Born in Exile (16 page)

'It's very interesting,' he exclaimed, at a moment when there
was silence throughout the company, 'to hear that Chilvers is
really coming to the front. At Whitelaw it used to be prophesied
that he would be a bishop, and now I suppose he's fairly on the way
to that. Shall we write letters of congratulation to him,
Earwaker?'

'A joint epistle, if you like.'

Mr. Morton, who had brightened since dinner, began to speak
caustically of the form of intellect necessary nowadays in a
popular clergyman.

'He must write a good deal,' put in Earwaker, 'and that in a
style which would have scandalised the orthodox of the last
century. Rationalised dogma is vastly in demand.'

Peak's voice drew attention.

'Two kinds of books dealing with religion are now greatly
popular, and will be for a long time. On the one hand there is that
growing body of people who, for whatever reason, tend to
agnosticism, but desire to be convinced that agnosticism is
respectable; they are eager for anti-dogmatic books, written by men
of mark. They couldn't endure to be classed with Bradlaugh, but
they rank themselves confidently with Darwin and Huxley. Arguments
matter little or nothing to them. They take their rationalism as
they do a fashion in dress, anxious only that it shall be "good
form". Then there's the other lot of people—a much larger class—who
won't give up dogma, but have learnt that bishops, priests, and
deacons no longer hold it with the old rigour, and that one must be
"broad"; these are clamorous for treatises which pretend to
reconcile revelation and science. It's quite pathetic to watch the
enthusiasm with which they hail any man who distinguishes himself
by this kind of apologetic skill, this pious jugglery. Never mind
how washy the book from a scientific point of view. Only let it
obtain vogue, and it will be glorified as the new evangel. The day
has gone by for downright assaults on science; to be marketable,
you must prove that
The Origin of Species
was approvingly
foreseen in the first chapter of Genesis, and that the Apostles'
Creed conflicts in no single point with the latest results of
biblical criticism. Both classes seek to avoid ridicule, and to
adapt themselves to a standard of respectability. If Chilvers goes
in for the newest apologetics, he is bound to be enormously
successful. The man has brains, and really there are so few such
men who still care to go into the Church.'

There was a murmur of laughing approval. The speaker had worked
himself into eloquent nervousness; he leaned forward with his hands
straining together, and the muscles of his face quivering.

'And isn't it surprising,' said Marcella, 'in how short a time
this apologetic attitude has become necessary?'

Peak flashed a triumphant look at her.

'I often rejoice to think of it!' he cried. 'How magnificent it
is that so many of the solemn jackasses who brayed against Darwin
from ten to twenty years ago should live to be regarded as beneath
contempt! I say it earnestly: this thought is one of the things
that make life tolerable to me!'

'You have need of charity, friend Peak,' interposed Earwaker.
'This is the spirit of the persecutor.'

'Nothing of the kind! It is the spirit of justified reason. You
may say that those people were honestly mistaken;—such honesty is
the brand of a brainless obstructive.
They
would have
persecuted, but too gladly! There were, and are, men who would have
committed Darwin to penal servitude, if they had had the power. Men
like Lyell, who were able to develop a new convolution in their
brains, I respect heartily. I only speak of the squalling mass, the
obscene herd of idiot mockers.'

'Who assuredly,' remarked Earwaker, 'feel no shame whatever in
the retrospect of their idiocy. To convert a
mind
is a
subject for high rejoicing; to confute a
temper
isn't worth
the doing.'

'That is philosophy,' said Marcella, 'but I suspect you of often
feeling as Mr. Peak does. I am sure
I
do.'

Peak, meeting an amused glance from the journalist, left his
seat and took up a volume that lay on one of the tables. It was
easy to see that his hands shook, and that there was perspiration
on his forehead. With pleasant tact, Moxey struck into a new
subject, and for the next quarter of an hour Peak sat apart in the
same attitude as before his outburst of satire and invective. Then
he advanced to Miss Moxey again, for the purpose of taking leave.
This was the signal for Earwaker's rising, and in a few minutes
both men had left the house.

'I'll go by train with you,' said Earwaker, as they walked away.
'Farringdon Street will suit me well enough.'

Peak vouchsafed no reply, but, when they had proceeded a little
distance, he exclaimed harshly:

'I hate emancipated women!'

His companion stopped and laughed loudly.

'Yes, I hate emancipated women,' the other repeated, with
deliberation. 'Women ought neither to be enlightened nor dogmatic.
They ought to be sexual.'

'That's unusual brutality on your part.'

'Well, you know what I mean.'

'I know what you think you mean,' said Earwaker. 'But the woman
who is neither enlightened nor dogmatic is only too common in
society. They are fools, and troublesome fools.'

Peak again kept silence.

'The emancipated woman,' pursued his friend, 'needn't be a Miss
Moxey, nor yet a Mrs. Morton.'

'Miss Moxey is intolerable,' said Peak. 'I can't quite say why I
dislike her so, but she grows more antipathetic to me the better I
know her. She has not a single feminine charm—not one. I often feel
very sorry for her, but dislike her all the same.'

'Sorry for her,' mused Earwaker. 'Yes, so do I. I can't like her
either. She is certainly an incomplete woman. But her mind is of no
low order. I had rather talk with her than with one of the imbecile
prettinesses. I half believe you have a sneaking sympathy with the
men who can't stand education in a wife.'

'It's possible. In some moods.'

'In no mood can I conceive such a prejudice. I have no great
attraction to women of any kind, but the uneducated woman I
detest.'

'Well, so do I,' muttered Peak. 'Do you know what?' he added,
abruptly. 'I shall be off to the Pacific. Yes, I shall go this next
winter. My mind is made up.'

'I shan't try to dissuade you, old fellow, though I had rather
have you in sight. Come and see Malkin. I'll drop you a note with
an appointment.'

'Do.'

They soon reached the station, and exchanged but few more words
before Earwaker's leaving the train at Farringdon Street. Peak
pursued his journey towards the south-east of London.

On reaching home, the journalist flung aside his foolish coat of
ceremony, indued a comfortable jacket, lit a pipe with long stem,
and began to glance over an evening newspaper. He had not long
reposed in his arm-chair when the familiar appeal thundered from
without. Malkin once more shook his hand effusively.

'Had my journey to Fulham for nothing. Didn't matter; I ran over
to Putney and looked up my old landlady. The rooms are occupied by
a married couple, but I think we shall succeed in persuading them
to make way for me. I promised to find them lodgings every bit as
good in two days' time.'

'If that is so easy, why not take the new quarters
yourself?'

'Why, to tell you the truth, I didn't think of it!—Oh, I had
rather have the old crib; I can do as I like there, you know.
Confound it! Now I shall have to spend all to-morrow
lodging-hunting for other people. Couldn't I pay a man to do it?
Some confidential agent—private police—you know what I mean?'

'A man of any delicacy,' replied Earwaker, with grave
countenance, 'would feel bound by such a promise to personal
exertion.'

'Right; quite right! I didn't mean it; of course I shall hunt
conscientiously. Oh, I say; I have brought over a couple of
armadilloes. Would you like one?'

'Stuffed, do you mean?'

'Pooh! Alive, man, alive! They only need a little care. I should
think you might keep the creature in your kitchen; they become
quite affectionate.'

The offer was unhesitatingly declined, and Malkin looked hurt.
There needed a good deal of genial explanation before Earwaker
could restore him to his sprightly mood.

'Where have you been dining?' cried the traveller. 'Moxey's—ah,
I remember. But who
is
Moxey? A new acquaintance, eh?'

'Yes; I have known him about six months. Got to know him through
Peak.'

'Peak? Peak? What, the fellow you once told me about—who
disappeared from Whitelaw because of his uncle, the cat's-meat
man?'

'The man's-meat man, rather.'

'Yes, yes—the eating-house; I remember. You have met him again?
Why on earth didn't you tell me in your letters? What became of
him? Tell me the story.'

'Certainly, if you will cease to shake down plaster from the
ceiling.—We met in a restaurant (appropriate scene), happening to
sit at the same table. Whilst eating, we stared at each other
fitfully. "I'll be hanged if that isn't Peak," I kept saying to
myself. And at the same moment we opened our lips to question each
other.'

'Just the same thing happened once to a friend of mine and a
friend of his. But it was on board ship, and both were devilish
seasick. Walker—you remember my friend Walker?—tells the story in a
side-splitting way. I wonder what has become of Walker? The last
time I met him he was travelling agent for a menagerie—a most
interesting fellow, Walker.—But I beg your pardon. Go on, old
fellow!'

'Well, after that we at once saw a good deal of each other. He
has been working for years at a chemical factory down on the river;
Moxey used to be there, and got him the place.'

'Moxey?—Oh yes, the man you dined with. You must remember that
these are new names to me. I must know all these new people, I say.
You don't mind?'

'You shall be presented to the whole multitude, as soon as you
like. Peak wants to see you. He thinks of an excursion like this
last of yours.'

'He does? By Jove, we'll go together! I have always wanted a
travelling companion. We'll start as soon as ever he likes!—well,
in a month or two. I must just have time to look round. Oh, I
haven't done with the tropics yet! I must tell him of a rattling
good insect-powder I have invented; I think of patenting it. I say,
how does one get a patent? Quite a simple matter, I suppose?'

'Oh, always has been. The simplest and least worrying of all
business enterprises.'

'What? Eh? That smile of yours means mischief.'

In a quarter of an hour they had got back to the subject of
Peak's history.

'And did he really run away because of the eating-house?' Malkin
inquired.

'I shall never venture to ask, and it's not very likely he will
admit it. It was some time before he cared to talk much of
Whitelaw.'

'But what is he doing? You used to think he would come out
strong, didn't you? Has he written anything?'

'A few things in
The Liberator
, five or six years
ago.'

'What, the atheistic paper?'

'Yes. But he's ashamed of it now. That belongs to a bygone stage
of development.'

'Turned orthodox?'

Earwaker laughed.

'I only mean that he is ashamed of the connection with
street-corner rationalism.'

'Quite right. Devilish low, that kind of thing. But I went in
for it myself once. Did I ever tell you that I debated with a
parson on Mile-end Waste? Fact! That was in my hot-headed days. A
crowd of coster-mongers applauded me in the most flattering way.—I
say, Earwaker, you haven't any whisky?'

'Forgive me; your conversation makes me forget hospitality.
Shall I make hot water? I have a spirit-kettle.'

'Cold for me. I get in such a deuced perspiration when I begin
to talk.—Try this tobacco; the last of half a hundred-weight I took
in at Bahia.'

The traveller refreshed himself with a full tumbler, and resumed
the conversation cheerily.

'Has he just been wasting his time, then, all these years?'

'He goes in for science—laboratory work, evolutionary
speculations. Of course I can't judge his progress in such matters;
but Moxey, a clever man in the same line, thinks very highly of
him.'

'Just the fellow to travel with. I want to get hold of some
solid scientific ideas, but I haven't the patience to work
steadily. A confounded fault of mine, you know, Earwaker,—want of
patience. You must have noticed it?'

'Oh—well, now and then, perhaps.'

'Yes, yes; but of course I know myself better. And now tell me
about Moxey. A married man, of course?'

'No, lives with a sister.'

'Unmarried sister?—Brains?'

'Pretty well supplied with that commodity.'

'You must introduce me to her. I do like women with brains.—

'Orthodox or enlightened?'

'Bitterly enlightened.'

'Really? Magnificent! Oh, I must know her. Nothing like an
emancipated woman! How any man can marry the ordinary female passes
my understanding. What do
you
think?'

'My opinions are in suspense; not yet precipitated, as Peak
might say.'

One o'clock sounded from neighbouring churches, but Malkin was
wide awake as ever. He entered upon a detailed narrative of his
travels, delightful to listen to, so oddly blended were the strains
of conscious and unconscious humour which marked his personality.
Two o'clock; three o'clock;—he would have talked till
breakfast-time, but at last Earwaker declared that the hour had
come for sleep. As Malkin had taken a room at the Inns of Court
Hotel, it was easy for him to repair to his quarters. The last his
friend heard of him was an unexplained laugh, echoing far down the
staircase.

Peak's destination was Peckham Rye. On quitting the railway, he
had a walk of some ten minutes along a road which smelt of new
bricks and stucco heated by the summer sun; an obscure passage led
him into a street partly of dwelling-houses, partly of shops, the
latter closed. He paused at the side door of one over which the
street lamp dimly revealed—'Button, Herbalist'.