The King's Achievement - Robert Hugh Benson (good short books txt) 📗

to me the other day," went on Ralph, excited by his success. "He told me you knew Horace too well."

"And that my morals were corrupted by him," went on More. "I know he thinks that, but I had the honour of confuting him the other day with regard to the flagon and gloves. Now, there is a subject for Martial, Mr. Torridon. A corrupt statesman who has retired on his ill-gotten gains disproves an accusation of bribery. Let us call him Atticus 'Attice ... Attice' ...--We might say that he put on the gloves lest his forgers should be soiled while he drank from the flagon, or something of the kind."

Sir Thomas's eyes beamed with delight as he talked. To make an apt classical quotation was like wine to him, but to have it capped appropriately was like drunkenness. Ralph blessed his stars that he had been so lucky, for he was no great scholar, and he guessed he had won his host's confidence.

Dinner passed on quietly, and as they rose from table More came round and took his guest by the arm.

"You must come with me and see my New Building," he said, "you are worthy of it, Mr. Torridon."

He still held his arm affectionately as they walked out into the garden behind the house, and as he discoursed on the joys of a country life.

"What more can I ask of God?" he said. "He has given me means and tastes to correspond, and what man can say more. I see visions, and am able to make them realities. I dream of a dovecote with a tiled roof, and straightway build it; I picture a gallery and a chapel and a library away from the clack of tongues, and behold there it is. The eye cannot say to the hand, 'I have no need of thee.' To see and dream without the power of performance is heart-breaking. To perform without the gift of imagination is soul-slaying. The man is blessed that hath both eye and hand, tastes and means alike."

It was a very pleasant retreat that Sir Thomas More had built for himself at the end of his garden, where he might retire when he wanted solitude. There was a little entrance hall with a door at one corner into the chapel, and a long low gallery running out from it, lined with bookshelves on one side, and with an open space on the other lighted by square windows looking into the garden. The polished boards were bare, and there was a path marked on them by footsteps going from end to end.

"Here I walk," said More, "and my friends look at me from those shelves, ready to converse but never to interrupt. Shall we walk here, Mr. Torridon, while you tell me your business?"

Ralph had, indeed, a touch of scrupulousness as he thought of his host's confidence, but he had learnt the habit of silencing impulses and of only acting on plans deliberately formed; so he was soon laying bare his anxiety about Chris, and his fear that he had been misled by the Holy Maid.

"I am very willing, Mr. More," he said, "that my brother should be a monk if it is right, but I could not bear he should be so against God's leading. How am I to know whether the maid's words are of God or no?"

Sir Thomas was silent a moment.

"But he had thoughts of it before, I suppose," he said, "or he would not have gone to her. In fact, you said so."

Ralph acknowledged that this was so.

"--And for several years," went on the other.

Again Ralph assented.

"And his tastes and habits are those of a monk, I suppose. He is long at his prayers, given to silence, and of a tranquil spirit?"

"He is not always tranquil," said Ralph. "He is impertinent sometimes."

"Yes, yes; we all are that. I was very impertinent to you at dinner in trying to catch you with Martial his epigram, though I shall not offend again. But his humour may be generally tranquil in spite of it. Well, if that is so, I do not see why you need trouble about the Holy Maid. He would likely have been a monk without that. She only confirmed him."

"But," went on Ralph, fighting to get back to the point, "if I thought she was trustworthy I should be the more happy."

"There must always be doubtfulness," said More, "in such matters. That is why the novitiate is so severe; it is to show the young men the worst at once. I do not think you need be unhappy about your brother."

"And what is your view about the Holy Maid?" asked Ralph, suddenly delivering his point.

More stopped in his walk, cocked his head a little on one side like a clever dog, and looked at his companion with twinkling eyes.

"It is a delicate subject," he said, and went on again.

"That is what puzzles me," said Ralph. "Will you not tell me your opinion, Mr. More?"

There was again a silence, and they reached the further end of the gallery and turned again before Sir Thomas answered.

"If you had not answered me so briskly at dinner, Mr. Torridon, do you know that I should have suspected you of coming to search me out. But such a good head, I think, cannot be allied with a bad heart, and I will tell you."

Ralph felt a prick of triumph but none of remorse.

"I will tell you," went on More, "and I am sure you will keep it private. I think the Holy Maid is a good woman who has a maggot."

Ralph's spirits sank again. This was a very non-committing answer.

"I do not think her a knave as some do, but I think, to refer to what we said just now, that she has a large and luminous eye, and no hand worth mentioning. She sees many visions, but few facts. That tale about the Host being borne by angels from Calais to my mind is nonsense. Almighty God does not work miracles without reason, and there is none for that. The blessed sacrament is the same at Dover as at Calais. And a woman who can dream that can dream anything, for I am sure she did not invent it. On other matters, therefore, she may be dreaming too, and that is why once more I tell you that to my mind you can leave her out of your thoughts with regard to your brother. She is neither prophetess nor pythoness."

This was very unsatisfactory, and Ralph strove to remedy it.

"And in the matter of the King's death, Mr. More?" he said.

Again Sir Thomas stopped in his walk.

"Do you know, Mr. Torridon, I think we may leave that alone," he said a little abruptly. And Ralph sucked in his lip and bit it sharply at the consciousness of his own folly.

"I hope your brother will be very happy," went on the other after a moment, "and I am sure he will be, if his call is from God, as I think likely. I was with the Carthusians myself, you know, for four years, and sometimes I think I should have stayed there. It is a blessed life. I do not envy many folks, but I do those. To live in the daily companionship of our blessed Lord and of his saints as those do, and to know His secrets--secreta Domini--even the secrets of His Passion and its ineffable joys of pain--that is a very fortunate lot, Mr. Torridon. I sometimes think that as it was with Christ's natural body so it is with His mystical body: there be some members, His hands and feet and side, through which the nails are thrust, though indeed there is not one whole spot in His body--inglorious erit inter viros aspectus ejus--nos putavimus eum quasi leprosum--but those parts of His body that are especially pained are at once more honourable and more happy than those that are not. And the monks are those happy members."

He was speaking very solemnly, his voice a little tremulous, and his kindly eyes were cast down, and Ralph watched him sidelong with a little awe and pity mingled. He seemed so natural too, that Ralph thought that he must have over-rated his own indiscretion.

A shadow fell across the door into the garden as they came near it, and one of the girls appeared in the opening.

"Why, Meg," cried her father, "what is it, my darling?"

"Beatrice has come, sir," said the girl. "I thought you would wish to know."

More put out his arm and laid it round his daughter's waist as she turned with him.

"Come, Mr. Torridon," he said, "if you have no more to say, let us go and see Beatrice."

There was a group on the lawn under one of the lime trees, two or three girls and Mr. Roper, who all rose to their feet as the three came up. More immediately sat down on the grass, putting his feet delicately together before him.

"Will, fetch this gentleman a chair. It is not fit for Master Cromwell's friend to sit on the grass like you and me."

Ralph threw himself down on the lawn instantly, entreating Mr. Roper not to move.

"Well, well," said Sir Thomas, "let be. Sit down too, Will, et cubito remanete presso. Mr. Torridon understands that, I know, even if Master Cromwell's friend does not. Why, tillie-vallie, as Mrs. More says, I have not said a word to Beatrice. Beatrice, this is Mr. Ralph Torridon, and this, Mr. Torridon, is Beatrice. Her other name is Atherton, but to me she is a feminine benediction, and nought else."

Ralph rose swiftly and looked across at a tall slender girl that was sitting contentedly on an outlying root of the lime tree, beside of Sir Thomas, and who rose with him.

"Mr. More cannot let my name alone, Mr. Torridon," she said tranquilly, as she drew back after the salute. "He made a play upon it the other day."

"And have been ashamed of it ever since," said More; "it was sacrilege with such a name. Now, I am plain Thomas, and more besides. Why did you send for me, Beatrice?"

"I have no defence," said the girl, "save that I wanted to see you."

"And that is the prettiest defence you could have made--if it does not amount to corruption. Mr. Torridon, what is the repartee to that?"

"I need no advocate," said the girl; "I can plead well enough."

Ralph looked up at her again with a certain interest. She seemed on marvellously good terms with the whole family, and had an air of being entirely at her ease. She had her black eyes bent down on to a piece of grass that she was twisting into a ring between her slender jewelled fingers, and her white teeth wore closed firmly on her lower lip as she worked. Her long silk skirts lay out unregarded on the grass, and her buckles gleamed beneath. Her voice was pleasant and rather deep, and Ralph found himself wondering who she was, and why he had not seen her before, for she evidently belonged to his class, and London was a small place.

"I see you are making one more chain to bind me to you," said More presently, watching her.

She held it up.

"A ring only," she said.

"Then it is not for me," said More,