William in Trouble Read online

  ‘I’m not,’ said the excavator pugnaciously. ‘You ever met an ole Roman wolf?’

  The objector had to admit that he had not had this experience.

  ‘Well then,’ said William triumphantly, ‘how do you know how they useter go on? I tell you that all ole Roman wolfs useter suck folks. It says so in the book. It’s just like dogs lickin’ folks to show that they’re pleased. Well, this tin is the tin what the wolf what sucked Romus an’ Remus useter drink out of—’

  Henry with his little wooden spade had unearthed a small dish. William carefully wiped it and examined it, adjusting his blue spectacles with a flourish and uttering the while his dramatic exclamations of surprised interest. Any member of William’s household would have recognised the soap-dish from William’s bedroom, but, fortunately for William, no members of his household were there.

  ‘Why, this is the basin where Julia washed the sailors’ hands,’ he said at last.

  There was a murmur of pleased recognition. That came in Exercise II. Most of them had got so far.

  ‘There’s a bit o’ soap still left in,’ said William, holding up a fragment of coal tar soap for inspection, ‘so that proves it.’

  Then he hastily passed on before anyone could challenge his deduction.

  Douglas was holding up a piece of wood.

  ‘Part of an ole Roman mensa,’ said William with an air of conscious scholarship which was both deprecating and proud.

  Next came the gem of the collection, a battered, once white cloth goose with a broken yellow beak, which Henry had taken, together with the spade, from his furiously protesting small sister.

  William rubbed this drooping creature with his earth-sodden handkerchief, and gave a well-simulated start of amazement.

  ‘Why, this,’ he said, ‘is one of the geese what woke the Capitol.’ He held it up. Its head drooped limply on to one side, ‘dead now, o’ course,’ he added.

  The boys in front demanded to handle the body, and were sternly refused.

  ‘’Course not,’ said William. ‘You don’ know how to hold the things. It’d drop into dust ’f you caught hold of it. Don’ you remember in that Tootman’s tomb the things dropped into dust? You’ve gotter be very careful. I know how to hold it so’s it won’t drop into dust an’ you don’t.’

  ‘Why’d it wake the Capitol?’ piped the small boy at the back.

  William had merely read the title of the story in his book, but as the story itself was in the Latin language, he had not been able to make himself further acquainted with it. But William was never at a loss.

  ‘’Cause it was time for him to get up, of course,’ he said crushingly.

  The next ‘discoveries’ followed thick and fast – a Roman hatpin, a Roman pipe, a Roman toasting fork and a Roman tennis ball. Upon all of these the excavator held forth eloquently with great empressement if little accuracy. The audience was warming to the game. Each ‘discovery’ was cheered loudly and the account of the excavator challenged at every detail. The excavator liked that. His eloquence thrived on contradiction. He proved conclusively that the little figure of the Lincoln Imp upon the hatpin was the figure of one of the Roman gods, ‘Joppiter or Minevus or one of ’em – or I don’ say it isn’t Romus or Remus or the wolf.’

  ‘Or the goose,’ put in the small boy at the back.

  ‘Yes,’ said William kindly, ‘I don’ say it isn’t the goose.’

  He proved too, from the presence of a pipe among his other ‘discoveries’, that smoking, far from having been discovered by Sir Walter Scott, as the small boy insisted, had been one of the favourite pastimes of Julius Cæsar during his residence in England. An empty match box, lying not far from the other discoveries, said by the excavator upon examination, to be ‘mos’ cert’nly ole Roman,’ was admitted by most of those present to be conclusive proof of this.

  The ‘discoveries’ might have gone on indefinitely had not Farmer Jenks appeared upon the scene. The sight of the Outlaws had that effect upon Farmer Jenks that the proverbial ‘red rag’ is supposed to have upon the proverbial bull. When the Outlaws weren’t climbing his fences, they were treading down his meadowland, or walking through his corn or climbing his trees or birds’ nesting in his woods. They didn’t seem to be able to live without trespassing on his land.

  Farmer Jenks spent a good deal of time and energy chasing the Outlaws. On this occasion he first saw a crowd of boys (he hated boys) on the public path that bordered his ploughed field. He then noticed that the crowd was distinctly encroaching upon his ploughed land. Finally he saw ‘that boy’ (thus always in his mind he designated William) and the rest of them actually digging up his field. He rushed at them with a yell of fury.

  The chief excavator, with great presence of mind, caught up the basket in which his ‘finds’ had been placed, jumped across the ditch, and scrambled through a hole in the hedge. The others followed.

  Farmer Jenks had outgrown the youthful slimness of his earlier days. Even the occasional physical exercise which the pursuit of the Outlaws gave him had done little to keep down his weight. He was just in time to seize the smallest boy (who was the last to attempt the hole in the hedge) by the scruff of his neck.

  The smallest boy, though of inconsiderable stature, possessed well-developed teeth which, with a quick twist of his neck, he planted firmly in Farmer Jenks’ detaining hand. Farmer Jenks released him with a yell, and the small boy, smiling sweetly to himself, scraped through the hole and trotted as quickly as he could after the others, who were already disappearing in the distance.

  Farmer Jenks turned wrathfully and began to kick back the earth into the hole.

  William reached home breathless, but, on the whole, satisfied with his afternoon. He’d given them a better show than that ole man with the white beard, anyway. He didn’t seem to know how to make things interesting. Fancy digging up nothing but bits of ole pot and dirty ole halfpennies. Anyone’d get tired of watching that all day.

  William carried the basket containing his ‘finds’ up to his bedroom, and there amused himself by taking them out one by one and holding forth to an imaginary audience. He thought of a lot more things to say. He wished he could do it all over again. He could do it heaps better. He heard his father come in with a visitor and stopped a dramatic account of the meeting of Romus and Remus and the wolf in the wood to go and lean over the banisters to see who it was. Crumbs! it was the little old man with the white beard.

  He returned very slowly to his bedroom. He did not continue the account of the meeting of Romus and Remus with the wolf. Instead, he tried to express to an imaginary accuser the fact that p’raps he might have shot the catapult by mistake. Yes, he remembered distinctly holding it in his hand, and he admitted that it might have gone off by mistake when he wasn’t looking. They did sometimes. He was very sorry if he hit anyone, very sorry indeed. He remembered when it went off by mistake hoping that it hadn’t hit anyone, because he always tried to be very careful with it and hold it so that if it went off by mistake it wouldn’t hit anyone.

  William practised in his looking-glass for a few minutes the sort of face that went with the foregoing sentiments, and having achieved a look of blank imbecility which he fondly imagined to express concern and contrition, he went downstairs, his features still carefully composed.

  Determining to get the worst over at once, he entered the drawing-room where his father sat conversing with the visitor. William sat down by the door and stared at the visitor. On his entrance into the room his features had, unknown to himself, taken on an expression of pugnacious fury, and the ferocious glare which he turned on the innocent old man would have reduced any of William’s own followers to instant subjection. The old man, however, met it blandly enough.

  ‘Is that the little boy?’ he asked. ‘Come nearer, my little fellow,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid I can hardly see you over there. I’m so near-sighted that I can hardly see across a room.’

  William’s expression softened. He liked old men who we
re so near-sighted that they could hardly see across a room. It meant that they were so near-sighted that they could hardly see across a field at the end of which a small boy might stand with a catapult which had a habit of going off by mistake.

  William shook hands with the benign old man, who then immediately went on with his conversation with William’s father.

  ‘Yes, we’ve got some most interesting exhibits – most interesting. Your valley has proved indeed a most fruitful field.’

  ‘When do you finish?’ asked Mr Brown.

  ‘On Saturday. The discoveries cannot, of course, be moved till next week. I shall send off the bulk of them on Friday, but the half-dozen or so more valuable ones I shall take up myself on Saturday. The vicar has asked me to be present at the Village Social on Saturday evening and give the people a little talk with an exhibition of the chief discoveries before I take them away. It will, of course, be highly educative for them. A few came to watch the excavations, but on the whole I was disappointed – disappointed. A good many boys came on Wednesday afternoon. It would have been an experience – a cultural experience – that they would have remembered all their lives – but they soon tired of it and went over to another part of the valley to join in some childish game, I suppose. The modern child lacks perseverance. I fear that it was one of those children who projected some missile across the field the evening before, which precipitated me into the trench and obliged me to swallow a large amount of moist earth.’

  William’s father threw a quick glance of suspicion at William, who had hastily composed his features into their expression of blank imbecility in readiness to receive that glance.

  It was arranged, before William left the room, that the Professor was to dine at the Browns’ on Saturday evening before he went on to the Village Social.

  William’s pride as an excavator was piqued. If that old man was going to give a show of his finds so would William. He lost no time in making preparations. The old barn was jolly well as good as the Village Hall any day, and while the adults of the village were listening to the old man lecturing on his discoveries in the Village Hall, William decided that the youth of the village should be listening to him lecturing on his discoveries in the old barn.

  Moreover, he’d be able to prepare a few more ‘discoveries’. It was duly announced that William was going to hold a ‘show’ of his discoveries and lecture on them, and it seemed as though the youth of the village meant to be there in force. Anything might happen at one of William’s ‘shows.’ They were things not be missed. They rarely turned out as they were meant to turn out, and there was always a chance of their ending in a free fight.

  Saturday evening arrived and Professor Porson arrived at the Browns’ house for dinner. He left his bag of ‘exhibits’ in the hall and went into the drawing-room. William never scorned to learn from an expert. He wanted to do the thing properly. As soon as the drawing-room door shut, he hastened to examine his rival’s preparations. William’s own exhibits were still in the basket in which he had brought them from the field. He examined the bag first of all. Why, his father had a brown leather bag just exactly like that. He’d ‘borrow’ his father’s bag for his things. He opened the bag. They looked a mouldy lot of things, anyway. His were a jolly sight more exciting.

  But he noticed that to each of them was attached a number. All right. He’d stick numbers on all his things, too. He went upstairs, ‘borrowed’ his father’s leather bag from his dressing-room, and some labels from his desk, and then set to work fixing the labels on to his exhibits.

  Soon he had them all labelled and arranged in the brown bag. He took it downstairs (fortunately meeting no one on the way), put it in the hall near the old Professor’s, looked at it with deep and burning pride, and then went to join his family.

  William always insisted that he was not to blame for what happened.

  He didn’t take the wrong bag. The old man did that. The old man went out of the house first and he took up the only brown bag he could see, which happened to be William’s father’s bag ‘borrowed’ by William.

  His own bag happened to be in the shadow of the hall table – exactly where he himself had put it, as William later repeatedly told his accusers. He insisted that he hadn’t touched the old man’s bag, he’d only put his down near it, and he couldn’t help it if the old man took the wrong one. It wasn’t his fault. Well, and if his bag spoilt the old man’s show, he could jolly well tell them the old man’s bag had jolly well spoilt his.

  But all this comes afterwards. The Professor was rather late for his lecture, as the result of having talked too long to Mrs Brown on the subject of hypocausts in Roman villas. The conversation had been very one-sided, because Mrs Brown was somewhat vague as to the exact meaning of the term. At the beginning of the conversation she thought that they were prehistoric animals, and at the end had a vague idea that they had something to do with kitchen flues. But the professor had four cups of her excellent coffee, and drank them with leisurely enjoyment while he wandered from hypocausts to tessellated pavements (Mrs Brown confused these with macadam pavement, and murmured that she understood that they were less dangerous for skidding), then, realising with a start that he ought to have departed at least ten minutes ago, he uttered hasty thanks and apologies and farewells, seized a bag from the hall, and fled out into the night.

  About five minutes later, William might have been observed to creep downstairs, stealthily, seize the remaining bag, and also flee out into the night.

  The Professor hurried up on the stage and faced his audience. The Village Hall was crowded. A Whist Drive was to follow the Professor’s discourse, and upon the faces of most members of his audience was an expression of suffering patience. After all, the expressions seemed to say, it would only last half-an-hour. They might as well go through with it.

  The Professor scuttled across the stage to the table in the centre, where waited a lanky youth who was to help him to display the exhibits. The Professor placed his bag on to the table.

  ‘I must go and stand over there by the light,’ he said in a hasty whisper. ‘I’ll read my notes from there. The exhibits are numbered. All you have to do is to find the number I call out and hold it up in sight of the audience while I read the appropriate remarks upon it. We are, I think, ready – I’ll go over to the light.’

  There was a feeble burst of applause as the Professor cleared his throat, took up his position beneath the light at the side of the stage and unfolded his little sheaf of notes. He then adjusted his spectacles. When wearing them he could barely discern an object two yards away. He held his notes close to his eyes and began to read.

  ‘Exhibit No. 1?’ he announced.

  The lanky youth searched in the bag and finally, with an expression of interest and surprise, brought out the battered, grimy cloth goose which belonged to Henry’s sister. It certainly bore a label on its neck with Number I inscribed upon it. He held it up to the audience. Its neck, which had lost most of its stuffing, hung limply on to one side. Its broken beak wobbled pathetically.

  ‘This delightful little object,’ read the Professor, ‘must have been the pride of the Roman villa which enshrined it. We are lucky, indeed, to have secured it. It argues its possessors to be people of taste and culture. Its exquisite grace and beauty prove it, I think, beyond doubt to be of Greek workmanship, and make it, I may tell you at once, the gem of the collection.’

  The hideous face of the goose upon its wobbling neck leered comically at the audience.

  ‘Observe,’ went on the lecturer, still reading from his notes, ‘observe the grace of posture, the clarity of outline, the whole dignity and beauty of this little objet d’art.’

  Someone applauded half-heartedly, and the audience seemed to begin to wake up. Some there were – earnest souls and seekers after knowledge – who at the Professor’s words immediately gazed at Henry’s sister’s goose and conscientiously saw in it such an object of beauty as the Professor had described. Some there were who had
a dim suspicion that something must be wrong and looked bewildered. Some there were who had a sudden glorious conviction that something was wrong, and from their faces the expressions of boredom were disappearing as if by magic. Some there were who had come to sleep and had already attained their object.

  ‘No. 2,’ called out the Professor.

  The lanky youth examined the contents of the bag and at last brought out the toasting fork. There are some dainty toasting-forks that might grace a drawing-room, but this was not of that fashion. It was unmistakably a kitchen toasting-fork made to fulfil its primary function of toasting rather than conform to any known standard of beauty. It was large and stout and rusty. It bore a label marked 2. The lanky youth held it up.

  ‘THIS DELIGHTFUL OBJECT,’ READ THE PROFESSOR, ‘MUST HAVE BEEN THE PRIDE OF THE ROMAN VILLA WHICH ENSHRINED IT. ITS EXQUISITE GRACE AND BEAUTY MAKE IT THE GEM OF THE COLLECTION.’

  ‘Exhibit No. 2,’ said the Professor, his notes held closely up to his spectacled eyes. ‘This little article of feminine adornment is a fibula or Roman brooch. It is, you will remark, somewhat larger than the brooch of the modern daughter of Eve, and the reason for that is that it was used to pin the lady’s garment together upon the shoulder, and so a certain strength and firmness was required. You will agree that its greater beauty of design is sufficient recompense for its larger size in comparison with its modern descendant. I want you to admire in this the beauty of design and the exquisite workmanship.’

  SOMEONE APPLAUDED HALF-HEARTEDLY, AND THE AUDIENCE SEEMED TO BEGIN TO WAKE UP.

  These statements were received with ironical cheers by some of the audience, but the Professor was on the staff of one of our great Universities, and was quite accustomed to his statements being received with ironical cheers.

  The sleepers were awaking. Those who had realised that something was wrong were beginning thoroughly to enjoy the evening. Only the few honest seekers after culture were following the Professor’s speech with earnest attention, looking with reverent eyes at Henry’s sister’s goose and Ginger’s kitchen’s toasting-fork, and seeing in them that strange beauty that they tried so conscientiously to see in things they ought to see it in. They knew that to be really cultured you had to make yourself see beauty in things that you knew in your heart to be ugly. Their only consolation for the effort this entailed was their feeling of superiority over the common herd that it left behind. . . .