Beyond this place (2 page)

game between Ireland and England. Nothing surely could have been more gratifying to a mother's heart. Yet she had positively refused to allow him to accept. Why? Then, he could not guess. Now, dimly, he divined the reason. Indeed, considering the pattern of her existence, in its guarded quiet, its shrinking from all contacts, its secrecy, its passionate dependence upon the Almighty, he saw it, with a start of apprehension, as the life of one who has something to conceal.

On Saturday, which was her half holiday, she came in from her work at two o'clock. By this time he had made up his mind to have the matter out with her. The weather had turned to rain, and, after leaving her umbrella in the hall, she entered the living room where he sat turning the pages of a book. Her appearance really startled him: her face was quite grey. But she seemed composed.

"Have you had lunch, Son?"

"I had a sandwich at the Union. How about you?"

"Ella Fleming made me some hot cocoa."

He glanced at her quickly.

"You've been there again?"

She sat down wearily.

"Yes, Paul. I've been there again. Asking and praying for guidance."

There was a pause, then he straightened himself, tensely grasping; the arms of his chair.

"Mother, we can't go on like this. There's something wrong. Tell me, did you get that certificate this morning?"

"No, Son. I didn't. I didn't even write for it."

The blood rushed to his face.

"Why not?"

"Because I had it all the time. I lied to you. It's here now, in my bag."

The heat went out of his anger. He gazed at her, startled, as she tumbled in the satchel on her lap and brought out a folded blue-grey paper.

"All these years I've fought to keep it from you, Paul. At first, I thought I'd never do it, it was sore and difficult. Every step

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on the stairs, every voice in the street made me tremble tor you. Then, as the years went on, and you grew up, I fancied with the help or God I had won through. But it was not His will. I had feared the big things, but it was a little thing that did it, just that trifle of your teaching in the summer school. But maybe it had to come sooner or later. So the pastor says. I begged him to help me to put you off some way. But he says No. He says you are a man now, that you must know the truth."

Her agitation had increased with every word and despite her resolution to be calm she ended with a kind of moan. Her hand quivered as she held out the paper to him. In a daze he took it, looked at it, and saw immediately that the name there was not his name. Instead of Paul Burgess he read, Paul Mathry,

"This isn't right . . ." He broke off, gazing from the paper to her, a chord, deep in his memory, faintly touched by the name "Mathry," vibrating almost painfully like a plucked harp-string in a long-deserted room. "What does it mean?"

"When we came here I took my maiden name of Burgess. I am Mrs. Mathry, your father was Rees Mathry, you are Paul Mathry. But I wanted to forget that name." Her lips twitched. "I wanted you to be out of sight and sound of it forever."

"Why?"

There was a pause. Her eyes fell. Almost inaudibly she answered:

"To save you . . . from a horrible shame."

Conscious of the rapid beating of his heart and of a hollow sickness in his stomach, he waited, motionless, until she should continue. But this seemed beyond her. She threw him a despairing glance.

"Don't force me to go on, Son. Mr. Fleming promised me he'd tell you everything. Go to him. He expects you now."

He saw that it was torture for her to proceed, but he too was suffering and he could not spare her.

"Go on," he said palely. "It's your duty to tell me."

She began to weep, in choking sobs which convulsed her narrow shoulders. Never before had he seen her in tears. After a moment she took a quick, painful breath, as though gathering all her strength. Without looking at him she gasped:

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"Your father did not die on a trip to South America. He was trying to get there when the police arrested him."

Of all things that he had expected this was the last. His heart missed a beat, then bounded into his throat.

"For what?" he faltered.

"For murder."

There was a mortal stillness in the little room. Murder. The petrifying word echoed and re-echoed down the rolling convolutions of his brain. He felt limp. A cold perspiration broke all over his body. His question came in a trembling whisper.

"Then ... he was hanged."

She shook her head, her pupils filmed with hatred.

"Better for us if he had been. He was sentenced to death . . . reprieved at the last minute ... he is a life convict in Stone-heath Prison."

It was too much for her. Her head drooped sideways, she swayed and fell forward in her chair.

CHAPTER III

PASTOR Fleming's house stood in the busy heart of Belfast near the Northern Station — an ugly, narrow dwelling painted slate-grey, like the chapel, which it adjoined. Although he felt physically exhausted, fit only to hide in some dark corner, a gnawing urgency had driven Paul to trudge through the wet streets, flaring with lights and rowdy with Saturday-night revellers, to see the minister. His mother, recovered from her fainting attack, had retired to bed. He could not rest until he knew more; until he knew everything.

In answer to his knock the hall light was turned up and Ella Fleming admitted him.

"It's you, Paul. Come along in."

She showed him to the parlour, a low-ceilinged room, with dark

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red curtains and horsehair furnishings, warmed by a small coal fire.

"Father is busy with a parishioner. He won't be long." She forced a small, suitable smile. "It's turned damp outside. I'll make you some cocoa."

Ella's panacea lor most ills was a cup of cocoa — a true parochial gesture — yet, though he had no wish for the innocuous beverage, he was too spent to refuse. Was it his imagination which saw in her too inconsequential manner, her slightly tightened lips, an awareness of his predicament? He sat down in a deadened fashion, while she brought a tray from the kitchen, stirred the sugar in with the cocoa and poured the hot water.

She was two years older than he, yet with her trim narrow-waisted figure and pale complexion, she had a somewhat girlish air. Her eyes, of a greyish green, were large and expressive — her best feature. Usually they were shining and soulful, but on occasion they could fill with tears, and spark with temper too. Always attentive to her appearance, she wore tonight a neat dark accordion-pleated skirt, black stockings, and a loose, white, freshly laundered blouse, cut round at the neck.

He accepted and drank the cocoa in silence. Once or twice she lifted her eyes and looked at him questioningly over the knitting; she had taken up. She was naturally talkative, with a flow of bright conversation, and keeping house for her widowed father had given her a certain social assurance. But when he failed to respond to a few desultory remarks, her well-marked brows drew together, she seemed to resign herself to silence.

Presently there came the sound of voices in the passage followed by the click of the front door. Ella rose at once.

"I'll tell Father you're here."

She went out of the room and a moment later the minister, Emmanuel Fleming, appeared. He was a man of about fiftv, with thick shoulders and big clumsy hands. He wore dark trousers, heavy workman's boots and a black alpaca jacket turning whitish at the seams. His beard, clipped to a point, was iron grev, but his wide light blue eyes gave him the look of a child.

He immediately came forward, grasped Paul's hand with extra

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warmth, then with meaningful affection took him by the arm.

"You're here, my boy. I'm very glad. Come along and we'll have a little chat."

He led Paul to his study, a small austere room at the back of the house, uncarpeted, the bare boards stained, sparsely furnished with a yellow oak roll-top desk, some bent wood chairs, and a glazed bookcase. A presentation green marble clock, a hideous affair, supported by gilt angels, weighed down the flimsy mantelpiece, which was edged with a velvet ball fringe. Having seated his visitor, the pastor took his place slowly at the desk. He hesitated for some time, then began, in a tone of affection and sympathy.

"My dear boy, this has been a frightful shock to you. But the great thing to remember is that it is God's will. With His help you'll get over it."

Paul swallowed dryly.

"I can't get over it till I know something about it. I must know."

"It's a sad and sordid story, my boy." The minister answered gravely. "Had we not better leave it buried in the past?"

"No, I want to hear it. I must hear it or I'll never stop imagining ..." His voice broke.

There was a silence. Pastor Fleming rested his elbow on the desk, shading his eyes with his big hand, as though engaged in inward prayer for help. He was an earnest and well-meaning man who had laboured long and unsparingly "in the vineyard of the Lord." But he was limited in many ways and often, with great despondency, saw his best efforts and intentions go astray. He was a lonely soul and knew many moods of self-reproach. Even his love for his daughter became an accusation to him — for he realized her imperfections, her pettiness, her vanities, yet was too fond of her to correct them. It was his tragedy that he longed to be a saint, a true disciple who would heal by his touch, make his flock radiant with the word of God, which he himself felt so deeply. He wanted to soar. But alas, his tongue was clumsy, his feet were bogged — he was earth-bound. Now, when he began to speak, his tone was troubled, his grave, pedantic phrases seemed measured by the sombre beat of the clock.

"Twenty-two years ago, in Tynecastle, I married Rees Mathry

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to Hannah Burgess. Hannah I had known for some years, she was one of the dearest of my flock. Rees I did not know, but he was a well-mannered, engaging young man, of Welsh extraction, and I liked and trusted him. He had an excellent position as the Northern counties' representative for a big wholesale firm of confectioners. I had every reason to believe them happy, especially when a son was born to them. It was I, dear boy, who christened you Paul Mathry."

He paused, as though weighing his words with the utmost care.

"I will not deny that there were occasional slight rifts in the harmony of the home. Your mother was strictly religious — a true Christian — your father, to put it charitably, held more liberal views and this naturally produced a clash. Your mother, for instance, was firmly set against the use of wine and tobacco in the house — a prejudice your father could never fully understand. Again, your father's work took him away from home for at least one week every month, which had, perhaps, an unsettling influence upon him. Also he made friends, many friends I may say — for he was a handsome, likeable fellow — of whom one could not always approve and who consorted with him in pool rooms, saloon bars, and other unsavory haunts. Still, 1 had nothing serious against him until the terrible events of the year 1921."

He sighed and, removing his hand from his brow, pressed his thick fingertips together, his eyes pained and remote, as though they looked back sadly across the years.

"In January of '21 the firm which employed your father made some staff changes, in consequence of which your parents moved with you to the Midlands. For that matter, a few months previously, I myself had been transferred to this parish in Belfast, but I still kept closely in touch with your mother by correspondence. And I must confess that your life in Wortley was, from the first, unsettled. Your father seems to have resented his removal to a district which appeared to offer him less scope. Wortley. although surrounded by a pleasant countryside, is a grey unprepossessing city and your mother never liked it. They could not find a suitable house and occupied a succession of furnished rooms. Suddenly, in September, to be precise, on the ninth of that month,

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your father announced that he had reached the end of his patience. He proposed to throw up his job and emigrate straight away to the Argentine — there would be a better chance for all of you in the new world. He booked three passages on the liner Eastern Star due to sail on the fifteenth of September. On the thirteenth he sent you and your mother to Liverpool in advance, to await him at the Great Central Hotel. Late on the night of the fourteenth he left Wortley by train to join you. But he did not join you. At two in the morning, when he reached the Central Station the police were on that platform. After a violent struggle, he was arrested and lodged in Canon Street Jail. Dear God, I can still remember the stunning shock of it — the charge was wilful murder."

There was a long, tense pause. Paul, hunched in his chair, like a hypnotised figure, scarcely breathed until the minister resumed.

"On the night of September eighth, a particularly horrible and sordid crime had been perpetrated. Mona Spurling, an attractive young woman of twenty-six, employed in a florist's shop in the vicinity of Leonard Square, was brutally done to death in the flat which she occupied at 52 Ushaw Terrace in Eldon, a near suburb of Wortley. The time of the crime was quite definite, for it occurred between eight o'clock and ten minutes past that hour. Returning from her work at seven-thirty, Miss Spurling had apparently partaken of a light meal, and had then changed into the flimsy negligee in which she was found. At eight o'clock a couple named Prusty in the flat below heard sounds of unusual violence coming through their ceiling, and urged by his wife, Albert Prusty went up to investigate. He knocked loudly on the door of the flat above but received no answer. He was standing on the landing in some perplexity when a young vanman named Edward Collins came up the stairway to deliver a package of laundry. Just as Collins joined him the door opened, a man came from the Spurling apartment, brushed past them, and dashed down the stairs. They hastened into the sitting room, where they found Miss Spurling, her head almost severed from her body, stretched on the hearthrug in a pool of her own blood.