Читать книгу The Vision Splendid (D. K. Broster) (Literary Thoughts Edition) - D. K. Broster - Страница 25

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Dormer's pen was still between his fingers. He roused himself, turned once more to the table, added a final sentence to the last sheet, and laid down the pen; then he leant back again with a long sigh. He was tired, for he had been finishing his book at high pressure; but he was more tired than he ought to have been, and he knew it. He supposed that he would pay for the strain by a bout of the disabling headaches, whose increasing frequency, during the last six months, had begun to make him uneasy.

And at this moment, just as Tristram in his need was riding towards him up St. Aldate's, he put his head back against his chair and began to think of him with peculiar affection. For fourteen years the bonds of their friendship had only drawn the closer. Tristram at last had the same cause at heart, and was about to take Orders. There was only one thing which separated them. He himself would never marry, but Tristram certainly would, and Dormer continually reproached himself with the quite human regret which this reflection sometimes roused in him. With his profound belief in the Providence of God, he felt that Tristram had always been destined for home life, and that he belonged, or would belong to the class of clergy who, in England at all events, seem able to serve their people best by being one with them in actual experience of the common life. For though Dormer would have wished that class to be numerically the smaller, the idea of an enforced celibacy was abhorrent to him.

And hitherto he had encouraged Tristram to hope that the time might yet come when Horatia would listen to him. But the results of his observations at Tristram's dinner-party last week had been most disturbing. Was it possible that this young Frenchman was carrying off Miss Grenville's heart – he did not say her hand – under Tristram's very eyes? This seemed scarcely credible, yet he had of set purpose interrupted their conversation that evening, and had felt uneasy ever since, for a reason that he could scarcely define. But perhaps he had been mistaken; at any rate, he hoped so...

He was at this point when a knock came at the door.

"Come in," he said, opening his eyes to see the subject of his meditations before him. He sprang up. "My dear fellow! I am delighted to see you. Forgive this litter."

"I hardly expected to find you in college at this hour," remarked Tristram, glancing at the table. "I suppose this is the reason for it."

Dormer nodded, and began gathering the sheets together. "The Non-jurors must be got out of the way as soon as possible, now that I have promised to undertake this work on the Councils for Rose. I've just been writing to Keble about his proposals, for, adequately carried out, they might provide almost a lifework for the person who undertook them."

"But you have promised definitely to undertake them."

"Yes, I've accepted," said Dormer sitting down again with something like a sigh. "It's rather a daunting prospect, you know, Tristram, and yet it may be the work for which one has been waiting. I am so glad that you managed to see Rose the other evening; I wanted you particularly to meet him. He is the coming man."

"Oh, is he?" replied Tristram not very enthusiastically. "Well, yes, I was glad to meet him. He showed his sense in asking you to do this, anyhow. But what about those headaches?"

"Suppose you leave my headaches alone," retorted Dormer smiling. "You look rather fagged yourself. Will you have some tea, or would you rather have a glass of ale after your ride? – I seem to have been talking a great deal about myself."

If he had, the circumstance was so unusual – save perhaps in his present company – as scarcely to call for apology.

"Neither, thanks," answered Tristram, who was wandering restlessly round the room, which he knew as well as his own. "I am not tired that I know of... I like that drawing of Cologne Cathedral. Who gave it you – Froude?"

"No," said Dormer, watching him suddenly rather intently. "It was Robert Wilberforce."

Tristram strayed to a bookcase. "Hallo," he remarked, "here are these Non-juring books of yours which I am always meaning to have a look at. What is this – 'Devotions for the Canonical Hours, to be used in the houses of the clergy and by all religious societies where there is a priest.' Surely that is strange!"

"It always sounds to me like an eighteenth century Little Gidding," answered his friend. "That copy belonged to Cartwright, the Shrewsbury apothecary, and the last Non-juring Bishop. I had an older book, called 'A Companion for the Penitent, and for Persons troubled in mind,' but I gave it to Keble."

"I expect he was pleased with it," commented his visitor. He put back the book and came and threw himself down in a chair. "Doesn't it seem strange to have finished, after all this time?"

"Yes," said Dormer, looking at his papers, "and I believe I am almost sorry. But it would have been a pity to spend longer over the Non-jurors, for I expect very few people will so much as glance at the book."

"When I was talking to Froude the other day he seemed to hold a different opinion," said Tristram.

"Ah, yes, but then you see he is almost as keen about the Non-jurors as I am myself. I have heard him say that he was beginning to think that they were the last of English divines, and that those since were twaddlers."

"Froude is almost too bold. He doesn't seem to care what he says."

"But," continued Dormer, leaning back in his chair, "although I know, of course, that it will be read by a few, what I mean is that it will appeal chiefly to those already interested. And if this remark applies to a modern book, how much more will it apply to what I am afraid will be a rather dull work on the first centuries. – You know, Tristram, what we want alongside of this sort of thing is some more arresting kind of writing, some series of short essays in a popular form that could be circulated among the country clergy – essays to prove the continuity of the Church for instance. In this book I've been trying to show the direct connection between Non-jurors, the Caroline divines, the ancient Church of England, and the primitive Church. For the next five years or so I shall be trying to point out, by means of the history of the principal Councils, that the doctrine of the Church of England is that of an undivided Christendom. I don't say my volumes won't be read, but I do say that the same thing put in a cheaper and shorter form would be more read."

"Why shouldn't it be done, then?"

"Well, it's an idea," admitted Dormer. "It is the country clergy that we need to get hold of, for after all they are the people who really count. I must talk to Newman about it. I fancy it might appeal to him."

"What might appeal to Newman?" asked a voice. The door was open, and in the aperture stood a young man of twenty-seven or so, tall, thin to the point of emaciation, with very bright eyes and an air of being intensely alive. "I beg your pardon, gentlemen, for bursting in upon you; but the only thing that appeals to Newman just now is his mother's furniture at Rose Hill – at least I hope it is appealing to him, for he has gone to Iffley with Wilberforce to inspect it."

"Oh, come in, Froude," said Dormer. "If you had been eavesdropping a moment or two earlier you would have heard Hungerford's opinion of you."

Hurrell Froude smiled, and, shutting the door, half leant, half sat on Dormer's writing-table. "I don't care in the least what Hungerford thinks of me. I have just had a shock. Did you know that the first Latitudinarians were Tories? I did not. It looks as if Whiggery has by degrees taken up all the filth that has been secreted by human thought – Puritanism, Latitudinarianism, Popery, infidelity, they have it all!"

Tristram laughed. "Is that the result of your studies at Dartington last month, Froude? I thought you were working at the English Reformers."

"So I was," replied the intruder, "but their civilities to the smug fellows on the Continent, added to the fact that the weather was rather hot, stuck in my gizzard. Their odious Protestantism – – "

"Ah!" interrupted Dormer like lightning. "It was too hot for work at Dartington, was it? We've got that admission at last! Have I not always maintained that there was no air so far up the Dart? Now at Colyton there is always the valley breeze either up or down the Axe."

"Horrible!" ejaculated Froude, running his long thin hand through his hair with a gesture of repulsion. "Like living in a perpetual draught! Now at Dartington – – "

"O, for Heaven's sake!" cried Tristram. The interminable feud between the two Devonians on the merits of their respective birthplaces and rivers was one of the standing jokes of the Common Room, and Dormer had just scored one by Froude's careless admission.

Froude got off the table. "Out of regard for you, my dear Hungerford, we will cease. I really came in to ask Dormer if he would ride with me one afternoon this week. I have found a delightful little thirteenth century church in Buckinghamshire with piscina, sedilia and all complete, and I want him to see it."

"I'll come with pleasure. But that reminds me," said Dormer, rummaging in a drawer and getting out a little water-colour sketch of a church tower. "What do you think of that?"

The visitor took it and looked at it attentively for a moment. "Charming," he pronounced. "Where is it? I sometimes think I like a square tower better than a spire, especially when it has an elegant lantern like this. It is nowhere near here, I am sure. Is – – " He broke off suspiciously, for Dormer was standing looking at him with a mischievous smile.

"That is Colyton church tower which you are pleased to admire," said he.

Hurrell Froude flung down the sketch. "Villain!" he exclaimed, and broke into a fit of coughing. "That was a traitor's trick," he said, as soon as he could get breath. "I don't admire it at all, and I'm off. You will end as a Whig, or something worse, if that is possible!"

"Well, I must be getting back also," said Tristram, as the door closed. "How did Froude get that cough, I wonder? I only came in to see how you were."

"Your guest has gone, I suppose?"

"Went this morning," responded his friend, briefly.

"Oh, I thought he was to leave yesterday."

"He stayed another night. Good-bye; I must go."

"Wait a moment," urged Dormer. "I want you to read that." And he tossed a letter across the table.

"From Habington," remarked Tristram, taking it up. "What has he got to say?"

"You read it and see," persisted Dormer. "I wish someone would tell me what to say. I haven't the knack of writing to people in his interesting situation."

Tristram read the letter as desired, Dormer studying him the while. Something had happened!

"Habington engaged to be married!" exclaimed Tristram. "Well, I must say I am surprised. I thought he was a convert to your celibate views."

"I thought so once too, but, apart from Froude, and perhaps Newman, I intend to believe in no man's constancy in future."

"You're very fierce, Charles!"

"Well, I am disappointed. Habington was doing good work here in Oxford; now he must give up his Fellowship at Trinity and be a family man in a country parsonage. He will do good and be an example whereever he is, but he cannot be what he might have been."

"Then," said Tristram slowly, "if I marry after I take Orders I shall not be what I might have been?"

A look that few people ever saw came into Charles Dormer's eyes. He leant forward on the table, his elbows on his scattered manuscripts. "Tristram," he said earnestly, "you know that you have always had my good wishes, and you have them still. You are so obviously cut out for the charities and the humanities...." He stopped and looked down at his papers. "I don't think I am being a sawney about you, even when I want you to be happy."

Tristram was at the door, his hand on the handle. His voice came jerkily. "I am afraid your good wishes are of no use to me now ... Yes, I wanted you to know, but I can't tell you, after all ... I only hope I shall do what is right."

He was gone, and Dormer, half-risen from his chair, was left staring at the closed door.

But as Tristram rode over Folly Bridge, where the river ran yellow in the sunset, he knew that his course lay plain before him.

Half way up the long hill he checked his horse, and from sheer habit turned in the saddle. There stood the towers, orderly and lovely, in the faint mist of the autumn day's ending. He almost fancied that he could hear the bells of Magdalen. Many and many a time, riding into Oxford on summer afternoons, on winter mornings, had he pretended to himself that he was seeing the city for the first time, that its streets were strange to him, its pinnacles a new delight. Now, without any effort of the imagination, it seemed to him both that everything he had ever loved lay below him, cruel and valedictory, never to greet him again, and that it was a place in essence still unentered, an alien city. So, by the mind's alchemy, were the town he had loved and the woman he had lost made one, for a second, in his spirit.

But his course was plain. He rode on up the hill.