Guilty: The Lost Classic Novel by Anna Kavan Page B

and, by being so referred to, attained exceptional importance. So everybody was most curious to hear what he had to say that night.
    Most of his hearers would know, he began, that a new boy was joining their ranks; a fact only deserving of notice because connected, in this case, with a secondary and sinisterfactor of the utmost significance. Never, in all the centuries of the school’s existence, had there been any deviation from the principles laid down by the original founders, one of which was the Head’s right to refuse admission to a pupil at his discretion. This right had now been summarily suppressed by a high authority he wasn’t free to name, this same authority having enforced upon him the acceptance of the boy he’d just mentioned. To some members of his audience the boy’s name might be familiar. It was a name which had been prominent in the press, receiving much publicity of widely different kinds. The boy’s father had served his country well and this fact had been recognized, making his subsequent traitorous apostasy even more odious than it would otherwise have been. Admittedly, the son was not old enough to have participated actively in his father’s guilt. But he’d been in intimate contact with loathsome doctrines, by which he must inevitably have been infected. Left to his own discretion, the Head would no more have dreamed of admitting him to the school than he would have allowed a known carrier of disease to mingle with his pupils. Authority had taken the matter out of his hands, forcing acceptance upon him with menaces, threatening dire consequences if the boy complained, either of the treatment he received here, or of disrespect to his father’s name. In these circumstances, he had to forbid all reference to the man, and to enjoin upon them a distant attitude, flavoured with suspicion, towards the son. The principal felt that he could only keep his integrity by thus taking the whole school into his confidence, warning them solemnly of the danger in their midst, while relying upon their loyalty not to bring him into further conflict with those in power. He was sure they all shared his own horror of the doctrines with which the newcomer had been contaminated. It was his duty to remind them to be always on their guard,bearing in mind this infection carried within. Outwardly the boy was presentable; the impression he made was in some respects not unfavourable. Let them not be deceived by appearances, or his warning would have been in vain.
    This speech was recorded in a volume the Head published some years later under the title ‘Words and Warnings to Youth’, from which I was able to copy it, and it explains much that was mysterious to me at the time. During my first term, while I was still unused to community life and everything still seemed strange, I was made most unhappy by the way my companions avoided me, despite all my efforts to please. Since I was, in spite of everything, a fairly normal young animal whose behaviour presented nothing unfamiliar to them, I think they’d have liked to be friendly. Some would even respond to my advances up to a point; but then, remembering the Head’s warning, or reminded of it, would withdraw hastily in confusion, to my increasing bewilderment. I really began to think there must be something about me which prohibited friendship and that I’d lived too long alone ever to have any friends.
    The following term my situation improved, mainly, I think, because it was summer, when a general tendency to relax is felt in our northern climate after the ice-bound winter and chilly reluctant spring. Having, presumably, got over the indignities he’d suffered on my account, the Head didn’t repeat his warning. And as, with the passing terms, there was a larger and larger proportion of boys to whom his words were just hearsay, the memory of his speech gradually faded out: the whole affair slowly passed into a sort of legend, which finally even enhanced my