You can't begin
and then stop. If you begin, you must keep on beginning;
that's the truth. No rest for the wicked.'
A horrible sense of blackness and the treachery of fate
seized hold upon the soul of the unhappy student.
'My God!' he cried, 'but what have I done? and when did I
begin? To be made a class assistant - in the name of reason,
where's the harm in that? Service wanted the position;
Service might have got it. Would HE have been where I am
now?'
'My dear fellow,' said Macfarlane, 'what a boy you are! What
harm HAS come to you? What harm CAN come to you if you hold
your tongue? Why, man, do you know what this life is? There
are two squads of us - the lions and the lambs. If you're a
lamb, you'll come to lie upon these tables like Gray or Jane
Galbraith; if you're a lion, you'll live and drive a horse
like me, like K-, like all the world with any wit or courage.
You're staggered at the first. But look at K-! My dear
fellow, you're clever, you have pluck. I like you, and K-
likes you. You were born to lead the hunt; and I tell you,
on my honour and my experience of life, three days from now
you'll laugh at all these scarecrows like a High School boy
at a farce.'
And with that Macfarlane took his departure and drove off up
the wynd in his gig to get under cover before daylight.
Fettes was thus left alone with his regrets.
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