The Keys of the Kingdom (2 page)

‘Impossible!’

‘On Whitsunday you told your congregation “Don’t think heaven is in the sky … it’s in the hollow of your hand … it’s everywhere and anywhere.”’ Sleeth frowned censoriously as he turned the pages. ‘And again … here is an incredible remark you made during Holy Week. “Atheists may not all go to hell. I knew one who didn’t. Hell is only for those who spit in the face of God!” And, good gracious, this atrocity: “ Christ was a perfect man, but Confucius had a better sense of humour!”’ Another page was turned indignantly. ‘And this incredible incident … when one of your best parishioners, Mrs Glendenning, who cannot of course help her extreme stoutness, came to you for spiritual guidance you looked at her and replied, “ Eat less. The gates of Paradise are narrow.” But why should I continue?’ Decisively, Monsignor Sleeth closed the gilt-edged book. ‘To say the least, you seem to have lost your command of souls.’

‘But …’ Calmly: ‘I don’t want to command anyone’s soul.’

Sleeth’s colour heightened disagreeably. He did not see himself in theological discussion with this shambling dotard.

‘There remains the matter of this boy whom you have so misguidedly adopted.’

‘Who is to look after him – if I don’t?’

‘Our own Sisters at Ralstone. It is the finest orphanage in the diocese.’

Again Father Chisholm raised his disconcerting eyes. ‘Would you have wished to spend your own childhood at that orphanage?’

‘Need we be personal, Father? I’ve told you … even conceding the circumstances … the situation is highly irregular and must be ended. Besides …’ He threw out his hands. ‘If you are going away – we must find some place for him.’

‘You seem determined to be rid of us. Am I to be entrusted to the Sisters too?’

‘Of course not. You can go to the Aged Priests’ Home at Clinton. It is a perfect haven of rest.’

The old man actually laughed – a dry short laugh. ‘I’ll have enough perfect rest when I’m dead. While I’m alive I don’t want to be mixed up with a lot of aged priests. You may think it strange – but I never have been able to stand the clergy in bulk.’

Sleeth’s smile was pained and flustered. ‘I think nothing strange from you, Father. Forgive me, but to say the least of it … your reputation, even before you went to China … your whole life has been peculiar!’

There was a pause. Father Chisholm said in a quiet voice: ‘ I shall render an account of my life to God.’

The younger man dropped his eyelids with an unhappy sense of indiscretion. He had gone too far. Though his nature was cold he strove always to be just, even considerate. He had the grace to look uncomfortable. ‘Naturally I don’t presume to be your judge – or your inquisitor. Nothing is decided yet. That is why I am here. We must see what the next few days bring forth.’ He stepped towards the door. ‘I am going to the church now. Please don’t trouble. I know my way,’ His mouth creased into an unwilling smile. He went out.

Father Chisholm remained seated, motionless, at the table, his hand shading his eyes, as though thinking deeply. He felt crushed by this threat which had gathered, so suddenly, above the quiet of his hard-won retreat. His sense of resignation, long overtaxed, refused acceptance of it. All at once he felt empty and used-up, unwanted by God or man. A burning desolation filled his breast. Such a little thing; and yet so much. He wanted to cry out: My God my God why hast thou forsaken me? He rose heavily, and went upstairs.

In his attic above the spare room the boy Andrew was already in bed and asleep. He lay upon his side, one skinny arm crooked before him on the pillow, defensively. Watching him, Father Chisholm took the pear from his pocket and placed it on the clothes folded upon the cane-bottomed chair beside the bed. There seemed nothing more for him to do.

A faint breeze swayed the muslin curtains. He moved to the window and parted them. Stars were quivering in the frosty sky. Under these stars the span of his years reached out in all its ineptitude, built of his puny strivings, without form or nobility. It seemed such a short time since he had been a boy himself, running and laughing in this same town of Tweedside. His thoughts flew back. If there were any pattern in his life at all the first fateful stroke was surely drawn on that April Saturday sixty years ago when, out of untroubled happiness, so deep it passed unrecognized …

That spring morning, at early breakfast in the snug dark kitchen, with the fire warm to his stockinged feet and the smell of kindling wood and hot oat-cakes making him hungry, he was happy, despite the rain, because it was Sunday and the tide was right for salmon.

His mother finished her brisk stirring with the wooden spurtle, and placed the blue-ringed bowl of pease brose on the scrubbed table between his father and himself. He reached for his horn spoon, dipped in the bowl, then in the cup of buttermilk before him. He rolled his tongue over the smooth golden brose, made perfectly, without lumps or gritty unmixed meal.

His father, in worn blue jersey and darned fishing stockings, sat opposite, his big frame bowed, supping in silence, with quiet slow movements of his red hands. His mother shook the last batch of oat-cakes from the griddle, set them on their ends against the bowl, and sat down to her cup of tea. The yellow butter melted on the broken oat-cake which she took. There was silence and comradeship in the little kitchen, with the flames leaping across the bright fender and the pipe-clayed hearth. He was nine years of age and he was going to the bothy with his father.

There, he was known – he was Alex Chisholm’s laddie, accepted by the men in their woollen jerseys and leather hip-boots with a quiet nod or, better still, a friendly silence. He had a dark secret glow of pride as he went out with them, the big flat cobble sweeping wide round the butt, the rowlocks creaking, the seine skilfully payed out by his father in the stern. Back on the butt, their tackets rasping the wet stones, the men huddled themselves low against the wind, some squatting with a yellowed sailcloth across their shoulders; others sucking warmth from a blackened inch-long clay. He stood with his father, apart. Alex Chisholm was the head man, the watcher of Tweed Fisheries station No 3. Together, not speaking, cut by the wind, they stood watching, the far circle of corks dancing in the choppy back-lash where the river met the sea. Often the glare of sun upon the ripples made his head swim. But he would not, he could not blink. Missing even a single second might mean the missing of a dozen fish – so hard to come by, these days, that in distant Billingsgate they brought the Fisheries Company a good half-crown a pound. His father’s tall figure, the head sunk a little on the shoulders, the profile keen beneath the old peaked cap, a fine blood whipped into the high cheekbones, had the same still unswerving tensity. At times, mingled exquisitely in his consciousness with the smell of wrack, the distant strike of the Burgess Clock, the cawing of the Derham rocks, the sense of this unspeaking comradeship drew moisture to the boy’s already smarting eyes.

Suddenly his father shouted. Try as he might Francis could never win first sight of the dipping cork: not that tidal bobbing which sometimes caused him foolishly to start, but the slow downward tug which to long experience denoted the thrusting of a fish. At the quick high shout there was an instant clatter as the crew jumped to the windlass which hauled the net. Usage never staled that moment: though the men drew a poundage bonus on their catch, the thought of money did not stir them; this deep excitement sprang from far primeval roots. In came the net, slowly, dripping, flaked with kelp, the guide ropes squeaking on the wooden drum. A final heave, then, in the purse of the billowing seine, a molten flash, powerful, exquisite – salmon.

One memorable Saturday they had taken forty at a cast. The great shining things arched and fought, bursting through the net, slithering back to the river from the slippery butt. Francis flung himself forward with the others, desperately clutching at the precious escaping fish. They had picked him up, sequined with scales and soaked to the bone, a perfect monster locked in his embrace. Going home that evening, his hand inside his father’s, their footfalls echoing in the smoky twilight, they had stoppped, without comment, at Burley’s in the High Street, to buy a pennyworth of cockles, the peppermint ones that were his special choice.

Their fellowship went further still. On Sundays, after mass, they took their rods and slipped secretly – lest they shock finer sensibilities – through the back ways of the Sabbath-stricken town, out into the verdant valley of the Whitadder. In his tin, packed with sawdust, were luscious maggots, picked the night before from Mealey’s boneyard. Thereafter the day was heady with the sound of the stream, the scent of meadowsweet, – his father showing him the likely eddies, – the crimson-speckled trout wriggling on bleached shingle – his father bent over a twig fire, – the crisp sweet goodness of the frizzled fish …

At other seasons they would go to gather blueberries, wood strawberries, or the wild yellow rasps which made good jam. It was a gala day when his mother accompanied them. His father knew all the best places and would take them deep into devious woods, to untouched cane-breaks of the juicy fruit.

When snow came and the ground was clamped by winter, they stalked between the frozen trees of Derham ‘policies’, his breath a rime before him, his skin pricking for the keeper’s whistle. He could hear his own heart beating as they cleared their snares, under the windows almost, of the great house itself – then home, home with the heavy gamebag, his eyes smiling, his marrow melting to the thought of rabbit pie. His mother was a grand cook, a woman who earned – with her thrift, her knack of management and homely skill – the grudging panegyric of a Scots community: ‘Elizabeth Chisholm is a well-doing woman!’

Now, as he finished his brose, he became conscious that she was speaking, with a look across the breakfast table towards his father.

‘You’ll mind to be home early tonight, Alex, for the Burgess.’

There was a pause. He could see that his father, preoccupied, – perhaps by the flooded river and the indifferent salmon season, – was caught unawares, recalled to the annual formality of the Burgess Concert which they must sustain that evening.

‘You’re set on going, woman?’ With a faint smile.

She flushed slightly; Francis wondered why she should seem so queer. ‘It’s one of the few things I look forward to in the year. After all you are a Burgess of the town. It’s … it’s right for you to take your seat on the platform with your family and your friends.’

His smile deepened, setting lines of kindness about his eyes – it was a smile Francis would have died to win. ‘Then it looks like we maun gang, Lisbeth.’ He had always disliked ‘ the Burgess’ as he disliked teacups, stiff collars, and his squeaky Sunday boots. But he did not dislike this woman who wanted him to go.

‘I’m relying on you. Alex. You see,’ her voice, striving to be casual, sounded an odd note of relief, ‘I have asked Polly and Nora up from Tynecastle – unfortunately it seems Ned cannot get away.’ She paused. ‘You’ll have to send someone else to Ettal with the tallies.’

He straightened with a quick look which seemed to see through her, right to the bottom of her tender subterfuge. At first, in his delight, Francis noticed nothing. His father’s sister, now dead, had married Ned Bannon, proprietor of the Union Tavern in Tynecastle, a bustling city some sixty miles due South. Polly, Ned’s sister and Nora, his ten-year-old orphan niece, were not exactly close relations. Yet their visits could always be counted occasions of joy.

Suddenly he heard his father say in a quiet voice: ‘I’ll have to go to Ettal all the same.’

A sharp and throbbing silence. Francis saw that his mother had turned white.

‘It isn’t as if you had to … Sam Mirlees, any of the men, would be glad to row up for you.’

He did not answer, still gazing at her quietly, touched on his pride, his proud exclusiveness of race. Her agitation increased. She dropped all pretence of concealment, bent forward, placed nervous fingers upon his sleeve.

‘To please me, Alex. You know what happened last time. Things are bad again there – awful bad, I hear.’

He put his big hand over hers, warmly, reassuringly.

‘You wouldn’t have me run away, would you, woman?’ He smiled and rose abruptly. ‘I’ll go early and be back early … in plenty time for you, our daft friends, and your precious concert to the bargain.’

Defeated, that strained look fixed upon her face, she watched him pull on his hip-boots. Francis, chilled and downcast, had a dreadful premonition of what must come. And indeed, when his father straightened it was towards him he turned, mildly, and with rare compunction.

‘Come to think of it, boy, you’d better bide home today. Your mother could do with you about the house. There’ll be plenty to see to before our visitors arrive.’

Blind with disappointment, Francis made no protest. He felt his mother’s arm tensely, detainingly about his shoulders.

His father stood a moment at the door, with that deep contained affection in his eyes, then he silently went out.

Though the rain ceased at noon the hours dragged dismally for Francis. While pretending not to see his mother’s worried frown, he was racked by the full awareness of their situation. Here in this quiet burgh they were known for what they were – unmolested, even warily esteemed. But in Ettal, the market town four miles away where, at the Fisheries Head Office, his father, every month, was obliged to check the record of the catches, a different attitude prevailed. A hundred years before the Ettal moors had blossomed with the blood of Covenanters; and now the pendulum of oppression had relentlessly swung back. Under the leadership of the new Provost a furious religious persecution had recently arisen. Conventicles were formed, mass gatherings held in the Square, popular feelings whipped to frenzy. When the violence of the mob broke loose, the few Catholics in the town were hounded from their homes, while all others in the district received solemn warning not to show themselves upon the Ettal streets. His father’s calm disregard of this threat had singled him for special execration. Last month there had been a fight in which the sturdy salmon-watcher had given good account of himself. Now, despite renewed menaces, and the careful plan to stay him, he was going again … Francis flinched at his own thoughts and his small fists clenched violently. Why could not people let each other be? His father and his mother had not the same belief; yet they lived together, respecting each other, in perfect peace. His father was a good man, the best in the world … why should they want to do him harm? Like a blade thrust into the warmth of his life came a dread, a shrinking from that word ‘religion’, a chill bewilderment that men could hate each other for worshipping the same God with different words.