CHAPTER XV

LEANNESS OF SOUL

Life meandered on in the village. Mrs. Yellam spent her mornings at Pomfret Court; Fancy took her place in the afternoon; they were together during the light-lengthening evenings. By this happy arrangement, two women, not of the same temperament, never saw too much of each other. They met at supper, glad to exchange the mild gossip of the day. And, always, after uneasy matutinal hours, Fancy felt a renewed zest in life, an appetite for work amongst the "boys," and a delightful consciousness that physical strength--heretofore lacking--was slowly coming to fortify a frail body against the still far-off ordeal. She learnt much from Mrs. Yellam, and said so with flattering reiteration. Mrs. Yellam may have learnt more from her, but she did not say so. That, perhaps, constituted the essential difference between them. Fancy's thoughts and ideas bubbled out of her mind, effervescent, like water from a chalybeate spring. Mrs. Yellam had suppressed her intimate thoughts since childhood. What she said, indeed, masked her real feelings, conveying to others an impression of shrewdness, cocksureness and unruffled calm. It would be grossly unfair to speak of this as a pose. Since girlhood, she had been shrewd, sure of herself, and calm. Now, when she was past sixty, these comfortable and admirable attributes deserted her. She judged herself quite as severely as she judged her neighbours. She knew that, inwardly, she was questioning her wisdom, her cherished convictions, and her unruffled deportment.

"I be a whited sepulchre," she told Solomon.

Nevertheless, during these Spring days, when May was dancing in the woods and across the fields, rest and refreshment fell upon Mrs. Yellam's perplexed mind. By sheer force of will, for her own sake and for Fancy's sake, she called "Pax" to introspection, and, like a schoolboy, almost believed that the kindliest dew from heaven had fallen upon her. During this month, too, Alfred happened to be out of the danger zone, busy with new drafts who had not yet been under fire. And everybody in Nether-Applewhite predicted that the war must end soon because sheer exhaustion, military and economic, affected so tremendously the belligerents. Upon this _cheval de bataille_ Sir Geoffrey Pomfret rode over all obstacles. Old Captain Davenant bestrode just such another charger. Uncle, you may be sure, ran with them, throwing his tongue, speaking to a breast-high scent.

"We be nigh the end on't," he told his cronies. "They Proosians be more fed up wi' mud and blood than us. I talks of what I knows. The slaughter o' they Huns be so fearsome that Kayser Bill be a-thinkin' night and day o' polligammy."

"Polly--who? I never heard tell o' she, Uncle."

To this interruption Uncle replied with something of his sister's majesty.

"Ah-h-h! This war'd be over now, if beastly ignerunce ran mute. Polligammy be practised, as I told old Captain, by cannibals and such. For why? Because they eats up the young men, and then there bain't husbands enough to go round. Polligammy allows a man to marry so many wives as he's a mind to."

"Lard preserve our dear lives!"

"Yes, my sonnies, that's how life be preserved amongst savage tribes. They Huns be cannibals and worse. When I told Squire as they fellers used corps to make them tasty Bolony sausages, he couldn't believe me; but 'tis a fact."

"How do you know?" asked William Saint.

"Never you mind how I knows, Saint Willum. I don't never help myself to what isn't mine. I nourishes meself wi' sober truth, not lies. Where be I? Ah, yes. Well, neighbours, they be come to that pretty pass, polligammy. I allows that one wife be enough for me."

"More than enough, 'tis said, Uncle."

"You be seldom right, my man, but times you hit the mark. Now, I figures it out this way. They Huns be savages, but not fools. One wife be more'n enough for any man, and if so be as Kayser Bill makes polligammy the law in German land, why, I says they won't stick it. 'Tis the beginning o' the end."

An old gaffer was not sure about this. Women in Germany, so he'd been told, worked with dogs in carts. A farmer with fifty wives might get a lot of work out of them. The gaffer spoke with some authority, having buried three wives in his time. All present knew that they had worked hard for their husband. Uncle, however, after more strong talk and weak ale, convinced his audience that peace would be declared before October. Wiser folk held the same opinion.

The villagers, at last, were beginning to feel the pinch of war. Wages had risen, greatly to their satisfaction, but prices outstripped them. The local store closed shutters, because the proprietor was called up. The baker was baking bread somewhere in the North Sea. On Sundays Mrs. Yellam and other housewives ate cold victuals for dinner, unless they stayed away from Morning Service to make hot beef-and-kidney puddings. Shopping had to be done in Salisbury. This meant increased business for the carrier. But, unhappily, Alfred's _locum tenens_ lacked the executive ability to cope successfully with a glut of orders.

In August, William Saint began a daily service to the county town. Peace fled, silently, from Mrs. Yellam's pillow.

In September, worse followed. Fortune, cruel jade, lashed out at Mrs. Yellam, striking her hard below the belt. Alfred's resplendent 'bus was knocked into a deep ditch by a huge Government trolley, which rolled serenely on--undamaged.

_Et tu, Brute----!_

Try to picture Mrs. Yellam's feelings. The 'bus was out of action. That in itself might be deemed a serious mishap, to use a word often in Nether-Applewhite mouths, a word applicable to murders, chicken-pox, frozen water-pipes and other domestic disasters. External and internal injuries to the car might be set right in six weeks or so. Skilled mechanics in Salisbury were overworked. No definite promise could be extracted from the firm that sold the 'bus to Alfred. But the driver, the middle-aged man whom, with all his faults, Mrs. Yellam had come to regard as a tower of sobriety and honesty, sustained concussion of the brain. He soon recovered from this but, alas! his nerve was gone. Obstinately, deaf to Fancy's coaxing and to Mrs. Yellam's trenchant protestations, he tendered notice. How could he be replaced? By the time that the 'bus was in order again--insurance covered all damage--William Saint would have captured Alfred's faithful customers; the faithless were his already.

But what rankled so bitterly in Mrs. Yellam's heart, and would have provoked the Caesarean apostrophe had she indulged in quotations from the Swan of Avon, was the tormenting reflection that the Army had dealt her this parlous blow, the Army she loved, because Alfred was part of it. Rampaging on, like a ruthless Juggernaut, the trolley had crashed into the 'bus, wiping it out, killing it and burying it in a ditch.

Sympathy flowed into the Yellam cottage from all points of the compass, a generous flood upon which Fancy floated buoyantly. Poor Mrs. Yellam sank beneath it, helplessly aware of its significance. Everybody, of course, knew that Alfred's business was bound up in the 'bus, ditched indefinitely, perhaps forever. The cynical thought obtruded itself, grinning derisively; help was proffered so eagerly, because it could not be accepted.

Satan had triumphed again.

Uncle was nearly as much upset as the 'bus. The gallant fellow offered his services to his sister.

"Look 'ee here, Susan. I be a man o' parts. 'Tis no trick for me to larn motor-drivin'. To use a figure o' speech, I be a born shover, clever, as you be, wi' my brain and my fingers. Such a thatcher as Habakkuk Mucklow be fit for anything. I feel it in me, dear, to command armies. Say the word, and I'll declare war wi' Saint Willum; I'll downscramble 'un in two jiffs."

Mrs. Yellam thanked him, but the word was not said.

She appeared to accept misfortune with grim resignation. Not even to Fancy dared she unveil her heart. Alone with Solomon, she permitted a few words to escape.

"My faith, Solly, be on the wing again. Why should God Almighty raise His hand against an old 'ooman? He might ha' seen fit to cripple me wi' rheumatics. I could ha' borne that wi'out whimpering. But why do He exalt Willum Saint? That's what tears me, my dog."

Solomon spared no effort of mind or body in the attempt to assure his mistress that these high matters were apprehended by all dumb animals. Conscious of failure, he became very dejected.

A letter from Alfred heartened her a little.

"Dear Mother:" (he wrote) "I hope this finds you in the pink, as it leaves me. Don't worry about the old 'bus! _I don't, not a bit._ I have a notion that if you worry much 'twill be bad for Fancy and for Somebody Else, you know who I mean. As for William Saint, I say this--take a squint at his face! I wouldn't have his liver for the best carrying business in the world. If you've set your dear heart on my punching a rascal's head, I'll do it, so soon as I get back, and make a job of it, too. Hard blows hurt them as get them; hard thoughts hurt them as think them. I puzzled that out in the trenches, where we be making very merry again. You'll worry too about the loss of money. I say to that--_Napoo_! That's French. I parleyvoo with the best of them, but when it comes to buying stuff, they do me in a fair treat...."

Mrs. Yellam read and re-read the letter. Fancy was at the Court when it came. Then she said to Solomon:

"Wherever does that boy o' mine get his Christian principles? Not from me, Solly, not from me. Wag tail, little man, and I'll tell 'ee for why. Willum Saint, next Christmas, maybe, 'll take such a head to Salisbury as never was."

Sol barked.

Alfred's sentence about merry-making in the trenches provoked much thought. Mrs. Yellam had talked freely with scores of wounded Tommies. They came, they conquered all reserves, they went. Some actually complained that life in Nether-Applewhite seemed "dull" after the "fun" in the dug-outs. At first, she suspected "leg-pulling," but she limped to the slow conclusion that the high spirits of these gallant fellows came _from_ the trenches, and were not, as she had supposed at first, a natural result of finding themselves snug and safe after shell-fire. Possessing the qualities which distinguish a "tufting" hound--a good nose for a scent, staying powers, and tenacity in sticking to her quarry, Mrs. Yellam decided, ultimately, that millions of young men and women were living, like gnats, for the passing hour, buzzing gaily here and there, utterly regardless of past and future.

Could she bring herself to so happy a condition of mind?

"Take no thought for the morrow."

That injunction couldn't be ignored. Nevertheless, she had ignored it all her life. Hence, from a material point of view, her sound economic condition. She was independent of the 'bus.

Such thoughts were obsessing, also, the parson of the parish.

Hamlin was quite as handicapped as Mrs. Yellam by principles adopted long ago which he deemed, before the war, to be bomb-proof. He had pinned his faith to the masses, dismissing the classes as effete and lapped in luxury and indifference. All workers appealed to him irresistibly; men and women of leisure rather exasperated him. He held with Matthew Arnold that conduct was three-fourths of life, whereas culture might or might not claim the odd quarter.

The masses had disappointed him. The classes seemed to have justified their claim to superiority not in mere education but in a capacity and willingness to scrap self-interest which astounded him. He had expected, too, a tremendous upward movement from German Socialists. Indeed, he had regarded the Socialists of Europe as a band of brothers prepared to stand shoulder to shoulder against autocracy.

And they had not done so.

He could find for the masses, not at the front, all the excuses which fell so glibly from the lips of Democracy's champions. Strikers complained of lack of good faith on the part of the Government, of local injustices, of this and that, but the fact remained that self-interest swayed them, as it had swayed the privileged classes before the war. The tables seemed to be turned. Aristocracy, governed possibly by its fine motto, "_Noblesse oblige_," hurled self-interest to the void; Democracy picked it up and hugged it. Indisputable evidence exhibited Labour as rejoicing in an increased wage, and spending pounds a week upon luxuries, many actually praying that the war might continue, because they believed that the end of it would mean a return to dull, grinding pre-war conditions.

And Hamlin admitted sorrowfully to himself that if the war did end suddenly, leaving Labour triumphant, insatiate for more and more wealth, and in a position to dictate terms to Capital, that the country would be plunged into abysmal depths, depths in which new tyrants would impose a new slavery without any of the restrictions which culture and tradition had prescribed upon the former autocrats and plutocrats.

He envisaged England at the mercy of the mob!

With pleasure and relief he turned from the Industrials to the Soldiers. What a fine spirit animated them! With Mrs. Yellam, he had arrived, by a different road, at the same conclusion.

Our men of all ranks were facing unspeakable horrors with a laugh.

How had it come to pass?

According to Hamlin's teaching, a supreme Sacrifice, a Divine Atonement, had regenerated the pagan world. Did sacrifice make not only for regeneration but for joyousness? Lionel Pomfret, still on his crutches, was joyous. The Squire, after the sale of many heirlooms, was joyous. A finer humanity informed him, radiating from him.

The Parson pondered these things in his heart. He might have found another object-lesson in William Saint. He was unmistakably prospering, making money hand over fist. But he was not joyous.

Very reluctantly, Hamlin decided that the time for peace might be far distant, if the designs of Omnipotence were rightly apprehended by him. Armageddon would continue till pain had purged the whole world, till materialism in its hydraheaded forms was slain by spirituality, by a faith, simple as that preached by the Nazarene, which counted worldly gain as naught if such gain involved the loss of the soul.

Faithful to his promise to Alfred, Hamlin kept a watchful eye on Mrs. Yellam. Her empty pew had affected him poignantly. He thought of empty pews throughout Europe. They stood mute witnesses against teachers and preachers, against creeds that crumbled when the cannon thundered. He respected this old woman for braving gossip by staying at home. She had moral courage, nearly as rare and even more precious than common-sense. But when she came back to her pew, when he heard her loud responses, he realised sadly that her son, not her God, had found this wandering sheep and led it back to the fold.

At any moment the pew might be empty again.

Next Sunday, he took for his text the verse out of the hundredth-and-sixth Psalm:

"_And He gave them their desire; but withal He sent leanness into their soul._"

No coincidence was involved in this choice of a text. Fancy Broomfield, before she married, had asked her master to explain "leanness of soul." He had said a few simple words. Afterwards, he jotted down some notes and put them away.

He re-read these notes, thinking of William Saint, whose activities had not escaped his notice. But he wrote the sermon with a wider application. And although he had to bear in mind the limited intelligence of his congregation, what he set down constituted an indictment of a material, world-wide prosperity.

Hamlin began by reminding his parishioners of what he had said in his sermon on patriotism: the soul in its essence was always right.

"What there is of it," he added impressively. "Some souls are very lean."

Jane Mucklow maintained afterwards that the Parson looked hard at Uncle. Uncle was equally positive that austere eyes dwelt on Jane. Mrs. Yellam sat bolt upright in her pew with Fancy beside her. William Saint assumed an air of detachment. He attended church once a week to curry favour with his Squire and landlord. He held Hamlin in some disdain, because so able a man had pushed himself no farther along preferment's highway than Nether-Applewhite. A man who had played cricket for the Gentlemen of England ought surely to be a dean at least, if he had any gumption in him.

Hamlin repeated the text.

"I want you to notice," he said, in his quiet voice, "that the word 'soul' is used in the singular. God sent leanness into the soul of His people. Nations, therefore, like individuals, possess souls.

"Has leanness entered into our national soul?

"We have prospered exceedingly. We are even richer than our expert accountants deemed us to be. Some of you may have glanced casually at the stupendous figures which set forth the wealth and resources of the British Empire. We forget to consider how this vast wealth is piled up. It is not my purpose to consider that with you, to-day. But such consideration is the duty of those who are able to deal intelligently with these astounding figures.

"We have been, in short, given our desire.

"In the text you will note that God gave His people their desire; and then He sent leanness into their souls.

"What was their desire? The Psalmist informs us in the context. God's Chosen People had wandered from Him. They had corrupted themselves, as we read in Exodus. I will cite one instance known to the youngest child here: they had set up and worshipped the calf of Horeb, the golden calf, which has stood forth ever since as the symbol of Mammon, the symbol of material prosperity. They wanted this golden calf, and God gave it to them. And then He sent leanness into their soul.

"To many of us this text presents difficulties. Is it wrong for a nation to desire worldly prosperity? Is it wrong for an individual, for any one of us, to desire to better one's condition in life, to rise, as it is called, in the world? Most certainly not. Such a desire is firmly rooted in every healthy nation, in every healthy man and woman. It is basic, the mainspring of human endeavour and human advancement, rooted in nations and individuals by God.

"The desire, then, in its simplest form, must be right. Its accomplishment may be utterly wrong.

"Desires change their character during accomplishment. Thrift, for instance, may degenerate into parsimony; temperance, if uncontrolled, leads to intemperance; the noblest ambitions may become insensate; proper care of the body, which I have commended to you, may end in vanity; love, alas! is often deformed into lust. All that is obvious. Nobody here questions it.

"Desires, then, face two ways. They may lead us to God or away from Him; they may enrich or impoverish the soul.

"But why, you may ask, does God, as in the text, deliberately gratify soul-impoverishing desires in a nation, with the knowledge and therefore with the intention of making the soul of that nation lean?

"The answer is plain. Nations, like individuals, exercise the privilege of free-will. The choice between good and evil is theirs, as it is mine, and yours.

"How can we tell whether the soul of a nation be lean?

"There is an infallible test, the same test which each of us must apply to ourselves. Never forget that what we think, we are. What we go on thinking, we become. By a nation's thoughts, by your own thoughts, the soul's stature may be measured. If the thoughts of a nation, if your own thoughts, dwell habitually upon self-advancement and self-indulgence, be sure that the soul is dwindling instead of expanding. If our thoughts, collectively or individually, are hard, jealous thoughts concerning other nations, the soul is growing lean. But when we think of others with love animating our thoughts, and if that love, in ever-widening circles, includes not only our friends but all, all who claim from us pity and consideration, then it is very well with the soul. It is expanding, and it is capable of an expansion so immense that, like Time and Space, no finite mind can measure it. Hate impoverishes souls and bodies. A man under the influence of violent passion is physically the worse. Any doctor will tell you that. A nation convulsed by hate is physically weaker. Violence is not strength. It may appear to be so for a brief time. In a stand-up fight, between two men, the man who loses his temper is likely to lose the victory. At this moment, a gospel of hate is convulsing our enemies. We may, and must, hate what they have done, the atrocious crimes perpetrated by and for Authority, but let us beware of hating, as they hate, because such rancour eats away the soul. Let us remember Who said: 'God forgive them, for they know not what they do!'

"Let us consider more attentively the desires of a nation and their direction--upward or downward. I repeat emphatically that the desires of a nation are the desires of the individual immeasurably multiplied.

"And, first, I should like to suggest to you that desires concerned with material ends, such as money, or any other worldly ambition, are generally gratified, provided we work for them hard enough.

"When are desires soul-impoverishing? How can we tell when a nation or an individual, after rising steadily upward, reaches a point from which they and he, as steadily, descend?

"The answer may be found in the Book of Micah: 'He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good, and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?'

"In itself a nation can achieve much, so can an individual; but if self-advancement, in any form, whether modest or far-reaching, relies upon itself and takes to itself the credit and glory, then we are not walking humbly with God, but speeding from Him along a road that may lead to success, as the world interprets success, but which leads, also, to disappointment, disillusionment, and often at the last--despair.

"The great conquerors of history have not been happy men.

"Everything that is done vaingloriously turns to ashes. From that sad thought we may take this much consolation. Ashes, as you farmers know, are great fertilisers. I know of no greater proof of God's wisdom and mercy than this: the ashes of our failures do, so I believe, cause good to bloom out of evil.

"If it be true that leanness has been sent into the soul of this nation, if we have not walked humbly with God, what can be done? The answer is to be found not only in the Bible, but in every chapter of the world's history. We must make atonement by sacrifice."

He paused, and many remembered that pause afterwards. The preacher stood erect, but his eyes were not on the congregation. They looked out dreamily into a world in anguish. Tears trickled down Fancy's cheeks. With her quick sensibilities, she divined that the Parson's thoughts had flown to France, where his Benjamin was fighting, not in hate, none who knew the boy could believe that, but inspired by the faith that a selfless Cause would triumph. Instantly, her own thoughts flew to Alfred. If--if sacrifice were demanded of her--? She looked up. Some intuition told her that Hamlin was ready for any sacrifice. His face appeared calm. But she became aware of tension, as if a far-seeing man were braced against impending calamity. She recalled stories current in the village after the _Lusitania_ was torpedoed: stories of men who had confronted death without a tremor. Surely, at such a moment God stood with them.

Would He stand with her, if Alfred did not come back?

She stole a glance at Mrs. Yellam.

Her face remained impassive. But again intuition told Fancy that this outward calmness masked bitter trouble and perplexity. Timidly she slipped her hand into the hand of the old woman, pressing it gently. The pressure was not returned, because, perhaps, it may not have been felt. Mrs. Yellam, Fancy perceived, was staring at a mural tablet to the right of the pulpit, new and shining brass upon which were inscribed the names of two nephews of Captain Davenant. He had read the Lessons, as usual, but in a less rasping voice, so she had thought. She heard Hamlin's quiet tones:

"Let us prepare ourselves for greater sacrifices."

The rest of the sermon was devoted to particular rather than general ends. The Parson appealed, as was his wont, to the children, and the younger members of the congregation, the twigs waiting to be inclined. And to these his appeal was persuasive and suggestive, never didactic or minatory. He shone best when conducting a children's service, when he walked amongst them using the simplest words.

Perhaps he knew that the middle-aged and old could be touched to finer issues indirectly. In every heart, however worn and tired, there lingers a subtle fragrance of youth which thought of youth releases. The sad fact that many of the elder people were mourning may have tempered what speech he addressed to them, and many of them were aware of this, shifting uneasily in their pews as they remembered similar words spoken in the same place by the same man twenty years back.

Once more, Mrs. Yellam walked home in silence. Fancy, engrossed by her own thoughts, did not speak till they entered the cottage. Then she said, hesitatingly:

"'Tis strange. We talked of lean souls the first day Alfie brought me to see you."

"Ay--so we did."

"And afterwards I asked Mr. Hamlin to tell me what 'lean souls' meant."

"Did 'ee? He never looked once at me this marning."

"Why should he?"

Mrs. Yellam answered heavily:

"I dunno. But I'd a notion that he had me in mind. 'Twas a notable sermon, but----"

"Yes?"

"He ain't been tried as I have."

She went upstairs slowly to take off her bonnet and shawl.

Upon the following Wednesday, the sermon assumed a fresh importance and significance.

Edward Hamlin was killed in action.