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When he hinted to Kenrick, as delicately and distantly as he could, that he thought his manner to his mother rather brusque, Kenrick reddened rather angrily, but only replied, "Ah, it's all very well for you to talk; but you don't live at Fuzby." "Yet I've enjoyed my visit very much, Ken; you can't think how much I love your mother." "Thank you, Walter, for saying so.
From Semlyn Lake, Walter's home, to Fuzby, Kenrick's home, the change is great indeed; yet I must take the reader there for a short time, before we return to the noisy and often troubled precincts of Saint Winifred's School.
When Kenrick came to school, his wardrobe, the work of Fuzbeian artists, was not only well worn for his mother was too poor to give him new clothes but also of a somewhat odd cut; and accordingly the very first words Mackworth had ever addressed to Kenrick were "You new fellow, what's your father?" "My father is dead," said Kenrick in a low tone. "Then what was he?" "He was curate of Fuzby."
"Yes; it isn't a particularly jolly place, certainly, but he doesn't make the best of it; he makes up his mind to detest it." "Why?" "O, I don't know. They didn't treat his father well. His father was curate of the place." "As far as I've seen, Fuzby isn't singular in that respect. It's no easy thing in most places for a poor clergyman to keep on good terms with his people."
Ever since then the boy had walked among the Fuzby people with open scorn and defiance, as among those whose slanders had done to death the father whom he so proudly loved. In spite of his mother's wishes, he would not stoop to pay them even the semblance of courtesy. No wonder that he hated Fuzby with a perfect hatred, and that his home there was a miserable home.
The Vicar of Fuzby, a non-resident pluralist, only appeared at rare intervals to receive the adoration which his flock never refused to any one who was wealthy. His curate, having a very slender income, came in for no share at all of this respect. On the contrary, the whole population assumed a right to patronise him, to interfere with him, to annoy and to thwart him.
He hated the place so much, he hated the people in it so much, he felt the annoyances of their situation with so keen and fretful a sensibility, that at Fuzby, even though with his mother, he was never happy. Even her society could not make up to him for the detestation with which he not unnaturally regarded the village and its inhabitants.
There was at Fuzby one squire a rich farmer, coarse, ignorant, and brutal. This man, being the richest person in the parish, generally carried everything in his own way, and among other attempts to imitate the absurdities of his superiors, had ordered the sexton never to cease ringing the church-bell, however late, until he and his family had taken their seats.
So I don't ask you; and yet if you could come why, the day would be marked with white in the dull calendar of Your ever affectionate "Harry Kenrick." As Fuzby lay nearly in the route to Saint Winifred's, Walter, grieved that his friend should be doomed to such dull holidays, determined, with Mr Evson's leave, to pay him a three-days' visit on his way to school.
Accordingly, towards the close of the holidays, after a hopeful, a joyous, and an affectionate farewell to all at home, he started for Fuzby, from which he was to accompany Kenrick back to school; a visit fraught, as it turned out, with evil consequences, and one which he never afterwards ceased to look back upon with regret.
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