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The Pretty Lady: A Novel, a novel by Arnold Bennett |
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Chapter 10. The Mission |
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_ The great dim place was full, but crowding had not been permitted. With a few exceptions in the outlying parts, everybody had a seat. G.J. was favourably placed for seeing the whole length of the interior. Accustomed to the restaurants of fashionable hotels, auction-rooms, theatrical first-nights, the haunts of sport, clubs, and courts of justice, he soon perceived, from the numerous samples which he himself was able to identify, that all the London worlds were fully represented in the multitude--the official world, the political, the clerical, the legal, the municipal, the military, the artistic, the literary, the dilettante, the financial, the sporting, and the world whose sole object in life apparently is to be observed and recorded at all gatherings to which admittance is gained by privilege and influence alone. There were in particular women the names and countenances and family history of whom were familiar to hundreds of thousands of illustrated-newspaper readers, even in the most distant counties, and who never missed what was called a "function," whether "brilliant," "exclusive," or merely scandalous. At murder trials, at the sales of art collections, at the birth of musical comedies, at boxing matches, at historic debates, at receptions in honour of the renowned, at luscious divorce cases, they were surely present, and the entire Press surely noted that they were present. And if executions had been public, they would in the same religious spirit have attended executions, rousing their maids at milkmen's hours in order that they might assume the right cunning frock to fit the occasion. And they were here. And no one could divine why or how, or to what eternal end. G.J. hated them, and he hated the solemn self-satisfaction that brooded over the haughty faces of the throng. He hated himself for having accepted a ticket from the friend in the War Office who was now sitting next to him. And yet he was pleased, too. A disturbed conscience could not defeat the instinct which bound him to the whole fashionable and powerful assemblage. For ever afterwards, to his dying hour, he could say--casually, modestly, as a matter of course, but he could still say--that he had been there. The Lord Mayor and Sheriffs, tradesmen glittering like Oriental potentates, passed slowly across his field of vision. He thought with contempt of the City, living ghoulish on the buried past, and obstinately and humanly refusing to make a pile of its putrefying interests, set fire to it, and perish thereon. The music began. It was the Dead March in _Saul_. The long-rolling drums suddenly rent the soul, and destroyed every base and petty thought that was there. Clergy, headed by a bishop, were walking down the cathedral. At the huge doors, nearly lost in the heavy twilight of November noon, they stopped, turned and came back. The coffin swayed into view, covered with the sacred symbolic bunting, and borne on the shoulders of eight sergeants of the old regiments of the dead man. Then followed the pall-bearers--five field-marshals, five full generals, and two admirals; aged men, and some of them had reached the highest dignity without giving a single gesture that had impressed itself on the national mind; nonentities, apotheosised by seniority; and some showed traces of the bitter rain that was falling in the fog outside. Then the Primate. Then the King, who had supervened from nowhere, the magic production of chamberlains and comptrollers. The procession, headed by the clergy, moved slowly, amid the vistas ending in the dull burning of stained glass, through the congregation in mourning and in khaki, through the lines of yellow-glowing candelabra, towards the crowd of scarlet under the dome; the summit of the dome was hidden in soft mist. The music became insupportable in its sublimity. G.J. was afraid, and he did not immediately know why he was afraid. The procession came nearer. It was upon him.... He knew why he was afraid, and he averted sharply his gaze from the coffin. He was afraid for his composure. If he had continued to watch the coffin he would have burst into loud sobs. Only by an extraordinary effort did he master himself. Many other people lowered their faces in self-defence. The searchers after new and violent sensations were having the time of their lives. The Dead March with its intolerable genius had ceased. The coffin, guarded by flickering candles, lay on the lofty catafalque; the eight sergeants were pretending that their strength had not been in the least degree taxed. Princes, the illustrious, the champions of Allied might, dark Indians, adventurers, even Germans, surrounded the catafalque in the gloom. G.J. sympathised with the man in the coffin, the simple little man whose non-political mission had in spite of him grown political. He regretted horribly that once he, G.J., who protested that he belonged to no party, had said of the dead man: "Roberts! Well-meaning of course, but senile!" ... Yet a trifle! What did it matter? And how he loathed to think that the name of the dead man was now befouled by the calculating and impure praise of schemers. Another trifle! As the service proceeded G.J. was overwhelmed and lost in the grandeur and terror of existence. There he sat, grizzled, dignified, with the great world, looking as though he belonged to the great world; and he felt like a boy, like a child, like a helpless infant before the enormities of destiny. He wanted help, because of his futility. He could do nothing, or so little. It was as if he had been training himself for twenty years in order to be futile at a crisis requiring crude action. And he could not undo twenty years. The war loomed about him, co-extensive with existence itself. He thought of the sergeant who, as recounted that morning in the papers, had led a victorious storming party, been decorated--and died of wounds. And similar deeds were being done at that moment. And the simple little man in the coffin was being tilted downwards from the catafalque into the grave close by. G.J. wanted surcease, were it but for an hour. He longed acutely, unbearably, to be for an hour with Christine in her warm, stuffy, exciting, languorous, enervating room hermetically sealed against the war. Then he remembered the tones of her voice as she had told her Belgian adventures.... Was it love? Was it tenderness? Was it sensuality? The difference was indiscernible; it had no importance. Against the stark background of infinite existence all human beings were alike and all their passions were alike. The gaunt, ruthless autocrat of the War Office and the frail crowned descendant of kings fronted each other across the open grave, and the coffin sank between them and was gone. From the choir there came the chanted and soothing words: _Steals on the ear the distant triumph-song_. G.J. just caught them clear among much that was incomprehensible. An intense patriotism filled him. He could do nothing; but he could keep his head, keep his balance, practise magnanimity, uphold the truth amid prejudice and superstition, and be kind. Such at that moment seemed to be his mission.... He looked round, and pitied, instead of hating, the searchers after sensations. A being called the Garter King of Arms stepped forward and in a loud voice recited the earthly titles and honours of the simple little dead man; and, although few qualities are commoner than physical courage, the whole catalogue seemed ridiculous and tawdry until the being came to the two words, "Victoria Cross". The being, having lived his glorious moments, withdrew. The Funeral March of Chopin tramped with its excruciating dragging tread across the ruins of the soul. And finally the cathedral was startled by the sudden trumpets of the Last Post, and the ceremony ended. "Come and have lunch with me," said the young red-hatted officer next to G.J. "I haven't got to be back till two-thirty, and I want to talk music for a change. Do you know I'm putting in ninety hours a week at the W.O.?" "Can't," G.J. replied, with an affectation of jauntiness. "I'm engaged for lunch. Sorry." "Who you lunching with?" "Mrs. Smith." The Staff officer exclaimed aghast: "Conception?" "Yes. Why, dear heart?" "My dear chap. You don't know. Carlos Smith's been killed. _She_ doesn't know yet. I only heard by chance. News came through just as I left. Nobody knows except a chap or two in Casualties. They won't be sending out to-day's wires until two or three o'clock." G.J., terrified and at a loss, murmured: "What am I to do, then?" "You know her extremely well, don't you? You ought to go and prepare her." "But how can I prepare her?" "I don't know. How do people prepare people?... Poor thing!" G.J. fought against the incredible fact of death. "But he only went out six days ago! They haven't been married three weeks." The central hardness of the other disclosed itself as he said: "What's that got to do with it? What does it matter if he went out six days ago or six weeks ago? He's killed." "Well--" "Of course you must go. Indicate a rumour. Tell her it's probably false, but you thought you owed it to her to warn her. Only for God's sake don't mention me. We're not supposed to say anything, you know." G.J. seemed to see his mission, and it challenged him. _ |
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