"Peter McGuffie and Duncan R. S. Robertson, who at the risk of their own lives saved a schoolfellow from drowning."
It stood before the school, so that all could see; but if anyone dared to make a sign in that direction as he passed Speug's desk, his life was not worth living for seven days, and it was felt that Speug never completely recovered from the moral disgrace of that day.
NESTIE
III
It was understood that Nestie's mother was dead and that his father was the Baptist minister of Muirtown—a denomination whose adherents were few and whose practices were vaguely associated with the mill lade—and for two years before he appeared at school Nestie and his father were quite familiar to the boys. Nestie began his education at a ladies' school, not far from the Seminary, where he was much petted by the big girls, and his father could be seen waiting for him every afternoon at dismissal time. A gentle, timid little man, apt to blush on being spoken to, with a hesitating speech and a suggestion of lasting sorrow in his eyes, Mr. Molyneux would sooner have faced a cannon than Miss Letitia MacMuldrow's bevy of young women, and it was a simple fact that when, meditating his sermon one day in the North Meadow, he flopped into their midst and his son insisted on introducing him to the boarders and to Miss Letitia, the poor man went home to bed and left the pulpit next Sunday to an amateur exhorter. His plan of campaign was to arrive on the opposite side of the terrace about a quarter to three, and, as the hour drew near, reconnoitre the door from behind a clump of bushes at the foot of the garden. Nestie usually made his appearance with a bodyguard of maidens, who kissed him shamelessly, and then, catching sight of the anxious face peeping through the laburnums, he would dash down the walk and, giving his slaves a last wave, disappear round the corner. The minister used to take a hasty survey lest they should become a sport to the barbarians in a land where for a father to kiss his boy was synonymous with mental incapacity, and then—it was a cat of a girl who oversaw the meeting—they hugged one another for the space of a whole minute, in which time it is wonderful what can be done if your heart is in it and your hat is allowed to go without care. Had a Seminary boy seen the sight—but the savages were caged at that hour—his feet would have been glued to the ground with amazement, and he had gone away full of silent gratitude that Providence had cast his lot north of the Tweed; but of course he had not reckoned that the father and son had been separated for, say, six whole hours—or almost—and it was necessary to re-establish relations. When this had been done satisfactorily the two crossed a wooden bridge into the Meadow arm-in-arm—Mr. Molyneux unconsciously wearing his hat with a rakish air on the side of his head. Between this hour and sunset was their pleasure in the summer time, and the things they did were varied and remarkable. Sometimes they would disappear into the woods above Muirtown, and return home very dirty, very tired, very happy, laden with wild flowers and dank, earthy roots, which they planted in their tiny garden and watered together with tender solicitude. Other times they played what was supposed to be golf over a course of their own selection and creation at the top of the Meadow, and if by any chance the minister got a ball into a hole, then Nestie danced for a space and the minister apologised for his insolent success. Times there were—warm, summer days—when the minister would bring a book with him and read to Nestie as they lay in a grassy hollow together. And on these days they would fall a-talking, and it would end in a photograph being taken from a case, and after they had studied it together, both would kiss the face, which was as if Nestie had kissed himself. Regular frequenters of the North Meadow began to take an interest in the pair, so that the golfers would cry "Fore" in quite a kindly tone when they got in the way of the balls, and one day old Peter Peebles, the chief of the salmon-fishers and a man of rosy countenance, rowed them up to Woody Island, and then allowed the boat to drop down with the tide past the North Meadow and beneath the two bridges, and landed them at the South Meadow, refusing all recompense with fierce words. Motherly old ladies whose families were off their hands, and who took in the situation at a glance, used to engage Mr. Molyneux in conversation in order to warn him about Nestie's flannels and the necessity of avoiding damp at nightfall. And many who never spoke to them, and would have repudiated the idea of sentiment with scorn, had a tender heart and a sense of the tears of things as the pair, strange and lonely, yet contented and happy, passed them in the evening.
When the time came that Nestie had to leave Miss Letitia's, his father began to hang round the Seminary taking observations, and his heart was heavy within him. After he had watched a scrimmage at football—a dozen of the aboriginal savages fighting together in a heap, a mass of legs, arms, heads—and been hustled across the terrace in a rush of Russians and English, from which he emerged without his hat, umbrella, or book, and after he had been eyewitness of an encounter between Jock Howieson and Bauldie over a misunderstanding in marbles, he offered to teach Nestie at home.
"Those Scotch boys are very ... h-healthy, Nestie, and I am not sure whether you are quite ... fit for their ... habits. There is a master, too, called ... Bulldog, and I am afraid——" and Mr. Molyneux looked wistfully at his boy.
"Why, pater, you are very n-naughty, and don't d-deserve two lumps of sugar," for ever since they were alone he had taken his mother's place and poured out the tea. "Do you think I am a coward? A boy must learn to play games, you know, and they won't be hard on a little chap at first. I'll soon learn f-football and ... the other things. I can play golf a little now. Didn't you tell me, pater, that mother was as bwave as ... a s-soldier?"
"Of course she was, Nestie," and Mr. Molyneux fell into the innocent little snare. "If you had only seen the pony your mother used to ride on her father's farm in Essex, where I saw her first! Do you know, nobody could ride 'Gypsy' except its mistress. It r-reared and ... k-kicked, Nestie"—the little man spoke with awe—"and once ran away; but your mother could always manage it. She looked so handsome on 'Gypsy'; and you have her spirit. I'm very ... t-timid."