In his heart he cursed Foster for a meddling, cantankerous fanatic.
Rogers broke in. "I must say," he exclaimed in a strange shrill voice like a peac.o.c.k"s, "that I a.s.sociate myself with every word of Canon Foster"s.
Whatever we may pretend in public, the great desire of our hearts is to drive Brandon out of the place. The sooner we do it the better. It should have been done long ago."
Martin spoke. "I"m sorry," he said. "If I had known that this meeting was to be a personal attack on the Archdeacon, I never would have come. I don"t think the diocese has a finer servant than Archdeacon Brandon. I admire him immensely. He has made mistakes. So do we all of course. But I have the highest opinion of his character, his work and his importance here, and I would like every one in the room to know that before we go any further."
"That"s right. That"s right," said Ryle, smiling around nervously upon every one. "Canon Martin is right, don"t you think? I hope n.o.body here will say that I have any ill feeling against the Archdeacon. I haven"t, indeed, and I shouldn"t like any one to charge me with it."
Ronder struck in then, and his voice was so strong, so filled with authority, that every one looked up as though some new figure had entered the room.
"I should like to emphasise at once," he said, "so that no one here or anywhere else can be under the slightest misapprehension, that I will take part in nothing that has any personal animus towards anybody. Surely this is a question of Pybus and Forsyth and of nothing else at all. I have not even anything against Mr. Forsyth; I have never seen him--I wish him all the luck in life. But we are fighting a battle for the Pybus living and for nothing more nor less than that.
"If my own brother wanted that living and was not the right man for it I would fight him. The Archdeacon does not see the thing at present as we do; it is possible that very shortly he may. As soon as he does I"m behind him."
Foster shook his head. "Have it your own way," he said. "Everything"s the same here--always compromise. Compromise! Compromise! I"m sick of the cowardly word. We"ll say no more of Brandon for the moment then. He"ll come up again, never fear. He"s not the sort of man to avoid spoiling his own soup."
"Very good," said Bentinck-Major in his most patronising manner. "Now we are all agreed, I think. You will have noticed that I"ve been waiting for this moment to suggest that we should come to business. Our business, I believe, is to obtain what support we can against the gift of the living to Mr. Forsyth and to suggest some other candidate...hum, haw...yes, other candidate."
"There"s only one possible candidate," Foster brought out, banging his lean fist down upon the table near to him. "And that"s Wistons of Hawston.
It"s been the wish of my heart for years back to bring Wistons here. We don"t know, of course, if he would come, but I think he could be persuaded. And then--then there"d be hope once more! G.o.d would be served!
His Church would be a fitting Tabernacle!..."
He broke off. Amazing to see the rapt devotion that now lighted up his ugly face until it shone with saintly beauty. The harsh lines were softened, the eyes were gentle, the mouth tender. "Then indeed," he almost whispered, "I might say my "Nunc Dimittis" and go."
It was not he alone who was stirred. Martin spoke eagerly: "Is that the Wistons of the _Four Creeds_?--the man who wrote _The New Apocalypse_?"
Foster smiled. "There"s only one Wistons," he said, pride ringing in his voice as though he were speaking of his favourite son, "for all the world."
"Why, that would be magnificent," Martin said, "if he"d come. But would he? I should think that very doubtful."
"I think he would," said Foster softly, still as though he were speaking to himself.
"Why, that, of course, is wonderful!" Martin looked round upon them all, his eyes glowing. "There isn"t a man in England----" He broke off. "But surely if there"s a _real_ chance of getting Wistons n.o.body on the Chapter would dream of proposing a man like Forsyth. It"s incredible!"
"Incredible!" burst in Foster. "Not a bit of it! Do you suppose Brandon--I beg pardon for mentioning his name, as we"re all so particular--do you suppose Brandon wouldn"t fight just such a man? He regards him as dangerous, modern, subversive, heretical, anything you please. Wistons!
Why, he"d make Brandon"s hair stand on end!"
"Well," said Martin gravely, "if there"s any real chance of getting Wistons into this diocese I"ll work for it with my coat off."
"Good," said Bentinck-Major, tapping with a little gold pencil that he had been fingering, on the table. "Now we are all agreed. The next question is, what steps are we to take?"
They all looked instinctively at Ronder. He felt their glances. He was happy, a.s.sured, comfortable once more. He was master of them. They lay in his hand for him to do as he would with them. His brain now moved clearly, smoothly, like a beautiful shining machine. His eyes glowed.
"Now, it"s occurred to me----" he said. They all drew their chairs closer.
Chapter V
Falk by the River
Upon that same evening when the conspirators met in Bentinck-Major"s handsome study Mrs. Brandon had a ridiculous fit of hysterics.
She had never had hysterics before; the fit came upon her now when she was sitting in front of her gla.s.s brushing her hair. She was dressing for dinner and could see her reflection, white and thin, in the mirror before her. Suddenly the face in the gla.s.s began to smile and it became at that same instant another face that she had never seen before.
It was a horrid smile and broke suddenly into laughter. It was as though the face had been hit by something and cracked then into a thousand pieces.
She laughed until the tears poured down her cheeks, but her eyes protested, looking piteously and in dismay from the studied gla.s.s. She knew that she was laughing with shrill high cries, and behind her horror at her collapse there was a desperate protesting attempt to calm herself, driven, above all, upon her agitated heart by the fear lest her husband should come in and discover her.
The laughter ceased quite suddenly and was followed by a rush of tears.
She cried as though her heart would break, then, with trembling steps, crossed to her bed and lay down. Very shortly she must control herself because the dinner-bell would ring and she must go. To stay and send the conventional excuse of a headache would bring her husband up to her, and although he was so full of his own affairs that the questions that he would ask her would be perfunctory and absent-minded, she felt that she could not endure, just now, to be alone with him.
She lay on her bed shivering and wondering what malign power it was that had seized her. Malign it was, she did not for an instant doubt. She had asked, did ask, for so little. Only to see Morris for a moment every day.
To see him anywhere in as public a place as you please, but to see him, to hear his voice, to look into his eyes, to touch his hand (soft and gentle like a woman"s hand)--that had been now for months an absolute necessity.
She did not ask more than that, and yet she was aware that there was no pause in the acc.u.mulating force of the pa.s.sion that was seizing her. She was being drawn along by two opposite powers--the tenderness of protective maternal love and the ruthlessness of the l.u.s.t for possession.
She wanted to care for him, to watch over him, to guard him, to do everything for him, and also she wanted to feel her hold over him, to see him move, almost as though he were hypnotised, towards her.
The thought of him, the perpetual incessant thought of him, ruled out the thought of every one else in the world--save only Falk. She scarcely now considered her husband at all; she never for an instant wondered whether people in the town were talking. She saw only Morris and her future with Morris--only that and Falk.
Upon Falk now everything hung. She had made a kind of bargain. If Falk stayed and loved her and cared for her she would resist the power that was drawing her towards Morris. Now, a million times more than before she had met Morris, she must have some one for whom she could care. It was as though a lamp had been lit and flung a great track of light over those dark, empty earlier years. How could she ever have lived as she did? The hunger, the desperate, eager, greedy hunger was roused in her. Falk could satisfy it, but, if he would not, then she would hesitate no longer.
She would seize Morris as a tiger seizes its prey. She did not disguise that from herself. As she lay now, trembling, upon her bed, she never hesitated to admit to herself that the thought of her domination over Morris was her great glory. She had never dominated any one before. He followed her like a man in a dream, and she was not young, she was not beautiful, she was not clever....
It was her own personal, personal, personal triumph. And then, on that, there swept over her the flood of her tenderness for him, how she longed to be good to him, to care for him, to mend and sew and cook and wash for him, to perform the humblest tasks for him, to nurse him and protect him.
She knew that the end of this might be social ruin for both of them!...
Ah, well, then, he would only need her the more! She was quieter now--the trembling ceased. How strange the way that during these months they had been meeting, so often without their own direct agency at all! She recalled every moment, every gesture, every word. He seemed already to be part of herself, moving within herself.
She sat up on her bed; moved back to her gla.s.s. She bathed her face, slipped on her dress, and went downstairs.
They were a family party at dinner, but, of course, without Falk. He was always out in the evening now.
Joan talked, chattered on. The meal was soon over. The Archdeacon went to his study, and the two women sat in the drawing-room, Joan by the window, Mrs. Brandon, hidden in a high arm-chair, near the fireplace. The clock ticked on and the Cathedral bells struck the quarters. Joan"s white dress, beyond the circle of lamp-light was a dim shadow. Mrs. Brandon turned the pages of her book, her ears straining for the sound of Falk"s return.
As she sat there, so inattentively turning the pages of her book, the foreboding sense of some approaching drama flooded the room. For how many years had she lived from day to day and nothing had occurred--so long that life had been unconscious, doped, inert. Now it had sprung into vitality again with the sudden frantic impertinence of a Jack-in-the-Box. For twenty years you are dry on the banks, half-asleep, stretching out lazy fingers for food, slumbering, waking, slumbering again. Suddenly a wave comes and you are swept off--swept off into what disastrous sea?
She did not think in pictures, it was not her way, but to-night, half- terrified, half-exultant, in the long dim room she waited, the pressure of her heart beating up into her throat, listening, watching Joan furtively, seeing Morris, his eternal shadow, itching with its long tapering fingers to draw her away with him beyond the house. No, she would be true with herself. It was he who would be drawn away. The power was in her, not in him....
She looked wearily across at Joan. The child was irritating to her as she had always been. She had never, in any case, cared for her own s.e.x, and now, as so frequently with women who are about to plunge into some pa.s.sionate situation, she regarded every one she saw as a potential interferer. She despised women as most women in their secret hearts do, and especially she despised Joan.
"You"d better go up to bed, dear. It"s half-past ten."
Without a word Joan got up, came across the room, kissed her mother, went to the door. Then she paused.
"Mother," she said, hesitating, and then speaking timidly, "is father all right?"