Short Stories 1927-1956 (61 page)

What
she
was thinking of, or rather, not
thinking
of, Hilbert hadn't the faintest notion. And yet, such is the inflammability of the imagination, but one single glance into this fair serious face had sufficed him for the vernal stirrings of a latter-day
Paradiso
(and that in
terza
rima
)
to which even the long and hairy ear of Fleet Street would be compelled to incline. But now, alas! as he had forlornly foreseen, since the train had stopped, the voice had stopped, and so had his own semi-conscious ‘cerebration'.

‘Well, Miss Mute, and what do
you
say?' The young curate had bawled his second mocking challenge at his Griselda-like sister as if it were a bone to a dog. And she, as if to be serious was a refuge for everything worth having in a world so noisy and exclamatory and absurd, turned not to her brother, but to Hilbert. She sat there, quite still, for a full moment, one hand resting lightly on either side of her lap, and then, smiled. A volley of the quasi-archest and hollowest ecclesiastical laughter followed.

‘Oh,
she
!
–
she never says anything!' the young man had assured his fellow-traveller, and – with a breezy ‘Good day to you!' – he was gone.

Left alone for the fourth time since, hot and panting, he had galloped up into Bovey Fausset station, Hilbert drew his brown bag a little closer. It
contained
at this moment, apart from his Wilcox and his other shocker, that one forlorn copy of his
Par
ley
ings.
And this now would never, never, never
leave his possession. He might perhaps get another copy exquisitely bound in green tooled lambskin, its margins edged with a tiny design of doves and daisies, just in the remote hope that destiny would give him one more chance. But that copy would have nothing whatever to do with his bet, which by a niggardly twenty-five per cent had now, it seemed, been
irretrievably
lost.

For now not only was his time up, but, since he had to be honest with himself, if only for his old Jesuit's sake, the
terms
and conditions of his wager had been poetry ‘
audibly
proved'. And she – she had said nothing, not a word. And of course, strictly speaking, Thomas Gray's ‘mute … Milton' was a contradiction in terms. Hilbert could quite easily have
explained
all this to her – if only she had been there to explain it to!
Meanwhile
he had realized also that there is a goddess whose name is Silence, and that it is in her light and loveliness that the buds of Sharon break into bloom.

‘You see,' he was patiently explaining to himself, as he pulled the bell in the old eighteenth-century porch of his mother's house, for he had forgotten his latch-key, ‘you see what is
called
poetry is merely a trying to put into words what can, of course, never, never be really
said.'

A tiny barking like the remote jangling of Chinese temple bells had greeted him from afar; and a voice no less silvery had thereupon
expostulated
: ‘Silence, Pym! You naughty, foolish Pym, don't you know who
that
is! And now go and tell the poet that he is exactly forty minutes late for tea, bad boy!' But Hilbert was too deep in thought to have heeded this familiar greeting. He had gently closed the door. ‘Never,' he added
sotto
voce,
as he hung up his hat.
‘Never,
I am afraid.'

The Trumpet

The Trumpet
*

The minute church, obscurely lit by a full moon that had not yet found window-glass through which her direct beams could pierce into its
gloaming
, was deserted and silent. Not a sound, within or without, disturbed its stony quiet – except only the insect-like rapid ticking of a clock in the vestry,
and the low pulsating thump of a revolving cogwheel in the tower above the roof. Here and there a polished stone gleamed coldly in the vague
luminous
haze – a marble head, a wing-tip, a pointing finger, the claws and beak of the eagle on the brazen lectern, the two silvergilt candlesticks flanking the colourless waxen flowers upon the altar. So secret and secluded seemed the church within its nocturnal walls that living creature might never have been here at all – or creatures only so insignificant and transitory as to have left no perceptible trace behind them.

Like a cataleptic’s countenance it hinted moreover at no inward activity of its own. And yet, if – fantastic notion – some unseen watcher through the bygone centuries had kept it perpetually within gaze, he might at last have concluded that it possessed a
sort
of stagnant life or animation, at least in its passive obedience to the influences of time, change, decay, and the laws of gravitation. Now it revealed not the faintest symptom of it. If, on the other hand, any immaterial sentinel were still, as ever, on guard within it, he made no sign of his presence here.

Unhasteningly, like water dripping from a fateful urn, the thump-recorded moments ebbed away; and it was approaching midnight and first cockcrow when from beyond the thick stone chancel walls there came the sound of a stealthy footfall, crunching the rain-soaked gravel. An owl squawked, the footsteps ceased; and after a brief pause, began again. The groping rattle of a key in the wards of a lock followed, and presently – with a motion so slow that it was barely perceptible – the heavy curtain that hung over the entrance to the vestry began as if with an extreme caution to be drawn aside; and the slender cone-shaped rays from the thick glass of a small bull’s-eye lantern – its radiance thinning into the dusk of the moonlight as it expanded in area – to funnel inquisitively to and fro.

The lantern-bearer himself now appeared – a small boy. His thick fair hair was tousled over a pale forehead, his mouth was ajar and his lips were drawn back a little above his teeth, his eyes gleamed as they moved. The collar of his dark great-coat had been turned up about his ears, but
nevertheless
disclosed in the crevice between its lapels the stripes of his pyjama’s jacket which had been tucked into a pair of old flannel breeches. Stockinged ankles and damp mud-stained rubber shoes showed beneath the great-coat. His cheeks at this moment were so pale as scarcely to be tinged with red, and since the pupils of his blue eyes were dilated to their full extent they appeared to be all but jet-black. He was shivering, in part by reason of the cold, in part because of certain inward qualms and forebodings. Only by an effort was he preventing his teeth from beginning to chatter. Still acutely cautious and intent, his head thrust forward, his eyes searching the darker recesses of the building around him as they followed the direction of his tiny searchlight, he stole a pace or two forward, the border of the heavy curtain
furtively swinging-to behind him. In spite of the door-key safe in his pocket, he appeared to be divided in mind between hope and dread that he might prove to be not the sole occupant of the church.

Where there is space enough for the human cranium to pass, the shoulders, it is said, can follow; and particularly if they all three belong to a child. One small diamond-paned window in the vestry he had already
observed
was open. Images, too, less substantial in appearance than those of human beings were occupying his mind’s eye. When then a little owl in the dark of the yew tree over the south gate in the moonlit churchyard again suddenly screeched, he started as if at an electric shock. And twice his mouth opened before he managed to call low and hoarsely, ‘Are you there, Dick? … Dick, are you there?’

Not a stony eyelid in the heads around him had so much as flickered at this timid challenge. The stooping eagle – a large shut Bible on its
outstretched
wings – had stirred not a feather; the pulpit remained cavernously empty. But a few high-panelled pews, relics of the past, were within view, and even moonlight and lantern-light combined were powerless to reveal anything or anybody that might be hiding behind them. The trespasser appeared to be on the point of retiring as secretly as he had come, when a jangling gurgle, as of some monster muttering in its sleep, began to sound above his head, and the clock chimes rang out the second quarter of the hour. The vibrant metal ceased to hum; and, as if reassured by this
interruption
, he drew out of his pocket a large stone – a flint such as his
remote
ancestors would have coveted – roughly dumb-bell in shape, and now waisted with a thick and knotted length of old blindcord. This primitive weapon, long treasured for any emergency, he gently deposited on the shelf behind him, and then followed it into the pew.

Lantern still in hand, he seated himself on the flat faded red cushion that lay along the seat. It was that of one of the mighty, the rector’s warden. Even in this half-light, as easily as a cat in the dark, he could spy out all about him now, organ-recess to gallery; but he opened his brand-new lantern nonetheless and trimmed as best he could with his finger nail its charred and oily wick. The fume and stench of the hot metal made him sneeze,
whereupon
he clicked-to the glass, covered it with his hand, and began listening again. ‘Sneak,’ he muttered, then suddenly plumped down on the hassock at his feet, rapidly repeated a prayer, with a glance over his shoulder
half-covertly
crossed himself, then as promptly sat up again; glancing as he did so at the pulpit over his head which he was accustomed to find comfortably brimmed with his father’s portly presence.

Fortified by his prayer and by his wrath with the friend who it seemed at the last moment had abandoned their enterprise, he was now comparatively at ease. Tortoise-fashion he snuggled down in his great-coat in the corner
of the pew, having discovered that by craning his neck a little he could fix his vacant eyes on the brilliant disc of the still-ascending moon.

She was the Hunter’s moon, and her beams had now begun to silver a clear-glassed square-headed window high up in the south wall of the
chancel
. He watched her intently, lost in astonishment that at this very moment she should be keeping tryst with him here. But before she had edged far enough above the sill to greet the gilded figure of an angel that surmounted an ornate tomb opposite her peephole, a faint thief-like shuffle from the direction of the vestry door caught his ear. He instantly dropped out of sight into the shelter of his pew. The shuffling ceased, the door creaked. He crouched low; a smile at once apprehensive and malicious creasing his
still-childish
face. He would give his friend Dick a taste of his own physic.

In the hush, an anguished
Oh,
oh,
oh,
oh!
–
like the wailing of a lost soul – fountained up from his lips into the dusk of the roof.
Oh,
oh,
oh!
Then silence – and silence. And still there came no response. The smile faded out of his face; he had begun to shiver again. He was positively certain that this must be the friend whom he was expecting. And yet – suppose it was not! He leapt up, flashing at the same instant his toy lantern full into the
glittering
eyes of a dwarfish and motionless shape which were fixed on him through the sockets of a pitch-black battered mask – a relic of the last Fifth of November.

He had realized what trick was being played on him almost before he had time to be afraid. Nevertheless, for a few moments, his mouth wide-open, he had failed to breathe; and stood shuddering with rage as well as terror. His friend Dick, however, having emerged from his lair in the folds of the curtain, was now plunging about half doubled-up and almost helpless with laughter.

‘You silly fool!’ he fumed at him in a whisper, ‘what did you want to do that for? Shut up! Shut
up,
I tell you! You think it’s funny, I suppose. Well, I don’t. You’re hours late already, and I’m going home. Stop it, do you hear? Can’t you remember you’re in a
church
?
’

From beneath its mask a small sharp-nosed and utterly sober face now showed itself – all laughter gone. ‘Who began it, then?’ Dick expostulated, dejectedly squeezing his pasteboard mask into his pocket. ‘You tried it first on me, with your Oh-oh-oh-ing. And now just because … You didn’t think of “church” then.’

‘Well, I do now. Besides, it’s near the time, and I might have broken my neck for all you cared, getting out of the window. What made you so late?’

Dick had been eyeing his friend as might a sorrowful mouse a slice of plum cake a few inches out of its reach. ‘I’m sorry, Philip,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean any harm; honest, I didn’t. It was only a lark.’ He turned penitently away, and the next instant, as if all troubles were over and all discord
pacified, began peeping about him with the movements and anglings of some little night-creature on unexpectedly finding itself in an utterly strange place.

‘I say, Philip,’ he whispered, ‘doesn’t it look creepy, just – the moon
shining
in? I had a dream, and then I woke. But I couldn’t have come before. My father was downstairs with a lamp, reading. Besides I was waiting for you
out
side, under the trees. Why did you come
in
? It’s by the gate you see them. That’s what my mother heard
your
mother say. Oh, I’m glad I came; aren’t you?’

The sentences were sprayed out in minute beads of words like the hasty cadenzas of a bird. The neat black head, the small bright eyes, the shallow wall of close-cropped hair, the sloping shoulders – every line, movement and quick darting variation of posture gave him a resemblance to a bird – including the alert, quick, shy yet fearless spirit within that neat skull’s brittle walls.

Philip, who had been intently watching him meanwhile, had now
recovered
his equanimity, his pulse had sobered down, but he was still only partially placated, and querulous.

‘Of course I came in. What was the good of loafing out there where
any
body
might see us? It’s cold and mouldy enough in here. You don’t seem to remember I mustn’t go out at night, because of my chest. I’ve been waiting until my feet are like stones. Did you hear that owl just now – or some thing?’

Dick having at last ventured in from the other end of the pew, had now seated himself beside his friend on the flat crimson cushion.

‘Golly!’ he exclaimed, his sharp eyes now fixed on the flint, ‘what’s that for? I shouldn’t care to have a crump over the head with that!’ He peered up winningly into his companion’s fair face. ‘I didn’t really expect you would come, Philip. But,’ he sighed, ‘I’m glad.’

‘Didn’t I
say
I would come?’ retorted Philip in a small condescending voice. ‘That’s nothing.’ He nodded at his stone. ‘I always carry that at night. How was I to know …?
Didn’t
I?’

The neat small head nodded violently. ‘M’m.’

‘Then why didn’t you expect me to?’

‘Oh, well, I didn’t.’ A thin ingratiating little smile passed over Dick’s face and as quickly vanished. ‘It wasn’t so easy for you as it was for me. That’s why.’

‘That stone,’ said Philip incisively, ‘keeps any harm from happening to me. It’s got magic in it.’

‘Has it, Philip? What did
that
?’
He was eyeing the patch of dried blood on the hand that clutched the bent wire handle of the lantern.

‘Oh, that?’ was the lofty reply. ‘That’s nothing; that was only the rope. It
burned like billy-ho, and I fell halfway from my bedroom window-sill on to the lawn. An awful crack. But nobody heard me, even though the other windows were wide open round the corner. You could see them against the sky. My mother always sleeps with her windows open – all the year round. A doctor in London told her it would be good for her. I don’t believe that about your father reading, though. When everybody is in bed and asleep! I didn’t even know your father
could
read.’

‘Well, he was, or I wouldn’t have said so. He was reading the Bible. How could I tell that if he wasn’t reading at all?’

‘Anyhow, I bet it wasn’t the Bible. Even my father wouldn’t do that – not after evening prayers. Would he whack you much if he caught you?’

Dick shook his head. ‘No fear. My mother won’t have
him
punishing me, whatever happens. He preaches at me no end; and says I’ll never be good for anything. Once,’ he added pensively, as if scarcely able to believe his own ears, ‘once he said I was a little imp of hell. Then my mother flared up. But he wouldn’t beat me; oh no, he wouldn’t beat me. Yesterday my mother came back with a big bundle of old clothes. There was a black silk jacket, and some stockings and hats and feathers and things, an
enormous
bundle. And this – look!’