As he glanced round the
room, at the flushed faces of the boys, some of whom he could not
recognise in the dusky atmosphere, a qualm of disgust and shame passed
over him. Several of them were smoking, and, with Bull and Brigson
heading the line on each, side of the table, he could not help observing
what a bad set they looked. The remembrance of Russell came back to him.
Oh, if Edwin could have known that he was in such company at such a
place! And by the door stood Billy, watching them all like an evil
spirit, with a leer of saturnine malice on his evil face.
But the bright little Wildney, unconscious of Eric's bitter thoughts,
sang on with overflowing mirth. As Eric looked at him, shining out like
a sunbeam among the rest, he felt something like blood-guiltiness on his
soul, when, he felt that he was sanctioning the young boy's presence in
that degraded assemblage.
Wildney meanwhile was just beginning the next verse, when he was
interrupted by a general cry of "cave, cave." In an instant the room was
in confusion; some one dashed the candles upon the floor, the table was
overturned with a mighty crash, and plates, glasses, and bottles rushed
on to the ground in shivers.
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