by James Hilton
Then he visited Joe Maracot, a former chapel member, now turned atheist, who had fallen off a lorry and fractured a leg. Maracot treated him with scarcely veiled hostility; he was a strong Labour enthusiast, an admirer of Councillor Higgs, and tried to lure Howat into an argument about Russia, but Howat, feeling himself being baited, declined to be drawn.
Then (purely as a treat for himself) he looked in at the Infirmary and spent half an hour in the children’s ward. After that he called on the two Miss Jekylls, who talked endlessly about foreign missions—a department of religious enterprise for which he had never, somehow, been able to share the optimism of its partisans. The continual twitter of the two ladies bored him (try as he would he could not help it), and their vision of an Africa perfected by frock-coats and hymn-books had that large simplicity that always affected him with a certain sadness of mind. And yet, he felt, the Misses Jekyll were very likeable; they believed in their vision and subscribed money for it with far more generosity than they could really afford (there was a little box for ‘missionary pennies’ behind the clock on the mantelpiece); they thought as kindly of an idealised black man bowing down to wood and stone as they did harshly of the real unfortunates who lived within a quarter-mile of their own house. If only Howat could give a twist to that pathetic stream of good will, could bring it nearer home and canalise it so that it ran in a warming current through the streets of Browdley! He tried valiantly, but as fast as he mentioned local hardship, the two ladies romped merrily along to some other instance of wholesale conversion in distant lands—“over a thousand baptised last month in India alone, so my missionary cousin writes to me.” Howat forebore to reply that during that same month in India there must have been at least a quarter of a million non-Christians born; he felt so sure that they would be offended as well as unable to see the point of such a remark. He just let them talk on, accepted a cup of tea and a piece of cake, and then, after many mutual assurances that the visit had been enjoyable, took his leave.
Lastly he visited an old man, a former chapel caretaker, slowly dying of heart disease; the man was obviously too ill to talk or to want to be talked to, and Howat did not stay more than a few minutes.
By that time it was time for ‘high tea’ at the Manse.
After tea he went into his study and prayed. He did not kneel or even bow his head; he just sat back in an armchair before the fire and shut his eyes. He did not want his wife or Aunt Viney to come in (as they would often do without knocking) and find him in an obviously prayerful attitude; not that he was ashamed of praying, but prayer to them was such a professional business, something a parson did night and morning, a good deal on Sunday, and occasionally at other people’s bedsides; he was sure they would think him ill if they caught him at it on any less customary occasion. Besides, his wasn’t a definite prayer; he didn’t put much of it even into words; it was just an expression of the feeling of worthlessness that had come over him, the doubt as to whether he was doing any good, and the desire to be given (if it were possible) some secret reassurance.
As it chanced, Aunt Viney did interrupt; a message, she said, had come from Miss Monks—would Howat call round and see her some time that evening, if he could, as it was important?
He sighed and answered yes, certainly. It was all over the town, of course, that the old woman was dying, and that Ringwood had given her the news, however, had been dwarfed in significance by that more exciting business about Garland’s daughter. He put on his hat and overcoat and went into the chilly, lamp-lit streets. Well, he reflected, he would have a chance to do better with the poor old soul than the day before—perhaps it was more than he deserved. But he was very tired again, and there was the Temperance meeting he ought to look in at later on—they liked him to lead the singing.
He reached the house in Lower George Street about half-past seven, and was shown up into that same stuffy, stale-smelling bedroom. But instead of a dying woman’s greeting he was welcomed by a brisk “Good evening, Mr. Freemantle “, and saw Miss Monks sitting up cheerfully in bed with her eyes fixed on him in a way that put him rather in mind of a snake poised to strike. He began:
“Well, Miss Monks, and how are you to-day?” in the usual manner, but he was hardly prepared for the tremendous precision with which she replied: “Better.”
“Better? That’s great—great!” he murmured, and added irrelevantly that it was a gloriously clear evening, cold, but no fog—so different from yesterday.
“And so I suppose,” said Miss Monks, ignoring the weather, “that Garland’s girl has run away from home?”
“I believe so, yes.”
“I’m not surprised. There was always something queer about that girl. I put it all down to not being made to go to chapel—Garland seemed to have no control over her at all. And then having that job at the library, too.” She paused and continued impressively: “There are books in that library, Mr. Freemantle, whether you believe me or not, which ought not to exist anywhere—let alone where young people can get hold of them. I don’t hold with public libraries.”
Howat made no answer to that, but smiled gently and waited for her to get to the real reason why she had sent for him. It was soon forthcoming. It appeared that she had been on the point of death about three o’clock that morning and had then made a sudden recovery. She was convinced it was a miracle—the special intervention of a Providence evidently desirous of preserving her for some future activity. “I’m grateful, too, for such mercies,” she added, “and I’d like you, Mr. Freemantle, to join with me in a little prayer of thankfulness.”
So he prayed again, and when that was over she went on to say that, as a more practical expression of gratitude, she had been thinking of making an alteration in her will. She had only a few hundred pounds to dispose of, and as the will stood, it was all left to Mrs. Kerfoot, her widowed niece who lived next door and had looked after her for many years. In view, however, of the recent dramatic intervention of Providence, she had come to feel that this would be a selfish arrangement; a hundred pounds would surely be enough for Mrs. Kerfoot, and the rest could then be devoted to loftier things. She had been thinking out details, in fact, ever since early morning, and had already sent a message to her lawyer. What she had in mind was some sort of charity, associated with the chapel and administered by the parson. She knew there were several existing charities of the kind in Browdley—one provided for loaves and candles to be given every Christmas to fifty deserving Church of England spinsters—she had often seen mentions of it in the local paper, and she had noticed that it was always called after the name of the original benefactor. Something like that she had in mind; it seemed to her a really charitable way of disposing of money, much better than leaving it all in bulk to a private person, however deserving.
Howat listened rather unhappily as she expounded this evidently well- prepared scheme. He mentioned with diffidence that most charities of such a kind dated from hundreds of years back, when social conditions were different, and survived nowadays merely as antiquities. He also indicated that it was already becoming a matter of some intricacy to discover the fifty deserving spinsters who would accept the Christmas loaves and candles, and that the vicar of the parish church had often commented that there ought to be some way of altering things to fit in with more modern needs. In his (Howat’s) opinion, if she would forgive him for expressing it, he didn’t think such a bequest would really be the best way of using the money; there were many other things in these days—the infirmary, for instance, which badly required new X-ray equipment, or the cottage hospital—
But that, if he had remembered, was tactless of him, for Miss Monks had a violent grudge against all such institutions, and answered tartly: “Not with my money, thank you, Mr. Freemantle—I don’t hold with them at all. Those who give to such things can do what they like with their own, but I have a right to do what I like with mine.”
“Oh quite, quite,” agreed Howat.
In the end he did, after much persuasion
, manage to convince her that a Letitia Monks Bequest on the lines of the loaves and candles would be a rather pointless affair. But he could not convert her to any alternative idea of his own; two things, he realised, were fixed in her mind—first, that the bequest should be connected with the chapel, and second, that it should be permanently associated with her own name. Finally, as the only terms on which she could be diverted from something absolutely fatuous, he agreed that the chapel was in some need of a new vestry. Yes, of course, it could be the Letitia Monks Vestry, and the name could be inscribed in stone somewhere—oh yes, he was sure it could. And he would certainly consult with her lawyer about it, if she wished—yes, he would do anything she asked. A splendid idea—extremely generous of her—future generations would undoubtedly appreciate it—oh yes, yes—undoubtedly…
“You see,” said Miss Monks, with shrewd triumph, “I feel it’s the chapel that has made me what I am.”
He stayed a little longer till a distant chiming reminded him that it was nine o’clock; he had been there for an hour and a half; it really was time he looked in at that Temperance meeting. He was just shaking hands and preparing to leave when Ringwood’s brusque voice came booming up the stairs.
Ringwood, red-cheeked and cheerful as ever, came striding into the room in his heavy motoring coat. “Hullo, Miss Monks! Thought I’d just look in to see you again on my way home! Still feeling better? That’s right—take things easily. Hullo, Freemantle—you here, too? Wonderful old lady, isn’t she? No, don’t run away—we’ll go down together in a minute just give me time to hold her hand!”
He had an air with him, Ringwood had; and Howat had often half-envied it. He was bluff and sometimes rude in his jovial way, but nobody ever minded—not that he cared if they did. He was by far the most popular doctor in Browdley; he was generous, kind-hearted, and hard-working, but he stood no nonsense and never let anyone waste his time. And the brusquer he was, the more, in a way, he was liked. In a few years, when his hair had turned completely white, he and his sayings would doubtless begin to grow legendary.
Miss Monks, at eighty-nine, was no more impervious to that forceful charm than many a girl in her teens. She simpered almost coyly as Ringwood felt her pulse and passed a hand across her forehead. “Keep quiet,” he adjured her. “You’ve been talking too much. Freemantle’s fault, I daresay. Good night, now. Sleep well. And I’ll be round in the morning.”
He nodded, drew on his gloves, and took Howat’s arm; and the latter, with a murmured farewell to the old lady, allowed himself to be piloted downstairs and into the street. The doctor’s Morris, five years old, waited at the kerb. “Get inside,” said Ringwood, “I’m going to drive you home.”
Howat clambered in; he was weary, and not sorry to be given a lift. “It’s a cold night,” he commented. “Damn cold,” agreed Ringwood, and slipped into gear. It was difficult to talk during the drive, as the car made at least twice as much noise as any other Howat had ever experienced; he stared ahead through the murky windscreen, a little confused in mind with that sudden rush of lamp-posts and shop-fronts past him. “That was a stuffy room,” he shouted, as if in indirect explanation of his silence. Ringwood shouted back: “Sour as a midden. Why don’t she have a window opened? How long had you been there?” Howat answered: “Since about half-past seven,” and Ringwood, with a curious and characteristic noise in his throat, exclaimed: “Good God!”
Then it was gradually borne upon Howat’s mind that Ringwood was driving him, not to the Manse, but to his own house in Dawson Street. He said “I say, Ringwood, I thought you were taking me home,” and Ringwood replied, gruffly: “So I am—to my home. What more do you want?” Howat began to explain his Temperance meeting, but Ringwood interrupted: “My dear man, you’re coming in with me for a while, and your temperance people can all go and drink themselves to death.”
They drew up outside the ugly detached villa in which the doctor lived. He had only a housekeeper to look after him, and the house was many rooms too big; it had formerly belonged to an older-fashioned doctor with a large family, a top-hat and tail-coat, and a brougham. Ringwood had made no effort to adapt the premises to his more modest uses; some of the rooms were altogether unfurnished, and all were shabby. He had a decent income, but he never cared about the more complicated comforts of life; he would keep the chairs in his dining-room till they actually fell to pieces, just as he would drive his old car till the repairers finally declined to patch it up any more. He liked good, plain food and fifteen-year-old whisky, and (when he had any spare time, which was not often) he would read any sort of book except novels.
“Go on,” he said, almost pushing Howat out of the car. He followed the parson up the short gravelled path and, unlocking a side-door, manoeuvred him into the unlit waiting-room that adjoined the surgery. “Straight through—you know the way,” he directed, switching on a light. The unlovely room faced them with its stiff array of straight-backed chairs and table of ancient magazines. Ringwood passed through into the surgery beyond. It was a crowded, glass-roofed apartment, not unlike a greenhouse, full of the usual smell of drugs and india-rubber, and lined with shelves of books, bottles, and the accumulated litter of three decades in Browdley. It was extraordinary, though true, that amidst this confusion Ringwood always did know exactly where everything was.
“Now,” said the doctor, “sit down and make yourself comfortable.”
He put Howat in a big leather chair that could be made to tilt backwards—the chair in which, before the days of specialised dentistry, many a Browdley sufferer had lost an aching tooth. Then he lit the gas-fire and wandered away into the small dispensary that opened off the surgery at the further end. He kept shouting out from this inner room, his words punctuated with the clink of bottles and glasses.
“Yes, I was wrong about the old girl after all, Freemantle—you win that bob. Could have sworn she’d peg out during the night—never was more surprised than when I saw her perking up in bed at ten o’clock this morning. They’ll have to shoot her, that’s all…Seriously, though, her heart’s pretty dicky—take her off sudden one of these days. I wouldn’t mind betting all the money I’ve got that you and I’ll be in at the kill before this time next month.”
Howat half-smiled; Ringwood’s flippant phrases sometimes shocked, but never exactly offended him. He said, after a pause: “You know, Ringwood, I often envy you doctors. There’s something so downright about the things you do for people. We parsons have to grope about wondering what we can do. You just go and do it. To-night, for instance, you took that woman’s pulse and temperature in about a minute—probably a far more useful service than I managed to perform in the whole hour and a half I was there with her.”
“Oh, I don’t know—it depends a lot on what you did do. Chattered, I suppose—I noticed her heart was a bit jerkier after it. If she dies in the night I shall put on the certificate ‘Talked to death by a parson.’ Can’t think what you found to say to her all that time, I must admit.”
“Well, for one thing, I prayed.” He said that in a queerly troubled voice, and added: “Does that sound to you a rather odd confession?”
“Not at all. After all, it’s in your line of business, just as I tap chests and look at tongues.”
“I wonder if it really is quite the same sort of thing as that.”
“Sometimes, Freemantle, I think you wonder a damn sight too much.” Ringwood came bounding out of the dispensary with a tumbler of whisky and water in one hand and a half-filled medicine-glass in the other. The latter he held out to Howat. “Here, drink this. You need it—it’s only a pick-me-up—quite harmless and nonalcoholic. Don’t think I haven’t noticed the state you’ve been getting yourself into these last few months.”
Howat took the glass. “Thanks, Ringwood—though I’m not sure I do need it. Touch of nerves, perhaps. A few rather troublesome things have been happening lately. Last night, for instance, I had a worrying kind of interview with the chapel secretary, Garland.”
; “Oh, Garland the draper?—yes, I know him. Little chap with black moustaches—looks rather like a seedy croupier at a fifth- rate casino. Well, what was all the fuss over? They say, by the way, his daughter’s hopped it—maybe the old boy was feeling a bit peeved over that when you saw him.”
“It was about that—that we had the—the argument,” said Howat. Then he told Ringwood briefly all the details. Ringwood listened intently, perching himself on the edge of the desk and sipping whisky from time to time. At the end of the story he said: “So they’re trying to blame you for what’s happened, are they? Well, I don’t think I’d worry about it if I were you. Queer sort of girl, I remember—rather nice voice—good figure, too—I had to give her the once-over, you know, before she took on that job at the library. Cut above her pa and ma, I thought jolly good luck to her if she has left the old folks at home. Wish there were more would do it—look at the unemployed—thousands of ’em—no initiative—no ambition—rather hang about Browdley street-corners than try their luck anywhere else. Of course they might say much the same of us—we stick to the old place, don’t we?—but then, we’re getting on—at least I am—I’m sixty next birthday. But you’re not so old, Freemantle—I often wonder why you stay on here. Don’t you ever feel you’d like to try for a change?”
“Often. Terribly often. But there again, you doctors have the advantage. You could clear out to-morrow and feel that you were doing just as much good somewhere else, but I couldn’t—it’s taken me twelve years even to begin to do anything here, and if I went away all that would probably be wasted.”
“Oh, nonsense. You parsons take yourselves far too seriously. After all, if you do your best, what more can you do? That’s how I always feel in my job. Sometimes I cure, sometimes I kill—people take the risk when they call me in—I make no promises except to do as well as I know how. If I come a cropper over something it’s not my fault—I can’t help it—and I assure you I never let it lose me a wink of sleep. Why should I?”