On Sunday we went to the Parish Church. At breakfast, Charmion seemed silent and depressed; but, true to our agreement, I asked no questions, and she volunteered no explanation. She said she was not going to church, but later on she changed her mind. I think she saw that I was disappointed, and a trifle shy at going alone, so off we went together—Charmion a marvel of unobtrusive elegance in grey, and I “taking the eye” in sapphire-blue—along the breezy lane, past the closed gates of Uplands, through the shuttered High Street into the tiny square, in a corner of which the church was nooked, with the vicarage garden adjoining the churchyard.
The congregation was assembling from different parts, and everybody who passed stared at us, the men stolidly enough, the women with a curiosity which, to my mind at least, had something antagonistic in its nature. Their pursed lips, their sidelong glances, reminded me of the assistants in the draper’s shop; of the cook who muttered that she was not “the only one”. I looked at Charmion to see if she felt the atmosphere, but her eyes held the blank, far-off expression which marked her dark hours. She had no attention to spare for village worthies: nothing that they could do or think was of sufficient importance to arouse her attention. Inside, the church was bare and uninteresting, and the musical service poor, but the Vicar himself attracted me greatly. A plain-looking man nearing forty, but with a most expressive and eloquent voice. He read the service exquisitely—so exquisitely, that words which one knew by heart seemed suddenly filled with new meaning. When the time came for the sermon I expected great things. It seemed to me that the man who could so wonderfully interpret the words of others, must be endued with the gift of eloquence for himself. I even braced myself for a mental effort, in case his argument should soar above my head. And then—a child could have followed him! It was absolutely the simplest, plainest, and most intimate address which I had ever heard from a church pulpit. Incidentally, it was also the shortest!
It was ten minutes to twelve o’clock when he folded his arms on top of the open Bible, and leant forward for a long, silent moment, looking earnestly from side to side into the upturned faces of his hearers. Then he began to talk—to talk, not to preach, speaking every word with an inflection of the truest sincerity. The text was “Forgetting the things that are behind, I press towards the mark,” and the “talk” ran pretty much like this:—
“How has this week gone with you, Brothers and Sisters? To some it has brought success, to others failure. Bad weather, bad temper, lost control, a host of tiny troubles have sprung upon us unprepared; have worked their will, and left us discouraged and weak. Thank God for beginnings! New years, new months, new weeks—after every twenty-four hours, a new day, with the sun rising over a new world! Last week is dead. All the grieving in the world cannot revive it into life. Bury it! Remember only the lessons it has taught. Forget the things that lie behind. Press forward! This week is alive. This week brings opportunity. Live! Work! Pray! With God’s grace make it the best, the truest, the kindliest week you have ever lived.”
The clock struck twelve, and the sermon was over. A bare ten minutes, but if he had preached for an hour on end he could not have added to its effect. The congregation listened in tense silence, as though afraid of losing a word. One felt the electric thrill of hope and courage and high resolve which, flooded their hearts; felt it oneself; went out from the church braced in heart and soul.
I want to know more of that man. He could help one along.
I have got my wish. He called with his wife this afternoon—the first callers since we arrived. They were shown into the drawing-room, where Charmion and I were lolling over our tea. There was fruit on the table, besides a selection of cakes from town, and as we had been gardening in the earlier part of the afternoon, and got thoroughly grubby and untidy, we had changed into the tea-gowns which we wear in the evening when we are too lazy to put on more elaborate clothes. They are very nice tea-gowns, and, though I say so who shouldn’t, we look exceedingly nice in them, but to the eye of a hard-working country clergyman the whole interior may have looked too luxurious to be approved! His face looked very grave as he shook hands.
Mrs Merrivale is a surprise. The Vicar figures on the church board as the Reverend John C. Merrivale, but she has her cards printed, “Mrs J. Courtney Merrivale,” and she calls him “Jacky” in public. She is very young—twenty-two or three at the most—and has a very long neck and a pretty little face, with huge pale-blue eyes, and a minute mouth with coral-pink lips. She is dressed in cheap clothes made in the latest fashion, and she asks questions all the time, and doesn’t wait for an answer. When you tell her a definite fact, such as that you have been planting tulips in the garden, she says, “Not really!” or as a change, “Fancy!” or “Just think!” He adores her. Every time he meets her eyes, his grave, strong face softens and glows in a way which makes one feel inclined to cry. Lonely women feel so very lonely at such moments as these! She contradicts him over the most futile things, and says, “No, Jacky, it was three o’clock, not four; I was just getting up from my rest,” and he smiles, and doesn’t mind a bit.
They had tea, but refused fruit, with an air of being rather outraged by the offer. Mrs Merrivale surreptitiously studied the details of Charmion’s tea-gown, and the Vicar and I laboured assiduously at conversation. I had liked him so much on Sunday, and had hoped he would be a real friend; but—things didn’t go! I had a miserable feeling that he had paid the call as a matter of duty, that he disapproved of us, that he dreaded our influence on his precious little goose of a wife. There was certainly a restraint in his manner. Everybody seemed restrained in this funny little place. I wonder if it was something in the air!
Having made mental notes concerning the tea-gown, Mrs Merrivale next turned her attention to the room, and stared around with frank curiosity and a barely concealed envy.
“Your room looks so pretty. Jacky, that’s exactly the material I wanted for our curtains. You have beautiful china. I’m collecting, too; but”—she gave an expressive shrug. “Of course, this room lends itself; it is so big, and get’s all the sun. You remember, Jacky”—she looked at her husband with widened eyes—“Mr Maplestone called it a ‘Sun Trap’.”
It seemed an innocent enough remark, but the Vicar’s grave assent implied a deeper meaning. Mrs Merrivale sighed, and elaborately lengthened her chin.
“Uplands is so bleak. General Underwood feels the cold so much. All the windows of the entertaining rooms seem to look the wrong way.”
“He should have some more put in, facing the sun,” Charmion suggested in her regal way, and Mrs Merrivale looked as much aghast as if she had suggested pulling down the whole house and building it afresh. I burst hastily into the conversation.
“I think I met General Underwood the other day. In a bath-chair. I was glad that he was well enough to get out. I hope he will soon be quite well.”
The Vicar said gravely:—
“He will never be well. The most that can be hoped is that he will not grow worse rapidly. He is a fine man, and has done good service. We are proud to have him back amongst us, but I am afraid, for his own sake, it has been a bad move. He ought to have settled in a kindlier climate.”
“Yes, but—” Mrs Merrivale began impulsively, and pulled herself up, and bit her red lip. “Jacky,” she said hurriedly, “I’m afraid we must go.”
They went, and I felt a worm. It was plain to me now that the parish in general, from the Vicar downward, had absorbed the idea that the strange ladies at Pastimes had played a mean trick on their local hero, and were not inclined to smile upon the ladies in consequence. The Vicar had probably heard the Squire’s prejudiced story direct, and from the Manor House and the Vicarage reports had percolated, as such reports will percolate, to the draper’s assistants, and the man in the street, down and down to the truant cook herself.
Now the feudal feeling still lingers in English villages, and no self-respecting tenant chooses to range herself against the Squire. The cook’s mother, no doubt, lived in a cottage owned by the Squire, and enjoyed perquisites of various sorts which she had no disposition to throw away. Beside the kitchen fire there had, no doubt, been a lengthy conference over that rumour, and the mother had said, “Don’t you do it, Mary Jane. If the ladies are across with the Squire, how’ll he take it if he hears my daughter’s in their service? And half a dozen people with their eyes on this cottage as it is. A nice thing it would be for me if I got notice to quit!” The gardener’s mother had probably presented the same argument to him, and the good people who had eyed us askance on Sunday morning were probably reflecting to themselves, “They look all right, but you never know! There was evidently something very unpleasant about that lease. Poor General Underwood, too. Well, we won’t be in a hurry to call. We will just wait and see!”
I felt horribly depressed, and somehow Charmion’s utter indifference made me feel worse. I do love to be liked; it would poison me to live in an atmosphere of prejudice and suspicion, but she doesn’t appear to care. I have a curious conviction that to be socially ostracised would be just what she would prefer. Books, the garden, my companionship—these would supply her need. New claims would be rather a bore.
I am not made like that. I need more. I feel horribly depressed.
Charmion saw it, and spoke out before we went to bed.
“You are worrying, Evelyn. That disagreeable autocrat has succeeded in prejudicing our neighbours against us, and it hurts you. Well, nothing is irrevocable. Say the word, and we will leave the house to-morrow, and put up a bill—to let!”
I jumped nearly out of my skin, with horror and amazement.
“Never! Not for the world. My pride wouldn’t let me even if I wanted to do it, and I don’t—I don’t! I love the house and the life with you even more than I expected, it’s only that I’m sorry about. I do like to live at peace with all men. Doesn’t it worry you, Charmion, to feel yourself unjustly accused?”
“It would have done once. At your age. Since then”—her eyes took the blank, far-away look which always attended even the faintest allusion to the past—“since then I have lost the power of caring. When one has borne the one big hurt, the gnats have no power to sting.”
I looked up eagerly, but she rose from her seat, pressing one hand gently over my eyes.
“No! Don’t ask me! You have been very sweet, very forbearing. One great reason why my heart went out to you, Evelyn, was that you never questioned, never tried to probe. Go on being patient! Some day you shall know. I should like to tell you now, but I can’t, I can’t! You must wait. Some day the impulse will come, then it may be a relief. Till then, Evelyn, you must wait!”