The Cathedral Part 55

After Matins in the Cathedral next day one thought came to him. He would go and see the Bishop. The Bishop had come in from Carpledon for the Jubilee celebrations and was staying at the Deanery. Brandon spoke to him for a moment after Matins and asked him whether he might see him for half an hour in the afternoon on a matter of great urgency. The Bishop asked him to come at three o'clock.

Seated in the Dean's library, with its old-fas.h.i.+oned cosiness--its book- shelves and the familiar books, the cases, between the high windows, of his precious b.u.t.terflies--Brandon felt, for the first time for many days, a certain calm descend upon him. The Bishop, looking very frail and small in the big arm-chair, received him with so warm an affection that he felt, in spite of his own age, like the old man's son.

"My lord," he began with difficulty, moving his big limbs in his chair like a restless schoolboy, "it isn't easy for me to come to-day. There's no one in the world I could speak to except yourself. I find it difficult even to do that."

"My son," said the Bishop gently, "I am a very, very old man. I cannot have many more months to live. When one is as near to death as I am, one loves everything and everybody, because one is going so soon. You needn't be afraid."

And in his heart he must have wondered at the change in this man who, through so many years now, had come to him with so much self-confidence and a.s.surance.

"I have had much trouble lately," Brandon went on. "But I would not have bothered you with that, knowing as I do all that you have to consider just now, were it not that for the first time in my life I seem to have lost control and to be heading toward some great disaster that may bring scandal not only on myself but on the Church as well."

"Tell me your trouble," said the Bishop.

"Nine months ago I seemed to be at the very height of my powers, my happiness, my usefulness." Brandon paused. Was it really only nine months back, that other time? "I had no troubles. I was confident in myself, my health was good, my family were happy. I seemed to have many friends....

Then suddenly everything changed. I don't want to seem false, my lord, in anything that I may say, but it was literally as though in the course of a night all my happiness forsook me.

"It began with my boy being sent down from Oxford. I have only one boy, as I think your lords.h.i.+p knows. He was--he is, in spite of what has happened --very dear to me." Brandon paused.

"Yes, I know," said the Bishop.

"After that everything began to go wrong. Little things, little tiny things--one after another. Some one came to this town who almost at once seemed to put himself into opposition to me." Brandon paused once more.

The Bishop said again: "Yes, I know."

"At first," Brandon went on, "I didn't realise this. I was preoccupied with my work. It had never, at any time in my life, seemed to me healthy to consider about other people's minds, what they were thinking or imagining. There is quite enough work to do in the world without that. But soon I was forced to consider this man's opposition to me. It came before me in a thousand little ways. The att.i.tude of the Chapter changed to me-- especially noticeable at one of the Chapter meetings. I don't want to make my story so long, my lord, that it will tire you. To cut it short--a day came when my boy ran off to London with a town girl, the daughter of the landlord of one of the more disreputable public-houses. That was a terrible, devastating blow to me. I have quite literally not been the same man since. I was determined not to allow it to turn me from my proper work. I still loved the boy; he had not behaved dishonourably to the girl.

He has now married her and is earning his living in London. If that had been the only blow----" He stopped, cleared his throat, and, turning excitedly towards the Bishop, almost shouted:

"But it is not! It is not, my lord! My enemy has never ceased his plots for one instant. It was he who advised my boy to run off with this girl.

He has turned the whole town against me; they laugh at me and mock me! And now he...now he..." He could not for a moment find breath. He exercised an impulse of almost superhuman self-control, bringing his body visibly back into bounds again. He went on more quietly:

"We are in opposite camps over this matter of the Pybus living--we are in opposition over almost every question that arises here. He is an able man.

I must do him that justice. He can plot...he can scheme...whereas I..."

Brandon beat his hands desperately on his knees.

"It is not only this man!" he cried, "not only this! It is as though there were some larger conspiracy, something from Heaven itself. G.o.d has turned His face away from me when I have served Him faithfully all my days. No one has served Him more whole-heartedly than I. He has been my only thought, His glory my only purpose. Nine months ago I had health, I had friends, I had honour. I had my family--now my health is going, my friends have forsaken me, I am mocked at by the lowest men in the town, my son has left me, my--my..."

He broke off, bending his face in his hands.

The Bishop said: "My dear friend, you are not alone in this. We have all been tried, like this--tested----"

"Tested!" Brandon broke out. "Why should I be tested? What have I done in all my life that is not acceptable to G.o.d? What sin have I committed! What disloyalty have I shown? But there is something more that I must tell you, my lord--the reason why I have come to you to-day. Canon Ronder and I--you must have known of whom I have been speaking--had a violent quarrel one afternoon on the way home after luncheon with you at Carpledon. This quarrel became, in one way or another, the town's property. Ronder affected to like me, but it was impossible now for him to hide his real intentions towards me. This thing began to be an obsession with me. I tried to prevent this. I knew what the danger of such obsessions can be.

But there was something else. My wife--" he paused--went on. "My wife and I, my lord, have lived together in perfect happiness for twenty years. At least it had seemed to me to be perfect happiness. She began to behave strangely. She was not herself. Undoubtedly the affair of our son disturbed her desperately. She seemed to avoid me, to escape from me when she could. This, coming with my other troubles, made me feel as though I were in some horrible dream, as though the very furniture of our home and the appearance of the streets were changing. I began to be afraid sometimes that I might be going mad. I have had bad headaches that have made it difficult for me to think. Then, only last night, a woman brought me a letter. I wish you most earnestly to believe, my lord, that I believe my wife to be absolutely loyal to me--loyal in every possible sense of the word. The letter purported to be in her handwriting. And in this matter also Canon Ronder had had some hand. The woman admitted that she had been first to Canon Ronder and that he had advised her to bring it to me."

The Bishop made a movement.

"You will, of course, say nothing of this, my lord, to Canon Ronder. I have come privately to ask your prayers for me and to have your counsel. I am making no complaint against Canon Ronder. I must see this thing through by myself. But last night, when my mind was filled with this letter, I found myself suddenly next to Canon Ronder, and I had a murderous impulse that was so fierce and sudden in its power that I--" he broke off, shuddering. Then cried, suddenly stretching out his hands:

"Oh, my lord, pray for me, pray for me! Help me! I don't know what I do--I am given over to the powers of h.e.l.l!"

A long silence followed. Then the Bishop said:

"You have asked me to say nothing to Canon Ronder, and of course I must respect your confidence. But the first thing that I would say to you is that I think that what you feared has happened--that you have allowed this thought of him to become an obsession to you. The ways of G.o.d are mysterious and past our finding out; but all of us, in our lives, have known that time when everything was suddenly turned against us--our work, those whom we love, our health, even our belief in G.o.d Himself. My dear, dear friend, I myself have known that several times in my own life. Once, when I was a young man, I lost an appointment on which my whole heart was set, and lost it, as it seemed, through an extreme injustice. It turned out afterwards that my losing that was one of the most fortunate things for me. Once my dear wife and I seemed to lose all our love for one another, and I was a.s.sailed with most desperate temptation--and the end of that was that we loved and understood one another as we had never done before. Once--and this was the most terrible period of my life, and it continued over a long time--I lost, as it seemed, completely all my faith in G.o.d. I came out of that believing only in the beauty of Christ's life, clinging to that, and saying to myself, 'Such a friend have I--then life is not all lost to me'--and slowly, gradually, I came back into touch with Him and knew Him as I had never known Him before, and, through Him, once again G.o.d the Father. And now, even in my old age, temptation is still with me. I long to die. I am tempted often to look upon men and women as shadows that have no longer any connection with me. I am very weak and feeble and I wish to sleep.... But the love of G.o.d continues, and through Jesus Christ, the love of men. It is the only truth--love of G.o.d, love of man--the rest is fantasy and unreality. Look up, my son, bear this with patience. G.o.d is standing at your shoulder and will be with you to the end. This is training for you. To show you, perhaps, that all through life you have missed the most important thing. You are learning through this trouble your need of others, your need to love them, and that they should love you--the only lesson worth learning in life...."

The Bishop came over to Brandon and put his hand on his head. Strange peace came into Brandon's heart, not from the old man's words, but from the contact with him, the touch of his thin trembling hand. The room was filled with peace. Ronder was suddenly of little importance. The Cathedral faded. For a time he rested.

For the rest of that day, until evening, that peace stayed with him. With it still in his heart he came, late that night, into their bedroom. Mrs.

Brandon was in bed, awake, staring in front of her, not moving. He sat down in the chair beside the bed, stretched out his hand, and took hers.

"Amy, dear," he said, "I want us to have a little talk."

Her little hand lay still and hot in his large cool one.

"I've been very unhappy," he went on with difficulty, "lately about you--I have seen that you yourself are not happy. I want you to be. I will do anything that is in my power to make you so!"

"You would not," she said, without looking at him, "have troubled to think of me had not your own private affairs gone wrong and--had not Falk left us!"

The sound of her hostility irritated him against his will; he beat the irritation down. He felt suddenly very tired, quite exhausted. He had an almost irresistible temptation to go down into his dressing-room, lie on his sofa there, and go instantly to sleep.

"That's not quite fair, Amy," he said. "But we won't dispute about that. I want to know why, after our being happy for twenty years, something now has come in between us or seems to have done so; I want to clear that away if I can, so that we can be as we were before."

Be as they were before! At the strange, ludicrous irony of that phrase she turned on her elbow and looked at him, stared at him as though she could not see enough of him.

"Why do you think that there is anything the matter?" she asked softly, almost gently.

"Why, of course I can see," he said, holding her hand more tightly as though the sudden gentleness in her voice had touched him. "When one has lived with some one a long time," he went on rather awkwardly, "one notices things. Of course I've seen that you were not happy. And Falk leaving us in that way must have made you very miserable. It made me miserable too," he added, suddenly stroking her hand a little.

She could not bear that and very quietly withdrew her hand.

"Did it really hurt you, Falk's going?" she asked, still staring at him.

"Hurt me?" he cried, staring back at her in utter astonishment. "Hurt me?

Why--why----"

"Then why," she went on, "didn't you go up to London after him?"

The question was so entirely unexpected that he could only repeat:

"Why?..."

"Oh, well, it doesn't matter now," she said, wearily turning away.

"Perhaps I did wrong. I think perhaps I've done wrong in many ways during these last years. I am seeing many things for the first time. The truth is I have been so absorbed in my work that I've thought of nothing else. I took it too much for granted that you were happy because I was happy. And now I want to make it right. I do indeed, Amy. Tell me what's the matter."

She said nothing. He waited for a long time. Her immobility always angered him. He said at last more impatiently.

"Please tell me, Amy, what you have against me."

"I have nothing against you."