Part 5 (1/2)

”What I call an all-round-man?” Ames looked bewildered.

”I mean,” Waters continued, with desperate efforts to explain himself, ”I mean the man who is rather good all round, rows, and that sort of thing. Perhaps he didn't get a First; didn't care much what he got, didn't approve of the system.”

Ames seemed busy looking for his gla.s.ses.

”There are people who don't approve of the system,” Waters went on. ”I read an article once by someone, Professor something, not approving of examinations. I forget just who it was.”

”Professor Freeman, perhaps?”

”Yes, that's it! Well now, a man like that, what is he going to do?”

Waters asked, with renewed confidence.

”But Professor Freeman is dead, you know.”

”But,--but,--I'm not speaking of Professor Freeman.”

”How would you like to be a solicitor?” Ames asked, putting on his gla.s.ses.

”A solicitor! oh, I shouldn't care for that,” Waters promptly replied.

”You see it isn't the kind of work I like, and then the vacations are too short.”

Ames said nothing. He was sitting unusually still, and his large gla.s.ses reflecting the light, resembled two enormous s.h.i.+ning oval eyes in the smoothness of his face. What he was really looking at Waters could not tell, and he grew more and more uncomfortable. At last, with diminished confidence, ”There _are_ men who get on well at the Bar?” he said.

”There are.”

”And if I were living in London I might do some writing? They do that, don't they?”

”They do.” Then Ames sighed and shook his head. ”I think you had better go home, Waters,” he added; ”I'm afraid there's nothing else. If you had spoken to me before, I should have told you this.”

”Oh, good Lord, Mr. Ames, you don't mean there's nothing!” Waters sat up in his chair, with open mouth, staring at his tutor.

”Well, you know, I'm afraid there isn't.”

”Oh but, Mr. Ames, there must be something!”

”Well you can try; but honestly, I think you had--if your father can have you--I think you had better go home.”

Waters looked at him. ”He knows I helped to paint his door red last week,” the young man muttered to himself, ”and now he's furious about it.”

But the comfort of this ebbed away gradually, as Ames went on to describe the different professions, the struggle for success, the cruel compet.i.tion. Ames indeed seemed to have focussed himself, and instead of the vague astonished way in which he was wont to speak of practical affairs, he now showed a precision, and clearness, and knowledge of life that was really appalling. ”I am sorry it is so, Waters,” he ended. ”We live pleasantly here, and we almost forget what the world outside is like.”

”I do think some one might have told me, Mr. Ames; I do indeed.” Waters could have cried with disappointment.

”You would never have believed it, Waters; we none of us can believe that the world doesn't need us. It's hard, but whether we live or die, the world doesn't care, can get on perfectly well without us. We each have to find it out for ourselves.” He sighed as if he too had once known youth and hope, and the indifference of the world.

”But, Mr. Ames, I can't go home, indeed I can't. My other brother was going into the business, and I always told people,--and everybody supposed,--and to think that all my time here is wasted.”

”Oh, not exactly wasted,” Ames answered kindly. ”It will always help you, to be an Oxford man, and you will be sure to find it pleasanter at home than you expected.” Then beginning again to look at his papers, he added, more in his old distant way, ”I'll see you again, I hope, before you go down. They'll miss you in College,” he added politely, as Waters moved towards the door. ”I'm sure the 'Torpid'--”

”I might be a solicitor, Mr. Ames,” Waters said in a meek voice, as he stood disconsolately, his hand on the door-k.n.o.b.