CAMBRIDGE
We no sooner get into the second Chamber, which I shall call the
Chamber of Maiden-Thought, than we become intoxicated with the light
and the atmosphere; we see nothing but pleasant wonders, and think of
delaying there for ever in delight. However ... this Chamber of
Maiden-Thought becomes gradually darkened, and at the same time, on all
sides of it, many doors are set open--but all dark--all leading to dark
passages. We see not the balance of good and evil--we are in a
mist--we feel the "burden of the Mystery" ...--KEATS: _Letters_, May,
1818.
I asked for Truth--
My doubts came in
And with their din
They wearied all my youth.
D. M. DOLBEN: Requests.
His Name will flee, the while thou mouldest thy lips for
speech.--JELLALUDIN.
(1)
"Yes, sir; this is the gentleman's keepin' room, sir. A bit small, but
cosy and 'omelike, as I allus told pore Mr. Bruce wot was haccidental
shot in Scotland last Haugust. I keeps my bit o' brooms and cleanin'
things in that cupboard, sir--bedder's room they calls it, though it
ain't much of a room. Through that there door is the bedroom, and that
might be bigger, that's sartin sure. But I don't know as 'ow it much
matters to the young gentlemen, sir. If so be they can lay down in it,
and 'as room for a chest o' drawers and a bath on the floor, that's
about all has they want. But you'll need to take a bit o' care in the
bath, sir, if I may make bold to say so. Mr. Bruce, 'e fair soak 'is
blankets now an' agin. Ah, that couch now, sir! Springs be broken, I
will say. But then, lor, sir, how the young gentlemen bangs on 'em!
They will 'ave their bit o' fun, sir, same as what you did in your day,
I daresay. Still it's a bin like that for years, an' p'rhaps a new one
would be a good thing. Expensive? Ah yes, sir. Things his dear. Let
it stand over a bit, so to say. P'rhaps in 'is second year, with 'is
friends an' all a-coming hup, it might be done. That all, sir? Thank
you, sir, thank you kindly. Mr. Mavis is 'is gyp, sir, an' 'e'll be
about soon I daresay, though 'e's none too fond of work, is Mavis.
'E'll tell you all you wants to know, sir. Good afternoon, sir."
Mrs. Rover departed, and shut the door behind her. Mr. Kestern smiled.
"She's a talker, Paul," he said, "but a good sort, I daresay. The race
of bedders doesn't seem to have changed since I was up. Well, what do
you think of it?"
Paul glanced round again with shining eyes. The little attic room was
practically square. On the left as you entered, two high windows in
the thick ancient wall, each allowing you to sit there and gaze through
its mediæval aperture, looked out over a narrow college garden to the
river. Since this staircase was only the second from the main entrance
in the First Court, the room's occupant had a view as well down the
narrow old-world street which crossed the river here by a bridge and
twisted away past overhanging ancient houses. In the near distance
rose the spire of St. Lawrence's Church. Chestnuts, bare now, guarded
the river-front, and trailed their lower boughs in the leaf-strewn
stream.
Between the windows was a fireplace with a bamboo overmantel.
Opposite, the right wall met a sloping roof which just allowed a
bookcase to stand beneath it and was pierced by two more windows which,
however, looked out on to the inner battlemented wall of the First
Court, and permitted no more than a glimpse of St. Mary in her turret
over the chapel on the farther side. The little room itself was bare
save for a square table in its centre; a couch, quite obviously much
the worse for wear, against the wall immediately opposite the door; and
a couple of chairs. A faded red paper covered the walls. A still more
faded red carpet lay on the floor. Yet Paul saw his own room, the goal
of years of work; he saw in imagination his little desk already in a
corner, his books on the shelves, himself in an arm-chair before a fire
with leisure to read, to write, to think. And he saw something else
too, which might immediately materialise.
"It's splendid, dad--just what I wanted. I'm glad to be high up; the
view's so good. But I'll do one thing right away, first of all. Sit
down for a minute, will you?"
He placed on the table a brown paper parcel he had been carrying
beneath his arm, and hurriedly tore off the wrapping. A framed text
revealed itself. Then, mounting precariously on the couch, he sought
and found a nail from which the last occupant had hung some picture,
and there he hung his challenge, right in the centre of the wall,
exactly opposite the door, placed in such wise that no one could enter
without seeing the words. He stepped off and surveyed the effect. A
touch made the frame finally level. Their capital letter entwined with
spraying daffodils, the multi-coloured words proclaimed plainly an
insistent and dogmatic legend: "One is your Master, even Christ."
"That takes possession, dad, somehow. And everyone will know at once
Whose I am and Whom I serve."
The short elderly kindly clergyman nodded proudly, but with a little
mist before his eyes. "Ay, ay, Paul laddie," he said, "I'm glad you
thought of that. But it's easy to hang a text, Paul; it's harder to
live up to it. Let us ask the help of the Master, my son, here and
now, at the beginning of your college life."
So the two knelt, with the simplicity of children. Outside, listening
at the door, Mrs. Rover heard, and expressed herself strongly
thereafter to Mr. Mavis. "Left hattic is one o' the pious sort,
Mavis," she said. "Put a text hup, 'e 'as. Ought ter be a soft job
for you."
But Mavis was in his own way a philosopher, and an observer of life.
"Is 'e?" he queried. "Well, I'm glad to hear it. May 'e stay so. But
I dunno; I've seen a few o' them pious ones, and they often turns out
more mischievous than the other young devils. Seems ter me we ought'er
'ave put new screws in them winder bars."
Arm in arm, father and son went out to do some shopping. Paul, used to
hard economy, was highly pleased with his father's generosity.
Crockery marked with the arms of St. Mary's was an unexpected joy; two
arm-chairs, and only one of them second-hand; a few groceries, cakes
and biscuits; two framed prints of Landseer's dogs, to brighten things
up, as his father said; even a toasting-fork, a lamp, a side-table, a
tablecloth--all these, and a hearthrug, and the room seemed furnished.
He unpacked a box, and graced his mantel-shelf with photographs, a
presentation clock from the children of the Mission Hall, and a couple
of ancient candlesticks, in the form of metal storks upholding hollowed
bulrushes, from his bedroom at home. Then it was time for his father
to return, and the boy saw him to the station.
Paul wandered back in the dusk: his hands in his pockets turning a
final gift of a new sovereign, his mind on fire. He peered curiously
in at the gateways of unknown colleges, examined the gay shops,
lingered over the bookcases of the numerous booksellers. A bell was
ringing in St. Lawrence's steeple as he passed, and he stepped for a
minute into the church. It was a dark gloomy place, but a couple of
lighted candles on the altar showed him a crucifix and six more tall
lights behind. He came out quickly, conscious of a little flush of
anger. People of that sort were betraying the Faith.
He mounted the two flights of wooden stairs light-heartedly however,
and entered his own room. Mrs. Rover had kindled a fire, and its ruddy
glow welcomed him. Then he saw that there was a man standing by the
fireplace. He paused, a little bewildered.
"Oh, I say," said the other breezily, "I'm glad you've come in. I
thought I'd wait a few minutes. There's nobody up yet you know, except
a few of us freshers. I heard about you from the Dean, and I thought
I'd call at once. My name's Donaldson. You're going to be a parson,
aren't you? And so am I. How do you do?" He held out his hand.
Paul warmed to the cheery greeting. "Topping of you to call," he said.
"My name's Kestern." Then he remembered it was on the door, and he
felt a fool.
"Yes. Are you busy? My things haven't all come yet, and your room's a
damned sight more cheerful than mine."
"Do sit down," said Paul. "Take the new armchair. You're the first
person to sit in it."
"They call 'em pews here," rejoined the other, sinking into the seat.
He had a pipe in his hand, which he lit. "You smoke?" he queried.
"No," said Paul.
"Well, I do. Always have. I can't read without it. I mean to row if
I can, and I don't know how I'll get on when we train. What are you
going to do?"
"I'm not sure," said Paul cautiously, not sure either what the other
really meant.
"Well, row then. The boat captain's up already. I saw him after
lunch. I'll tell him you want to tub, shall I? It'll be sporting if
we get in a boat together."
"Yes," said Paul, kindling at the proffered friendship.
Sitting opposite across the fire, Paul took stock of his companion who
did the major part of the talking. Donaldson was a busy personage and
an unfamiliar type to Paul. It soon appeared that he held a missionary
bursarship from a society which Paul called "high church"; that he was
not, however, at all keen on a missionary vocation; that the fact that
he was to be a "priest" (as he put it) did not proscribe his pleasures
to any great extent; and that he was very sure of himself. Much of his
conversation was unintelligible to Paul, but he was friendly, and the
boy was more lonely than he knew. They went down to Hall together
seemingly the best of friends, but Paul was already aware that he was
wading in unfamiliar waters.
His first Hall was responsible for a series of indelible impressions.
The lovely old room, lit only by candles in great silver sconces, with
its sombre portraits, its stone-flagged floor, its arching roof, made
him unutterably proud. The few shy freshers in an oasis of light,
emphasised the dignity of the place. This was his Hall. A solitary
fellow at the high table read a Latin grace in which Paul understood
only the Sacred Name, and that was repeated with what struck him as a
familiarity, an indifference, to which he was wholly a stranger.
Accustomed to the simplest meals, the dinner (rather unusually good at
St. Mary's), and the many waiters seemed grand to him. The comparative
ease of his companions, who nevertheless, being all freshers, eyed each
other curiously, made him self-conscious to a degree, and Donaldson,
more at his ease than anyone, seemed in his eyes to be bold and daring.
Next him, on the other side, sat a quiet man sombrely dressed, who, he
gathered, had been a day-boy like himself at a lesser public school,
and who introduced himself as Strether. He kept in the Second Court.
The three came out together, and Strether asked them up to his rooms
for coffee.
The clock in the Elizabethan gable above the Hall was striking eleven
as he and Donaldson, the ritual of that first coffee ended, came out
into the starlight. Below, in the First Court, they stood a moment to
say good-night. Lights gleamed in a few windows and a soft radiance of
moonshine fell on the armorial bearings in the great oriel of the Hall.
The few street noises seemed very remote. There was an air of
seclusion, of peace, about the place, and Paul drew in the night air
with great breaths. "How unutterably lovely it all is!" he exclaimed.
The other glanced round carelessly. "Yes," he said, "I say, that
fellow Strether wants taking in hand."
"Oh?" queried Paul dubiously.
"Good God, yes. Did you ever see such boots? And his bags! But he's
got some money, I should say. Still, one can't be seen with him till
he gets something decent to wear."
"I liked him," said Paul shortly.
"Oh so did I. But look here, let's pinch his boots and make him buy
some decent brogues."
Paul was tickled. "All right," he said, laughing. "But how?"
"Easily enough. Wait till he's out. Come to brekker to-morrow, and
arrange a plan of campaign."
"What time?"
"Any time you like. Say nine. There's no chapel and no lekkers yet.
Will that do?"
"Right-o," said Paul. "Good-night."
"Good-night. Doesn't matter if you're a bit late."
In his room, Paul lit a candle. Then he climbed into one of his
window-seats and stared out at the moonlit, slow-moving river, the bare
chestnuts, the empty street. "How too lovely," he whispered to himself
again, and sat long ere he got down to go to his little bedroom. As he
did so, the flickering candlelight showed him his multi-coloured text
with its white background. The words stared at him silently, and he
repeated them to himself with something already of the air of a
stranger.
(2)
Paul acclimatised with astonishing rapidity. Within a fortnight his
"square" was gloriously "bashed," no one thundered more boisterously up
and down the stairs, and few strolled into Hall with more nonchalance.
He tubbed daily and promisingly. He was poor, but he was learning to
make his own porridge and fry his own breakfast eggs and bacon without
an apology to Mrs. Rover. Donaldson and Strether (in brogues now) had
taken to foregathering in his rooms as a regular thing. He was known
at large to be "pi," but among the freshers he was shaping for a place
which would discount that to some extent. A few literary men of his
own year had already heard some of his verses and read a short story or
two, and the three friends had begun to conceive of "The Literary
Lounge," a free and easy club which was to gather from time to time for
the encouragement of amateur talent. Cambridge was moulding him far
more speedily than even Edith had expected.
The Chapel had been an unforgettable experience. His first Sunday, at
the early service, Paul saw a vision of beauty which he had never
associated with religion before. The small clean Gothic sanctuary,
with its old oak stalls, its fourteenth-century chalice, its air of age
and quiet, was a new thing to him. The Dean, with his flaming scarlet
hood, "took up" the Eastward position it is true; but his reading was
so scholarly, his rendering of the service so reserved, that Paul knew
that here was an atmosphere which, if utterly familiar to most of the
men, was completely foreign to himself. Fervour, loud congregational
singing, intense pietism, all had gone; but in their stead had come a
sober solemn figure of austere beauty who was a new interpreter in
religion to him. The change entranced even while it repelled him.
Robed in his white surplice in his stall, he was aware of a historic
past which had scarcely concerned him religiously heretofore, and he
was awed into reverence. Back in his own room, it is true he was
chiefly conscious of a lack somewhere, a lack which, however, was made
up to him by the Cambridge Intercollegiate Christian Union with its
prayer meetings and its evening sermon to first year men in St.
Saviour's Church. But even these struck a new note. There was an
emphasis on the intellectual side of belief. That had been all but
entirely absent in Claxted.
His growing friendship with Manning emphasised all this. Manning was a
second year man who had rowed in his first year Lents and Mays, and was
now coaching the new freshers. Paul had tubbed late one evening, and
he and Manning had left the boathouse together. They bicycled back in
company, and in the porch of the college, the great man invited Paul in
to tea. He would scarcely have dared to refuse.
The other had ground-floor rooms, much finer and bigger than Paul's.
They had been redecorated; a baby grand stood in one corner; a
revolving bookcase by the fire held a terra-cotta Winged Victory; two
or three gilt-framed pictures graced the white-papered walls. "Take a
pew," said Manning carelessly, and shouted at the door for the kitchens.
He ordered "oils" and cakes lavishly, and when the buttered buns had
duly arrived and tea was well forward, Paul ventured a word of praise.
"What topping rooms you have," he said.
"Yes. They are rather jolly, aren't they? That's a genuine Corot over
there which I bamboozled the governor into letting me bring up. Are
you fond of art?"
"Very," said Paul, "but I know so little about it. Literature's more
in my line. I'm awfully keen. I say, I wonder if you'd come to 'The
Literary Lounge' one night?"
The other smiled. "That's the new freshers' effort, isn't it? Still,
I don't mind. What night?"
Paul was hugely delighted, and began to expand. "I'd love to know what
you think of some of my things," he said.
"You should show them to Tressor. He'd help you."
"Great Scott!" exclaimed Paul, "I shouldn't dare."
"Why not? Not that I think much of Tressor's stuff myself. Of course
he can write rattlin' English, and it all flows placidly enough, but
there's nothing much in it. It's extraordinary what the public will
read. He has huge sales. I know him quite a lot you know. Knew him
at Winchester."
"He reads my essays, of course," said Paul, "but I never thought to
show a don my verse, let alone a fellow with a reputation like
Tressor's."
"Well, he's the man to help you obviously. And he would too. He's a
jolly decent sort is Tressor. I spent a week last vac. at his place.
He's got some rippin' stuff."
"Has he?" said Paul, eyeing with astonished awe the man who had stayed
with a foremost literary lion and actually dared to criticise him.
"Yes, jolly fine. And it's a lovely old house and grounds, under the
South Downs. I read quite a lot there, and we had some toppin'
motoring and a little rough shooting. He keeps a good cellar, too,
which is something these days. By the way, have you tried the college
port?"
"No," said Paul shortly. He wondered if he ought to say that he was a
teetotaler for life.
"Well, you should. It's damned good. Have a cigarette."
"I don't smoke," said Paul.
"Wise man," said the other. "By the way, there's a company bringing up
_The Mikado_ and _The Gondoliers_ this term, a good crowd, I think. I
know a girl in it. Gilbert and Sullivan's stuff's great, I think.
Don't you?"
"I'm afraid I haven't seen any," said Paul, who had never been to a
theatre in his life. He began to wish he had got out of coming to tea,
but he need not have done so, for the other seemed curiously
unsurprised.
"Haven't you? Then you've a treat in store for you," he said. And he
plunged into gossip in which Paul heard great names bandied
about--Ibsen, Bernard Shaw, Galsworthy--almost for the first time in
conversation. He said Yes and No at intervals; and if he had no
contribution of his own to make, he was at least very obviously
interested. Manning was attracted by the boy. He told Tressor, later,
that Kestern knew nothing and had been nowhere, but that he had
possibilities and was at any rate not consciously a prig. As for Paul,
there opened before him a new heaven and a new earth. When he had
departed, carrying volumes of the _Plays Pleasant and Unpleasant_, he
found it hard to settle down to his books. In half an hour, he was,
indeed, repolishing some verses entitled "The Backs in Autumn" with a
view to getting Manning to read a fair copy.
At lunch next day, there came a knock on his door. "Come in," he
called, expecting the arrival of Donaldson to fetch him for the river.
The door opened, and a stranger entered. "Kestern?" he said
enquiringly, standing in the doorway. "How do you do. I must
introduce myself--I'm Hartley of Jesus. Possibly you may know my name
as I'm on the Committee of the C.I.C.C.U. I meant to call before, for
I heard you were up at St. Mary's and you ought to be a great strength
to us."
Paul got eagerly to his feet. "Do come in," he said. "Have you had
lunch? Oh well, do have some. It's only a scratch affair, but there's
enough to go round." (He burrowed in the cupboard for plates and a
knife.) "I'm tubbing early, so I have to hurry. Awfully good of you
to call. Of course I've heard of you."
The other took a seat at the table. He had frank keen eyes and paused
a second for grace. Paul was suddenly aware that he himself had said
none. He pushed the cheese towards his guest and began to cut bread.
"I'm glad you're up here," said Hartley. "We haven't a college
secretary in St. Mary's and I hope you'll take it on. Then I've been
wondering if you'd help me with something on Sunday. I run a
children's service at St. Saviour's schools in the mornings, and I'd be
awfully grateful if you'd lend me a hand. The Committee want to put
your name down too for the open-airs on Parker's Piece. They hold one
there every Sunday night, you know."
Paul smiled warmly. The atmosphere of Claxted had come in with the
visitor. "I'll be delighted to help," he said, "but you've outlined a
pretty tall programme for the first five minutes."
"Oh no," said Hartley. "You're used to all that kind of thing, I know."
"How did you come to hear of my being up?" queried Paul.
"I was on a Children's Seaside Mission at Eastbourne last August, and
met Mr. Ernest. He told me you were coming up. Miss Ernest played for
us sometimes. She sang your praises sky-high."
Paul blushed, but it was very pleasant to hear of the home folk this
way. They were deep in talk when a clamour of ascending feet sounded
on the stairs and Donaldson was heard without shouting breezily:
"Kestern! Kestern! Four, you're late! Damn it all, sir" (bursting
open the door), "you're late again. Oh--I beg your pardon."
"May I introduce you?" said Paul. "Mr. Hartley of Jesus, Mr. Donaldson
of this college."
"How do you do?" said Donaldson, smiling characteristically. "Awfully
sorry. Didn't know anyone was here."
"Oh, that's all right," replied Hartley. "I was just going. You are
both tubbing, are you? Well, Kestern, Sunday at eleven, eh? Will you
give the address?"
"Right," said Paul. "Ten minutes?"
"Yes--not longer. Cheerio. Good luck on the river." And he went out.
"Who's that?" demanded Donaldson. "Pal of yours? He looks a bit of an
ass to me."
Paul explained, reaching for his cap and stick.
"Gosh! So you're preaching on Sunday, are you? He won't get me,
anyway."
"Don't suppose he'll ask you," said Paul. "Where's Gus Strether?"
"Gussie? Waiting below, I expect. He was ordering tea for three at
the kitchens when I came up."
"Well, let's go. We haven't much time if we're walking down together."
The three friends foregathered in the Court, Donaldson chaffing
Strether whom he had christened "Gus" by way of a comical allusion to
the other's very undandified dress. He himself wore socks and ties
that proclaimed themselves, a Norfolk jacket of a light tweed and a
fancy waistcoat. As they went, Paul was a little silent. He was
wondering whether he liked Donaldson. And if so, why? He was aware
that the meeting with Hartley had been significant, that the two would
never get on together, that he was proposing to get on with both. It
was puzzling....
By Jesus Bridge they chanced to meet a girl. Donaldson smiled at her,
after the manner of his kind, and she smiled back at him after the
manner of hers. Strether snorted after a fashion of his own.
Donaldson took up his parable.
"I say, Kestern, did you see that? Gus, that girl made eyes at you.
Yes, by Jove, she's looking back at you. Oh I say, Gussie, this won't
do, my boy! It's those new brogues of yours. I've seen her along here
before, and I bet she's on the lookout for you. Here, you aren't
tubbing; go and pick her up, and tell us all about it at tea."
Strether snorted again. "Opprobrious conduct," he muttered stormily.
Donaldson roared with laughter and Paul could not help smiling.
Strether loved long words, and it was characteristic of him that he
made odd noises. He retorted now, fiercely. "Don't bray like an ass,"
he said. "Do you want all the street to hear you?"
"Gus, you'll be the death of me! Opprobrious conduct! But did you see
her ankles--pretty little ankles and a neat little waist. I must say
you've got quite good taste."
"Some hussy of a shop-girl," growled the other. "Disgusting, I call
it. Why can't you leave females alone?"
Paul chuckled again. "Come on you two," he said. "Let him alone,
Donaldson. We've still to change, and it's past two now."
Next day the intrigue so lightly begun developed. Manning had
consented to tea with Paul, and Donaldson, who was there, told him the
story with certain emendations natural to him. Manning was highly
amused. "Write Strether a letter," he suggested, "pretending that it
comes from the girl and asking him to meet her on Jesus Bridge some
night. Very likely he'll bite out of sheer funk of what she might do
if he does not. You can go and watch. He'll walk up and down
snorting. It'd be rather a joke."
"By Jove, we will," cried Donaldson. "It'll be no end of a rag. But
look here, he knows our handwriting. Will you write it?"
"Yes, if you like. Give me some paper, Kestern."
Paul got up for the materials with some reluctance. "But I like old
Strether," he objected. "He may be an ass, but he's a good sort. It
mustn't go further."
"The more the merrier," said Donaldson. "Don't spoil sport."
Paul shook his head, hesitating. But Manning supported him. "You're
right, Kestern," he said. "We'll keep the joke to ourselves. You
three are pretty thick, and it would be low down to split on a pal."
So the letter was written and posted, and Paul was at breakfast next
morning when Strether came in with it. He flung himself into an
arm-chair and tossed the note on the table. "Who wrote that?" he
demanded savagely, his limbs sprawling all over the place.
Paul, feigning surprise, opened it. "'Elsie Dawson,'" he read, as one
bewildered. "Great Scott, Gussie, I shouldn't have thought you'd have
had a correspondence with girls! Why, she's the girl we met yesterday!
Good Lord--'Will you meet me to-night at 9.30 on Jesus Bridge?' What
are you going to do? My aunt, fancy her having the cheek!"
Strether kicked out at a footstool. "I don't know the girl," he
exclaimed bitterly.
For the life of him, Paul couldn't help playing up to the game now that
the victim had risen so well. He got up and went over to the fire.
"But look here," he said seriously, "she's seen you and she's plainly
after you. Well, hang it all, man, we don't want her sort hanging
about whenever we go down to the river. You'd better meet her once and
choke her off. Take Donaldson with you; he'll take her off your hands."
Strether growled, muttered, and kicked out at the footstool again, the
while Paul, intensely amused but outwardly serious, gathered at last
that he was cursing Donaldson, declining to tell that worthy a thing
about the letter, and demanding how the girl could have learnt his name.
"She overheard Donaldson saying it, I expect," invented the resourceful
Paul.
He was cut short by the noise on the stair that usually heralded that
gentleman's approach. "Give me the letter," said Strether hurriedly,
"and don't say anything."
"If you go, come in here afterwards and tell me what happens," replied
Paul quickly, tossing it him. The other nodded.
"Has he got it?" demanded Donaldson eagerly, as soon as they were alone
at the boathouse that afternoon.
Paul nodded.
"Oh my holy aunt, what a spree! What did he say? What's he going to
do?"
Paul explained, smiling. "You're not to know. I kidded him all right,
and I think he's going to-night."
"Lor! what an ass! Well, we'll be there anyway. Wonder if Manning
would care to come?"
"Don't ask him," said Paul. "After all Gussie's our pal, and Manning's
not our year. I wish he knew nothing about it."
Donaldson stared. "He's a damned good sport, anyway."
"May be," retorted Paul. "So's old Gussie, if it comes to that."
"All right," conceded the other. "But we'll go. We'll go out at nine.
It'll need a bit of reconnoitring."
Paul showed admirable strategy by suggesting to Strether that he, Paul,
should take Donaldson out of college before the arranged hour for the
rendezvous to avoid any awkward questions as to the other getting away
from them. In the shadow of a tree, with coat collars turned up, they
watched their victim arrive, cross and recross the bridge nervously;
advance, obviously fuming, some way into the Common; return; look at
his watch; fume some more; stamp about for a quarter of an hour; and
finally make off for home. The conspirators returned another way, and
Donaldson went to his own room. Paul found Strether in his, awaiting
him.
"Hullo! Back?" queried Paul. "What happened, Gussie?"
No answer.
"Oh come on," said Paul, "what did she say? Did you get rid of her
easily?"
"All this fuss about beastly females," muttered Strether. Then he
flung himself back in his chair and half bellowed: "She wasn't there!"
Paul could have screamed. It was irresistibly comic, but he maintained
his composure by an effort. "Not there!" he exclaimed. "What do you
mean?"
The other explained. Paul suggested that she might have been kept at
home. Hadn't he, Strether, left the Bridge a bit too soon? Strether
emphatically thought not, and gloom descended upon him. What if she
wrote again? What if the porters spotted her hanging around? What
if--but further speculation was cut off, the wooden stairs betraying
approaching visitors. Manning and Donaldson came in together.
"Hullo, Gus Strether," cried the latter noisily, "where've you been?
We've been searching the place for you."
"Shut up," growled Strether suspiciously.
Manning smiled at both of them. "What a bally row you do make,
Donaldson," he said. "Can you give us some coffee, Kestern? Look
here, I thought those verses of yours the other night jolly good."
The talk drifted into literature, but ten minutes later there was a
further knock on the door. "Come in," called Paul.
The door opened, and "old Sam," an under-porter, put in his head. He
was an ancient mariner, short, red-faced, with smiling eyes, a genial
old boy and popular, since he was ready for anything that included a
tip. "Beggin' your pardon, sir," he said to Paul, "but is Mr. Strether
'ere? I couldn't find 'im in 'is rooms."
Strether made a noise of some sort, indicative of his presence, from
his chair. His face was a study.
"Oh there you are, sir. 'Xcuse me, but there's a young lady in the
porch a-arskin' after you."
Pandemonium. Donaldson attempted to rush out and Strether closed with
him. Manning sprang to the lamp, laughing so much that he could hardly
hold it. An arm-chair was overturned. Paul caught Donaldson, and
Strether freed himself. Sam beamed beneficently on them all and closed
the door with a wink as Strether went out.
"Oh my holy aunt," roared Donaldson. "Gussie will be the death of me.
Did you see his face? But what's the next move, Manning?"
"Wait for him to come back. Then pull his leg."
They waited a long ten minutes, and then went off to Strether's rooms.
His oak was sported, and no amount of banging, not even Donaldson's
uproarious "Gus Strether! Open, you old blighter. Come on, Gussie!
Pull up your socks. Who's your lady friend?" echoing through the
night, was of any use.
The three departed together, Donaldson to Manning's rooms for a drink.
But Paul refused the invitation. He climbed his stairway, a bit
conscious-stricken, and sported his own door. He glanced round the
little room, and drew consolation from its remote comfortable air.
Then he remembered that it was Saturday night and he had an address for
the morrow to prepare. He sighed and sat down to think.
(3)
The children's service proved to be a small affair compared with his
own at Claxted and requires no further notice, but the open-air meeting
on Parker's Piece was a different matter. When Paul at last found
himself on a chair beneath the central lamp-post, it was with feelings
he had never had before. A big crowd of townsfolk surrounded him, but
among them were 'Varsity men, some members of the C.I.C.C.U., but
others who were not. Paul realised himself and his position as he had
never done in Lambeth Court. He was not merely preaching repentance to
obvious and ignorant sinners; he was challenging life and thought which
could meet him on equal terms. The sense of it surged through him as
he stood there and read the curious faces, yellow in the lamplight,
that ringed him round against the foggy gloom behind. Even these
town's men were a new audience to him. They had caught something of
the criticism, the independence, of the University; and they were also
sarcastic, as Mr. Mavis and Mrs. Roper might be, having seen in their
day many things. This particular young gentleman's whim was religion,
just as another's might be the breaking of windows, or the purchase of
a certain kind of picture, or some form of sport, or highly coloured
socks. One had to take these phenomena philosophically, thankful if
one's own young gentleman had the more harmless crazes.
The sensitive Paul was aware that this was the temper of the greater
part of his audience, while the lesser part would be critical, amused,
or ragging undergraduates. He faced the crowd uncertainly for a few
moments. And then the blinding conviction in which he had been
nurtured swept down on him that, after all, these were but sinful souls
needing the Saviour, their very complexity but making the more
necessary His divine simplicity. Indecision went to the winds. As he
wrote home later to his father, he, thereafter, "preached unto them
Jesus."
When the circle broke up, a man bore down upon him. Paul saw him,
started, hesitated, blushed and would have escaped. But it was too
late. "Comin' back now?" queried Manning with a smile. "I was
returning from calling on some people who live across the Piece, and
saw you. We might as well walk back together and I'll brew some
coffee. You'll want it after that effort."
Reassured to some extent, Paul thanked him, exchanged a word or two
with Dick Hartley in explanation, and set off with the other. Clear of
the crowd, they fell into step. "I congratulate you on your sermon,
Kestern," said Manning. "It was a great effort."
Paul thought he detected a note of mockery in the words. He pulled
himself together and mustered up all his courage. He must not, he told
himself, be ashamed of his Master. "I spoke what I believe with all my
heart," he said simply.
The senior man was instantly aware of the other's implied reproach. He
slipped his arm into Paul's familiarly. "Exactly," he said. "No one
with a grain of sense could doubt that. If you don't mind my saying
so, it was a sincere, genuine and remarkable performance. It was,
honestly, the best sermon I've heard for a long time."
Paul warmed naturally to the praise. The friendly appreciation cheered
and encouraged him. "That's jolly good of you," he exclaimed boyishly.
"I thought at first you were pulling my leg."
"My dear fellow, I know true art when I see it," protested Manning.
"Art?" queried Paul, bewildered.
"Yes, art. Skilful execution. A fine art, too, for your imagination
was at work. And I'm inclined to think that you have a great gift of
imagination, Kestern. You felt strongly, you saw vividly, and you knew
instinctively how to express yourself. In the superlative, that's
genius. That's how the great pictures come to be painted, the great
books to be written, and the great orations to be made. The
interesting thing about you is that one is not yet sure which you will
do."
Paul was silent. He was at once elated, bewildered and disappointed.
Gradually the humbler feeling predominated. He had never thought of
himself as an artist, and as an evangelist he knew instinctively that
he had failed with Manning. "The Gospel is not a work of art," he said
shortly, and shrewdly.
"But your presentation of it was a distinct _tour de force_," said
Manning.
Paul took his courage in both hands. "You praise the presentation, not
the thing," he said. "What is the Gospel to you, Manning?"
The other smiled genially. "Ah well," he said, "if I invite an
evangelist to coffee, I suppose I must expect to be asked if I am
saved."
"Don't!" cried Paul. "You laugh at it. I cannot do that."
"You're wrong there," replied the other quickly. "I do not laugh at
it. A man is a fool who does that. It is impossible to deny that
Christianity was, and probably is, a great dynamic in the world's
affairs. You cannot dismiss St. Paul, Augustine, Francis of Assisi, or
even Luther and Wesley or Moody, with a gesture. But I confess that
to-night's affair interested me most as an observer of men. You
interest me more than your religion. But here we are. Let's talk over
coffee."
Paul, in his arm-chair by the fireplace, glanced round the now familiar
room with an air of hostility of which his subconscious more than his
conscious mind was aware. But he had had tea that day with Hartley,
and he definitely compared his friend's room at Jesus with this, for
the first time. He had yet to discover that he was sensitive to an
"atmosphere," but he was already well on the road to that discovery.
Hartley's room was big and rather bare. He was athletic, and the
wall-space was almost wholly given up to a number of oars, and a dozen
or so plainly-framed groups with a cricket cap hanging from the corner
of one. The exceptions were two other photographs, one of the service
on the sands at Eastbourne (in which Paul had discovered Madeline) and
one of the Cambridge University Missionary Campaigners in some Midland
town. The mantelshelf was overcrowded with photographs of men,
snapshots of children, and the cards of a variety of chiefly religious
societies and activities among which a Bump Supper menu seemed out of
place. The electric lights were naked; the window-curtains
commonplace; the tea had been homely. The room focussed activities.
It had made Paul feel instinctively "keen," as they said at the
Christian Union.
Manning, kneeling before the fire, was carefully pouring boiling water
into a Turkish coffee-pot of burnished copper. Delicate china
coffee-cups stood by a silver cigarette-box on an Indian lacquered
table. A diffused light filtered through silken lamp-shades, and two
wall-sconces of candles lit the pictures with a faint radiance. The
corners and distances of the room were heavy with shadows. Bronze
chrysanthemums stood in a tall vase on an otherwise bare overmantel.
The chairs the big footstools, the lounge, the carpet--all were soft,
rich, heavy. The firelight glinted on the tooled leather bindings of
books in a case opposite him. The room made him feel comfortable and
introspective. Parker's Piece seemed to belong to a different world.
He pulled himself together, and deliberately continued the
conversation. "But it is Christ Who matters, Manning," he said with
real bravery.
The other replaced the kettle and set the coffee-pot on the table. He
selected a cigarette and lit it over the lamp. Then he settled himself
comfortably on the lounge. "Matters?" he queried. "Your
technicalities are new to me, Kestern."
But Paul was not going to shirk issues. "Yes," he said, "matters to
your soul, for life or death."
"That, then," said Manning, "is my business. My soul is my own, at any
rate."
"No," said Paul, "it was bought with a price. 'Ye are not your own.'"
"I was not aware that I had put mine up for sale," retorted Manning,
"and if it was purchased, on your own showing, some nineteen hundred
years before it came into my possession at all, it seems to me that I
don't get much of a chance."
"Christ bought you to set you free," said Paul, and he mentally
recalled a favourite anecdote of his concerning a travelling Englishman
and a freed slave. For the first time, perhaps, he decided not to use
it in this connection.
"Thanks," said Manning drily. "Then I claim my freedom."
"But," capped Paul, "you have to choose whom you will serve."
Manning flicked off his cigarette ash with a little gesture. "Look
here," he said, "words are words. They serve a purpose, but they are
not ends in themselves. St. Paul used Jewish and Rabbinic phraseology,
and appealed to his day with metaphors. Thus--it's as old as the
hills--if you talk of purchase, you imply a seller. Did Christ buy me
from Satan or from Almighty God or from whom? So far as I am aware,
the point is not even yet settled. Nor is it meant to be settled. It
implies a conception of the universe generally that is outworn.
Neither you nor I are ancient Jews. A good deal of water has flowed
under the bridges since Habakkuk."
Paul said nothing. In point of fact, he hardly understood. This was
all new to him.
"Well, I see God in art and beauty. He has given me a soul that finds
Him there, rather than in sacrifice of the fat of rams and the thunder
of Sinai. I take it, even you do not regard Him as tied to pitch-pine,
corrugated iron and Moody and Sankey's hymns. He is not to me a tribal
deity, needing propitiation and ordering the slaughter of women and
children, flocks and herds. 'Nothing but the Blood of Jesus,' sounded
all right on Parker's Piece and offers an emotional stimulus to
uneducated people. But when you come to definitions, the thought of
the Old Testament leaves me rather cold. How in the world can blood
wash me clean?"
"But you believe in the Bible, surely?" queried Paul, puzzled and
honestly grieved.
"My dear fellow, what in the world do you mean by 'believe in'? I
believe in Browning. Personally, I believe in the present Government.
As a matter of fact, I believe in you."
Paul flushed. "But the Bible is the 'verbally inspired Word of God,'"
he ventured to quote.
"Which of the ten-score different versions?" queried Manning calmly.
"By the way, have you shown your verses to Tressor yet?"
If his visitor accepted the change of subject, it was because he was,
for the moment, clean bowled.
(4)
Paul had left a note asking Strether to breakfast, and he rather
wondered if, after the previous day's rag, his friend would come. But
he came. To mark the occasion, Paul had fish and an omelette sent up
from the kitchens, and over these burnt sacrifices he made his apology.
"Look here, Gussie," he said, "I'm sorry that rag ended as it did. I
had no idea the others had arranged it with old Sam like that, and I
couldn't help Donaldson kicking up all that row on the stairs. That
was beastly, I admit. I'm awfully sorry. Hope it won't make any
difference to our friendship."
Strether growled in his throat. "Who bagged my boots?" he demanded,
with a sense of humour.
Paul laughed. "Let's rag Donaldson somehow," he suggested, "and I'll
give them back."
Strether smiled. Then frowned. "Always talking about girls," he
muttered. Then, dropping the subject for good and all, "Come to _The
Mikado_ this week," he invited.
"I've never been to the theatre," said Paul frankly.
The other nodded slowly in his meditative fashion. "So?" he queried.
"Yes," said Paul. "My people are against it. They say the stage is
immoral. I don't know...."
"Then so are newspapers," said Strether, "and so's Cambridge too for
the matter of that."
"That's different," objected Paul.
Strether laid down his knife and fork. "Going to the P.M., Sunday?" he
queried.
"Yes, I expect so," said Paul. "Why?"
"I'll come with you, if you'll come with me to _The Mikado_. I've
never been to a P.M. My people say prayer meetings make religion too
emotional."
Paul got up dubiously. He looked out of the window.
After all, there were, it seemed, many points of view in the world.
Ought he to see none other than his father's? And besides, if this
would get Gus Strether to a prayer meeting ...
"I'll go," he said. "I see that it is certainly foolish to condemn a
thing you haven't seen."
That night, over his fire in his own beloved room, he got out a secret
and personal diary which an evangelical missioner had urged him to
keep, and sat thoughtfully over it, pencil in hand. Then he wrote
slowly: "Nov. 13. I have decided to go to a theatre, since it is
obviously unfair to condemn anything unseen. I wish to be sure of the
spirit in which I go and for what I ought to look. Therefore I shall
ask myself afterwards three questions, and I write these down now to
make certain that I do not forget:
1. If Christ came while I was there, should I mind?
2. Do I see anything bad in this play?
3. Has it helped my Christian life?"
Years later he turned up his old answers, written late on the Wednesday
night of the play, and smiled at their amazing and yet serious
youthfulness. "1. I should mind Christ's advent while I was in the
theatre no more than I should mind His coming while I was laughing over
a humorous novel," so ran the first answer.
"2. Honestly, I see nothing bad in the play. It was beautiful, the
colour and music bewitching, and the only fault, overmuch foolishness.
But in the bar and lounge, one felt that the men about were mostly of
the sort who are careless about their souls. Query: But what about a
bump supper or a smoking carriage?
"3. No, it has not helped my Christian life, but it has not, so far as
I can see, hindered it. Indirectly, it has perhaps helped me, just as
exercise, music, poetry and ordinary conversation, may be said to do.
"_Note_. Honestly, I have never enjoyed myself more in all my life."
Poor Paul!
(5)
But he was to enjoy himself still more that memorable term. Towards
its close, as a scholar, he received an invitation to the big college
Feast of St. Mary's, a commemoration to which some distinguished
outsider was always invited and which celebrated itself with the aid of
a classic menu and some historic music. Neither Strether nor Donaldson
were asked, for neither had achieved scholarship fame, and Manning was
separated from the fresher by an impassable gulf of table. Paul, in
fact, sat between Judson and the wall farthest from the High Table.
Judson, cox of his boat, was a genial person, but no particular friend
of Paul's, and Judson, moreover, was frankly there to eat and drink.
Paul functioned merely automatically in regard to these. It was the
splendour, the glamour, that he feasted upon, and his imagination saw
to it that neither lacked. Even the sheer beauty of the shining plate,
the silver candelabra, the ancient hall and the glittering tables,
touched, here and there, with the orange and yellow and green and gold
of the piled dessert, was all but forgotten as he read his list of
distinguished names, caught the gleam of ribbons across this and that
shirt-front, listened to the clever short speeches, delighted in the
historic music, shared, timidly, in the ceremonies of toast and
loving-cup. He saw a world worth entering. He was intoxicated, though
he drank no more than a shy glass of lemonade. If, in the dark
shadowed gallery away from the bustling waiters, there lingered
understanding spirits, as like as not Paul Kestern was the most
entertaining person present.
In the library, the great Tressor singled him out. "Well, Kestern," he
said smiling, "what did you think of it all?"
The boy looked at him gravely. "It was all rather wonderful to me,
sir," he said.
"It was a good feast, certainly," said the other. "By the way, I fear
I can't get away from all this now, but I wanted to say a word to you
about those verses of yours. They are very distinctly good, I think.
The shortest is the best--_The Spent Day_. You'll do much better work,
but in its own way, it's a perfect poem."
Paul could hardly believe his ears. "It is awfully good of you to read
them," he managed to say.
"Oh not at all. I'm delighted. Look here, are you engaged to-morrow?
Come to luncheon, will you? You row, don't you? so you'll want to
leave early. I won't invite anybody else, and we can discuss them
then. Good-night."
The big man, with the heavy eyebrows, slightly bowed shoulders and
kindly eyes, smiled, nodded, and passed on. Manning followed him up to
Paul. "What did he say?" he asked.
Paul hardly liked to tell him. It seemed fantastic as he said it.
Manning nodded. "I thought as much," he said, smiling. "Remember me,
Kestern, when you're a big man. I at any rate put one of your feet on
the ladder."
Paul mumbled something, and soon escaped. His fire was out in his
room, but it mattered little; he could not sit down to read or think
quietly after all this. Up and down he paced, repeating Tressor's
words: "In its own way, it's a perfect poem." A perfect poem! And
Tressor had said it! Said it after those songs, those speeches; said
it in that company.
Then, as the boy passed and repassed, his eye fell on his text. He
looked at it critically: the frame and flowers and lettering were so
extraordinarily bad. A few weeks ago he had not remarked that. Still,
it was the words that mattered. What would the Master have thought of
the college feast? Cana of Galilee? Yes, but He would have been but a
visitor. Could He have had a real part in it?
Paul swung into a new train of thought. He considered the cost of it
all. Why, when he had refused the first cigar, Judson had said _he_
never refused a half-crown smoke. Half a crown for a cigar!--the thing
was monstrous to evangelical Paul. The smokes of the dinner alone
would have kept a catechist in India for a year! Probably the wines
would have paid the annual salary of a white missionary in China. And
with every tick of the clock, a heathen soul passed into eternity. How
often he had said it! What, then, was he doing among such things?
What part had he in such extravagance? "One is your Master, even
Christ."
Paul sighed, and reached for his diary. "The feast was wonderful (he
wrote), extraordinarily beautiful I thought.... But..." Then he went
to bed.
Wonder on wonders. The morning's post brought him a letter from the
editor of _The Granta_, accepting, magnanimously, a short story of an
imaginative nature that he had placed in Egypt with the aid of a
Baedeker. The editor asked, interestedly, if he had been there. He
supposed that Paul must have been, for the descriptions were so vivid.
Paul's porridge grew cold. He sat on with the letter in his hand.
Donaldson found him so, calling to go with him to a distant lecture.
"Hullo," he said, "not finished brekker? You're late again, four!"
"I say," said Paul, "_The Granta_'s taken that yarn of mine about
Egypt."
"By Jove, that's topping." Donaldson spoke enviously, staring at him.
"But I told you it was jolly good, didn't I?"
"You did," said Paul, "but I say, what do you think Tressor said last
night about my verse?"
"Can't say," said Donaldson.
Then Paul told him.
His friend whistled. "Damn it all, Paul," he said--"by the way, let me
call you 'Paul,' may I?--I should chuck all those preaching and praying
stunts of yours now."
"Why on earth----" began Paul, utterly surprised.
"Oh well, do as you think best. But it'll spoil you for literature.
Didn't Tressor tell you the other day that your essays were too like
sermons? And if you get in with Manning and all that set, Hartley and
his crowd won't be of any use."
Paul got up slowly and walked to the fire. He stood still awhile,
gazing into it. The other fidgeted. "Come on now, anyway," he said.
"We shall be late for that lekker."
"I shan't go this morning. I shall cut it."
"Right-o. Good-bye. I'm off," retorted the other, and departed, a
little huffed.
Mrs. Roper came in to clear away. "Aren't you a-going to finish your
breakfuss, sir?" she asked.
"I've done, thanks," said Paul. "I don't want any more."
"Off 'is feed," said Mrs. Roper outside to her "help." "'Ad too much
at that there feast, I expect. 'Ere, you can 'ave them eggs."
As for Paul, he mounted his bicycle and rode out into the country. A
wintry sun lay on the bare woods and stubble fields, and it was all
very lovely. Even the close-cropped hedges were beautiful. The fallen
beech-leaves were a spread of old gold under the trees by Madingley.