Part 10

Lucilla could surmise only too well the effect of a long talk upon Adrian, if his frame of mind might be judged correctly from his impassioned letter to her.

As usual, however, she said nothing.

The Canon’s mood of mellow forbearance continued to wax as the day went on, and he met his favourite son with a benign affectionateness that contrasted strangely with Adrian’s dramatically-restrained demeanour.

Flora, as a rule utterly incurious, asked Lucilla what was the matter.

“I don’t quite know. Something to do with Olga Duffle, I imagine. Probably Adrian has proposed to her, or something foolish of the kind, and the Duffles want it stopped.”

“Has he said anything more about his idea of taking Orders?”

“I hope not,” said Lucilla rather grimly.

She preferred not to imagine the Canon’s probable reception of an ambition thus inspired.

The long talk projected by Canon Morchard was impracticable on a Sunday, always his busiest day, until evening.

As the Canon rose from the late, and scrupulously cold, evening meal, he said:

“Daughters, you will not sit up beyond your usual hour. Adrian, my dear--come.”

The door of the study shut, and Lucilla and Flora remained in the drawing-room.

Lucilla occupied herself with note-books and works of reference, and Flora, in the exquisite copper-plate handwriting that the Canon had insisted upon for all his children, in close imitation of his own, wrote out an abstract of her father’s sermon, as she had done almost every Sunday evening ever since she could remember.

The silence was unbroken till nearly an hour later, when Lucilla observed:

“Do you know, Flossie, that Father’s book is very nearly finished? There are only two more chapters to revise.”

“‘Leonidas of Alexandria,’” said Flora thoughtfully.

The subject of the Canon’s exhaustive researches and patient compilations was known to the household.

“He’ll publish it, of course?”

“He hopes to. But Owen told me that there isn’t a very great demand for that kind of work, nowadays.”

Flora looked inquiringly at her sister.

“I hope Father isn’t going to be disappointed,” she said, half interrogatively.

“I’m very much afraid that he is.”

On this encouraging supposition of Miss Morchard’s, the conversation ended.

In accordance with their father’s desire, both sisters had gone upstairs before the conference in the study came to an end.

There came a knock at Lucilla’s door.

She opened it.

“Come in, Adrian.”

“It’s all up,” said Adrian, in the eloquent idiom of his generation, and made a melodramatic gesture of desperation.

Lucilla closed the door and sat down, seeming undisturbed by so cataclysmic an announcement of finality.

“I’m off on my own, after this. Father has utterly mucked up my entire life, as I think I told you in my letter, and he can’t see what he has done!”

Lucilla wondered whether Adrian had spent two and a half hours in endeavouring to open his parent’s eyes to his own work of destruction.

“Would you mind telling me exactly what has happened?”

Adrian embarked upon a tone of gloomy narrative.

“Well, I don’t know whether you had any idea that I am--was--well, frightfully hard hit by that girl Olga. Not just thinking her pretty and clever, and all that sort of thing, you know, though of course she was--_is_, I mean. But simply knowing that she was the one and only person I should ever care for. Of course, I know now that I was mistaken in her, to a certain extent, and I can tell you, Lucilla, that it’s very hard on a man to be as thoroughly disillusioned as I’ve been. It’s enough to shatter one’s faith in women for life.”

“But what did Father do?” said Lucilla, as her brother seemed inclined to lose himself in the contemplation of his own future mysogyny.

“What did he _do_?” echoed Adrian bitterly. “He and old Duffle had the--the audacity to meet together and discuss my private affairs, and take upon themselves to decide that anything between me and Olga ought to be put an end to. I must say, I thought that kind of thing had gone out with the Middle Ages, when people walled up their daughters alive, and all that kind of tosh. And how Olga, of all people, put up with it I can’t imagine; but they seemed to have pitched some yarn about my not being able to afford to marry, and frightened her with the idea of my being after her money, I suppose.”

“But Adrian, had you asked her to marry you?”

“No, of course not. But I did think we might have been engaged. Then I wouldn’t have had to put up with seeing a lot of other fellows after her,” said Adrian naïvely.

“And did you explain that to Father?” Lucilla inquired, not without a certain dismay in picturing the Canon’s reception of these strange ideals.

“More or less; but you know what he is. He always does most of the talking himself. I can quite understand why we were so frightened of him as kids, you know. He seems to work himself up about things, and then he always has such a frightfully high-faluting point of view. We might really have been talking at cross-purposes, half the time.”

“I can quite believe it.”

“Of course, I’m not exactly afraid of him now, but it does make it a bit difficult to say what’s in one’s mind.”

“That’s just the pity of it, Adrian. He always says that he does so wish you were more unreserved with him. He does very much want you to say what’s in your mind.”

“But he wouldn’t like it if I did--in fact, he probably wouldn’t understand it.”

Few things could be more incontrovertible.

“The fact is that father has quite a wrong idea of me. He seems to expect me to have all the notions that _he_ had, when he was a young high-brow at Oxford, about ninety years ago. As I told him, things have gone ahead a bit since then.”

Lucilla, for her consolation, reflected that few people are capable of distinguishing accurately between what they actually say, and what they subsequently wish themselves to have said, when reporting a conversation. It was highly probable that Adrian had been a good deal less eloquent than he represented himself to have been.

“You didn’t say anything, did you, about your idea of taking Orders?”

“No,” said Adrian rather curtly. “I did begin something about it, just to show that I hadn’t been the unpractical ass he seemed to think I was, but he went off at the deep end almost directly. I said something about going into the Church, you see, and he didn’t wait for me to finish, but started away about our all being ‘in the Church’ from the day of our baptism, and so on--splitting hairs, I call it. As if everyone didn’t know what is generally meant by going into the Church.”

“Well, in this case, I really hope he didn’t know. Flossie and I always told you that Father would be very much shocked at your way of looking at the priesthood.”

“Anyhow, it’s all off now,” said Adrian gloomily. “There wouldn’t be the slightest object in it, and besides I’m thoroughly off religion at the moment, as I think I told you. No, I shall go to London.”

Lucilla looked further inquiry.

“No, I’m not going after Olga; you can be quite easy about that. In fact, I may say I don’t ever want to set eyes on her again, after the way she’s let me down. No, I’m going to try journalism, or something like that. Anyhow, I mean to be a free lance for a bit.”

The first note of real resolution that Lucilla had heard there, crept into Adrian’s young voice.

“Father really can’t go on running the show for me like this. It’s me that’s got to decide what to do with my life, and I’m going to get a bit of experience on my own. I know I had six months in France, but that isn’t going to be the whole of my life. In fact, Lucilla, I’ve decided, though I’m sorry in a way, to say such a thing, that Father has got to be taught a lesson, and it’s me that’s going to do the teaching.”

Iron firmness, denoted by a closely compressed mouth and a rather defiant eye fixed glassily upon Lucilla’s, characterized Adrian’s announcement.

“Listen,” said Lucilla.

They heard a heavy footfall, eloquent of weariness, outside the door. It was followed by the sound of an imperative tap.

Adrian’s face relaxed and a more normal expression succeeded to the compelling one that had petrified his gaze.

“Adrian, my son, are you there?”

“Yes, father.”

“Dear lad, how thoughtless you are! Your sister is tired, and it is already very late. Finish your talk tomorrow, my dear ones.”

There was a pause.

Then Adrian said:

“Well, I suppose Time _is_ on the wing, as usual. Good-night, Lucilla.”

He went out.

Lucilla heard the Canon bid him good-night, and his voice held profound sadness, rather than the vexation that she had feared.

She moved swiftly to the door.

“Father, I have found that reference in Origen.”

The Canon’s face, drawn and tired, lightened on the instant.

“My indefatigable searcher after truth! Lucilla indeed casts light into dark places--you were well named, my daughter. That is good news indeed--good news indeed.”

“Should you like me to come down again, or are you too tired?”

“Nay, Lucilla, you heard me bid Adrian to his room. Would you have me transgress my own regulations? That would be inconsistent indeed. We will investigate our Origen tomorrow.”

“You are so near the end of it now, Father.”

“Aye, the work has progressed wonderfully these last few months. And I have been wonderfully blessed in your help, my child--my right hand! It has been a labour of love indeed.”

Lucilla hoped that he would go to his room still cheered by the thought of the book. But the Canon lingered, to enquire sadly:

“You have talked with Adrian?”

“A little.”

“Dear fellow, one must make all allowance for his disappointment of his first fancy, but there is a want of stability--what I can only call a levity of spirit--that distresses one beyond words. He was all submission and deference, but there was not the spontaneous calling of deep unto deep that one somehow looked for.... And yet Adrian is the one of you all from whom I had hoped for the greatest unreserve, the most ideal companionship....”

Lucilla knew it, had always known it, only too well.

Not one of his other children had been treated with the indulgence that the Canon had always displayed towards his youngest-born.

The Canon’s next words chimed in oddly with her thoughts.

“Perhaps I have condoned too much in Adrian. It is not a strong character--but the strongest are not always the most lovable. He talks now of going to London.”

“So he told me.”

“One can only trust,” said the Canon with a heavy sigh. “I must bid you good-night, dear daughter. It is not right that you should be kept up in this fashion.”

Lucilla was left to seek what repose she might.

The next day at St. Gwenllian was one of constraint.

Adrian was silent in his father’s presence, and full of adamantine resolution in his absence. At meal times, the subjects to be avoided--which now included the Admastons, their theatricals, and the Duffle family, as well as Valeria’s marriage--seemed unduly numerous. In the evening, the Canon made a great and evident effort, that struck Lucilla as infinitely pathetic, to readjust matters.

His show of laboured brightness could deceive no one, but Lucilla and Mr. Clover seconded his attempts at general conversation with determination, and Flora was not more silent than was her wont. Adrian, manifestly sulky at first, awoke presently to a change in the atmosphere, and thereupon erred rather upon the side of garrulity than on that of restraint.

His face darkened, however, when the Canon after dinner suddenly said with pseudo-heartiness:

“I am about to call one of our old-time family councils, young people. What say you, Adrian, to a little friendly discussion of your future plans? Time was, perhaps, when these things were settled rather in a long, heart-to-heart talk between father and son; but times change, and we must move with them--we must move with them.”

It was impossible to doubt that the Canon was, or supposed himself to be, moving with the times rather in the hope of pleasing Adrian, than from any personal liking for the direction in which they appeared to be taking him.

“Perhaps some of these wiseacres may make a helpful suggestion as to the future. Clover, you have been guide, philosopher and friend to us all this many a year. And Lucilla--Lucilla is gifted with a very level head, as I sometimes tell her--a very level head. As for my little Flora, whose head is sometimes in the clouds, at least those who say least see most, eh Flora? Let us to the with-drawing-room, children.”

Seated in the lamp light, with Lucilla and Flora both occupied with needlework--the Canon had long ago decreed that no discussion need entail idle hands--Canon Morchard looked wistfully at Adrian, leaning against the marble mantelpiece with an air of embarrassment.

“What are your wishes, dear lad--your hopes, your plans?”

To this singularly comprehensive enquiry, Adrian seemed to find some difficulty in making an immediate reply.

“Your father is very anxious--we’re all anxious,” said Mr. Clover pleadingly.

“Why should you be?” Adrian demanded fretfully, turning sharply towards the curate. “I’m quite old enough to settle for myself what I’m going to do.”

“But you haven’t settled it, Adrian,” said Lucilla mildly.

“That is why we all want to help you, if possible,” the Canon observed. “Perhaps you may remember some words that I am very fond of, and that have found their way now and again into our pleasant confabulations on life and letters in general:

There comes a tide in the affairs of men That, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.

“There is, indeed, a higher Leading that I trust, and indeed know, you would none of you disregard, but opportunity may very often serve us as an indication--an indication. It seems to me, dear Adrian, that some such ‘tide’ has come in your affairs now, and it would be pleasant indeed to feel that, taken at the flood, it would lead on to fortune, in the best and highest sense of the word.”

There was a pause, and then Mr. Clover said:

“Or at least independence.”

“That’s what I want,” said Adrian ungraciously. “Only never having been brought up to anything special, it’s a bit hard to know what to go in for.”

“You said something about journalism,” Lucilla reminded him, aware that the word, which would certainly be distasteful to the Canon, must be uttered sooner or later.

Adrian looked at his sister, and not at his father, as he replied:

“I think that’s really what I shall do.”

“But who is going to employ you, Adrian?” Flora enquired with simplicity.

The boy frowned.

“You don’t understand these things. I shall just get up one or two things, and show them to the right people, and if they’re any good at all I shall get taken on somewhere.”

“The Press is a great force for good as, alas, for evil, my son, but I confess that such a course would be a disappointment to me. Have you no other ambition?” asked the Canon wistfully.

“I can’t think of anything else, Father.”

“I thought--” breathed Flora to Lucilla.

Lucilla shook her head, in repudiation of Adrian’s erstwhile schemes of clerical life, and she heard from Flora a sigh that probably denoted relief.

“Then, my dearest fellow, so be it. You know that we wish nothing but your highest good, and your happiness here and hereafter. I will increase your present allowance as far as I can do so without robbing others, and that should enable you to maintain yourself in London until you are earning enough to dispense with it. Have you any definite starting point in your mind?”

“Not yet, but I can write to a fellow I know. I say, Father--this is very good of you.”

There was both surprise and genuine gratitude in Adrian’s voice.

The Canon, entirely regardless of anyone else as he always was when deeply in earnest, rose and placed his hand on the young man’s shoulder.

“I have no wish but your truest and highest good, dear lad, as I said before. If I have been weak enough to indulge in plans and fancies of my own, they shall not come between us now. I believe I may say that I have learnt at last that whatever _is_, is best. Let us go on, believing all things, hoping all things.... If there has been weakness in the past, dear Adrian, I _know_ that you will justify my confidence in the future, God helping you.”

The Canon’s voice had grown husky over the last few words. He bent his head and gently and solemnly kissed Adrian’s forehead.

Then he went out of the room.

(iv)

For many months after Adrian’s departure, the monotonous round of life at St. Gwenllian remained undisturbed.

News came from Canada of the birth of a son to Valeria, and the Canon’s last resentment vanished, although he still spoke of “our poor Valeria.”

He derived unmistakable satisfaction from Owen Quentillian’s presence at Stear, and the young man received frequent invitations to the Vicarage, after a first visit during which the host suffered infinitely more than the guest, in the fear of reviving past associations.

Adrian wrote occasionally, giving no very encouraging accounts of his progress in journalism, and continued to receive the increased allowance that his father sent him with scrupulous regularity. He did not come home again, even in the summer.

Then one day the Canon, at his writing-table, laid down his pen and said to Lucilla:

“_Nunc dimittis_.... My book is done, Lucilla; I can add no more to it. It has been a long task, and at times a heavy one, for the flesh is weak--for all that the spirit is willing, the flesh is weak. But it is over now.”

His rapt, smiling gaze held Lucilla’s for a long while, as she smiled back her congratulation.

“And now, my dear one, to give our work to the world!” He rubbed his hands together exultantly. “For it is yours, Lucilla, almost as much as mine.”

She shook her head, still smiling. The Canon’s generosity, any more than his occasional injustice, did not blind his daughter to the bald facts of a case as she saw it.

A shadow was across her genuine participation in his joy, now.

“What shall you do with it, Father?”

“There is no more to be done,” repeated the Canon. “All is copied, all is corrected. Your typescript is admirable, Lucilla, and I trust that my few emendations have not defaced it.”

“Then is it going to the publishers?”

“My practical Lucilla! Is your mind already in search of an adequate supply of brown paper and sealing wax? These things are not done so hastily as impetuous youth would wish, however. There will be a preliminary correspondence, my dear, even when I have definitely decided which of the publishing houses to approach. A work such as this one, which has taken years of labour, is not sent lightly forth to take its chance, as might be a work of fiction.”

The Canon laid his hand lovingly upon the immense pile of typescript before him. It represented, as he had said, the labour of years.

“Owen is in touch with several publishers, I believe.”

“Possibly so, Lucilla.” The Canon’s tone was not altogether pleased. “But such a work--on such a subject--requires no casual introduction.”

Lucilla wondered, not without foreboding, what it did require. Owen Quentillian, who shared her own inability to take optimistic views on principle, had spoken discouragingly of the modern market for such works as the Canon’s on “Leonidas of Alexandria.”

The Canon himself appeared to entertain no misgivings, until a few weeks later, when he handed a letter silently to Lucilla.

It was a courteously worded assurance from the most eminent of theological publishing firms that the probable sales of such a work as “Leonidas of Alexandria” would not, in their opinion, justify the expenses of publication.

The Canon seemed more bewildered than dismayed.

“I shall approach the Oxbridge Press,” he declared. “I had decided against them, but this very unexpected attitude leaves me no alternative.”

The reply of the Oxbridge Press, although longer delayed, was almost identical in substance with that of its predecessors.

“I do not understand it,” the Canon repeated, and wrote to another publishing house.

He still spoke as though the ultimate appearance of the book were a certainty; even when confronted with a third refusal, but he allowed Lucilla to consult Owen Quentillian.

As the result of a letter to Quentillian’s own publishers, an offer came from them to produce “Leonidas of Alexandria” if the author would advance a substantial sum towards the cost of bringing out the book.

“It’s more than I dared to hope for,” Owen told Lucilla candidly, in private. “Only I’m afraid he’ll still be disappointed, if the book appears and makes no stir.”

“He has thought of it for so many years,” said Lucilla.

“And always as a _magnum opus_--something that the world would recognize?”

“Yes, I think so. But even so, I’m not certain whether he’ll accept these terms.”

“He won’t get better ones,” said Owen with conviction.

They awaited the Canon’s reply. It came, calm and very decided.

“It cannot be. It is not within my power to accept the terms suggested. Thank you, Owen, my dear--and you Lucilla--but my work must await better days--better days.”

For the first time, Owen was struck by the singular sweetness of the Canon’s smile, as he stood with his hand resting on the great bulk of papers that stood to him for the loving preoccupation of many years. No faintest touch of bitterness accompanied his deep disappointment.

“I have had the great pleasure of the work, and it has brought me into close association with many writers, both living and dead. We have derived great benefit from our toil, Lucilla, and if the fruits of reward are to be denied us yet awhile, so be it. You remember the old story of the dying man who bade his sons dig for a treasure beneath the apple-tree. They did so, and the natural yield of the fertile earth was their reward--their own industry proved to be their treasure. If it is to be so with my book, I am content.”

Quentillian’s stern sense of the futility of false hopes kept him silent, but Lucilla said:

“Is it any use to try another publisher?”

The Canon shook his grey head.

“This is neither our first attempt nor our second. No doubt times have changed, and there is no longer the same interest taken in these researches. The wheel will come round in due course, young people, and I make no doubt that Leonidas will yet be given to the world, in God’s good time whether in my day or not. I am very well content.”

He put the heavy package into a drawer, of which he turned the key.

“You remember, Lucilla, the words inscribed upon my front page--‘_Ad majorem Dei gloriam_’? Surely we can trust the fulfilment of those words to Him, and as surely He can justify them in obscurity as in the notoriety of a day. We will say no more about this, children.”

He turned towards Quentillian, and smiled again.

“Nay, dear fellow, there is nothing to look so blank about. I will not deny a natural disappointment, but it is no more than that--no more than that. These things pass....”

Even to Lucilla, in private, the Canon scarcely said more. The one revelation that he did make, hardly surprised her.

“All else apart, I could not have paid the money to that publishing firm. The dear Adrian must be my first consideration at present, and with the increased amount that he is receiving, the drain upon my purse is too heavy to admit of a personal gratification. Some day the dear fellow will pay it all back, I make no doubt, though even were it not so--but it _will_ be so. And now, Lucilla, we will drop the subject. What I have told you is between ourselves, and we need not refer to it again.”

A very little while later, the Canon began to make minute and elaborate notes for a Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians.

Lucilla, according to her wont, acted as his secretary without comment.