"Yes; you were going out, and said quickly to me, 'Another time, Mr. Henry, another time.' I went down to Mrs. Paradyne's that evening, and she—my mother—utterly forbid me to disclose it. 'Did I want to ruin everybody?' she asked; 'herself, me, George.' Was it likely that I, Arthur Paradyne's son, should be retained at my post to teach the College boys, when a question had arisen whether George might be even allowed to study with them? It was a doubt that had never before struck me; it staggered me now. My mother took a different view of it. The fact of my being a Paradyne could not make any difference to the boys, or render me less efficient as a teacher, she urged, so long as they were in ignorance of it. It was only by the knowledge that harm could come. Well; I yielded. I yielded, knowing how mistaken the reasoning was, utter sophistry; knowing how wrong a part I should be playing; but she was very urgent, and—she was my mother. There's my secret, Dr. Brabazon."
"A secret truly," observed the Head Master, leaning back in his chair, while he revolved the tale.
"The weight of it has half killed me," returned Mr. Henry, lifting his hand to his head, as if he felt a pain there. "At any moment discovery was liable to fall, bringing disgrace in its train. It was not so much that that I felt—or feared—as the actual deceit in itself. My life was a long living lie, every moment of it one of acted duplicity: I, set up in a post of authority to guide and train others! When the school broke up for Christmas I begged my mother to withdraw her embargo, and let me speak then, but she would not. She would see about it when George had passed his Oxford examination, she said, not before. It is not with her full consent that I speak now; but I laid the two only alternatives before her—to declare myself, or leave the College—and she allowed me to speak as the lesser evil. In any case I may have to leave."
"We'll see: we'll see: I think not. Why should you?" added the master, apparently putting the question to himself, or to the four walls of the room, but not to Mr. Henry. "I am glad to see young men respect the wishes of their mother."
And Mr. Henry's respect for his—that is, his sense of the law of filial obedience—was something ultra great. But he did not say it.
"What a trouble that past business of your father's must have been to you!" exclaimed the doctor, whose thoughts were roving backwards.
Trouble! Mr. Henry shrank at the word, as relating to it, even now. "It took every ray of sunshine out of my life," he breathed.
"No, no; not every one," said the master, kindly.
"For a long, long time every ray of hope—of life I may say—went out of me. And now my—my hope lies elsewhere; there's not much of it left for daily use."
"Where does it lie?" questioned the Head Master, rather puzzled.