1
Wheezing, cook had spread a plaster of dampened ashy cinders upon the
basement schoolroom fire and gone bonily away across the oilcloth in her
heelless boots. As the door closed Miriam’s eye went up from her book to
the little slope of grass showing above the concrete wall of the area.
The grass gleamed along the edge of a bank of mist. In the mist the area
railings stood hard and solid against the edge of empty space. Several
times she glanced at the rich green, feeling that neither ‘emerald,’
‘emerald velvet,’ nor ‘velvety enamel’ quite expressed it. She had not
noticed that there was a mist shutting in and making brilliant the
half-darkness of the room at breakfast-time, only feeling that for some
reason it was a good day. “It’s fog--there’s a sort of fog,” she said,
glowing. The fog made the room with the strange brilliant brown light on
the table, on the horsehair chairs, on the shabby length of brown and
yellow oilcloth running out to the bay of the low window, seem to be
rushing through space, alone. It was quite safe, going on its
journey--towards some great good.
The back door, just across the little basement hall, scrooped inwards
across the oilcloth, jingling its little bell, and was banged to. The
flounter-_crack_ of a rain-cloak smartly shaken out was followed by a
gentle scrabbling in a shoe-box,--the earliest girl, peaceful and calm,
a wonderful sort of girl, coming into the empty basement quietly getting
off her things, with all the rabble of the school coming along the
roads, behind. The jingling door was pushed open again just as her
slippered feet ran upstairs. “Khoo--what a filthy day!” said a
vibrating hard mature voice. Miriam glanced at her time-table,
history--dictation--geography--sums--writing--and shrank to her utmost
air of preoccupation lest either of the elder girls should look in.
Sounds increased in the little hall, loud abrupt voices, short rallying
laughs, the stubbing and stamping of feet on the oilcloth. At the
expected rattling of the handle of her own door she crouched over her
book. The door opened and was quietly closed again. A small figure flung
itself forward. Miriam was clutched by harsh serge-clad arms. As she
moved, startled, firm cracked lips were pressed against her cheekbone.
“Good morning, Burra,” she said, turning to put an arm round the child.
She caught a glimpse of broad cheeks bulging firmly against a dark bush
of short hair. Large fierce bloodshot eyes glared close to her own.
“Hoo--angel.” The little gasping body stiffened against her shoulder,
pinning down her arm. The crimson face tried to reach her breast. “Have
you changed your boots,” said Miriam coldly. “Hoo--hoo.” The short hard
fingers hurt her. “Go and get them off at once.” Head down Burra rushed
at the door, colliding with the incoming figure of a neat little girl
dressed in velvet-trimmed red merino, with a rose and white face and
short gentle gold hair. She put a little pile of books on the table and
stood still near to Miriam, with her hands behind her. They both looked
down the room out of the window, with quiet unsmiling faces. “What have
you been doing since Friday, Gertie?” Miriam said presently. “We went
for a walk,” said Gertie in a neat liquid little voice, dimpling and
faintly raising her eyebrows.
The eight little girls who made up the upper class of the junior school
stood in a close row as near as possible to Miriam’s chair at the head
of the table. They were silent and fresh and eagerly crowded, waiting
for her to begin. She kept them silent for a few moments for the
pleasure of having them there with her. She knew that Miss Perne,
sitting in the window space with the youngest class drawn up in a
half-circle for their Scripture lesson, was an approving presence,
keeping her own little class at a level of quiet question and answer
that made a background rather than a disturbance for the adventure of
the elder girls. “Not too close together,” said Miriam at last,
gathering herself with a deep breath; “throw back your shoulders and
stand straight. Don’t lump down on your heels. Let your weight come on
the ball of your feet. Are you all all right? Don’t poke your heads
forward.” As the girls eagerly manoeuvred themselves, wilfully carrying
out her instructions even to turning their heads to face the opposite
wall, she caught most of the eyes in turn smiling their eager
affectionate conspiracy, and restraining her desire to get up then and
there and clasp the little figures one by one, began the lesson. Four of
the girls, two square-built Quakeresses with straight brown frocks, deep
slow voices and dreamy eyes, a white-faced, tawny-haired, thin child
with an eager stammer, and a brilliant little Jewess knew the “principal
facts and dates” of the reign of Edward I by rote backwards and forwards
in response to any form of question. Burra hung her head and knew
nothing. Beadie Featherwell, dreadfully tall, a head taller, with her
twelve years, than the tallest child in the lower school, knew no more
than Burra and stood staring at the wall and biting her lips. A stout
child with open mouth and snoring breath answered with perfect
exactitude from the book, but her answers bore no relationship to the
questions, and Gertie could only pipe replies if the questions were so
put as to contain part of the answer. The white-faced girl was beginning
to gnaw her fingers by the time the questioning was at an end.
“Well now, what is the difficulty,” said Miriam, “of getting hold of the
events of this queer little reign?” Everybody laughed and was silent
again at once because Miriam’s voice went on, trying to interest both
herself and the successful girls in inventing ways of remembering all
the things that had to be “hooked on to the word Edward.” In less than
ten minutes even the stout snoring girl could repeat the reign
successfully, and for the remainder of their time they talked aimlessly.
The children standing at ease, saying whatever occurred to them, even
the snoring girl secured from ridicule by Miriam’s consideration of
whatever was offered. Their adventure took them away from their subject
into what Miriam knew “clever” people would call “side issues.” “Nothing
is a side issue,” she told herself passionately with her eyes on the
green glare beyond the window. The breaking up of Miss Perne’s class
left the whole of the lower school on her hands for the rest of the
morning.
2
By half-past twelve she was sitting alone and exhausted with aching
throat at her place at the head of the table.
“Khoo, _isn’t_ it a filthy day!” Polly Allen, a short heavy girl with a
sallow pitted face, thin ill-nourished hair and kind swiftly moving grey
eyes, marched in out of the dark hall with flapping bootlaces. In the
bay she sat down and began to lace up her boots. The laces flicked
carelessly upon the linoleum as she threaded, profaning the little
sanctuary of the window space. “Oh me bones, me poor old bones,” she
muttered. “Eunice!” her hard mature voice vibrated through the room.
“Eunice Dupont!”
“What’s the jolly row?” said a slow voice at the door. “Wot’s the bally
shindy, beloved?”
“Like a really beautiful Cheshire cat,” Miriam repeated to herself,
propped studiously on her elbows shrinking, and hoping that if she did
not look round, Eunice’s carved brown curls, her gleaming slithering
opaque oval eyes and her short upper lip, the strange evil carriage of
her head, the wicked lines of her figure, would be withdrawn. “Cheshire,
Cheshire,” she scolded inwardly, feeling the pain in her throat
increase.
“Nothing. Wait for me. That’s all. Oh, my lungs, bones _and_ et ceteras.
It’s old age, I suppose, Uncle William.”
“Well, hurry your old age up, that’s all. I’m ready.”
“Well, don’t go away, you funny cuckoo, you can wait, can’t you?”
A party of girls straggled in one by one and drifted towards Polly in
the window space.
“It’s the parties I look forward to.”
“Oh, look at her tie!”
“My tie? Six-three at Crisp’s.”
The sounds of Polly’s bootlacing came to an end. She sat holding a
court. “Doesn’t look forward to parties? She must be a funny cuckoo!”
“Dancing’s divine,” said a smooth deep smiling voice. “Reversing. Khoo!
with a fella. Khooo!”
“You surprise me, Edie. You do indeed. Hoh. Shocking.”
“Shocking? Why? What do you mean, Poll?”
“Nothing. Nothing. Riang doo too.”
“I don’t think dancing’s shocking. How can it be? You’re barmy, my son.”
“Ever heard of Lottie Collins?”
“Ssh. Don’t be silly.”
“I don’t see what Lottie Collins has got to do with it. My mother thinks
dancing’s all right. That’s good enough for me.”
“Well--I’m not your mother.”
“Nor anyone else’s.”
“Khoo, _Mabel_.”
“Who wants to be anyone’s mother?”
“Not me. Ug. Beastly little brats.”
“Oh shut _up_. Oh you _do_ make me tired.”
“Kids are jolly. A1. I hope I have lots.”
Surprised into amazement, Miriam looked up to consult the face of Jessie
Wheeler, the last speaker--a tall flat-figured girl with a strong
squarish pale face, hollow cheeks, and firm colourless lips. Was it
being a Baptist that made her have such an extraordinary idea? Miriam’s
eyes sought refuge from the defiant beam of her sea-blue eyes in the
shimmering cloud of her hair. The strangest hair in the school; negroid
in its intensity of fuzziness, but saved by its fine mesh.
“Don’t you adore kiddies, Miss Henderson?”
“I think they’re rather nice,” said Miriam quickly, and returned to her
book.
“I should jolly well think they were,” said Jessie fervently.
“Hope your husband’ll think so too, my dear,” said Polly, getting up.
“Oh, of course, I should only have them if the fellow wanted me to.”
“You haven’t got a fella yet, madam.”
“Of course not, cuckoo. But I shall.”
“Plenty of time to think about that.”
“Hoo. Fancy never having a fellow. I should go off my nut.”
When they had all disappeared Miriam opened the windows. There was still
someone moving about in the hall, and as she stood in the instreaming
current of damp air looking wearily at the concrete--a girl came into
the room. “Can I come in a minute?” she said, advancing to the window.
“I want to speak to you,” she pursued when she reached the bay. She
stood at Miriam’s side and looked out of the window. Half-turning,
Miriam had recognized Grace Broom, one of the elder first-class girls
who attended only for a few subjects. She was a dark short-necked girl
with thick shoulders; a receding mouth and boldly drawn nose and chin
gave her a look of shrewd elderliness. The heavy mass of hair above the
broad sweep of her forehead, her heavy frame and flat-footed walk added
to this appearance. She wore a high-waisted black serge pinafore dress
with black crape vest and sleeves.
“Do you mind me speaking to you?” she said in a hot voice. Her
black-fringed brown eyes were fixed on the garden railings where people
passed by and Miriam never looked.
“No,” said Miriam shyly.
“You know why we’re in mourning?”
Miriam stood silent with beating heart, trying to cope with the
increasing invasion.
“Our father’s dead.”
Hurriedly Miriam noted the superstitious tone in the voice.... This is a
family that revels in plumes and hearses. She glanced at the stiff
rather full crape sleeve nearest to her and sought about in her mind for
help as she said with a blush, “Oh, I see.”
“We’ve just moved.”
“Oh yes, I see,” said Miriam, glancing fearfully at the heavy scroll of
profile and finding it expressive and confused.
“We’ve got a house about a quarter as big as where we used to live.”
Miriam found it impossible to respond to this confession and still tried
desperately to sweep away the sense of the figure so solidly planted at
her side.
“I’ve asked our aunt if we can ask you to come to tea with us.”
“Thank you very much,” said Miriam in one word.
“When could you come?”
“Oh, I’m afraid I couldn’t come. It would be impossible.”
“Oh no. You must come. I shall ask Aunt Lucy to write to Miss Perne.”
“I really couldn’t come. I shouldn’t be able to ask you back.”
“That doesn’t matter,” panted the relentless voice. “I’ve wanted to
speak to you ever since you came.”
3
When next Miriam saw the black-robed Brooms and their aunt file past the
transept where were the Wordsworth House sittings, she felt that to
visit them might perhaps not be the ordeal she had not dared to picture.
It would be strange. Those three heavy black-dressed women. Their small
new house. She imagined them sitting at tea in a little room. Why was
Grace so determined that she should sit there too? Grace had a life and
a home and was real. She did not know that things were awful. Nor did
Florrie Broom, nor the aunt. But yet they did not look like ‘social’
people. They were a little different. Not worldly. Not pious either. Nor
intellectual. What could they want with her? She had soon forgotten them
and the congregation assumed its normal look. As the service went on the
thoughts came that came every Sunday. An old woman with a girl at her
side were the only people whose faces were within Miriam’s line of
vision from her place at the wall end of the Wordsworth House pew. The
people in front of them were not even in profile, and those behind were
hidden from her by the angle of the transept wall. To her right she
could just see rising above the heads in the rows of pews in front of
her the far end of the chancel screen. The faces grouped in the transept
on the opposite side of the church were a blur. The two figures sat or
knelt or stood in a heavy silence. They neither sang nor prayed. Their
faces remained unaltered during the whole service. To Miriam they were
its most intimate part. During the sermon she rarely raised her eyes
from the circle they filled for her as they sat thrown into relief by
the great white pillar. Their faces were turned towards the chancel.
They could see its high dim roof and distant altar, the light on the
altar, flowers, shining metal, embroideries, the maze of the east
window, the white choir. They showed no sign of seeing these things. The
old woman’s heavy face with its heavy jaw-bone seemed to have been dead
for years under its coffin-shaped black bonnet. Her large body was
covered by a mantle of thickly ribbed black material trimmed with braid
and bugles. That bright yellow colour meant liver. Whatever she had she
was dying of it. People were always dying when they looked like that.
But it was a bad way to die. The real way was the way of that lady
trailing about over the Heath near Roehampton, dying by inches of an
internal complaint, with her face looking fragile--like the little
alabaster chapelle in the nursery with a candle alight inside. She was
going to die, walking about alone on the Heath in the afternoons. Her
family going on as usual at home; the greengrocer calling. She knew that
everybody was alone and that all the fuss and noise people made all day
was a pretence.... What to _do_? To be walking about with a quiet face
meeting death. Nothing could be so alone as that. The pain, and
struggle, and darkness.... That was what the old woman feared. She did
not think about death. She was afraid and sullen all the time. Stunned,
sitting there with her cold common daughter. She had been common herself
as a girl, but more noisy, and she had married and never thought about
dying, and now she was dying and hating her cold daughter. The daughter,
sitting there with her stiff slatey-blue coat and skirt, her indistinct
hat tied with a thin harsh veil to her small flat head--what a home with
her in it all the time. She would never laugh. Her poor-looking cheeks
were yellowish, her fringe dry, without gloss. She would move her mouth
when she spoke, sideways with a snarling curl of one-half of the upper
lip and have that resentful way of speaking that all North Londoners
have, and the maddening North London accent. The old woman’s voice would
be deep and hollow.... The girl moving heavily about the house wearing
boots and stiff dresses and stiff stays showing their outline through
her clothes. They would be bitter to their servant and would not trust
her. What was the good of their being alive ... a house and a water
system and drains and cooking, and they would take all these things for
granted and grumble and snarl ... the gas meter man would call there.
Did men like that resent calling at houses like that? No. They’d just
say, “The ole party she sez to me.” How good they were, these men. Good
and kind and cheerful. Someone ought to prevent the extravagance of
keeping whole houses and fires going for women like that. They ought to
be in an institution. But they never thought about that. They were
satisfied with themselves. They were self-satisfied because they did not
know what they were like.... _Why_ should you have a house, and
tradesmen calling?
“_Jehoiakin!_” The rush of indistinct expostulating sound coming from
the pulpit was accompanied for a moment by reverberations of the one
clearly bawled word. The sense of the large cold church, the great stone
pillars, the long narrow windows faintly stained with yellowish green,
the harsh North London congregation stirred and seemed to settle down
more securely. She saw the form of the vicar in the light grey stone
pulpit standing up short and neat against the cold grey stone wall,
enveloped in fine soft folds, his small puckered hands beautifully
cuffed, his plump crumpled little face, his small bald head fringed with
little saffron-white curls, his pink pouched busy mouth. What was it all
about? Pompous pottering, going on and on and on--in the Old Testament.
The whole church was in the Old Testament.... _Honour_ thy father and
thy mother. How horribly the words would echo through the great cold
church. _Why_ honour thy father and thy mother? What had they done that
was so honourable? Everybody was dying in cold secret fear. Christ, the
son of God, was part of it all, the same family ... vindictive.
Christmas and Easter, hard white cold flowers, no real explanation. “I
came not to destroy but to fulfil.” The stagnant blood flushed in her
face and tingled in her ears as the words occurred to her. Why didn’t
everybody die at once and stop it all?
4
Miss Haddie paused at the door of her room and wheeled suddenly round to
face Miriam who had just reached the landing.
“You’ve not seen my little corner,” she tweedled breathlessly, throwing
open her door.
Miriam went in. “Oh how nice,” she said fearfully, breathing in the
freshness of a little square sun-filled muslin-draped, blue-papered
room. Taking refuge at the white-skirted window, she found a narrow view
of the park, greener than the one she knew. The wide yellow pathway
going up through the cricket ground had shifted away to the right.
“It’s really a--a--a dressing-room from your room.”
“Oh,” said Miriam vivaciously.
“There’s a door, a--a--a door. I daresay you’ve noticed.”
“Oh! _That’s_ the door in our cupboard!” The dim door behind the hanging
garments led to nothing but to Miss Haddie’s room. She began unbuttoning
her gloves.
Miss Haddie was hesitating near a cupboard, making little sounds.
“I suppose we must all make ourselves tidy now,” said Miriam.
“I thought you didn’t look very happy in church this morning,” cluttered
Miss Haddie rapidly.
Miriam felt heavy with anger. “Oh,” she said clumsily, “I had the most
frightful headache.”
“Poor child. I thought ye didn’t look yerself.”
The window was shut. But the room was mysteriously fresh, far away from
the school. A fly was hovering about the muslin window blind with little
reedy loops of song. The oboe ... in the quintet, thought Miriam
suddenly. “I don’t know,” she said, listening. The flies sang like this
at home. She had heard them without knowing it. She moved in her place
by the window. The fly swept up to the ceiling, wavering on a deep note
like a tiny gong.... Hot sunny refined lawns, roses in bowls on
summerhouse tea-tables, refined voices far away from the Caledonian
Road.
“Flies don’t _buzz_,” she said passionately. “They don’t _buzz_. Why do
people say they buzz?” The pain pressing behind her temples slackened.
In a moment it would be only a glow.
Miss Haddie stood with bent head, her face turning from side to side,
with its sour hesitating smile, her large eyes darting their strange
glances about the room.
“Won’t you sit down a minute? They haven’t sounded the first bell yet.”
Miriam sat down on the one little white-painted, cane-seated chair near
the dressing-table. “Eh--eh,” said Miss Haddie, beginning to unfasten
her veil. “She doesn’t approve of general conversation,” thought Miriam.
“She’s a female. Oh well, she’ll have to see I’m not.”
“What gave you yer headache?”
“Oh well, I don’t know. I suppose I was wondering what it was all
about.”
“I don’t think I quite understand ye.”
“Well, I mean--what that old gentleman was in such a state of mind
about.”
“D’ye mean Mr. La Trobe!”
“Yes. Why do you laugh?”
“I don’t understand what ye mean.”
Miriam watched Miss Haddie’s thin fingers feeling for the pins in her
black toque. “Of course not,” she thought, looking at the unveiled
shrivelled cheek.... “thirty-five years of being a lady.”
“Oh well,” she sighed fiercely.
“What is it ye mean, my dear?”
--‘couldn’t make head or tail of a thing the old dodderer said’--no ‘old
boy,’ no--these phrases would not do for Miss Haddie.
“I couldn’t agree with _anything_ he said.”
Miss Haddie sat down on the edge of the little white bed burying her
face in her hands and smoothing them up and down with a wiping movement.
“One can always criticise a sermon,” she said reproachfully.
“Well, why not?”
“I mean to say ye _can_,” said Miss Haddie from behind her fingers,
“but, but ye shouldn’t.”
“You can’t help it.”
“Oh yes, ye can. If ye listen in the right spirit,” gargled Miss Haddie
hurriedly.
“Oh, it isn’t only the sermon, it’s the whole thing,” said Miriam
crimsoning.
“Ye mustn’t think about the speaker,” went on Miss Haddie in faint
hurried rebuke. “That’s wrong. That sets people running from church to
church. You must attend your own parish church in the right spirit, let
the preacher be who--who--what he may.”
“Oh, but I think that’s positively _dangerous_,” said Miriam gravely.
“It simply means leaving your mind open for whatever they choose to say.
Like Rome.”
“Eh, no--o--o,” flared Miss Haddie dropping her hands, “nonsense. Not
like Rome at all.”
“But it _is_. It’s giving up your conscience.”
“You’re very determined,” laughed Miss Haddie bitterly.
“I’m certainly not going to give my mind up to a parson for him to do
what he likes with. That’s what it is. That’s what they do. I’ve seen it
again and again. I’ve heard people talking about sermons,” finished
Miriam with vivacious intentness.
Miss Haddie sat very still with her hands once more pressed tightly
against her face.
“Oh, my dear. This is a dreadful state of affairs. I’m afraid you’re all
wrong. That’s not it at all. If you listen only for the good, the good
will come to you.”
“But these men don’t know. How should they? They don’t agree amongst
themselves.”
“Oh, my dear, that is a very wrong attitude. How long have ye felt like
this?”
“Oh, all my life,” responded Miriam proudly.
“I’m very sorry, my dear.”
“Ever since I can remember. Always.”
There were ivory-backed brushes on the dressing-table. Miriam stared at
them and let her eyes wander on to a framed picture of an agonised
thorn-crowned head.
“Were you--have ye--eh--have ye been confirmed?”
“Oh yes.”
“Did ye discuss any of your difficulties with yer vicar?”
“Not I. I knew his mind too well. Had heard him preach for years. He
would have run round my questions. He wasn’t capable of answering them.
For instance, supposing I had asked him what I’ve _always_ wanted to
know. How can people, ordinary people, be expected to be like Christ, as
they say, when they think Christ was supernatural? Of course, if he was
supernatural it was easy enough for him to be as he was; if he was not
supernatural, then there’s nothing in the whole thing.”
“My _dear_ child! I’m dreadfully sorry ye feel like that. I’d no idea ye
felt like that, poor child. I knew ye weren’t quite happy always; I mean
I’ve thought ye weren’t quite happy in yer mind sometimes, but I’d no
idea--eh, eh, have ye ever consulted anybody--anybody able to give ye
advice?”
“There you are. That’s exactly the whole thing! _Who_ can one consult?
There isn’t anybody. The people who are qualified are the people who
have the thing called faith, which means that they beg the whole
question from the beginning.”
“Eh--dear--me--Miriam--child!”
“Well, I’m made that way. How can I help it if faith seems to me just an
abnormal condition of the mind with fanaticism at one end and
agnosticism at the other?”
“My dear, ye believe in God?”
“Well, you see, I see things like this. On one side a prime cause with a
certain object unknown to me, bringing humanity into being; on the other
side humanity, all more or less miserable, never having been consulted
as to whether they wanted to come to life. If that is belief, a South
Sea Islander could have it. But good people, people with faith, want me
to believe that one day God sent a saviour to rescue the world from sin
and that the world can never be grateful enough and must become as
Christ. Well. If God made people he is responsible and ought to save
them.”
“What do yer parents think about yer ideas?”
“They don’t know.”
“Ye’ve never mentioned yer trouble to them?”
“I did ask Pater once when we were coming home from the Stabat Mater
that question I’ve told you about.”
“What did he say?”
“He couldn’t answer. We were just by the gate. He said he thought it was
a remarkably reasonable dilemma. He laughed.”
“And ye’ve never had any discussion of these things with him?”
“No.”
“Ye’re an independent young woman,” said Miss Haddie.
Miriam looked up. Miss Haddie was sitting on the edge of her bed. A
faint pink flush on her cheeks made her eyes look almost blue. She was
no longer frowning. ‘I’m something new--a kind of different world. She
is wondering. I must stick to my guns,’ mused Miriam.
“I’ll not ask ye,” said Miss Haddie quietly and cheerfully, “to expect
any help from yer fellow creatures since ye’ve such a poor opinion of
them. But ye’re not happy. Why not go straight to the source?”
Miriam waited. For a moment the sheen on Miss Haddie’s silk sleeves had
distracted her by becoming as gentle and unchallenging as the light on
her mother’s dresses when there were other people in the room. She had
feared the leaping out of some emotional appeal. But Miss Haddie had a
plan. Strange secret knowledge.
“I should like to ask ye a question.”
“Yes?”
“Well, I’ll put it in this way. While ye’ve watched the doings of yer
fellow creatures ye’ve forgotten that the truth ye’re seeking is a--a
Person.”
Miriam pondered.
“That’s where ye ought to begin. And how about--what--what about--I
fancy ye’ve been neglecting the--the means of grace.... I think ye
have.” Miss Haddie rose and crossed the room to a little bookshelf at
the head of her bed, talking happily on. ‘Upright as a dart,’ commented
Miriam mentally, waiting for the fulfilment of the promise of Miss
Haddie’s cheerfulness. Against the straight lines of the wall-paper Miss
Haddie showed as swaying slightly backwards from the waist as she moved.
The first bell rang and Miriam got up to go. Miss Haddie came forward
with a small volume in her hands and held it out, standing close by her
and keeping her own hold on the volume. “Ye’ll find no argument in it.
Not but I think a few sound arguments would do ye good. Give it a try.
Don’t be stiff-necked. Just read it and see.” The smooth soft leather
slipped altogether into Miriam’s hands and she felt the passing contact
of a cool small hand and noted a faint fine scent coming to her from
Miss Haddie’s person.
In her own room she found that the soft binding of the book had rounded
corners and nothing on the cover but a small plain gold cross in the
right-hand corner. She feasted her eyes on it as she took off her
things. When the second bell rang she glanced inside the cover.
“Preparation for Holy Communion.” Hurriedly hiding it in her long drawer
under a pile of linen, she ran to the door. Running back again she took
it out and put it, together with her prayer book and hymn book, in the
small top drawer.
5
The opportunity to use Miss Haddie’s book came with Nancie’s departure
for a week-end visit. Beadie was in the deeps of her first sleep and the
room seemed empty. The book lay open on her bed. She noted as she placed
it there when she began preparing for bed that it was written by a
bishop, a man she knew by name as being still alive. It struck her as
extraordinary that a book should be printed and read while the author
was alive, and she turned away with a feeling of shame from the idea of
the bishop, still going about in his lawn sleeves and talking, while
people read a book that he had written in his study. But it was very
interesting to have the book to look at, because he probably knew about
modern people with doubts and would not think about them as
‘infidels’--‘an honest agnostic has my sympathy,’ he might say, and it
was possible he did not believe in eternal punishment. If he did he
would not have had his book printed with rounded edges and that
beautiful little cross.... “Line upon Line” and the “Pilgrim’s Progress”
were not meant for modern minds. Archbishop Whateley had a “chaste and
eloquent wit” and was a “great gardener.” A witty archbishop fond of
gardening was simply aggravating and silly.
Restraining her desire to hurry, Miriam completed her toilet and at last
knelt down in her dressing-gown. Its pinked neck-frill fell heavily
against her face as she leant over the bed. Tucking it into her neck she
clasped her outstretched hands, leaving the book within the circle of
her arms. The attitude seemed a little lacking in respect for the
beautifully printed gilt-edged pages. Flattening her entwined hands
between herself and the edge of the bed, she read very slowly that just
as for worldly communion men cleanse and deck their bodies so for
attendance at the Holy Feast must there be a cleansing and decking of
the spirit. She knelt upright, feeling herself grow very grave. The cold
air of the bedroom flowed round her carrying conviction. Then that
dreadful feeling at early service, kneeling like a lump in the pew, too
late to begin to be good, the exhausted moments by the altar rail--the
challenging light on the shining brass rod, on the priest’s ring and the
golden lining of the cup, the curious bite of the wine in the
throat--the sullen disappointed home-coming; all the strange failure was
due to lack of preparation. She knelt for some moments, without
thoughts, breathing in the cleansing air, sighing heavily at intervals.
What she ought to do was clear. A certain time for preparation could be
taken every night, kneeling up in bed with the gas out if Nancie were
awake, and a specially long time on Saturday night. The decision took
her back to her book. She read that no man can cleanse himself, but it
is his part to examine his conscience and confess his sins with a prayer
for cleansing grace.
The list of questions for self-examination as to sins past and present
in thought, word, and deed brought back the sense of her body with its
load of well-known memories. Could they be got rid of? She could cast
them off, feel them sliding away like Christian’s Burden. But was that
all? Was it being reconciled with your brother to throw off ill-feeling
without letting him know and telling him you were sorry for unkind deeds
and words? Those you met would find out the change; but all the
others--those you had offended from your youth up--all your family?
Write to them. A sense of a checking of the tide that had seemed to flow
through her finger-tips came with this suggestion, and Miriam knelt
heavily on the hard floor, feeling the weight of her well-known body.
The wall-paper attracted her attention and the honeycomb pattern of the
thick fringed white counterpane. She shut the little book and rose from
her knees. Moving quickly about the room, she turned at random to her
washhand basin and vigorously rewashed her hands in its soapy water. The
Englishman, she reflected as she wasted the soap, puts a dirty shirt on
a clean body, and the Frenchman a clean shirt on a dirty body.