Then Oliver heard all that sad story with which the reader is now familiar. How that first act of fraud about the rod had been the beginning of all this misery. How Cripps had used his advantage to drive the boy from one wickedness and folly to another—from deceit to gambling, from gambling to debt, from debt to more deceit, and so on. How drinking, low company, and vicious habits had followed. How all the while he was trying to keep up appearances at the school, though he saw that he was gradually becoming an object of dislike to his fellows. How he had staked everything—his whole hope of getting free from Cripps—on the result of the Nightingale examination; and how, when the critical moment came, he yielded to the tempter and stole the paper.
“And you can fancy how punished I was when, after all, the Doctor missed the paper and altered the questions, Greenfield. I was so taken aback that I didn’t even answer as well as I could. And then I lost the paper I had stolen—couldn’t find it anywhere, and for weeks I was in constant terror lest it should turn up. Then I saw the fellows were all suspecting you to be the thief, and you know how meanly I took advantage of that to hide my own guilt. Oh, Greenfield, what a wretch, what a miserable wretch I have been!”
“Poor fellow!” said Oliver, with true sympathy. “But, I say, do let’s be going back, it’s getting late, and looks as if it might rain.”
“I must tell you the rest, Greenfield, please. You’re the only fellow I can tell it to. Somehow I think if I’d had a friend like you all the last year I shouldn’t have gone wrong as I have. How I used to envy you and Wraysford, always together, and telling one another your troubles! Well, of course, after the Nightingale exam, things were worse than ever. I’d given Cripps a bill, you know, a promise to pay in September. I don’t know anything about bills, but he made me sign it. Of course I couldn’t pay when it came due, and had to make all sorts of excuses and tell all sorts of lies to get him to give me more time; as if I was more likely to pay later on than then! But, somehow, if I could only get the thing off my mind for the present, I felt that was all I cared about. He gave in at last, and I was able to pay it off bit by bit. But I was in constant terror all that term of his coming up to Saint Dominic’s. You know he did come once, at the football match against Landfield, and I thought I was done for.”
Here Loman paused a moment, and Oliver, seeing that he was determined to tell his story to the end, waited patiently till he continued.
“Then there was that Waterston exam. I fancied I might get that if I worked. Ass that I was to think, after all my wasted time and sin, I had any chance against you or Wraysford! I tried to work, but soon gave it up, and went on going down to the Cockchafer instead, to keep Cripps in good humour, till I was quite a regular there. You know what a fearful hash I made of the exam. I could answer nothing. That very day Cripps had sent up to threaten to tell the Doctor everything unless I paid what I still owed. I had paid off all the bill but eight pounds. I had got some of it from home, and some of it by gambling; I’d paid off all but eight pounds. You know, Greenfield, who lent me that.”
“I’m thankful we were able to do it,” said Oliver.
“If you’d known how I hated you and despised myself over that eight pounds you would hardly have been glad. Everything was hateful. I took the money down to Cripps and paid it him. He pretended at first that he wouldn’t take it; and then when he did, and I asked him to give me back my promissory note, he laughed at me. I nearly went mad, Greenfield, at the thought of not being clear after all. At length he did make believe to give in, and produced what I thought was the bill, and tore it up in my presence. I couldn’t see it, but he read it out aloud, and I had no doubt it was actually the thing. I was so grateful I actually felt happy. But then came the discovery of that miserable exam paper. I must have left it in my Juvenal last September, and forgotten all about it. I was certain the Doctor knew quite well I was the thief, but I denied it and tried feebly to put it on you. Then everybody cut me; but I hoped still all might blow over in time. But every day it became harder to bear; I should have had to confess at last, I believe. Then came Cripps’s final villainy. He had never destroyed my bill after all, but now calmly claimed the whole amount.”
“The scoundrel!” exclaimed Oliver, indignantly.
“I had no receipts to show what I had paid, and of course was at his mercy. This last move really drove me half crazy. I daren’t tell any one about it. I was too desperate to think of anything but running away and hiding somewhere. I had no money. I came to you with a lie to try to borrow a pound, so that I might go somewhere by train. You couldn’t do it, and so I had to walk, and—and—oh! Greenfield, what shall I do? what will become of me?”