The Elderbrook Brothers Read Online Free PDF Page A

submit, gracefully or sullenly: they will listen, willingly or woodenly. But they will not change themselves by one iota. He sighed, for the gentle stubbornness of children sometimes maddened him. The school entrance and the playground were not visible from the garden, but the boys’ voices reached him, loud and clear, across the distance that intervened, reminding him that he had other things to do than stare at his beloved salix babylonica, or weeping willow, ancient and benign umbrella of many a flattered senior class of boys. He must now go to his study and receive, one by one, any new boys who might be arriving this Easter term.
    The study, situated on the top floor of the headmaster’s private quarters, had for the school the effect of a tower-room, which the boys could approach only by way of an iron spiral stair running from the level of the playground up the outside wall of the house. It was an attractive ascent, with j ust enough suggestion of danger and desolation to tickle the fancy of an imaginative child: such as the slim, coltish, large-eared little boy who, under instructions from certain elders, came stamping his way up.
    â€˜Come in,’ said Mr Williams.
    He sat at his desk, pen in hand, a number of open books spread out in front of him. The assault on the outer door was repeated. It was, he knew, a difficult door to open.
    â€˜Come in, come in, come
in!’
he cried impatiently. ‘Ah!’ he said, recovering his good humour; for someone had indeed come in. ‘A new boy, I think?’
    â€˜Yes, sir,’ said the new boy.
    Already he had heard the headmaster described, by a candid schoolfellow, as a funny little monster, and was prepared to see him so. But, in this moment of introduction, awe prevailed. Mr Williams was the shortest man Felix had ever seen, but because of their relative positions the most awe-inspiring. Here was wisdom and authority, the pride of knowledge and the majesty of punishment. Vast powers were concentrated for Felix in this short square figure, those darkly scrutinizing and heavily browed eyes, the broad hirsute nose, the round brownish face so copiously and vigorously whiskered. He had time to notice the ivory baldness of the pate, the almost monkeylike growth of strong dark hairs on the hands, and the crisp curling hair about the broad temples. He had time to notice these alarming and fascinating aspects of the man whose word was now his law, and he winced under the first impact of that unageing energy, that controlled authoritative voice. But his main preoccupation was still, as it had been all day, the resolve on no account to let anybody see his feelings.
    â€˜And what is your name, my boy?’ said the Head kindly, yet speaking with what seemed to the child a quite enormous gravity.
    â€˜Elderbrook, sir.’
    â€˜Ah! Elderbrook!’ said Mr Williams. ‘Of course. I remember.’ Herein he lied, though with the best intentions. ‘Your father is, er, Mr Elderbrook, er, of …’
    If Joe Elderbrook had lived and died a thousand years ago, and had entertained heretical notions about the nature of the Incarnation or the precise constitution of the Holy Trinity, Mr Williams would have known all about him. But as things were he had to wait for Felix to supply him with the name of Upmarden.
    â€˜Upmarden, yes,’ agreed the headmaster.
    He did in fact now remember Joe Elderbrook, remembered being impressed by the curious force and vigour of the man. No such qualities were to be discerned in the child, who resembled his father only, if at all, in his rustic speech.
    â€˜Well, Elderbrook, I hope you’ve made up your mind to do your best in everything you undertake here. We have a high tradition to maintain at St Swithins, and if you play the man, as I ‘m sure you want to do, we may yet be as proud of you as we are of some illustrious figures in our past. Keep that thought with you, my boy …’
    But when he