Robert Keable

“ Manning smiled languidly. "Well, you don't guess, that's all. It's quite simple. Perhaps there is a god; perhaps He is all that is said about Him. Perhaps.... Only we are reasonable men and we have to go upon facts, and the facts are that there is no trace of Him."
"Unless very existence is a sign—the fact that things are," said Paul, catching at a straw.
"Oh, very well, have it if you will. But of what or of whom is existence a sign? I know it's sentimental twaddle to talk of the cruelty and so on of Nature, and I won't. But you know and I know there are laws, and what sort of laws? ”

“ Paul had come into King's Parade with his friends a new man. A light had fallen on his ways, and at first, as always, he had been blissfully ignorant of the bitter that lurks in all earth's sweets. He had been ignorant for about as long as it took him to walk to the post office. There, when Donaldson had said that there was no good his sending a telegram, he had seen real envy in the eyes of a friend, and when the clerk had read the flimsy paper without the flicker of an eyebrow, had realised that the world is mighty big and cares nothing. ”

“ Several thousand men and women had looked on truth in its beauty, stripped of the shams and conventionalities of orthodox religion, and the utter loveliness of it had gone straight to their hearts.
Of course, the applause had come, had grown, had begun as a breath of relief and had risen to a crescendo of tumult. People had invaded the box. The manager had gestured towards a sea of upturned faces, looking their way. Paul had gone behind, shaken hands with a sudden grateful eagerness with the men and women who had played in his success, and appeared for a moment before the curtain. ”

“ The elder man was a quiet, serious, thoughtful person who made no attempt whatever to destroy any of his young companion's beliefs, and really very little to instruct him. But Paul was inexorable. His inchoate eyes fastened on the other, he heard of auras and astral bodies and familiar spirits with an ever-deepening amazement. It was not that the things themselves made much of a contribution to his mind; he was not, perhaps, ready for them; but it was Childers himself, especially in contrast to Mr. Stuart, Leather, Henderson, Dick, who affected him profoundly. ”

“ Paul was coming daily to love more and more this kindly pleasant man, but he was beginning to see joints in his harness. The three of them would talk of an evening, for Paul could not do otherwise, and he would drag a somewhat unwilling Manning into it; but Tressor answered the younger man not at all. He clung to a refuge that was not yet, at any rate, storm-proof for Paul. Logic, said Tressor, failed at a point. The heart of man universally had need of God, and it would not crave if there was nothing to crave for. Tressor relied on intuition and instinct. ”

“ The stone effigy reeled insecurely against a broken pillar, and the glow of the dying sun caught on its upcast face. The girl had copied some Greek masterpiece, and there, in that lone waste, as if to mock the beaten human figure, a regular, perfect, immobile brow and eyes and nose and lips turned upwards to the sky. In the fallen man was life, beaten and despairing, but life; in the fallen god was death, serene and lovely, but death.
"This is not what I wrote," repeated Paul again. ”

“ Paul had always loved nature; he had always "been one" (as his mother would have said) for a country walk; and he had written verses to chestnut-trees in May and beech-trees in Autumn. Yet for all that, the beauty of the world had ever been a secondary thing—something you enjoyed because you were satisfied. But that morning he had come to it because he was not satisfied. And he lay now, almost immovable, introspective, peering at the tiny heather-bells, taking definite note of a fragment of moss, seeing with delight the veins of colour in the small stones. ”

“ It was rather like Chanctonbury all over again, he thought instantly, and smiled involuntarily at the thought. Here, in Egypt, in the whirl of new experience, her touch on his arm brought back the song of the lark and the vision of the English sun on the fields and woods round Steyning. And she knew it.
"You old dear," she said. "What about the beggar's clay? Is clay magical in plants and flowers, and sinful in human bodies?"
"But that sort of thing outrages the moral law," he objected, soberly.
She laughed a very little. "Has God spoken His laws so clearly, Paul?" she said. ”

“ He went up to town to meet Strether who had taken a couple of tickets for a matinée of Peter Pan, with which play his friend's curious personality was violently intrigued. The artist in Paul revelled in the fairy tale, and deep called to deep before the boy who would not grow up. But his passionate creed would not let him alone.
"It's all very well, Gus Strether," he said, arm in arm in Regent Street, "but do you think a girl ought to dress up like that in boy's clothes? And what good does it do? It's like sitting down to play a round game while the house is on fire!" ”

“ In and out of the shadows, while the music rose and fell, those white legs twinkled and danced. Now back, now out again. A twirl of short skirts, and in a cascade of white, one throws herself backward in a man's arms. Paul seemed to meet her eyes as she looked out across the footlights, with the powder and rouge on her cheeks and her bosom all but bared. Thunder of applause; smiles, bows, a hand-in-hand appearance in the naked light of the great hall; Donaldson half on his feet, staring; even Judson clapping vigorously.
Paul turned to Manning. "I'm going," he said thickly. "I must, Manning." ”

“ Meantime, why wouldn't God speak? Just a word, a flicker of a curtain.... It was all so still. Not even a wind. The silence listened, that was the awful thing; it listened for him to pray. And if he prayed—oh, if he prayed, he would break down like a baby, and surrender, and he would never really have known.
Then Paul knew he could not pray.
But he shut his eyes; he groped into the blackness; he pressed against the silence; he knew he was alone, all alone; he knew if he could have fled, he would have done so, but that he could not move. He must fight it out alone, endure alone ”

“ Even Donaldson got to bed somehow. Manning, like Paul, walked back under the stars, whistling gently to himself in the more empty stretches. The dancer who had looked at Paul across the footlights slept, and the girl who had asked for a drink. Yet dancing and drinking and praying never cease altogether, nor does the voiceless cry of the world ever cease to echo through the silences. ”

“ This serene Christmas night, he and Edith alone in it, the world wide and wonderful—oh, it was good to live.
The paved footpath became a gravelled walk, and the walk, a mere track. They were on the far edge of the town. Across the stubble, a line of not yet doomed elms stretched delicate bare twigs clear in the moonlight, and the stars swung emmeshed in their net. A half-built house flung a deep shadow across their path, and Paul stopped without warning on its verge. ”

“ He, Paul Kestern, called of God, destined for the ministry, even now at odds in his own inmost heart and with his best-beloved parents for the truth of Christ, had been drunk and had gone to a music hall. He was all superlatives and saw no door of escape for his soul. But to do him justice, it was not his own soul that he worried about. He scarcely thought of himself. He had indeed been thinking of himself most of the evening, but now he thought of his Master. "One is your Master, even Christ." ”

“ And when Manning did begin to speak, he was abrupt, and there was a hard note in his voice.
"Look here, Paul," he said, "the root of the matter is just this: God is a guess in the dark. You are driven back and back and back, as you say, till you can't go further, but then you begin to invent meaningless words to cover your inadequacy. You talk about infinite and eternal and almighty, words which are no more than scraps of mathematical logic. The mind knows that it's beaten, that for some odd reason it cannot travel back beyond certain bounds. ”

“ Paul told him.
He smoked thoughtfully. "Humph," he said at last, dubiously, "but I doubt if Ursula is as much an atheist as an agnostic. She probably put it that way because her god, whatever she thinks, has nothing worth mentioning in common with any idea of God in your mind."
Paul regarded him for a moment in troubled silence, weighing his words. Then he sighed. "It is utterly beyond me," he said. "How, in the face of things as they are, you or anyone can fail to believe in a Creator, an Inspirer, a Supporter, I do not see. ”

“ The gospel of the Beggar-Man banishes fear. He knows right values. He knows he cannot be robbed of anything that matters. He fears no man; all men are brothers; all are blind beggars with potential sight; he has nothing but pity for your aristocrat, your millionaire."
"'News from Nowhere'," chuckled Arnold.
"True—with the path blazoned to it," she exclaimed.
"It appears to be you and not Paul who is preaching anyway," put in Ursula, staring into the fire.
"He will live it, and he will sing it—and you will paint it," cried Muriel. ”

“ Does God hear? demanded Manning, and Paul had no answer but the echo of Job's old cry: "Oh that I knew where I might find Him!"
Small wonder that he could not write poetry. Poetry! There was no meaning in life if God were not—no reasonable end, no conceivable beginning, nothing worth while. Arnold might grub about with his science; Paul sought the spirit of things. And when he turned to Tressor, the don utterly failed him. ”

“ Near the woods, the sun caught the slim trunks of the silver birches in a spinney there, and their silver contrasted exquisitely with the stretch of dying bracken beyond. A lark cried the ecstasy of living in the untroubled spaces of light and air.
The road climbed steeply to the woods, and they walked to the summit, he pushing her machine. They hesitated at the leafy glade that invited to the undulating heathery expanse of Hursley, but the artist in Paul decided against the temptation. "No," he said, "don't let's go in there. Everyone goes there. ”

“ The boy on the chair announced that they would sing as a last hymn "God be with you till we meet again." The haunting lilt, the genuine poetry and life there is in it, overcame the crude composition, the tortured air which was the best the old harmonium could do, the vulgar surroundings, the banal words. At the third verse, Paul held up his hand. A little hush fell on the whole Court, which deepened as he spoke. Paul had not learnt the tricks that it was possible for him to play with his oratorical power, but it was a naturally clever thing that he did. ”

“ Arnold laughed. "Hear that, Ursula? Still, I suppose it's excusable. Personally I should have been drunk before this. You're really a marvel, Paul."
"What in the world are you talking about? Ursula, do explain."
Her eyes danced at him. "Oh, it's nothing," she said. "We're all of us too excited to talk sense. Paul, isn't it absolutely priceless?"
"I can't tell you what I feel," said Paul.
"Tressor shook hands with you, and said good-night and that he'd clear off, and you were to let him know when you were going down to Fordham," explained Arnold belatedly. ”

“ You can go no further. Nothing imaginable can have created it—nothing—nothing." And forgetting Tennyson, he pushed his arm through Paul's and led him out into the garden.
The sweet warm sun was releasing a thousand scents. Paul drew trailing fingers through a spiky host of lavender. Butterflies fluttered their apparently aimless dance over the beds, and bees, more obviously purposeful, dived into flowerets. Even the ancient flags on which they stood were cracked and broken by the impetuous thrust of tiny tendrils one could destroy with a pinch.
Arnold Manning took up his parable. ”

“ Paul sat down deliberately in such a position that he could see Edith. "Don't, Madeline," he said. "She's a thoroughly good sort really, and means well."
"Paul, you know perfectly well you used to laugh at her as much as any of us."
"Did I? Then I was wrong. I'm beginning to see that the world is full of queer sorts of people, and that the only real test is their sincerity."
"Well, then, some sincere people are impossible. You know they are. At any rate I'm sincere enough to tell you that I think so."
Ethel Cator came up to them. ”

“ Paul renewed the conversation that the kissing had interrupted. "You see, Edith, dear," he said, "it's so illogical to believe one thing and act another. What are the realities of life? God, and a lost world, and Christ our Saviour. What does anything matter beside them? Both Dick and I feel that everything—everything—ought to be surrendered to Him. Even things good in themselves must go down before the awful necessity of preaching the Gospel. ”

“ She lay quite still. Then she heaved a little sigh. She couldn't help it. For one thing, Paul was rather delicious in his collarless shirt and blazer, the pillar of his throat good to see. For another, there was utter charm about them: the soft-flowing river, the whisper of the water under the punt's stern, the tall trees that met high overhead and interlaced in their delicate beauty, the bright sunlight on the green fields and swifter flow yonder, without the brooky tunnel. ”

“ Thus, then, came Paul Kestern to his last night at Thurloe End. Judge ye, who may. This, at least, was the manner of it.
The Father had read aloud The Holy Grail, and Paul The Hound of Heaven. He had himself chosen it; he had no one to blame for that.
Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest (he read) ,
I am He Whom thou seekest;
Thou drivest Love from thee, Who drivest Me.
He shut the book. The little priest was nursing his knees against the tall fender, and the boy looked from him to the candlelight on the white of the uncanonised saint's hat on the mantelshelf. ”

“ And he had chosen well, for Edith Thornton understood.
"I don't see why evangelicalism should be all pitch-pine and Moody and Sankey," he grumbled. "I don't see why things good in themselves should be wrong simply because even Roman Catholics do them. I don't love our Lord less because I rather like to see chrysanthemums behind the Holy Table."
"Do you love Him more if they are there?" she asked.
"No, of course not. At least—no; I will say no. Not that, at all. But the beauty of things reflects Him somehow. It's easier to worship in an atmosphere of beauty, Edith. ”

“ In the afternoon, the five of them went to a tea garden on the Upper River. Paul refrained from asking any other men for two reasons: for one, there was no one up, unless it were Strether, who would mix with his father and Mr. Ernest; for the other it was rather a wonderful Madeline that he met on the station platform. He never guessed how perseveringly the visit and the garnishings had been schemed for, planned and prepared. He only knew that she wore an amazingly simple frock and a big hat from whose shade the regular beauty of her face looked out at him. ”