Love and Money (25 page)

“You remember Eliza, John,” said Lucy at his elbow: “Mrs. James Brigg, you know.”

The introduction was perhaps not unnecessary, for the former Eliza Starbotton had changed so much since her marriage that for a moment Mr. Aquile had not recognised her. The wonderful fair hair was still as abundant as ever, though now draped in over-elaborate coils about her head; but her brilliant complexion had faded and her rounded features, once almost baby-like in their contour and texture, looked pinched and pale.

“We go to Salem,” she said hastily, rising from a chair by the fire and giving him her hand.

“Yes, yes. And these are your children,” said Mr. Aquile, seating himself beside his wife on a settee and taking the little girl by the hand.

“Yes. Alice and Henry,” said Mrs. Brigg, smoothing
Alice's fair hair. “I didn't know it was the Dorcas meeting— I just called in to see mother—James is coming to fetch us soon.”

At first, naturally, Alice was shy and hung back, and Baby Henry, sucking his thumb in his mother's arms, gazed in solemn question at the newcomer. But Mr. Aquile, as has been said, was quite irresistible to children. He was genuinely and seriously interested in them, and talked to them about their affairs without any of that facetious and factitious condescension which children so abominate. Besides, his hands were strong and gentle, his smile loving and warm. They felt safe with him. In no time at all Alice was sitting on his knee describing the dolls' pram which her grandfather had brought from London for her, and Baby Henry was playing a kind of infant tattoo with Mr. Aquile's left hand.

There was the sound of arrivals at the front door and Councillor Starbotton bustled cheerfully in, followed by his son-in-law.

James Joshua Henry Brigg was at this time in appearance a younger edition of his grandfather: shortish, solid, swarthy, high-coloured, not unhandsome, with the strong, blunt features of an obstinate man. He walked straight over to Mr. Aquile and lifted Alice peremptorily out of his lap. Eliza exclaimed, and the husband and wife exchanged a look.

Years of married misery were in that look. To anyone with eyes to see it was clear that James Joshua Henry Brigg had been bitterly jealous of Eliza's attendance at Mr. Aquile's literature classes and admiration for Mr. Aquile during their engagement; that he had married her after the Trust Deed row out of obstinacy, lust of the flesh and a determination not to be bossed by anyone, even his grandfather; that as soon as he had her to wife he thought he had paid too high a price for her and did not scruple to let her know it. In Eliza's look, for those who could see, there was the angry resentment of the spoiled child deprived of its cosseting, the misery of the woman despised by her husband,
and the proud determination never to let her father know her wretchedness. Now Mr. Aquile's perceptions were extremely keen, extremely sensitive; keener and more sensitive perhaps than those of anyone else at that time in Annotsfield.

“James!” said Eliza, reproving her husband's rudeness.

“Well, lovey!” said James Brigg to Alice in a loud hearty tone, kissing her and in general playing the doting father to her—this was not all affectation, for he doted indeed on Alice; but he did not object to exaggerating his devotion to vex his wife and make her jealous. Alice, who as children do instinctively knew all this, with a side glance of triumph down at her mother threw her arms ecstatically round her father's neck.

“Mr. Aquile is here, James,” said Eliza in a cool light tone.

“Oh! How do you do, Mr. Aquile?” said James in an offhand tone, smiling.

“We are just leaving—I fear we must not wait for that cup of tea,” said Mr. Aquile, starting up.

“Oh, but it's here now,” wailed Mrs. Starbotton, advancing into the room, teapot in hand.

“Aye, drink it up before you go—it's perishing cold outside,” said Councillor Starbotton, who had noticed nothing amiss.

The pastor drank the cup of scalding tea in record time, and the Aquiles left.

“James Brigg has become a disagreeable young man, I think,” said Lucy to her husband, as arm in arm they fought their way home through the driving sleet under one umbrella. “I don't think Eliza is very happy with him.”

Mr. Aquile sighed. “I fear not,” he said.

It was in the early hours of the following morning that Lucy suddenly started awake. Some sound had broken her sleep, she knew not what. She stretched out her hand towards her husband, but his place was empty. Then a long shuddering sigh came out of the darkness. Lucy sat up, tossing her heavy russet plaits back over her shoulders, and taking matches from a candlestick which stood at the bedside, made a light. Her husband was revealed kneeling by
the bed in an attitude of prayer, his hands stretched out and clenched in tense supplication, his head bowed upon the coverlet. Not presuming to intrude upon his devotions, Lucy silently plucked a shawl from a nearby chair and laid it gently over his shoulders. He raised his head; his face was agonised—white, distorted, and beaded with sweat.

“John! Are you ill?” exclaimed Lucy, alarmed.

“Only in soul,” whispered John Aquile.

“In soul? Few have healthier souls than you,” said Lucy firmly.

“No. Lucy, I was wrong. I acted in pride, in spiritual arrogance.”

“Never!” said Lucy.

“Yes—in the matter of the Trust Deed. I am not sure that I was right.”

“But I am sure, husband,” said Lucy, gently caressing his hair.

“Look at the terrible consequences of my action.”

“Emmanuel is a splendid consequence.”

“But that poor young woman this afternoon, and her husband. Their lives are ruined. Full of hate and bitterness. Even the child—even that little Alice, Lucy—is being led into wickedness and sin.”

“You must not take the sins of others upon your shoulders, John.”

“And your uncle's death was all my fault.”

“It was not you who brought the Chancery action.”

“I provoked it.”

“But look at Emmanuel, John!” exclaimed Lucy. “Emmanuel is doing the Lord's work magnificently. Annotsfield would be spiritually poorer without Emmanuel. It is an example to all, a shining light. If you had not fought the Trust Deed, Emmanuel would not exist.”

“The balance of good and evil in the consequences of my actions is very difficult to judge,” said Mr. Aquile, frowning.

“It is not for you to judge.
God is the judge”
quoted Lucy firmly.

“Yes. Yes. Perhaps you are right. One must do one's
best and leave the rest. My own Lucy, what should I do without you?”

He seemed reassured; his face resumed its usual contours, he exclaimed in a natural tone that he was cold, sprang into bed and soon fell heavily asleep.

Nevertheless, this was the beginning of the first of his three nervous breakdowns. He woke next morning with a severe headache, rose only by a strong effort of will, and could eat no breakfast. The weather was still very inclement, and Lucy urged him to stay in. He agreed apathetically and sat down at his desk to make notes for his next Sunday's sermon. But when Lucy took him a bowl of broth a couple of hours later the paper was still blank and he lay slumped in his chair, his eyes closed, his forehead a knot of pain. When she spoke his name he opened his eyes and gazed at her with infinite weariness, but did not move or answer.

The doctor whom Lucy summoned diagnosed severe nervous overstrain, culminating in collapse.

“Consider what he has been through, Mrs. Aquile,” he said, “in the last few years! All that trouble in Resmond Street, and the Chancery case, and then the burden of the building of the new church! Anxiety, worry, public criticism, public ordeal, a load of responsibility, and all the time incessant mental work. Mr. Aquile is so sensitive, too, so warm-hearted; he feels everything more than most men. He needs a complete rest. Three months' holiday at least. Take him away from Annotsfield and don't let him look at a book.”

The congregation, deeply distressed by the thought that their young pastor had sacrificed his health to bring them fame—for Emmanuel was certainly famous these days— contributed handsomely to a holiday fund, and Mr. and Mrs. Aquile set off for Switzerland for three months.

As soon as the train left Annotsfield Mr. Aquile began to look better; his listless eyes brightened, his leaden complexion took on a clearer hue. Amid the superb mountain scenery— the peaks, the pines, the rushing torrents, the clear crisp sunny air—he gradually regained health. Always a great
walker, he presently began to make long excursions with guides or even by himself, Lucy remaining at the hotel, for she saw he wished to be alone with himself and his God. On returning from one of these he kissed her with especial tenderness, and she felt a change in his appearance and demeanour without being able to define exactly what it was.

“You are happier now, dearest?” she ventured.

“Yes. I have wrestled out a course of action for myself. I cannot undo the past, Lucy, but I can atone for it by the future. That is my duty and I will strive to perform it.”

“I do not believe any atonement is called for,” said Lucy staunchly. “Your actions were noble.”

Her husband gave her a sad smile and shook his head.

“But that it is your duty to lead and guide Emmanuel, I do believe,” concluded Lucy.

They returned to England. Only Lucy saw how her husband's ease and confidence clouded, how the burden seemed to increase upon his shoulders, with every yard they advanced towards Annotsfield. When at last they were actually in their little home, whence the pointed tower of Emmanuel could be seen, the whole weight of the stone buildings seemed to bear down upon his neck. He made a great effort—only Lucy knew how great—and took up his duties with even more zeal, if that were possible, than before. His sermons during this period, on texts relating to responsibility, humility, vainglory, and kindred subjects, had a profundity, a poignancy which really astonished his hearers; hard-headed business men and practical, realistic Yorkshire housewives actually sobbed aloud as they listened. He was unanimously invited to preside at a Yorkshire missionary conference to be held in Annotsfield—a rare honour for so young a man. He carried out his duties to admiration and closed the highly successful conference amid universal applause. But next morning as he and his wife were dressing, Lucy heard a low sigh of distress and turning to him saw that he had buttoned his shirt unevenly and was fumbling in vain with clumsy fingers to set it right. He swayed on his feet and in a moment fell forward into her arms.

This time Lucy felt they could not call upon the congregation for aid. But there were always plenty of friends who were only too glad, or whose parents were only too glad, to give Mr. Aquile hospitality. He paid short visits to one or two such friends, without his wife, and returned apparently restored to health.

But now the Emmanuel congregation had to suffer all the pangs of pity for Mr. Aquile which Resmond Street had suffered on account of old Mr. Tolefree, and these pangs were increased by the fact of Mr. Aquile's youth. It was Mr. Aquile now who grew terribly thin, whose shoulders bowed, who gave out announcements incorrectly, whose sentences in prayer and sermon trailed off, not certainly into shapeless mumblings but into agonised searchings, as yet ultimately successful, for words. This was sad enough in an old minister of many years' service, but in a man still in his late thirties it was heartrending. Lucy privately urged the doctor to persuade her husband to
read
his sermons. The doctor did so with some skill, strictly forbidding Mr. Aquile to indulge in any extempore speaking, as though it were a luxury, and it was clear that the veto was a relief to the young pastor. But the first time he read a sermon in Emmanuel such a ripple of horrified astonishment ran through the congregation that he could not but feel it, and his talk thereafter was often turned to the time when he should be able to preach without manuscript again. He was determined to do it, he said, with a kind of humble cheerfulness which harrowed his hearers, and was practising learning by heart and reciting short paragraphs, in preparation.

Only Lucy knew what self-command he had to exercise to force himself to enter Emmanuel at all. To him the big church, the crowded school, were emblems, reminders, of his own sin. Even Lucy, because she was niece to old Mr. Tolefree, of whose death he believed himself guilty, reminded him of his sin. As for her black silk dress—which after all these years still remained, a trifle modified, her best, its durability a tribute to Alderman Brigg's purse—Mr. Aquile looked at it as a flagellant saint of old might have
looked at his scourge. Yet he struggled on manfully, Sunday by Sunday reading short essays (which grew more and more confused) in the church which he had once enthralled by his eloquence, and attending every meeting where his presence was officially required.

At last there came a Sunday when, as he stood in the pulpit with his manuscript before him, Lucy to her horror saw him sway upon his feet. He began to read, but could only continue with the greatest difficulty; his face was white and became beaded with sweat as he proceeded, and he held tightly to the wooden rail before him. His subject was atonement. At the end, in a clear ringing voice more like his former tones than any he had used of late, he said:

“My friends, I offer you my apologies for not having done this important subject the justice which it and you deserve.”

“You'll have to take another holiday,” said Councillor Starbotton—he was still not an Alderman owing to Alderman Brigg's machinations—seriously to him before Sunday School that afternoon.

“Do you think so?” said Mr. Aquile sadly.

“I'm sure of it. Go off tomorrow morning for a couple of weeks. Somewhere bracing, by the sea. Why not Blackpool?”

“The rough seas there are often very fine,” put in Lucy.

“Yes—well—if you think so,” said Mr. Aquile mildly. “I own I should be glad of a rest.”