Part 6 (1/2)
”Do you go there?” cried Tom in astonishment. For Penrose was looked upon as anything but goody-goody, and he was generally admired. He was the best boxer in the company, was smart in drill, could do long marches with the best of them, and was always ready to do a kindly action. Besides all that, his evident education and social superiority made him a marked man. It was rumoured, too, that he had refused a commission.
”Of course I go,” replied Penrose.
”What, and listen to their pie-jaw?”
”There is precious little pie-jaw, as you call it,” was Penrose's response. ”We have jolly good entertainments almost every night, and some of the fellows who come to talk to us are not half bad, I can tell you! Besides, I go there to rub up my conversational French.”
”Conversational French!” said Tom, only dimly understanding what he meant. ”Dost 'a mean to say that they learn you French there?”
”There's a Frenchman who gives his services free,” replied Penrose.
”It's jolly good of him too, for the poor wretch has hardly a sixpence to his name; still he does it. In his way he's quite a French scholar, and he has helped me no end.”
”Ay, but you learnt French at school,” said Tom; ”he would have nowt to do wi' a chap like me.”
”Don't be an a.s.s. Why, dozens of fellows go to him every night. A few weeks ago they didn't know a word of French, and now they are picking it up like mad. Besides all that, the Y.M.C.A. rooms are open every night, they have all sorts of games there, lots of newspapers, and they give you every facility for writing letters and that sort of thing.”
”By gum!” said Tom, ”I didn't know that.”
”That's because you have been making an a.s.s of yourself. While the other fellows have been improving themselves you have been loafing around public-houses. Good night,” and Penrose left him alone.
Tom felt rather miserable; he was somewhat angered too. He didn't like the way Penrose had spoken to him. In the old days he had been proud of his respectability, and before he had made Polly Powell's acquaintance, and when Alice Lister had shown a preference for him, Tom was very ambitious. Now he knew he had not only sunk in the social scale, but he had less self-respect than formerly. ”After all,” he argued to himself presently, ”I didn't join the Army to go to Sunday School, I joined to lick the blooming Germans.”
Still he could not help recalling the feelings which possessed him on the night he came out of the great hall at the Mechanics' Inst.i.tute.
He had felt stirred then; felt indeed as though he had heard the call of some higher power. Hitherto he had looked upon wearing the King's uniform as something ign.o.ble; then it had appeared to him almost as a religious act. The speaker had called upon him to fight against brutality, butchery, devilry, and his heart had burned at the thought of it. Something which he felt was holy made him leap to his feet and give his name, yet now he found his chief delights in coa.r.s.e a.s.sociations and debasing habits.
He was still fond of Polly Powell. The girl's coa.r.s.e beauty made a strong appeal to him, but he remembered Alice Lister; remembered the things which she had said to him, and he could not help sighing.
”Eh, Tom, is that you?”
Tom turned and saw a tall raw-boned fellow in kilts.
”Ay, Alec; wher't' baan?”
”There's a wee la.s.sie I promised to meet to-nicht,” replied the other.
Alec McPhail belonged to the Black Watch, a battalion of which was stationed in the town, and Tom and Alec had become friends.
”What's thy la.s.s's name?” asked Tom.
”I dinna ken reightly, except that they ca' her Alice. Come wi' me, Tom; mebbe she has a friend.”
”Nay,” replied Tom, ”I doan't feel like skylarking with the la.s.ses to-night.”
”Weel, I'm not ower particular mysel', but I have not much siller.
Three bawbees will have to last me till Sat.u.r.day, otherwise I'd be asking ye to come and have a drop of whisky wi' me.”
”I am stony-broke too,” said Tom. ”I expect I have been a fool.”
”Nay, man, nae man's a fool who spends his siller on good whisky.”