Part 45 (2/2)

'I wish you had been here yesterday,' said Leonard; 'then you would not have found me so. No, not thankless, indeed!'

'No, indeed; but--yes, I see it was folly--nay, harshness, to expect you to be glad of what lies before you, my poor boy.'

'I am--am thankful,' said Leonard, struggling to make the words truth.

'Wednesday is off my mind--yes, it is more than I deserve--I knew I was not fit to die, and those at home are spared. But I am as much cut off from them--perhaps more--than by death. And it is the same disgrace to them, the same exile. I suppose Henry still goes--'

'Yes, he does.'

'Ah! then one thing, Dr. May--if you had a knife or scissors--I do not know how soon they may cut my hair, and I want to secure a bit for poor Ave.'

Dr. May was too handless to have implements of the first order, but a knife he had, and was rather dismayed at Leonard's reckless hacking at his bright s.h.i.+ning wavy hair, pulling out more than he cut, with perfect indifference to the pain. The Doctor stroked the chestnut head as tenderly as if it had been Gertrude's sunny curls, but Leonard started aside, and das.h.i.+ng away the tears that were overflowing his eyes under the influence of the gentle action, asked vigorously, 'Have you heard what they will do with me?'

'I do not know thoroughly. A year or six months maybe at one of the great model establishments, then probably you will be sent to some of the public works,' said the Doctor, sadly. 'Yes, it is a small boon to give you life, and take away all that makes life happy.'

'If it were only transportation!'

'Yes. In a new world you could live it down, and begin afresh. And even here, Leonard, I look to finding you like Joseph in his prison.'

'The iron entering into his soul!' said Leonard, with a mournful smile.

'No; in the trustworthiness that made him honoured and blessed even there. Leonard, Leonard, conduct _will_ tell. Even there, you can live this down, and will!'

'Eighteen to-morrow,' replied the boy. 'Fifty years of it, perhaps! I know G.o.d can help me through with it, but it is a long time to be patient!'

By way of answer, the Doctor launched into brilliant auguries of the impression the prisoner's conduct would produce, uttering a.s.surances, highly extravagant in his Wors.h.i.+p the Mayor, of the charms of the modern system of prison discipline, but they fell flat; there could be no disguising that penal servitude for life was penal servitude for life, and might well be bitterer than death itself. Sympathy might indeed be balm to the captive, but the good Doctor pierced his own breast to afford it, so that his heart sank even more than when he had left the young man under sentence of death. His least unavailing consolations were his own promises of frequent visits, and Aubrey's of correspondence, but they produced more of dejected grat.i.tude than of exhilaration. Yet it was not in the way of murmur or repining, but rather of 'suffering and being strong,' and only to this one friend was the suffering permitted to be apparent. To all the officials he was simply submissive and gravely resolute; impa.s.sive if he encountered sharpness or sternness, but alert and grateful towards kindliness, of which he met more and more as the difference between dealing with him and the ordinary prisoners made itself felt.

To Dr. May alone was the depth of pain betrayed; but another comforter proved more efficient in cheering the prisoner, namely, Mr. Wilmot, who, learning from the Doctor the depression of their young friend, hastened to endeavour at imparting a new spring of life on this melancholy birthday. Physically, the boy was better, and perhaps the new day had worn off somewhat of the burthen of antic.i.p.ation, for Mr.

Wilmot found him already less downcast, and open to consolation. It might be, too, that the sense that the present was to have been his last day upon earth, had made him more conscious of the relief from the immediate shadow of death, for he expressed his thankfulness far more freely and without the effort of the previous day.

'And, depend on it,' said Mr. Wilmot, 'you are spared because there is something for you to do.'

'To bear,' said Leonard.

'No, to do. Perhaps not immediately; but try to look on whatever you have to bear, not only as carrying the cross, as I think you already feel it--'

'Or there would be no standing it at all.'

'True,' said Mr. Wilmot; 'and your so feeling it convinces me the more that whatever may follow is likewise to be looked upon as discipline to train you for something beyond. Who knows what work may be in store, for which this fiery trial may be meant to prepare you?'

The head was raised, and the eyes brightened with something like hope in their fixed interrogative glance.

'Even as things are now, who knows what good may be done by the presence of a man educated, religious, unstained by crime, yet in the same case as those around him? I do not mean by quitting your natural place, but by merely living as you must live. You were willing to have followed your Master in His death. You now have to follow Him by living as one under punishment; and be sure it is for some purpose for others as well as yourself.'

'If there is any work to be done for Him, it is all right,' said Leonard, cheerily; and as Mr. Wilmot paused, he added, 'It would be like working for a friend--if I may dare say so--after the hours when this place has been made happy to me. I should not mind anything if I might only feel it working for Him.'

'Feel it. Be certain of it. As you have realized the support of that Friend in a way that is hardly granted, save in great troubles, so now realize that every task is for Him. Do not look on the labour as hards.h.i.+p inflicted by mistaken authority--'

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