It was May morning, and Taffy made one of the group gathered on the
roof of Magdalen Tower. In the groves below and across the river-meadows
all the birds were singing together. Beyond the glimmering suburbs, St.
Clement's and Cowley St. John, over the dark rise by Bullingdon Green,
the waning moon seemed to stand still and wait poised on her nether
horn. Below her the morning sky waited, clean and virginal, letting her
veil of mist slip lower and lower until it rested in folds upon the high
woodlands and pastures. While it dropped, a shaft of light tore through
it and smote flashing on the vane high above Taffy's head, turning the
dark side of the turrets to purple and casting lilac shadows on the
surplices of the choir. For a moment the whole dewy shadow of the tower
trembled on the western sky, and melted and was gone as a flood of gold
broke on the eastward-turned faces. The clock below struck five, and
ceased. There was a sudden baring of heads; a hush; and gently, borne
aloft on boys' voices, clear and strong, rose the first notes of the
hymn—
Te Deum Patrem colimus,
Te laudibus prosequimur,
Qui corpus cibo reficis,
Coelesti mentem gratia.
In the pauses Taffy heard, faint and far below, the noise of cowhorns
blown by the street boys gathered at the foot of the tower and beyond
the bridge. Close beside him a small urchin of a chorister was singing
away with the face of an ecstatic seraph; whence that ecstasy arose the
urchin would have been puzzled to tell. There flashed into Taffy's brain
the vision of the whole earth lauding and adoring—sun-worshippers and
Christians, priests and small children; nation after nation prostrating
itself and arising to join the chant—"the differing world's agreeing
sacrifice." Yes; it was Praise that made men brothers; praise, the
creature's first and last act of homage to his Creator; praise that made
him kin with the angels. Praise had lifted this tower; had expressed
itself in its soaring pinnacles; and he for the moment was incorporate
with the tower and part of its builder's purpose. "Lord, make men as
towers!"—he remembered his father's prayer in the field by Tewkesbury;
and at last he understood. "All towers carry a lamp of some kind"—why,
of course they did. He looked about him. The small chorister's face was
glowing—
_Triune Deus, hominum
Salutis auctor optime,
Immensum hoc mysterium
Ovante lingua canimus!_
Silence—and then with a shout the tunable bells broke forth, rocking
the tower. Someone seized Taffy's college-cap and sent it spinning
over the battlements. Caps? For a second or two they darkened the sky
like a flock of birds. A few gowns followed, expanding as they dropped,
like clumsy parachutes. The company—all but a few severe dons and their
friends—tumbled laughing down the ladder, down the winding stair, and
out into sunshine. The world was pagan after all.
* * * * *
At breakfast Taffy found a letter on his table, addressed in his
mother's hand. As a rule she wrote twice a week, and this was not one of
the usual days for hearing from her. But nothing was too good to happen
that morning. He snatched up the letter and broke the seal.
"My dearest boy," it ran, "I want you home at once to consult with me.
Something has happened (forgive me, dear, for not preparing you; but
the blow fell on me yesterday so suddenly)—something which makes it
doubtful, and more than doubtful, that you can continue at Oxford. And
something else _they say_ has happened which I will never believe in
unless I hear it from my boy's lips. I have this comfort, at any rate,
that he will never tell me a falsehood. This is a matter which cannot
be explained by letter, and cannot wait until the end of term. Come home
quickly, dear; for until you are here I can have no peace of mind."
So once again Taffy travelled homeward by the night mail.
* * * * *
"Mother, it's a lie!"
Taffy's face was hot, but he looked straight into his mother's eyes.
She, too, was rosy-red, being ever a shamefast woman. And to speak of
these things to her own boy—
"Thank God!" she murmured, and her fingers gripped the arms of her chair.
"It's a lie! Where is the girl?"
"She is in the workhouse. I don't know who spread it, or how many have
heard. But Honoria believes it."
"Honoria! She cannot—" He came to a sudden halt. "But, mother, even
supposing Honoria believes it, I don't see—"
He was looking straight at her. Her eyes sank. Light began to break in
on him.
"Mother!"
Humility did not look up.
"Mother! Don't tell me that she—that Honoria—"
"She made us promise—your father and me.... God knows it did no more
than repay what your father had suffered.... Your future was everything
to us...."
"And I have been maintained at Oxford by her money," he said, pausing
in his bitterness on every word.
"Not by that only, Taffy! There was your scholarship ... and it was true
about my savings on the lace-work...."
But he brushed her feeble explanations away with a little gesture of
impatience. "Oh, why, mother? Oh, why?"
She heard him groan and stretched out her arms.
"Taffy, forgive me—forgive us! We did wrongly, I see—I see it as plain
now as you. But we did it for your sake."
"You should have told me. I was not a child. Yes, yes, you should have
told me."
Yes; there lay the truth. They had treated him as a child when he was
no longer a child. They had swathed him round with love, forgetting
that boys grow and demand to see with their own eyes and walk on their
own feet. To every mother of sons there comes sooner or later the sharp
lesson which came to Humility that morning; and few can find any defence
but that which Humility stammered, sitting in her chair and gazing
piteously up at the tall youth confronting her: "I did it for your
sake." Be pitiful, O accusing sons, in that hour! For, terrible as your
case may be against them, your mothers are speaking the simple truth.