A Laodicean

Chapter 8

That evening Somerset was so preoccupied with these things

that he left all his sketching implements out-of-doors in the

castle grounds. The next morning he hastened thither to

secure them from being stolen or spoiled. Meanwhile he was

hoping to have an opportunity of rectifying Paula's mistake

about his personality, which, having served a very good

purpose in introducing them to a mutual conversation, might

possibly be made just as agreeable as a thing to be explained

away.

He fetched his drawing instruments, rods, sketching-blocks and

other articles from the field where they had lain, and was

passing under the walls with them in his hands, when there

emerged from the outer archway an open landau, drawn by a pair

of black horses of fine action and obviously strong pedigree,

in which Paula was seated, under the shade of a white parasol

with black and white ribbons fluttering on the summit. The

morning sun sparkled on the equipage, its newness being made

all the more noticeable by the ragged old arch behind.

She bowed to Somerset in a way which might have been meant to

express that she had discovered her mistake; but there was no

embarrassment in her manner, and the carriage bore her away

without her making any sign for checking it. He had not been

walking towards the castle entrance, and she could not be

supposed to know that it was his intention to enter that day.

She had looked such a bud of youth and promise that his

disappointment at her departure showed itself in his face as

he observed her. However, he went on his way, entered a

turret, ascended to the leads of the great tower, and stepped

out.

From this elevated position he could still see the carriage

and the white surface of Paula's parasol in the glowing sun.

While he watched the landau stopped, and in a few moments the

horses were turned, the wheels and the panels flashed, and the

carriage came bowling along towards the castle again.

Somerset descended the stone stairs. Before he had quite got

to the bottom he saw Miss De Stancy standing in the outer

hall.

'When did you come, Mr. Somerset?' she gaily said, looking up

surprised. 'How industrious you are to be at work so

regularly every day! We didn't think you would be here to-

day: Paula has gone to a vegetable show at Markton, and I am

going to join her there soon.'

'O! gone to a vegetable show. But I think she has altered

her--'

At this moment the noise of the carriage was heard in the

ward, and after a few seconds Miss Power came in--Somerset

being invisible from the door where she stood.

'O Paula, what has brought you back?' said Miss De Stancy.

'I have forgotten something.'

'Mr. Somerset is here. Will you not speak to him?'

Somerset came forward, and Miss De Stancy presented him to her

friend. Mr. Somerset acknowledged the pleasure by a

respectful inclination of his person, and said some words

about the meeting yesterday.

'Yes,' said Miss Power, with a serene deliberateness quite

noteworthy in a girl of her age; 'I have seen it all since. I

was mistaken about you, was I not? Mr. Somerset, I am glad to

welcome you here, both as a friend of Miss De Stancy's family,

and as the son of your father--which is indeed quite a

sufficient introduction anywhere.'

'You have two pictures painted by Mr. Somerset's father, have

you not? I have already told him about them,' said Miss De

Stancy. 'Perhaps Mr. Somerset would like to see them if they

are unpacked?'

As Somerset had from his infancy suffered from a plethora of

those productions, excellent as they were, he did not reply

quite so eagerly as Miss De Stancy seemed to expect to her

kind suggestion, and Paula remarked to him, 'You will stay to

lunch? Do order it at your own time, if our hour should not

be convenient.'

Her voice was a voice of low note, in quality that of a flute

at the grave end of its gamut. If she sang, she was a pure

contralto unmistakably.

'I am making use of the permission you have been good enough

to grant me--of sketching what is valuable within these

walls.'

'Yes, of course, I am willing for anybody to come. People

hold these places in trust for the nation, in one sense. You

lift your hands, Charlotte; I see I have not convinced you on

that point yet.'

Miss De Stancy laughed, and said something to no purpose.

Somehow Miss Power seemed not only more woman than Miss De

Stancy, but more woman than Somerset was man; and yet in years

she was inferior to both. Though becomingly girlish and

modest, she appeared to possess a good deal of composure,

which was well expressed by the shaded light of her eyes.

'You have then met Mr. Somerset before?' said Charlotte.

'He was kind enough to deliver an address in my defence

yesterday. I suppose I seemed quite unable to defend myself.'

'O no!' said he. When a few more words had passed she turned

to Miss De Stancy and spoke of some domestic matter, upon

which Somerset withdrew, Paula accompanying his exit with a

remark that she hoped to see him again a little later in the

day.

Somerset retired to the chambers of antique lumber, keeping an

eye upon the windows to see if she re-entered the carriage and

resumed her journey to Markton. But when the horses had been

standing a long time the carriage was driven round to the

stables. Then she was not going to the vegetable show. That

was rather curious, seeing that she had only come back for

something forgotten.

These queries and thoughts occupied the mind of Somerset until

the bell was rung for luncheon. Owing to the very dusty

condition in which he found himself after his morning's

labours among the old carvings he was rather late in getting

downstairs, and seeing that the rest had gone in he went

straight to the dining-hall.

The population of the castle had increased in his absence.

There were assembled Paula and her friend Charlotte; a bearded

man some years older than himself, with a cold grey eye, who

was cursorily introduced to him in sitting down as Mr. Havill,

an architect of Markton; also an elderly lady of dignified

aspect, in a black satin dress, of which she apparently had a

very high opinion. This lady, who seemed to be a mere dummy

in the establishment, was, as he now learnt, Mrs. Goodman by

name, a widow of a recently deceased gentleman, and aunt to

Paula--the identical aunt who had smuggled Paula into a church

in her helpless infancy, and had her christened without her

parents' knowledge. Having been left in narrow circumstances

by her husband, she was at present living with Miss Power as

chaperon and adviser on practical matters--in a word, as

ballast to the management. Beyond her Somerset discerned his

new acquaintance Mr. Woodwell, who on sight of Somerset was

for hastening up to him and performing a laboured shaking of

hands in earnest recognition.

Paula had just come in from the garden, and was carelessly

laying down her large shady hat as he entered. Her dress, a

figured material in black and white, was short, allowing her

feet to appear. There was something in her look, and in the

style of her corsage, which reminded him of several of the

bygone beauties in the gallery. The thought for a moment

crossed his mind that she might have been imitating one of

them.

'Fine old screen, sir!' said Mr. Havill, in a long-drawn voice

across the table when they were seated, pointing in the

direction of the traceried oak division between the dining-

hall and a vestibule at the end. 'As good a piece of

fourteenth-century work as you shall see in this part of the

country.'

'You mean fifteenth century, of course?' said Somerset.

Havill was silent. 'You are one of the profession, perhaps?'

asked the latter, after a while.

'You mean that I am an architect?' said Somerset. 'Yes.'

'Ah--one of my own honoured vocation.' Havill's face had been

not unpleasant until this moment, when he smiled; whereupon

there instantly gleamed over him a phase of meanness,

remaining until the smile died away.

Havill continued, with slow watchfulness:--

'What enormous sacrileges are committed by the builders every

day, I observe! I was driving yesterday to Toneborough where

I am erecting a town-hall, and passing through a village on my

way I saw the workmen pulling down a chancel-wall in which

they found imbedded a unique specimen of Perpendicular work--a

capital from some old arcade--the mouldings wonderfully

undercut. They were smashing it up as filling-in for the new

wall.'

'It must have been unique,' said Somerset, in the too-readily

controversial tone of the educated young man who has yet to

learn diplomacy. 'I have never seen much undercutting in

Perpendicular stone-work; nor anybody else, I think.'

'O yes--lots of it!' said Mr. Havill, nettled.

Paula looked from one to the other. 'Which am I to take as

guide?' she asked. 'Are Perpendicular capitals undercut, as

you call it, Mr. Havill, or no?'

'It depends upon circumstances,' said Mr. Havill.

But Somerset had answered at the same time: 'There is seldom

or never any marked undercutting in moulded work later than

the middle of the fourteenth century.'

Havill looked keenly at Somerset for a time: then he turned

to Paula: 'As regards that fine Saxon vaulting you did me the

honour to consult me about the other day, I should advise

taking out some of the old stones and reinstating new ones

exactly like them.'

'But the new ones won't be Saxon,' said Paula. 'And then in

time to come, when I have passed away, and those stones have

become stained like the rest, people will be deceived. I

should prefer an honest patch to any such make-believe of

Saxon relics.'

As she concluded she let her eyes rest on Somerset for a

moment, as if to ask him to side with her. Much as he liked

talking to Paula, he would have preferred not to enter into

this discussion with another professional man, even though

that man were a spurious article; but he was led on to

enthusiasm by a sudden pang of regret at finding that the

masterly workmanship in this fine castle was likely to be

tinkered and spoilt by such a man as Havill.

'You will deceive nobody into believing that anything is Saxon

here,' he said warmly. 'There is not a square inch of Saxon

work, as it is called, in the whole castle.'

Paula, in doubt, looked to Mr. Havill.

'O yes, sir; you are quite mistaken,' said that gentleman

slowly. 'Every stone of those lower vaults was reared in

Saxon times.'

'I can assure you,' said Somerset deferentially, but firmly,

'that there is not an arch or wall in this castle of a date

anterior to the year 1100; no one whose attention has ever

been given to the study of architectural details of that age

can be of a different opinion.'

'I have studied architecture, and I am of a different opinion.

I have the best reason in the world for the difference, for I

have history herself on my side. What will you say when I

tell you that it is a recorded fact that this was used as a

castle by the Romans, and that it is mentioned in Domesday as

a building of long standing?'

'I shall say that has nothing to do with it,' replied the

young man. 'I don't deny that there may have been a castle

here in the time of the Romans: what I say is, that none of

the architecture we now see was standing at that date.'

There was a silence of a minute, disturbed only by a murmured

dialogue between Mrs. Goodman and the minister, during which

Paula was looking thoughtfully on the table as if framing a

question.

'Can it be,' she said to Somerset, 'that such certainty has

been reached in the study of architectural dates? Now, would

you really risk anything on your belief? Would you agree to

be shut up in the vaults and fed upon bread and water for a

week if I could prove you wrong?'

'Willingly,' said Somerset. 'The date of those towers and

arches is matter of absolute certainty from the details. That

they should have been built before the Conquest is as unlikely

as, say, that the rustiest old gun with a percussion lock

should be older than the date of Waterloo.'

'How I wish I knew something precise of an art which makes one

so independent of written history!'

Mr. Havill had lapsed into a mannerly silence that was only

sullenness disguised. Paula turned her conversation to Miss

De Stancy, who had simply looked from one to the other during

the discussion, though she might have been supposed to have a

prescriptive right to a few remarks on the matter. A

commonplace talk ensued, till Havill, who had not joined in

it, privately began at Somerset again with a mixed manner of

cordiality, contempt, and misgiving.

'You have a practice, I suppose, sir?'

'I am not in practice just yet.'

'Just beginning?'

'I am about to begin.'

'In London, or near here?'

'In London probably.'

'H'm. . . . I am practising in Markton.'

'Indeed. Have you been at it long?'

'Not particularly. I designed the chapel built by this lady's

late father; it was my first undertaking--I owe my start, in

fact, to Mr. Power. Ever build a chapel?'

'Never. I have sketched a good many churches.'

'Ah--there we differ. I didn't do much sketching in my youth,

nor have I time for it now. Sketching and building are two

different things, to my mind. I was not brought up to the

profession--got into it through sheer love of it. I began as

a landscape gardener, then I became a builder, then I was a

road contractor. Every architect might do worse than have

some such experience. But nowadays 'tis the men who can draw

pretty pictures who get recommended, not the practical men.

Young prigs win Institute medals for a pretty design or two

which, if anybody tried to build them, would fall down like a

house of cards; then they get travelling studentships and what

not, and then they start as architects of some new school or

other, and think they are the masters of us experienced ones.'

While Somerset was reflecting how far this statement was true,

he heard the voice of Paula inquiring, 'Who can he be?'

Her eyes were bent on the window. Looking out, Somerset saw

in the mead beyond the dry ditch, Dare, with his photographic

apparatus.

'He is the young gentleman who called about taking views of

the castle,' said Charlotte.

'O yes--I remember; it is quite right. He met me in the

village and asked me to suggest him some views. I thought him

a respectable young fellow.'

'I think he is a Canadian,' said Somerset.

'No,' said Paula, 'he is from the East--at least he implied so

to me.'

'There is Italian blood in him,' said Charlotte brightly.

'For he spoke to me with an Italian accent. But I can't think

whether he is a boy or a man.'

'It is to be earnestly hoped that the gentleman does not

prevaricate,' said the minister, for the first time attracted

by the subject. 'I accidentally met him in the lane, and he

said something to me about having lived in Malta. I think it

was Malta, or Gibraltar--even if he did not say that he was

born there.'

'His manners are no credit to his nationality,' observed Mrs.

Goodman, also speaking publicly for the first time. 'He asked

me this morning to send him out a pail of water for his

process, and before I had turned away he began whistling. I

don't like whistlers.'

'Then it appears,' said Somerset, 'that he is a being of no

age, no nationality, and no behaviour.'

'A complete negative,' added Havill, brightening into a civil

sneer. 'That is, he would be, if he were not a maker of

negatives well known in Markton.'

'Not well known, Mr. Havill,' answered Mrs. Goodman firmly.

'For I lived in Markton for thirty years ending three months

ago, and he was never heard of in my time.'

'He is something like you, Charlotte,' said Paula, smiling

playfully on her companion.

All the men looked at Charlotte, on whose face a delicate

nervous blush thereupon made its appearance.

''Pon my word there is a likeness, now I think of it,' said

Havill.

Paula bent down to Charlotte and whispered: 'Forgive my

rudeness, dear. He is not a nice enough person to be like

you. He is really more like one or other of the old pictures

about the house. I forget which, and really it does not

matter.'

'People's features fall naturally into groups and classes,'

remarked Somerset. 'To an observant person they often repeat

themselves; though to a careless eye they seem infinite in

their differences.'

The conversation flagged, and they idly observed the figure of

the cosmopolite Dare as he walked round his instrument in the

mead and busied himself with an arrangement of curtains and

lenses, occasionally withdrawing a few steps, and looking

contemplatively at the towers and walls.