by A. J. Cronin
I was too, too happy in my pagan life. The moorland wind had blown God out of my head; the postcards which Grandma sent me received scant attention; I no longer bade the Evil One emerge from dark corners of the house but fell asleep at once, barely muttering the hastiest of prayers. Ah, I had fallen from grace. The heavens were preparing fresh miseries for me.
First came the news that Gavin must again leave me. Every summer his father rented in Perthshire a lodge with a small moor offering fishing and rough shooting—another extravagance which was later to be cast, like an infamy, upon the Provost’s Olympian head!—and of course Gavin would spend the school vacation there, amidst the purple of the heather and the blue of the distant hills.
There was more than a whisper originating from Miss Julia Blair that I might accompany him; but my miserable wardrobe, the cost of the railway fare, a score of chill realities, stilled that warm breath to silence. Gavin and I said good-bye at the railway station, our eyes suspiciously bright, pledging our eternal friendship in a special handclasp which we had adopted, firm as steel, with a special cabalistic interlocking of our thumbs.
Then, as I came home along the High Street, the real bolt came streaking from the sky—I found my progress barred. I glanced up and, with a start of undiluted terror, found myself before the tall dark figure of Canon Roche, who, leaning on his flapping umbrella, now transfixed me—as I might petrify a minute organism beneath my microscope—with his dark, unblinking, basilisk stare.
Though, thus far, I had tactfully avoided him, the Canon was one of the town’s most striking figures. He was young, in fact the youngest canon in the diocese. He had thin features, a beaky nose, and a fine brow—his distinguished scholastic career at the Scots College in Rome gave ample evidence of a keen intelligence. On his accession to the pastorate of the Holy Angels Church he had found badly run to seed a parish always unruly because of its admixture of races: Polish, Lithuanian, Slovak and Irish emigrants had been at different times attracted to the town by reason of the work and good wages offered by the Boilerworks. Quickly, the Canon realized that one weapon above all was likely to control this rough and scarcely literate flock. He did not hesitate to use it. With a severity foreign to his nature he thundered at them from the pulpit, flayed them with his satire on the church steps, accosted and denounced them in the public streets. In twelve months he had tamed the congregation, earned the friendship of the Marshall Brothers, owners of the Boilerworks, and won the grudging respect of the more liberal town authorities—a difficult matter in a small Scottish community where “the Catholics” were detested and despised. Strangely, too, he had gained not alone the awe but the admiration of his parish. A terror he was, yes, by God, a holy terror was the Canon, God bless and confound him!
Small wonder, though his present tone was mild, that I trembled to be singled out by such a man.
“You are Robert Shannon, are you not?”
“Yes, Father.”
Ah, that “Father”—I had betrayed myself. He smiled faintly.
“And a Catholic, surely?”
“Yes, Father.”
He began to furl the flapping umbrella. “I’ve had a letter about you from a colleague in Dublin … Father Shanley … He writes me, asking me to look you up.” He shot a glance at me. “You come to Mass on Sundays, don’t you?”
I hung my head. I had suffered for my allegiance to the Scarlet Woman; her mark was upon my brow; but, alone and timid, since coming to Levenford, I had not visited her Temple.
“Ah!” What a lot of trouble the umbrella was giving him. “You’ve made your First Communion, of course.”
“No, Father.”
“Your first confession, then.”
The illness of my parents had got in the way of this tremendous obligation; I wished the earth would open to swallow me and my shame: “‘No, Father.”
“Dear me. That’s a sad omission for a man by the name of Shannon. We must put it right, Robert. Right, right away, if you’ll forgive the pun which is, I’m sure you will agree, the lowest form of all wit and more worthy of a worthy Episcopal clergyman than of my unworthy self!”
Why did he smile? Why did he not thunder at me? My eyes, already, were smarting with tears—Gavin gone, and this! I knew, too, that we were the object of many curious glances from the passers-by, numerous because it was the dinner hour. Soon the shocking tale of this interview would spread far and wide, damning me once again in the eyes of my schoolfellows, upsetting everything at Lomond View.
“We have a First Communion class beginning next month at the convent. Tuesdays and Thursdays after four. Quite convenient, really. Mother Elizabeth Josephina takes it … I think you’ll like her, if you come.” He smiled at me with his compelling black eyes. “ Will you come, Robert?”
“Yes, Father.” I mumbled out of stiff lips.
“That’s a good chap.” His umbrella, though frightfully untidy, now seemed to his satisfaction. At least, he studied it amiably and began to make whirligigs with it while giving me a short talk upon my obligations. He concluded with a final injunction: “ One point, Robert, not very easy, living with non-Catholic relatives as you do, but most important. It’s this. Do not eat meat on Fridays. A strict rule of the Church. Remember now … no meat on Fridays.” A parting gleam from those stern, yet kindly eyes, and he was gone.
I tottered off in the opposite direction, still dazed by the mischance of the encounter. I was crushed, caught and convicted of my crimes. The brightness of the day was dulled. It did not for a moment occur to me that I might disregard the Canon’s commands. No, no, his eye was now upon me; he loomed, in all his spiritual and temporal powers, too near and awful to be disobeyed. All Grandma’s careful preparation of the vineyard of my spirit was obliterated, as by a hurricane. I felt that the mischance of my origin had finally overtaken me. It only remained for me to suffer and submit.
Then, as I approached the back door of Lomond View, a sudden recollection made the sweat break coldly on my brow. To-day—this very day—was Friday. And in the air I could smell my favourite dish, beef stew. I groaned. Dear God and Canon Roche! What was I to do?
I entered the kitchen with a faltering step, took my place at the table where Kate and Murdoch were already seated. Yes, as I feared, Mama placed before me a plateful of stewed steak which seemed, indeed, a larger portion and, from its steam, more savoury than usual. I viewed it distractedly.
“Mama,” I said at last, in a weak voice. “ I don’t think I want this stew to-day.”
I was immediately the centre of inquiring stares. Mama considered me doubtfully. “Are you sick?”
“Well, I don’t know. Perhaps a slight headache.”
“Take some gravy and potatoes then.”
Gravy—ah, that, too, was forbidden. I shook my head with a pale smile. “I think perhaps it would be better if I didn’t eat anything.”
Mama made a little clicking sound with her tongue as she did when not sure about something. Before I returned to school, where classes were going on for a few final days, she gave me a dose of Gregory’s Mixture. Passing through the scullery, I had stuffed a hunk of bread furtively into my breeches pocket, and I devoured it hungrily on my way to the Academy. But all afternoon my stomach made painful empty rumbles.
That evening at the family meal Mama, with a nice air of favouring me and at the same time doing a good deed, placed before me a thin slice of the potted head on Mr. Leckie’s plate—at this time he always had some “ kitchen,” as it was called, for his high tea. She glanced at the others self-accusingly: “ Robert has not been very well to-day.”
My soul shrank within me. I stared glassily at the tender pieces of meat, visible through the clear jelly which encased the delicacy. Why didn’t I come out with the truth? Oh, no, no, a thousand no’s. I could not do it. The strange and tragic history of my affiliation with the Church of Rome was too painful a subject in this family. It was veiled, buried. To resurrect it would surely bring about my ears upheaval and catas
trophe, comparable only to the havoc wrought by Samson in Grandma’s picture upstairs. The thought of Papa’s face alone …
Yet it was he who, for the present, saved me.
“That boys’s been at the green grosets,” he suddenly declared crossly. “Get him away early to his bed.” He lifted the potted head back from my plate to his own.
I had not been near his unripe gooseberries. But I welcomed the injustice, suffered myself to be sent supperless to my little curtained alcove.
On Sunday, before the family was awake, I crept through the dim lobby and scudded out to the seven o’clock Mass, sitting in the back seat of all, hiding my face as the offertory box went round. It was a fine church—built by Pugin, I afterwards discovered—in a simple Gothic style; and very “ devotional,” with stained glass windows in excellent taste, the white high altar set well back, a series of high arches giving dignity to the nave. But this morning, reeling off my little incantations breathlessly, I drew no solace from it. My knees knocked together as Canon Roche mounted to the pulpit. Perhaps he would preach against me, this faithless renegade who had not the courage of his belief. What a relief … he did not! Yet the announcement he made was equally destructive to my peace of mind. The following week was Ember Week: Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday were days of fasting and abstinence; God would have no mercy on those weak and faithless souls who dared indulge themselves with flesh upon these days. I went home, my eyes blinking, stricken to the depths, repeating to myself, in a daze: “Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.” To offend God was bad enough. Yet it was my terror of the terrible Canon which held me to the impossible task.
On Wednesday I was fortunate. Mama, distracted by the prospect of her “washing day,” received without suspicion my whispered excuse that I must spend the dinner hour clearing up my books at the Academy, and, bending over the scullery boiler, absently bade me prepare and take along with me some slices of bread and jam. But on Friday when I tried the same device her mood was different: she sharply commanded me to return for my good hot dinner. It was mince she put before me and she left the kitchen with an air which boded ill for me if I had not cleared the plate on her return.
Oh, God, how I was suffering! No bearded Jew, confronted by a crackling loin of pork before the Inquisition, endured, such tortures as were mine. I glanced desperately across at Murdoch, who, while chewing, watched me curiously. He was studying at home now, and, since Kate was delayed by the “ break-up” at the Elementary School, he was the only other occupant of the table.
“Murdoch!” I gasped. “This meat gives me terrible indigestion.” Swiftly, I took my plate and transferred all my mince to his.
He goggled at me. But he was a big eater, he made no protest except to remark suspiciously: “ Quite a vegetarian these days.” Did he guess? Impossible to tell. Trembling, with my head down, I ate up my potatoes, careful not to touch those stained with gravy.
The next day I had reached the end of my resources. Unmanned and starving, there was no invention which I could produce: I simply stayed away from Lomond View at the dinner hour, stayed away altogether, wandering round the harbour in lacklustre style, sniffing the good smells of tar and oil like a dog. As I dragged myself home in the evening I was faint with hunger. Pinched by ravening pangs, I forgot my anxiety as to how I should explain my absence to Mama. I wanted food, food.
At her front gate Mrs. Bosomley was standing with some letters in her hand. She asked me to run to the pillar box and post them. Impossible to run. Yet, weak though I was, I could not refuse a favour to this warm-hearted friend. I posted her letters in the round red pillar at the corner of Banks Lane. When I returned she beckoned me to the open window. My eyes lit up. Yes, she was handing me my usual reward, a great warm double sandwich: Bovril on toast.
I stumbled round the back to the rockery, bearing the thick golden sandwich, the fragrance of which, alone, almost caused me to swoon. I sat down and bared my young fangs from which water already streamed. Then, oh, merciless Heaven, I remembered: Bovril! It was meat, pure meat; there was a poster at the railway bridge showing in bright-colours the enormous ox which went into every bottle!
For a full minute, paralysed with dismay, I stared stonily at the ox, the sublimation of all flesh meat, the occasion of sin, clasped between my small hands. Then, with a cry, I fell ravenously upon it. My teeth bit, tore and devoured. Oh, the goodness of it. I forgot the Avenging Angel and Canon Roche. I sucked in the salty, meaty juice with sinful lips. I licked my fingers in carnal joy. When it was all finished down to the last crumb, I heaved a great appeased, triumphant sigh.
Then, horrified, I realized what I had done. A sin. A mortal sin. A moment of awful silence. Then wave after wave of remorse broke over me. The Canon’s dark eyes glittered before me. I could stand it no longer. I broke into tears and ran upstairs to Grandpa.
Chapter Eleven
Grandpa was seated, with his face screwed scientifically to the microscope, when I burst upon him. And in this academic position he heard me, in silence, to the end. It did me good that he did not look at me. I dried my eyes and watched him as he rose and in his burst green slippers began to pace the floor. I felt safe in his hands. How I wished that he, and not the Canon, might ordain my religious future.
“It’s very simple, boy, to straighten out your Fridays. A word from me to Mama and it is done. But,” he quenched my joy with a shake of his head, “ that’s just the beginning of it. This thing has been brewing for some time. You’re in a difficult position here, there’s no denying … all on your own … It’s a queer kind of legacy your poor mother left ye.” He paused, stroking his beard, throwing a peculiar glance at me. “ Maybe the easiest solution would be for ye just to row in with the rest of them. I mean … go to church at Knoxhill with the others.”
Inexplicably, my tears spouted hotly again. “Oh, no, I couldn’t, Grandpa. A boy’s got to be what he’s born to be, even if it’s difficult…”
He persisted, showing me all the kingdoms of the earth. “Grandma would just love you if ye went to Knoxhill. On my oath I assure ye there is nothing she would not do for you.”
“No, Grandpa. I couldn’t.”
Strange pause. Then he smiled at me, not aloofly, but with his rare, slow, heart-warming smile. He came forward and shook me by the hand. “Well done, Robie, lad!”
Deliberately, he selected two peppermint oddfellows from the small stock in his tin, and pressed them upon me. I could not understand these supreme signs of his approval. He only called me “Robie, lad” on the rarest occasions and as the highest token of his regard.
“I might define my own position.” He took an oddfellow himself, enthroned himself loftily in his chair. “ I stand for religious freedom. Let a man believe what he likes, provided he doesn’t interfere with what I believe. That’s all over your head, boy. I’ll just say, if ye’d gone to Knoxhill, I’d have disowned ye on the spot.”
Philosophical silence while he lit a pipe. “I have nothing against the Catholics, except maybe their Popes. No, boy, I cannot say I approve of your Popes … some of these Borgias, with their poisoned rings and sichlike, were not quite the clean potato. However, say no more, you’re not to blame. You believe in the same Almighty as your grandma, though she won’t let you worship Him with candles and incense. Well, I will, boy. I will. I defend your right to do it. And I’ll tell ye this, ye’ve as much chance of getting through the Pearly Gates, or whatever gates we do go through, with your Mass and vestments as she has with her psalms and Bible-banging.”
I had never seen Grandpa so worked-up. He, who despised prosiness in others—who curtly dismissed every speaker he heard as “ too prolix”—could, oddly enough, be magnificently long-winded himself. He moralized for half an hour in the most heated and dramatic style: burning and immortal words flowed from his tongue, like “ freedom,” “liberal,” “tolerance,” “ free-thinker,” “imperishable heritage” and “the dignity of man.” He expressed such wonderful and high-flown sentiments I kn
ew I must be mistaken in fancying that he several times contradicted himself—as when, for example after extolling the virtues of universal love, he banged his fist fiercely on the table and declared that “we,” meaning he and I, would “certainly do the old besom,” meaning Grandma, “in the eye!”
Nevertheless the general effect of his oration was to bring me comfort. On subsequent Fridays, Mama, without a word, gave me discreet helpings of vegetables and, when Papa was not there, a hard-boiled egg. On the first of August—saying nothing, on Grandpa’s recommendation, to anyone—I began to attend the little convent of the Holy Angels and to be prepared for my First Communion.
We were a small class under the care of Mother Elizabeth Josephina, only six or seven sniffing little girls and another little boy, Angelo Antonelli, son of the Italian ice-cream vendor in the town. He was a beautiful child, with a skin like a peach, great dark luminous imploring eyes, and soft curly brown hair. He was exactly like one of Murillo’s children, though of course I did not know that then; I only knew that he delighted me and, as he was small, more than a year younger than myself, I immediately took him under my protection.
The class was held sometimes in the still twilight of the church, before the side altar, under a stained-glass window of “Our Lord Carrying His Cross”; occasionally in a prim parlour in the convent; but most frequently, since the weather was warm, on the lawn of the convent garden. Here we children would sit on the grassy bank in the shade of a blossoming syringa bush while the good nun, with the book on her knee, and placid hands in the wide sleeves of her habit, occupied a camp stool in front of us. The high walled garden was exquisitely quiet, it seemed a million miles from the busy town. Now and then one could see another of the Sisters, her face screened by her white wimple, pacing up and down one of the paths, saying her rosary. The sweep of her flowing habit was slow and gracious. Some plump pigeons strutted trustingly, quite near us. There was a low still drone of insects hovering about the white syringa flowers, which, with their delicate scent of orange blossom, seemed strangely appropriate to this enclosed place and to these pious nuns who—each with a plain gold ring on the fourth finger of her right hand—counted themselves espoused to God. Through the waving trees the stone cross of the church—its arms enclosed by a circle, the Saint Andrew’s Cross—could be seen against the sky. Then our Sister would raise her forefinger to her lips for silence and, while we gazed at her with round obedient eyes, she began to speak to us of the infant Saviour. It is a moment of innocence to remember; never before, and never since, have I known such peace, such a sense of tranquil happiness.