It was a great rambling building of quite remarkable ugliness. Remarkable, too, for it stood alone among ploughed fields, no other house appeared to be anywhere near and more oddly still, no church. He blinked. The rectory crouched like some gray animal against the wide curve of the sky, there were a couple of wind-torn elms beside it, a line of fencing badly in need of repair. There was no church.
“But where is St. Wilbrod’s…?”
He had been made welcome by the rector, his uncle had, it seemed, gone out.
“St. Wilbrod’s? A commonplace story, my dear sir. There used to be a thriving village here in the last century, oh yes, oh dear me yes, a sizable community. By some unlucky chance—failed crops, disease, bad husbandry, I cannot precisely identify the cause—the people moved away. What was the village of Barscombe has moved quite five miles to the east. A shift in the population which has, I fear, done nothing to enlarge my parish.”
“Has the church gone too?”
“Good heavens, no.” Alaric rose with a cold smile, and drew the young man toward the window. He had very soft white fingers, which stuck to Paul’s arm like so many enlarged slugs. “Some things are not easily destroyed, I assure you. There is my church.”
It lay behind the house, invisible from the main path. It astonished by reason of its shape, for it was tiny, a tiny Norman building. A squat tower with a little spirelet or “Sussex cap”; surely incredible that such a miniature affair should have warranted this great barn of a rectory. Paul said as much. His host nodded, drawing hairy eyebrows together, dark eyes gazed at the boy.
“It has been a matter of some concern to the Church authorities. The ever-present question of finance! We live in difficult times, my son, singularly difficult times. Perhaps you would care to examine St. Wilbrod’s? It has great historical though little artistic merit.”
He led the way across a path made slippery by decayed leaves; the debris of autumn lay around them, there had been no attempt to clear the ground and an unpleasant musty smell contaminated the air. The rain had stopped, leaving a pervading dampness. As they went, Paul felt constrained to explain, to excuse himself—though he had done no wrong and merely chanced to benefit from a family quarrel.
“I trust my uncle keeps in good health, sir?”
“Tolerably.” Again the wintry smile.
“I am very conscious he has been unfairly treated…”
“Life is not fair, Mr. Bernays. Fascinating. Complex. But not fair.”
“Does he hold my good fortune against me?”
“Oh come, Mr. Bernays! You have the money. You really must not expect to be popular as well.”
“Perhaps if I made him a small allowance, in recompense?”
“I think not,” said the Reverend Alaric evenly; and motioned him inside the church.
It was bare to the point of emptiness; a simple altar, two Early English lancets in the chancel, a stained glass window of no merit whatsoever. Paul sat down. He was rehearsing a suitable comment when the priest murmured: “You must excuse me. I think I hear your uncle on the drive, he may not have a latch key.” The next instant he had gone, fading noiselessly into the shadows. His guest remained seated, lost in a conflicting whirl of emotion; he did not wish to harm anybody, anybody in the world, and surely he could not be blamed for inheriting… He closed his eyes and composed a brief prayer. Dear Lord, bless this house and me and Uncle Nicholas.
He stiffened. There seemed to be a murmur, the dry patter of innumerable lips. Consciously he knew that he sat alone in a country church; yet he felt most powerfully that behind him opened a vast nave; a huge assembly of people were seated just out of sight behind his back. The very air opened up, he must be in the center of a great cathedral…
Paul jerked round.
Bare walls, almost within touching distance. A few empty pews, stained and scratched with age. Dusty altar hangings. Needless to say, nobody was there. His bewilderment still lay strong upon him when the Reverend Alaric slipped from the gloom and, bending over him, whispered:
“Your uncle has returned and is most eager to see you. Come, follow.”
The second encounter with Mr. Nicholas Bernays proved even more tedious than the first. He stammered his apologies, how monstrously careless to have forgotten the raincoat, and in this weather too! He seemed incapable of looking anybody in the face, his balding head twisted from side to side and when by chance Paul caught his eye the man blinked as if stung. By contrast, the Reverend Alaric Halsey appeared totally at his ease; he talked learnedly of St. Wilbrod’s, its history and its architecture; he spoke of the Saxons and the influence Christianity had had on them.
“And vice versa, of course! You do know that Easter derives from the Saxon word Eostre, a festival celebrating the goddess of Spring? Our somewhat confusing habit of fixing Easter by the full moon must surely be pagan in origin; it is also linked to the Jewish Passover. As for Christmas—why, it seems tolerably certain that whenever Our Savior was born, it was not in the middle of winter! You may remember that a decree went forth at the time of His birth that all the world should be taxed? In the ancient world taxes were levied at harvest time, therefore we can immediately discount December the twenty-fifth. But that date is the winter solstice, the Mithraic birthday of the Unconquered Sun. It would seem that the early Fathers of the Church found it paid them to be reasonably accommodating in the matter of dates. We have here a combination of Mithraism, Judaism, and who knows what pagan nature worship!” The Reverend Alaric smiled, he had a compelling manner and some degree of charm; after a while he proposed to show their visitor the Rectory, a tour which Paul had no desire to make and found himself quite incapable of refusing.
It proved a most embarrassing experience. Clearly the general exodus of its congregation had thrown the parish of St. Wilbrod’s into a state of quite desperate poverty; room after room held nothing save a threadbare rug on the floor and two or three dilapidated chairs. It must once have been of some importance for the house boasted six bedrooms, three reception rooms, a library, a study, and a positive warren of kitchen and pantries. From these last Paul deduced that his host was in the habit of cooking for himself; various pots and pans lay on the table, uncleaned and smelling slightly of rancid fat. He wondered how in heaven’s name the two men contrived to exist in such a penniless wreck of a home. The contrast between this squalor and the comfort of his own manor house, West Farthing, with its full complement of amiable Sussex maids and kindly gardeners, seemed too much for Paul altogether—he made his excuses and fled out into the wintry afternoon, taking his raincoat with him. Even as he pulled it on it struck him that Uncle Nicholas must have thrown the garment down in that abominable kitchen. It felt sticky.
The day had darkened, a discolored sky fitted over the hills like a lid. Paul Bernays hurried on, conscious of a most irrational desire to escape.
From what?
The derelict rectory with its learned owner—his uncle, ducking that thin red head, avoiding all direct contact with the eyes? Absurd. His uncle was merely a nervous, unlucky man and the priest—why, the priest must be both charitable and kind to have offered him a home. Paul quickened his pace and nearly fell, the ground being pitted with disused rabbit holes and littered with stones. The strange depression, the mounting unease, could only be the result of bad weather and a bad conscience; he did indeed feel guilty, he must certainly do something to make life more tolerable for the ill-assorted pair he had just left. Meanwhile, home and tea!