The Listener

by Taylor Caldwell

  He looked about the room with pain in his gray eyes. “It’s very strange,” he said. “My family was very pious, even though my father was a successful businessman and very popular and belonged to all the best clubs in this city — I am a member too. We had prayers every evening, as well as prayers before our meals. Father used to lead us in the Bible reading and in the prayers. He was, I suppose, a very old-fashioned man. I worshiped him. When I told him I wished to be a minister and not take over his business later, he well, he became very emotional in the way of Victorians. I wasn’t embarrassed, but after all, I was only seventeen then. One doesn’t expect men with high self-esteem and a sense of individual worth to burst out crying with joy — not in these days! I think we have better control of our emotions now, don’t you? If I were a father, for instance, and had a son who told me he wished to enter the ministry, I’d say to him, ‘You must give a great deal of consideration to this and weigh the advantages and the disadvantages thoroughly. I think we should consult an expert on aptitude tests and then a psychiatrist before you commit your life to any — profession’. ”

  He waited. No one answered him. Then something rose in him like the high and thundering swell of a wave. He fought it down, but it rose high and higher, and out of its smothering he cried, “ ‘Profession!’ I call it ‘profession’! But it is a calling — a calling! — isn’t it? That is what my father said — ‘a holy calling’!”

  He put the heels of his hands hard over his eyes. “Oh, my God,” he murmured. “To think that there were people long ago who thought God ‘called’ them! Now we gravely consider the impulse we have toward the ministry and wonder if we are well rounded enough, and fully psychologically educated, and adjusted, to become ministers of the Gospel! Are we good administrators? Do we like people? Do people instinctively like us? Are we excellently grounded in the social ethic? Do young people naturally gravitate toward us? Are we expert businessmen? Do women like us? Are we liberal in our ideas? Do we have good voices which inspire confidence? Can we meet men on their own ground easily and confidently, whether it is the golf course, the broker’s office, the club, the family living room, the parish hall, the community activities, the schools, the theater, the good restaurants? In short, are we ‘good fellows, sweet guys, regular people’? Are we enthusiastic about sports and take an active part in them? Are we ‘broad’? Men of ‘diversified’ interests? Conversant with television? Are we on the board of this and that? In short, are we ‘active’?”

  He stood up, looking about him with a kind of wild hopelessness. “In short,” he cried, “must we be everything but ministers of the Gospel?”

  The white walls were lined with his questions. He stared at them. He shrank. He fumbled for the chair and sat down again. He was breathing in short gasps. He looked at the curtain. “You probably know,” he said. “As a clergyman, you probably know. You can see, surely, what confronts every minister, a pastor, a shepherd.”

  The room appeared to become cold, the light glacial. “It’s not my fault,” said the minister. “Not my fault. It is what they want. I give it to them. And it is killing me.” He added in a groaning voice, “It is killing me.”

  He waited. Then he said roughly, “You are probably a very successful clergyman. Your people love you, admire you, and talk over your lectures — I mean, your sermons. You satisfy them. You give them what they want, easily, silkily. You never tell them about their ‘sin’! You never rebuke them. No minister would dare, these days.

  “Do you know that no one speaks of sin these days? Except, of course, the Roman Catholic priests and perhaps a scattered Orthodox rabbi here and there? There is no ‘sin’. It’s a matter of environment, of conditioning, of lack of opportunity, of society’s ‘oppression’. Of broken homes. Of racial discrimination. Of bad housing. Of slum conditions. Of ‘rejection’ by parents. Of physical disability. Of not being able to adjust to the ‘peer group’. Of lack of conventional clothing, or money, or recreational advantages, or luxurious schools, or unsympathetic teachers, parents, neighborhoods, ministers, priests, rabbis. In short, ‘sin’ is not the fault of the individual. It is not his responsibility. He has ‘rights’ and ‘claims’ but he has no duties. Not to himself, his community, his church, his parents, his wife and children, his pastor, his country. He has ‘rights’. And,” said Mr. Carr in a low and desperate voice, “he has no sin. There is no sin. Man, as Rousseau said, is sinless. Only the institutions around him provoke anti-social behavior, for which we must be compassionate, surrounding the sinner with ‘help’. But we must never blame him. We must never say, ‘Rise, and sin no more’. We must never call evil people a ‘brood of vipers’, as John the Baptist called them. We must never call them liars and hypocrites, as Christ called them. This would give the ‘victim’ a trauma. We must, at all costs, reassure the sinner that he has been sinned against.”

  His voice rose, stammered. “Above all things, we must never say, ‘You are evil; you have an immortal soul which is in danger. God will not be mocked. You are black with sin, a sinner. But you can be saved. Repent, and do penance, before it is too late’. No, we can’t say that to our congregations. Not our congregations who gather on Sunday morning well shaved, well brushed, well dressed, well furred, happy with themselves. And those of us who are ministers to the poor dare not call our people ‘sinners’ either. The damned social workers would be rushing in, in droves, in their fluttering black skirts and ballet slippers and fierce little faces, screaming about ‘discrimination’ and what ‘chance’ did our congregation have in this competitive society.”

  Mr. Carr stood up again, straining tensely toward the curtains, which did not move.

  “Who is the competent receiver of all this? The government? With its slips of green paper recoverable in more green paper at the bank? What value is in that? Who will ‘recover’ our world for us? Who will teach us to say, as we all ought, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner’? How can we pastors call our congregations vipers, liars, hypocrites? There would not be a church standing if we dared to say that!”

  He dropped his head. Then he said, “But first we must say that to ourselves. Yes, first of all to ourselves, we the false shepherds, who led our people into the papier-mache valleys of complacency, who laid mirrors in the earth, instead of living water, so that our people could contemplate themselves with self-congratulation, who spread carpets of artificial green grass for them, steam-heated, on which they could bask and forget the earthquakes rumbling below them. But which will never feed their hunger.”

  He moved toward the curtain, his face damp and very white under the tan.

  “Do you know what I said in that locker room, where I embarrassed the men of my age who were preparing to shower and go home for the nightly drinks, the well-served dinner out of the deep-freeze, and the hi-fi afterward, and the television, and their badly behaved and godless children? And the urbane programs which featured, in long and boring detail on a wide screen, the houses, jewels, furniture, dresses, shrill aspirations, simperings — and, God forgive me! — the evil nonsense of actresses, ‘public personalities,’ politicians, songsters, and dancers?

  “I said to my friends, ‘This also is vanity’. I don’t know what made me speak! I said, ‘What have you done today for God? What did you do yesterday for God? What do you intend to do tomorrow for God?’

  “If they were appalled — after all, it’s socially unpardonable to speak of God these days except in church, and then only in passing — I was even more appalled. No wonder they were embarrassed. I was even more so, though the older men nodded seriously. My friends covered up for me quickly, for which I am grateful. I had exhibited myself as a kind of Fundamentalist screecher, and that is not the picture I have of myself at all.”

  He leaned sideways against the tall marble chair. He could hardly get his breath. His head pounded violently. It was some time before he could speak, and then only faintly. “What picture do I have of myself? A community leader, a sportsman, a good fellow, a sha
ker of hands, a soother of aggressive women, an adviser on problems on which I consider myself a psychological expert, a coordinator, a raiser of funds, a sweet patter of heads, arms, shoulders, a fine partner at bridge, an adolescents’ pal, an arranger of parish amusements, a smiler. God forgive me! Always a smiler! Forever and forever a smiler!

  “What does Shakespeare say about that? ‘. . . Smile, and smile, and be a villain’. ”

  He fell into the chair, slumping forward, his hands between his knees. “A villain,” he repeated. “That is what Alice called me when she broke our engagement. ‘What do you tell them of God, and the Laws of God, and penance and repentance, and their immortal souls?’ she asked me. ‘Do you ever say to them, “This night your soul will be required of you”? Do you ever tell them why they were born? Why do you let them believe that all will be forever sunshine for them on this earth, that they will always be young, their children forever children, their money always available, their health unfailing, their legs always strong and their hearts always brave, their security unshakable, their lives ever eager and full of food and entertainment and dances? Why don’t you tell them all that tonight, perhaps, but tomorrow, surely, their souls will be required of them, and that all the dancing they did and all the fun they had, and all the bells they rang, and all the money they made will be nothing at all, not even a memory?’ ”

  The room waited, as if for an answer. Mr. Carr, waiting also, could see vast answers shaping in his spirit, and he cringed before them.

  “Yes,” he said finally. “It is all my fault. The desert I live in; the dry bones I offer my people. For I am the desert and the dry bones. I am the liar and the hypocrite. I never had the faith to tell my people the truth, nor the spirit, nor the courage. I am the guilty. I not only never had a flock, I am not even a shepherd.”

  He pushed himself to his feet, tired to the very heart, aching like an old man. He said to the curtain, “Do you understand? You are a clergyman too. But did you ever have a flock like mine, resentful of the truth, liars to themselves, complacent, hurrying, grasping, smirking, preening, authorities on everything, greedy, betrayers, hard-eyed, coveting social honors, doubters, atheists, hypocrites, adulterers, sportsmen, lovers of the trivial and the passing, sheepish before the mention of God’s name? Did you? If you did not, then you can’t answer me and you can’t help me!”

  He ran to the curtains, his head roaring, his finger outstretched toward the button.

  The curtains rushed aside. Mr. Carr stood and looked in the light. Then he stepped back slowly, foot by groping foot.

  And then he fell to his knees.

  “Yes,” he said, “of course you did. That is the flock you had, and that is the flock I have. We have them together; we have them together. Until the end of time, we have them together. You and I.

  “But you never had to say to yourself, ‘I am the guilty,’ as I say to myself now. I am the guilty. God, be merciful to me, a sinner.

  “Give me strength to tell my people the truth. If they reject me, as they rejected you, what does it matter? There is only the truth. Forgive me. Above all things, forgive me. For betraying you in trivialities.

  SOUL EIGHT

  The Condemned

  Because I could not stop for Death,

  He kindly stopped for me;

  The carriage held but just ourselves

  And Immortality.

  We slowly drove, he knew no haste,

  And I had put away

  My labour, and my leisure too,

  For his civility.

  Emily Dickinson: “The Chariot”

  Eugene Emory walked stiffly into the sitting room, saw those waiting in silence, and hesitated. How placid they were, like cattle, some reading a magazine, some only staring at nothing. Like people in an anteroom of the Salvation Army! Why had he come here? That specialist who had given him the irrevocable news, finally! What had he said? “I think you’ll find some peace there. We’re very proud of old John Godfrey’s place. I’ve seen some remarkable things. No, I was never there myself. But you must have read about it.”

  He had. In one of the big national magazines. A beautiful square building, set in flower gardens, with trees and arbors — the finest architects had built it. It was open twenty-four hours a day to everybody and anybody. “The Man who Listens.” The reporter in that magazine had been a very amusing boy, full of mocking wide-eyes and arched brows and rounded, contemptuous mouth. “Ooh,” he seemed to be saying in every clever paragraph. “Ooh. Ooh! The lame, the halt, the blind — come one, come all. Find your particular nostrum here, your own face, your own voice. That’s what they say. Your reporter did enter the inner sanctum of sanctums and asked a lot of questions aloud. That big, bright, melodramatic curtain just wouldn’t open! It couldn’t be pried open. I know; I tried. Velvet over steel mesh, apparently, which could only be parted by electrical impulse, and the boys had shut the juice off. Everybody welcome, except a reporter whose job it is to expose sham, cheapness, brash popularity, vulgarity, and pretense. Why the clergy haven’t denounced it is one of the continuing wonders of the years.”

  The colored photographs, however, had been exceedingly handsome, the pictured gardens exquisite, the paths carefully tended, the trees luxurious. No walls or fences guarded the four acres of land, and though the grounds were in the very center of a very populous part of the city, it had never been reported that any vandalism had been committed here, except an attempted robbery a few times, scattered over the years.

  The reporter had been particularly annoyed and skeptical, because no donations were solicited and none accepted. He scattered a few dark rumors for public speculation. The governor of the state, after reading that article, had ordered an ‘investigation’, though he knew all about old John’s structure, for he had been there himself one quiet night. But the public ‘clamored’ for the investigation, the governor said apologetically, though he failed to notice that the clamor did not come from the city itself, or even the state, but from towns and villages and cities in far parts of the country. The governor found ‘nothing wrong’. It was a quiet, restful place where you could think, he announced.

  A quiet, restful place, thought Eugene Emory as he sat down. Just what I need now! A quiet, restful place, closely resembling a grave. And these are my companions, these dolt-faced women and men, waiting. He saw that one by one, in perfect silence and composure, they rose at the chiming of a bell, opened the oaken door, and disappeared from sight. That was all. My God, what am I doing here? thought Eugene Emory, thinking of what he must tell his wife tomorrow, and his children.

  He was forty-nine years old. He had worked all his life, worked while going to high school, worked while going to the university in his home city. He had known nothing but work all his life. He had not resented that until a month ago, or was it two months? Then his resentment had reached fury. He had been so enraged that he had lost two of his easiest cases in court, and the judge, his friend, had looked at him with concern. Three days later he had looked at him sternly and had called him to account with a threat of punishment for contempt of court. Emory, Dean and Hartford had lost face through him, he who had established the firm. Jack Dean, his best friend, had told him that he looked sick and that he was perhaps too tired. “I’ve been feeling like a sick pup,” he had finally admitted. “I suppose I need a vacation. Haven’t had one in eight years; no time. You ought to know that. I’ll talk to Emily tonight, and maybe we can plan something, a cruise or a trip to Europe.”

  His wife had been joyful over the idea, but first she had insisted that he see the family physician for a thorough examination. “I hardly know the man,” he had protested. “I only know his bills, and that’s enough! What are you doing here, running a hospital?” But Emily could not be turned aside and, fuming, he had gone to the physician. “I have only an hour to spare,” he told the doctor immediately on entering the examination room. “I’m very busy, you know. How are you?” he added as a belated thought. Had he ever se
en this competent youngish man before? He seemed vaguely familiar. At the club? In his house?

  “I’m all right. But I don’t think you are,” said the doctor, looking at the ghostly face of his patient, the gray lines under his strenuous blue eyes, the clefts about his mouth, the ashen color of his thin lips. “Well, we’ll soon see.”

  Tests, tappings, soundings, breathings, bendings, listening. The hour was up, but the doctor had not finished. “I must go,” said Eugene impatiently.

  “Yes,” said the doctor with grave thoughtfulness. “But just to be sure, I want you to see Dr. Hampshire in this same building. He’s the blood specialist, you know. I want to be absolutely sure.”

  “Of what?”

  “Of something I suspect. Of course I may be wrong. I hope I am. How long, by the way, has it been since you had that attack of tonsillitis?”

  “Two months ago. How did you know I had that attack?” Eugene became alert.