“Ah,” he said, “but you have not had to wade through over thirty of these gems in a single week. I have. I can assure you your views would undergo a change if you could go through what I have. Let me read you a selection. If that does not convert you, nothing will. If you will excuse me for a moment, Beckett, I will leave the groaning board, and fetch the manuscripts.”
He left the room, and returned with a pile of paper, which he deposited in front of him on the table.
“Now,” he said, selecting the topmost manuscript, “I will take no unfair advantage. I will read you the very pick of the bunch. None of the other—er—poems come within a long way of this. It is a case of Eclipse first and the rest nowhere. The author, the gifted author, is a boy of the name of Lorimer, whom I congratulate on taking the Rajah’s prize. I drain this cup of coffee to him. Are you ready? Now, then.”
He cleared his throat.
XVI
A Disputed Authorship
“One moment,” said Mr. Lawrie, “might I ask what is the subject of the poem?”
“Death of Dido,” said the Headmaster. “Good, hackneyed, evergreen subject, mellow with years. Go on, Wells.”
Mr. Wells began.
Queen of Tyre, ancient Tyre,
Whilom mistress of the wave.
Mr. Lawrie, who had sunk back into the recesses of his chair in an attitude of attentive repose, sat up suddenly with a start.
“What!” he cried.
“Hullo,” said Mr. Wells, “has the beauty of the work come home to you already?”
“You notice,” he said, as he repeated the couplet, “that flaws begin to appear in the gem right from the start. It was rash of Master Lorimer to attempt such a difficult metre. Plucky, but rash. He should have stuck to blank verse. Tyre, you notice, two syllables to rhyme with ‘deny her’ in line three. ‘What did fortune e’er deny her? Were not all her warriors brave?’ That last line seems to me distinctly weak. I don’t know how it strikes you.”
“You’re hypercritical, Wells,” said the Head. “Now, for a boy I consider that a very good beginning. What do you say, Lawrie?”
“I—er. Oh, I think I am hardly a judge.”
“To resume,” said Mr. Mortimer Wells. He resumed, and ran through the remaining verses of the poem with comments. When he had finished, he remarked that, in his opinion a whiff of fresh air would not hurt him. If the Headmaster would excuse him, he would select another of those excellent cigars, and smoke it out of doors.
“By all means,” said the Head; “I think I won’t join you myself, but perhaps Lawrie will.”
“No, thank you. I think I will remain. Yes, I think I will remain.”
Mr. Wells walked jauntily out of the room. When the door had shut, Mr. Lawrie coughed nervously.
“Another cigar, Lawrie?”
“I—er—no, thank you. I want to ask you a question. What is your candid opinion of those verses Mr. Wells was reading just now?”
The Headmaster laughed.
“I don’t think Wells treated them quite fairly. In my opinion they were distinctly promising. For a boy in the Upper Fifth, you understand. Yes, on the whole they showed distinct promise.”
“They were mine,” said Mr. Lawrie.
“Yours! I don’t understand. How were they yours?”
“I wrote them. Every word of them.”
“You wrote them! But, my dear Lawrie—”
“I don’t wonder that you are surprised. For my own part I am amazed, simply amazed. How the boy—I don’t even remember his name—contrived to get hold of them, I have not the slightest conception. But that he did so contrive is certain. The poem is word for word, literally word for word, the same as one which I wrote when I was at Cambridge.”
“You don’t say so!”
“Yes. It can hardly be a coincidence.”
“Hardly,” said the Head. “Are you certain of this?”
“Perfectly certain. I am not eager to claim the authorship, I can assure you, especially after Mr. Wells’s very outspoken criticisms, but there is nothing else to be done. The poem appeared more than a dozen years ago, in a small book called The Dark Horse.”
“Ah! Something in the Whyte Melville style, I suppose?”
“No,” said Mr. Lawrie sharply. “No. Certainly not. They were serious poems, tragical most of them. I had them collected, and published them at my own expense. Very much at my own expense. I used a pseudonym, I am thankful to say. As far as I could ascertain, the total sale amounted to eight copies. I have never felt the very slightest inclination to repeat the performance. But how this boy managed to see the book is more than I can explain. He can hardly have bought it. The price was half-a-guinea. And there is certainly no copy in the School library. The thing is a mystery.”
“A mystery that must be solved,” said the Headmaster. “The fact remains that he did see the book, and it is very serious. Wholesale plagiarism of this description should be kept for the School magazine. It should not be allowed to spread to poetry prizes. I must see Lorimer about this tomorrow. Perhaps he can throw some light upon the matter.”
When, in the course of morning school next day, the School porter entered the Upper Fifth form-room and informed Mr. Sims, who was engaged in trying to drive the beauties of Plautus’ colloquial style into the Upper Fifth brain, that the Headmaster wished to see Lorimer, Lorimer’s conscience was so abnormally good that for the life of him he could not think why he had been sent for. As far as he could remember, there was no possible way in which the authorities could get at him. If he had been in the habit of smoking out of bounds in lonely fields and deserted barns, he might have felt uneasy. But whatever his failings, that was not one of
