almost the last words that ambrose had heard after his wonderful awaking were odd enough, though at the time he took little note of them, since they were uttered amidst passionate embraces, amidst soft kisses on his poor beaten flesh. indeed, if these words recurred to him afterwards, they never made much impression on his mind, though to most people they would seem of more serious import than much else that was uttered that night! the sentences ran something like this:
“the cruel, wicked brute! he shall be sorry all his days, and every blow shall be a grief to him. my dear! i promise you he shall pay for to-night ten times over. his heart shall ache for it till it stops beating.”
there cannot be much doubt that this promise was kept to the letter. no one knew how wicked rumours concerning mr. horbury got abroad in lupton, but from that very day the execution of the sentence began. in the evening the high usher, paying a visit to a friend in town, took a short cut through certain dark, ill-lighted streets, and was suddenly horrified to hear his name shrieked out, coupled with a most disgusting accusation. his heart sank down in his breast; his face, he knew, was bloodless; and then he rushed forward to the malpassage whence the voice seemed to proceed.
there was nothing there. it was a horrid little alley, leading from one slum to another, between low walls and waste back-gardens, dismal and lampless. horbury ran at top speed to the end of it, but there was nothing to be done. a few women were gossiping at their doors, a couple of men slouched past on their way to the beer-shop at the corner — that was all. he asked one of the women if she had seen anybody running, and she said no, civilly enough — and yet he fancied that she had leered at him.
he turned and went back home. he was not in the mood for paying visits. it was some time before he could compose his mind by assuring himself that the incident, though unpleasant, was not of the slightest significance. but from that day the nets were about his feet, and his fate was sealed.
personally, he was subjected to no further annoyance, and soon forgot that unpleasant experience in the back-street. but it seems certain that from that sunday onwards a cloud of calumny overshadowed the high usher in all his ways. no one said anything definite, but everyone appeared to be conscious of something unpleasant when horbury’s name was mentioned. people looked oddly at one another, and the subject was changed.
one of the young masters, speaking to a colleague, did indeed allude casually to horbury as xanthias phoceus. the other master, a middle-aged man, raised his eyebrows and shook his head without speaking. it is understood that these muttered slanders were various in their nature; but, as has been said, everything was indefinite, intangible as contagion — and as deadly to the master’s worldly health.
that horrible accusation which had been screamed out of the alley was credited by some; others agreed with the young master; while a few had a terrible story of an idiot girl in a remote derbyshire village. and the persistence of all these fables was strange.
it was four years before henry vibart chesson, d. d., ascended the throne of st. guthmund at dorchester; and all through those four years the fountain of evil innuendo rose without ceasing. it is doubtful how far belief in the truth of these scandals was firm and settled, or how far they were in the main uttered and circulated by ill-natured people who disliked horbury, but did not in their hearts believe him guilty of worse sins than pompousness and arrogance. the latter is the more probable opinion.
of course, the deliberations of the trustees were absolutely secret, and the report that the chairman, the marquis of dunham, said something about c?sar’s wife is a report and nothing more. it is evident that the london press was absolutely in the dark as to the existence of this strange conspiracy of vengeance, since two of the chief dailies took the appointment of the high usher to the headmastership as a foregone conclusion, prophesying, indeed, a rule of phenomenal success. and then millward, a winchester man, understood to be rather unsound on some scholastic matters —“not quite the right man”; “just a little bit of a jesuit”— received the appointment, and people did begin to say that there must be a screw loose somewhere. and horbury was overwhelmed, and began to die.
the odd thing was that, save on that sunday night, he never saw the enemy; he never suspected that there was an enemy; and as for the incident of the alley, after a little consideration he treated it with contempt. it was only some drunken beast in the town who knew him by sight and wished to be offensive, in the usual fashion of drunken beasts.
and there was nothing else. lupton society was much too careful to allow its suspicions to be known. a libel action meant, anyhow, a hideous scandal and might have no pleasant results for the libellers. besides, no one wanted to offend horbury, who was suspected of possessing a revengeful temper; and it had not dawned on the lupton mind that the rumours they themselves were circulating would eventually ruin the high usher’s chances of the headmastership. each gossip heard, as it were, only his own mutter at the moment. he did not realize that when a great many people are muttering all at once an ugly noise of considerable volume is being produced.
it is true that a few of the masters were somewhat cold in their manner. they lacked the social gift of dissimulation, and could not help showing their want of cordiality. but horbury, who noticed this, put it down to envy and disaffection, and resolved that the large powers given him by the trustees should not be in vain so far as the masters in question were concerned.
indeed, c. l. wood, who was afterwards headmaster of marcester and died in egypt a few years ago, had a curious story which in part relates to the masters in question, and perhaps throws some light on the extraordinary tale of horbury’s ruin.
wood was an old luptonian. he was a mighty athlete in his time, and his records for the long jump and throwing the cricket ball have not been beaten at lupton to this day. he had been one of the first boarders taken at the old grange. the early relations between horbury and himself had been continued in later life, and wood was staying with his former master at the time when the trustee’s decision was announced. it is supposed, indeed, that horbury had offered him a kind of unofficial, but still important, position in the new model; in fact, wood confessed over his port that the idea was that he should be a kind of “intelligence department” to the head. he did not seem very clear as to the exact scope of his proposed duties. we may certainly infer, however, that they would have been of a very confidential nature, for wood had jotted down his recollections of that fatal morning somewhat as follows:
“i never saw horbury in better spirits. indeed, i remember thinking that he was younger than ever — younger than he was in the old days when he was a junior master and i was in the third. of course, he was always energetic; one could not disassociate the two notions of horbury and energy, and i used to make him laugh by threatening to include the two terms in the new edition of my little book, latin and english synonyms. it did not matter whether he were taking the fifth, or editing classics for his boys, or playing rocker — one could not help rejoicing in the vivid and ebullient energy of the man. and perhaps this is one reason why shirkers and loafers dreaded him, as they certainly did.
“but during those last few days at lupton his vitality had struck me as quite superhuman. as all the world knows, his succession to the headmastership was regarded by everyone as assured, and he was, naturally and properly, full of the great task which he believed was before him. this is not the place to argue the merits or demerits of the scheme which had been maturing for many years in his brain.
“a few persons who, i cannot but think, have received very imperfect information on the subject, have denounced horbury’s views of the modern public school as revolutionary. revolutionary they certainly were, as an express engine is revolutionary compared to an ox-waggon. but those who think of the late canon horbury as indifferent to the good side of public school traditions knew little of the real man. however, were his plans good or bad, they were certainly of vast scope, and on the first night of my visit he made me sit up with him till two o’clock while he expounded his ideas, some of which, as he was good enough to say, he trusted to me to carry out. he showed me the piles of ms. he had accumulated: hundreds of pages relating to the multiple departments of the great organisation which he was to direct, or rather to create; sheets of serried figures, sheaves of estimates which he had caused to be made out in readiness for immediate action.
“nothing was neglected. i remember seeing a note on the desirability of compiling a ‘lupton hymn book’ for use in the chapel, and another on the question of forming a botanical garden, so that the school botany might be learned from ‘the green life,’ as he beautifully expressed it, not from dry letterpress and indifferent woodcuts. then, i think, on a corner of the ‘botany leaf’ was a jotting — a mere hasty scrawl, waiting development and consideration: ‘should we teach hindustani? write to tucker re the moulvie ahmed khan.’
“i despair of giving the reader any conception of the range and minuteness of these wonderful memoranda. i remember saying to horbury that he seemed to be able to use the microscope and the telescope at the same time. he laughed joyously, and told me to wait till he was really at work. ‘you will have your share, i promise you,’ he added. his high spirits were extraordinary and infectious. he was an excellent raconteur, and now and again, amidst his talk of the new lupton which he was about to translate from the idea into substance, he told some wonderful stories which i have not the heart to set down here. tu ne qu?sieris. i have often thought of those lines when i remember horbury’s intense happiness, the nervous energy which made the delay of a day or two seem almost intolerable. his brain and his fingers tingled, as it were, to set about the great work before him. he reminded me of a mighty host, awaiting but the glance of their general to rush forward with irresistible force.
“there was not a trace of misgiving. indeed, i should have been utterly astonished if i had seen anything of the kind. he told me, indeed, that for some time past he had suspected the existence of a sort of cabal or clique against him. ‘a. and x., b. and y., m. and n., and, i think, z., are in it,’ he said, naming several of the masters. ‘they are jealous, i suppose, and want to make things as difficult as they can. they are all cowards, though, and i don’t believe one of them — except, perhaps, m. — would fail in obedience, or rather in subservience, when it comes to the point. but i am going to make short work of the lot.’ and he told me his intention of ridding the school of these disaffected elements. ‘the trustees will back me up, i know,’ he added, ‘but we must try to avoid all unnecessary friction’; and he explained to me a plan he had thought of for eliminating the masters in question. ‘it won’t do to have half-hearted officers on our ship,’ was the way in which he put it, and i cordially agreed with him.
“possibly he may have underrated the force of the opposition which he treated so lightly; possibly he altogether misjudged the situation. he certainly regarded the appointment as already made, and this, of course, was, or appeared to be, the conviction of all who knew anything of lupton and horbury.
“i shall never forget the day on which the news came. horbury made a hearty breakfast, opening letters, jotting down notes, talking of his plans as the meal proceeded. i left him for a while. i was myself a good deal excited, and i strolled up and down the beautiful garden at the old grange, wondering whether i should be able to satisfy such a chief who, the soul of energy himself, would naturally expect a like quality in his subordinates. i rejoined him in the course of an hour in the study, where he was as busy as ever —‘snowed up,’ as he expressed it, in a vast pile of papers and correspondence.
“he nodded genially and pointed to a chair, and a few minutes later a servant came in with a letter. she had just found it in the hall, she explained. i had taken a book and was reading. i noticed nothing till what i can only call a groan of intense anguish made me look up in amazement — indeed, in horror — and i was shocked to see my old friend, his face a ghastly white, his eyes staring into vacancy, and his expression one of the most terrible —the most terrible — that i have ever witnessed. i cannot describe that look. there was an agony of grief and despair, a glance of the wildest amazement, terror, as of an impending awful death, and with these the fiercest and most burning anger that i have ever seen on any human face. he held a letter clenched in his hand. i was afraid to speak or move.
“it was fully five minutes before he regained his self-control, and he did this with an effort which was in itself dreadful to contemplate — so severe was the struggle. he explained to me in a voice which faltered and trembled with the shock that he had received, that he had had very bad news — that a large sum of money which was absolutely necessary to the carrying out of his projects had been embezzled by some unscrupulous person, that he did not know what he should do. he fell back into his chair; in a few minutes he had become an old man.
“he did not seem upset, or even astonished, when, later in the day, a telegram announced that he had failed in the aim of his life — that a stranger was to bear rule in his beloved lupton. he murmured something to the effect that it was no matter now. he never held up his head again.”
this note is an extract from george horbury: a memoir. it was written by dr. wood for the use of a few friends and privately printed in a small edition of a hundred and fifty copies. the author felt, as he explains in his brief foreword, that by restricting the sale to those who either knew horbury or were especially interested in his work, he was enabled to dwell somewhat intimately on matters which could hardly have been treated in a book meant for the general public.
the extract that has been made from this book is interesting on two points. it shows that horbury was quite unaware of what had been going on for four years before chesson’s resignation and that he had entirely misinterpreted the few and faint omens which had been offered him. he was preparing to break a sulky sentinel or two when all the ground of his fortalice was a very network of loaded mines! the other point is still more curious. it will be seen from wood’s story that the terrific effect that he describes was produced by a letter, received some hours before the news of the trustees’ decision arrived by telegram. “later in the day” is the phrase in the memoir; as a matter of fact, the final deliberation of the lupton trustees, held at marshall’s hotel in albemarle street, began at eleven-thirty and was not over till one-forty-five. it is not likely that the result could have reached the old grange before two-fifteen; whereas the letter found in the hall must have been read by horbury before ten o’clock. the invariable breakfast hour at the old grange was eight o’clock.
c. l. wood says: “i rejoined him in the course of an hour,” and the letter was brought in “a few minutes later.” afterwards, when the fatal telegram arrived, the memoir notes that the unfortunate man was not “even astonished.” it seems to follow almost necessarily from these facts that horbury learnt the story of his ruin from the letter, for it has been ascertained that the high usher’s account of the contents of the letter was false from beginning to end. horbury’s most excellent and sagacious investments were all in the impeccable hands of “witham’s” (messrs. witham, venables, davenport and witham), of raymond buildings, gray’s inn, who do not include embezzlement in their theory and practice of the law; and, as a matter of fact, the nephew, charles horbury, came into a very handsome fortune on the death of his uncle — eighty thousand pounds in personality, with the old grange and some valuable ground rents in the new part of lupton. it is as certain as anything can be that george horbury never lost a penny by embezzlement or, indeed, in any other way.
one may surmise, then, the real contents of that terrible letter. in general, that is, for it is impossible to conjecture whether the writer told the whole story; one does not know, for example, whether meyrick’s name was mentioned or not: whether there was anything which carried the reader’s mind to that dark evening in november when he beat the white-faced boy with such savage cruelty. but from dr. wood’s description of the wretched man’s appearance one understands how utterly unexpected was the crushing blow that had fallen upon him. it was a lightning flash from the sky at its bluest, and before that sudden and awful blast his whole life fell into deadly and evil ruin.
“he never held up his head again.” he never lived again, one may say, unless a ceaseless wheel of anguish and anger and bitter and unavailing and furious regret can be called life. it was not a man, but a shell, full of gall and fire, that went to wareham; but probably he was not the first of the klippoth to be made a canon.
as we have no means of knowing exactly what or how much that letter told him, one is not in a position to say whether he recognised the singularity — one might almost say, the eccentricity — with which his punishment was stage-managed. nec deus intersit certainly; but a principle may be pushed too far, and a critic might point out that, putting avenging deities in their machines on one side, it was rather going to the other extreme to bring about the great catastrophe by means of bad sherry, a trying headmaster, boiled mutton, a troublesome schoolboy and a servant-maid. yet these were the agents employed; and it seems that we are forced to the conclusion that we do not altogether understand the management of the universe. the conclusion is a dangerous one, since we may be led by it, unless great care is exercised, into the worst errors of the dark ages.
there is the question, of course, of the truthfulness or falsity of the various slanders which had such a tremendous effect. the worst of them were lies — there can be little doubt of that — and for the rest, it may be hinted that the allusion of the young master to xanthias phoceus was not very far wide of the mark. mrs. horbury had been dead some years, and it is to be feared that there had been passages between the high usher and nelly foran which public opinion would have condemned. it would be difficult to tell the whole story, but the girl’s fury of revenge makes one apt to believe that she was exacting payment not only for ambrose’s wrongs, but for some grievous injury done to herself.
but before all these things could be brought to their ending, ambrose meyrick had to live in wonders and delights, to be initiated in many mysteries, to discover the meaning of that voice which seemed to speak within him, denouncing him because he had pried unworthily into the secret which is hidden from the holy angels.
