The Cathedral by Hugh Walpole

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The door closed; the room was suddenly silent. Miss Ronder sat without
moving, her eyes staring in front of her.

Soon Ronder returned.

Miss Ronder said nothing. She was the one human being who had power to
embarrass him. She was embarrassing him now.

"Aren't things strange?" he said. "I've seen four different people this
afternoon. They have all of their own accord instantly talked about
Brandon, and abused him. Brandon is in the air. He's in danger."

Miss Ronder looked her nephew straight between the eyes.

"Frederick," she said, "how much have you had to do with this?"

"To do with this? To do with what?"

"All this talk about the Brandons."

"I! Nothing at all."

"Nonsense. Don't tell me. Ever since you set foot in this town you've been
determined that Brandon should go. Are you playing fair?"

He got up, stood opposite her, legs apart, his hands crossed behind his
broad back.

"Fair? Absolutely."

Her eyes were full of distress. "Through all these years," she said, "I've
never truly known you. All I know is that you've always got what you
wanted. You're going to get what you want now. Do it decently."

"You needn't be afraid," he said.

"I _am_ afraid," she said. "I love you, Fred; I have always loved
you. I'd hate to lose that love. It's one of my most precious
possessions."

He answered her slowly, as though he were thinking things out. "I've
always told you the truth," he said; "I'm telling you the truth now. Of
course I want Brandon to go, and of course he's going. But I haven't to
move a finger in the matter. It's all advancing without my agency. Brandon
is ruining himself. Even if he weren't, I'm quite square with him. I
fought him openly at the Chapter Meeting the other day. He hates me for
it."

"And you hate _him_."

"_Hate_ him? Not the least in the world. I admire and like him. If
only he were in a less powerful position and were not in my way, I'd be
his best friend. He's a fine fellow--stupid, blind, conceited, but finer
made than I am. I like him better than any man in the town."

"I don't understand you"; she dropped her eyes from his face. "You're
extraordinary."

He sat down again as though he recognised that the little contest was
closed.

"Is there anything in this, do you think? This chatter about Mrs. Brandon
and Morris."

"I don't know. There's a lot of talk beginning. Ellen Stiles is largely
responsible, I fancy."

"Mrs. Brandon and Morris! Good Lord! Have you ever heard of a man called
Davray?"

"Yes, a drunken painter, isn't he? Why?"

"I talked to him in the Cathedral this afternoon. He has a grudge against
Brandon too...Well, I'm going up to the study."

He bent over, kissed her forehead tenderly and left the room.

Throughout that evening he was uncomfortable, and when he was
uncomfortable he was a strange being. His impulses, his motives, his
intentions were like a sheaf of corn bound tightly about by his sense of
comfort and well-being. When that sense was disturbed everything fell
apart and he seemed to be facing a new world full of elements that he
always denied. His aunt had a greater power of disturbing him than had any
other human being. He knew that she spoke what she believed to be the
truth; he felt that, in spite of her denials, she knew him. He was often
surprised at the eagerness with which he wanted her approval.

As he sat back in his chair that evening in Bentinck-Major's comfortable
library and watched the other, this sense of discomfort persisted so
strongly that he found it very difficult to let his mind bite into the
discussion. And yet this meeting was immensely important to him. It was
the first obvious result of the manoeuvring of the last months. This was
definitely a meeting of Conspirators, and all of those engaged in it, with
one exception, knew that that was so. Bentinck-Major knew it, and Foster
and Ryle and Rogers. The exception was Martin, a young Minor Canon, who
had the living of St. Joseph's-in-the-Fields, a slum parish in the lower
part of the town.

Martin had been invited because he was the best clergyman in Polchester.
Young though he was, every one was already aware of his strength,
integrity, power with the men of the town, sense of humour and
intelligence. There was, perhaps, no man in the whole of Polchester whom
Ronder was so anxious to have on his side.

He was a man with a scorn of any intrigue, deeply religious, but human and
impatient of humbug.

Ronder knew that he was the Polchester clergyman beyond all others who
would in later years come to great power, although at present he had
nothing save his Minor Canonry and small living. He was not perhaps a
deeply read man, he was of no especial family nor school and had graduated
at Durham University. In appearance he was common-place, thin, tall, with
light sandy hair and mild good-tempered eyes. It had been Ronder's
intention that he should be invited. Foster, who was more responsible for
the meeting than any one, had protested.

"Martin--what's the point of Martin?"

"You'll see in five years' time," Ronder had answered.

Now, as Ronder looked round at them all, he moved restlessly in his chair.

Was it true that his aunt was changing her opinion of him? Would he have
to deal, during the coming months, with persistent disapproval and
opposition from her? And it was so unfair. He had meant absolutely what he
said, that he liked Brandon and wished him no harm. He _did_ believe
that it was for the good of the town that Brandon should go....

He was pulled up by Foster, who was asking him to tell them exactly what
it was that they were to discuss. Instinctively he looked at Martin as he
spoke. As always, with the first word there came over him a sense of
mastery and happiness, a desire to move people like pawns, a readiness to
twist any principle, moral and ethical, if he might bend it to his
purpose. Instinctively he pitched his voice, formed his mouth, spread his
hands upon the broad arms of his chair exactly as an actor fills in his
part.

"I object a little," he said, laughing, "to Foster's suggestion that I am
responsible for our talking here. I've no right to be responsible for
anything when I've been in the place so short a time. All the same, I
don't want to pretend to any false modesty. I've been in Polchester long
enough to be fond of it, and I'm going to be fonder of it still before
I've done. I don't want to pretend to any sentimentality either, but there
are broader issues than merely the fortunes of this Cathedral in danger.

"Because I feel the danger, I intend to speak out about it, and get any
one on my side I can. When I find that Canon Foster who has been here so
long and loves the Cathedral so passionately and so honestly, if I may say
so, feels as I do, then I'm only strengthened in my determination. I don't
care who says that I've no right to push myself forward about this. I'm
not pushing myself forward.

"As soon as some one else will take the cause in hand I'll step back, but
I'm not going to see the battle lost simply because I'm afraid of what
people will say of me.... Well, this is all fine words. The point simply
is that, as every one knows, poor Morrison is desperately ill and the
living of Pybus St. Anthony may fall vacant at any moment. The appointment
is a Chapter appointment. The living isn't anything very tremendous in
itself, but it has been looked upon for years as _the_ jumping-off
place for preferment in the diocese. Time after time the man who has gone
there has become the most important influence here. Men are generally
chosen, as I understand it, with that in view. These are, of course, all
commonplaces to you, but I'm recapitulating them because it makes my point
the stronger. Morrison with all his merits was not out of the way
intellectually. This time we want an exceptional man.

"I've only been here a few months, but I've noticed many things, and I
will definitely say that the Cathedral is at a crisis in its history.
Perhaps the mere fact that this is Jubilee Year makes us all more ready to
take stock than we would otherwise have been. But it is not only that. The
Church is being attacked from all sides. I don't believe that there has
ever been a time when the west of England needed new blood, new thought,
new energy more than it does at this time. The vacancy at Pybus will offer
a most wonderful opportunity to bring that force among us. I should have
thought every one would realise that.

"It happens, however, that I have discovered on first-hand evidence that
there is a strong resolve on the part of most important persons in this
town (I will mention no names) to fill the living with the most
unsatisfactory, worthless and conservative influence that could possibly
be found anywhere. If that influence succeeds I don't believe I'm
exaggerating when I say that the progress of the religious life here is
flung back fifty years. One of the greatest opportunities the Chapter can
ever have had will have been missed. I don't think we can regard the
crisis as too serious."

Foster broke in: "Why _not_ mention names, Canon? We've no time to
waste. It's all humbug pretending we don't know whom you mean. It's
Brandon who wants to put young Forsyth into Pybus whom we're fighting.
Let's be honest."

"No. I won't allow that," Ronder said quickly. "We're fighting no
personalities. Speaking for myself, there's no one I admire more in this
town than Brandon. I think him reactionary and opposed to new ideas, and a
dangerous influence here, but there's no personal feeling in any of this.
We've got to keep personalities out of this. There's something bigger than
our own likes and dislikes in this."

"Words! Words," said Foster angrily. "I hate Brandon. You hate him,
Ronder, for all you're so circumspect. It's true enough that we don't want
young Forsyth at Pybus, but it's truer still that we want to bring the
Archdeacon's pride down. And we're going to."

The atmosphere was electric. Rogers' thin and bony features were flushed
with pleasure at Foster's denunciation. Bentinck-Major rubbed his soft
hands one against the other and closed his eyes as though he were
determined to be a gentleman to the last; Martin sat upright in his chair,
his face puzzled, his gaze fixed upon Ronder; Ryle, the picture of nervous
embarrassment, glanced from one face to another, as though imploring every
one not to be angry with him--all these sharp words were certainly not his
fault.

Ronder was vexed with himself. He was certainly not at his best to-night.
He had realised the personalities that were around him, and yet had not
steered his boat among them with the dexterous skill that was usually his.

In his heart he cursed Foster for a meddling, cantankerous fanatic.

Rogers broke in. "I must say," he exclaimed in a strange shrill voice like
a peacock's, "that I associate myself with every word of Canon Foster's.
Whatever we may pretend in public, the great desire of our hearts is to
drive Brandon out of the place. The sooner we do it the better. It should
have been done long ago."

Martin spoke. "I'm sorry," he said. "If I had known that this meeting was
to be a personal attack on the Archdeacon, I never would have come. I
don't think the diocese has a finer servant than Archdeacon Brandon. I
admire him immensely. He has made mistakes. So do we all of course. But I
have the highest opinion of his character, his work and his importance
here, and I would like every one in the room to know that before we go any
further."

"That's right. That's right," said Ryle, smiling around nervously upon
every one. "Canon Martin is right, don't you think? I hope nobody here
will say that I have any ill feeling against the Archdeacon. I haven't,
indeed, and I shouldn't like any one to charge me with it."

Ronder struck in then, and his voice was so strong, so filled with
authority, that every one looked up as though some new figure had entered
the room.

"I should like to emphasise at once," he said, "so that no one here or
anywhere else can be under the slightest misapprehension, that I will take
part in nothing that has any personal animus towards anybody. Surely this
is a question of Pybus and Forsyth and of nothing else at all. I have not
even anything against Mr. Forsyth; I have never seen him--I wish him all
the luck in life. But we are fighting a battle for the Pybus living and
for nothing more nor less than that.

"If my own brother wanted that living and was not the right man for it I
would fight him. The Archdeacon does not see the thing at present as we
do; it is possible that very shortly he may. As soon as he does I'm behind
him."

Foster shook his head. "Have it your own way," he said. "Everything's the
same here--always compromise. Compromise! Compromise! I'm sick of the
cowardly word. We'll say no more of Brandon for the moment then. He'll
come up again, never fear. He's not the sort of man to avoid spoiling his
own soup."

"Very good," said Bentinck-Major in his most patronising manner. "Now we
are all agreed, I think. You will have noticed that I've been waiting for
this moment to suggest that we should come to business. Our business, I
believe, is to obtain what support we can against the gift of the living
to Mr. Forsyth and to suggest some other candidate...hum, haw...yes,
other candidate."

"There's only one possible candidate," Foster brought out, banging his
lean fist down upon the table near to him. "And that's Wistons of Hawston.
It's been the wish of my heart for years back to bring Wistons here. We
don't know, of course, if he would come, but I think he could be
persuaded. And then--then there'd be hope once more! God would be served!
His Church would be a fitting Tabernacle!..."

He broke off. Amazing to see the rapt devotion that now lighted up his
ugly face until it shone with saintly beauty. The harsh lines were
softened, the eyes were gentle, the mouth tender. "Then indeed," he almost
whispered, "I might say my 'Nunc Dimittis' and go."

It was not he alone who was stirred. Martin spoke eagerly: "Is that the
Wistons of the _Four Creeds_?--the man who wrote _The New Apocalypse_?"

Foster smiled. "There's only one Wistons," he said, pride ringing in his
voice as though he were speaking of his favourite son, "for all the
world."

"Why, that would be magnificent," Martin said, "if he'd come. But would
he? I should think that very doubtful."

"I think he would," said Foster softly, still as though he were speaking
to himself.

"Why, that, of course, is wonderful!" Martin looked round upon them all,
his eyes glowing. "There isn't a man in England----" He broke off. "But
surely if there's a _real_ chance of getting Wistons nobody on the
Chapter would dream of proposing a man like Forsyth. It's incredible!"

"Incredible!" burst in Foster. "Not a bit of it! Do you suppose Brandon--I
beg pardon for mentioning his name, as we're all so particular--do you
suppose Brandon wouldn't fight just such a man? He regards him as
dangerous, modern, subversive, heretical, anything you please. Wistons!
Why, he'd make Brandon's hair stand on end!"

"Well," said Martin gravely, "if there's any real chance of getting
Wistons into this diocese I'll work for it with my coat off."

"Good," said Bentinck-Major, tapping with a little gold pencil that he had
been fingering, on the table. "Now we are all agreed. The next question
is, what steps are we to take?"

They all looked instinctively at Ronder. He felt their glances. He was
happy, assured, comfortable once more. He was master of them. They lay in
his hand for him to do as he would with them. His brain now moved clearly,
smoothly, like a beautiful shining machine. His eyes glowed.

"Now, it's occurred to me----" he said. They all drew their chairs closer.

Chapter V

Falk by the River

Upon that same evening when the conspirators met in Bentinck-Major's
handsome study Mrs. Brandon had a ridiculous fit of hysterics.

She had never had hysterics before; the fit came upon her now when she was
sitting in front of her glass brushing her hair. She was dressing for
dinner and could see her reflection, white and thin, in the mirror before
her. Suddenly the face in the glass began to smile and it became at that
same instant another face that she had never seen before.

It was a horrid smile and broke suddenly into laughter. It was as though
the face had been hit by something and cracked then into a thousand
pieces.

She laughed until the tears poured down her cheeks, but her eyes
protested, looking piteously and in dismay from the studied glass. She
knew that she was laughing with shrill high cries, and behind her horror
at her collapse there was a desperate protesting attempt to calm herself,
driven, above all, upon her agitated heart by the fear lest her husband
should come in and discover her.

The laughter ceased quite suddenly and was followed by a rush of tears.
She cried as though her heart would break, then, with trembling steps,
crossed to her bed and lay down. Very shortly she must control herself
because the dinner-bell would ring and she must go. To stay and send the
conventional excuse of a headache would bring her husband up to her, and
although he was so full of his own affairs that the questions that he
would ask her would be perfunctory and absent-minded, she felt that she
could not endure, just now, to be alone with him.

She lay on her bed shivering and wondering what malign power it was that
had seized her. Malign it was, she did not for an instant doubt. She had
asked, did ask, for so little. Only to see Morris for a moment every day.
To see him anywhere in as public a place as you please, but to see him, to
hear his voice, to look into his eyes, to touch his hand (soft and gentle
like a woman's hand)--that had been now for months an absolute necessity.
She did not ask more than that, and yet she was aware that there was no
pause in the accumulating force of the passion that was seizing her. She
was being drawn along by two opposite powers--the tenderness of protective
maternal love and the ruthlessness of the lust for possession.

She wanted to care for him, to watch over him, to guard him, to do
everything for him, and also she wanted to feel her hold over him, to see
him move, almost as though he were hypnotised, towards her.

The thought of him, the perpetual incessant thought of him, ruled out the
thought of every one else in the world--save only Falk. She scarcely now
considered her husband at all; she never for an instant wondered whether
people in the town were talking. She saw only Morris and her future with
Morris--only that and Falk.

Upon Falk now everything hung. She had made a kind of bargain. If Falk
stayed and loved her and cared for her she would resist the power that was
drawing her towards Morris. Now, a million times more than before she had
met Morris, she must have some one for whom she could care. It was as
though a lamp had been lit and flung a great track of light over those
dark, empty earlier years. How could she ever have lived as she did? The
hunger, the desperate, eager, greedy hunger was roused in her. Falk could
satisfy it, but, if he would not, then she would hesitate no longer.

She would seize Morris as a tiger seizes its prey. She did not disguise
that from herself. As she lay now, trembling, upon her bed, she never
hesitated to admit to herself that the thought of her domination over
Morris was her great glory. She had never dominated any one before. He
followed her like a man in a dream, and she was not young, she was not
beautiful, she was not clever....

It was her own personal, personal, personal triumph. And then, on that,
there swept over her the flood of her tenderness for him, how she longed
to be good to him, to care for him, to mend and sew and cook and wash for
him, to perform the humblest tasks for him, to nurse him and protect him.
She knew that the end of this might be social ruin for both of them!...
Ah, well, then, he would only need her the more! She was quieter now--the
trembling ceased. How strange the way that during these months they had
been meeting, so often without their own direct agency at all! She
recalled every moment, every gesture, every word. He seemed already to be
part of herself, moving within herself.

She sat up on her bed; moved back to her glass. She bathed her face,
slipped on her dress, and went downstairs.

They were a family party at dinner, but, of course, without Falk. He was
always out in the evening now.

Joan talked, chattered on. The meal was soon over. The Archdeacon went to
his study, and the two women sat in the drawing-room, Joan by the window,
Mrs. Brandon, hidden in a high arm-chair, near the fireplace. The clock
ticked on and the Cathedral bells struck the quarters. Joan's white dress,
beyond the circle of lamp-light was a dim shadow. Mrs. Brandon turned the
pages of her book, her ears straining for the sound of Falk's return.

As she sat there, so inattentively turning the pages of her book, the
foreboding sense of some approaching drama flooded the room. For how many
years had she lived from day to day and nothing had occurred--so long that
life had been unconscious, doped, inert. Now it had sprung into vitality
again with the sudden frantic impertinence of a Jack-in-the-Box. For
twenty years you are dry on the banks, half-asleep, stretching out lazy
fingers for food, slumbering, waking, slumbering again. Suddenly a wave
comes and you are swept off--swept off into what disastrous sea?

She did not think in pictures, it was not her way, but to-night, half-
terrified, half-exultant, in the long dim room she waited, the pressure of
her heart beating up into her throat, listening, watching Joan furtively,
seeing Morris, his eternal shadow, itching with its long tapering fingers
to draw her away with him beyond the house. No, she would be true with
herself. It was he who would be drawn away. The power was in her, not in
him....

She looked wearily across at Joan. The child was irritating to her as she
had always been. She had never, in any case, cared for her own sex, and
now, as so frequently with women who are about to plunge into some
passionate situation, she regarded every one she saw as a potential
interferer. She despised women as most women in their secret hearts do,
and especially she despised Joan.

"You'd better go up to bed, dear. It's half-past ten."

Without a word Joan got up, came across the room, kissed her mother, went
to the door. Then she paused.

"Mother," she said, hesitating, and then speaking timidly, "is father all
right?"

"All right, dear?"

"Yes. He doesn't look well. His forehead is all flushed, and I overheard
some one at the Sampsons' say the other day that he wasn't well really,
that he must take great care of himself. Ought he to?"

"Ought he what?"

"To take great care of himself."

"What nonsense!" Mrs. Brandon turned back to her book impatiently. "There
never was any one so strong and healthy."

"He's always worrying about something. It's his nature."

"Yes, I suppose so."

Joan vanished. Mrs. Brandon sat, staring before her, her mind running with
the clock--tick-tick-tick-tick--and then suddenly jumping at the mellow
liquid gurgle that it sometimes gave. Would her husband come in and say
good-night?

How she had grown, during these last weeks, to loathe his kiss! He would
stand behind her chair, bending his great body over her, his red face
would come down, then the whiff of tobacco, then the rough pressure on her
cheek, the hard, unmeaning contact of his lips and hers. His beautiful
eyes would stare beyond her, absently into the room. Beautiful! Why, yes,
they were famous eyes, famous the diocese through. How well she remembered
those years, long ago, when they had seemed to speak to her of every
conceivable tenderness and sweetness, and how, when he thus had bent over
her, she had stretched up her hand and found the buttons of his waistcoat
and pushed her fingers in, stroking his shirt and feeling his heart thump,
thump, and so warm beneath her touch.

Life! Life! What a cheat! What a cheat! She jumped from her chair, letting
the book drop upon the floor, and began to pace the room. And why should
not this, too, cheat her once again? With the tenderness, the poignancy
with which she now looked upon Morris so once she had looked upon Brandon.
Yes, that might be. She would cheat herself no longer. But she was older
now. This was the last chance to live--definitely, positively the last. It
was not the desire to be loved, this time, that drove her forward so
urgently as the desire to love. She knew that, because Falk would do. If
Falk would stay, would let her care for him and mother him and be with
him, she would drive Morris from her heart and brain.

Yes, she almost cried aloud in the dark room. "Give me Falk and I will
leave the other. Give me my own son. That's my right--every mother's
right. If I am refused it, it is just that I should take what I can get
instead."

"Give him to me! Give him to me!" One thing at least was certain. She
could never return to the old lethargy. That first meeting with Morris had
fired her into life. She could not go back and she was glad that she could
not....

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