A Complete Story

New Zealand Tablet, Volume L, Issue 20, 24 May 1923, Page 11

A Complete Story

Dusk, Dark, and Dawn (By C. C. Martindale, S.J., in London Catholic Truth.) It was six o'clock, and, despite the electric standards at Curfew Corner, of which Wilchurch is so proud, it was very dark. The rain simply sluiced off the waterproof cape of my friend P.C. Albert Alfred Hawthorne, who stood on duty there. "Hullo, Albert Alfred!" I said; "how's crime in Wilchurch?" "You didn't ought," he said with great severity, "to be out on such a night."

When Albert Alfred was severe, not the boldest might defy him. I sought a propitiatory approach.

“I was just going to look in at Mrs. Bolton,” I said. “She’s got rheumatism badly, and Amelia Jane isn’t keeping the house as it should be. You’re a greater favorite than ever there, Albert Alfred, since you taught her how to prevent her hens eating their own eggs.”

“Ah,” said he; “there’s many as could do with a. bit of teachin’, eggs or no eggs, if you take me. Henery Leggett —that’s Number 59, don’t know if you know him—he has his hands full an’ a bit over down St. Aldhelm’s way, as never a night goes by without him telling me. Never one for varying his conversation, was 59. There’s them as says we wants another war. That’s not me. But for sure we need summat, and quick, too.”

“The Turks may supply it,” I said, beginning to shiver.

“My old dad,” said he, “as lives at —an’ I see him no longer ago than last August—when pointin’ out to me as Rye harbor ain’t what it were, ‘ Some years ago,’ he says, ‘ when the Turks was sailin’ up the Channel, it were Rye as stopped ’em.’ Now it stands to reason that that can’t ha’ been yesterday, but it’s all one to him, and what I says is, That was sce-in’; and if them as stayed at home during this last war had seen what them as went out saw, they’d have known how to take ’em when they come back, and there wouldn’t have been half this trouble to-day. Not the ’alf. What you wants is to see; bearin’ ain’t nothing.”

“Well,” I said, “that sounds an interesting theory, and I wish you’d come in for your cup of cocoa to-night at the usual time and tell me about it. But if I stand here any longer, it’s no mere rheumatism for me.”

He told me when he’d be round, and I went off to my dear old Mrs. Bolton, whom I found very doubled up by her fire.

When she saw me, her face crinkled with smiles, and then with the attempt to be quite as severe as Albert Alfred was.

“Though glad and proud to see your Reverence,” she began at once, “how ever you can make it with your conscience, on such a night as this, and the Ark itself wouldn’t keep it out, though mentioned in the Scriptures.”

“Lor’, aunt,” said Amelia Jane. She was a small creature, but she did an immense amount of work, though her conversation must have rivalled P.C. 59’s for simplicity.

“Lor’ it may be,” rejoined Mrs. Bolton, “or lor’ it may not be, but run such risks you should not, or it’ll be Mary Bolton cornin’ to visit you in hospital, though not a word would I be saying against them as looks after you at the ’All. But men is men, and keep the dust out of the corners they never did nor will, nor so much as make your bed proper, let alone lie on it.” “I hope they don’t,” I said. “But Providence looks after me very well, Mrs. Bolton, so don’t you worry.” “And we is but prawns in the hands of Providence,” she observed, 'as is well known; but tempt Providence your Reverence should not, and if I may make so bold, Reverence is as reverence does,” said she v

“I’ve brought Mr. Hawthorne’s best wishes,” I said, to divert the subject.

“There, now,” said Amelia Jane. “Which Amelia Jane was just saying what a kind

gentleman he is,” said her aunt, “and should be married, him knowing more about the house than ever I did,« them hens not laying and all.” (For Albert Alfred had taught

Mrs. Bolton how to- prevent her hens eating their own eggs, by giving them artificial eggs stuffed with mustard. But that was an old story.) “But married he should be,” she resumed; “and if your Reverence would but find him a good Catholic girl as would teach him to see the light, worth ten of himself he would be, as even my Amelia Jane could do, her having took the prize in Catechism regular along of what I’ve taught her, though say it I shouldn’t.” “Lor’, aunt,” said Amelia Jane.

“Why shouldn’t you say it, if it’s true?” I asked. “At the convent she hears,” said Mrs. Bolton cryptically, “and along of her- poor old aunt she sees.” • “How do you mean 'sees’?”

I reads and I reads,” said Mrs. Bolton, “for never a little book about the Sacraments or our dear Blessed Lady or our Lord an’ His holy life as the C.T.S. brings out, does the Guild of St. Anne not bring me. But remember the words I cannot, but I gets the meaning into me, and I sit and I see Him and I give Him me humble thanks, and Amelia Jane she sits on her stool aside me in the firelight, an’ bit by bit she sees no less than me. Tell the Reverend Father, Amelia Jane.”

“Oo,” said Amelia Jane.

lion should I live happy,” she said, “if I couldn’t see Him? M hen I was busy and about, and could make the little cakes and what not for the young Scotch gentleman you were so fond of, an’ many a little thing like that, I didn’t need to see; and when I could be mending for Mr R a ikes, the Sergeant, I could say, ’Tis for You, dear Lord, as loves the gentleman, an’ make his young lady a good Catholic, as from the very first it could be seen she was to be, else why would she have got so angry with the Holy Father’s picture, poor holy gentleman? And after I once meet the Jock, when your Reverencel took me to the hospital, which in them days it was a hospital, no need I had to see, it being heaven already with that young man in it, and God rest him, though never a prayer of mine does he need, but prays for me I have no doubt; Our Lord was in his face, and none shall deny me. But now that I’m an old, old woman, and out an’ about I cannot be, see Him I must, and see Him I do, when I’ve finished reading and lets me thoughts dwell.”

Amelia Jane snuffled, but she wasn’t unhappy. I had no doubt she saw too.

“You may teach,” said Mrs. Bolton, “and you may preach, an’ hear you I wish I could. But seeing’s better.” lar better,” I said. “Mind you pray for us all, my dear, else we go talking and listening, and writing and readng, and be no nearer what we wanted to get to than when we started.

She patted my hand.

“It’s when you begin to go blind,” she said, “that you H'gin to see. But may you keep your sight in spite of that for many a long day yet.” “Now I must be off,” I said. “Fancy having to leave your nice room for the rain, ...” “I asked Him to stop it a bit,” she said. “Amelia Jane, you look if it’s not stopped.” It had.

“There now,” said Amelia Jane.

Albert Alfred,” I said, when he had settled by my fire into his armchair, “you’re looking remarkably fed up.” “Who wouldn’t be?” he asked. “Nothing ain’t what B were. Same as me dad said. Guy Fawkes’s day, it ain t been what it was. Nor yet Wilchurch Fair ain’t. An’ Armistice'Day won’t be, and that I’d wager on.” “D’you think things are getting worse, then?” “It ain’t things,” said he; “it’s us.”

“Same thing. But how are we getting worse?” “Because before, we was in a mess, but w© didn’t know it, we having guessed no different. But now we’ve seen different, and we know the mess things is in, and we can’t see no way out. Got our eyes open, and nothing to see with them.” &

“Pessimist!”

“P’raps,” said he, “an p’raps not. Now you hearken to me,” he broke out, quite roughly. “What was we before? You know what I was, for'l’ve told you many a time. Worse by far at nineteen than what I was no more than a year after, though I says it. Sloppy kid I was, yet knowing and sharp more than most in this old town, along

*of me seein’ so much of me brother that’s London way. Ho, Drinks? See me drbppin’ into the WilcKurch pubs, an’ same in the villages round about, and plankin’ down a penny, an’ ‘ Blimey,’ says I, ‘if I didn’t think it were a florin, and not another cent have I on me.’ ‘ Never you mind, kid,’ says the house-man, ‘ I’ll stand you this one, an’ you make up another day.’ And along I’d go to another pub, plank down the same penny, and pitch the same yarn. Don’t you worry,’ says ’e, 'but you ’ave this one along with me.’ And have it I would, an’ again. Pint upon pint I’d get that road.”

“And now, you’re on point duty,” said I nervously. He looked at me with suspicion.

“An’ as you know very well, that weren’t the worst.”

“Well, what’s made the difference?”

"There's them," he said, "as says the war ain't done nothing but harm. Bunkum. Harm it did do; but not only harm. Thousands of lads like me there must have been that never saw an inch beyond the next pint an' the next girl, and never once did nothing for a pal, let alone for 'lm," said Albert Alfred, "as is above. And then the war comes. And then they gets first an' foremost the idea of duty an' discipline. But that ain't what I mean, though it's a lot. Keeping yourself clean. Doing your job just so. But that ain't it. Doing a thing for your pal. Silly things, in a manner of speakin'. Things as couldn't do no good to you, not if it was ever so. Crawling out to bring him back. Give him your last drop, when wounded. Pinch a blanket, you sure might, and keep it when, no need to do other. But freeze, you would, and glad to, if so be you saw a pal as needed it —an' who wasn't a pal? Give it to your worst enemy, you would, if need be. Beautiful things. Things you'd 'ave tears in your eyes to think of. 'Eavenly things. And never guessed you ad it in you. Laughed, you would have, if you'd been told you'd do them, a year before. But now, who'd do them now?" "Why not?" "Ah! Didn't last. Even before the war ended, it was fading. Fading, it was. Like a vision. Visions, we saw. Couldn't tell you what they was; why, say we never had 'em, like as not. But have 'em we did, for sure. An' there was them as come back with them visions stjill in their eyes. - But since then? What have we seen? Not them visions, you believe me. Same old world. Same old graft, and grab, an' nothing to do— help your pal? Why! he wouldn't want it, 'alf the time; and when he did, then you couldn't. Shut, their eyes is; and when opened, nothing to be seen, as I was telling you." "That was because you only had a. half-time vision. Visions? I believe you. There were visions during the war, and nearly all of you saw them at least sometimes. But you want an all-the-time vision. What you want to see is truth, true truth that doesn't depend on a war being on, or on anything except itself." "Ho," said he. "What's truth?" The question thundered down the ages. "Are you going to try to find an answer to that?" I asked. He stirred uncomfortably. "There are times," I went on, "when every single man would like to be told it." "Think so?" he said. "Better be blind, an' not know it, if having your sight means seein' nothing." "Perhaps," said I, thinking of Mrs. Bolton, "the best hope does lie in at least seeing you don't see. But I don't admit there are many people that can't. Or couldn't." "The most," he confessed, "won't own up. Pretend, they do. Say the war's been an eye-opener to them, but all they means by that is, not them visions, but the opposite. That having a good time's the best you can hope for, and not too much said about how you get it. Do same as you did before, but somehow choosin' it, out of despair like."

“That is the dark,” I said. “Twilight may mean that there’s a dawn coming, and you may want it. It’s awful when you settle down to the dark and call it light.” “There’ll have to be that said he, “as leaves ’em no chance but to own up they’re in the dark and get out of it they must, short of dying in it.”

v/a * u y -- —•/ <=» iV Clay. He put clay upon the blind eyes. Blinder than ever, they seemed to have become. . . Blinder than

ever, despite our frightful efforts to give sight. At least, let us beg to be that clay, clay in His hand to become the vehicle of Truth, Catholic Truth, not of, a day nor a place, but divine and universal. By touch of word,- or book, or tendance of suffering or hunger, to become His clay, or His garment’s dusty fringe. . .

t y The Eleventh came. Before the Memorial Cross the

town grouped itself. Clergymen, white-surpliced, stood upon its steps and faced the crowd. Round them, a thin square of —men who had marched from barracks playing “Tipperary.” Music old incredibly, echo from a world unspeakably far off, and charged with an anguish, surely, insupportable. Over us, Apocalypse had been given veils had been torn, and either the dazzle through them had been too bright, or that light, to our eyes in their weakness, had, for very purity, remained invisible. Agonizing music; terrible marching khaki. Albert Alfred passed and took up a position. Impossible to read anything in his face. Was this, for him, one more duty of a day? The crowd grew dense, girls criefly, in bright tam-o’-shanters, gay dresseswith that one didn’t quarrel. Nor with the poppies, since one little song has worked a miracle over the forgetful flower, the ancient emblem of oblivion. One little song about the fields of Flanders and their flowers has unhypnotised the Lethe-blooms, and made them for remembrance ever wakeful. But wakeful towards what? The silence fell. Whither did thoughts go? Was all thought stunned? AAhat stirred within those minds? Prayer ? No prayer for the innumerable dead rose round that Cross from which Christ had been taken down. No Christ was nailed to it. "Where was He gone? Buried quite? Risen, assuredly, and moving among that crowd, whose silence gave Him the chance, for the moment, of a hearing. But. did they hear? Who knows! Perhaps they would have heard still better if the Cross had not been empty. His very death speaks loud. Hundreds did listen to it, over there. . . "Well, if the Crucifix is seldom here to speak to them, if the Invisible Christ has so seldom His two minutes when, at least, the other noises sink silenced round about Him, other voices, ours, have to cry and cry more loudly, and in every way to herald His Name; other men have to carry forth His Presence in their poor pitiful image, if perchance the world may hear, and may sec, and so be saved.

Under the exquisite autumn sky gold leaves fell from the trees in showers. All else was still. Then, the bugles. And the crowd went quickly about its avocations. And the night came, and its merrymaking, and the red flowers drooped.

But early the next morning I took Mrs. Bolton her Communion. For her there- was no need of any further witness. She had received her sight.

Sacred Heart Girls' College, Christchurch The following pupils of the Sisters of the Missions, of the Sacred Heart Girls' College, Christchurch, obtained certificates for special merit at the May term's examination: Secondary division Honors in English, Latin, French, science, and arithmetic, Molly Goldstone; English and Latin, Nora Mahoney; English and literature, Phyllis Neil; credit in mathematics, Latin, English, science, geography, history, and arithmetic: E. Williams, R. Tanner, D. McGillicuddy, B. Kingam, G. Green, M. Farrell, B. Fardell, N. McKendry, N. Ryan, E. Scullion, I. Coulston, N. McCort, G. Moulin, K. Quigley, E. Shamy. Commercial division (honors) — Eileen Gartly, M. O'Donoghue; credit: M. Swanston, 0. O'Reilly, G. Smith, M. Coughlan, L. Hickey. Standards V. and Vl.Honors in Christian Doctrine, conduct, home lessons, English and essay, reading and recitation, dictation and spelling, and arithmetic: E. McCurrie, M. McCormick, D. Steele, K. McCormack, E. Grennell; credit: V. O'Donohue, TJ. McLennan. x