The Prelude to Adventure Part 13

"Why didn't you talk to your mother about it?--

"I did. But they were always too busy with missions and things. And then there was my elder brother. _He_ understood about G.o.d and went to all the Bible meetings and things, and he was always so neat-never dirty--I used to wonder how he did it . . . always so neat."

Bunning took off his great spectacles and wiped them with a very dirty handkerchief.

"And had you no friends?"

"None--n.o.body. I didn't want them after a bit. I was afraid of everybody. I used to go down all the side-streets between school and home for fear lest I should meet some one. I was always very nervous as a boy--very. I still am."

"Nervous of people?"

"Yes, of everybody. And of things, too--things. I still am. You'd be surprised. . . . It's odd because none of the other Bunnings are nervous. I used to have fancies about G.o.d."

"What sort of fancies?"

"I used to see Him when I was in bed like a great big shadow, all up against the wall. A grey shadow with his head ever so high. That's how I used to think of Him. I expect that all sounds nonsense to you."

"No, not at all!" said Olva.

"I think they thought me nearly an idiot at home--not sane at all. But they didn't think of me very often. They used to apologise for me when people came to tea. I wasn't clever, of course--that's why they thought I'd make a good parson."

He paused--then very nervously he went on. "But now I've met you I shan't be. Nothing can make me. I've always watched you. I used to look at you in chapel. You're just as different from me as any one can be, and that's why you're like G.o.d to me. I don't want you to be decent to me. I think I'd rather you weren't. But I like to come in sometimes and hear you say that I'm dirty and untidy. That shows that you've noticed."

"But I'm not at all the sort of person to make a hero of," Olva said hurriedly. "I don't want you to feel like that about we. That's all sentimentality. You mustn't feel like that about anybody. You must stand on your own legs."

"I never have," said Burning, very solemnly, "and I never will. I've always had somebody to make a hero of. I would love to die for you, I would really. It's the only sort of thing that I can do, because I'm not clever. I know you think me very stupid."

"Yes, I do," said Olva, "and you mustn't talk like a schoolgirl. If we're friends and I let you come in here, you mustn't let your vest come over your cuffs and you must take those spots off your waistcoat, and brush your hair and clean your nails, and you must just be sensible and have a little humour. Why don't you play football?"

"I can't play games, I'm very shortsighted."

"Well, you must take some sort of exercise. Run round Parker's Piece or something, or go and run at Fenner's. You'll get so fat."

"I _am_ getting fat. I don't think it matters much what I look like."

"It matters what every one looks like. And now you'd better cut. I've got to go out and see a man."

Burning submissively rose. He said no more but bundled out of the door in his usual untidy fas.h.i.+on. Olva came after him and banged his "oak"

behind him. In Outer Court, looking now so vast and solemn in the silence of its snow, Bunning, stopping, pointed to the grey buildings that towered over them.

"It was against a wall like that that I used to imagine G.o.d--on a night like this--you'll think that very silly." He hurriedly added, "There's Marshall coming. I know he'll be at me about those Christian Union Cards. Good-night." He vanished.

But it was not Marshall. It was Rupert Craven. The boy was walking hurriedly, his eyes on the ground. He was suddenly conscious of some one and looked up. The change in him was extraordinary. His eyes had the heavy, dazed look of one who has not slept for weeks. His face was a yellow white, his hair unbrushed, and his mouth moved restlessly. He started when he saw Olva.

"Hallo, Craven. You're looking seedy. What's the matter?"

"Nothing, thanks. . . . Good-night."

"No, but wait a minute. Come up to my rooms and have some coffee. I haven't seen you for days."

A fortnight ago Craven would have accepted with joy. Now he shook his head.

"No, thanks. I'm tired: I haven't been sleeping very well."

"Why's that? Overwork?"

"No, it's nothing. I don't know why it is."

"You ought to see somebody. I know what not sleeping means."

"Why? . . . Are _you_ sleeping badly?" Craven's eyes met Olva's.

"No, I'm splendid, thanks. But I had a bout of insomnia years ago. I shan't forget it."

"You _look_ all right." Cravan's eyes were busily searching Olva's face.

Then suddenly they dropped.

"I'm all right," he said hurriedly. "Tired, that's all."

"Why do you never come and see me now?"

"Oh, I will come--sometime. I'm busy."

"What about?"

Olva stood, a stern dark figure, against the snow.

"Oh, just busy." Craven suddenly looked up as though he were going to ask Olva a question. Then he apparently changed his mind, muttered a good-night and disappeared round the corner of the building.

Olva was alone in the Court. From some room came the sound of voices and laughter, from some other room a piano--some one called a name in Little Court. A sheet of stars drew the white light from the snow to heaven.

Olva turned very slowly and entered his black stairway.

In his heart he was crying, "How long can I stand this? Another day?

Another hour? This loneliness. . . . I must break it. I must tell some one. I _must_ tell some one."

As he entered his room he thought that he saw against the farther wall an old gilt mirror and in the light of it a dark figure facing him; a voice, heavy with some great overburdening sorrow, spoke to him.

"How terrible a thing it is to be alone with G.o.d!"

CHAPTER IX

REVELATION OF BUNNING (II)

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