MR. ISIDORE TAKES CHARGE.
"Uncle Copas," said Corona, as the two passed out through the small
doorway in the southern aisle and stood blinking in the sunshine,
"I want you next to show me what's left of the old Castle where the
kings lived: that is, if you're not tired."
"Tired, child? 'Tis our business--'tis the Brethren's business--
to act as guides around the relics of Merchester. By fetching a very
small circuit we can take the Castle on our way, and afterwards walk
home along the water-meads, my favourite path."
Corona slipped her hand into his confidentially. Together they left
the Close, and passing under the King's Gate, turned down College
Street, which led them by the brewhouse and outer porch of the great
School. A little beyond it, where by a conduit one of the Mere's
hurrying tributaries gushed beneath the road, they came to a regiment
of noble elms guarding a gateway, into which Brother Copas turned
aside. A second and quite unpretentious gateway admitted them to a
green meadow, in shape a rough semicircle, enclosed by ruinated
walls.
"You may come here most days of the month," said Brother Copas,
holding the gate wide, "and never meet a soul. 'Tis the
tranquillest, most forsaken spot in the city's ambit."
But here, as Corona caught her breath, he turned and stared.
The enclosure was occupied by a squad of soldiers at drill.
They wore uniforms of khaki, and, dressed up with their backs to the
gateway, were performing the simple movements of foot drill in face
of a choleric sergeant-major, who shouted the words of command, and
of a mounted officer who fronted the squad, silent, erect in saddle,
upon a strapping bay. Some few paces behind this extremely military
pair stood a couple of civilian spectators side by side, in attire--
frock-coats, top-hats, white waistcoats--which at a little distance
gave them an absurd resemblance to a brace of penguins.
"Heavens!" murmured Brother Copas. "Is it possible that Bamberger
has become twins? One never knows of what these Jews are
capable. . . ."
His gaze travelled from the two penguins to the horseman in khaki.
He put up a shaking hand to shade it.
"Colt? Colt in regimentals? Oh, this must be vertigo!"
At a word from the sergeant-major the squad fell out and stood in
loose order, plainly awaiting instructions. Mr. Colt--yes, indeed it
was the Chaplain--turned his charger's head half-about as the two
frock-coated civilians stepped forward.
"Now, Mr. Bamberger, my men are at your disposal."
"I t'ank you, Reverent Mr. Major--if zat is ze form to address you--"
began Mr. Bamberger's double.
"'Major,' _tout court_, if you please," Mr. Colt corrected him.
"One drops the 'reverend' while actually on military duty."
"So? Ach, pardon!--I should haf known. . . Now Ze first is, we get ze
angle of view, where to place our Grandt Standt so ze backgrount mek
ze most pleasing pigture. At ze same time ze Standt must not
tresbass--must not imbinge, _hein_?--upon our stage, our
what-you-call-it area. Two t'ousand berformers--we haf not too mooch
room. I will ask you, Mr. Major, first of all to let your men--zey
haf tent-pegs, _hein_?--to let your men peg out ze area as I direct.
Afterwards, with your leaf, you shall place z'em here--z'ere--in
groups, zat I may see in some sort how ze groups combose, as we say.
Himmel! what a backgroundt! Ze Cathedral, how it lifts over ze
trees--Bar-fect! Now, if you will follow me a few paces to ze right,
here . . . Ach! see yonder, by ze gate! Zat old man in ze red
purple _poncho_--haf ze berformers already begon to aszemble
zemselves? . . ."
Mr. Colt slewed his body about in the saddle.
"Eh? . . . Oh, that's Brother Copas, one of our Beauchamp Brethren.
Mediaeval he looks, doesn't he? I assure you, sir, we keep the
genuine article in Merchester."
"You haf old men dressed like _zat_? . . . My dear Julius, I see zis
Bageant retty-made!"
"It was at St. Hospital--the almshouse for these old fellows--that
the notion first came into my head."
"Sblendid! . . . We will haf a Brocession of them; or, it may be, a
whole Ebisode. . . . Will you bid him come closer, Mr. Major, zat I
may study ze costume in its detail?"
"Certainly." Mr. Colt beckoned to Brother Copas, who came forward
still holding Corona by the hand. "Brother Copas, Mr. Isidore
Bamberger here--brother of Our Member--desires to make your
acquaintance."
"I am honoured," said Brother Copas politely.
"Ach, so!" burst in Mr. Isidore. "I was telling the major how moch I
admire zat old costume of yours."
"It is not for sale, however." Brother Copas faced the two Hebrews
with his ironical smile. "I am sorry to disappoint you, sirs, but I
have no old clothes to dispose of, at present."
"No offence, no offence, I hope?" put in Mr. Julius. "My brother,
sir, is an artist--"
"Be easy, sir: I am sure that he intended none. For the rest,"
pursued Brother Copas with a glance at Mr. Colt and a twinkle,
"if we had time, all four of us here, to tell how by choice or
necessity we come to be dressed as we are, I dare say our stories
might prove amusing as the Calenders' in _The Arabian Nights_."
"You remind me," said Mr. Isidore, "zat I at any rate must not keep
zese good Territorials standing idle. Another time--at your
service--"
He waved a hand and hurried off to give an instruction to the
sergeant-major. His brother followed and overtook him.
"Damn it all, Isidore! You might remember that Merchester is my
constituency, and my majority less than half a hundred."
"_Hein_? For what else am I here but to helb you to increase it?"
"Then why the devil start by offending that old chap as you did?"
"Eh? I offended him somehow. Zat is certain: zough why on earth he
should object to having his dress admired--" Mr. Isidore checked his
speech upon a sudden surmise. "My goot Julius, you are not telling
me he has a Vote!"
"You silly fool, of course he has!"
"Gott in himmel! I am sorry, Julius. . . . I--I sobbosed, in England,
that paupers--"
"State-paupers," corrected his brother. "Private paupers, like the
Brethren of St. Hospital, rank as tenants of their living-rooms."
"I shall never gombrehend the institutions of zis country," groaned
Mr. Isidore.
"Never mind: make a Pageant of 'em," said his brother grimly.
"I'll forgive you this time, if you'll promise me to be more
careful."
"I'll do more, Julius. I'll get aroundt ze old boy somehow: mek him
bivot-man in a brocession, or something of the sort. I got any
amount of tagt, once I know where to use it."
"Smart man, Our Member!" commented Mr. Colt, gazing after the pair.
"And Mr. Isidore doesn't let the grass grow under his feet, hey?"
"Has an eye for detail, too," answered Brother Copas, taking snuff.
"See him there, upbraiding his brother for want of tact towards a
free and independent elector. . . . But--excuse me--for what purpose
are these two parcelling out the Castle Meadow?"
"You've not heard? There's a suggestion--and I may claim some share
in the credit of it, if credit there be--to hold a Pageant here next
summer, a Merchester Pageant. Mr. Bamberger's full of it.
What's your idea?"
"A capital notion," said Brother Copas slowly. "Since _jam pridem
Syrus in Tamesin defluxit Orontes_, I commend any attempt to educate
Mr. Bamberger and his tribe in the history of this England they
invade. But, as you say, this proposed Pageant is news to me.
I never seem to hear any gossip. It had not even reached me, Mr.
Chaplain, that you were deserting St. Hospital to embrace a military
career."
"Nor am I. . . . At Cambridge I ever was an ardent volunteer.
Here in Merchester (though this, too, may be news to you) I have for
years identified myself with all movements in support of national
defence. The Church Lads' Brigade, I may say, owed its inception to
me; likewise the Young Communicants' Miniature Rifle Association; and
for three successive years our Merchester Boy Scouts have elected me
President and Scoutmaster. It has been a dream of my life, Brother
Copas, to link up the youth of Britain in preparation to defend the
Motherland, pending that system of compulsory National Service which
(we all know) must eventually come. And so when Sir John
Shaftesbury, as Chairman of our County Territorial Force Association,
spoke to the Lord-Lieutenant, who invited me to accept a majority in
the Mershire Light Infantry, Second Battalion, Territorial--"
"I can well understand, sir," said Brother Copas, as Mr. Colt drew
breath; "and I thank you for telling me so much. No wonder Sir John
enlisted such energy as yours! Yet--to be equally frank with you--I
am sorry."
"You disapprove of National Service?"
"I approve of it with all my heart. Every young man should prepare
himself to fight, at call, for his country. But the devotion should
be voluntary."
"Ah, but suppose our young men will not? Suppose they prefer to
attend football matches--"
"That, sir--if I may respectfully suggest it--is your business to
prevent. And I might go on to suggest that the clergy, by preaching
compulsory military service, lay themselves open, as avowed
supporters of 'law and order,' to a very natural suspicion.
We will suppose that you get your way, and every young Briton is
bound, on summons, to mobilise. We will further suppose a
Conservative Government in power, and confronted with a devastating
strike--shall we say a railwaymen's strike? What more easy than to
call out one-half of the strikers on service and oblige them, under
pain of treason, to coerce the other half? Do you suppose that this
nation will ever forget Hounslow Heath?"
"Let us, then," said Mr. Colt, "leave arguing this question of
compulsory National Service until another occasion, when I shall hope
to convince you. For the moment you'll allow it to be every man's
duty, as a citizen, to carry arms for his country?"
"Every man's, certainly--if by that you exclude priests."
"Why exclude priests?"
"Because a priest, playing at warfare, must needs be mixing up things
that differ. As I see it, Mr. Colt, your Gospel forbids warfare; and
if you consent to follow an army, your business is to hold a cross
above human strife and point the eyes of the dying upward, to rest on
it, thus rebuking men's passions with a vision of life's ultimate
peace."
"Yet a Bishop of Beauvais (as I read) once thought it not unmeet to
charge with a mace at the head of a troop; and our own dear
Archbishop Maclagan of York, as everyone knows, was once lieutenant
in a cavalry regiment!"
"Oh, la, la!" chuckled Brother Copas. "Be off, then, to your
Territorials, Mr. Chaplain! I see Mr. Isidore, yonder, losing his
temper with the squad as only an artist can. . . . But--believe an
old man, dear sir--you on your horse are not only misreading the
Sermon but mistaking the Mount!"
Mr. Colt rode off to his squad, and none too soon; for the men,
startled by Mr. Isidore's sudden onslaught of authority and the
explosive language in which he ordered them hither and thither,
cursing one for his slowness with the measuring-tape, taking another
by the shoulders and pushing him into position, began to show signs
of mutiny. Mr. Julius Bamberger mopped a perspiring brow as he ran
about vainly trying to interpose.
"Isidore, this is damned nonsense, I tell you!"
"You leave 'em to me," panted Mr. Isidore. "Tell me I don't
understand managing a crowd like this! It's part of ze _method_, my
goot Julius. Put ze fear of ze Lord into 'em, to start wiz.
Zey gromble at first; Zen zey findt zey like it: in the endt zey lof
you. _Hein_? It is not for nozzing zey call me ze Bageant
King! . . ."
The old man and the child, left to themselves, watched these
operations for a while across the greensward, over which the elms now
began to lengthen their shadows.
"The Chaplain was right," said Brother Copas. "Mr. Isidore certainly
does not let the grass grow under his feet."
"If I were the grass, I shouldn't want to," said Corona.