MURAL PAINTINGS
JOHN walked up the flagged path of the churchyard. Sounds of work came
to him through the little Norman doorway--the beating of hammers, the
rasping of saws, the jangle of buckets.
Arrived at the doorway he paused for a moment to look at the scene
before him. It would seem almost incredible that order should ever be
abstracted from the present chaos, at all events in the space of time
proposed. Doorless, windowless,--in the matter of glass,--it was a mere
shell of a church, filled with scaffolding, planks, barrows, buckets;
echoing with the ceaseless sound of hammering, sawing, chiselling,
planing; while, within the shell, the creators of the various noises
moved and worked like a handful of restless ants.
John looked towards the scaffolding surrounding the east window.
Perched high on a narrow planked platform was Corin, absorbed in his
work, entirely lost to the sounds around him.
John picked his way among the scattered débris made for the chancel.
Here there was a ladder roped against a lower platform, from whence, by
means of a second ladder placed thereon, Corin’s eyrie might be gained.
John had his foot on a rung of the first ladder in a trice, swarmed up
it, and a second or so later was giving Corin warning of his approach
by:
“Behold the little cherub perched aloft.”
Corin turned.
“Oh, it’s you, is it? Well, just come and look.” There was suppressed
exultation in his voice.
John scrambled on to the platform, came alongside Corin,--Corin who
pointed with a triumphant chisel.
Some half-dozen or so square yards of wall had been cleared of many
coats of plaster, and there, on the original groundwork, stood out thin
red lines vertical and horizontal, flowers in bold outline.
“Masonry, they call it,” announced Corin, “and the flower is the herb
Robert. Isn’t it gorgeous?”
Now to the purely uninitiated, to the mere casual observer, the adverb
might have appeared unduly extravagant. What, such a one might have
demanded, was there in a few crude brush lines to justify this mode of
speech? Yet John, artist though he was not, understood, and not only
understood, but endorsed to the full Corin’s rapture. Here was the work
of age-old centuries, the frank expression of some long-ago-forgotten
painter, brought once more to the light of day. Fresh as when first
limned the simple lines glowed crimson from the cream-coloured surface
of the wall.
“It’s--it’s fine,” said John simply.
Corin, radiant, beaming, waved his chisel in a comprehensive sweep
around the walls.
“And think,” cried he exultant, “what more there may be, there
assuredly is, to find. Think what further glories this plaster hides.
Man, it’s hard to restrain one’s impatience and not hack, which would
be a truly disastrous proceeding.”
John laughed.
Then, “Try another spot,” he urged. “Here, close by the east window.
I’ll not divert the stroke of the chisel by the faintest whisper.”
Pretending to a half-reluctance, though at heart, truly, he was nothing
loath to consent, Corin let himself be persuaded. He shifted his
position. By the outer edge of the window splay he raised his chisel
and set himself to work.
The outer coats of plaster fell in thick flakes before that same
remorseless chisel; they crumbled on to the platform upon which Corin
stood. Below the plaster was a thin substance lying on the wall like a
film. Here the chisel came lightly into play; that film must be removed
carefully, with touch as delicate as the touch of a butterfly’s wing.
It entailed a suspension of breath, an excited prevention of the merest
involuntary quivering of a muscle. The film broke and powdered at the
lightest stroke, covering Corin’s hand and wrist with a soft grey dust.
Breathless he pursued his work; then, suddenly, he stopped, his eyes
gleaming with pleasure.
John bent forward. Here assuredly was novelty,--no longer the crimson
masonry, but black chevrons set within two narrow black lines showed
on the cream-coloured wall, and extending, it was evident, around the
whole window.
“Ah!” breathed John.
Corin nodded, his chisel again raised.
In places the plaster adhered like glue to the walls; it had to be
chipped away inch by inch, and through sheer force. Here it was that
the work required the greatest skill and dexterity. The pressure of
the chisel by an extra hair’s breadth would have meant the cutting
through of the film below the plaster, and destroying the painting that
lay beneath. It required a fine strength of wrist, the calculation
to a nicety of the depth to which to cut, above all, an infinity of
patience. Yet, again, there were patches where not only the plaster,
but the film with it, flaked away at the lightest stroke, and here the
painting was at its freshest.
For full twenty minutes John gave close eye to the proceedings. At the
end of that time he sighed, a mere tiny sigh. If Corin heard, he heeded
not. Stepping back a pace he regarded his work, head on one side, soul
absorbed.
John took him firmly by the arm.
“I vowed I’d not divert the stroke of the chisel by the faintest
whisper,” he announced. “At the moment shouting would be harmless.
Therefore let me tell you in merely normal tones that I’m hungry.”
“Hungry!” Corin blinked at him. “What’s the time?”
“Long past the luncheon hour,” John assured him. “Come!”
Corin reluctantly laid down his chisel, turned for a final look at
masonry, herb Robert, and chevrons.
“And to think,” he ejaculated, “that the plaster hides all this! There
must be ten coats of plaster or thereabouts. After the first Goth,
the first horrible Philistine, plastered, no one can have known what
was hidden, and they just went on plastering at intervals. I’ve made
out six plasters for certain,--grey, green, white adorned with awful
scroll-work, purple, green again with more scroll-work, and then this
dingy brown,” he waved his hand towards the walls. “There are other
plasters so stuck together no one can distinguish them, and underneath
it all, this.” He touched a flower in a kind of subdued and dreamy
ecstasy.
John took him once more kindly but firmly by the arm.
“It’s extremely beautiful,” he said in a tone conciliatory. “Presently
you shall rhapsodize again to your heart’s content and I’ll help you.
At the moment,” he propelled him gently towards the ladder, “we leave
ecstasy for the mundane, the mere sordid occupation of eating.”