To steady herself she looked at the driver. She could see his back clad in a grey flannel shirt through which the sweat showed in dark patches on his shoulder blades. Rising out of the crumpled collar was an inch or two of stubble-like bristle, so sharp that it looked dangerous. Above it a strong growth of grey clotted hair mounted up the cranium like a crop on a hillside. If she looked in his driving mirror she could see a reflection of the front of him. The bristles of his beard went a long way down his neck and disappeared into a matted growth visible on his chest through his unbuttoned shirt. He is not my idea of a pilgrimage leader, Mrs Lemming from Tunbridge Wells thought.
At Leeds Station, Canon Beagle manoeuvred his wheelchair up and down the parking area, scattering pedestrians in his path. He had made no apology. When his arthritis had finally prevailed and he’d been reduced to a chair, he’d resolved he’d make no concessions. He’d go on just as he always had. He liked a challenge. He particularly liked signs which said ‘No Disabled Access’. His greatest feat to date, he reckoned, had been the steps of the Athenaeum. He’d commandeered two well-built archdeacons and blackmailed them of their Christian charity to take a wheel each and heave him up. He was helping them to keep fit, he reckoned. So now he rolled up and down the indeterminate area between the taxi ranks and the station booking-office, twenty yards each way and then the equivalent of a handbrake turn and back again. He’d just accomplished the ninth of these when he spotted the St Sylvan’s bus nosing its way through the cabs. He remarked with pleasure the narrow door and steep steps of the minibus’s entrance. She’d be a poser.
The hirsute driver swung himself down from the driving seat and surveyed the wheelchair. He eyed Canon Beagle as an adversarial equal. He said nothing but weighed up the distances silently for a moment then, with a swift movement, he seized the handles of the chair, tipped it slightly backward until the feet pedals rested on the bottom step of the bus and then with a jerk heaved the whole through the door. Canon Beagle, no bantamweight, was impressed. The driver slewed the chair round and locked it into a couple of floor bolts designed to hold it.
The driver eased himself back behind the wheel. They were all set then, thought Mrs Lemming, who had remarked Canon Beagle’s clerical collar and felt that in some way its presence marked the proper beginning of the pilgrimage. The driver revved the engine and let in the clutch. Then he stamped on his brake. Something was happening outside the bus in front of them. A high boyish voice could be heard clamouring outside in the street. ‘Hang on. Half a mo,’ it said. Mrs Lemming crouched forward to get a look. Jumping up and down in front of the bus was a small figure in a red-and-white-check shirt and shiny black nylon cycling pants which stopped just above the knee. The boy was steadying a yellow mountain bike in his right hand and his left held a red nylon knapsack. On his head was a red knitted cap. The driver wound down the window.
‘St Sylvan’s?’ said the figure. ‘Guy Tussock,’ it added. ‘Can I put my bike in the boot?’
‘No boot,’ said the driver with satisfaction.
‘Well actually it folds up.’ Guy bent round his bicycle, twiddled a couple of bolts and the bike folded neatly in upon itself, wheel to wheel. Reluctantly the driver admitted defeat. The door was opened and Guy manoeuvred his machine aboard. Once it had been stowed behind the driver and in front of the flinching Mrs Lemming, Guy slid himself into a seat in front of the Clutton Brocks, breathed in and out six times, folded his legs into a good full lotus, placed his hands on each bare knee and closed his eyes. He clearly had his methods of dealing with boring journeys.
The driver too had his methods of passing the time. As he achieved the highest gear he leaned forward in the driving seat, fiddled for a moment and then switched on the radio. The thud of heavy metal shook the small space. Canon Beagle was aware of a twittering protest stemming from behind his right ear but the angle of his chair was such that he couldn’t turn round. He bethought him of the driver’s interior mirror and focused his gaze on the reflection. Mrs Lemming could be seen making small signals of distress. Behind her, on the back seat, he glimpsed a tubby man caught with a look of horror on his features and a hard-boiled egg held in his hand at chin-level. His eyes bulged with shock as the drums got to him. Canon Beagle watched with interest as the man took a napkin from his knee and heaved himself out of his seat. The vehicle picked up speed as it left the traffic of Leeds behind. Mr Clutton Brock swayed his way down the central aisle. Canon Beagle watched the reflection turning into reality as he hoved abreast of the wheelchair.
The man was fiftyish, dressed in a green tweed suit. His thin fair hair was economically arranged across his pate. He bent his head down just behind the driver’s ear, steadied himself with his free hand and kept the egg clear of the driver’s cheek. Then he shouted in a high, penetrating voice, ‘It may have escaped your notice but we consider ourselves to be on a pilgrimage. Would you mind turning that thing off?’
The driver gave no sign of having heard him. Then, his eye still entirely concentrated on the road, he flicked the switch. The throb of the engine felt like silence. The pilgrim executed a three-point turn, guarding his egg the while, and started back towards the rear. He had reached halfway when the music blared forth again. The man flushed purple, stopped and started to turn round. The bus heeled over to cope with a corner and the man was flung into a vacant seat. As he rose again and struggled to start forward, the driver flicked the switch and once again quiet returned. The man hesitated for a moment, threw a baffled look at the driver and then picked his way back to his seat.
Theodora, boarding the bus at York station forty minutes later, scented the turbulence. All is not well, she thought, scanning the tense faces with a skilled pastoral eye. She’d better see what she could do. Who looked most in need? It was a toss-up between the woman in the purple cardigan just behind the driver and the old cleric in the wheelchair, his hands clamped on his panama hat. The couple in the rear had, after all, each other. Guy’s neat figure, deep in the fissure between the middle seats, she did not detect. Providence decided for her. The driver let in the clutch suddenly and the vehicle jumped forward precipitating her into the seat beside the wheelchair.
The Canon turned a concerned face towards her. ‘I hope you’re all right. These physical surprises can be painful.’
Theodora regained her breath and nodded. ‘Fine, thank you.’ She saw a large head in the mode of a Roman senator. It had a strong nose, thin lips and a growth of thick curly grey hair which did credit to a man who must be in his eighties. A connoisseur in the genre, she took in the excellence of his clerical suiting.
‘I’m Canon Henry Beagle. And you would be?’
‘Theodora Braithwaite.’
‘Ah. Braithwaite. A clerical name. I wonder, would you by any chance be any relation of Nicholas?’
‘My father.’ Theodora embarked on the familiar catechism.
‘I was so sorry to hear of his early death. A remarkable man.’
‘Yes, he was. So do I. Miss him, I mean.’
‘And Canon Hugh, of course …’
‘My great uncle.’
‘A distinguished family.’
‘So far,’ Theodora deprecated.
‘But you carry on the tradition?’
‘I’m in deacons’ orders, yes,’ Theodora admitted.
There was a slight pause and then Canon Beagle’s curiosity got the better of his good manners. ‘Will you seek priests’ orders?’ he enquired.
‘No. Not until the whole Church has made up its mind on the matter. There’s very little that I can do, that needs to be done, that can’t be done as a deacon. The priest thing seems rather too closely connected with wanting power. Best left, I’ve come to feel.’
Canon Beagle felt this was all he could desire. He folded his arthritic hands with their enlarged knuckles on his broad chest and prepared to give himself up to the pleasures of clerical conversation with a sympathetic companion. Outside the window of the minibus
, the plain of Yorkshire sped past disclosing fields of mown barley, the stubble bleached by the July sun. The bus’s engine ceased to complain and settled into a steady low roar.
‘Where would you be serving at the moment?’ Canon Beagle pursued. ‘A chaplaincy perhaps?’ He could imagine Theodora in a hospital. She looked competent, a list-maker, if he were not mistaken. A good woman at a death-bed, he wouldn’t be surprised, like Mrs Gaskell.
‘I did a first curacy in East Africa. Now I’m doing a second at St Sylvester’s Betterhouse in South London.’
‘Ah. St Sylvester’s. Gilbert Racy, Geoffrey Brighouse. Very interesting area.’ Canon Beagle positively purred. He knew them both. The ecclesiastical pedigree could not have been better.
‘St Sylvan’s at Rest,’ he said, ‘have you been there before?’
Theodora shook her head. ‘No. My uncle Hugh recommended it as a complete change from London and as I was in the North anyway, it seemed worth making the effort. I have to admit I’ve never made a pilgrimage.’
‘Never done the Walsingham run?’ Canon Beagle showed surprise.
‘No, nor the Glastonbury one either.’
‘Glastonbury’s difficult,’ said Canon Beagle, a connoisseur of these matters. ‘The pagan associations are so strong there, one can waste an awful lot of time repelling the Arthurian brigade or the Wikke element. Purity’s very important. We’ve simply got to draw the line somewhere.’
Theodora wasn’t entirely convinced of this. She felt pilgrimages, like the Church, should be capacious. A gaggle of true believers reinforcing each other’s bigotries might not be the best setting for revelation or even, more modestly, new learning.
‘I’ve spent time at Little Gidding,’ Theodora said, not wishing to disappoint him.
‘It has its strengths,’ Canon Beagle conceded. ‘But it’s very different from St Sylvan’s which has a flavour all of its own. Little Gidding concentrates on the Christian life, St Sylvan’s tends to have its focus on the well, naturally. Water does draw us, don’t you find?’
Theodora agreed. ‘We hope to be clean, new made over.’
‘Quite so. And of course in my own case, it takes away my weight and frees me from my body. An analogue of Heaven, perfection.’
‘What’s St Sylvan’s like? No pagan associations?’
‘All the best sites have an atmosphere and there’s no doubt that the more ancient, the more saturated in prayer, the more potent to move us.’
‘Magic?’ Theodora hazarded.
‘Numinous,’ Canon Beagle corrected her.
‘The legend of St Sylvan,’ Theodora was hesitant, ‘it resonances of the Old English legends. Herne the Hunter. Slaying of the innocent. That sort of thing.’
Canon Beagle was unmoved. ‘No doubt. I’ve always thought that the very best religious stories start in myth which is universal and then end up being incarnated in religious truth, Christian truth, which is historical, concrete and particular.’
‘And Father Bellaire?’
Canon Beagle grinned, ‘Kept deer-hounds.’
‘You knew him well?’
Canon Beagle pursed his lips. ‘On and off. I used to go regularly when I was home on leave from China and before Tusk got hold of the place.’
‘Cannon Tussock was a rather different kettle of fish?’
‘I’ve no doubt the evangelical wing meets many needs,’ said Canon Beagle with distaste.
‘I suppose people look for different things from a pilgrimage,’ Theodora advanced cautiously.
‘What would you be looking for in this pilgrimage?’ Canon Beagle asked, suddenly direct. It was the tone, Theodora recognised it instantly, of someone who had years of experience in the field, who was in fact an authority.
Theodora considered his question. There were matters with which it would be tiresome to burden Canon Beagle. Emotions, relationships were not the fodder of casual acquaintance. It wasn’t the confessional, telling all was not required. She selected. ‘I suppose if I’m honest I’m looking for a way to reunite the different bits of me. My work, I mean in Betterhouse, it’s, well, it’s diverse and draining. We see a lot of people in trouble so dire they can’t rise out of it and violence is often the only way they have to express themselves.’
‘It’s contagious, violence. It draws other people in and goes on down the generations so it becomes an institution. It’s very difficult to break it. Perhaps only a saint can manage it.’ Canon Beagle had not, after all, led a sheltered life, Theodora surmised.
As he finished speaking, Mrs Lemming leaned across the aisle from her seat. Their conversation had not been conducted in whispers. The noise of the engine had made them speak more loudly than they had realised.
‘I do so agree with you,’ she said rapidly. ‘I mean about evil being contagious, drawing you in so that you get sucked down into someone else’s whirlpool. Wouldn’t you say that marriage was a bit like that?’ She appealed first to Canon Beagle then Theodora.
Theodora felt her own inadequacy. She hesitated. Canon Beagle turned a gentle eye to the little cardiganed figure who, in her agitation, had clutched her easel to her as though for comfort. ‘I’ve often seen it,’ he assured her.
Mrs Lemming pressed on as though she hadn’t heard him. ‘I live in Tunbridge Wells. I’m making a pilgrimage to find somewhere to start from. I want a birth, a beginning, a new me. I’m tired to death of myself. I can’t wait for it to start.’ She sank back into her seat as though exhausted by her outburst.
‘I, on the other hand,’ said Canon Beagle, his eye fixed on the road ahead, ‘am looking in my pilgrimage for an end, something final. A consummation almost.’
CHAPTER THREE
He Who Would Valiant Be
‘All out,’ said the driver without turning round.
There was a flurry of movement behind him as the passengers got themselves together. Mr Guy Tussock and his bicycle got off. Mr and Mrs Clutton Brock and their cello got off. Mrs Lemming and her easel got off. Canon Beagle and his wheelchair were got off. Theodore swung her small leather holdall down from the rack, felt herself rather underaccoutred, and got off.
They appeared to be in the middle of a field. A rutted path bounded by banks of sheep-nibbled thyme wound away into the distance. There was no habitation in sight.
‘Where are we?’ Mrs Lemming asked. The enquiry, the querulous tone, came naturally to her.
‘There’s clearly been a mistake,’ Clutton Brock turned to the driver. ‘Mr, er …?’
‘Bough,’ said the driver. ‘Tom Bough.’
‘Well, this isn’t the entrance, Mr Bough. I remember it quite well. Have we broken down?’
‘Nope. House rules. All pilgrims to walk the last two miles.’
‘Impossible,’ said Mrs Lemming.
‘New since my day,’ admitted Canon Beagle. ‘Bit of a challenge.’ But he didn’t seem daunted.
Theodora breathed the fresh air, smelt the new hay and remarked the long shadow of the hills in the distance. I’ve come from one place of learning to another, she thought. Her spirits rose. It was going to be all right.
‘We are pilgrims after all,’ she said.
‘S’right,’ the driver agreed. ‘Not a holiday. Not yer annual beano at Blackpool.’
It looked as though Clutton Brock might do Bough some violence. Theodora stepped in quickly.
‘We’ll walk, of course. But could you take some of our luggage?’
Bough looked doubtful. ‘Orders are pilgrims carry their own luggage. What you bring, you carry.’
‘Come on,’ said Canon Beagle, ‘Be a sport. They’re too old.’ He looked with derision at his companions.
‘I’m not,’ said Clutton Brock. He put a protective arm around the cello.
‘How about if we do a deal,’ Canon Beagle cajoled. ‘You take the luggage, we’ll take the extras. That seems to keep the spirit of the rule. Yes?’
‘I’ll take Mrs – it’s
Mrs Lemming, isn’t it? – your easel if you’ll allow me.’ Canon Beagle hoisted it on to his lap. ‘And you’ll push us, yes?’ he enquired of Theodora.
‘Yes,’ said Theodora, ‘with pleasure.’
‘Just what I need,’ said Guy Tussock, bending to reassemble his machine. ‘A bit of a spin. I’ll go on ahead.’ He tried in vain to line up the two wheels of the bicycle. Then looked with his boyish smile at the only able-bodied man. ‘Do you think you could possibly hold an end for me?’
Mr Clutton Brock laid the cello on the grass and wedged the front wheel between his knees.
‘Thanks awfully,’ said Guy, then swung himself on to his machine, did something complicated to the gears and, after a couple of effortful heaves on the peddles, gathered speed up the track.
‘Right you are then,’ Bough said and without further delay hoisted himself back into the cab. He too did something horrible to the gears and reversed the bus back down the track.
The little party set off.
Canon Beagle sang, ‘He who would valiant be ’gainst all disaster,’ in a serviceable tenor. Theodora pushed him. Mrs Lemming trotted behind and joined in with a breathy alto. The Clutton Brocks followed a little apart and behind them. Mr Clutton Brock carried the cello and blew his nose a good deal. He seemed to be afflicted with hay fever. The heat was considerable. They sweated, some from exertion, some from unsuitable dress. Behind her, Theodora could hear the irregular panting of Mr Clutton Brock. She glanced back and saw his wife walking at some distance from him. Her long lean face with its abundance of faded fair hair was partly turned away from them gazing towards the woods on their right. She wore a dark blue silk dress. In her hand she carried a mauve parasol held high above her head. It waved about like a flag, it’s uncertain shade darting too and fro in front of her. Mrs Lemming was beginning to whimper.
‘It’s not quite what I’d imagined, what I’d hoped for.’
‘That’s life,’ said Canon Beagle cheerfully.
Every Deadly Sin Page 3