The “Dominican” comes round.
The Fifth were a good while coming round on the question of Greenfield senior. But the delay was more on account of pride than because they still considered their old class-fellow a knave. They had taken up such a grand position last term, and talked so magnificently about honour, and morality, and the credit of the school, that it was a sad come-down now to have to admit they had all been wrong, and still more that they had all been fools. And yet, after what had happened, they could no longer retain their suspicions of Oliver Greenfield.
A few of the better sort, like Pembury and Bullinger, had the courage, at whatever cost, to act up to their convictions, and declared at once that they had been wrong, and were ashamed of it.
The next step was to approach Oliver, and that was more difficult, for he was such a queer fellow there was no knowing where to have him. However, Pembury’s wit helped him over the difficulty as usual.
He was hobbling down the passage one morning when he suddenly encountered Oliver and Wraysford, arm-in-arm, approaching him. If at any time in his life Pembury did feel uncomfortable and awkward he felt it now. If he let Oliver go by this time without making it up somehow, the chance might never come again; but how to set about it, that was the difficulty, and every half-second brought the two nearer. Twenty different ideas flashed through his mind. He was not the sort of fellow to go to any one and eat humble-pie straight off. That was far too tame a proceeding. No, there was only one way he could think of, and he would chance that.
“Noll, old man,” said he, in the old familiar tones, “you’ve got a spare arm. May I take it?”
Oliver stopped short and looked at him for an instant in astonishment. Next moment, with a hearty “Rather!” he slipped his arm into that of the happy Pembury, and the three went on their way rejoicing, a sight and a moral for all Saint Dominic’s.
That was the whole of Anthony Pembury’s making up. As for Bullinger, he wrote his man a letter, worded in beautiful English, in the most elegant handwriting and punctuated to a nicety, setting forth his contrition, and his hope that Greenfield would henceforth reckon him among his friends—“Yours very sincerely, H. Bullinger.” This literary effort he carefully dispatched by a Guinea-pig to its destination, and awaited a reply with the utmost impatience. The reply was laconic, but highly satisfactory. It was a verbal one, given by Oliver himself in class that afternoon, who volunteered the information to the delighted Bullinger that it was a “jolly day.”
It was indeed a jolly day to that contrite youth. He never believed it would all be got over so easily. He had dreaded all sorts of scenes and lectures and humiliations, but here he was, by a single word, passed back straight into friendship, and no questions asked.
The sight of Oliver surrounded by these three friends, of whom it would have been hard to say which was the happiest, made a deep impression on the rest of the Fifth, and certainly did not tend to make them feel more comfortable as to what they ought to do in a similar direction.