“Not to go, why not? Who says so? What! has Percy cut up rough, with his sanctified, Puritanical, Puseyitical, Pontifical, Hieroglyphical notions; oh! leave him to me, I’ll soon talk him round;—I’ve the highest possible veneration for morality and piety, and all that sort of thing, particularly on Sundays; but to fancy they’ve got anything to do with going to the play, is an association of ideas little short of downright sacrilege, to my notion.”
“No, it is not that,” returned Hugh; “Percy would have let let me go, only——”
“Only what?” inquired Wilfred, “come, make haste, I’ve got thirty lines of Terence to knock off before I go up to Carrington.”
“Only we’ve both spent our allowance, and I’ve not got money to pay,” replied poor Hugh, fairly driven into confessing his poverty.
“Phew!” whistled his patron, “no assets forthcoming, eh, that’s unfortunate, all the more so, because just at the present epoch my own financial arrangements are in a somewhat embarrassed condition—ar—banker’s account over-drawn—owing to their confounded free-trade, I expect, I can’t get my rents paid up,—in fact, to be frank with you, when this play business was first started, I, with incautious liberality, volunteered to make one of a jovial crew of fifth-formers, who intend to follow up the theatrical entertainments with a sort of extempore déjeuné à la fourchette of oysters and porter. Well, sir, when I came to examine into the state of my funds, I, after much deep and intricate calculation, arrived at the following result viz., that I had contracted liabilities to the amount of one pound five, while to meet them I possessed the exact sum of two shillings and threepence halfpenny—the halfpenny being scarcely an efficient coin of the realm, by reason of my having that morning punched a large hole in its centre, in pursuance of a mechanical experiment which failed. Under these circumstances I immediately wrote to the governor, saying that several unusually distressing cases of charity having come under my notice since I had last received his blessing and a ten-pound note, the blessing alone remained; adding that another case more urgent than any of the former now appealing to my sympathies, I trusted he would not object to replace the money without unnecessary delay. They say it is a wise child that knows its own father; certainly in this particular instance I seem to have formed a strangely mistaken estimate of the manners and customs of mine, for yesterday morning I received from him the following heartless reply:—
“‘Dear Wilfred Jacob,—As I happen to know your charity is of the kind which begins and ends at home, and as two pounds a week is rather more than I wish you to spend on lollipops, I strongly recommend total abstinence from such delicacies for the next fortnight, at the expiration of which period you may look for a five-pound note (the last you will receive before the holidays), from,
“‘Your affectionate father.’”
“Well, my father being thus obdurate, the only alternative that remained for me was to apply to my uncle, in consequence of which application, my watch will have a little extra ticking to do for the next fortnight; ‘my relation, on the security of that valuable, favouring me with the loan of five and twenty shillings. Thus, the admission to the theatre being two and sixpence, you will perceive, by a reference to ‘Bonnycastle’s Arithmetic,’ or ‘Smith’s Wealth of Nations,’ I am still two-pence-halfpenny behind the world, which sum I must beg, borrow, or otherwise realise before two o’clock to-day, at which time the doors open. So, you see, young’un, I literally cannot treat you, for which, without chaffing, I’m really uncommon sorry; but never mind, put your trust in jollity, and depend upon it something to your advantage will turn up some day and with this well-meant, but slightly vague attempt at consolation,” Wilfred Jacob passed on to have, as he termed it, a “go in” at Terence.
In the meantime, a solemn and important discussion was being held among the boys of the sixth form (some of whom were lads of seventeen and eighteen, and considered themselves young men), as to whether these morning theatricals, being got up solely with a view to the juveniles, were not infra dig. Biggington, who had grown up to fit his name, and stood six feet one in his stockings, and who, moreover, in virtue of the date of his entrance, as well as from his strength and prowess, was looked upon as leader of the school, decidedly set his face against it, and declared, with unnecessary vehemence of expression, that the play might be—that to which its author would have especially objected—before he would go to see it.
Stradwick quite agreed with him, which fact possessed every advantage but that of novelty; Stradwick being a mere reflection, and by be means a brilliant one, of Biggington.