CANDLES AND MASSES
I
If at the beginning of the last chapter Miss Haldane was perturbed,
worried, perplexed, so, rather more than two months later, Muriel
Lancing was perturbed, worried, perplexed, also; and for the same
cause, namely, the strange demeanour of the Lady Anne Garland, who had
returned to town at the beginning of November.
She was changed, she was totally different, so sighed Muriel,
reflective, meditative. Where was her former charm? her former
sweet kindliness? her faith, her trust, her buoyancy--in short, her
everything that went to make up the Anne Muriel knew and loved? An
obsession seemed to have come upon her. She was cynical, hard, the
speaker of little bitter phrases, deliberately calculated to wound
and hurt. She was not, as Muriel reflected, Anne at all, but a mask,
a shell of a woman, in which deep down the real Anne was imprisoned,
buried.
"If only she would speak," sighed Muriel to herself. "If only the
mask could be removed for a moment the real Anne would be liberated.
Confession, so says dear old Father O'Sullivan, is good for the soul.
It would be incalculably good for Anne's. But she won't make one. And
short of asking her straight out to do so, which would inevitably fix
the mask on tighter still, I can do nothing."
But, all the same, Muriel went off to the Oratory and set up a candle
to St. Joseph, telling him pretty lucidly the whole state of affairs
and requesting him to do something.
Now whether it was the intervention of St. Joseph, or whether it was
that the real imprisoned Anne could bear her solitary confinement no
longer, must be a matter for pure conjecture: but on the next occasion
that Muriel visited Anne's house in Cheyne Walk she was distinctly
conscious that though the mask was on there was a tiny crack in it,
and through the crack the real Anne was looking with a kind of dumb
pleading.
In a twinkling Muriel's finger was towards it, in, of course, the
most insidious and hidden way imaginable. It is useless to attempt to
describe her methods; they were purely feminine, entirely delicate.
At length the shell, the mask, fell asunder, and the real Anne, being
liberated, spoke. It was an enormous relief to her, and from the very
beginning up to Millicent's disclosure she confided the whole story to
Muriel, who watched her with her greeny-grey eyes full of sympathy.
"Oh, but," cried Muriel as she stopped, "I quite understand your anger.
Of course, it's very difficult to put into exact words why you are
angry, the whole situation is so extraordinarily complicated. But," she
concluded, "any woman with the smallest modicum of sense must see why.
And the fact that Millicent was the person there at the time can't have
made things a bit nicer."
"It didn't," said Anne quietly. "But I haven't finished yet. He wrote
to me."
"Yes?" queried Muriel.
"It--his letter swept away all my anger. I--I understood."
"Of course," Muriel nodded, "there is his point of view."
"I saw it," said Anne. "I realized--or thought I realized--the utter
loneliness that made him act as he had done. I--I wrote to him."
"Yes?" queried Muriel again, and very gently.
"I said--oh, I said a good deal," confessed Anne. "And--and he has
never replied. Oh, don't you see it's that that hurts? I said things
I would never have said if I hadn't believed he was longing for me to
say them, if I hadn't"--Anne's face was crimson--"wanted to say them.
I was so sure I'd hear from him again. And--and there was only a cruel
silence. I'd give anything never to have written that letter." Shamed,
broken, she looked piteously at Muriel. Anne was proud, and she was
young. She did not yet know that there is no shame in giving love,
offering it purely, finely, as she had done. Is not God Himself daily
making the offering, an offering from which too many of us turn away?
"But, darling Anne," cried Muriel, "perhaps--surely he could not have
received it."
Anne shook her head. "It's what I'd like to believe," she said with
a little bitter laugh, "what we'd both like to believe. But it's no
good. I sent it to his publishers, the same address as that to which
I'd sent the others. Oh, no! that kind of letters don't miscarry. I
have misunderstood all through."
"Darling!" said Muriel softly.
There was a long silence, broken only by an occasional little
sputtering of the coal in the fire, and the rumble of wheels and clack
of horses' hoofs without. And in the silence Muriel was giving very
deep thanks to St. Joseph that Anne--her beloved Anne--was once more
restored to her. Also she was cogitating in her own mind still further
benefits to be asked of him.
Presently Anne broke the silence.
"Muriel, I'd rather you should forget--that we should never speak
again--about what I've told you this afternoon."
Muriel took up an illustrated paper from a side table.
"Hats," she announced sententiously, "will be worn small this winter,
and skirts mercifully not quite so tight. Have you noticed Mrs.
Clinton? She's positively indecent. I blush scarlet if I'm with a man
when I meet her."
Anne laughed, though there were tears in her eyes.
"Muriel," she said, "you're the silliest and dearest little elf in
Christendom."
II
Muriel made more than one further journey to the Oratory to
explain matters to St. Joseph, on each occasion presenting that
delightful saint with a candle. The first time--subsequent to Anne's
confession--that she went to the Oratory she gave him two, one being
for thanksgiving.
Also she invited Father O'Sullivan to tea on an occasion when Tommy, by
Muriel's suggestion, had taken Anne to skate at Prince's.
Father O'Sullivan was a short, stoutish man, with grizzled hair, small
twinkling eyes, and a mouth that had the kindliest twist of a smile
imaginable. To know Father O'Sullivan for an hour was to love him. To
know him for longer was to love him better. Muriel had known him from
her babyhood.
This afternoon, having invited him to tea, she plied him with cakes and
quince sandwiches, which latter his soul adored, and talked in a gay
and inconsequent fashion of airy nothings, to which Father O'Sullivan
responded after the manner of Irishmen, be they priests or laymen.
But on the conclusion of the meal she dropped into a pensive mood,
and sat with her elbow on the arm of her chair, and her pointed chin
resting in her cupped hand, gazing into space with great dreamy eyes.
And then all at once she roused herself and looked across at Father
O'Sullivan.
"Father," she said seriously, "I want you to say a Mass for me."
"You do, do you?" said Father O'Sullivan, stroking his chin. "And with
what intention?"
"Well," said Muriel, reflective, "it's not quite easy to explain. I
think I'd better tell you the story." And she launched forth, omitting
names at the moment, though at a future date she happened inadvertently
to mention Peter's.
"Well, now," said Father O'Sullivan as she ended, and his eyes were
twinkling, "is it just a little small story like that you'd have me be
repeating at Mass, for I'm thinking it will take just no time at all."
"Oh, don't laugh at me!" begged Muriel. "Don't you see how difficult
it is to put into words what I want!" She dropped her hands in her lap
and gazed at him tragically.
"Well, but have a try," urged Father O'Sullivan. "Perhaps I can be
helping you out."
"First, then," said Muriel, "I want her to be happy again, and I don't
see how that can be unless she hears from him, and even that alone
would be no good, because I'm sure to be really happy she'd have to
marry him, and you see he has committed forgery. If only that could
be untrue--but it's impossible, and I don't see how anything can come
right," she ended despairingly.
Father O'Sullivan rubbed his hair up the wrong way. "And it's a Mass
with the intention of things coming right you want me to say, when all
the time you're feeling sure they can't," he remarked severely. "And if
I'm going to say it that way myself, what kind of faith do you think
I'm going to have in it?"
Muriel looked at him contritely. "But don't you see--" she began.
"Oh, I see fast enough," he responded. "Let's get at what you want the
other way round. To begin with, you want the young man never to have
committed the forgery, and then you want to run through the whole gamut
till they live happily ever after. And all the time you're wishing it,
and wanting me to pray for it, you're telling yourself it can't be.
Isn't that so?" His twinkling old eyes belied the half-severity of his
words.
"Oh, but," said Muriel, "it's--it's such a lot to ask."
Father O'Sullivan leaned forward and tapped the forefinger of his right
hand in the palm of his left.
"Faith, my child, is not asking God for bushels and setting out a pint
measure to catch them in. It's a good old saying, but not my own,
more's the pity of it. Now, do you want me to say this Mass for you
with the intention we've arranged?"
"Yes," said Muriel firmly.
"And you'll come to it, and believe that it will be answered, whether
in your way or God's you leave to Him?" he asked gravely.
"Yes," said Muriel again.
Father O'Sullivan nodded his head approvingly. "To-morrow morning at
eight o'clock I'll be saying it then," he said, "and you'll be praying
too." He leaned back in his chair.
"Of course," ventured Muriel, "it's rather a complicated thing to put
into words."
Father O'Sullivan smiled, a merry, twinkling humorous old smile.
"Faith, I'll be getting it into some kind of shape," he promised. "And
if we could hear all the prayers sent up to heaven I'm thinking we'd
find many a muddled phrase down here straightened out by the holy
saints as they carry them up to God's Throne. And no matter what the
muddles are, the answer's clear enough when it comes."
And then the door opened and Anne, Tommy, and General Carden walked in.
Muriel gave a little gasp. "I thought you were having tea at Prince's,"
she said.
And Father O'Sullivan, as he watched her face with wicked pleasure,
realized--and it did not take a vast amount of sagacity to do so--that
one at least of the three was concerned with the story she had just
confided to his ears. And as it obviously was not Tommy, and he
concluded he might rule out the white-haired military-looking man, it
left only the tall, graceful woman who crossed to a chair by Muriel
and began pulling off her gloves.
"We got bored," said Tommy; "at least Anne did, and we decided to come
home to tea. And we met General Carden on the doorstep, and here we all
are. And if you're too flustered for some reason to introduce everybody
nicely, I will."
"Don't be silly, Tommy," said Muriel, laughing and recovering her
equanimity. "Ring the bell, and we'll have fresh tea made."
"No need," said Tommy. "I saw Morris in the hall and told him." And he
sat down by Father O'Sullivan. General Carden took a chair near Anne.
"I was sorry not to find you at home when I called last Thursday," he
said. "Your servant told me you were at home on Tuesdays."
"Yes," said Anne. She hesitated, half doubtful. Then she added: "But
perhaps you'll come another afternoon? At-home days are not very
satisfactory. Shall we say Wednesday?"
"I shall be delighted," returned General Carden. "We had, if I remember
rightly, a long argument the last time we met, about a book. Let me
see, what was the author's name?" He wrinkled his brows, reflective,
thoughtful.
Anne turned to put her gloves on the table beside her. "Robin Adair,
wasn't it?" she asked quietly.
"Ah, yes, of course!" replied the old hypocrite.
Muriel glanced at Anne. "I wish," she reflected with admiration, "that
I could act as well. I nearly gave myself away just now, when they all
descended on me like an avalanche. And I'd bet my bottom dollar Father
O'Sullivan guessed something." Which bet, if there had been any one to
take her on, Muriel would certainly have won.
Anne, as she drove towards Chelsea half an hour later, wondered vaguely
why she had asked General Carden to tea with her. Finally she decided
that it was for the obvious reason that he wanted to come, and she
would have been rude if she had not done so.
And Father O'Sullivan, as he walked home, ruminated on the tangled
story Muriel had told him. It was only one of the many tangles in the
world, and he knew it, but it had been brought directly to his notice,
and he had a very simple and perfect faith that the good God would
unravel the knots in His own way and at His own time.