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Page 64
He smiled at this and said:
"Yes, I am afraid I am too easy-going." He had never cared to talk about
himself, and now he said, "Well, yes, I go along in my old prosy way.
It is just like the old schooldays, with half the difficulties gone. Of
course the children are not always good, but that makes it the more
amusing; and one can see much more easily what they are thinking of and
dreaming about."
I found myself telling him my adventures, which he heard with the same
quiet attention and I was sure that he would never forget a single
point--he never forgot anything in the old days.
"Yes," he said at the end, "that's a wonderful story. You always had the
trouble of the adventures, and I had the fun of hearing them."
He asked me what I was now going to do, and I said that I had not the
least idea.
"Oh, that will be all right," he said.
It was all so comfortable and simple, so obvious indeed, that I laughed
to think of the bitter and miserable reveries I had indulged in when he
was taken from me, and when the stay of my life seemed gone. The whole
incident seemed to give me back a touch of the serenity which I had
lost, and I saw how beautifully this joy of meeting had been planned for
me, when I wanted it most. Presently he said that he must go off for a
lesson, and asked me to come with him and see the children. We went into
a big class-room, where some boys and girls were assembling. Here he was
exactly the same as ever; no sentiment, but just a kind of bluff
paternal kindness. The lesson was most informal--a good deal of
questioning and answering; it was a biographical lecture, but devoted,
I saw, in a simple way, to tracing the development of the hero's
character. "What made him do that?" was a constant question. The answers
were most ingenious and extraordinarily lively; but the order was
perfect. At the end he called up two or three children who had shown
some impatience or jealousy in the lesson, and said a few half-humorous
words to them, with an air of affectionate interest.
"They are jolly little creatures," he said when they had all gone out.
"Yes," I said, with a sigh, "I do indeed envy you. I wish I could be set
to something of the kind."
"Oh, no, you don't," he said; "this is too simple for you! You want
something more artistic and more psychological. This would bore you to
extinction."
We walked all round the place, saw the games going on, and were
presently joined by Amroth, who seemed to be on terms of old
acquaintanceship with my friend. I was surprised at this, and he said:
"Why, yes, Amroth had the pleasure of bringing me here too. Things are
done here in groups, you know; and Amroth knows all about our lot. It is
very well organised, much better than one perceives at first. You
remember how you and I drifted to school together, and the set of boys
we found ourselves with--my word, what young ruffians some of us were!
Well, of course all that had been planned, though we did not know it."
"What!" said I; "the evil as well as the good?"
The two looked at each other and smiled.
"That is not a very real distinction," said Amroth. "Of course the poor
bodies got in the way, as always; there was some fizzing and some
precipitation, as they say in chemistry. But you each of you gave and
received just what you were meant to give and receive; though these are
complicated matters, like the higher mathematics; and we must not talk
of them to-day. If one can escape the being shocked at things and yet be
untainted by them, and, on the other hand, if one can avoid pomposity
and yet learn self-respect, that is enough. But you are tired to-day,
and I want you just to rest and be refreshed."
Presently Amroth asked me if I should like to stay there awhile, and I
most willingly consented.
"You want something to do," he said, "and you shall have some light
employment."
That same day, before Amroth left me, I had a curious talk with him.
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