Uncle Paul

“ Later they change about, so that in the end each ‘Bit of Reality’ has gathered all possible experiences in nature before it passes on into men and women.
‘Think, Uncle Paul, of the joy of a stone, who after centuries of patience and endurance, cramped and pressed down, knows suddenly the freedom of wind and sea! Of the restlessness of flame that, after ages of leaping unsatisfied to the sky, learns the repose of a tree, moved only by the outside forces of wind and rain! ”

“ For the moment Paul did not stop to ask how many ‘others’ there were. He stood rigidly still for fear that if he moved he might tread on something living.
There came a scratching sound at the door, and Toby dashed forward to open it.
‘Silly, naughty babies!’ she cried, nearly tumbling over the fender in her attempt to seize two round bouncing things that came tearing into the room like a couple of yellow puddings. ‘Uncle Paul has come to see you all the way from America! And then you’re late like this! ”

“ Be glad, Paul, that you are like your mother, and hope that with the power to think her thoughts and dream lier dreams, you may also have the power to love as she loved, and, if need be, die her death!"
"But you think the same thoughts, Uncle Paul. You believe all I believe!"
"Because she taught me, Paul—because she taught me! I slept the sleep of the blind and deaf and soulless until her touch woke my soul into being. You have always been alive to the joy of the world and the beauty of living. Your soul was born with your body and lived purposefully from the very beginning of things. ”

“ You half remember.’
‘And Death,’ he whispered, trembling with the joy of infinite spiritual desire.
The answer sank down into him with the Little Wind that stirred the cedars overhead, or else rose singing up from the uttermost depths of his listening heart—to the end of his days he never could tell which.
‘What you call Death is only slipping through the Crack to a great deal more memory, and a great deal more power of seeing and telling—towards the greatest Expression that ever can be known. It is, I promise you faithfully, Uncle Paul, nothing but a very-wonderfulindeed Aventure, after all!’ ”

“ The question had come at last—the question that Paul Verdayne had been dreading for years.
"Uncle Paul," the Boy was saying, "what relation are you to me? You are not really my uncle, though I have been taught to call you so after this quaint English fashion of yours. I know it is something of a secret, but I know no more! We are closer comrades, it seems to me—you and I—than any others in all the world. We always understand each other, somehow, almost without words—is it not so? I even bear your name, and I am proud of it, because it is yours. ”

“ He had learned his own values in his own way, and was now engaged in sorting them out with Nixie’s fairy help to guide him.
342And all souls that find themselves probably do likewise. The strength and blessing they shed about them as a result is beneficial, but the close details of the process by which they have ‘arrived’ can only seem to the world at large unintelligible, possibly even ridiculous; and this late interior blossoming of Uncle Paul, though it actually happened, must seem to many a tissue of dreams knit together with a strange fantastic nonsense. ”

“ And now, Uncle Paul, if you don't object I'll take out my pipe and have a smoke. I always smoke after dinner."
He lit his pipe, and throwing himself back in a chair, began to puff away leisurely, his uncle surveying him with fear and embarrassment. Why should his graceless nephew turn up, after so many years, in the form of this big, broad-shouldered, heavy-bearded stranger, only to annoy him, and thrust his unwelcome company upon him? ”

“ And he thought to himself how strange it was that, when you are young yourself, you call everybody old: Granny van Lowe and Grandpapa and Grandmamma van der Welcke were old; and Uncle Ruyvenaer and Auntie were old; and the two old aunts, Auntie Rine and Auntie Tine, were very old, regular old mummies. But Papa, Papa was young. Why, he was only a year or two older than Uncle Paul, who was always the young man, the dandy, with his exquisite coats and beautiful ties. And Papa looked younger than Uncle Paul, Papa certainly looked younger.... Addie bent over him, while he slept. ”

“ She had only to go to Uncle Paul and all that she longed for would be given her, together with the faithful, protecting fatherly love and care that in all its strength and sweetness had never been hers.
She must decide for herself. Not even of Aunt Charlotte or Aunt Ellen could she ask advice. She knew they would entreat her to accept, and she needed no such incentive to her own wishes. Far on into the night Worth sat at the white-curtained dormer window, looking at the stars over the apple trees, and fighting her battle between inclination and duty. ”

“ Uncle Paul’s Return—We embark—Overtaken by a Furious Gale—Our Provisions washed away—José’s Death—Burial at Sea—Our Sufferings—A Breeze—A Sail—Disappointment—Catching Fish.
Another day passed, and we became more and more anxious for the return of our uncle and cousin. Sometimes our father talked of going back and braving the worst; and sometimes he seemed eager to embark, to get clear away from the island in which his once bright hopes had been so completely destroyed. Frequently he spoke as if all happiness in life for him was over, and seemed only to wish for death as an end to his sorrows. ”

“ When he shuts himself up in his room it takes something very serious to divert him from his reading. And so they say that Uncle Paul knows any number of stories. He investigates, he observes for himself. When he walks in his garden he is seen now and then to stop before the hive, around which the bees are humming, or under the elder bush, from which the little flowers fall softly, like flakes of snow; sometimes he stoops to the ground for a better view of a little crawling insect, or a blade of grass just pushing into view. ”

“ When I think of what my feelings were that evening—of my murderous hatred of that smirking, jesting Jezebel who sat opposite me at dinner, my wrathful indignation at the thought of the poor little expected heir defrauded ere his birth; of the crushing contempt I felt for myself and the bishop as a pair of witless idiots unable to see our way out of the dilemma; all this boiling and surging through my soul, I can only wonder—Domenico having given himself a holiday, and the kitchen maid doing her worst and wickedest—that gout or jaundice did not put an end to this story at once.
"Uncle Paul!" ”

“ They covered him with kisses.
‘We never thought you were as important as you pretended,’ Jonah said; ‘and your being so big made no difference.’
‘Or your beard, Uncle Paul,’ added Toby.
‘And we never think people old till they’re married,’ Jonah explained, putting the mitre on his uncle’s head.
‘So now we can have our aventures all together,’ exclaimed Nixie, kissing him swiftly, and leaping off his knee. The other two followed her example, and suddenly—he never quite understood how it happened so quickly—the summer-house was empty, 120and he was alone with the moonlight. ”

“ But is not my uncle William coming down to see us? He promised to do so, and it made you quite happy—, Papa, for two days. I hope he will not disappoint you; and I am sure that it is not his fault if he ever seems to neglect you. He spoke of you to me, when I saw him, in the kindest and most affectionate manner. I do think, my dear father, that he loves you very much. ”

“ Uncle Paul advised that we should all look out for sleeping-places, where we might rest without the danger of tumbling off. Our first care was to find one for Marian. A mass of sepos hung down and formed a regular hammock close under a bough, and by carefully arranging a few more sepos, Uncle Paul and Arthur made it so secure that it was impossible for her to fall out. They told me to take a berth of a similar character close to her, while Uncle Paul formed one for himself on a bough, a little on one side. ”

“ Worth shook her brown head sadly. "Oh, I cannot, Uncle Paul. You know—I told you—"
"Yes, I know," he interrupted. "I have been thinking it all over every day since. You know yourself what the Ingelow determination is. It's a good thing in a good cause but a bad thing in a bad one. And it is no easy thing to conquer when you've let it rule you for years as I have done. But I have conquered it, or you have conquered it for me. Child, here is a letter. It is to your mother—my sister Elizabeth. ”

“ Let me see, I'll do the cooking."
"I don't want you here," said the old man, desperately. "Why do you come to disturb me, after so many years?"
"I'll go away on one condition," said Ben Haley.
"What's that?"
"Give me, or lend me--I don't care which--a hundred dollars."
"Do you think I'm made of money?" asked Paul, fear and anger struggling for the mastery.
"I think you can spare me a hundred dollars."
"Go away! You are a bad man. You were a wild, bad boy, and you are no better now."
"Now, Uncle Paul, I think you're rather too hard upon me. Just consider that I am your nephew. ”

“ You did your best for me, Uncle Paul, and managed admirably, but it was all no use. I hoped against hope that what between the dusk of the drawing-room before dinner, and being put at opposite ends of the table, we might get through without a meeting—"
"But, my dear, explain. Why shouldn't the bishop and Lady Carwitchet meet? Why is it worse for him than anyone else?"
"Why? I thought everybody had heard of that dreadful wife of his who nearly broke his heart. If he married her for her money it served him right, but Lady Landor says she was very handsome and really in love with him at first. ”

“ Old stockings are the favorites with old maids and widows, but I don't believe Uncle Paul has got any without holes in them. He's more likely to hide his gold under the hearth. That's a good idea, I'll try the hearth first."
He kneeled down, and began to examine the bricks, critically, with a view of ascertaining whether any bore the marks of having been removed recently, for he judged correctly that a miser would wish, from time to time, to unearth his treasure for the pleasure of looking at it. ”

“ His nephew took it from his hand, and unlocking the door, brought out a liberal supply of potatoes, beets and squashes.
"We'll have a good dinner, after all," he said. "You don't half know how to live, Uncle Paul. You need me here. You've got plenty around you, but you don't know how to use it." ”

“ Yours, I admit is a heavy one for a boy to bear. But when men are unjust there is One above who will deal justly with us. You have not forgotten him.”
“No, Uncle Hugh,” said Paul, reverently.
“Trust in him, Paul, and all will come out right at last. He can prove your innocence, and you may be sure he will, in his own good time. ”

“ Paul?... Paul? Where are you? Why don't you answer?... Paul! (She turns on the light. It is a studio. At the piano, fallen forward upon the keys, sits the body of a man. There is a revolver on the floor beside him.) Paul!... As I saw him! Is this my happiness. Oh God, must I?
A MODERN PRODIGAL
The scene shows Uncle Richard's library, a massive and expensive interior suggesting prosperity rather than meditation. It is obviously new, and in the whole room there is only one intimate and human note, a quaint little oil painting of a boy with bright eyes—Uncle Richard at the age of eleven. ”

“ He insists that Uncle Hugh, who is getting infirm, should resign his office, as he is abundantly able to support the whole family. But the good sexton loves his duties, and will continue to discharge them as long as he is able.
And now we must bid farewell to Paul. He has battled bravely with the difficulties and discouragements that beset him in early life, he has been faithful to the charge which he voluntarily assumed, and his father's memory is free from reproach. He often wishes that his father could have lived to witness his prosperity? ”

“ It occurred to him that his uncle, the furrier, had an enormous bear-skin, with head, eyes, claws, and all that was necessary, and without delay he went to try it on.
His uncle, feeling that this event was somehow to redound to the credit of the family, agreed to make the necessary alterations at a trifling cost, and when the night of the masquerade arrived, Paul was so startled at his appearance that he would have run away from himself if such a thing had been possible. He had never imagined that he would make such a successful Beast. ”

“ The False Paul, that is, was within an ace of running away with all his elaborate armour, and leaving the True Paul dancing on the floor, a child among children, a spirit of impulse, enthusiasm and imagination, laughing with the sheer happiness of his perpetual youth. ”

“ Paul's Churchyard he had hopes, but these hopes had grown dimmer. His perceptions on such matters were keen; few persons, no matter what their age, could see farther into a brick wall than he. He felt certain that his uncle only kept him at all because Mrs. Elmore had wrung from him a promise that he should have a place, of sorts, in his office. So far from having an eye to his nephew's advancement, it seemed to Rodney that his uncle even went out of his way to let him have as little as possible to do with the conduct of his business. ”

“ He spends nothing for dress or amusements. I do believe that I've had three coats since he's been wearing that old brown one. Yet, he always looks neat. I wonder what he's saving up his money for."
Meanwhile Paul went home.
The sexton and his wife looked the same as ever. Paul sometimes fancied that Uncle Hugh stooped a little more than he used to do; but his life moved on so placidly and evenly, that he grew old but slowly. Aunt Hester was the same good, kind, benevolent friend that she had always been. No mother could have been more devoted to Paul. ”