Читать книгу Under St Paul's: A Romance - Dowling Richard - Страница 8

When Miss Gordon and Miss Osborne came down to the drawing-room again they found only the two men there. 'What are you going to do to-day, Osborne?' asked Nevill, after a few minutes. 'I really don't know. Miss Gordon, could you suggest something? Here we are, four idle people, in this big place. What shall we do?' 'I do not care. What would you suggest, Miss Osborne?' 'I should prefer staying in to-day. I feel strange.' 'Then let us stay in, by all means,' said Nevill eagerly. 'You look tired; you want a rest. Let us all stay in. It is a beastly, damp, dull British day. No one but a numskulled Englishman would consent to live through such weather as you have here. Even Englishmen would not consent to live here only for the purpose of making money. What do you say, Miss Gordon? About a plan for to-day?' 'I thought you were going to Salisbury.' 'Too late now. I am willing to make one of your party, if you will allow me.' 'I am sure we shall be very glad to have you, if you are so good as to join us, Mr Nevill,' said George quickly. For many reasons two pairs of people were much better than three people in a group. Nevill would no doubt tire out Kate; but better this than that Marie should shock his timid fair sister. But this indoor scheme did not suit Osborne; and yet when a stranger saw signs of fatigue in his sister, and suggested she should rest, how could he do anything but accede? 'Let me see,' said Nevill; 'let me see. It's now past three. It will be dark in a short time. These January days earn their bread as easily as the honest British working-man wants to earn his. Nature set a bad example in starting these eight-hour days. But, as I was saying, let me see if I can suggest a programme. Suppose we stay in, and chat and play and sing and look at pictures for a few hours, and then dine, and after dinner drive off to the Albert Hall, where there is a concert to-night? Now, I don't say that is a brilliant programme; it's sound, sound as British courage.' Nevill's programme was adopted, and the four sat from the daylight into the twilight, and from the twilight into dark, chatting; now of this, now of that, never keeping very long to the one point. The two men did most of the talking; Osborne lent the heavier, and Nevill the lighter. Miss Gordon said singularly little, and Miss Osborne almost nothing at all. But they omitted one feature of Nevill's programme, they had no singing. Each had thoughts he or she might not utter. Osborne was mentally bowed down before the only earthly shrine at which he worshipped. Nevill congratulated himself upon not having gone to Salisbury, and made up his mind that Miss Osborne was not as strong as open-air exercise and a little rousing up would make her. Osborne and Miss Gordon were getting on very nicely. All right. Two of a trade never agree. Miss Gordon thought how noble he looked! How simple and sincere he was! What a compliment it was to have such an intellect stooping down to her! And how she yearned for the peace of faith such as he dwelt in! Miss Osborne thought how beautiful this dark girl, how homely and tender-minded and sweet of thought. How handsome George was; and did that plain-looking man rattle on always as now? Upon those four people and the thoughts they kept within their breasts, upon the four millions of people around and the thoughts they kept within their breasts, the darkness of night descended. For sixteen hours all London, its cities, its towns, its villages, would be buried in the vault of winter night. For eight of these hours the vast majority of those four millions of souls would be buried in sleep, deceived by dreams. When morning once more came, what changes of fortune while London had slept! The first post, the first telegrams, would bring joy and misery to thousands. Before breakfast, many who had had no warning of evil, would have to think of the mourning they could afford out of resources sadly diminished during night by death. The morning mail would bring the dearest letter man ever gets, that one with Yes from his beloved. Where affluence was to-night bankruptcy would be to-morrow. Where penury had pinched, and poverty had degraded, thither by the light of day wealth would be borne. Between this and then one hundred and twenty Londoners would pass away for ever, and one hundred and ninety-six be born into the great horde camped under St Paul's. What a motley horde it is! Here is a native of every civilised and semi-civilised nation on earth, and many of the barbarous peoples are represented. What a hideous collection of swarthy scoundrelism in the regions lying east-about Catherine Street, Lower East Street, Smithfield, High Street, Wapping and Wapping Wall! And much of what is not swarthy and foreign there is lower still. Here are Mongolians, Negroes, Hottentots, and Malays hearsed in sleep. Here is Newgate Prison, with a sufficient variety of criminals to colonise Pandemonium, with a sufficient variety of tongues to confound the builders of a new Babel. Over the water rest factories of all kinds, silent by night, trembling with noise and travail by day. Around these factories are crowded working-men, thieves, and scum of the vilest kind. Beyond that belt is a region of poor shops; and beyond, all reaching out to touch the green fields, lie pleasant villas where men, sufficiently good as men go, sleep, where women of spotless purity dream blameless dreams. Westward repose those who own the riches which are for expense. Here are coronets embroidered upon the hangings of the beds. Here is ambition, restless and insatiable, ambition not of the moneygrubbing kind, but for place, position, power. The East and the West are the latest to sleep. One is kept awake by orgies and broils, the other by pleasure and aspirations. The orgies of the East have in the West developed into decorous balls and receptions. The taproom and the bar of the East have been changed into the ballroom and club of the West. The rude broilers of the East have in the progress of time been developed into the political and financial speculators of the West. From East to West is from primitive means to civilised means of defeating someone or gaining something you cannot freely get. North lie the couches of the liberal arts, professions, and of commerce once again. It is the region of new men-of men whose father's names were unknown to Londoners. These are the ardent workers. They have not succeeded to a heritage of mere muscle and ignorance like the men in the East. They have not come into entailed properties or established historic business firms like the men in the West. They have made their own way in the world. When they grow older and richer they may drift West. The North invents, the South supplies the tools, the East the hands, the West the patrons and critics of the work, while out of the yellow heart of the city comes the gold, the incentive to the North, South, and East. As St Paul's is the spiritual centre of London, the bank is the commercial centre. All the moneyed eyes of the Empire are fixed on that unsightly block of building in Threadneedle Street. If it had any pretensions to architectural beauty or grace-if it had a dome, or a campanile, or a minaret, or anything less tame than its dull, dreary, uninformed walls-that characteristic feature would be looked upon all over the world as the symbol of England's wealth, as the dome, ball, and cross of St Paul's are regarded as the insignia of the Anglo-Saxon race. Night had settled down on the City for hours. The men hunted by men drew easier breath. Bailiffs had ceased from troubling, policemen were almost at rest. The pursued and the pursuers had lain down to snatch a brief respite from terrors or business. The black silence between day and day lay like a weight upon the camp under the dome of the vast fane. In Peter's Row not a sound could be heard save now and then the faint mutter of a far-off cab or the bark of a distant dog. The lights in the dining-room where supper had been served were out. All the guests and servants had long since retired to their rooms. All the servants and most of the guests had gone to rest. The back of the hotel commanded a view of the cathedral. One of the finest sights in London is the sun rising behind St. Paul's while you are high at the western side. There is something triumphant and terrible in the sight. It seems as if the cathedral would crumble away, and disclose in the fiery core of dawn the intolerable Judgment Seat. But by night, when there is no moon, and one is near enough to be impressed by the stupendous proportions of the building, and yet far enough away to yield it grandeur in losing detail, the feeling is one of melancholy. The dome seems a buoy set to mark the site where millions of men have been overwhelmed by darkness and drowned, because of their rejection of spiritual light. In the back of the hotel two people were still awake, a man and a woman. The man was in his bedroom. His gas was turned up. He was sitting astride a chair and, contrary to the rules of the house, smoking a cigar. His arms were folded on the back of his chair, his chin rested on his arms. His face at the best was not handsome. This attitude made it almost repulsive. His thoughts ran: "By Jove, didn't she look well! Never seen anything like it in my life, and I've seen a few good-looking girls. Miss Gordon wasn't in it with her, and Miss G. isn't a bad-looking girl. But that beautiful, pale, sad, round face, and her eyes-her soft sad eyes! As some fellow put it, she 'is as pure as the saints on high, and never was saint so fair.' But I'm not a poet. I don't think like a poet; I don't look like a poet; I don't eat or drink like a poet. I suppose, as there is the seed of every disease in man, there's the seed of poetry in me. Where they put the blessed seed I don't know. What's the good of a seed that's in some cupboard if you don't know which, and when only four out of eight of the keys you have fit the locks? It's discouraging. I suppose every fellow thinks of poetry when he sees a face like hers. I wonder if a member of the London board of actuaries saw a face like that, what kind of poetry would he think of. Maybe he wouldn't think of poetry at all. Perhaps he'd try to estimate the superficial area of her face, allowing of course for the eyes. If I knew any figure-painter, I think I'd ask him to paint her and me as Psyche and Adonis. I'd get up an appropriate expression like this," he said to himself, throwing away the butt of his cigar, contorting his face until he was positively hideous, and then approaching the glass with a burlesque mincing gait. When he saw his reflection in the glass he laughed aloud. Then he undressed, put out the light, and went to bed. The woman still was up. She sat by the window of her bedroom. Her eyes were fixed on the cloudlike mass of St. Paul's towering above her. She was not thinking of St. Paul's. She was not thinking of London. She was not thinking of George Osborne. She had been to a concert that night, and she had heard a song often heard and sung by her before. It was a well-known song, a well-known air. It had never touched her until to-night. The music had reached some range of feeling, or emotion, or spirituality, of which she had had no previous acquaintance. While she listened she was conscious of some mighty upheaval of her nature. She saw all her past life by a new light, and she shrank back from the vague possibilities of what was to come. She could understand nothing of this change. She heard the rumble of some noble thought, but could not figure to her mind its appearance. She knew something great was at hand. She could not think of lying down. She must wait for what was coming, be it what it might. Hours went by, and still she did not move. Still she had the words of that refrain, the tone of the singer's voice, the rumble of the approaching revelation. Yet the revelation did not come. Hours again went by without change. She was unconscious of fatigue, unconscious there was cause for fatigue, unconscious of everything but the powers that kept her spell-bound. At last the east grew slowly grey. She marked this, and then came her first thought outside the tyranny that possessed her, – 'I shall not go down early.' The light broadened in the east. Gradually the gates of the morning were opened, and through their chinks great beams of pale-yellow light set themselves across the sky, and stood up like the fingers of a fan. Gradually these beams changed to orange, and then to crimson, and just where they converged, and forming the centre of their base, stood out in vague purple the shadow of St Paul's. All at once something seemed to strike her. She rose hastily to her feet, muttering, – 'How august! The dome is like the Head, the sunbeams form the aureola.' All at once to the great apparition before her came the words which had haunted her all night, Miserere nobis.' For a moment she shook. Her face, lighted up by the blazing east, was perplexed, perturbed, contorted. All at once it lost the look of conflict. An expression of infinite supplication settled upon it, and raising her clasped hands to Heaven, she fell upon her knees and sang out in a low broken voice, – 'Miserere nobis!'