Corona undressed herself very deliberately; and, seating herself again on the edge of the bed, as deliberately undressed Timothy and clothed him for the night in his pyjamas.
"I am sorry, dear, thatyoushould suffer.… But I can't tell what isn't true, not even for your sake; and I can't take back what I said. Nurse Turner is a beast, if we starve for saying it—which," added Corona reflectively, "I don't suppose we shall. I couldn't answer back properly on Uncle Copas, because when you say a thing to grown-ups they look wise and ask you to prove it, and if you can't you look silly. But Nurse Turner is a beast.… Oh, Timmy! let's lie down and try to get to sleep. But itismiserable to have all the world against us."
She remembered that she was omitting to say her prayers, and knelt down; but after a moment or two rose again.
"It's no use, God," she said. "I'm very sorry, and I wouldn't tell it to anyone butYou—and perhaps Uncle Copas, if he was different: but I can't say 'forgive us our trespasses' when I can't abide the woman."
She had already pulled down the blind. Before creeping to bed she drew the curtains to exclude the lingering daylight. As she did so, she made sure that her window was hasped wide. Her bedroom (on the ground floor) looked out upon a small cabbage-plot in which Brother Bonaday, until warned by the doctor, had employed his leisure. It was a wilderness now.
As a rule Corona slept with her lattice wide to the fullest extent: and at any time (upon an alarm of fire, for example) she could have slipped her small body out through the opening with ease. To-night she drew the frame of the window closer than usual, and pinned it on the perforated bar; so close that her small body could not squeeze through it even if she should walk in her sleep. She was a conscientious child. She only forbore to close it tight because it was wicked to go without fresh air.
She stole into bed and curled herself up comfortably. For some reason or other the touch of the cold pillow drew a tear or two. But after a very little while she slept, still hugging her doll.
There was no sound to disturb her; no sound but the soft dripping, now and again, of a cinder in the grate before which Brother Bonaday sat, with misery in his heart.
"Corona!"
The voice was low and tremulous. It followed on the sound of a loud sneeze. Either the voice or the sneeze (or both) aroused her, and she sat up in bed with a start. Like Chaucer's Canace, of sleep "She was full mesurable, as women be."
"Corona!"
"Is that you, Daddy?" she asked, jumping out of bed and tiptoeing to the door.
What the hour was she could not tell: but she knew it must be late, for a shaft of moonlight fell through a gap in the window-curtains and shone along the floor.
"Are you ill?… Shall I run and call them up at the Nunnery?"
"I was listening.… I have been listening here for some time, and I could not hear you breathing."
"Dear Daddy… is that all? Go back to your bed—it's wicked of you to be out of it, with the nights turning chilly as they are. I'll go back to mine and try to snore, if that's any comfort."
"I haven't been to bed at all. I couldn't… Corona!"
"You are not to turn the key!" she commanded in a whisper, for he was fumbling with it. "Uncle Copas pretended he was taking it away with him: or that was what I understood, and if he breaks an understanding it'shisaffair."
"I—I thought, dear, you might be hungry."
"Well, and suppose I am?"
Corona, now she came to think of it, was ravenous.
"I've a slice of bread here, and a cold sausage. If you'll wrap yourself up and come out, we can toast them both: the fire is still clear."
"As if I should think of it!… And it's lucky for you, Daddy, the key's on your side of the door. You ought to be ashamed of yourself, out of bed at—whatisthe time?"
"Past ten o'clock."
"You are not telling me a fib, I hope, about keeping up a clear fire?" said Corona sternly.
"If you like, I will open the door just a little: then you can see for yourself."
"Cer—tainly not. But if you've been looking after yourself properly, why did you sneeze just now?"
"'Sneeze'? I never sneezed."
Silence, for a moment—
"Somebodysneezed… I 'stinctly heard it," Corona insisted. "Now I come to think, it sounded—"
There was another pause while, with a question in her eye, she turned and stared at the casement. Then, as surmise grew to certainty, a little laugh bubbled within her. She stepped to the window.
"Good night, Uncle Copas!" she called out mischievously. No one answered from the moonlit cabbage-plot. In fact, Brother Copas, beating his retreat, at that moment struck his staff against a disused watering-can, and missed to hear her.
He objurgated his clumsiness and went on, picking his way more cautiously.
"The question is," he murmured, "how I'm to extort confession from Bonaday to-morrow without letting him suspect…"
While he pondered this, Brother Copas stumbled straight upon another shock. The small gate of the cabbage-plot creaked on its hinge… and behold, in the pathway ahead stood a woman! In the moonlight he recognised her.
"Nurse Branscome!"
"Brother Copas!… Why, what in the world are you doing—at this hour—and here, of all places?"
"Upon my word," retorted Copas, "I might ask you the same question. … But on second thoughts I prefer to lie boldly and confess that I have been stealing cabbages."
"Is that a cabbage you are hiding under your gown?"
"It might be, if this place hadn't been destitute of cabbages these twelve months and more.… Pardon my curiosity: but is that also a cabbage you are hiding under your cloak?"
"It might be—" But here laughter—quiet laughter—got the better of them both.
"I might have known it," said Brother Copas, recovering himself. "Her father is outside her door abjectly beseeching her to be as naughty as she pleases, if only she won't be unhappy. And she— woman-like—is using her advantage to nag him."
'But if ne'er so fast you wall her—'
'But if ne'er so fast you wall her—'
'But if ne'er so fast you wall her—'
"Danæ, immured, yet charged a lover for admission. Corona, imprisoned, takes it out of her father for speaking through the keyhole."
"You would not tell me what the child did, that you two have punished her."
"Would I not? Well, she was abominably rude to Nurse Turner this afternoon—went to the extent of calling her 'a nasty two-faced spy.'"
"Was that all?" asked Nurse Branscome.
"It was enough, surely?… As a matter of fact she went farther, even dragging your name into the fray. She excused herself by saying that she had a right to hate Nurse Turner because Nurse Turner hated you."
"Well, that at any rate was true enough."
"Hey?"
"I mean, it is true enough that Nurse Turner hates me, and would like to get me out of St. Hospital," said Nurse Branscome quietly.
"You never told me of this."
"Why should I have troubled to tell? I only tell it now because the child has guessed it."
Brother Copas leaned on his staff pondering a sudden suspicion.
"Look here," he said; "those anonymous letters—"
"I have not," said Nurse Branscome, "a doubt that Nurse Turner wrote them."
"You have never so much as hinted at this."
"I had no right. I have no right, even now; having no evidence. You would not show me the letter, remember."
"It was too vile."
"As if I—a nurse—cannot look at a thing because it is vile! … I supposed that you had laid the matter aside and forgotten it."
"On the contrary, I have been at some pains—hitherto idle—to discover the writer.… Does Nurse Turner, by the way, happen to start her W's with a small curly flourish?"
"That you can discover for yourself. The Nurses' Diary lies in the Nunnery, in the outer office. We both enter up our 'cases' in it, and it is open for anyone to inspect."
"I will inspect it to-morrow," promised Brother Copas. "Now—this Hospital being full of evil tongues—I cannot well ask you to eat anal frescosupper with me, though"—he twinkled—"I suspect we both carry the constituents of a frugal one under our cloaks."
They passed through an archway into the great quadrangle, and there, having wished one another good night, went their ways; she mirthfully, he mirthfully and thoughtfully too.
Next morning Brother Copas visited the outer office of the Nunnery and carefully inspected the Nurses' Diary. Since every week contains a Wednesday, there were capital W's in plenty.
He took tracings of half a dozen and, armed with these, sought Nurse Turner in her private room.
"I think," said he, holding out the anonymous letter, "you may have some light to throw on this. I have the Master's authority to bid you attend on him and explain it."
He fixed the hour—2 p.m. But shortly after mid-day Nurse Turner had taken a cab (ordered by telephone) and was on her way to the railway station with her boxes.
"I am not," said the Bishop, "putting this before you as an argument. I have lived and mixed with men long enough to know that they are usually persuaded by other things than argument, sometimes by better. … I am merely suggesting amodus vivendi—shall we call it a truce of God?—until we have all done our best against a common peril: for, as your Petition proves you to be earnest Churchmen, so I may conclude that to all of us in this room our Cathedral stands for a cherished monument of the Church, however differently we may interpret its history."
He leaned forward in his chair, his gaze travelling from one to another with a winning smile. All the petitioners were gathered before him in the Master's library. They stood respectfully, each with his hat and staff. At first sight you might have thought he was dismissing them on a pilgrimage.
Master Blanchminster sat on the Bishop's right, with Mr. Colt close behind him; Mr. Simeon at the end of the table, taking down a verbatim report in his best shorthand.
"I tell you frankly," pursued the Bishop, "I come rather to appeal for concord than to discuss principles of observance. If you compel me to pronounce on the points raised, I shall take evidence and endeavour to deal justly upon it: but I suggest to you that the happiness of such a Society as this is better furthered by a spirit of sweet reasonableness than by any man's insistence on his just rights."
"Fiat Caelum ruat justitia," muttered Brother Copas. "But the man is right nevertheless."
"Principles," said the Bishop, "are hard to discuss, justice often impossible to deal.… 'Yes,' you may answer, 'but we are met to do this, or endeavour to do it, and not to indulge in irrelevancy.' Yet is my plea so irrelevant?… You are at loggerheads over certain articles of faith and discipline, when a sound arrests you in the midst of your controversy. You look up and perceive that your Cathedral totters; that it washervoice you heard appealing to you. `Leave your antagonisms and help one another to shore me up—me the witness of past generations to the Faith. Generations to come will settle some of the questions that vex you; others, maybe, the mere process of time will silently resolve. But Time, which helps them, is fast destroying us. You are not young, and my necessity is urgent. Surely, my children, you will be helping the Faith if you save its ancient walls.' I bethink me," the Bishop went on, "that we may apply to Merchester that fine passage of Matthew Arnold's on Oxford and her towers: 'Apparitions of a day, what is our puny warfare against the Philistines compared with the warfare which this queen of romance has been waging against them for centuries, and will wage after we are gone?'" He paused, and on an afterthought succumbed to the professional trick of improving the occasion. "It may even be that the plight of our Cathedral contains a special lesson for us of St. Hospital: 'If a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand'"
"Tilly vally!" muttered Brother Copas, and was feeling for his snuff-box, but recollected himself in time.
"You may say that you are old men, poor men; that it is little you could help. Do not be so sure of this. I am informed, for instance, that the proceeds of our forthcoming Pageant are to be devoted to the Restoration Fund, and not (as was originally intended) to missionary purposes."
Here Mr. Simeon, bending over his shorthand notes, blushed to the ears. It was he, good man, who had first thought of this, and suggested it to Mr. Colt; as it was Mr. Colt who had suggested it to the Committee in the presence of reporters, and who, on its acceptance, had received the Committee's thanks.
"I am further told"—here the Bishop glanced around and caught the eye of the Chaplain, who inclined his head respectfully—"that a—er—representation of the Foundation Ceremony of St. Hospital may be included among the—er—"
"Episodes," murmured Mr. Colt, prompting.
"Eh?—yes, precisely—among the Episodes. I feel sure it would make a tableau at once impressive and—er—entertaining—in the best sense of the word.… So, you see, there are possibilities; but they presuppose your willingness to sink some differences and join heartily in a common cause.… Or again, you may urge that to re-edify our Cathedral is none of your business—as officially indeed it is none of mine, but concerns the Dean and Chapter. I put it to you that it concerns us all." Here the Bishop leaned back in his chair, on the arms of which he rested his elbows; and pressing his finger-tips together, gazed over them at his audience. "That, at any rate, is my plea; and I shall be glad, if you have a spokesman, to hear how the suggestion of a 'truce of God' presents itself to your minds."
In the pause that followed, Brother Copas felt himself nudged from behind. He cleared his throat and inclined himself with a grave bow.
"My lord," he said, "my fellow-petitioners here have asked me to speak first to any points that may be raised. I have stipulated, however, that they hold themselves free to disavow me here in your lordship's presence, if on any point I misrepresent them."
The Bishop nodded encouragingly.
"Well then, my lord, it is peculiarly hard to speak for them when at the outset of the inquiry you meet us with a wholly unexpected appeal … an appeal (shall I say?) to sentiment rather than to strict reason."
"I admit that."
"As I admit the appeal to be a strong one.… But before I try to answer it, may I deal with a sentence or two which (pardon me) seemed less relevant than the rest?…If a house be divided against itself, that house cannot stand. True enough, my lord: but neither can it aspire."
The Bishop lifted his eyebrows. But before he could interpose a word Brother Copas had mounted a hobby and was riding it, whip and spur.
"My lord, when a Hellene built a temple he took two pillars, set them upright in the ground, and laid a third block of stone a-top of them. He might repeat this operation a few times or a many, according to the size at which he wished to build. He might carve his pillars, and flourish them off with acanthus capitals, and run friezes along his architraves: but always in these three stones, the two uprights and the beam, the trick of it resided. And his building lasted. The pillars stood firm in solid ground, into which the weight of the cross-beam pressed them yet more firmly. The whole structure was there to endure, if not for ever, at least until some ass of a fellow came along and kicked it down to spite an old religion, because he had found a new one.… But this Gothic—this Cathedral, for example, which it seems we must help to preserve—is fashioned only to kick itself down."
"It aspires."
"Precisely, my lord; that is the mischief. When the Greek temple was content to repose upon natural law—when the Greek builder said, 'I will build for my gods greatly yet lowlily, measuring my effort to those powers of man which at their fullest I know to be moderate, making my work harmonious with what little it is permitted to me to know'—in jumps the rash Christian, saying with the men of Babel,Go to, let us build us a city and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven; or, in other words, 'Let us soar above the law of earth and take the Kingdom of Heaven by storm.'… With what result?"
"'Sed quid Typhœus et validus MimasContra sonantem Palladis ægida… ?'"
"'Sed quid Typhœus et validus MimasContra sonantem Palladis ægida… ?'"
"'Sed quid Typhœus et validus MimasContra sonantem Palladis ægida… ?'"
"The Gothic builders, like the Titans, might strain to pile Pelion on Olympus.Vis consili expers, my lord. From the moment they take down their scaffolding—nay, while it is yet standing—the dissolution begins. All their complicated structure of weights, counterweights, thrusts, balances, has started an internecine conflict, stone warring against stone, the whole disintegrating—"
"Excuse me, Brother—"
"Copas, my lord."
"Excuse me, Brother Copas," said the Bishop with a smile, "if I do not quite see to what practical conclusion we are tending."
"There is a moral ahead, my lord.… Thanks to Mr. Colt's zeal, we have all begun to aspire along our different lines, with the result that St. Hospital has become a house divided against itself. Now, if I may say it modestly,Ithink your lordship's suggestion an excellent one. We are old poor men—what business have we, any longer, with aspiration? It is time for us to cease from pushing and thrusting at each other's souls; time for us to imitate the Greek beam, and practise lying flat.… I vote for the truce, my lord; and when the time comes, shall vote for extending it."
"You have so odd a way of putting it, Brother—er—Copas," his lordship mildly expostulated, "that I hardly recognise as mine the suggestion you are good enough to commend."
Brother Copas's eye twinkled.
"Ah, my lord! It has been the misfortune of my life to follow Socrates humbly as a midwife of men's ideas, and be accused of handing them back as changelings."
"You consent to the truce, at any rate?"
"No, no!" muttered old Warboise.
Copas turned a deaf ear.
"I vote for the truce," he said firmly, "provided the one condition be understood. It is thestatus quo anteso far as concerns us Protestants, and covers the whole field. For example, at the Sacrament we receive the elements in the form which life-long use has consecrated for us, allowing the wafer to be given to those Brethren who prefer it. Will the Master consent to this?"
Master Blanchminster was about to answer, but first (it was somewhat pitiful to see) turned to Mr. Colt. Mr. Colt bent his head in assent.
"That is granted," said the Master.
"Nor would we deny the use of Confession to those who find solace in it—"
"Yes, we would," growled Brother Warboise.
"—Provided always," pursued Copas, "that its use be not thrust upon us, nor our avoidance of it injuriously reckoned against us."
"I think," said the Master, "Brother Copas knows that on this point he may count upon an honourable understanding."
"I do, Master.… Then there is this new business of compulsory vespers at six o'clock. We wish that compulsion removed."
"Why?" snapped Mr. Colt.
"You would force me to say, sir, 'Because it interferes with my fishing.' Well, even so, I might confess without shame, and answer with Walton, that when I would beget content and increase confidence in the power and wisdom and providence of Almighty God I will walk the meadows by Mere, 'and there contemplate the lilies that take no care, and those very many other various little living creatures that are not only created but fed (man knows not how) by the goodness of the God of nature, and therefore trust in Him.'… But I am speaking here rather on behalf of Brother Warboise—if he will leave off nudging me in the small of the back. It happens that for a number of years Brother Warboise has daily, at this hour, paid a visit to a sick and paralysed friend—"
"He is not a friend," rasped out Brother Warboise. "On the contrary—"
"Shall we," interposed the Master, "agree to retain the service on the understanding that I am willing to hear any reasonable plea for non-attendance? I need hardly say, my lord, that visiting the sick would rank with me before any formal observance; and," he added, with the hint of a smile which Brother Copas caught, "even to less Christian excuses I might conceivably be willing to listen."
So, piece by piece, the truce was built up.… When the petitioners had thanked his lordship and withdrawn, and Mr. Simeon, having gathered up his notes, presently followed them out, the Bishop, the Master, and the Chaplain sat for half an hour talking together.
The time came for Mr. Colt to take his leave, being due at a Pageant rehearsal. When he was gone the Bishop suggested a quiet stroll in the home-park, and the two old divines fared forth to take the benediction of evening, still keeping good grave converse as they paced side by side.
"My dear Eustace," said the Bishop (they were friends of long standing, and in private used Christian names in place of titles), "confess, now that this business is over, it was not so bad as you feared."
The Master respired the cool air with a quiet sigh.
"No, Walter, it was not so bad as I feared. But having ruled all these years without question, you understand—"
"You have certainly not ruled all these years for nothing. They were honest fellows, and made it pretty plain that they loved you. It does not rankle, I hope?"
"No." Master Blanchminster drew another deep breath and emitted it as if expelling the last cloudy thought of resentment. "No," he repeated; "I believe I may say that it rankles no longer. They are honest fellows—I am glad you perceived that."
"One could read it in all of them, saving perhaps that odd fellow who acted as spokesman. Brother—er—Copas?… He lectured me straightly enough, but there is always a disposition to suspect an eccentric."
"He was probably the honestest man in the room," answered Master Blanchminster with some positiveness.
"I am the more glad to hear it," said the Bishop, "because meeting a man of such patent capacity brought so low—"
"I assure you, he doesn't even drink—or not to excess," the Master assured him.
They were passing under the archway of the Porter's Lodge.
"But hallo!" said the Bishop, as they emerged upon the great quadrangle, "what in the world is going on yonder?"
Again, as the Master had viewed it many hundreds of times, the sunset shed its gold across the well-kept turf between long shadows cast by the chimneys of the Brethren's lodgings. As usual, in the deep shadow of the western front were gathered groups of inmates for the evening chat. But the groups had drawn together into one, and were watching a child who, solitary upon the grass-plot, paced through a measure before them 'high and disposedly.'
"Brayvo!" shrilled the voice of Mrs. Royle, champion among viragoes. "Now, at the turn you come forward and catch your skirts back before you curtchey!"
"But what on earth does it all mean?" asked the Bishop, staring across from the archway.
"It's—it's Bonaday's child—he's one of our Brethren: as I suppose, rehearsing her part for the Pageant."
Corona's audience had no eyes but for the performance. As she advanced to the edge of the grass-plot and dropped a final curtsey to them, their hands beat together. The clapping travelled across the dusk of the quadrangle to the two watchers, and reached them faintly, thinly, as though they listened in wonder at ghosts applauding on the far edge of Elysian fields.
"I won't say you sold the pass," snarled Brother Warboise, "though I might. The fact is, there's no trusting your cleverness. You see a chance of showing-off before the Bishop, and that's enough. Off you start with a lecture on architecture (which he didn't in the least want to hear), and then, when he finds a chance to pull you up, you take the disinterested line and put us all in the cart."
"You hit it precisely," answered Brother Copas, "as only a Protestant can. His eye is always upon his neighbour's defects, and I never cease to marvel at its adeptness.… Well, I do seem to owe you an apology. But I cannot agree that the Bishop was bored. To me he appeared to listen very attentively."
"He affected to, while he could: for he saw that you were playing his game. His whole object being to head off our Petition while pretending to grant it, the more nonsense you talked, within limits, the better he was pleased."
Brother Copas pondered a moment.
"Upon my word," he chuckled, "it was something of a feat to take a religious cock-pit and turn it into an Old Men's Mutual Improvement Society. Since the Wesleyans took over the Westminster Aquarium—"
"You need not add insult to injury."
"'Injury'? My good Warboise, a truce is not a treaty: still less is it a defeat.… Now look here. You are in a raging bad temper this evening, and you tell yourself it's because the Bishop, with my artless aid, has—as you express it—put you in the cart. Now I am going to prove to you that the true reason is a quite different one. For why? Because, though you may not know it, you have been in a raging bad temper ever since this business was broached, three months ago. Why again? I have hinted the answer more than once; and now I will put it as a question.Had Zimri peace, who slew his Master?"
"I do not understand."
"Oh yes, you do! You are in a raging bad temper, being at heart more decent than any of your silly convictions, because you have wounded for their sake the eminent Christian gentleman now coming towards us along the river-path. He has been escorting the Bishop for some distance on his homeward way, and has just parted from him. I'll wager that he meets us without a touch of resentment.… Ah, Brother, you have cause to be full of wrath!"
Sure enough the Master, approaching and recognising the pair, hailed them gaily.
"Eh? Brother Copas—Brother Warboise—a fine evening! But the swallows will be leaving us in a week or two."
For a moment it seemed he would pass on, with no more than the usual nod and fatherly smile. He had indeed taken a step or two past them as they stood aside for him in the narrow path: but on a sudden thought he halted and turned about.
"By the way—that sick friend of yours, Brother Warboise.… I was intending to ask about him. Paralysed, I think you said? Do I know him?"
"He is not my friend," answered Brother Warboise gruffly.
"His name is Weekes," said Brother Copas, answering the Master's puzzled look. "He was a master-printer in his time, an able fellow, but addicted to drink and improvident. His downfall involved that of Brother Warboise's stationery business, and Brother Warboise has never forgiven him."
"Dear, dear!" Master Blanchminster passed a hand over his brow. "But if that's so, I don't see—"
"It's a curious story," said Brother Copas, smiling.
"It's one you have no right to meddle with, any way," growled Brother Warboise; "and, what's more, you can't know anything about it."
"It came to me through the child Corona," pursued Brother Copas imperturbably. "You took her to Weekes's house to tea one afternoon, and she had it from Weekes's wife. It's astonishing how these women will talk."
"I've known some men too, for that matter—"
"It's useless for you to keep interrupting. The Master has asked for information, and I am going to tell him the story—that is, sir, if you can spare a few minutes to hear it."
"You are sure it will take but a few minutes?" asked Master Blanchminster doubtfully.
"Eh, Master?" Brother Copas laughed. "Did you, too, find me somewhat prolix this afternoon?"
"Well, you shall tell me the story. But since it is not good for us to be standing here among the river damps, I suggest that you turn back with me towards St. Hospital, and where the path widens so that we can walk three abreast you shall begin."
"With your leave, Master, I would be excused," said Brother Warboise.
"Oh, no, you won't," Brother Copas assured him. "For unless you come too, I promise to leave out all the discreditable part of the story and paint you with a halo.… It began, sir, in this way," he took up the tale as they reached the wider path, "when the man Weekes fell under a paralytic stroke, Warboise took occasion to call on him. Perhaps, Brother, you will tell us why."
"I saw in his seizure the visitation of God's wrath," said Warboise. "The man had done me a notorious wrong. He had been a swindler, and my business was destroyed through him."
"Mrs. Weekes said that even the sight of the wretch's affliction did not hinder our Brother from denouncing him. He sat down in a chair facing the paralytic, and talked of the debt: 'which now,' said he, 'you will never be able to pay.'… Nay, Master, there is better to come. When Brother Warboise got up to take his leave, the man's lips moved, and he tried to say something. His wife listened for some time, and then reported, 'He wants you to come again.' Brother Warboise wondered at this; but he called again next day. Whereupon the pleasure in the man's face so irritated him, that he sat down again and began to talk of the debt and God's judgment, in words more opprobrious than before.… His own affairs, just then, were going from bad to worse: and, in short, he found so much relief in bullying the author of his misfortunes, who could not answer back, that the call became a daily one. As for the woman, she endured it, seeing that in some mysterious way it did her husband good."
"There was nothing mysterious about it," objected Brother Warboise. "He knew himself a sinner, and desired to pay some of his penance before meeting his God."
"I don't believe it," said Copas. "But whether you're right or wrong, it doesn't affect the story much.… At length some friends extricated our Brother from his stationery business, and got him admitted to the Blanchminster Charity. The first afternoon he paid a visit in his black gown, the sick man's face so lit up at the sight that Warboise flew into a passion—did you not, Brother?"
"Did the child tell you all this?"
"Aye: from the woman's lips."
"I was annoyed, because all of a sudden it struck me that, in revenge for my straight talk, Weekes had been wanting me to call day by day that he might watch me going downhill; and that now he was gloating to see me reduced to a Blanchminster gown. So I said, 'You blackguard, you may look your fill, and carry the recollection of it to the Throne of Judgment, where I hope it may help you. But this is your last sight of me.'"
"Quite correct," nodded Copas. "Mrs. Weekes corroborates.… Well, Master, our Brother trudged back to St. Hospital with this resolve, and for a week paid no more visits to the sick. By the end of that time he had discovered, to his surprise, that he could not do without them—that somehow Weekes had become as necessary to him as he to Weekes."
"How did you find that out?" asked Brother Warboise sharply.
"Easily enough, as the child told the story.… At any rate, you went. At the door of the house you met Mrs. Weekes. She had put on her bonnet, and was coming that very afternoon to beseech your return. You have called daily ever since to talk about your debt, though the Statute of Limitations has closed it for years. … That, Master, is the story."
"You have told it fairly enough," said Warboise. "Now, since the Master knows it, I'd be glad to be told if that man is my friend or my enemy. Upon my word I don't rightly know, and if he knows he'll never find speech to tell me. Sometimes I think he's both."
"I am not sure that one differs very much from the other, in the long run," said Copas.
But the Master, who had been musing, turned to Warboise with a quick smile.
"Surely," he said, "there is one easy way of choosing. Take the poor fellow some little gift. If you will accept it for him, I shall be happy to contribute now and then some grapes or a bottle of wine or other small comforts."
He paused, and added with another smile, still more penetrating—
"You need not give up talking of the debt, you know!"
By this time they had reached the gateway of his lodging, and he gave them a fatherly good night just as a child's laugh reached them through the dusk at the end of the roadway. It was Corona, returning from rehearsal; and the Chaplain—the redoubtable William the Conqueror—was her escort. The two had made friends on their homeward way, and were talking gaily.
"Why, here is Uncle Copas!" called Corona, and ran to him.
Mr. Colt relinquished his charge with a wave of the hand. His manner showed that he accepted the new trucede bon cœur.
"Is it peace, you two?" he called, as he went past.
Brother Warboise growled.What hast thou to do with peace? Get thee behind me, the growl seemed to suggest. At all events, it suggested this answer to Brother Copas—
"If you and Jehu the son of Nimshi start exchanging rôles," he chuckled, "where will Weekes come in?"
Master Blanchminster let himself in with his latchkey, and went up the stairs to his library. On the way he meditated on the story to which he had just listened, and the words that haunted his mind were Wordsworth's—
"Alas! the gratitude of menHath oftener left me mourning."
"Alas! the gratitude of menHath oftener left me mourning."
"Alas! the gratitude of menHath oftener left me mourning."
A solitary light burned in the library—the electric lamp on his table beside the fire-place. It had a green shade, and for a second or two the Master did not perceive that someone stood a pace or two from it in the penumbra.
"Master!"
"Hey!"—with a start—"Is it Simeon?… My good Simeon, you made me jump. What brings you back here at this hour? You've forgotten some paper, I suppose."
"No, Master."
"What then?"
By the faint greenish light the Master missed to observe that Mr. Simeon's face was deadly pale.
"Master, I have come to make confession—to throw myself on your mercy! For a long time—for a year almost—I have been living dishonestly.… Master, do you believe in miracles?"
For a moment there was no answer. Master Blanchminster walked back to an electric button beside the door, and turned on more light with a finger that trembled slightly.
"If you have been living dishonestly, Simeon, I certainly shall believe in miracles."
"But I meanrealmiracles, Master."
"You are agitated, Simeon. Take a seat and tell me your trouble in your own way—beginning, if you please, with the miracle."
"It was that which brought me. Until it happened I could not find courage—"
Mr. Simeon's eyes wandered to this side and that, as though they still sought a last chance of escape.
"The facts, if you please?"
The Master's voice had of a sudden become cold, even stern. He flung the words much as one dashes a cupful of water in the face of an hysterical woman. They brought Mr. Simeon to himself. His gaze shivered and fixed itself on the Master's, as in a compass-box you may see the needle tremble to magnetic north. He gripped the arms of his chair, caught his voice, and went on desperately.
"This afternoon it was.… On my way here I went around, as I go daily, by the Cathedral, to hear if the workmen have found any fresh defects.… They had opened a new pit by the south-east corner, a few yards from the first, and as I came by one of the men was levering away with a crowbar at a large stone not far below the surface. I waited while he worked it loose, and then, lifting it with both hands, he flung it on to the edge of the pit.… By the shape we knew it at once for an old gravestone that, falling down long ago, had somehow sunk and been covered by the turf. There was lettering, too, upon the undermost side when the man turned it over. He scraped the earth away with the flat of his hands, and together we made out what was written."
Mr. Simeon fumbled in his waistcoat, drew forth a scrap of paper, and handed it to the Master.
"I copied it down then and there: no, not at once. At first I looked up, afraid to see the whole building falling, falling upon me—"
The Master did not hear. He had unfolded the paper. Adjusting his spectacles, he read: "God have Mercy on the Soul of Giles Tonkin. Obiit Dec. 17th, 1643. No man can serve two masters."
"A strange text for a tombstone," he commented. "And the date—1643? That is the year when our city surrendered in the Parliament wars. … Who knows but this may have marked the grave of a man shot because he hesitated too long in taking sides… or perchance in his flurry he took both, and tried to serve two masters."
"Master, I am that man.… Do not look at me so! I mean that, whether he knew it or not, he died to save me… that his stone has risen up for witness, driving me to you. Ah, do not weaken me, now that I am here to confess!"
And leaning forward, his elbows on his knees, his hands spread to hide his face, Mr. Simeon blurted out his confession.
When he had ended there was silence in the room for a space.
"Tarbolt!" murmured the Master, just audibly and no more. "If it had been anyone but Tarbolt!"
There was another silence, broken only by one slow sob.
"For either he will hate the one and love the other; or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. . . Simeon, which was I?"
Mr. Simeon forced himself to look up. Tears were in his eyes, but they shone.
"Master, can you doubt?"
"I am sorry to appear brutal," said Master Blanchminster, coldly and wearily, "but my experiences to-day have been somewhat trying for an old man. May I ask if, on taking your resolution to confess, you came straight to me; or if, receiving just dismissal from my service, you yet hold Canon Tarbolt in reserve?"
Mr. Simeon stood up.
"I have behaved so badly to you, sir, that you have a right to ask it. But as a fact I went to Canon Tarbolt first, and said I could no longer work for him."
"Sit down, please.… How many children have you, Mr. Simeon?"
"Seven, sir.… The seventh arrived a fortnight ago—yesterday fortnight, to be precise. A fine boy, I am happy to say."
He looked up pitifully. The Master stood above him, smiling down; and while the Master's stature seemed to have taken some additional inches, his smile seemed to irradiate the room.
"Simeon, I begin to think it high time I raised your salary."