[CHAPTER XXII.]
Before the Examiners.
The great day had come, big with the fate of the Orville, All Saints' Day, the First of November. In the large hall, made ready for the occasion, wearing their gowns, their trenchers laid beside them, sat the candidates, before the gentlemen who had come from other parts and schools to preside with the masters of the college. It might, on the face of things, have been almost called a solemn farce, this sitting there in conclave, this great examination, confined to one day and to the formal routine of questioning, but that it was known the true adjudicator of the prize was Dr. Brabazon, who had probably decided beforehand upon the victor. Essays and papers on various subjects had been prepared and given in previously by the candidates; these had been examined, and their respective merits adjudicated upon by the masters in their several departments, whose opinions as to individual merit were conveyed to the Head Master in sealed notes. It had been impossible for Mr. Henry to assign the palm in his branches, French and German, to any other than Paradyne; but the just impartial tone of his mind might be seen by the fact that he had appended to his decision a memorandum, calling the Head Master's attention to the fact of George Paradyne's partly foreign education; thus leaving it to Dr. Brabazon whether the proficiency should be allowed to weigh in the contest. He need not have troubled, for, after all, now that the trial had come, Paradyne did not go up for it.
A sort of disturbance took place the previous night about Paradyne. Mr. Jebb, made acquainted with the cabal in the quadrangle, had carried the grievance to the Head Master, and the candidates were called into the study, Paradyne excepted. Gall, who had come back, made one of them. Sir Simon Orville was sitting with the Master—which was unexpected. The question to be decided was this: was Paradyne, with his burden of inherited disgrace, to be allowed to compete for the Orville with themselves, who had no such inheritance, and repudiated all possibility of disgrace on their own score, present and future, and for their forefathers in the past. The matter was settled by Sir Simon, who scarcely allowed the Head Master to put in a word edgeways, even to acquiesce. He said that if Paradyne was excluded from the trial, his nephews, Loftus and Trace, should not go up for it, nor Gall either, for he should take upon himself to act for his friend, Gall the elder, who was a very particular enemy to oppression in any shape. It decided the question. Gall and Talbot at once spoke up, saying they had never wished Paradyne not to try; Loftus said the same; Brown major, with round eyes, avowed an opinion that it would be horribly unfair to Paradyne to deprive him of the chance, and he had always privately thought so, though he had gone in for the row against him. Dr. Brabazon dismissed the lot with a covert reprimand, and Trace, speaking a private word with Sir Simon, learnt that the man whom he had seen with Mr. Henry was not the dreaded Hopper. The news consoled Trace in some degree for this unwelcome decision, and he was uncharitable enough to hope that individual had been drowned.
But on this, the eventful morning, a note had been delivered to the Head Master from George Paradyne, saying he withdrew from the contest. And perhaps the master was not in his heart sorry, for it put an end to a matter of strife that had been somewhat difficult to deal with.
How had George Paradyne been won over to do this? you may be asking in surprise. In the first place, Hopper had—so to say—eaten his words. George had found out where he was staying, at a small obscure inn beyond the station, and went to him in the evening, pressing the man to say who was really guilty. Hopper could only be brought to respond in a joking, derisive sort of way; but insisted that the guilty man was really Captain Paradyne. "You know it was your father, after all," he said emphatically to George; and his look and tone were so sincere, that George's heart sunk, for the first time, with a doubt that it had been. In this frame of mind, his spirit subdued almost to despondency, George went round to Mr. Henry's; and when the latter urged him again to give up the Orville, George received the advice in silence.
"You think it right, then, that I should yield to this cabal against me?"
"It is not altogether that, George," said Mr. Henry, who was lying upon three chairs, and spoke slowly, as if in pain. "They are all against you, and perhaps it is not right that one should hold out in opposition to the many. Not on that account would I so strenuously urge it, but on another. There is little doubt that the real contest will lie between you and Trace."
"And as little doubt that I shall beat him in it," added George.
"Yes, I believe you would. Well, George, do a generous action and withdraw from it for his sake. Let Trace get it. That past wrong upon him can never be wiped out by us; but we, you and I, may do a trifle now and then of kindness to him, perform some little sacrifice or other in requital of it. I have been ever seeking for the opportunity since I came here; it is one reason why I have been always urging you to peaceful endurance, rather than active resentment; George, be generous now."
And George Paradyne was at length won over to this view. His mother, in her haughty resentment against the school for their treatment of him that day, had already urged it. The note of renouncement was written to the Head Master, and one candidate's chance for the coveted prize was over. It was made known just before the examination began, after the morning service in the chapel.