Bickley

“ Bickley does not believe although he worships. You only half believe and do not worship, because memory holds you back, and I myself do not understand. I only know though knowing so much, still I seek roads to learning, even the humble road called Bastin, that yet may lead my feet to the gate of an immortal city. ”

“ Then Bickley, who had been suppressing himself all this while, went off like a bomb.
“Do you tell us, Bastin,” he asked, “that you believe one word of all this ghastly rubbish? I mean as to that antique charlatan being a thousand years old and having caused the Flood and the rest?”
“If you ask me, Bickley, I see no particular reason to doubt it at present. A person who can go to sleep in a glass coffin kept warm by a pocketful of radium together with very accurate maps of the constellations at the time he wakes up, can, I imagine, do most things.”
“Even cause the Deluge,” jeered Bickley. ”

“ Even Tommy is better off, for at least he can bark and hunt rats.”
“You see,” said Bickley, “we are following our trades. Arbuthnot is a lawyer and acts as a judge. I am a surgeon and I may add a general—a very general—practitioner and work at medicine in an enormous and much-neglected practice. Therefore, you, being a clergyman, should go and do likewise. There are some ten thousand people here, but I do not observe that as yet you have converted a single one.”
Thus spoke Bickley in a light and unguarded moment with his usual object of what is known as “getting a rise” out of Bastin. ”

“ I even thought of passing him on to Bickley, but had no time. Indeed I could not attract his attention, for Bickley was staring with all his eyes at the nightmare-like spectacle which was in progress about us. Indeed no nightmare, no wild imagination of which the mind of man is capable, could rival the aspect of its stupendous facts.
Think of them! The unmeasured space of blackness threaded by those globes of ghastly incandescence that now hung a while and now shot upwards, downwards, across, apparently without origin or end, like a stream of meteors that had gone mad. ”

“ They pounded away at each other, Bickley frequently getting the best of it in the argument, and when at last Bastin rose to go, he generally made the same remark. It was:
“It really is sad, my dear Bickley, to find a man of your intellect so utterly wrongheaded and misguided. I have convicted you of error at least half a dozen times, and not to confess it is mere pigheadedness. Good night. I am sure that Sarah will be sitting up for me.” ”

“ You have naught to fear from us, and I believe that no harm will happen to you. But you will see many strange things that will anger Bickley because he cannot understand them, and perhaps will weary Bastin because his heart turns from what is wondrous and ancient. Only Humphrey will rejoice in them because the doors of his soul are open and he longs—what do you long for, Humphrey? ”

“ Bickley pricked up his ears at this statement and looked incredulous.
“You do not believe, O Bickley,” she said, studying him gravely. “Indeed, you believe nothing. You think my father and I tell you many lies. Bastin there, he believes all. Humphrey? He is not sure; he thinks to himself, I will wait and find out whether or no these funny people cheat me.”
Bickley coloured and made some remark about things which were contrary to experience, also that Tommy in a general way was rather a greedy little dog. ”

“ I want to go to the South Seas about which we were talking yesterday, to get the thorough change that Bickley has been advising for me, and I should be very grateful if you would both come as my guests. You, Bickley, make so much money out of cutting people about, that you can arrange your own affairs during your absence. But as for you, Bastin, I will see to the wherewithal for the locum tenens, and everything else. ”

“ Bastin deals with such things by that acceptance which is the privilege and hall-mark of faith; Bickley disposes, or used to dispose, of them by a blank denial which carries no conviction, and least of all to himself.
What is life to most of us who, like Bickley, think ourselves learned? A round, short but still with time and to spare wherein to be dull and lonesome; a fateful treadmill to which we were condemned we know not how, but apparently through the casual passions of those who went before us and are now forgotten, causing us, as the Bible says, to be born in sin ”

“ So Oro was an astronomer as well as a king and a god. I had guessed as much from those plates in the coffin which seemed to have stars engraved on them.
At this point our conversation came to an end, for the Ancient himself approached, leaning on the arm of Bickley who was engaged in an animated argument with Bastin.
“For Heaven’s sake!” said Bickley, “keep your theology to yourself at present. If you upset the old fellow and put him in a temper he may die.”
“If a man tells me that he is a god it is my duty to tell him that he is a liar,” replied Bastin obstinately. ”

“ If you and I chanced to have dreamed the same thing, it was only because my dream travelled to you. It is most common, or used to be. Humphrey, Bickley is quite right, I am not altogether as your women are, and I can bring no happiness to any man, or at the least, to one who cannot wait. Therefore, perhaps you would do well to think less of me, as I have counselled Bastin and Bickley. ”

“ If so, it must have given you lots to explain for quite a long while.”
“Jugglery never appealed to me, whether in London or in Orofena,” replied Bickley in a sour voice as he extracted from his pocket an end of candle to which he set light.
“What is jugglery?” asked Bastin, and they departed arguing, leaving me alone with Yva in the sepulchre.
“What have I seen?” I asked her.
“I do not know, Humphrey. Everyone sees different things, but perhaps something of the truth.”
“I hope not, Yva, for amongst other things I seemed to see you swear yourself to a man for ever.” ”

“ The two Betseys were out in the Bickley garden gathering drenched roses for the want of something better to do. All of a sudden from the sleepy road there came the [44] clatter of wheels and the clink of a slow nag's feet. Then into view loomed a comfortable chaise of the style afterwards known as the "Postmaster-General." The pair nearly dropped their budholders in the momentary excitement. Rising from her seat and waving a kerchief was a girl. The face they knew well.
"Sarah Franklin, I do believe," called Betsey Bickley. "Yes, yes; 'tis her father with the reins." ”

“ When I woke up again it was to find the Lady Yva seated at my side watching me.
“Forgive me, Humphrey, because I here; others gone out walking,” she said slowly in English.
“Who taught you my language?” I asked, astonished.
“Bastin and Bickley, while you ill, they teach; they teach me much. Man just same now as he was hundred thousand years ago,” she added enigmatically. “All think one woman beautiful when no other woman there.”
“Indeed,” I replied, wondering to what proceedings on the part of Bastin and Bickley she alluded. ”

“ I interrupted, “is it possible to imagine old Basil deceiving anyone?”
“Why not,” snorted Bickley, “seeing that he deceives himself from one year’s end to the other?”
“I think,” said Bastin, “that this is an unholy business and that we are both deceived by the devil. I will have no more to do with it,” and he departed to his cabin, probably to say some appropriate prayers.
After this the seances were given up but Jacobsen produced an instrument called a planchette and with difficulty persuaded Bickley to try it, which he did after many precautions. ”

“ When he heard this saying I saw Oro start as though struck by a new thought and look at Bastin with a curious intentness.
“Who are the heathen?” Yva asked again after a pause, for she also seemed to be impressed.
“All who do not agree with Bastin’s spiritual views,” answered Bickley.
“Those who, whether from lack of instruction or from hardness of heart, do not follow the true faith. For instance, I suppose that your father and you are heathen,” replied Bastin stoutly. ”

“ My other friend, Bickley, was a person of a quite different character. Like Bastin, he was learned, but his tendencies faced another way. If Bastin’s omnivorous throat could swallow a camel, especially a theological camel, Bickley’s would strain at the smallest gnat, especially a theological gnat. The very best and most upright of men, yet he believed in nothing that he could not taste, see or handle. He was convinced, for instance, that man is a brute-descended accident and no more, that what we call the soul or the mind is produced by a certain action of the grey matter of the brain ”

“ Bickley and I intimated that we would, though to tell the truth, if less frank we were quite as alarmed as Bastin.
“No, I’ll come too. I suppose one may as well die this way as any other, and if anything were to happen to them and I were left alone, it would be worse still.”
“Then be prepared,” said Yva, “for presently this air-chariot of ours will return. When it appears and hangs upon the edge, step on to it and throw yourselves upon your faces and all will be well. ”

“ They would have turned the stomachs of a gathering of early Christians, who appear to have been the worst mannered people in the world, and at any decent heathen feast your neck would have been wrung as that of a bird of ill omen.”
“Why?” asked Bastin blankly. “I only said what I thought to be the truth. The truth is better than what you call good taste.”
“Then I will say what I think also to be the truth,” replied Bickley, growing furious. “It is that you use your Christianity as a cloak for bad manners. It teaches consideration and sympathy for others of which you seem to have none. ”

“ Bickley picked it up and opened it at a photograph of a very pretty South Sea Island girl clad in a few flowers and nothing else, which he held towards Bastin, saying:
“Is it to this child of Nature that you object? I call her distinctly attractive, though perhaps she does wear her hibiscus blooms with a difference to our women—a little lower down.”
“The devil is always attractive,” replied Bastin gloomily. “Child of Nature indeed! I call her Child of Sin. That photograph is enough to make my poor Sarah turn in her grave.” ”

“ At least now you will no longer deny my power.”
“I am not so sure,” answered Bickley, “since it seems that there is a greater Power, namely that of a woman’s love and sacrifice.”
“And a greater still,” interrupted Bastin, “Which put those ideas into her head.”
“As for you, Humphrey,” went on Oro, “I rejoice to think that you at least have lost two things that man desires above all other things—the woman you sought and the future kingship of the world.” ”

“ There ought to be a shaft, but we seem to be standing on a level floor.”
“The odd thing is,” said Bickley, “that we can see at all. Where the devil does the light come from thousands of feet underground?”
“I don’t know,” answered Bastin, “unless there is natural gas here, as I am told there is at a town called Medicine Hat in Canada.”
“Natural gas be blowed,” said Bickley. “It is more like moonlight magnified ten times.” ”

“ Bastin would answer that their souls were more important than their bodies, to which Bickley replied that as there was no such thing as a soul except in the stupid imagination of priests, he differed entirely on the point. ”

“ We should have liked to walk but refrained from doing so for fear lest we might dirty our clean clothes. So we just sat and thought. At least Bickley thought, and so did I for a while until I gave it up. What was the use of thinking, seeing that we were face to face with circumstances which baffled reason and beggared all recorded human experience? What Bastin did I am sure I do not know, but I think from the expression of his countenance that he was engaged in composing sermons for the benefit of Oro and the Glittering Lady. ”

“ I don’t know about the Deluge, but perhaps he may have been permitted to cause a deluge. Why not? You can’t look at things from far enough off, Bickley. And if something seems big to you, you conclude that therefore it is impossible. The same Power which gives you skill to succeed in an operation, that hitherto was held impracticable, as I know you have done once or twice, may have given that old fellow power to cause a deluge. ”

“ By the time that we got back to camp it was drawing towards evening, so we cooked our food and ate, and then, thoroughly exhausted, made ourselves as comfortable as we could and went to sleep. Even our marvelous experiences could not keep Bickley and myself from sleeping, and on Bastin such things had no effect. He accepted them and that was all, much more readily than we did, indeed. Triple-armed as he was in the mail of a child-like faith, he snapped his fingers at evil spirits which he supposed the Sleepers to be, and at everything else that other men might dread. ”

“ Shortly after our return Bickley, like a patriotic Englishman, volunteered for service at the front and departed in the uniform of the R.A.M.C. Before he left he took the opportunity of explaining to Bastin how much better it was in such a national emergency as existed, to belong to a profession in which a man could do something to help the bodies of his countrymen that had been broken in the common cause, than to one like his in which it was only possible to pelt them with vain words. ”