Christopher Woolf Roe was painfully surprised. He had arrived at Harley by a train previously notified to his father in bold and legible handwriting and not a soul had met him. He had not exactly expected an ornamental awning over the station exit, but he had presumed that somebody of standing in the school would have been waiting upon the platform keenly peering into the carriages as the train came in; somebody who would escort him to the school and introduce him to its leading lights, who would converse with him amiably as they went along the highroad, congratulating him repeatedly upon his delightful father.
There had, as a matter of fact, been a suggestion made that he should be received by a comb-and-paper band comprised of school prefects who would march funereally in front of him all the way from the station to the school, but word from Terence Nicholson had gone forth that this would not be in keeping with school dignity.
Hence he had come unwelcomed and unsung.
Arrived at the school, he had sought out his father. His father had been out. This had put the finishing touch to his complete depression. So far, all he knew was that, according to his father’s letter, circumstances had arisen which made it advisable that he should come to Harley. Another letter to the new Head of Wilton had intimated, possibly in more detail, that he should do so as soon as possible, and this had turned out to be in three days’ time. But as to the real why and wherefore, and as to what the circumstances were he was still completely in the dark.
He sought for aid.
The school porter fetched the bursar, who told him that he would be in Seymour’s house, and who coldly pointed out the way to him with a pencil. Here another porter had shown him to a vacant study. On the way there he had, of course, passed any number of boys. Not one solitary soul amongst them, from the oldest to the youngest, had paid the slightest attention to him. He might have been invisible.
Two hours later he had seen his father and he understood.
“The secretary,” Dr Roe had told him, “is a boy called Smythe.”
He sought Smythe out.