Deadham Hard by Lucas Malet

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"This is a matter of common knowledge," Dr. Cripps said; "but one about
which, for reasons of policy, or, more truly, of snobbery, it is the
fashion to keep silent. So, for goodness' sake, don't give me as your
authority if you should ever have occasion to speak of it"--

And lowering his voice he mentioned a name.

"As like as two peas," he added, "when you see them side by side--which,
in point of fact, you never do. Oh! I promise you the whole dirty
business has been remarkably well engineered--hush-money, I suppose.
Sometimes I am tempted to think poverty is the only punishable sin in
this world. For those who have a good balance at their bankers there is
always a safe way out of even the most disgraceful imbroglios of this
sort. But I must be moving on, Mr. Sawyer. I sympathize with your
annoyance. You have been very offensively treated. Good night."

The young clergyman remained planted on the doorstep, incapable of
ringing the bell and presenting himself to his assiduously attentive
hostesses, the Miss Minetts, for the moment.

He was, in truth, indescribably shocked. Deadham presented itself to
his mind as a place accursed, a veritable sink of iniquity. High and
low alike, its inhabitants were under condemnation.--And he had so
enjoyed his tea with the ladies at The Hard. Had been so flattered by
their civility, spreading himself in the handsome room, agreeably
sensible of its books, pictures, ornaments, and air of cultured
leisure.--While behind all that, as he now learned, was this glaring
moral delinquency! Never had he been more cruelly deceived. He felt
sick with disgust. What callousness, what hypocrisy!--He recalled his
disquieting sensations in crossing the warren. Was the very soil of
this place tainted, exhaling evil?

He made a return upon himself. For what, after all, was he here for save
to let in light and combat evil, to bring home the sense of sin to the
inhabitants of this place, convincing them of the hatefulness of the
moral slough in which they so revoltingly wallowed. He must slay and
spare not. He saw himself as David, squaring up to Goliath, as Christian
fighting single-handed against the emissaries of Satan who essayed to
defeat his pilgrimage. Yes, he would smite these lawbreakers hip and
thigh, whatever their superficial claims to his respect, whatever their
worldly position. He would read them all a lesson--that King Log, Canon
Horniblow, included.

He at once pitied and admired himself, not being a close critic of
his own motives; telling himself he did well to be angry, while
ignoring the element of personal pique which gave point and
satisfaction to that anger.

He was silent and reserved with the Miss Minetts at supper; and retired
early to his own room to prepare a sermon.

CHAPTER III

BROTHER AND SISTER

Upon the Sunday morning following, Damaris went to the eleven o'clock
service alone. Miss Felicia Verity attended church at an earlier hour
to-day, partly in the interests of private devotion, partly in those of a
person she had warmly befriended in the past, and wanted to befriend in
the present--but with delicacy, with tact and due consideration for the
susceptibilities of others. She wished earnestly to effect a
reconciliation; but not to force it. To force it was to endanger its
sincerity and permanence. It should seem to come about lightly,
naturally. Therefore did she go out early to perfect her plans--of which
more hereafter--as well as to perform her religious duties. Sir Charles
Verity was from home, staying with Colonel Carteret for partridge
shooting, over the Norfolk stubble-fields. The habit of this annual visit
had, for the last two seasons, been in abeyance; but now, with his return
to The Hard, was pleasantly revived, although this autumn, owing to
business connected with the publication of his book, the visit took place
a few weeks later than usual.

Hence did Damaris--arrayed in a russet-red serge gown, black velvet
collar and cuffs to its jacket of somewhat manly cut, and a russet-red
upstanding plume in her close-fitting black velvet hat--set forth alone
to church. This, after redirecting such letters as had arrived for her
father by the morning post. One of them bore the embossed arms of the
India Office, and signature of the, then, Secretary of State for that
department in the corner of the envelope. She looked at it with a measure
of respect and curiosity, wondering as to the purport of its contents.
She studied the envelope, turning it about in the hope of gleaning
enlightenment from its external aspect. Still wondering, slightly
oppressed even by a persuasion--of which she could not rid herself--that
it held matters of no common moment closely affecting her father, she
went out of the house, down the sheltered drive, and through the entrance
gates. Here, as she turned inland, the verve of the clear autumn morning
rushed on her, along with a wild flurry of falling leaves dancing to the
breath of the crisp northerly breeze.

A couple of fine days, with a hint of frost in the valley by night, after
a spell of soft mists and wet, sent the leaves down in fluttering
multitudes, so that now all trees, save the oaks only, were bare.
These--by which the road is, just here, overhung--still solidly clothed
in copper, amber and--matching our maiden's gown--in russet-red, offered
sturdy defiance to the weather. The sound of them, a dry crowded
rustling, had a certain note of courage and faithfulness in it which
caused Damaris to wait awhile and listen; yet a wistfulness also, since
to her hearing a shudder stirred beneath its bravery, preluding the
coming rigours of winter.

And that wistfulness rather strangely enlarged its meaning and area, as
the reiterated ting, tang, tong of Deadham's church bells recalled the
object of her walk. For English church services, of the parochial variety
such as awaited her, had but little, she feared, to give. Little, that
is, towards the re-living of those instants of exalted spiritual
perception which had been granted to her at distant Avila.

In overstrained and puritanic dread of idolatory, the English Church has
gone lamentably far to forfeit its sacramental birthright. It savours too
strongly of the school and class-room, basing its appeal upon words, upon
spoken expositions, instructive no doubt, but cold, academic. It offers
no tangible object of worship to sight or sense. Its so-called altars are
empty. Upon them no sacrifice is offered, no presence abidingly dwells.
In its teaching the communion of saints and forgiveness of sins are
phrases rather than living agencies. Its atmosphere is self-conscious,
its would-be solemnity forced.--This, in any case, was how Damaris saw
the whole matter--though, let us hasten to add, she was modest enough to
question whether the fault might not very well be in herself rather than
in our national variant of the Christian Faith. Many sweet, good
persons--dear Aunt Felicia among them--appeared to find Anglican
ministrations altogether sufficient for their religious needs. But to
Damaris those ministrations failed to bring any moment of vision, of
complete detachment. She must be to blame, she supposed--which was
discouraging, a little outcasting and consequently sad.

In a somewhat pensive spirit she therefore, pursued her way, until, where
the prospect widened as she reached the village green, a larger sky
disclosed itself flaked with light cirrus cloud. This glory of space, and
the daring northerly breeze blowing out from it, sent her fancy flying.
It beckoned to journeyings, to far coasts and unknown seas--an offshore
wind, filling the sails of convoys outward bound. And, with the thought
of ships upon the sea, came the thought of Darcy Faircloth, and that with
sharp revolt against the many existing hindrances to his and her
intercourse. Freedom seemed abroad this morning. Even the leaves declared
for liberty, courting individual adventure upon the wings of that daring
wind. And this sense of surrounding activity worked upon Damaris, making
her doubly impatient of denials and arbitrary restraints. She sent her
soul after Darcy Faircloth across the waste of waters, fondly, almost
fiercely seeking him. But her soul refused to travel, curiously turning
homeward again, as though aware not the prodigious fields of ocean, nor
any loud-voiced foreign port of call, held knowledge of him, but rather
the immediate scene, the silver-glinting levels of the Haven and lonely
stone-built inn.

Deadham church, originally a chapelry of Marychurch Abbey, crowns a green
monticule in the centre of Deadham village, backed by a row of big
elms.--A wide, low-roofed structure, patched throughout the course of
centuries beyond all unity and precision of design; yet still showing
traces of Norman work in the arch of the belfry and in the pillars
supporting the rafters of the middle aisle. At the instance of a former
vicar, the whole interior received a thick coat of whitewash, alike over
plaster and stone. This, at the time in question, had been in places
scraped off, bringing to light some mural paintings of considerable
interest and antiquity.

In the chancel, upon the gospel side, is a finely-carved tomb, with
recumbent figures of an armoured knight and richly-robed lady, whose
slippered feet push against the effigy of a particularly alert,
sharp-muzzled little hound. The two front pews, in the body of the
church, at the foot of the said tomb, are allotted to the owner and
household at The Hard. The slender, lively little hound and the two
sculptured figures lying, peaceful in death, for ever side by side,
touched and captivated Damaris from the first time she set eyes on them.
She reverenced and loved them, weaving endless stories about them when,
in the tedium of prayer or over-lengthy sermon, her attention, all too
often, strayed.

This morning the three bells jangled altogether as she reached the
churchyard gate. Then the smallest tolled alone, hurrying stragglers. She
was indeed late, the bulk of the congregation already seated, the Canon
at the reading-desk and Mrs. Horniblow wheezing forth a voluntary upon
the harmonium, when she walked up the aisle.

But, during her brief passage, Damaris could not but observe the
largeness of the assembly. An uncommon wave of piety must have swept over
the parish this morning! The Battyes and Taylors were present in force.
Farmers and tradespeople mustered in impressive array. Even Dr.
Cripps--by no means a frequent churchgoer--and his forlorn-looking,
red-eyed little wife were there. The Miss Minetts had a lady with them--a
plump, short little person, dressed with attempted fashion, whose back
struck Damaris as quaintly familiar, she catching a glimpse of it in
passing. Most surprising of all, William Jennifer headed a contingent
from the Island, crowding the men's free seats to right and left of the
west door. An expectancy, moreover, seemed to animate the throng. Then
she remembered, the new curate, Reginald Sawyer, had informed her and
Miss Felicia two evenings ago when he had called and been bidden to stay
to tea, that he would preach for the first time at the eleven o'clock
service. So far he had only occupied the pulpit on Sunday afternoons,
when a country congregation is liable to be both scanty and somnolent.
To-day he would prove himself before the heads of tribes, before the
notables. And Damaris wished him well, esteeming him a worthy young man,
if somewhat provincial and superfluously pompous.

In the servants' pew directly behind, Mary and Mrs. Cooper were duly
ensconced, supported by Mr. Patch, two small male Patches, white-collared
and shining with excess of cleanliness, wedged in between him and his
stable sub-ordinate Conyers, the groom. The Hard thus made a commendably
respectable show, as Damaris reflected with satisfaction.

She stood, she knelt, her prayer book open upon the carved margin of the
tomb, the slender crossed legs and paws of the alert little marble dog
serving as so often before for bookrest. Canon Horniblow boomed and
droned, like some unctuous giant bumble-bee, from the reading-desk. The
choir intoned responses from the gallery with liberal diversity of pitch.
And presently, alas! Damaris' thoughts began to wander, making flitting
excursions right and left. For half-way through the litany some belated
worshipper arrived, causing movement in the men's free seats. This oddly
disturbed her. Her mind flew again to Faircloth, and the strange
impression of her own soul's return declaring this and no other to be his
actual neighbourhood. And if it indeed were so?--Damaris thrust back the
emotions begotten of that question, as unpermissibly stormy at this time
and in this place.

She tried to fix her thoughts wholly upon the office. But, all too soon
they sprang aside again, now circling about the enigmatic back beheld in
the Miss Minetts' pew. Of whom did that round, dressy little form remind
her? Why--why--of Theresa, of course. Not Theresa, genius and saint of
Spanish Avila; but Theresa Bilson, her sometime governess-companion of
doubtfully amiable memory. She longed to satisfy herself, but could only
do so by turning round and looking squarely--a manoeuvre impossible
during the prayers, but which might be accomplished later, when the
congregation rose to sing the hymn before the sermon.

She must wait. And during that waiting light, rather divertingly, broke
in on her. For supposing her belief as to the lady's identity correct,
must not dear Aunt Felicia be party to this resurrection? Had not she
known, and stolen forth this morning to perfect some innocent plot of
peace-making? In furtherance of which she now cunningly remained at home,
thus leaving Damaris free to offer renewal of favour or withhold it as
she pleased. Was not that deliciously characteristic of Aunt Felicia and
her permanent effort to serve two masters--to make everybody happy, and,
regardless of conflicting interests, everybody else too?--Well, Damaris
was ready to fulfil her wishes. She bore Theresa no ill-will. An
inclination to grudge or resentment seemed to her unworthy. Whatever
Theresa's tiresomenesses, they were over and done with, surely, quite
immensely long ago.

The hymn given out and the tune of it played through, the assembly
scraped and rustled to its feet. Damaris standing, in height overtopping
her neighbours, discreetly turned her head. Let her eyes rest an instant,
smiling, upon the upturned polished countenances of the two small
Patches--shyly watching her--and then seek a more distant goal. Yes,
veritably Theresa Bilson in the flesh--very much in the flesh, full of
face and plump of bosom, gold-rimmed glasses gleaming, her mouth opened
wide in song. It was a little astonishing to see her so unchanged. For
how much had happened since the day of that choir-treat, at Harchester,
which marked her deposition, the day of Damaris' sleep in the sunshine
and awakening in the driving wet out on the Bar.--The day wherein so much
began, and so much ended, slashed across and across with an extravagance
of lasting joy and lasting pain!--In the sense of it all Damaris lost
herself a little, becoming forgetful of her existing situation. She
looked past, over Theresa and beyond.

At the extreme end of the church, in the last of the free seats where
the light from the west door streamed inward, a man's figure detached
itself with singular distinctness from the background of whitewashed
wall. He, too, overtopped his fellows, and that by several inches. And
from the full length of the building, across the well-filled benches, his
glance sought and met that of Damaris, and held it in fearless, high
security of affection not to be gainsaid.

The nice, clean-shining little Patches, still watching shyly out of their
brown, glossy, mouse-like eyes, to their extreme mystification saw the
colour flood Damaris' face, saw her lips tremble and part as in prelude
to happy speech. Then saw her grow very pale, and, turning away, clutch
at the head of the alert little hound. Mrs. Cooper delivered herself of a
quite audible whisper to the effect--"that Miss Damaris was took
faint-like, as she feared." And Mary leaned forward over the front of the
pew in quick anxiety. But our maiden's weakness was but passing. She
straightened herself, stood tall and proudly again, looking at the knight
and his lady lying so peacefully side by side upon their marble couch.
She gathered them into her gladness--they somehow sympathized, she felt,
in her present sweet and poignant joy. Her soul had known best, had been
right in its homing--since Faircloth was here--was here.

That sweet, poignant joy flooded her, so that she wordlessly gave thanks
and praise. He was in life--more, was within sight of her, hearing the
same sounds, breathing the same air. Across the short dividing space,
spirit had embraced spirit. He claimed her.--Had not his will, indeed,
far more than any curiosity regarding the identity of poor, plump little
Theresa, compelled her to look around?

She demanded nothing further, letting herself dwell in a perfection of
content--without before or after--possible only to the pure in heart and
to the young.

The hymn concluded, Damaris knelt, while Reginald Sawyer, having mounted
into the pulpit, read the invocation; mechanically rose from her knees
with the rest, and disposed herself in the inner corner of the pew,
sitting sideways so that her left hand might rest upon the carven marble
margin of the tomb. She liked touch of it still, in the quietude of her
great content, cherishing a pretty fancy of the knight and his lady's
sympathy and that also of their sprightly little footstool dog.

Otherwise she was deaf to outward things, deliciously oblivious, wrapped
away sweetly within herself. Hence she quite failed to notice how
awkwardly Sawyer stumbled, treading on the fronts of his long surplice
when going up the pulpit stairs. How he fumbled with his manuscript as
he flattened it out on the cushioned desk. Or how husky was his voice,
to the point of the opening sentences being almost inaudible. The young
clergyman suffered, indeed, so it appeared, from a painfully excessive
fit of nervousness. All this she missed, not awakening from her state of
blissful trance until the sermon had been under way some good five to
ten minutes.

Her awakening even then was gradual. It was also unpleasant. It began in
vague and uneasy suspicion of something unusual and agitating toward. In
consciousness of a hushed and strained attention, very foreign to the
customary placid, not to say bovine, indifference of the ordinary country
congregation. The preacher's voice was audible enough now, in good truth,
though still under insufficient control. It roared, cracked upward,
approaching a scream. Sentences trod on one another's heels, so rapid was
his delivery; or bumped and jolted so overlaid was it with emphasis. He,
dealt in ugly words, too--"lies, drunkenness, theft, profanity;" and
worse still, "uncleanness, adultery, carnal debauchery." For not venial
sins only, but mortal sins likewise were rife in Deadham, as he averred,
matters of common knowledge and everyday occurrence--tolerated if not
openly encouraged, callously winked at. The public conscience could
hardly be said to exist, so indurated was it, so moribund through lack of
stimulation and through neglect. Yet such wickedness, sooner or later,
must call down the vengeance of an offended God. It would be taken upon
these lawbreakers. Here or hereafter these evil-livers would receive the
chastisement their deeds invited and deserved. Let no man deceive
himself. God is just. He is also very terrible in judgment. Hell yawns
for the impenitent.

Breathless, he paused; and a subdued sigh, an instinctive shuffling of
feet ran through the assembly.--Yet these were but generalities after
all, often heard before, when you came to think, though seldom so
forcibly put. Every man made liberal gift of such denunciations to his
neighbours, rather than applied their lesson to himself. But Reginald
Sawyer was merely gathering energy, gathering courage for more detailed
assault. He felt nervous to the verge of collapse--a new and really
horrible experience. His head was hot, his feet cold. The temptation
simply and crudely to give in, bundle down the pulpit stairs and bolt,
was contemptibly great. His eyesight played tricks on him. Below there,
in the body of the church, the rows of faces ran together into irregular
pink blots spread meaninglessly above the brown of the oaken pews, the
brown, drab, and black, too, of their owners' Sunday best. Here and
there a child's light frock or white hat intruded upon the prevailing
neutral tints; as did, in a startling manner, Damaris Verity's
russet-red plume and suit.

Time and again, since he began his sermon, had that dash of rich colour
drawn his reluctant attention. He recoiled from, oddly dreaded it--now
more than ever, since to him it rather mercilessly focussed the subject
and impending climax of his denunciatory address.

The pause began to affect the waiting congregation, which stirred
uneasily. Some one coughed. And Sawyer was a sufficiently practised
speaker to know that, once you lose touch with an audience, it is next to
impossible successfully to regain your ascendency over it. Unless he was
prepared to accept ignominious defeat he must brace himself, or it would
be too late. He abominated defeat. Therefore, summoning all his native
combativeness, he took his own fear by the throat, straightened his
manuscript upon the desk, and vehemently broke forth into speech.

--Did his hearers deny or doubt the truth of his assertions, suppose that
he spoke at random, or without realization of the heavy responsibility
he incurred in advancing such accusations? They were in error, so he told
them. He advanced no accusations which he could not justify by examples
chosen from among themselves, from among residents in this parish. He
would be false to his duty both to them--his present audience--and to his
and their Creator, were he to abstain from giving those examples out of
respect of persons. Other occupants of this pulpit might have--he feared
had--allowed worldly considerations to influence and silence them.

A nasty cut this, at the poor vicar-canon, increasingly a prey to
distracted fidgets, sitting helpless in the chancel.

But of such pusillanimity, such time-serving, he--Reginald
Sawyer--scorned to be guilty. The higher placed the sinner, the more
heinous the sin.--He would deal faithfully with all, since not only was
the salvation of each one in jeopardy, but his own salvation was in peril
likewise, inasmuch as, at the dread Last Assize, he would be required to
give account of his stewardship in respect of this sinful place.

Thus far Damaris had listened in deepening distaste. Surely the young man
very much magnified his office, was in manner exaggerated, in matter
aggressive and verbose? Notwithstanding its attempted solemnity and heat,
his sermon seemed to be conventional, just a "way of talking," and a
conceited one at that. But, as he proceeded to set forth his promised
examples of local ill-living, distaste passed into bewilderment and
finally into a sense of outrage, blank and absolute. He named no names,
and wrapped his statements up in Biblical language. Yet they remained
suggestive and significant enough. He spoke, surely, of those whose
honour was dearest to her, whom she boundlessly loved. Under plea of
rebuking vice, he laid bare the secrets, violated the sanctities of their
private lives. Yet was not that incredible? All decencies of custom and
usage forbade it, stamped such disclosure as unpermissible, fantastic. He
must be mad, or she herself mad, mishearing, misconceiving him.

"Adulterous father, bastard son--publican sheltering youthful offenders
from healthy punishment in the interests of personal gain."--Of that last
she made nothing, failed to follow it. But the rest?--

It was true, too. But not as he represented it, all its tragic beauty,
all the nobleness which tempered and, in a measure at least, discounted
the great wrong of it, stripped away--leaving it naked, torn from its
setting, without context and so without perspective. Against this not
only her tenderness, but sense of justice, passionately fought. He made
it monstrous and, in that far, untrue, as caricature is untrue, crying
aloud for explanation and analysis. Yet who could explain? Circumstances
of time and place rendered all protest impossible. Nothing could be done,
nothing said. Thus her beloved persons were exposed, judged, condemned
unheard, without opportunity of defence.

And realizing this, realizing redress hopelessly barred, she cowered
down, her head bowed, almost to the level of the marble couch whereon the
figures of knight and lady reposed in the high serenity of love and
death. Happier they than she, poor child, for her pride trailed in the
dust, her darling romance of brother and sister and all the rare pieties
of her heart, defiled by a shameful publicity, exposed for every Tom,
Dick and Harry to paw over and sneer at!

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