Wadsworth Camp - The Guarded Heights

The renewed racket at the tub pursued him until he had placed a screen of foliage between himself and the little house. His last recollection of home, indeed, was of swollen hands and swollen eyes, and of clean, white tears dropping into offensive water.

He got his money and walked past the great house and down the driveway. He would not see home again. At a turn near the gate he caught his breath, his eyes widening. The vague chance had after all materialized. Sylvia walked briskly along, accompanied by a vicious-looking bulldog on a leash. Her head was high and her shoulders square, as she always carried them. Her eyes sparkled. Then she saw George, and she paused, her expression altering into an active distaste, her cheeks flushing with tempestuous colour.

"I can't go back now," George thought.

She seemed to visualize all that protected her from him. He put his cheap suitcase down.

"I'm glad I saw you," he said, deliberately. "I wanted to thank you for having me fired, for waking me up."

She didn't answer. She stood quite motionless. The dog growled, straining at his leash toward the man in the road.

"I've been told to get out and stay out," he went on, his temper lashed by her immobility. "You know I meant what I said yesterday when I thought you couldn't hear. I did. Every last word. And you might as well understand now I'll make every word good."

He pointed to the gate.

"I'm going out there just so I can come back and prove to you that I don't forget."

Her colour fled. She stooped swiftly, gracefully, and unleashed the anxious bulldog.

"Get him!" she whispered, tensely.

Like a shot the dog sprang for George. He caught the animal in his arms and submitted to its moist and eager caresses.

"It's a mistake," he pointed out, "to send a dog that loves the stables after a stable boy."

He dropped the dog, picked up his suitcase, and started down the drive. The dog followed him. He turned.

"Go back, Roland!"

Sylvia remained crouched. She cried out, her contralto voice crowded with surprise and repulsion:

"Take him with you. I never want to see him again."

So, followed by the dog, George walked bravely out into the world through the narrow gateway of her home.

"Young man, you've two years' work to enter."

"Just when," George asked, "does college open?"

"If the world continues undisturbed, in about two months."

"Very well. Then I'll do two years' work in two months."

"You've only one pair of eyes, my boy; only one brain."

George couldn't afford to surrender. He had arrived in Princeton the evening before, a few hours after leaving Oakmont. It had been like a crossing between two planets. Breathlessly he had sought and found a cheap room in a students' lodging house, and afterward, guided by the moonlight, he had wandered, spellbound, about the campus.

Certainly this could not be George Morton, yesterday definitely divided from what Old Planter had described as human beings. His exaltation grew. For a long time he walked in an amicable companionship of broader spaces and more arresting architecture than even Oakmont could boast; and it occurred to him, if he should enter college, he would have as much share in all this as the richest student; at Princeton he would live in the Great House.

His mood altered as he returned to his small, scantily furnished room whose very unloveliness outlined the difficulties that lay ahead.

He unpacked his suitcase and came upon Sylvia's photograph and her broken riding crop. In the centre of the table, where he would work, he placed the photograph with a piece of the crop on either side. Whenever he was alone in the room those objects would be there, perpetual lashes to ambition; whenever he went out he would lock them away.

How lovely and desirable she was! How hateful! How remote! Had ever a man such a goal to strain for? He wanted only to start.

Immediately after breakfast the next morning he set forth. He had never seen a town so curiously empty. There were no students, since it was the long vacation, except a few backward men and doubtful candidates for admission. He stared by daylight at the numerous buildings which were more imposing now, more suggestive of learning, wealth, and breeding. They seemed to say they had something for him if only he would fight hard enough to receive it.

First of all, he had to find someone who knew the ropes. There must be professors here, many men connected with this gigantic plant. On Nassau Street he encountered a youth, a little younger than himself, who, with a bored air, carried three books under his arm. George stopped him.

"I beg your pardon. Are you going here?"

The other looked him over as if suspecting a joke.

"Going where?" he asked, faintly.

George appraised the fine quality of the young man's clothing. He was almost sorry he had spoken. The first thing he had to do was to overcome a reluctance to speak to people who obviously already had much that he was after.

"I mean," he explained, "are you going to this college?"

"The Lord," the young man answered, "and Squibs Bailly alone know. I'm told I'm not very bright in the head."

George smiled.

"Then I guess you can help me out. I'm not either. I want to enter in the fall, and I need a professor or something like that to teach me. I'll pay."

The other nodded.

"You need a coach. Bailly's a good one. I'm going there now to be told for two hours I'm an utter ass. Maybe I am, but what's the use rubbing it in? I don't know that he's got any open time, but you might come along and see."

George, his excitement increasing, walked beside his new acquaintance.

"What's your name?" the bored youth asked all at once.

"Morton. George Morton."

"I'm Godfrey Rogers. Lawrenceville. What prep are you?"

"What what?"

"I mean, what school you come from?"

George experienced a sharp discomfort, facing the first of his unforeseen embarrassments. Evidently his simple will to crush the past wouldn't be sufficient.

"I went to a public school off and on," he muttered.

Rogers' eyes widened. George had a feeling that the boy had receded. It wasn't until later, when he had learned the customs of the place, that he could give that alteration its logical value. It made no difference. He had a guide. Straightway he would find a man who could help him get in; but he noticed that Rogers abandoned personalities, chatting only of the difficulties of entrance papers, and the apparent mad desire of certain professors to keep good men from matriculating.

They came to a small frame house on Dickinson Street. Rogers left George in the hall while he entered the study. The door did not quite close, and phrases slipped out in Rogers' glib voice, and, more frequently, in a shrill, querulous one.

"Don't know a thing about him. Just met him on the street looking for a coach. No prep."

"Haven't the time. I've enough blockheads as it is. He'd better go to Corse's school."

"You won't see him?"

"Oh, send him in," George heard Bailly say irritably. "You, Rogers, would sacrifice me or the entire universe to spare your brain five minutes' useful work. I'll find out what he knows, and pack him off to Corse. Wait in the hall."

Rogers came out, shaking his head.

"Guess there's nothing doing, but he'll pump you."

George entered and closed the door. Behind a table desk lounged a long, painfully thin figure. The head was nearly bald, but the face carried a luxuriant, carelessly trimmed Van Dyke beard. Above it cheeks and forehead were intricately wrinkled, and the tweed suit, apparently, strove to put itself in harmony. It was difficult to guess how old Squibs Bailly was; probably very ancient, yet in his eyes George caught a flashing spirit of youth.