Under St Paul's: A Romance

CHAPTER VII.

FROM STRATFORD TO PETER'S ROW

'I am sure, mother, I cannot understand what he wants of me in London. He knows I do not like going about, and the idea of living in a hotel is hateful. What can he want of me?' On the round, pale, sweet face of the girl there was a look of perplexity and pain as she raised her soft hazel eyes to her mother's, when Mrs Osborne had finished reading the letter addressed by her son to her daughter Kate. 'My dear Kate,' said the stout, silver-haired matron, laying down her gold-rimmed spectacles on the open page of her son's letter, and fixing her mild, contented eyes on her elder daughter, 'we know George has always good reasons for what he does and says, and I think we need not fear he is wrong in this case. He says he wants you in London very particularly, and no doubt he does. Now, if he wants you very particularly, of course you will go.' 'But, mother, I do not like to go. I'd much rather not. What can he want me for?' The old woman took up the letter and spectacles again, set her spectacles on her nose, and read the letter from beginning to end. When she had finished she sat silent awhile, swinging her spectacles with one hand and keeping the letter open on the table before her with the other. 'He does not,' she said, 'give any reason for his wishing you to go to London; but, no doubt, Kate, he feels lonely and strange in that great place where he has no friends, and it may be he wants to give the place a look of home by having you with him. George is a good son and a good brother; and when we were not nearly so well off as we are now, he stood by us and denied himself many luxuries and amusements young men look for, in order that we might have everything in reason we could desire. So that altogether, Kate, you ought not to make any objection to going.' The soft hazel eyes of the girl were cast down upon the cloth. She said nothing for a few seconds, and then, in a tone of profound resignation, only, – 'If I must I must.' 'I wish he had asked me to go,' said Alice, "little Alice" as they called her. 'I wouldn't say no, or take five minutes to make up my mind. There's no one spooning me.' The elder girl blushed and did not raise her eyes. 'Alice,' said Mrs Osborne severely, 'I have forbidden you to speak in a light manner of such matters. If any gentleman, such as Mr Garvage, should offer attentions to Kate, that is nothing to be ashamed of in her or him; for he comes of an honourable family, who have lived at Chatsley Manor for many generations, and honoured the Church and supported the State; for they always have been Conservatives-staunch Conservatives. Alice, you must not. I tell you once for all, you must not. Attend to me! "Spooning!" What abominable slang! When I was your age I should as soon have thought of jumping out of the window as of using such vile language.' 'Kate wouldn't a bit mind jumping out of the window if Mr Garvage was below.' 'Be silent, Alice! How dare you say such things!' Kate looked up in distress and said, – 'But I assure you, mother, there is nothing at all in what Alice says. Mr Garvage has never said anything that a most distant acquaintance might not say.' 'He carried your umbrella all the way home from church last Sunday, and he kissed the handle before he gave it back to you.' 'Oh, Alice, how can you say such things! He did not kiss the handle, mother; he only put it to his lips idly. Alice, you know very well I do not like Mr Garvage. I have told her so, mother, a hundred times, and she is speaking of him now only to annoy me.' 'There now, old Kitty, don't get cross with little Alice. Little Alice won't be naughty any more. Little Alice is sure her big sister will be delighted to get away to London from the persecutions of Mr Garvage.' Indeed, mother, you must not mind what Alice says. I am quite indifferent to Mr Garvage, and he can have nothing to do with my going or staying.' 'Alice, dear,' said Mrs Osborne, in a tone of rebuke, 'I wish you would be more collected and staid. Well, Kate, what do you propose doing?' 'Really I don't see anything for it but to go. I am sure he must have good reason for asking me.' 'So am I,' said Mrs Osborne. 'Maybe he has met an awfully nice fellow there, Kate,' said the younger girl, looking up with an expression of infantile simplicity. 'And maybe, Kate, he thought Mr Garvage was not nice enough. I will say Mr Garvage's feet are against him. Mother, how do you account for Mr Garvage's feet and hands? You told me Conservatives had always small feet and hands.' Mrs Osborne disregarded the last speech of her younger daughter, and, turning to the elder, asked, – 'And when do you think you will be ready to go? He says he wishes you to stay for a few weeks.' 'In a couple of days. I need not go to Birmingham for what I may want; I can get them in London.' 'Ah, Kittie,' cried Alice plaintively, 'I wish I was going to London with you. Think of buying things in London! Kittie, I won't say another nasty thing to you if you only get George to ask me up next time. I know you are the elder and ought to go first. But won't you make him take me? Tell him I am quite reformed, and that I am as demure as a lamb. If he likes, I'll hold his hand when we go out together. I have four pounds ten saved up in my workbox, and I know there are lots of things in London I want desperately. Kittie, won't you get him to ask me?' 'I'll try, little Alice,' answered Kate. The third day from that Kate Osborne was on her way from Stratford to London. She wondered George had not offered to come for her. She did not know the fascination which bound him with bands of steel to London. She disliked travelling alone. She had no desire to see London. She would have been quite content to live her life on the banks of the gentle Avon, and sink into her eternal rest soothed by the soft ripple of the river. She was shy and domestic and home-loving. She delighted most in calm routine and placid ways. Never had she wished to adventure on the troubled waters of life. George was quiet and home-loving like her, but he had at heart a speculative turn she did not own. He had always intended going to London. She had never thought of it, and now she was going against her inclination. To be among strangers, to be stared at by them, hustled about by them, was her horror. She did not like to meet people whom she did not know. A request that anyone might be introduced to her filled her with uneasiness. And yet here she was now travelling alone to the city where the most people were gathered under one roof of smoke, and where there was but one face, George's, she had ever to her knowledge seen before! George was at the terminus to meet her. When he had handed her out he asked her with a smile how she was. 'I am a little frightened, George,' she said timidly, and without an answering smile. 'By what?' he asked uneasily. He wished his sister to like everything and every person in London, especially one person, a girl the very opposite of pale still Kate. 'The idea of being here.' 'That will wear away in a few days, and you will feel as much at home as at Stratford.' 'Oh, George, never! How can you say such a thing? I hope you have not already grown to like this place as well as home. It can't be that in a week you have put this place in the stead of our home?' she asked pathetically. She loved this brother with all her heart and soul, and it hurt her to hear him speak so lightly of that home sanctified by so many memories. He had, when speaking, thought little of London or home. He had thought of only one thing, that girl. He had in a few days grown to like that girl better than anything on earth. In the silent watches of night, when he was alone, and walked up and down his room, intoxicated with the memory of her beauty, he would not, he feared in his inner heart, have bartered her for anything the world contained, for anything the next world might offer. She-she-she only! What music of praise and love and incommunicable ecstasy floated round him when he saw her approaching! What perfumes of all the South flowed in upon him when he heard her speak! What wild visions and splendid castles sprang up before the eyes of his spirit when he touched her hand! This love could not be opposed to the Spirit of God. It must be of the Spirit of God, for it had brought with it charity and greatness. It had deposed the lesser and crowned the ideal man. It had robed mankind in a new radiance. It had dignified human action and sentiment. Things belonging to the tame routine of every-day life had drawn importance from the fact that they might aid or please or be necessary to her-to her! As he and his sister drove to Mrs Barclay's in the cab little was said. She felt dazed and repelled by the great city, by the knowledge that she would have to remain in it for what seemed to her a long time, and by an undefined dread, a vague presentiment of evil, arising insensibly in her mind from what he had said about growing to like London as much as home. He was too uneasy for conversation. Carried away by an infatuation, he had written for his sister at the request of Miss Gordon. Now his sister had arrived, they were driving to the hotel, and what explanation could he give his sister of his wish for her presence in London? Then how would these two girls get on? His heart sank when he came to consider that question. It seemed to him there was no chance of the two agreeing. Kate had no acquaintance with the world; Miss Gordon had had no home but the world. Kate had never met intimately anyone at all like Miss Gordon. His sister would be sure to think his sweetheart intolerably bold. Then again Kate would undoubtedly find out in a few hours, before this time to-morrow, how matters stood. Already some of Mrs Barclay's other guests had begun to be sly, and ready with quiet smiles full of meaning. What would be the outcome of all this? Here he paused for awhile in his thought. When he resumed it was with the passionate cry in his heart, 'There can, there shall, there must be but one outcome from all this: she and I shall never part!' The fire had taken complete hold, and the building must burn down. 'If,' he again thought fervently, 'Marie Gordon will have me, no power on earth shall keep us asunder.' Nothing more was said in the cab. Kate was stunned and dulled by the racket of even the quiet northern squares through which they passed, and he sat brooding over the image of his worship. How would she and Kate get on? No two styles could possibly be more opposed. Marie would think Kate dull and proper and stupid and tell her so; and Kate, gentle Kate, would feel hurt, and the two would give up all thought of friendship. Well, he had tried his best to prevent Kate's coming. Now that she was here, nothing could be done but allow matters to take their course. In about half-an-hour they arrived at Mrs Barclay's, and were received by the lady of the house in the drawing-room. Osborne introduced his sister to the landlady, and then looked round the room hastily. The only other person present was Nevill, who had been turning over the leaves of an album at the end of the room farthest from where Mrs Barclay sat. Upon hearing the words 'my sister' uttered by Osborne, Nevill rose hastily to his feet and approached the group at the other end, saying, while he came, – 'As an old friend of George's, may I hope to have the honour of an introduction to his sister?' Osborne was somewhat taken aback and confused. He had expected her to be there, and instead of her he had found this irrepressible Nevill. This was the last man staying in the house he should wish his sister to meet so early. Nevill would be sure to frighten gentle retiring Kate out of her wits. There was, however, no alternative but to introduce them. He did so in a bungling, hesitating manner. 'I am delighted to meet you, Miss Osborne. You have just come from Stratford-on-Avon. Take my advice, and never go there again.' 'Why?' she faltered, casting a frightened look at her brother, whose eye she did not catch; he was watching the door. 'What can the meaning of all this be?' she thought. 'This man tells me he is an old friend of George's. Nevill-I never heard his name before. An old friend of George's, whose name I have never heard! And yet it was more surprising of George to say that in a little time I should grow to like London as well as home. Now, here is this strange, ill-favoured man telling me never to go back to Stratford. What can have happened to George? This is like a conspiracy.' 'Because it is an intolerably dull, stupid, dead-and-buried sort of place. It's all very well for a dead poet; but no misfortune on earth could compel me to live there. Nothing.' 'I am sorry you do not like it,' was all she said, and she was not conscious of saying that. She had a dead dull feeling, and would have given all the world to get into a cab, wrap herself up closely so as to keep the very air of London from her, drive back to the railway station, and get into a train for home. If she were at home she could steal away to her own room and cry. Neither in this room nor in any other in London could she cry. Tears could not relieve in a strange room, where nothing had ever witnessed your smiles or your tears before, which had no memory of you, no connection with your history. In the meantime this plain-looking dark-faced man was rattling on in a shocking and distressing manner, and George stood by seemingly unconscious of her presence. His eyes were on the door every five seconds. When she had arrived at the London railway station, she had shrunk from it as a place that put a barrier between her and her home. Now she looked on it with yearning eyes; it had ceased to be a barrier, and had become the link between her and the peaceful past. In the midst of her isolation of spirit and her distress, she became conscious of the approach of someone. She grew conscious that someone was standing over her, and that George was speaking to the newest stranger. But she did not realise what was taking place until she heard George say 'My sister.' Miss Osborne raised her eyes, and looked long into the face bending over her. There was a light of home in those dark eyes. There was a manner of sympathy on that young face. There was a touch of sisterhood in that bending figure. Insensibly Miss Osborne rose, and stretched out her hand to the other girl. 'You look very tired,' said Miss Gordon, in her low, rich, melodious voice. 'I am a little.' 'I should,' said Mrs Barclay, 'have asked Miss Osborne to go to her room before this, but the smoke has not yet cleared away. The flue was cold, and it smoked. Will you go to another room and take off your hat, and have a cup of tea sent up to you, Miss Osborne?' 'Come to mine,' said the soft voice. The two girls were standing face to face, looking earnestly at one another. 'Thank you, I will,' answered Miss Osborne. Still holding her by the hand, Miss Gordon led her out of the room. When they had gone, Nevill turned to Osborne and said, – 'She is very beautiful.' 'Very.' 'Is she strong?' 'I hope so. I think so,' uneasily, with a questioning look. 'But she is so pale.' 'Pale? Pale? You must be mistaken.' 'Never less likely to be mistaken in all my life.' 'Of whom are you speaking?' 'Your sister.' The two men stood staring mutely into one another's eyes.

CHAPTER VIII.

SUNRISE

When Miss Gordon and Miss Osborne came down to the drawing-room again they found only the two men there. 'What are you going to do to-day, Osborne?' asked Nevill, after a few minutes. 'I really don't know. Miss Gordon, could you suggest something? Here we are, four idle people, in this big place. What shall we do?' 'I do not care. What would you suggest, Miss Osborne?' 'I should prefer staying in to-day. I feel strange.' 'Then let us stay in, by all means,' said Nevill eagerly. 'You look tired; you want a rest. Let us all stay in. It is a beastly, damp, dull British day. No one but a numskulled Englishman would consent to live through such weather as you have here. Even Englishmen would not consent to live here only for the purpose of making money. What do you say, Miss Gordon? About a plan for to-day?' 'I thought you were going to Salisbury.' 'Too late now. I am willing to make one of your party, if you will allow me.' 'I am sure we shall be very glad to have you, if you are so good as to join us, Mr Nevill,' said George quickly. For many reasons two pairs of people were much better than three people in a group. Nevill would no doubt tire out Kate; but better this than that Marie should shock his timid fair sister. But this indoor scheme did not suit Osborne; and yet when a stranger saw signs of fatigue in his sister, and suggested she should rest, how could he do anything but accede? 'Let me see,' said Nevill; 'let me see. It's now past three. It will be dark in a short time. These January days earn their bread as easily as the honest British working-man wants to earn his. Nature set a bad example in starting these eight-hour days. But, as I was saying, let me see if I can suggest a programme. Suppose we stay in, and chat and play and sing and look at pictures for a few hours, and then dine, and after dinner drive off to the Albert Hall, where there is a concert to-night? Now, I don't say that is a brilliant programme; it's sound, sound as British courage.' Nevill's programme was adopted, and the four sat from the daylight into the twilight, and from the twilight into dark, chatting; now of this, now of that, never keeping very long to the one point. The two men did most of the talking; Osborne lent the heavier, and Nevill the lighter. Miss Gordon said singularly little, and Miss Osborne almost nothing at all. But they omitted one feature of Nevill's programme, they had no singing. Each had thoughts he or she might not utter. Osborne was mentally bowed down before the only earthly shrine at which he worshipped. Nevill congratulated himself upon not having gone to Salisbury, and made up his mind that Miss Osborne was not as strong as open-air exercise and a little rousing up would make her. Osborne and Miss Gordon were getting on very nicely. All right. Two of a trade never agree. Miss Gordon thought how noble he looked! How simple and sincere he was! What a compliment it was to have such an intellect stooping down to her! And how she yearned for the peace of faith such as he dwelt in! Miss Osborne thought how beautiful this dark girl, how homely and tender-minded and sweet of thought. How handsome George was; and did that plain-looking man rattle on always as now? Upon those four people and the thoughts they kept within their breasts, upon the four millions of people around and the thoughts they kept within their breasts, the darkness of night descended. For sixteen hours all London, its cities, its towns, its villages, would be buried in the vault of winter night. For eight of these hours the vast majority of those four millions of souls would be buried in sleep, deceived by dreams. When morning once more came, what changes of fortune while London had slept! The first post, the first telegrams, would bring joy and misery to thousands. Before breakfast, many who had had no warning of evil, would have to think of the mourning they could afford out of resources sadly diminished during night by death. The morning mail would bring the dearest letter man ever gets, that one with Yes from his beloved. Where affluence was to-night bankruptcy would be to-morrow. Where penury had pinched, and poverty had degraded, thither by the light of day wealth would be borne. Between this and then one hundred and twenty Londoners would pass away for ever, and one hundred and ninety-six be born into the great horde camped under St Paul's. What a motley horde it is! Here is a native of every civilised and semi-civilised nation on earth, and many of the barbarous peoples are represented. What a hideous collection of swarthy scoundrelism in the regions lying east-about Catherine Street, Lower East Street, Smithfield, High Street, Wapping and Wapping Wall! And much of what is not swarthy and foreign there is lower still. Here are Mongolians, Negroes, Hottentots, and Malays hearsed in sleep. Here is Newgate Prison, with a sufficient variety of criminals to colonise Pandemonium, with a sufficient variety of tongues to confound the builders of a new Babel. Over the water rest factories of all kinds, silent by night, trembling with noise and travail by day. Around these factories are crowded working-men, thieves, and scum of the vilest kind. Beyond that belt is a region of poor shops; and beyond, all reaching out to touch the green fields, lie pleasant villas where men, sufficiently good as men go, sleep, where women of spotless purity dream blameless dreams. Westward repose those who own the riches which are for expense. Here are coronets embroidered upon the hangings of the beds. Here is ambition, restless and insatiable, ambition not of the moneygrubbing kind, but for place, position, power. The East and the West are the latest to sleep. One is kept awake by orgies and broils, the other by pleasure and aspirations. The orgies of the East have in the West developed into decorous balls and receptions. The taproom and the bar of the East have been changed into the ballroom and club of the West. The rude broilers of the East have in the progress of time been developed into the political and financial speculators of the West. From East to West is from primitive means to civilised means of defeating someone or gaining something you cannot freely get. North lie the couches of the liberal arts, professions, and of commerce once again. It is the region of new men-of men whose father's names were unknown to Londoners. These are the ardent workers. They have not succeeded to a heritage of mere muscle and ignorance like the men in the East. They have not come into entailed properties or established historic business firms like the men in the West. They have made their own way in the world. When they grow older and richer they may drift West. The North invents, the South supplies the tools, the East the hands, the West the patrons and critics of the work, while out of the yellow heart of the city comes the gold, the incentive to the North, South, and East. As St Paul's is the spiritual centre of London, the bank is the commercial centre. All the moneyed eyes of the Empire are fixed on that unsightly block of building in Threadneedle Street. If it had any pretensions to architectural beauty or grace-if it had a dome, or a campanile, or a minaret, or anything less tame than its dull, dreary, uninformed walls-that characteristic feature would be looked upon all over the world as the symbol of England's wealth, as the dome, ball, and cross of St Paul's are regarded as the insignia of the Anglo-Saxon race. Night had settled down on the City for hours. The men hunted by men drew easier breath. Bailiffs had ceased from troubling, policemen were almost at rest. The pursued and the pursuers had lain down to snatch a brief respite from terrors or business. The black silence between day and day lay like a weight upon the camp under the dome of the vast fane. In Peter's Row not a sound could be heard save now and then the faint mutter of a far-off cab or the bark of a distant dog. The lights in the dining-room where supper had been served were out. All the guests and servants had long since retired to their rooms. All the servants and most of the guests had gone to rest. The back of the hotel commanded a view of the cathedral. One of the finest sights in London is the sun rising behind St. Paul's while you are high at the western side. There is something triumphant and terrible in the sight. It seems as if the cathedral would crumble away, and disclose in the fiery core of dawn the intolerable Judgment Seat. But by night, when there is no moon, and one is near enough to be impressed by the stupendous proportions of the building, and yet far enough away to yield it grandeur in losing detail, the feeling is one of melancholy. The dome seems a buoy set to mark the site where millions of men have been overwhelmed by darkness and drowned, because of their rejection of spiritual light. In the back of the hotel two people were still awake, a man and a woman. The man was in his bedroom. His gas was turned up. He was sitting astride a chair and, contrary to the rules of the house, smoking a cigar. His arms were folded on the back of his chair, his chin rested on his arms. His face at the best was not handsome. This attitude made it almost repulsive. His thoughts ran: "By Jove, didn't she look well! Never seen anything like it in my life, and I've seen a few good-looking girls. Miss Gordon wasn't in it with her, and Miss G. isn't a bad-looking girl. But that beautiful, pale, sad, round face, and her eyes-her soft sad eyes! As some fellow put it, she 'is as pure as the saints on high, and never was saint so fair.' But I'm not a poet. I don't think like a poet; I don't look like a poet; I don't eat or drink like a poet. I suppose, as there is the seed of every disease in man, there's the seed of poetry in me. Where they put the blessed seed I don't know. What's the good of a seed that's in some cupboard if you don't know which, and when only four out of eight of the keys you have fit the locks? It's discouraging. I suppose every fellow thinks of poetry when he sees a face like hers. I wonder if a member of the London board of actuaries saw a face like that, what kind of poetry would he think of. Maybe he wouldn't think of poetry at all. Perhaps he'd try to estimate the superficial area of her face, allowing of course for the eyes. If I knew any figure-painter, I think I'd ask him to paint her and me as Psyche and Adonis. I'd get up an appropriate expression like this," he said to himself, throwing away the butt of his cigar, contorting his face until he was positively hideous, and then approaching the glass with a burlesque mincing gait. When he saw his reflection in the glass he laughed aloud. Then he undressed, put out the light, and went to bed. The woman still was up. She sat by the window of her bedroom. Her eyes were fixed on the cloudlike mass of St. Paul's towering above her. She was not thinking of St. Paul's. She was not thinking of London. She was not thinking of George Osborne. She had been to a concert that night, and she had heard a song often heard and sung by her before. It was a well-known song, a well-known air. It had never touched her until to-night. The music had reached some range of feeling, or emotion, or spirituality, of which she had had no previous acquaintance. While she listened she was conscious of some mighty upheaval of her nature. She saw all her past life by a new light, and she shrank back from the vague possibilities of what was to come. She could understand nothing of this change. She heard the rumble of some noble thought, but could not figure to her mind its appearance. She knew something great was at hand. She could not think of lying down. She must wait for what was coming, be it what it might. Hours went by, and still she did not move. Still she had the words of that refrain, the tone of the singer's voice, the rumble of the approaching revelation. Yet the revelation did not come. Hours again went by without change. She was unconscious of fatigue, unconscious there was cause for fatigue, unconscious of everything but the powers that kept her spell-bound. At last the east grew slowly grey. She marked this, and then came her first thought outside the tyranny that possessed her, – 'I shall not go down early.' The light broadened in the east. Gradually the gates of the morning were opened, and through their chinks great beams of pale-yellow light set themselves across the sky, and stood up like the fingers of a fan. Gradually these beams changed to orange, and then to crimson, and just where they converged, and forming the centre of their base, stood out in vague purple the shadow of St Paul's. All at once something seemed to strike her. She rose hastily to her feet, muttering, – 'How august! The dome is like the Head, the sunbeams form the aureola.' All at once to the great apparition before her came the words which had haunted her all night, Miserere nobis.' For a moment she shook. Her face, lighted up by the blazing east, was perplexed, perturbed, contorted. All at once it lost the look of conflict. An expression of infinite supplication settled upon it, and raising her clasped hands to Heaven, she fell upon her knees and sang out in a low broken voice, – 'Miserere nobis!'