Ivy Compton-Burnett - Two Worlds and Their Ways

When the summons to Lucius came, he went with a sinking heart that he did not explain. The glances of the boys gave him a feeling he would not recognise. He could hardly believe it when he found his shadowy suspicions fulfilled. What was known as simple truth was simple indeed.

Lucius sat at his desk, with Mr. Spode and Mr. Bigwell at his hand. Their faces defined Sefton’s foreboding. As Lucius spoke, his heart was still.

“Sefton, I ask you to speak the truth, to show me you are a person who can speak it. You have had answers to the questions set by Mr. Spode?”

“Yes — yes, sir,” said Sefton realising that honesty was the best policy, at the usual moment of finding that other policies had failed.

“You have had books with the answers appended to them?”

“Yes; yes, sir,” said Sefton, preferring this picture to that of himself creeping forth by night to pursue the books to their place.

“Did you bring them from home?”

“They were with the books that were packed for me. I did not know what they were.”

“Did you think that copying the answers and faking the work above them was the proper use of them?”

“I did not know how to use them, sir. I think Miss Petticott looked first at the answers.”

Lucius looked him in the eyes, uncertain how far to accept this innocence. Mr. Spode and Mr. Bigwell kept their eyes averted, not being subject to the uncertainty.

“And had you translations of the books you read with Mr. Bigwell?”

“Well, I had read the book of extracts at home.”

“You did not say you had read it?”

“No, sir,” said Sefton, seeing that Mr. Bigwell recalled his saying he had not.

“And the other books you used? Had you translations of those?”

“I found some old ones in the classroom. I did not know at first we were not supposed to use them.”

“But you did not show them to the other boys?”

“No, sir,” said Sefton, weeping. “I wanted to do better than they did.”

“Even when you realised you were gaining credit that was not yours, you did not show them?” said Lucius, his tone suggesting that honour among wrong-doers rendered the latter more acceptable to him.

“No, sir. I thought that would make it more likely that it would be found out,” said Sefton, on an honest note.

“Well, go and fetch those books and bring them to me.”

“I can’t, sir. I have destroyed them. I put them on the fire. I wanted to stop using them before the examinations. I thought if I did not use them for those, it would not much matter my doing it before. And I did not use them for those. I did not open a single book all through them. I had not got the books any longer.” Sefton raised his eyes with a childish openness that was echoed in his tone.

“There was no sign that you did use them,” said Mr. Spode.

“You could not have done so,” said Mr. Bigwell. “The invigilation would have made it impossible.”

Sefton lifted his eyes again in innocent acceptance.

“So this was the reason of the sleep-walking and pallid looks,” said Lucius. “It was what you had on your mind.”

“Yes, sir,” said Sefton, causing his shoulders to rise, as though he felt the burden rolling off them.

“What made you so anxious to do better than the other boys?”

“My mother wanted it, sir, because of my father,” said Sefton, arousing in Lucius a familiar doubt whether to encourage parents in interest in their sons.

“We have never had to deal with such a protracted course of deceit.”

Sefton broke into natural tears, as the long stretch of weariness and effort surged over him.

“Your parents will feel more sorrow in your wrongdoing than they had pleasure in your success. I need hardly say that to your father’s son.”

“No, sir,” said Sefton, his eyes dilating as he grasped the possible result of his sacrifice.

“The masters cannot write a report of your work without mention of a thing so much involved in it,” said Lucius, in an empty tone, as though getting through what must be said. “And we could not take it upon ourselves to keep such a thing from your parents. We must not fail them because you have done so.”

“I suppose you do have to depend on them in any real thing to do with the boys.”

Sefton spoke under some strange urge, surprised by the directing force within himself. He saw the shaft go home, saw a gleam of hope and saw it fade, knew without seeing it the comprehension in the masters’ eyes.

“I am glad there has been no suggestion of trouble in your work for Mr. Dalziel.”

“No, sir. There was nothing in the books I had, to do with that,” said Sefton, as though the trouble in the other things were hardly to be referred to himself.

“You may go now. There is no more to say on the matter. I wish that words could mend it.”

“It is a sorry thing to see a child at bay,” said Mr. Bigwell. “We could only be ashamed of our own position.”

“He saw us as secure and pitiless,” said Mr. Spode, “and what is greater cause for shame? And a child is not what we think. We should not know, if we did not see it, that it was a child. That is a knowledge that has come to me.”

“The childishness of the whole affair is its saving grace,” said Lucius. “Thank you for giving me your time.”

“So he does not want to give us his,” said Mr. Spode in the passage. “He does not like to hear us doing justice to ourselves. Most of this trouble is saving grace. It is so gentle and aspiring a crime. That may be true of many crimes. It is righteousness that tends to lack quality.”

“Oh, it has more on the whole,” said Mr. Bigwell.

“The boy was surprised that it had not. I observed the boy.”

“I wonder what he is doing now. I hope not crying in the dormitory.”

“Your hope is realised. I can hear him with the other boys. He is vaunting himself and being puffed up.”

“I do not see he has cause for doing that.”

“I think I see why he does. The way of transgressors may be hard in a subtle sense.”

Sefton had intended to go upstairs and face alone the death of hope. He was not yet versed in the ways of his present world. In the passage, at a considered distance from the study, stood the three partners of his life, if not of his experience.

“What had the Head to say?” said Holland. “You have not lost a relation, have you? I mean, nobody is dead at home? It is just that you did your papers less well than your ordinary work?”

“Yes, of course it is that. Don’t you really know the game I have played?”

“We knew there was something. We began to guess. Had you cribs and keys and things?”

“Yes, of course I had. I have torn them all up now. I have watched their death in the flames. I wanted to see how far I could go without being suspected. And it was a pretty long way. What fools these masters are!”

“It is not a sign of intelligence to be easily suspicious,” said Bacon.

“I got rid of the keys before the examinations. I could not use them for those. It would not have been fair on the rest of you. And there is such a thing as going too far.”

“You did not stop far short of it. You went a pretty long way.”

“And I expect the Head thought so,” said Holland, “and said what he thought.”

“And you were not so fair to the rest of us as all that,” said Bacon. “We had to suffer through the term by comparison with you.”

“With your keys and cribs, which was worse,” said Sturgeon.

“Isn’t there going to be any trouble about it?” said Holland, in a baffled tone.

“Allusions on report, and all that,” said Sefton, in an airy manner, feeling this would satisfy any normal desire for justice.