“Perhaps you didn’t, not this time, though I’ve only your word for it; but you would have, sooner or later, under different conditions. There’s only one end to that sort of thing. And even if you were all right yourself, how did you know that Brewster was going to be? That’s the beastly part of it. That’s what sickens me with you. Your own life is your own to do what you like with, but you’ve no right to contaminate others. You encourage this young fellow to go about with a girl four years older than himself, about whom you know nothing. How could you tell what might be happening to him? He may not have your self-control. He’d never have started this game but for you, and now that he’s once begun he may be unable to break himself of it. You may have ruined his whole life, mayn’t you?”
Roland considered the question.
“I suppose so, but I didn’t look at it that way.”
“Of course, you didn’t. But it’s the results that count. That’s what you’ve got to keep in mind; actions are judged by their results. And now, what do you imagine is going to happen to you? I suppose you know that if I go across and report you to the headmaster that it’ll mean the next train back to London?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And if I did, you’d have no cause for complaint. It would be what you’d deserved, wouldn’t it?”
“Yes, sir.”
There was a pause. They looked at each other. Carus Evans hoped that he had frightened Roland, but he had not. Roland knew that Carus did not intend to get him expelled. He would not have talked like that if he had. He was trying to make Roland feel that he was conferring a favor on him in allowing him to stop on.
“There’s no reason why I should feel kindly disposed towards you,” Carus said. “We’ve never got on well together. You’ve worked badly in my form. I’ve never regarded you as a credit to the school. When you were a small boy you were rowdy and bumptious, and now that you have reached a position of authority you have become superior and conceited. There’s no reason why I, personally, should wish to see you remain a member of the school. As regards my own house, I cannot yet judge what harm you may have done me. You’ve started the poison here. Brewster will have told his friends. One bad apple will corrupt a cask. I don’t know what trouble you may have laid up for me.”
“No, sir.”