Part 11 (2/2)
The absurdity of the position struck the chaplain as soon as he collected himself from his first surprise. It never would do for _him_ to look as if he had any thing to be ashamed of; so, summoning to his aid all the dignity of his office and his own self-importance, with a great effort, he spoke steadily:
”I presume you wish to talk to me, Major Keene? I shall be glad to hear any thing that you may have to communicate or explain. It is my duty as well as my desire to be useful to any member of my congregation, however little disposed they may be to avail themselves of their privileges.
Interested, as I must be in the welfare of all committed to my charge, I need hardly say that the course you have chosen to pursue here has caused me great pain and anxiety--I own, not so much for your sake as that of others, to whom your influence was likely to be pernicious. What I heard this morning makes matters look still worse. I wish I could antic.i.p.ate any satisfactory explanation.”
The old _ex cathedra_ feeling came back upon him while he was speaking; his tone, gradually becoming rounder and more sonorous, showed this. Was he so besotted by sacerdotal confidence as to fancy that he could win that grim penitent to come to him to be confessed or absolved?
Since the chaplain first saw him Royston had never changed his att.i.tude.
He was leaning with his shoulder against the corner of rock round which the path turned, standing half across it, so that no one could pa.s.s him easily. The dense blue cloudlets of smoke kept rolling out from his lips rapidly, but regularly, and his right hand twined itself perpetually in the coils of his heavy brown mustache. That gesture, to those who knew his temper well, was ever ominous of foul and stormy weather. He did not reply immediately, but, taking the cigar from his mouth, began twisting up the loose leaf in a slow, deliberative way. At last he said,
”You did that rather well this morning. How much did you expect to get for it? My wife is liberal enough in her promises sometimes, when she wants to make herself disagreeable, but she don't pay well. You might have driven a better bargain by coming to me. I would have given you more to have held your tongue.” His tone was such as the other had never heard him use--such as most people would be loth to employ toward the meanest dependent. No description can do justice to the intensity of its insolence; it made even Mr. Fullarton's torpid blood boil resentfully.
”How dare you address such words to me?” he cried out, trembling with rage. ”If it were not for my profession--”
”Stop!” the other broke in, rudely; ”you need not trouble yourself to repeat that stale clap-trap. You mean to say that, if I were not safe from your profession, I should not have said so much. It isn't worth while lying to yourself, and I have no time to trifle. The converse is the truer way of putting it. You know better than I can tell you that, if you had been unfrocked, you would never have ventured half what you have done to day. You don't stir from hence till this is settled. Do you suppose I'll allow my private affairs to be made, again, an occasion for indulging your taste for theatricals?”
The chaplain flushed apoplectically. He just managed to stammer out,
”I will not remain another instant to listen to your blasphemous insults. If you mean to prevent me from pa.s.sing, I will return another way.”
Scornfully He turned; but thrilled with priestly wrath, to feel His sacred arm locked in a grasp of steel.
A bolder man might have got nervous, finding himself on a lonely hill-side, face to face with such an adversary, reading, too, the savage meaning of those murderous eyes. Remember that Mr. Fullarton held Royston capable of any earthly crime. His own short-lived anger was instantly annihilated; the sweat of mortal terror broke out over all his livid face; his lips could hardly gasp out an unintelligible prayer for mercy.
The soldier's stern face settled into an expression of contempt: in his gentlest moods he could find little sympathy for purely physical fear.
”Don't faint,” he said; ”there is no occasion for it. Do you think I shall 'slay you as I slew the Egyptian yesterday?' Well, I have scanty respect for your office, especially when its privileges are abused. If it were not for good reasons, I would serve you worse than I did that drunken scoundrel who frightened you almost to death down there among the vines; but that don't suit my purpose. Listen: if you dare to interfere again, by word, or deed, or sign, in the affairs of me and mine, I know a better way of making you repent it.”
As soon as he saw that there was no real danger to life or limb, the chaplain's composure began to return. He launched forth immediately into a gallant though incoherent defiance. Royston's features never for an instant changed or softened in their scorn.
”Fair words,” he retorted; ”but I'll make your bubbles burst. You don't monopolize _all_ the resources of the Private Inquiry Office;” and, stooping down, he whispered a dozen words in the other's ear. They related to a charge brought against Mr. Fullarton years ago, so circ.u.mstantial and difficult to disprove that, with all the advantages of counter-evidence at hand, it had well-nigh borne him down. He knew right well that, if it were once revived here abroad, where the lightest suspicion is caught up and used so readily, the consequences would be nothing short of utter ruin. He was a poor man, with a large family. No wonder if he quailed.
”You know--you know,” he gasped, ”that it is a vile, cruel falsehood.”
To do him justice, he spoke the simple truth there.
With a cold, tranquil satisfaction, the major contemplated his victim's agony.
”I choose to know nothing about it, except that it carries more probability than most stories one hears. The world in general is, fortunately, not incredulous, and I have seen a man 'broke' on lighter evidence. Well, you will take your own course, and I shall take mine. I fancy we understand each other--at last.”
By a superhuman effort the unlucky ecclesiastic did contrive to mutter something about his ”determination to do his duty.” Royston listened to him with his worst smile.
”I'll take my chance about that,” he said. ”I feel tolerably safe. Now I'll leave you to settle the affair between your interest and your conscience.”
He turned on his heel, and strode away without another word. Long after he was out of sight the chaplain stood fixed in the same att.i.tude of panic-stricken, helpless despondency. By my faith! even in these degenerate days, we have petrifying influences left that may match the head of the Gorgon.
Meanwhile, the others were wending slowly homeward, truly in a very different mood from that in which they had gone forth that morning. Even as no man can be p.r.o.nounced happy till the hour of his death, so can no excursion or entertainment be called successful till night has fairly closed in. Caprice of climate is only one of the many sources of disappointment, and the event justifies so seldom our sanguine predictions that we have little right to complain of false and fallible barometers. It is worthy of remark how often these trifles ill.u.s.trate that trite and time-honored simile of Life. The vessel starts gayly enough, heeling over gracefully to the land-wind in the old, approved fas.h.i.+on--”Youth at the prow, and pleasure at the helm”--there is not a misgiving in the heart of any of the pa.s.sengers; they can not help pitying those left behind on the sh.o.r.e. What a cheery adieu they wave to the friends who come down to wish them ”good-speed!” After a voyage more or less prolonged the same s.h.i.+p drifts in slowly sh.o.r.eward, over the harbor-bar, under the calm of the solemn sunset. Even the deepening twilight can not disguise the evidences of a terrible ”sea-change.” Not a trace of paint or gilding remains on the wave-worn, shattered timbers.
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