i f6c06dd9cf3fe221 by Unknown (100 books to read in a lifetime .txt) 📗

Hole in corner? The term struck him like a cold douche; the fastidious part of him reared its head. No, he had always been against affairs of that sort; hole-in-comer affairs which had aroused his disgust in others, even while sympathising with tnem. He drew away and settled in his seat again. He was shaking slightly, and his voice betrayed it:

"You're right, Kate; and I'm sorry. But don't let us spoil this hour, it has been so good up till now. Tell me more of yourself; or Annie.

Have you any plans for her? " He fumbled at relighting his pipe.

She didn't answer. And when he cast a quick glance at her, she said dully, "I'd like her to go to a good school."

"Are you going to send her to a convent?"

"No. You see ;.." she hesitated; then went on, "I'm even afraid to put my thoughts into words. I never have done yet ... but ... well, I want to take her away from the Catholic school."

"Really, Kate!" Rodney stopped ramming his pipe in surprise.

"Why?"

"You wouldn't understand as you're not a Catholic. It's religion, religion all the time. Learning takes a second place, especially in the elementary schools. And then there's the fear...."

"Fear, Kate?" He seemed to have forgotten the personal issue of a few minutes ago, and was the professional man once again.

"You think that the religion frightens the children, then?"

"Well, not exactly the religion; because if all the priests were like Father White and Father Bailey and all the teachers were like Miss Cail and Miss Holden you couldn't imagine being frightened. But it's the priests like Father O'Malley and teachers like the headmistress of the Borough Road school who inst il fear into you; and | I don't want Annie to be afraid as I was."

"Go on, Kate; tell me how it affected you. I'm very interested, as I've had a few cases of children being afraid of Hell this past month."

Kate seemed relieved, and begun to talk as if recently the beating of her heart had not threatened to suffocate her: "That was my main fear, too. After my first confession, at the age of seven, I had the idea that hosts of people in Heaven were watching my every move and would report to God on all my misdeeds, and so I would be sent to Hell. I used to placate them, one after the other--the Virgin Mary, Joseph, St.

Anthony, St. Catherine, St. Agnes--and instead of getting relief by going to confession Father O'Malley made it worse, a thousand times worse. After being told I'd end up " in Hell's flames, burning", I had a might mare I dreamed that I was thrown into Hell, falling through layer after layer of terrible blackness, with things in it, not seen but felt, until I reached a red, gaping void. For years that dream recurred, and sometimes, even now, it comes back."

"Are you still afraid?" asked Rodney.

"No, not really; al thought at times I am haunted by vague fears for which I have no explanation. Do you know, I have never prayed to God in my life until recently. The Tolmaches, who practise no religion, have, really brought me nearer to a knowledge of God than I have ever been before."

"Not prayed to God!" exclaimed Rodney.

"To whom did you pray, then?"

"The Holy Family, the saints, the martyrs."

"But what about Jesus, Kate?"

"Jesus? ... Well, Jesus was more frightening than the rest, for he was dead, dead and aweful, so dead that no resurrection could ever bring him to life again. Every Sunday, in church, I sat opposite to him, a life-size Jesus, just taken down from the cross, his limp body trailing to the ground from his mother's arms, his blood realistically red and dripping from his wounds. He was naked but for a loincloth, and all his body had that sickly pallor of death. He was quite dead, and Easter Sunday could do

nothing to bring him to life again. "

"Good heavens, Kate," exclaimed Rodney, 'do you think the statues make the same impression on most children? "

"No," said Kate.

"Some don't seem to mind. But I know I did, and I don't want Annie to suffer in the same way. So that's why I want to take her away from the school and the Borough Road church. But I'll still send her to a Catholic church, for they don't all have such gruesome statues as in the Borough Road church. But whatever I do it's going to be difficult, because as long as she's at home there's my da father to contend with."

"Kate, stick to the decision you have already come to in your mind,"

Rodney entreated her.

"Don't let your father or anyone else turn you from it. I should hate to think of Annie's little mind being tortured like that. And if there's anything I can do to help you with Annie, Kate, you know I will; I'm very fond of her."

"I know that, doctor. You have always been so good to her, and I am very grateful. But it's my father and Father O'Malley I'll have to fight. If only I could take her away;

but I can't. I can't hurt my mother, she's suffered so much.

Everything is so difficult. "

Rodney sought an answer to a question he was asking himself: "Why were you going to Midnight Mass, Kate, feeling about things as you do?"

Kate considered a minute: "Habit, I suppose, and ... yes, because a part of me is attracted by the mass and, I feel, always will be. There is a lot of beauty in the religion if one were allowed to look at it without its coating of Hell and sin. I have thought a