The Cathedral by Hugh Walpole

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As she came downstairs the clock struck half-past seven. In the hall she
met Gladys.

"Please, miss," said Gladys, "is dinner to be kept back?"

"Why," said Joan, "isn't mother in?"

"No, miss, she went out about six o'clock and she hasn't come in."

"Isn't father in?"

"No, miss."

"Did she say that she'd be late?"

"No, miss."

"Oh, well--we must wait until mother comes in."

"Yes, miss."

She saw then a letter on the hall-table. She picked it up. It was
addressed to her father, a note left by somebody. She thought nothing of
that--notes were so often left; the hand-writing was exactly like her
mother's, but of course it could not be hers. She went into the drawing-
room.

Here the silence was oppressive. She walked up and down, looking out of
the long windows at the violet dusk. Gladys came in to draw the blinds.

"Didn't mother say _anything_ about when she'd be in?"

"No, miss."

"She left no message for me?"

"No, miss. Your mother seemed in a hurry like."

"She didn't ask where I was?"

"No, miss."

"Did she go out with father?"

"No, miss--your father went out a quarter of an hour earlier."

Gladys coughed. "Please, miss, Cook and me's wanting to go out and see the
Procession."

"Oh, of course you must. But that won't be until half-past nine. They come
past here, you know."

"Yes, miss."

Joan picked up the new number of the _Cornhill Magazine_ and tried to
settle down. But she was restless. Her own happiness made her so. And then
the house was "queer." It had the sense of itself waiting for some effort,
and holding its breath in expectation.

As Joan sat there trying to read the _Cornhill_ serial, and most
sadly failing, it seemed to her stranger and stranger that her mother was
not in. She had not been well lately; Joan had noticed how white she had
looked; she had always a "headache" when you asked her how she was. Joan
had fancied that she had never been the same since Falk had been away. She
had a letter in her dress now from Falk. She took it out and read it over
again. As to himself it had only good news; he was well and happy, Annie
was "splendid." His work went on finely. His only sadness was his breach
with his father; again and again he broke out about this, and begged,
implored Joan to do something. If she did not, he said, he would soon come
down himself and risk a row. There was one sentence towards the end of the
letter which read oddly to Joan just now. "I suppose the old man's in his
proper element over all the Jubilee celebrations. I can see him strutting
up and down the Cathedral as though he owned every stone in it, bless his
old heart! I tell you, Joan, I just ache to see him. I do really. Annie's
father hasn't been near us since we came up here. Funny! I'd have thought
he'd have bothered me long before this. I'm ready for him if he comes. By
the way, if mother shows any signs of wanting to come up to town just now,
do your best to prevent her. Father needs her, and it's her place to look
after him. I've special reasons for saying this...."

What a funny thing for Falk to say! and the only allusion to his mother in
the whole of the letter.

Joan smiled to herself as she read it. What did Falk think her power was?
Why, her mother and father had never listened to her for a single moment,
nor had he, Falk, when he had been at home. She had never counted at all--
to any one save Johnny. She put down the letter and tried to lose herself
in the happy country of her own love, but she could not. Her honesty
prevented her; its silence was now oppressive and heavy-weighted. Where
could her mother be? And dinner already half an hour late in that so
utterly punctual house! What had Falk meant about mother going to London?
Of course she would not go to London--at any rate without father. How
could Falk imagine such a thing? More than an hour passed.

She began to walk about the room, wondering what she should do about the
dinner. She must give up the Sampsons, and she was very hungry. She had
had no tea at the Flower Show and very little luncheon.

She was about to go and speak to Gladys when she heard the hall door open.
It closed. Something--some unexpressed fear or foreboding--kept her where
she was. Steps were in the hall, but they were not her father's; he always
moved with determined stride to his study or the stairs. These steps
hesitated and faltered as though some one were there who did not know the
house.

At last she went into the hall and saw that it was indeed her father now
going slowly upstairs.

"Father!" she cried; "I'm so glad you're in. Dinner's been waiting for
hours. Shall I tell them to send it up?"

He did not answer nor look back. She went to the bottom of the stairs and
said again:

"Shall I, father?"

But still he did not answer. She heard him close his door behind him.

She went back into the drawing-room terribly frightened. There was
something in the bowed head and slow steps that terrified her, and
suddenly she was aware that she had been frightened for many weeks past,
but that she had never owned to herself that it was so.

She waited for a long time wondering what she should do. At last, calling
her courage, she climbed the stairs, waited, and then, as though compelled
by the overhanging silence of the house, knocked on his dressing-room
door.

"Father, what shall we do about dinner? Mother hasn't come in yet." There
was no answer.

"Will you have dinner now?" she asked again.

A voice suddenly answered her as though he were listening on the other
side of the door. "No, no. I want no dinner."

She went down again, told Gladys that she would eat something, then sat in
the lonely dining-room swallowing her soup and cutlet in the utmost haste.

Something was terribly wrong. Her father was covering all the rest of her
view--the Jubilee, her mother, even Johnny. He was in great trouble, and
she must help him, but she felt desperately her youth, her inexperience,
her inadequacy.

She waited again, when she had finished her meal, wondering what she had
better do. Oh! how stupid not to know instantly the right thing and to
feel this fear when it was her own father!

She went half-way upstairs, and then stood listening. No sound. Again she
waited outside his door. With trembling hand she turned the handle. He
faced her, staring at her. On his left temple was a big black bruise, on
his forehead a cut, and on his left cheek a thin red mark that looked like
a scratch.

"Father, you're hurt!"

"Yes, I fell down--stumbled over something, coming up from the river." He
looked at her impatiently. "Well, well, what is it?"

"Nothing, father--only they're still keeping some dinner--"

"I don't want anything. Where is your mother?"

"She hasn't come back."

"Not come back? Why, where did she go to?"

"I don't know. Gladys says she went out about six."

He pushed past her into the passage. He went down into the hall; she
followed him timidly. From the bottom of the stairs he saw the letter on
the table, and he went straight to it. He tore open the envelope and read:

* * * * *

I have left you for ever. All that I told you on Sunday night was true,
and you may use that information as you please. Whatever may come to me,
at least I know that I am never to live under the same roof with you
again, and that is happiness enough for me, whatever other misery there
may be in store for me. Now, at last, perhaps, you will realise that
loneliness is worse than any other hell, and that's the hell you've made
me suffer for twenty years. Look around you and see what your selfishness
has done for you. It will be useless to try to persuade me to return to
you. I hope to God that I shall never see you again.

AMY.

* * * * *

He turned and said in his ordinary voice, "Your mother has left me."

He came across to her, suddenly caught her by the shoulders, and said:
"Now, _you'd_ better go, do you hear? They've all left me, your
mother, Falk, all of them. They've fallen on me and beaten me. They've
kicked me. They've spied on me and mocked me. Well, then, you join them.
Do you hear? What do you stay for? Why do you remain with me? Do you hear?
Do you hear?"

She understood nothing. Her terror caught her like the wind. She crouched
back against the bannisters, covering her face with her hand.

"Don't hit me, father. Please, please don't hit me."

He stood over her, staring down at her.

"It's a plot, and you must be in it with the others.... Well, go and tell
them they've won. Tell them to come and kick me again. I'm down now. I'm
beaten; go and tell them to come in--to come and take my house and my
clothes. Your mother's gone--follow her to London, then."

He turned. She heard him go into the drawing-room.

Suddenly, although she still did not understand what had happened, she
knew that she must follow him and care for him. He had pulled the curtains
aside and thrown up the windows.

"Let them come in! Let them come in! I--I----"

Suddenly he turned towards her and held out his arms.

"I can't--I can't bear any more." He fell on his knees, burying his face
in the shoulder of the chair. Then he cried:

"Oh, God, spare me now, spare me! I cannot bear any more. Thou hast
chastised me enough. Oh, God, don't take my sanity from me--leave me that.
Oh, God, leave me that! Thou hast taken everything else. I have been
beaten and betrayed and deserted. I confess my wickedness, my arrogance,
my pride, but it was in Thy service. Leave me my mind. Oh, God, spare me,
spare me, and forgive her who has sinned so grievously against Thy laws.
Oh, God, God, save me from madness, save me from madness."

In that moment Joan became a woman. Her love, her own life, she threw
everything away.

She went over to him, put her arms around his neck, kissed tim, fondled
him, pressing her cheek against his.

"Dear, dear father. I love you so. I love you so. No one shall hurt you.
Father dear, father darling."

Suddenly the room was blazing with light. The Torchlight Procession
tumbled into the Precincts. The Cathedral sprang into light; on all the
hills the bonfires were blazing.

Black figures scattered like dwarfs, pigmies, giants about the grass. The
torches tossed and whirled and danced.

The Cathedral rose from the darkness, triumphant in gold and fire.

Book IV

The Last Stand

Chapter I

In Ronder's House: Ronder, Wistons

Every one has, at one time or another, known the experience of watching
some friend or acquaintance moved suddenly from the ordinary atmosphere of
every day into some dramatic region of crisis where he becomes, for a
moment, far more than life-size in his struggle against the elements; he
is lifted, like Siegmund in _The Valkyrie_, into the clouds for his
last and most desperate duel.

There was something of this feeling in the attitude taken in our town
after the Jubilee towards Archdeacon Brandon. As Miss Stiles said (not
meaning it at all unkindly), it really was very fortunate for everybody
that the town had the excitement of the Pybus appointment to follow
immediately the Jubilee drama; had it not been so, how flat would every
one have been! And by the Pybus appointment she meant, of course, the
Decline and Fall of Archdeacon Brandon, and the issue of his contest with
delightful, clever Canon Ronder.

The disappearance of Mrs. Brandon and Mr. Morris would have been
excitement enough quite by itself for any one year. As every one said, the
wives of Archdeacons simply did _not_ run away with the clergymen of
their town. It was not done. It had never, within any one's living memory,
been done before, whether in Polchester or anywhere else.

Clergymen were, of course, only human like any one else, and so were their
wives, but at least they did not make a public declaration of their
failings; they remembered their positions, who they were and what they
were.

In one sense there had been no public declaration. Mrs. Brandon had gone
up to London to see about some business, and Mr. Morris also happened to
be away, and his sister-in-law was living on in the Rectory exactly as
though nothing had occurred. However, that disguise could not hold for
long, and every one knew exactly what had happened--well, if not exactly,
every one had a very good individual version of the whole story.

And through it all, above it, behind it and beyond it, towered the figure
of the Archdeacon. _He_ was the question, he the centre of the drama.
There were a hundred different stories running around the town as to what
exactly had happened to him during those Jubilee days. Was it true that he
had taken Miss Milton by the scruff of her long neck and thrown her out of
the house? Was it true that he had taken his coat off in the Cloisters and
given Ronder two black eyes? (The only drawback to this story was that
Ronder showed no sign of bruises.) Had he and Mrs. Brandon fought up and
down the house for the whole of a night, Joan assisting? And, above all,
_what_ occurred at the Jubilee Fair? _Had_ Brandon been set upon
by a lot of ruffians? Was it true that Samuel Hogg had revenged himself
for his daughter's abduction? No one knew. No one knew anything at all.
The only certain thing was that the Archdeacon had a bruise on his temple
and a scratch on his cheek, and that he was "queer," oh, yes, very queer
indeed!

It was finally about this "queerness" that the gossip of the town most
persistently clung. Many people said that they had watched him "going
queer" for a long while back, entirely forgetting that only a year ago he
had been the most vigorous, healthiest, sanest man in the place. Old
Puddifoot, with all sorts of nods, winks and murmurs, alluded to
mysterious medical secrets, and "how much he could tell an' he would," and
that "he had said years ago about Brandon...." Well, never mind what he
had said, but it was all turning out exactly as, for years, he had
expected.

Nothing is stranger (and perhaps more fortunate) than the speed with which
the past is forgotten. Brandon might have been all his days the odd,
muttering, eye-wandering figure that he now appeared. Where was the Viking
now? Where the finest specimen of physical health in all Glebeshire? Where
the King and Crowned Monarch of Polchester?

In the dust and debris of the broken past. "Poor old Archdeacon." "A bit
queer in the upper storey." "Not to be wondered at after all the trouble
he's had." "They break up quickly, those strong-looking men." "Bit too
pleased with himself, he was." "Ah, well, he's served his time; what we
need are more modern men. You can't deny that he was old-fashioned."

People were not altogether to be blamed for this sudden sense that they
were stepping into a new period, out of one room into another, so to
speak. The Jubilee was responsible for that. It _did_ mark a period,
and looking back now after all these years one can see that that
impression was a true one. The Jubilee of '97, the Boer War, the death of
Queen Victoria--the end of the Victorian Era for Church as well as for
State.

And there were other places beside Polchester that could show their
typical figures doomed, as it were, to die for their Period--no mean nor
unworthy death after all.

But no Polcastrian in '97 knew that that service in the Cathedral, that
scratch on the Archdeacon's cheek, that visit of Mrs. Brandon to London--
that these things were for them the Writing on the Wall. June 1897 and
August 1914 were not, happily for them, linked together in immortal
significance--their eyes were set on the personal history of the men and
women who were moving before them. Had Brandon in the pride of his heart
not claimed God as his ally, would men have died at Ypres? Can any bounds
be placed to one act of love and unselfishness, to a single deed of mean
heart and malicious tongue?

It was enough for our town that "Brandon and his ways" were out-of-date,
and it was a lucky thing that as modern a man as Ronder had come amongst
us.

And yet not altogether. Brandon in prosperity was one thing, Brandon in
misfortune quite another. He had been abominably treated. What had he ever
done that was not actuated absolutely by zeal for the town and the
Cathedral?

And, after all, had that man Ronder acted straight? He was fair and genial
enough outwardly, but who could tell what went on behind those round
spectacles? There were strange stories of intrigue about. Had he not
determined to push Brandon out of the place from the first moment of his
arrival? And as far as this Pybus living went, it was all very well to be
modern and advanced, but wasn't Ronder advocating for the appointment a
man who laughed at the Gospels and said that there were no such things as
snakes and apples in the Garden of Eden? After all, he was a foreigner,
and Brandon belonged to them. Poor old Brandon!

Ronder was in his study, waiting for Wistons. Wistons had come to
Polchester for a night to see his friend Foster. It was an entirely
private visit, unknown to anybody save two or three of his friends among
the clergy. He had asked whether Ronder could spare him half an hour.
Ronder was delighted to spare it....

Ronder was in the liveliest spirits. He hummed a little chant to himself
as he paced his study, stopping, as was his habit, to touch something on
his table, to push back a book more neatly into its row on the shelf, to
stare for an instant out of the window into the green garden drenched with
the afternoon sun.

Yes, he was in admirable spirits. He had known some weeks of acute
discomfort. That phase was over, his talk with Brandon in the Cloisters
after the Cathedral service had closed it. On that occasion he had put
himself entirely in the right, having been before that, under the eye of
his aunt and certain critics in the town, ever so slightly in the wrong.
Now he was justified. He had humbled himself before Brandon (when really
there was no reason to do so), apologised (when truly there was not the
slightest need for it)--Brandon had utterly rejected his apology, turned
on him as though he were a thief and a robber--he had done all that he
could, more, far more, than his case demanded.

So his comfort, his dear consoling comfort, had returned to him
completely. And with it had returned all his affection, his tenderness for
Brandon. Poor man, deserted by his wife, past his work, showing as he so
obviously did in the Jubilee week that his brain (never very agile) was
now quite inert, poor man, poor, poor man! Ronder, as he walked his study,
simply longed to do something for Brandon--to give him something, make him
a generous present, to go to London and persuade his poor weak wife to
return to him, anything, anything to make him happy again.

Too sad to see the poor man's pale face, restless eyes, to watch his
hurried, uneasy walk, as though he were suspicious of every man.
Everywhere now Ronder sang Brandon's praises--what fine work he had done
in the past, how much the Church owed him; where would Polchester have
been in the past without him?

"I assure you," Ronder said to Mrs. Preston, meeting her in the High
Street, "the Archdeacon's work may be over, but when I think of what the
Church owes him----"

To which Mrs. Preston had said: "Ah, Canon, how you search for the Beauty
in human life! You are a lesson to all of us. After all, to find Beauty in
even the meanest and most disappointing, that is our task!"

There was no doubt but that Ronder had come magnificently through the
Jubilee week. It had in every way strengthened and confirmed his already
strong position. He had been everywhere; had added gaiety and sunshine to
the Flower Show; had preached a most wonderful sermon at the evening
service on the Tuesday; had addressed, from the steps of his house, the
Torchlight Procession in exactly the right words; had patted all the
children on the head at the Mayor's tea for the townspeople; had enchanted
everywhere. That for which he had worked had been accomplished, and
accomplished with wonderful speed.

He was firmly established as the leading Churchman in Polchester; only now
let the Pybus living go in the right direction (as it must do), and he
would have nothing more to wish for.

He loved the place. As he looked down into the garden and thought of the
years of pleasant comfort and happiness now stretching in front of him,
his heart swelled with love of his fellow human beings. He longed, here
and now, to do something for some one, to give some children pennies, some
poor old men a good meal, to lend some one his pounds, to speak a good
word in public for some one maligned, to------

"Mr. Wistons, sir," said the maid. When he turned round only his exceeding
politeness prevented him from a whistle of astonishment. He had never seen
a photograph of Wistons, and the man had never been described to him.

From all that he had heard and read of him, he had pictured him a tall,
lean ascetic, a kind of Dante and Savonarola in one, a magnificent figure
of protest and abjuration. This man who now came towards him was little,
thin, indeed, but almost deformed, seeming to have one shoulder higher
than the other, and to halt ever so slightly on one foot. His face was
positively ugly, redeemed only, as Ronder, who was no mean observer, at
once perceived, by large and penetrating eyes. The eyes, indeed, were
beautiful, of a wonderful softness and intelligence.

His hair was jet black and thick; his hand, as it gripped Ronder's, strong
and bony.

"I'm very glad to meet you, Canon Ronder," he said. "I've heard so much
about you." His voice, as Mrs. Combermere long afterwards remarked, "has a
twinkle in it." It was a jolly voice, humorous, generous but incisive, and
exceedingly clear. It had a very slight accent, so slight that no one
could ever decide on its origin. The books said that Wistons had been born
in London, and that his father had been Rector of Lambeth for many years;
it was also quickly discovered by penetrating Polcastrians that he had a
not very distant French ancestry. Was it Cockney? "I expect," said Miss
Stiles, "that he played with the little Lambeth children when he was
small"--but no one really knew...

The two men sat down facing one another, and Wistons looked strange indeed
with his shoulders hunched up, his thin little legs like two cross-bones,
one over the other, his black hair and pale face.

"I feel rather like a thief in the night," he said, "stealing down here.
But Foster wanted me to come, and I confess to a certain curiosity
myself."

"You would like to come to Pybus if things go that way?" Ronder asked him.

"I shall be quite glad to come. On the other hand, I shall not be at all
sorry to stay where I am. Does it matter very much where one is?"

"Except that the Pybus living is generally considered a very important
step in Church preferment. It leads, as a rule, to great things."

"Great things? Yes..." Wistons seemed to be talking to himself. "One thing
is much like another. The more power one seems to have outwardly, the less
very often one has in reality. However, if I'm called I'll come. But I
wanted to see you, Canon Ronder, for a special purpose."

"Yes?" asked Ronder.

"Of course I haven't enquired in any way into the probabilities of the
Pybus appointment. But I understand that there is very strong opposition
to myself; naturally there would be. I also understand that, with the
exception of my friend Foster, you are my strongest supporter in this
matter. May I ask you why?"

"Why?" repeated Ronder.

"Yes, why? You may say, and quite justly, that I have no right at all to
ask you that question. It should be enough for me, I know, to realise that
there are certain people here who want me to come. It ought to be enough.
But it isn't. It _isn't_. I won't--I can't come here under false
pretences."

"False pretences!" cried Ronder. "I assure you, dear Mr. Wistons--"

"Oh, yes, I know. I know what you will naturally tell me. But I have
caught enough of the talk here--Foster in his impetuosity has been perhaps
indiscreet--to realise that there has been, that there still is, a battle
here between the older, more conservative body of opinion and the more
modern school. It seems to me that I have been made the figure-head of
this battle. To that I have no objection. It is not for the first time.
But what I want to ask you, Canon Ronder, with the utmost seriousness, is
just this:

"Have you supported my appointment because you honestly felt that I was
the best man for this particular job, or because--I know you will forgive
me if this question sounds impertinent--you wished to score a point over
some personal adversary?"

The question _was_ impertinent. There could be no doubt of it. Ronder
ought at once to resent any imputation on his honesty. What right had this
man to dip down into Ronder's motives? The Canon stared from behind his
glasses into those very bright and insistent eyes, and even as he stared
there came once again that cold little wind of discomfort, that
questioning, irritating wind, that had been laid so effectively, he
thought, for ever to rest. What was this man about, attacking him like
this, attacking him before, even, he had been appointed? Was it, after
all, quite wise that Wistons should come here? Would that same comfort, so
rightly valued by Ronder, be quite assured in the future if Wistons were
at Pybus? Wouldn't some nincompoop like Forsyth be perhaps, after all, his
best choice?

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