WEIGHING DELIGHT AND DOLE
Hamlet, i. 2.
Strangely enough the thought which most strongly impressed Maurice
Wynne on the morning following the Mardi Gras ball was the simplicity
of life. He had heard in the early dawn the bell for rising; he had
started up, then upon his elbow realized that he had freed himself from
its tyranny. He had slidden back into his warm place, smiling to
himself, and fallen into a sleep as quiet as that of a child. About
eight he was roused by a brother sent to see if he was ill, his absence
from early mass having been noted. Maurice sent the messenger away with
the explanation that having been out to the midnight service he had
slept late; then, being left alone, he made his toilet with
deliberation. He seemed to himself a new man. There appeared to be no
longer any difficulty in life. He reflected that one had but to follow
common sense, to live sincerely up to what commended itself to his
reason, and existence became wonderfully simplified. He no longer
experienced any of the confusing doubts and perplexities which had of
late made him so thoroughly miserable.
He hesitated to don again the dress of a deacon, but he reflected that
to do otherwise would be to expose himself to the curiosity and comment
of his fellows. With a smile and a sigh he put on for the last time the
cassock, recalling the contemptuous terms in which at the time of the
accident Mehitabel Durgin had referred to the garment. He wondered at
himself for ever finding it possible to appear before the eyes of men
in such a dress, and blushed to think how incongruous the clerical
livery must have looked in the ballroom.
Breakfast was already half over when he appeared, and the reading of
Lamentations was accompanying the frugal meal. He sank into his seat in
silence, casting his eyes down upon his plate lest they should betray
the joy he felt. He knew that he could have no talk with Philip until
after nones, and he was not willing to leave the house without bidding
his friend good-by. While he went on with his breakfast he was busy
planning what he would do when he had left the routine of the Clergy
House behind him. He determined to go to Mrs. Staggchase for advice,
and to ask her to direct him to some quiet boarding-place where he
might reorganize his scheme of life.
In the study hour which followed breakfast Wynne went boldly to the
room of Father Frontford, and knocked at the door. When he heard the
voice of the Father Superior bidding him enter he was for the first
time seized with an unpleasant doubt. The long habit of obedience half
asserted itself, so that for an instant he was almost minded to turn
back. With a smile of self-scorn he shook off the feeling, and opened
the door.
The Father looked up in evident surprise at sight of the deacon who
came unsummoned at such an hour. He was alone, a fact which Maurice
noted with satisfaction.
"Good morning, Wynne," he said. "Did you wish to see me?"
"Yes, sir," Maurice answered, closing the door, and standing before it.
"I came to tell you that I have decided to leave the Clergy House."
The abruptness of the communication evidently startled the Superior.
Wynne watched him as he laid down his pen, the lines about his thin
lips growing tense.
"Sit down," he said gravely.
Maurice obeyed unwillingly. He would have been glad to retreat at once,
his errand being done; but he knew this to be of course impossible. He
sat down facing the other, meeting with steadfast eyes the searching
look fastened upon him.
"Since when," Father Frontford asked, "have you held this
determination?"
"Since last night."
"Is it founded upon any especial circumstance connected with your going
with Mrs. Wilson to midnight service?"
Maurice looked down for a moment in thought, then he met the eyes of
the other frankly.
"Father," he said, "I don't think that I could tell you all that has
led to this decision if I would; and I do not see that it would be wise
for us to go into the matter in any case. It seems to me that the fact
that I have decided, and decided absolutely, is enough."
The face before him grew a shade sterner.
"You seem to forget that you are speaking to your Superior."
"Perhaps," the young man returned with calmness, "it is you who forget
that I have ended that relation."
Father Frontford's face darkened.
"I do not recognize that you have authority to end it."
Maurice tried to repress the irritation which he could not but feel;
and forced himself to speak as civilly as before.
"Will you pardon me," he said; "I do not wish that our last talk should
be bitter. I owe you much, and I shall never cease to respect the
unselfishness with which you have tried to help me. That I cannot
follow your path does not blind me to the fact that you have worked so
untiringly to make the way plain and attractive to me."
He was not without a secret feeling that he was speaking with some
magnanimity, yet he was entirely sincere. He realized with thorough
respect, even at the moment of breaking away, how complete was the
devotion of the Father. There was in his mind, too, some satisfaction
at the tone he had unconsciously adopted. It flattered him to find that
he should be almost patronizing his Superior.
Father Frontford regarded Maurice with a look in which were mingled
surprise, disapprobation, and regret. As the two sat holding each
other's eyes, the face of the older man changed and softened. Into it
came a smile of high and spiritual beauty, of nobility and
unworldliness, of tenderness most touching. All that was most winning
in the character of the man was embodied in the look which he fixed
upon his recreant disciple, a look pleading and wistful, yet full of
dignity and strength. He leaned forward, laying the tips of his thin
fingers almost caressingly on the arm of the other.
"My son," he said, "it is not what I have done that you remember; it is
what I represent. The truth and sweetness of religion is what has
touched you. I am only the representative; and no one knows better how
unworthy I am to be so looked on. If the grace of divine love seems to
you good shining through me, think what it is in itself. Oh, my son,"
he went on, the tears coming into his eyes, "I have loved you, and I
love you more now that I see you tempted and bewildered. Turn back to
the bosom of the church before it is too late."
Maurice sat silent with look downcast. His firmness was not shaken; he
had no inclination to reconsider his decision, but he was deeply moved
by the emotion of the other. He could not bear to meet pleading so
affectionate with a cold negative.
"It is for yourself that I appeal to you," the priest went on. "It is
for the good of your own soul, and for your happiness in this world and
the world to come. Think of your mission. Think how men need you; of
the sin and the error that cry out to Heaven, and of how few there are
to do the Lord's work. You have been confused by the temptations of the
world, and in all of us there is a selfish spirit that may lead us to
do in a moment of madness what we shall repent with tears of blood all
our lives."
Still Maurice could not answer; and the Father, bending still nearer,
taking one of the young man's hands in both his own, still pleaded.
"You have said that you felt my interest in you. Do not give me the
bitterness of feeling that I am a careless shepherd who has lost a lamb
to the wolves. If you have gone astray it must be in part my fault; it
must be my negligence. Oh, my son, don't force me to stand guilty
before God to answer for your lost soul."
It seemed to Maurice that he was being swept away by the simple power
of the emotion of Frontford. He felt the tears in his eyes, and almost
without his volition his hand responded to the pressure of the hand
that clasped it. He made a strong effort to call back his will.
"Father," he responded, "we must each stand or fall alone. It is not
your fault that I can't see things as you do, or that I can't any
longer remain here. I am changed. If I stayed, it would be against my
convictions."
"Ah," was the eager reply, "but you could submit your convictions to
the church."
Maurice drew back.
"I am a man, to think for myself. I must be honest with my reason. The
church cannot take for me the place of honesty and conviction."
The Father Superior dropped the hand he held.
"Then you insist on putting your own will and your own wisdom above
that of the church?"
"I must do the thing that seems to me right."
The priest's face hardened. It was as if over the surface of a pool a
film of ice formed. He sank back in his chair, and when he spoke again
it was in a voice so hard and cold that the young man started.
"When do you leave?" the Father Superior asked.
"I meant to wait until after nones so as to say good-by to Philip."
"I prefer that you should go at once."
"You mean that you prefer that I should not see him?" Maurice demanded
quickly.
"I merely said that I prefer that you should go at once," was the cold
reply.
Maurice rose briskly. His impulse was to retort sharply, but he held
himself in check.
"Very well," he answered. "I shall take it as a favor if you will let
Philip know that I did not willingly leave him without a word. It would
hurt him to think that."
"The wounds of earth," the Father Superior said gravely, "are the joys
of heaven."
Maurice stood an instant with a keen desire to reply, to break down
this icy statue of religion; then he drew back.
"I will not trouble you longer," he said. "Good-by."
"Good-by, Mr. Wynne," the other responded with the manner of one
addressing a stranger.
Maurice went to his chamber thoroughly aroused and excited. The
restraint which he had put on himself during the talk with Father
Frontford brought now its reaction. He rehearsed in his mind the
telling and caustic things which he might have said, then laughed at
himself for his unnecessary fervor. He packed his belongings, and,
leaving them to be called for, set out for the house of his cousin. To
go out from the Clergy House seemed to him like the ending of a life.
Mrs. Staggchase was fortunately at home. It seemed to Maurice that her
keen eyes took in the whole story from his secular dress. He blushed as
she gave him her hand.
"Well, my dear boy," she observed, "you have come to luncheon, I
suppose, because the fare at the Clergy House is so poor in Lent. Sit
down, and give me an account of your doings last night. I trust that
you saw Mrs. Wilson safe home."
"I left her in the church."
"Ah! And what did you do then?"
"I went home and fought it out with myself. You were right in saying
that things were not concluded when I became a deacon. I have given up
the whole thing."
"What do you mean by the whole thing?"
"I mean," he returned earnestly, "that I found out that I was acting a
part. That I didn't believe even the first principles of the religion I
was getting ready to teach. I have broken down in the temptation,
Cousin Diana."
She looked at him closely. The buoyancy of his morning mood was gone,
and it was hard for him to endure her searching look. It came over him
that he was an apostate; one who had abandoned all that he had vowed to
uphold; his vanity smarted at the thought that she must think him weak
and unstable as water.
"I am only what I was," he went on. "The difference is that I have
discovered what you probably saw all the time, that I don't believe the
things I have been taught. I am as free from the old creeds as you are.
I don't even pretend to know that there is a God."
"My dear boy," she responded, shrugging her shoulders, "you run into
extremes like a schoolgirl. I beg you won't talk as if I could be so
vulgar as not to believe in a deity. Don't rank me with the crowd of
common folk that try to increase their own importance by insisting that
there's nothing above them. Really, an atheist seems to me as bad as a
man who eats with his knife."
He changed countenance, but her words left him speechless. He could not
hear her speak in this way without being shocked. He might be without
creed, but his temper was still devout.
"If you've thrown overboard all your old dogmas," she went on with
unruffled face, "you'd better go to work to get a new set. I've just
heard of some sort of a society got up by women out in Cambridge, where
they deduce the ethnic sources of prophetic inspiration--whatever that
means!--from the 'Arabian Nights' and 'Mother Goose.' You might find
something there to suit you."
He could not answer her; he could only wonder whether she disapproved
of what he had done, or if she were vexed with him for coming to her.
"It's possible," she went on mercilessly, a fresh note of mockery in
her voice, "that Berenice might help you. Very often a woman wins
converts where a priest fails. After last night"--
He came to his feet with a spring.
"Don't!" he exclaimed. "I can't stand any more. Do you think that it's
been easy for me to find out the truth about myself; to have to own
that I've been a cheating fool, without honesty enough to know my own
mind? As for Miss Morison"--
His voice failed him. He was unnerved; the reaction from his long
vigil, from his interview with Father Frontford, overcame him. The
simple mention of the name of Berenice made him choke, and he stood
there speechless. His cousin rose and came to him softly. Before he
knew what she was doing, she bent forward and kissed his forehead.
"You poor boy," she said in a voice half laughing, yet so gentle that
he hardly recognized it, "don't take my teasing so much to heart. You
are only finding out like the rest of us that it is impossible not to
be human."
He could answer only by grasping her hand, ashamed of the weakness
which had betrayed him, and touched deeply by her kindness.
"Come," Mrs. Staggchase said, moving to the bell, and speaking in her
natural tone. "I have helped you to break your life into bits; I must
try to help you to put the pieces together into something better. You
must stay here for a while, and we'll consider what is to be done next.
Will you tell Patrick how to get your things from the Clergy House?
Take your old room. I'll see you at luncheon."
And as the servant appeared at one door she withdrew by another.