New Money, on the other hand, had taken its cue from Edward VII, who had a high regard for wealth however it was come by, and liked people with some “go” in them. New Money aspired to be Big Money, and did not greatly care if the drawing-rooms of Old Money were not easily opened. New Money wore dinner suits, which it called tuxedos, and smoked big cigars from which it removed the band before lighting up—an unthinkable solecism, for what if you should get a tobacco stain on your white glove? The O’Gormans knew they were New Money, but were aware that a trust company which was not on good terms with Old Money could run into quite unnecessary obstructions. The Senator, too, presented a problem. His gallant manners and handsome person recommended him anywhere, but it could not be concealed from the never-sleeping vigilance of Old Money that he was a Roman Catholic and a Liberal in politics. A difficult situation was avoided by the Cornish family, just as the Senator had foreseen.
Everything fell into place on June 3, when the Birthday Honours were announced, and Major Francis Cornish, President of the soon-to-be-opened Cornish Trust, became Sir Francis Cornish, K.B.E. How did he get it? The whisper was that he had done extraordinary work in Intelligence during the War, and not simply Canadian Intelligence, which was rather small potatoes. Non-military people, and even a lot of military people, have a notion that Military Intelligence implies uncommon brilliance of intellect, extraordinary resource and daring, ability to solve codes over which the enemy has toiled for years, and iron control over beautiful and alluring female spies. Of course, this may be quite true, but nobody knows, and everybody speculates. The passing of time had given the Wooden Soldier an air of distinction, of the grizzle-headed, frozen-faced, uncommunicative variety. His monocle gleamed with suppressed secrets; his moustache spoke of Nature subdued, tamed, domineered over. Just the man to trust your money to: just the man to ask to dinner. And his wife! What a stunner! Could she have been a spy, do you think?
Thus the Cornish name shed lustre over the sturdy under-structure of McRorys and O’Gormans. Long before the announcement of the honour, and before its doors were officially opened for business, the Cornish Trust was a financial certainty. No trust company opens for business until a great deal of solid and profitable business has already been done, and promises and assurances have been given. Sir Francis’s knighthood gave strong assurance to what was already a reality.
This should by no means be taken as evidence that Toronto’s social and business communities were snobbish. They would assure you, almost before you asked, that they were pioneers and democrats to a man, or a woman. But they were well-connected pioneers and democrats, and if they kept a sharp eye on Roman Catholics and Jews it was not to be interpreted as prejudice, but because Roman Catholics and Jews—fine people among them, mind you!—had not been particularly visible when the colony began its long pull toward nationhood. Their time would come, no doubt. But just for the present it was as well for Old Money, and such New Money as showed itself worthy, to keep things on an even keel. And what better guarantee of evenness of keel than a president of the trust company who had served his country well in war, whose intelligence was of a guaranteed respectable sort, and who looked so trustworthy?
What Sir Francis thought about it, nobody ever knew. Probably he believed some of what was said about him. Undoubtedly he understood the language of finance, and had the good sense to leave the deployment of finance to his father-in-law and his brother-in-law, and to take his generous reward while keeping his mouth shut.
In these circumstances, Dr. J.A.’s ludicrously provincial notion that the third generation of the family should attend the big school kept by the Christian Brothers played no part. The young O’Gormans, Gerald Lawrence and Gerald Michael, were entered at Colborne College, a great stronghold of Old Money. At the same time the “Gerald” was discreetly dropped from their names; Mary-Tess sensed that the family habit of tacking the same dynastic label on several children might be very well for Blairlogie, but did not suit their changed situation.
Sir Francis also decided on Colborne for his son. The cousins did not see much of one another in their new school; the O’Gormans were in the Lower School because of their age, and were day-boys because their parents lived in Toronto. Sir Francis knew, and his wife (who had ceased to be Mary-Jim to anyone but her McRory family, and was known to everyone else as Jacko, which was what her husband called her) knew also, that they did not intend to be in Toronto for many months of the year. Sir Francis let it be known that his continuing relationship (never specified) with Very Important People in England would take him abroad often, and Jacko did not choose to be left behind. So Francis was to be a boarder at Colborne. Thus it was that Francis entered what looked like a new world, but which was not, in several respects that mattered to him, as new as it might appear.
Since Francis’s days at Colborne, the reading world has been subjected to a flood of books written by men who hated their boarding-schools, and whose sensitive natures were thwarted and warped by early experience. It was not so with Francis. His life hitherto had made him philosophical and ingenious—not to say devious—in his dealings with his superiors and his contemporaries, and at Colborne he was philosophical and ingenious. He was not brilliant, in the prize-winning, examination-passing mode that makes for a splendid school career, but he was not stupid. He took life as it came, and some of what came was uncommonly like what had come at Carlyle Rural.
Much may be learned about any society by studying the behaviour and accepted ideas of its children, for children—and sometimes adults—are shadows of their parents, and what they believe and what they do are often what their parents believe in their hearts and would do if society would put up with it. The dominant group, though by no means the majority of the boys at Colborne College, were the sons of Old Money, and in their behaviour the spirit of Old Money was clear. They were the conservers of tradition, and they imposed tradition without discrimination and without mercy. The tradition best calculated to reduce a New Boy to his lowest common denominator was fagging.
On the first day of the autumn term, each senior boy was assigned, by decision of the prefects, a New Boy who was to be his fag for the year that followed, and it was clearly understood that the fag was the slave and creature of his fag-master, to do his bidding without question at any hour. There was an understanding that if a fag were seriously ill-used he could complain to the prefects, but to do so was squealing, and incurred contempt. Like all such systems it was conditioned by the people who practised it, and some fags had an easy time; it was even known for a fag-master to help a junior boy with his work. A few fag-masters were brutes, and a few fags lived in hell; the majority, like all slave classes, were genially derisive of their masters when they could get away with it, respectful when they had to be, and cleaned boots and put away laundry as badly as they could without incurring punishment. If the system taught them anything at all it was that all authority is capricious, but may be appeased by a show of zeal, unaccompanied by any real work.
Francis was assigned to a large boy named Eastwood, who came from Montreal, and who was on the whole good-natured and untroubled by intelligence. He was an officer in the Cadet Corps, and it was one of his fag’s duties to polish the buttons on his uniform, and to bring his sword up to a high finish every Sunday night, ready for Monday’s parade. Francis was never guilty of cheek; he allowed Eastwood to think that he admired him and took pride in his appearance on parade, and that did the trick. In his heart he thought Eastwood was a mutt.
Fagging had been good enough for your father, and it was therefore good enough for you. A certain amount of servitude and humiliation made a man of you. There may even have been some truth in this belief. Everybody ought to have some experience of being a servant; it is useful to know what virtually unlimited authority is like for those on the receiving end.