Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood

CHAPTER XV. DR DUNCAN’S STORY

On the next Sunday but one—which was surprising to me when I considered the manner of our last parting—Catherine Weir was in church, for the second time since I had come to the place. As it happened, only as Spenser says—

—and why I say this, will appear afterwards—I had, in preaching upon, that is, in endeavouring to enforce the Lord’s Prayer by making them think about the meaning of the words they were so familiar with, come to the petition, “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors;” with which I naturally connected the words of our Lord that follow: “For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; but if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.” I need not tell my reader more of what I said about this, than that I tried to show that even were it possible with God to forgive an unforgiving man, the man himself would not be able to believe for a moment that God did forgive him, and therefore could get no comfort or help or joy of any kind from the forgiveness; so essentially does hatred, or revenge, or contempt, or anything that separates us from man, separate us from God too. To the loving soul alone does the Father reveal Himself; for love alone can understand Him. It is the peace-makers who are His children.

This I said, thinking of no one more than another of my audience. But as I closed my sermon, I could not help fancying that Mrs Oldcastle looked at me with more than her usual fierceness. I forgot all about it, however, for I never seemed to myself to have any hold of, or relation to, that woman. I know I was wrong in being unable to feel my relation to her because I disliked her. But not till years after did I begin to understand how she felt, or recognize in myself a common humanity with her. A sin of my own made me understand her condition. I can hardly explain now; I will tell it when the time comes. When I called upon her next, after the interview last related, she behaved much as if she had forgotten all about it, which was not likely.

In the end of the week after the sermon to which I have alluded, I was passing the Hall-gate on my usual Saturday’s walk, when Judy saw me from within, as she came out of the lodge. She was with me in a moment.

“Mr Walton,” she said, “how could you preach at Grannie as you did last Sunday?”

“I did not preach at anybody, Judy.”

“Oh, Mr Walton!”

“You know I didn’t, Judy. You know that if I had, I would not say I had not.”

“Yes, yes; I know that perfectly,” she said, seriously. “But Grannie thinks you did.”

“How do you know that?”

“By her face.”

“That is all, is it?”

“You don’t think Grannie would say so?”

“No. Nor yet that you could know by her face what she was thinking.”

“Oh! can’t I just? I can read her face—not so well as plain print; but, let me see, as well as what Uncle Stoddart calls black-letter, at least. I know she thought you were preaching at her; and her face said, ‘I shan’t forgive YOU, anyhow. I never forgive, and I won’t for all your preaching.’ That’s what her face said.”

“I am sure she would not say so, Judy,” I said, really not knowing what to say.

“Oh, no; she would not say so. She would say, ‘I always forgive, but I never forget.’ That’s a favourite saying of hers.”

“But, Judy, don’t you think it is rather hypocritical of you to say all this to me about your grandmother when she is so kind to you, and you seem such good friends with her?”

She looked up in my face with an expression of surprise.

“It is all TRUE, Mr Walton,” she said.

“Perhaps. But you are saying it behind her back.”

“I will go home and say it to her face directly.”

She turned to go.

“No, no, Judy. I did not mean that,” I said, taking her by the arm.

“I won’t say you told me to do it. I thought there was no harm in telling you. Grannie is kind to me, and I am kind to her. But Grannie is afraid of my tongue, and I mean her to be afraid of it. It’s the only way to keep her in order. Darling Aunt Winnie! it’s all she’s got to defend her. If you knew how she treats her sometimes, you would be cross with Grannie yourself, Mr Walton, for all your goodness and your white surplice.”

And to my yet greater surprise, the wayward girl burst out crying, and, breaking away from me, ran through the gate, and out of sight amongst the trees, without once looking back.

I pursued my walk, my meditations somewhat discomposed by the recurring question:—Would she go home and tell her grandmother what she had said to me? And, if she did, would it not widen the breach upon the opposite side of which I seemed to see Ethelwyn stand, out of the reach of my help?

I walked quickly on to reach a stile by means of which I should soon leave the little world of Marshmallows quite behind me, and be alone with nature and my Greek Testament. Hearing the sound of horse-hoofs on the road from Addicehead, I glanced up from my pocket-book, in which I had been looking over the thoughts that had at various moments passed through my mind that week, in order to choose one (or more, if they would go together) to be brooded over to-day for my people’s spiritual diet to-morrow—I say I glanced up from my pocket-book, and saw a young man, that is, if I could call myself young still, of distinguished appearance, approaching upon a good serviceable hack. He turned into my road and passed me. He was pale, with a dark moustache, and large dark eyes; sat his horse well and carelessly; had fine features of the type commonly considered Grecian, but thin, and expressive chiefly of conscious weariness. He wore a white hat with crape upon it, white gloves, and long, military-looking boots. All this I caught as he passed me; and I remember them, because, looking after him, I saw him stop at the lodge of the Hall, ring the bell, and then ride through the gate. I confess I did not quite like this; but I got over the feeling so far as to be able to turn to my Testament when I had reached and crossed the stile.

I came home another way, after one of the most delightful days I had ever spent. Having reached the river in the course of my wandering, I came down the side of it towards Old Rogers’s cottage, loitering and looking, quiet in heart and soul and mind, because I had committed my cares to Him who careth for us. The earth was round me—I was rooted, as it were, in it, but the air of a higher life was about me. I was swayed to and fro by the motions of a spiritual power; feelings and desires and hopes passed through me, passed away, and returned; and still my head rose into the truth, and the will of God was the regnant sunlight upon it. I might change my place and condition; new feelings might come forth, and old feelings retire into the lonely corners of my being; but still my heart should be glad and strong in the one changeless thing, in the truth that maketh free; still my head should rise into the sunlight of God, and I should know that because He lived I should live also, and because He was true I should remain true also, nor should any change pass upon me that should make me mourn the decadence of humanity. And then I found that I was gazing over the stump of an old pollard, on which I was leaning, down on a great bed of white water-lilies, that lay in the broad slow river, here broader and slower than in most places. The slanting yellow sunlight shone through the water down to the very roots anchored in the soil, and the water swathed their stems with coolness and freshness, and a universal sense, I doubt not, of watery presence and nurture. And there on their lovely heads, as they lay on the pillow of the water, shone the life-giving light of the summer sun, filling all the spaces between their outspread petals of living silver with its sea of radiance, and making them gleam with the whiteness which was born of them and the sun. And then came a hand on my shoulder, and, turning, I saw the gray head and the white smock of my old friend Rogers, and I was glad that he loved me enough not to be afraid of the parson and the gentleman.

“I’ve found it, sir, I do think,” he said, his brown furrowed old face shining with a yet lovelier light than that which shone from the blossoms of the water-lilies, though, after what I had been thinking about them, it was no wonder that they seemed both to mean the same thing,—both to shine in the light of His countenance.

“Found what, Old Rogers?” I returned, raising myself, and laying my hand in return on his shoulder.

“Why He was displeased with the disciples for not knowing—”

“What He meant about the leaven of the Pharisees,” I interrupted. “Yes, yes, of course. Tell me then.”

“I will try, sir. It was all dark to me for days. For it appeared to me very nat’ral that, seeing they had no bread in the locker, and hearing tell of leaven which they weren’t to eat, they should think it had summat to do with their having none of any sort. But He didn’t seem to think it was right of them to fall into the blunder. For why then? A man can’t be always right. He may be like myself, a foremast-man with no schoolin’ but what the winds and the waves puts into him, and I’m thinkin’ those fishermen the Lord took to so much were something o’ that sort. ‘How could they help it?’ I said to myself, sir. And from that I came to ask myself, ‘Could they have helped it?’ If they couldn’t, He wouldn’t have been vexed with them. Mayhap they ought to ha’ been able to help it. And all at once, sir, this mornin’, it came to me. I don’t know how, but it was give to me, anyhow. And I flung down my rake, and I ran in to the old woman, but she wasn’t in the way, and so I went back to my work again. But when I saw you, sir, a readin’ upon the lilies o’ the field, leastways, the lilies o’ the water, I couldn’t help runnin’ out to tell you. Isn’t it a satisfaction, sir, when yer dead reckonin’ runs ye right in betwixt the cheeks of the harbour? I see it all now.”

“Well, I want to know, old Rogers. I’m not so old as you, and so I MAY live longer; and every time I read that passage, I should like to be able to say to myself, ‘Old Rogers gave me this.’”

“I only hope I’m right, sir. It was just this: their heads was full of their dinner because they didn’t know where it was to come from. But they ought to ha’ known where it always come from. If their hearts had been full of the dinner He gave the five thousand hungry men and women and children, they wouldn’t have been uncomfortable about not having a loaf. And so they wouldn’t have been set upon the wrong tack when He spoke about the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees; and they would have known in a moment what He meant. And if I hadn’t been too much of the same sort, I wouldn’t have started saying it was but reasonable to be in the doldrums because they were at sea with no biscuit in the locker.”

“You’re right; you must be right, old Rogers. It’s as plain as possible,” I cried, rejoiced at the old man’s insight. “Thank you. I’ll preach about it to-morrow. I thought I had got my sermon in Foxborough Wood, but I was mistaken: you had got it.”

But I was mistaken again. I had not got my sermon yet.

I walked with him to his cottage and left him, after a greeting with the “old woman.” Passing then through the village, and seeing by the light of her candle the form of Catherine Weir behind her counter, I went in. I thought old Rogers’s tobacco must be nearly gone, and I might safely buy some more. Catherine’s manner was much the same as usual. But as she was weighing my purchase, she broke out all at once:

“It’s no use your preaching at me, Mr Walton. I cannot, I WILL not forgive. I will do anything BUT forgive. And it’s no use.”

“It is not I that say it, Catherine. It is the Lord himself.”

I saw no great use in protesting my innocence, yet I thought it better to add—

“And I was not preaching AT you. I was preaching to you, as much as to any one there, and no more.”

Of this she took no notice, and I resumed:

“Just think of what HE says; not what I say.”

“I can’t help it. If He won’t forgive me, I must go without it. I can’t forgive.”

I saw that good and evil were fighting in her, and felt that no words of mine could be of further avail at the moment. The words of our Lord had laid hold of her; that was enough for this time. Nor dared I ask her any questions. I had the feeling that it would hurt, not help. All I could venture to say, was:

“I won’t trouble you with talk, Catherine. Our Lord wants to talk to you. It is not for me to interfere. But please to remember, if ever you think I can serve you in any way, you have only to send for me.”

She murmured a mechanical thanks, and handed me my parcel. I paid for it, bade her good night, and left the shop.

“O Lord,” I said in my heart, as I walked away, “what a labour Thou hast with us all! Shall we ever, some day, be all, and quite, good like Thee? Help me. Fill me with Thy light, that my work may all go to bring about the gladness of Thy kingdom—the holy household of us brothers and sisters—all Thy children.”

And now I found that I wanted very much to see my friend Dr Duncan. He received me with his stately cordiality, and a smile that went farther than all his words of greeting.

“Come now, Mr Walton, I am just going to sit down to my dinner, and you must join me. I think there will be enough for us both. There is, I believe, a chicken a-piece for us, and we can make up with cheese and a glass of—would you believe it?—my own father’s port. He was fond of port—the old man—though I never saw him with one glass more aboard than the registered tonnage. He always sat light on the water. Ah, dear me! I’m old myself now.”

“But what am I to do with Mrs Pearson?” I said. “There’s some chef-d’oeuvre of hers waiting for me by this time. She always treats me particularly well on Saturdays and Sundays.”

“Ah! then, you must not stop with me. You will fare better at home.”

“But I should much prefer stopping with you. Couldn’t you send a message for me?”

“To be sure. My boy will run with it at once.”

Now, what is the use of writing all this? I do not know. Only that even a tete-a-tete dinner with an old friend, now that I am an old man myself, has such a pearly halo about it in the mists of the past, that every little circumstance connected with it becomes interesting, though it may be quite unworthy of record. So, kind reader, let it stand.

We sat down to our dinner, so simple and so well-cooked that it was just what I liked. I wanted very much to tell my friend what had occurred in Catherine’s shop, but I would not begin till we were safe from interruption; and so we chatted away concerning many things, he telling me about his seafaring life, and I telling him some of the few remarkable things that had happened to me in the course of my life-voyage. There is no man but has met with some remarkable things that other people would like to know, and which would seem stranger to them than they did at the time to the person to whom they happened.

At length I brought our conversation round to my interview with Catherine Weir.

“Can you understand,” I said, “a woman finding it so hard to forgive her own father?”

“Are you sure it is her father?” he returned.

“Surely she has not this feeling towards more than one. That she has it towards her father, I know.”

“I don’t know,” he answered. “I have known resentment preponderate over every other feeling and passion—in the mind of a woman too. I once heard of a good woman who cherished this feeling against a good man because of some distrustful words he had once addressed to herself. She had lived to a great age, and was expressing to her clergyman her desire that God would take her away: she had been waiting a long time. The clergyman—a very shrewd as well as devout man, and not without a touch of humour, said: ‘Perhaps God doesn’t mean to let you die till you’ve forgiven Mr–.’ She was as if struck with a flash of thought, sat silent during the rest of his visit, and when the clergyman called the next day, he found Mr – and her talking together very quietly over a cup of tea. And she hadn’t long to wait after that, I was told, but was gathered to her fathers—or went home to her children, whichever is the better phrase.”

“I wish I had had your experience, Dr Duncan,” I said.

“I have not had so much experience as a general practitioner, because I have been so long at sea. But I am satisfied that until a medical man knows a good deal more about his patient than most medical men give themselves the trouble to find out, his prescriptions will partake a good deal more than is necessary of haphazard.—As to this question of obstinate resentment, I know one case in which it is the ruling presence of a woman’s life—the very light that is in her is resentment. I think her possessed myself.

“Tell me something about her.”

“I will. But even to you I will mention no names. Not that I have her confidence in the least. But I think it is better not. I was called to attend a lady at a house where I had never yet been.”

“Was it in–?” I began, but checked myself. Dr Duncan smiled and went on without remark. I could see that he told his story with great care, lest, I thought, he should let anything slip that might give a clue to the place or people.

“I was led up into an old-fashioned, richly-furnished room. A great wood-fire burned on the hearth. The bed was surrounded with heavy dark curtains, in which the shadowy remains of bright colours were just visible. In the bed lay one of the loveliest young creatures I had ever seen. And, one on each side, stood two of the most dreadful-looking women I had ever beheld. Still as death, while I examined my patient, they stood, with moveless faces, one as white as the other. Only the eyes of both of them were alive. One was evidently mistress, and the other servant. The latter looked more self-contained than the former, but less determined and possibly more cruel. That both could be unkind at least, was plain enough. There was trouble and signs of inward conflict in the eyes of the mistress. The maid gave no sign of any inside to her at all, but stood watching her mistress. A child’s toy was lying in a corner of the room.”

I may here interrupt my friend’s story to tell my reader that I may be mingling some of my own conclusions with what the good man told me of his. For he will see well enough already that I had in a moment attached his description to persons I knew, and, as it turned out, correctly, though I could not be certain about it till the story had advanced a little beyond this early stage of its progress.

“I found the lady very weak and very feverish—a quick feeble pulse, now bounding, and now intermitting—and a restlessness in her eye which I felt contained the secret of her disorder. She kept glancing, as if involuntarily, towards the door, which would not open for all her looking, and I heard her once murmur to herself—for I was still quick of hearing then—‘He won’t come!’ Perhaps I only saw her lips move to those words—I cannot be sure, but I am certain she said them in her heart. I prescribed for her as far as I could venture, but begged a word with her mother. She went with me into an adjoining room.

“‘The lady is longing for something,’ I said, not wishing to be so definite as I could have been.

“The mother made no reply. I saw her lips shut yet closer than before.

“‘She is your daughter, is she not?’

“‘Yes,’—very decidedly.

“‘Could you not find out what she wishes?’

“‘Perhaps I could guess.’

“‘I do not think I can do her any good till she has what she wants.’

“‘Is that your mode of prescribing, doctor?’ she said, tartly.

“‘Yes, certainly,’ I answered—‘in the present case. Is she married?’

“‘Yes.’