‘Death of the body is, of course,’ his voice smiled in deprecation, ‘inevitable. But death of the ego is not. The true pilgrim seeks to reduce his destructive ego and so save his soul. I use the generic masculine’, he said carefully, ‘to include the female sex.’
A sound suspiciously like a snore emanated from the direction of Canon Beagle’s wheelchair. Theodora wondered whether she should wake him up. What was the state of his destructive ego? She was saved from the need to act by Mr Clutton Brock clearing his throat and saying loudly, ‘I came here to pray. I need to pray regularly. I need help. I feel,’ he looked round accusingly as though this might be someone’s fault, ‘I feel lost.’
Angus paused and gave him the measure of his careful attention. ‘Aye,’ he said, ‘Aye, that’s very good. That’s a good place from which to start a spiritual journey.’ The Scottish accent was prominent. ‘Perhaps if I run through the domestic arrangements you will see that they have been evolved by our founder, the Reverend Augustine Bellaire, who was perhaps known to some of you, to meet just those needs which’, he consulted one of his bits of paper, ‘Mr Clutton Brock has mentioned.’
He shuffled his papers and extracted the appropriate one.
‘Prayers are said in the chapel at eight o’clock in the morning, five-thirty in the afternoon and nine o’clock in the evening. The eight o’clock service is a Eucharist, the five-thirty an evensong and the nine o’clock compline. The chapel is open throughout the day for private prayer and meditation. The sacrament is reserved.’
Mrs Lemming thought how much Norman would have disapproved. It must have changed since his day, since Tussock’s retirement.
Angus had switched from soul to body. ‘Breakfast is at eight-fortyfive, lunch at one and supper at seven-thirty. A cup of tea’, he smiled at the trolley in their midst, ‘is served here at four-thirty. The evening meal is taken in silence and silence is kept until breakfast the following morning. With regard to the rhythm of the week, it is usual for us to conclude our time together with a procession to the well of St Sylvan and to celebrate a Eucharist there on the last morning.’ Angus cleared his throat and girded his loins. ‘This year there are several reasons for this being a very special occasion. It is by tradition the feast day of St Sylvan as well as being by legend the day of his martyrdom. Our neighbours from nearby parishes, some church groups, a number of people of traveller descent, generally come along. It is, moreover, an important juncture in the life of this foundation.’ Angus’s noble brow puckered for an instant and then he resumed. ‘You will, therefore, on your last day with us, have an opportunity to join in our celebrations.’
‘What happens the rest of the time?’ It was Guy’s voice. Mrs Lemming turned to look at him. ‘I’d thought I might get to know some of the countryside. I’ve got a bike, you see,’ he said as though letting Angus into a secret. ‘And I’ve got a lot to do.’
Theodora wondered what that might be. She had seen little of Guy at the Open University week. He had not, after all, been in her group but she’d heard one of her colleagues say Tussock never wasted a minute.
‘I haven’t got very much to do,’ Mrs Lemming said. ‘But I thought I might try a little sketching.’ She looked round as though someone might object to so extravagant an activity.
‘We’ve brought our cello,’ said Mr Clutton Brock, wiping his watering eyes and entering into the competition.
‘Father Augustine’s rule was that pilgrims should, within the framework of communal prayer, find their own rhythm of work, rest and reading. This may well be different for each of you. Certainly exploring the countryside, sketching, music-making or, if you should feel so inclined, gardening are all perfectly acceptable activities. If we each do all that we choose to do with complete attention to that thing we shall find ourselves new made over. I shall be available to any who would like advice about reading or the disposition of time while you are with us. As you may have heard, we have no newspapers, wireless, television or telephone. It was Father Augustine’s intention that as pilgrims we should withdraw from the trivial anxieties of the world and seek to reunite ourselves with what is of infinite value, wheresoever each of us may find that thing.’
‘What about electricity?’ It was Mrs Lemming’s voice.
Angus smiled his reassuring smile. ‘Father Augustine himself found it helpful to be without electric light during the hours of darkness. He felt the essential nature of the Christian symbolism of light shining in darkness could only properly be understood if darkness was a daily and inescapable experience. But that doesn’t mean that there’s no electricity here. The gentlemen will find electric shavers in their rooms and there are fridges and hoovers in the domestic apartments. The showers will be hot in the mornings. Though not always’, he admitted, ‘in the evenings.’
Theodora wondered how consistent this was. If darkness was an essential spiritual experience, why not cold or raw or rotting food? However, she was game for anything.
‘We all want something’, said Canon Beagle suddenly jerking out of sleep. ‘We’ve all come to get something. Tusk used to say that.’ He fixed his eye on Angus. ‘You’re too young to remember Canon Tussock, I dare say.’
‘I had the pleasure of meeting the Canon on a number of occasions. The last was at his reunion party seven years ago when he retired. Moreover, if I may say so,’ – he consulted his list – ‘Canon Beagle, what we want and what we get may not be the same thing. Our wanting something does not constitute a good reason for having it. We are in the Lord’s hands. The form of our death, both natural and spiritual, will not be apparent until the end.’
All good apocalyptic stuff, Theodora thought. Nor does Angus scruple to teach his grandmother to suck eggs. She would not herself have ventured to address Canon Beagle in such tones. Canon Beagle had the tips of his fingers pressed together but didn’t seem to resent Angus’s remarks. Perhaps he recognised a fellow professional.
Angus shuffled his papers and cleared his throat. ‘I think that is more than enough from me at the moment. It remains for me to wish you all a pleasant and profitable sojourn with us. I hope you will not allow any of our present difficulties to cloud your concentration on whatever it is that has brought you to us. I think you will find the domestic arrangements comfortable. If there is anything you want, our excellent housekeeper, Mrs Swallow, Ruth, will be happy to help you. She is assisted in her duties by Mr Tom Bough whom I think you have already met. There is access for the disabled to all groundfloor rooms,’ – he glanced kindly at Canon Beagle who looked disappointed – ‘and of course to the chapel. As some of you will know, I am the incumbent of the parish church of St Sylvan and All Angels in the village of St Sylvan at Rest. For the period of the retreat, however, I shall be sleeping in the guest-house in room twelve. Oh, and if any of you should wish to telephone your relations, perhaps to assure them of your safe arrival, you will find the public phone box very conveniently situated in the village at the end of the lane a little to the left of the signpost. It is a most pleasant walk of about two and a half miles. Shall we end with the grace?’
The little group eased itself from the embrace of the armchairs and dutifully applied to the Holy Trinity for grace, love and fellowship.
The portrait of Father Augustine Bellaire, the founder, dominated the entrance hall. Theodora, longing for fresh air and solitude after the stuffy drive, found she could not pass it by without contemplating it. It hung on the wall opposite the front door and a shaft of evening light slashed it from top to bottom, illuminating the face. Father Bellaire had been painted in the scarlet-and-white robe of the Warden of the Shrine of St Sylvan, designed by himself on the lines of a Knight of the Garter. He exhibited considerable physical presence. Theodora scrutinised the face. It was that of a man in late middle age with a good growth of silvery fair hair worn rather long and curling round the ears. The face was emaciated and ascetic, the eyes pale and far apart, slanting upwards like a deer’s. The lips of the wide mou
th were thin and to them the painter had imparted an air of sensitivity, which, however, as Theodora looked upon them, seemed to lack charity. In his right hand Father Augustine clasped a book; his left rested on a biretta placed next to a crucifix on a table beside him. The overall effect was of an Edwardian Shakespearian actor. Turning from the portrait Theodora saw the same biretta preserved in a glass case on the table in the middle of the hall. He had liked tranklements then, Father Augustine?
What had he been like in real life, she wondered, besides being handsome and pious? She wished she’d met him. And what about Benjamin Tussock? There was no portrait of him to be seen. What had these two, by all accounts, very disparate personalities had in common that they should both have come together to organise retreats for Anglican pilgrims? Had there been conflict? Surely there must have been tension. Both were opinionated and their views were located at different ends of the spectrum of churchmanship.
She turned away from the detritus of a life, the influence of which she felt pervaded the whole atmosphere of the place and pushed on into the open air. She recalled Canon Beagle’s remark, ‘We have all come here for something.’ What had she come for? If she was honest she supposed she’d come to get away from Geoffrey’s marriage preparations. She’d worked as a curate at Betterhouse for just over a year and had thought she knew and appreciated her vicar, Geoffrey Brighouse, quite well enough to be confident of his common sense in all important matters. She’d reckoned without the irrational impulses, both Geoffrey’s and indeed her own. Geoffrey had briefly met and instantly proposed to a colleague of his sister’s, Oenone Troutbeck. Oenone taught English at a smart independent girls’ school. She had a commanding presence and a sound opinion of her own worth. Theodora had been amazed and then, to her shame, jealous. She had grown more and more irritated with Geoffrey as she watched him apply his energy and intelligence, usually given without stint to the parish’s affairs, to the trivia of marriage preparation. She did not in the least want to marry Geoffrey herself, so the debilitating and unfamiliar emotion took her by surprise and left her tired and out of temper both with herself and with Geoffrey. A retreat, a space to confront and discipline her disorderly emotions was what she told herself she needed. She had seven days to take herself in hand. The easy and wrong thing to do would be to plan; instead she’d leave herself open to events. Let the spirit flow, she told herself, and trust in it.
She had arrived in her peregrination at the back door of the kitchen. It stood open, guarded by large pots of herbs. Rosemary and marjoram scented the early evening air. Theodora hesitated. The door was open. It invited. She stepped inside. The preparations for the evening meal were evident. All was tidy. Plates were stacked to warm on the aga. Pans simmered quietly as though pursuing a life of their own. On the table a wooden sewing-box stood open to disclose its organised contents of threads and needles, thimbles and scissors, as esoteric to Theodora as a surgeon’s trolley. The feeling that this was someone else’s domain impinged. It would be an intrusion to stay. Theodora turned and made her way out into the garden. Just turning in through the wicket gate at the far end were Ruth and Tom, hand in hand. They looked, Theodora thought, partnered, joined man and wife. She thought of Geoffrey and instantly regretted doing so.
‘They’re terribly good,’ said a voice at her elbow. ‘Just ripe and flavoursome.’
Theodora glanced down and detected at knee-level the small form of Guy Tussock crouched between a row of raspberry canes. He extended his hand and offered her the fruit.
‘The grub’s going to be OK,’ his tone suggested she had voiced some fear to the contrary. ‘They grow a lot of their own.’ He indicated the rows of onions and beans, potatoes and leeks, as orderly it its way as the kitchen. ‘This is my kingdom,’ Guy observed. He gestured round the garden and pointed to the huge mulberry tree in the centre which divided the flower garden from the vegetable. ‘Cosmic trees, the lot. The whole works.’
I’m the king of the castle, Theodora thought. She liked the idea of Guy claiming the place as his kingdom. Would this point to his being a relation of Ben Tussock? ‘So we’re all set to learn,’ she said recalling her last conversation with Guy.
‘Could be,’ he extended his arm round the whole of the pleasant space. ‘Grandad always said they were good providers.’
‘You’re a relation then of Canon Tussock?’ Theodora was tentative. She felt it was intrusive to ask a direct question about someone’s relations but she was genuinely curious. She liked to get such matters straight.
Guy parted the raspberry canes and stood up. A stray tendril had entwined itself in his hair. He looked like some sprite of the place, either more or less than human. His eyes as he smiled up at her were small and unblinking. ‘Yes. Tusk was my grandad.’ His grin widened. ‘I’m the new young master. I’m the successor to Father Bellaire.’
Angus Bootle said grace and there was a scraping of chairs as the pilgrims took their places for their first supper. The silence that followed was precarious. People drew breath to converse and then remembered and desisted. The sound of knifes wrestling with pork cutlet or nut roast, as the individual regimen dictated, was unnaturally loud. The splash of water in glass resounded like a bath filling. Deprived of the cover of conversation, eye contact was embarrassing and therefore avoided. We do not know how to cope, Theodora thought as she addressed her chop. It is as though we are being punished. We shall have to work at this to turn it into something positive. She had made a silent retreat before her own deaconing but that occasion had been completely silent apart from the celebration of the liturgy. Then, too, she had been with people going through the same training as herself. She could recall no strain then, only peace. She tried to recollect how she had behaved. Where ought we to put our thoughts? On our food? But though this was delicious it seemed too carnal to take all one’s attention. Should she simply notice her own thoughts? But at present she had none and when she had any they tended to take the form of thinking about Geoffrey and that was distressing. She would concentrate on the silence itself then.
They were all seated at one long table in a dining-room the same size as the library but without the scattering of books which that room had. Here there was nothing to take the eye. There was no furniture apart from the table and chairs. White walls enclosed them on three sides and on the fourth the open window gave a view to the hortus conclusus beyond. The only decoration, though that was no name by which to call it, was a large black wooden cross fixed to the wall above Angus’s head.
Mr and Mrs Clutton Brock sat opposite her. Canon Beagle was on her left. Mrs Clutton Brock was sipping water with a gesture which suggested it might have been claret, her eyes fixed on the ceiling. Mr Clutton Brock was dealing with some soya confection as though this required his whole attention. Canon Beagle was having difficulty with his teeth.
To her left Guy had his head down, eating with the ravenous concentration of the still-growing young and working his way through a mound of the excellent spinach, to which every now and then he applied lavish quantities of butter from the dish which he seemed to have commandeered. Angus ate as though he were performing a duty, punctiliously but without apparent enjoyment.
At that point she became aware of a restlessness beside her. Mrs Lemming was clearing her throat and shuffling her elbows in a meaningful way. Theodora inferred the need for salt. Of course, that was what was required, a calm attentiveness to the needs of others. She edged the salt in the direction of Mrs Lemming and glanced round to see if other of her neighbours was in want. They were all coping.
The silence grew more familiar. They began to be more comfortable with it. It was an event when Mrs Clutton Brock managed with a single elegant eyebrow to summon the bread from Canon Beagle’s end of the table without, as it were, interrupting the flow of things. Smiling was allowed. Theodora turned and smiled at Mrs Lemming who, after a moment’s hesitation, returned it.
The cat when it appeared at the open window felt like a
temptation. He paused for a moment on the sill and then plopped heavily down into the room and progressed silently across the bare floorboards. He was large and muscular with long black hair. His eye had that remote concentrated look of the hunter and from his mouth hung the limp furry form of his latest prey. Guy paused in mid-mouthful and went white. The silence turned expectant. All except Angus ceased to eat and fixed their eyes on the animal. The cat continued his deliberate progress round the edge of the room and stopped opposite the door. Mrs Clutton Brock rose and opened it for him. Without sparing her a look, he stalked out still holding his burden. The pilgrims settled back again bound together as though by some common victory. Their silence could deal, they felt, with whatever should be thrown at them.
The final hurdle came into view. Theodora recognised it as a familiar one. It was a question of timing. Four years at an English girls’ boarding school and another four at an Oxford college had left her with an eating rate well above the socially accepted norm. She tried slowing down. Gazing at an empty plate for ten minutes while Canon Beagle got command over his teeth and caught up would be more than trying. In the event they finished more or less together. Plates were passed up and Angus doled out the queen’s pudding with mathematical precision. The concluding grace sounded and they scraped their chairs again, the first challenge of their common life triumphantly accomplished.
Theodora had crossed the hall and reached the top of the staircase when she heard the scream. There was a sound of thudding footsteps as she turned back. In the fading light, which inside the house was darker than outside the windows, she discerned Mrs Lemming standing in the middle of the hall in front of the glass case which held Father Bellaire’s biretta. Theodora’s instinct was to reach for the electric-light switch but the click produced no answering illumination. The electricity had, of course, been turned off, presumably at the mains, to insure the keeping of the night hours according to Father Bellaire’s rule. Mrs Lemming clutched her arm and pointed to the case. Under the biretta could just be seen the yellowish-white shape of a human skull.
Every Deadly Sin Page 5