Chapter I

/T~AHE street of Medhurst Village resembles that •*• of the mean average of English villages throughout the land: that is to say that it has specimens of the architecture of about eight hundred years, from the Norman church on the left, in the middle, to the corrugated-iron roofs of the twentieth century covering the ricks, in the suburb on the right. It can look, therefore, exceedingly beautiful or exceedingly dreary, according to the place where one stands to view it.

On this June morning it ought to have looked exceedingly beautiful to Lady Beatrice Medd as she stood in the gate of the Home Farm, looking up past the church, with her Bath-chair, drawn by an Egyptian donkey, waiting behind her. Only she was thinking about something else.

The village ran at the bottom of a shallow valley. Behind Lady Beatrice and the farm-yard were the kitchen gardens, the glass houses, and the park. Opposite her was the village inn, and the Medd Arms swinging from an iron scroll-work bracket that was hung in front; and through the open doors she could see the June flowers in the garden beyond; and down, away to the left, ran the street — here a row of " magpie " houses, dating from Tudor days; there a red-brick Queen Anne house, standing back, with a little strip of greenery in front, as if in a mood of staid and modest gentility, with a roof like that of a chapel appearing behind; then a row of thatched cottages, half hidden under the giant flowers that towered before them. All this was on the opposite side of the road from the Home Farm; on this side, the churchyard wall began immediately, over which looked the church-tower, like a tall, high-shouldered man, peeping. And then the road curved and disappeared towards the school and the farmer's house and the vicarage. The June sun lay hot and bright on road and house and trees and flowers.

Lady Beatrice, it has been said, was thinking of something else than the view. Besides, she had seen it a thousand times before. It was her custom, once or twice a week at least, if the weather was respectable, to come down here in- her donkey-carriage, and talk to the bailiff, or inspect the orchid-house, or visit the school (which, by the way, she almost entirely financed). She loved the leisurely sense of business and responsibility that it all gave her; and there was often, honestly, something for her to do. This morning she was undecided. She had told the schoolmistress on Sunday that she might be looking in to-day; yet she felt disinclined to go. Two or three ideas floated through her quiet mind; and, meantime, she stood, her parasol resting on her shoulder, watching the infinitesimal drama of the village street.

First there came a tight-breeched cyclist, crouched like a great ape over his low handle-bars, striding up past the church; he eyed the great lady standing there as he came near, seemed inclined to ask her a question, and then thought better of it. He dismounted at the inn opposite and went in; and presently could be descried in the dark little open-windowed parlour on the right, tilting a long glass to his mouth. Lady Beatrice hoped he was enjoying himself....

Then out of the inn door came a fat white dog that reminded her of dear Jimbo, long ago laid to rest under the cedar in the garden, with a Latin inscription, designed by Professor Macintosh, over him. This one came out with the same assured and proprietary air, barked sullenly once at Lady Beatrice, just to tell her he was there, and then lay down on the cobble-stones in the shadow, to keep an eye on her. She could hear, all across the road, the grunt of pleasure (or was it rheumatics?) with which he plumped himself down. Probably he had been disturbed by the tight-breeched cyclist who was now sitting in a chair and smoking.

Then came a procession of fowls round the corner of the inn, through an open wicket gate. Obviously they were doing wrong, for they walked with an air compounded of expectancy, timidity, and defiance. A cock came first, fiery-eyed and high-stepping, once or twice stooping hastily to pick at the ground, and immediately straightening himself, as if he were some great man caught in a moment of weakness, and challenging criticism; he was followed by four homely hens, who picked with more abandon and eyed the world with less. She saw the cock pause suddenly in his progress with uplifted claw, and then dart back to lead the retreat, as a girl came out of the inn door and seized a birch-broom to demonstrate with.

The girl then bobbed to Lady Beatrice and went to shut the gate.

" Good morning, Alice."

" Good morning, m'lady."

" Father and mother well? "

" Yes, m'lady; and thank you."

Then the dog barked again; and the Vicar came out of the churchyard gate on the right, with his coat-tails flying behind him. He had just finished reading the Morning Prayer and Litany, and was preparing to go to the school. (Morning Prayer and Litany were at eleven, on Wednesdays and Fridays, Lady Beatrice remembered.) He took off his hat.

" Good morning, Mr. Arbuthnot."

" Good morning, Lady Beatrice."

He was a pleasant, fervent man who worked hard, and thought the Lady Bountiful a little unsympathetic. He himself was Oxford and Cuddesdon; and she was of a strongly Evangelical stock. He was exceedingly active, and read Matins and Evensong every day, and had a Guild of St. Mary for females and a Guild of St. George for males, and suffered secretly and intensely from the presence of Father Maple in the village. He had had a list of the vicars of Medhurst Village, from Thomas de Hoppe of 1493 down to James Arbuthnot of 1891, engraved in brass, and erected in the church porch, soon after Father Maple's arrival, without the least hint that anything whatever had been tended to break the line about the years 1 540 or 1560 A.D. He spoke of him always as the " Roman " priest, or when he was not quite well, as the " Romish clergyman." But he was a good-hearted and sincere man, and did his best under discouraging circumstances. And he never was uncharitable or bitter, beyond the requirements of strict odium theologicum.

" I've been thinking how nice the village looks this morning," said Lady Beatrice, who had not previously thought anything at all about it. " I suppose you are on your way to the schools? "

" Well, I generally go about this time."

r< Will you give me your arm as far as that then? I said I would look in myself this morning."

They talked, as they went slowly up the street, about this and that and the other. Lady Beatrice said that she really thought that it was time for Alice-of-the-Inn to go out to service; it wasn't good for young girls, etc., etc. And the Vicar said that he had been speaking to Mr. Jeaffreson himself (tenant of the " Medd Arms ") only last Friday on the subject, and that that parent of Alice had given his formal consent; but that Mrs. Jeaffreson still remained to be persuaded. Perhaps Lady Beatrice herself would, etc., etc. It was just that pleasant, kindly, paternal talk of the Great Powers who were beginning to wonder how much longer their absolute domination would continue.

Then they reached the school door. As they entered a loud female voice cried, " Stand "; and then, " Say, ' Good morning, my lady; good morning, sir/ '... And so the Great Powers were saluted; and both sides were pleased: the one by a sense of fitting homage and respect, the other by a visible reassurance that there were such things as Dominations and Authorities still in existence, who walked with men.

(n)

She came out alone, ten minutes later, assuring the Vicar that she could get back unaided, and went slowly down the street. When she came opposite the church she hesitated. Then she turned and limped in.

Churches on weekday mornings are apt to look chilly and unreal, even rather repellent; there is a curious smell about them too, reminiscent of restraint and of Sunday mornings; and the Prayer Books in the pews look desolate. One is tempted — I do not know why — to be profane and worldly when one finds oneself alone in one — to mount the pulpit and gesticulate in dumb show, to pretend to go to sleep in a pew, and to behave generally like a vulgar boy. (Probably it arises from a sense that the tables are turned, and that for once Solemnity is at one's mercy, instead of the other way about. )

Lady Beatrice, it need hardly be said, did none of these things. She limped up the aisle into the Medd chapel, and sat down in the dusky, smelly splendour, beneath the banners and the hatchments. She had not come to pray; but she had an idea that she could think here more detachedly than at home.

It was about ten minutes before she moved, and then it was with a sudden start at the sound of a piano. Very delicately and sweetly the music came in here — some grave and humorous gavotte by a German master, scholarly, melancholy, academic, and yet with soft laughter in it too. Little positive phrases asserted themselves solemnly, then turned head over heels, chuckled, and vanished. It sounded like a light argument by wits round a dinner-table in the open air. The wind was very still in the village this morning, and the music came in, obviously from the Queen Anne house just opposite, as clear as if played in the churchyard itself.

She listened, charmed in spite of herself, fixing her eyes on the communion-table, gay with its brass vases, its painted brass cross and candlesticks hung with pious emblems on shields. Overhead a few scraps of really old glass — a broken crucifix, two headless saints, and some detached black-letters - pieced together reverently by the modern successor to Thomas de Hoppe, let the sunlight through. The other windows were not so fortunate. Opposite the entrance, for example, a green Elijah in a blue chariot, ascended amid purple flames, resembling streams of cherry sauce, towards a heaven that consisted entirely of Gothic crockets and pinnacles.

Still she listened, and still the music went on. She began mechanically to read some of the inscriptions with which the chapel walls bulged so thickly. Here was an urn and a broken column, and a list of virtues: she had smiled before now at the sentence with which it ended: " In short, he was endued with every virtue that could grace the Christian or adorn the man." (That was old Christopher Medd, who had a family of seventeen children — "ob. 1734.") There was a brass to Anthony Medd, who had fought and died at Naseby; there, a plain marble slab to John Valentine Medd.... She looked at them, listening to the music. Then, as it ended, she got up and went out, passed across the street, and rang the bell at the Queen Anne house.

" Is Father Maple at home? " she said.

Lady Beatrice Medd was honestly, except for her very distinguished appearance and her history, not a very interesting woman. She was as good as gold; she was conscientious and domestic, rather religious in her own way, perfectly honourable, perfectly fearless. But her worst enemy could not have called her subtle, nor her best friend, imaginative. She had instincts which she usually followed, and gravely justified to herself afterwards. She had her joys, which she took tranquilly, as of right; and sorrows, which she bore stoically, like a very intelligent animal, without resentment or indignation. In a word, she was an absolutely perfect success in her station. Certainly she had rather dull things to do; but then she was rather dull herself, to compensate.

It was one of those above-mentioned sorrows and one of those instincts that sent her across now to Father Maple's house. She would probably not have gone if she had not heard the piano and known it to be his; even though the idea had crossed her mind as she left in the donkey-carriage this morning that she might perhaps look in and ask him to dinner.

It was a very pleasant room into which she was shown by the Irish housekeeper — a long, high room, lined with bookcases, carpetless except for a big mat before the fire-place, with a writing-table between the windows, and a full-sized grand piano in the very middle of the floor. Another little bookcase stood close beside this, with tall shelves filled with music.

" I thought his reverence was here, m'lady.... He must have been after stepping out into the garden. I'll get him."

Lady Beatrice sank down into a chair. Through the windows she could see the side of the tall red-brick chapel, that was an object of such mysterious wonder to the village and of such Christian dislike to the Vicar. In very sardonic moods he called it a " schism-shop.'5

Then the tall window-door was darkened and the little priest came in in his cassock.

First she said, " How do you do? " and then she said she had just looked in to see if he would come to dinner on Thursday. No one would be there, she said, except themselves and her son Val, who came down from Cambridge on that day. And then she said how very nice his music sounded as she sat in the church just now; and what was it that he was playing?

He answered all these remarks suitably: said that he would be delighted to dine on Thursday; and showed her the manuscript from which he had been playing, saying that he had copied it in the British Museum the other day, and believed it to be by Sebastian Bach. He sat down even at the piano, and played a phrase or two over again. She liked him, as she watched him with his serious face and grey hair.

And then she suddenly began her real business.

" Father Maple," she said, " you'll think it very extraordinary of me, but as a matter of fact I want to consult you very much about my son Val."

He made a little murmurous sound of encouragement as he wheeled round on his music-stool.

" I know Roman Catholic priests are supposed to know a great deal about human nature and young men and so on. /.. Well, have you heard anything about our trouble? " (She was in for it now, and plunged boldly.)

" Yes," he said.

" Oh!... Well, I suppose somebody was certain to talk. It's perfectly true, I'm sorry to say. And I can't tell you how strongly his father feels about it all. May I tell you all, from the beginning?"

" Please do."

So she related the story quite adequately, calling Val " poor boy " two or three times, describing the treatment that her husband had decided upon, and ending with her own bewilderment as to what was to be done next. For it seemed to her that Val's letters were very odd and unlike him; they came punctually, but there was no regret in them, and, it seemed, no real affection. He related the most ordinary things of Cambridge, and that was all.

" And I'm not at all sure," she said, " of what's to be done next. His father won't speak of it even to me. I don't think that anything that has ever happened has affected him so much."

Father Maple was quite silent for a minute, and she wondered whether she had done right in coming to him. But he had learned two things since he was a priest: first, that priests are told things which no one else in the world is told; and second, that those who give such confidences in nine cases out of ten do not really want any advice at all — they come simply to relieve their own minds. He waited, therefore, simply to see whether she really wanted him to speak. Then he spoke quite simply.

" I think your treatment of him is very severe, you know."

"Severe! Why "

" I mean that you are forbidding him the one thing that might relieve the strain. To forbid him to talk about it is to drive him back into himself. And I do not see what comfort he is to find there."

" Well, perhaps that is so," she murmured.

" I don't at all mean that it's necessarily the wrong treatment," he went on, smiling. (He was right round on the music-stool now, with one darned elbow resting on the edge of the open piano.) '' You see I hardly know your son. But it's heroic treatment. If he's really fine clay inside, he'll respond, no doubt. But if not — one hardly knows."

" Ah! yes; if not. That's what I want to know."

He evaded.

" Really it's impossible to tell."

" Well, make a gitess at what might happen — the worst, you know."

He looked straight at her, and she noticed the keen, kindly brightness of his eyes.

"If you really want to know — well — I should think he might go to the bad — or to despair, which is the worst/'

It suddenly came over her how very odd this all was — this sudden plunge into intimacy. But the man was as impersonal as a doctor; he seemed quite at his ease, and to think it entirely natural to be consulted and to talk like this. She made- an effort to respond.

" I see; thanks very much. Then you think it dangerous not to allow him to talk? "

He seemed to hint at a shrug with his eyebrows and shoulders. Then he smiled again, and she noticed his white, even teeth.

" Yes, it seems to me dangerous, but not necessarily fatal."

" I wish you'd notice him on Thursday, and let me know what you think. I meant to talk to the Vicar about it, but somehow I've not had an opportunity. And then the Vicar knows him almost too well to judge."

" Certainly. I'll have a talk with him if I can. But, you know, one evening "

She stood up, and he handed her her stick.

" Thank you so much, Father Maple. I'm so glad I came.... Then, on Thursday."

She smiled genially and impulsively as she gave him her hand, with all her great lady's air back again.

Again the feeling that it was all very strange and unconventional came on her as she sat in her donkey-carriage, going slowly up the park and along the garden paths, with the old groom at the donkey's head. She had talked to Father Maple about a dozen times in the whole of her acquaintance with him, and never until to-day had she even dreamed of consulting him about any intimate matters. And yet she was astonished at the way she had felt at her ease with him. She supposed that the reason was that he had not looked surprised, had not hummed or hawed, or put on a professional air; he had been as natural as a surgeon consulted about a rickety child.

And, ah! the rickety child in question!

She could hardly tell when her anxiety had begun, nor even her reasons for it. Yet from the first moment, when she had come in at her husband's call and seen the boy standing there, white and set-faced, a spring had been tapped in her which she scarcely suspected her heart contained — a spring of extraordinary compassion. Her old pride in him was gone, struck dead when she had first read May's letter; all those attributes which by training and birth she had associated with manhood were no longer his; yet in their place she was conscious of an emotion which she had never felt towards her other children. She had been perfectly loyal to her husband's plan — of which, indeed, she had approved— and never in her letters to Val at Cam-bridge had she allowed any unusual emotion to show itself; she wrote of the surfaces of things, of the prospects of the young pheasants, of a fall May had had out riding; and she had received in turn the same kind of letters back with disconcerting promptness. She would probably have snubbed him had he broken the contract, but she was inexplicably troubled by the fact that he had not.... She was just normally unreasonable and inconsistent.

It was this compassion that had made uneasiness possible, so soon as she was able to readjust herself to these new sentiments; and it was an uneasiness for which she could find neither remedy nor explanation. Neither remedy — since she did not dream of speaking to the old General; he felt it all too cruelly; he had sat motionless, evening after evening, for these two months, pretending to read books on things just like Afghanistan, but again and again, she knew very well, thinking of the son who had disgraced him so intimately. Nor explanation, since there was nothing that was not dutiful and ordinary in Val's letters. It was this uneasiness, then, that had gradually melted her reserve and driven her to the very last man to whom, a year ago, she would have thought a confidence possible.

Even now she wondered meditatively at herself. She did not know why she had chosen him; she supposed it must have been the cultivated discreet air of him, or perhaps his music, or perhaps his kindly bright eyes. She felt she had been vaguely disloyal to the Vicar. She must make up for it. Should she ask him, too, to dinner on Thursday?... No; some other day... next week... or the week after.

May met her by the gold-fish fountain under the further cedars.

" What a long time you've been! " said the girl.

" I went into the schools with Mr. Arbuthnot," said Lady Beatrice.