When It Was Dark Part 24

His great talent was for organisation, and all his powers in that direction were devoted towards the preservation and unification of the Church to which he was a convert.

Sir Michael's convictions were perfectly clear and straightforward. He believed, with all his heart, in the Catholicity of the Anglican persuasion. Roman priests he spoke of as "members of the Italian mission"; Nonconformists as "adherents to the lawless bands of Dissent."

He allowed the validity of Roman orders and spoke of the Pope as the "Bishop of Rome," an Italian ecclesiastic with whom the English communion had little or nothing to do.

In his intimate and private life Sir Michael lived according to rubric.

His splendid private chapel at Fencastle enjoyed the services of a chaplain, reinforced by priests from a community of Anglican monks which Sir Michael had established in an adjacent village. In London, St.

Mary's was, in some sense, his particular property. He spent fabulous sums on the big Bloomsbury Parish and the needs of its great, cathedral-like church. There was no vicar in London who enjoyed the command of money that Father Ripon enjoyed. Certainly there was no other priest in the ranks of the High Churchmen who was the confidential friend and spiritual director of so powerful a political and social personality.

Yet in his public life Sir Michael was diplomatic enough. He worked steadily for one thing, it is true, but he was far too able to allow people to call him narrow-minded. The Oriental strain of cunning in his blood had sweetened to a wise diplomacy. While he always remembered he was a Churchman, he did not forget that to be an effective and helpful one he must keep his political and social eminence. And so, whatever might take place behind the scenes in the library with Father Ripon, or in the Bloomsbury clergy house, the baronet showed the world the face of a man of the world, and neither obtruded his private views nor allowed them to disturb his colleagues.

The day after the news arrived in Fleet Street from Palestine--while nothing was yet known and Harold Spence was rushing through Amiens _en route_ for Paris and the East--a house party began to collect at Fencastle, the great place in Lincolnshire.

For a day or two a few rather important people were to meet under Sir Michael's roof. Now and then the palace in the fen lands was the scene of notable gatherings, much talked of in certain circles and commented on by people who would truthfully have described themselves as being "in the know."

These parties were, indeed, congresses of the eminent, the "big" people who quietly control an England which the ignorant and the vulgar love to imagine is in the hands of a corrupt society of well-born, "smart," and pleasure-seeking people.

The folk who gathered at Fencastle were as remote from the gambling, lecherous, rabbit-brained set which glitters so brightly before the eyes of the uninformed as any staid, middle-cla.s.s reader of the popular journals.

In this stronghold of English Catholicism--"hot-bed of ritualists" as the brawling "Protestant" journals called it, one met a diversity of people, widely divided in views and only alike in one thing--the dominant quality of their brains and position.

Sir Michael thought it well that even his professed opponents should meet at his table, for it gave both him and his lieutenants new data and fresh impressions for use in the campaign. Sir Michael's convictions were perfectly unalterable, but to find out how others--and those hostile--really regarded them only added to the weapons in his armoury.

And, as one London priest once remarked to another, the combination of a Jewish brain and a Christian heart was one which had already revolutionised Society nearly two thousand years ago in the persons of eleven distinguished instances.

As Father Ripon drove to Liverpool Street Station after lunch, to catch the afternoon train to the eastern counties, he was reading a letter as his cab turned into Cheapside and crawled slowly through the heavy afternoon traffic of the city.

" ... It will be as well for you to see the man _a huisclos_ and form your own opinions. There can be no doubt that he is a force to be reckoned with, and he is, moreover, as I think you will agree after inspection, far more brilliant and able than any other _professed_ antichristian of the front rank. Then there will also be Mrs. Hubert Armstrong. She is a pseudo-intellectual force, but her writings have a certain heaviness and authoritative note which I believe to have real influence with the large cla.s.s of semi-educated people who mistake an _atmosphere_ of knowledge for knowledge itself. A very charming woman, by the way, and I think sincere. Matthew Arnold and water!

"The Duke of Suffolk will stop a night on his way home. He writes that he wishes to see you. As you know, he is just back from Rome, and now that they have definitely p.r.o.nounced against the validity of Anglican orders he is most anxious to have a further chat with you in order to form a working opinion as to _our_ position. From his letter to me, and the extremely interesting account he gives of his interview at the Vatican, I gather that the Roman Church still utterly misunderstands our att.i.tude, and that hopes there are high of the ultimate "conversion" of England. I hope that as a representative of English Churchmen you will be able to define what we think in an unmistakable way. This will have value. Among my other guests you will meet Canon Walke. He is preaching in Lincoln Cathedral on the Sunday, fresh from Windsor. "Render unto Caesar"

will, I allow myself to imagine, not be an unlikely text for his homily.--I am, Father, yours most sincerely,

"M. M."

Still thinking carefully over Sir Michael's letter, Father Ripon bought his ticket and made his way to the platform.

He got into a first-cla.s.s carriage. While in London the priest lived a life of asceticism and simplicity which was not so much a considered thing as the outcome of an absolute and unconscious carelessness about personal and material comfort; when he went thus to a great country house, he complied with convention because it was politic.

He was the grandson of a peer, and, though he laughed at these small points, he wished to meet his friend's opinions in any reasonable way, rather than to flout them.

The carriage was empty, though a pile of newspapers and a travelling rug in one corner showed Father Ripon that he was to have one companion at any rate upon the journey.

He had bought the _Church Times_ at the bookstall and was soon deeply immersed in the report of a Bampton Lecture delivered during the week at the University Church in Oxford.

Some one entered the carriage, the door was shut, and the train began to move out of the station, but he was too interested to look up to see who his companion might be.

A voice broke in upon his thoughts as they were tearing through the wide-spread slums of Bethnal Green.

"Do you mind if I smoke, sir? This isn't a smoking carriage, but we are alone----"

It was an ordinary query enough. "Oh, dear, no!" said the priest.

"Please do, to your heart's content. It doesn't inconvenience _me_."

Father Ripon's quick, breezy manner seemed to interest the stranger. He looked up and saw a personality. Obviously this clergyman was some one of note. The heavy brows, the hawk-like nose, the large, firm, and yet kindly mouth, all these seemed familiar in some vague way.

For his part, Father Ripon experienced much the same sensation as he glanced at the tall stranger. His hair, which could be seen beneath his ordinary hard felt hat, was dark red and somewhat abundant. His features were Semitic, but without a trace of that fulness, and often coa.r.s.eness, which sometimes marks the Jew who has come to the period of middle life.

The large black eyes were neither dull nor lifeless, but simply cold, irresponsive, and alert. A ma.s.sive jaw completed an impression which was remarkable in its fineness and almost sinister beauty.

The priest found it remarkable but with no sense of strangeness. He had seen the man before.

Recognition came to Schuabe first.

"Excuse me," he said, "but surely you are Father Ripon? I am Constantine Schuabe."

Ripon gave a merry chuckle. "I knew I knew you!" he said, "but I couldn't think quite who you were for a moment. Sir Michael tells me you're going to Fencastle; so am I."

Schuabe leaned back in his seat and regarded Father Ripon with a steady and calm scrutiny, somewhat with the manner of a naturalist examining a curious specimen, with a suggestion of aloofness in his eyes.

Suddenly Father Ripon smiled rather sternly, and the deep furrows which sprang into his cheeks showed the latent strength and power of the face.

"Well, Mr. Schuabe," he said abruptly, "the train doesn't stop anywhere for an hour, so w.i.l.l.y-nilly you're locked up with a priest!"

"A welcome opportunity, Father Ripon, to convince one that perhaps the devil isn't as black as he's painted."

"I've read your books," said Ripon, "and I believe you are sincere, Mr.

Schuabe. It's not a personal question at all. At the same time, if I had the power, you know I should cheerfully execute you or imprison you for life, not out of revenge for what you have done, but as a precautionary measure. You should have no further opportunity of doing harm." He smiled grimly as he spoke.

"Rather severe, Father," said Schuabe laughing. "Because I find that in a rational view of history there is no place for a Resurrection and Ascension you would give me your blessing and an _auto da fe_!"

"I rather believe in stern measures, sometimes," answered the clergyman, with an underlying seriousness, though he spoke half in jest. "Not for _all_ heretics, you know--only the dangerous ones."

"You are afraid of _intellect_ when it is brought to bear on these questions."

"I thought that would be your rejoinder. Superficially it is a very telling one, because there is nothing so insidious as a half-truth. In a sense what you say is true. There are a great many Christians whose faith is weak and whose natural inclinations, a.s.sisted by supernatural temptations, are towards a life of sin. Christianity keeps them from it.

Now, your books come in the way of such people as these far more readily and easily than works of Christian apologetics written with equal power.

An _attack_ upon our position has all the elements of popularity and novelty. _It is more seen._ For example, ten thousand people have heard of your _Christ Reconceived_ for every ten who know Lathom's _Risen Master_. You have said the last word for agnosticism and made it widely public, the Master of Trinity Hall has said the last word for Christianity and only scholars know of it. It isn't the strength of your case which makes you dangerous, it's the ignorance of the public and a condition of affairs which makes it possible for you to shout loudest."

"Well, there is at least a half-truth in what you say also, Mr. Ripon,"

said Schuabe. "But you don't seem to have brought anything to eat. Will you share my luncheon basket? There is quite enough for two people."

Father Ripon had been called away after the early Eucharist, and had quite forgotten to have any breakfast.

"Thank you very much," he said; "I will. I suddenly seem to be hungry, and after all there is scriptural precedent for spoiling the Egyptians!"

Both laughed again, sheathed their weapons, and began to eat.

Each of them was a man of the world, cultured, with a charming personality. Each knew the other was impervious to attack.

Only once, as the short afternoon was darkening and they were approaching their destination, did Schuabe refer to controversial subjects. The carriage was shadowed and dusky as they rushed through the desolate fenlands. The millionaire lit a match for a cigarette, and the sudden flare showed the priest's face, set and stern. He seemed to be thinking deeply.