The Cathedral Part 64

In the dust and debris of the broken past. "Poor old Archdeacon." "A bit queer in the upper storey." "Not to be wondered at after all the trouble he's had." "They break up quickly, those strong-looking men." "Bit too pleased with himself, he was." "Ah, well, he's served his time; what we need are more modern men. You can't deny that he was old-fas.h.i.+oned."

People were not altogether to be blamed for this sudden sense that they were stepping into a new period, out of one room into another, so to speak. The Jubilee was responsible for that. It _did_ mark a period, and looking back now after all these years one can see that that impression was a true one. The Jubilee of '97, the Boer War, the death of Queen Victoria--the end of the Victorian Era for Church as well as for State.

And there were other places beside Polchester that could show their typical figures doomed, as it were, to die for their Period--no mean nor unworthy death after all.

But no Polcastrian in '97 knew that that service in the Cathedral, that scratch on the Archdeacon's cheek, that visit of Mrs. Brandon to London-- that these things were for them the Writing on the Wall. June 1897 and August 1914 were not, happily for them, linked together in immortal significance--their eyes were set on the personal history of the men and women who were moving before them. Had Brandon in the pride of his heart not claimed G.o.d as his ally, would men have died at Ypres? Can any bounds be placed to one act of love and unselfishness, to a single deed of mean heart and malicious tongue?

It was enough for our town that "Brandon and his ways" were out-of-date, and it was a lucky thing that as modern a man as Ronder had come amongst us.

And yet not altogether. Brandon in prosperity was one thing, Brandon in misfortune quite another. He had been abominably treated. What had he ever done that was not actuated absolutely by zeal for the town and the Cathedral?

And, after all, had that man Ronder acted straight? He was fair and genial enough outwardly, but who could tell what went on behind those round spectacles? There were strange stories of intrigue about. Had he not determined to push Brandon out of the place from the first moment of his arrival? And as far as this Pybus living went, it was all very well to be modern and advanced, but wasn't Ronder advocating for the appointment a man who laughed at the Gospels and said that there were no such things as snakes and apples in the Garden of Eden? After all, he was a foreigner, and Brandon belonged to them. Poor old Brandon!

Ronder was in his study, waiting for Wistons. Wistons had come to Polchester for a night to see his friend Foster. It was an entirely private visit, unknown to anybody save two or three of his friends among the clergy. He had asked whether Ronder could spare him half an hour.

Ronder was delighted to spare it....

Ronder was in the liveliest spirits. He hummed a little chant to himself as he paced his study, stopping, as was his habit, to touch something on his table, to push back a book more neatly into its row on the shelf, to stare for an instant out of the window into the green garden drenched with the afternoon sun.

Yes, he was in admirable spirits. He had known some weeks of acute discomfort. That phase was over, his talk with Brandon in the Cloisters after the Cathedral service had closed it. On that occasion he had put himself entirely in the right, having been before that, under the eye of his aunt and certain critics in the town, ever so slightly in the wrong.

Now he was justified. He had humbled himself before Brandon (when really there was no reason to do so), apologised (when truly there was not the slightest need for it)--Brandon had utterly rejected his apology, turned on him as though he were a thief and a robber--he had done all that he could, more, far more, than his case demanded.

So his comfort, his dear consoling comfort, had returned to him completely. And with it had returned all his affection, his tenderness for Brandon. Poor man, deserted by his wife, past his work, showing as he so obviously did in the Jubilee week that his brain (never very agile) was now quite inert, poor man, poor, poor man! Ronder, as he walked his study, simply longed to do something for Brandon--to give him something, make him a generous present, to go to London and persuade his poor weak wife to return to him, anything, anything to make him happy again.

Too sad to see the poor man's pale face, restless eyes, to watch his hurried, uneasy walk, as though he were suspicious of every man.

Everywhere now Ronder sang Brandon's praises--what fine work he had done in the past, how much the Church owed him; where would Polchester have been in the past without him?

"I a.s.sure you," Ronder said to Mrs. Preston, meeting her in the High Street, "the Archdeacon's work may be over, but when I think of what the Church owes him----"

To which Mrs. Preston had said: "Ah, Canon, how you search for the Beauty in human life! You are a lesson to all of us. After all, to find Beauty in even the meanest and most disappointing, that is our task!"

There was no doubt but that Ronder had come magnificently through the Jubilee week. It had in every way strengthened and confirmed his already strong position. He had been everywhere; had added gaiety and suns.h.i.+ne to the Flower Show; had preached a most wonderful sermon at the evening service on the Tuesday; had addressed, from the steps of his house, the Torchlight Procession in exactly the right words; had patted all the children on the head at the Mayor's tea for the townspeople; had enchanted everywhere. That for which he had worked had been accomplished, and accomplished with wonderful speed.

He was firmly established as the leading Churchman in Polchester; only now let the Pybus living go in the right direction (as it must do), and he would have nothing more to wish for.

He loved the place. As he looked down into the garden and thought of the years of pleasant comfort and happiness now stretching in front of him, his heart swelled with love of his fellow human beings. He longed, here and now, to do something for some one, to give some children pennies, some poor old men a good meal, to lend some one his pounds, to speak a good word in public for some one maligned, to------

"Mr. Wistons, sir," said the maid. When he turned round only his exceeding politeness prevented him from a whistle of astonishment. He had never seen a photograph of Wistons, and the man had never been described to him.

From all that he had heard and read of him, he had pictured him a tall, lean ascetic, a kind of Dante and Savonarola in one, a magnificent figure of protest and abjuration. This man who now came towards him was little, thin, indeed, but almost deformed, seeming to have one shoulder higher than the other, and to halt ever so slightly on one foot. His face was positively ugly, redeemed only, as Ronder, who was no mean observer, at once perceived, by large and penetrating eyes. The eyes, indeed, were beautiful, of a wonderful softness and intelligence.

His hair was jet black and thick; his hand, as it gripped Ronder's, strong and bony.

"I'm very glad to meet you, Canon Ronder," he said. "I've heard so much about you." His voice, as Mrs. Combermere long afterwards remarked, "has a twinkle in it." It was a jolly voice, humorous, generous but incisive, and exceedingly clear. It had a very slight accent, so slight that no one could ever decide on its origin. The books said that Wistons had been born in London, and that his father had been Rector of Lambeth for many years; it was also quickly discovered by penetrating Polcastrians that he had a not very distant French ancestry. Was it c.o.c.kney? "I expect," said Miss Stiles, "that he played with the little Lambeth children when he was small"--but no one really knew...

The two men sat down facing one another, and Wistons looked strange indeed with his shoulders hunched up, his thin little legs like two cross-bones, one over the other, his black hair and pale face.

"I feel rather like a thief in the night," he said, "stealing down here.

But Foster wanted me to come, and I confess to a certain curiosity myself."

"You would like to come to Pybus if things go that way?" Ronder asked him.

"I shall be quite glad to come. On the other hand, I shall not be at all sorry to stay where I am. Does it matter very much where one is?"

"Except that the Pybus living is generally considered a very important step in Church preferment. It leads, as a rule, to great things."

"Great things? Yes..." Wistons seemed to be talking to himself. "One thing is much like another. The more power one seems to have outwardly, the less very often one has in reality. However, if I'm called I'll come. But I wanted to see you, Canon Ronder, for a special purpose."

"Yes?" asked Ronder.

"Of course I haven't enquired in any way into the probabilities of the Pybus appointment. But I understand that there is very strong opposition to myself; naturally there would be. I also understand that, with the exception of my friend Foster, you are my strongest supporter in this matter. May I ask you why?"

"Why?" repeated Ronder.

"Yes, why? You may say, and quite justly, that I have no right at all to ask you that question. It should be enough for me, I know, to realise that there are certain people here who want me to come. It ought to be enough.

But it isn't. It _isn't_. I won't--I can't come here under false pretences."

"False pretences!" cried Ronder. "I a.s.sure you, dear Mr. Wistons--"

"Oh, yes, I know. I know what you will naturally tell me. But I have caught enough of the talk here--Foster in his impetuosity has been perhaps indiscreet--to realise that there has been, that there still is, a battle here between the older, more conservative body of opinion and the more modern school. It seems to me that I have been made the figure-head of this battle. To that I have no objection. It is not for the first time.

But what I want to ask you, Canon Ronder, with the utmost seriousness, is just this:

"Have you supported my appointment because you honestly felt that I was the best man for this particular job, or because--I know you will forgive me if this question sounds impertinent--you wished to score a point over some personal adversary?"

The question _was_ impertinent. There could be no doubt of it. Ronder ought at once to resent any imputation on his honesty. What right had this man to dip down into Ronder's motives? The Canon stared from behind his gla.s.ses into those very bright and insistent eyes, and even as he stared there came once again that cold little wind of discomfort, that questioning, irritating wind, that had been laid so effectively, he thought, for ever to rest. What was this man about, attacking him like this, attacking him before, even, he had been appointed? Was it, after all, quite wise that Wistons should come here? Would that same comfort, so rightly valued by Ronder, be quite a.s.sured in the future if Wistons were at Pybus? Wouldn't some nincomp.o.o.p like Forsyth be perhaps, after all, his best choice?

Ronder suddenly ceased to wish to give pennies to little children or a present to Brandon. He was, very justly, irritated.

"Do forgive me if I am impertinent," said Wistons quietly, "but I have to know this."

"But of course," said Ronder, "I consider you the best man for this appointment. I should not have stirred a finger in your support otherwise." (Why, something murmured to him, are people always attributing to you unworthy motives, first your aunt, then Foster, now this man?) "You are quite correct in saying that there is strong opposition to your appointment here. But that is quite natural; you have only to consider some of your published works to understand that. A battle is being fought with the more conservative elements in the place. You have heard probably that the Archdeacon is their princ.i.p.al leader, but I think I may say that our victory is already a.s.sured. There was never any real doubt of the issue. Archdeacon Brandon is a splendid fellow, and has done great work for the Church here, but he is behind the times, out-of-date, and too obstinate to change. Then certain, family misfortunes have hit him hard lately, and his health is not, I fear, what it was. His opposition is as good as over."

"That's a swift decline," said Wistons. "I remember only some six months ago hearing of him as by far the strongest man in this place."

"Yes, it has been swift," said Ronder, shaking his head regretfully, "but I think that his position here was largely based on the fact that there was no one else here strong enough to take the lead against him.

"My coming into the diocese--some one, however feeble, you understand, coming in from outside--made an already strong modern feeling yet stronger."

"I will tell you one thing," said Wistons, suddenly shooting up his shoulders and darting forward his head. "I think all this Cathedral intrigue disgusting. No, I don't blame you. You came into the middle of it, and were doubtless forced to take the part you did. But I'll have no lot or hold in it. If I am to understand that I gain the Pybus appointment only through a lot of backstairs intrigue and cabal, I'll let it be known at once that I would not accept that living though it were offered me a thousand times."

"No, no," cried Ronder eagerly. "I a.s.sure you that that is not so. There has been intrigue here owing to the old politics of the party who governed the Cathedral. But that is, I hope and pray, over and done with. It is because so many of us want to have no more of it that we are asking you to come here. Believe me, believe me, that is so."

"I should not have said what I did," continued Wistons quietly. "It was arrogant and conceited. Perhaps you cannot avoid intrigue and party feeling among the community of any Cathedral body. That is why I want you to understand, Canon Ronder, the kind of man I am, before you propose me for this post. I am afraid that you may afterwards regret your advocacy.

If I were invited to a Canonry, or any post immediately connected with the Cathedral, I would not accept it for an instant. I come, if I come at all, to fight the Cathedral--that is to fight everything in it, round and about it, that prevents men from seeing clearly the figure of Christ.

"I believe, Canon Ronder, that before many years are out it will become clear to the whole world that there are now two religions--the religion of authority, and the religion of the spirit--and if in such a division I must choose, I am for the religion of the spirit every time."

The religion of the spirit! Ronder stirred, a little restlessly, his fat thighs. What had that to do with it? They were discussing the Pybus appointment. The religion of the spirit! Well, who wasn't for that? As to dogma, Ronder had never laid very great stress upon it. A matter of words very largely. He looked out to the garden, where a tree, scooped now like a great green fan against the blue-white sky, was shading the sun's rays.

Lovely! Lovely! Lovely like the Hermes downstairs, lovely like the piece of red amber on his writing-table, like the Blind Homer...like a scallop of green gla.s.s holding water that washed a little from side to side, the sheen on its surface changing from dark shadow to faintest dusk. Lovely!