Delphi Collected Works of Hugh Walpole (Illustrated)

by Hugh Walpole

  And to-day it was Ronder; from the first, without any ostentation or presumption, with the utmost naturalness, he led the field. To understand the full truth of this occasion it must be known that Mr. Ponting had, for a considerable number of years past, cherished a deep but private detestation of the Archdeacon. It was hard to say wherein that hatred had had it inception — probably in some old, long-forgotten piece of cheerful patronage on Brandon’s part; Mr. Ponting was of those who consider and dwell and dwell again, and he had, by this time, dwelt upon the Archdeacon so long and so thoroughly that he knew and resented the colour of every one of the Archdeacon’s waistcoat buttons. He was, perhaps, quick to perceive to-day that a mightier than the Archdeacon was here; or it may have been that he was well aware of what had been happening in Polchester during the last weeks, and was even informed of the incidents of the last three days.

  However that may be, he did from the first pay an almost exaggerated deference to Ronder’s opinion, drew him into the conversation at every possible opportunity, with such, interjections as “How true! How very true! Don’t you think so, Canon Ronder?” or “What has been your experience in such a case, Canon Ronder?” or “I think, my lord, that Canon Ronder told me that he knows that place well,” and disregarding entirely any remarks that Brandon might happen to make.

  No one could have responded more brilliantly to this opportunity than did Ronder; indeed the Bishop, who was his host at the Palace to-day for the first time, said after his departure, “That’s a most able man, most able. Lucky indeed for the diocese that it has secured him...a delightful fellow.”

  No one in the world could have been richer in anecdotes than Ronder, anecdotes of precisely the kind for the Bishop’s taste, not too worldly, not too clerical, amusing without being broad, light and airy, but showing often a fine scholarship and a wise and thoughtful experience of foreign countries. The Bishop had not laughed so heartily for many a day. “Oh, dear! Oh, dear!” he cried at the anecdote of the two American ladies in Siena. “That’s good, indeed...that’s very good. Did you get that, Ponting? Dear me, that’s perfectly delightful!” A little tear of shining pleasure trickled down his cheek. “Really, Canon, I’ve never heard anything better.”

  Brandon thought Ronder’s manners outrageous. Poor Bishop! He was indeed failing that he could laugh so heartily at such pitiful humour. He tried, to show his sense of it all by grimly pursuing his food and refusing even the ghost of a chuckle, but no one was perceiving him, as he very bitterly saw. The Bishop, it may be, saw it too, for at last he turned to Brandon and said:

  “But come, Archdeacon. I was forgetting. You wrote to me s-something about that Jubilee-music in the Cathedral. You find that Ryle is making rather a m-mess of things, don’t you?”

  Brandon was deeply offended. Of what was the Bishop thinking that he could so idly drag forward the substance of an entirely private letter, without asking permission, into the public air? Moreover, the last thing that he wanted was that Ronder should know that he had been working behind Ryle’s back. Not that he was in the least ashamed of what he had done, but here was precisely the thing that Ronder would like to use and make something of. In any case, it was the principle of the thing. Was Ronder henceforth to be privy to everything that passed between himself and the Bishop?

  He never found it easy to veil his feelings, and he looked now, as Ponting delightedly perceived, like an overgrown, sulky schoolboy.

  “No, no, my lord,” he said, looking across at Ponting, as though he would love to set his heel upon that pale but eager visage. “You have me wrong there. I was making no complaint. The Precentor knows his own business best.”

  “You certainly said something in your letter,” said the Bishop vaguely. “There was s-something, Ponting, was there not?”

  “Yes, my lord,” said Ponting. “There was. But I expect the Archdeacon did not mean it very seriously.”

  “Do you mean that you find the Precentor inefficient?” said the Bishop, looking at the coffee with longing and then shaking his head. “Not to-day, Appleford, alas — not to-day.”

  “Oh, no,” said Brandon, colouring. “Of course not. Our tastes differ a little as to the choice of music, that’s all. I’ve no doubt that I am old- fashioned.”

  “How do you find the Cathedral music, Canon?” he asked, turning to Ronder.

  “Oh, I know very little about it,” said Ronder, smiling. ‘“Nothing in comparison with the Archdeacon. I’m sure he’s right in liking the old music that people have grown used to and are fond of. At the same time, I must confess that I haven’t thought Ryle too venturesome. But then I’m very ignorant, having been here so short a time.”

  “That’s right, then,” said the Bishop comfortably. “There doesn’t seem much wrong.”

  At that moment Appleford, who had been absent from the room for a minute, returned with a note which he gave to the Bishop.

  “From Pybus, my lord,” he said; “some one has ridden over with it.”

  At the word “Pybus” there was an electric silence in the room. The Bishop tore open the letter and read it. He half started from his chair with a little exclamation of distress and grief.

  “Please excuse me,” he said, turning to them. “I must leave you for a moment and speak to the bearer of this note. Poor Morrison...at last... he’s gone! — Pybus!...”

  The Archdeacon, in spite of himself, half rose and stared across at Ronder. Pybus! The living at last was vacant.

  A moment later he felt deeply ashamed. In that sunlit room the bright green of the outside world quivering in pools of colour upon the pure space of the white walls spoke of life and beauty and the immortality of beauty.

  It was hard to think of death there in such a place, but one must think of it and consider, too, Morrison, who had been so good a fellow and loved the world, and all the things in it, and had thought of heaven also in the spare moments that his energy left him.

  A great sportsman he had been, with a famous breed of bull-terrier, and anxious to revive the South Glebeshire Hunt; very fine, too, in that last terrible year when the worst of all mortal diseases had leapt upon his throat and shaken him with agony and the imminent prospect of death — shaken him but never terrified him. Brandon summoned before him that broad, jolly, laughing figure, summoned it, bowed to its fortitude and optimism, then, as all men must, at such a moment, considered his own end; then, having paid his due to Morrison, returned to the great business of the — Living.

  They were gathered together in the hall now. The Bishop had known Morrison well and greatly liked him, and he could think of nothing but the man himself. The question of the succession could not come near him that day, and as he stood, a little white-haired figure, tottering on his stick in the flagged hall, he seemed already to be far from the others, to be caught already half-way along the road that Morrison was now travelling.

  Both Brandon and Ronder felt that it was right for them to go, although on a normal day they would have stayed walking in the garden and talking for another three-quarters of an hour until it was time to catch the three- thirty train from Carpledon. Mr. Ponting settled the situation.

  “His lordship,” he said, “hopes that you will let Bassett drive you into Polchester. There is the little wagonette; Bassett must go, in any case, to get some things. It is no trouble, no trouble at all.”

  They, of course, agreed, although for Brandon at any rate there would be many things in the world pleasanter than sitting with Ronder in a small wagonette for more than an hour. He also had no liking for Bassett, the Bishop’s coachman for the last twenty years, a native of South Glebeshire, with all the obstinacy, pride and independence that that definition includes.

  There was, however, no other course, and, a quarter of an hour later, the two clergymen found themselves opposite one another in a wagonette that was indeed so small that it seemed inevitable that Ronder’s knees must meet Brandon’s and Brandon’s ankles glide against Ronder’s.

  The Archd
eacon’s temper was, by this time, at its worst. Everything had been ruined by Ronder’s presence. The original grievances were bad enough — the way in which his letter had been flouted, the fashion in which his conversation had been disregarded at luncheon, the sanctified pleasure that Ponting’s angular countenance had expressed at every check that he had received; but all these things mattered nothing compared with the fact that Ronder was present at the news of Morrison’s death.

  Had he been alone with the Bishop then, what an opportunity he would have had! How exactly he would have known how to comfort the Bishop, how tactful and right he would have been in the words that he used, and what an opportunity finally for turning the Bishop’s mind in the way it should go, namely, towards Rex Forsyth!

  As his knees, place them where he would, bumped against Ronder’s, wrath bubbled in his heart like boiling water in a kettle. The very immobility of Bassett’s broad back added to the irritation. “It’s remarkably small for a wagonette,” said Ronder at last, when some minutes had passed in silence. “Further north this would not, I should think, be called a wagonette at all, but in Glebeshire there are special names for everything. And then, of course, we are both big men.”

  This comparison was most unfortunate. Ronder’s body was soft and plump, most unmistakably fat. Brandon’s was apparently in magnificent condition. It is well known that a large man in good athletic condition has a deep, overwhelming contempt for men who are fat and soft. Brandon made no reply. Ronder was determined to be pleasant.

  “Very difficult to keep thin in this part of the world, isn’t it? Every morning when I look at myself in the glass I find myself fatter than I was the day before. Then I say to myself, ‘I’ll give up bread and potatoes and drink hot water.’ Hot water! Loathsome stuff. Moreover, have you noticed, Archdeacon, that a man who diets himself is a perfect nuisance to all his friends and neighbours? The moment he refuses potatoes his hostess says to him, ‘Why, Mr. Smith, not one of our potatoes! Out of our own garden!’ And then he explains to her that he is dieting, whereupon every one at the table hurriedly recites long and dreary histories of how they have dieted at one time or another with this or that success. The meal is ruined for yourself and every one else. Now, isn’t it so? What do you do for yourself when you are putting on flesh?”

  “I am not aware,” said Brandon in his most haughty manner, “that I am putting on flesh.”

  “Of course I don’t mean just now,” answered Ronder, smiling. “In any case, the jolting of this wagonette is certain to reduce one. Anyway, I agree with you. It’s a tiresome subject. There’s no escaping fate. We stout men are doomed, I fancy.”

  There was a long silence. After Brandon had moved his legs about in every possible direction and found it impossible to escape Ronder’s knees, he said:

  “Excuse my knocking into you so often, Canon.”

  “Oh, that’s all right,” said Ronder, laughing. “This drive comes worse on you than myself, I fancy. You’re bonier.... What a splendid figure the Bishop is! A great man — really, a great man. There’s something about a man of that simplicity and purity of character that we lesser men lack. Something out of our grasp altogether.”

  “You haven’t known him very long, I think,” said Brandon, who considered himself in no way a lesser man than the Bishop.

  “No, I have not,” said Ronder, pleasantly amused at the incredible ease with which he was able to make the Archdeacon rise. “I’ve never been to Carpledon before to-day. I especially appreciated his inviting me when he was having so old a friend as yourself.”

  Another silence. Ronder looked about him; the afternoon was hot, and little beads of perspiration formed on his forehead. One trickled down his forehead, another into his eye. The road, early in the year though it was, was already dusty, and the high Glebeshire hedges hid the view. The irritation of the heat, the dust and the sense that they were enclosed and would for the rest of their lives jog along, thus, knee to knee, down an eternal road, made Ronder uncomfortable; when he was uncomfortable he was dangerous. He looked at the fixed obstinacy of the Archdeacon’s face and said:

  “Poor Morrison! So he’s gone. I never knew him, but he must have been a fine fellow. And the Pybus living is vacant.”

  Brandon said nothing.

  “An important decision that will be — I beg your pardon. That’s my knee again.

  “It’s to be hoped that they will find a good man.”

  “There can be only one possible choice,” said Brandon, planting his hands flat on his knees.

  “Really!” said Ronder, looking at the Archdeacon with an air of innocent interest. “Do tell me, if it isn’t a secret, who that is.”

  “It’s no secret,” said Brandon in a voice of level defiance. “Rex Forsyth is the obvious man.”

  “Really!” said Ronder. “That is interesting. I haven’t heard him mentioned. I’m afraid I know very little about him.”

  “Know very little about him!” said Brandon indignantly. “Why, his name has been in every one’s mouth for months!”

  “Indeed!” said Ronder mildly. “But then I am, in many ways, sadly out of things. Do tell me about him.”

  “It’s not for me to tell you,” said Brandon, looking at Ronder with great severity. “You can find out anything you like from the smallest boy in the town.” This was not polite, but Ronder did not mind. There was a little pause, then he said very amiably:

  “I have heard some mention of that man Wistons.”

  “What!” cried Brandon in a voice not very far from a shout. “The fellow who wrote that abnominable book, The Four Creeds?”

  “I suppose it’s the same,” said Ronder gently, rubbing his knee a little.

  “That man!” The Archdeacon bounced in his seat. “That atheist! The leading enemy of the Church, the man above any who would destroy every institution that the Church possesses!”

  “Come, come! Is it as bad as that?”

  “As bad as that? Worse! Much worse! I take it that you have not read any of his books.”

  “Well, I have read one or two!”

  “You have read them and you can mention his name with patience?”

  “There are several ways of looking at these things — —”

  “Several ways of looking at atheism? Thank you, Canon. Thank you very much indeed. I am delighted to have your opinion given so frankly.”

  (“What an ass the man is!” thought Ronder. “He’s going to lose his temper here in the middle of the road with that coachman listening to every word.”)

  “You must not take me too literally, Archdeacon,” said Ronder. “What I meant was that the question whether Wistons is an atheist can be argued from many points of view.”

  “It can not! It can not!” cried Brandon, now shaking with anger. “There can be no two points of view. ‘He that is not with me is against me’ — —”

  “Very well, then,” said Ronder. “It can not. There is no more to be said.”

  “There is more to be said. There is indeed. I am glad, Canon, that at last you have come out into the open. I have been wondering for a long time past when that happy event was to take place. Ever since you came into this town, you have been subverting doctrine, upsetting institutions, destroying the good work that the Cathedral has been doing for many years past. I feel it my duty to tell you this, a duty that no one else is courageous enough to perform — —”

  “Really, is this quite the place?” said Ronder, motioning with his hand towards Bassett’s broad back, and the massive sterns of the two horses that rose and fell, like tubs on a rocking sea.

  But Brandon was past caution, past wisdom, past discipline. He could see nothing now but Ronder’s two rosy cheeks and the round gleaming spectacles that seemed to catch his words disdainfully and suspend them there in indifference. “Excuse me. It is time indeed. It is long past the time. If you think that you can come here, a complete stranger, and do what you like with the institutions here, you are mistaken, and thoroughly m
istaken. There are those here who have the interests of the place at heart and guard and protect them. Your conceit has blinded you, allow me to tell you, and it’s time that you had a more modest estimate of yourself and doings.”

  “This really isn’t the place,” murmured Ronder, struggling to avoid Brandon’s knees.

  “Yes, atheism is nothing to you!” shouted the Archdeacon. “Nothing at all! You had better be careful! I warn you!”

  “You had better be careful,” said Ronder, smiling in spite of himself, “or you will be out of the carriage.”

  That smile was the final insult. Brandon, jumped up, rocking on his feet. “Very well, then. You may laugh as you please. You may think it all a very good joke. I tell you it is not. We are enemies, enemies from this moment. You have never been anything but my enemy.”

  “Do take care, Archdeacon, or you really will be out of the carriage.”

  “Very well. I will get out of it. I refuse to drive with you another step. I refuse. I refuse.”

  “But you can’t walk. It’s six miles.”

  “I will walk! I will walk! Stop and let me get out! Stop, I say!”

  But Bassett who, according to his back, was as innocent of any dispute as the small birds on the neighbouring tree, drove on.

  “Stop, I say. Can’t you hear?” The Archdeacon plunged forward and pulled Bassett by the collar. “Stop! Stop!” The wagonette abruptly stopped.

  Bassett’s amazed face, two wide eyes in a creased and crumpled surface, peered round.

  “It’s war, I tell you. War!” Brandon climbed out. “But listen, Archdeacon! You can’t!”

  “Drive on! Drive on!” cried Brandon, standing in the road and shaking his umbrella.

  The wagonette drove on. It disappeared over the ledge of the hill.

  There was a sudden silence. Brandon’s anger pounded up into his head in great waves of constricting passion. These gradually faded. His knees were trembling beneath him. There were new sounds — birds singing, a tiny breeze rustling the hedges. No living soul in sight. He had suddenly a strange impulse to shed tears. What had he been saying? What had he been doing? He did not know what he had said. Another of his tempers....