair, Godfrey, knowing that Arthur had an excellentmemory, only the night before the examination, made him learn a coupleof propositions selected out of the books which were to be studied,quite at hazard, with injunctions that no matter what otherpropositions were set he should write out these two, pretending that hehad mistaken the question. This Arthur did with perfect accuracy, andby the greatest of good luck one of the two propositions was actuallythat which he was asked to set down, while the other was allowed topass as an error.
So he bumped through somehow, and in the end the Indian Army gained amost excellent officer. It is true that there were difficulties when heexplained to his aunt and his trustees that in some inexplicable mannerhe had passed for Sandhurst instead of into the Diplomatic Service. Butwhen he demonstrated to them that this was his great and final effortand that nothing on earth would induce him to face another examination,even to be made a king, they thought it best to accept the accomplishedfact.
"After all, you have passed something," said his aunt, "which is morethan anyone ever expected you would do, and the army is respectable,for, as I have told you, my grandfather was killed at Waterloo."
"Yes," replied Arthur, "you have told me, my dear Aunt, very often. Hebroke his neck by jumping off his horse when riding towards or from thebattlefield, did he not? and now I propose to follow his honouredexample, on the battlefield, if possible, or if not, in steeplechasing."
So the pair of them went to Sandhurst together, and together in duecourse were gazetted to a certain regiment of Indian cavalry, the onlydifference being that Godfrey passed out top and Arthur passed outbottom, although, in fact, he was much the cleverer of the two. Of theinterval between these two examinations there is nothing that need bereported, for their lives and the things that happened to them were asthose of hundreds of other young men. Only through all they remainedthe fastest of friends, so much so that by the influence of GeneralCubitte, as has been said, they managed to be gazetted to the sameregiment.
During those two years Godfrey never saw his father, and communicatedwith him but rarely. His winter vacations were spent at Mrs. Parsons'house in Hampstead, working for the most part, since he was absolutelydetermined to justify himself and get on in the profession which he hadchosen. In the summer he and Arthur went walking tours, and once, withsome other young men, visited the Continent to study variousbattlefields, and improve their minds. At least Godfrey studied thebattlefields, while Arthur gave most of his attention to the youngerpart of the female population of France and Italy. At Easter again theywent to Scotland, where Arthur had some property settled on him--for hewas a young man well supplied with this world's goods--and fished forsalmon and trout. Altogether, for Godfrey, it was a profitable andhappy two years. At Sandhurst and elsewhere everyone thought well ofhim, while old General Cubitte became his devoted friend and could notsay enough in his praise.
"Damn it! Sir," he exclaimed once, "do you mean to tell me that younever overdraw your allowance? It is not natural; almost wrong indeed.I wonder what your secret vices are? Well, so long as you keep themsecret, you ought to be a big man one day and end up in a verydifferent position to George Cubitte--called a General--who never saw ashot fired in his life. There'll be lots of them flying about beforeyou're old, my boy, and doubtless you'll get your share ofgunpowder--or nitro-glycerine--if you go on as you have begun. If Iweren't afraid of making you cocky, I'd tell you what they say aboutyou down at that Sandhurst shop, where I have an old pal or two."
Shortly after this came the final examination, through which, as hasbeen said, Godfrey sailed out top, an easy first indeed--a position towhich his thorough knowledge of French and general aptitude for foreignlanguages, together with his powers of work and application, reallyentitled him. All his friends were delighted, especially Arthur, wholooked on him as a kind of _lusus naturae_, and from his humble positionat the bottom of the tree, gazed admiringly at Godfrey perched upon itstopmost bough. The old Pasteur, too, with whom Godfrey kept up analmost weekly correspondence, continuing his astronomical studies byletter, was enraptured and covered him with compliments, as did hisinstructors at the College.
All of this would have been enough to turn the heads of many young men,but as it happened Godfrey was by nature modest, with enoughintelligence to appreciate the abysmal depths of his own ignorance bythe light of the little lamp of knowledge with which he had furnishedhimself on his journey into their blackness. This intense modestyalways remained a leading characteristic of his, which endeared him tomany, although it was not one that helped him forward in life. It isthe bold, self-confident man, who knows how to make the most of hissmall gifts, who travels fastest and farthest in this world of ours.
When, however, actually he received quite an affectionate and pleasedletter from his father, he did, for a while, feel a little proud. Theletter enclosed a cutting from the local paper recording his success,and digging up for the benefit of its readers an account of hisadventure on the Alps. Also, it mentioned prominently that he was theson of the Rev. Mr. Knight, the incumbent of Monk's Abbey, and hadreceived his education in that gentleman's establishment; soprominently, indeed, that even the unsuspicious Godfrey could not helpwondering if his father had ever seen that
paragraph before it appearedin print. The letter ended with this passage:
"We have not met for a long while, owing to causes to which I will not allude, and I suppose that shortly you will be going to India. If you care to come here I should like to see you before you leave England. This is natural, as after all you are my only child and I am growing old. Once you have departed to that far country who knows whether we shall ever meet again in this world?"
Godfrey, a generous-hearted and forgiving person, was much touched whenhe read these words, and wrote at once to say that if it wereconvenient, he would come down to Monk's Abbey at the beginning of thefollowing week and spend some of his leave there. So, in due course, hewent.
As it happened, at about the same time Destiny had arranged thatanother character in this history was returning to that quiet Essexvillage, namely Isobel Blake.
Isobel went to Mexico with her uncle and there had a most interestingtime. She studied Aztec history with her usual thoroughness; so well,indeed, that she became a recognised authority on the subject. Sheclimbed Popocatepetl, the mysterious "Sleeping Woman" that overhandsthe ancient town, and looked into its crater. Greatly daring, she evenvisited Yucatan and saw some of the pre-Aztec remains. For thisadventure she paid with an attack of fever which never quite left hersystem. Indeed, that fever had a peculiar effect upon her, which mayhave been physical or something else. Isobel's fault, or rathercharacteristic, as the reader may have gathered, was that she built toomuch upon the material side of things. What she saw, what she knew,what her body told her, what the recorded experience of the worldtaught--these were real; all the rest, to her, was phantasy orimagination. She kept her feet upon the solid ground of fact, and leftall else to dreamers; or, as she would have expressed it, to thevictims of superstition inherited or acquired.
Well, something happened to her at the crisis of that fever, which wassharp, and took her on her return from Yucatan, at a horrible portcalled Frontera, where there were palm trees and _zopilotes_--a kind ofvile American vulture--which sat silently on the verandah outside herdoor in the dreadful little hotel built upon piles in the mud of thegreat river, and mosquitoes by the ten million, and sleepy-eyed,crushed-looking Indians, and horrible halfbreeds, and everything elsewhich suggests an earthly hell, except the glorious sunshine.
Of a sudden, when she was at her worst, all the materiality--if therebe such a word--which circumstances and innate tendency had woven abouther as a garment, seemed to melt away, and she became aware ofsomething vast in which she floated like an insect in theatmosphere--some surrounding sea which she could neither measure nortravel.
She knew that she was not merely Isobel Blake, but a part of theuniverse in its largest sense, and that the universe expressed itselfin miniature within her soul. She knew that ever since it had been, shewas, and that while it existed she would endure. This imagination orinspiration, whichever it may have been, went no further than that, andafterwards she set it down to delirium, or to the exaltation that oftenaccompanies fever. Still, it left a mark upon her, opening a new doorin her heart, so to speak.
For the rest, the life in Mexico City was gay, especially in theposition which she filled as the niece of the British Minister, who wasoften called upon to act as hostess, as her aunt was delicate and hercousin was younger than herself and not apt at the business. There wereDiaz and the foreign Diplomatic Ministers; also the leading Mexicans tobe entertained, for which purpose she learned Spanish. Then there wereEnglish travellers, distinguished, some of them, and German nobles,generally in the Diplomatic Service of their country, whom by somepeculiar feminine instinct of her own, she suspected of being spies andgenerally persons of evil intentions. Also there was the Britishcolony, among whom were some very nice people that she made herfriends, the strange, adventurous pioneers of our Empire who are to bebound in every part of the world, and in a sense its cream.
Lastly, there were the American tourists and business men, many of whomshe thought amusing. One of these, a millionaire who had to do with a"beef trust," though what that might be she never quite understood,proposed to her. He was a nice young fellow enough, of a real oldAmerican family whose ancestors were supposed to have come over in the_Mayflower_, and possessed of a remarkable vein of original humour;also he was much in love. But Isobel would have none of it, and said soin such plain, unmistakable language that the millionaire straightwayleft Mexico City in his private railway car, disconsolately to pursuehis beef speculations in other lands.
On the day that he departed Isobel received a note from him which ran:
"I have lost you, and since I am too sore-hearted to stay in this antique country and conclude the business that brought me here, I reckon that I have also lost 250,000 dollars. That sum, however, I would gladly have given for the honour and joy of your friendship, and as much more added. So I think it well spent, especially as it never figured in my accounts. Good-bye. God bless you and whoever it may be with whom you are in love, for that there is someone I am quite sure, also that he must be a good fellow."
From which it will be seen that this millionaire was a very nice youngman. So, at least, thought Isobel, though he did write about her beingin love with someone, which was the rankest nonsense. In love, indeed!Why, she had never met a man for whom she could possibly entertain anyfeelings of that sort, no, not even if he had been able to make a queenof her, or to endow her with all the cash resources of all the beeftrusts in the world. Men in that aspect were repellent and hateful toher; the possibility of such a union with any one of them waspoisonous, even unnatural to her, soul and body.
Once, it is true, there had been a certain boy--but he had passed outof her life--oh! years ago, and, what is more, had affronted her byrefusing to answer a letter which she had written to him, just, as sheimagined--though of course this was only a guess--because of hisridiculous and unwarrantable jealousy and the atrocious pride that washis failing. Also she had read in the papers of a very brave act whichhe had done on the Alps, one which filled her with a pride that was notatrocious, but quite natural where an old playmate was concerned, andhad noticed that it was a young lady whom he had rescued. That, ofcourse, explained everything, and if her first supposition should beincorrect, would quite account for her having received no answer to herletter.
It was true, however, that she had heard no more of this young lady,though scraps of gossip concerning Godfrey did occasionally reach her.For instance, she knew that he had quarrelled with his father becausehe would not enter the Church and was going into the army, a careerwhich she much preferred, especially as she did not believe in theChurch and could not imagine what Godfrey would look like in a blackcoat and a white tie.
By the way, she wondered what he did look like now. She had an oldfaded photograph of him as a lanky youth, but after all this time hecould not in the least resemble that. Well, probably he had grown asplain and uninteresting--as she was herself. It was wonderful that theAmerican young man could have seen anything in her, but then, no doubthe went on in the same kind of way with half the girls he met.
Thus reflected Isobel, and a little while later paid a last visit tothe museum, which interested her more than any place in Mexico, perhapsbecause its exhibits strengthened her theories as to comparativereligion, and shook off her feet the dust of what her American admirerhad called that "antique land." It was with a positive pang that fromthe deck of the steamship outside Vera Cruz she looked her last on thesnows of the glorious peak of Orizaba, but soon these faded away intothe skyline and with them her life in Mexico.