{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_55994/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_55994","id":"gutenberg_55994","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/55994","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Novels","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Church of England -- Fiction","Religion -- Fiction","Young men -- Fiction"],"text":"PERADVENTURE\n\n  OR THE SILENCE OF GOD\n  BY ROBERT KEABLE\n\n\n\n  \"He is a god; peradventure he sleepeth\"--1 _Kings xviii._ 27\n\n\n\n  CONSTABLE & CO LTD\n  LONDON BOMBAY SYDNEY\n\n\n\n\nFirst published, 1922\n\n\n\n\n  _BY THE SAME AUTHOR_\n\n  THE MOTHER OF ALL LIVING\n  A CITY OF THE DAWN\n  SIMON CALLED PETER\n  PILGRIM PAPERS\n  STANDING BY\n  _ETC._\n\n\n\n\nDEDICATION\n\n_MY DEAR CHRISTOPHER,_\n\n_Recently a very eminent Anglican divine gave us a book which he said\nembodied \"forty years of profound thought.\"  In it he deals to no small\nextent with the subject of this novel, a novel which, though hiddenly,\nI wish to dedicate to you._\n\n_I want to do so because, perhaps, you alone of all my friends will\nknow how much herein written down is true to the life we both led and\nboth have left.  It is odd, I think, as I look back, how little we have\nseen of each other, and how much: how little, because great tracts of\nyour life and mine have been traversed wholly apart, and we only met,\nin the beginning, when we had both of us come some distance along the\nway; but how much, since each time we met and walked a mile or two\ntogether, we talked very freely and we found we understood.  Now, as\nlike as not, I shall see increasingly less of you, seeing that you have\nbecome a Catholic, a religious, and a priest at that.  It is little one\nknows of life and its surprises, but we have shaken hands at the\ncross-roads anyway.  A moment, then, ere you go up the steep hill ahead\nof you, and a moment ere I take my own road that has I cannot see what\nlevel or uphill or down in it,--a moment ere you put my book in your\npocket for the sake of the days gone by._\n\n_You will appreciate the fact that I should have put my thought into a\nnovel and not into a book of serious theology.  Man's thoughts about\nGod are read best in a novel.  Yes, on the one hand, they are best set\nin a transitory frivolous form that booksellers will expose on their\nstalls labelled with one of those neatly-printed little tickets--you\nknow: \"Just the Book for a Long Journey\"--to catch the attention of a\nman off for his holiday or a girl bored with having to return.  Yes,\nthey are best set where they can be read in a few hours by the\ndrawing-room fire.  For, after all, ten years or forty or four hundred\nof man's profound thought about God is worth, maybe a little more than\nthe price of a pound of chocolates, maybe a little less than that of a\ntheatre seat.  Besides the novel has a coloured wrapper, and they are\nnot yet brave enough or sufficiently wise to wrap up theology in that\nform._\n\n_But on the other hand, my dear Chris, there is no form of writing yet\ndevised quite so true or quite so profound as the novel of human\naffairs may well be.  For, Incarnation or no Incarnation, beyond doubt\nyou cannot separate man and God.  We have no medium other than the\nhuman brain by which to think of Him, however illumined or deluded that\nbrain may be, and no other measure of His Person than that of human\nlife.  Your abstract theologian may decide that He is or is not a\nFather: it is man's striving soul that knows; and against their\npresumptive reasoning of the spiritual heaven, I would set half a dozen\npages torn from earth._\n\n_You will be well aware as you read that these chapters are such pages\ntruly enough.  I do not mean that it is not the stuff of fiction that\nis here, but I do protest that Claxted and Keswick and Port o' Man and\nThurloe End and Fordham, yes, and Zanzibar, are true to type, though\nmany readers will scarcely believe me.  I can see the critics mocking\nthough the ink is not yet dry upon the page.  And if, by chance, one of\nthem should catch a fleeting glimpse of his own face in the glass, he\nwill assuredly throw it up at me that the mirror is distorted.  Yet, as\nSamuel Butler says: \"If a bona fide writer thinks a thing wants saying\n... the question whether it will do him personally good or harm, or how\nit will affect this or that friend, never enters his head, or if it\ndoes, it is instantly ordered out again.\"_\n\n_Allow me then, for this reason, your name within the boards.  You will\nknow, however much you disapprove, that there is no malice here.  For\nwhat would I gain by mockery, old friend, who have already lost friends\nenough by speaking the truth? It is a pitiable dance this of ours\naround the altar of Baal, over which, if God be too divine, at least\nman should be human enough rather to weep than to mock.  Yet I believe,\nas indeed I have written, that sorrow in the human story is but the\nshadow of a lovelier thing; that the grass grows green, that the flower\nblows red, that in the wide sea also are things creeping innumerable\nboth small and great beasts, and that every one is good.  And God's in\nHis Heaven?  Peradventure.  At least His Veil is fair._\n\n_But--and it is a big \"but\"--for you in your high vocation and for me\nin this of mine, for each of us, oddly enough, in his own way, there is\na verse from Miss V. H. Friedlaender's_ A Friendship _which I find I\ncannot easily forget:_\n\n  _When we are grown\n  We know it is for us\n  To rend the flowery lies from worlds\n  Foul with hypocrisy;\n  To perish stoned and blinded in the desert--\n  That men unborn may see._\n\n_And I want to set that down too, before a reader turns a page._\n\n_Ever yours,\n    ROBERT KEABLE._\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\nCHAPTER\n\n  DEDICATION\n\n  I. LAMBETH COURT\n  II. CAMBRIDGE\n  III. CHRISTMAS CAROLS\n  IV. FATHER VASSALL\n  V. VACATION\n  VI. MOUNT CARMEL\n  VII. THURLOE END\n  VIII. JUDGMENTS\n  IX. FORDHAM\n  X. \"THE BLIND BEGGAR\"\n  XI. URSULA\n  XII. ZANZIBAR\n\n\n\n\nPERADVENTURE\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nLAMBETH COURT\n\n  Bring me my Bow of burning gold!\n  Bring me my Arrows of desire!\n  Bring me my Spear!  O clouds, unfold!\n  Bring me my Chariot of fire!\n\n  I will not cease from Mental Fight,\n  Nor shall my Sword sleep in my hand,\n  Till we have built Jerusalem\n  In England's green and pleasant land.\n                                BLAKE: Milton.\n\n  Thirsting for love and joy,\n    Eager to mould and plan,\n  These were the dreams of a boy....\n        ARTHUR C. BENSON: Peace and Other Poems.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\nIt must be presumed that some reason underlies the nomenclature of the\nways of our more modern towns, but the game of guessing will long\nremain an entertainment to the curious.  True, we think to honour our\nillustrious dead by calling some business street wholly given over to\nmodern commercialism after one of them, as also we occasionally seek\nsatisfaction by casting forth a name now identified with our equally\ninfamous enemies; but the process by which were named byways and courts\nthat, after all, have not been in existence a lifetime, must remain a\npuzzle.  Thus if, walking down the dreary monotony of Apple Orchard\nRoad, one might conceive that at some time or another it boasted an\napple-tree, the most nimble imagination baulks at that blind alley\nleading from it into an open irregular space entirely surrounded by the\nmeanest houses, entitled Lambeth Court.  It, at least, was surely never\nassociated with an Archbishop.  The mere sight of his gaiters there\nwould have been the occasion for an hilarious five minutes.  And if it\nwas ever part of his property, the least said about that the better.\n\nFor all this the Borough of Claxted, now within the boundaries of\nGreater London, was a highly respectable town.  Its citizens were\nmainly composed of those who go daily to the City round and about the\ndecent hour of nine-thirty for frequently mysterious but none the less\nremunerative occupations, and of those who supply their households with\nthe necessaries and pleasant superfluities of good living.  A class\napart, these latter nevertheless shone, in Claxted, with some of the\nlustre of their betters, and were, indeed, known, when Paul Kestern was\nyoung, as Superior Tradespeople.  For both, at Claxted, there were\nmiles of trim villas ascending to avenues of detached houses; churches\nthere were, swept and garnished, or empty with an Evangelical Christian\nemptiness; Municipal buildings, dignified, sufficient, new and clean.\nThere was, in short, an air about the place and its citizens, in those\ndays, almost wholly neatly and simply Conservative.  The Borough,\nmoreover, obtained a suffragan bishop about this time, and may thus be\nsaid to have been sealed with a just measure of divine approval.\n\nYet the untroubled broad stream of Claxted's righteous prosperity had\nits occasional backwater into which there drifted the rubbish which\nwould otherwise have defiled the comfortable colour of waters neither\nmuddy nor translucent.  Lambeth Court was one such.  Possibly it was\noverlooked by the Borough Council; possibly it was allowed to remain\nfor some such definite purpose as that it certainly fulfilled.  In any\ncase the Court afforded a \"problem\" for the church in whose parish it\nlay, and the principles of the Christian Endeavour Society, which set\nevery young Christian immediately to work (thus preventing the leakage\nwhich otherwise occurs after the Sunday School age in the South), were\noffered in it an ample field for exercise.  God knows it needed all\nthat the young Christian Endeavourers and their more adult directors\nstrove to give it.  Their work was possibly a forlorn hope, but if the\nSunshine Committee could not lighten the darkness of the Court, what\nelse, asked Claxted, could?  Nothing, it may well be conceded, except\nrebuilding and replanning to admit light and air.  These, however, cost\nmoney, and besides the dwellers in Lambeth Court would only have moved\nthemselves elsewhere.  The poor, reflected the Claxted councillors, ye\nhave with you always, and went home to dinner.\n\nSo far as the Christian Endeavour Society was concerned, it was Paul\nKestern who discovered Lambeth Court.  He was eighteen at the time and\nsecretary of the Open-Air Committee--a committee, it must be explained\nperhaps, which did not function in town-planning but in\ngospel-preaching.  One Sunday morning, returning from a children's\nservice in the Mission Hall at the end of Apple Orchard Road, he\nentered it for the first time.  A scholar had said that his elder\nsister, regular in attendance at the service, was sick, and Paul,\nenquiring her whereabouts, had learned that she lived \"in the Court.\"\nIts inhabitants rarely aspired to the \"Lambeth\" part of their\ndesignation, but if the enquirer needed further enlightenment added\n\"Behind the 'South Pole.'\"  Paul, thus informed, remembered the dim\nopening under the railway bridge behind the public-house of that name,\nand said he would \"call in\" that morning.  The urchin looked doubtfully\nat his teacher's silk hat and frock coat, but ran off after service to\nacquaint his mother.  Paul had followed at leisure.\n\nIt is not necessary to give a detailed description of Lambeth Court,\nbut it may be pointed out how the place instantly struck Paul\nstrategically.  It was not too far from the Hall, he saw at once, to\nmake the work of carrying the harmonium too heavy; every corner of its\narea could be reached with a powerful voice; in the very centre stood a\nlamp-post, and, what was more, that lamp-post stood alone in its glory\nin the Court.  This condition offered two great advantages: first, that\nof supplying all the light required for the evangelists, and secondly,\nthat of creating those dark shadows beyond beloved by Nicodemus and his\nlike.  The railway arch through which one entered and which shut off\nthat end of the place, would, of course, occasionally vibrate with\ntrains--an item on the debit side of the account; but on the other hand\nthe filthy tumbling hovels were enclosed on three sides by hoardings\nand tall blank warehouse walls which would catch the voice, and their\nstrips of refuse-strewn gardens, separated from each other by broken\npalings, were just such as would invite the inhabitants to sit and\ngossip there on summer and early autumn evenings.  Paul noted all this\nin a moment so soon as he was inside the arch.  He was a born\nevangelist.\n\nBut to do the boy justice, he noted far more than this.  He saw the\nslatternly woman, with an unspeakable gaping blouse, her hair in\ncurl-papers and her feet in bulging unlaced boots, who came to the door\nof the first cottage and shouted at a flaxen-haired little toddler of a\ngirl playing with a matchbox in the gutter.  The burning words fell on\nhis ears like a scream from hell.  \"Maud-Hemily, yer bloody little\nbitch, come in out o' that muck or I'll smack your bottom for yer.\"  He\nsaw the two men by the lamp-post look at him, and he read aright their\nbesotted faces.  Neither spoke, but one spat well and truly at the base\nof the pillar, and that did for speech.  He rapped on the door of No.\n5, and when Jimmie opened it, he saw the remains of a meal in greasy\nnewspapers on the filthy table, and his nostrils caught the smell of\nunwashed clothes and Sunday morning's kippers.  He tried to avoid the\nwall as he went up the stairs.  And when he was in the little overhead\nbedroom, whose window never opened and through whose grimy glass one\nread an advertisement of Reckitt's Blue on the hoarding opposite, and\nstood by the side of a heap of blankets and sacks on which lay and\ncoughed a child of thirteen in consumption, a cracked article on a\nchair by her bedside over which she occasionally leaned and\nexpectorated, his heart moved with something of that compassion which\nhad been the outstanding characteristic of the greatest Evangelist the\nworld has ever known.\n\nHe was more silent than his wont at the midday dinner.  But when\nSaturday's hot joint, cold on Sundays, had been removed, he looked\nacross the table to the clergyman at its head, and spoke.  \"Dad,\" he\nsaid, \"do you know Lambeth Court?\"\n\n\"Lambeth?\" queried the clergyman.  \"No.  Oh, let me see.  Isn't it that\nplace behind the 'South Pole'?\"\n\n\"Yes.  I went in to-day to see Queenie Archer.  She's awfully bad\nagain.  Dad, it's a ghastly place.  I thought I'd speak to the\nCommittee this afternoon and arrange an open-air there.\"\n\nHis mother looked up from helping the pudding and spoke with a trace of\nanxiety.  \"Paul, she has consumption.  Ought you to visit her, dear?\nAnd it's a dreadful place; I don't think the C.E. girls ought to go\ninto it even for an open-air.\"\n\nPaul moved restlessly.  \"They'd be all right with us, mother,\" he said.\n\"Do you think Jesus Christ would have stayed away because it was dirty\nor because Queenie had consumption?  If there's a place in the parish\nwhere souls need saving, that place is Lambeth Court.\"\n\nHis mother suppressed a little sigh.  The speech was typical of Paul.\nAs a Christian she loved him for it; as a mother she was very proud.\nBut this irresistible logic, which he was so prone to use, however much\nit belonged to the atmosphere of religion in which she whole-heartedly\nbelieved, affrighted her a little.  It opened up infinities.  She made\nthe rather pathetic appeal which was characteristic of her.  \"What do\nyou think, father?\" she queried.\n\nMr. Kestern had very kindly eyes, a forehead which would have made for\nintellectuality if his ever-narrowing outlook on life had given it a\nchance, and a weak chin hidden by a short-beard and moustache.  He\nsmiled at her.  \"The boy is quite right, dear,\" he said, \"but, Paul,\nyou should not run unnecessary risks, especially now.  You might have\nleft the visit to me.  I will go to-morrow.  As for the open-air, I\nshould think it would be a capital place, but keep the girls by you and\ndon't let them wander alone into the houses with tracts or leaflets.\nDo you mean to go to-night?\"\n\n\"No, not to-night, dad.  Our pitch is in Laurence Place to-night.  I\nthought perhaps next Sunday.\"\n\n\"Next Sunday is the first in the month, dear,\" said his mother gently.\n\"Won't it be rather late?  You don't usually have open-airs on the\nfirst Sunday, do you?\"\n\n\"I know, mother,\" said Paul, \"but why not?  It is better to be a bit\nlate when we go to Lambeth Court.  Some of the men may be out of the\npublics by then.  And it always seems to me that Communion Sunday is\nthe best in the month for an open-air.  Surely after we've remembered\nHis 'precious Death and Burial' at the Table, that is just the time for\nus to preach the Cross.\"\n\n\"And 'His glorious Resurrection and Ascension,' Paul,\" quoted his\nfather softly.  \"Don't forget that.  It's the living Saviour, no dead\nChrist on a crucifix, that we proclaim.\"\n\n\"I know, dad,\" said the boy, his eyes shining.  \"How could one think\notherwise?\"\n\n\"I don't know, laddie,\" said his father, smiling tenderly at him, \"but\nsome appear to do so.  God guard you from such errors, Paul.  Don't be\nover-confident; Satan can deceive the very elect.\"\n\nThus was the mission to Lambeth Court decided upon.  Paul had carried\nhis Committee with him, as he always did.  Its eldest member, a married\nbank clerk of a nervous temperament, had indeed echoed something of\nMrs. Kestern's fears.  He thought that the Court was no place for\nladies, and said, frankly, he would not care for his wife to go there.\nPaul, at the head of the Mission vestry table, played with a pencil,\nand showed his instinctive leadership again by not answering him.  He\nlooked up instead, and caught Edith Thornton's eyes as she sat opposite\nhim.  They were eager and indignant, and he nodded ever so slightly.\nEdith, therefore, had taken up her parable, and the more forcefully\nsince she did not often speak on Committee.  \"Oh, Mr. Derrick,\" she\nexclaimed, \"I don't agree with you at all!  What about our\nmissionaries' wives?  What about the Salvation Army?  Do you think any\nplace can be too bad for a Christian if there is one single soul to be\nsaved?\"  She flushed a little at her own vehemence.\n\nMr. Derrick coughed, fumbling with his watchchain.  He was well aware\nthat the Spirit was at work in Apple Orchard Mission Hall, and he was\nconscious of being one of the weaker brethren.  Paul's very silence\ndaunted him, for he honestly loved the eager Paul.  \"Let us pray about\nit,\" he suggested.\n\nPaul pushed his chair back, and slipped to his knees.  Instinctively he\nalways knelt to pray, though the more general custom was to sit.  \"A\nfew minutes' silent prayer first,\" he commanded, and, in the slow\nticking of the clock, he prayed himself, with utter simplicity and\nearnestness, for Lambeth Court, for the guidance of the Holy\nSpirit--and for Mr. Derrick.  The result was, of course, a foregone\nconclusion.\n\nThus, at intervals, all that golden summer, Lambeth Court heard the\nWord.  True, the signs following were so small that the less zealous\nEndeavourers openly shook their heads, and even the more ardent of the\nband would have been tempted to give in.  But Paul and Edith were of\ndifferent mettle.  At devotional meetings, Paul spoke of heroic souls\nwho had preached for half a generation in heathen lands and not seen a\nconvert, until, one day, the tide turned in all its power.  Most\neffective was the story of the Moravians who laboured among a certain\nband of Esquimaux for forty years unblessing and unblessed, and then,\ndiscovering that the channels were choked in themselves, cleared them,\nand saw many mighty works.  And in July, indeed, the doubters had\nreceived a knock-out blow.  Mrs. Reynolds, of No. 11, had been as truly\nconverted as Saul on the road to Damascus, converted by the human\ninstrumentality of Edith and a novel tract in the shape of a small slip\nof cardboard bearing nothing but a question mark on one side and on the\nother:\n\n  _HOW_ SHALL YE ESCAPE\n  IF YE NEGLECT\n  SO GREAT SALVATION?\n\n\nPoor Mrs. Reynolds, one would have thought that her present woes were\nbig enough to discount effectively all future ones.  Reynolds hawked,\nwhen he had anything to hawk or time to spare from the \"South Pole\" and\nregular terms of service for His Majesty.  Mrs. Reynolds, herself,\ndrank, when, more rarely than her spouse, she had the wherewithal to\nobtain drink.  Reynolds, who should have accounted himself blessed in\nthe number of olive branches round about his table, illogically cursed\nwhenever he saw them, but added to the tribe as fast as Nature\npermitted.  It was, indeed, when his wife was expecting what turned out\nto be twins, that Edith came her way.  Against orders, she left the\ncircle and gave the woman a chair within her palings whereon she might\nsit and listen.  Mrs. Reynolds, gently intoxicated, was grateful, and\nasked her visitor to fetch a Bible from within which had remained to\nthe family because it could not be pawned.  On the table Edith silently\nlaid the tract.  Mrs. Reynolds, returning later, had seen it, and had\nbeen (as she said) knocked all of a heap.  Why, particularly, by that\ntract or just then, does not appear, and was not indeed questioned for\na moment by the Endeavourers.  For converted Mrs. Reynolds honestly and\ntruly had been.  Into her dwarfed and darkened life had shone the\nradiance of a new hope, and from her hardened heart, so strangely\nbroken, had come welling out a vivid and wonderful spring.  Regular at\nservices, humble at home, zealous in her work, undaunted by scoffing\nand blows, Mrs. Reynolds had not only been constrained, nervously and\npathetically, to testify publicly in her own Court, but honestly did\ntestify by her life every day of the week.  The very publican at the\ncorner, who had a soft spot for Paul by the way, admitted it.  \"Let the\npoor devil alone,\" he would shout at Reynolds cursing his wife and\ndamning the Mission across the bar, \"or get out of 'ere.  Christ!\nYou're a bloody fool, you are!  'Ere's the Mission give you as good a\nwife as any man ever 'ad, and you cursin' of 'em.  Wouldn't mind if\nthey converted my ole woman, I wouldn't.  She might 'old a\nprayer-meetin' now and agin in the bar-parlour, off-hours, if she'd\nkeep it clean.\"\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nBut this Sunday in October was to see the end of the effort for the\nseason.  In the first place, Paul left that week for his first term at\nCambridge, and this was a bigger damper than the Committee cared to\nallow.  In the second, however, it was getting cold in the evenings,\nand activities took a new direction in the winter.  Thus, a little\nlate, after Communion, the band sallied out for the last time.  Some\nfifteen or twenty of them, they gathered round the lamp-post.  A couple\nof young men distributed the hymn-sheets to the loungers in the\ngardens, with a cheerful smile and a word of friendly greeting, fairly\nwell received, as a matter of fact, by now.  Paul mounted his chair\nunder the light.  Edith took her seat beneath at the harmonium, for\nMiss Madeline Ernest, daughter of the Rev. John Ernest, an elderly\nassistant curate, who usually played, was unwell.  The last faint\nradiance of the day was dying out over the railway bridge, and the\nstars shone steadily in a clear sky above the hoardings.\n\nThe Court greeted the Missioners in various moods.  \"They've come,\nJoe,\" said Mrs. Reynolds to her husband who, for once and for obvious\nreasons, was at home and sober; \"won't yer come out and listen-like a\nbit?  The 'ymns will cheer yer up, and they carn't do yer no 'arm\nanywise.  It's yer larst charnst for the season, Joe.\"\n\n\"Garn,\" said Joe, \"damn yer!\"\n\nHilda Tillings put her hat at a becoming angle in the back kitchen of\nNo. 9 and sallied out into the parlour.  Her mother sniffed.  \"Silly\nfool,\" she said, \"ter go and suck up ter 'em like that.  'E won't look\ntwice at yer.  It'll be a case between 'im and that there Madeline\nlidy, if yer asks me.\"\n\nHilda tossed her head.  \"Miss Ernest's not come to-night,\" she said.\n\"I saw out of the top winder.  'Sides, yer don't know wat yer talking\nof, ma.  I like the meeting.\"  And she sallied out.\n\nTwo urchins, tearing at top speed under the arch, made for the\nlamp-post.  \"'Ere, 'ook it,\" gasped the first to arrive, _sotto voce_,\nto a diminutive imp already there.  \"I'll bash yer 'ead in for yer if\nyer don't.  This 'ere's my job.\"  And he clutched at the lantern which\nilluminated the music-book on the required occasions, and kicked his\nweaker brother on the shin.\n\n\"Silence, boys,\" said Mr. Derrick, in his best manner; \"don't fight\nwith that lantern now.\"\n\n\"Orl rite, guv'nor, but it's my job.  Don't yer 'member me larst tyme?\nYer said I 'eld it steady and yer give me a copper.\"\n\n\"I got 'ere fust\"--shrilly, from the other.\n\n\"There, there, my lad, give it up.  This boy usually holds it.  No\nstruggling, please.  That's better.  You can help with the harmonium\nafterwards if you like.\"\n\n(The smaller boy recedes into the background snuffling.  Throughout the\nfirst part of the meeting he is trying to kick the elder, jar the\nlantern, or otherwise molest its holder.  After the second hymn, Edith\nintervenes with a penny.  The smaller boy exits triumphantly.)\n\nPaul, from his somewhat rickety chair, surveyed the little scene with a\ndefinite sense of exultation in his heart.  The last trace of\nnervousness dropped from him with his first half-dozen sentences.  He\nhad the voice of an orator, a singularly attractive, arresting voice,\nthat penetrated easily the furthest recesses of the Court and even\nbrought in a few passers-by from the street.  The only son, he was, as\nhis parents often told him, the child of prayers, and he was named Paul\nthat he might be an apostle.  He would have been a dreadful prig if he\nhad not been so tremendously convinced and in earnest.  Radiant on that\nmission chair beneath the garish lamp-light, he bared his head and\nlifted his eyes to the heavens above him.  Had they opened, with a\nvision of the returning Christ escorted by the whole angelic host, he\nwould quite honestly not have been surprised; indeed, if anything, he\nwas often surprised that they did not.  Christ waited there as surely\nas he stood beneath to pray and preach.  His young enthusiasm, his\nvital faith, stirred the most commonplace of the little group about\nhim, and no wonder, for he added to it an unconscious and undeveloped\nbut undoubted power.  To-night, the last night of the series, the last\nnight, perhaps, for ever there, he drew on all his gifts to the utmost.\nIt was small wonder that such as Hilda came to listen and such as Mrs.\nReynolds stayed to pray.  There fell even on Theodore Derrick a sense\nthat the Acts of the Apostles might after all be true.\n\nThey began by singing \"Tell me the old, old story.\"  Before the hymn\nwas half over Paul had his audience under his influence as if they had\nbeen little children and he a beloved master, or an orchestra and he\nthe efficient conductor.  He laughed at them for not singing.  He made\nthem repeat the chorus in parts, women a line, men a line, children a\nline, and then the last line all together.  He made them triumph it to\nGod, and then whisper it to their own hearts.  He stayed them\naltogether impressively, and would not have those sing who could not\nsay whole-heartedly:\n\n  Remember I'm the sinner\n  Whom Jesus came to save....\n\n\nThen he prayed.  No one there could pray as Paul prayed, and Paul\nhimself might have wondered how long he would be able to pray so.  An\nagnostic rarely interrupted Paul's meetings.  There might be no sure\nknowledge of God, but it was plainly useless to tell that to Paul after\nyou had heard him pray.  Also, incidentally, there were few, however\nrough, who did not feel that it would be a brutal thing to do.\n\nA hymn again--the \"Glory Song,\" by request--and Paul announced his\ntext, his farewell message, their last word to Lambeth Court for many\nmonths.  It was the kind of text which, in his mouth, took on that\nirresistible logic that he loved, and which, in his own heart, glowed\nand beat like the throb of an immense dynamo.  \"The Cross,\" so he\nproclaimed, \"is to them that are perishing foolishness, and to them\nthat are being saved the power of God.\"  Telling anecdotes, however\ncommonplace, hammered in his points.  It was not the Cross that was on\ntrial; it was his hearers who were then and there being judged by the\nCross.  Was all this to them foolishness, or was it the power of God?\nAn easy question!  Each one knew well enough for himself.  And the\ninevitable followed; indeed, in Paul's eager soul, could not be\ngainsaid.  His hearers to a man were being saved--the speaker's face\nlit up with the honest joy of it;--or--or--_perishing_.  The whispered\nword reached the far corners of the Court.  It even reached Reynolds.\nHe stirred uneasily, and wished he had more beer.\n\nThe boy on the chair announced that they would sing as a last hymn \"God\nbe with you till we meet again.\"  The haunting lilt, the genuine poetry\nand life there is in it, overcame the crude composition, the tortured\nair which was the best the old harmonium could do, the vulgar\nsurroundings, the banal words.  At the third verse, Paul held up his\nhand.  A little hush fell on the whole Court, which deepened as he\nspoke.  Paul had not learnt the tricks that it was possible for him to\nplay with his oratorical power, but it was a naturally clever thing\nthat he did.  The tone of his voice wholly changed.  All hardness,\nlogic, conquest, argument, had gone from him, and it vibrated with\ntenderness, was all but broken with honest emotion.  He begged, by the\npity and gentleness of the Saviour, that they might meet at His feet.\nThey had, he said, all of them, to travel down the long roads of life;\nnone knew where such might lead; would that all their diverse ways\nmight at least lead home--home to the one safe shelter, home to the one\nsure haven, home to Jesus' feet.\n\nThe little band moved off out of the Court, the loungers' eyes looking\ncuriously at Paul.  He stopped again and again to shake hands, and, at\nthe Mission Hall, found the instrument, books, chair, and the rest of\nthe paraphernalia already put away.  He said good-bye to one and\nanother.  Edith held out her hand.\n\n\"Are you alone?\" he asked.  \"May I see you home?\"\n\n\"I don't like to trouble you,\" she said.\n\nHe smiled at her eagerly.  \"I believe you know I'm glad of the chance,\"\nhe replied.\n\nShe lived some way off and scarcely in his direction, but young\nVintner, who usually escorted her home, saw the arrangement, and\nsurrendered her to Paul without a question.  Still he wished Miss\nErnest had been there; then, of necessity, the vicar's son saw the\ncurate's daughter home.  Under those circumstances, he usually secured\nEdith, who fell to him likewise, more often than not, on school-treats\nor C.E. excursions or riding back on summer evenings with the Members'\nCycling Club.  But there was nothing tangible between them, and he was\ndevoted to Paul like all the rest of their circle.  So the two leaders\nwent off together.\n\nThey said little at first.  Their way lay down a long wide well-lit\nmain street with many people about, if few vehicles seeing that it was\nSunday evening.  There was a sense of triumph in Paul, a sense growing\nsteadily now that the service was over and other less personal\ninfluences laid for awhile aside, and he saw the commonplace street as\na vista of magic and wonder.  They passed a darkened church, all locked\nat this late hour, which was little thought of in their circle as\nlacking in evangelical zeal.  At a street corner, under a banner with a\ntext upon it, another open-air service from the local Wesleyan chapel\nwas in progress, and a speaker with a harsh voice was thundering\ntorrential salvation.  Paul glanced at the girl by his side with a\nsmile.  \"'Peace be to all them who love our Lord Jesus Christ in\nsincerity,'\" he quoted quietly.\n\nShe nodded.  \"But the Wesleyans are so noisy,\" she said, \"and I don't\nsee why they need have left the Church.\"\n\n\"We shall right all that,\" said Paul, utterly unconscious of boasting.\n\"The Evangelicals in all the churches must come together.  I don't know\nwhy there is any delay.  They want someone to make a move.  When I'm\nordained I shall go and preach in Nonconformist chapels and invite them\nto my church no matter what the Bishop says.  'We must obey God rather\nthan man.'\"\n\nThe girl looked up at him.  \"Why does everything you say ring so\nunanswerably true?\" she demanded with a little smile.\n\n\"Does it?\"\n\n\"Yes.  Everyone thinks so.  Do you know you frighten me sometimes.\"\n\n\"Frighten you!  Why in the world?\"\n\n\"Because you're irresistible.  Do you remember last week's prayer\nmeeting?  Maud said to me afterwards: 'He'll make us all foreign\nmissionaries.'\"\n\n\"I wish I could,\" said Paul, quite gravely.  \"Why not?\"\n\n\"That's just it,\" she replied.  \"When you say 'Why not?' there doesn't\nseem to be any answer.  But my father would find one quickly enough.\"\n\nThey turned off into the first of a network of darker side-streets of\nvillas leading to her road.  A sedate suburban air brooded there, and\nexcept for a wandering couple and a distant policeman, no one else was\nin sight or hearing.  The night was clear and sweet.  A little moon was\nclimbing into the sky.  Paul and Edith slowed down instinctively.\n\nPaul did not pursue the complication.  Mr. Thornton was a photographer\nin Edward Street, a highly respectable person, a member of his father's\nchurch, but not within the circle of his father's actual friends.  The\nmention of him gave Paul a slight jar about Edith.  He knew well enough\nthat if he had been seeing Madeline home, his mother would have been\nhighly delighted, but that she would be slightly uneasy at hearing that\nhe had been with Edith.  But he was just discovering Edith.  He liked\nMadeline--she was far too pretty, with her fair hair and big eyes and\nnicely-tempered lady-like admiration, not to be liked.  At the last\nschool-treat--oh well, but he hadn't said anything really.  And it was\nin the return train that very day that he had, so to say, discovered\nEdith.  He had found himself in her carriage, having strayed from that\nreserved for his father and mother to shepherd some late arrivals, and\nshe had been opposite him the whole way.  She was quiet--he had noticed\nthat first; but when he did succeed in drawing her out a little, he had\nfound a very attractive creature.  It was hard to say why, but still,\nas he analysed her, she was frank, gay, and yet unexpectedly deep.  And\nshe, too, was pretty.  He had seen her home from the station, for the\nfirst time, and discovered that his mother was just a little annoyed.\n\n\"Do you know,\" he said now, continuing the subject, \"I can't make up my\nmind what I want exactly.  There seems such a lot to do in England, and\nyet of course I'm pledged to be a foreign missionary.\"\n\n\"I see,\" she said.\n\n\"Well, what do you think?\" he demanded.  \"It makes me burn to see the\ndeadness and disunion among Christians at home, and yet the heathen,\ndying daily without Christ--how can one stay in England for a moment\nlonger than is necessary?\"\n\n\"God will surely show you what you must do,\" said the girl quietly.\n\nThere was a depth of sincerity in the simple words that struck him.  It\nwas the kind of thing Madeline would never have said, and would not\nhave meant if she had.  He eyed her with a sudden wish to see more of\nher.  \"Do you know I go to Cambridge on Tuesday?\" he asked.\n\nShe nodded.\n\n\"It's going to cut me off from things here,\" he went on.  \"I shall have\nto work in the vacs., you know.  And I'm tingling to get there.  I'll\nhave time to write a bit, and I expect editors will look at stuff that\ncomes from the 'Varsity.\"\n\n\"I read that bit of yours in _The Record_,\" she said.\n\nThe implied praise pleased him.  \"Did you?\" he cried.  \"Did you like\nit?  I'm longing to be able to write as well as preach.  I want God to\nhave my pen as well as my tongue.\"\n\n\"Oh you are lucky!\" she exclaimed involuntarily.\n\n\"Lucky?  Why?\"\n\n\"You've so much to give.  I've nothing.\"\n\nHe was extraordinarily touched by her humility.  He wanted to take her\narm, but he did not like to do so.  They turned another corner, and\nwere in her street.\n\n\"Don't say that,\" he said.  \"You've yourself--give that.  No one can\ngive more.\"\n\n\"I'm not sure,\" she said, with a nervous catch in her voice, \"that I\ncan give that.\"\n\n\"Why not?\" he asked.\n\nShe did not reply directly.  \"I wonder what you will be like after a\nterm at Cambridge,\" she said, inconsequently.\n\n\"It won't change me at all,\" said Paul.\n\nThe girl made little stabs with her umbrella at the pavement.  \"It\nwill,\" she said.  \"I wonder if you'll come back the least bit the same.\nOh, I know!  You'll have new friends and new interests, and you'll\nthink us all just a little cheap.  You'll go away in the holidays,\nabroad very likely, and even our country won't seem the same to you.\"\n\nPaul was surprised at her vehemence, and he came to a sudden\nresolution.  \"Do you know,\" he said, \"I'm going to take a last bike\nride to-morrow round Hursley Woods and Allington, just to say good-bye.\nI meant to go alone, but do you think you could come too?  I'd love it.\nWe'd be able to talk, up there in the heather.  Will you?\"\n\nThe girl slowed down still more; they were very near her home.  She was\nso glad that he had asked her that she could hardly speak.  \"Yes,\" she\nsaid; and then, with a burst of confidence: \"Do you think we ought to?\"\n\n\"Why not?\" he queried, frowning.  \"Well, we'll risk it anyway.  Look\nhere, let's meet at the bottom of Coster Lane--say at eleven.  Shall\nwe?  That will give us two hours, lots of time.\"\n\nShe nodded without speaking, and put her hand on the latch.\n\n\"You won't be late--Edith,\" he said, calling her, on the impulse, by\nher Christian name.\n\nShe flushed in the kindly dark.  \"No,\" she said softly.  How could she?\nshe asked herself as she let herself in.\n\nIt was half-past ten when Paul climbed the steps of his father's house\nand rang the bell.  The little family had finished supper and were\nwaiting prayers for him.  \"Where have you been, Paul?\" questioned his\nmother.  \"It's very late, dear.\"\n\n\"I saw Miss Thornton home, mother,\" said Paul.\n\n\"Oh, Paul!  Was no one else going her way?\"\n\n\"I did not think to ask,\" replied Paul frankly.\n\n\"Dear, you ought to take care.  Such a lot is expected of your father's\nson.  Did you go in?\"\n\n\"No, mother.\"\n\n\"Well, dear, go and take your boots off while Annie brings the cocoa\nin.  And don't be long, Paul.  I don't want you to miss prayers on your\nlast Sunday.\"\n\nHe went out, closing the door.  Mrs. Kestern looked across at her\nhusband, stretched out in his arm-chair, tired after a heavy day, and\ngazing into the glowing coals.  \"Father, I think you ought to say\nsomething to him,\" she said.  \"That girl is very attractive, and quite\nclever enough not to run after him too obviously.\"\n\nThe clergyman stirred.  \"I don't know, dear,\" he said.  \"You know well\nenough we have never had any trouble of that sort with him, and Paul is\nnot without ballast.  God, Who redeemed me from all evil,\" he added\ngently, \"bless the lad.\"\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nIn truth Mr. Kestern was both right and wrong.  The next morning,\ndeparting on his bicycle with a mere statement that he wanted a last\nride, Paul was very conscious of doing something he had never done\nbefore.  He had no sister, and his girl friends were mainly a family of\ncousins so closely interested in each other, that, although they were\nfriendly enough and admitted him to the family circle on long summer\nholidays together, he was not really intimate with any one of them.\nNor had he wanted any girl in his life.  He and his father were great\nfriends, and the two shared pleasures and work with a rare\ncompanionship.  Paul, with his natural gifts, had thus been drawn into\nactive religious life much earlier than is common, and he was naturally\nstudious, fond of nature and of a literary bent.  What with one thing\nand another, his life was full.  With his father he departed on\nSaturday afternoons for the woods and the ponds, and Sunday was the\nbest day of the week to him despite its strict observance in that\nEvangelical atmosphere.  But nature is not easily defeated.  He rode,\nnow, to meet Edith, with a virgin stirring of his pulses.\n\nShe was wearing a little fur cap that sat piquantly on her brown hair,\nand was flushed and eager.  Her slim figure, neatly dressed in a brown\ncloth coat and skirt, pleased him, with the tan stockings and shoes\nbelow at which he scarcely dared to glance.  As they spun along the dry\nroad together, under the autumnal trees whose brown twisted leaves\nfluttered to the ground with every breath that crossed the pale blue\nsky flecked with little white clouds above, she seemed to him a fitting\npart of the beauty of the world.  Near the woods, the sun caught the\nslim trunks of the silver birches in a spinney there, and their silver\ncontrasted exquisitely with the stretch of dying bracken beyond.  A\nlark cried the ecstasy of living in the untroubled spaces of light and\nair.\n\nThe road climbed steeply to the woods, and they walked to the summit,\nhe pushing her machine.  They hesitated at the leafy glade that invited\nto the undulating heathery expanse of Hursley, but the artist in Paul\ndecided against the temptation.  \"No,\" he said, \"don't let's go in\nthere.  Everyone goes there.  Let's coast down to Allington, and turn\nto the left.  I know a lovely place up there where there will be no\ntrace of Saturday afternoon's visitors.  What do you say?\"\n\nShe shot a look at him, and made a grace of submission.  \"Just as you\nlike,\" she said.\n\nSo they mounted on the crest and were away down the long hill together.\nOaks leant over the road at first, but beyond them the tall hedges were\nlovely with scarlet October hips and haws, masses of trailing Old Man's\nBeard, and sprays of purple blackberries.  To the right the fields\nstretched away to a far distant ridge scarred with chalk where one\nmight dig for fossils.  Ahead clustered the old roofs of Allington, and\nthe little church that stood below estates linked for centuries with\nLambeth and Canterbury.\n\n\"After Lambeth Court, Allington Church,\" cried Paul gaily.  \"Let's go\nin.\"\n\nThey left their bicycles at the lych-gate and walked into the silent\nclean-swept place.  She followed him in silence, and marvelled inwardly\nthat he seemed to know so much.  \"That,\" he said, towards the end of\nthe inspection, \"is the coat of arms of Archbishop Whitgift.  He was a\npoor man's son and had no armorial bearings, so he took a cross and\ninserted five little Maltese crosses for the Five Wounds of Christ,\nquartering it with the arms of Canterbury.  It's very lovely here,\nisn't it?\"\n\nShe glanced dubiously at the two candles and the cross on the altar.\n\"It's rather 'high,' don't you think?\"\n\nHe looked judicially at the simple neat sanctuary.  \"There is no harm\nin the things themselves,\" he said.  \"After all, they make for a sort\nof beauty, don't they?  It's the Spirit that matters.  When I'm\nordained, I shall be willing to preach in a coloured stole if I can\npreach the gospel.\"\n\nThe daring heresy of it secretly astonished her.  But it was like Paul,\nshe thought.  He stepped into a pew, and moved up to make room for her.\n\"Let us pray a little, shall we?\" he said simply.\n\nShe knelt by his side, her heart beating violently.  In the hush of the\nplace, it sounded so loud to her that she thought he must hear.  She\ndared not look at him, but she knew what he was doing.  Kneeling erect,\nhis eyes would be open, seeing and yet not seeing.  She felt very\nhumble to be allowed to be there.  That in itself was enough just now.\nShe wished they might be there for ever and ever, just they two, and\nGod.\n\nTen minutes later, in the heart of the deserted woods, he flung himself\non the moss at her feet.  \"I love to lie like this and look right away\ninto the depths of the trees,\" he said.  \"If you come alone and lie\nvery still, rabbits come out and squirrels, and you begin to hear a\nhundred little noises that you never heard before.  And I love the tiny\ninsects that crawl up the blades of grass and find a world in a single\ntuft.  Edith, how wonderfully beautiful the world is, isn't it?\"\n\nShe did not want to speak at all, but he seemed to expect it.  \"Not\neveryone can see all that,\" she said.  \"But it is like you to feel it.\nAnd when you talk, I feel it too.  Always, when you talk, you show me\nwonderful things.\"\n\n\"Do I?\" he queried dreamily.  \"I don't mean to particularly.  It's all\nso plain to me.\"\n\n\"That's just it,\" she said.\n\nIn a thicket close at hand, a thrush broke out into song.  His praise\nended, he flew down to a soft bit of ground and began busily to look\nfor worms.  Paul moved his head ever so slightly, and the bird and the\nboy looked at each other.  The thrush eyed him boldly, summed him up\nwith a quick little pipe, and flew away.\n\nPaul sighed.  \"I almost wish I were not going to Cambridge,\" he said.\n\n\"Why?\" she asked.\n\nHe reached out for a broken stick and began to play with it.  \"Oh, I\ndon't know,\" he said restlessly.  \"Perhaps because it's so good to be\nhere.  Cambridge is a new world.  I want to do great things, of course,\nbut it's leaving things that I can do behind.  Suppose I fail?  I wish\nI could be ordained to-morrow and go to the Mission Hall to work at\nonce.  Or no, I'd like to go to Africa at once.  Do you remember that\nman who came and spoke for the South American Missionary Society?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"\n\n\"Well, I carried his bag to the station.  He had pleaded for\nmissionaries, and had said that he had been speaking at meetings for\nsix months up and down the country, asking for help, and had not had a\nsingle volunteer.  He was about to go back alone.  So, on the station,\nI offered to go.  I said he should not say again that he had had no\noffer of service.  I was sixteen.\"\n\n\"What did he say?\"\n\n\"Oh, the usual things.  That I must be trained first.  I asked what\nmore was necessary than that one loved Jesus, and had been saved, and\nwanted to serve.\"\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\n\"Well, I thought he half believed that I was right.  But he didn't dare\nsay so, like all the rest of them.  I must wait God's time, he said.\nGod's time!  He meant man's time.\"\n\nShe said nothing.  \"It's so hard to wait,\" he added restlessly.\n\n\"I'm glad you didn't go,\" she ventured.\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"Many of us are,\" she equivocated.\n\n\"Why?\" demanded Paul again, looking boldly at her.\n\nShe disdained further subterfuge.  \"You have made God real to me,\" she\nsaid, \"and if you had gone, you would have had no opportunity to do\nthat.\"\n\nHis eyes shone.  \"I'm very glad,\" he said softly.  \"Will you pray for\nme, Edith?\"\n\nShe wanted to fling herself down beside him, to hide her flushed face\nin his coat, to shed the tears that would stupidly start behind her\neyes for no reason at all, to tell him that she hardly dared to breathe\nhis name, but that, when she prayed, she could think of scarcely anyone\nelse; but she could not.  Every instinct in her cried for\nhim--religion, sex, passionate admiration.  But she only clenched one\nlittle gloved hand tightly and said that she would.  A daughter of\nClaxted could hardly do otherwise.\n\nThe minutes slipped by.  Paul rolled over on his back and took out his\nwatch.  \"My word,\" he exclaimed, \"we ought to be going!  We shall be\nlate as it is.  But what a topping morning it has been.  Come on.\"  And\nhe jumped to his feet.\n\nShe got up slowly, and he dusted a few dry leaves from her skirt.\nStraightening himself, he stood looking at her.  \"I've known you such a\nlittle while,\" he said.  \"I wonder why?\"\n\n\"Do you know me now?\" she asked.\n\n\"Much better.  When I come back, shall we have more rides like this?\"\n\n\"I don't know,\" she said.\n\n\"What do you mean?\"\n\n\"You may not want them.  Your mother might not like it.  And\" (Eve will\nout, even in an Evangelical) \"nor will Miss Ernest.\"\n\nHe flushed.  \"I shall do as I please,\" he said.  \"And I know I shall\nwant you.\"\n\nShe lifted her dark eyes to his face.  \"Will you?\" she cried.  \"Oh I\nhope you do!  I can't help it.  It means so much to me.  Ask me just\nsometimes, Paul.\"\n\n\"Will you write to me at Cambridge?\" he demanded.\n\nShe shook her head.  \"No,\" she said decidedly, \"not yet, anyway.  I\ncan't write good enough letters for one thing, and for another you\nmustn't waste your time on me.\"\n\nPaul stood considering her.  He had an idea, but he was in truth rather\nfrightened of it.  It seemed to be going too far.  But his desire won\nthe battle with his caution.  \"Would you give me a photograph of\nyourself to take to Cambridge?\" he asked.\n\n\"I haven't a good one,\" she said.\n\n\"But you've something--a snapshot, anything,\" he pressed eagerly.\n\nShe smiled radiantly and suddenly.  \"I've a rubbishy old thing they\ntook on the river at Hampton Court last August,\" she said, \"but my hair\nwas down then.\"\n\n\"That'll be lovely!\" he cried.  \"Do give me that.\"\n\n\"How?  Shall I send it you?\"\n\nPaul's letters were not many, and fairly common property at the family\nbreakfast table.  He sought for an escape from that.  \"Will you be at\nthe prayer meeting to-night?\" he asked.\n\n\"Yes,\" she said.\n\n\"Well, so shall I.  In fact, I'm leading it.  Write me a little letter\nand give it me afterwards, will you?\"\n\nShe nodded.  Neither of them were aware of incongruity.  Possibly they\nwere right, and there was none.\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nPaul's bedroom was a big attic at the top of the Vicarage, running the\nwhole width of the house.  It was entirely characteristic of him.  In\none corner was a large home-made cage for a pair of ring-doves, with a\nspace in front for their perambulations, fitted with convenient\nperches.  Under the window was what had been an aquarium, but was now,\nafter many vicissitudes, temporarily doing duty as a vivarium.  It was\na third full of sand and pebbles and soil, and contained plants and a\nshallow pool of water, constituting, in its owner's imagination, a\nsection of African forest for three water-tortoises, a family of green\ntree-frogs, and some half-developed tadpoles.  Above a writing-desk was\na bookshelf full of cheap editions of the English classics, purchased\nlargely with prize money won by literary efforts in his school\nmagazine.  The books are worth reviewing, for his father's well-stocked\nshelves of Evangelical theology held none such.  The great English\npoets were all there, with Carlyle, Emerson, Lamb, Machiavelli, Locke,\nMacaulay, and a further miscellaneous host.  A smaller bookshelf held\nMSS. books--three slim volumes of his own verse, one of acrostics\nsuitable for children's addresses, several of sermon notes, another of\nspecial hymns, choruses and tunes, and two of essays and short stories\nwhich had not seen the light in printer's ink.  Paul would have added\n\"as yet.\"  Bound volumes of his school magazine shone resplendent in\nleather, and were sprinkled interiorly with his verse and prose.  There\nwere fencing sticks in a corner, and framed shooting and cadet groups.\nA cabinet contained glass jars and medicine bottles of chemicals, and a\nmuch-prized retort stood above it.  The mantelpiece was fairly full\nwith phials of spirit that had a home there, and in which had been\npreserved an embryo dog-fish, a newt with three legs, a small\ngrass-snake, a treasured scorpion (the gift of an African missionary),\nand the like.  Lastly, over the bed was a text.  That, principally of\nall these treasures, was to go with its owner to Cambridge.\n\nPaul that night sat on his little bed and looked around him.  The last\nminutes of the eve of the great to-morrow had really come at last.  He\nwell remembered the hours in this room, during which the things that\nwere now largely accomplished had seemed to him overwhelming obstacles\nin the race.  The open scholarship, the school exhibitions, the Little\nGo--all these were past.  There stretched ahead the Tripos and the\nBishop's Examinations, but in imagination these were lesser\ndifficulties than those already surmounted.  Linked with them were his\nother ambitions, his writing, his preaching, and a vista of endless\nyears.  Like a traveller who has reached a hill-top, he viewed the\npeaks ahead.\n\nPaul looked down on the letter in his hand.  The ill-formed sprawling\nhandwriting addressed it to P. Kestern, Esq., with several\nunderlinings.  He turned it over curiously, not in the least aware that\nthe amazing thing was that this should be the first of its kind for him\nto handle.  Then he broke the envelope and drew out first the\nphotograph.\n\nIt had been badly and amateurishly snapped on a sunny day.  The shadows\nwere under-exposed, the lights far too strong.  It showed part of a\npunt moored beneath the trees of a river bank, and one girl wholly,\nanother in part, who lay stretched out at the far end.  She in part, he\ndecided, was Maud.  Edith lay laughing unrestrainedly, one hand above\nher head gripping an overhanging branch, the other trailing in a black\nshade that was undoubtedly (from the context, so to speak) water.  A\nplait of her hair lay across her shoulder.  She did not look\nparticularly pretty, but she did look jolly.  Paul turned the\nphotograph over.  On the back he read: \"From A. V.\"  The inscription\njarred on him.  From Albert Vintner.  Mentally, he could see Albert, in\nwhite flannels, a collar, a made tie, and brown shoes, taking it.  A\nthoroughly good fellow, converted, earnest, but----  Yet he loathed\nhimself for that \"but.\"\n\nHe opened the half-sheet of paper that had enwrapped it.  He was\ndistinctly curious to see what she would say.  He did not guess for a\nmoment how long she had taken to say it.\n\n\n\"Here is the snap\" (she had written, without introduction).  \"I look a\nlanky thing, and did not know that ('he' erased) it was being taken\njust then.  Do you remember that you had gone on up the river, rowing\nyour father and mother and Mr. and Miss Ernest?  I did so wish I had\nbeen in your boat!  And at tea you pretended I was not to have a cream\nbun!  But it was a jolly day, wasn't it? and if the photo helps you to\nremember _that_ and think kindly at Cambridge of all of us at Claxted,\nI am glad for you to have it.\n\n  \"Yours sincerely,\n      \"EDITH.\"\n\n\nPaul smiled.  Then he frowned.  He re-read the letter several times and\nlooked again at the photograph.  Then he folded the one in the other,\nand placed them in the inner recess of a new pocket-book.  Then he\nreached for a Bible from which to read his evening Scripture Union\nportion.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nCAMBRIDGE\n\nWe no sooner get into the second Chamber, which I shall call the\nChamber of Maiden-Thought, than we become intoxicated with the light\nand the atmosphere; we see nothing but pleasant wonders, and think of\ndelaying there for ever in delight.  However ... this Chamber of\nMaiden-Thought becomes gradually darkened, and at the same time, on all\nsides of it, many doors are set open--but all dark--all leading to dark\npassages.  We see not the balance of good and evil--we are in a\nmist--we feel the \"burden of the Mystery\" ...--KEATS: _Letters_, May,\n1818.\n\n  I asked for Truth--\n    My doubts came in\n    And with their din\n  They wearied all my youth.\n            D. M. DOLBEN: Requests.\n\nHis Name will flee, the while thou mouldest thy lips for\nspeech.--JELLALUDIN.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\n\"Yes, sir; this is the gentleman's keepin' room, sir.  A bit small, but\ncosy and 'omelike, as I allus told pore Mr. Bruce wot was haccidental\nshot in Scotland last Haugust.  I keeps my bit o' brooms and cleanin'\nthings in that cupboard, sir--bedder's room they calls it, though it\nain't much of a room.  Through that there door is the bedroom, and that\nmight be bigger, that's sartin sure.  But I don't know as 'ow it much\nmatters to the young gentlemen, sir.  If so be they can lay down in it,\nand 'as room for a chest o' drawers and a bath on the floor, that's\nabout all has they want.  But you'll need to take a bit o' care in the\nbath, sir, if I may make bold to say so.  Mr. Bruce, 'e fair soak 'is\nblankets now an' agin.  Ah, that couch now, sir!  Springs be broken, I\nwill say.  But then, lor, sir, how the young gentlemen bangs on 'em!\nThey will 'ave their bit o' fun, sir, same as what you did in your day,\nI daresay.  Still it's a bin like that for years, an' p'rhaps a new one\nwould be a good thing.  Expensive?  Ah yes, sir.  Things his dear.  Let\nit stand over a bit, so to say.  P'rhaps in 'is second year, with 'is\nfriends an' all a-coming hup, it might be done.  That all, sir?  Thank\nyou, sir, thank you kindly.  Mr. Mavis is 'is gyp, sir, an' 'e'll be\nabout soon I daresay, though 'e's none too fond of work, is Mavis.\n'E'll tell you all you wants to know, sir.  Good afternoon, sir.\"\n\nMrs. Rover departed, and shut the door behind her.  Mr. Kestern smiled.\n\"She's a talker, Paul,\" he said, \"but a good sort, I daresay.  The race\nof bedders doesn't seem to have changed since I was up.  Well, what do\nyou think of it?\"\n\nPaul glanced round again with shining eyes.  The little attic room was\npractically square.  On the left as you entered, two high windows in\nthe thick ancient wall, each allowing you to sit there and gaze through\nits medi\u00e6val aperture, looked out over a narrow college garden to the\nriver.  Since this staircase was only the second from the main entrance\nin the First Court, the room's occupant had a view as well down the\nnarrow old-world street which crossed the river here by a bridge and\ntwisted away past overhanging ancient houses.  In the near distance\nrose the spire of St. Lawrence's Church.  Chestnuts, bare now, guarded\nthe river-front, and trailed their lower boughs in the leaf-strewn\nstream.\n\nBetween the windows was a fireplace with a bamboo overmantel.\nOpposite, the right wall met a sloping roof which just allowed a\nbookcase to stand beneath it and was pierced by two more windows which,\nhowever, looked out on to the inner battlemented wall of the First\nCourt, and permitted no more than a glimpse of St. Mary in her turret\nover the chapel on the farther side.  The little room itself was bare\nsave for a square table in its centre; a couch, quite obviously much\nthe worse for wear, against the wall immediately opposite the door; and\na couple of chairs.  A faded red paper covered the walls.  A still more\nfaded red carpet lay on the floor.  Yet Paul saw his own room, the goal\nof years of work; he saw in imagination his little desk already in a\ncorner, his books on the shelves, himself in an arm-chair before a fire\nwith leisure to read, to write, to think.  And he saw something else\ntoo, which might immediately materialise.\n\n\"It's splendid, dad--just what I wanted.  I'm glad to be high up; the\nview's so good.  But I'll do one thing right away, first of all.  Sit\ndown for a minute, will you?\"\n\nHe placed on the table a brown paper parcel he had been carrying\nbeneath his arm, and hurriedly tore off the wrapping.  A framed text\nrevealed itself.  Then, mounting precariously on the couch, he sought\nand found a nail from which the last occupant had hung some picture,\nand there he hung his challenge, right in the centre of the wall,\nexactly opposite the door, placed in such wise that no one could enter\nwithout seeing the words.  He stepped off and surveyed the effect.  A\ntouch made the frame finally level.  Their capital letter entwined with\nspraying daffodils, the multi-coloured words proclaimed plainly an\ninsistent and dogmatic legend: \"One is your Master, even Christ.\"\n\n\"That takes possession, dad, somehow.  And everyone will know at once\nWhose I am and Whom I serve.\"\n\nThe short elderly kindly clergyman nodded proudly, but with a little\nmist before his eyes.  \"Ay, ay, Paul laddie,\" he said, \"I'm glad you\nthought of that.  But it's easy to hang a text, Paul; it's harder to\nlive up to it.  Let us ask the help of the Master, my son, here and\nnow, at the beginning of your college life.\"\n\nSo the two knelt, with the simplicity of children.  Outside, listening\nat the door, Mrs. Rover heard, and expressed herself strongly\nthereafter to Mr. Mavis.  \"Left hattic is one o' the pious sort,\nMavis,\" she said.  \"Put a text hup, 'e 'as.  Ought ter be a soft job\nfor you.\"\n\nBut Mavis was in his own way a philosopher, and an observer of life.\n\"Is 'e?\" he queried.  \"Well, I'm glad to hear it.  May 'e stay so.  But\nI dunno; I've seen a few o' them pious ones, and they often turns out\nmore mischievous than the other young devils.  Seems ter me we ought'er\n'ave put new screws in them winder bars.\"\n\nArm in arm, father and son went out to do some shopping.  Paul, used to\nhard economy, was highly pleased with his father's generosity.\nCrockery marked with the arms of St. Mary's was an unexpected joy; two\narm-chairs, and only one of them second-hand; a few groceries, cakes\nand biscuits; two framed prints of Landseer's dogs, to brighten things\nup, as his father said; even a toasting-fork, a lamp, a side-table, a\ntablecloth--all these, and a hearthrug, and the room seemed furnished.\nHe unpacked a box, and graced his mantel-shelf with photographs, a\npresentation clock from the children of the Mission Hall, and a couple\nof ancient candlesticks, in the form of metal storks upholding hollowed\nbulrushes, from his bedroom at home.  Then it was time for his father\nto return, and the boy saw him to the station.\n\nPaul wandered back in the dusk: his hands in his pockets turning a\nfinal gift of a new sovereign, his mind on fire.  He peered curiously\nin at the gateways of unknown colleges, examined the gay shops,\nlingered over the bookcases of the numerous booksellers.  A bell was\nringing in St. Lawrence's steeple as he passed, and he stepped for a\nminute into the church.  It was a dark gloomy place, but a couple of\nlighted candles on the altar showed him a crucifix and six more tall\nlights behind.  He came out quickly, conscious of a little flush of\nanger.  People of that sort were betraying the Faith.\n\nHe mounted the two flights of wooden stairs light-heartedly however,\nand entered his own room.  Mrs. Rover had kindled a fire, and its ruddy\nglow welcomed him.  Then he saw that there was a man standing by the\nfireplace.  He paused, a little bewildered.\n\n\"Oh, I say,\" said the other breezily, \"I'm glad you've come in.  I\nthought I'd wait a few minutes.  There's nobody up yet you know, except\na few of us freshers.  I heard about you from the Dean, and I thought\nI'd call at once.  My name's Donaldson.  You're going to be a parson,\naren't you?  And so am I.  How do you do?\"  He held out his hand.\n\nPaul warmed to the cheery greeting.  \"Topping of you to call,\" he said.\n\"My name's Kestern.\"  Then he remembered it was on the door, and he\nfelt a fool.\n\n\"Yes.  Are you busy?  My things haven't all come yet, and your room's a\ndamned sight more cheerful than mine.\"\n\n\"Do sit down,\" said Paul.  \"Take the new armchair.  You're the first\nperson to sit in it.\"\n\n\"They call 'em pews here,\" rejoined the other, sinking into the seat.\nHe had a pipe in his hand, which he lit.  \"You smoke?\" he queried.\n\n\"No,\" said Paul.\n\n\"Well, I do.  Always have.  I can't read without it.  I mean to row if\nI can, and I don't know how I'll get on when we train.  What are you\ngoing to do?\"\n\n\"I'm not sure,\" said Paul cautiously, not sure either what the other\nreally meant.\n\n\"Well, row then.  The boat captain's up already.  I saw him after\nlunch.  I'll tell him you want to tub, shall I?  It'll be sporting if\nwe get in a boat together.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Paul, kindling at the proffered friendship.\n\nSitting opposite across the fire, Paul took stock of his companion who\ndid the major part of the talking.  Donaldson was a busy personage and\nan unfamiliar type to Paul.  It soon appeared that he held a missionary\nbursarship from a society which Paul called \"high church\"; that he was\nnot, however, at all keen on a missionary vocation; that the fact that\nhe was to be a \"priest\" (as he put it) did not proscribe his pleasures\nto any great extent; and that he was very sure of himself.  Much of his\nconversation was unintelligible to Paul, but he was friendly, and the\nboy was more lonely than he knew.  They went down to Hall together\nseemingly the best of friends, but Paul was already aware that he was\nwading in unfamiliar waters.\n\nHis first Hall was responsible for a series of indelible impressions.\nThe lovely old room, lit only by candles in great silver sconces, with\nits sombre portraits, its stone-flagged floor, its arching roof, made\nhim unutterably proud.  The few shy freshers in an oasis of light,\nemphasised the dignity of the place.  This was his Hall.  A solitary\nfellow at the high table read a Latin grace in which Paul understood\nonly the Sacred Name, and that was repeated with what struck him as a\nfamiliarity, an indifference, to which he was wholly a stranger.\nAccustomed to the simplest meals, the dinner (rather unusually good at\nSt. Mary's), and the many waiters seemed grand to him.  The comparative\nease of his companions, who nevertheless, being all freshers, eyed each\nother curiously, made him self-conscious to a degree, and Donaldson,\nmore at his ease than anyone, seemed in his eyes to be bold and daring.\nNext him, on the other side, sat a quiet man sombrely dressed, who, he\ngathered, had been a day-boy like himself at a lesser public school,\nand who introduced himself as Strether.  He kept in the Second Court.\nThe three came out together, and Strether asked them up to his rooms\nfor coffee.\n\nThe clock in the Elizabethan gable above the Hall was striking eleven\nas he and Donaldson, the ritual of that first coffee ended, came out\ninto the starlight.  Below, in the First Court, they stood a moment to\nsay good-night.  Lights gleamed in a few windows and a soft radiance of\nmoonshine fell on the armorial bearings in the great oriel of the Hall.\nThe few street noises seemed very remote.  There was an air of\nseclusion, of peace, about the place, and Paul drew in the night air\nwith great breaths.  \"How unutterably lovely it all is!\" he exclaimed.\n\nThe other glanced round carelessly.  \"Yes,\" he said, \"I say, that\nfellow Strether wants taking in hand.\"\n\n\"Oh?\" queried Paul dubiously.\n\n\"Good God, yes.  Did you ever see such boots?  And his bags!  But he's\ngot some money, I should say.  Still, one can't be seen with him till\nhe gets something decent to wear.\"\n\n\"I liked him,\" said Paul shortly.\n\n\"Oh so did I.  But look here, let's pinch his boots and make him buy\nsome decent brogues.\"\n\nPaul was tickled.  \"All right,\" he said, laughing.  \"But how?\"\n\n\"Easily enough.  Wait till he's out.  Come to brekker to-morrow, and\narrange a plan of campaign.\"\n\n\"What time?\"\n\n\"Any time you like.  Say nine.  There's no chapel and no lekkers yet.\nWill that do?\"\n\n\"Right-o,\" said Paul.  \"Good-night.\"\n\n\"Good-night.  Doesn't matter if you're a bit late.\"\n\nIn his room, Paul lit a candle.  Then he climbed into one of his\nwindow-seats and stared out at the moonlit, slow-moving river, the bare\nchestnuts, the empty street.  \"How too lovely,\" he whispered to himself\nagain, and sat long ere he got down to go to his little bedroom.  As he\ndid so, the flickering candlelight showed him his multi-coloured text\nwith its white background.  The words stared at him silently, and he\nrepeated them to himself with something already of the air of a\nstranger.\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nPaul acclimatised with astonishing rapidity.  Within a fortnight his\n\"square\" was gloriously \"bashed,\" no one thundered more boisterously up\nand down the stairs, and few strolled into Hall with more nonchalance.\nHe tubbed daily and promisingly.  He was poor, but he was learning to\nmake his own porridge and fry his own breakfast eggs and bacon without\nan apology to Mrs. Rover.  Donaldson and Strether (in brogues now) had\ntaken to foregathering in his rooms as a regular thing.  He was known\nat large to be \"pi,\" but among the freshers he was shaping for a place\nwhich would discount that to some extent.  A few literary men of his\nown year had already heard some of his verses and read a short story or\ntwo, and the three friends had begun to conceive of \"The Literary\nLounge,\" a free and easy club which was to gather from time to time for\nthe encouragement of amateur talent.  Cambridge was moulding him far\nmore speedily than even Edith had expected.\n\nThe Chapel had been an unforgettable experience.  His first Sunday, at\nthe early service, Paul saw a vision of beauty which he had never\nassociated with religion before.  The small clean Gothic sanctuary,\nwith its old oak stalls, its fourteenth-century chalice, its air of age\nand quiet, was a new thing to him.  The Dean, with his flaming scarlet\nhood, \"took up\" the Eastward position it is true; but his reading was\nso scholarly, his rendering of the service so reserved, that Paul knew\nthat here was an atmosphere which, if utterly familiar to most of the\nmen, was completely foreign to himself.  Fervour, loud congregational\nsinging, intense pietism, all had gone; but in their stead had come a\nsober solemn figure of austere beauty who was a new interpreter in\nreligion to him.  The change entranced even while it repelled him.\nRobed in his white surplice in his stall, he was aware of a historic\npast which had scarcely concerned him religiously heretofore, and he\nwas awed into reverence.  Back in his own room, it is true he was\nchiefly conscious of a lack somewhere, a lack which, however, was made\nup to him by the Cambridge Intercollegiate Christian Union with its\nprayer meetings and its evening sermon to first year men in St.\nSaviour's Church.  But even these struck a new note.  There was an\nemphasis on the intellectual side of belief.  That had been all but\nentirely absent in Claxted.\n\nHis growing friendship with Manning emphasised all this.  Manning was a\nsecond year man who had rowed in his first year Lents and Mays, and was\nnow coaching the new freshers.  Paul had tubbed late one evening, and\nhe and Manning had left the boathouse together.  They bicycled back in\ncompany, and in the porch of the college, the great man invited Paul in\nto tea.  He would scarcely have dared to refuse.\n\nThe other had ground-floor rooms, much finer and bigger than Paul's.\nThey had been redecorated; a baby grand stood in one corner; a\nrevolving bookcase by the fire held a terra-cotta Winged Victory; two\nor three gilt-framed pictures graced the white-papered walls.  \"Take a\npew,\" said Manning carelessly, and shouted at the door for the kitchens.\n\nHe ordered \"oils\" and cakes lavishly, and when the buttered buns had\nduly arrived and tea was well forward, Paul ventured a word of praise.\n\n\"What topping rooms you have,\" he said.\n\n\"Yes.  They are rather jolly, aren't they?  That's a genuine Corot over\nthere which I bamboozled the governor into letting me bring up.  Are\nyou fond of art?\"\n\n\"Very,\" said Paul, \"but I know so little about it.  Literature's more\nin my line.  I'm awfully keen.  I say, I wonder if you'd come to 'The\nLiterary Lounge' one night?\"\n\nThe other smiled.  \"That's the new freshers' effort, isn't it?  Still,\nI don't mind.  What night?\"\n\nPaul was hugely delighted, and began to expand.  \"I'd love to know what\nyou think of some of my things,\" he said.\n\n\"You should show them to Tressor.  He'd help you.\"\n\n\"Great Scott!\" exclaimed Paul, \"I shouldn't dare.\"\n\n\"Why not?  Not that I think much of Tressor's stuff myself.  Of course\nhe can write rattlin' English, and it all flows placidly enough, but\nthere's nothing much in it.  It's extraordinary what the public will\nread.  He has huge sales.  I know him quite a lot you know.  Knew him\nat Winchester.\"\n\n\"He reads my essays, of course,\" said Paul, \"but I never thought to\nshow a don my verse, let alone a fellow with a reputation like\nTressor's.\"\n\n\"Well, he's the man to help you obviously.  And he would too.  He's a\njolly decent sort is Tressor.  I spent a week last vac. at his place.\nHe's got some rippin' stuff.\"\n\n\"Has he?\" said Paul, eyeing with astonished awe the man who had stayed\nwith a foremost literary lion and actually dared to criticise him.\n\n\"Yes, jolly fine.  And it's a lovely old house and grounds, under the\nSouth Downs.  I read quite a lot there, and we had some toppin'\nmotoring and a little rough shooting.  He keeps a good cellar, too,\nwhich is something these days.  By the way, have you tried the college\nport?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Paul shortly.  He wondered if he ought to say that he was a\nteetotaler for life.\n\n\"Well, you should.  It's damned good.  Have a cigarette.\"\n\n\"I don't smoke,\" said Paul.\n\n\"Wise man,\" said the other.  \"By the way, there's a company bringing up\n_The Mikado_ and _The Gondoliers_ this term, a good crowd, I think.  I\nknow a girl in it.  Gilbert and Sullivan's stuff's great, I think.\nDon't you?\"\n\n\"I'm afraid I haven't seen any,\" said Paul, who had never been to a\ntheatre in his life.  He began to wish he had got out of coming to tea,\nbut he need not have done so, for the other seemed curiously\nunsurprised.\n\n\"Haven't you?  Then you've a treat in store for you,\" he said.  And he\nplunged into gossip in which Paul heard great names bandied\nabout--Ibsen, Bernard Shaw, Galsworthy--almost for the first time in\nconversation.  He said Yes and No at intervals; and if he had no\ncontribution of his own to make, he was at least very obviously\ninterested.  Manning was attracted by the boy.  He told Tressor, later,\nthat Kestern knew nothing and had been nowhere, but that he had\npossibilities and was at any rate not consciously a prig.  As for Paul,\nthere opened before him a new heaven and a new earth.  When he had\ndeparted, carrying volumes of the _Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant_, he\nfound it hard to settle down to his books.  In half an hour, he was,\nindeed, repolishing some verses entitled \"The Backs in Autumn\" with a\nview to getting Manning to read a fair copy.\n\nAt lunch next day, there came a knock on his door.  \"Come in,\" he\ncalled, expecting the arrival of Donaldson to fetch him for the river.\n\nThe door opened, and a stranger entered.  \"Kestern?\" he said\nenquiringly, standing in the doorway.  \"How do you do.  I must\nintroduce myself--I'm Hartley of Jesus.  Possibly you may know my name\nas I'm on the Committee of the C.I.C.C.U.  I meant to call before, for\nI heard you were up at St. Mary's and you ought to be a great strength\nto us.\"\n\nPaul got eagerly to his feet.  \"Do come in,\" he said.  \"Have you had\nlunch?  Oh well, do have some.  It's only a scratch affair, but there's\nenough to go round.\"  (He burrowed in the cupboard for plates and a\nknife.)  \"I'm tubbing early, so I have to hurry.  Awfully good of you\nto call.  Of course I've heard of you.\"\n\nThe other took a seat at the table.  He had frank keen eyes and paused\na second for grace.  Paul was suddenly aware that he himself had said\nnone.  He pushed the cheese towards his guest and began to cut bread.\n\n\"I'm glad you're up here,\" said Hartley.  \"We haven't a college\nsecretary in St. Mary's and I hope you'll take it on.  Then I've been\nwondering if you'd help me with something on Sunday.  I run a\nchildren's service at St. Saviour's schools in the mornings, and I'd be\nawfully grateful if you'd lend me a hand.  The Committee want to put\nyour name down too for the open-airs on Parker's Piece.  They hold one\nthere every Sunday night, you know.\"\n\nPaul smiled warmly.  The atmosphere of Claxted had come in with the\nvisitor.  \"I'll be delighted to help,\" he said, \"but you've outlined a\npretty tall programme for the first five minutes.\"\n\n\"Oh no,\" said Hartley.  \"You're used to all that kind of thing, I know.\"\n\n\"How did you come to hear of my being up?\" queried Paul.\n\n\"I was on a Children's Seaside Mission at Eastbourne last August, and\nmet Mr. Ernest.  He told me you were coming up.  Miss Ernest played for\nus sometimes.  She sang your praises sky-high.\"\n\nPaul blushed, but it was very pleasant to hear of the home folk this\nway.  They were deep in talk when a clamour of ascending feet sounded\non the stairs and Donaldson was heard without shouting breezily:\n\"Kestern!  Kestern!  Four, you're late!  Damn it all, sir\" (bursting\nopen the door), \"you're late again.  Oh--I beg your pardon.\"\n\n\"May I introduce you?\" said Paul.  \"Mr. Hartley of Jesus, Mr. Donaldson\nof this college.\"\n\n\"How do you do?\" said Donaldson, smiling characteristically.  \"Awfully\nsorry.  Didn't know anyone was here.\"\n\n\"Oh, that's all right,\" replied Hartley.  \"I was just going.  You are\nboth tubbing, are you?  Well, Kestern, Sunday at eleven, eh?  Will you\ngive the address?\"\n\n\"Right,\" said Paul.  \"Ten minutes?\"\n\n\"Yes--not longer.  Cheerio.  Good luck on the river.\"  And he went out.\n\n\"Who's that?\" demanded Donaldson.  \"Pal of yours?  He looks a bit of an\nass to me.\"\n\nPaul explained, reaching for his cap and stick.\n\n\"Gosh!  So you're preaching on Sunday, are you?  He won't get me,\nanyway.\"\n\n\"Don't suppose he'll ask you,\" said Paul.  \"Where's Gus Strether?\"\n\n\"Gussie?  Waiting below, I expect.  He was ordering tea for three at\nthe kitchens when I came up.\"\n\n\"Well, let's go.  We haven't much time if we're walking down together.\"\n\nThe three friends foregathered in the Court, Donaldson chaffing\nStrether whom he had christened \"Gus\" by way of a comical allusion to\nthe other's very undandified dress.  He himself wore socks and ties\nthat proclaimed themselves, a Norfolk jacket of a light tweed and a\nfancy waistcoat.  As they went, Paul was a little silent.  He was\nwondering whether he liked Donaldson.  And if so, why?  He was aware\nthat the meeting with Hartley had been significant, that the two would\nnever get on together, that he was proposing to get on with both.  It\nwas puzzling....\n\nBy Jesus Bridge they chanced to meet a girl.  Donaldson smiled at her,\nafter the manner of his kind, and she smiled back at him after the\nmanner of hers.  Strether snorted after a fashion of his own.\nDonaldson took up his parable.\n\n\"I say, Kestern, did you see that?  Gus, that girl made eyes at you.\nYes, by Jove, she's looking back at you.  Oh I say, Gussie, this won't\ndo, my boy!  It's those new brogues of yours.  I've seen her along here\nbefore, and I bet she's on the lookout for you.  Here, you aren't\ntubbing; go and pick her up, and tell us all about it at tea.\"\n\nStrether snorted again.  \"Opprobrious conduct,\" he muttered stormily.\n\nDonaldson roared with laughter and Paul could not help smiling.\nStrether loved long words, and it was characteristic of him that he\nmade odd noises.  He retorted now, fiercely.  \"Don't bray like an ass,\"\nhe said.  \"Do you want all the street to hear you?\"\n\n\"Gus, you'll be the death of me!  Opprobrious conduct!  But did you see\nher ankles--pretty little ankles and a neat little waist.  I must say\nyou've got quite good taste.\"\n\n\"Some hussy of a shop-girl,\" growled the other.  \"Disgusting, I call\nit.  Why can't you leave females alone?\"\n\nPaul chuckled again.  \"Come on you two,\" he said.  \"Let him alone,\nDonaldson.  We've still to change, and it's past two now.\"\n\nNext day the intrigue so lightly begun developed.  Manning had\nconsented to tea with Paul, and Donaldson, who was there, told him the\nstory with certain emendations natural to him.  Manning was highly\namused.  \"Write Strether a letter,\" he suggested, \"pretending that it\ncomes from the girl and asking him to meet her on Jesus Bridge some\nnight.  Very likely he'll bite out of sheer funk of what she might do\nif he does not.  You can go and watch.  He'll walk up and down\nsnorting.  It'd be rather a joke.\"\n\n\"By Jove, we will,\" cried Donaldson.  \"It'll be no end of a rag.  But\nlook here, he knows our handwriting.  Will you write it?\"\n\n\"Yes, if you like.  Give me some paper, Kestern.\"\n\nPaul got up for the materials with some reluctance.  \"But I like old\nStrether,\" he objected.  \"He may be an ass, but he's a good sort.  It\nmustn't go further.\"\n\n\"The more the merrier,\" said Donaldson.  \"Don't spoil sport.\"\n\nPaul shook his head, hesitating.  But Manning supported him.  \"You're\nright, Kestern,\" he said.  \"We'll keep the joke to ourselves.  You\nthree are pretty thick, and it would be low down to split on a pal.\"\n\nSo the letter was written and posted, and Paul was at breakfast next\nmorning when Strether came in with it.  He flung himself into an\narm-chair and tossed the note on the table.  \"Who wrote that?\" he\ndemanded savagely, his limbs sprawling all over the place.\n\nPaul, feigning surprise, opened it.  \"'Elsie Dawson,'\" he read, as one\nbewildered.  \"Great Scott, Gussie, I shouldn't have thought you'd have\nhad a correspondence with girls!  Why, she's the girl we met yesterday!\nGood Lord--'Will you meet me to-night at 9.30 on Jesus Bridge?'  What\nare you going to do?  My aunt, fancy her having the cheek!\"\n\nStrether kicked out at a footstool.  \"I don't know the girl,\" he\nexclaimed bitterly.\n\nFor the life of him, Paul couldn't help playing up to the game now that\nthe victim had risen so well.  He got up and went over to the fire.\n\"But look here,\" he said seriously, \"she's seen you and she's plainly\nafter you.  Well, hang it all, man, we don't want her sort hanging\nabout whenever we go down to the river.  You'd better meet her once and\nchoke her off.  Take Donaldson with you; he'll take her off your hands.\"\n\nStrether growled, muttered, and kicked out at the footstool again, the\nwhile Paul, intensely amused but outwardly serious, gathered at last\nthat he was cursing Donaldson, declining to tell that worthy a thing\nabout the letter, and demanding how the girl could have learnt his name.\n\n\"She overheard Donaldson saying it, I expect,\" invented the resourceful\nPaul.\n\nHe was cut short by the noise on the stair that usually heralded that\ngentleman's approach.  \"Give me the letter,\" said Strether hurriedly,\n\"and don't say anything.\"\n\n\"If you go, come in here afterwards and tell me what happens,\" replied\nPaul quickly, tossing it him.  The other nodded.\n\n\"Has he got it?\" demanded Donaldson eagerly, as soon as they were alone\nat the boathouse that afternoon.\n\nPaul nodded.\n\n\"Oh my holy aunt, what a spree!  What did he say?  What's he going to\ndo?\"\n\nPaul explained, smiling.  \"You're not to know.  I kidded him all right,\nand I think he's going to-night.\"\n\n\"Lor! what an ass!  Well, we'll be there anyway.  Wonder if Manning\nwould care to come?\"\n\n\"Don't ask him,\" said Paul.  \"After all Gussie's our pal, and Manning's\nnot our year.  I wish he knew nothing about it.\"\n\nDonaldson stared.  \"He's a damned good sport, anyway.\"\n\n\"May be,\" retorted Paul.  \"So's old Gussie, if it comes to that.\"\n\n\"All right,\" conceded the other.  \"But we'll go.  We'll go out at nine.\nIt'll need a bit of reconnoitring.\"\n\nPaul showed admirable strategy by suggesting to Strether that he, Paul,\nshould take Donaldson out of college before the arranged hour for the\nrendezvous to avoid any awkward questions as to the other getting away\nfrom them.  In the shadow of a tree, with coat collars turned up, they\nwatched their victim arrive, cross and recross the bridge nervously;\nadvance, obviously fuming, some way into the Common; return; look at\nhis watch; fume some more; stamp about for a quarter of an hour; and\nfinally make off for home.  The conspirators returned another way, and\nDonaldson went to his own room.  Paul found Strether in his, awaiting\nhim.\n\n\"Hullo!  Back?\" queried Paul.  \"What happened, Gussie?\"\n\nNo answer.\n\n\"Oh come on,\" said Paul, \"what did she say?  Did you get rid of her\neasily?\"\n\n\"All this fuss about beastly females,\" muttered Strether.  Then he\nflung himself back in his chair and half bellowed: \"She wasn't there!\"\n\nPaul could have screamed.  It was irresistibly comic, but he maintained\nhis composure by an effort.  \"Not there!\" he exclaimed.  \"What do you\nmean?\"\n\nThe other explained.  Paul suggested that she might have been kept at\nhome.  Hadn't he, Strether, left the Bridge a bit too soon?  Strether\nemphatically thought not, and gloom descended upon him.  What if she\nwrote again?  What if the porters spotted her hanging around?  What\nif--but further speculation was cut off, the wooden stairs betraying\napproaching visitors.  Manning and Donaldson came in together.\n\n\"Hullo, Gus Strether,\" cried the latter noisily, \"where've you been?\nWe've been searching the place for you.\"\n\n\"Shut up,\" growled Strether suspiciously.\n\nManning smiled at both of them.  \"What a bally row you do make,\nDonaldson,\" he said.  \"Can you give us some coffee, Kestern?  Look\nhere, I thought those verses of yours the other night jolly good.\"\n\nThe talk drifted into literature, but ten minutes later there was a\nfurther knock on the door.  \"Come in,\" called Paul.\n\nThe door opened, and \"old Sam,\" an under-porter, put in his head.  He\nwas an ancient mariner, short, red-faced, with smiling eyes, a genial\nold boy and popular, since he was ready for anything that included a\ntip.  \"Beggin' your pardon, sir,\" he said to Paul, \"but is Mr. Strether\n'ere?  I couldn't find 'im in 'is rooms.\"\n\nStrether made a noise of some sort, indicative of his presence, from\nhis chair.  His face was a study.\n\n\"Oh there you are, sir.  'Xcuse me, but there's a young lady in the\nporch a-arskin' after you.\"\n\nPandemonium.  Donaldson attempted to rush out and Strether closed with\nhim.  Manning sprang to the lamp, laughing so much that he could hardly\nhold it.  An arm-chair was overturned.  Paul caught Donaldson, and\nStrether freed himself.  Sam beamed beneficently on them all and closed\nthe door with a wink as Strether went out.\n\n\"Oh my holy aunt,\" roared Donaldson.  \"Gussie will be the death of me.\nDid you see his face?  But what's the next move, Manning?\"\n\n\"Wait for him to come back.  Then pull his leg.\"\n\nThey waited a long ten minutes, and then went off to Strether's rooms.\nHis oak was sported, and no amount of banging, not even Donaldson's\nuproarious \"Gus Strether!  Open, you old blighter.  Come on, Gussie!\nPull up your socks.  Who's your lady friend?\" echoing through the\nnight, was of any use.\n\nThe three departed together, Donaldson to Manning's rooms for a drink.\nBut Paul refused the invitation.  He climbed his stairway, a bit\nconscious-stricken, and sported his own door.  He glanced round the\nlittle room, and drew consolation from its remote comfortable air.\nThen he remembered that it was Saturday night and he had an address for\nthe morrow to prepare.  He sighed and sat down to think.\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nThe children's service proved to be a small affair compared with his\nown at Claxted and requires no further notice, but the open-air meeting\non Parker's Piece was a different matter.  When Paul at last found\nhimself on a chair beneath the central lamp-post, it was with feelings\nhe had never had before.  A big crowd of townsfolk surrounded him, but\namong them were 'Varsity men, some members of the C.I.C.C.U., but\nothers who were not.  Paul realised himself and his position as he had\nnever done in Lambeth Court.  He was not merely preaching repentance to\nobvious and ignorant sinners; he was challenging life and thought which\ncould meet him on equal terms.  The sense of it surged through him as\nhe stood there and read the curious faces, yellow in the lamplight,\nthat ringed him round against the foggy gloom behind.  Even these\ntown's men were a new audience to him.  They had caught something of\nthe criticism, the independence, of the University; and they were also\nsarcastic, as Mr. Mavis and Mrs. Roper might be, having seen in their\nday many things.  This particular young gentleman's whim was religion,\njust as another's might be the breaking of windows, or the purchase of\na certain kind of picture, or some form of sport, or highly coloured\nsocks.  One had to take these phenomena philosophically, thankful if\none's own young gentleman had the more harmless crazes.\n\nThe sensitive Paul was aware that this was the temper of the greater\npart of his audience, while the lesser part would be critical, amused,\nor ragging undergraduates.  He faced the crowd uncertainly for a few\nmoments.  And then the blinding conviction in which he had been\nnurtured swept down on him that, after all, these were but sinful souls\nneeding the Saviour, their very complexity but making the more\nnecessary His divine simplicity.  Indecision went to the winds.  As he\nwrote home later to his father, he, thereafter, \"preached unto them\nJesus.\"\n\nWhen the circle broke up, a man bore down upon him.  Paul saw him,\nstarted, hesitated, blushed and would have escaped.  But it was too\nlate.  \"Comin' back now?\" queried Manning with a smile.  \"I was\nreturning from calling on some people who live across the Piece, and\nsaw you.  We might as well walk back together and I'll brew some\ncoffee.  You'll want it after that effort.\"\n\nReassured to some extent, Paul thanked him, exchanged a word or two\nwith Dick Hartley in explanation, and set off with the other.  Clear of\nthe crowd, they fell into step.  \"I congratulate you on your sermon,\nKestern,\" said Manning.  \"It was a great effort.\"\n\nPaul thought he detected a note of mockery in the words.  He pulled\nhimself together and mustered up all his courage.  He must not, he told\nhimself, be ashamed of his Master.  \"I spoke what I believe with all my\nheart,\" he said simply.\n\nThe senior man was instantly aware of the other's implied reproach.  He\nslipped his arm into Paul's familiarly.  \"Exactly,\" he said.  \"No one\nwith a grain of sense could doubt that.  If you don't mind my saying\nso, it was a sincere, genuine and remarkable performance.  It was,\nhonestly, the best sermon I've heard for a long time.\"\n\nPaul warmed naturally to the praise.  The friendly appreciation cheered\nand encouraged him.  \"That's jolly good of you,\" he exclaimed boyishly.\n\"I thought at first you were pulling my leg.\"\n\n\"My dear fellow, I know true art when I see it,\" protested Manning.\n\n\"Art?\" queried Paul, bewildered.\n\n\"Yes, art.  Skilful execution.  A fine art, too, for your imagination\nwas at work.  And I'm inclined to think that you have a great gift of\nimagination, Kestern.  You felt strongly, you saw vividly, and you knew\ninstinctively how to express yourself.  In the superlative, that's\ngenius.  That's how the great pictures come to be painted, the great\nbooks to be written, and the great orations to be made.  The\ninteresting thing about you is that one is not yet sure which you will\ndo.\"\n\nPaul was silent.  He was at once elated, bewildered and disappointed.\nGradually the humbler feeling predominated.  He had never thought of\nhimself as an artist, and as an evangelist he knew instinctively that\nhe had failed with Manning.  \"The Gospel is not a work of art,\" he said\nshortly, and shrewdly.\n\n\"But your presentation of it was a distinct _tour de force_,\" said\nManning.\n\nPaul took his courage in both hands.  \"You praise the presentation, not\nthe thing,\" he said.  \"What is the Gospel to you, Manning?\"\n\nThe other smiled genially.  \"Ah well,\" he said, \"if I invite an\nevangelist to coffee, I suppose I must expect to be asked if I am\nsaved.\"\n\n\"Don't!\" cried Paul.  \"You laugh at it.  I cannot do that.\"\n\n\"You're wrong there,\" replied the other quickly.  \"I do not laugh at\nit.  A man is a fool who does that.  It is impossible to deny that\nChristianity was, and probably is, a great dynamic in the world's\naffairs.  You cannot dismiss St. Paul, Augustine, Francis of Assisi, or\neven Luther and Wesley or Moody, with a gesture.  But I confess that\nto-night's affair interested me most as an observer of men.  You\ninterest me more than your religion.  But here we are.  Let's talk over\ncoffee.\"\n\nPaul, in his arm-chair by the fireplace, glanced round the now familiar\nroom with an air of hostility of which his subconscious more than his\nconscious mind was aware.  But he had had tea that day with Hartley,\nand he definitely compared his friend's room at Jesus with this, for\nthe first time.  He had yet to discover that he was sensitive to an\n\"atmosphere,\" but he was already well on the road to that discovery.\nHartley's room was big and rather bare.  He was athletic, and the\nwall-space was almost wholly given up to a number of oars, and a dozen\nor so plainly-framed groups with a cricket cap hanging from the corner\nof one.  The exceptions were two other photographs, one of the service\non the sands at Eastbourne (in which Paul had discovered Madeline) and\none of the Cambridge University Missionary Campaigners in some Midland\ntown.  The mantelshelf was overcrowded with photographs of men,\nsnapshots of children, and the cards of a variety of chiefly religious\nsocieties and activities among which a Bump Supper menu seemed out of\nplace.  The electric lights were naked; the window-curtains\ncommonplace; the tea had been homely.  The room focussed activities.\nIt had made Paul feel instinctively \"keen,\" as they said at the\nChristian Union.\n\nManning, kneeling before the fire, was carefully pouring boiling water\ninto a Turkish coffee-pot of burnished copper.  Delicate china\ncoffee-cups stood by a silver cigarette-box on an Indian lacquered\ntable.  A diffused light filtered through silken lamp-shades, and two\nwall-sconces of candles lit the pictures with a faint radiance.  The\ncorners and distances of the room were heavy with shadows.  Bronze\nchrysanthemums stood in a tall vase on an otherwise bare overmantel.\nThe chairs the big footstools, the lounge, the carpet--all were soft,\nrich, heavy.  The firelight glinted on the tooled leather bindings of\nbooks in a case opposite him.  The room made him feel comfortable and\nintrospective.  Parker's Piece seemed to belong to a different world.\n\nHe pulled himself together, and deliberately continued the\nconversation.  \"But it is Christ Who matters, Manning,\" he said with\nreal bravery.\n\nThe other replaced the kettle and set the coffee-pot on the table.  He\nselected a cigarette and lit it over the lamp.  Then he settled himself\ncomfortably on the lounge.  \"Matters?\" he queried.  \"Your\ntechnicalities are new to me, Kestern.\"\n\nBut Paul was not going to shirk issues.  \"Yes,\" he said, \"matters to\nyour soul, for life or death.\"\n\n\"That, then,\" said Manning, \"is my business.  My soul is my own, at any\nrate.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Paul, \"it was bought with a price.  'Ye are not your own.'\"\n\n\"I was not aware that I had put mine up for sale,\" retorted Manning,\n\"and if it was purchased, on your own showing, some nineteen hundred\nyears before it came into my possession at all, it seems to me that I\ndon't get much of a chance.\"\n\n\"Christ bought you to set you free,\" said Paul, and he mentally\nrecalled a favourite anecdote of his concerning a travelling Englishman\nand a freed slave.  For the first time, perhaps, he decided not to use\nit in this connection.\n\n\"Thanks,\" said Manning drily.  \"Then I claim my freedom.\"\n\n\"But,\" capped Paul, \"you have to choose whom you will serve.\"\n\nManning flicked off his cigarette ash with a little gesture.  \"Look\nhere,\" he said, \"words are words.  They serve a purpose, but they are\nnot ends in themselves.  St. Paul used Jewish and Rabbinic phraseology,\nand appealed to his day with metaphors.  Thus--it's as old as the\nhills--if you talk of purchase, you imply a seller.  Did Christ buy me\nfrom Satan or from Almighty God or from whom?  So far as I am aware,\nthe point is not even yet settled.  Nor is it meant to be settled.  It\nimplies a conception of the universe generally that is outworn.\nNeither you nor I are ancient Jews.  A good deal of water has flowed\nunder the bridges since Habakkuk.\"\n\nPaul said nothing.  In point of fact, he hardly understood.  This was\nall new to him.\n\n\"Well, I see God in art and beauty.  He has given me a soul that finds\nHim there, rather than in sacrifice of the fat of rams and the thunder\nof Sinai.  I take it, even you do not regard Him as tied to pitch-pine,\ncorrugated iron and Moody and Sankey's hymns.  He is not to me a tribal\ndeity, needing propitiation and ordering the slaughter of women and\nchildren, flocks and herds.  'Nothing but the Blood of Jesus,' sounded\nall right on Parker's Piece and offers an emotional stimulus to\nuneducated people.  But when you come to definitions, the thought of\nthe Old Testament leaves me rather cold.  How in the world can blood\nwash me clean?\"\n\n\"But you believe in the Bible, surely?\" queried Paul, puzzled and\nhonestly grieved.\n\n\"My dear fellow, what in the world do you mean by 'believe in'?  I\nbelieve in Browning.  Personally, I believe in the present Government.\nAs a matter of fact, I believe in you.\"\n\nPaul flushed.  \"But the Bible is the 'verbally inspired Word of God,'\"\nhe ventured to quote.\n\n\"Which of the ten-score different versions?\" queried Manning calmly.\n\"By the way, have you shown your verses to Tressor yet?\"\n\nIf his visitor accepted the change of subject, it was because he was,\nfor the moment, clean bowled.\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nPaul had left a note asking Strether to breakfast, and he rather\nwondered if, after the previous day's rag, his friend would come.  But\nhe came.  To mark the occasion, Paul had fish and an omelette sent up\nfrom the kitchens, and over these burnt sacrifices he made his apology.\n\n\"Look here, Gussie,\" he said, \"I'm sorry that rag ended as it did.  I\nhad no idea the others had arranged it with old Sam like that, and I\ncouldn't help Donaldson kicking up all that row on the stairs.  That\nwas beastly, I admit.  I'm awfully sorry.  Hope it won't make any\ndifference to our friendship.\"\n\nStrether growled in his throat.  \"Who bagged my boots?\" he demanded,\nwith a sense of humour.\n\nPaul laughed.  \"Let's rag Donaldson somehow,\" he suggested, \"and I'll\ngive them back.\"\n\nStrether smiled.  Then frowned.  \"Always talking about girls,\" he\nmuttered.  Then, dropping the subject for good and all, \"Come to _The\nMikado_ this week,\" he invited.\n\n\"I've never been to the theatre,\" said Paul frankly.\n\nThe other nodded slowly in his meditative fashion.  \"So?\" he queried.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Paul.  \"My people are against it.  They say the stage is\nimmoral.  I don't know....\"\n\n\"Then so are newspapers,\" said Strether, \"and so's Cambridge too for\nthe matter of that.\"\n\n\"That's different,\" objected Paul.\n\nStrether laid down his knife and fork.  \"Going to the P.M., Sunday?\" he\nqueried.\n\n\"Yes, I expect so,\" said Paul.  \"Why?\"\n\n\"I'll come with you, if you'll come with me to _The Mikado_.  I've\nnever been to a P.M.  My people say prayer meetings make religion too\nemotional.\"\n\nPaul got up dubiously.  He looked out of the window.\n\nAfter all, there were, it seemed, many points of view in the world.\nOught he to see none other than his father's?  And besides, if this\nwould get Gus Strether to a prayer meeting ...\n\n\"I'll go,\" he said.  \"I see that it is certainly foolish to condemn a\nthing you haven't seen.\"\n\nThat night, over his fire in his own beloved room, he got out a secret\nand personal diary which an evangelical missioner had urged him to\nkeep, and sat thoughtfully over it, pencil in hand.  Then he wrote\nslowly: \"Nov. 13.  I have decided to go to a theatre, since it is\nobviously unfair to condemn anything unseen.  I wish to be sure of the\nspirit in which I go and for what I ought to look.  Therefore I shall\nask myself afterwards three questions, and I write these down now to\nmake certain that I do not forget:\n\n  1. If Christ came while I was there, should I mind?\n  2. Do I see anything bad in this play?\n  3. Has it helped my Christian life?\"\n\n\nYears later he turned up his old answers, written late on the Wednesday\nnight of the play, and smiled at their amazing and yet serious\nyouthfulness.  \"1. I should mind Christ's advent while I was in the\ntheatre no more than I should mind His coming while I was laughing over\na humorous novel,\" so ran the first answer.\n\n\"2. Honestly, I see nothing bad in the play.  It was beautiful, the\ncolour and music bewitching, and the only fault, overmuch foolishness.\nBut in the bar and lounge, one felt that the men about were mostly of\nthe sort who are careless about their souls.  Query: But what about a\nbump supper or a smoking carriage?\n\n\"3. No, it has not helped my Christian life, but it has not, so far as\nI can see, hindered it.  Indirectly, it has perhaps helped me, just as\nexercise, music, poetry and ordinary conversation, may be said to do.\n\n\"_Note_.  Honestly, I have never enjoyed myself more in all my life.\"\n\nPoor Paul!\n\n\n\n(5)\n\nBut he was to enjoy himself still more that memorable term.  Towards\nits close, as a scholar, he received an invitation to the big college\nFeast of St. Mary's, a commemoration to which some distinguished\noutsider was always invited and which celebrated itself with the aid of\na classic menu and some historic music.  Neither Strether nor Donaldson\nwere asked, for neither had achieved scholarship fame, and Manning was\nseparated from the fresher by an impassable gulf of table.  Paul, in\nfact, sat between Judson and the wall farthest from the High Table.\nJudson, cox of his boat, was a genial person, but no particular friend\nof Paul's, and Judson, moreover, was frankly there to eat and drink.\nPaul functioned merely automatically in regard to these.  It was the\nsplendour, the glamour, that he feasted upon, and his imagination saw\nto it that neither lacked.  Even the sheer beauty of the shining plate,\nthe silver candelabra, the ancient hall and the glittering tables,\ntouched, here and there, with the orange and yellow and green and gold\nof the piled dessert, was all but forgotten as he read his list of\ndistinguished names, caught the gleam of ribbons across this and that\nshirt-front, listened to the clever short speeches, delighted in the\nhistoric music, shared, timidly, in the ceremonies of toast and\nloving-cup.  He saw a world worth entering.  He was intoxicated, though\nhe drank no more than a shy glass of lemonade.  If, in the dark\nshadowed gallery away from the bustling waiters, there lingered\nunderstanding spirits, as like as not Paul Kestern was the most\nentertaining person present.\n\nIn the library, the great Tressor singled him out.  \"Well, Kestern,\" he\nsaid smiling, \"what did you think of it all?\"\n\nThe boy looked at him gravely.  \"It was all rather wonderful to me,\nsir,\" he said.\n\n\"It was a good feast, certainly,\" said the other.  \"By the way, I fear\nI can't get away from all this now, but I wanted to say a word to you\nabout those verses of yours.  They are very distinctly good, I think.\nThe shortest is the best--_The Spent Day_.  You'll do much better work,\nbut in its own way, it's a perfect poem.\"\n\nPaul could hardly believe his ears.  \"It is awfully good of you to read\nthem,\" he managed to say.\n\n\"Oh not at all.  I'm delighted.  Look here, are you engaged to-morrow?\nCome to luncheon, will you?  You row, don't you? so you'll want to\nleave early.  I won't invite anybody else, and we can discuss them\nthen.  Good-night.\"\n\nThe big man, with the heavy eyebrows, slightly bowed shoulders and\nkindly eyes, smiled, nodded, and passed on.  Manning followed him up to\nPaul.  \"What did he say?\" he asked.\n\nPaul hardly liked to tell him.  It seemed fantastic as he said it.\n\nManning nodded.  \"I thought as much,\" he said, smiling.  \"Remember me,\nKestern, when you're a big man.  I at any rate put one of your feet on\nthe ladder.\"\n\nPaul mumbled something, and soon escaped.  His fire was out in his\nroom, but it mattered little; he could not sit down to read or think\nquietly after all this.  Up and down he paced, repeating Tressor's\nwords: \"In its own way, it's a perfect poem.\"  A perfect poem!  And\nTressor had said it!  Said it after those songs, those speeches; said\nit in that company.\n\nThen, as the boy passed and repassed, his eye fell on his text.  He\nlooked at it critically: the frame and flowers and lettering were so\nextraordinarily bad.  A few weeks ago he had not remarked that.  Still,\nit was the words that mattered.  What would the Master have thought of\nthe college feast?  Cana of Galilee?  Yes, but He would have been but a\nvisitor.  Could He have had a real part in it?\n\nPaul swung into a new train of thought.  He considered the cost of it\nall.  Why, when he had refused the first cigar, Judson had said _he_\nnever refused a half-crown smoke.  Half a crown for a cigar!--the thing\nwas monstrous to evangelical Paul.  The smokes of the dinner alone\nwould have kept a catechist in India for a year!  Probably the wines\nwould have paid the annual salary of a white missionary in China.  And\nwith every tick of the clock, a heathen soul passed into eternity.  How\noften he had said it!  What, then, was he doing among such things?\nWhat part had he in such extravagance?  \"One is your Master, even\nChrist.\"\n\nPaul sighed, and reached for his diary.  \"The feast was wonderful (he\nwrote), extraordinarily beautiful I thought....  But...\"  Then he went\nto bed.\n\nWonder on wonders.  The morning's post brought him a letter from the\neditor of _The Granta_, accepting, magnanimously, a short story of an\nimaginative nature that he had placed in Egypt with the aid of a\nBaedeker.  The editor asked, interestedly, if he had been there.  He\nsupposed that Paul must have been, for the descriptions were so vivid.\n\nPaul's porridge grew cold.  He sat on with the letter in his hand.\nDonaldson found him so, calling to go with him to a distant lecture.\n\"Hullo,\" he said, \"not finished brekker?  You're late again, four!\"\n\n\"I say,\" said Paul, \"_The Granta_'s taken that yarn of mine about\nEgypt.\"\n\n\"By Jove, that's topping.\"  Donaldson spoke enviously, staring at him.\n\"But I told you it was jolly good, didn't I?\"\n\n\"You did,\" said Paul, \"but I say, what do you think Tressor said last\nnight about my verse?\"\n\n\"Can't say,\" said Donaldson.\n\nThen Paul told him.\n\nHis friend whistled.  \"Damn it all, Paul,\" he said--\"by the way, let me\ncall you 'Paul,' may I?--I should chuck all those preaching and praying\nstunts of yours now.\"\n\n\"Why on earth----\" began Paul, utterly surprised.\n\n\"Oh well, do as you think best.  But it'll spoil you for literature.\nDidn't Tressor tell you the other day that your essays were too like\nsermons?  And if you get in with Manning and all that set, Hartley and\nhis crowd won't be of any use.\"\n\nPaul got up slowly and walked to the fire.  He stood still awhile,\ngazing into it.  The other fidgeted.  \"Come on now, anyway,\" he said.\n\"We shall be late for that lekker.\"\n\n\"I shan't go this morning.  I shall cut it.\"\n\n\"Right-o.  Good-bye.  I'm off,\" retorted the other, and departed, a\nlittle huffed.\n\nMrs. Roper came in to clear away.  \"Aren't you a-going to finish your\nbreakfuss, sir?\" she asked.\n\n\"I've done, thanks,\" said Paul.  \"I don't want any more.\"\n\n\"Off 'is feed,\" said Mrs. Roper outside to her \"help.\"  \"'Ad too much\nat that there feast, I expect.  'Ere, you can 'ave them eggs.\"\n\nAs for Paul, he mounted his bicycle and rode out into the country.  A\nwintry sun lay on the bare woods and stubble fields, and it was all\nvery lovely.  Even the close-cropped hedges were beautiful.  The fallen\nbeech-leaves were a spread of old gold under the trees by Madingley.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nCHRISTMAS CAROLS\n\n  ... Doubt, which, like a ghost,\n    In the brain's darkness haunted me,\n  Was thus resolved: Him loved I most,\n    But her I loved most sensibly.\n  Lastly, my giddiest hope allow'd\n    No selfish thought, or earthly smirch;\n  And forth I went, in peace, and proud\n    To take my passion into Church;\n  Grateful and glad to think that all\n    Such doubts would seem entirely vain\n  To her whose nature's lighter fall\n    Made no divorce of heart from brain.\n        COVENTRY PATMORE: _The Angel in the House_.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\nPaul, walking home from Claxted Station down Edward Street and past Mr.\nThornton's \"Elite Photographic Studio,\" was puzzled.  Some bewildering\nspell had fallen upon Claxted in a couple of months.  The suburban\nstation had a strange respectable air that sat ill on it, and whereas a\nstation may smell of dirt or smoke, it should not smell of stale paint.\nEdward Street was horribly tidy, and gaped.  The Town Hall and its\nLibraries, once majestic centres of learning and authority, had been\ncheapened.  And the familiar road to his home appeared to have been\nnewly washed and to have shrunk in the process.\n\nHis father's house had only escaped the snare by a miracle, and Paul\nwas obsessed by a sense of that miracle.  The case of stuffed birds in\nthe hall, the gilt presentation clock in the drawing-room, the old\narm-chair in the dining-room, the yards of commentaries and sermons in\nthe study, with the illuminated addresses above them, were miraculously\npleasant.  For days after his return, he kept looking at them, and\nmarvelling inwardly that they were just the same.  The furniture of\nManning's and Mr. Tressor's rooms had already made him feel that in his\nhome recollections there must be some mistake.  But he knew now,\nstaring about him, that there was not.  And he was still quite glad,\nand a little subdued.\n\n\"Oh, Paul,\" cried his mother, hurrying into the hall to meet him, \"how\nwell you're looking!  Are you glad to be back?\"\n\n\"Very glad, mother darling,\" said Paul, kissing her.  \"Where's dad?\"\n\n\"It's the Band of Hope night, dear, don't you remember?  He's not back\nyet.  But he said he wouldn't be late for supper.  Sit down over there\nwhere I can see you, and tell me all about Cambridge.\"\n\nPaul laughed.  \"That's a big order,\" he said.  \"I don't know where to\nbegin.\"\n\n\"Tell me about your children's service and the open air meetings,\nPaul,\" said his mother.  \"Is Mr. Hartley nice?  Your father and I are\nso glad you've made such friends.\"\n\nPaul thrust \"The Literary Lounge,\" the College Feast, the Theatre,\nDonaldson, Strether and Manning, into the back of his mind, and told\nher.\n\n\"And do you find the lectures hard?\" she queried.\n\nPaul laughed gaily.  What a topsy-turvy notion of Cambridge his mother,\nafter all, must have!\n\nHis father's key grated in the door and Paul ran out into the hall.\nThe clergyman came in, followed by Mr. Derrick.  \"Ah, Paul,\" he said,\n\"it is good to see you home again.  Come in, Mr. Derrick.  Paul's just\nback.  I'll get you the books at once.\"\n\nHe entered the study, and Mr. Derrick held out his hand.  Paul took in\nthe dapper little man, from his spotless tall linen collar to his neat\nblack boots.  \"How are you?\" he said genially.  \"How goes things?\"\n\n\"How do you do, Mr. Paul,\" said Mr. Derrick nervously.  \"We are all\nvery well, thank you.  Have you had a good time at college?  How short\nthe terms are!  You seem scarcely to have gone away at all.\"\n\n\"Eh?\" queried Paul, momentarily astonished.  Then he recollected.\n\"Yes,\" he confessed, \"I suppose they do seem short.  We read more in\nthe vacs. than in the terms, you know.\"\n\n\"I hope you will still be able to lend us a hand, however,\" said his\nvisitor.\n\n\"Rather,\" said Paul.  \"Who's taking the children on Sunday?\"\n\n\"I am, unless you'd rather.\"\n\n\"I put Paul down for the evening,\" said his father, returning.  \"I\nrather hope he'll go to church with his mother in the morning.  She'd\nenjoy having him.  You know what mothers are, Derrick.\"\n\n\"Yes, yes, to be sure,\" said the little man quickly.  \"I should have\nthought of it.  But I expect we shall see a good deal of you, Mr. Paul.\"\n\n\"Rather,\" said the young man again.  \"Are all the folk going strong?\"\n\n\"Yes.  Mr. Vintner is secretary of the Missionary Committee in your\nplace.  He's coming on well.\"\n\n\"Vintner!\" exclaimed Paul.  But he was ashamed of his instinctive\nthought the next moment.  \"Splendid,\" he said.\n\nMr. Derrick nodded.  \"He gave a most helpful address on Henry Martyn\nlast week....  Thank you, Mr. Kestern.  Are those the books?  I'll go\nthrough them to-night and let you have them on Sunday.  I don't suppose\nit'll take me long.  Good-night.  Good-night, Mr. Paul.\"\n\nThe clergyman thanked him and saw him out.  \"Capital fellow,\" he said,\nentering the dining-room.  \"Wait till you're ordained, Paul, and you'll\nknow what such lay help means to a clergyman.  Well, dear boy, and how\nare you?  Really I think you've grown.  What do you think, mother?\"\n\n\"I've been admiring his fancy waistcoat,\" said Mrs. Kestern.  \"Where\ndid you get it, Paul?\"\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nPaul was soon aware that he was in for a delightful vacation.  Not many\nyoung men in their circle went to the University, and none at all,\nnaturally, from among \"the workers.\"  Paul was, therefore, lionised.\nIt was impossible for him not to be aware of it.  He had always been a\nkind of natural leader, but he was now something more.  A glamour sat\nabout him.  It was possibly Miss Ernest who made him aware of it first.\n\nShe was to play at the Mission Hall that first Sunday night, and Paul\ncalled for her to take her down through the dark, slummy streets.  She\nkept him waiting some minutes, and when she came down, she was most\nunusually resplendent even for her.\n\n\"How do you do?\" she said, shaking hands and smiling.  \"Do you know, I\nhardly dare call you Paul now?\"\n\n\"Why ever not?\" he asked, closing the house door behind her.\n\n\"You're so much older,\" she said.\n\n\"Two months, Madeline,\" he protested, using her name deliberately.\n\n\"Is that all?  It seems to me that you've been away ages.\"\n\nPaul glanced at her.  She was entirely demure, and did not look at him.\n\n\"Well,\" he confessed, \"it seems a long time to me too.  It's curious\nhow quickly Cambridge changes things.  I hardly feel the same as I did\ntwo months ago.\"\n\n\"I suppose you've met all sorts of ripping people.\"\n\n\"Rather.  Do you know Mr. Tressor's at our college, and I've shown him\nmy verses.  He said--he was awfully nice about them.  And _The Granta_\nhas taken a story of mine.\"\n\n\"I'm not surprised,\" she said.  \"I always thought you had it in you.\"\n\nPaul was a little piqued that she took it so easily, though on\nreflection he perceived that this was a compliment.  \"It is impossible\nnot to write at St. Mary's,\" he said.\n\n\"Is it very lovely?\" she asked softly.\n\n\"Oh, exquisite.  You must see.  Do you think you could come up in the\nsummer term?  My rooms are small and high up you know, but perfect I\nthink.  And the Hall and Chapel thrill me every time I see them.  If\nyou could see the moonlight on our First Court!\"\n\n\"Doesn't Claxted bore you after all that?\"\n\nPaul laughed.  \"It's rather quaint,\" he confessed.  \"It's really rather\nlike another world.  Do you know, I've been to the theatre.\"\n\n\"Have you?  Oh how splendid!  I'd love to go.\"\n\n\"Don't tell anyone,\" said Paul, cautiously.\n\n\"Of course not.  What did you see?\"\n\n\"The Mikado.\"\n\n\"Oh don't--I can't bear it.  You make me so jealous.  There you are,\nleading your own life, and I'm tied down to this.  You don't know how\nthings bore me at times.\"\n\nPaul grew suddenly grave.  \"I think perhaps I am beginning to,\" he\nsaid, and lapsed into silence.\n\nA lay-reader took the service, and Paul, in cassock and surplice on the\nplatform of the little mission church, had leisure to observe.  He had\nbeen there a thousand times; very dear memories linked him to it; but\nnot till now had he looked about him critically.  The place was an iron\nbuilding of good size, garishly lit with gas, and at one end was a\nplatform which could be screened off from the body of the hall.  The\ncurtains were drawn apart for this service, and Paul from where he sat,\nstared sideways at the varnished Table within the encircling wood\nrailings; at the text above it; at the harmonium opposite him, with the\nback of Miss Ernest visible, and the side of her face, under its big\nhat, when she occasionally glanced at the lay-reader who was taking the\nprayers and announcing the hymns.  Below her sat the choir of working\nmen, and near them a couple of forms of girls who \"strengthened\" their\nefforts.  Paul scanned their faces surreptitiously with amusement.\nThere, against the wall, was old Miller who invariably started each\nverse a word ahead of the rest, and got steadily more flat as the hymn\ncontinued.  Among the girls, he was surprised to see Miss Tillings.  He\nsupposed she had been converted in his absence.  In the front row was\nHodgson, a police-sergeant and a thoroughly good fellow.  Next him,\nMcArthur, who played a cornet when he knew the tune.  And then the\ncongregation, among them Mrs. Reynolds.  If Edith Thornton were\npresent, he could not see her.  But he looked.\n\nThe lay-reader was occasionally doubtful about his aspirates.  He also\nread an unduly large selection of collects.  His voice, too, got on\nPaul's nerves.  He read for the hundredth time the short, staring gilt\ntext above the Table.  \"Till He Come.\"  Except for the hymn notices,\nthere was nothing else to catch the attention.  Oh yes, I.H.S. in a\nmonogram under the text.  Paul wondered if the lay-reader knew what the\nletters meant.  He wondered if any of them knew what they meant.  Then,\nas the reader began the prayer for Parliament, if anyone knew what\nanything meant.  Mrs. Reynolds, for example.  \"That all things may be\nbordered and settled by their hendeavours, upon the best and surest\nfoundations....\"  \"Amen\"--very loudly from old Miller.  But he had\nheard that old Miller was a strong Conservative and concerned with\npolitics in his off hours.  Curious; it struck Paul suddenly that \"the\nworkers\" never seemed to have politics.  Oh, at last--Hymn 148.\n\nAfterwards, they were all very kind.  He shook hands with the departing\ncongregation, including Hilda Tillings.  Hodgson was unfeignedly glad\nto see him back.  But outside, while Paul was smilingly making his way\nback to the platform by which Madeline was standing drawing on her\ngloves, the sergeant was rebuffed by old Miller.\n\n\"Good sermon, Miller,\" he said.  \"He's a fine young chap, and I'm glad\nhe's back.\"\n\n\"Eh, eh, sergeant, but I dunno as I 'olds with all this 'ere\nbook-larning.  'E's got more grammar nor ever, and, seems ter me, less\ngrace.\"\n\n\"Doesn't it all seem rather queer to you now?\" asked Madeline, as they\nwalked home.\n\nPaul shrugged his shoulders.  \"They're rattling good people,\" he said,\nenigmatically.\n\n\"Yes, of course.  By the way, do you remember that the Sale of Work is\nto be this week.  You will help me decorate our stall, won't you, Paul?\"\n\n\"Rather.  Is it this week?  I'd forgotten.  Do you want all that muslin\nstuff tacked up again?\"\n\n\"Yes.  But we'll get you a step-ladder this year.  The boxes collapsed\nlast time--remember?\"\n\nHe nodded, amused.  \"But why don't you try a new idea?\" he suggested.\n\"Why always keep to the same old muslin?\"\n\nMadeline sighed.  \"We do always keep to the same old things, don't we?\nBut what could we do?  Suggest something.\"\n\n\"Have a background of palms and cover the framework with ivy.\"\n\n\"That'd be lovely.  But how could we get the ivy?\"\n\n\"Leave that to me.  I'll get it for you.\"\n\n\"Will you?  Thanks so much.  Could I help?\"\n\nPaul glanced at her carefully.  She walked gracefully, but with her\neyes on the pavement.  He admired her fair hair and her new hat, her\ntrim figure.  After all, why not?\n\n\"Bicycle out with me on Friday and get some,\" he suggested.  \"There's\nlots at Hursley.\"\n\nHer voice was even as ever as she replied.  \"That would be delightful,\"\nshe said.  \"Come in now and ask father, will you?  Perhaps he'd come\ntoo.  And I say, do let me read your verses.  I'd like to so much.\"\n\nPaul was suddenly shy.  \"Oh they're nothing,\" he said.\n\nShe smiled.  \"Mr. Tressor did not think so,\" she retorted.  \"Paul, I\nwonder if you're going to be a poet.\"\n\n\"I'm going to be a foreign missionary,\" he said.\n\n\"Well, you can be both.  I expect abroad you would have no end of\ninspiration.  You're not likely to be sent among utter savages.  You're\nmore likely to be made the head of some college or another, perhaps in\nIndia.  You could write too.  I should think Calcutta or Delhi, or some\nplace like that, would be heavenly.  And you'd go to the mountains in\nthe summer.  It makes me envious to think of you.  You'll have a\nglorious life.\"\n\nPaul grew grave.  \"I'd prefer to be among savages,\" he said.\n\n\"Why?  Besides, do you think that's altogether right?  God didn't give\nyou your gifts for you to waste them.  And they want the other sort of\nmissionary just as much.\"\n\n\"I suppose they do,\" said Paul.  \"And if I lived that sort of life, I\nshould marry.  One could.  I've always doubted if a pioneer missionary\nought to marry.\"\n\nMadeline nodded.  \"I think you're right.  And besides, the wives of\nthat sort of missionary do get so awfully dowdy.  I suppose it doesn't\nmatter what you wear among savages, and so they don't care any more\nabout dressing.  I'm afraid I could never be so good as all that.\"\n\nPaul laughed.  \"Honestly, I can't see you dowdy, Madeline,\" he said.\n\nShe smiled, but said nothing.  He glanced at her shyly.  \"Summery\nfrocks and Indian Society would suit you,\" he said.\n\n\"Do you think so?\" she said easily.\n\n\"Yes.  By the way, you just must come up for the Mays.  Will you\npromise?\"\n\n\"I'll come if I possibly can,\" she said, \"and thank you ever so much\nfor asking me.  Here we are.  Now come in and settle with father about\nthe ivy, will you?\"\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nThe Annual Sale of Work was the parochial Feast of Claxted.  A\ndistinguished visitor was always invited to open it; the stalls through\nwhich one wandered, were so many courses, so to speak; and in the\nevening, there were always songs, a few speeches, and light\nrefreshments.  So far as the Mission Hall of the church was concerned,\nonly the more superior members were expected to put in an appearance,\nand these chiefly in the evening.  Thus Hodgson always came, but not\nold Miller.  The Christian Endeavour arranged little side-show concerts\nfrom six o'clock onwards, at half-hour intervals, but even the\nEndeavourers were not seen in the afternoon.  During those sacred\nhours, the carriages drew up outside the Parish Room in Edward Street,\nand there descended from them the elite and the wealthy of the\ncongregation.  These, entering the half-empty room, caused a ripple of\ncomment to run through the stall-holders proportionate to their\nimportance.  \"Old Mrs. Wherry,\" Mrs. Ernest would whisper\nenthusiastically to Madeline.  \"Oh, my dear, try to get her here at\nonce.  She always spends such a lot, and she's so blind, she can't see\nwhat she buys.  She just decides to spend so much, I believe, and when\nit's spent, no one can get another penny out of her.  Do fetch her\nhere.\"\n\n\"How can I, mother?\" retorted Madeline, on this occasion.\n\n\"I'll try,\" said Paul, good-humouredly, and strolled off in her\ndirection.\n\n\"Madeline, I saw you fastening that ivy with Paul,\" said Mrs. Ernest,\nas he went.\n\n\"Well, mother?\"\n\n\"My dear, anyone might have seen.  I thought I saw Mrs. Cator watching.\nAnd you know what she is likely to say.\"\n\nMadeline tossed her pretty head.  \"I know what I am about, mother,\" she\nsaid.\n\n\"I hope you do,\" sighed Mrs. Ernest.  Her husband was a good man, but\nwithout distinction, and truth to tell, she was tired of living on a\ncurate's stipend.\n\nPaul came up with Mrs. Wherry.  The old lady had been genuinely glad to\nsee him, and, since her own sons had been at Cambridge, she showed him\ncaustic good humour.  \"You want me to spend my money here, I suppose,\ndo you?  Well, it doesn't much matter to me.  Good afternoon, Mrs.\nErnest.  I see you've adopted a system of pickets.  Or is it Miss\nErnest?  Still everything's fair in love and war, and certainly a Sale\nof Work is war.  What have you?  I shall only buy things that I can\nsend elsewhere.\"\n\nPaul stood chatting with Madeline again while the old lady did her\nshopping.  A little hum of talk covered their conversation, which was\nbroken now and again as someone nodded and spoke to him, or he was sent\noff by his father on some trivial errand.  He was not as bored as\nusual, but drifted back to the ivy-hung stall fairly regularly.  At\nhalf past four he suggested tea.  \"You can go, Madeline,\" said Mrs.\nErnest.  \"I'll wait a little.  Someone must watch the stall.\"\n\n\"Come on then,\" said Paul, catching Madeline's eye, and she moved off\nwith him.\n\nFormerly it had been hard to get Madeline for tea.  Young men, who had\nrecently started going to the City, used to drop in about this time and\ntake her off.  There were one or two about now, but she had no eyes for\nthem.  He piloted her into a corner, and went to get the tea from the\nbuffet which was presided over by Mrs. Cator herself.  She kept him\nchatting while a fresh pot was made, and he was steering his way back\nto Madeline with the little tray when he saw Edith.\n\nIt was early for her, for she arrived, as a rule, with the rest of the\nEndeavourers.  There she was, however, with her mother in a black dress\nand a bead bonnet.  Mrs. Thornton was well known in the congregation.\nShe aspired to rather a high estate, which was impossible for her,\nsocially, with her husband's shop in Edward Street.\n\nPaul watched Edith bring her in.  The girl was quiet and\nself-possessed, and did not, apparently, see him.  She steered her\nmother to a little table and sat down by her.  One of the Miss Cators,\nacting waitress, went up for the order.\n\n\"Here's the tea,\" said Paul.  \"Sorry I was so long.  You must want it.\"\n\n\"I do.  Oh, and you've got eclairs!  How delicious; I love them.\"\n\n\"I remembered that you did at the school-treat last August.\"\n\n\"That terrible day!  Do you remember how Mrs. Thornton would have lunch\nat our table?  Look--there she is.  I do hope she doesn't see you.\nShe's sure to come over if she does.  ''Ow do you do, Mr. Paul, and 'ow\ndo you like Cambridge?  We're glad to see you back, I'm sure.'\"\n\nPaul sat down deliberately in such a position that he could see Edith.\n\"Don't, Madeline,\" he said.  \"She's a thoroughly good sort really, and\nmeans well.\"\n\n\"Paul, you know perfectly well you used to laugh at her as much as any\nof us.\"\n\n\"Did I?  Then I was wrong.  I'm beginning to see that the world is full\nof queer sorts of people, and that the only real test is their\nsincerity.\"\n\n\"Well, then, some sincere people are impossible.  You know they are.\nAt any rate I'm sincere enough to tell you that I think so.\"\n\nEthel Cator came up to them.  She was a brunette, tall and thin, and in\na cap and apron she looked pretty.  She was one of Madeline's friends.\n\"Hullo, Madeline,\" she said.  \"How are you two getting on?  Have some\nmore tea?\"\n\n\"My dear, aren't you worn out with this tea business?  Can't I give you\na hand?  It's a slack time at the stall.\"\n\n\"Oh no.  It's all right.  But it's our busy time, of course.  Have some\nmore eclairs.  We're running a bit short, but I can get some for you.\"\n\n\"I couldn't.  Really, I couldn't.  Will you, Paul?  I say, Ethel, are\nyou going to the school dance?  Grace said yesterday she didn't know\nwhat you had decided.  Do come, my dear.  I've said I'll go, and you\nmust be there.  I've positively got a new frock for it.\"\n\n\"Look here,\" said Paul, laughing, \"this is no place for me.  I'm off.\nI'll tell your mother to expect you in half an hour, Madeline.\nGood-bye.  Good-bye, Miss Cator.  Your tea's topping.  I'll send in\neveryone I see.\"  And he walked off.\n\nMadeline glanced quickly across the room; Mrs. Thornton and Edith were\nmaking their way to the door; Paul caught them up as she watched.  She\nflushed slightly.  Ethel Cator slipped into the empty place by her\nside, and dropped her voice a little.  \"He's not keen on that girl,\nsurely,\" she said.\n\nMadeline shrugged her shoulders.  \"How should I know?\" she asked, with\nan assumption of indifference.\n\nEthel laughed.  \"Well, my dear, of course it's not my business, but I\nthought you saw a good deal of him.\"\n\n\"Well, naturally, seeing what our fathers are.\"\n\n\"Has Cambridge changed him?  I should have thought he'd have dropped\nthe Mission Hall now.\"\n\nEthel's tone was a little contemptuous, and it roused Madeline to the\ndefensive.\n\n\"My dear, you don't know Paul,\" she said coolly.  \"He doesn't play at\nreligion.  He probably wants to speak to Miss Thornton about the\nChristian Endeavour.  It would take more than a term at Cambridge to\nmake Paul throw that over.  And I like him for it.\"\n\nHer friend got up.  \"I must go,\" she said.  \"I didn't mean to be a cat,\nMadeline.  Everybody knows Paul's a born parson, and of course he'll\nmake a good one.\"\n\n\"He wants to go to India,\" said Madeline, mollified and inconsequent,\nand not realising that she lied.  \"He'll be a bishop one day, I expect.\"\n\nEthel looked envious, and rewarded her.  \"India!\" she exclaimed, and\nsat down again for a minute or two.  The girls fell to discussing Simla\nwith a suburban imagination.\n\nMrs. Thornton had asked him \"'Ow he liked Cambridge?\" and Paul had\nreplied at length.  But she had gone off at last, and left him with the\ntall girl whose brown eyes had been alight with a flicker of amusement\nthe while he had talked to her mother.  They were standing near the\nplatform at the top of the room, and a not yet opened \"fishpond\" with\nits appurtenances screened them slightly.  He was able to look her full\nin the face now and realise how good she looked, though the little fur\nhat was slightly out of place there, and her coat a little shabby.\n\n\"Mother's a dear,\" she said.\n\nHe nodded.  \"I know.  Edith, I've longed to see you again.  Why weren't\nyou at the Mission Hall on Sunday?\"\n\n\"I couldn't go.  I was ever so sorry.\"\n\n\"Really?\"\n\nShe nodded.  \"I knew you were preaching.  Mr. Derrick told us.  But I\nhad to stay and help mother with the kiddies.\"\n\nPaul saw a mental vision of the little rooms over the shop and the\nthree small Thornton children sprawling everywhere.  Once or twice he\nhad been in on business for the Society, and he knew it well.  Edith in\nthat setting had always puzzled him a little.  She did not seem quite\nto belong to it, and yet she moved about household jobs with a quiet\ndignity that did not in the least suggest resentment or incongruity.\n\n\"You'll be here to-night?\" he questioned.\n\nShe shook her head.  \"That's why I've come this afternoon.\"\n\n\"When are we going to meet then?  I do so want to talk to you.\nCambridge is wonderful, Edith.  There's heaps to say.  I don't know\nwhy, but I want to tell you things.\"\n\nHe couldn't know that she had to make a little effort to steady her\nvoice.  \"Do you, Paul,\" she said.  \"That's awfully good of you.\"\n\nHe studied her a minute, thinking rapidly.  \"Tell me what you're doing\nthis week,\" he demanded.\n\n\"Oh, the usual things.  Band of Hope, a committee Thursday, prayer\nmeeting Friday, and Saturday, some cousins of ours are coming over.\"\n\n\"Sunday?\"\n\n\"You silly!  You know as well as I do!\"\n\nPaul reflected.  He would have to call for Madeline for the children's\nservice.  Afternoon Sunday school--no good, he knew.  Evening, his\nmother would be going down to the Mission Hall.  He shrugged his\nshoulders impatiently.  \"Monday?\" he queried.\n\nShe smiled.  \"Monday's the first night of carol singing,\" she said.\n\n\"No!\" he cried eagerly.  \"I'll come.  What time do you start?\"\n\n\"You know you _never_ come,\" she said laughing.  \"Have you learned to\nsing so much better at Cambridge?\"\n\nA little thrill of pleasure at her laughter ran through him.  \"You\nshall hear,\" he said.  \"I shall be there.  And when we've finished, I\nshall see you home.\"\n\n\"I half promised Mr. Vintner,\" she said, \"but perhaps----  There's\nmother looking for me.  I must go.\"\n\nAnd Paul, alone, could not get Albert Vintner out of his mind while he\ndiscoursed of the University to his father's senior churchwarden.\n\nMrs. Kestern left before the conclusion of the proceedings, and Paul\nstood by the table alone, watching his father, Mr. Derrick and a warden\nmake neat piles of silver and gold, enter totals on slips of paper and\nfinally arrive at the exact figure taken.  Conversation among the\nwaiting onlookers died down while the final immense calculation was\nbeing made, and it was in a solemn silence that at last Mr. Kestern\nstood erect, beaming and triumphant, to announce that the result\nexceeded by five pounds, seven and fourpence the previous year's\nfigure, and to say that he thanked all who had in any way assisted at\nthis magnificent result with all his heart.  They would now join in\nsinging the Doxology.  Madeline went to the piano; \"Thank God from whom\nall blessings flow,\" they sang.  Paul joined in heartily, but a little\nself-consciously.  It was odd, but the familiar words did not come as\nnaturally as they had used to do.  Five pounds, seven and fourpence!\nBut his father was a saint, Paul thought, as he looked at him.\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nPaul, Mr. Kestern and Miss Bishop walked home together, the latter a\ngreat friend of the Church.  She was angular, tall, a little caustic\nand an able speaker, and she had a great reputation for knowledge.  She\nfelt deeply and expressed herself strongly.  Paul liked her immensely.\n\nShe led the conversation now, in her clear, incisive, deep voice.  It\nappeared that a newly-appointed neighbouring vicar had accepted the\noffer of a cross and two candlesticks for the Holy Table in his church.\nIt was known, at last, that he had definitely accepted; it was not\nknown, yet, what would be done about it--whether appeal would be made\nby some aggrieved members of the congregation against the granting of a\nfaculty, or whether Mr. Kensit would be called in.  Miss Bishop was\nwholly in favour of this latter.\n\n\"What is the good of faculties and appeals?\" she demanded.  \"They\nalways confuse the real issue.  Kensit knocks the nail on the head\nanyway.  It's not a case of legal or illegal ornaments; it's a case of\nRome.  Do they take us all for fools?  Church after church has begun\nthat way, and ended with Mass and the confessional!\"\n\n\"Mr. Duncan,\" observed Mr. Kestern mildly, \"is entirely against all\nthat.  This is a mistake, of course, but he seems to me a sincere,\nearnest evangelical at bottom.\"\n\n\"Then what,\" continued Miss Bishop decisively, \"has he to do with a\ncross and candlesticks?  It's all very well, Vicar, but that's the thin\nend of the wedge.  You know it as well as I do.  His work is the saving\nof souls, and that sort of thing never saved a soul yet.  Is that not\nso?\"\n\n\"I'm afraid you're only too right,\" admitted Mr. Kestern.  \"It's a\ngreat pity--a great pity.\"\n\n\"A pity!  I should call it something worse than that,\" retorted the\nlady.\n\nPaul's mind was busy.  He was recalling the chapel at St. Mary's in the\nearly mornings, and the remote, austere, moving little service enacted\nthere on Sundays before a cross and candlesticks.  For the life of him\nhe had to say something.\n\n\"Miss Bishop,\" he said, \"do you think, nowadays, a cross always leads\nto Rome?  There is one on the Table at St. Mary's.\"\n\n\"And how much Gospel have you heard preached there?\" she demanded,\nshrewdly.\n\n\"Yes, Paul, that's the test,\" said his father.\n\nThe boy hesitated.  Then he equivocated.  \"But the cross is the sign of\nour faith,\" he said.\n\n\"Is it?\" Miss Bishop was emphatic.  \"I do not know that it is--not, at\nany rate, in the sense people use the phrase.  'Christ is Risen':\nthat's Christianity.\"\n\n\"The empty cross symbolises that,\" said Paul.\n\n\"Then put a cross on the steeple, in the porch, over the pulpit even.\nWhy on the Table?  You know as well as I do that the thing is\nPre-Reformation, Roman usage.\"\n\n\"A little earlier,\" retorted Paul.\n\n\"But not early enough.  Did Paul have a cross in the catacombs?\"\n\n\"Possibly,\" said Paul, nettled.\n\nMiss Bishop uttered an indignant exclamation.  \"Not of that sort,\" she\nsaid.\n\nMr. Kestern linked his arm in Paul's.  \"The lad doesn't mean to defend\nRitualism,\" he said kindly.  \"I know my boy too well.  Keep to the Word\nof God, Paul, and you won't go wrong.\"\n\n\"But, father,\" began his son----\n\nMr. Kestern pressed his arm.  \"That will do, Paul,\" he said.  \"I want\nto ask our friend something.  The theatre service for the last night of\nthe year is definitely settled, Miss Bishop; will you say a few words?\"\n\nMiss Bishop did not at once reply.  Then: \"I hate the place, Vicar,\"\nshe said; \"you know I do.  I don't believe in using it.  The whole\natmosphere reeks of the devil.  Last year I could hardly bring myself\nto go inside.\"\n\n\"Perhaps, possibly--but if we can perhaps draw the people there----\"\n\n\"Yes, show them the road in, and maybe they'll go again.\"\n\n\"We hope not,\" said the clergyman meekly, \"by the grace of God.\"\n\nShe shot a swift glance at him.  They were outside her own door now,\nand the light fell on the kind, gentle face of the man before her.  Her\nsharp face changed a little.\n\n\"I will speak, Mr. Kestern,\" she said, \"if you wish it.\"\n\nPaul and his father walked on a little in silence.  Then the elder\nsighed.  \"It's not easy, Paul,\" he said, \"to combine the Master's\ncharity and the Master's zeal.\"\n\n\"You do, dad,\" cried Paul, moved more than a little, and meant it.\n\nBut as the days sped by, Paul was aware that at every turn he was\nconfronted with a contrast that gradually deepened into something\napproaching a question.  Moving with his father cheerily about the\nparish; walking the familiar streets with his mother, so absurdly and\nyet so lovably proud, by his side; stepping again into the round of\nparochial activities, yet always now, as one who had no permanent place\namong them; Paul had constantly to check within himself a certain\ncritical outlook that had never been his before.  He criticised, too,\nin more than one direction.  There was the incident, for example, of\nthe Christmas decorations at the Mission Hall.  Red Turkey twill, as\nusual, had he and Madeline inserted into the panels of the Commandments\nand the Lord's Prayer behind the little altar, for a brief while\nescaping from the domination of their gilt lettering.  Ivy tendrils,\nlikewise, had they set twining here and there across them, but, at this\northodox conclusion, Paul had slipped back discontented.\n\n\"It still looks bare, Madeline,\" he said.  \"Let's put a big vase of\nwhite chrysanthemums on the ledge behind.\"\n\n\"Rather,\" she said; \"that will improve things.\"\n\nThey made it two vases and surveyed the result.  Madeline shrugged her\npretty shoulders.  \"Of course I'm not high,\" she said, \"but I must say\nI like flowers on the altar--always.\"  And Paul, looking at her,\nagreed.  But he was still his father's son.  \"If you don't call it an\naltar,\" he said, smiling.  Madeline smiled back.\n\nEarly Christmas morning, however, his father ordered their removal, and\nwith them sundry woven paper chains and flowers that Sergeant Hodgson,\nwith great enthusiasm, had erected with the aid of old Miller, after\nMrs. Kestern and Paul had left the night before.  The gaily-coloured\npaper had indeed been incongruous against the natural flowers, and Mrs.\nKestern had exclaimed at it.  Her husband had been ruthless likewise.\nBut Paul had criticised their edict.\n\n\"Father,\" he had said, with his direct logic, \"ought you to take away\nold Miller's chains?  He thinks them beautiful.  They're his offering\nto our Saviour.  Surely God looks at the devotion more than at the\nthing.  And you abolish my flowers too.  Surely there's nothing Popish\nin a vase or two of chrysanthemums!\"\n\nMr. Kestern had been, however, obdurate.  \"We cannot have paper chains,\nPaul,\" he said, \"not even to please you.  I should have thought you, a\nbudding poet, would have especially disliked them!  And as to flowers\nbehind the Table, you know it's not our custom.\"\n\nPaul, as usual, persisted.  \"Of course I don't like the paper,\" he\nsaid, \"but that's not the point.  And if a custom is good, why refuse\nit because Mohammedans or heathens, let alone Catholics, practice it?\"\n\n\"Don't argue with your father, my son,\" begged Mrs. Kestern, timidly.\nShe hated argument.  Besides Mr. Kestern was above criticism.\n\n\n\n(5)\n\nThat Christmas night, there was a last carol singing.  Dr. Barnardo's\nHomes had already benefitted heavily as a result of the Endeavourers'\nefforts, and, truth to tell, the band of young people went singing that\nevening under the twinkling, frosty sky more because they liked each\nother's company than for charitable reasons.  Mr. Derrick had been\noutvoted, and, true Christian democrat, he had given in.  They went\ntowards a new, wealthy suburb of Claxted, not far from the edge of the\ncountry and Hursley Woods, and they sang here and there with great\nsuccess.  At last, as, far off, the Town Hall clock boomed eleven, Mr.\nDerrick nervously declared for home.  It was cold, he said, and he was\nsure they were all tired.  In the deserted street of curtained and\nmysterious villa windows, the moon glittering on the frosty road, the\nlittle knot of young people prepared to go their several ways.\n\nPaul, wrapped to the ears in his overcoat, stood by Edith altogether\ndelightful and attractive in her furs.  Albert Vintner was collecting\nhymn-books.  He came up to them and hesitated.  \"May I see you home,\nMiss Thornton?\" he asked.\n\n\"It's out of your way, Vintner,\" said Paul.  \"I can do it.\"\n\nThe young shop-assistant ignored him.  \"It's the last night of the\ncarols,\" he said to Edith.\n\nThe girl flushed, ill at ease.  Paul realised, suddenly, that they were\nat a crisis.  For a second or two it seemed to him that the small group\nabout them stood still watching, that the very stars listened.  Then he\nmade up his mind and descended into the arena.\n\n\"Well, Miss Thornton,\" he said easily, \"you must choose between us, it\nseems.  We can hardly both of us see you home.  Which is it to be?\"\n\nEdith turned to the other and held out her hand.  \"I practically\npromised Mr. Kestern before,\" she said.  \"Good-night, Mr. Vintner, and\nthank you for asking me.\"\n\nThe young fellow took her hand with a muttered good-evening, and turned\naway.  Paul felt reproached.  \"Good-night, Albert,\" he said, with a\nring of friendliness.  \"I'm sorry I was before you.  Another time,\nperhaps.\"\n\nVintner moved off after the others, and Edith and Paul walked a little\nup the road.  Their turning lay on the right, but at the corner Paul\nhesitated.  \"It will only take a quarter of an hour longer,\" he said.\n\"Let's go home by the field-path to Coster Lane.  Probably your people\nwon't expect you till midnight.\"\n\nShe nodded without words, and the turn to the left hid them in a minute\nfrom the least chance of observation by the others.  Before them the\nroad ran straight ahead in the clear night, till the villas thinned,\nand it became a scarcely-used way, and finally a half-country footpath\nby a couple of fields.  Paul drew her arm through his in silence, and\nthey fell into step together.  They had been singing a carol with a\nhaunting refrain about a night of wonder, a night of grace.  It rang in\nhis head now, and he could have sung as they walked.  Every yard\ndeepened a sense of exaltation in him.  This serene Christmas night, he\nand Edith alone in it, the world wide and wonderful--oh, it was good to\nlive.\n\nThe paved footpath became a gravelled walk, and the walk, a mere track.\nThey were on the far edge of the town.  Across the stubble, a line of\nnot yet doomed elms stretched delicate bare twigs clear in the\nmoonlight, and the stars swung emmeshed in their net.  A half-built\nhouse flung a deep shadow across their path, and Paul stopped without\nwarning on its verge.  He had realised suddenly that his companion was\nvery silent and he wanted to see her.  A little swing of his arm\nbrought the girl face to face with him, and he looked down into her\neyes.  So he looked a minute, and then very slowly he bent his head,\nand, still with his eyes on hers, their lips met.  At that soft, warm,\nfragrant, unaccustomed touch, his heart leapt and great waves of\nemotion surged and tore within him.\n\n\"Oh!\" cried Edith, and fell back from him.\n\nThe two stood quite still.  Paul swallowed once or twice before he\ncould speak.  Then: \"Edith,\" he whispered foolishly, and again: \"Edith.\"\n\n\"Oh, Paul!\" she cried, \"Paul!  Paul! ... Oh, I never meant to let you\ndo it!\"\n\nHer words recalled the boy to his senses.  He took her two hands, and\nshe did not stay him.  \"Edith,\" he said exultantly, \"you're mine, now,\nmine!  Christmas night, too!  Oh, it's wonderful, just wonderful!\"\n\n\"No, no, _no!_\" she cried, almost fiercely.\n\n\"No?\" he queried, bewildered.  \"What do you mean?  You let me kiss you.\nYou love me, Edith, don't you?  You must!  You couldn't have kissed me\nlike that if you hadn't loved me!\"\n\n\"Don't, don't, Paul!\" she cried again, and bent her head, trying to\nrelease her hands.\n\nSomething that was almost anger surged up in him.  He drew her to him.\n\"What do you mean, Edith?\" he demanded.  \"I love you, do you hear?  I\nsee now, I have been loving you for a long time.  I love you with all\nmy heart.  Don't you love me?\"\n\nAt that new note in his voice, she faced him bravely.  \"Paul, dear,\"\nshe said, \"listen.  I do love you, God knows I do, but--but--well, your\npeople would hate it if they knew.  (Paul made an angry movement, but\nshe checked him.)  No, listen.  They would say you're too young; that\nyou ought not to think of such things now; that--that----  Oh, you\nknow.  Don't make it hard for me.  Your mother would hate you to marry\na girl like me.\"\n\nPaul stared into her sad young face in silence for a moment, but his\nheart sank.  Then: \"Mother hardly knows you,\" he said miserably.\n\n\"But she knows my mother,\" said the girl, simply.\n\nPaul knew exactly what she meant.  Vividly, he saw it all.  His gift of\nkeen imagination aided him.  He saw his mother's surprised, pained,\nworried look; his father's perplexity.  But he pushed it from him.\n\"Look here,\" he began.\n\n\"One minute, Paul, dear.  Oh, Paul, do listen to me!  I know what\nyou're going to say, and I love you for it.  Perhaps, one day, I'll let\nyou say it.  After all, in the end, that will be for us to decide.  But\nstill I ought not to have kissed you.  No, really I ought not.  You've\ngot your work to do.  You don't know what God will call you to.  You're\nso wonderful, Paul, dear--you with all your power of speaking and\nwriting and learning.  You don't know how wonderful you are to me,\nPaul.  I don't see why you like me a bit.  But _I_ won't stand in your\nway.  You must go on, and find out what God wants you to do, and go and\ndo it.  And then, then, perhaps--later on----  Oh, Paul, say something!\nI--I can't say--any more.\"  The tears stood in her eyes.  Her voice\nchoked.\n\nHe drew her to him and put one arm round her.  She made a little\nmovement to resist, but in doing so, shot a glance at him and at what\nshe saw let him have his way.  Then, in the luminous winter dark, he\npeered down at her, and took her hand, and studied the oval of her\nface, and her little ears, and the stray hair that escaped from her fur\ncap.  Love at any rate has this in common with true religion, that it\nawes a man.\n\n\"I can't tell you all I feel,\" he declared at last, speaking very\nslowly.  \"Edith, _I_ don't know you yet.  You're very, very wonderful,\nlittle girl.  And you're such heaps bigger than I--that's what I see\nmost clearly.  Edith, will you at least let me see you and talk to you?\nI'm beginning to be worried, and I believe you're just the person I've\nbeen wanting to talk to about it all.  Will you let me?  And will you\ntell me just what you think?  Shall we have it as a secret between us,\nthat you help me like that?\"\n\n\"Oh, Paul!  Could I?  May I?\"\n\n\"It's _will_ you,\" he said, smiling.\n\n\"You know I will.  I think there's nothing I wouldn't do for you,\nPaul,\" she said.\n\nHe kissed her again, then, gently, and she suffered him.\n\nThey made an odd couple as they walked home together.  For a reason he\ncould not have explained, Paul saw so many things clearly--or thought\nhe saw--that Christmas night under the stars.  He put into words the\ngrowing criticism he was feeling of his father's traditional outlook on\nlife and religion.  Explaining things to her, they became clearer to\nhimself.  He set before her, one by one, the straws that had been\nblowing past him on the wind.  And he had chosen well, for Edith\nThornton understood.\n\n\"I don't see why evangelicalism should be all pitch-pine and Moody and\nSankey,\" he grumbled.  \"I don't see why things good in themselves\nshould be wrong simply because even Roman Catholics do them.  I don't\nlove our Lord less because I rather like to see chrysanthemums behind\nthe Holy Table.\"\n\n\"Do you love Him more if they are there?\" she asked.\n\n\"No, of course not.  At least--no; I _will_ say no.  Not that, at all.\nBut the beauty of things reflects Him somehow.  It's easier to worship\nin an atmosphere of beauty, Edith.  Or it is for me.  And surely that\ncan't be wrong!\"\n\n\"But suppose He comes to us with His face so scarred that there is no\nbeauty that we should desire Him?\"\n\nPaul frowned a little.  \"That's not exactly what I mean,\" he said.\n\"There's no point in our making things ugly.\"\n\n\"No.  But--oh, I hardly like to say it to you!--but don't you think,\nsomehow, one rather forgets about all that, seeing Him?\"\n\nIn silence they reached the bottom of her street, and stood a moment.\n\"Edith,\" he exclaimed impulsively, \"you're heaps better than I.  Pray\nfor me, darling, won't you?\"\n\n\"Oh, Paul, of course.  And you mustn't say that.\"\n\n\"I shall.  It's true....  Edith, when shall I see you again?\"\n\n\n\n(6)\n\nThe days sped by.  They made a curious kaleidoscope as each morning\ngave a new twist to life.  Paul read most mornings; spent an afternoon\nand evening or two in town with Strether who lived in South Kensington;\nand mostly took his share in parochial gaieties and more serious\nbusiness for the rest of the time.  He did not find it in the least\ndull.  He could still sit in a clothes' basket slung on a stout pole\nbetween two chairs, and dust four others precariously with the aid of a\nbig stick, amid the tumultuous laughter of a Mothers' Meeting Tea.  Or\nhe decorated the Infants' Christmas Tree, distributed sweets at the\nSunday School Treat, boxed with boys at the Lads' Brigade, conducted a\nprayer meeting at the Christian Endeavour, called for Madeline on\nSunday mornings and took her in to supper at sundry parties.  Except at\nthe latter, he met Edith frequently and revelled in the understanding\nthere was between them.  Moreover there was hardly the suspicion of any\nrift between him and his father.\n\nYet, once or twice, both Paul and Mr. Kestern were aware that things\nwere not wholly unchanged.  And possibly the last night of the old year\noffers the best example.\n\nThe Vicar had taken the Mission Hall Watch Night Service, and his son\nhad gone into the vestry to seek him when it was over.  He had entered\nwithout knocking as he was used to do, and found his father facing a\nstained, unshaven, ragged tramp in the little wood and iron room, with\nits incandescent light, photographs of previous vicars, shelf of hymn\nand prayer books, and illuminated texts.  He apologised, and made to go\nout.\n\n\"Come in, Paul,\" said his father.  \"Our brother here is seeking the\nLord while He may be found and you can help us both.  Sit down a\nminute, will you.\"\n\nPaul watched, while his father endeavoured to penetrate the other's\nbewildered intelligence.  The boy saw at once that the fellow was\nmaudlin with drink, but he did not estimate the extent to which \"A few\nmore years shall roll,\" and the hot air of the crowded hall, were also\nentering into the process of conversion.\n\n\"My brother,\" said his father again, earnestly, \"it has all been done\nfor you.  You have only to accept.  Don't take my word for it; let us\nsee what God says.  Listen.  (He turned the pages of his Bible\nimpressively as though he did not know the texts by heart; but he was\nwholly unconscious of posing.)  'Though your sins be as scarlet, they\nshall be as white as wool....  Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise\ncast out....  The Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.'  And\nwhat then?  The Apostle sums it up: '_Therefore_, being justified by\nfaith, we HAVE PEACE with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ.'  That is\nall.  Claim God's free, perfect salvation, and you HAVE PEACE with God.\"\n\n\"Aye, aye, mister, but I bain't be no scholard.  I've not bin so bad as\nsome blokes I knows on.  A glass o' beer now and agin, Gawd Almighty 'E\ncarn't send a bloke to 'ell for that.  Can 'E now, mister?  I want ter\nbe saved, that's wot _hi_ want.  Ter be saved.  An' Gawd's truth, I\ndon't know wot'll do fur a doss ternight, Gawd's struth, mister....\"\n\n\"Let us pray,\" said the clergyman suddenly.\n\nThe tears stood in Paul's eyes, as, his face hidden in his hands\nagainst the rough wooden bars of his chair, he heard his father wrestle\nwith his God for the man's soul.  He never heard his father pray thus\nwithout seeing a mental picture from an old Bible of his childhood,\nwherein Jacob, an ill-drawn figure in a white robe girt up about his\nwaist, twisted back with his shrunken sinew from an angel with an odd\ndistorted face like the one that a crack in the ceiling made with the\nwall in the candle-light above his bed.  Even now, he saw it again.\n\"Lord, we will not let Thee go except Thou bless us.  Have mercy upon\nthis poor storm-tossed soul.  Give him joy and peace in believing.  Let\nthere be joy in the presence of the angels of God this night over one\nsinner returning.\"\n\nOut in the sharp air, he took his father's arm.  \"Daddy, he was\nhalf-drunk.  Do you think he understood?\"\n\n\"Nothing is impossible with God, Paul, always remember that.  If the\nMaster could save the dying thief, He can save him.\"\n\nA dozen silent paces, and then: \"But, father, suppose he were run over\nand killed on his way to the lodging house, this night, as he is, do\nyou think he would go straight to heaven?\"\n\n\"Yes, Paul, I do--by the infinite grace of God.  Drunk as he was, I\nbelieve he knew what he said when he repeated: 'Just as I am--I come,'\nafter me.\"\n\n\"But--but----\"  Paul found it hard to put his new thought into words.\n\n\"Well, Paul, laddie, out with it.\"\n\n\"Well, dad, I don't see how that could have made him fit for heaven.\"\n\nHis father's hand tightened on his arm.  \"Nor I, Paul, nor any man.\nBut do you suppose that God will go back on His pledged and written\nWord?\"\n\nAnd then, just then, a memory had shot through Paul's mind.  \"Which of\nthe ten score different versions?\" Manning had queried again, coolly.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nFATHER VASSALL\n\nGod, if there be any God, speaks daily in a new language, by the\ntongues of men; the thoughts and habits of each fresh generation and\neach new-coined spirit throw another light upon the universe, and\ncontain another commentary on the printed Bibles; every scruple, every\ntrue dissent, every glimpse of something new, is a letter of God's\nalphabet; and though there is a grave responsibility for all who speak,\nis there none for those who unrighteously keep silence and conform?  Is\nnot that also to conceal and cloak God's counsel?--ROBERT LOUIS\nSTEVENSON: _Lay Morals_.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\nMr. Tressor had not yet returned from lecturing, the man said in\nresponse to Paul's knock, but he had left word that he would not be\nmore than a few minutes late.  Would Mr. Kestern come in?  Mr. Manning\nwas also coming to luncheon.\n\nAs the door of the don's keeping-room closed behind him, Paul looked\nround eagerly.  He walked over to the fireplace and stood on the rug,\nwith his back to the fire as if he owned the place.  His eyes roved\nround the remembered room.  There were the bookshelves, with the hid\nelectric lights at the top of them as he knew, in which, during just\nsuch a moment of waiting, he had once looked for Mr. Tressor's own\nworks and found none.  There were the few odd vivid little\npictures--the amateur photograph of Tressor himself with a leaping pack\nof dogs, the cartoon from Vanity Fair, the water-colour of the old\nhouse in the Weald, Loggan's print of the College, an impression of the\ngorge at Ronda, and a pencil sketch of the Chelsea Embankment.  There\nwere the few big comfortable chairs; the little table with its fat\ncigarette-box, a new book or two, the ivory paper-cutter; the tall\nfirescreen, not used now, of faded tapestry; the window-seat.  He\nglanced through the high wide windows.  The bare trees of the Fellows'\ngarden were wet and dismal in a January mist, but seen so, Paul had an\nodd feeling that they were quiet and dignified.  In short, it was the\nold room, with its air of serene, silent waiting, in which the boy had\nalready seen visions and dreamed dreams.\n\nMr. Tressor came in, big, slow, kindly.  He shook hands with Paul,\nsmiling upon him.  \"Well, glad to be up again?  Been writing more\nverses in the Vac., eh?\"\n\nPaul shook his head.  \"I could not write at home, somehow,\" he said.\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"I don't know.  I was too busy, perhaps, for one thing.\"\n\n\"Reading?\"\n\n\"No, not much.\"  (Paul hesitated.  Then he spoke out.)  \"You see\nthere's no end to do in a parish, Christmas-time.\"\n\nThe other nodded with a comprehension at which Paul wondered slightly.\n\"I know.  School treats, socials and prayer meetings.  I admire the\npeople who do them enormously.  I suppose you had your full share?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Paul, and was silent, remembering Edith.  It was\nodd--Tressor and Edith.  And he liked both.\n\nManning was announced.\n\nManning entered easily, nodded to Tressor, apologised for being late,\nand greeted Paul.  \"Hullo, Paul,\" he said, \"had a good Vac.?\"\n\n\"We were just talking of his manifold activities,\" said Tressor, \"but I\nexpect luncheon is ready.  Let's go in.\"\n\nPaul felt a little out of it during the meal.  The others talked so\neasily of places, people and things which were foreign to him.\nPersonalities were mentioned of whom you never heard at Claxted.  He\nfelt an absurd desire to retaliate in kind and tell of a restaurant\nlunch with Gipsy Smith after a big meeting in Westminster Chapel and of\nveteran Mr. Henry Hutchinson's visit to his father.  But quite possibly\nneither Tressor nor Manning had ever heard of the World's Conference of\nChristian Endeavour or of the Children's Special Service Mission.\nAlso, though he knew what to do at table of course, he was rather on\nhis guard.  He was self-conscious when he had to help himself from the\ndishes with which the man served him.  At home, helpings were handed to\nyou.\n\nThey went back to the study for coffee, and it was then that Manning\nremarked disconnectedly to the don: \"I hear Father Vassall is coming\ninto residence at the Catholic Church this term.\"\n\n\"Yes.  He's a great preacher in his way.  Have you heard him?\"\n\n\"No, but I shall go.  Catholicism interests me.  There's so much more\nto be said for it than for any other form of religion it seems to\nme,--and just as much to be said against it.\"\n\nTressor laughed, and looked across at Paul.  \"What do you say to that,\nKestern?\" he asked.\n\nPaul glanced from one to the other, and flushed slightly.  \"There seems\nto me nothing in the world to be said for it,\" he said bravely.\n\n\"There you are, Manning,\" laughed Tressor kindly.  \"And I must say I\nagree with Kestern in the main.\"\n\nManning crossed his legs, and lit a cigarette.  \"Do you?\" he said, in\nhis cool, attentive, but cynical way.  \"I suppose you would.  But I\nshall divide my foes, after the Apostolic manner.  You do not believe\nin dogma; Paul does.\"\n\n\"Surely----\" began Paul, and stopped, wishing he had not begun.\n\n\"Well?\" queried Tressor.\n\nPaul took the plunge.  \"Well, you believe in our Lord, sir, don't you?\nAnd surely the Atonement and the Resurrection stand for dogmas.\"\n\nManning and Tressor exchanged a glance.  Manning laughed.  \"'Now the\nSadducees say there is no resurrection,'\" he quoted.\n\nPaul looked bewildered; the elder don a little grave.  \"I expect we do\nnot both interpret the story in quite the same way, Kestern,\" he said.\n\n\"But, sir,\" said Paul earnestly, \"what two ways can there be?  The\nwhole of Christianity is based on our Lord's Resurrection.  'If Christ\nbe not raised, your faith is vain.'\"\n\nManning settled himself into his chair.  \"Do go on,\" he said.\n\"Theology interests me enormously.  I told you, Tressor, that Paul here\nwould convert you if he could.\"\n\nThe boy felt uneasy.  He did not want to argue and could not bring\nhimself to speak to the don as Manning did, though he was well aware\nthat Tressor would not in the least have resented it.  But he felt he\nmust say something, and his evangelical upbringing taught him what to\nsay.  \"Surely the Bible story is simple enough,\" he said.\n\nTressor moved, for him, a trifle impatiently.  \"You think so, do you?\"\nhe said.\n\n\"Oh, yes,\" said Paul, much more sure of his ground now.\n\n\"I confess I do not.  What of the discrepancies in the story?  What of\nthe late additions to the text?  And what, still more, of the\natmosphere in which it was written?  But I grant you, in a different\nsense, that the Bible picture is simple enough.  Jesus is to me a\nsimple, brave, kindly man whose gospel has never been transcended and\nwhose spirit will never die.  If you allow for Eastern imagination and\nCatholic reductions, it is indeed simple enough.\"\n\nPaul heard bewildered.  He knew, of course, that Higher Critics\nexisted, a strange, disloyal, un-Christian few, mostly to be found in\nGermany--and left there by sensible people.  It ought, perhaps, to be\nexplained that he had taken a scholarship in history and was reading\nfor that Tripos.  At Claxted, a theological degree seemed unnecessary.\nThe Gospel was so simple that the Bishop's examination, to be taken in\ndue course, was training all sufficient for a Christian minister.\nGipsy Smith, for example, knew little theology.\n\n\"But,\" he stammered, \"our Lord was God.  He died to save us.  If He had\nnot been God, what power could there have been in the Cross?  What\nmerit in His Blood?\"\n\nA little silence fell on them all.  Tressor, after his fashion, was\nsmoking cigarettes in hasty puffs, extinguishing one after another in\nhis ash-tray half burned.  Manning stared thoughtfully and a little\ncynically into the fire.  Paul's questions hung in the air, and his\nlisteners' silence answered them.\n\n\"I wonder how long you will believe all that,\" queried Tressor gravely.\n\n\"All my life,\" answered Paul resolutely, his embarrassment gone.  \"I\nhope to spend it preaching the Gospel.  It seems to me there is nothing\nelse worth doing.  What good is there in\"--(he nearly said \"all this,\"\nbut checked himself in time)--\"in learning, comfort, art, music,\nanything, except as aids to this?  What else matters besides this?\nSir, surely you see that!\"\n\nIt was odd that the don should echo Maud Thornton, but he did.  \"You\nwould make us all foreign missionaries, I suppose,\" he said.\n\nOnly for a moment did Paul hesitate.  Then: \"Yes,\" he said simply, \"I\nsuppose I would.  Not all are called to the same sort of work, of\ncourse, but it should be all to that end.\"\n\nAgain his listeners exchanged glances, but this time they could afford\nto smile.  \"I fear I should make a poor missionary,\" said Tressor.\n\nPaul looked at him, distressed.  He had not meant to bring the\nconversation to such a head, but what else could he have said?  The don\nsaw his uneasiness, and rose, smiling.\n\n\"Well, Kestern,\" he said, \"don't think I mind in the least your saying\nwhat you think.  Besides you are flattering; I confess no one yet even\nthought he saw a potential missionary in me.  But however tight you sit\nto your dogmas, I should give ear to the other side also, if I were\nyou.  After all, you are up here for that, aren't you?  And now I'm\nwalking with the Master this afternoon, and I fear I've got to go.\nCome again sometime.  Look in any evening.  If I'm busy, I'll say so.\nAnd bring me some more verses.  Good-bye.\"\n\nPaul, on his feet, ventured however one more direct question.\n\"Good-bye, sir,\" he said, \"but it worries me.  Do tell me one thing.\nDo you honestly mean that, as you read your Bible, you do not think\nChrist dogmatic?\"\n\n\"Honestly, I do not,\" said Tressor, and nodded kindly.  \"Good-bye,\" he\nsaid again.\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nIt was Manning who enlightened Paul on the other's attitude, however,\nmuch later in the term.  Spring had made an unexpectedly early\nappearance, and they took a Canader to paddle up the Backs.  The\nsunlight lay soft and lovely on the mellow walls, the slow-moving black\nriver, the willows just breaking into new green, and the trim lawns.\nPaul as yet, however, had not begun to attempt to find refuge in beauty\nand to rest his soul upon it.  He even surveyed the Spring flowers on\nthe banks of Trinity Fellows' garden with dissatisfaction.  Tressor's\nkindly but obviously unmoved criticism of a rapture of his read to him\nthe night before on the parallel of natural and supernatural\nresurrection, had occasioned more immediately his present attitude.  \"I\ndon't understand it at all,\" he remarked to Manning, digging his paddle\nferociously into the water and forcing his companion to lean hard on\nhis in the stern to escape striking the centre arch of Trinity Bridge.\n\n\"Well, let us avoid a collision anyway,\" said Manning good-humouredly.\n\"But look here, Paul, Tressor's position is simple enough.  You read\nthe Bible as if it were yesterday's _Times_; he doesn't.  He considers,\nfirst, the difficulty of choosing between the variations in the many\ntexts; then the difficulty of getting back behind fifth-century\nmanuscripts to the original; then the difficulty of knowing how much\nthe original owes to the unscientific mind and Eastern imagination of\nthe writer.  Heavens!  You read history!  Do you not do the same thing\nwith Bede and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and all the rest of the musty\nstuff?  Well, then, in his mind the Christ shrinks to shadowy\nproportions.  He remains possibly the most interesting and arresting\nfigure in history, but that is all.  You see, resurrection or no, all\nthose events are nineteen hundred years behind us.\"\n\nPaul leant back in his canoe and forgot to paddle.  \"Oh,\" he said at\nlast, \"I see.\"\n\nThe other looked at him curiously.  \"You're an odd fish, Paul,\" he\nsaid.  \"What do you see?\"\n\n\"I see the difference between Tressor's Christianity and--and my\nfather's.\"\n\n\"Which is?\"\n\n\"Tressor reads about Christ, but my father knows Him.  He is more real\nto my father, Manning, than I am.\"\n\nThe curious look died out of Manning's face, but an affectionate ring\ncrept into his voice.  \"Lord, Paul, you're a rum ass, you know,\" he\nsaid, \"but you are rather an interesting one.\"\n\nPaul was due at Dick Hartley's for tea, and as soon as they had landed,\nhe rushed round to his friend.  It was odd, he thought as he went, how\none suddenly saw things, by some curious indefinable process, which one\nhad known, one thought, for years.  After all, he had preached on the\nBlind Beggar in St. John's Gospel a score of times one way and another,\nyet he had never really understood it until this afternoon.  He had\n\"known\" Christ ever since he could well remember, but somehow it was\nthe Christ of the printed page that he had known.  Alive to-day, yes,\nbut not alive in such a way that His living actually solved\nintellectual doubts.  To Paul, the Cambridge streets had suddenly\nbecome the streets of a New Jerusalem.  From old gables to modern\nshop-fronts, they had all at once become intimate and tender.  He\nthought, even as he ran, that just as he had come to dwell tenderly on\na mental image of Edward Street because Edith lived, moved, and had\nassociation there, so now the whole world was transfigured before him.\nChrist moved in it, and he knew Christ.\n\nHe rattled up the wooden stairs to his friend's room and burst in\nalmost without knocking.  Dick was reading in an arm-chair and a kettle\nhissed on the hob.  He looked up from his book.\n\n\"Heavens!  What's the matter?\" he asked, smiling.\n\nPaul slowed down, shut the door, and came over to the fire, his face\nshining.  \"I say, Dick,\" he said, \"do you realise what it means that we\nknow Christ?\"\n\nThe older man stared, as well he might have done.  Then a rather\nenvious expression crept into his face.  Wistfulness was scarcely what\none thought of in connection with matter-of-fact, athletic,\nsober-minded Dick Hartley, but it was there at that moment.\n\n\"Ah,\" he said shortly, and was silent.\n\n\"Of course I thought I did,\" poured out Paul excitedly, walking up and\ndown, \"but I begin to think I never have till this afternoon.  I see,\nnow, what's the matter with Tressor and Manning and all the rest of\nthem.  They think Christ is a story out of a book, Dick.  Even I\" (all\ninnocent of self-righteous priggishness was Paul), \"even I thought of\nHim only as emotionally alive, so to speak.  But He lives, Dick, He\nlives!  We know Him!  We aren't worried by criticism or any of their\nintellectual doubts, because we know Him.  Don't you see?\"\n\nDick closed Harnack's _Acts of the Apostles_ and put it on one side.\n\"You have a great gift of faith, Paul,\" he said.\n\n\"Faith!  It isn't faith!  It's sight, I tell you.  Why, man, look here,\nif Manning were to come gravely to my room to-night and argue that you\nwere a myth, what the blazes do you think I should say?  I should laugh\nin his face!  'Why, I had tea with him this afternoon,' I should say!\nAnd it's the same with Jesus.  Dick\"--the eager voice hushed a\nlittle--\"we're having tea with _Him_ this afternoon.\"\n\nHartley did not laugh.  He half glanced round.  \"Can one act on that\naltogether?\" he queried.\n\nPaul flung out his hand with an eager gesture.  \"Why not?\" he cried.\n\"One should act on it absolutely I think.\"\n\nHartley spoke slowly.  \"Well, but would Christ stay here, read Harnack,\ntake in a newspaper\" (his eyes roved the room), \"row, get new\nwindow-curtains, and--and fall in love?\"  His gaze rested on a portrait\non the mantelpiece.\n\nPaul's hand fell to his side.  He, too, glanced round the simple,\ncommonplace, in the opinion of most people severely plain room.  Then\nhe dropped into a chair.  \"You must ask Him,\" he said slowly.\n\n\"Suppose I have?\"\n\n\"Then you must do what He says.\"\n\nDick was altogether more slow, more solid, than Paul.  He began to make\ntea.  \"It's odd,\" he said, busy over the cups, \"but I'm not sure that I\nknow.\"\n\n\"Ah,\" said Paul, still triumphant and impetuous, \"I asked you if you\nreally knew Him, Dick.\"\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nIn Hursley Woods that vacation, Paul explained it all to Edith.  They\nwere seated side by side on a fallen log, and all around them the fresh\nblue of the wild hyacinths was unstained as Paradise.  They lit the\ndull day with a radiance of their own.  Brown and green and grey blent\nabout them and faded into distance, and he held her hand.  The two had\njust kissed with a solemn virginal innocence.  They were glad, but not\ngay.  Francis of Assisi would have wondered at them, had he been there.\nAs it was one of his brethren, a big blackbird with a bright enquiring\neye, emphatically did so.  It probably struck him that these restrained\nhumans were out of place in such a vivid, tingling, riotous life as\nthat of a wood in spring.  He hopped off to look for a worm.\n\nPaul renewed the conversation that the kissing had interrupted.  \"You\nsee, Edith, dear,\" he said, \"it's so illogical to believe one thing and\nact another.  What are the realities of life?  God, and a lost world,\nand Christ our Saviour.  What does anything matter beside them?  Both\nDick and I feel that everything--_everything_--ought to be surrendered\nto Him.  Even things good in themselves must go down before the awful\nnecessity of preaching the Gospel.  Mind you, I don't speak of learning\nquite as I did.  I see, for example, that if I get a first in my\nHistory, it will be of use in the Church.  But all the rest--do you\nsee?\"\n\nShe nodded slowly.  \"Yes, in a way,\" she said.\n\n\"Look here\"--he jumped up eagerly--\"I'll give you an illustration.\nIt's a silly one, in a way, but it's all the better for that.  It's the\ncommonplace things people won't see.  In my rooms, last term, Donaldson\nand Strether and I--oh, and a man called Hannam--were discussing dress.\nDonaldson was saying that there was no reason why a Christian shouldn't\nwear decent socks--clocked, gay things like his own.  There was nothing\nwrong in them, he said.  I agreed, but I couldn't help it; I said:\n'Would Christ have worn them?  Would He have spent an extra shilling on\na yellow stripe in His socks when that shilling would send a Testament\nto China?'  Would He?  What do you think?\"\n\n\"He would not,\" she said.\n\n\"Exactly.\"  In his triumph, Paul sobered and sat down.  \"There's no\nescape,\" he said.\n\nEdith leant forward and prodded the soft earth with a stick.  \"Then\nyou'd wear the oldest clothes and live on just anything and have no\nhome and go about preaching,\" she said.\n\n\"Exactly,\" said Paul again.\n\n\"But what would happen to the world if everyone did that?\" queried\nEdith.\n\n\"That is not our concern,\" said Paul gravely.  \"I do not know and I do\nnot care.  But this I do know, if Christians started in to do that,\nthey'd--they'd--well, they'd turn the world upside down.  Which is\nexactly what the world said Paul and Barnabas were doing.\"\n\n\"And so it stoned them.\"\n\n\"So it stoned them.  You're quite right.  It was the Apostles' lives or\ntheir own.  Heathen Rome saw the issue admirably.  Heathen England\ndoesn't.  Why not?  Because Christians are no longer Apostolic.\"\n\nThe girl turned wide eyes on him.  \"But oh! Paul,\" she cried, \"think\nwhat that means!  It would mean giving up everything; it would mean\ndeath!\"\n\n\"'I can do all things through Christ that strengtheneth me',\" quoted\nPaul gravely.\n\nThe girl looked away.  The heart of the rich woods grew dim before her.\nShe fumbled for her handkerchief.\n\nVery tenderly the boy put his arm about her.  \"Edith, darling,\" he\nsaid, \"don't think I don't love you.  I don't think I've ever loved you\nmore than I do now.  But if Christ told us to put our love aside,--for\na while, down here perhaps,--could we refuse Him?\"\n\nAll the woman in her revolted.  \"I don't know!\" she sobbed.  \"I don't\nmind giving up everything else.  But I could help you.\"\n\nPaul's own eyes clouded.  \"Dear, darling Edith,\" he said, \"I know you\ncould.  And you would help too.  I expect you will.  Oh, I hope so--you\ndon't know how much!  But we ought to face the full bitterness of the\nCross, and then, if God makes it possible, take what He gives us very\ngratefully.  Surely you see that?\"\n\nThe girl dabbed at her eyes and rolled her handkerchief into a hard\nball.  Then she looked up at him with a wintry smile.  \"I shouldn't\nlove you so much if you weren't so awfully right always, Paul,\" she\nsaid.\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nIn his new eagerness, Paul sprang a mine on his father.  He went up to\ntown to meet Strether who had taken a couple of tickets for a matin\u00e9e\nof _Peter Pan_, with which play his friend's curious personality was\nviolently intrigued.  The artist in Paul revelled in the fairy tale,\nand deep called to deep before the boy who would not grow up.  But his\npassionate creed would not let him alone.\n\n\"It's all very well, Gus Strether,\" he said, arm in arm in Regent\nStreet, \"but do you think a girl ought to dress up like that in boy's\nclothes?  And what good does it do?  It's like sitting down to play a\nround game while the house is on fire!\"\n\nStrether grunted.  He was between the devil and the deep sea.  He loved\nPeter Pan with a deep love that was all the fonder for being buried so\ndeep in his queer hidden self, but he hated Pauline Chase--at least on\nthe picture postcards.  That, then, he passed over.  But the other he\nwould not pass.  \"You row, and eat chocolate biscuits in my rooms while\nthe house is on fire,\" he retorted.\n\n\"Only while waiting to get to work,\" persisted Paul.\n\n\"Might be at a prayer meeting,\" growled the other.\n\nPaul assented sadly.  \"I admit that's logical,\" he said.\n\nStrether lengthened his ungainly stride.  \"Balderdash,\" he muttered.\n\"If you tried to live at prayer meetings, you'd soon cease to live at\nall.  Go and see Peter Pan while you're waiting to get to work.\"\n\n\"It's a bad example.  People wouldn't understand.  But it's awfully\njolly.\"\n\n\"Thought you'd got a bloomin' text up in your rooms to make 'em\nunderstand.\"\n\nPaul stopped in the middle of Regent Street.  \"I've got it,\" he cried\nexcitedly.  \"I'll put a cross up as well--a big, plain, empty cross\nover my writing-table.\"\n\n\"Thought that was Popish.\"\n\n\"I don't care if it's Popish or not.  It's a symbol of Christ.  The\nshadow of it ought to lie everywhere and touch everything.  Come on,\nlet's go and get one now.  Mowbray's have them.  Come on.  There's time\nbefore tea.\"\n\nThe odd pair explored the premises of the Margaret Street shop.\nSecretly, Paul was moved by the beauty of the crucifixes, though his\nsoul was stirred by a host of Madonnas which should have been painted,\nhe said, quoting a Protestant tract, as if the Virgin were a woman of\nfifty, and were not.  Strether lurched around, grunting to himself.  He\nwas curious over most things.  Paul bought a big plain cross for his\nrooms, and, on second thoughts, a small silver one for his watchchain.\n\n\"Thought you ought to give all your money to the Chinese,\" said\nStrether.\n\nPaul laughed.  \"Old ass,\" he said; \"this is missionary work.\"\n\nMiss Bishop happened to be at his home as he unrolled his parcel.  She\nwas caustic and cynical.  \"My experience is that if you wear the cross\non your watch-chain, you soon cease to bear it in your heart,\" she said.\n\nPaul retorted hotly.  \"Why?\" he demanded.  \"It's that kind of saying\nthat we have got to disprove.  Christ is real to me.  I want to feel\nHim at every turn.  I want to give up all my life to the Cross.  This\nis only the sign of it, I know, but why should you argue that my\nwearing of the sign will make the thing itself unreal to me, just\nbecause some people wear it and have forgotten its meaning?\"\n\n\"But is it necessary, Paul?\" queried his mother gently.\n\n\"You don't understand, mother,\" said Paul.  \"Is it necessary to put up\nyour portrait in my rooms at Cambridge?  Can't I remember you without?\"\n\nHis mother sighed; that was so like Paul.  His father looked troubled.\n\"It's the thin end of the wedge, laddie,\" he said, \"so often.  We\ndon't, of course, object to the thing itself; it's only that we hate\nthe religion that has destroyed the truth of Christ while it has decked\nitself out with crosses.  Isn't the Saviour without the symbol enough\nfor you, my boy?  The old devil is so cunning, Paul, lad.\"\n\n\"And the cocksure folk are the people he gets first,\" added Miss Bishop.\n\n\"Then,\" said Paul shrewdly, \"you ought to look out, Miss Bishop.\"\n\n\"Paul,\" said his father sternly, \"you forget yourself.\"\n\n\n\n(5)\n\nYet one might almost have supposed that Miss Bishop had indeed stirred\nthe devil into action.  She would have said that he was positively\nwaiting for cocksure Paul that very first afternoon of the May term.\nHis emissary was a youthful-looking man, rather small, light and quick\nin movement, fair of complexion, with alert, keen, grey-blue eyes that\nperpetually brimmed over with humour, although the home of it was low\ndown in them, out of sight.  He was decorously dressed in black, but\nwith a rather shabby buttoned frock-coat, for he was careless of\nappearances, and when he spoke at first to strangers, or if he were\nunusually moved, there was often a little stammer in his voice.  He\nwas, in short, the Rev. Father Vassall, a Popish priest.\n\nPaul found him in Hannam's rooms, Hannam being the new acquaintance of\nthe previous term.  He kept in the rooms below Paul, who did not care\nfor him particularly, and had, indeed, done no more than call the first\nterm.  But Hannam was a lonely individual, of somewhat eccentric\ntastes, one of which was for verse.  He, therefore, admired Paul and\nPaul's writings, and latterly the two had seen more of each other.\nPaul knew, that he was a Catholic, but as one did not exactly associate\nreligion of any sort with Hannam, who, nevertheless, was tolerant of\nPaul's ardent faith, this fact had not obtruded as one might have\nexpected.\n\nThus, then, it chanced that Kestern arrived at St. Mary's a day before\nManning, and by an earlier train than that of any of his more intimate\nfriends.  He was chaffing old Tom about four of the clock in the First\nCourt, and on his way to his rooms knocked by an impulse at Hannam's\ndoor.\n\n\"Hallo, Kestern,\" cried Hannam joyfully as he entered, \"glad you're up\nearly.  Want some tea?  Do come in.  Let me introduce you--Father\nVassall, Mr. Kestern of this college.\"\n\nPaul found himself shaking hands with the Popish priest.  He did it\nnervously, but with obvious interest.  Odd as it may seem, Popish\npriests were as rare and as strange to Paul as Buddhist monks.  The\nstranger seemed to appreciate the fact.  His eyes twinkled.\n\"H-H-Hannam has t-told me a little about you, Mr. K-Kestern,\" he said.\n\nPaul laughed engagingly, and much more pleasantly than one ought to do\nwith the devil.  But then there was an air about this priest that was\namazingly boyish, eager and attractive.  You felt at once, as it were,\nhis radiant personality.  Besides there were no hypocrisies about\nFather Vassall, and he always came straight to the point.  His tone\nsuggested to Paul what he meant.\n\n\"That I am a fierce Protestant, I suppose you mean,\" smiled Paul.\n\n\"And a p-p-poet,\" stammered the little priest, \"which is very much\nnicer, Mr. Kestern.\"\n\n\"You two ought to have a lot in common,\" put in Hannam with lazy\ninterest.  \"Father Vassall was once a Protestant, Kestern, and he is\nstill a poet.\"\n\n\"Much b-better P-P-Protestant than p-p-poet,\" exploded the accused\nmerrily.\n\nThey drew round the fire with their tea.  Conversation ranged over\ntheir doings in the vacation and the prospects of the term, and Paul\nlearned that Father Vassall had been a wet Bob at Eton and cox of his\ncollege crew at the University.  Absurdly enough, he had never\nassociated such healthy doings with Papistry.  But Father Vassall had\nbeen a Protestant then.  This amazing fact held Paul's mind.  It\nstaggered him to think that Protestants could ever become Catholics.\nHe looked on the priest with amazement and real sorrow.  For one thing\nhe could never have known Christ....\n\nHannam asked Paul if he had been to the theatre; Paul confessed to\n_Peter Pan_; Father Vassall said that above all things he would like to\nsee it.\n\n\"Why don't you go then?\" enquired Paul carelessly.\n\n\"P-priests are forbidden to go to p-plays,\" said Father Vassall.\n\n\"What!\" cried Paul.  Ridiculously, it was his first shock.  He had\nalways understood that actors, actresses and Roman Catholics owned the\nsame master and were as thick as thieves, and here was a priest\nprofessing to be forbidden by his Church to go to the theatre at all!\nFather Vassall explained.  \"But we can go to m-m-music halls,\" he\nstammered, his eyes alight with mischief.\n\n\"Kestern prefers missionary meetings,\" said Hannam.\n\n\"Why,\" exclaimed the priest eagerly, his stutter all but disappearing\nin his enthusiasm; \"you should come and hear Father Kenelm then, Mr.\nKestern.  He has been t-thirty years in South America, and is utterly\ndevoted to our Lord and the Church's work out there.  He is over here\narranging for the publication of the B-Bible in one of the native\ntongues and is speaking in Cambridge this week.\"\n\n\"The Bible!\" cried Paul aghast.  \"But the Roman Catholic Church does\nnot allow people to read the Bible!\"\n\nHannam grinned, and threw himself back in his chair.  He anticipated\nenjoyment.\n\n\"Father Kenelm has himself translated, published and distributed some\nhalf-million B-Bibles in two or three l-l-languages,\" retorted the\npriest.\n\n\"But, Father,\" said Paul, utterly serious, copying Hannam's mode of\naddress and scarcely noticing it in his eagerness, \"you can't deny that\nyour Church burnt Bibles openly in St. Paul's Churchyard at the\nReformation.\"\n\n\"Never one,\" said Father Vassall.\n\nPaul stiffened angrily, though his anger relaxed into bewilderment at\nthe other's laughing face.  The priest leant forward.\n\n\"Have you ever seen a copy of what we did b-burn?\" asked the other.\n\nPaul shook his head.\n\n\"Well, I could show you one at the Presbytery.  We burnt P-Protestant\ncopies of the Holy Scripture which had been mutilated by the removal of\nwhole books and made worse than valueless by the bias of the\ntranslation and the m-marginal notes that had been added.\"\n\n\"Ah,\" said Paul, relieved, \"I see.  But that depends on what view you\ntake of the notes.\"\n\n\"Excuse me,\" retorted the other, \"it does not.  We burnt annotated and\nmis-translated portions of the Scriptures, not the Holy Bible.  Those\nare indisputable historical f-facts.  The annotation cannot be denied\nand the mis-translation is proved even by your own Revised Version.\nAnd as for motive, may I ask what you would advise a heathen convert of\nyours to do who was given a Bible containing notes which taught\nT-Transubstantiation and M-m-mariolatry?\"\n\n\"Burn it,\" said Paul instantly.\n\nThe little priest laughed.  \"Q-q-quite so,\" he exploded.\n\n\"He has you, Kestern,\" put in Hannam; \"admit it.  Have a cigarette,\nFather.\"\n\nPaul glanced from one to the other.  \"I do,\" he said frankly.  \"But,\nFather, you interest me enormously.\"  (He hesitated.)  \"May I speak\nfrankly?\"\n\nThe priest nodded, with a little quick gesture, his eyes searching the\nother's face.\n\n\"Well, you don't speak of Christ and--and so on, one little bit as I\nexpected a Roman Catholic to speak.  Missionaries too--I hardly knew\nyou had any.  And--well, aren't they nearly always political?  Aren't\nCatholic conversions nearly always forced?\"\n\nThe priest no longer smiled.  He looked away into the fire.  \"Do you\nsuppose it was force,\" he queried solemnly, \"which made South American\nIndians dig up their buried treasures valued at two hundred and fifty\nthousand pounds to give to Father Kenelm for the conversion of\nP-Protestant England?\"\n\nThere was magic in Father Vassall, and Paul's imagination saw a story\nin which, had the boot been on the other foot, he would have gloried.\n\nA little silence fell on the conversation.  Suddenly: \"What about the\nInquisition?\" he queried.\n\n\"You read h-history?\" the priest asked, a trifle sharply.\n\nPaul nodded.\n\n\"Then you ought to know that the Spanish Inquisition was political and\nnational, not Catholic.  You ought to know that some of the most\ndisreputable Popes protected such people as the Jews from the fury of\nfanatics.  You ought to know that the long-suffering of the average\nBishop in heresy trials was amazing.  Read Gairdner.  But waive all\nthat.  See here, would you hang a murderer?\"\n\n\"Of course.\"\n\n\"Then if you honestly b-believed that the teaching of heresy was the\nmurdering of innocent souls, and if you had the power, what would you\ndo to heretics?\"\n\nPaul's silence was sufficient answer to the old dilemma.\n\n\"As to actual penalties, the age did not see or feel as ours does.\nTorture was English law, remember, and boiling alive or pressing to\ndeath or breaking on the wheel ordinary legal p-punishments.\"\n\n\"Perhaps,\" said Paul, \"but such things were the punishments of crime.\nMary burnt Protestants for religion.\"\n\n\"Elizabeth r-racked and hung and disembowelled more Catholics than Mary\nProtestants,\" retorted Father Vassall.  \"Besides, ten times, no, thirty\ntimes as many suffered for Catholicism under Henry VIII. and Edward VI.\nthan for Protestantism all the way through English history.\"\n\nPaul looked hopelessly round the little room.  He saw himself, as it\nwere, hemmed in and overwhelmed by inexorable fact.  Besides, it was\nall so unexpected.  Did Claxted know nothing of these as of other\nthings?  Why, indeed, had he himself never seen them in this light?\n\n\"P-Protestantism,\" went on Father Vassall, \"taught that it belonged to\nevery man to pick and choose for himself among doctrines, and it\ntherefore had no m-manner of reason for what it did.  Calvin's burning\nof Servetus at Geneva really outrages d-d-decency.  And the P-Pilgrim\nFathers burnt more witches in a year in New England than the Catholic\nChurch heretics in pre-Reformation England in a c-century.\"\n\nPaul drew a long breath.  \"I--I must think,\" he said confusedly.  \"I\nhad no idea there was anything on your side.\"  He moved restlessly.\n\"But tell me one thing, don't you teach that all Protestants go to\nhell?\"\n\nHannam laughed outright.\n\nBut the priest did not.  He glanced up sharply.  \"Don't you\nevangelicals teach,\" he demanded with the quickness of a rapier thrust,\n\"that all unbelievers go to hell?\"\n\nPaul's face was a study.  Father Vassall chuckled youthfully as he\nlooked at him.  Then his own face changed and his eyes grew tender.\n\"I'm s-sorry,\" he said, stammering again.  \"That wasn't q-quite fair.\nBut we do not teach that, and I think you do.  No; when you get to\nP-Purgatory, I'll say to St. Peter: 'Let K-Kestern in; he's a g-g-good\nboy!'\"\n\nHe stood up and reached for his hat and stick.  \"Are you going home?\"\nasked Paul.  \"Might I walk a little way with you?\"\n\nThe priest nodded, and turned for a word with Hannam as Paul went to\nthe door.\n\nThey were an odd pair as they walked together through the streets.\nPaul was a good deal taller than his companion, and very serious.  The\nlittle priest was gay again, and chattered about odd subjects and\nCambridge topics.  When a don nodded to Vassall, it struck the\nundergraduate as something he had scarcely realised, that his new\nacquaintance had a great and growing reputation.  But not until they\nwere at the door of the Catholic church could Paul speak his mind.\n\n\"I must g-go in here now,\" said Father Vassall.  \"I've got to hear the\nconfessions of a lot of nuns much holier than I should be if I lived\nfor a c-century.\"\n\nLater on, Paul realised what an amazing light that threw upon the\nSacrament of Penance, but just at present he was too much occupied to\nconsider it.  \"Father,\" he said abruptly, \"will you forgive me if I ask\nyou one thing?  It isn't a usual thing, I know, and it's awfully\npersonal, but I can't help it.\"\n\nThe elder looked into the flushed, serious face of the undergraduater\nand kept his eyes upon him.\n\n\"W-what is it?\" he asked.\n\n\"Do you believe in the reality of Christ, here and now, on earth?\nCould you say you know Him?\"\n\n\"With all my heart,\" said the priest simply and unhesitatingly.\n\n\"Then may I call and see you some time?\" asked the boy, with a little\ncatch in his throat.\n\nFather Vassall named a day and time.\n\n\n\n(6)\n\nPaul's new friendship soon became the dominant interest of the term for\nhim.  Even the prospects of the May eight in which he rowed were less\nprominent in his mind.  His father's letters vigorously denouncing any\nintercourse with a Papist at all, only aroused his hostility.  Of what\nuse was he, if by this time he was not able to defend evangelical\nreligion?  Besides, he had rapidly become whole-heartedly aware that\nthere was no sort of question that Father Vassall loved Christ with a\nsincerity not exceeded by that of his own father.  Paul grew ever more\ncertain of that.  He wrote as much to Mr. Kestern, but Mr. Kestern\nwould not admit the other's sincerity at all.  At best, the priest was\na deluded, scheming fanatic out to trap his son.  The home letters grew\npassionate; Paul the more bewildered.  Authority and experience were at\ntheir first serious conflict within him, though he never phrased it so.\nInstead he opened his heart to the priest, who was enormously more\ncharitable to the boy's father than Mr. Kestern was to him.  And Paul\nread books, and talked to Dick.\n\nPossibly he reached a spiritual climax as early as that bright\nmidsummer day that the two of them took on the Upper River.  They had\nstarted in a Canader, and got as far as Haslingfield.  They had\nstripped among the gold of buttercups, and plunged down into the cool,\nclear water where the mazy reeds twisted this way and that in the slow\ncurrent.  They had lunched, and bathed again, and lying side by side in\nthe sun on the grass, had fixed up in common a good deal of the coming\nLong Vacation.  Then, settling into the canoe, they had drifted slowly\ndown-stream, Dick on his back lazily dipping a paddle now and again to\navoid an obstacle, and Paul reading.  Now the latter tossed the book\ndown, and spoke.\n\n\"Dick,\" he said vehemently, \"I can't help it.  They're right.\"\n\n\"Who are?\"\n\n\"Roman Catholics.\"\n\n\"Don't be an ass.\"\n\n\"I'm not an ass, or at least not over this.  Besides I don't mean that\nall they say and do is right.  Some things obviously can't be.  I shall\nnever be a Catholic.  But there is no way out of the difficulty about\nauthority.\"\n\n\"No?  Well, chuck me over that toffee, and for goodness sake don't say\nso at Port o' Man.\"\n\n\"But I say, Dick,\" said Paul earnestly, \"do listen.  It's worrying me\nno end.  You can't answer the dilemma, either.\"\n\n\"Don't want to,\" ejaculated the other.\n\nPaul stared at him.  \"But why not?\" he demanded.  \"Your attitude amazes\nme, and oddly enough, you are not unlike my father.  But anyway that\n_attitude's_ plainly wrong.  There must be a way out.  The fellow who\nsays: 'I'm an evangelical, and I won't discuss the question or hear\nanother side,' _must_ be wrong.\"\n\nDick grunted.\n\n\"Listen.  The very first time I called on Father Vassall, he had me.\nHe was frightfully kind; he understood about our Lord being real as\nnext to nobody seems to do, and he was entirely sympathetic about the\nCross just dominating everything.  In fact, he was evangelical over it.\nHe admitted he was.  He said Catholics were at one with evangelicals on\nthat point, and that their Religious Orders were composed of people who\nsimply lived the Gospel life.  But let's waive that.  He went on to ask\nme how, despite all that, I knew what our Lord had meant by His words.\n\n\"I said: 'Because it's in the Bible.'\n\n\"He said: 'Granted.'  (Notice there's nothing of Manning or Tressor\nabout him, belittling the Bible.)  'But' (he went on) 'let's be\ndefinite.  Take a text: _This is My Body_--what does it mean?'\n\n\"I said: 'It means the bread represents His Body broken for us.'\n\n\"He said: 'How do you know?  At any rate for fifteen hundred years\nnobody thought so.'\n\n\"I said: 'By prayer, by reason, and by the guidance of the Holy Spirit.'\n\n\"And then he said: 'That's what Luther said, and taught\nConsubstantiation.  That's what Calvin said and denied it.  That's what\nWesley said and taught the Real Presence, but not Consubstantiation or\nTransubstantiation.  That's what Spurgeon said and denied all three.\nAnd that's what General Booth said and dispensed with sacraments\naltogether.  If you care to shut yourself up with your Bible and pray,\nyou will probably arrive at some further opinion.  There are about\nthree hundred and sixty-five Protestant sects, and there is no reason\nwhy there should not be three hundred and sixty-six.'\"\n\n\"None at all,\" said Dick; \"and I say, sit steady, or you'll upset this\nbally canoe.\"\n\n\"But look here, Dick--hang it all, be serious.  He's right.  The Bible,\nbeing nineteen hundred years old and a written book, _is_ open to\nscores of different interpretations.  Mere praying obviously does not\nprevent such differences of opinion; it almost seems to increase them.\nAnd consequently, if there is not some one authoritative voice to\ninterpret, we might as well not have the Bible at all.  Or, like\nTressor, we must chuck dogma overboard.  Either way our position goes.\"\n\n\"And so?\"\n\n\"Well, so, if you will have it, we've got to find some better reason\nthan our view of the Bible for condemning the Catholic Church.  We've\ngot to find some further basis for our position.\"\n\nDick sat up and fell to paddling.  Paul watched him anxiously.  After a\nwhile, his companion began to whistle, and at that Paul could stand it\nno more.  \"Dick,\" he cried, \"do you mean to say you don't see it at\nall?\"\n\nDick Hartley trailed his paddle behind him and laughed a little.  \"Look\nhere, Paul,\" he said, \"you're too logical.  Religion is not a primary\ntextbook.  You and I know and love Christ, and we know that Roman\nCatholicism is not His Gospel.  The thing is so obvious that it isn't\nworth discussion.  Chuck it, then.  Pitch that book overboard and say\nyour prayers.\"  And he recommenced to paddle.\n\nPaul flushed beneath his summer tan.  He leant back and stared up\nthrough the weave of leaves and twigs above them, and when he spoke, he\nwas deliberate and cool.  \"Dick,\" he said, \"Christ is the truth, and\nyour attitude to truth seems to me simple blasphemy.\"\n\nDick laughed again.  \"You're a nice old ass,\" he said.\n\nPaul's letters were full of the burning subject, and he wrote at length\nto his father and to Edith.  His father was both incredulous and\nindignant at the boy's attitude, and his replies threw his son into\ndespair.  The elder man would admit nothing at all.  He declined to\nargue; he refused even to consider what seemed to Paul reasonable\nhistorical evidence.  Rome was the great Babylon, the Scarlet Woman,\nAnti-Christ; it had lied, tricked, tortured and sold its Master all\ndown the centuries.  \"I would sooner see a son of mine dead,\" wrote Mr.\nKestern, \"than a Roman Catholic.\"\n\nPaul, in an agony of doubts and fears, lived a tempestuous life.  To\nEdith he unburdened at length, and she, though utterly bewildered at\nthese new things, was at least sympathetic and understanding.  The\nburden of her cry was: \"How can it be, dear?\" but with the\nundercurrent--\"You must face it\"; \"your father is wrong to denounce\nyour honesty\"; but \"Don't be rash or act in a hurry.\"  To her, then,\nthe boy turned as to a new anchorage.\n\n\n\n(7)\n\nDonaldson and Strether saw the conflict only superficially; Manning\nmore truly, but as a cynic.  Thus one riotous night of a meeting of the\nnew Literary Society, Paul had had something of an ovation.  His little\nroom--its text still on the wall and the cross over the writing bureau\nin the corner--was beginning to reflect the growth of his artistic\nsense.  Landseer's pictures had gone, and in their place hung some\nengravings, rescued from old books dug out of the boxes in Charing\nCross Road, in neat ebony frames.  A \"Falkland\" graced one side of the\nmantelshelf, and quite a good \"Melanchthon\" by Holl the other.  The\nroom was lit with candles, and tobacco smoke drifted thickly, since a\nchildish rule of the society enforced smoking out of churchwardens.\nPaul, as president, had been overruled, and now always smoked one pipe.\nOn this particular occasion, he was smoking a second in great\nexultation, having just read his last and lengthiest poetical effort to\na really appreciative audience.  Not without significance, it dealt\nwith an Indian legend of the search for the white bird of truth.\n\n\"By Jove, damned good,\" burst out Donaldson.  \"Paul, you've the makings\nof a real poet.  What do you think, Manning?\"\n\n\"He may do stuff worth reading yet, if he'll take good advice.\"\n\n\"Which is?\" asked Paul.\n\nManning lit a cigarette, cigarettes being allowed after the solemn\npreliminaries.  \"You won't like it, Kestern,\" he said, \"but here it is.\nBurn that.  Get rid of it.  It's been good practice, and I should judge\nit's not at all bad, but don't sit tight to it.  Anything good in it\nwill stick and come out again; the second and third rate had better go\nup in smoke.\"\n\n\"Oh, cheese it all, Manning!  Show it to Tressor and get it pushed into\nsome magazine\"; and chorus of assent from the members backed Donaldson\nup.\n\nManning shook his head.  \"I know I'm right,\" he said.  \"Pass the cake,\nStrether.\"\n\nStrether disengaged his long form from the chair he occupied, and\npassed it.  \"More coffee?\" he grunted at Paul.\n\nPaul was watching Manning closely.  Then, suddenly: \"You are right,\" he\nsaid, and with a swift movement tore the thing in halves.\n\nDonaldson swore.\n\n\"Well, I'm damned!\" put in a member.  \"You silly blighter!\"\n\nManning finished his cake, and stood up.  He looked round amusedly,\nstretching himself.  \"I reckon that finishes the sitting anyway,\" he\nsaid.  \"Come over to my rooms a little later, Kestern, will you?\nGood-night, you people.\"\n\nThe company dispersed, all save Strether, who sat on imperturbably, his\neyes on the ceiling.  He refused to smoke, and had returned to dull\nsuits and heavy boots, with an occasional concession to society in the\nshape of a tie or waistcoat.  Paul, having seen the last down the\nstairs, and exchanged a fusillade of sugar with the departing\nDonaldson, re-entered the room.  He shut the door and looked round\ndispiritedly.  A candle was guttering on the bureau; heavy smoke hung\nin the air; dirty plates and cups littered the table; one picture was\nawry.  He walked to the window and opened it wide, to let in the clear\nnight air.  Stars shone serenely aloft and mirrored themselves in the\nstill river.\n\n\"Another letter from my pater to-day, Gussie,\" he said at last, turning\nback to the fire.  \"He'll not see, or understand.\"\n\nStrether grunted.\n\n\"It's so odd,\" went on Paul wearily.  \"In some ways, he's the gentlest\nand most lovable of men.  He's full of the love of God.  He is a\nhundred times better than I shall ever be.  But over this, he's mad,\nrabid.  He seems to picture Father Vassall as a mixture of Torquemada\nand Judas Iscariot.  If only I could get them to meet....\"\n\n\"Going to the joss-house again, Sunday?\"  Strether had his own\npicturesque and blasphemous slang.\n\nPaul smiled, understanding him.  \"Why?\" he demanded.\n\n\"I'll come with you.  It's more amusing than the 'Ciccu' or chapel.  Is\nthere a wander round with candles this week?\"\n\n\"Gussie, you're incorrigible.  But, heavens, what a tangle it all is!\nDoes this look like the room of a Christian?  Look at it!\"  Paul made a\nsweeping gesture.\n\nStrether pushed back heavily from the fire.  \"Beastly cheap cake this\nevening, anyway.\"\n\nPaul hurled a cushion at him.  The two friends went down and out\ntogether.\n\n\"What's worrying you especially?\" asked Manning, half an hour later.\n\n\"Oh, nothing much.  At least, that's not right; it is much to me.\nManning, it's awful.  It's my father's attitude towards Catholicism.\"\n\n\"Ah!  No time at all for it?\"\n\n\"No.  And he doesn't _understand_.\"\n\n\"Complain in verse,\" said Manning, handing him a Swinburne, \"and read\nthat.  'E'en the weariest river winds somewhere safe to sea.'  Leave\nthe wise to wrangle.  Your line is going to be literature, my son.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nVACATION\n\n  The sticks break, the stones crumble,\n  The eternal altars tilt and tumble,\n  Sanctions and tales dislimn like mist\n  About the amazed evangelist.\n  He stands unshook from age to youth\n  Upon one pin-point of the truth.\n                  ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\nPaul lay very still in the heather.  An occasional bee buzzed past his\nface, and, high aloft, a towering hawk regarded him severely, until,\nsatisfied that he was alive, it gave its wings an imperceptible tilt\nand glided swiftly away.  The sun drew out the sweet scents from\nflowers and bracken, and a small wind brought up, now and again, a\nwhiff of the sea.\n\nFar below, Port o' Man nestled peacefully in its bay.  A sort of toy\ntown even in reality, from this height it appeared to the watcher as if\nmodelled by a child in coloured clays, so remote and still and small it\nwas.  It looked no more than a thin moon of buildings between the\nfields and the sea.  No sound came up so far, but now and again there\nwas a sparkle on the edge of the brown rocks when the surf ran up a\nshade higher than usual, and in the wide expanse of sea itself, green\nand blue changed the one with the other perpetually.  Moreover Paul's\nsharp eyes could detect a vivid spot of scarlet on the sands that was\nnever still either.  He knew it to be the banner of the Children's\nSpecial Service Mission, flapping in the wind.\n\nHe ought, of course, to have been there, and when he had announced to\nMr. Stuart, the leader, his intention of playing truant for one whole,\ngolden morning, he had been received with frowns.  But that had not\ndaunted Paul.  It took a good deal more than a Mr. Stuart, in fact, to\ndaunt him.  And so he had risen before the sun and taken his stick and\nhis breakfast, and departed for a long, solitary climb up South\nBarrule.  Dick Hartley had offered to come as well, but Paul had\nrefused.  In the first place he wanted to be alone; in the second, he\nreally did not want Dick of all people, however much he loved him, just\nthen; and thirdly, he had still a sense of missionary responsibility,\nand he declined to deplete the staff for a single day by another worker.\n\nNevertheless, he was there himself on that day because he was rapidly\nreaching a frame of mind which would probably make the C.S.S.M., and\nmany other evangelical activities, finally impossible.  Mr. Stuart, for\nexample--he reflected on Mr. Stuart.  He was a nice, big, old gentleman\nwhom parents liked.  He had no visible vices of any sort.  He liked a\nreally big dinner in the midday on Sunday.  He played cricket on the\nsands with a kindly smile and the aptitude of a rhinoceros.  He told\nimpossible school stories fifty years old when preaching on the sands,\nand the moral of them all was the same--the necessity for a clean\nheart.  As for his own heart, he was quite sure that it was clean.  He\nwas Church of England, but he had only one definite theological\nbelief--Salvation was by Faith Alone without Works.  But he had one\nstrong negation--he believed that Confirmation was unbiblical and\nwrong.  And, instructively enough, it was over Confirmation that Paul\nwas beginning to jib.\n\nPossibly it is necessary, at this point, to say something as to the\nmethods and devices of a C.S.S.M.  There may yet be the uninitiated.\nIn the first place, then, a staff of voluntary workers, female and\nmale, is drawn together during a summer month at some popular seaside\nresort, which should, if possible, have sands rather than a beach, and\nbe to some extent \"select.\"  This latter is partly due to the fact that\nthe Mission aims more especially at the children of the better classes,\nbut also because, whereas the C.S.S.M. can compete with the more\nordinary nigger-minstrel troupe and itinerant show, nowadays these\nthings are done, at the bigger holiday places, upon so lavish and\nSatanic a scale, that the funds of the Mission are scarcely large\nenough to provide adequate equipment for honest competition with them.\nHowever, if the staff be wisely chosen--a blue or two, or at least some\nmen in recognised blazers, are necessary, as well as ladies with good\nvoices--much may be done.  On an ordinary day, after a prayer meeting,\nthis staff proceeds to the sands.  Some members wander up and down the\nseashore distributing attractive cards of invitation to children, and\nengaging parents in amiable conversation where possible.  The others,\nchiefly the masculine section, throw off coats, and with hearty\nenthusiasm commence to build a pulpit.  Some roving children will\ninevitably be persuaded to help, and the crowd grows as the pulpit is\ndecorated with seaweed, flowers, shells, and stones, with a suitable\ntext outlined upon it.  \"JESUS only,\" or \"God is Love\"; but\noccasionally the unusual is worth trying--\"Ephphatha\" or \"Two Sparrows\"\nor \"Five Smooth Stones.\"  And finally the banner is hoisted and the\nservice merrily begins.\n\nChoruses with variations play a large part--\"Let the sunshine in,\" \"Let\nthe sunshine out,\" \"Let the sunshine all round about\"; \"Step by step\nwith Jesus\"; \"We are building day by day\" (and there are actions in\nthat); but the Scriptures are read to sword drill (\"The Word of God is\nsharper than any two-edged sword\"), and the addresses are short and\nbreezy.  The notices always take a long while.  Walks for the girls,\ngames for the boys, sports for both--excursions, picnics, competitions;\ncheery exhortations to \"Watch for the Banner,\" or \"Come to the House\";\nand lastly, special services for boys and girls indoors in the\nevenings.  These latter are the ultimate hook.  At them, many a man and\nwoman has accepted Christ in youth with real sincerity and\ndetermination.\n\nPaul threw himself heart and soul into all this.  He did a great part\nin making religion seem to the holiday-makers what it was truly and\nhappily to himself, the central joy and inspiration of life.  If any\nwere inclined to think that attendance at a mission might be a poor way\nof spending a holiday, they had only to watch Paul for a while.  He was\nin love with Christ, and he was indifferent to the world's opinion that\nit might be indecent to show it as brazenly as a pair of Cockney lovers\non the top of a motor-bus.  In which conclusion both Paul and the\nlovers are undoubtedly and altogether right.\n\nAnd yet Paul was troubled.  Mr. Stuart's bland piety was new to him;\nthe workers' robust ignorance had him by the throat; above all the\nscorning of a ceremony (he would not have said a sacrament) which he\nhad come to feel had behind it the authority of an Institution that he\nwas finding increasingly necessary to the interpretation of the Bible,\nwhile it might be a small thing in itself, worried him.  And it worried\nhim the more because nobody else--not even Dick--was worried; while\nbehind everything, lay the ever-deepening shadow of his father's\nrefusal to see one particle of evidence or necessity for the Church.\n\nBut still another influence had laid fingers on Paul's life, although\nhe knew it not yet.  He had come out that morning definitely to seek\nsomething, definitely to rest himself on something.  Paul had always\nloved nature; he had always \"been one\" (as his mother would have said)\nfor a country walk; and he had written verses to chestnut-trees in May\nand beech-trees in Autumn.  Yet for all that, the beauty of the world\nhad ever been a secondary thing--something you enjoyed because you were\nsatisfied.  But that morning he had come to it because he was not\nsatisfied.  And he lay now, almost immovable, introspective, peering at\nthe tiny heather-bells, taking definite note of a fragment of moss,\nseeing with delight the veins of colour in the small stones.  Things\nwere beautiful, he told himself, beautiful in themselves; also they\nwere unfathomable; and the joy of them was a caress to his troubled\nspirit.\n\nPresently he sighed, and rolled over on his back, staring up and away\ninto the vast, distant blue, watching, as the minutes sped, a pin-point\nof white come out of nothing, gather, build itself with others, form a\ntiny cloud, and trail off across the sparkling sea.  Paul felt himself\nincredibly small; saw himself, definitely, less than nothing, for the\nfirst time in his life.  And was content.\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nWhen he entered the dining-room of the \"House,\" the others were already\nat lunch.  The Mission party were housed in a typical, tall\nflat-chested house on the front, of the kind that one finds inevitably\nalong all the shores of Britain, houses of apparently one period, as if\nthe English middle-class had found the sea simultaneously in a\ngeneration.  That, indeed, did happen.  The room itself was threadbare.\nEverything in it from the furniture to the wall-paper, was thin, and\naped solidity.  The very linen on the table knew that it was cheap.\nOnly where a scarlet fuchsia flamed in an earthen pot on the\nwindow-ledge, was there depth.\n\nMr. and Mrs. Stuart, and the ladies, were not lodged there.  The men of\nthe party had it as much to themselves as the admiring followers of\nHenderson (who had played cricket for his county) and Leather, a Church\nMissionary Society Islington missionary from India, would allow them.\nBut besides these two, and Dick, and a lad of seventeen whom Henderson\ntutored, a stranger was at lunch that day.  Dick introduced him.\n\n\"Hullo, Paul,\" he said, \"you're not so late as you might be.  Let me\nintroduce you to Mr. Childers.\"\n\n\"How do you do?\" said Paul correctly, eyeing him.\n\nThe newcomer rose easily, and held out his hand.  He was fair, slight,\na little bowed, and perhaps forty.  But it was hard to say his age.  He\ntook Paul's hand firmly, and met his glance with a curiously remote\nfrankness.\n\n\"Mr. Childers is a storybook uncle from foreign parts, Paul,\" said\nDick.  \"Aileen Childers introduced me this morning, and I persuaded him\nto come in to lunch.  He is just back from India.\"\n\nPaul, not in the least understanding why, was suddenly aware that there\nwas hostility in the room, but it did not come from the stranger.  He\nglanced round.  Leather, who had finished his cold mutton, had pushed\nhis plate back slightly after his manner, and was looking puzzled and a\nlittle annoyed.\n\n\"To escape the nephews and nieces,\" said Childers smiling, \"and to meet\nMr. Leather.\"\n\n\"How jolly,\" said Paul eagerly, taking his seat.  \"What part of India\nwere you in?\"  He was always eager to hear of heathen lands.\n\n\"I've travelled pretty extensively,\" returned the other, \"but recently\nI've been living in Bombay for some months.\"\n\n\"In the native quarter,\" said Dick, playing with his fork.\n\nSomething in his tone caught Paul's attention again.  He looked more\nclosely at the visitor.  \"Were you doing missionary work?\" he asked.\n\nChilders shook his head.  \"No,\" he said; \"indeed, on the contrary, I\nwent to learn.\"\n\n\"The language?\" persisted Paul, still at sea.\n\n\"I learnt that at Cambridge years ago,\" said Childers.\n\n\"You don't say so.  Did you take Oriental Languages, or whatever they\ncall it?\"\n\n\"No.  The fact is, Mr. Kestern, I learnt it from Indian students, and I\nwas out in India studying Indian religious mysticism.\"\n\n\"Oh!\" said Paul, and glanced swiftly again at Leather.  He understood\nat last.  Little as he knew of the subject (though he had heard Father\nVassall speak of it), he knew that a man who studied Indian mysticism,\nand the Rev. Herbert Leather, C.M.S., Benares, would not have much in\ncommon.  Leather could play most games and preach a \"downright\" Gospel\nsermon, but the Apostles were the only mystics in whom he believed and\nhe would not have called them by that title.  Even less than Dick was\nhe metaphysical, and even more than Paul at his worst was he dogmatic.\n\nHe spoke now.  \"As a matter of fact we are having a bit of an argument,\nKestern,\" he said.  \"Mr. Childers seems to believe in Hinduism.\"\n\n\"I never said that, Mr. Leather,\" put in Childers.\n\nThe other shrugged his shoulders.  There was something of contempt in\nthe gesture, and the stranger seemed to read a challenge there.\n\n\"I did say that we often did the Brahmin less than justice, and that\nthe Yogi adept had usually true spirituality,\" he said.\n\n\"Do you mean the fellows who sit on spikes and swing from hooks on\nfestivals?\" enquired Dick, bewildered.\n\nThe other laughed a little, pleasantly.  \"That is not all they do, and,\nput like that, it certainly sounds foolish, but still those who are\ngenuine among them, do sometimes show the complete power of spirit over\nmatter in that way,\" he replied.\n\n\"A pack of liars and scoundrels,\" said Leather hotly, brimming over.\n\nChilders' eyes flamed suddenly, and as suddenly the light in them died\ndown.  He kept his temper perfectly.  \"I do not think so,\" he said with\nserene control.\n\n\"But you do not mean that they have any power which Christians have not\ngot, surely?\" queried Paul.\n\n\"I do indeed,\" said Childers, \"if you mean by Christians the average\nfollowers of Christ.\"\n\nLeather drummed with his fingers on the table.\n\nPaul stared into the other's face.  There was something so subdued and\nyet so powerful about it, that he was very deeply interested.  \"Will\nyou explain a little?\" he asked.  \"We don't hear of these things from\nthat point of view.\"\n\n\"Well, Mr. Kestern, I do not know that there is much to explain.  After\nall, prayer and fasting have a prominent place in all forms of\nChristian thought, have they not?  And by prayer and fasting these men\nso subdue the body that the spirit in them can live almost\nindependently of bodily aids, and even of itself affect material\nthings.\"\n\n\"Prayer to a false god never did that for a man,\" retorted Leather.\n\n\"We should probably differ in our definition of false,\" returned\nChilders courteously.\n\n\"But look here,\"--the missionary leant over the table--\"do you mean\nyou've ever seen them do anything that was not a clever conjuring\ntrick?\"\n\n\"Most certainly,\" said Childers.\n\nLeather threw himself back.  \"You can do the same yourself, I suppose,\"\nhe sneered.\n\n\"A little,\" said Childers, \"though I am really a mere novice.\"\n\nThe other completely lost his temper.  \"Show us then,\" he said curtly.\n\n\"Oh yes, do,\" cried Paul, but in a wholly different tone.\n\nThe elder man glanced from one to the other, and then back again to\nPaul.  He hesitated.  \"I would rather not,\" he said.  \"One ought not to\nplay tricks.\"\n\n\"Exactly,\" cut in Leather.  \"Tricks.\"\n\nChilders tightened his lips, and once again fire flashed in his eyes.\n\"Oh, I say,\" cried Dick, and stopped.  A little silence fell on them.\nThe situation was distinctly strained.\n\nIt was odd, Paul thought afterwards, how time seemed to stand still.\nThe little storm had come up so suddenly, and the commonplace meal and\nroom had so swiftly taken on a new aspect.  Leather was insufferably\nrude.  It struck Paul that here, again, was the harsh dogmatic attitude\nthat would not even allow that there could be anything else to see or\nto believe.  He felt suddenly that he must end it.  \"Mr. Childers,\" he\nsaid, \"if you could show us what you mean we should be very glad.\"\n\nThe eyes of the two met once more across the table, and Childers made\nup his mind.  \"I dislike this sort of thing,\" he said, \"but perhaps\nsometimes it may be of value.  Has Mr. Leather a pin?\"\n\nLeather got up and took one from a painted satin pincushion that hung\non the wall by the fire.  They were all so supremely grave that no one\nsaw the humour of it, especially the visitor, who would have seen none\nin any case.\n\nChilders pushed his chair back a few feet from the table.  \"Mr.\nKestern,\" he said, \"would you clear a place on the table?  I would\nrather touch nothing myself.  And then perhaps Mr. Leather would set\nthe pin there.  Let it lie on the cloth, please.\"\n\nBewildered, Paul obeyed.  The others drew in eagerly.  No one knew what\nwas to be attempted, but all were eager to see.  Even Leather showed\nkeen interest.\n\nPaul pushed back the potatoes and a tablespoon, and swept a few crumbs\nto one side.  Leather dropped the pin into the cleared space, threw\nhimself back into his chair, and thrust his hands into his pockets.\nDick leant his elbows on the table and stared at their visitor.\n\n\"Now,\" said Childers, \"would you mind keeping quiet?  I will not ask\nyou to keep your eyes wholly on the pin, or you will say you have been\nhypnotised or something of that sort, but please watch it and me, and\ndo not speak.\"\n\nIn the tense quiet that followed, Paul threw a look at his companions.\nDick was puzzled, Leather sceptical and attempting indifference,\nHenderson and his pupil a-quiver with equal curiosity.  Only Childers\nsat on serene, his eyes on the commonplace pin that lay so still on the\ntable.  From without, the sea's murmur came softly in.  There was a\npatch of sunlight on the white cloth.  The pin lay clearly in the very\ncentre of it.  It lay quite still, naturally, and shone in the light.\n\nStill?  Was it still?  Paul caught his breath.\n\nFor then, as they watched, as the clock ticked the minutes loudly on\nthe mantelshelf, as the boy beside him breathed hard, and Paul himself\nclasped and unclasped his hands, the tiny shining thing stirred,\ntrembled, flickered as it were, made spasmodic movements, and finally\nrose, trembling, to stand on its point.  Paul swallowed in his throat,\nand Leather cried out.  \"It's a trick,\" he exclaimed sharply.  The pin\nfell back silently.\n\n\"Oh no, how could it be?\" said Childers quietly.  \"I am not so good a\nconjurer as all that.\"\n\n\"How on earth----\" began Dick.\n\nLeather stood up.  \"I am playing cricket at three,\" he said abruptly.\n\"I fear I must go.  I--I beg your pardon if I was--was rude, Mr.\nChilders.  But--but----\"\n\n\"That is quite all right.  Perhaps I should not have said what I did.\nBut there is nothing really strange in what you have seen, Mr. Leather.\nI hope I have not put you off your game.\"\n\nAll that afternoon, Paul and the visitor sat by the sea on the sand and\ntalked together.  The elder man was a quiet, serious, thoughtful person\nwho made no attempt whatever to destroy any of his young companion's\nbeliefs, and really very little to instruct him.  But Paul was\ninexorable.  His inchoate eyes fastened on the other, he heard of auras\nand astral bodies and familiar spirits with an ever-deepening\namazement.  It was not that the things themselves made much of a\ncontribution to his mind; he was not, perhaps, ready for them; but it\nwas Childers himself, especially in contrast to Mr. Stuart, Leather,\nHenderson, Dick, who affected him profoundly.  It was his first contact\nwith a true but alien spirituality, his first lesson in comparative\nreligion.  He saw at once how closely a scheme of things that allowed\nfor transition planes of spiritual life, the interweaving of the\nmaterial and spiritual, and the help of unseen beings, fitted in with\nCatholicism.  Here, from another source, came confirmation of his new\nsurmises.  And above all, here was lacking that ignorant, dogmatic\ntemper of evangelicalism, indifferent to beauty and living, with which\nhe was finding himself increasingly at odds.\n\nTowards the end of the afternoon, he ventured the supreme question\nwhich had been on his lips for long, but which he was more than\nhalf-afraid to speak.\n\n\"Mr. Childers,\" he asked, \"what do your spirit-guides say of Christ?\"\n\nThe clear blue eyes looked into his serenely.  \"They do not say much,\"\nhe said.\n\n\"But why not?\"\n\n\"He was strikingly adept,\" said Childers, \"and has advanced far beyond\nus.  But we shall see Him at some distant time, if we continue steadily\nto progress.\"\n\n\"But we know Him,\" objected Paul, \"here and now.\"\n\n\"You feel the influence of His Spirit, for all spiritual living has\nleft its impress which those who follow after may enjoy along the road.\"\n\n\"Along the road?\"\n\n\"Yes.  Prayer, Fasting, Self-discipline.  It is very hard.\"\n\nPaul shook his head.  \"'My yoke is easy and My burden is light,'\" he\nquoted.\n\n\"That was not all He said,\" said Childers gravely.\n\nAnd Paul, stricken by a host of texts, sat on very still.\n\n\"Do you yourself find God?\" he asked at last.\n\n\"He is very far above us,\" replied Childers.  \"It is scarcely a\nquestion of God.\"\n\n\"'He that hath seen Me, hath seen the Father,'\" returned the boy\neagerly.\n\n\"And what precisely does that mean?\" asked Childers, rather tenderly.\n\nPaul leapt to his feet.  \"Ah, what!\" he cried.  \"I see that that's the\nquestion.  But I will not believe that God is far, Mr. Childers; He is\nnear, very near, in the Person of His Son.\"\n\nAfter a moment, Childers, too, got up.  He had decided not to speak.\nHe linked his arm in the other's affectionately.  \"Let us go,\" he said.\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nThe month drew to its close; fair success attended the Mission; and one\nday Dick and Paul said good-bye to the rest, and to a smiling, cheering\ncrowd of children on the station platform, setting off in the toy train\nwhich steamed importantly by the fuchsia-hedges and the old tin mines,\nto Douglas and civilisation.  They were off to Keswick, for the great\nConvention.  Paul had long wanted to go, and was all eagerness for it.\nHis companion had been several times before, and, as always, was the\nmore steady and self-contained.  At Liverpool they stayed a night with\nfriends, and were walking through the little Westmoreland town the\nfollowing evening.\n\nThe streets were fairly full.  Clergymen in semi-clerical dress--black\ncoat and grey trousers, or vice versa--and moustaches abounded, but\nstill more, young earnest men in grey flannels and bright smiling young\nwomen.  Little parties moved up and down the street, frequently singing\nor humming hymns.  Fragments of hymn-tunes drifted out of open windows,\nand a party leisurely rowing shorewards, were singing well in unison.\nPaul began himself to sing.  \"'Oh that will be Glory for me,'\" he\nhummed, his head high, scenting the pine-woods.\n\n\"You old crow,\" said Dick.\n\n\"Well, if I can't sing,\" retorted Paul, \"I can at least make a joyful\nnoise.\"\n\n\"Well, then, make it in company where it's drowned, and not alone,\"\nsaid Dick, grinning at him.\n\nNext morning Paul did sing in company.  The friends stayed at a house\ntaken regularly for the period of the Convention by an elderly lady,\nand charitably filled with missionaries, ordinands, and young\nclergymen.  She called them all her \"boys,\" and they took it in turns\nto conduct family prayers.  Moreover they went with her in a body\nwherever she went, and, truth to tell, she was rather proud of them.\nOne carried her umbrella, another her Bible, a third her hymn-book, and\nso on.  This year two of them were coloured.  Thus went Paul and Dick\nto the big tent for the first morning's meeting.\n\nIt was packed with several thousand people drawn from a large variety\nof Protestant denominations, and the speakers were a Church of England\nbishop, a Baptist layman, and a Methodist missionary.  An Adventist led\nin prayer, or at least Paul gathered that he was an Adventist from the\nintimate information he volunteered in the course of it, as to the\ndetails and date of the Second Coming of Christ.  The vast congregation\nadopted many attitudes for prayer, but, chiefly, that of the half-bend;\nthe chairman announced that he trusted the utmost unity and harmony\nwould prevail throughout the several meetings; it was understood that\nthe subject of the Sacraments and such-like controversies was to be\navoided; and a motto in red and white burgeoned immense over the\nplatform: \"ALL ONE in Christ Jesus.\"\n\nThroughout the week, Paul followed the usual course of a member of the\nConvention.  He bought a new hymn-book of \"The Hymns of Consecration\nand Faith,\" and a new Bible, a \"Baxter,\" whose leaves were also neatly\ncut away in index form to facilitate the finding of the more minor\nMinor Prophets.  He also bought a small text framed in straws for his\nmother, but, the exultation of the moment which had prompted the\npurchase having worked off, gave it away next day.  He went to Friar's\nCrag by moonlight, and sang (in company) \"There'll be no shadows,\" and\n\"When the mists have rolled away.\"  On the Sunday he went to outdoor\nmeetings.  There was an official Convention open-air, but the\nmarket-place was quite full of other open-airs, conducted by people\nwhose ideas were not sufficiently expressed in the central one; and\nthere was also to be seen a somewhat dirty, very ragged and unkempt\nprophet who had come all the way from the South on foot to denounce\nmodern Christianity in the cause of Humanitarian Deism, and whose rabid\nsincerity attracted Paul.  Finally he went (out of curiosity) to a\nmeeting for men only addressed by a prominent evangelical lady whose\nsubject was \"The Personal Devil,\" and to a series of meetings in which\na new baptism of the Spirit was being taught, the idea of the pastor\nwho conducted them being that if one only claimed the promise, one\nwould become full--the emphasis lay there--full of the Holy Spirit.\nThese meetings continued sometimes until midnight and were occasionally\nnoteworthy for the Gift of Tongues.  But as there were not found any\nwho could interpret, the authorities, remembering St. Paul, rather\ncold-shouldered them.\n\nTwo days before the friends were to leave, as they were coming from a\nservice in the tent, they ran straight into Edith Thornton.  Paul gave\na shout of surprise and ran forward eagerly.  \"You here!\" he exclaimed.\n\nShe turned, and he saw that her sister Maud was with her.\n\n\"Oh, Mr. Kestern,\" cried the elder girl, \"we wondered if we should see\nyou!  We heard that you were coming on to Keswick after Port o' Man,\nbut it was only just the other day that we got the chance of coming\nourselves.\"\n\n\"But how topping to see you,\" said Paul, delighted, shaking hands.  \"I\nsay, do let me introduce my friend.  Mr. Hartley; Miss Thornton, Miss\nEdith Thornton.  Where are you staying?\"\n\n\"At 'The Pines.'\"\n\n\"I know--the Y.W.C.A. house.  When did you arrive?\"\n\n\"Saturday.  We might have met before, only really there are so many\ngirls in the house, and the Matron arranges a full programme for us\neach day.  Where are you staying, Mr. Hartley?\"\n\nPaul turned more directly to Edith, who had scarcely spoken.  \"What\nluck!\" he exclaimed, his eyes sparkling.\n\nEdith glanced cautiously at her sister, who was talking now animatedly\nto Dick.  \"Paul, isn't it?\" she said.  \"And I do want to see you so\nmuch.\"\n\n\"We must fix up something.  What are you doing this afternoon?\"\n\n\"We're all going for a picnic on the lake.\"\n\n\"Then we'll come too.\"\n\nShe laughed.  \"You can't, you know.  Unless you come and be introduced\nto Matron and she invites you.  And that she won't do unless you please\nher immensely--which I fear is not likely.\"\n\n\"Oh, I say--why ever not?\"\n\nThe girl flushed, and laughed again.\n\n\"Why?\" cried the intrigued Paul.\n\n\"I shan't tell you.\"\n\n\"Oh, do!\"\n\n\"Well, if you must know, because you won't behave.  You give yourself\naway too openly.  Girls, staying at the Y.W.C.A. in Keswick Week, are\nsupposed to--to--to----\"\n\n\"To what?\"\n\n\"To get on without men, anyway.  Unless they're properly engaged.\"\n\n\"But aren't you ever free?\"\n\n\"I might be.\"\n\n\"When?  I know--to-morrow morning, early.  We'll cut the prayer meeting\nfor once, and go and walk by the lake.\"\n\n\"Oh, Paul, if we could!\"\n\n\"Will you try?\"\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nAnd so, on that last day, Paul and Edith wandered off in the early\nmorning by the road that leads along the lake, and exchanged\nimpressions.  It was a cold summer that year in the North, and there\nwas a drifting mist over the water which the sun had not yet dispersed.\nHigh above it, the great hills lifted themselves, and there was a sound\nof tinkling water on the air, for it had rained heavily the night\nbefore and the little rills were full.  The sky, too, was alive with\nsoft lights of grey and white and blue.  Where the road bends out of\nsight of the last houses, Paul took the hand that swung by the girl's\nside, and, remote and virginal, they walked together hand in hand.\n\n\"Well, Paul dear,\" she said, \"tell me everything.\"  And Paul tried to\ntell her....\n\n\"And Keswick,\" he said at last, \"only sums it all up.  You can't escape\nfrom it, Edith.  People believe all sorts of different things even\nhere.  'All one in Christ'--but they aren't.  And how can they be,\nunless there is some voice to interpret Him to us?\"\n\n\"But it can't be the Church of Rome, Paul!\" she cried, in real distress.\n\n\"You say that,\" said Paul, \"but why?  Because you've a distorted notion\nof the Church of Rome.  Look here, Edith, we won't go into it now, but\nI tell you that _everything_ I was told about Rome, turns out to be\nwrong.  The more I see, the more I hear, the more I think, the more\nreasonable it is.\"\n\n\"But you can't, can't, can't, give up all you've believed and taught\nabout Jesus.\"\n\n\"Dear, one isn't asked to give up anything.  Father Vassall believes in\nHim just as much as you or I or my father.  Indeed, he believes more,\nEdith.  I feel that in this place.  These people say they believe in\nHim, but they don't think out what they mean.  He is God, Edith, truly,\nreally, altogether God.  And if the Baby in the cradle could be God,\nwhy shouldn't the Sacrament be Jesus?  Why shouldn't he choose that\nveil as He chose the other?  And see what it would mean!  There He\nwould be, for our worship, our service, really, bodily, spiritually\ntoo.  As He was in Bethlehem, He would be the same there for ever.  And\nthere is His Church speaking for Him, guarding Him.\"\n\n\"How can it speak for Him?\"\n\nPaul made a characteristic gesture.  \"'He that heareth you, heareth\nMe,'\" he quoted.  \"And the first Council--'It seems good to the Holy\nGhost, and to us.'  Think of the arrogance of that!  And St. Paul--'The\nChurch, the Pillar (that is the Upholder), and the Ground (that is the\nBasis) of the Faith.'  The Church, not the Bible.  And: 'We have the\nSpirit of God.'\"\n\n\"Mr. Irving said that of us all in the tent last night.\"\n\n\"I know.  But 'by their fruits ye shall know them.'  Have we unity?\nAnd who was teaching Mr. Irving's particular gospel of the fulness of\nthe Spirit, a hundred, no, ten years ago?  Whereas the Catholic\nChurch----\"\n\nHe broke off, and loosed her hand.  They stood on the fragrant, peaty\nsoil, strewn with brown pine needles, under the crags above the lake,\nand the further rocks were just breaking through the mist.  A faint\nsound of early singing floated over to them.  They listened.\n\n  Let me come closer to Thee, Jesus,\n    Yes, closer day by day;\n  Let me lean harder on Thee, Jesus,\n    Yes, harder all the way.\n\n\n\"Do you know who wrote that?\" Paul queried.\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"A monk, who believed that our Lord was in the Sacrament on the Altar.\"\n\n\"Oh, Paul!\"\n\n\"It's true.  It's a kind of omen.  Edith, do you know I see a sort of\nvision nowadays.  I see Jesus, planning, choosing, endowing His little\nband, and making them His Church.  'As the Father hath sent Me, even so\nsend I you.'  I see that same Church growing all down the years, always\nmisunderstood, always persecuted, always other-worldly at bottom, and\nalways teaching the same one faith.  Its voice, His voice; its power,\nHis power; its heart, His heart.  And I seem to see Jesus beckoning me\nthere.\"\n\n\"Oh, Paul, don't, don't.  Pray, pray!\"\n\n\"I have prayed, dear, and as I pray--oh, Edith, I don't know!  But\nnothing _stops_ my seeing.  It just gets clearer.  Everything fits.\nLittle things sort of seem to come my way.  If it's wrong, surely our\nLord Whom I _do_ love, Edith, and Whom I have tried to serve, won't let\nme go wrong.\"\n\n\"But suppose,--suppose it's a temptation?\"\n\n\"I know.  Dad says it's the Devil.  Exactly.  'They called the Master\nof the House Beelzebub, and how much more they of His Household?'\n_Everything_ fits.\"\n\n\"Oh, Paul,\" she cried, \"there you go again!  I can't argue with you.\nI----\"\n\n\"No, because it's unanswerable.  And it's been so for two thousand\nyears.\"\n\n\"Paul, Paul, do _pray_!\"\n\n\"Darling, I do pray.  But what can I do?  Mother says: 'Cling to the\nBook--Don't let go the Word,' but the Word itself seems to me to point\nthat way.  I can't help it; it does.  I don't _want_ to be a Roman\nCatholic.  I'd _hate_ to be.  But, Edith, oh Edith, Edith, why is there\nno _answer_ when one prays?\"\n\n\"Paul, there is, there is!\"\n\nHe turned on her.  \"Then you pray.  Now.  Here.  God will answer you,\nperhaps.\"\n\n\"Oh, I can't, Paul.  Not with you here.  I wouldn't dare.\"\n\nHe caught her hands.  \"Oh, darling, do.  I'm so tired of begging and\ncrying for light.  I seem always to have to be the leader, and I do so\nwant to be led.\"\n\nThe girl's eyes filled with swift tears.  \"Paul, darling,\" she\nwhispered....  \"Well, I will.\"\n\nThey knelt in the shadow of the pines, unashamed, and in the air there\nwas a tremble of a sound--the ripple of the tiny wavelets on the beach\nbeneath, and the sough of the pines above.  They knelt hand in hand,\nlike two children; and after a moment or two she prayed aloud, in a\nhushed whisper.\n\n\"Oh God\" (she said), \"Thou canst see us.  Thou art here.  Do, do, show\nPaul--show us both, what is right and true, and what we ought to do.\nDon't let us be led astray from Thee.  Don't let us be frightened of\nfollowing Thee.  Just let us--let us draw closer to Thee and lean\nharder on Thee, all the way.  For Jesus Christ's sake.\"\n\nSobs choked her Amen, and Paul, his eyes wet, put his arm about her.\nSo clasped they knelt.  And the little waves rippled on the shore and\nthe wind soughed in the pines above.\n\nThey walked home soberly.  At the entrance to the town, Edith put\nanother question.  \"Paul,\" she said, \"tell me, haven't you _liked_\nKeswick?\"\n\nHe was silent for a moment.  Then: \"Edith, shall I tell you the truth?\"\n\n\"Yes--and always.\"\n\n\"Well, I've loved it so much that I've almost hated it.  Our friends\nare so sincere, so good, and I seem to know it all so well.  It's my\n_home_, but I'm beginning to feel myself a stranger among my own\npeople.\"\n\nThe girl swallowed that stupid lump that would keep rising in her\nthroat.  \"Dear,\" she said, \"will you promise me one thing?\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"Promise.\"\n\n\"You must tell me what it is first.  I can't tie my hands, even for\nyou.\"\n\n\"Well, promise that whatever happens to you, you'll never laugh at all\nthis.\"\n\nThey were at her corner, and the boy looked into her grave face.  \"I\nwon't,\" he said.  \"I promise.  I owe it too much.  But, Edith, one\nthing I won't promise.  I won't promise that, if I ever see it to be\nfalse, I won't fight it with every weapon on which I can lay hand.\"\n\nAnd she dropped her eyes from his, forlorn, for she saw that it was not\nin him to say more.\n\n\n\n(5)\n\nPaul went to Ripon, and Dick, saying good-bye for some time, to the\nSouth.  He was to be ordained in September, and had to interview his\nprospective Vicar, somewhere in North London.  Paul was staying with\nJudson for a few days, that Judson whom he had hardly known at the\ncollege feast, but who had come rather more intimately into his life of\nlate.\n\nJudson was a Congregationalist, and his father was a minister of the\ndenomination in Ripon.  He himself was a short, bullet-headed sort of\nperson, whom Paul usually thought of as a bullet.  At any rate, there\ndid not seem to be much room for emotionalism or sentiment in his\nmake-up, and he had a bullet-like way of boring into things.  He had\nbored straight into Paul.  Blunt, definite, ready, he had liked Paul,\nand had started to call and to demand to be called upon.  His rooms\nreflected in a negative way his personality.  Being poor, they remained\npoorly furnished, but even on tuppence-halfpenny they might have been\nless hard.  On either side of the mantelpiece were two humorous\ncoloured plates out of _Printers' Pie_.  Paul thought they symbolised\nthe man.  How anyone could look at the same two jokes for ever, one on\neach side of the mantel-piece, used to strike him as an incredible\nmystery.  He thought at first that it meant that Judson had no soul at\nall.\n\nIt was when he discovered his mistake that he began to like the man.\nFor Judson had a soul.  He went regularly, without any advertisement of\nit, to a Congregational chapel.  He addressed Congregational meetings\nin villages at considerable inconvenience and quite unobtrusively.  He\nand Paul alone at St. Mary's had the sin of public preaching to their\ncharge.  And Paul was beginning to find out that he alone neither\nmocked at nor disregarded his own religious struggles.  Judson surveyed\nthe Catholic Church with a shrewd eye.  He left Paul to make enquiries,\nbut he took them seriously.  In his rooms he wore carpet slippers and a\nblazer, and smoked an ugly pipe, but, feet on his mantelpiece and hands\nin his pockets, he was prepared to admit that there were many points of\nview.\n\nHearing, then, that Paul was going to the Isle of Man and Keswick, he\nhad persuaded him to come for a few days to Ripon on his way South.  It\nwas inconvenient that, at the time, a Congregational conference was\ntaking place in Ripon, but as money for train fares was a consideration\nto both friends, Paul's visit was not delayed.  He himself was glad, as\na matter of fact, that the conference was sitting.  Congregationalism\nwas not immediately on his road, but he thought he would turn off to\nsee a little of it as he passed.\n\nThree ministers were staying in the house, and the friends were out of\nit most days.  They made sundry excursions, and lunched away.  That\nfirst afternoon, Paul was taken to his friend's father's chapel.  He\nwas shown affectionately round.  Judson opened the door of the roomy,\nclean, pitch-pine vestry with an air, and took obvious pride in a new\npulpit of considerable dimensions.  He explained the heating apparatus\nwith the same sponsorial solicitude that a priest takes when he shows a\nvisitor a new altar.  He opened and played the new American organ.  He\nexhibited, in short, an unhushed genial interest in and affection for a\nseries of what already seemed to Paul incredibly ugly and unattractive\nthings.  For Paul had never admired his own mission hall.  He had never\neven thought of admiration, or the reverse, in connection with it.  It\nhad stood for use, not for ornament.  But Judson evidently saw in his\nchapel beautiful and holy ground.  He did not take off his shoes,\nbecause he was not a ritualist and that was not his way, but he liked\nthe heating apparatus to shine brightly and to burn the best coal.\n\nIt was much the same in the Minster.  There had been a time when Paul\nhad thought all cathedrals \"high\" and tending to Popery.  Now he saw in\nRipon a lovely thing misused and defaced.  The choir was full of cane\nchairs, rank on rank, for it alone was chiefly used.  They stood in\nplatoons on the wide, dignified steps leading up to the altar, steps\nthe stone of whose very approach was all but entirely concealed by an\nexpensive red Turkey carpet, presented, they were impressively\ninformed, by a lesser Royalty, when staying with the Bishop who had\nbeen popular at Court.  The altar frontal had the appearance of red\nplush, with a multi-coloured Maltese cross worked upon it, flanked by\nlilies.  It had cost seventy-five pounds sixteen shillings.  They were\ntold so.  Also the two shades of red were locked in a violent argument.\n\nThey saw the high, oak-roofed Lady Chapel, which was lined with\nnever-opened books, called a library, and used for a choir vestry.  The\nlight streamed through its lovely window upon dog-eared piles of\nTallis's chant-books.  And in the North Transept, they stood in front\nof an immense and decorated Georgian memorial for which pillars had\nbeen broken and carvings cut away, a memorial which was approached\nstill by ancient altar steps, and on the top of which reposed a\nGeorgian figure in coloured stone who reclined upon his side, one elbow\npropping up his bewigged head, and one hand, with lace at the wrist,\nfrozen for ever in a timeless pat upon a bulging stomach.\n\nJudson saw pleasant humanity in the effigy, the verger magnificence,\nPaul an artistic and religious abomination of desolation, and they all\nthree ascribed their own feelings to the all-seeing deity.  The\nsunlight continued to dapple the stone which ever way it was.\n\nThey went, also, to Fountains Abbey.  Judson expressed contempt for the\ndecadent English aristocracy, excited thereto by some subtle influence\narising from the well-cut, trim lawns, and much admired the view of a\nclassical temple which is to be seen through a well-placed gap.  He\nadmired it to the extent of a pipe upon the spot.  Within the ruin,\nPaul sat on a fallen stone, and fell on silence.  Returning from a tour\nof inspection, Judson surveyed him with amusement.\n\n\"Are you brooding upon a sonnet, Kestern?\" he enquired, feeling for his\nmatches again.\n\nPaul's tragic youth forbade him to reply.\n\n\"Well, those blessed monks of yours did themselves proud, anyway,\"\ncontinued his companion.  Puff-puff.  \"Wonder if we could get up a\npicnic here.\"\n\nThe distant hoot of a char-a-banc appeared more or less to answer him.\n\n\"Thank God it's a ruin,\" said Paul savagely; \"let's go.\"\n\n\"Wonder how long it took 'em to build it,\" remarked Judson as they\nwalked away.\n\n\"Generations,\" said Paul.  \"When they first came, they starved in the\nforest on berries while they ploughed and planted lands, and lived in\ndaub and wattle huts.  Slowly, piece by piece, they raised all that, to\nthe honour and glory of God.  The place was a prayer in stone.\"\n\n\"They knew how to choose a site,\" remarked the practical Judson.\n\"Wonder if it could be repaired?\"\n\n\"And I wonder if it was answered,\" said Paul.\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"The prayer.  Does the ruin look like it?\"\n\n\"You're a rum ass,\" said Judson affectionately.\n\nPaul kicked a stone savagely from his path.  \"I'm sick of being called\na rum ass by everyone,\" he said.  \"I see nothing rum or asinine in what\nI said.\"\n\n\"You wouldn't,\" said Judson.  \"But then we aren't all poets,\" he added.\n\n\"Nor am I,\" retorted Paul gloomily, \"and anyhow what I said had nothing\nto do with poetry.\"\n\n\"Well, let's get lunch at that place by the gate.  The poetry in a ham\nsandwich is what I want at present.\"\n\nPaul returned to earth.  \"I could do with two,\" he echoed with\nenthusiasm.\n\n\n\n(6)\n\nThat night, over and after a \"high\" Yorkshire tea, Paul was able to\nstudy Congregational ministers.  A round dozen of them sat in Mr.\nJudson's study beneath a large engraving of the late Mr. Spurgeon in\nthe act of preaching from the pulpit of his Tabernacle.  Paul was\ninterested in their apparently infinite variety.  There was the type he\nknew well in the Church of England Claxted circles, the sincere,\nlovable, earnest, bearded sort who do not smoke and are rather silent\nin a general conversation.  There was the hearty, bluff, unclerical\nsort, who do smoke and who talk a good deal and tell humorous\nanecdotes.  One such related with great good humour how he had been\nknocked up one rainy night in mistake for a High Church parson, and\nasked to bicycle five miles to baptize a dying baby a few hours old.  A\nyoung man in a corner, in a Roman collar and a frock coat, asked if he\nwent.\n\n\"Go?  Not I!  D'you suppose I'd go out on a cold night to sprinkle half\na dozen drops of water over a baby?  I told the fellow I was sorry, but\nthat if he was wise, he'd go home to bed, as I proposed to go.  And I\nshut the window before he answered.\"\n\nTwo or three laughed, Paul could not see why.  \"That's like you, Joe,\"\nsaid Mr. Judson.\n\n\"I should have gone,\" said the young man in the corner gravely.\n\n\"More fool you then,\" retorted Joe, apparently living up to his\nreputation for bluff good humour.\n\n\"I do not think so,\" said the young man.  \"The ceremony may mean a\ngreat deal to the mother, and the Church ought to be human enough to\ncater for all.  That kind of attitude gives people a wrong impression\nof Nonconformity.\"\n\n\"Not so wrong as the impression you'd give,\" put in a third missionary\nhotly.  \"The Church of Christ cannot cater for sacerdotalism.\"\n\n\"What did you think of the Moderator's address?\" asked Mr. Judson of\nthe company in general, a little too quickly, Paul thought.  But he\nthought also that he had seen yet another type in ministerial\nCongregationalism.\n\n\n\n(7)\n\nRolling Londonwards, watching the speeding fields and the quiet sleepy\nMidland villages, Paul turned over the kaleidoscope of his vacation and\nrealised that he was approaching a return to Claxted with something\nlike dismay.  Dismay, however, did not last long.  He was determining\nat all costs to preach something of the new spirit that was in him, and\nto show Lambeth Court and Apple Orchard Road that with broader\nsympathies and a more theological outlook could also march all the zeal\nand fervour of evangelicalism.  The train slowed down for Leicester.  A\nfigure of outstanding dress and height detached itself from the little\nthrong of waiting passengers, and selected his compartment.  The\nnewcomer carried an attach\u00e9 case, a leather package of odd and awkward\nsize, a suitcase, and a box of lantern slides, and he was moreover\nencumbered with a travelling rug, a silk hat, an overcoat, and a stick.\nPaul assisted with these, and the stranger sat down opposite him.\nPaul's eyes took in his gaitered legs and his silk apron, and rested\neven more enquiringly on his purple stock.  It was his first personal\nmeeting with a bishop.  They two were alone in the carriage.\n\n\"Thanks,\" said the Bishop.  \"I'm sorry to be hung about with things\nlike this, but I don't seem able to dispense with any of them.\"\n\nHe sounded quite human, and even friendly.  Paul wondered who he was\nand if he ought to introduce \"my lord\" at once into the conversation.\nHowever he blackballed the idea.  \"I know,\" he said.  \"I always seem to\naccumulate heaps of things myself.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said the other, a twinkle in his eye, \"it's a nuisance, you\nknow, being a bishop, and especially a bishop from abroad, home on\nleave.  You've got to fit in so much.  There's lecturing and passing\nproofs and preaching, and a bishop has to carry so many things around\nwith him.\"\n\n\"Does he?\" said Paul, smiling and meeting the other's mood, \"I fear I\ndon't know what he wants.  But--er--may we introduce ourselves--er--my\nlord?\"\n\nThe big, clean-shaven, young-looking prelate chuckled pleasantly.\n\"Certainly,\" he said.  \"I'm the Bishop of Mozambique, and as I'm only a\ncolonial, you needn't call me 'my lord,' you know, unless you like.\"\n\nPaul looked at him with increased interest.  Of course; he ought to\nhave recognised him.  He was an extreme High Church bishop, not unknown\nto controversial fame.  \"I'm Paul Kestern, of St. Mary's,\" he said.\n\n\"Oxford?\"\n\n\"No, Cambridge.  I'm sorry.  Or at least I'm not really.\"\n\nThe other laughed outright.  \"We'll agree to differ, and get on\nfamously,\" he said.  \"And where do you come from just now, Mr. Kestern?\"\n\nPaul determined in a moment to be quite frank.  \"A Children's Special\nService Mission in the Isle of Man, the Keswick Convention, and the\nCongregationalist Congress in Ripon,\" he said, very gravely.\n\n\"Good,\" said the other.  \"From which I gather you are a Nonconformist\ncandidate for the ministry.\"\n\n\"Wrong,\" said Paul.  \"I'm Church of England, or I think I am still.\nAnd I'm going to be a missionary, or\"--and suddenly for the first time\nhe saw, clearly, the gulf that might be ahead--\"I pray God that I am.\"\n\nThe Bishop's smile died away, but his tone was none the less kindly\nwhen he spoke after a few minutes' quiet scrutiny of the other's face.\nThen: \"Mr. Kestern,\" he said, \"I take it, if you won't think me rude,\nthat you are going through the mill like the rest of us have had to do.\"\n\nAnd Paul, impulsively, nodded, and in a few minutes was opening his\nheart, while the miles slipped fast away and the train rushed as easily\nas destiny along its railed road.\n\n\"You can't be a Roman Catholic,\" said the Bishop decisively when Paul\nhad finished.\n\n\"Why not?\"\n\n\"Because you know too much history to believe in the Pope.\"\n\n\"Honestly,\" said Paul, \"I see no reason in history to disbelieve in the\nPope.\"\n\n\"His infallibility?\"\n\n\"_Vox corporis, vox capitis_,\" retorted Paul; \"and if the Church has no\nhead, no ultimate authority, how can it speak?\"\n\n\"The Church has ultimate authority.  It resides in the whole college of\nbishops dispersed throughout the world.  The Papal power is a growth\ndue to various human circumstances, and in its final definition is\ncontrary to the true Catholic faith.\"\n\n\"Surely that's what every heretic has said of every definition.  That's\nwhat was said when every creed came to be formulated in order to\nsafeguard the faith against the increasing theorising of men.  That's\nwhat the Congregationalists say about the Sacraments.\"\n\n\"But the test lies in the acceptance of the new statement by the whole\nCatholic body.\"\n\nPaul nodded eagerly.  \"And for four hundred years at least the whole\nCatholic body accepted Pope Leo's definition of the Papacy, which is\ngood enough to justify it, and, sir, has the whole Church accepted your\ntheory?  Have even the English bishops accepted it?  Are you not almost\nalone on the bench in your views?\"\n\n\"Well, but judge for yourself.  Read your Bible and pray.  Is there a\nPope in the Holy Scriptures?  Wasn't the First Council of Jerusalem a\nmeeting of the college of bishops?\"\n\n\"And that,\" retorted Paul, \"is what they said at Keswick.  'Read your\nBible and pray.'  Only, let alone the Pope, most of them don't see even\na bishop at Jerusalem!\"\n\nThe big man took it in good part.  \"Someone has been prompting you,\nyoung man,\" he said kindly.\n\n\"Father Vassall,\" replied Paul instantly.\n\n\"Ah!  Have you ever been abroad?\"  The elder man's voice hardened\nsubtly.\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Well, don't judge Roman Catholicism by its appearance in England.\nIt's at its best here.  It wears Sunday clothes.  Priests don't keep\nmistresses in England, and the worship of the saints is not quite the\nidolatry it is in Italy.\"\n\nPaul flushed suddenly, but sat silent.\n\n\"Concubinage is a regular thing in Spain,\" went on the other suavely.\n\"In France they're very dubious about the Pope.  In England, below the\nsurface, they are as disunited pretty nearly as we are.  In South\nAmerica, the people would have more religion if they were still\nheathen.\"\n\nPaul recalled, in a swift flood of memory, his meeting with Father\nKenelm at Cambridge.  He recalled his stories of immense adoring\ncrowds, of persecution willingly endured, of heroic self-sacrifices for\nthe propagation of the faith.  Still more he remembered how the father,\neagerly talking to him, had seemed to take it for granted that he was a\nCatholic; and how he, feeling that he must be honest, had said he was\nnot; and how instantly, across the crowded drawing-room, without a\ntrace of nervousness or any sense of indecorum, the sudden stab of the\npoignant question had flashed--\"Oh, but Mr. Kestern, surely you love\nour Lord?\"  Would such a man condone immorality?\n\nThe boy's face hardened.  \"There was an Iscariot among the Apostles,\nBishop,\" he said.\n\n\"Yes, one.  Not eleven out of twelve.\"\n\nThe train began to slow down, and the Bishop stirred to gather his\ntraps.  \"My lord,\" said Paul, curt in his ardour, \"you merely propound\na dilemma.  Either the Holy Ghost has kept silence as to the essential\ncentral authority of the Church till He showed it to Anglo-Catholics\nseventy years ago, the devil triumphing meanwhile, or--or----\"\n\n\"Eh?\" queried the astonished Bishop.\n\n\"Or it is all a lie.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nMOUNT CARMEL\n\nThou art a God that hidest Thyself.--ISA. xlv.\n\nThen Job answered and said: \"Oh that I knew where I might find\nHim.\"--JOB xxiii.\n\nThere is no proof of God's existence, and you must first of all believe\nin it if you want to prove it.  Where does he show himself?  What does\nhe save?  What tortures of the heart, what disasters does he turn aside\nfrom all and each in the ruin of hearts?  Where have we known or\nhandled or embraced anything but his name?  God's absence surrounds\ninfinitely and even actually each kneeling suppliant, athirst for some\nhumble personal miracle, and each seeker who bends over his papers as\nhe watches for proofs like a creator; it surrounds the pitiful\nantagonism of all religions, armed against each other, enormous and\nbloody.  God's absence rises like the sky over the agonising conflicts\nbetween good and evil, over the trembling heedfulness of the upright,\nover the immensity--still haunting me--of the cemeteries of agony, the\ncharnal-heaps of innocent soldiers, the heavy cries of the shipwrecked.\nAbsence!  Absence!  In the hundred thousand years that life has tried\nto delay death, there has been nothing on earth more fruitless than\nman's cries to divinity, nothing which gives so perfect an idea of\nsilence.--HENRI BARBUSSE: Light (translated by Fitzwater Wray).\n\n\n\n(1)\n\nIn Mr. Kestern's study the curtains were close drawn and no gas had\nbeen lit.  They were heavy crimson curtains, thick and old-fashioned,\nand they hung motionless, completely screening the windows.  A fire\nflickered fitfully in the grate, with so little light that the army of\ndancing invading shadows rushed even more and more tempestuously and\noverwhelmingly forward towards it.  They leapt over the sombre-backed\nbooks in their close rows on the shelves around the room, flicking a\nletter tooled in gold here and there as they passed.  In the corners\nthey already ruled supreme.  High upon the walls they hung, like\ngathered clouds.  Only immediately before the grate, where the big\n_secretaire_ stood with its roll-top lid pushed back, was their kingdom\nnot yet.\n\nThe little light showed the open desk, its half-filled and\nneatly-labelled pigeon-holes, its inkstand, blotter and loose papers.\nLeft and right of the centre, the big drawers were all shut, save one,\nthat gaped half-open.  The heavy piece seemed almost as it were to\nbrood over that drawer.  It was seldom open.  It held Paul's old school\nreports and essays and some ancient sermon notes, chiefly things he did\nnot guess were still in existence.  A few of them, disordered, lay half\nin, half out, tossed down there by a quick movement.  One lay on the\nfloor, white in the gloom, as it had fallen from the reader's hand.\n\nThe reader himself had slipped from his seat.  The revolving chair in\nwhich he had been sitting, was pushed slightly back, and he himself was\nkneeling, head forward, face hid in his hands.  Mr. Kestern often\nprayed there thus, busy at his sermons, and there was a footstool below\nthe desk for him to kneel upon.  But he was not kneeling on it now.\nHis was no premeditated praying.  He had dropped the manuscript, turned\nthe gas hastily out, and fallen forward there, in one swift motion,\nsome half-hour or more ago.  The fire had thus begun to die, but he\npaid no heed.  His head, with its hair already more nearly white than\ngrey, had scarcely moved in his hands for all that time.\n\nYet if the man's bowed shoulders were all but motionless, the rapid\nagonised thoughts lanced this way and that without ceasing through his\ntortured soul.  Now they were flying back down the years, revealing,\nlike lightning flashes, other great moments in the drama of his son:\nthe moment he had knelt praying--good God, how he had prayed!--and\nwaiting for the news of the birth in the room above; the moment when\nhe, and his wife with him this time, had knelt and wrestled with God in\nan agony for the life of the lad upon whom the consulting doctors were\neven then pronouncing a final decision.  In each case, there had been\nsteps at last outside announcing what had seemed and what he had\nacclaimed to be a veritable miracle.  But now--ah! now....\n\n\"'Father, if it be possible...' 'The Lord, Who hath redeemed us from\nall evil, bless the lad...' 'Lord of All power and might...'\n'Master...'\"--it was in broken phrases that he prayed.  It was, indeed,\na prayer not truly of words at all.  Mr. Kestern, stricken as he had\nnever dreamed he could be stricken, flung his racked and aching soul at\nthe feet of his God.\n\nAnd it was all so still: the silent dance of the shadows, the silent\nexisting of the heavy curtains and old-fashioned furniture, the silent,\nbroken man.  It was still outside in the suburban street, dank and\nunlovely in the dull December evening.  It was still high up where the\nlowering clouds, heavy with snow that year, hid the moon.  And God on\nHis throne sat still.\n\n\"Oh, my God, spare me this thing....  Thou knowest....  Let not Satan\ntriumph over me....  The boy is Thine--given, dedicated, bought;--save\nThou my son, my only son.  Yet not my will, but Thine be done....  Ah,\nbut it cannot be Thy will--this deceit, this lie!  O God of Truth, open\nhis eyes that he may see wondrous things out of Thy Word....\"\n\nKnives, lances--each broken sentence was one such.  And truly Mr.\nKestern would have counted his heart's blood a light offering if\nthereby he might have saved his son.  His heart's blood!  He was\noffering even more as he knelt there now.  His faith and love were\nbreaking his soul upon the wheel, and not one blow would he spare\nhimself.\n\nAnd within, without, above, silences, interwoven silences, a\nveil--inscrutable.\n\nBut God must be made to hear...  \"'Father, if it be possible....'\"\n\n\nThe handle of the door turned, futilely since the door was locked.  Mr.\nKestern rose slowly, and opened it.  Mrs. Kestern came in.  \"Father!\"\nshe exclaimed.  \"Your fire's nearly out!  And no gas?  Whatever--  Oh,\nfather dear, what is it?  How long have you been here alone?  Why\ndidn't you call me in?  Let me light the gas for you.\"\n\nShe walked over and lit the yellow jet, turning again to the man who\nstood, silent and motionless, by the table.  Her eyes took in the drawn\nface, the haggard brow, even the signs of a man's difficult tears.  She\nmoved swiftly to him.  \"Father!\" she cried again, \"what is it?  Has\nanything happened to Paul?\"  One hand reached up to his shoulder and\nthe other was pressed hard on her heart.\n\n\"No, no, Clara,\" said the man.  \"He's written, that's all.  In advance\nof his coming, I suppose, so as to prepare us.  You had better read\nwhat he says.\"\n\nHis wife detected the bitter, hopeless pain that underlay the words.\nHer glance, too, read aright the open drawer and the disordered papers.\nMechanically she reached out for the letter.  \"He's still our boy,\" she\ncried, inconsequently.\n\nThe old Puritan straightened himself.  \"A son of mine a Roman\nCatholic!\" he cried.  \"What is my sin that God should bring this upon\nme?  Would God he had died first!\"\n\n\"Father!--no!--oh, don't say that!  I can't bear it, I can't bear it.\nOh, God help us, God help us----\"  She sank heavily into a chair, her\nbody shaken with sobs.\n\nMr. Kestern moved over, and laid his hand on her shoulder.  It was an\nutterly pathetic gesture that he made, as if, whatever her grief, they\nwere both of them powerless before it.  \"He's not taken the step yet,\"\nhe said as one catching at a straw.  Then, bitterly, \"Or he says not.\nHe wishes to consult us first.  But you can read that his mind is made\nup.  They have trapped my boy.\"\n\nThrough her tears, his wife asked for the letter to be read.\n\n\"It's quite short,\" said Mr. Kestern heavily, as he recrossed the room\nand seated himself in his chair, and then, with that new bitterness,\n\"short and sweet.  You can read between the lines.\n\n\n\"'MY DEAR, DEAR FATHER,\n\n\"'I know that what I am going to say will give you terrible pain, and\nbelieve me, it is only after hours of real agony in prayer for light\nthat I have come to something of a decision.  Not by the way that I\nhave really come to a decision at all, for I shall take no step, now or\nat any time, without consulting you first.  Please, please, believe\nthat.  But I feel I must tell you definitely that it seems to me very\nlikely that I shall make my submission to the Church of Rome.'  ('Make\nhis submission!'--do you notice that?  Submit to the Devil!  Our Paul!)\n'I do not love our Lord one whit less than I ever did; indeed I think I\nlove Him more.  It is because I love Him that I shall take this step,\nif I feel it to be finally right.  If I go, I shall go because it seems\nto me to be His Will and that the Catholic Church is His one True\nChurch.  I know you will find it all but impossible to understand, but,\ndear father, for God's sake believe me when I say that I believe I go\nto Him because He is the Truth and because I believe that that is His\nTruth.'\"\n\n\n\"'Truth!'  That tissue of lies and Devil's deceits!  Oh, the power of\nthe old Enemy!  I would never have believed it possible of our boy, the\nson of our prayers, our Paul.  But no son of mine----\"\n\n\"Father, father, don't!  For my sake, stop.  He won't go--he can't go.\nYou will be able to talk to him.  He knows the Word of God too well to\nbe led so awfully astray.  Don't get angry, dearest, don't, I beg you.\nIt--it'll pass, this trial.  It breaks my heart to see you look like\nthat.\"\n\n\"My heart is broken already, I think, Clara.  'His one true Church!'\nIf anyone had told me that Paul, Paul----\"\n\n\"Father, let's pray.  God will help us.  He won't allow the Devil to\ntake our boy.  Let's pray, and trust Him, dearest.  He's never failed\nus yet.  Do you remember when Paul was so ill----\"\n\nAnd once more, this time together, father and mother cried upon their\nGod.\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nThat night, too, as if the odd development of life wished to make a\nsecret jest of it, Edith Thornton made her great resolve.  She put on\nher coat and hat, made an excuse about some Christmas shopping, and\nwent out into the foggy air.  The shop-fronts were gay and tempting,\nbut she had no eyes for them to-night.  Edward Street was full of\nhurrying foot passengers, intent on their own business, but cheerful\nwith the good-will of the season when they blundered into each other or\ndropped their parcels.  She steered through them scarcely aware that\nthey were there.  Her own eyes, if any had looked into them, would have\nrevealed a tension of spirit and a high purpose which accounted for all\nthat.  Deep down in her, unreasoning and unreasonably, she knew that\nshe was about no light adventure.  Yet it was all so absurdly simple\nand commonplace.\n\nIn Wellington Road the stripped trees dripped gloomily in the dark.\nLittle sharp pats of falling moisture were distinctly audible on the\ncarpet of dead leaves that strewed the long old-fashioned gardens on\neither side.  This street, but little used, was almost deserted, and\nthe lamps gleamed at rare intervals.  Edith lived, as it were, from\nlamp-post to lamp-post.  She bade her unwilling feet reach that next\none, and that next, and that next; and so she passed.\n\nWithin St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Church lights shone gaily.  The\nbuilding, of no great size, laid no claim to architectural glory and\nharboured no air of mystery or double-dealing.  But Edith's heart beat\nfiercely as she went up the path.  In the porch, she stared at the\nuntidy notice-board stuck with black-edged funeral cards requesting\nprayers for the dead, at the poster of a New Year whist drive, and at\nthe stoup of holy water.  This Christ's Church!  But even as she\nlooked, her simple mind swiftly adjusted values.  Paul's letters, and\nher own secret reading, had taught her to do so.  She understood how\none might, for example, come to believe in prayers for the dead, and\nhow, if so, there would be nothing against printed reminders, and how,\nif so, such reminders would naturally be placed in the church and\nmight, equally naturally, get a little dirty.  Holy water too; well, it\nwas in the Old Testament, more or less, and its saving logic adumbrated\nin the New.  But the whist drive was a stickler.  Would the Apostles\nhave tolerated cards? ... But she would go through with her visit of\nenquiry now.\n\nShe pushed open the door and looked in.  Then, with a quick little\ngesture, entered, and let it swing to behind her.  And there she stood,\nlooking curiously round the place, with that unreasoning fear taking\never more steadily possession of her heart.\n\nThe altar was lit with many candles.  She stared at it almost literally\nwith a sort of horror, as if it were a monstrous thing.  The statues\nabout, the odd pictures, the praying people here and there, even the\nentry of a man into a confessional and the fleeting glimpse of the head\nand shoulders of the priest, were small things.  That altar stood to\nher for everything.  Authority, logic, history--what were they to a\ngirl?  Oh, well, these had a place, perhaps; she liked to hear Paul\nspeak of them; she assented to what he had to say; but one thing more\nthan any other had gripped her, how or why she knew not, in all this\nstrange talk of this incredible religion.  The Baby in the Manger, the\nSacrament on the altar--suppose that were true?  And she had come to\nsee; come up out of Galilee of the Gentiles to Jerusalem that is from\nabove; come up from afar like the Wise Kings.  Where is He that is born\nKing of the Jews? she asked, trembling, in her heart.  Here!  What,\namong those candles, under that strange canopy--He?\n\nSo she stood hesitating.  An old woman, bent, clean, made a deep\ncurtsey in the aisle and came noisily down to the door.  As she passed\nEdith, she looked up, surveyed her for a moment, and smiled.  \"A happy\nChristmas, honey,\" she said.  \"Go forward, and sit down.  Himself is\nwaiting you.\"\n\nEdith smiled an answer, mechanically.  She did not question the odd\nsaying.  Neither then nor later did she doubt that the thing was a\nmiracle.  She went forward.  \"Himself is waiting you,\" she repeated\nwonderingly.  It was as if a deep musical bell had pealed within her,\nand a whole sweet carillon broken out.  \"Himself is waiting you,\nHimself is waiting you, Himself is waiting you,\" rang the merry bells.\nShe actually flushed a little.  She sat down in a pew and stared at the\naltar.\n\nAmid a host of confused unknown objects which shone and blended the one\nin the other, she perceived a kind of box.  It had curtains, she saw,\nand they were drawn.  Why drawn?  Her eyes wandered upwards.  She\nperceived that from the four corners sprang metals which met above\nafter an interval and upheld a cross.  The little gold, shining thing\nheld her for a moment.  Then she looked into the space beneath.\nCandlelight gleamed, sparkled, leapt, on a brilliant, glittering\nsomething not unlike a vase filled with scintillating flowers.  In the\nvery heart of the flowers gleamed a living white.  She stared at it.\nAnd then, suddenly, all untaught, she knew.\n\n\"Himself is waiting you; Himself is waiting you; Himself is waiting\nyou\"--lower and even lower, a faint whisper of music, the little peal\nrang on.  But she did not believe ... Yet for centuries on centuries,\nPaul had said, men had thought ... Martyrs had died ... Saints had\nseen....  He?  Well, a Baby....  Like her last-arrived sister, tiny,\npuckered, remote, dear.  He?  Suppose that that small white circle was\na little window, through which her soul could pass; could pass and\npass; to His embrace, His tone, His heart....  Slowly, very slowly,\nEdith Thornton, who envied dear, eager, clever Paul since he had so\nmuch to give, slipped forward en her knees, and closed her eyes.\n\nAnd then, in the fragrant, gleaming silence of her mind, there arose a\nlittle fear.  She watched it come.  It was very small at first, like a\nman's hand.  Only it grew and grew, till it filled all her gaze and\nthundered in her soul's ear.  Wave on wave it thundered, thundered and\nbroke, this overwhelming mastery of fear.  And she knew quite well why\nshe was afraid.  Her soul had passed through the little door, but it\nwas lonely there.  \"Paul, Paul, dear, dear Paul!\" she cried, striving\nso hard to see him.  \"Paul!\"--the echoes went wandering down the\ncorridors of her soul, and came reverberating back to her.  She was\nalone--alone.  And the light died, and the music died, and she was very\nsore afraid.\n\nAnd then He came.  Walking through the dark He came, seeking her.  She\nsaw Him, only there was no sight.  The very scent of His robes was\nsweet, only there was no smell.  He spoke, too; clearer than the noise\nof the water-floods that drowned her, louder than the great winds\nroaring through the lashed Hursley pines, she heard Him, only there was\nno sound.  And she knew what He said, only there was no thought.  \"It\nis I,\" He said, \"I, I; be not afraid.\"\n\nShe gripped the feet of Him, and marvelled as she did so that they\nshould tread her down so ruthlessly, so immeasurably happy.  And she\ncried up to Him--\"Paul, Paul!  Oh, Master, give me Paul!  Don't take\nPaul away!  I can't live without Paul!\"\n\n\"Daughter,\" He said, \"it is I--I; be not afraid.\"\n\nShe sobbed; she choked with sobs.  \"Paul!\" she tried to cry, \"Oh\nMaster, dear dear Master, give me Paul--Paul!\"  And the sound, that was\nno sound, echoed away and away and out on great mountain places, vast\nand bare.  The White Feet slowly died between her hands.  She looked\nup.  \"It is I,\" He whispered, bending over her.  She looked right into\nHis eyes, down, down, down.  She had not thought death could be so\nunutterably sweet.\n\nShe felt a hand on her shoulder.  \"Can I do anything for you?\" said a\nman's voice.  \"Please excuse me asking, only you seemed in trouble.\"\n\nShe felt ashamed because her face was wet with tears.  Also she did not\nknow what to say.  Long afterwards, she realised that what she had said\nwas a second miracle.  \"Father, please,\" she said, like a child, \"I\nwant to--to come in.\"\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nPaul himself that night, whose soul's welfare was already so great a\ntrouble to so may diverse persons, was, almost for the first time, not\nthinking of religion at all.  To his lips the gods were early lifting\nthe immortal chalice in whose draught lies utter bitterness.  That\nwhich had been to him a kind of visionary thing, a holy grail floating\non light between heaven and earth, had taken form between his hands.\nHe had, indeed, hoped for something one day of the sort, but not that\nthe laurel leaves should be plucked for his head before he had even\ntaken his degree.  True, they were as yet in shadow rather than in\nsubstance, but others were seeing that crowning shadow even more than\nhe.\n\nHe was by this time in his last year, in the first autumn term of it,\nand that very term a firm of publishers had accepted his first book of\npoems.  Tressor's name had brought it within the range of practical\npolitics, but since then one or two critics had read the boy's verse\nand offered the usual qualified praise.  But in the qualifications ran\na sincere note.  It had impressed the publishers.  They had consented\nto publish at their own expense, and had even offered a royalty after a\nsale which they had estimated at the outside possible probability.  For\nPaul's first cheque bugles should blow--in fairyland.\n\nBut then Paul was already in fairyland.  Manning had suggested that the\nsuccess of \"The Literary Lounge\" warranted an annual dinner, and\nDonaldson had added the corollary that this triumph of the club's first\npresident ought to be celebrated in town.  The idea suggested, it had\nseemed obvious and inevitable.  Term over, Paul had gone down to\nManning's home in Oxfordshire for a fortnight or so, and now both had\ncome up together for the celebration.  Paul was Manning's guest at the\nBalmoral for the night, and a private dining-room had been engaged at\nan hotel on the river side of the Strand.  Finally, that there should\nbe no lack of glory, Tressor himself was the guest of the evening.\n\nThe evening Manning and Paul arrived there was a wonderful sunset, as\nif the heaven itself would fling an earnest of the boy's success across\nthe world.  From the Strand, the great golden glow seemed to burn\nbehind the Admiralty Arch, far off, behind the Park and the great\nPalace.  The spire of St. Martin's and the incredible globe on the top\nof the Coliseum caught its radiance, and, looking east, the whole\nfa\u00e7ade of the busy street shone with that unimaginable radiance.  The\ngreat central column of the Square burgeoned black and monstrous\nagainst it.  Whitehall was an avenue of glory washed with fairy gold.\n\nYet it was things undistinguished and unbeautiful in themselves that\ngave the best effects.  Slipping through back streets to Leicester\nSquare, the two friends were now and again brought to a complete stop.\nBetween the great bulk of a towering house utterly blocked in with\nshadow and some tawdry outpost of a spreading theatre splashed with\nadvertisement, they would see a patch of sky twisted into writhen\ncloud, royal, amber, impenetrable.  Some Titan, striding through the\nheavenlies, had flung his Bacchic scarf from him.  Stained with the\npurple of his feast, it fell across the world, an orange symbol of\ndrunken ecstasy.\n\nSaid Paul: \"Manning, God gave us eyes to see that.\"\n\nThe other's face remained immobile.  It was odd to see how that\nsplendour shone on his hair and eyes, odd, Paul thought, because his\nfriend's face was hard, and no less hard for that caress.  \"Surely you\nmust think so!\" he exclaimed.\n\n\"'I am all that has been and that is and that shall be, and no mortal\nhas ever raised my veil,'\" quoted Manning.\n\nPaul looked up and away.  \"We cannot even touch it,\" he said suddenly.\n\"I've never thought of that.\"\n\nA suggestion of the after-glow still hung suspended in the sky as he\nbathed and dressed.  He ran his blind up to see it as he stood in his\nshirt-sleeves before the glass.  But even the poet in him could not be\nholden by such beauty to-night.  The earth was too real beneath his\nfeet.  It was so wonderful that he, Paul Kestern, should be standing\ndressing there.  Memories came and went like meteors through his mind.\nHe remembered his first sonnet.  He remembered how, for the first time,\nin the harsh atmosphere of a school class-room and through the, to him,\nuncertain medium of a Latin poet, the first glimpse of fairy lands\nforlorn had come to him, and the magic casement opened.  A new master\nhad found them plodding wearily through Horace and had, by an impulse,\nstayed the halting construe of--of--(yes, it was old Lammick; he\nthought he had forgotten Lammick!)--of Lammick, to render the thing\nhimself.  As he spoke, it was plain that he had forgotten the boys, and\nso far as Paul was concerned, he had very soon forgotten the master.\nOnly he saw the old Roman singing woven words of music about\nunutterable things.\n\nAnd he saw himself going up for his scholarship exam.  He had\npainstakingly read Macaulay's essays in the train for style.  He\nremembered putting his old Waterbury on the desk before him so that\neach question might have fifteen minutes.  He remembered--oh, he\nremembered the look of the commons on his first breakfast table, a\nploughed field the first time he walked to Coton, the stained glass in\nthe Round Church East window seen from the Union writing-room, villas\nin the Cherry Hinton Road, a print on David's stall in the\nmarket-place, rain on Garret Hostel Bridge, Clare Avenue one very early\nmorning.  Then he saw, suddenly, grotesquely stretched bodies and legs,\nsprawled fervently by praying men in the Henry Martyn Hall.  He heard\none of them speak: \"O God, make all slack men _keen_.\"  Paul chuckled\nto himself, because he loved it so.\n\nThen he wished vividly and acutely that he had finally rewritten that\nline in the proof of his book.  It was about brown withered ivy on the\ntrunk of a pine in Hursley Woods.  There was a little curl of brown\nhair too that slipped always under Edith's ear.  He would give her the\nfirst copy himself, if he had to go to Claxted personally and\nespecially to do it.  He would give it her in Hursley Woods.  No he\nwouldn't; he would give it her in Lambeth Court.  He would take her for\na walk.  They would go past the \"South Pole.\"  They would walk up to\nthe lamp-post, and he would hand her the book.  \"That's yours,\" he\nwould say, \"all of it.  And I still want to preach in Lambeth Court\nthough I did write it.  Now what do you say?\"\n\nPaul began to sing the Glory Song.\n\nManning put his head in.  \"Great Scott, Paul,\" he said, \"what's all the\nnoise about?\"\n\nPaul flushed guiltily.  Then he laughed.  \"I can't help it, Manning,\"\nhe said.  \"I feel too bucked for words.  I know I'm quite mad, but I\ncan't help it.\"\n\nAnd it was jolly threading the busy Christmas streets in a taxi,\narriving at the hotel door, having a man in uniform open it for you so\nimportantly, hearing the girl in the office tell the page to take the\ngentlemen to the Literary Lounge dining-room, and the finding of it\nfull of men awaiting them.  There was Donaldson, explosive but genial,\nwarmed with excitement already.  \"Hullo, Kestern!  Damned glad to see\nyou again.  I say, I congratulate you, you know, but didn't I always\nsay you'd do it?\"  And Strether, looking big and ungainly in his black\nclothes that never fitted particularly, but smiling grimly.\n\"Felicitations, Kestern, and all that sort of thing.\"  (\"By Gad,\nGussie, felicitations!  Keep that for your speech, old horse.  What's\nthat?  Always making a row?  Ha, ha, ha--that's damned good!  Good old\nGussie!\")\n\nTressor put Paul at his ease.  He was so big and smiling; he talked so\neasily; it was all so natural to him.  He was on Paul's right, of\ncourse, and Paul could look past him, down the table, at them all,\nManning at the other end, glancing up now and again, with a reassuring\nnod.  Judson, by the way, was there, for he had insisted on admission\nto the club and had turned out the coolest critic of them all.  Paul\nsmiled to see how he enjoyed himself; and he drank his unaccustomed\nwine and leaned back in his chair at last, when he had made his speech,\nwith all self-consciousness gone from him.\n\nBut it was hard to sit still and listen to Tressor.  The chief guest of\nthe evening rose to respond to the toast in his slightly heavy way, but\nhe smiled down the disordered table and met the eyes turned to him as\nif he were no more than an undergraduate himself.  He talked of the\ncollege and of literature, as he was in duty bound to do; he introduced\nan anecdote or two; at last he turned slightly to Paul.  Well, at any\nrate, they had reason to hope great things from the president.  He\nmight perhaps say there that from the first he had detected in the\nverses the president had been good enough to show him, the true mark,\nthe real spirit of a poet.  He was very grateful for the part he had\nbeen able to play in advising and reading, but it was genuine\nrecognition that had led to the acceptance for publication of the book\nwhich they all expected so eagerly.  It was a first book, and a\nyouthful book, but he was not exaggerating when he said that he looked\nforward to the day when they would all be proud of having been among\nthe first to recognise the author's undoubted genius and greet his\nfirst appearance in print.  He anticipated that, in the days to come,\nthey would remember this night with real pride.  He thanked the club\nfor having invited him to share in that.  They had been good enough to\nsay that they were honoured by his presence, but he assured them that\nhe felt honoured to be there.\n\nThey toasted him.  They toasted Paul.  They toasted each other.\nExcitement, the toasts, the ring of friendly faces, the hot room, his\nown achievement--all these things intoxicated Paul.  Tressor left.\nDonaldson proposed a music hall; Paul hardly realised that he agreed.\nIn Leicester Square, people smiled as they tumbled out of their taxis,\nand the lights were blurred.  Paul scarcely knew where he was till he\nfound himself in the stalls.\n\nThen came the gradual awakening.  They were too near the footlights for\none thing.  The orchestra blared and crashed at them, and the solemn,\ntired faces of the men behind the fiddles began to obsess Paul.  They\nlaughed at no jokes, these fellows.  They had heard them all a score of\ntimes before.  There was no honest laughter on the stage, and\nDonaldson, next him, lolled about and held his sides at a painted\ntravesty of humour.  When a turn allowed, these performers crept out by\na small black hole and returned presently wiping their lips.  Of\ncourse, it was, it had to be, a business, but Paul saw it all through\ninnocent eyes.  Essential glory had glowed upon him from the sky;\ngenuine tributes had blessed him on Tressor's lips; this began to shape\nitself as a horrible thing.\n\nThe great curtain went up and down inexorably.  In the dazzling glow of\nthe searchlights a couple of dancers pirouetted before him, painted,\nhalf-naked.  His own face flushed; he glanced guiltily round.  \"By Gad,\nlook at that girl's thighs,\" whispered Donaldson.  Strether was bolt\nupright, cynical, his lips pursing in a way he had.  The light glowed\nred, shadowed.  In and out of the shadows, while the music rose and\nfell, those white legs twinkled and danced.  Now back, now out again.\nA twirl of short skirts, and in a cascade of white, one throws herself\nbackward in a man's arms.  Paul seemed to meet her eyes as she looked\nout across the footlights, with the powder and rouge on her cheeks and\nher bosom all but bared.  Thunder of applause; smiles, bows, a\nhand-in-hand appearance in the naked light of the great hall; Donaldson\nhalf on his feet, staring; even Judson clapping vigorously.\n\nPaul turned to Manning.  \"I'm going,\" he said thickly.  \"I must,\nManning.\"\n\nThe other looked at him closely.  \"I'll come too,\" he said, and rose.\n\"I don't want to see any more.\"\n\n\"No, no,\" said Paul, vehemently, \"I'd rather go alone.  Do you mind,\nManning?  I'm all right, only I'd like to walk back.\"\n\nManning nodded.  \"I see,\" he said.  \"We'll meet at breakfast.\nGood-night.\"\n\n\"Oh, I say, damn it all, you can't go, Paul.  'Tisn't done, my dear\nchap.  Eyes in the boat, four!  Sit still, sir.\"\n\n\"Shut up,\" whispered Paul savagely.  \"Everybody can hear you.  Let me\nget out of this.\"\n\nThe loungers in the promenade looked at him curiously.  A girl nudged\nagainst him; \"Get me a drink, dear,\" she said in a low tone, and even\nhalf-rested a hand upon his arm.  A feeling of all but physical\nsickness nauseated the boy.  In the cloak-room, he thought that the\nattendant leered at him.  In the street he dared not look at the folk\nlingering and passing below the steps.\n\nSwiftly, drinking great draughts of the night air, he set off home.  It\nwas drizzling slightly, but he did not notice it.  Staring straight\nahead, he found himself hardly able to think, only dimly aware of\nstreet-lamps and great, black, velvet spaces.  He was plainly not to be\naccosted in Piccadilly.  In Knightsbridge, the streets emptier, he\nbegan to feel released.  But not till he was in his own room at the\nhotel, and had thrown off his coat and bathed his face and sunk by his\nbed with his head in his hands, was he able to formulate his thoughts.\n\nThen they came, in a torrential flood.  He, Paul Kestern, called of\nGod, destined for the ministry, even now at odds in his own inmost\nheart and with his best-beloved parents for the truth of Christ, had\nbeen drunk and had gone to a music hall.  He was all superlatives and\nsaw no door of escape for his soul.  But to do him justice, it was not\nhis own soul that he worried about.  He scarcely thought of himself.\nHe had indeed been thinking of himself most of the evening, but now he\nthought of his Master.  \"One is your Master, even Christ.\"  His\ntortured conscience painted vividly to him the scene upon which he had\ndwelt often enough--the open courtyard; the fire in the corner, where\nthe light leaped and danced on wall and gate; the sudden opening of a\ndoor; the buzz of voices, cries, torch-lights; the coward Apostle\nstarting to his feet, while the guard felt for spears and came to\nattention; the passing of a young erect Figure with set face, Whose\ncheek was already reddened with a blow; and the turning of the head, so\nthat the eyes of prisoner and betrayer met on an instant.  He, Paul,\nhad forgotten his Master.  He, Paul, had denied his Master.  He, Paul,\nhad been shown the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them, and had\nfallen at the feet of the tempter.\n\nPeter had gone out and wept bitterly, with the memory of a look.\n\nPaul, then, tried to pierce the darkness and see.  He did not sit by\nthe fire and wait; he was up, in his soul, and out, searching for Him.\nIn broken sentences, he was crying his confession, renewing his\npledges, seeking for pardon.  But it was to-night as though for long he\nsought in vain.  \"Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow,\" he prayed,\nand Manning's voice came echoing back: \"How in the world can blood wash\nme clean?\"  He turned to stray phrases of the old hymns: \"While others\nThou art saving, do not pass me by,\" and Mr. Stuart presented himself\nbefore him, suave, smiling, and with the ghost of a voice: \"Well, dear\nboys, have you given your hearts to Jesus?  Is there one here who has\nnot?\"\n\nHe writhed upon the rack.  He hated himself for all that he would not\nallow himself to think.  Somehow Father Vassall crept into his mind,\nsitting in his old arm-chair at the presbytery in his ancient cassock,\nsmoking a cigarette, looking at him with kindly eyes through the smoke.\n\"Concubinage is a regular thing in Spain,\" said a clear, scholarly\nvoice, with just that suspicion of veiled triumph in it that had goaded\nthe boy to madness in the train.\n\n\"She has g-g-gentle fingers that nevertheless d-d-draw men to God.\"\nFather Vassall had quoted the words once, with his little stammer that\nsomehow did away with all suspicion of effeminacy.  The specks of light\nceased to dance before Paul's closed eyes.  It was as if he was in a\nvery wide room.  He grew still.  His mind settled down to the great\nquestion.  Did God really will that men should come to Him that way?\nWhat if he took a step forward?  \"Faith is a step in the dark.\"  In the\ndark?  But this was light!  That glare over the footlights, that\nsearching limelight, that had been darkness.  In an audible whisper,\nhis face hidden in his hands upon his bed, Paul made his experiment.\n\n\"Hail Mary\" (he whispered) \"full of grace, the Lord is with thee;\nblessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb,\nJesus.\"  Well, but that was merely a confession of faith that he might\nhave made at any time.  There was more.  Should he dare it?\n\n\"Holy Mary\"--it was like a solemn oath--\"Mother of God, pray for us\nsinners, now, and in the hour of our death.  Amen.\"\n\nSilence, above, about, beneath.  A veil of silence.  But there was\npeace in the silence, surely, surely, the peace of God.\n\nIn the silence, Paul Kestern crept into bed, and believed himself\ncomforted.\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nA few hours before, at Claxted, Madeline Ernest had been sitting alone\nby the fire, putting a few finishing touches to a blouse.  It was a\nChristmas present for Ethel Cator, and it had to be finished that\nnight.  That was the worst of making Christmas presents.  In a way it\nwas rather fun, but before you had finished, the days had nearly always\nall but run out and you had to go on working when you were tired.\nMadeline was tired, but she wished she could afford to buy presents.\nAlso to buy a few more things for herself--some silk stockings, for\nexample; she put her head on one side to consider that.  She looked\nvery pretty as she did so.  The lamplight shone on her fair abundant\nhair and her white skin.  Big eyes, too, she had, and lovely lashes.\nIt was a pity there was nobody more appreciative than the old purring\ntabby by the fire to see her.\n\nShe dabbed with her needle once or twice, and lifted the shining stuff.\nThrough her pretty head a current of thoughts was flowing\ninconsequently.  Then the door opened, and Mrs. Ernest came in.\n\nMrs. Ernest was short, comfortably stout, a little bent.  She had been\npretty, and she was growing grey.  She was almost always tired, and\nwith good reason.  Mr. Ernest was not even a Vicar, and, truth to tell,\nshe had ceased to hope that he ever would be.\n\n\"Still working, Madeline?\"\n\n\"Yes, mother.  I must finish this.  Ethel always sends me something and\nI must remember her.\"\n\n\"Have you put the clean things away?\"\n\n\"No.  I'm so sorry.  I'll go at once.  I forgot all about them.\"\n\n\"Never mind.  Sit down a minute.  Madeline, have you heard about Paul?\"\n\n\"What, mother?\"  Madeline bent earnestly over her work.\n\n\"He's written a book of poems and it's going to be published early next\nyear.  Mrs. Kestern told me this afternoon.\"\n\n\"Mother!  You don't say so.  How splendid!\"  The girl flushed with\ngenuine pleasure and excitement.\n\n\"Yes, dear.  He is clever, is Paul.  I expect he'll do great things one\nday.\"\n\nThe eyes of mother and daughter met.  \"I always thought so,\" said\nMadeline.\n\nMrs. Ernest sat down in an arm-chair, and reached for her work-basket.\nShe opened it with a little sigh.  There were always socks or stockings\nin it, and no more than her daughter did she like mending them.  She\nthreaded her needle, and fitted the wooden heel into a sock.  \"Father\nhad a talk with Mr. Kestern this morning,\" she said, vaguely.\n\nMadeline straightened out her work.  \"Yes?\" she queried, critically, as\nif to the blouse.\n\n\"Yes.  Mr. Kestern is troubled about Paul.\"\n\n\"Really?  Why?\"\n\n\"He's getting High Church.\"\n\n\"Well, what about it?  I like things a bit higher than father and Mr.\nKestern myself.\"\n\n\"I know.  You are so musical.  I wish Tom didn't wear out his socks\nquite so fast.  But Paul's getting very High Church.\"\n\n\"Very?\"  Madeline looked up meditatively.\n\n\"Yes, very.  Of course your father would not wish you to know anything.\nMr. Kestern told him privately.  He's very worried about it.\"\n\n\"It's that Father Vassall,\" said Madeline.\n\n\"How do you know about Father Vassall?\"\n\n\"Paul told me.  He likes him very much.\"\n\n\"Well, I'm sure it would be too dreadful for the Kesterns if Paul\nbecame a Roman Catholic.\"\n\n\"It won't matter much if he's a poet.\"\n\n\"Madeline!  It would.  I'm sure Roman Catholicism is very\ndreadful--there's the confessional.  Though I must say it's worse for a\nwoman than a man.  And the Pope too.  But that's the point.  Suppose\nPaul became a priest.  They'll get him if they can.  Jesuits always try\nfor clever young men.\"\n\nMadeline laughed.  \"Mother!  As if Paul would be a Roman Catholic\npriest!\"\n\n\"Why not?  Father says he would not be surprised.\"\n\n\"Well, I should.  Paul!  He's so very evangelical.\"\n\n\"I know.  But----\" (There was a little pause.) \"Madeline, does he see\nmuch of that girl, Edith Thornton?\"\n\nThe girl put down her work and looked into the fire.  She was silent.\n\"Oh, I don't know,\" she exclaimed suddenly.\n\n\"Well, dear, I've thought once or twice he looked at her rather as if\nhe liked her.  I'm sure I don't know what he can see in her.  But of\ncourse if he's a priest, he won't be able to marry at all.\"\n\n\"No, mother, I suppose not.\"\n\n\"Well, my dear, I think it would be terrible for the Kesterns, Paul\ndoing so well and all.  Just too terrible.  I am sure all their friends\nought to try and prevent it.  And if he becomes an author too, he's not\nlikely to be a missionary after all.  He ought to be a great preacher\none day, and if he writes as well, I suppose it would help a great\ndeal.\"\n\n\"Yes, I suppose it would.\"  The girl propped her head on her hands, and\nstared into the flames.\n\nMrs. Ernest finished her sock.  \"What's the time?\" she asked.\n\nThe girl looked up.  \"Ten o'clock,\" she said.\n\n\"Dear, you ought to be going up.  You look tired.  Give me a kiss,\nMadeline.\"\n\nFor once, the girl got up at once and went over to her mother.  Mrs.\nErnest put her arms round her, and smoothed back her hair.  She sighed.\n\"I do hope you'll be happy,\" she said.  \"I'm sure I don't want anything\nexcept the best for my girl.\"\n\n\"I know, mumsie.  Don't worry, darling.\"\n\n\"No, dear, I won't.  Only----  Dear girl, I expect Paul is very easily\nled.  That Father Vassall now.  And a good woman can have such an\ninfluence on a man, Madeline.\"\n\nThe girl kissed her again, and hid her face on her shoulder.\n\n\"Your father and I have prayed for you ever since you were a wee girl,\ndarling, that you might marry the right man.  Good-night, dear child.\"\n\n\"Good-night, mumsie.  Is daddy in the study?\"\n\n\"Yes, dear.  Tell him it's ten, will you?  Paul comes home to-morrow,\nMadeline.\"\n\n\"Does he?\"\n\n\"Yes.  Take those cards round to the Kesterns in the afternoon, will\nyou.  If you see him, tell him how pleased we are about the book.\"\n\n\"Yes.  Good-night, mother.\"\n\n\"Good-night, dear.  Sleep sound.\"\n\nMadeline undressed slowly.  Then she slipped on her dressing-gown and\nknelt by her bed.  She habitually said the prayers that she had said\nsince she was a little girl, and she said them now.  But she said them\na little more slowly than usual, and when she had finished, she did not\njump at once between the sheets as she usually did.  She knelt on,\nthinking.\n\nShe did not want to be a clergyman's wife anywhere really, in England\nor abroad.  Yet she couldn't tell God that.  But she did want to be a\nsuccessful author's wife, only she could not tell God that either.  She\nhad never even told God properly about Paul, partly because she had\nnever known quite what to tell.  Now, however, she was realising just\nwhat it would mean to her if he became a Roman Catholic priest, utterly\npreposterous as it seemed.  Besides, in her heart of hearts, it did not\nseem quite so preposterous as she had said.  Paul was like that.  Also,\nhe was rather nice.  Such a boy.  Much to good for that Edith Thornton,\nonly that also you couldn't tell God.\n\nAnd then, quite suddenly, she did begin to tell God things.  She really\nprayed.  She said she was sorry for lots of things and that she would\ngive them up.  She prayed not to be always wanting nice clothes, and\nshe prayed to have more faith.  It was an expression, and she used it\nas such.  For more grace too, she prayed, not really knowing what grace\nmight be.  And she meant that also.  But her soul, not very big, at the\nbest, truly immolated itself, and she did the very utmost she could\nwith it.  And when she had leaped upon the altar as well as she was\nable, and had gashed herself with great horrid knives of renunciation,\nshe preferred her request.  \"Make Paul love me, O God,\" she whispered,\n\"and make me love him very, very much.\"\n\nSo, then, at last, the pall of deep night settled down on half the\nworld.  Even Donaldson got to bed somehow.  Manning, like Paul, walked\nback under the stars, whistling gently to himself in the more empty\nstretches.  The dancer who had looked at Paul across the footlights\nslept, and the girl who had asked for a drink.  Yet dancing and\ndrinking and praying never cease altogether, nor does the voiceless cry\nof the world ever cease to echo through the silences.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nTHURLOE END\n\n  MADMAN.\n\n  The wild duck, stringing through the sky,\n  Are south away.\n  Their green necks glitter as they fly,\n  The lake is grey.\n  So still, so lone, the fowler never heeds.\n  The wind goes rustle, rustle, through the reeds.\n\n  * * * * *\n\n  Not thus, not thus are the wild souls of men.\n  No peace for those\n  Who step beyond the blindness of the pen\n  To where the skies unclose.\n  From them the spitting mob, the cross, the crown of thorns,\n  The bull gone mad, the Saviour on his horns.\n                            JOHN MASEFIELD: _Good Friday_.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\n\"Mr. Kestern, sir?\" enquired the man, outside the little country\nstation.\n\nPaul nodded.  \"Yes,\" he said; \"are you from Father Vassall?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir.  Been waiting 'arf an hower, sir.  Trains that late.  We've\nfive mile to drive, sir, so if you'll get in....\"\n\nPaul deposited his suitcase in the dog-cart and climbed on to the seat\nalongside the driver.  He was in the heart of the Midlands, and the\nlamps on the little country station were already being dimmed to save\nthe Company's oil, since the next and last train of the day was not due\nfor several hours.  Outside the station enclosure, lights behind the\nred blinds of an inn threw a glow on the hard road, and from a cottage\nwindow or two came here and there a flicker; but these passed, they\nwere speedily out into the open country.  Trees loomed up against\nfrosty stars; but for the most part high hedges hid even the fields on\neither side the narrow lane.  A small moon, low on the horizon, swung\nup and down over them like a child's toy.  The beast between the shafts\nkept up a steady trot, though now and again the steam of his exertion\nrose mistily in the radiance of the poor lamps of the dog-cart as he\nploughed uphill at a walk.  By his side, Paul's driver soon relapsed\ninto the monotonous silence of the country.  Paul himself, muffled up\non his high seat, swaying a little with the motion, had time to think.\n\nHe was actually on his way to stay with Father Vassall, and he was\naware that he was in doubt as to the issue of his journey.  The last\nChristmas vacation and the ensuing Lent term had goaded him to the act.\nChristmas had been almost impossible at home, and the Lent term had\nshown him, every day more clearly, that he could not profess\nevangelical Anglicanism as a minister and a missionary.  Claxted had\nstung him into that conclusion on every side.  The atmosphere of the\nMission Hall, sincere, earnest, zealous as it was, left him gasping now\nas a fish out of water.  He had stood on its platform and not known\nwhat to say.  The illogical inconclusiveness of the old attitude stared\nat him so starkly that he could no longer repeat the old shibboleths.\nThe sermon in which one expounded a text as if the phrases of it and\nthe entire context had dropped, verbally complete, like the image of\nthe great goddess Diana, from the skies, and then exhorted, in words\nmade as vivid and as practical as possible, to the vague sensationalism\nof \"Come to Jesus\" or \"Accept Salvation,\" was now beyond him.  The\nthing, left thus in the air, had become meaningless to him, and his\nvery sincerity forbad his preaching anything in which he did not\nwholeheartedly believe.  The Church and Sacraments, the old truths set\nin a practical system, these seemed necessary to the Gospel salvation.\nYet a more thoughtful worker or two had already been offended by the\nvague and tentative phrasing in which he tried to hint at it.\n\nOr again, though this he tried to suppress, the gorge of the poet in\nhim would rise now against Moody and Sankey or Torrey and Alexander.\nMetre and rhyme had come to be things that he could not help\nsubconsciously analysing, but it does not do to analyse mission\nhymn-books.  Nor can one make a really successful evangelist if one is\naffected almost to desperation by a cornet out of tune, or tracts for\ndistribution that are neither English nor common sense.\n\nLastly, the home atmosphere was electric with disagreement.  He was out\nof tune with it all.  There seemed no longer anything to talk about at\ntable.  Mr. Kestern was not interested in literature and art; with his\npolitics Paul, feeling after Socialism, was in violent collision; the\nparish was no longer his world; and even into talk of the Second Coming\nof Christ would creep the voice of criticism, or into the Islington\nConference the question of Rome.  It was, of course, a common-place\ntragedy, but that did not make it the less tragic.  The man had stood\nstill, and the boy had gone on.  Also, at the fork roads, he had taken\nthe unfamiliar turn.\n\nFull of it all, then, he was coming to stay with Father Vassall.  He\nhad determined to do that this once at least.  He must talk things out\nwith his friend.  But should they come to a conclusion, and if so to\nwhat conclusion and with what results, that was the question.\n\n\"That's the 'ouse, sir.\"\n\nPaul peered eagerly ahead.  He could make out a dark, vague outline,\nand a wall on the left.  \"Wo-up, beauty,\" cried his driver to the\nhorse.  They came to a standstill before a big iron gate between tall\nred-brick gate-posts.\n\nPaul climbed stiffly down, and swung his bag out.  He found himself on\na flagged path that ran up to a door set in a shallow portico in the\nfront of a long, low, mellow Queen Anne house.  It was not too dark to\nsee a solid cornice and parapet.  \"The bell's on the right, sir,\" said\nthe voice at the gate.  \"I'll drive on round to the stable.\"\n\nPaul pulled the wrought-iron bell-pull, and somewhere in the black\nrecesses a bell jangled.  He heard a door open and the sound of feet.\n\"All right, Bridget,\" called a familiar voice; \"I'll let him in.\"  A\ndoor opened somewhere.  A faint glimmer of moving light shone through\nthe glass panes and drew nearer.  The front door swung open.  Paul\nblinked in the light.\n\nThe priest stood with a lantern in his left hand.  He wore his cassock,\nand was muffled in a cloak, with a black skull-cap on his head.  His\nmerry smiling face was turned up to Paul, clean shaven, youthful\nlooking, the hair a little tumbled.\n\n\"Good evening, Father,\" said Paul.  \"Sorry I'm late.  I've been longing\nto get here.\"\n\n\"H-how are you?\" exploded the priest.  \"C-come in.  It's splendid, your\nc-coming.\"\n\nPaul passed in.  He had the odd thought that it was all part of a\ndream.  The passage was stone-flagged and the hall beautifully bare.\nAn oak bench ran along one wall.  There were a few carvings and weapons\nand curios about.  A sombre print or two hung opposite: St. Francis\nXavier in a high biretta, and an Entombment.  The figure in black\nputting up the latch by the light of the lantern was medi\u00e6val and\nfantastic.  Yet it was all real, and it was real that he, Paul Kestern,\nwas there at last, in the house of a Catholic priest.\n\n\"Come in,\" said Father Vassall again.  \"You must be cold.  Come and get\nwarm before supper.  There's a t-t-topping fire in the p-parlour.\"\n\nHe led the way, bustling forward with a swish of cassock, welcoming,\nkind.  Paul entered the long low library, hung with panels of green\ncloth, and took in its satisfactory furnishing at a glance.  The room\nrested quietly, waiting for him.  With a swift mental comparison, he\nsaw himself arriving at Claxted instead.  Then he, too, laughed\neagerly, and moved forward to the big open Tudor fireplace.\n\nA log burned there brightly, the \"royal flames\" leaping in the iron\ngrate behind a high screen.  A deep green-brocaded arm-chair stood back\nin an ingle, a litter of papers on the rug near by, a shaded candle in\na tall twisted candlestick throwing a pool of light down upon them.\nAbove the fireplace stood unfamiliar incongruous objects: a white\nskull-cap that had been Pius IX.'s, in a glass-fronted box, and a black\nMadonna hung with beads.  There was an unframed water-colour too, and a\npencil sketch.  From the rug, he turned to survey the room.  Its bare\nwood floor reached out into the shadows, save where a goat-skin caught\nthe light.  Bookcases with white shelves stood out from the walls.  On\na stand in a window recess were tall lilies growing in a pot.  The\nmarble head of Bernard of Clairvaux, wrapt in contemplation, stood on a\nbracket; he could just see the aquiline nose, and downcast eyes.  There\nwas a solid narrow oak table with a chest below.  In a corner there was\na hanging lamp, burning dimly, so that one could see to move over\nthere.  It glinted on a grand piano.  A comfortable chintz-covered\nchair or two stood about.\n\nHis host pulled forward an arm-chair whose elbows ended in carved\ngriffin-heads.  \"Sit down,\" he reiterated, \"and toast yourself.  It is\njolly to see you here.  How's C-Cambridge?\"\n\nPaul drew a deep breath and seated himself.  \"Fine,\" he said.  \"I\nsuppose it exists, by the way,\" he went on, with a laugh.  \"We went up\nfour in the Lents.  I say, this is just heavenly.\"\n\n\"Good man.  Have a cigarette.  Supper won't be long.\"\n\n\"Are you very busy, Father?  We miss you awfully at Cambridge.  When's\nthe next book to appear?\"\n\n\"I'm so b-b-busy I don't know what to do.  Preaching nearly every\nSunday, and lectures.  I've got to l-lecture to Anglicans on\nM-Mysticism in t-town on Monday.  Oh, I say, they are coming in.  Two\nconversions last week, both c-clergymen and such good fellows.  And\nit's such fun here.  There's heaps to do yet.  You shall see to-morrow.\"\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\nHe nodded, wrapping his hands in his cloak and laughing merrily.  \"Of\ncourse, when I came I built a chapel.  It's an old barn, much older\nthan the house, thirteenth century they say.  It must have been a\nchapel before, I think; it feels like it.  Well, all the village\ntalked, of course.  P-Popish treason and p-plot!  Bridget told me, and\nTim; all the servants are Catholic you know.  But I wouldn't let anyone\nsee it, for I'm not here regularly enough to start a new church like\nthat.  Perhaps we'll have another priest one day, and a Mission.  Of\ncourse, if they enquire, that's another story.  So, last week when\nseveral of them came to Tim and got him to ask me to have a service on\nSunday evening, I did.  It was full; p-packed.  The Wesleyan local\npreacher came too.  We had B-Benediction.  Oh, you ought to have been\nhere, my dear.  They all sang 'Star of the Sea' b-b-beautifully!\"\n\nIt was so like Father Vassall, Paul thought.  He was as eager as a boy,\nand the Faith was a glorious kind of adventure with him.  There was no\nchecking his enthusiasm.  In his company Paul always felt as if he were\nliving in the times of the Apostles when Christians were a little\npersecuted, defiant, daring band, but the Cross and the Resurrection\nthings of but yesterday.  And although he always had a sense that the\nworld of thought and action in which the priest lived was utterly\nremote from the world of the average man, still he had come to see that\nthere was nothing of the poseur in his friend.  He did not pose as a\nmedi\u00e6valist; he simply was one.  And he did not adapt his religion to\nthe world; he adapted his world to his religion.\n\nIt was on that platform that the two met so readily.  Paul was utterly\naccustomed to that point of view.  Only at Claxted there was a\ndifferent religion.\n\nSo now, at once, the little priest shot his swift question quite\nsimply.  \"And how is it with you?\" he asked.  \"Have you decided to\nl-l-let yourself g-go?\"  Not so differently does a Salvationist ask a\nsinner at the penitent form if he is saved.\n\nPaul moved uneasily.  \"Don't, Father,\" he said; \"don't ask me that yet.\nI can't say.  I'm pulled all ways.  Whenever I sit down to think, a\ngreat tangle grows and weaves in my mind till I'm in despair at ever\ndeciding anything.\"\n\nFather Vassall nodded.  \"I know,\" he said.  \"So it was with me.  You're\non the r-rack.  Every n-nerve gives you pain.  You've thought enough.\nYou know enough really.  If you went on reading and talking and arguing\ntill d-d-doomsday, you'd get no c-clearer.  You must turn simply to our\nLord and do His W-Will.\"\n\n\"If I knew it!\"\n\nThe priest watched him in silence.  Then he rose and felt for a\ncigarette.  \"You do know it,\" he said.  \"What you don't know is whether\nyou dare do it.\"\n\n\"My father says I'm too young to make such a decision.  He wanted me to\ngo and see Prebendary----\"\n\nFather Vassall interrupted him.  \"See no one,\" he said.  \"Don't see me\nif you like.  Go away alone and ask our Lord, in the light of what He\nhas shown you.  Oh, my dear!  It's as plain as the n-n-nose on your\nf-f-face!\"\n\n\"My father says I'm utterly unstable and always changing my mind.\"\n\n\"That's not t-t-true.  See here: I know exactly what's happened to you.\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"You began, as a boy, by turning to our Lord with all the love of which\nyour heart was capable.  You vowed to be His lover.  And He weighed\nyou, looked you through and through, and accepted you.  Step by step He\nled you on.  He showed you new things about Himself as you were ready\nto bear them.  He trusted you.  He never left you.  And now at last, He\nhas shown you Himself in His Church.  You know He's there.  I believe,\nin your heart of hearts, you have faith.  And you hang back because you\nare afraid.  You ought to be a Catholic.  You ought to be a religious,\na R-Redemptorist, I think.  You're stamped and marked out for it.\nThere!  I've never said as much to anyone.  God help you.\"\n\nHe ended abruptly, utterly earnest, and stared at the fire, stretching\na hand out to it.\n\n\"I shall break my father's heart.  How can I?\" cried Paul, all the\nbitter agony of days at home and hours of prayer, sweeping down upon\nhim.\n\nThe priest made a gesture.  \"Excuses.  You know that too.  'He that\nloveth father or mother more than Me...'  And would you break His\nheart?\"\n\n\"It's so cruel, so awfully hard.\"\n\n\"Of course it's cruel.  Wasn't the Cross cruel?  Do you think\nChristianity is a d-drawing-room g-game?  It's fire.  It's a sword.\nIt's death or life.  Good Lord, what else has it been from the first\nmartyr to the last, yesterday?  And you k-k-know it.\"\n\n\"It's more than I can bear,\" the boy burst out.\n\n\"It's n-n-not,\" stuttered the priest instantly.  \"Our Lord never offers\nanyone a heavier cross than he can b-b-bear.\"\n\nThe passion of the declaration silenced Paul.  But only for a few\nseconds.  Then the full force of what it would mean to his people\novercame him.\n\n\"You don't know my father,\" he half whispered.  \"He says he would\nrather see me dead.  Oh, he says terrible things!  Father, he will see\nnothing, nothing.  And he always harps on the strain of my past\nreligious experiences.  I deny them, he says, if I become a Catholic.\"\n\n\"You do no such thing.  What does he himself think, for example,\nhappened at your Communions?  He thinks Christ came to you spiritually\nand fed your s-s-soul with His S-Spirit.  And so He did.  The Church\ndoesn't deny that.  The Church says you will receive something within\nher that outside they do not even pretend to give.  You are not asked\nto deny one whit of the past.  And you know that too.\"\n\nPaul sprang to his feet.  \"With you, it looks inevitable.  You\nhypnotise me into believing.  But there are heaps of things to be said.\nI do see the need for authority; I do understand the reasonableness of\nthe whole philosophy--from the Incarnation to relics and\nindulgences--it's reasonable enough, it's logical; but is it true?  Is\nPeter true?  Is the Church what you say?  Come to that, is the Gospel\nstory itself true?  Is it?  Is it?  Oh, my God, I would give everything\nto know!\"\n\nHe stood there, hands flung out, his whole soul in his face.  And as\nhis tense voice ceased, the silence of the room hemmed them in.\n\nSlowly Father Vassall got, too, to his feet.  They faced each other\nacross the rug, and the black Madonna, hung with dripping beads, thrust\nher Son out before them.\n\n\"Oh, my dear, I'm afraid for you!\" whispered the priest, staring.\n\n\"Afraid?\"\n\nHe nodded.  \"You see, you have the soul of a r-religious and that's no\nt-t-trifle.  And there you dare to stand, asking if the story of\nB-Bethlehem and C-Calvary is true!\"\n\n\"Well?\"  Paul was defiant.\n\nThe priest crossed the room, and came back from a little search on the\ntable with a paper in his hand.  All the merriment had died out of his\nface; it looked years older, wan.  \"I w-want you to p-promise me\nsomething,\" he said, stammering much again in his emotion.\n\nPaul leant back against the mantelpiece, wearily.  \"What, Father?\" he\nasked; \"I'll do anything I can.\"\n\n\"You c-c-can do this, ea-easily.  Don't let's argue any more all the\ntime you're here.  Don't read books, except the N-N-New T-T-Testament.\nAnd promise me to pray this every day in the chapel before the\nS-Sacrament with all your heart.\"\n\nHe held out a paper.  \"I've w-w-written it out for you,\" he said.\n\nPaul took the half-sheet of notepaper, written in the clear print of\nthe priest's hand.  He read it through once, and then he read it\nthrough again, only, this time, the letters were a little blurred.\nThen he looked up at his friend.\n\n\"Father,\" he said, \"I can't help it.  I know this, whatever anyone\nsays.  You bring our Lord to me as no one and nothing else has ever\ndone.\"\n\n\"Ah, then,\" cried the priest, \"if you turn back now!\"\n\nBridget put her head in.  \"Supper's ready, your reverence,\" she said.\n\nFather Vassall nodded swiftly at her.  \"You promise?\" he said, turning\nto Paul.\n\n\"Oh, yes.  And you'll pray for me?\"\n\nFather Vassall laughed meaningly.  \"Come to supper,\" he said gaily.\n\"It's p-p-pork and b-b-beans.  But I can give you a glass of\nSp-Sp-Spanish B-B-Burgundy!\"\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nIn the chapel that night Paul prayed his prayer for the first time.\nThe priest walked in before him and showed him to his chair and a\nprayer-desk with a courtly little gesture.  The three servants sat\nbehind.  A candle was already lit for Paul, and one burned also for the\npriest in his corner.  There was a white sanctuary lamp before the\naltar, and a red one on the left.  Otherwise there was no light.\n\nPrayers began with Scripture reading.  Father Vassall had announced the\nfact with his odd air of almost playing with the thing.  \"We read the\nB-B-Bible every night,\" he had said.  \"Do you m-m-mind?  We read for\nt-t-ten m-m-minutes!\"\n\nPaul had said, smilingly, that he did not mind.\n\nSo now he sat back in his chair and composed himself to listen and to\nlook.  The priest opposite, a little black hunched-up figure, half\nturned on one side to allow the candlelight to fall on his book, had\nannounced: \"The Acts of the Holy Apostles\" and begun in a\nmatter-of-fact, rather rapid tone, to read.  As when he preached, so\nwhen he read, he did not stammer, being shortly utterly engrossed in\nhis subject.  He read on, chapter after chapter, without break or\ndivision.  Paul grew interested in the manner of it.  The narrative\nrolled out before him as a whole, a simple, nervous, obvious story\nwhich singularly held even the attention of a listener who could have\ngone on, pretty well, wherever the reader had cared to stop.  But after\na while the boy allowed his eyes to rove.  This story of Peter's\ndoings--odd, how Peter dominated the early chapters--did not somehow\nseem out of place here.  He began to apprise the details of the\nbuilding and its furniture.\n\nIt was plainly a barn.  It had a barn roof of ancient unstained timber,\nand a stone floor.  The windows were irregular, uncurtained; he saw his\nlittle moon again, steady now, shining through the bare casement, just\ntouching rough beams that spanned the irregular rectangle as a\nrood-screen.  In the centre rose a cross with flanking figures.  They\nwere rudely carved, by the priest himself, but there was death in the\nwhite nude body of the Christ and passionate life in the upturned head\nof the Mary.  John stood acquiescent; Paul wondered at his attitude.\nIt hid him; perhaps there was conflict in his heart.  Perhaps he\nunderstood.  Perhaps, if one understood, conflict died down to peace.\n\nThe thin supports of the rood dropped down through the shadows to the\nfloor.  A little figure stood half-way up one of them.  Oh, and in the\ncorner, between the far support and the wall, stood another statue.\nPaul stared at it.  Something writhed in the candlelight.  Then he saw\nthat it should do so.  St. Michael trod down the dragon there.\n\nPaul looked through the rood to the altar.  High hangings ran up into\nthe canopy, but it and they were lost in the shadows.  In the centre, a\ncartoon was appliqu\u00e9d upon them; a Madonna and Child; it was just\nvisible.  There were four candlesticks, silver; the candles were burned\nlow in them.  A silver figure hung on an ebony cross--or it looked like\nebony.  The tabernacle was a blur of white silk.  A white cloth\nglimmered there; and below, under the altar, a row of painted carven\nshields.  Paul could not distinguish more, but he knew them.  He had\nseen Father Vassall at work upon them in his study at Cambridge.  They\nemblazoned symbols of the Passion.\n\nThen he began to concentrate on the gloom to the left, where the red\nlight burned.  The shadows were all confused and blurred.  There were\nirregular outlines, streaks, shadowy lines.  He puzzled out a small\naltar, with tiny candlesticks and a biggish case upon it, that shone\nfitfully.  The lines radiated from the case, stuck through it, behind\nit, as though they were a bundle of spears.  Spears!  It was a spear;\nhe could see, now, a gleam on the blade.  Another was headed with a\nbunched object.  And then he knew.\n\nA small ladder, a sponge on a reed, a spear, a shorter stick dripping\nwith the knotted cords of a scourge; these he could see now.  And he\nknew too what the reliquary held.\n\nIf it was true, that little heavily guarded splinter within had once\nbeen stained with the Blood, the real, literal Blood, about which he\nhad so often preached and sung.  Just such thongs as those had bit into\nthe reddening flesh, curled and twisted and hissed on white thighs and\nshoulders that shrank to the utmost limit of the cords in the human\nwrithe and agony of Christ....  \"But Peter and the Apostles answering,\nsaid\" (the reader read on): \"We ought to obey God rather than men.  The\nGod of our fathers hath raised up Jesus, whom you put to death, hanging\nHim upon a tree.  Him hath God exalted with His right hand to be Prince\nand Saviour, to give repentance to Israel and remission of sins.  And\nwe are witnesses of these things: and the Holy Ghost, whom God hath\ngiven to all that obey Him.\"\n\nPaul stared out before him motionless, with set lips.  Before him,\nplain, far far too plain against the dim wall, the twisting whips rose\nand fell.\n\n\"'In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost, Amen,'\"\nsaid Father Vassall, and there was a little shuffling as they all knelt\ndown.\n\nActs of Faith, Hope, Charity and Contrition; the Creed; Our Father,\nHail Mary, Glory Be; odd-Englished prayers for night protection; more\nshuffling; now Paul and the priest were alone.  It grew utterly still.\nPaul fumbled for his slip of paper and drew it out.  The rustling\ndominated the whole chapel; it even seemed to stir the shadows that\nshifted always, silently, in the candlelight.  He spread the paper on\nthe desk before him.  Slowly he prayed each sentence.\n\n\n  AN ACT OF CONSECRATION.\n\n  O Lord JESUS Christ, Who art the Way, the Truth and the Life,\n      Without Whom no man cometh to the Father,\n      No man is free,\n      And no man lives eternally,\n  Unite me wholly to Thyself that I may walk in light and truly live.\n\n  But Thy Way must be the Way of Sorrows,\n      Thy Truth sharper than scourges,\n      And Thy Life a losing of my own....\n\n  Give me therefore Grace--or rather Thyself, the Fount of Grace;\n      Carry me, for I cannot walk alone;\n      Enlighten me, for I am all darkness;\n      Live in me, for I cannot live except in Thee.\n\n  Let me count all things loss but Thee, since Thou didst count all\n            things loss except my love.\n      For me Thou didst leave the joys of heaven;\n      For me Thou wast born in cold and nakedness;\n      For me Thou didst bear the contempt of Thy creatures and\n            hadst not where to lay Thy head;\n      For me Thou didst die daily in the souls of those that\n            rejected Thee, and in the souls of them that loved Thee;\n            die therefore in mine that Thou mayst live and I in\n            Thee;\n      For me Thou didst suffer Thy Mother to be pierced with\n            swords, Who wast Thyself pierced with nails; pierce me\n            then too, and nail me to Thy Cross.\n\n  I offer myself wholly and without reserve to Thee Who didst count\n            nothing greater than my love:\n      My flesh is weak, as Thou knowest Who didst bear it,\n      But my spirit is willing, though sorrowful as Thine even\n            unto death.\n\n  Unite me then, body and soul with Thy Divinity;\n      My sins to Thy Redemption;\n      My weakness to Thy Strength;\n      My abyss of nothingness to Thy Plenitude.\n\n  I give myself to Thee, stained, shrinking and afraid;\n  Give Thyself to me, O my crucified God, and make me Thine.\n  Dear JESUS!  Be to me not a Judge, but a Saviour!\n\n\n\"Dear Jesus!  Be to me not a Judge, but a Saviour!\"\n\nHe cried it again, and again.  Tears blinded him.  He choked them back.\nIt was so still that he could not break the silence even with a sob.\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nThe Truce of God held.  It held so truly that for a brief succession of\ndays Paul banished the major part of his doubts and haunting fears in\nthe vivid atmosphere of Thurloe End.  They did not sleep; they fled.\nHe was not quiescent, but rather overwhelmingly alive.  He drank a\nlargely new and intoxicating drink.\n\nIt must be remembered for what, exactly, Claxted stood.  Quite apart\nfrom the rights or wrongs of religion, there was a life in Claxted that\nwas a sheer antithesis to this.  It was an antithesis in small things\nas well as in big, in utterly unreasonable and stupid things as well as\nin vital ones.  Thus, at Claxted, one never, at dinner or supper, sat\ndown to boiled beans and bacon; if one had, it would not have been\nregarded as an adventure; moreover one never did sit down without\npotatoes.  It is extraordinarily easy to make a mock of it, but there\nwas a hid parable there.  Food was food at Claxted; at Thurloe End it\nwas a sacrament, and a merry sacrament of life.  Nor was it less life\nbecause to Father Vassall it was Catholic life.  Thus Father Vassall\neven ate fish and maigre soup on Fridays, and enjoyed disliking it.\nMost mornings there chanced to be early spring sunshine, and breakfast\nwas served out of doors.  Breakfast out of doors at Claxted would have\nseemed to verge on the profane, almost on the immoral.  Tea, out of\ndoors, in midsummer, yes; prepared for, with guests.  At Thurloe End\nthey ran in hastily for a little tea because they were so busy\ngardening, and the lights were not long.  At Claxted wine was a mocker;\nat Thurloe End, the cask of Spanish Burgundy having just arrived, they\nbottled it with zest and solemnity.\n\nAt Claxted, again, the rooms were elect to their various ends.  The\ndrawing-room was for callers, tea and Sunday afternoons.  The study was\nfor sermons.  The dining-room was the room in which one dined; in which\nMr. Kestern rested for an hour after dinner; in which, after supper,\nall duly remained, with books or work, till prayers and bed.  Moreover,\nthere was routine order at Claxted, a pleasant, simple, kindly routine,\nbut routine.  A Puritan routine, too, it was of course.  It had never\nstruck Paul before, but no one laughed much at Claxted.  The family was\nanything but solemn; possibly, temperamentally, it was inclined to be\ngrave; but, then, on the other hand, it never, never _rioted_.  Oh,\nexcept at a Christmas party, at hide and seek and blind man's buff.\nAnd now that one was grown up, one did not play such games.\n\nOn the other hand, at Thurloe, humour raced unrestrainedly.  The\nmorning's post brought laughter (and tears) with it always.  The day's\nwork was a perpetual surprise.  Father Vassall would announce his\nintention of doing something with as solemn a determination as Mr.\nKestern would have given to a month's holiday.  \"I shall wr-wr-write on\nthe v-v-verandah all the morning,\" he would announce firmly.  Or: \"I\nshall r-r-read in the p-p-parlour for t-t-two hours.\"  Sometimes he\nwould go to his room, and not reappear till luncheon.  Sometimes he\nwould return to the chapel after breakfast for just as long.  In the\nevenings, before the fire, he would read what he had written during the\nday, or Paul would read to him.  Or they would make tapestry, or\nwood-carve, or Father Vassall would play the piano; or sit still,\noccasionally talking, but much more often sitting silently, while peace\ndripped slowly in on Paul's soul.  One never did nothing at Claxted.\nHe himself, in the mornings, usually strolled round till some corner\nseemed inevitable for a letter, a book, or a poem, or the little table\nin his bedroom beckoned inexorably to work.  In a sentence, the day\narranged itself; perhaps better, it presented itself arranged; at\nClaxted, as it was in the beginning, so it was, and ever would be.\n\nThen again, at Thurloe End, the house was invested with a personality.\nPaul used to wander around at first, making friends.  The rooms stood\nback, gravely, but with a smile hidden in them.  The furniture belonged\nto the house, and had been selected by it, he felt, with care.  It had\nchosen unvarnished oak, for the most part, because its tall, clear\nwindows were looking up always to the light, and old oak is wise about\nlight, taking its measure and passing the rest on enriched.  Its\nchairs, forms, tables, bookcases, were like open hands, holding much\ngraciousness.  Moreover it was gravely proud of itself, and not ashamed\nof its wide walls and the pools of its floors.  Where it held out a\npicture or a print, it did so with a curious restraint, yet with a kind\nof courtesy.  It wore pictures like a beautiful woman wears jewels.\n\nAt Claxted there was no house at all.  There was a middle-class home.\nEverything that the family had ever possessed, for three generations,\nwas collected in it.  The Kesterns said about a new possession that it\nwould \"go\" there or there, and new possessions constantly poured\nin--testimonials, seasonable gifts, kindly presents from workers after\nsummer holidays, another antimacassar after the Sale of Work,\nphotographs, texts, missionary curios.  Things overflowed on to each\nother: an occasional table on a rug; a crochet mat on a table; a pot on\nthe crochet mat; a fern in the pot; a cover about them both; a picture\nabove the fern; framed photographs below the picture; as like as not,\nin the end, a small basket under the table.  Small baskets were always\nso useful for putting odds and ends in.  And all the furniture and\ncarpets and mats and pictures, jostled each other, and cried to heaven\nthat here was no continuing city.  Which, of course, is quite true, for\nwe seek one to come.\n\nClocks were all over the house at Claxted; at Thurloe End there was one\nover the stable that struck the hours with much solemnity.  Moreover it\nhad its own views as to correct time-telling which, as Father Vassall\nsaid, was wholly right, since t-t-time was r-r-relative.\n\nPaul told himself that religion had nothing to do with all this; that\nthere were Catholic middle-class homes, and Protestant houses.  He was\nnot such a fool as not to know, too, that his own temperament liked the\none and disliked the other, but was not necessarily right or wrong\nbecause of that.  Yet after all we are all of us concerned with things\nas we meet them, and religion and philosophy, speaking in generalities,\ndo shape people's houses, occupations and dress.  Here, then, came the\nGreeks bringing gifts, generous gifts for which he felt he had been\nsearching, at one time blindly, lately more definitely, all his days.\nIf the gifts were of God, they would leave little room for doubt.\n\nThe days of truce, however, were not without event.  The pair of them\ndid portentous things.  Up the centre of the garden ran an ancient\novergrown hedge, tangled, vast; and through it, with axe and saw, they\ncut a leafy tunnel.  In old flannel trousers, and shirts without\ncollars, they laboured in the sweat of their brows, and cut their hands\nand scratched their faces and lost their way and despaired of finishing\nand finally attained.  Just before sunset they emerged one warm\ndelirious day, the scent of rising sap overflowing from the broken\ntwigs and boughs about them, a mellow light on the wall across a small\ngreen ahead.  Father Vassall cut the last impeding growth away, as was\nfit, but Paul dragged it behind.  They stepped out together.  The\nlittle priest looked about him with triumph, excitement and discovery\non his face.  So Bilboa hailed the Pacific, and Pizarro climbed the\nAndes.  And so, also, Father Vassall had some such thought as they.\n\n\"A cross, just here, in the middle of that green,\" he cried.  \"One will\nb-burrow through the tunnel, and find the c-cross at the end!\"\n\nAnd then, suddenly, the merriment died out of his face, and the two\nlooked at each other.\n\n\"I will go for the saw and the hammer,\" said Paul, after a second.\n\n\"Yes,\" cried Father Vassall, animation again.  \"I know of two\ns-saplings which will just do.\"\n\nPaul turned back.  \"N-N-No!\" spluttered his friend; \"n-n-not through\nthe tunnel now!\"\n\nSo Paul went back another way.\n\nOr, intermittently, they laboured at a rockery.  The priest had been\nengaged upon it, but he took a dislike to the job soon after Paul's\narrival.  One day, after half an hour's work, he flung down his spade.\nPaul grounded a loaded wheelbarrow, and laughed.\n\n\"What in the world is the matter?\" he demanded.\n\n\"I will not have a r-r-rockery in my garden,\" said the priest, \"not a\nmade rockery anyway.  I knew it was a bad idea.\"\n\n\"Why ever?\" asked Paul, frankly puzzled.\n\n\"The d-d-devil makes r-rockeries,\" said Father Vassall, \"not G-G-God.\"\n\nOne evening Paul related at length the incidents of the Port o' Man\nmission, and particularly that of Mr. Childers.  Father Vassall heard\nhim gravely.  At the close he asked: \"Do you know David Etheridge?\"\n\nPaul shook his head.\n\n\"Ever heard of him?\"\n\n\"No.  Who is he?\"\n\n\"We'll go and see him to-morrow.  Shall we?  You'll like him.  He lives\nabout two miles off.\"\n\n\"Good,\" said Paul, smiling.  \"But who in the world is he?\"\n\n\"He's a Catholic.  He was a Spiritualist.  He became converted because\nit was the d-d-devil.\"\n\n\"Oh, I'd love to meet him then,\" cried Paul.\n\nThey went, then, luncheon being over, the priest in his rusty country\nulster, a little bent, preoccupied, grave; Paul swinging along in a\ntweed jacket eagerly.  The few passers-by saluted the priest, and a\nclergyman on a bicycle looked at Paul intently.  \"He's the V-V-Vicar,\"\nsaid Father Vassall, bubbling with laughter.  \"He's a g-g-good man; I\nlike him; but I expect he'd like to r-r-rescue you!\"\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nDavid Etheridge lived in a small cottage, and he was pottering about\nthe garden when they arrived.  Paul had received no description of him\nand had no reason to expect one thing more than another, but the\nex-Spiritualist's short, rather tubby figure and round, smiling, pink\nface, tickled him.  He looked the last man in the world to have met\nwith the devil.  Anyway he seemed to have come well out of the\nencounter.\n\nHe greeted the priest eagerly, and was introduced to Paul without\nexplanations.  First he must show them round the garden.  He had bulbs\nin the grass, and others hidden cunningly among tree-roots, and these\nhe discovered with triumph.  New green had been made, he declared,\nsince yesterday, and in one spot there were six tiny thrusting points,\nwhen the brown leaves were raked away with discerning fingers, where at\nthe last visit there had been but five.  They bent lingeringly over\nthem.  \"Wonderful, wonderful,\" cried Etheridge, in a subdued ecstasy.\n\"I don't care how many times one sees them, they're wonderful!\"\n\nPaul looked from the face of the priest to that of his friend.  There\nwas genuine awe written on them both.  It was odd, he thought, the\noutlook of everyone down here.  He himself loved the beauty of that new\ndetermined virginal life, but these two saw more.  They saw holy things.\n\nBack in the cottage at tea, Paul's visit was frankly expounded.  \"I\nb-brought K-K-Kestern to see you, Etheridge,\" said Father Vassall,\n\"because he's met a clairvoyant and seen a m-m-miracle.  He's\nimpressed, naturally.  And the fellow talked to him no end.  I want him\nto hear your side of the c-case.\"\n\n\"What was it you saw, Mr. Kestern?\" asked Etheridge.  \"Was it at a\ns\u00e9ance?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Paul, \"and that's what seems to me particularly interesting.\nIt was in a very ordinary house at a very ordinary luncheon, and in the\npresence of four or five men who, as certainly as anything is certain,\nwere neither accomplices nor credulous nor open to hypnotic influence.\nAnd it happened in broad daylight in about two minutes, while we all\nsat round and watched.\"\n\n\"What happened?\" queried Mr. Etheridge, with a serious air that did not\ngo so strangely with his face as a stranger would suppose.\n\n\"A pin, an ordinary pin, wobbled on a white tablecloth and stood on\nend, all by itself.\"\n\n\"W-W-Wobbled?\" exploded Father Vassall, earnestly.\n\nPaul, looking at him, loved him suddenly with a great passionate\nmovement towards his childlike sincerity and profound faith.  \"Yes,\nFather,\" he said as gravely, \"wobbled.\"\n\n\"Do you mind telling me all about it?\" put in their host.  \"You've\nreally begun at the wrong end of the stick, you know, Mr. Kestern.\"\n\nAnd Paul told him.  He told him everything, including the clairvoyant's\nstatement that God was very far off.\n\nWhen he had finished, David Etheridge nodded.  \"That would be it,\" he\nsaid.  \"So much of truth, so much of plausibility, a little release of\npower, and the grain of error that would, without God, crack even\nPeter's rock.\"\n\n\"But the p-pin?\" asked Father Vassall.  \"How did he do that?\"\n\n\"It's simple, Father.  He was perfectly right.  It is no miracle,\nreally, as he himself said.  There is psychic power.  It is as real a\nthing as that of my muscles, perhaps in a sense more real because more\nfundamental.  All ultimate power may be psychic.  And what he did with\na pin, all the mystic saints have done, when necessary, again and\nagain.  Only they have done so under God and at His direction.  Maybe\nGod Himself, incarnate, only made use of some such hidden human power\nof His creation, when He walked the waves.\"\n\n\"Then Childers was right?\" asked Paul, glancing at the priest however.\nEtheridge seemed to be contradicting the verdict of his friend.\n\n\"Right, and from our standpoint wrong too, Mr. Kestern.  So far as his\nexplanation of the pin went, he was right, but he was in the wrong\nsince he was playing with a power only to be exercised along the lines\nrevealed; and he was deluded by Satan when he spoke as he did of God.\"\n\n\"By Satan?\"\n\n\"I have no doubt at all.  It always begins so.  He lies in wait to\ndeceive.\"\n\n\"I don't understand,\" said Paul, bewildered.  \"Childers was a man of\nprayer and of great reverence.  He spoke very kindly even of\nCatholicism.\"\n\n\"That,\" said Etheridge gravely, \"I fear the most.\"\n\nPaul studied his face intently.  He was looking out of the cottage\nwindow at the broad high-road, his features very set and grave, and\nwith a strange mask of pain lying upon their cheery commonplace\nexterior that was not good to see.\n\nHe seemed to become aware of the other's examination, and turned to\nhim.  \"It is like this,\" he said.  \"God has marked out the spiritual\nway.  He has hedged and protected it.  Souls may go safely there very,\nvery far, even here, towards the celestial city.  But if they stray off\nthat path for any reason, why, Mr. Kestern, in the woods and hollows\nlurk enemies that let none escape.\"\n\n\"How do you know?\" burst out Paul, vehemently.  \"Does the Church\ndefinitely say so?\"\n\nEtheridge nodded towards the priest, with a faint smile that only\nlingered a second however.  \"That's a question for his reverence,\" he\nsaid, \"but I can offer you an authority, if you like.\"\n\n\"Please,\" said Paul.  There was something in the other's tone that awed\nhim.\n\n\"Well, Mr. Kestern, there was a young man who knew nothing of that\ndivine road save that, by Providence, his feet were placed upon it at\nhis baptism.  But he was enticed aside.  He was shown a seemingly fair\nand direct path to the same bourne.  He followed it.  At first all went\nwell.  To be precise, he, too, obtained something of the powers of\nwhich you have seen a sample.  He became adept at seeking escape in\ntrance.  The pencil wrote for him automatically, and wrote good and\nwise things.  He made the practice of these things his life, and\nfinally they dominated him.  He became all but their slave.\"\n\n\"Yes--and then?\"\n\n\"Well, first, the character of the messages changed a little.  His\nfriends in the _gnosis_ warned him of mischievous spirits, even of bad\nones, but he was not to be afraid.  He would not be afraid.  For a\nwhile the good returned--and riveted his chains more firmly.  Then the\nshadow crept in again.  He was told of a new morality, led on to seek\nrelief in stimulants, encouraged to voyage far and often in trance.  At\nlast only there, in trance, was there full escape.  He loathed himself,\nbut his waking life was beset with devils, prurient curiosity,\nperverted sensuality, a desire to inflict pain.  He struggled, but in\nvain.  But in the trance-sleep he was free.\"\n\nA motor car hummed up the hill and buzzed over the crest.  Etheridge\n\"waited till the sound died away.  Neither of his listeners moved.\n\n\"And then one day, Mr. Kestern,\" went on the narrator at last evenly,\n\"having gone over in trance, he found his return barred.  He could see\nhis own body on the couch and he longed to re-enter it.  But he could\nnot.  A Watcher stood on the Threshold.  For an eternity there seemed\nno possibility of return.\"\n\nPaul moistened dry lips.  \"A watcher?\" he managed to ask.\n\n\"Yes.  Beyond telling.  Do you loathe anything?  Have you ever felt\nFear?  Do you shrink from corruption, its scent and sight?  You cannot\nimagine all those incarnate, but it was that.\"\n\n\"My G-G-God,\" said Father Vassall.  \"That's enough, Etheridge.\"\n\n\"But you are here,\" cried Paul.  \"What saved you?\"\n\n\"The grace of God, which is beyond telling, at the moment, and, under\nHim, Father Vassall afterwards.  He may tell you if he please.\"\n\nPaul glanced at the priest.  But he shook his head.  \"I t-t-told you it\nwas the d-d-devil,\" he said.\n\n\"Father Vassall, perhaps, can hardly speak of it, Mr. Kestern.  He\nfought for my soul.  He held me all one night, and a crucifix in my\nhands, while Satan shook my body, my bed, the very room, but could not\nprevail.\"\n\nAnd silence drew in and sat between the three of them.\n\nPaul broke it.  He sighed.  \"Forgive me,\" he said, \"but what is one to\nbelieve?  You explain one thing by an unknown force; why not so explain\nthis?  And--I don't mean to be rude, Mr. Etheridge--I suppose we all\nhave a side to our character which, supposing it were for any reason\ndeveloped and released, might do terrible things.\"\n\nThe ex-Spiritualist bowed slightly.  \"You are quite right,\" he said\ntranquilly.  \"That is one explanation.  You can explain the Gospels and\nthe Incarnation and Lourdes and--and Spiritualism that way.  Men even\nexplain man.  If there were no explanation possible, there would be no\nneed of faith.\"\n\n\"But I haven't----\" began Paul.\n\nFather Vassall made a quick gesture.  \"'_Si scires donum Dei_,'\" he\nsaid.  \"Don't t-t-tempt God, Kestern.\"\n\nEtheridge rose as if he had not heard.  \"Let us walk in the garden a\nlittle,\" he said, \"and breathe clean air.\"\n\nThat evening, Father Vassall varied the order of night prayers\nsomewhat.  He crossed over the chapel to Paul, after the Scripture\nreading, and put a little manual in his hand.  It was not wholly\nunfamiliar to the boy, but for the first time the real significance of\nthe Office of Compline dawned on him.  He saw the long dark corridors\nleading from chapel, the silent shut-off monastic cells, the peasant on\nhis lonely road home, the soldier on sentry guard while the camp slept.\nHe saw that the night had been alive to such, and that their faith had\nmade these prayers for a shield.  And he was not sorry for that shield\nhimself that night.\n\n  Grant us, O Lord, a quiet night and a perfect end.\n  Your adversary the devil, goeth about as a roaring lion seeking\n      whom he may devour.\n  Thou shalt not be afraid for the Terror by night,\n  For He shall give His angels charge over thee.\n  Visit this house, we beseech Thee, O Lord.  Drive far from it\n      all snares of the enemy.  Let Thy holy angels dwell therein....\n\n\nAll his imagination astir, Paul listened, in his secret heart, for the\ndrift of pinions.  Nor, then, did he wonder that he failed to hear\nthem; he only marvelled a little at the impenetrability of\nclay-shuttered doors.\n\n\n\n(5)\n\nThus, then, came Paul Kestern to his last night at Thurloe End.  Judge\nye, who may.  This, at least, was the manner of it.\n\nThe Father had read aloud _The Holy Grail_, and Paul _The Hound of\nHeaven_.  He had himself chosen it; he had no one to blame for that.\n\n  Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest (he read),\n  I am He Whom thou seekest;\n  Thou drivest Love from thee, Who drivest Me.\n\n\nHe shut the book.  The little priest was nursing his knees against the\ntall fender, and the boy looked from him to the candlelight on the\nwhite of the uncanonised saint's hat on the mantelshelf.  It rather\nfascinated him, that round skull-cap.  It was a child's trick to put it\nthere, the little white satiny thing in its glass-fronted box--a\nchild's trick, lovable.  He looked at the priest again.  The other\nstirred.\n\n\"My dear,\" he said, stammering badly, \"you g-g-go to-m-m-morrow.  And\nwe've kept the tr-truce.\"\n\nPaul nodded.\n\nSilence.\n\nThe priest spoke again.  \"I don't know,\" he said.  \"I can't stick my\nfingers into your soul.  I d-d-don't want to.  Only God's been good to\nyou, you know.  And--and He's a j-j-jealous God.\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know,\" burst out the boy.  \"Father, I don't know.  There's\nso much for and against.  And I've prayed and prayed and prayed,\nand--and God hides Himself.\"\n\n\"He's given you all the l-l-light you need.  He's shown you!  He's sent\nHis Son and appointed His Church and p-p-put it b-b-bang in your\np-path.  What else do you want?  Do you want a special r-r-revelation?\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know,\" wailed Paul.  \"I don't KNOW.\"\n\nHis voice broke a little.  Father Vassall dropped his knees and jumped\nup, catching his robe about him.  His eyes shone, though his face was\ngrave.  \"L-look here,\" he said.  \"Here's a bit of paper.  I'll put here\nall the things that make for the Church, unless you feel honestly, in\nyour own mind, that the balance of evidence on a point puts it on the\nother side.  Now.\"\n\nWhen the paper was written it appeared thus:\n\n  WHICH is TRUE?\n\n  _R.C._                               _Anglican._\n\n  Emotions in Catholic Church.         Emotions at Claxted, Keswick,\n                                         etc.\n      Reason?\n      History?\n      Which Works?\n      Scripture?\n      Tradition?\n      Catholic Idea?\n      Consistency?\n      Gospel of the Poor?\n      Beauty?\n      Common sense?\n      Miracles?\n      Peter?\n\n\n(After the first, Paul had objected: \"But Christianity may not be\nreasonable at all.\"  \"T-t-that hardly makes for Anglicanism,\" retorted\nFather Vassall.  \"Is _it_, the Via Media, reasonable?\"  And Paul had\nbeen silent thereafter.)\n\n\"That's enough, Father,\" said Paul, in a still voice.\n\n\"It is, only this.\"  (He added, last on the list--Peter.)  \"Now, here\nyou are.  To-morrow, after breakfast, go into the chapel, put this\nbefore you, and pray.  Pray.  PRAY.  Hear?  I'll say no more, now or\never.  You're alone, you know, you must be....  If it's 'yes,' after\nthat, come and tell me, and I'll get the faculties and receive you.  If\nit's 'no,' then don't say anything.  Just 'good-bye.'  And G-God bless\nyou, anyway.\"\n\nHe had his way.  The boy went almost silently to bed, heard Mass, ate\nbreakfast quietly, went into the chapel, and knelt down.  He propped\nhis papers before him.  He chose to kneel before the red lamp.\n\nHe read his paper, but he could not think.  Confused\n\nimages buzzed through his head, and voices.  \"I'd rather see a son of\nmine dead,\" said Mr. Kestern.  \"God is very far off,\" said Childers.\n\"He was deluded by Satan,\" said David Etheridge.  \"Oh, don't break your\nfather's heart, Paul,\" cried his mother.  \"Concubinage is a regular\nthing in Spain,\" said the Bishop of Mozambique.  \"Christ is the most\narresting figure in history,\" said Manning coolly.  \"He's a j-j-jealous\nGod,\" said Father Vassall.\n\nPaul shut his eyes.  He was so tired.  He turned deliberately away and\nthought of Edith.  He remembered Hursley Woods, and the little brown\ncap, and the brown leaves, and the blue sky.  A thrush, too, that\nlooked at them out of beady eyes.  And here he was, in a Popish chapel,\nFather Vassall's chapel.\n\nHe looked up.  In the clear morning light, the chapel was all so plain.\nIn front of him, as plain as plain, was a sponge on reed, a spear, a\nladder, a scourge.  He noticed that they were a little dusty.  The\nglass reliquary reminded him of wax flowers under a glass case\nbelonging to his great-aunt Sophie; no, it did not remind him of the\nflowers, it was just the case, with its plush fringe, that it brought\nridiculously to his mind.  But inside the case was that small splinter\nthe priest had described, a fragment splintered from Calvary with its\nsweat and turmoil and blood.\n\nIt had been, of course, like that figure on the rood.  He had hung\ndead.  Dead.  Drained of blood.  Dead.\n\nDead?  A little to the right the white tabernacle veil hung in the\nfolds to which Father Vassall had adjusted it this morning.  And behind\nlay the mystery.  If only he KNEW.\n\nAnd then, suddenly, he saw it all as clearly as the day through the\nchapel window: his broken home, his mother's tears, Edith lost to him,\nhis ambition to write poetry blocked out, and instead, instead--that\nsilver Cup behind the white curtain thrust into his hand.  A\nhalf-remembered line shot into his head:\n\n            And down the shaft of light\n  Blood-red...\n\n\nAnd suppose, after all, it were _not_ true....\n\nIf it were true, surely God would show him.  If He were a Father,\nsurely, surely...\n\n\n\n(6)\n\nThat, then, was the manner in which Paul Kestern grew afraid.  The\nutter silence of the chapel grew on him, bore down on him, wave on\nwave.  Was it not time for the trap?  Oh, but they would call him.\nMeantime, why wouldn't God speak?  Just a word, a flicker of a\ncurtain....  It was all so still.  Not even a wind.  The silence\nlistened, that was the awful thing; it listened for him to pray.  And\nif he prayed--oh, if he prayed, he would break down like a baby, and\nsurrender, and he would never really have known.\n\nThen Paul knew he could not pray.\n\nBut he shut his eyes; he groped into the blackness; he pressed against\nthe silence; he knew he was alone, all alone; he knew if he could have\nfled, he would have done so, but that he could not move.  He must fight\nit out alone, endure alone; and though that awful silence terrorised\nhis very thought, he must still try to think....\n\n\"It's t-t-time to go,\" whispered a voice in his ear.\n\nHe got up, and stumbled out.  \"Thank you so much, Father,\" he said.\nThere was utter terror in his soul, but that was what he said.  He saw\nthe other's face, tender and grave, and his quaint black gown, and the\nbare hall, and the little flagged path, and the iron gate, and the\ntrap.  Oh, he was glad to see the trap.  He mustn't be afraid; it was\nabsurd; he could walk out.  \"Really I've loved being here,\" he heard\nhimself saying.\n\n\"C-come again s-s-some t-time,\" stammered Father Vassall.\n\n\"Thanks, I will, Father.  Good-bye.\"\n\n\"G-g-good-bye.\"\n\nHe balanced himself as the horse started forward, and then turned and\nwaved.  The little priest waved too.  They swung round the turn.\n\nPaul looked at the clouds, moving serenely across the sky.  He peered\ninto the bare twigs of an oak.  Some palm was in bloom, soft, yellow,\nfeathery.\n\n\"Truth, it's real mild spring, sir,\" said Tim.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Paul.  \"I must say I'm glad summer is coming.\"\n\n\"London, single,\" he said through the wicket at the booking office.  It\nwas real, that funny little window, and odd, how absurd the man looked,\npeering at him!  A couple of turns up the platform, a good asphalted\nplatform, with staring advertisements, rather jolly--about pens, Easter\nin Normandy, Nestle's Milk.  And there was the train at last, swinging\nmerrily round the corner, noisy, fussy, _real_.\n\nThird class, smoker, empty, that would do.  Paul flung himself into a\nfar corner.  \"Thank God,\" he said to himself, \"thank _God_.\"\n\nA tall dark girl walked up the train.  She looked in at Paul's window.\nHe didn't see her, but she saw him, hesitated a moment, and decided,\nafter all, she wouldn't travel to town with him.  If perhaps, the next\ncompartment was empty, she would prefer that.  It was.  She got in and\nshut the door.  She had a newspaper and a novel to read, but she\nsettled herself to stare out of the window instead.  The country was so\nunimaginably lovely.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nJUDGMENTS\n\nI am certain of nothing but of the holiness of the heart's affections,\nand the truth of Imagination.  What the Imagination seizes as Beauty\nmust be Truth....  The Imagination may be compared to Adam's dream;--he\nawoke and found it truth.--KEATS: _Letters_, November 22, 1817.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\n\"Well,\" queried Tressor, \"and what's the next move?\"\n\nHe was seated at his desk in his study, pen in hand, a pile of\ncorrespondence before him, and Paul, who had not been able to remain\nstill for five minutes since he had heard the news, was leaning at the\nmoment against the open window opposite.  June had come in\nfull-throated.  The trees in the Fellows' Garden were thick with green,\nand the roses in the parterres flamed in the sun.  Everything flamed in\nsuch a sunlight as had never been before, nor, in its own way, would be\nagain.  Miracles of that sort are not so uncommon in life as might be\nthought, but each one stands by itself.  So to-day Paul was inwardly if\nonly half-consciously marvelling at the world, seeing that it was\ntransfigured before him.\n\nThe don, watching him thoughtfully, was well aware of it.  His own\nexperiences of a quarter of a century before, rose like a kindly ghost\nbefore him.  He knew in what a turmoil of suspense the boy must have\nwakened, but yet how a kind of dear regret had lingered with him at\nbreakfast, the last breakfast of the true undergraduate stage, the\nstage in which the future is all possibility, the die still unread even\nif cast.  He guessed how he and his friends had talked about everything\nand thought only about one thing; how they had strolled round to the\nSenate House; how a glamour had been there upon the ugly unimposing\ndull building that he, the don, knew so well; how anxiety had spurred\nthe spirits of the men in the gallery; how the first names had been\ngreeted with relieved cheers.  And he knew how Paul had heard his own\nin the First Class Honours List of the History Tripos with a sense,\nfirst, of utter unreality, and then of triumph that had given him for a\nfleeting hour the carriage of a god.\n\nPaul had come into King's Parade with his friends a new man.  A light\nhad fallen on his ways, and at first, as always, he had been blissfully\nignorant of the bitter that lurks in all earth's sweets.  He had been\nignorant for about as long as it took him to walk to the post office.\nThere, when Donaldson had said that there was no good his sending a\ntelegram, he had seen real envy in the eyes of a friend, and when the\nclerk had read the flimsy paper without the flicker of an eyebrow, had\nrealised that the world is mighty big and cares nothing.  Ah well, Paul\nhad thought as he hastened back to college, that made no difference to\nthe fact that he, Paul Kestern, had got a First, which nothing could\never destroy and which would remain a title to respect among all sorts\nand conditions of men.  Differ with him as men might and would, he had\nentered set and recognised lists and ridden a triumphant course.\n\nAnd Tressor was genuinely pleased that the boy had come bursting in to\nhim, scarcely waiting to knock, greeting him with the eyes of a\ngrateful friend.  \"I've got it,\" he had cried, \"I've got it, Tressor!\nA First after all!  Thanks to you more than to anyone.  I can hardly\nbelieve it's true.\"\n\nPaul had walked about the study to tell his news.  \"Donaldson got a\nthird, Strether a second.  I wish Gussie had got a first.  I say, my\nfather will be pleased.  How many?  Oh there were only five given, out\nof a hundred and thirty, I think.  You know I never could have written\na decent line if it hadn't been for you.  As it was I thought that\nSpecial Period would dish me.  I say--does it sound beastly?--I'm most\nglad of all for one thing.  Whatever I become, no one will ever be able\nto say that if I'd known a little history I'd have been different!\"\n\nAnd so on, disjointedly, as the sense of it soaked in, and thoughts\nrose in his mind like bright bubbles--rose and burst.  Tressor\nunderstood it all.  And he liked the way the boy peered at a picture,\npicked up a paper-knife and examined it as if it were something rare,\nlooked out at the roses, shot a questioning glance at him, and so on.\nAll these things were so many signposts to the eager mind.  Tressor\nfelt again his own keen interest as to what that mind would do.  And so\nhe had at last asked his question.  \"Well,\" he had said, \"and what's\nthe next move?\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said Paul, and leant up against the open window-frame all at\nonce, very still.\n\n\"I'm only twenty-one,\" he said at last.\n\nTressor turned the statement over.  Then he understood.  \"Two years\nbefore you can be ordained,\" he said.\n\n\"Yes, thank God,\" said Paul, sincerely.\n\n\"Oh! Has it come to that?\"\n\nPaul's restlessness fell on him again, like a mantle.  He straightened\nhimself, thrust his hands into his pockets, looked round, and flung\nhimself into a chair.  \"I suppose I've known it all the term,\" he said,\n\"but I've never realised it till now.\"\n\nTressor laid down his pen and leaned back.  He was frankly curious.\nThe term had been so busy for both of them that this was the first\nvital conversation, although, at odd intervals, he had thought a good\ndeal about the boy.  Thus he knew of the visit to Thurloe End, but not\nof any details.  He knew of conflicts, not of decisions, if there had\nbeen any.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Paul, \"it has.  I know one thing.  I cannot be ordained in\nthe Church of England unless my mind changes a great deal between this\nand then.\"\n\n\"That is odd to me,\" said Tressor meditatively.  \"That is one of the\nthings I could do.\"\n\n\"You?\"\n\n\"Yes.  The Anglican ministry stands for an orderly, decent, restrained\nreligious profession, but it does not commit the priest to dogmatic\nextravagance.\"\n\n\"I see,\" said Paul.  \"The Church of England appeals to you on those\ngrounds exactly which make it impossible for me, at least as yet.\"\n\n\"But why?  No bishop would refuse you on account of moderation.\"\n\n\"Quite so.  But the Apostle had a word to say on that to the Church of\nLaodicea.\"\n\nTressor frowned slightly.  He disliked Paul in that mood.  \"Surely you\nsee now,\" he said, \"that you cannot determine the universe by a single\ntext.\"\n\nPaul threw his leg over the arm of his chair.  \"That is precisely what\nI do see,\" he said.  \"I'm one immense note of interrogation.\"\n\nThe don smiled.  \"That's admirable, anyway, and that, I suppose, blocks\nRome.  I'm unfeignedly glad.  I confess I saw you go to Thurloe End\nwith some fear.  You're impressionable, and Father Vassall has a\nmagnetic personality.\"\n\nA shadow gathered in Paul's face, gathered and deepened.  \"But I played\nthe coward there,\" he said.\n\n\"Tell me,\" said Tressor, \"if you can, that is.\"\n\n\"I'd like to.\"  Paul was emphatic.  Also the thing was very vivid to\nhim and had lost nothing in retrospection.  His hearer saw the\nsituation as he unfolded it, saw it almost as vividly as Paul had seen\nit, but his wonder grew almost more quickly than his interest.  He\nfound himself scarcely listening, impatient of the final details.  \"So\nyou see,\" concluded Paul, \"I was afraid to pray.  I knew that if I gave\nway an inch I should give way altogether.  And in the end, I--I fled.\"\nThere was death in his voice.\n\n\"Well,\" retorted Tressor, \"I congratulate you with all my heart.\nHonestly, Paul, I did not think you had so much in you.  Really, you\ninterest me enormously.\"\n\n\"What!\" cried the genuinely astonished Paul.\n\n\"Of course.  The whole thing was consummate staged emotionalism.  And\nyou came through it, and Vassall's overwhelming hypnotic personality,\nby the sheer force of your own will.  No, honestly, I never dreamed you\nhad it in you.  I am most extraordinarily glad.\"\n\nPaul returned his leg to a normal position.  He stared at the speaker\nfor appreciable seconds without a word.  Then he laughed.  \"Well,\" he\nsaid, \"well----  And of course you may be right.\"\n\n\"I should say there can be no room for doubt....  But, if that's Rome,\nwhy not the Church of England?  Orders and a fellowship--writing,\nlecturing, preaching.  It would suit you admirably.\"\n\n\"It would not,\" retorted Paul decisively.  \"I should never be content.\nBesides, what should I preach?  For what should I stand?  I cannot see\nthe Bible without the Gospel, and I can preach, in Christ's name,\nnothing but that.\"\n\nThe don knit his brows.  \"Then what's the matter with an evangelical\nministry?\"\n\nPaul jumped up.  He prowled about restlessly.  Suddenly he made a\ncouple of gestures, one to the well-lined shelves, the other to the\ngarden.  \"That and that,\" he said.\n\n\"I'm afraid you go beyond me,\" said Tressor politely.\n\n\"Oh, I say, I'm sorry,\" cried Paul.  \"But--but--can't you see?\nDoubtless it's sheer presumption, but evangelicalism seems to me\nutterly divorced from reason and knowledge.  It has no logical basis at\nall.  Rome may be wrong, but it's logical.  It's a conceivable theory.\nEvangelical Protestantism just won't _do_....  Look here, the Church\nmight be infallible, divine.  It's just possible.  I don't _know_ ...\nbut it's _possible_.  But the Bible is not infallible--we know\nthat--and what is more, it would be useless if it were without an\nexplicit interpretation.  That's certain, final.\"\n\nTressor glanced at his correspondence.  He ought to attend to it, but,\non the other hand, an idea was forming in his mind.  The more he\nthought of it, the more he liked it.  The letters might wait.  He got\nup and moved over towards the bookshelves.  Paul, behind him, went on\nabstractedly.\n\n\"And then there's the other reason.  That seems to me less honourable,\nless convincing, but--I can't help it--it's overpowering.  Put it like\nthis.  Could I possibly put on the scarlet jersey of the Salvation Army\nand follow the band?  _Could_ I?  Well, I couldn't.  That--that's an\ninsult to--to beauty, a blasphemy against--against--oh, I don't\nknow--against a summer's day, I think.  And an evangelical ministry\nmeans a red jersey, you know--or something like it.  The Mission Hall,\nfor example; the Religious Tract Society....  I say, am I a--a damned\nfool?\"\n\nTressor had taken a little book off the shelves, and was half\nmechanically turning the leaves.  Immature, of course, weak in places,\nbut----  He put it back.\n\n\"Eh?\" he queried, smiling.  \"A red jersey?  No, I rather agree.  But\nthe morning's going.  Where are you lunching?  Have some with me?\"\n\n\"I'd love to,\" said Paul.\n\n\"Right.  Give me half an hour for these letters.  And at luncheon I'll\ntell you what's come into my head.\"  He smiled, affectionately.\n\n\"Thanks,\" said Paul, getting up.  Then he remembered his First again,\noverwhelmingly.  \"I think I'll just go and see,\" he said boyishly,\n\"whether there are any telegrams for me.\"\n\nTressor turned to his desk.  \"Do,\" he said.  \"One o'clock.\"\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nPaul walked across the Second Court whistling.  In the screens he met\nStrether.  \"There's only one other first,\" growled his friend.\n\"Judson.  Shows what egregious asses the examiners were.\"\n\nPaul hit him in the ribs.  \"Where is he?\" he demanded.  \"I must go and\ncongratulate him.\"\n\n\"He's in the garden, reading telegrams.  I believe there are some for\nyou.  It's a sickening sight, but I'll come with you if you like.\"\n\nPaul took his arm and they marched off.  \"I'm sorry you didn't get one,\nGussie,\" he said.  \"You deserved it.\"\n\nThe other snorted.  \"Rot,\" he grunted.  \"Never stood a look in.  Lucky\nto get a second.  But I always thought you'd score.\"\n\nBetween the First Court and the river, under the chestnuts, were a\ncouple of deck-chairs and a rug.  Judson in flannels sprawled there,\nwith Hannam, Donaldson and one or two others.  Somebody tossed Paul\nhalf a dozen orange envelopes.  He threw himself down, and tore them\nopen.  Mr. Kestern wired that he and Mrs. Kestern were coming up\nto-morrow.  Then an uncle had wired, and a grandfather.  Mr. Ernest\nalso.  There was one from school, and that intrigued Paul.  It was\njolly to think that the Head and the rest of them had been expecting\nthe occasion, thinking of it, caring.  Pleasant, too, that he had\nconferred honour on the school.  He stared out at the shining river,\nand saw the old hall, the cut and mutilated forms, the honour boards,\nthe dais, the rows of shuffling schoolboys, and himself amongst them.\nAnnouncements were made after prayers.  To-morrow, probably, then, the\nHead would say precisely: \"I am sure the school will be glad to learn\nthat Paul Kestern, who went up to St. Mary's, Cambridge, in ... has\n...\"  The school would cheer, sensing a possible half-holiday in\nconnection therewith.  Well, he'd look in next month, towards the end\nof July, and then----  It was really rather pleasant.\n\nHe reached for the last telegram, speculating idly who had sent it.  He\ncould not know that Mr. Kestern had told the news to every possible\nperson in the street as he himself went to the post office.  \"I'm so\nglad--Edith,\" he read.\n\nHe read it again and again.  He glanced up covertly at the others.\nThen he folded the thin paper, slipped it back in its envelope,\nstretched himself out at full length and stared up into the blue sky.\nFragments of conversation from the men about him drifted in and out of\nhis mind, and now and again he had to respond to a remark addressed\npoint-blank to him.  He was still pleasantly aware of achievement and\npride that must be hid.  But he was wrestling all the while with an\nenigma.\n\nHe had seen the girl once only after his visit to Thurloe End, during\nthe brief week-end of the vacation that he had spent at home.  They had\nwalked deviously home from Sunday evening service, and he had poured\nout his heart to her.  He had been full of the contrast between Claxted\nand Thurloe End, as well as the growing impossibility he was\nexperiencing in these occasional returns to service in the evangelical\natmosphere.  There had been reaction, too, in his outlook after the\nrelief of escape from Father Vassall, and what with one thing and\nanother he had been meditating--he spoke to her as if he were\nmeditating--a return and a surrender.  And she had astounded him: she\nhad utterly refrained from suggesting that he should not do so.  Indeed\nshe had done more; she had brought to bear upon the problem the mind\nof, as it were, a Claxted Catholic, though, since nothing had as yet\ncome of it, she had said nothing of her visit to St. Patrick's.\n\nThe witchery of Thurloe End had been meaningless to her.  Claxted was\nstill to her dear and simple.  She saw nothing whatever to alter in her\nown home or in his.  Barns, and shrines, and carven shields, merely\nbewildered her.  He had felt, as he talked, that so far as externals\nwent, she would have preferred the incandescent lights in rows, the red\ndrugget and the pitch-pine of the Mission Hall.  Perfectly simply,\nthen, she had said:\n\n\"Paul, dear, if Jesus calls you, you must do what He says.\"\n\nParrot-like, he had answered her with the old cry: \"But I don't know!\"\n\nHe could feel now her fingers on his arm, clutching a little more\ntightly.  \"Don't, Paul,\" she had said.  \"It seems to me quite plain.\nJesus doesn't hide Himself.  He speaks plainly enough in our hearts,\nand you--you 'know His voice.'\"\n\nHe had stared hard at her in the light of a street lamp as they passed:\nthe firm little face rather sedate; the precise, neat dress; her gloved\nhand; the little hymn and prayer book she carried which he had given\nher, surreptitiously.  Intuitively he saw that she belonged to Claxted;\nyes, though he knew that he had modified her views not a little,\nClaxted was bone of her bone and flesh of her flesh.  Life was\namazingly simple to her.  She might question the form in which the\nthings of religion reached her--the authority of Christ, His presence\nin the Sacrament; she might become High Church in practice; but nothing\nin Claxted rubbed her up the wrong way.  And he saw suddenly just what\nit meant that her home was in Edward Street and her father a\nphotographer.  She was unobtrusive, trim, conventional.  He had wanted\nto seize her almost roughly, shake her, drag her out, and he had not\nbeen able to do it at all because she would not have understood the\nfirst syllable of explanation.  Come to that, did he?  Perhaps, that\nvery day, he had come to see more plainly the point.  The scarlet\njersey--well, it was just a scarlet jersey to Edith Thornton.  You put\nit on, if Christ said so.  Why not?\n\nLying there then, in the flush of success, blue shining sky above,\nclear shining river hard by, her words in his pocket, no, in his heart,\nPaul nevertheless saw a shadow athwart the sky.  He had known long that\nan impermeable curtain was slowly dropping between him and his people;\nhe had known that their very voices sounded odd--familiar, arrestingly\nfamiliar, but as those who speak another tongue; and he had known that\nthe change lay in him and not in them.  There were notes in the past\nthat no longer struck response, that reached him muffled, through the\ncurtain.  And he saw plainly enough that Edith belonged to that side.\n\nThere was a shadow then even on this bright day.  He loved her so.  One\nmoment, was it quite that?  Was it not rather that he wanted to love\nher so much, wanted that they should speak and walk together, and knew\nthey could not?  Inexorably, hate it as he might, the irresistible\ntides were sweeping them apart.  He was being moved on and out, protest\nas he would and did.  Yet he could not protest altogether as he would,\nfor his very heart was shaken.  There was a \"war in his members\"--the\nold, old phrase rose unbidden in his mind.  And, serene and far as that\nblue sky, God seemed to be.\n\nThus a thoughtful Paul went in to luncheon, yet wholly unaware of the\nnew flood that was even then gathering to its height and was about to\novermaster him.  For a while the two talked inconsequently, on small\nthings.  Then, when the coffee was on the table, Tressor reopened the\nconversation of the morning.\n\n\"So, honestly, you don't quite know what to do next?\"\n\n\"No.  But I suppose I shall teach for a year or two, if possible do\nsome private coaching.  I must earn money; I shall have to say no\ndefinitely to the theological college next year, not this.\"\n\n\"Literature?\"\n\n\"Well, of course, wherever I am I shall write.  I can't help it.  But\ncould I make a living with my pen?  I don't suppose so, and I can't ask\nmy father for money.  And even if I could, I doubt awfully if I could\ndo occasional journalism.\"\n\nTressor shook his head emphatically.  \"Don't try,\" he said.  \"It's an\nimpossibility for you, I should say--not your line at all.\"\n\nPaul suddenly realised what a problem he was up against.  He sighed.\n\"It's awfully hard,\" he said.  \"I suppose I must teach.\"\n\n\"No,\" said Tressor, \"not yet anyway.  I want you to give your own\nliterary taste a chance.  Write poetry.  Do another play--more\ncarefully this time.\"\n\nPaul smiled ruefully.  In the Lent Term he had had an inspiration.\nDropping his reading, cutting his lectures, burying himself in his\nrooms, he had begun and written a play.  And Tressor had lectured him\nfor the first, threatened dire things for the second, and finally and\nutterly turned down the last.\n\n\"I'd love to,\" said Paul, \"but--I couldn't write a line in Claxted\nanyway.\"\n\n\"I know,\" said Tressor equably.  \"I don't suppose you could, and I'm\nnot suggesting it.  But what about Fordham?\"\n\n\"Fordham?\" queried Paul, puzzled.\n\nThe other nodded.  \"Fordham--my house.\"\n\n\"But--but----\"\n\n\"Yes; as you know, I have a house to which I go occasionally.  My\nfriends sometimes consider it an unnecessary luxury since I'm only\nthere two or three times a year.  But it's rather a nice house, and it\nwants living in.  It would do it good to have someone living in it and\nlooking after it a little.  There are some cottages, and some rough\nshooting, and a garden.  I bought the place because of the garden;\nyou'd like it.  You might write poetry in it, and a play, or half a\ndozen, seeing how quickly you write.  What do you say?\"\n\nHe had talked slowly on to give Paul time.  The boy's face was a study.\nEven then, he hardly took it in.\n\n\"Do you mean go--go--as your--your guest?\" he stammered.\n\n\"No,\" said Tressor, \"not exactly as my guest.  Have some more coffee?\nYou see, I want you to do some work.  Go as my agent, let us say.  My\nhousekeeper will look after you, and be glad of it, and I'll give you a\nsmall salary.  You'll keep yourself, and, I think, you'll write.  To be\nhonest, I think you'll write well.\"\n\n\"Oh, I say!\" cried Paul, only when it came to the point he had nothing\nto say.\n\n\"I take it that's settled then?\"\n\nWords came with a rush.  \"I'd like it more than anything on earth.  It\nwould be absolutely too good to be true.  I can't thank you enough.\nI--I----\"\n\n\"Right, then.  Thank me by writing good poetry.  By the way, Manning is\ncoming down with me in August; do you think you could join us, and\nremain on?\"\n\n\"I must consult my father, of course,\" said Paul, \"but I'm certain I\ncan say yes.  How perfectly too glorious.  Oh, I say, you're just too\ngood to me, sir.\"\n\n\"Let's go and smoke a cigarette in the Fellows' Garden.\"\n\nOn the way Paul remembered that another Children's Special Service\nMission had been in the air for that August.  Dick Hartley had urged\nit.  Well, it was no longer in the air.\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nPaul met his parents on the station platform.  Mr. Kestern shook his\nhand firmly; his mother kissed him with tears of pride in her eyes.\n\"Oh, Paul,\" she whispered, \"I'm so glad.  Father's just delighted.\"\n\n\"The Lord has given you brains, sonnie,\" said the clergyman.  \"I pray\nthat you will use them always in His service.\"\n\n\"Yes, father,\" said Paul.  \"I say, I've such news for you.\"\n\n\"So have we, Paul,\" said Mrs. Kestern.  \"Madeline and Mr. Ernest are\ncoming up to see you take your degree.\"\n\n\"Are they?  How jolly!  We'll have a picnic up the river.  But you'll\nnever guess what I've got to tell you.  Wait till we're in the cab.\nPorter, lend a hand with these traps, will you?  I've got rooms for you\nquite near St. Mary's, mother.\"\n\n\"Yes, dear.  Oh, Paul, I can't believe you're grown up!  It's so funny\nto have my little son taking rooms for me.\"\n\nPaul took her arm.  \"But, mater dear, I wish you would remember how old\nI am.\"\n\nMrs. Kestern sighed.  \"We don't want to lose you, dear,\" she said\nwistfully.\n\nThey were on thin ice, he thought.  \"Come on, this way.  That cab will\ndo for us.  In you get, mother.\"\n\n\"Well, Paul, and what's the great news?\" asked his father as they drove\noff.\n\nPaul studied his face.  He could not tell how he would take it.  He\nwould be disappointed, but he might be rather proud.  Anyway, he must\nplunge.\n\n\"Mr. Tressor, father, wants me to go down to Fordham, nominally as his\nagent, really to have a year at least in which to write.  He thinks I\nshall be able to do some good stuff.  It will cost me nothing; he will\neven give me a small salary; and I shall really and truly be able to\nwrite at last.\"\n\n\"Paul!\" cried his mother, and glanced swiftly at his father.\n\nHis father was not looking at him.  \"I take it, then,\" he said, \"that\nthis project--possibility--of joining the Church of Rome, is\npostponed--indefinitely?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" replied Paul, suddenly astonished.\n\n\"Thank God,\" said Mr. Kestern, \"thank God.\"  (He paused a second,\nswallowing in his throat.)  \"May I be forgiven for doubting that our\nLord ever failed to hear and answer prayer.\"\n\nA little burst of anger flashed in Paul's heart.  \"At Thurloe End,\" he\nsaid, \"I should have become a Roman Catholic if--if----\"  He remembered\nTressor's comment, and stopped.  If!  If what?  His mother supplied a\nfurther example of the diverse possible interpretations of that\nincident.\n\n\"Oh, my son,\" she said, \"you will never know how your father agonised\nin prayer for you.  All the time you were in that terrible place----\"\n\n\"That will do, mother,\" put in Mr. Kestern quickly.  \"The lad has been\nsaved, as it were, out of the mouth of the lion.  That is enough.\nThank God, thank God.  And when do you go to Fordham, Paul?\"\n\nEnthusiasm had died in the boy.  \"In August, father,\" he said heavily.\n\n\"For a year, Paul?  You will be able to go to Ridley Hall afterwards?\"\n\n\"I don't know, mother.  Or at least----  It all depends, anyway.\"\n\n\"Mr. Tressor must take a great interest in you, dear.  Shall we meet\nhim?  Your father and I would like to thank him for his great kindness\nto our boy.\"\n\n\"He is coming to lunch,\" said Paul.  \"Mrs. Roper is probably getting it\nready now.  Manning and Strether are coming too.  It'll be a bit of a\ntight fit, but I think we can all squeeze in somehow.\"\n\nIt was two years since his parents had last been in his rooms.  His\nfather's first look was for the text.  It hung there still, Paul having\nstubbornly refused to take it down.  The man remembered that first\nprayer, and again saw the hand of God upon him for good.  Then he\nespied the writing-desk; by this time it was a crucifix that hung\nthere.  He looked quickly away; it were best to say nothing.  His wife\ntook that cue from him.  Besides, she had eyes for the oar that hung\nimmense the length of the wall.  \"Is that your oar, dear?\" she asked.\n\"Did you row with it?\"\n\nPaul smiled.  \"No, mummie,\" he said with affectionate raillery, \"I used\nit for a walking-stick.\"\n\nShe glanced at him incredulously.  Then smiled.  \"You shouldn't laugh\nat me,\" she said.  \"Paul, where did you get the pictures!\"\n\nShe was examining his prints.  \"Do you like them, mother?\" he asked\nproudly.\n\n\"Fairly, Paul.  But I think I liked those dogs you had best.  You\nalways were an odd boy.  Do you remember your doves, and your newts?\nNasty things.\"\n\nHe laughed outright.  \"Oh, mother,\" he said, \"my poor prints!  But I've\ngot the Landseers stored in the Gyp-room and I'll bring them home for\nyou.\"\n\n\"Thank you, dear.  I think they'd do nicely in your old bedroom, and\nthey'll remind you of college when you come home.\"\n\nPaul was not required to answer.  Manning knocked, came in, and was\nintroduced.\n\nThe days that followed were unforgettable.  For one thing, they were to\nbe the last in the old town and each one had to be savoured to the\nfull.  For another, only a few men, waiting for degrees, were up, and\nPaul had to take his people through colleges and churches and chapels\nthat were not wholly deserted, but in which, nevertheless, beauty\nreigned supreme in unaccustomed silence.  He had a new pride in lawn\nand court and hall.  In a little, he was to be a part of the ancient\nplace, an admitted son, and a son, moreover, who could, so to speak,\nlook his foster-mother fairly in the face.  Each separate street and\nbuilding, too, held a remembered association.  It was odd to recall how\nhe had peered through the gate of Christ's and wondered if it were St.\nMary's; wandered through Trinity, not quite sure that he had a right to\nbe there; bought his first cake in that little grocer's; swept, one rag\nnight, triumphantly down Pety Cury in a hurrying host with proctors\nhard in the rear.  Then he had to show the Henry Martyn Hall, Parker's\nPiece, St. Saviour's, and he even dared greatly and pointed out the\ncreeper-fronted Catholic presbytery.\n\nBesides, the days gave him a new intimacy with his parents.  A barrier\nhad gone, now that the spectre of the Scarlet Woman no longer peeped\nout of every conversation.  Also the furnishings of Claxted at least\nwere not here.  His father, it is true, occasionally probed him to see\nhow far the original impulse to take Anglican Orders really remained,\nbut the thrusts were easily parried.  His mother was more of a\ndifficulty.  In Great St. Mary's she had laid a hand on his arm.  \"I\nwonder if I shall ever see my son preach in that pulpit,\" she said\nwistfully.\n\nPaul had no heart to shatter her dream.  \"I wonder,\" he replied\nlightly.  But he knew that he did not.\n\nThe Ernests came up the day before the great occasion.  In the\nafternoon, the five of them went to a tea garden on the Upper River.\nPaul refrained from asking any other men for two reasons: for one,\nthere was no one up, unless it were Strether, who would mix with his\nfather and Mr. Ernest; for the other it was rather a wonderful Madeline\nthat he met on the station platform.  He never guessed how\nperseveringly the visit and the garnishings had been schemed for,\nplanned and prepared.  He only knew that she wore an amazingly simple\nfrock and a big hat from whose shade the regular beauty of her face\nlooked out at him.  In the shaded sunlight, her big eyes, under the\ndark lashes striking and unusual in so fair a blonde, laughed up at\nhis.  \"I say, Paul,\" she said, \"you've no idea how proud we are of you.\"\n\n\"Don't,\" he cried, \"you'll make me horribly nervous.\"\n\n\"Rubbish, you never are,\" she challenged.  But it was not that that\nmade her look away content.\n\nStrether saw them together, and found occasion to make enquiries in his\nown fashion.  \"Who's the girl?\" he growled.\n\nPaul told him, gaily.\n\n\"Humph!  Disgustin'.  Better tell her there's no vicar's wife job going\nbeggin'.\"\n\n\"You old ass,\" said Paul.\n\nBut he told her, all the same.  After tea, the elders sat on in the\ndappled shade, and Paul dug out a punt and put the girl into it.  They\nfloated gently into \"Paradise,\" and he pulled in under a spreading\ntree.  \"By Jove, it's hot,\" he said.  \"I think we'll lay up, if you\ndon't mind.\"\n\n\"Of course.  Come and sit down.\"  She moved her skirt and shifted a\ncushion.  She had no doubt whatever where he was to sit.\n\nHe threw himself down beside her.  \"May I smoke?\" he asked.  Claxted\nseemed impossibly far.\n\n\"Of course.  I love it, you know.  I don't see why you shouldn't.\"\n\nHe tapped his cigarette on his case.  \"No,\" he said vaguely.  It was so\ntrifling an incident, but it was one among many.  Madeline at Cambridge\nwas, somehow, a new Madeline.  He was aware how much he liked the\nchange, and he resolved to take Strether's advice.\n\n\"Do you know what I'm going to do next year?\" he asked.\n\n\"No.  Ridley?\"\n\nHe told her.\n\nShe lay quite still.  Then she heaved a little sigh.  She couldn't help\nit.  For one thing, Paul was rather delicious in his collarless shirt\nand blazer, the pillar of his throat good to see.  For another, there\nwas utter charm about them: the soft-flowing river, the whisper of the\nwater under the punt's stern, the tall trees that met high overhead and\ninterlaced in their delicate beauty, the bright sunlight on the green\nfields and swifter flow yonder, without the brooky tunnel.  And\nbesides----\n\n\"I prayed about it, Paul,\" she said simply.  She meant it.  In her own\nway, she meant it absolutely.  Honestly, too, she was too glad to think\nfor a moment, as she might have done, that perhaps this was the very\nbest opening of them all.  Yet, after all, it was not.\n\n\"_You_ prayed,\" queried Paul, frankly astonished.\n\n\"Yes.  I thought you liked that horrid Father Vassall too much.  I\nthought you'd become a Roman Catholic as sure as fate.  Mother said----\nBut never mind.  You won't now anyway.  Oh, Paul, will you write a real\nplay?\"\n\n\"Look here,\" he said grimly, \"I don't suppose I'll ever be a parson.\"\n\n\"Of course not.  You can do much bett----  No,\" (she was very honest)\n\"that's not right.  I admire clergymen ever so much.  But you know,\nPaul, almost anyone can be a clergyman.\"\n\n\"Can they?  Yes, I suppose you're right.  It looks rather like it\nanyway.\"\n\n\"Of course they can.  Ethel Cator's brother is going to be a clergyman;\nyou know him: he sings rather nicely.  But just fancy writing a play!\nPaul, I don't care what they say at Claxted: you must give me a box the\nfirst night.\"\n\nPaul suddenly thought he would.\n\nShe looked up at him dreamily.  \"You might even be an actor yourself,\"\nshe said.  \"Do you remember those charades that Christmas at the\nGators'?\"  Then a trifle hastily: \"Talking of them reminds me.\"\n\nShe had taken off her hat.  Her hair was so much sunshot silk.  And\nPaul understood all about the charades at the Gators'.  He had\nextemporised the whole affair, scene by scene.  It was the one thing he\nloved at parties.  And one scene had been the deck of a ship in the\nevening, a piano playing in the background, she in a chair, he, playing\nthe lover, leaning on the bulwark.  They had played it rather too well,\nif anything, though the Gators were not the sort of people, even at\nClaxted, to mind.  And afterwards, Paul remembered, they had been\nchaffed over it, in a jolly kind of way, and he had been flattered, and\nthey had gone on playing they were lovers, especially going down to\nsupper, on the stairs.  It was rather nice of her to remember.\n\nHe leant a little towards her.  \"I remember,\" he said, looking down\ninto her face.\n\n\"We shall never see you after you go to Mr. Tressor's.\"\n\n\"You certainly will,\" he vowed.  \"I shall jolly well come.  And I say,\nperhaps you and your father might even come to see me, at Fordham.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" she breathed, \"that _would_ be jolly.  But it won't be possible,\nyou know, unless----\"\n\n\"Unless what?\"\n\nShe looked up swiftly, and away.  A spirit moved in Paul, but then,\nafter all, he was not going to be a parson.  He reached out and took\nher hand.  \"Unless what?\"\n\nShe laughed.  \"But perhaps you'll come back and preach occasionally at\nthe Mission Hall,\" she said.  \"The workers will miss you, Paul.  Mr.\nDerrick, Albert Vintner and Edith Thornton.\"\n\nPaul gave no sign, or he thought he did not.  She studied him.  The\ntemptation to probe a little further was irresistible.  \"Miss\nThornton's getting quite High Church,\" she said.  \"Her people are\nrather worried about it.\"\n\n\"Well,\" said Paul, rapidly mastering himself and speaking deliberately\nnow, \"I'm inclined to be High Church myself, come to that.  The\nCatholic religion's rather wonderful, Madeline.  Father Vassall thought\nI ought to be a Redemptorist.\"\n\n\"What's that?\"\n\n\"A friar.  A member of the religious order of the Redemptorists.  They\npreach missions--a sort of Catholic evangelists.\"\n\n\"Is Father Vassall a Redemptorist?\"\n\n\"Oh, no.  He's a secular priest.\"\n\nShe nodded.  \"Yes, that's it.  _He_ isn't a monk or a friar, but he'd\nlike you to be one.  I know.  I've heard father talk about it.\"\n\nPaul detected the sneer.  He was perfectly cool now.  More than that,\nhe was getting angry.  But he still held her hand, and she noticed\nnothing.  \"Edith Thornton,\" he said, \"is rather wonderful.\"\n\nMadeline shifted a little.  \"Is she?\" she questioned.  \"I can't say I\nknow her very well.  She's full of good works, of course.  I expect\nshe'd make a splendid wife for a curate.  She'd rather like to marry a\nclergyman, Paul.\"\n\n\"Wouldn't you, Madeline?\"\n\nShe smiled slowly.  \"I think I'd rather marry a--a----\"\n\nFor the life of him he couldn't help it.  \"An actor, perhaps,\" he said,\n\"or an author.\"\n\nShe flushed.  \"I don't know,\" she said in an undertone.\n\nHe laughed suddenly.  \"Well, Madeline,\" he said, \"I'll remember.  I\nexpect I'll be able to introduce you to ever so many.  And I'm sure\nthey'd want to marry you anyway.  There'll be no need to pray about\nthat.\"\n\nHe let go her hand and stood up.  \"By Jove,\" he said, \"I think we ought\nto be getting back.\"\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nSo, then, the great day came and went.  Scarlet splashed the streets.\nSelf-conscious young men moved about them in rabbit-skin hoods and\nundergraduate gowns and fluttering bows of white, girls walked beside\nthem in conscious surrender of one day at any rate to superior claims,\nand parents brooded majestically in the background.  The files of\nneophytes lined up on the crowded floor of the Senate House in an\natmosphere of subdued whispering talk, peering over heads and round\nshoulders in an endeavour to see what was going forward at the far end.\nOne had occasional glimpses of a rather bored-looking personage in\nrobes on a raised chair, dons with sheafs of papers in the vicinity,\nand some young man or another kneeling in stiff self-consciousness.\nOther colleges' undergraduates went up, applauded by compatriots,\ndisdained by the rest.  Paul was vividly rejoiced that he came from St.\nMary's and not from Emmanuel or Cats.; an Emmanuel rowing-blue,\narriving a little late, shouldered past him with a glance that shouted\naloud the absurdity of those half-dozen St. Mary's men.  An usher gave\nthem their signal.  Paul found himself in a cleared space, and saw\nTressor looming large on its edge.  He was aware that he had to kneel\nin a feudal attitude and that the Vice-Chancellor was murmuring Latin.\nThe indifference of the majority about him made the whole ceremony\noddly impersonal.  And now they were all out again, and there was the\nfa\u00e7ade of the Library, and the buttresses of King's Chapel, looking\nstained and grey against a grey sky.\n\nThat evening, Paul had an odd encounter.  He had seen his people to\ntheir rooms, and, returning, hesitated to ring the bell and enter\ncollege.  It had become a jolly night of stars, with a fleeting mist on\nthe river, and he was going down for good the very next day.  He\nthought he would walk through the old town for the last time, in the\nways he had walked so many times during the past three years, his mind\nin a whirl of thought.  So he strolled over the bridge, and down past\nspectral St. Laurence's, and round the corner by portentous John's, and\nso on to Trinity.  And as he drew near to Trinity, the sound of bolts\nbeing withdrawn in the great gateway came to his ears in the stillness.\n\nThe door opened, and a tall figure emerged.  \"Good-night, my lord,\"\nsaid the porter's voice, subservient, deferential.\n\n\"Good-night,\" replied the other cheerfully, and strode briskly forward.\n\nPaul smiled to himself.  When the black-gaitered figure came abreast,\nhe, too, spoke.  \"Good evening, my lord,\" he said.\n\nThe Bishop of Mozambique halted and stared through the night at his\ninterlocutor curiously.  \"Good evening,\" he said.  \"I fear I don't\nrecognise you.\"\n\n\"Naturally,\" said Paul.  \"Do you remember a railway carriage?\"\n\n\"What!  The sampler of Keswick Conventions and Wesleyan--was\nit?--Conferences.  A rather dogmatic and assertive young man, if I\nremember rightly.  Of course.  How are you?\"\n\n\"Very well, thanks.  I've stayed up to take my degree.\"\n\n\"Good.  Congratulations.  What class did you get?\"\n\nPaul told him.\n\n\"Splendid,\" said the other, looking down more closely.  \"And now what's\nthe next move?  Have you made up your mind yet?  How's Father Vassall?\"\n\nPaul was wide awake and in a state of mental exaltation.  The other's\nvoice was kindly and cheerful, and somehow invited confidences.  He\nthought rapidly, that, after all, here was an adviser to hand whose\npoint of view would be interesting hearing.  Probably they would never\nmeet again, and instinctively he knew that this big, almost boyish\nbishop would spare him five minutes and respect his confession.\nMoreover, though the Bishop of Mozambique could hardly be said to be in\nany way representative of the Church of England, at any rate he was an\nAnglican bishop with authority and Paul was still of his communion.\n\nIt was a rapid and impulsive decision, but once made, he acted\nimmediately upon it.  \"Are you in a hurry?\" he asked.\n\n\"Not particularly,\" said the Bishop, \"but I'm lodging at Selwyn and\nmust get back pretty soon.\"\n\n\"May I walk up with you?  I wanted a stroll.  It's my last Cambridge\nnight, and it would be jolly through the Backs.\"\n\n\"Delighted.  Shall we get on?\"\n\nThey paced off together, a few steps in silence.  Then Paul explained.\n\n\"I've decided what to do, temporarily at least.  It doesn't matter what\njust now, but it means a rejection of Orders, for a time at any rate,\nand also of the Church of Rome.  Now I came to that conclusion at\nFather Vassall's house down at Thurloe End last vac., but it has\ntroubled me, more or less, ever since.  I've heard several opinions\nupon it, none of which agree with my own, and I'd very much like yours.\nYou see, you're the only bishop I know, and--and--you're Church of\nEngland too.\"\n\nThe big man laughed.  \"Excellent,\" he said.  \"'I'm Church of England\ntoo.'  Well, well....  But I suppose I am, and if I can do anything\nI'll be delighted.  Not particularly for that reason though.\"\n\nPaul sensed humour, but he could not see it.  The other's voice,\nhowever, was very friendly.  And when the Bishop thrust his hand into\nhis arm and bade him get on with it, he did so.\n\nOnce more again, then, this time under the shadowy high trees, as they\npaced in the scented dark past Fellows' gardens and placid sleeping\nlawns, Paul told of his conflict in the little chapel.  The Bishop\nheard him very gravely.  He asked a question or two as the story was\ntold, but for the most part heard in silence.  And when the boy\nfinished, they walked a good hundred yards before he spoke.  Then,\nlooking straight before him, weightily, gently, he delivered his\nverdict.\n\n\"Kestern,\" he said, \"I will tell you what I think, and I am pretty sure\nof it because, though I've seen so little of you, I feel fairly sure of\nyou.  I believe you love our Lord with all your heart.  I believe you\nwish to serve Him.  And therefore I can tell you what I think of that\nexperience in the chapel.\"\n\nPaul said nothing.  Perhaps the other waited for him to speak, perhaps\nhe did not.  At any rate, at last he spoke again.  Indirectly he passed\nhis judgment.  \"'He shall give His angels charge concerning thee',\" he\nquoted, \"'to keep thee in all thy ways.'\"\n\nAnd once more Paul could not believe his ears.\n\nIn silence the two finished their walk.  They stood for a few minutes\noutside of Selwyn Lodge, the tall big man looking into the boy's face\nwith oddly troubled eyes.  \"But----\" he said at last.  He broke off\nabruptly.  \"I won't say it,\" he said.  \"It's not my job.  You've asked\nme one thing, and given me one confidence; I can say no more.  You must\nsettle your own life.\"\n\n\"That's what Father Vassall says,\" put in Paul.\n\nThe other nodded.  \"He knows, of course,\" he said, as one professional\nmight speak of another.  \"But look here: we could do with you in\nMozambique if you care to come.\"\n\nPaul was interiorly shaken by that more than a little.  It was so\nsudden.  In a flash, he saw a path before his feet.  A clergyman, a\nmissionary; not quite as he had imagined, but suppose the Bishop, after\nall, were right?  Catholicism without the Pope, Catholicism in a sense\nwith a kindlier, less definite cross.  Fordham suddenly menaced him.\nWhat if it meant, well, well--betrayal, a cleverly hid, intriguing,\nattractive scheme, but betrayal.  He hesitated.\n\n\"Think it over,\" said the Bishop.\n\nHe did not, could not know, of course, but the word tipped the scale.\nThink!  Paul had thought till he could think no more.  For a while he\nwas done with thought.  Fordham meant a year's rest, a year's solace.\n\n\"Thank you ever so much,\" he said.  \"I won't forget it.  And thanks\nawfully for hearing me.  But I'm booked for a year at least.  Good-bye.\"\n\n\"Good-bye,\" said the Bishop.  \"God bless you.\"\n\nPaul walked off to St. Mary's alone, if a man who walks with a thousand\nfears, doubts, desires, hopes and loves legioned in his heart, ever\nwalks alone.\n\nIn the morning he breakfasted with Manning.  His friend was\nenthusiastic over the possibility of Fordham, and utterly and wholly\ndelighted.  He himself, having spent a fourth year in research work,\nwas off to Central Africa in September to shoot big game and\nincidentally study tropical medicine, but he would see Paul at the\nManor before he went.  He was an odd mixture, and Paul rather envied\nhim.  Money, or the lack of it, did not hamper him; in his own subject,\nhe was distinctly brilliant; yet his science was a plaything in his\nlife.  He did not sit lightly to the serious subjects that worried\nPaul, but he rode them on the curb with easy mastery.  Paul was\nincreasingly aware that he wanted, nowadays, to talk to Manning.\n\nThus, then, that the second post and not the first brought him his\nletter, mattered not a little--perhaps.\n\n\n\"MY DEAR\" (Father Vassall wrote),\n\n\"I'll be quite honest; I don't like it.  It seems to me that you are\ngoing down to Fordham as Jonah took ship for Tarshish.  God grant\nthere's a storm--and a whale!  I shall pray for it anyway, so look out.\nOf course, after your visit here, I've no right to judge, for I believe\nyou did not play tricks.  But it beats me....  Honestly, I'd rather,\nfar rather, hear that you were going to be a PROTESTANT CLERGYMAN!\n\n\"However, I'm here if you want me.\"\n\n\nPaul, Mr. and Mrs. Kestern, Mr. Ernest and Madeline caught the 11.20 to\ntown.  They were all a bit subdued, especially Madeline.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nFORDHAM\n\n  Foot after foot ye go back and travail and make yourselves mad;\n  Blind feet that feel for the track where highway is none to be had.\n  Therefore the God that ye make you is grievous, and gives not aid,\n  Because it is but for your sake that the God of your making is made.\n\n  * * * * *\n\n  Cry out, for his kingdom is shaken; cry out, for the people\n          blaspheme;\n  Cry aloud till his godhead awaken; what doth he to sleep and\n          to dream?\n  Is not this the great God of your sires, that with souls and with\n          bodies was fed,\n  And the world was on flame with his fires?  O fools, he was God,\n          and is dead.\n                      ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE: _Hymn of Man_.\n\nLe silence \u00e9ternel de ces espaces infinis m'effraie.--PASCAL: _Pens\u00e9es_.\n\n  And that inverted Bowl we call the Sky,\n  Whereunder crawling coop't we live and die,\n    Lift not thy hands to It for help--for It\n  Rolls impotently on as Thou or I.\n                                  OMAR KHAYY\u00c1M.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\nUrsula Manning stared out at the rods of rain.  Chanctonbury Ring was\nall but blotted out; she could just see the crown of beeches when the\nmists were blown aside for a few moments, and that was all.  The woods\nbelow stood heavy and motionless, and the fields between them and the\ncottage lay stretched out, drinking it in.  It had been a hot dry\nsummer, and the whole world was rejoicing in the rain.  That decided\nUrsula.  She turned back into the bedroom, opened a wardrobe, and took\nout an old tweed skirt and jumper.  Then she took off most of her\nclothes and assumed these.  She let down her hair, twisted it into a\nlong black plait, tied it firmly, and swung the heavy mass over her\nshoulder with a defiant jerk.  Then, bareheaded, she went downstairs\nhumming a little song, and selected a stick in the hall.  She looked\nabout eighteen, dressed so.\n\nHer mother came out of the sitting-room.  \"Ursula,\" she cried, \"you're\nnot going out!\"\n\n\"Yes, mother, I am.  Why not?  The rain's heavenly, and the woods have\nspread out their hands to it.  And I want to get soaked.\"\n\nThe elder lady stood irresolute, a ludicrous expression of dismay in\nher face.  The girl looked at her and laughed.  \"Oh, mother,\" she\ncried, \"say it if it's any help!\"\n\nMrs. Manning, at that, smiled ruefully.  \"Ursula,\" she said, \"it's all\nvery well, but you are trying.  You'll probably catch your death of\ncold.\"\n\nUrsula opened the door and stepped into the porch.  She looked up into\nthe leaden sky and down at the runnels of water on either side of the\nlittle garden path to the gate.  Then she glanced back at her mother,\nsmiled at her, waved her hand, and stepped into the downpour without a\nword.\n\nHer mother gave a little scream.  \"Ursula!  Where's your mac.?\"  The\nmuffled click of the latch at the gate answered her.\n\nIt opened into a little lane that ran down on the left to a main road\nand up on the right towards the woods below Chanctonbury.  Up this\nthen, she went, swinging her stick, swinging out.  The rain fell\nsteadily around and upon her, and ever and again she lifted her face to\nit and smiled slowly to herself at the kiss and sting of it.  In a\nlittle the winding track became a mere footpath and debouched into an\nold chalk-quarry, cut from the side of the hill, fringed with immense\nbeech-trees and an occasional oak.  The girl ran a few steps up a\nsodden low bank and stood for a moment looking down into the great\nbowl.  A continual patter and sough of rain came up to her, though\nhere, under the giant trees, less of the actual downpour reached her.\nThe white chalk shone through the misty air.  A miniature torrent\npoured as a little waterfall over the far brink and splashed below on\nto bushes and brambles.  A warm, rich, wet fragrance rose all about\nher, and every living green thing seemed stretched out and motionless\nin an utter ecstasy of enjoyment.\n\nThe girl drew a deep breath.  Unconsciously, she was registering it\nall.  All the grey monotones, all the myriad little drips and\nsplashings, all the washed leaves and grasses around and underfoot, and\nall the tall upreaching brown trunks that rose against the teeming sky,\nwere impressing themselves upon her mind.  She knew it as an instinct\nand stood there to miss nothing.  And one day Ursula Manning would\npaint just such a picture, and people would wonder how she did it, and\nthe critics talk of her unique gift.\n\nBut at the quarry she turned to the left.  The high soaked grasses\nreached to her knees; last year's litter of leaves clung to her feet;\nsprays of bramble clutched at her short skirt; but she moved slowly and\npersistently on.  Her eyes, that looked at you always without a tremor,\nglanced quietly right and left as she went.  By field-path and coppice,\nand now in a sunken lane that skirted an old wall behind which rose\nFordham Manor, she made her way.  She was drenched through and through,\nbut it was warm rain, and besides the exercise kept her warm.  The\npores of her skin, like those of the woods and the plants, opened to\nthe joyous quickening benison of it.  Rain dripped from her plaited\nhair and shone on her face.  And still she moved steadily through it,\nwith the erect carriage and proud swing of her, and those resolute\neager eyes.\n\nJust past the old wall, where it turns to run up to the coach-house and\nstables and barns against which fruitful ancient fig-trees grow, she\ncrossed a field diagonally to her left.  Its boundary hedge was thick\nand she moved along to the right seeking an opening.  Not until she was\nall but at the corner did she find it, and there, pushing back a tangle\nof old man's beard and bryony, she leapt through and out on to the\ncarriage-drive running by the park up to the house.  And just then a\ncar turned the corner and swept past her.\n\nThere were three men in it besides the driver.  One sat next him, his\nhat pulled down, muffled in an overcoat, but she knew him.  Of the\nothers, one turned and waved cheerfully over the back as the car went\non.  She knew him, too, just as she knew that he was arriving that day\nto stay with Mr. Tressor.  The third man she did not know.  She smiled\nsuddenly to herself.  It was plain they had been caught in the open car\nby the sudden storm, driving up from Brighton probably.  What fun!  Her\ncousin hated rain.\n\nManning turned back to Paul.  \"My cousin Ursula,\" he said.  \"She lives\njust here, when she's not in town.  Possibly you know the name.  She\npaints, and has rather a growing reputation.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" said Paul.  \"What in the world was she doing out in this then?\nShe looked drowned.\"\n\n\"I know.  She loves that sort of thing.  I wonder what you'll think of\nher, Paul.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"I don't know.  She's rather unusual.  Not your sort at all I should\nimagine.  But--well, I don't know.  It will be rather amusing to see.\"\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nUrsula went on down the drive, her thoughts idle, her appreciation\nvivid.  Arrived in the macadamised road of civilisation, she followed\nit without giving a thought to the fact that girls, soaked to the skin,\nhatless but happy, are rareties along even country roads.  The surface\nhad been rapidly softening under the downpour, but little she cared for\nthat either.  Blackberries gleamed scarlet, purple, black in every\nhedge; thrushes, in the now gentle rain, were already out on the\nwar-path for worms; and the sweep of the South Downs on her right was\nvisible through the dripping trees.  Ursula began to sing to herself as\nshe went, breaking off to nod friendlily to a carter who knew her, and\npicking up her song again without troubling whether or not he was out\nof earshot.  That was her way.  She had always seen clearly and scorned\nmuddle-headed conventionalities; at first, while her father lived and\nshe was still in her teens, with a certain submission to authority, but\nsince, after her twenty-first birthday, quite openly and frankly.  Her\nmother, who never had had much of a will of her own, gave in to her\ndaughter as she had to her husband.  Thus, at Ursula's suggestion, they\nhad taken the old cottage under Chanctonbury on the edge, but actually\npart of, Mr. Tressor's estate, and Mrs. Manning had been forced to\nadmit the advantage of the change from the big establishment which Mr.\nManning had maintained as befitted a banking magnate.  Then, a rather\nlonely aunt coming to live with them, the girl had announced her\nintention of having a flat and studio in town, and since she had her\nown money and moreover made more, nothing in the world was able to\nprevent her.  She came and went now between the two, with intervals of\nwandering abroad.  She had a big circle of her own acquaintances of\nwhom her mother knew little, chiefly however, it must be confessed,\nbecause she did not understand more than about a third of what they\nsaid and did when they came down to Sussex with her daughter; but she\nhad only a few friends.  These her mother knew less than the rest,\nretaining enough spirit to avow definitely that she did not want to\nknow them.  They professed views and took part in movements which were,\nfrankly, beyond toleration.  There was Muriel Lister, for example, who\npreached in churches and actually led a campaign for the admission of\nwomen to the priesthood.\n\nYet Ursula herself took active part in no movements or campaigns.  On\naccount of this it was perhaps odd that the leaders of them should be\nher friends.  But then a subtle reason underlay that.  For Ursula was\nrather a good person to talk to, and a very good person to have coffee\nwith by night in her studio after the fatigue of committees, inclined,\nas is the way of committees, to be a little heavy in hand.  She was\nsympathetic, understanding, entirely capable of giving an opinion, but\nshe did not say much.  Also she was clean-handed, so to speak.  It was\na little irritating, possibly, at times, that she was so resolutely\nunimpassioned when a reactionary bishop insulted women or ministers\ntook back by some Civil Service Regulation what the Removal of Sex\nDisabilities Act had given.  But one knew it was Ursula.  And one knew,\nmoreover, that at a crisis neither bishop nor ministers mattered to her\na toss of her present rain-soaked plait.\n\nFor Ursula, with her quiet, good-humoured resolution and her\nunquestioned art, not only saw life from an enviable angle, but quietly\nacted as if that were the only one from which it should be seen by\nreasonable people.  Her cousin had once said of her that she \"pressed\ntowards the goal\" with apostolic conviction.  Not that it was a wholly\ngood definition because, unlike the apostle, she tried to make no\nproselytes, seeing the world about her as a very lovely satisfying\nthing with which she was content to be satisfied.  Constitutionally,\nand from environment, no lost cause had as yet come vividly her way.\n\nTwo days later she was introduced to Paul.  Manning and he were doing\nthe round of the park, Manning with a gun under his arm, Paul,\nmetaphorically, with a pencil in his hand.  In other words, he was\nrealising what a lovely place it was.  The wide sweeps of grass, the\nclumps of trees, the views of the Downs, and the utter quiet of this\nlittle Sussex backwater were already exercising their magic upon him.\nThe two of them had come along the northern boundary of the estate and\nwere now skirting the lake.  It was a wild overgrown place, with\nnothing formal about it, a big irregular sheet of water with a tangle\nof weeds and lilies at one end and a regiment of great elms closing it\nin.  An avenue of limes led from it to the house, an odd avenue that\nonly appeared as an avenue when you came upon its entrance, suddenly,\nin the middle of grassy park-land.  Thus it started nowhere in\nparticular, and, from a distance, had no particular object, since the\nwater itself lay low at the far end of it behind a raised bank.  Paul\nalready loved that.  You wandered down from the garden and saw,\nsuddenly, the green guarded road of it running away into the park.\nIntrigued, you entered, and sauntered carelessly up it.  Then, at quite\na long last, you climbed the slope of the bank and suddenly saw before\nyou this still enchanted refuge where the fish leaped in the gathering\ndusk and white swans sailed friendlily up in the heat of the sun.  Here\nand there a fallen trunk lay half in and half out of the water.  In\nplaces there was no coming at the brink for forests of reeds.  But, at\nits deepest corner, a promontory of hazels that was almost an island,\nthrust out into its serenity.\n\nThe friends leaped from stone to tussock and tussock to log and landed.\nA suggestion of a path led them through the few yards of undergrowth.\nAnd there, hidden by a screen of green, with the water at her feet, sat\nUrsula on the flat prow of a punt.  She was making a little\nwater-colour, palette in one hand, brush in the other, a little\nimpressionist study of a pine that stood by himself on the bank\nopposite, his brown roots reaching down into the lake.\n\n\"Hullo, Ursula,\" said Manning, \"we didn't see you.  Let me introduce\nPaul Kestern.  He's going to be a near neighbour, so you've got to know\nhim.\"\n\nThe girl looked up but did not move.  Paul found himself staring across\na tiny strip of water into clear brown eyes, a pale oval face, and a\nframe of black hair, all set on a tall pillar of white throat and neck.\nShe was wearing a brilliant yellow jumper, without adornment, and a\nshort blue skirt.  She was long-limbed, and he realised vaguely that\nher white bare arms and black stockinged legs were shapely and lissom\nand good to see.  \"How do you do,\" he said properly.\n\n\"I've seen you before somewhere,\" she replied.\n\nPaul was puzzled.  He shot a glance at Manning, but he was fiddling\nunconcernedly with his gun.  Left to his own resources, he continued to\nbe polite.\n\n\"It's awfully rude of me,\" he said, \"but I'm afraid I don't remember.\"\n\n\"Neither do I,\" she said.\n\nHe smiled.  So did she.  \"Let's call it quits,\" he suggested.\n\n\"I'm afraid I must, but I shall hope to remember yet,\" she retorted\nwhimsically.\n\n\"Possibly it was at Cambridge,\" suggested Paul.\n\n\"Rather not,\" put in Manning, restoring his piece to his arm, \"Ursula\nnever comes to see me.\"\n\n\"Of course not,\" she returned equably, \"why should I?\"\n\nManning laughed.  They were good friends, these two.  \"Why, indeed,\" he\nsaid, \"but you needn't rub it in.  And you might be so nice as to come\nand have dinner in the immediate future and make up a four at bridge.\"\n\n\"You must first,\" she said, \"extract a nice note of invitation from Mr.\nTressor, and it must include mother and auntie.  In addition you must\ncall upon us.  Call this afternoon, and bring Mr. Kestern.  Meantime\nyou're just a little bit of a nuisance at the moment.  I want to paint.\"\n\n\"Kestern's a poet,\" remarked Manning gravely.\n\nThe girl nodded.  \"'_Leaves in Autumn_,'\" she said.\n\nPaul flushed.  \"You've read it?\" he cried excitedly.\n\nShe smiled slowly.  \"I've even painted it,\" she said.\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"Painted it.  That is, there was one poem especially I couldn't forget.\nI saw it rather vividly.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" said Paul, with a deep breath.  Somehow the fact that she knew of\nhis work and had appreciated it to that extent, seemed to him the\nbiggest praise that he had had yet.  He could not take his eyes off\nher.  \"Which one?\" he asked at last.\n\nShe considered him a moment Then: \"I'll show you the sketch,\" she said,\n\"and you shall guess which it is meant to illustrate.\"  She got up as\nshe spoke and turned round for a case that lay behind her in the punt.\n\n\"Oh, do,\" cried Paul, starting forward.\n\nManning laughed.  \"She's not got it there,\" he said.\n\nSomething in his tone--a faint trace of mockery, it seemed to\nPaul--struck them both.  Paul looked guilty of foolishness and the girl\nstood arrested.  They both of them looked at Manning.  That instant\npose remained with Paul long afterwards as the key-note of their\nmeeting.  It was symbolic, somehow, as if Manning would always be\nfaintly contemptuous of them.  But why, the boy had no idea.\n\n\"Well,\" said Ursula, and she spoke so soon that it was as if there had\nbeen no pause, \"I have not, it is true.  I was only going to pack up\nbecause I can paint no more just now, thanks to you, Arnold, you old\nrotter.  But I will do more now.  Mr. Kestern, will you walk back with\nme, and see your picture?\"\n\n\"May I?\" asked Paul eagerly.\n\nManning thrust his hand into his arm.  \"What about the Mill cottage?\"\nhe asked banteringly.\n\n\"Oh, I clean forgot,\" said Paul, and hesitated.\n\nHis friend laughed.  \"Good Lord, Paul,\" he said, \"a pretty sort of an\nagent you'll make!  I was taking him to see his first job,\" he\nexplained.  \"Old Morley wants a new roof, or something of that sort.\nBut, of course, it doesn't matter.  I was only rotting.  We'll walk up\nwith you, Ursula.  That'll be the call, and on my own responsibility\nI'll invite you and my dear aunt in to bridge after dinner this very\nday.\"\n\n\"So he's going to be Mr. Tressor's agent,\" said Ursula, busy over her\npainting materials.\n\n\"Well,\" said Paul honestly and a little awkwardly, \"it's only an\nexcuse, I fear.\"\n\n\"Paul's to prove himself a poet,\" said Manning, \"and incidentally to\nsettle the theory and content of revelation.  Perhaps you'll help him.\"\n\n\"Perhaps,\" said the girl serenely.  \"I hope so.\"\n\nThey strolled back together, Manning in the middle, and it was Manning\nwho did most of the talking.  He chatted on, occasionally asking a\nquestion, but for the most part taking it for granted, apparently from\nexperience, that Ursula would listen rather than speak.  Paul, too, was\nnot much included in the conversation, which concerned the Manning\nfamily and their friends and the girl's work.  Thus he gathered from\nthe bantering talk a good deal concerning her life here and in London,\nher art and her friends.  It interested him profoundly.  She was a new\ntype altogether in his experience, one of which he had heard rumours,\nso to speak, at Claxted (where such strange goings-on were occasionally\nmentioned with scandalised horror), but which one would equally fail to\nfind at Thurloe End or St. Mary's.  Glancing past his friend from time\nto time, he watched her face.  She turned her head but little, walking\nsteadily and silently forward.  But he noticed how she kept her eyes\nup, and how she had a trick of staring at a tree or a cloud or a beast\nin the lush pasture with a kind of untroubled wonder.  It was easy to\nunderstand that here was an artist.\n\nThey came then to the cottage and Paul was introduced to the mother and\naunt.  Ursula stood by while the usual things were said, and then\nturned to him.  \"Now, Mr. Kestern,\" she said, \"will you come this way?\"\n\nHer mother glanced up, but said nothing, and Paul, since no one else\nmoved, followed her alone.\n\nShe led the way upstairs and into a room over the porch, the room from\nwhich she had watched the rain.  It was big and airy and light, half\nstudio and half bedroom.  The bed itself stood in an alcove, curtained\nwith a vivid cretonne, blue in the main, on which rioted a bold design\nof orange and yellow and scarlet fruit, with apple-blossom and leaves.\nThe curtain was half drawn, and the still Puritan Paul felt a little\nthat he ought not to look that way.  Ursula, quite obviously had no\nsuch views at all, for she crossed the room to the alcove, pulled the\ncurtain yet further back, and sought for a portfolio that lay in a\nlittle recess near the head of the bed.\n\nPaul stood hesitatingly.  He did not quite know what to do.  The girl\ncalled to him over her shoulder.  \"Sit down, will you,\" she said,\n\"anywhere.\"\n\nHe walked over to a couch by the window and sat down, looking out over\nthe gay garden to the Downs.  Hollyhocks marched as an army with\nbanners in a bed beneath the window.  Chanctonbury's crown, clear and\nbright in the sunlight to-day, rose into the pale blue sky above.\n\n\"What a glorious window-seat,\" he said, with a little note of content\nin his voice.  She threw him a glance, but did not speak.  She was\nsearching through the portfolio.\n\n\"I think,\" observed Paul meditatively, \"I'm the luckiest man alive to\nget a chance of a year here.\"\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\n\"I can't make up my mind what to do, you see,\" he said.\n\n\"I should have thought there was absolutely no doubt.\"\n\n\"No?\" queried Paul in genuine astonishment.\n\n\"Of course not.  You've got to write great poetry.\"\n\n\"I've also got to live,\" said Paul, with a flicker of a smile.\n\n\"Naturally.  What about it?\"\n\n\"Well, I've got to earn money.\"\n\nUrsula found what she was looking for.  \"Here it is,\" she said, coming\nover to him.\n\nAnd then, carrying on the conversation: \"I think those of us who can\nsee and express things, ought to think first of that,\" she said.\n\"After all, one lives somehow.\"\n\nBut Paul hardly heard.  He was staring at the little picture, and was\nvery silent.\n\nShe broke the silence.  \"Well, can you guess the poem?\" she demanded.\n\n\"'Spent,'\" he whispered, half to himself.\n\nHer silence told him he was correct.  It was the short thing, since\nthen slightly renamed and improved, that Tressor had, of all he had\nwritten, praised superlatively.  Of all he had written, but, as he\nlooked at this, astonishment welled up in him.  \"But this is not what I\nwrote,\" he said.\n\nIt was a picture of dull-red angry sunset tones over a bare stony plain\nand a dimly-outlined ragged track.  A solitary figure of a man lay\nthere, just as he had stumbled forward and fallen at the last step.\nThe light glowed on his sunburnt nude back, his face in shadow; and on\none other object, for, some short way beyond him, was a dimly-seen\nruined shrine, with the statue of a god, half overthrown.  The stone\neffigy reeled insecurely against a broken pillar, and the glow of the\ndying sun caught on its upcast face.  The girl had copied some Greek\nmasterpiece, and there, in that lone waste, as if to mock the beaten\nhuman figure, a regular, perfect, immobile brow and eyes and nose and\nlips turned upwards to the sky.  In the fallen man was life, beaten and\ndespairing, but life; in the fallen god was death, serene and lovely,\nbut death.\n\n\"This is not what I wrote,\" repeated Paul again.\n\n\"But you instantly named it.\"\n\n\"It alone, of the pieces in the book, fitted at all,\" he said.\n\n\"I suspect that was not all.  I should not be in the least surprised if\nyou had more in your mind than you knew.  Anyway, your spent day struck\nme so.\"\n\nPaul started, and looked at her almost with awe.  He saw it all so\nplainly.  He had sat down to write one evening after a dull heavy day\nwhen all the growing doubt and despair in his soul had been surging\naround him.  He had written of a dying sun, a barren waste, a wearied\nwalk, a lost hope; yet he had not seen this--no, no, not this.\n\n\"It was an ordinary day,\" said Paul.\n\n\"To you perhaps.  To me it meant a life.\"\n\n\"But it's wrong of life,\" he said.\n\nShe hesitated.  \"Speaking generally, I agree,\" she answered, \"but why\ndo you say so?\"\n\n\"That fallen god, that empty temple,\" he urged, suddenly, almost\npassionately moved, he could hardly say why.\n\n\"I see.\"  She was quite deliberate.  \"I remember what Arnold said.  You\nhave still an idol in the shrine.\"\n\n\"God,\" said Paul reverently, \"only He is no idol.\"\n\n\"There is no god,\" said Ursula.\n\nIf she had lashed him with a whip, he could not have been more\nstartled, more outraged.  There, in that sunny window, looking out over\nthat gay garden, this attractive, striking, interesting girl, for whose\nwork and thought he had already a youthful generous impulse, had\nsuddenly blasphemed.  And she had done it so coolly, so unemotionally.\n\"There is no god,\" she had said, exactly as if she had passed a\ndetached criticism on art or verse.\n\nAnd yet no ringing affirmation, no dogmatic assertion to equal hers,\nsprang to his lips.  Conflict and pain had done more in his heart than\nhe had guessed.  \"Oh, there must be, there must be!\" was all that he\ncould cry, as if he hoped against hope.\n\nUrsula took the picture from his hand and their eyes met.  Even in his\ndistress, he saw the miracle.  Hers were utterly serene.  He knew his\nown to be inchoate, baffled, grieved.  And yet in her serenity, too,\nwas a touch of kindliness, and a kind of deep wonder of understanding\nas if, despite her empty heaven, she looked on mystery.\n\nSomething deep down in him stirred before those eyes of hers.  He\nforgot that he had only known her half a morning.  He forgot that he\nwas a man and a Christian, and she was a girl and a heathen.  And he\nforgot entirely that it was the fool who said in his heart there is no\ngod.  \"Oh,\" he cried, \"you've no idea how down and out I am!\"\n\nShe smiled and put out her hand.  \"I'll help,\" she said, \"and I put it\nbadly, too, just now.  Peradventure there is a god, but, you know, we\ndon't know even his Name and--and--he seems asleep.\"\n\nThey were odd words, he thought vaguely, but somehow there was\ntenderness and strength hidden in them.  Paul Kestern knew suddenly how\nmuch he wanted both.  And so he reached out, too, and put his hand into\nhers.\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nThe impression of Ursula's personality was indeed strong enough to veil\nthe full significance of what she had said for several days.  In part,\nmoreover, the influence of Tressor and Manning, and still more, the\nbusiness of adjustment to his new environment made for this.  Paul\nalways sensed the atmosphere of houses and places in rather a cat-like\nway, wandering about a little, twisting, as it were, in the new bed,\nuntil it was familiar and friendly.  And Fordham Manor was so different\nfrom any other house in which he had ever stayed, let alone lived, that\nthe process took time.\n\nIt was a very beautiful place, of more than one date, but the front had\nbeen wholly rebuilt in the early Georgian period, while the back had\nbeen left Jacobean.  The result was singularly arresting.  Strong,\nsevere, plain, dignified, yet not pompous and over heavy, a circular\ndrive ran up to the entrance hall.  On either side equally matched\nbuildings--the servants' quarters and the like--pushed out, each with a\nlittle cupola and gables.  Wide open high iron gates led to a gravelled\ndrive with a balustrade, a slope, and below a big herbaceous border.\nBelow that again there was a further walk, a low railing, and a full\nwide sweep of park-land where, away to the right and but trees from\nhere, ran the avenue.  But when one skirted or passed right through the\nhouse, one came out on a herb garden and box-trimmed walks; and from\nthe beds of rosemary, lavender and thyme one looked back to the sweet\nsmiling red brickwork and wide windows of the earlier building, with an\nirregular roof and high dormer windows.\n\nWithin, the house had in fact many faults.  The rooms were much too\nsmall for its size for one thing.  But while this would have mattered\nto a family in residence, if anything it added to its suitability for\nTressor, a bachelor and only an occasional visitor.  Besides there was\nat least one feature which admirably fitted now.  There was a large\npartially divided hall into which descended a wide dignified staircase.\nThis hall particularly pleased Paul.  It was rather a stately obvious\nhall as one entered from the front, but one skirted the stairs, and\nbehold its aspect changed.  The big fireplace behind was Jacobean.\nThere was a bookcase full of new books meant to be read.  There were\nlong low chairs and a plenty of rugs and footstools.  And the portraits\nin the front portion gave way to a picture or two which he was\nbeginning to love.  One was a Dutch landscape, sombre, mysterious, and\nthe other ploughlands and three strong horses that climbed a ridge in a\ngale of driving wind.\n\nThe men were already settling down.  They met at breakfast, and\nthereafter Tressor departed to his study and was no more seen till\nlunch.  Manning and Paul, however, gaily wasted half a morning.  They\nsmoked a pipe in the gardens, and picked up the newspapers in the\nlounge hall on their way to work afterwards, Paul usually reading or\nglancing through anything he had done the day before.  In the\nafternoon, they rode or motored or walked, found tea waiting them on\ntheir return, and separated for a couple of hours' more serious going\nbefore the dressing bell.  In the evening things seemed to fall out\nwith easy content, though Tressor would withdraw to his study again as\noften as not.  It was all rather leisured and easy.  Expressed in\ncolour, Paul thought of Claxted as having none; of Thurloe End as black\nand white and scarlet; of Fordham as blue and old gold within and brown\nand green without.\n\nAs for duties, as yet he had none worth the mention.  Old Mrs. Bird,\nthe housekeeper, and he, already loved each other.  It was obvious that\nshe proposed to take charge of him.  Rider, who combined the functions\nof valet and butler and chauffeur, had instructions to take Paul over\nwhen Tressor was away, and seemed gravely imperturbed.  Timothy, the\nhead gardener and an institution, appeared actually prepared to teach\nhim a little; and as for the gamekeeper, who lived at the lodge, he\ntalked dogs and horses with Manning by the hour, and accepted Paul\nbecause he could listen with grave attention.  In a word, the\nestablishment was plainly ready to accept him, and he was, as he should\nhave been, profoundly grateful.\n\nIt was thus, then, after a morning stroll, while Manning was\nperfunctorily looking through _The Times_, that Paul broached the\nagnosticism of Ursula.  The ladies had dined at the Manor the previous\nevening, and she had sung.  Paul had had no conversation out of the\nordinary with her, and yet once again the strength of her personality\nhad impressed him.  So now, as he stood by the carved and decorated\nmantelpiece and looked out through the open window to the sunny garden,\nsniffing the fragrant scent of herbs and box that wafted in, the girl\nwas vividly in his mind.  \"Arnold,\" he said.\n\n\"Yes?  What's up now?\"\n\n\"I say, I like your cousin.\"\n\nManning folded the paper carelessly and tossed it aside, feeling for\nhis tobacco pouch.  \"I'm sure I'm very pleased,\" he said.\n\n\"Don't rag.  She worries me.\"\n\n\"I thought you said you liked her.\"\n\n\"So I do, but it is exactly that that worries me.  She's an atheist.\"\n\n\"True.  It runs in the family in this generation.  A reaction perhaps.\nHer father was a churchwarden, and her mother likes the vicar to call\nonce a month.\"\n\nPaul shifted uneasily.  \"It isn't a subject for joking to me,\" he said.\n\"You know that, very well you know it.  I may be in difficulties, but I\nbelieve in God with all my heart.\"\n\nManning leaned back easily in his chair and lit his pipe.  \"You think\nyou do,\" he said, between the puffs.\n\nPaul rounded on him eagerly.  \"But I do,\" he insisted.  \"To be honest,\nit is an utter mystery to me how you do not.  I can't conceive of it at\nall.  I know we've never discussed the point before--it hasn't seemed\nto me worth discussion, the existence of God, I mean--but I want to\nnow.\"\n\n\"Ahl And why now?\"\n\n\"Because, impossible as it seems to me in your or anybody's case, that\nyour cousin should say 'There is no god' utterly staggers me.\"\n\n\"When did she say that?\"\n\nPaul told him.\n\nHe smoked thoughtfully.  \"Humph,\" he said at last, dubiously, \"but I\ndoubt if Ursula is as much an atheist as an agnostic.  She probably put\nit that way because her god, whatever she thinks, has nothing worth\nmentioning in common with any idea of God in your mind.\"\n\nPaul regarded him for a moment in troubled silence, weighing his words.\nThen he sighed.  \"It is utterly beyond me,\" he said.  \"How, in the face\nof things as they are, you or anyone can fail to believe in a Creator,\nan Inspirer, a Supporter, I do not see.  It may be old-fashioned, but\neven _Paley's Evidences_ seem good enough to me.  Allow evolution if\nyou like, allow anything, you've got to get back to _something_.  There\nmust have been a beginning, even if it was all the most tenuous of\nspiral nebul\u00e6.  Well, who made that?\"\n\n\"I haven't the remotest notion,\" said Manning.\n\n\"Well, but....\"\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\n\"Well, if God didn't create it, how did it come?  What other hypothesis\nis possible?  It's not conceivable, thinkable even at all, that matter\nis eternal.  Why, eternity, backwards or forwards, is unthinkable.\"\n\n\"Exactly.  Yet you ascribe this unthinkable attribute to God.\"\n\nPaul knit his brows.  \"One must,\" he objected.\n\n\"No,\" said Manning, sitting up sharply, \"that's exactly where you're\nwrong.  One most emphatically must not.\"\n\nComplete bewilderment settled down on Paul.  He made a characteristic\nlittle gesture at last.  \"I suppose I haven't the intelligence\nnecessary to follow you,\" he said almost bitterly.\n\n\"Paul,\" said Manning, \"you have, that's the rub.  More, I shouldn't be\nin the least surprised if you did.  You've been God-ridden all your\nlife, obsessed, bound, but you've broken steadily away from the chains.\nIt seems inevitable to me that sooner or later you will break with this\nalso.  If I've said nothing much so far, it's because, in a way, I'm\nnot interested.  I like you too much to want to see you rot up your\nlife with Roman Catholicism or any arrant nonsense of that sort, but\nI've always thought you had better keep your God till--till----\"  He\nhesitated.  Then: \"Possibly till the right person came along to deliver\nyou.\"\n\n\"You mean your cousin, I suppose,\" Paul said slowly.\n\n\"Indeed I do not,\" replied Manning quickly.  \"I had no idea you two\nwould seriously broach the subject.  But it is interesting that it has\ncome that way.  You're in good hands, though Ursula keeps more of the\ncargo than I can carry.\"\n\n\"Precious little, I should think,\" retorted Paul.\n\n\"Well, you can discuss that with her.  As for myself----\"\n\n\"Yes, then, as for yourself.\"\n\n\"You honestly want to know?\"\n\n\"I do.\"\n\n\"Sit down then.  Don't prowl about.  I've got to be steadily serious\nand profound for at least ten minutes, and I need help.\"\n\nPaul perceived a hassock at his feet and dropped on to it.  \"Carry on,\"\nhe said, smiling a little as the other had meant him to do.\n\nBut Manning was in no hurry to begin.  Before he began to speak,\nTimothy came past the window, saw the two sitting silently, and went on\nagain, shaking his head and muttering to himself.  And when Manning did\nbegin to speak, he was abrupt, and there was a hard note in his voice.\n\n\"Look here, Paul,\" he said, \"the root of the matter is just this: God\nis a guess in the dark.  You are driven back and back and back, as you\nsay, till you can't go further, but then you begin to invent\nmeaningless words to cover your inadequacy.  You talk about infinite\nand eternal and almighty, words which are no more than scraps of\nmathematical logic.  The mind knows that it's beaten, that for some odd\nreason it cannot travel back beyond certain bounds.  It's like space:\nyou cannot conceive of something that ends, without your demanding what\ncomes next.  Something, you say, must come next, and next, and next.\nAnd there can't be a last; and yet there must be a last, an end...\"\n\nHe stopped, as if he was trying once more himself to beat back against\nthe reeling thought.  Paul remained immovable.\n\n\"Well, now, the mind hates a vacuum.  It must round off things.  Thus,\nthen, at that extreme limit of comprehension, when no further logical\nsequence is possible, it gets out of the difficulty by creating a\nconception upon which it can rest.  Thought demands a beginning, an\nend, a supreme power, a reason, and the imagination of man, when his\nmind can no more, simply jumps in the dark.  'All right,' it says,\n'there is One Who is Eternal, Almighty, Infinite--God.'  A guess in the\ndark, you see.\"\n\nPaul stared into that shifting black abyss.  The horror of it rose into\nhis eyes.  Waves and seas, inexorable, heartless, rolled in upon him,\nand he felt himself sinking, sinking.  The sensation was almost\nphysical, and he had literally to moisten his lips to speak.  \"We have\nChrist,\" he said.  \"He was not in the dark.  He knew.\"\n\nManning shrugged his shoulders at that, and said nothing.\n\n\"Arnold,\" cried Paul again, \"He knew!\"\n\nManning got up.  \"Look here, Paul,\" he said, \"we've worked over that\nground.  Christianity is a matter of evidence.  God Almighty, you know\nsomething of it!  'By what authority?'\"  He relit his pipe and tossed\nthe match through the window.\n\nPaul turned the question over in his mind.  Of course, that was the\nquestion.  He saw it, like a flaming note of interrogation, burning in\nupon him.  That unanswerable question: \"By what authority?\"  Father\nVassall----\n\nHis friend interrupted him.\n\n\"And,\" Arnold burst out, \"ultimately, that is evidence we can test for\nourselves.  What did Christ say of God?  Take one thing: that He was a\nFather, who heard and answered and cared for His creatures, for the\nleast of them.  Well, does He--I ask you, does He?  Come, now, be\nhonest.  You know He doesn't.  There is not a flicker of evidence in\nthe whole vast universe that God hears or answers or cares.  There are\nlaws, great driving laws, that's all.  Shove your finger in and you'll\nget hurt; jump right in and you'll be killed.  Inevitably.  Always.\nScreaming to God won't save you.  Some bloody war's on, and a woman\nimplores God to save her lover.  Well, does He?  If He turn a single\nbullet aside, He must disarrange the whole cosmic law.  _Does He_?  I\nask you--does He?\"\n\nPaul hid his face.  He saw the past three years white as an open road\nbefore him....  \"Does He?\"\n\nBut Manning did not seem to notice.  \"There's no _fatherly_ control,\nthat's the point.  Even religion squirms before the obviousness of\nthat, and invents excuses.  God maketh His rain to fall on the just and\non the unjust.  Pish, He does no such thing.  He has nothing to do with\nthe fall of rain, or He abdicated His power before the dawn of history.\"\n\n\"But Somebody _must_,\" cried Paul.\n\nManning dropped back into his chair.  \"Stop,\" he cried.  \"If we are to\ngo on talking you must not say that.  You surrender to the savage when\nyou say that.  He, poor devil, sees the lightning hit his hut:\n'Somebody must be angry,' he says.  Experience comes along and shows\neven unscientific minds the irrefragable laws of thunderstorms, and\nyour poor fellow bleats: 'Then somebody must have caused them.'\nScience comes along and demonstrates without a doubt the unity of\nmatter and the existence of the electron, and the dear Christian folds\nhis hands: 'But God is the First Cause, the Creator.'  Guesses, all of\nthem.  Guess if you want to, Kestern, but not to me.  I won't.  That's\nflat.\"\n\nPaul could stand it no more.  He jumped up and paced restlessly about.\n\"I see what you mean,\" he cried....  \"Oh, and I see what she meant,\ntoo....  It was beautiful, beautiful, but a marble statue after all;\nand it's the end of the day; and it's fallen--fallen....  Well, the\ntraveller has fallen too....  No wonder....  Oh, no wonder....\"\n\nManning smoked steadily.  He had been unusually vehement, and was a\ntrifle ashamed of himself.  \"I say, Paul,\" he said at last, \"pull\nyourself together.  You're not a fool.\"\n\nPaul stopped in his walk and stood regarding him.  But he did not make\nan answer to that.  \"If you don't guess, what happens then?\"\n\nManning smiled languidly.  \"Well, you don't guess, that's all.  It's\nquite simple.  Perhaps there is a god; perhaps He is all that is said\nabout Him.  Perhaps....  Only we are reasonable men and we have to go\nupon facts, and the facts are that there is no trace of Him.\"\n\n\"Unless very existence is a sign--the fact that things are,\" said Paul,\ncatching at a straw.\n\n\"Oh, very well, have it if you will.  But of what or of whom is\nexistence a sign?  I know it's sentimental twaddle to talk of the\ncruelty and so on of Nature, and I won't.  But you know and I know\nthere are laws, and what sort of laws?  To what sort of mind can you\nargue from Nature's laws?  Think.\"\n\nPaul thought.  He thought of the regularity and beauty of ice-crystals\nwhich no one can see without a microscope.  Why always regular?  Why\nbeautiful?  He thought of the evolution and the extinction of the\ndinosaur, the pterodactyl and the rest.  Why?  Necessary?  Useful?\n\"Did the hand, then, of the Potter shake?\"  He thought of the laws that\ncalmly allow men and women to bring forth congenital idiots or children\nloathsomely diseased in body or in soul.  Laws!  He flamed suddenly\nwith rage.  \"The mind of a devil!\" he cried.\n\n\"Rubbish,\" retorted Manning.  \"Good heavens, Paul, pull yourself\ntogether!  But there, I suppose it takes time.\"\n\n\"An idiot, then.\"\n\n\"Oh, chuck it.  I've some work to do.  Go and read Tennyson.\"\n\n\"Well, what other sort of personality could it be?\"\n\n\"You dear old ass, there's NO personality in it at all.  That's the\nwhole argument.  You will _guess_.  Talk about the high hills!  You go\nskipping on from point to point--in imagination.  Existence exists so\nfar as we can tell.  Relatively to us it exists, anyway.  But that is\nthe end of the argument.  You can go no further.  Nothing imaginable\ncan have created it--nothing--nothing.\"  And forgetting Tennyson, he\npushed his arm through Paul's and led him out into the garden.\n\nThe sweet warm sun was releasing a thousand scents.  Paul drew trailing\nfingers through a spiky host of lavender.  Butterflies fluttered their\napparently aimless dance over the beds, and bees, more obviously\npurposeful, dived into flowerets.  Even the ancient flags on which they\nstood were cracked and broken by the impetuous thrust of tiny tendrils\none could destroy with a pinch.\n\nArnold Manning took up his parable.  \"'Consider the lilies,'\" he\nquoted.  \"Christ took a far step forward, anyway, Paul.  The savage\nonly saw horror, and made his grinning abomination as an image of God.\nThe Jew saw, for some reason, the beauty of law and unity, and Elijah\nmocked the poor leaping priests of Baal and cried out on Jehovah.\nChrist saw beauty and tenderness, and invested His God with a still\nhigher personality.  'Ye know not the Father,' He said.  And we, we\npoor moderns, we see it all, Paul, and we see that all--all--those\nconceptions were just shadows of ourselves.\"\n\nPaul was gazing up towards the Downs with a far-away look in his eyes.\nLittle fleecy floating clouds were racing shadows of themselves across\nthe rich green turf.  \"I see,\" he said sadly.\n\nThey strolled up and down.  \"Go and write a poem about this,\" said\nManning with unusual gentleness.  \"That will buck you up.\"\n\nPaul slowly shook his head.\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nIt would be foolish to pretend that a couple of conversations shattered\nthe faith of years, and yet, in life, it often seems so.  Under the\nsurface, the insidious work goes on, and perhaps there is never a\ncrisis for which there has not been preparation.  So it was with Paul.\nThe ground had been steadily slipping from beneath his feet.  Upon a\nproffered rock, for good or ill, he had not climbed.  Now, with all the\nthunder and confusion of a cataclysm, the elaborate structure fell.\n\nManning's cool challenge, as much or more than his logic, had brought\nabout the ruin.  Does God hear? he had asked, and deliberately awaited\nthe answer.  Once Paul would have been as swift and as assured in his\nreply.  In Lambeth Court, on Parker's Piece, even at Port o' Man, he\nwould instantly have answered yes.  But those days had gone.  He fought\nthe conclusion, wrestled with it, even still prayed earnestly against\nit, but could not escape the only possible deduction, as it seemed to\nhim.  There had been no answer at all, absolutely and literally none;\nor else, as Father Vassall would have it, he had been heard and led,\nled deliberately and as he could bear it, to the threshold of the\nCatholic Church.  But his father, than whom none prayed more earnestly,\nsaid that that was the devil, and the Bishop of Mozambique that there\nthe angels of God had been set about him for deliverance.  Which was\nright?  He had been tossed like a shuttlecock among them.\n\nOut of that dilemma, Tressor's quiet reasoned judgment had opened up a\nway of escape.  Fordham Manor had seemed so plainly the best and wisest\nrefuge.  His father, again, had approved.  Besides, if he could write\nverse, that was a gift of God given him for improvement.  And it was\nnot that he did not pray even now, and read the Bible, too, as he had\nbeen taught.  Only the Bible pointed, if anywhere, where they who\nadvised him most to read it would not admit there was any conceivable\npossibility of going.\n\nNo, the arches of the years had led Paul irresistibly on.  One by one,\nsoaring unseen before him, they had closed down at the end of each span\nan appreciable march nearer to the brink of the precipice.  He stood\nthere now, peering into its depths, discerning no path at all,\nsuspecting that the plunge into the abyss was only a matter of weeks,\nor days.  Does God hear? demanded Manning, and Paul had no answer but\nthe echo of Job's old cry: \"Oh that I knew where I might find Him!\"\n\nSmall wonder that he could not write poetry.  Poetry!  There was no\nmeaning in life if God were not--no reasonable end, no conceivable\nbeginning, nothing worth while.  Arnold might grub about with his\nscience; Paul sought the spirit of things.  And when he turned to\nTressor, the don utterly failed him.\n\nIt was odd, Paul thought, how entirely he failed him.  Paul was coming\ndaily to love more and more this kindly pleasant man, but he was\nbeginning to see joints in his harness.  The three of them would talk\nof an evening, for Paul could not do otherwise, and he would drag a\nsomewhat unwilling Manning into it; but Tressor answered the younger\nman not at all.  He clung to a refuge that was not yet, at any rate,\nstorm-proof for Paul.  Logic, said Tressor, failed at a point.  The\nheart of man universally had need of God, and it would not crave if\nthere was nothing to crave for.  Tressor relied on intuition and\ninstinct.  Instinct and intuition, said Manning, were the result of\ntraining and environment.  Psychology could dissect and label both,\nalmost as easily as physiology the bones and muscles of a man.  There\nwas mystery before and behind, said Tressor, but God was fatherly, and\nin the end the weary soul would fall back upon His heart and rest.\n\n\"Sir,\" Manning cried one evening, goaded for once out of his habitual\ncalm, \"if your principles had been applied in science, man would be\nstill in the Stone Age!\"\n\nTressor had flicked an eyelid and looked hurt.  He had shortly gone off\nto his study, and Manning had as shortly gone after him to apologise.\nHe had returned a little flushed.  \"He's a jolly good chap,\" he said to\nPaul.  \"It's beastly of me to hurt his feelings.\"\n\nFeelings!  As if, Paul thought, feelings mattered.  He walked\nbareheaded in the avenue and stood on the edge of the sleeping lake,\nand he cried out of the depths of his tortured soul to God.  One\nsyllable of an answer, one solitary sign out of the still night, one\nresolute conviction even, if God preferred that secret way, among the\nchanging shifting doubts that racked his soul, and he would be ready to\ndrink any kind of cup and be baptized with any baptism.\n\n\n\n(5)\n\nTacked on to the very house, was a peculiar feature of the place.  The\nparish church was also the private chapel.  The parish had dwindled all\nbut to the inhabitants of the park and grounds, and one clergyman\nserved Fordham and held as well the living of the considerable village\nthat lay beyond; but, occasionally, once a month for each service,\nCommunion was celebrated, Evensong sung, so near to them that it was\ndifficult even for unsympathetic guests not to go.  Besides, Tressor\nliked one to go, and that was enough for Manning and Paul.\n\nThe last Sunday in the month, then, Paul went to Evensong.  All the\nservants were there: dear old Mrs. Bird in a bonnet that tinkled with\njet, with service-books the treasured gifts of her master; Timothy, for\nthe most part crouched in his pew, expressionless; Rider, precise and\nunderstanding; the maids, strange in Sunday outdoor garments.  The\nthree friends occupied a pew discreetly not in the front, flatteringly\nnot too far behind.  And Mr. Prideaux took the service and preached.\n\nThere had, it appeared, but lately been a serious controversy in the\nChurch.  A dean had preached at Westminster on the earlier chapters of\nGenesis, had depreciated their historic value, and had welcomed the\nteachings of Professor Darwin.  A bishop had retorted in the\n_Guardian_, and Catholic-minded clergy taken the matter up in the\n_Church Times_.  The _Record_ had said that it had long told the public\nthat this would be the result of ... And so on.\n\nMr. Prideaux, an able, energetic, zealous man, preached upon the\nsubject.  He believed in dealing with subjects of current interest,\nbesides (though he did not say so), unless you are very High Church,\nthe month of August is singularly desert in regard to festivals.  He\nmay also have thought that here his small select congregation did at\nany rate contain a proportion of listeners who would be more interested\nin such matters than the average villager.  And he was quite right in a\nsense.\n\nOnly the Vicar could not know that there was a veritable gulf fixed\nbetween his comfortable reasoned theology and the devastating vivid\nmodernism of either Manning or Paul.  The priest said that, \"of\ncourse,\" Darwinism was not proved; an increasing host of scientists\ndisagreed with it.  Besides, Darwin had never taught Darwinism.  Again,\nif he had, there was nothing inherently hostile to the true teachings\nof the Church in the theory of evolution.  There was nothing of\nrevelation as to the precise point at which the ape-man became the\nman-ape with a soul.  And it was only those who had forgotten the true\nrelation of Church and Bible who found any difficulty in Genesis.  The\ndevout churchman only saw in these inspired fragments of ancient legend\nillustrations of the eternal groping of the soul of man after truth,\nand, he might say, an unique witness to the guiding hand of God....\n\nMr. Prideaux came to supper afterwards, and played a couple of rubbers\nof bridge.  He was genial, and hoped, when he learned of Paul's taking\nup of residence at Fordham, that Paul would come to see him.  He was a\nbachelor, and it would be delightful if they could see a good deal of\neach other.\n\nPaul went up slowly to his room at last.  He opened the window and\nlooked out towards the avenue and the lake.  The trees stretched grey\nand ghostly in a dim misty starlight, but they were not friendly or\ninviting to-night.  Something had gone from the face of earth and sky.\nDarwin, evolution, science, ape-men, the interpretations of texts--what\njargon!  Where was God now, and why would He not speak?  What else\nmattered?  He was silent; He had been eternally silent it seemed; it\nwas but the promptings of their own imagination which men had taken for\nHis voice.\n\nNo, he could not go and write poetry any more.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\n\"THE BLIND BEGGAR\"\n\nThe only strength for me is to be found in the sense of a personal\npresence everywhere, it scarcely matters whether it be called human or\ndivine; a presence which only makes itself felt at first in this and\nthat particular form and feature....  Into this presence we come, not\nby leaving behind what are usually called earthly things, or by loving\nthem less, but by living more intensely in them, and loving more what\nis really lovable in them; for it is literally true that this world is\neverything to us, if only we choose to make it so, if only we \"live in\nthe present\" because it is eternity....--RICHARD LEWIS NETTLESHIP:\n_Lectures and Memories_, Vol. I., p. 72.\n\nHe hath made everything beautiful in its time; He hath also set the\nworld in their heart, and yet so that man cannot find out the work that\nGod hath wrought from the beginning even unto the end....--ECCLES. iii.\n\n\"Fool,\" said my muse to me, \"look in thy heart and write.\"--SIR PHILIP\nSIDNEY.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\nAugust drew to its sunny close, and Manning and Tressor departed,\nleaving Paul to superintend the reroofing of old Morley's Mill cottage,\nthe building of an extra poultry house, the laying-out of a new flower\nbed, the cutting down of a few trees and the letting of an empty\ncottage.  They also left him to write poetry; and whereas, without\nassistance, he would have cut a poor figure at any of the practical\njobs, he felt that he was doing even worse as a poet.  September found\nhim, then, alone and perturbed; but October came, heralded with the\ngleam of crimson and gold banners among the beeches of Chanctonbury,\nand found him alone and desperate.\n\nHe was the more overwhelmed by it all as he was totally unprepared.\nHitherto his days had been more full than he could manage, for, besides\ntalk and friends and all the incidents of life at Cambridge, he had had\nhis degree for which to work.  Hitherto verse had been a refuge, a joy\nwhich he had allowed himself with a kind of grim deliberation.  He\nwould want to write, feeling that strange, deep, indefinite hunger\nwithin him that all who have in any degree the gift of a creative art\nknow so well, and he would permit himself to leave his books and sit by\nthe fire or in the window-seat with a pencil for an hour, a measured\nhour only.  Or hitherto there had been other difficulties in the way,\nfrom Donaldson's tramp on the stairs to the disturbing furniture at\nClaxted--little things, things over which one ought to be able to\ntriumph, but things which ordinarily triumph over us all.\n\nThere, then, lay the sting of it.  He had now time and to spare.  He\nhad now both loneliness, and, on the other hand, the company of beauty\nboth within and without doors.  He had, in the well-trained servants of\nthe house and estate, the very best of human help towards that respect\nand leisure and comfort that our rather pitiable souls do need.  He had\nPrideaux at the Vicarage, the best of fellows, for a companionable pipe\nand chat, and he had Mrs. Manning and Miss Netterly, her sister, only\ntoo ready to give him tea in their drawing-room and be kind.  The\ndisturbing element was wholly withdrawn.  Ursula had gone to London on\na whim of her own in August, and on an ill-defined visit thereafter,\nand had at last returned so absorbed in a picture perhaps, so possibly\ndeliberately remote, that, if he saw her, it was only to pass the time\nof day, or watch her face immobile as he rested in the evening in her\nmother's drawing-room.\n\nIn despair, he had abandoned the attempt to write for one to read.  The\npossibility of reading had been one of the attractions of Fordham.  At\nClaxted he had done but little more than learn the names of classical\nEnglish authors, at Cambridge but snatched odd moments for them.  He\nwas peculiarly unfamiliar with the work of the great poets and he had\nsoaked himself in none of the moderns.  He had longed so eagerly for\nthe chance really to read Swinburne, Francis Thompson and the like, and\nnow that it had come he could not.  The malignancy of his own\nparticular devil followed him even in this.  He would walk to\nStorrington and tramp back over the Downs to curl himself up in the\nlounge with the _Hound of Heaven_ in his hands, only to find his eyes\nwandering from the page and his feet stirring restlessly towards the\ngardens where old Timothy would be pottering about.  Not, of course,\nthat old Timothy helped at all, and he would perhaps take a hand with a\nspade or listen to a discourse on manners for half an hour or so, and\nthen turn unsatisfied to the towering strength of the animophilous\nlime-trees in the avenue and the quiet assurance of the sleeping water\nin the lake.  Old Timothy would look after him and shake his head.  He\nhad small opinion of strapping young men who could not dig for a\nmorning and be thankful.\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nHalf-way through October Paul came near to the climax.  A morning\nunusually wretched had led to an afternoon's honest endeavour with the\nforesters in the park, and he had returned to bath and change with a\nmore comfortable feeling in his heart and pleasurably tired muscles.\nBut even as he dressed, the shadows crept in again.  He came down the\nwide stairs to the hall slowly, a haunted man.  Its very quiet and\npeace and air of waiting kindly readiness to help, exasperated him.  A\nfriendly touch, where one looks for love, is worse than indifference to\na lover.  And brooding there, he had determined to write to Tressor and\ntell him that the experiment was a failure and that he must leave.\n\nAfter dinner, the company of his thoughts intolerable, he told Rider\nthat he was going out and walked across the park to the cottage below\nthe Downs.  Mrs. Manning was always glad to see him, and he knew he\nwould like to sit in an arm-chair and listen to her placid chat.  She\nunderstood just nothing at all, that was the best of her.  Prideaux\nwould understand sufficient to irritate but not enough to help; the\nManor had an air of understanding but of keeping its own placid secret.\nMrs. Manning would talk about her fowls and ask him if he did not think\nMr. Lloyd George too terrible.  And in the morning he would write to\nTressor.\n\nUrsula was there.  It appeared that her picture was nearing completion,\nand that she was, as it were, standing aside for a day or two to be\nquite sure of the necessary final touches.  She sat idly, watching her\nmother at work.  He studied her profile as she sat, deliberately\ntelling himself that this and that might have been improved,\ndeliberately conscious that he would not have altered a line.  Sure\nstrength lingered on her face in some subtle way.  She was oddly\nremote, splendidly active, he felt,--the other side of a veil.  Of that\nveil she was in supreme command.  Not that it mattered; he did not want\nher to lift it.  He was too preoccupied, too much on the rack to care.\n\nWhen he had gone, the girl sat on silent for a little.  Then, without\nmoving, she asked a question or two of her mother.\n\n\"Mother, did you see much of Mr. Kestern while I was away?\"\n\n\"Yes, dear, a good deal.  He and Arnold came several times, and when\nArnold went, he kept up the habit of dropping in.\"\n\n\"Does he ever talk much?\"\n\n\"No, not much.  He's a quiet man, I think.\"\n\nCertain vivid little scenes formed themselves in Ursula's mind.  She\nhad seen him walking and talking with Manning, had heard him with\nTressor.  And she remembered his face by the lake and in her room.  A\nquiet man?  Eager, ardent, she had thought him.  And there was his\nverse, too.\n\n\"He's absorbed in his work, I expect,\" went on her mother, her head on\none side as she touched her embroidery deftly.  \"Mr. Tressor said he\nthought he would do a great deal.  He said he was very prolific, I\nremember.  They use such odd words.\"\n\n\"He's all alone up there now, isn't he?\"\n\n\"Yes, dear.  But Mr. Prideaux calls, and he goes to see him.\"\n\n\"Mr. Prideaux?  Does he like him?\"\n\n\"Very much, dear, I believe.  But the Vicar is not at all gossipy, you\nknow.\"\n\n\"Do you like him, Ursula?\" asked Miss Netterly curiously.\n\nThe girl smiled.  \"I scarcely know him, auntie,\" she said.\n\n\"Well, dear,\" said her mother, folding her work, \"I think it's bedtime.\nYou must be tired, too.\"\n\nMrs. Manning always thought one must be tired.  Curiously enough, she\nwas so nice about it that one forgot to be irritated.\n\nIn her own room Ursula uncovered her picture and had a look at it.  She\nread a little.  Then she sat on awhile, staring out of the window.\nThen she got up, fetched her portfolio and looked through its contents.\nWhen she reached the little water-colour she had done to illustrate\nPaul's poem, she put it on one side--thereafter by itself on her\nmantelpiece.  Then she went to bed.\n\nIn the morning she announced the intention of taking a walk.  Everyone\nplacidly agreed, as they did from force of habit where Ursula was\nconcerned, and her mother came to the gate with her and watched her\naway in her yellow jumper, with a green scarf and skirt.  Mrs. Manning\nwas very proud of her daughter.  She did not ask where she was going,\nhowever.\n\nPaul, after a late breakfast, strolled out on to the terrace.  He was\nturning over the phrases of his letter to Tressor when he saw the girl\ncoming up the drive.  He went to meet her.  It crossed his mind that\nshe might be bringing a message from her mother.\n\n\"Hullo,\" he said, when he was within speaking distance.  \"Good morning.\nHow are you?\"\n\n\"Very well,\" she said.  \"Busy?\"\n\n\"Not particularly,\" replied Paul ruefully.  \"I was just about to write\na beastly letter.\"\n\nShe looked him frankly in the face.  \"How's the poetry going?\" she\nasked.\n\nHe did not think to be surprised.  \"It's not going at all,\" he said.\n\nShe nodded.  They were standing still there, on the drive.  She looked\naway from him, as if she had seen all she wanted, looking out over the\npark alive in the sun.\n\n\"I've written nothing for ages,\" he went on impulsively.  \"I can't.\nAnd I can't read either.\"\n\n\"Come for a walk,\" she said.\n\n\"Now?  With you?  Where?\"  It was only afterwards that he realised that\nthis was not the politest reply.\n\n\"At once, with me, on the Downs,\" she replied smiling.\n\nHis face lit up.  He saw in a flash how good a walk with her would be.\n\"Oh, good,\" he cried, \"I'd love to.  May I get a stick and a hat?  Will\nyou come in a moment?\"\n\n\"I'll wait here,\" she said.  \"Don't be long.\"\n\n\"I won't be two minutes,\" he replied, and ran up the steps.\n\nShe led the way, down the drive, past the lodge, up to the right, up a\nlittle path that skirted the hedges and ran through the woods at the\nfoot of the great hill, and then up still more, by a winding track that\nserpentined out into the open downland at the top.  The ring of\nChanctonbury was away on their right; a dew-pond ringed with a stony\nbeach just in front, its waters reflecting the blue of the autumn sky\nand ruffled with a wind from the sea.  Before them they could see\nCissbury in the distance and follow the coast line past Worthing, hid\nbehind a down, to Shoreham, with Lancing Chapel set up above it, and\nBrighton.  It was so clear to-day that the gleam of white on the cliffs\nbeyond Rottingdean was distinctly visible.\n\nThey had said little as they climbed, as one does, for it is a climb,\nbut now they turned to the left and walked slowly along the\nclose-cropped ride through the tufted hummocky grass, skirting that\nridge below which Fordham and Steyning nestle and a down winds to the\nsea.\n\n\"Now,\" she said, \"what's the matter?  Don't you think you'd like to\ntell me?\"\n\n\"I would,\" cried Paul eagerly, \"I'd love to.  Besides----\"   He broke\noff, puzzling at her as they walked.\n\n\"Well?\"\n\n\"I say, how did you know anything was the matter?\"\n\n\"I saw last night,\" she said imperturbably.  \"It struck me that you\nwere down and out, and hadn't a soul to speak to.\"\n\n\"You're right.  But why do you bother with me?\"\n\nShe walked on deliberately.  \"I'm not bothering.  You see, I like you,\nand I like your verse, and you're the sort of person it's worth while\ntalking to in life.\"\n\n\"That's very good of you,\" said Paul.  \"But I don't deserve all that.\nI'm an awful fool, and I've floundered about till I've got fairly well\nbogged.\"\n\n\"I thought so.  Tell me.\"\n\n\"I don't know where to begin.  Yes, I do though.  After all, it's you\nwho bogged me really.\"\n\nHe smiled at her ruefully, but she took no notice, her eyes on the\nlandscape below.  \"You said there was no God,\" went on Paul, \"and I\ncouldn't forget it, and spoke to Arnold about it at last.  Then he\nrubbed it in.  For three years, now, I've been seeking to get at the\ntruth about God.  You don't know how I've tried.  I've tried to hear\nHis voice, to know what He wants, and I've got no nearer.  Or I think I\nhaven't.  It hadn't struck me till you spoke and Arnold pushed it home\nthat perhaps the reason is that--that--there isn't a God at all.\"\n\n\"Do you honestly feel that three years is a long time?\"\n\n\"Well--it's three years, anyway.\"\n\n\"It is.  Three years.\"\n\nHer tone arrested him.  He knew what she meant.  They walked a hundred\nyards while he turned it over.  He had a sudden vision of the\ngenerations of seekers that had gone before him seeking.  He saw\nvividly that where the mystics, saints and doctors had spent lifetimes,\nthree years was not much.  But as he saw, he flamed out.  The\nfloodgates were loosened.  At last, like the psalmist, he spake with\nhis tongue.\n\n\"Yes.  Three years.  Oh, I know it's a drop in the bucket.  But they're\nthe three best years up to now of my life, and they are my life.\nThey're all I've had to give.  And if God is a Father to us, if He\ncares at all, He must be big enough to be interested even in my three\nyears.\"\n\n\"And instead of that----?\"\n\n\"He doesn't care at all.  He is silent, always silent.  You were right:\nHe must be asleep.  There's never any voice nor any that answers.  And\nso all the light's gone out of life.  What's the good of anything?\nWhat's the meaning of anything?  Before, everything in the world seemed\nto have a secret joy behind it, and it was wonderful to feel part of a\ngreat plan, to be able to lend oneself to it and work for it.  It was\nwonderful to feel that Christ knew and was our Master and Friend.  Oh,\nI loved Him so!  And He's gone, He's hidden.  And with Him has gone all\nthe light and joy in living.\"\n\nShe said nothing.  \"I tell you it's gone!\" he cried again, and it was\nan exceeding bitter cry.\n\nThey were walking on the edge of a beech spinney.  The tall dainty\ntrunks towered up towards the sun and their wide crown of leaves moved\ntogether with smooth billowy swaying motions.  And where their\nspreading branches reached out towards the slope of the Down, a rich\nwreath of colour was growing among them.  Ursula stretched up her hand\nas they walked and broke off a spray of golden glory.  She held it out\nto Paul without a word.\n\nHe took it mechanically.  \"Lovely,\" he said, unthinkingly.\n\n\"Oh, no,\" she replied calmly.  \"It's dull and ugly and useless and a\ncombination of so many chemical elements that you can read all about in\nthe books.  It's perfectly plain.  What is more, the leaves are already\nin decay.\"\n\nPaul heard her at first in blank amazement.  He glanced from her face\nto the bough in his hand, and from the bough to her face.  He could\nread nothing there.  He looked up at the spinney from which she had\nbroken it, and as he looked anew its brown and green and grey and gold\ncleared before his eyes.  It was as sudden as a song.  Some little\nhidden chain snapped inside him.  \"Please go on,\" he said, like a child.\n\n\"You're not worth it.  You're as blind as a bat.  And you, with your\nverse and your talk, you pretended to see!\"\n\nThe scorn of her voice lashed him.  She humbled him pitifully.  And yet\nshe said so little.  It was the tone of the biting words that did it,\nand the fact that she was so seemingly unmoved.\n\n\"I've tried to,\" he said, \"you don't know how I've tried.\"\n\n\"Tried!  That's exactly what you would do.  Tried!  One has to try so\nvery hard to see the sunlight.\"\n\nThey walked on in silence.  It was very odd; as they walked Paul began\nto study the short green grass and the delicate curving tendrils of\nmoss as if he had never seen them before.\n\n\"Paul,\" she said at last, and he was past thinking it strange, \"if one\nis blind one cannot see.  If one has eyes, one can't help seeing.\"\n\nHe made an effort to recover his position.  \"But it's God that\nmatters,\" he said, \"it's not the things themselves.  And if God is not\nthere, why, then----\"\n\n\"Why, then, the rose is still red to-day as it was yesterday, and still\nsweet, sweet in its life and sweet in its death.  And a new one is on\nthe way.  Who are you to talk about God Whom you do not and cannot\nunderstand?  Talk about the things that you see, that is your business.\nSmell the scent of the rose, pick it, love it, worship it.  Are you\nmad?\"\n\n\"God is silent,\" he reiterated sullenly.\n\n\"You see,\" she flashed instantly back.\n\n\"But the mind matters.  It's the first principle of philosophy.  You\ncan't get away from that.\"\n\nShe stopped and lay a hand upon his arm.  \"Listen,\" she said in a new\nvoice.  A lark was singing somewhere in the far blue empyrean.  \"Look,\"\nshe said.  The wide open country of field and coppice and lane lay\nspread before them.  And so they stood awhile.\n\n\"Paul,\" she went on presently, \"it's too lovely for you and me to\nspoil.  Let the priest and the philosopher go their own ways.  It's\ntheir vocation; perhaps they must, poor souls.  Meanwhile, the beauty\nof the world is beyond argument.  God!\"  (She spoke softly and rather\nwonderingly.)  \"God!  Oh, I know nothing of God.  Perhaps He is not,\nperhaps He is.  The God they talk about, anyway, is not here.  But the\nearth is here, light and colour are here, beauty is here, and beauty is\nenough for you to sing and for me to paint, all our days.\"\n\nPaul looked about him with eyes that had grown wider with a new\namazement as she spoke.  \"Oh,\" he said as softly as she, \"I see, I see.\"\n\n\"I knew you would,\" she said, and dropped her hand.\n\n\"But why did I never see it before?\" he asked softly.\n\nShe shrugged her shoulders, smiling at him.  \"Let's go,\" she said.\n\nThey walked down to Steyning by the steep path that drops over the hill\nand skirts the big bosom of the Down.  Paul plucked sprays of leaves,\nlaughed, swung his stick, sang.  She laughed back at him.  \"Madcap,\"\nshe said.\n\n\"Oh, I know.  I'm mad.  No, I'm not.  But I have been mad, you know.\nBut, I say, you must teach me more.  We must talk about this.  Will\nyou?\"\n\n\"Yes.  But you don't need teaching, you know.  You're a poet.  You'll\nteach.\"\n\n\"I know what I am,\" he cried, stopping suddenly, \"I know what I am!\"\n\n\"What?\" she queried, amused.\n\n\"I'm the blind beggar-man.  'One thing I know: once I was blind, but\nnow I see.'  Remember?\"\n\nShe nodded at him, sensing something of the old evangelical years in\nhis quotation.\n\n\"Oh, it's wonderful!  Heavens, what a poem!  No: I'll write a play\nabout it.  You see it, don't you?  How was he made to see, eh, how?\"\n\nShe laughed outright.  \"There you are!  I don't know.  How?\"\n\n\"Why, clay touched his eyes, common clay--and he saw!  You understand:\nit was just common clay that he had been walking upon, blind as a bat,\nfor all his days.  And he saw!\"\n\nShe saw the parable, grave all at once.  \"Paul,\" she said, \"I told you\na moment ago that you would teach.\"\n\n\"Come on,\" he shouted, plunging down the hill, \"I want to write.\nHeavens, how I want to write!  Ursula, I shall read it to you bit by\nbit.  And you shall paint a picture of it.  We'll do it together.  'The\nBeggar-Man.'  Shall we?\"\n\n\"Rather.  Begin to-day.  Come and read to me to-night.\"\n\n\"You don't mind?\"  He stopped again abruptly.\n\n\"Mind?  Of course not.  What a boy!\"\n\n\"Then we're real friends, are we?\"\n\n\"Of course,\" said Ursula.  \"I saw that last night.\"\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nThus, veritably, was born \"The Beggar-Man.\"  The general public knew\nnothing of it till the play was staged, more than twelve months later,\nafter the usual intolerable delays and the appearance of the author's\nsecond book of verse, and then, for all the interest it aroused in this\nnew author, and for all the heavy bookings, few ever knew the details\nof its origin and working out.  It was, as staged, a children's\nmystery.  They loved the Beggar-Man, and shouted with glee at his gay\nsallies and his new-born wonderment in wooden stools, his rickety hut\nand the weeds about his door.  They loved his adventure with the King,\nthe stupid old King who was as blind as--as a beggar-man.  But grown-up\npeople went, too, and they smiled a little wistfully when the children\nlaughed, and looked a little sadly at glittering Herod.  It was not a\nbiblical play in a sense, and yet, as a critic said, it was a chapter\nor two of St. John's gospel that had not previously been written.\n\nAs to Paul, in these days, that Beggar-Man moved into Fordham Manor and\nlived with him.  He and the boy became inseparables.  He inspired a\nthousand songs that did not mention his name, but he related incidents\nand preached parables that Paul would retail as wholly his own.  Ursula\nwas their confidante.  Mrs. Manning, at first bewildered, at length\nperforce tolerant, got used to the arrival of Paul on a morning\nbreathless from a race across the park.  \"Good-morning, Mrs. Manning,\"\nhe would shout, \"where's Ursula?\"\n\n\"Good-morning,\" she would say.  \"In the studio, painting.\"\n\n\"I'll go up, if I may,\" he would reply, and dash up the stairs.\n\nUrsula, at her easel, would smile gravely and call \"Come in\" almost\nbefore he knocked.\n\n\"Oh, I say,\" Paul would cry gaily, \"what do you think the Beggar-Man\ntold me last night?  He says that, after the cure, he went off to his\nhouse without his stick.  Without his stick.  He could hardly believe\nso simple a thing as that as he went, but it was true.  For the first\ntime, then, he saw his home--a poor enough shanty, but his own home,\nthat he saw for the first time.  He was still rubbing the tears out of\nhis eyes, when there came a knock at the door.\n\n\"He opened it.\n\n\"'Excuse me,' said the man without, trembling with eagerness, 'but is\nthere any more of that clay?  I don't want all yours, of course, only\njust a little....  Or if you could tell me where to get it....'\n\n\"'Good heavens!' roared the blind man (asserting himself for the first\ntime in history, Ursula), 'it was clay, man, good honest clay!  Look at\nit!  Turn round and look at it!  There's miles of the holy precious\nstuff.  Go down on your miserable knees, as I did, and thank God for\nit.  _I_ didn't make it.  _I_ can't give it to you.  God thrusts it at\nyou.  Were you born blind?'\"\n\nOr Paul would ascend the stairs more quietly, and knock.\n\n\"May I come in?\" he would say, opening the door gently.\n\n\"Yes, you old silly.  What is it now?\"\n\nPaul would throw himself into the window-seat and look gravely at her.\n\"I say, do you know, in the long run, they all said that he was still\nblind!\"\n\n\"What?\"\n\n\"They all said he was still blind.  The people, you know, and the\nPharisees.  The people said: 'But, look here, how could clay open a\nman's eyes?  The thing's ridiculous.  There must be more in it than\nthat.  Come now, He said a magic word, didn't He, that Jesus?  He had\nsome secret medicine, eh?  You're hiding something, you know you are!\nWhat was it?'\n\n\"'It was clay out of the street,' said the Beggar-Man, 'just clay.'\n\n\"'Rubbish,' said the people, 'you're as blind as a bat to believe that\ntwaddle.'\"\n\nUrsula would lean back thoughtfully, studying him.  \"And the\nPharisees?\" she asked softly.\n\n\"Ah, the Pharisees!\"  Paul jumped up and began to walk restlessly\nabout.  \"You see, Ursula, when he was blind they were rather satisfied\nwith him.  He saw so plainly what good, wise, holy men they were.  He\nsaw plainly that they were meant to be masters in Israel, and it is\nright and proper for beggars to see that.  But when they were up\nagainst his sight, and showed plainly that ultimately they knew no more\nthan he did, and, indeed, not so much, about God or Jesus or miracles\nor clay or anything, he began to think that they, too, must have been\nborn blind.\"\n\n\"I see,\" said the girl, \"I see, Paul.  And what then?\"\n\n\"Oh, they turned the Beggar-Man out of the temple,\" said Paul.\n\n\"Ah, and what then?\"\n\n\"He tells me, he went, Ursula, he just went.  And--and he's never gone\nback.\"\n\nSilence between them.  He was staring out of the window now, and she\nleaning back in her chair, playing with her brushes.\n\n\"Ursula.\"\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\n\"Do you know, the disciples thought him blind, too.\"\n\n\"Why?\"\n\n\"Well, they were so sure about Jesus.  They made a whole religion up\nabout him.  And the Beggar-Man never could do that.  'He took the clay\nthat he and I were standing on,' he would say, 'and I saw.  That's all\nI have to tell.  One thing I know: whereas I was blind, now I see.'\"\n\n\"'Love him, then,' said the disciples.\n\n\"'Good heavens, do you think I don't?' cried the Beggar-Man.\n\n\"'Worship him, then,' said the disciples.\n\n\"'Of course,' said the Beggar-Man, 'as I worship my mother and my wife\nand the little blue spring lilies on the hills of Galilee.'\n\n\"'No,' they said.  'He's the Second Person of the Trinity.  He's the\nLogos.  He's Eternal, Invisible, the Only Wise----'\n\n\"And the Beggar-Man used to interrupt them.  'Stop,' he used to say,\n'that's beyond me.  I can't follow that.  One thing I know: whereas----'\n\n\"'We've heard all that,' said the disciples, 'that's not enough.'\n\n\"'I'm sorry,' said the Beggar-Man.  'It is for me.'\"\n\n\"Well?\" queried Ursula.\n\nAnd Paul turned round from the window, his eyes meeting hers.  \"They\nturned the Beggar-Man out of the Church,\" he said gravely.\n\nAnd she would nod back at him, with a little smile.  \"He went on\nseeing, though,\" she would say.\n\n\"You're a dear, Ursula,\" cried Paul.\n\nDespite his eagerness that October morning, Paul did not then, all at\nonce, write his play.  He said that he and the Beggar had got to get to\nknow each other.  And before he got to the actual draft, he wrote down\na few definite incidents in the later life of the Beggar-Man.  He\nbrought the manuscript round to Ursula one day the following Spring\nwhen the new flowers were out on Chanctonbury very much as they had\nbeen when they sprang into vivid flames of being before the\nnewly-opened eyes of the blind Beggar on the hills of Galilee that he\nhad loved so much.  He brought it round to her very early, while the\nfamily at the cottage were still at breakfast, which did not perturb\nhim at all.\n\nAfter greetings, he looked across at Ursula.  \"Can you come for a long\nwalk this morning?\" he asked.\n\n\"Yes,\" she said.\n\n\"At least, not a very long walk.  I want you to come to that little\nwood on the crest of the Downs above Steyning--you know--and let me\nread this to you.\"\n\nMrs. Manning's eyes travelled from one to the other a little anxiously.\nReally, these two ... But perhaps this time ... Well, if the girl knew\nher own mind....\n\n\"All right,\" said Ursula.  \"I'll get a coat.\"\n\n\"Don't forget it's only Spring,\" said Mrs. Manning at the door.  \"Don't\ncatch cold.\"\n\n\"We'll remember, mother,\" said Ursula, and they set out.\n\nAt the remembered spot, Paul spread a mackintosh on the ground.\n\"There,\" he said, \"sit down.  I'm going to read to you.  Do you mind?\"\n\nShe smiled her own silent slow smile at him, and drew her knees up, and\nclasped her hands round them, and stared down at the sleepy little town\nnestling far below.\n\nPaul read.  It was the last stage before the actual and now famous\nplay.  He had written without introduction as if he were about a short\nstory, and, in main, it was this that was dramatised.\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nPaul finished.  Ursula, who had hardly moved, put out a hand and laid\nit gently on his arm.\n\nPaul drew a breath of relieved content, being satisfied now that he\nknew her so well.\n\n\"Now,\" he said, \"I shall begin that play.\"\n\n\"God is silent,\" said Ursula quizzically.\n\n\"But I see,\" cried Paul eagerly.\n\n\"What do you see?\"\n\n\"I see the wonder and beauty of things as they are.  I see that they\nsatisfy.  I see that that's enough, that--that they're a kind of avenue\ndown which a man can go forward.  And at the end, perhaps, he will\nfind, not all the secret, but a still living lovely lake of water into\nwhich he will plunge, content.\"\n\n\"Water?\"\n\nPaul nodded, with bright eyes.  \"The water of life,\" he said.\n\n\"And what is that, do you think?\"\n\n\"I don't know.  It's sure to be beautiful, though.\"\n\n\"Very, Paul, I think,\" replied Ursula, speaking very quietly as she\noften did.\n\nPaul studied her face.  \"I would like you to be there,\" he said, a\nlittle restlessly.\n\n\"Would you?\" she said.  \"Well, we shall see.\"\n\nNext morning, Ursula went up to town and took up residence again in her\nflat.  Mrs. Manning had fluttered about her all the afternoon, and\nlearned nothing.  Her daughter seemed wholly unaware that she might\nhave any question to ask, and Mrs. Manning did not dare ask her\nanything directly.  But she thought she might learn more from Paul.\nSo, when her daughter's car had driven off, she and her sister walked\nround to the Manor with a note Ursula had left for Paul.\n\nThey found him at work.  He got up, pen in hand, and a look in the back\nof his eyes that Mrs. Manning saw in her daughter's when she was very\nbusily painting.\n\n\"Ursula's gone to town,\" said her mother, \"and she's left you this\nnote.\"\n\n\"Has she?\" queried Paul.  \"She didn't tell me she was going.\"  He tore\nit open, and read it quickly.  It only took him a few seconds to read\nand he smiled as he finished.\n\n\"That's all right,\" he said.  \"It's nothing much, Mrs. Manning, only\nabout my work.\"\n\n\"Well, we won't interrupt you now,\" she said politely.  \"Come in when\nyou can.\"\n\nAt the end of a long morning's work, Paul picked up the note as if he\nhad not seen it before, and re-read it.  \"I'm off to town,\" she had\nwritten.  \"I've had a sudden notion.  Give my love to the Beggar-Man.\nYou and he have got your work to do together just now, and I should\nonly interrupt, but call me in at the finish and I want a box the first\nnight.  URSULA.\"  Having read it, Paul smiled again.  He was still\npreoccupied with the beauty of the budding limes that arched the avenue\nof Sight.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nURSULA\n\nIf you teach a man to keep his eyes upon what others think of him,\nunthinkingly to lead the life and hold the principles of the majority\nof his contemporaries, you must discredit in his eyes the authoritative\nvoice of his own soul.  He may be a docile citizen; he will never be a\nman.  It is ours, on the other hand, to disregard the babble and\nchattering of other men better and worse than we are, and to walk\nstraight before us by what light we have.  They may be right; but so,\nbefore heaven, are we.  They may know; but we know also, and by that\nknowledge we must stand or fall.  There is such a thing as loyalty to a\nman's better self; and from those who have not that, God help me, how\nam I to look for loyalty to others? ...\n\nAlthough all the world ranged themselves in one line to tell \"This is\nwrong,\" be you your own faithful vassal and the ambassador of\nGod--throw down the glove and answer \"This is right.\"  Do you think you\nare only declaring yourself?  Perhaps in some dim way, like a child who\ndelivers a message not fully understood, you are opening wider the\nstraits of prejudice and preparing mankind for some truer and more\nspiritual grasp of truth; perhaps, as you stand forth for your own\njudgment, you are covering a thousand weak ones with your body;\nperhaps, by this declaration alone, you have avoided the guilt of false\nwitness against humanity and the little ones unborn.  It is good, I\nbelieve, to be respectable, but much nobler to respect oneself and\nutter the voice of God.--ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.\n\n      You see deeper?  Thus saw he,\n  And by the light he saw, must walk: how else\n  Was he to do his part?\n            ROBERT BROWNING: _Saviour of Society_.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\nThe day had come at last, and had all but ended.  The busy writing,\nthat had been but an interlude, as it seemed afterwards, to the work of\ncurtailing, altering, lengthening and finally staging the play; the\nalternating moods of despair and hope; the weeks of rehearsals; the\nimmediate days before the performance, spent in town, half lived at the\ntheatre, spent in a new bewildering atmosphere of critical interested\nfaces, critical indifferent faces, toadying sycophant faces, stupid\ncareless faces; all these were over.  Arnold and Ursula had stood by\nhim all the time, Arnold giving him sanctuary in his rooms, Ursula\nready for his moods, the clearing-house of his thoughts and emotions.\nPaul had grown ever more clearly aware what good friends these were,\nand now, for the first night, they two and Tressor had been with him in\nthe box.\n\nHe was very tired; that seemed to stand out more clearly than anything\nelse.  He was utterly tired of his own work, and utterly tired of the\nwhole dreary business of staging.  He had seen the curtain go up\nchiefly with a kind of dull wonder that anyone should be there to watch\nthe fantastically familiar and now boring thing.  He had looked down\nwith the rest, across the footlights, into that Eastern street where\npassers by came and went, and mules and asses, where a radiant sun\nshone blindingly, where tall white houses and the gaudy booths of\nmerchants filled the scene; but he had a sudden odd sense of\nChanctonbury and dark pines and the cool mellow wind, and a feeling\nthat the beggar-man had no place there.  Yet the beggar-man was duly at\nhis corner crouching in the dust, whining, shrinking from the\nPharisee's robe, the merchant's stick.  Paul found himself staring with\naroused interest--his blind beggar-man!  And then there had been that\nconfused murmur off the stage; the sudden emptying of the street; that\ncry of the Son of David, startlingly clear, that had fetched the\nbeggar-man to his feet and drawn him groping off, leaving the deserted\nstalls, the glaring dust and a tethered beast or two for the audience\nto study the while the noise without died down, and leaped again into a\nsudden shout as the miracle was accomplished.  That had been his idea,\nhis only, and his the new striding in of that alert figure, thronged,\njostled, questioned, who made his resolute revolutionary way back to\nhis old seat for his bowl and his stool ere he marched off home--seeing.\n\nWith the fall of the curtain, an eager manager had pushed his way in.\n\"Capital, capital, Mr. Kestern.  It's going like a bell.  Thoroughwood\nis here, and he's very impressed, very impressed indeed.  I was not\nsure of him, you know, but if he says the right thing, the play's made.\nI congratulate you, Mr. Kestern, I do indeed.\"\n\nPaul had stared at him.  Then he bowed and murmured a conventional\nreply, and sat down heavily by Ursula.  She had put her hand on his arm\nand smiled.  \"That's all right,\" she said.  \"Don't mind him.  People\nwill see the right thing, if he doesn't.\"\n\n\"Will they?\" he had questioned.\n\n\"Boy,\" she said, \"I've never had a doubt.  There's no denying sight.\"\n\nAnd so it had been.  The thing was sight.  Even a first-night London\ntheatre audience, attracted by the advertisement of an unusual thing,\nhad seen that.  The play as a play was good, but the play as a parable\nwas something more.  The clay had touched more eyes than those of the\nblind beggar that night.  When the last curtain fell, it had fallen on\na silent house.  The weaving of the spell had been complete.  Art,\npoetry, drama and successful staging, all had been there, but the\nspirit of something more had stolen into the place.  Several thousand\nmen and women had looked on truth in its beauty, stripped of the shams\nand conventionalities of orthodox religion, and the utter loveliness of\nit had gone straight to their hearts.\n\nOf course, the applause had come, had grown, had begun as a breath of\nrelief and had risen to a crescendo of tumult.  People had invaded the\nbox.  The manager had gestured towards a sea of upturned faces, looking\ntheir way.  Paul had gone behind, shaken hands with a sudden grateful\neagerness with the men and women who had played in his success, and\nappeared for a moment before the curtain.  He had said something, and\nbowed, and felt suddenly utterly carried away, so that he had waved his\nhand boyishly and had, apparently, done just the right thing, whatever\nthat was.  At present he had no recollection.  But even Ursula had been\nsmiling when he rejoined them.\n\n\"Come on,\" cried Arnold, \"the taxi's waiting and we'll get out of this.\"\n\n\"Right,\" said Paul.  \"Which way? ... What is it?  Lend me a pencil,\nwill you?  There, will that do?\"\n\nArnold thrust his arm into his.  \"Look here,\" he said, \"for heaven's\nsake don't start signing programmes now.  On you go, Ursula.  We'll\nfollow.\"\n\nThe porter in his little box smiled at him.  The manager appeared again\nand smiled at him.  (\"Oh, I say, don't go.  Do stay for supper....\"\n\"Thanks awfully, but I've got a show fixed up, I fear.  Another\nnight....\")  A little crowd at the door smiled at him and thrust\nforward.  A policeman even smiled at him, and thrust back.  Ursula got\nin; Paul was vividly aware of the dark night, a muddy street, a yellow\nflare of light over the way, the tail of a poster: \"----AR-MAN,\" and\nthe gleam of the girl's white opera-cloak.  Then he too was in, in the\ndark confined little space, sitting down by her, fumbling to move her\nwraps a little, stowing his legs away to make room for Arnold.  And\nthen Arnold, lingering momentarily to bid the driver make all speed,\nwas in too, and the door banged, and the first performance was over.\n\n\"Thank God,\" said Arnold.  \"Give me a cigarette, somebody.\"\n\n\"Did you see Muriel?\" asked Ursula.  \"She was in front.  She waved to\nme.  I took it to mean that she'd go on.\"\n\n\"Where's Tressor?\" demanded Paul.\n\nArnold laughed.  \"Hear that, Ursula?  Still, I suppose it's excusable.\nPersonally I should have been drunk before this.  You're really a\nmarvel, Paul.\"\n\n\"What in the world are you talking about?  Ursula, do explain.\"\n\nHer eyes danced at him.  \"Oh, it's nothing,\" she said.  \"We're all of\nus too excited to talk sense.  Paul, isn't it absolutely priceless?\"\n\n\"I can't tell you what I feel,\" said Paul.\n\n\"Tressor shook hands with you, and said good-night and that he'd clear\noff, and you were to let him know when you were going down to Fordham,\"\nexplained Arnold belatedly.\n\n\"Oh, yes, so he did.  I say, Mortimer did 'Herod' well, didn't he?  And\nd'you know, that finish is good, isn't it?  It was wonderful to-night.\nIn the end, it seemed to me that I hadn't written it, hadn't even seen\nit before.\"\n\n\"Magic of an excited house,\" commented Arnold.  \"Well, you ought to be\na happy man.  You're a lucky one, anyway.\"\n\n\"I know.  I am.  I am both.  And I'm awfully grateful to you two.\"\n\nArnold put his head out of the window.  \"Here we are,\" he cried, half\nin and half out of the taxi.  \"We've done nothing.\"\n\nPaul turned suddenly to the girl.  \"You did everything,\" he said, with\nvivid realisation.\n\nIt had been Ursula's wish to give Paul a triumphant supper at her flat\nthe night of his success.  It was not to be a big affair, the three of\nthem and Muriel Lister only, and Paul had eagerly assented, realising a\nlittle how intolerable any other programme would be.  So now Ursula\nwent ahead upstairs, and when Paul and his friend came in, was drawing\nher gloves off before the fire and chatting with her friend.  \"Here he\nis,\" she cried.  \"Now Muriel.\"\n\nMuriel Lister took an eager pace forward and held out her hand.  \"Mr.\nKestern,\" she said, \"I don't know how to congratulate you.  You've done\nfar more than devise a successful play, far more than write some\nwonderful poetry.  You've preached a new religion, do you know that?\nYou're rightly called Paul; you're an apostle.\"\n\nPaul laughed.  \"That's the one role I've sought all my days,\" he said,\n\"but I thought I should never play it.\"\n\n\"Well, you have.  All London will know it to-morrow.  You've said the\nthing the churches are afraid to say.  You've said what we've been\ntrying to preach for years.  And what's more, you've said it in such a\nway that people will listen and see.  Oh, I do congratulate you!\"\n\n\"My dear Muriel,\" said Arnold, \"you're intolerable.  A parson is bad\nenough, but a woman parson is worse.  Whatever you girls may feel, I'm\ndying for eats and drinks, and I bet the successful author is too,\nonly, probably, he's too shy to say so.  Let's eat first and talk it\nover afterwards.\"\n\nMuriel chuckled and turned to Ursula.  \"What a pig he is,\" she cried,\n\"but perhaps he's right.  We're all four too exalted for life at\npresent.  Let's eat, and we shall grow sane.  It's a parable.  Come on,\nmy dear; shall I dole out chicken?\"\n\nThey gathered round the table in a corner of the big studio and fell\nto, talking reminiscently and mostly all at once the while.  Finally\nPaul pushed his chair back a little and laughed aloud.\n\n\"What is it now?\" mumbled Arnold, still busy.\n\n\"Oh,\" cried Paul, \"I can't believe it, you know, I can't believe it!\nWe four, here, and I the author of a play that--that (I know it's\nconceited, but I can't help it) that perhaps half London will be\ntalking about in a week!\"\n\nHis little gesture took them all in: Arnold opposite, consuming trifle;\nUrsula on his left, tall, dark, leaning back in her chair, playing with\na spoon, smiling; Muriel on his right, keen-faced, upright, fair; the\nbare table littered with pleasant things of glass and silver;\ndishes--the white d\u00e9bris of chicken, the shattered orange of a jelly;\nthe shadowed spaces of the studio about them; the blue curtains; the\nfaded Persian rug; easel; worn, easy chairs; model's throne; a shelf in\nthe corner gleaming with the hammered copper of Ursula's collection of\nantique Arab coffee-pots and bowls; a standard lamp shaded with blue\nand old gold; a bookcase with its owner's carefully selected volumes,\namong which were a couple now bearing his name.  And the three looked\nat him and read his face for a second or two in silence.  They all knew\nwhat he meant.  It was rather wonderful when one considered the Paul\nKestern of Lambeth Court.\n\nMuriel Lister broke the little silence.  \"It's like you not to believe\nit yet,\" she said.\n\nPaul studied her and grew puzzled.  \"Why do you say that?\" he asked.\n\nShe threw a glance at Ursula.  The two were great friends and confided\nin each other.  Then she laughed.  \"You're still a bit blind, you\nknow,\" she retorted.\n\n\"Why?\" queried Paul.  \"I don't see.\"\n\n\"Exactly,\" nodded the other.  \"But come on, let's talk.\"\n\nPaul chose the big footstool, which, in the studio, had come to be\nregarded as his special right.  Arnold sprawled on a couch.  Muriel\nLister sat on a chair by Paul.  Ursula had a pile of cushions in the\ncorner between Arnold and the fire, and said little as was her wont.\n\n\"You've got to preach that new religion of yours,\" went on Muriel when\nthey were settled.  \"I hope you realise that.\"\n\nPaul frowned.  He liked Miss Lister, but not especially her rather\nparsonic manner.  \"I don't know that I can,\" he said.\n\n\"You must.  Why shouldn't you?\"\n\n\"I'm not sure that I see it like that myself yet.\"\n\n\"Surely you do.  Don't you see it's just what the world is waiting for?\nMen and women have outgrown that old pious talk of a god that is no\nmore than a glorified human being, and especially they've outgrown all\nthose grave-clothes the Greek philosophers and Eastern gnostics wound\nabout the figure of the prophet of Nazareth in order to present to the\nworld a conception, a Jesus of the Nicene Creed.  But somehow there was\nno way out.  We all speculated as to the personality of God, except a\nfew, who were agnostics, but you get nowhere with negations.\"\n\n\"I know,\" said Paul gravely.  \"That God of theirs is asleep.  The\noracle is silent.  I know.\"\n\n\"Yes, and now by some stroke of genius you've put your finger on the\nthing that matters.  Sight.  The beauty of the world.  'He's good,\nomnipotent, a father'--that's what the theologians have said.  'It's\nbeautiful,' say you, and that's enough.\"\n\n\"The gospel of sheer slothful material sentimentalism,\" put in Manning\nlazily.\n\nShe flashed on him.  \"Rubbish,\" she cried.  \"That's not the gospel of\nthe Beggar-Man, is it, Mr. Kestern?\"\n\n\"No,\" said Paul, \"no, no, no; it's not that.\"\n\n\"No, the glory of this is that it is positive.  It strides forward.  It\nbuilds; it----\"\n\n\"It builds what?  Let's be practical.  That sort of talk, up to the\npresent anyway, has mostly built Agapemones.\"\n\nMuriel Lister frowned.  \"No,\" she said.  \"The Temple of Common Things.\"\n\nArnold sucked his pipe.  \"I fear I can't follow so quickly,\" he\nretorted cynically.\n\n\"You wouldn't.  But, don't you see?  This creed doesn't seek an\n\u00e6sthetic hybrid sensual beauty.  When the beggar-man had his eyes\nopened, what was it seemed beautiful to him?  Eh, what?\"\n\nPaul smiled.  \"His three-legged stool,\" he said, \"and his little hovel.\"\n\n\"Exactly.  Clay.  The beauty of gold-brown earth.\"  And Miss Lister\nrelapsed into silence.\n\n\"I still don't see the gospel,\" said Arnold.\n\n\"You're born blind, then,\" retorted the girl.\n\n\"Well,\" returned Arnold, \"be a little more explicit.  Get on with it.\"\n\n\"A gospel that origins and ends don't matter and that we ought to be\ninfluenced by them not at all; that God is veiled, but the veil is\ngood; that we are kin to all that is; that barriers are of our own\nmaking; that the urge of life within us is our guide; and that\nmoralities and revelations and false spiritualities have themselves\nmade sin.  And,\" she added slowly, \"that the true spiritual life\nconsists in the pursuit of learning, experience and beauty, according\nto vocation, without fear and for themselves alone.\"\n\n\"Fear?\" queried Arnold.\n\n\"Yes, without fear.  The gospel of the Beggar-Man banishes fear.  He\nknows right values.  He knows he cannot be robbed of anything that\nmatters.  He fears no man; all men are brothers; all are blind beggars\nwith potential sight; he has nothing but pity for your aristocrat, your\nmillionaire.\"\n\n\"'News from Nowhere',\" chuckled Arnold.\n\n\"True--with the path blazoned to it,\" she exclaimed.\n\n\"It appears to be you and not Paul who is preaching anyway,\" put in\nUrsula, staring into the fire.\n\n\"He will live it, and he will sing it--and you will paint it,\" cried\nMuriel.\n\n\"Which reminds me,\" said Paul gravely, \"that I've to go down to Claxted\nto-morrow.\"\n\n\"Claxted?\"\n\n\"Yes, to my people.  I've utterly neglected them lately.  They don't\neven know I've written a play.\"\n\n\"They will to-morrow,\" said Arnold, \"if they read the newspapers.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" Paul replied slowly, \"I think they will.\"  And was suddenly\nsilent, with a silence that the little company knew to be significant.\nThe firelight danced on his face.  Ursula turned her head slowly and\nstudied him.\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nPaul went back with Arnold, and next morning the two friends packed up\nand parted, Arnold going to Cambridge, Paul to Claxted.  The latter was\nto spend some weeks with his people and was restless over the prospect.\nHe did not say much, however; Arnold was almost incapable of\nunderstanding just what Claxted meant.  He knew that the Kesterns were\n\"old-fashioned\" and \"strait-laced\"; what he could not know was the\nsincerity, the earnestness on the one hand, and the fierce fanaticism\non the other, of their faith.  But Paul knew, or thought so.  Perhaps\nhe should have realised even more than he did, but the years of partial\nseparation and the mellow influence of Fordham had dulled his memory to\nsome extent.\n\nHe had hardly left Claxted station, however, before he got an inkling\nof what was to be.  In Edward Street he ran into Miss Bishop.  Now Miss\nBishop was Miss Bishop, a unique product of divine providence, but\nbeneath all her angularity and sectarianism ran a kindly current which\nhad hitherto embraced Paul.  He therefore smiled at seeing her, shifted\na suitcase to his left hand and held out his right.  \"Why, Miss\nBishop,\" he said, \"how do you do?\"\n\nThe woman's lips compressed and her eyes flashed.  \"You can be as\ncheerful as that, can you?\" she said.  \"Do you realise the evil you\nhave done?  But I suppose you don't.  May God open your eyes in time,\nthat is all I have to say.  Good-day.\"  And she passed on, without\ntaking his hand.\n\nPaul's astonishment and dismay were almost ludicrous.  A passing small\nboy with a street urchin's keen perception, perceived vaguely that he\nhad hit on a lucky incident.  His arrested whistle and wide grin\nrecalled Paul to his senses.\n\n\"Fair cop, mister?\" queried the small boy, hopefully.\n\nPaul ignored him, caught a glimmer of the humour of the situation,\nchanged his grip on his suitcase again, and passed on.  But as he went,\nhe turned her words over in his mind.  Increasingly he could see no\nsense in them.\n\nTaking the cinder-path that skirts the railway, the kindly touch of\nfamiliar things which have ceased to have power to perplex or terrify\ncame to his aid.  It was along this path that he had gone to the\nMission Hall Sunday by Sunday, the waters of his soul troubled with the\nfrenzy of apostleship, but it was along this path that he had returned\noften and again arm in arm with a tender kindly Mr. Kestern who had\nshared all his son's enthusiasms and sympathised in his distresses.\nHere, as a schoolboy, he had counted trains or trudged eagerly home\nfrom school for a Saturday afternoon excursion.  Here, more adult, he\nhad been first conscious of sex stimulus (though then and now he did\nnot so label it) in the company of Madeline and Edith.  Edith!  Yes, it\nwas of Edith that he thought mostly as he walked home.  She had been\nreserved and sorrowful on his going to Fordham, had replied more and\nmore tardily to letters, had finally ceased to write at all.  But he\ntoo had ceased.  Anyone as sensitive as Paul to surroundings would have\nfelt an incongruity between Edith Thornton and Fordham Manor, and then,\ntoo, he had been going through an emotional stress big enough to\ndominate his mind.  But now, back here in the home atmosphere, he\nthought very warmly of her.  He longed for her simplicity, her na\u00efve\nfaith.  It did not seem to him a barrier between them.  After all, with\nthe sight of the Beggar-Man, it was easy to enfold her in tenderness\nand understanding.\n\nThus, then, he came at last to his father's door, waited impatiently\nfor the maid to open it, dropped his bag in the little hall, and turned\nimpulsively to the figure of Mr. Kestern irresolute in the study door.\n\n\"Dad,\" he cried, \"it is good to see you again!  How are you?  How's\nmother?\"\n\n\"Oh, Paul!\"\n\nThe love, the sorrow, the yearning of Mrs. Kestern's cry stabbed him\nsuddenly and unexpectedly to the heart.  She had rushed past her\nhusband and flung her arms about his neck.  Emotion welling up in him,\nhe bent his head to kiss her, and felt the hot tears on her cheek.\n\n\"Oh, my boy, my boy....  You've come at last, Paul.  Oh, my son, you'll\nnever doubt your mother's love for you, will you?  Kiss your father,\nPaul.  I cannot lose either of my men.\"\n\nPaul was already bewildered.  The pathos of her grip on his arm, and\nthe significance of her eagerness to see the greeting between him and\nhis father, were not lost upon him.  His mother clinging to him, he\nturned to his father, who had not stirred.\n\n\"Of course I've come, mother darling,\" he said.  \"But I've been\nterribly busy, you know.  And it's awfully jolly seeing you and daddy\nagain.  (He used the childish word unconsciously.)  How are you,\nfather?\"\n\nThe man moved a little and brushed his son's lips.  Paul perceived in a\nmoment that he had aged.  Fear slipped suddenly into his mind.  He\npeered a little to see his father's eyes, and then, with something like\na catch in his heart, and with a deliberate blindness, pushed them\nbefore him into the study.  \"Oh, it is jolly to be back,\" he cried\nagain, but with simulated enthusiasm now, refusing to admit what he had\nseen, stifling his growing apprehension.\n\nMr. Kestern seated himself in his revolving chair in front of the\nbureau.  His Bible lay open upon it.  Paul caught a glimpse of the\nunderlinings, the \"railway-lines,\" the added red and black of the\nalmost microscopic notes in the neat handwriting he knew so well.  He\nlooked swiftly round.  The case of stuffed birds, the books, the framed\nportraits, a print of John G. Paton, missionary in the New\nHebrides--nothing had changed.  His eye fell on a text, the letters of\nwhich had been cut out separately with a fretsaw, hung on an invisible\nthread, and draped on the wall above the bureau.  \"Jesus Himself drew\nnear and went with them.\"  That was new; and yet, yet, how old!  The\nold Claxted; the old faith; the old obstinate unchanging evangelicalism\nthat was already a lifetime old to him.\n\n\"How are all your new friends?\" asked his father.\n\nThe hidden note of bitterness stung Paul for the first time to\nsomething like anger.  He choked it down, however.  \"Very well indeed,\nthanks,\" he said evenly.  \"I had supper with them last night, and saw\nManning off to Cambridge this morning.\"\n\n\"The very newspaper told us that much,\" said Mr. Kestern, with a\ngesture towards the _Morning Post_ that lay folded on a side-table.\n\"After the theatre, I understand.\"\n\nThe harshness of the man's voice was too obvious to allow of any\nfurther equivocation.  Paul moved over to the fireplace, and his\nmother, seated in an arm-chair, held out a hand appealingly to him.\n\n\"Paul, dear,\" she entreated, \"don't anger your father.  You know what\nhe feels about the theatre.\"\n\n\"But I've said nothing, mother,\" cried Paul miserably.\n\n\"Nothing!\" exclaimed Mr. Kestern, wheeling round on him, no longer able\nto restrain himself, \"nothing!  Do you think it is nothing that my boy\nshould write a play?  My son, photographed with a stage-manager,\nappearing--what is your word?--'called' before the curtain!  Oh, God,\nwhat have I done that my son should come to this!\"\n\n\"Father, father, don't!\" cried Mrs. Kestern.  \"Of course Paul must take\nhis own place----\"\n\n\"Mother, you don't know what you say.  His own place!  But that is the\nson we gave to God, that is the son of our hopes and prayers, that is\nthe boy for whom we contrived and saved that he might go to college,\nand now--now, he writes plays!  The bitterness is more than I can bear.\nI have lost my son.\"\n\nThe grim comedy of it was lost on the three of them.  Mrs. Kestern\nburst into tears.  \"Father, dear,\" she sobbed, \"don't say such terrible\nthings.  Oh, I can't bear it!\"\n\nSomething awoke and flared up in Paul.  The thing had come so quickly,\nwith such an appearance of inevitability that he had been taken wholly\nunawares.  He had hoped for a reasonable talk about the theatre, and at\nleast a comfortable agreement to differ.  But he had been conscious\nduring the last few minutes of utter helplessness before this\nincredible attitude, and now the cruel absurdity of it all flamed\nbefore him.\n\n\"Father,\" he burst out, \"you've no right to speak so.  You've no right\nto judge the theatre as you do.  You know nothing about it.  You've not\nseen my play.\"\n\n\"I haven't, thank God, I haven't.  But I've read about it.  I've read\nabout it with utter shame and dismay.  Yet I can't, I won't at least,\nbelieve all that the paper hints at.  Is it true that you have parodied\nthe Gospel?\"\n\n\"Parodied?\"  Paul was utterly bewildered again.\n\n\"Yes, parodied.  I gather you have taken a story that you learned as a\nboy at your mother's knee, upon which I have even heard you preach, and\nhave reset it, rewritten it, pushing the Master into the background,\ndenying, so far as I can see, the Son of God.\"\n\n\"Father----\" sobbed Mrs. Kestern.\n\n\"Mother, that will do.  Paul and I must thrash this thing out.  Tell\nme, Paul, once and for all, what is Jesus Christ now to you?\"\n\nPaul stared at him.  Mr. Kestern, flushed, vehement, terrible, was the\nfather of the old Catholic controversial days, the father from whom he\nwas divided by an impassable gulf.  What could he say?  How could he\nexplain?  He made an involuntary hopeless gesture that was immediately\nmisunderstood, and turned back to the fireplace.\n\n\"Ah,\" cried Mr. Kestern, \"you will not answer.  This is what your\nCatholic friends have done for you!  I told you so, but you would never\nbelieve me.  Rome was so reasonable and fair, wasn't it?--an angel of\nlight.  Father Vassall believed in Christ as earnestly as I did--did\nyou not say that?  But this is the end!  You deny the Master who bought\nyou with His own blood!\"\n\nThe utter injustice of that charge broke down Paul's last reserve.  He\nturned swiftly back, as vehement as the other, the true son of his\nfather if the elder could only have seen it.  \"You don't know what you\nsay,\" he cried.  \"This is utter madness, utter childish folly.  Father\nVassall has nothing whatever to do with all this.  How could he?  Do\nyou think he wanted me to go to Fordham, though you did.  Why, if he\nhad had his way, I should be a Catholic priest by now, or well on the\nway to it.\"\n\n\"Just so,\" stormed his father, \"a Catholic priest indeed!  Then he\nwould have trapped you finely.  As it is, baulked in that, he will send\nyour soul to hell by another road!\"\n\n\"Oh, I can't bear it, I can't bear it,\" cried Mrs. Kestern, rocking\nherself to and fro.\n\nPaul clenched his fists.  \"You've no right to speak so,\" he retorted\npassionately.  \"How dare you insult Father Vassall in that way?  Is it\nlike Christ to talk so?  If that is all your evangelicalism can do for\nyou, I am well quit of it.\"\n\n\"So you admit you are quit of it?  You turn your back on your father's\nand mother's faith?  You have no use for the Scripture of Truth?\"\n\nThe boy might, in a saner moment, have caught the tone of invincible\nbigotry that had crept into his father's words.  \"Of course I've use\nfor it,\" retorted Paul again, contemptuously.  \"Haven't I written a\nplay under its inspiration?  But I must make my own judgment on\nreligion.\"\n\nMr. Kestern sobered suddenly and terribly.  He spoke biting words with\nslow deliberation.  \"You must, sir,\" he said, \"only it is blasphemy to\nspeak so of inspiration.  And you will be good enough to tell me what\nis your judgment on the Master Who alone is served in this house.\"\n\nPaul gazed at him a minute.  Phrases rose to his lips.  Then he\nrealised how useless they would be.  His anger died as quickly as it\nhad arisen.  \"You would not understand,\" he said hopelessly.\n\n\"I know I have not the new learning of my son,\" retorted Mr. Kestern\nbitterly, \"but I think I can understand that much.  Will you answer a\nplain question?  Are you still on the Lord's side, or not?\"\n\n\"Of course he is,\" wept Mrs. Kestern.  \"Father, how can you ask?\nSpeak, Paul, and tell him you still love and serve the Lord Jesus?\"\n\nMr. Kestern studied his son's face.  \"Speak, then,\" he said slowly.\n\nPaul hesitated.  Then he drew himself up.  \"I love and respect and\nadmire Jesus of Nazareth with all my heart,\" he said.  \"His teaching it\nis that has opened my eyes, and his gospel of compassion and\nbrotherliness is as noble as any that the world has yet heard.  But I\ncannot call him God as you do, and as Catholics do.\"\n\nThe anger died in Mr. Kestern's face.  The look of an old and broken\nman crept into it.  He turned back to his desk and picked up his Bible.\n\"Do you perhaps remember what this says?\" he demanded.  \"Listen.\"  (He\nfumbled with the leaves.)  \"'He that confesseth not that Jesus Christ\nis come in the flesh is not of God, and this is the spirit of\nantichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come; and even now\nalready is it in the world.'\"\n\nThe words lingered in the little room.  The three of them, each in his\nor her own way, quailed before the stark decisiveness of them.  Mrs.\nKestern it was who first could bear it no longer.  \"Father, he is your\nson,\" she cried.  \"Nothing can alter that!\"\n\nMr. Kestern was on his feet, two thousand years of Christianity\nstripped from him, the spirit of the Old Testament glowing in his face.\n\"What saith the Scripture?\" he cried.  \"'Cursed be he that setteth\nlight by his father or his mother.'  'Cursed be he that maketh the\nblind to wander out of the way.'  Or our Master Himself: 'He that\nloveth child more than me is not worthy of me.'  And you, Paul, have\ndone both these things.  My grey hairs you would bring down in sorrow\nto the grave, but that is not enough.  Here, into this very parish of\nwhich I am pastor, you have brought your devil's doctrine and broken up\none family of Christ's flock already.  Shall I spare my son any more\nthan our brother spared his daughter?  You will leave this house, and I\ndo not want to see your face till you come as a penitent again.\"\n\nMrs. Kestern buried her face in her hands and cowered in her chair with\nan inarticulate cry of woe so bitter that both father and son shrank\nbefore it.  The clergyman stepped quickly over to her.  \"Mother,\nmother,\" he cried, \"the dear Lord knows.  He will save the boy yet.\nBut how can we have such in this house?\"\n\n\"My son, my son,\" she wailed.  Then, breaking free from her husband,\n\"Oh, Paul, say you don't mean it!  Paul, Paul, would you break your\nmother's heart?  Say you don't mean it, Paul, say you don't mean it!\"\n\nShe flung her arms round his neck, but the boy put her away.  He was\npiecing this and that together, and was no more only the boy.  \"What do\nyou mean,\" he demanded, \"when you say I have broken up a family in this\nparish?  What charge is that?  Tell me, if you have any justice left in\nyou.\"\n\n\"You know,\" said his father sternly; \"don't pretend you do not.\"\n\n\"I do not know,\" cried Paul passionately.  \"I begin to think you are\nmad, all mad.  My God, if this is the religion of Christ, Christ would\nnot know it!\"\n\nHis father started, and for a moment it was almost as if the old man\nwould strike his son.  Then, with a gesture, he strode to the door.\n\"Go,\" he said, \"go.  Only last month I had to comfort Mr. Thornton when\nhis child, Edith, left his house to become a Papist through you.\nPapist or atheist, it is all one to me.  I will not have such within my\nhouse.\"\n\n\"Edith!\" cried Paul, utterly dumbfounded.\n\nHis tone, and the use of the girl's name, braced Mrs. Kestern.  \"Oh,\nPaul,\" she cried, \"you knew of it, don't pretend you didn't!  How you\ncould have acted so behind our backs I can't think.  Poor, poor girl!\nOh, you had better go now.  It would be better for us all.  May our\nFather have mercy on us, and may you be spared the agony that your\nparents know.\"\n\nHis mother's action brought Paul to his senses.  He looked from one to\nthe other of them in consternation.  \"You don't mean it,\" he cried,\n\"surely you don't mean it!\"\n\n\"Don't go like that, Paul,\" sobbed Mrs. Kestern, breaking down again,\n\"I can't bear it.\"\n\nPaul pulled himself together.  \"But, mother, father,\" he said, \"this is\nsheer madness.  We are not living in the Middle Ages.  This isn't\nmelodrama.  I--I differ from you in religion, I know; I can't help it;\nI must do what seems right to me.  But surely, because of that----\"\n\nHis father opened the study door.  Broken and old, there was a certain\ndignity now in his face.  \"Paul,\" he said, \"we talk different tongues,\nbut nothing alters the fact that you have turned utterly from the\nreligion of your parents to serve another.  'As for me and my house, we\nwill serve the Lord.'  You have no place here.  Go now, lest we say in\nour anger what ought not to be said.\"\n\nPaul looked again heavily round the room.  \"You have said it already,\"\nhe replied, and left the house.\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nPaul walked down the street like a man in a dream.  Once he stopped,\nturned, and walked a few paces back, telling himself that it could not\nbe true, that it was too theatrical to be true.  But his father's face\nrose before him as he went, and still more the terror of his mother's\ntears.  He recalled the history of a friend of his in training for the\nBaptist ministry, who had decided he could not accept the doctrine of\nthe deity of Christ and had been cursed by his widowed mother and\nturned into the street with eighteenpence in his pocket.  Somehow it\nhad never seemed possible that it could happen to him.  Yet, in the\nthroes of the Catholic stage of his soul's pilgrimage, it had been\nplain enough that something of that sort would happen if he made his\nsubmission to the Church.  Once more, the horror of his parents' grief\nas he had seen it when he knelt in Father Vassall's chapel gripped his\nheart.  And now, and now, suddenly, so ironically, so futilely, so\nchildishly, this thing had swept down upon him.  He, Paul Kestern, had\nbeen turned from his father's house.  The thing was true.\n\nThen, into the stream of his thoughts, drifted the memory of what had\nbeen said of Edith Thornton.  Of all the incredible happenings of an\nincredible morning, that, perhaps, was ultimately one of the most\nincredible.  Edith a Catholic!  He thought of her face under the\nlamplight in Lambeth Court--oh, incredible!  But one moment: he thought\nof her prayer under the pines at Keswick, of her answer to his dilemma\nafter his return from Thurloe End.  Gradually he began to piece\ntogether the mosaic of her simple reasoning, her resolute faith, her\nardent love; it was exactly of such souls that Catholic saints are\nmade.  That, then, had been the inner meaning of her sorrow over his\ngoing to Fordham and of her silence thereafter.  This resolution, this\nterrible domestic retribution, had come crashing down on her head, and\nshe, too, had been driven out alone.\n\nOnce more the flame of anger flickered in his heart.  As he thought it\nover, his indignation grew.  He pictured her, as he loved best to do,\nin the quiet neat simplicity of that brown dress of hers, with her\nclear, trustful eyes.  And they had turned her out, had they, to what,\nhe should like to know?  Good God, and this was in England to-day!  He\nsaw Mr. Thornton, rotund, bald, very respectable, and realised that if,\nat bottom, he was as bigoted a Protestant as any of them, business was\nmixed up with religion.  The man had never really loved his daughter,\nPaul thought, he, with his commercial soul, his respectable tradesman's\nboot-licking servility, his front pew in the side aisle never empty on\na Sunday.  And as he thought of it all, he came to a resolution.  He\ngripped his stick more firmly and turned off to Edward Street.\n\nA girl assistant came forward.  Paul did not know her.  Could he see\nMr. Thornton?  She would enquire.  What name?\n\n\"Mr. Kestern,\" said Paul, a little grimly.\n\nA flutter of surprise and then of understanding crossed the girl's\nface.  Would he sit down.  She would tell Mr. Thornton.\n\nShe disappeared behind a screen and opened a door.  Paul, looking round\nthe suburbanly-fashionable shop, knew that she stood in front of a\nsolid, highly polished desk in that little inner sanctum, and wondered\nif she would say more than his name.  If not, it would be his father\nwho would be expected.  The immediate appearance of Mr. Thornton round\nthe screen, bowing, smiling, rubbing his hands, showed him that she had\nnot.  He walked forward.  As the photographer started in surprise, he\nspoke.\n\n\"How do you do, Mr. Thornton?  I've come to ask if I may see Edith.\"\n(Better to put it that way: the man would not know how much he had been\ntold.)\n\nEdith's father stood and looked at him in amazement.  Paul, out of the\ncorner of his eye, saw the interested friendly smile of the girl\nbehind.  Possibly Mr. Thornton saw it reflected in the young man's\nface, for his own flushed angrily.  He stumbled for words.  \"You,\nyou----\" he spluttered.  \"How dare you, sir?\"\n\nPaul surveyed him coolly.  He was sure of his ground now.  \"Really, Mr.\nThornton...\" he said.  \"Your daughter and I were very good friends in\nthe Mission, and I have not seen her for some time.\"\n\n\"Look here,\" burst out the man, \"you may be a clergyman's son, and you\nmay think to come it over me, but I tell you you were responsible--I\nknow you were responsible.  Broke her mother's 'eart, she has, and\nyou----\"\n\nHe realised suddenly that he was in the shop.  Anyone might come in.\nThe girl was there.  He took a grip of himself and prepared for a more\ncold-blooded battle.  \"Ah,\" he said conventionally, \"I'm very glad\nyou've called.  Will you please to come inside a moment.\"\n\nPaul entered the lion's den.\n\nThe little man was still more reassured by the weight and prosperity of\nhis office furniture.  He sank into his chair, and motioned Paul to a\nseat.  One glance to see that the door was shut behind him, and then:\n\n\"I'm _very_ glad you've called.  If there was a just law in this land,\nI ought to be able to prosecute you, I ought.  You made my girl a\nCatholic, you did,--a Papist, _my_ girl!  You go to college to learn to\nbe a minister, and you come sneaking back pervertin' a girl like my\nEdith.  And where is she now, I ask you, where is she now?  In a\nconvent, _that's_ where she is.  Fair broke her mother's 'eart it has.\nA convent!  Going to be a nun!  And what tricks they'll play on her\nthere, what dirty tricks them Jesuits will be up to----\"\n\nPaul cut in decisively.  \"Mr. Thornton,\" he said, \"that will do.  That\nis utter rubbish, you know.  What is more, it is beastly.  I won't hear\nit.\"\n\nMr. Thornton knew education and the manner of gentlemen.  He had all\nthe Claxted respect for them.  So now this peremptory young man\nmomentarily shut him up.  \"Er--er--I----\" he stuttered.\n\nPaul leaned coolly back and waited.  He was desperately angry, and he\nwas beginning to be aware of a sense of bitter loss, but both, here,\nonly made him cool.  And his coolness enraged the photographer even as\nhe stammered under his set-back.  His sense of outrage, of personal\ninjury, came rapidly to the fore again.  It grew every second, and at\nlast:\n\n\"Well, I've lost my girl, anyway, I have, and through you.  What had\nyou got to do with her, anyway, that's what I want to know?  Walkin'\nout with her--as good as--I hear now----\"\n\nPaul flushed.  There it was, the naked truth, as Alf Vintner and Maud\nand half the parish probably saw it.  He bit his lip.  \"Mr. Thornton,\"\nhe said, \"I wanted to marry your daughter.\"\n\nMarry!  The man gaped on him.  Somehow he had not thought that.  He had\nnever thought that Mr. Kestern's son, at Cambridge too, doing so well,\ngoing to be a minister, had thought seriously of marrying his daughter.\nHeavens, what they had missed!  And this young man apparently thought\nhe had missed something, too.  After all, then, he couldn't have\npersuaded her to seek a convent.  This was a new development.\n\n\"You don't say so, now, Mr. Kestern, sir,\" he said.  \"Well, Edith was a\ndear good girl, the best of the lot I always said.  Whatever made her\ntake up with that Catholikism, I can't tell.  She never heard it in\nthis house, I know.  And seeing that you were going High Church, mother\nand I, we thought...\"\n\n\"What happened, Mr. Thornton, can you tell me that?\"\n\n\"Well, sir, she outs with it one evening, six months or so ago it was.\nSays she's going to be received into the Church--those were her very\nwords.  Going to be received into the Church!  It made me very hot, Mr.\nKestern, it did.  No member of our family has ever been a Catholic,\nthank God, and I said as I wouldn't have a child of mine a Catholic in\na good church-going evangelical house like this.  Said it out plain and\nstraight, I did.  And she ups and walks out of the door that very\nnight.\"\n\n\"You mean you turned her out, I suppose.\"\n\n\"Well, sir, I was hot, I admit.  She provoked me, too, knowing better'n\nher father.  'If you can't go to my church, out you go,' I said.  'You\nmean that, father?' she asks.  'Yes,' I said, standing on my dignity,\nand she just walks off.  Her mother in tears, too.  'You go to\ncommunion with me, or you're no daughter of mine,' that was what I\nsaid, Mr. Kestern, and your father, he supported me in it afterwards.\"\n\n\"And you turned her out that night, as she was?\"\n\n\"As she was, she walked out, Mr. Kestern.  Went straight to the\nCatholic Convent, I believe.  Her mother saw her there once.  And where\nshe is now, _I_ don't know.  No, I don't _know_.  She was going to be a\nnun, she said, and it seems, she being over-age, nobody can't stop her.\nIf there was a law in this so-called Christian land, Mr. Kestern----\"\n\nPaul got up.  The look on his face checked the photographer.  \"I\nunderstand, Mr. Thornton,\" he said, \"despite your words.  Your\nChristianity was such that you drove your daughter from your house for\nthe sake of her new faith.  I should hardly have thought it possible,\nbut I fear I understand only too well.  And I will tell you what I\nthink of it, Mr. Thornton.  It was a cowardly, mean, base, unchristian\nthing of you to do, and that Jesus, in whose name you did it, would\nnever have lent his authority to any such thing.  It is utterly foreign\nto his gospel.  As for Edith, I hope to God she knows her own mind,\nthat is all, and in my own sorrow, I can only find heart to be glad\nthat at least she is not here.  Good-day.\"  And Paul, not waiting for\nthe other to recover, walked out of the shop.\n\nAt the corner of Edward Street and Wellington Road, scarcely reasoning\nas to what he was about to do, he hailed a cab and drove to the\nconvent.  He had bearded the nun who opened the door and was in the\nparlour waiting to see the Reverend Mother before he realised the\nfutility of his action.  Still, he was there now, and he looked\ncuriously about him.  It was while he waited in that parlour that he\ncame to a realisation of how far from the religion it represented he\nhad moved.  Plainly furnished with a table, a few stiff chairs, a\nforeign-looking so-called couch with an antimacassar, and a cheap\nbookshelf with old-fashioned books in it, an oleograph of Pius IX. hung\nover the mantelpiece, beaming blandly, half a crucifix behind him.  A\nMadonna in coloured plaster stood on a shelf, and on the mantel-piece\nat one end a cast of Christ pointing to his bleeding dripping heart,\nand at the other another of St. Theresa gazing seraphically upwards.  A\ncrucifix stood between them, the Christ meeting St. Theresa's gaze with\nagonised eyes, white girt about the waist with a heavy plaster\nloin-cloth.  The table was covered with a faded red cloth.  It held an\ninkstand and a blotter.  In the corner a _prie-Dieu_ was tucked out of\nthe way.\n\nThe Reverend Mother was kind and polite.  Did he come from the family?\nNo, and Paul hardly cared to explain.  Well, of course, he could not,\nin any case, see Sister Edith.  Nor was she there in fact.  She had\nbeen admitted to the novitiate, and, during training, the rules were\nstrict.  She could not promise that a letter would be given; it\ndepended on the letter.  Paul understood that it would be read.  The\nsister was very happy, however, much happier than she had been on the\nnight she arrived alone and in tears, turned out from her father's\nhouse....\n\nThat was all, of course.  He might have known it.  But one thing after\nanother....  Paul Kestern suddenly took stock of his own heart.\n\nWhere, indeed, was he even to sleep that night?  In the street, he\nturned the question over.  And afterwards, what was he to do?  Manning\nwas at Cambridge; well, Fordham....  But suddenly he hated Fordham.  He\nsaw it, proud, aloof, and utterly failing to understand such troubles\nas were his.  Tressor, too, would be there, and Paul shrank from\nTressor's dignified quiet kindliness.  He suddenly knew himself to be\nalone.  He knew himself to be beaten, bruised, lonely; yes, he, with\nthe morning's paper full of his triumph.  Apples of Sodom....  For this\nhe had made the great exchange.  This was what it all came to: he was\ndown and out and alone.  Ursula?\n\n\n\n(4)\n\nHe took train to town, engaged a room for the night at the Grosvenor as\nbeing the nearest hotel, and took a taxi to her flat.  Two at a time he\nmounted the stairs; damn the lift.  He knocked.  \"Come in,\" she called.\n\nIt was eight o'clock and the lights were on, of course.  She was\nsitting alone in an easy-chair by the fire, clad in a loose simple\ndress of a rich deep orange that became her well.  She was reading, and\nlooked up almost expectantly from her book at his knock.  A little fire\nleaped in the grate, and the room was still, familiar, kind.  She\nsmiled enquiringly as she saw him.  \"Why, Paul,\" she said.\n\nPaul moved slowly over to her, closing the door behind him.  On the rug\nbefore the fire, he came to a standstill, looking down into her\nupturned face with its clear unafraid open eyes, set in its ring of\nblack hair, taking in her regular definite features, her white throat.\nShe smiled at him again as he stood there, tenderly.\n\n\"Ursula, Ursula!\" he cried, took a hasty step forward, dropped on his\nknees before her, and buried his face in the kindly flame of her dress.\n\nShe reached a hand out and laid it on his head, stroking his hair.  For\na little neither moved.  Then: \"I understand, Paul,\" she said without\nmore words; \"I thought it might be so.  Your face told me last night.\"\n\nHe looked up.  \"You're very wonderful,\" he said slowly.  \"How could you\nguess?  But it's not only my people, Ursula.  That, of course, was just\ntoo terrible.  Father simply drove me out.  Not a word of explanation\nwould he allow.  It happened so quickly, too; at first I hardly\nunderstood....  But I think it was worse afterwards when I did.  Edith\nhas gone to be a nun.\"\n\n\"Edith?\"\n\n\"Yes.\"  (Words came quicker now.)  \"Of course you don't know about her\nthough.  I was in love with her.  Ursula, she was such a dear.  Somehow\nor another I see now what I've lost, desolatingly.  Do you know--of\ncourse, it sounds absurd--but in my mind she is, as it were, in the\nbalance against the theatre.  She was so different.  She was so\nunspoilt, so simple, so loving.  Oh, she was a dear, Ursula.  And she's\ngone to be a nun, and it was I who made her.\"\n\n\"You who made her?\"\n\n\"Well, I set her thinking about the Catholic Church, I suppose.  Of\ncourse I don't know in the least what brought her to it in the end, but\nstill I can see, somehow.  She was made to be a nun.\"\n\n\"Then she could hardly have been made for you.\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know.  She was such a dear.  You don't know,\" he cried\nbitterly.\n\nUrsula smiled.  \"You odd, impetuous, eager creature,\" she said.\n\n\"But, Ursula, I'm utterly sick and miserable to-night.  I can't put it\ninto words properly.  I see what I've lost.  My people--of course,\nthey're ignorant, almost mad, but they've got something that I've lost.\nTheir faith is wonderful.  Christ is so real to them.  They live in an\nodd world, but it isn't shallow, it isn't a sham, and our world is such\na sham, Ursula.  I feel that at the theatre so much.  You never know\nwhat people really think and mean.  And afterwards, in the morning\nlight, so to speak, it's all made-up and painted and false.\"\n\nShe said nothing, only shifted her eyes to the fire.\n\n\"And then there's Edith.  You can't see Edith, Ursula, as I do.  She\nwas like a flower.  She was so utterly simple and childish and true.\nShe was just the opposite to all this.  She saw through things.  That's\nwhy she's become a nun, of course; just walked straight forward into\nit.  And our world _never_ walks straight forward.\"\n\n\"Our world?\"\n\nThe tone of her voice held him.  She had shaded her face with her hand\nnow and did not look at him.  \"Our world, Paul?\" she queried again.\n\n\"What do you mean?\"\n\nShe did not at once reply.  Then, suddenly, she turned and looked at\nhim.  \"What are you going to do now?\" she asked.\n\n\"I don't know.  There seems nothing to do.\"\n\n\"I thought the blind beggar saw beauty so wonderfully.  Didn't it fill\nhis life?\"\n\nHe shrugged his shoulders and said nothing.  The room hung very still.\n\n\"Then you don't know what you're going to do?\" she asked again at last.\n\n\"No.\"\n\n\"Come with Muriel and me to Africa.\"\n\n\"_What?_\"\n\n\"I thought that would startle you.  We only fixed it definitely this\nmorning.  Muriel's brother is an assistant commissioner or something of\nthat sort in Basutoland, and he's given her an open invitation to visit\nhim.  Yesterday, too, she was asked to go out and address some series\nof meetings in the Cape and Natal.  I should like to see the country\nand paint.  So we settled this morning to go together--about June.\nCome too.\"\n\n\"Could I?\"\n\n\"Of course.\"\n\n\"But what about Muriel?\"\n\n\"She'd love it.  And one more in a South African house doesn't matter.\"\n\nPaul turned it swiftly over.  With his books and his successful play he\nknew he could raise enough money.  He drew a deep breath.  \"Oh,\" he\nsaid, \"I'd love it.\"\n\n\"Good,\" she said, \"that's settled.  We're travelling East Coast.  And\nnow, why not go down and stay with mother for a little?\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nZANZIBAR\n\n    Lo, winged with world's wonders,\n      With miracles shod,\n    With the fires of his thunders\n      For raiment and rod,\n  God trembles in heaven, and the angels are white with the terror\n            of God.\n\n  * * * * *\n\n    Thought made him and breaks him,\n      Truth slays and forgives;\n    But to you, as time takes him,\n      This new thing it gives,\n  Even love, the beloved Republic, that feeds upon freedom and lives.\n                              ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE: _Hertha_.\n\n  High sat white Helen, lonely and serene.\n    He had not remembered that she was so fair,\n  And that her neck curved down in such a way;\n  And he felt tired.  He flung the sword away,\n    And kissed her feet, and knelt before her there,\n  The perfect Knight before the perfect Queen.\n                              RUPERT BROOKE: _Menelaus and Helen_.\n\n\n\n(1)\n\nPaul was staring over Ursula's shoulder at her nearly finished\nwater-colour, and she, leaning back a little, was putting quick touches\nto it.  Her chair was against the rail on the shady side of the boat\ndeck; and just below, the endless procession of natives who had begun\ncarrying coal from lighters alongside to the coal bunkers of the ship\nsince but an hour or two after anchor had been dropped the night\nbefore, and who were still apparently as busy as ever, toiled, each man\nin it naked to the waist-cloth, sooty and perspiring, in the blazing\nsun.  The dingy, clumsy, rough-hewn boats in the utterly clear water\nthrough which you could see almost to their keels, were bathed in that\nvivid light, while, between burning blue above and sparkling blue\nbeneath, the chanting labourers passed up with full baskets and bent\nshoulders and down with empty ones and laughter.  Now and again a fussy\nlaunch, usually with a gay flag fluttering in the breeze of its\npassage, chunked or chortled by.  Across the flow, a big P. and O.\nsteamer moved slowly into the Canal, its crowd of emigrants leaning\nover the side, staring, shouting, talking.  On their own ship, people\nwere mostly clustered at the gangways chaffering with pedlars, or\ndispersed ashore or below.  Paul himself was back from a visit to Simon\nArtz and carried packages under his arm.\n\n\"There,\" Ursula said, holding the block out before her.  \"Will that do?\"\n\nHe did not at once reply.  She twisted round a bit and glanced up at\nhim.\n\n\"Well?\" she queried again.\n\n\"You've hit it absolutely,\" he said.  \"But the whole thing says\nsomething besides.  It says it plainly, too.  It's stupid of me not to\nbe able to put it into words.  I shall in a minute.\"\n\nThe boys' monotonous chant came steadily up to them, and a siren\nshrieked.  The P. and O. mail was lost behind a big Jap steamer, and\nfrom half a dozen ships about them came the sound of striking bells.\nAs the noise of the last of them died away, Paul spoke.\n\n\"I know,\" he said slowly.  \"You've got the incredible contrast there.\nNaked, sweating, tired natives, working endlessly for a mere trifle at\na boring weary job in a living world of light and colour, and--and\nbeing jolly over it.  They are jolly.  Look at that chap's face,\nlooking up at us.  And that one, chipping his neighbour.\"  (He\nindicated two figures in the sketch.)  \"It's just sheer animal spirits.\"\n\nUrsula said nothing.\n\n\"Paganism, too,\" said Paul.\n\n\"Paganism?\"\n\n\"Yes.  It's in the sketch as you've painted it.  A fierce\nvehemently-lived to-day, and no to-morrow or yesterday.\"\n\n\"Write that.\"\n\n\"I shall.  Do you realise I've written like blazes since we've been on\nthis stunt?\"\n\nShe stared over the side, hunching herself up a little.\n\n\"I have,\" Paul went on.  \"You've made me.  You're a perpetual\ninspiration, Ursula.\"\n\nHer body relaxed, and she laughed a little, happily.  \"The next book,\nplease,\" she said.  \"'To Ursula: An Inspiration.'\"\n\nHe moved forward a pace or two, and leaned over the rail, looking out\nand over the gimcrack shore buildings with their staring, blatant, ugly\nmodernity.  \"It's all very well,\" he said, \"for you to take it lightly,\nbut it happens to be so amazingly true.  I'm always seeing things with\nyou.\"\n\nUrsula studied his shoulders in her silent way for a minute or two.\nThen she got up.  \"I've to wash for luncheon, Paul,\" she said, as she\nmoved away, \"and don't forget we go ashore afterwards.\"\n\nHe half turned.  \"Shall I take your things?\"\n\n\"Oh, no.  Besides, you've got your own.  Coming?\"\n\n\"Five minutes,\" he said.  \"I haven't been painting, you know.\"\n\nLeft alone, he looked away again over the town.  In the middle\ndistance, a minaret rose into the hot air.  His gaze rested on it, and\nthe train of thought he had had running through his mind more or less\nconsciously all the morning since he had passed beneath its shadow in\nthe street and stared in through the little entrance to the vestibule\nthat was not screened from view, re-occurred to him.  It concerned\ntheir whole journey.  They had come overland to Marseilles, and had\nstopped twelve hours in Paris as Muriel wanted to do some shopping.\nLeaving the girls, then, he had gone up to Montmartre with the old\necclesiastical interest still keen in his mind, and thereafter had come\ndown to Notre Dame.  And in the two churches, a beginning to the lesson\nthat the voyage seemed to be reading him, had been made.\n\nThe great modern church, with its flaunting colour and electric light\nand garish decorations, had been offered first.  Herein the religious\nhalf of twentieth-century France placated God.  At the door, great\nlists of names, business-like, methodical, were a perpetual prayer for\nthe dead, the sick, specially needy souls, children, neophytes of the\npriesthood and all the other classes of that Catholic world.  Under the\nblown bubble of the dome, worshippers came and went with eager faith.\nWithout, the great carven figure of the Sacred Heart looked out across\nthe city that this new temple was to save.  Beneath, Paris laughed, and\nshopped, and went about its business in the more hidden streets and\nhouses with French alacrity.\n\nNotre Dame seemed to him an already half-deserted backwater.  All the\npageantry of the Middle Ages--bishop and cardinal, noble and king,\npeasant and soldier--had flowed in and out again through its great\nsombre austere doors, here, where massive pillars and narrow windows\nshut out the sun.  The ancient stone effigy of the Mother of God was\nblackened and a little disreputable.  She still had her candles, yes;\nbut official France no more bowed before her, and modern France was\ntrying a new supplication up on the hill.  Ten thousand thousand\nprayers had been prayed here.  As many broken hearts had wept here.\n_Cui bono_?  For without, the Seine still slipped lazily by, and over\nher bridges passed the crowd that laughed and shopped and went about\nits business.\n\nNaples had shown him Pompeii.  It had been an unforgettable day when\nthe three of them trod upon the old chariot-ruts in the gate of the\nancient city.  The roofless houses, the winding ways, the shops and\nbaths and theatres, had been alive and peopled again in Paul's\nimagination.  Neither the dust nor the tireless sun could daunt him as\nhe toiled with his ultimately protesting companions in and out and up\nand down.  He had seen the patrician roll by in his chariot, the\ngladiator boast and drink in the tavern, the slave girl laugh with her\nfriends at the street corner, the Greek merchant jostle his way through\nthe crowd with perspiring porters bearing his merchandise behind him.\nAnd then, in the temple of Apollo, he had seen the swaying crowd, the\nsacrosanct priest, the incense, the offering, the smiling god.  A place\nof prayer again; older now; more ruined; an ancient outworn faith, but\nstill the eternal place of prayer from which men had cried to the\nheavens above for the Kingdom of God on earth.  Well, and in the\nstreets of Pompeii, Americans laughed, and Cook's tourists bought\nspurious curiosities, and Neapolitan guides went about their business.\n\nHere, in Port Said, at the door of the immemorial East, he had seen\nJewish synagogue, Mohammedan mosque, Koptic chapel, Catholic cathedral\nand Anglican church.  A thousand tongues of prayer, and all about them\nPort Said: courtesan, merchant, material, tawdry Port Said.  British\nand French and Egyptian; Levantine and Syrian and Greek; American and\nJew and cosmopolite, how they went about their business!  They all\nwooed their gods one way and another, thought Paul, all but perhaps\nUrsula's nigger boys whose job was the hardest and dirtiest of all, and\nwho laughed in the sun.\n\nAnd then Paul laughed, and went below to luncheon.\n\nThey left at sunset, and after dinner, as in duty bound, the three of\nthem drew chairs forrard the wind-screen and watched the steady blaze\nof the white searchlights as the ship's great eyes stared ahead at the\nnarrow waterway, the steep engineered banks and the flat endless sands.\nHere and there dahabeeyahs, moored for the night, stood out for a few\nminutes with their thin spars black and graceful against that infinite\nwhite glare, and then slipped into the shadows behind.  Dredging barges\nloomed monstrous and distorted, and dropped silently behind.  Once a\nlonely Arab on a camel stood revealed in every detail, motionless, on\nthe bank above, and once a long string of mules passed, padding through\nthe night.  And always there were the stars, and low down the Cross\nthat Paul saw for the first time.  The majority of their\nfellow-passengers stood and chatted for a few minutes and then went\nbelow for music or cards.  But Ursula, Muriel and Paul sat on.\n\n\"Amazing thing,\" said Muriel at last.  \"I suppose the Children of\nIsrael crossed somewhere about here.  Moses has always seemed to me a\nslightly humorous person, but I don't think he will again.\"\n\n\"And to me,\" said Paul reflectively, \"he has always seemed immensely\nimpressive.  I don't think he will again.\"\n\nUrsula laughed quietly.\n\n\"Why not?\" queried Muriel aggressively.  She and Paul on the whole got\non very well together, but they nearly always sparred.  \"All this makes\nthe Exodus so extraordinarily real.  One can see it happening.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" assented Paul, \"but don't you see, it makes it also\nextraordinarily small.  Good Lord, look at those immemorial sands.\nIsraelites!  Why Egyptians and Assyrians and Ethiopians and Greeks and\nRomans and scores more whose names are forgotten have passed here.  I\nwas taught that the Exodus was the central act of the play, but it's\nmerely an interlude for the shifting of scenery.\"\n\n\"In the play called Kismet,\" put in Ursula.\n\nMuriel, who was sitting between them, glanced from one to the other.\nThen she settled herself back in her chair.  \"Oh, go on, you two,\" she\nsaid contentedly.  \"I love to hear you.  You're both of you making your\nown lives more than any other two people I know, and you both of you\npretend you're not.\"\n\nUrsula laughed again.  \"We're marionettes right enough,\" she said, \"but\nby some odd chance we're alive, and we can thoroughly enjoy the play.\"\n\nPaul drew a deep breath of content.  \"I wish this bit of it would\ncontinue for a very long time,\" he said happily.  And while the great\nvessel glided on almost silently with its impression of relentless\nirresistible purpose, the three sat silent, staring at the stars.\n\nThe Red Sea unfolded itself.  They saw a dawn in Port Suez.  Paul was\nfirst on deck in his pyjamas; and with but one glance around rushed\nexcitedly down to the cabin that Muriel and Ursula shared between them.\nTheir door stood on the latch.  He thumped on it vigorously.\n\n\"Come in,\" called Ursula at once.\n\nPaul fumbled with the lock and pushed aside the curtain.  Ursula was\nsitting up in bed reading, her hair about her, her thin silk nightdress\nexposing her shoulders and neck.  In the bunk above, Muriel, on her\nside, covered with a sheet, only half awake, opened her eyes sleepily.\n\nIt is odd how moments of understanding come in life, not to be hurried,\nnot to be gainsaid.  Paul Kestern had travelled with these two for some\ndays now with all their opportunities of intimacy, and in her own flat\nhe had seen Ursula Manning robed for the evening or making a belated\nbreakfast even more revealingly dressed than now.  He might, so to\nspeak, have known himself in love with her fifty times.  But not till\nthis minute did his hand clutch with a sudden nervousness at the\nnearest thing about him (which happened to be the curtain), and his\nbreath catch in his throat.  Not till this minute did she seem to him\nutterly desirable for himself alone, and--for that is the deviltry of\nlove--so supremely lovely that she must be unattainable.  Or all but\nunattainable.  Men dare great adventures with a kind of godlike\neffrontery.  But in nothing are they more godlike that when, realising\nthe awe and majesty of love, they conceive deliberately that they may\nwin to it.\n\nWould they, though, if, more often than not, the woman did not divine\ntheir thought and hold out the sceptre from her throne?  That, at any\nrate, is another deviltry.\n\nSo Ursula.  \"Hullo, Paul,\" she said, very unconcerned, her eyes resting\nsoftly on him, \"what's up?  Ship on fire?\"\n\n\"No,\" stammered Paul, \"I say, are you awake?  That is, I mean--well, of\ncourse, I see you are!  I say, come on deck.  The sunrise is too\nheavenly for words.\"\n\n\"It's also hot,\" said Muriel, sitting up in her bunk and leaning over\nto look at Ursula.  \"Hullo!  Good-morning.  You reading?\"\n\nPaul looked at Muriel.  She, too, wore a thin silk nightdress, but at\nthe sight of her he recovered his assurance.  \"Well, do come up, both\nof you,\" he said.  \"It's far too good to miss.\"\n\nUrsula closed her book and drew her knees up, preparatory to getting\nout of the bunk.  \"Coming,\" she said.  \"Paul, tell the steward we'll\nhave tea on deck.\"\n\nHe departed on his errand, humming to himself with sudden elation.  In\nthe passage he ran into Major Jardine.  On such occasions heretofore as\na fourth person had been demanded of necessity, Jardine had filled that\nposition, and had seemed increasingly to relish it.  He was in the\nKing's African Rifles, returning from leave to his companies in\nZanzibar.  He grinned at Paul, but with a certain gloom born of the\ntropics and the hour.\n\n\"Morning,\" he said.  \"You're devilish early and musical, Kestern.\"\n\nPaul laughed.  \"Come and see the sunrise, Major,\" he said.  \"It'll\ncheer you up.  We're having tea on deck.\"\n\nThen the other visibly brightened.  \"Good,\" he cried with alacrity.\n\"I'll tub later.  Shan't be a jiffy.\"  And he disappeared into his\ncabin to get rid of his impedimenta.\n\nOn the boat-deck, then, the four gathered.  Muriel dispensed tea,\nassisted by the Major, and lit cigarettes.  Ursula and Paul drew a\nlittle apart.  She leant a hand on the davits of one of the boats, and\nPaul stood back a little by her side.\n\nBrown and orange and yellow and burnt brick-red, the sandstone hills\nand sandy wastes grew startlingly and swiftly clear as they watched.\nThe new sun rose over the desert, over the rocky hills, a great golden\norb, instantly alive.  Magically the shadows drew off the sea or faded\nin its depths; the blue of it lightened, grew transparently clear,\ntranslucent.  \"Look,\" said Ursula, in a half whisper, and pointed down.\n\nPaul took a step forward, and peered where she indicated.  In the still\nwater a great shark followed by a small replica of itself moved lazily\nthrough the watery world about it.  Its gentle sinuous movements were\nscarcely noticeable; it glided by undisturbed with just fanning tail.\nSlate-grey, mottled with black, it was so near the surface that one\ncould fancy one saw its wicked little eye inspecting the silent monster\nof the ship lying there at its ease so invulnerable and great.\n\n\"It's gone,\" said Paul.  \"My first shark!  Even it was beautiful,\nUrsula.\"\n\n\"But that faery town,\" said the girl softly, who had raised her eyes\nfrom the sea.\n\nWhite and picturesque, with the green of palms flecked here and there\nupon it, Port Suez sparkled in the now risen sun.  With its tumbled\nflat-roofed houses, its occasional minaret, its fringe of gardens, it\nwas a painted thing, a bit of the veritable East, for all the heat and\ndust and smells and commonplaceness of day in its streets.\n\nPaul stood motionless by her side, gazing.  \"Do you suppose we can go\nashore?\" he asked at length.\n\n\"No.\"  She shook her head.  \"Nobody ever seems to here.  Besides you'd\nmuch better not, Paul.\"\n\n\"I'd love to.  I know what you're going to say, but I don't believe it.\nI like dirt and smells.  They're just as mysterious and magical as\ncolour and scent.\"\n\n\"Rubbish,\" said Muriel, who had come up behind them.  \"Eh, Major?\"\n\n\"Gad, yes.  Poet or not, Kestern, you wouldn't like Port Suez.\"\n\nUrsula glanced at them.  \"For all that, Paul's right,\" she said.  And\nshe smiled at him.\n\nA sort of fierce flame leapt in Paul at that.  He had hard work to\ncontrol himself.  The hid passion of his nature was asserting itself.\nHe threw his head back and laughed.  Then he caught Ursula by the hand.\n\"Oh, come on!\" he cried.  \"Ursula, I'll race you round the deck.\"\n\n\"Can't,\" she said laughing, \"in a nightie.  But I might manage to walk.\"\n\nShe slipped her hand into his arm, and they strolled off.  For the\nmoment it was enough for Paul that they two walked together.\n\nThat morning's sun, as it set at last over Egypt, lit up the peninsula\nof Sinai with fierce red flames.  The hot day had drawn slowly out, and\nmost people were in deck chairs, with their books on their laps as the\nsun went down.  Even the Major had been reading, a novel by Mr. Charles\nGarvice.  Earlier on, the three had merrily attacked him for his\nchoice, and he had stoutly defended himself.  \"That's all very well,\"\nhe said, \"but the sort of stuff they put in novels these days, beats\nme.  I don't want to read a bally sermon--can't understand it\neither--and half the rest a fellow's ashamed to read in ladies'\ncompany.  Now this chap, what's his name?\" (he looked back to the\ncover--\"Never can remember authors' names\")--\"Garvice, you always know\nwhat you've got with him.\"\n\n\"Milk and honey,\" said Muriel in her abrupt way, staring out over the\npeninsula in the direction of the Promised Land.\n\n\"Eh?\" queried the Major, hopelessly at sea.\n\nMuriel laughed.  \"Yes, and there are the Ten Commandments,\" she said,\n\"over there.\"\n\nJardine still looked puzzled.  He liked Muriel, against his will as it\nwere.  Ursula, he told Paul, was so damned quiet, but Muriel said\nthings a feller couldn't understand.  Odd pair.  Pretty though.  And\ndeuced attractive.  What did Kestern think?\n\nSo now.  \"That's where you get me,\" he said.  \"But, I say, what about a\nsundowner?  Coming, Kestern?\"\n\nPaul rose.  Ursula looked up.  \"Bring two more and come back,\" she said\nlazily.\n\n\"Right, Miss Manning.  You and Miss Lister can discuss the Commandments\nfor five minutes exactly.  Then you must forget them.\"\n\n\"But there's nothing about sundowners in the Decalogue, Major,\" said\nPaul gaily, as he moved off.  \"Or I shouldn't----\" They went out of\nhearing.\n\nMuriel glanced at her companion.  \"It's odd,\" she said.  \"Paul's lost\nsight of God, but he still thinks he can keep morality.\"\n\nUrsula fixed her gaze on the darkening mountains.  \"I don't agree, my\ndear,\" she said.\n\n\"How?\"\n\n\"He's not so much lost sight of God.  He's seeing Him truly at last.\"\n\nMuriel considered this.  \"You mean His veil of beauty that you're so\nfond of talking about, and painting,\" she said.  \"Well, perhaps....\nBut still he thinks he keeps orthodox morality.\"\n\n\"He simply hasn't thought of that,\" said Ursula.\n\nMuriel found a marker and shut her book.  Her motions suggested that\nshe was about to open a conversation, but she did not speak at once,\nthough she put her book down and stretched herself out in her chair.\nBut at last she spoke deliberately.\n\n\"Dear,\" she said, \"I know what you think about all that....  Now Paul's\nin love with you, whether he knows it or whether he doesn't.\"  (A\nlittle pause.)  \"You know it anyway.  Also you're high priestess of his\nnew religion.\"\n\nShe stopped.  She seemed to think the other would say something, but\nthat was not Ursula's way.  Not for the first time, despite their\nfriendship, Muriel found it irritating.  \"Look here, Ursula,\" she said,\nsitting up, \"what's going to happen when he does begin to think about\nmorality?\"\n\nA look grew in Ursula's face.  Her friend studied her intently.  \"I\nsay, Ursie,\" she said, but in a changed softened tone, \"it's playing\nwith fire.  Paul's not quite an ordinary man.\"\n\nUrsula made no direct reply.  But the other understood her.  \"He's like\na person who has glimpsed Paradise through the bars,\" she said.\n\n\"Yes?\" queried Muriel.\n\n\"The gate's open,\" said Ursula simply, as the men came back.\n\n\n\n(2)\n\nBut Paul was to fulfil Muriel's prediction sooner than she expected.\nThe little _Gaika_ meandered in her slow and steady way down the Red\nSea.  At the close of a sweltering day, she drew into Port Sudan, and\nit was at Port Sudan that Paul Kestern began first to think about\nmorality in the light of his opened eyes.  It happened this way.\n\nThe three were sitting over coffee in the saloon when the Major, who\nhad finished earlier and had gone up on deck, re-entered and crossed\nover to them.  \"I say,\" he said, \"the skipper says we shall be here all\nnight and can go ashore if we like.  You three care to come?\"\n\n\"By Jove, yes,\" cried Paul excitedly, jumping up.\n\n\"It's a dull place, you know,\" said the Major, as if it were his duty\nto apologise for it.  \"A wharf, a railway station and sand, mostly.\nBut it's rather interestin'.  It's going to be the main port for\nKhartoum and Upper Egypt one day.\"\n\n\"Is there nothing else to see but sand, Major?\" queried Muriel, smiling.\n\n\"Oh, there are some native stores, Miss Lister, and an hotel where we\ncan get a drink.  And it will be cool on shore in the night air.\"\n\n\"That settles it,\" said the girl.  \"Coming, Ursie?\"\n\n\"Rather,\" said Ursula.\n\n\"Hurrah,\" cried Paul.  \"Shall I get your scarves?\"\n\nIt was necessary to row across the harbour in a native boat.  The men\nhanded the girls in and sat beside them on the rough seats.  A \"boy\" in\na red fez, with his shirt hanging loose over his cotton drawers, who\nwas to act as guide, directed operations.  Two grinning negroes, their\nmuscles knotted beneath their flimsy vests, drove the boat over the\ndark waters with long sweeps of oars.  There was no moon, but the stars\ngave a soft light.  And as the blunt prow cut the sea, a thousand\nmolten ripples broke in little waves left and right, silver streamers\nmelted into the darkness on either side, while the blades of the oars\nturned up liquid fire.  Every little drop that fell from them was a\ndiamond of light.  As they looked over the side, gleaming flights of\nliving silver gems of fish fled before their approach.  Over the black\nwaters ahead, shone a yellow flicker or two from lanterns on the quay.\n\nThey landed, laughing and joking, and found themselves on a roadway\nthat was, as the Major had said, all sand, except for granite\ncurbstones that ran ahead into the night and marked its course.  Now\nand again, a board announced the site of a church or hotel; and at a\ncross-road in the waste, building operations had been begun for a big\nshop, a theatre and a restaurant.\n\n\"Piccadilly Circus here,\" said Jardine, \"all in good time!\"\n\n\"Which way now?\" laughed Muriel.\n\n\"Down towards those lights.  There are makeshift stores there, and the\nnative quarter.  I expect we might find a native caf\u00e9 and music hall\ngoing strong.\"\n\n\"What fun,\" said Ursula.  \"Lead on, Major.\"\n\nTheir guide jabbered in Swahili and Jardine interpreted.  \"He says\nthere's a theatre,\" he said smiling, \"if the ladies care to see it.\"\n\n\"A theatre!\" ejaculated Paul.  \"Heavens above!  What in the world do\nthey show here?\"\n\n\"There'll be a cinematograph,\" said the Major judicially, \"and a band,\nand dances, and songs screeched loud enough to drown even the band.  We\nmight look in.  If it's a bit too much for the ladies, we can leave.\"\n\nAs if in ready answer, the sound of a chorus was borne on the night air\nto them.  The party stood still and stared at each other.  Then they\nbroke into mutual laughter.  There was no mistaking it: Africa was\nsinging in what it called English: \"I'm a bro-ken doll.\"\n\n\"Come on, come on,\" cried Paul, recovering himself.  \"We shall miss\nhalf the fun.\"\n\n\"Oh, no, we shan't,\" said Jardine.  \"Take it easy, for goodness' sake.\nThey'll keep it up till morning, especially as there's a ship in.\"\n\nAs they approached, the glares and shadowy buildings ahead resolved\nthemselves into more recognisable objects.  They stopped at length on\nthe edge of a crowd that was sitting at trestle tables in a half-light\nthat faded into the dark night around.  Everyone was looking towards a\nbig ramshackle building that held out an open-air stage.  Kerosine\nflares and oil lamps illuminated it.  A band, in tattered crimson\ntunics, blared and beat below, but rather out of the way to the right\nto permit of the artistes descending into the auditorium, and on it, at\nthe moment, a stout dark-haired Greek woman was singing.  Her voice\nreached them only at intervals, for, harsh and loud and discordant as\nit was, the band beat it most of the time.  Suddenly, with a gesture,\nshe commanded the chorus.  The audience took it up.  Ragged\nAfricans--Sudanese, Fellahin, Swahilis; Indians, and half-castes;\nfrowsy Greeks and Levantines; and a sprinkling of white-ducked, more\nrespectable looking, but distinctly dark Europeans; they all sang,\nshouted, beat time.  It was obviously a popular item.  Ursula laughed\nheartily.  \"Oh,\" she cried, \"how priceless!  Can't we go nearer the\nstage and sit down, Major?\"\n\nJardine looked doubtful.  \"Oh, I don't know,\" he said.\n\nBut the guide had caught some of the English words.  \"Seet down?\" he\nqueried.  \"Yas, sar.  Plenty room up there.  Missy, come thees way.\"\n\n\"Right,\" said Ursula, smiling.  \"Lead on, Jacob.\"\n\nThe boy showed all his white teeth.  \"Me Abdullah, mees,\" he said.\n\"You follow me.\"\n\n\"For goodness' sake, keep to the other side of the band,\" urged Muriel.\n\nThe boy leading, the girls following, the Major and Paul were bound to\ngo.  Paul was eager enough.  Jardine was less ready, and, with some\nknowledge, more apprehensive.  \"Good God, Kestern,\" he said, \"this is\nmore than I bargained for.  You never know what you're in for here.\"\n\nIt was impossible, however, to draw back easily now.  The proprietor\nhimself, an oiled smiling Syrian in evening dress, had come forward.\nWith a magnificent gesture, he indicated a small table for four on the\nleft, and waved Abdullah into the surrounding blackness.  Jardine\nnodded to some ship's officers at a little distance, and seemed more\nrelieved when he saw a sprinkling of women about them and even a group\nof ladies from the ship on the edge of the shadows.  But they were too\nnoticeably prominent for his liking.  It was too late to move, however,\nand he bowed to the inevitable, giving orders for drinks to the Indian\nwaiter, but with audible misgivings over that.\n\n\"I'll order wine,\" he said.  \"We can see that the cork hasn't been\ntampered with, and that's less likely to poison you than anything else.\"\n\n\"You're mighty cheerful, Major,\" laughed Muriel.\n\n\"Well, Miss Lister, we're in for it now, anyway.  Don't blame me.\"\n\n\"I wouldn't have missed it for the world,\" put in Paul\nenthusiastically.  \"By Jove, Ursula, just look at that band!  Did you\never see anything more comic in your life?\"\n\nPaul shortly forgot the stage, or nearly so.  It was the audience that\ninterested him, and the great glow of light that lost itself in the\nblack desert about and shone on strange Eastern faces that came and\nwent on the shadow-line of its edge.  It was unusual, too, to sit with\nthat fantastic noise in one's ears and yet to be able to look out to\nthe silence yonder under the serene stars.  There were two\nsemi-European women at a table near, also, to whom his eyes constantly\nif surreptitiously returned.  Fat, bulging, in tawdry lace and\nimitation jewels, they were nevertheless smiling, gay, human, he\nthought, and one of them kept a motherly eye on a child of seven or\neight in a sailor suit who would wander from her side.  He leant\nforward to draw Ursula's attention to them.  And then he saw that her\neyes were fixed on the stage.\n\nInto the garish light, heralded with clashing cymbals, advanced three\nAfrican girls with elaborately dressed woolly hair, thick rouged lips,\nbright laughing eyes.  Their legs and feet were bare.  Short coloured\nskirts reached only to the knee, and scarcely to that.  Above the waist\nthey wore only tiny bodices of vivid colour, red and yellow, which were\nbound tightly across breasts firmly outlined beneath them.  Gaudy\nnecklaces of beads and coins sparkled around their necks, and a host of\njingling bangles decorated their bare arms.  Each carried a tambourine,\nand to the accompaniment of native drums, they postured and danced.\n\nIt was no more than a _danse du ventre_, but it was at least a new\nexperience for Paul.\n\nA tense stillness settled gradually down on the audience, it seemed to\nhim.  The edge of the broken irregular circle of light filled up with\nfaces, a grey and black wall of them, a fence of gleaming staring eyes.\nThe drums beat in a wild rhythm, and shrill native pipes broke in.\nWilder and wilder grew the dance.  The protuberant posturings, the\nvoluptuous writhings of which he hardly guessed the meaning, the\nextraordinary wheelings in swift steps during which the three\nperformers shook their heavy buttocks brazenly at the gazing crowd,\nglancing over their shoulders the while, were abandoned for more\nreckless tossing of arms and legs, more shrill, more cacophonous music.\nPaul grew white.  The Major leaned over towards the ladies.  \"Er--er,\"\nhe stammered, red-faced.  \"I think perhaps it's getting late.  Hadn't\nwe better be going?\"\n\n\"Certainly,\" said Muriel, getting up at once.  Paul followed suit.\n\n\"Wait till this is over,\" said Ursula, coolly.  \"You can't leave in the\nmiddle of a turn.\"\n\nPaul moistened his lips.\n\nAnd then, from the wings, into the blaze and noise, danced a swift\nfigure.  The girl was perhaps an Abyssinian with maybe French blood in\nher veins;--she was known at any rate to the crowd who cheered as one\nman and shouted her name.  Regularly featured, superbly framed, her\nraven-black hair flowed loose about her, crowned with a scarlet flower.\nHer skirt was diaphanous and spangled; a sort of loose white scarf was\nheld by a clasp between her breasts but floated in a cloud around her\nas she moved.  Her shapely back bare, her curved and lithesome body\nfirm, her twinkling little feet light, her colour too was at any rate\nwhite by comparison with the previous performers.  The barbaric clamour\nof music died down.  The three negro girls collapsed on one side.  The\naudience subsided with tense expectancy.  She danced in silence and\nalone.\n\nShe utterly held her audience.  Born of mixed parentage, better not\nnamed, where, how, God knows, probably she was dirty, certainly she was\nas coarse, as savage, as animal, as she well could be.  But she held\nher audience.  She weaved a spell of romance, of poetry, of magic,\nthere, in those garish lights and in that rough rude place.  She was\nincarnate grace, and she was lovely, say what you would.  Entreating,\nforbidding, abandoning, desiring, she was wild pagan love.  The\nnegresses, too, had danced a passion that had grown old, very, very\nold, a forced, a thought-out thing; she danced passion, but the passion\nof the Song of Songs, of Dionysus young in Attic fields, of youth\nitself.  And as she finished, she disengaged her flower with a swift\nmovement from her hair, and tossed it to--Paul.\n\nHe caught it instinctively.  And then he realised that he had caught\nit.  He held it in his fingers, felt its stem firm between them, and\nknew that he was himself and awake.  He realised that he had been\nstanding and that the four of them were in a prominent position.  He\nrealised, too, that he had been charmed against his will, caught away,\nand that his face had shown it; that she had seen it; that she had, in\nher wanton way, chosen him....  He uttered an exclamation and dropped\nthe bloom.\n\n\"For God's sake, let's get out,\" said Jardine, somewhere.  Lights swam\nbefore Paul.  He heard dimly a burst of cheering, voices speaking in a\nmoment of less noise, a little laughter, then more cheers.  He stumbled\namong chairs.  Perspiration stood on him so that he fumbled for his\nhandkerchief to wipe his face.  His brain cleared a little in doing so.\nHe saw a bloated face that leered up from a table and realised that the\nman was speaking to him.  With his hasty gesture of refusal, his brain\ncleared a little more, and he began to understand.  He began to\nunderstand, above all, how and why he had liked the dance.\n\nThey were outside an infinity later and walking through the cool night.\nHe glanced down, still rather stupidly, feeling his feet on sand, and\nsaw that his shoes were covered with it, and the black turned-up ankles\nof his evening trousers.  Looking ahead, he saw Jardine was on in front\nwith Muriel.  He turned his head to steal a glance at Ursula, and cried\nout on the instant.\n\n\"Ursula!  You're wearing it!\"\n\n\"Why not?  You dropped it rather rudely.\"\n\nHe marvelled at her level voice.  She was perfectly cool, he noticed,\nlooking straight ahead in her direct way as they walked.  And the\nflower was a trumpet-shaped hibiscus that burned in the opening of her\nevening frock even against the white skin of her neck.  He suddenly\nunderstood his confused memories.  They had laughed at him, and cheered\nher when she had picked it up.\n\n\"Give it me, Ursula!\" he cried.  \"Throw it away!  You can't wear it!\"\n\n\"Why ever not?\"\n\n\"Well, she ... That girl!\"  Then, swiftly, with a kind of brazen anger:\n\"She was practically naked!\"\n\n\"Yes.  She had one of the most lovely bodies I've ever seen.\"  Ursula\nturned her head and looked up at him with a faint twinkle of amusement\nin her eyes.\n\n\"But--but----\"  Paul stammered for words.  Yet even so, the girl by his\nside, with her serene smile, began to master his excitement by her mere\ncool presence.  \"But, Ursula, it was a disgraceful thing.\"\n\n\"Oh?  You didn't seem to think so while you watched.  Personally, I\nthought it was wonderfully beautiful.\"\n\n\"But in that place!\"\n\n\"Exactly.  Like a fresh flower on a dust-heap.  Naturally I picked up\nher gift.\"\n\n\"But you can't justify it,\" he protested in bewilderment that grew with\nevery sentence.  \"It was grossly immoral.\"\n\n\"Immoral?\"\n\n\"Yes.  You know it.\"  Paul was emphatic.\n\n\"What was immoral then?  The flower?  The dust-heap?  The girl's body?\nThe dance?  Ugly or beautiful, perhaps, but immoral?  What do you mean?\"\n\n\"Well, it appealed to the worst passions in everyone, to the animal in\nus, in--in me.\"\n\n\"It appealed to you sensually no doubt.  Your mind, informed by your\nsenses, appreciated the animal grace and beauty.  Why not?  Are animals\nimmoral?\"\n\n\"That was a girl though, a human being, a--a----\"\n\n\"And isn't a girl an animal?  Are you and I not animals?\"\n\n\"We've souls anyway.\"\n\n\"Are you so sure animals haven't souls?  How do you know?  What is a\nsoul, Paul?\"\n\n\"A soul?\" queried Paul.  \"Well...\"  (He stumbled desperately.)  \"The\nimmortal part of us, the home of the spirit, a bit of God.\"\n\n\"God?\"\n\nHer tone instantly arrested him.  There, in the night, picking their\nway down the road-to-be over the sand of the desert, the blare of the\nmusic behind them in the distance, he was arrested again.  He was quick\nenough to see it with the swiftness of thought.  God!  Everything came\nback to God.  And where was God?  And if there was no God, where was\nmorality?\n\nUrsula put her hand on his arm.  It was rather like Chanctonbury all\nover again, he thought instantly, and smiled involuntarily at the\nthought.  Here, in Egypt, in the whirl of new experience, her touch on\nhis arm brought back the song of the lark and the vision of the English\nsun on the fields and woods round Steyning.  And she knew it.\n\n\"You old dear,\" she said.  \"What about the beggar's clay?  Is clay\nmagical in plants and flowers, and sinful in human bodies?\"\n\n\"But that sort of thing outrages the moral law,\" he objected, soberly.\n\nShe laughed a very little.  \"Has God spoken His laws so clearly, Paul?\"\nshe said.  \"I thought you had come to the conclusion that He was rather\nsilent.\"\n\n\"But there must be a moral law!  Why, good heavens...\"\n\n\"Then where is the moral Lawgiver?\" she demanded, instantly.\n\n_Where is the moral Lawgiver?_\n\n\"Where!\"  The word echoed in his consciousness, and he knew that he had\nno answer.  Tramping over the sand, tramping through the night, he saw\nto what he had come, or thought he saw.  Thus soon was Muriel answered.\n\nUrsula laughed a little again.  \"Poor old Paul,\" she said.  \"Look here,\ndear, the girl gave us the best she had to give, and what she gave had\nreal beauty.  Isn't that enough for you and me?\"\n\nHe made no answer, and they walked a little further in silence.  Then\nher hand on his arm tightened.  \"Doesn't the blind beggar see?\" she\nqueried, smiling up at him in the dark.\n\n\"I'm not quite sure, Ursula,\" he said.\n\n\"There is clay that has not touched his eyes then,\" she replied gently.\n\nPaul caught her hand.  A glimmer of her meaning danced before him, but\nas a whole it still eluded him as yet.  It eluded him, but there was\nsomething in her voice that made his blood run swift and hot as it had\nbut just now in the _caf\u00e9 chantant_.  \"Ursula, darling,\" he whispered.\n\nShe checked him.  \"You see, Paul,\" she said gently, \"you were angry not\nbecause she was probably half a slave, or ill-treated, or ignorant, or\nas like as not solely out for your money.  You didn't think of those\nthings.  No, you were angry because she was naked.  _That_ was beastly,\nimmoral--that being what she was she gloried in her body and her grace.\nWell, it was not beastly to me, especially in her.  What else had she\nto glory in?  Why should she not have gloried in her body?  Is a\nbeautiful body beastly?  She danced natural passion--is natural passion\nimmoral?  I cannot follow your theology.  She was lovely and she gave\nus her best, and--well, I was glad to be able to thank her for it.\"\n\nPaul's grip tightened on her hand.  \"Why, Ursula,\" he said huskily, \"it\nwas I who was beastly, priggish----\"\n\nShe shrugged her shoulders.  Then she laughed lightly.  \"Let that\npass,\" she said.  \"Will you wear your flower now?\"\n\n\"Give it me,\" cried Paul.\n\nShe peered up at him.  Then she loosened her hand and took the bloom\nfrom her dress.  \"Here it is,\" she said, presenting it.\n\nHe held it in his fingers a moment or two, studying its fresh\nloveliness in the dim starlight.  Its faint scent came to his nostrils.\nShe stood smiling and looking at him.\n\nHe looked up suddenly.  \"May I drop it in the sea as we row back?\" he\nasked.\n\nShe read in his eyes what he meant, and if he had not been quite so\nblind and stupid and seeming rich he would have read in hers that the\ngate of Paradise stood open before him, as she had said to Muriel.  But\nshe saw that he had not read that yet, and if she was not quite\ncontent, she was at least very wise.  \"Because the sea is cool and\nlovely?\" she asked.\n\n\"And forgiving,\" he said.\n\nShe nodded, understanding.\n\n\n\n(3)\n\nPaul told himself as he went to sleep that he would ask Ursula to marry\nhim in the morning.  But he did not.  He may have been at one time a\nbudding evangelist and he was certainly now a poet, but he was still\nthe son of Claxted, and he found it hard to escape from all that that\nmeant.  He had ideas as to proposals, and this was a serious proposal\nof marriage.  He waited his chance, then; and missed a good many\nthrough waiting to be quite sure that the right moment had indeed come.\nThus and thus is it ever likely to be, even when we sleepers awake, and\nall roads lead to \"Nowhere.\"\n\nBut in Zanzibar he had his way.  Aden came and went, and Kilindini, and\nthat first walking through tropical bush to the old fort by the sea\nthat has dreamed so many hundred years away since the remnant of its\nPortuguese garrison was crucified on its walls.  Not even in Mombasa,\nsitting on the shore at the entrance of the river, did he speak, for\nthere is a golf links of sorts hard by and the Major and Muriel were\ngoing round.  Even more wonderfully, not even that night at sea did he\nspeak, though the surface was like a sheet of polished dark glass that\nnow and again shivered into an untellable pool of liquid silver as a\nschool of flying fish shattered its quietude into phosphorescent fire.\nYet, possibly, his silence then was not so wonderful after all.  It was\nsuch a night of wonder that he could hardly speak at all, even although\nhe thought himself in love.\n\nZanzibar, however, sufficed.  Here they were to leave the Major, and\nhere, naturally, he showed them round before they sailed.  He had a\nbungalow out past Mnazi Mmoja, before the barracks, overlooking the\nsea, and his car met him at the landing-stage.  So they were driven\nslowly past the front of the Sultan's palace and through the native\ntown to the tidal creek that washes the base of Livingstone's house\ntwice a day; up the creek road then, past the English Cathedral with\nits tall thin spire rising above what was once the whipping-post of the\nslave market, rising out of a sea of scarlet-flowering flamboyants that\nsurround it and were in full bloom to greet them; up the road that\nskirts the English Games Club; past the German Club; past the cemetery\nwhere waxen frangipanni and purple bougainvillaea shed their blossoms\nthe perpetual summer.  Down a private way to the right now, and there,\non a grassy knoll fronting the sea-beach, a grove of palms behind, the\nstill strait across which lay the hills of Africa in a haze before,\nstood Major Jardine's bungalow.\n\nThey had but the day and the evening, and the Major suggested a run\nacross the island to the beach at Chuaka where the surf of the Indian\nOcean beats all day and a cool wind blows even in the hot season.\nZanzibar, he said, was but a bigger Mombasa so far as the native town\nwent, but nowhere else on the coast would you find tangle of banana and\norange and lime and coconut and mango and almond and areca and date,\nwith here and there a grove of cassuarinas or cloves, to match this.\nHe was right.  They skirted the banks of low swampy rivers lovely with\nblue water-lilies and reeds and scarlet dragon-flies; ran through\nplantations of grey austere coconut trees through which the sunlight\ntrickled down on to thin sparse olive grass; left clusters of brown\nhuts set in small patches of delicately-leaved red-stemmed muhoga;\nclimbed the two hundred feet of the Liliputian hill of coral that makes\nthe backbone of the island; came out on to that plain at its summit\nwhere English bracken grows and a sweet yellow shrub that might, at a\ndistance, be English gorse; and descended at last through groves of\norange trees, the fruit scattered in lavish profusion on the very road,\nto the collector's house at Chuaka.\n\nHe was a polite Goanese, and he made them tea, serving them himself on\nhis barazza which was hung out from the first floor over the very beach\nbeneath, where the white coral sand glistened in the sun and the surf\nbeat in perpetually.  Thereafter they strolled off, theoretically to\nlook for shells, though no one did much looking: Jardine because he did\nnot care for shells; Muriel because, after her kind, she wanted\nhonestly to reach a distant point and see what lay beyond; Ursula\nbecause she was utterly entranced by the stretch of the foreshore, with\nthe riot of vegetation ever invading the sands and ever, in its\noutposts of mangrove, the very sea itself; and Paul because he was\nbeginning to realise that he cared about collecting nothing except\nUrsula.  Muriel and the Major were thus soon out of sight.  Ursula and\nPaul, having wasted half an hour watching the antics of a naked kiddie\nin a miniature outrigger canoe which he finally ran ashore with\nconsummate ease and made fast with the skill of an ancient mariner,\nfound a great mass of coral rock which overhung a pool that was one\nenchanted garden of colour and life.  They both waded in till Ursula\nhad her skirts high above her knees, and Paul's uprolled trousers\nshowed a good couple of inches of soaked territory.\n\n\"Look!\" she cried.  \"Paul, do you see that sea-urchin?  Look!  In\nthere.  Oh, my dear, do you see its spines?  Satiny brown, spotted with\nblue and red.  Could you get it?\"\n\n\"If I die in the attempt,\" said Paul manfully, giving a fresh tug to\nhis trousers and moving cautiously forward.  Here was promise of the\nClaxted vivarium at last!\n\n\"Good lord, this coral,\" he groaned.  \"Why don't some of the blighters\nwho write about African seas say coral is as sharp as--ugh!--needles!\"\nHe reached forward at length and plunged his arm deep into the pool.\n\n\"Oh, go on,\" laughed Ursula, \"another inch....  Your trousers don't\nmatter.  That's it....  Got it?\"\n\n\"Damn!\" cried Paul.  \"Oh, I say I'm sorry, but those spines are sharp.\nLor, I'm soaked.  But there, just look at him.  Look at him trying to\nwalk on my hand.  Come on out, and let's put him in shallow water and\nwatch him move.\"\n\nThey bent together over the lovely thing and watched it walk slowly but\npurposefully away.  And while they stood there, motionless, barefoot,\nside by side on the sand in some six inches or so of the warm water, a\nfleet of tiny sky-blue fish invaded the shallows.  Ursula caught Paul's\nhand, and there they stood, hardly daring to breathe, while the little\nliving fragments of sapphire poked their tiny noses about their toes.\nThen, suddenly, Paul laughed tempestuously, and they fled.\n\n\"Oh, you rotter,\" cried Ursula, smiling at him.  \"They'll never come\nagain.\"\n\n\"I couldn't help it,\" said Paul a little ruefully, stooping to rub his\nfoot.  \"That fellow was actually bedding down between my foot and\nyours, and he tickled so.\"\n\n\"Well, anyway, we've got to put on shoes and stockings now.  It'll be\nsunset in next to no time.  Paul, did you ever imagine anything quite\nas lovely as all this?\"\n\nPaul stood, and let his gaze wander around.  There was not a soul to be\nseen in the curve of the bay in which they were.  A little way off, the\noutrigger, rough-hewn and brown, lay on its side.  King crabs were\nbeginning to emerge from their holes in the sand and stand on their\nspidery legs and survey the evening world from their castles of eyes.\nFar out at sea feathery pink clouds were floating down to a barred\nhorizon of emerald and gold.  All around and about them a soft light\nglowed from which the fierce vividness of the day had died away.\n\nHe turned and put his arm in hers.  \"Let's sit in the outrigger and put\non our things,\" he said.\n\nThey sat side by side, and Paul was aware again, as he had been lately,\nof the girl's loveliness.  Unconcerned, gaily, she towelled her feet on\nhis handkerchief, drew on her stockings, fastened them, smoothed down\nher skirt.  She finished before him, since she had dried first, and sat\nwaiting for a second or two, her face resting on her hands, her eyes on\nthe ever-deepening sunset colours.  He too finished, and followed her\ngaze seawards.\n\nThen: \"Do you want anything more than that?\" she asked softly.\n\nAnd at her question Paul understood quite suddenly.\n\nAbsurdly enough, knowledge came to him just then, like a revelation.\nThere was no apparent reason why it should not have come before, and he\ndid not move for a little pondering his dulness and the surpassing\nwonder of things.  For this awakening was not a bit as he had imagined\nsuch things would be.  He was not excited or passionate, not now at any\nrate.  He wanted indeed to touch her, but tenderly, he could scarcely\ntell himself how tenderly.  He put his arm gently about her waist.\n\"Yes, Ursula, you, you,\" he whispered.\n\nShe turned with a swift movement and faced him.  \"I!\" she cried, her\neyes alight, \"I!\"\n\nThen, for Paul Kestern and Ursula Manning, for both of them, the\nkingdoms of this world and the glory of them passed away, and there was\nvision of a new heaven and a new earth.\n\nAfter a little, Paul disengaged himself from her arms.  There was an\nodd expression of wonder written on his face, very plain to see.\nUrsula tried to read it, but was puzzled.  \"What is it, Paul darling?\"\nshe whispered.\n\n\"Why,\" he said slowly, \"do you know what I was thinking?  All my years\nof worry and doubt, all that talk about religion----\"  He broke off.\n\n\"Yes?\"\n\nHe hesitated.  Then he laughed merrily like a child and flung his arms\nabout her again, eagerly, boisterously.  \"Of course,\" he managed to say\nat last, \"it was all awfully important.  _Really, truly_, Ursula.\"\n\n\n\n\nPrinted in Great Britain by Billing and Sons, Limited, Guildford and\nEsher.","title":"Peradventure; or, The Silence of God","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":101131}