1
Their Christmas was naturally overshadowed, and so, as it were by a
common impulse, they turned to such people as Barbara and Jamie, people
who would neither despise nor insult them. It was Mary who suggested
that Barbara and Jamie should be asked to share their Christmas dinner,
while Stephen who must suddenly pity Wanda for a misjudged and very
unfortunate genius, invited her also—after all why not? Wanda was more
sinned against than sinning. She drank, oh, yes, Wanda drowned her
sorrows; everybody knew that, and like Valérie Seymour, Stephen hated
drink like the plague—but all the same she invited Wanda.
An ill wind it is that blows no one any good. Barbara and Jamie accepted
with rapture; but for Mary’s most timely invitation, their funds being
low at the end of the year, they two must have gone without Christmas
dinner. Wanda also seemed glad enough to come, to leave her enormous,
turbulent canvas for the orderly peace of the well-warmed house with its
comfortable rooms and its friendly servants. All three of them arrived a
good hour before dinner, which on this occasion would be in the evening.
Wanda had been up to Midnight Mass at the Sacré Cœur, she informed them
gravely; and Stephen, reminded of Mademoiselle Duphot, regretted that
she had not offered her the motor. No doubt she too had gone up to
Montmartre for Midnight Mass—how queer, she and Wanda. Wanda was quiet,
depressed and quite sober; she was wearing a straight-cut, simple black
dress that somehow suggested a species of cassock. And as often happened
when Wanda was sober, she repeated herself more than when she was drunk.
‘I have been to the Sacré Cœur,’ she repeated, ‘for the Messe de Minuit;
it was very lovely.’
But she did not reveal the tragic fact that her fear had suddenly laid
hold upon her at the moment of approaching the altar rails, so that she
had scuttled back to her seat, terrified of receiving the Christmas
Communion. Even a painfully detailed confession of intemperance, of the
lusts of the eyes and the mind, of the very occasional sins of the body;
even the absolution accorded by a white-haired old priest who had spoken
gently and pitifully to his penitent, directing her prayers to the
Sacred Heart from which his own heart had derived its compassion—even
these things had failed to give Wanda courage when it came to the
Christmas Communion. And now as she sat at Stephen’s table she ate
little and drank but three glasses of wine; nor did she ask for a cognac
brandy when later they went to the study for coffee, but must talk of
the mighty temple of her faith that watched day and night, night and day
over Paris.
She said in her very perfect English: ‘Is it not a great thing that
France has done? From every town and village in France has come money to
build that church at Montmartre. Many people have purchased the stones
of the church, and their names are carved on those stones for ever. I am
very much too hard up to do that—and yet I would like to own a small
stone. I would just say: “From Wanda,” because of course one need not
bother about the surname; mine is so long and so difficult to
spell—yes, I would ask them to say: “From Wanda.”’
Jamie and Barbara listened politely, yet without sympathy and without
comprehension; while Mary must even smile a little at what seemed to her
like mere superstition. But Stephen’s imagination was touched, and she
questioned Wanda about her religion. Then Wanda turned grateful eyes
upon Stephen and suddenly wanted to win her friendship—she looked so
reassuring and calm sitting there in her peaceful, book-lined study. A
great writer she was, did not every one say so? And yet she was surely
even as Wanda . . . Oh, but Stephen had got the better of her fate, had
wrestled with her fate so that now it must serve her; that was fine,
that was surely true courage, true greatness! For that Christmas none
save Mary might know of the bitterness that was in Stephen’s heart,
least of all the impulsive, erratic Wanda.
Wanda needed no second invitation to talk, and very soon her eyes were
aglow with the fire of the born religious fanatic as she told of the
little town in Poland, with its churches, its bells that were always
chiming—the Mass bells beginning at early dawn, the Angelus bells, the
Vesper bells—always calling, calling they were, said Wanda. Through the
years of persecution and strife, of wars and the endless rumours of wars
that had ravaged her most unhappy country, her people had clung to their
ancient faith like true children of Mother Church, said Wanda. She
herself had three brothers, and all of them priests; her parents had
been very pious people, they were both dead now, had been dead for some
years; and Wanda signed her breast with the Cross, having regard for the
souls of her parents. Then she tried to explain the meaning of her
faith, but this she did exceedingly badly, finding that words are not
always easy when they must encompass the things of the spirit, the
things that she herself knew by instinct; and then, too, these days her
brain was not clear, thanks to brandy, even when she was quite sober.
The details of her coming to Paris she omitted, but Stephen thought she
could easily guess them, for Wanda declared with a curious pride that
her brothers were men of stone and of iron. Saints they all were,
according to Wanda, uncompromising, fierce and relentless, seeing only
the straight and narrow path on each side of which yawned the fiery
chasm.
‘I was not as they were, ah, no!’ she declared, ‘Nor was I as my father
and mother; I was—I was . . .’ She stopped speaking abruptly, gazing at
Stephen with her burning eyes which said quite plainly: ‘You know what I
was, you understand.’ And Stephen nodded, divining the reason of Wanda’s
exile.
But suddenly Mary began to grow restless, putting an end to this
dissertation by starting the large, new gramophone which Stephen had
given her for Christmas. The gramophone blared out the latest foxtrot,
and jumping up Barbara and Jamie started dancing, while Stephen and
Wanda moved chairs and tables, rolled back rugs and explained to the
barking David that he could not join in, but might, if he chose, sit and
watch them dance from the divan. Then Wanda slipped an arm around Mary
and they glided off, an incongruous couple, the one clad as sombrely as
any priest, the other in her soft evening dress of blue chiffon. Mary
lay gently against Wanda’s arm, and she seemed to Stephen a very perfect
dancer—lighting a cigarette, she watched them. The dance over, Mary put
on a new record; she was flushed and her eyes were considerably
brighter.
‘Why did you never tell me?’ Stephen murmured.
‘Tell you what?’
‘Why, that you danced so well.’
Mary hesitated, then she murmured back: ‘You didn’t dance, so what was
the good?’
‘Wanda, you must teach me to foxtrot,’ smiled Stephen.
Jamie was blundering round the room with Barbara clasped to her untidy
bosom; then she and Barbara started to sing the harmless, but foolish
words of the foxtrot—if the servants were singing their old Breton
hymns along in the kitchen, no one troubled to listen. Growing
hilarious, Jamie sang louder, spinning with Barbara, gyrating wildly,
until Barbara, between laughing and coughing, must implore her to stop,
must beg for mercy.
Wanda said: ‘You might have a lesson now, Stephen.’
Putting her hands on Stephen’s shoulders, she began to explain the more
simple steps, which did not appear at all hard to Stephen. The music
seemed to have got into her feet so that her feet must follow its
rhythm. She discovered to her own very great amazement that she liked
this less formal modern dancing, and after a while she was clasping Mary
quite firmly, and they moved away together while Wanda stood calling out
her instructions:
‘Take much longer steps! Keep your knees straight—straighter! Don’t get
so much to the side—look, it’s this way—hold her this way; always
stand square to your partner.’
The lesson went on for a good two hours, until even Mary seemed somewhat
exhausted. She suddenly rang the bell for Pierre, who appeared with the
tray of simple supper. Then Mary did an unusual thing—she poured
herself out a whiskey and soda.
‘I’m tired,’ she explained rather fretfully in answer to Stephen’s look
of surprise; and she frowned as she turned her back abruptly. But Wanda
shied away from the brandy as a frightened horse will shy from fire; she
drank two large glasses of lemonade—an extremist she was in all things,
this Wanda. Quite soon she announced that she must go home to bed,
because of her latest picture which required every ounce of strength she
had in her; but before she went she said eagerly to Stephen:
‘Do let me show you the Sacré Cœur. You have seen it of course, but only
as a tourist; that is not really seeing it at all, you must come there
with me.’
‘All right,’ agreed Stephen.
When Jamie and Barbara had departed in their turn, Stephen took Mary
into her arms: ‘Dearest . . . has it been a fairly nice Christmas after
all?’ she inquired almost timidly.
Mary kissed her: ‘Of course it’s been a nice Christmas.’ Then her
youthful face suddenly changed in expression, the grey eyes growing
hard, the mouth resentful: ‘Damn that woman for what she’s done to us,
Stephen—the insolence of it! But I’ve learnt my lesson; we’ve got
plenty of friends without Lady Massey and Agnes, friends to whom we’re
not moral lepers.’ And she laughed, a queer, little joyless laugh.
Stephen flinched, remembering Brockett’s warning.
2
Wanda’s chastened and temperate mood persisted for several weeks, and
while it was on her she clung like a drowning man to Stephen, haunting
the house from morning until night, dreading to be alone for a moment.
It cannot be said that Stephen suffered her gladly, for now with the New
Year she was working hard on a series of articles and short stories;
unwilling to visualize defeat, she began once again to sharpen her
weapon. But something in Wanda’s poor efforts to keep sober, in her very
dependence, was deeply appealing, so that Stephen would put aside her
work, feeling loath to desert the unfortunate creature.
Several times they made a long pilgrimage on foot to the church of the
Sacré Cœur; just they two, for Mary would never go with them; she was
prejudiced against Wanda’s religion. They would climb the steep streets
with their flights of steps, grey streets, grey steps leading up from
the city. Wanda’s eyes would always be fixed on their goal—pilgrim eyes
they would often seem to Stephen. Arrived at the church she and Wanda
would stand looking down between the tall, massive columns of the porch,
on a Paris of domes and mists, only half revealed by the fitful
sunshine. The air would seem pure up there on the height, pure and
tenuous as a thing of the spirit. And something in that mighty temple of
faith, that amazing thrust towards the sublime, that silent yet
articulate cry of a nation to its God, would awaken a response in
Stephen, so that she would seem to be brushing the hem of an age-old and
rather terrible mystery—the eternal mystery of good and evil.
Inside the church would be brooding shadows, save where the wide lakes
of amber fire spread out from the endless votive candles. Above the high
altar the monstranced Host would gleam curiously white in the light of
the candles. The sound of praying, monotonous, low, insistent, would
come from those who prayed with extended arms, with crucified arms, all
day and all night for the sins of Paris.
Wanda would make her way to the statue of the silver Christ with one
hand on His heart, and the other held out in supplication. Kneeling down
she would sign herself with His Cross, then cover her eyes and forget
about Stephen. Standing quietly behind her Stephen would wonder what
Wanda was saying to the silver Christ, what the silver Christ was saying
to Wanda. She would think that He looked very weary, this Christ Who
must listen to so many supplications. Queer, unbidden thoughts came to
her at such moments; this Man Who was God, a God Who waited, could He
answer the riddle of Wanda’s existence, of her own existence? If she
asked, could He answer? What if she were suddenly to cry out loudly:
‘Look at us, we are two yet we stand for many. Our name is legion and we
also are waiting, we also are tired, oh, but terribly tired . . . Will
You give us some hope of ultimate release? Will You tell us the secret
of our salvation?’
Wanda would rise from her prayers rather stiffly to purchase a couple of
votive candles, and when she had stuck them into the sconce she would
touch the foot of the silver Christ as she bade Him farewell—a
time-honoured custom. Then she and Stephen might turn again to the lake
of fire that flowed round the monstrance.
But one morning when they arrived at the church, the monstrance was not
above the high altar. The altar had just been garnished and swept, so
the Host was still in the Lady Chapel. And while they stood there and
gazed at the Host, came a priest and with him a grey-haired server; they
would bear their God back again to His home, to the costly shrine of His
endless vigil. The server must first light his little lantern suspended
from a pole, and must then grasp his bell. The priest must lift his Lord
from the monstrance and lay Him upon a silken cover, and carry Him as a
man carries a child—protectively, gently, yet strongly withal, as
though some frustrated paternal instinct were finding in this a divine
expression. The lantern swung rhythmically to and fro, the bell rang out
its imperative warning; then the careful priest followed after the
server who cleared his path to the great high altar. And even as once
very long ago, such a bell had been the herald of death in the
putrefying hand of the leper: ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ death and
putrefaction—the warning bell in the dreadful hand that might never
again know the clasp of the healthful—so now the bell rang out the
approach of supreme purity, of the Healer of lepers, earth-bound through
compassion; but compassion so vast, so urgent, that the small, white
disc of the Host must contain the whole suffering universe. Thus the
Prisoner of love Who could never break free while one spiritual leper
remained to be healed, passed by on His patient way, heavy-laden.
Wanda suddenly fell to her knees, striking her lean and unfruitful
breast, for as always she very shamefully feared, and her fear was a
bitter and most deadly insult. With downcast eyes and trembling hands
she cowered at the sight of her own salvation. But Stephen stood upright
and curiously still, staring into the empty Lady Chapel.