On the instant, as they gazed, the church, but for them and the prostrate form, was empty. The sunlight shone upon an altar as bare as the pavement before it; without violence, without parting, the Graal and its Lord were gone.
They knelt and prayed, and only stirred at last when, with the natural boredom of childhood, Adrian said in a minute to his mother: “Shall we go home now?” The words dissolved as by a predestined act the forces that held them. Barbara stood up, looked once at Lionel, smiled at Adrian, and went with him out of the church. The Duke came up the aisle.
“Will you tell his people or shall I?” he asked Lionel, and Lionel answered with an equal normality, “As you like. I will stay here, if you will go.”
“Very well,” the Duke said, and paused, looking at the body. Then he said, smiling at Lionel, “I suppose they will say he had a weak heart.”
“Yes,” Lionel answered, “I expect they will.” He felt suddenly the joy of the fantasy rise in his mind; he walked to the door and watched the Duke crossing the churchyard, and waited till beyond the hedge he saw Mr. Batesby hurrying to the church. Then he went out to meet him.
“Dear, dear,” Mr. Batesby said, “how truly distressing! ‘In the midst of life’ … The Archdeacon too.… Cut down like a palm-tree and thrust into the oven.… No doubt the knock on the head affected it rather much.”
THE END
About the Author
Charles Williams (1886–1945) was a British author and longtime editor at Oxford University Press. He was one of the three most prominent members of the literary group known as the Inklings—the other two being C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien. Williams wrote poetry, drama, biography, literary criticism, and more, but is best known for his novels, which explored the primal conflict between good and evil. T. S. Eliot, who wrote an introduction to Williams’s All Hallows’ Eve, praised the author’s “profound insight into … the heights of Heaven and the depths of Hell, which provides both the immediate thrill, and the permanent message of his novels,” and Time magazine called him “one of the most gifted and influential Christian writers England has produced this century.”
Jonathan Ryan is a novelist, columnist, and blogger. A former Presbyterian minister, he has spoken to thousands of people on writing and religion. His writing credits include articles in the Huffington Post, Christianity Today, the High Calling, TAPS ParaMagazine, Intrepid Magazine, and the popular horror site DreadCentral.com. Ryan is the author of two novels, 3 Gates of the Dead and Dark Bride, and is an acquisitions editor at Ave Maria Press. He has taken vows to become a Benedictine oblate novice at Marmion Abbey in Aurora, Illinois.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1930 by Charles Williams
Copyright © 1949 by Pellegrini & Cudahy
Cover design by Kat Lee
ISBN: 978-1-5040-0665-1
This edition published in 2015 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
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War in Heaven Page 26