It is a matter for speculation as to what extent environment can smother natural impulses. Surrounded on all sides by convention and routine, the spark of originality is in a fair way to become dampened or altogether extinguished.
Such was the case with Wynne Rendall. He was half confident that many existing ideals were not ideals at all, and that much that was desirable to develop was wilfully undeveloped; but weighing in the balance against this view were the actions and opinions of those with whom he came into contact. Was it, then, he who was at fault? A glance to the right and left seemed to point to that conclusion. And yet there was nature to support his view: nature with its thousand intricate moods of growth and illumination—nature who pranked the water to laughing wavelets and tasselled the sky with changing clouds—nature who made night a castle of mystery where invisible kings held court, and mischievous hobgoblins gobbled at the fairies’ toes as they tripped it beneath the laurel bushes in the garden. Surely, surely these things mattered more greatly than half-past eight breakfast, and the 9:15 to town? Surely there was greater happiness to be found thinking of these than in flinging a ball at ninepins or kicking it through a goal?
And yet his father beat him because he drew a fairy, and his mother threatened him with an early bed when he desired to do as others had never done before.
His brother and sister played at “shop,” and comforted their parents exceedingly by so doing. They never asked “silly questions,” he was constantly told. They were all right, and only he was wrong.
VIII
It is hard indeed to preserve faith with so great a consensus of opinion against one, and it is probable Wynne Rendall would have dulled into a very ordinary lad had it not been for a chance visit from his father’s brother. Wynne had often heard his parents speak of Clem Rendall. They referred to him as a “ne’er-do-well,” a term which Wynne took to imply a person who did not go to the City in the morning.
“Idle and good for nothing,” said his father—“never do anything useful in this world.”
If by doing anything useful he implied the achievement of business success his remarks were certainly true, and yet there were features in Clementine Rendall which called for and deserved a kindlier mention.
He was born, it will be remembered, at a time when his father’s virility had to some extent abated. He was, in a way, an old man’s child, free from all ambitions toward personal advancement. Heredity had endowed him with imagination, appreciation, a charming exterior, a fascinating address, and an infinite capacity for doing nothing. At the clubs—and he was a member of many—his appearance was always greeted with enthusiasm. Few men could claim a greater popularity with both men and women, and his generosity was as unfailing as his good humour.
There was no real occasion for Clementine Rendall to work, for he had inherited what little money his father had to leave, and a comfortable fortune from his mother, which he made no effort to enlarge.