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THE SCOURGE

I

Up to the death of his wife, that is to say for fifty-six years, Sir Hildebrand Oates held himself to be a very important and upright man, whose life not only was unassailable by slander, but even through the divine ordering of his being exempt from criticism. To the world and to himself he represented the incarnation of British impeccability, faultless from the little pink crown of his head to the tips of his toes correctly pedicured and unstained by purples of retributive gout. Except in church, where a conventional humility of attitude is imposed, his mind was blandly conscia recti. No ghost of sins committed disturbed his slumbers. He had committed no sin. He could tick off the Ten Commandments one by one with a serene conscience. He objected to profane swearing; he was a strict Sabbatarian; he had honoured his father and his mother and had erected a monument over their grave which added another fear of death to the beholder; he neither thieved nor murdered, nor followed in the footsteps of Don Juan, nor in those of his own infamous namesake; and being blessed in the world's goods, coveted nothing possessed by his neighbour – not even his wife, for his neighbours' wives could not compare in wifely meekness with his own. In thought, too, he had not sinned. Never, so far as he remembered, had he spoken a ribald word, never, indeed had he laughed at an unsavoury jest. It may be questioned whether he had laughed at any kind of joke whatsoever.

Sir Hildebrand stood for many things: for Public Morality; his name appeared on the committees of all the societies for the suppression of all the vices: for sound Liberalism and Incorruptible Government; he had poured much of his fortune into the party coffers and, to his astonishment, a gracious (and minister-harrassed) Sovereign had conveyed recognition of his virtues in the form of a knighthood. For the sacred rights of the people; as Justice of the Peace he sentenced vagrants who slept in other people's barns to the severest penalties. For Principle in private life; in spite of the rending of his own heart and the agonized tears of his wife, he had cast off his undutiful children, a son and a daughter who had been guilty of the sin of disobedience and had run away taking their creaking destinies in their own hands. For the Sanctity of Home Life; night and morning he read prayers before the assembled household and dismissed any maidservant who committed the impropriety of conversing with a villager of the opposite sex. From youth up, his demeanour had been studiously grave and punctiliously courteous. A man of birth and breeding, he made it his ambition to be what he, with narrow definition, termed "a gentleman of the old school"; but being of Whig lineage, he had sat in Parliament as an hereditary Liberal and believed in Progressive Institutions.

It is difficult to give a flashlight picture of a human being at once so simple and so complex. An ardent Pharisee may serve as an epigrammatic characterisation. Hypocrite he was not. No miserable sinner more convinced of his rectitude, more devoid of pretence, ever walked the earth. Though his narrowness of view earned him but little love from his fellow-humans, his singleness of purpose, aided by an ample fortune, gained a measure of their respect. He lived irreproachably up to his standards. In an age of general scepticism he had unshakable faith. He believed intensely in himself. Now this passionate certitude of infallibility found, as far as his life's drama is concerned, its supreme expression in his relation to his wife, his children, and his money.

He married young. His wife brought him a fortune for which he was sole trustee, a couple of children, and a submissive obedience unparalleled in the most correct of Moslem households. Eresby Manor, where they had lived for thirty years, was her own individual property, and she drew for pocket money some five hundred pounds a year. A timid, weak, sentimental soul, she was daunted from the first few frosty days of honeymoon by the inflexible personality of her husband. For thirty years she passed in the world's eye for little else than his shadow.

"My dear, you must allow me to judge in such matters," he would say in reply to mild remonstrance. And she deferred invariably to his judgment. When his son Godfrey and his daughter Sybil went their respective unfilial ways, it was enough for him to remark with cold eyes and slight, expressive gesture:

"My dear, distressing as I know it is to you, their conduct has broken my heart and I forbid the mention of their names in this house."

And the years passed and the perfect wife, though, in secret, she may have mourned like Rachel for her children, obeyed the very letter of her husband's law.

There remains the third vital point, to which I must refer, if I am to make comprehensible the strange story of Sir Hildebrand Oates. It was money – or, more explicitly, the diabolical caprice of finance – that first shook Sir Hildebrand's faith, not, perhaps, in his own infallibility, but in the harmonious co-operation of Divine Providence and himself. For the four or five years preceding his wife's death his unerring instinct in financial affairs failed him. Speculations that promised indubitably the golden fruit of the Hesperides produced nothing but Dead Sea apples. He lost enormous sums of money. Irritability constricted both his brow and the old debonair "s" at the end of his signature. And when the County Guarantee Investment Society of which he was one of the original founders and directors called up unpaid balance on shares, and even then hovered on the verge of scandalous liquidation, Sir Hildebrand found himself racked with indignant anxiety.

He was sitting at a paper-strewn table in his library, a decorous library, a gentleman's library, lined from floor to ceiling with bookcases filled with books that no gentleman's library should be without, and trying to solve the eternal problem why two and two should not make forty, when the butler entered announcing the doctor.

"Ah, Thompson, glad to see you. What is it? Have you looked at Lady Oates? Been a bit queer for some days. These east winds. I hold them responsible for half the sickness of the county."

He threw up an accusing hand. If the east wind had been a human vagabond brought before Sir Hildebrand Oates, Justice of the Peace, it would have whined itself into a Zephyr. Sir Hildebrand's eyes looked blue and cold at offenders. From a stature of medium height he managed to extract the dignity of six-foot-two. Beneath a very long and very straight nose a grizzling moustache, dependent on the muscles of the thin lips as to whether it should go up or down, symbolised, as it were, the scales of justice. Sketches of accurately trimmed grey whiskers also indicated the exact balance of his mind. But to show that he was human and not impassionately divine, his thin hair once black, now greenish, was parted low down on the left side and brought straight over, leaving the little pink crown to which I have before alluded. His complexion was florid, disavowing atrabiliar prejudice. He had the long blunted chin of those secure of their destiny. He was extraordinarily clean.

The doctor said abruptly: "It's nothing to do with east winds. It's internal complications. I have to tell you she's very seriously ill."

A shadow of impatience passed over Sir Hildebrand's brow.

"Just like my wife," said he, "to fall ill, when I'm already half off my head with worry."

"The County Guarantee – ?"

Sir Hildebrand nodded. The misfortunes of the Society were public property, and public too, within the fairly wide area of his acquaintance, was the knowledge of the fact that Sir Hildebrand was heavily involved therein. Too often had he vaunted the beneficent prosperity of the concern to which he had given his august support. At his own dinner-table men had dreaded the half-hour after the departure of the ladies, and at his club men had fled from him as they flee from the Baconian mythologist.

"It is a worry," the doctor admitted. "But financial preoccupations must give way" – he looked Sir Hildebrand clear in the eyes – "must give way before elementary questions of life and death."

"Death?" Sir Hildebrand regarded him blankly. How dare Death intrude in so unmannerly a fashion across his threshold?

"I should have been called in weeks ago," said the doctor. "All I can suggest now is that you should get Sir Almeric Home down from London. I'll telephone at once, with your authority. An operation may save her."

"By all means. But tell me – I had no idea – I wanted to send for you last week, but she's so obstinate – said it was mere indigestion."

"You should have sent for me all the same."

"Anyhow," said Sir Hildebrand, "tell me the worst."

The doctor told him and departed. Sir Hildebrand walked up and down his library, a man undeservedly stricken. The butler entered. Pringle, the chauffeur, desired audience.

Admitted, the man plunged into woeful apology. He had been trying the Mercédès on its return from an overhaul, and as he turned the corner by Rushworth Farm a motor lorry had run into him and smashed his head-lamps.

"I told you when I engaged you," said Sir Hildebrand, "that I allowed no accidents."

"It's only the lamps. I was driving most careful. The driver of the lorry owns himself in the wrong," pleaded the chauffeur.

"The merits or demerits of the case," replied Sir Hildebrand, "do not interest me. It's an accident. I don't allow accidents. You take a month's notice."

"Very well, Sir Hildebrand, but I do think it – "

"Enough," said Sir Hildebrand, dismissing him. "I have nothing more to hear from you or to say to you."

Then, when he was alone again, Sir Hildebrand reflected that noble resignation under misfortune was the part of a Christian gentleman, and in chastened mood went upstairs to see his wife. And in the days that followed, when Sir Almeric Home, summoned too late, had performed the useless wonders of his magical craft and had gone, Sir Hildebrand, most impeccable of husbands, visited the sick-room twice a day, making the most correct enquiries, beseeching her to name desires capable of fulfilment, and urbanely prophesying speedy return to health. At the end of the second visit he bent down and kissed her on the forehead. The ukase went forth to the servants' hall that no one should speak above a whisper, for fear of disturbing her ladyship, and the gardeners had orders to supply the sick-room with a daily profusion of flowers. Mortal gentleman could show no greater solicitude for a sick wife – save perhaps bring her a bunch of violets in his own hand. But with an automatic supply of orchids, why should he think of so trumpery an offering?

Lady Oates died. Sir Hildebrand accepted the stroke with Christian resignation. The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Yet his house was desolate. He appreciated her virtues, which were many. He went categorically through her attributes: A faithful wife, a worthy mother of unworthy children, a capable manager, a submissive helpmate, a country gentlewoman of the old school who provided supremely for her husband's material comforts and never trespassed into the sphere of his intellectual and other masculine activities. His grief at the loss of his Eliza was sincere. The impending crash of the County Guarantee Investment Society ceased to trouble him. His own fortune had practically gone. Let it go. His dead wife's remained – sufficient to maintain his position in the county. As Dr. Thompson had rightly said, the vulgarities of finance must give way to the eternal sublimities of death. His wife, with whom he had lived for thirty years in a conjugal felicity unclouded save by the unforgivable sins of his children now exiled through their own wilfulness to remote parts of the Empire, was dead. The stupendous fact eclipsed all other facts in a fact-riveted universe. Lady Oates who, after the way of women of limited outlook, had always taken a great interest in funerals, had the funeral of her life. The Bishop of the Diocese conducted the funeral service. The County, headed by the old Duke of Dunster, his neighbour, followed her to the grave.

II

"She was a good Christian woman, Haversham," said Sir Hildebrand later in the day. "I did not deserve her. But I think I may feel that I did my best all my life to ensure her happiness."

"No doubt, of course," replied Haversham, the county lawyer. "Er – don't you think we might get this formal business over? I've brought Lady Oates's will in my pocket."

He drew out a sealed envelope. Sir Hildebrand held out his hand. The lawyer shook his head. "I'm executor – it's written on the outside – I must open it."

"You executor? That's rather strange," said Sir Hildebrand.

Haversham opened the envelope, adjusted his glasses, and glanced through the document. Then he took off his glasses and his brows wrinkled, and with a queer look, half scared, half malicious, in his eyes, gazed at Sir Hildebrand.

"I must tell you, my dear Oates," said he, after a moment or so, "that I had nothing to do with the making of this. Nothing whatsoever. Lady Oates called at my office about two years ago and placed the sealed envelope in my charge. I had no idea of the contents till this minute."

"Let me see," said Sir Hildebrand; and again he stretched out his hand.

Haversham, holding the paper, hesitated for a few seconds. "I'm afraid I must read it to you, there being no third party present."

"Third party? What do you mean?"

"A witness. A formal precaution." The lawyer again put on his glasses. "The introductory matter is the ordinary phraseology of the printed form one buys at stationers' shops – naming me executor." Then he read aloud:

"I will and bequeath to my husband, Sir Hildebrand Oates, Knight, the sum of fifteen shillings to buy himself a scourge to do penance for the arrogance, uncharitableness and cruelty with which he has treated myself and my beloved children for the last thirty years. I bequeath to my son Godfrey the house and estate of Eresby Manor and all the furniture, plate, jewels, livestock and everything of mine comprised therein. The residue of my possessions I bequeath to my son Godfrey and my daughter Sybil, in equal shares. I leave it to my children to act generously by my old servants, and my horses and dogs."

Sir Hildebrand's florid face grew purple. He looked fishy-eyed and open-mouthed at the lawyer, and gurgled horribly in his throat. Haversham hastily rang a bell. The butler appeared. Between them they carried Sir Hildebrand up to bed and sent for the doctor.

III

When Sir Hildebrand recovered, which he did quickly, he went about like a man in a daze, stupified by his wife's hideous accusation and monstrous ingratitude. It was inconceivable that the submissive angel with whom he had lived and the secret writer of those appalling words should be one and the same person. Surely, insanity. That invalidated the will. But Haversham pointed out that insanity would have to be proved, which was impossible. The will contained no legal flaw. Lady Oates's dispositions would have to be carried out.

"It leaves me practically a pauper," said Sir Hildebrand, whereat the other, imperceptibly, shrugged his shoulders.

He realised, in cold terror, that the house wherein he dwelt was his no longer. Even the chairs and tables belonged to his son, Godfrey. His own personal belongings could be carried away in a couple of handcarts. Instead of thousands his income had suddenly dwindled to a salvage of a few hundreds a year. From his position in the county he had tumbled with the suddenness and irreparability of Humpty-Dumpty! All the vanities of his life sprang on him and choked him. He was a person of no importance whatever. He gasped. Had mere outside misfortune beset him, he doubtless would have faced his downfall with the courage of a gentleman of the old school. His soul would have been untouched. But now it was stabbed, and with an envenomed blade. His wife had brought him to bitter shame… "Arrogance, uncharitableness, cruelty." The denunciation rang in his head day and night. He arrogant, uncharitable, cruel? The charge staggered reason. His indignant glance sweeping backward through the years could see nothing in his life but continuous humility, charity, and kindness. He had not deviated a hair's breath from irreproachable standards of conduct. Arrogant? When Sybil, engaged in consequences of his tender sagacity to a neighbouring magnate, a widowed ironmaster, eloped, at dead of night on her wedding eve, with a penniless subaltern in the Indian Army, he suffered humiliation before the countryside, with manly dignity. No less humiliating had been his position and no less resigned his attitude when Godfrey, declining to obey the tee-total, non-smoking, early-to-bed, early-to-breakfast rules of the house, declining also to be ordained and take up the living of Thereon in the gift of the Lady of the Manor of Eresby, went off, in undutiful passion, to Canada to pursue some godless and precarious career. Uncharitableness? Cruelty? His children had defied him, and with callous barbarity had cut all filial ties. And his wife? She had lived in cotton-wool all her days. It was she who had been cruel – inconceivably malignant.

IV

Sir Hildebrand, after giving Haversham, the lawyer, an account of his stewardship – in his wild investments he had not imperilled a penny of his wife's money – resigned his county appointments, chairmanships and presidentships and memberships of committees, went to London and took a room at his club. Rumour of his fallen fortunes spread quickly. He found himself neither shunned nor snubbed, but not welcomed in the inner smoke-room coterie before which, as a wealthy and important county gentleman, he had been wont to lay down the law. No longer was he Sir Oracle. Sensitive to the subtle changes he attributed them to the rank snobbery of his fellow-members. No doubt he was right. The delicate point of snobbery that he did not realise was the difference between the degrees of sufferance accorded to the rich bore and the poor bore. In the eyes of the club, Sir Hildebrand Oates was the poor bore. He became freezingly aware of a devastating loneliness. In the meanwhile his children had written the correctest of letters. Deep grief for mother's death was the keynote of each. With regard to worldly matters, Sybil confessed that the legacy made a revolution in her plans for her children's future, but would not affect her present movements, as she could not allow her husband to abandon a career which promised to be brilliant. She would be home in a couple of years. The son, Godfrey, welcomed the unexpected fortune. The small business he had got together just needed this capital to expand into gigantic proportions. It would be two or three years before he could leave it. In the meantime, he hoped his father would not dream of leaving Eresby Manor. Neither son nor daughter seemed to be aware of Sir Hildebrand's impoverishment. Also, neither of them expressed sympathy for, or even alluded to, the grief that he himself must be suffering. The omission puzzled him; for he had the lawyer's assurance that they should remain ignorant, as far as lay in his power, of the dreadful text of the will. Did the omission arise from doubt in their minds as to his love for their mother and the genuineness of his sorrow at her death? To solve the riddle, Sir Hildebrand began to think as he had never thought before.

V

Arrogance, uncharitableness, and cruelty. To wife and children. For thirty years. Fifteen shillings to buy a scourge wherewith to do penance. He could think of nothing else by day or night. The earth beneath his feet which he had deemed so solid became a quagmire, so that he knew not where to step. And the serene air darkened. The roots of his being suffered cataclysm. Either his wife had been some mad monster in human form, or her terrible indictment had some basis of truth. The man's soul writhed in the flame of the blazing words. A scourge for penance. Fifteen shillings to buy it with. In due course he received the ghastly cheque from Haversham. His first impulse was to tear it to pieces; his second, to fold it up and put it in his letter-case. At the end of a business meeting with Haversham a day or two later, he asked him point-blank:

"Why did you insult me by sending me the cheque for fifteen shillings?"

"It was a legal formality with which I was bound to comply."

"De minimis non curet lex," said Sir Hildebrand. "No one pays barley-corn rent or farthing damages or the shilling consideration in a contract. Your action implies malicious agreement with Lady Oates' opinion of me."

He bent his head forward and looked at Haversham with feverish intensity. Haversham had old scores to settle. The importance, omniscience, perfection, and condescending urbanity of Sir Hildebrand had rasped his nerves for a quarter of a century. If there was one living man whom he hated whole-heartedly, and over whose humiliation he rejoiced, it was Sir Hildebrand Oates. He yielded to the swift temptation. He rose hastily and gathered up his papers.

"If you can find me a human creature in this universe who doesn't share Lady Oates's opinion, I will give him every penny I am worth."

He went out, and then overcome with remorse for having kicked a fallen man, felt inclined to hang himself. But he knew that he had spoken truly. Meanwhile Sir Hildebrand walked up and down the little visitors' room at the club, where the interview had taken place, passing his hand over his indeterminate moustache and long blunt chin. He felt neither anger nor indignation – but rather the dazed dismay of a prisoner to whom the judge deals a severer sentence than he expected. After a while he sat at a small table and prepared to write a letter connected with the business matters he had just discussed with Haversham. But the words would not come, his brain was fogged; he went off into a reverie, and awoke to find himself scribbling in arabesque, "Fifteen shillings to buy a scourge."

After a solitary dinner at the club that evening he discovered in a remote corner of the smoking-room, a life-long acquaintance, an old schoolfellow, one Colonel Bagot, reading a newspaper. He approached.

"Good evening, Bagot."

Colonel Bagot raised his eyes from the paper, nodded, and resumed his reading. Sir Hildebrand deliberately wheeled a chair to his side and sat down.

"Can I have a word or two with you?"

"Certainly, my dear fellow," Bagot replied, putting down his paper.

"What kind of a boy was I at school?"

"What kind of a … what the deuce do you mean?" asked the astonished colonel.

"I want you to tell me what kind of a boy I was," said Sir Hildebrand gravely.

"Just an ordinary chap."

"Would you have called me modest, generous, and kind?"

"What in God's name are you driving at?" asked the Colonel, twisting himself round on his chair.

"At your opinion of me. Was I modest, generous, and kind? It's a vital question."

"It's a damned embarrassing one to put to a man during the process of digestion. Well, you know, Oates, you always were a queer beggar. If I had had the summing up of you I should have said: 'Free from vice.'"

"Negative."

"Well, yes – in a way – but – "

"You've answered me. Now another. Do you think I treated my children badly?"

"Really, Oates – oh, confound it!" Angrily he dusted himself free from the long ash that had fallen from his cigar. "I don't see why I should be asked such a question."

"I do. You've known me all your life. I want you to answer it frankly."

Colonel Bagot was stout, red, and choleric. Sir Hildebrand irritated him. If he was looking for trouble, he should have it. "I think you treated them abominably – there!" said he.

"Thank you," said Sir Hildebrand.

"What?" gasped Bagot.

"I said 'thank you.' And lastly – you have had many opportunities of judging – do you think I did all in my power to make my wife happy?"

At first Bagot made a gesture of impatience. His position was both grotesque and intolerable. Was Oates going mad? Answering the surmise, Sir Hildebrand said:

"I'm aware my question is extraordinary, perhaps outrageous; but I am quite sane. Did she look crushed, down-trodden, as though she were not allowed to have a will of her own?"

It was impossible not to see that the man was in a dry agony of earnestness. Irritation and annoyance fell like garments from Bagot's shoulders.

"You really want to get at the exact truth, as far as I can give it you?"

"From the depth of my soul," said Sir Hildebrand.

"Then," answered Bagot, quite simply, "I'm sorry to say unpleasant things. But I think Lady Oates led a dog's life – and so does everybody."

"That's just what I wanted to be sure of," said Sir Hildebrand, rising. He bent his head courteously. "Good night, Bagot," and he went away with dreary dignity.

VI

A cloud settled on Sir Hildebrand's mind through which he saw immediate things murkily. He passed days of unaccustomed loneliness and inaction. He walked the familiar streets of London like one in a dream. One afternoon he found himself gazing with unspeculative eye into the window of a small Roman Catholic Repository where crucifixes and statues of the Virgin and Child and rosaries and religious books and pictures were exposed for sale. Until realisation of the objects at which he had been staring dawned upon his mind, he had not been aware of the nature of the shop. The shadow of a smile passed over his face. He entered. An old man with a long white beard was behind the counter.

"Do you keep scourges?" asked Sir Hildebrand.

"No, sir," replied the old man, somewhat astonished.

"That's unfortunate – very unfortunate," said Sir Hildebrand, regarding him dully. "I'm in need of one."

"Even among certain of the religious orders the Discipline is forbidden nowadays," replied the old man.

"Among certain others it is practised?"

"I believe so."

"Then scourges are procurable. I will ask you to get one – or have one made according to religious pattern. I will pay fifteen shillings for it."

"It could not possibly cost that – a mere matter of wood and string."

"I will pay neither more nor less," said Sir Hildebrand, laying on the counter the cheque which he had endorsed and his card. "I – I have made a vow. It's a matter of conscience. Kindly send it to the club address."

He walked out of the shop somewhat lighter of heart, his instinct for the scrupulous satisfied. The abominable cheque no longer burned through letter-case and raiment and body and corroded his soul. He had devoted the money to the purpose for which it was ear-marked. The precision was soothed. In puzzling darkness he had also taken an enormous psychological stride.

The familiar club became unbearable, his fellow-members abhorrent. Friends and acquaintances outside – and they were legion – who, taking pity on his loneliness, sought him out and invited him to their houses, he shunned in a curious terror. He was forever meeting them in the streets. Behind their masks of sympathy he read his wife's deadly accusation and its confirmation which he had received from Haversham and Bagot. When the scourge arrived – a business-like instrument in a cardboard box – he sat for a long time in his club bedroom drawing the knotted cords between his fingers, lost in retrospective thought… And suddenly a scene flashed across his mind. Venice. The first days of their honeymoon. The sun-baked Renaissance façade of a church in a Campo bounded by a canal where their gondola lay waiting. A tattered, one-legged, be-crutched beggar holding out his hat by the church door… He, Hildebrand, stalked majestically past, his wife following. Near the fondamenta he turned and discovered her in the act of tendering from her purse a two-lire piece to the beggar who had hobbled expectant in her wake. Hildebrand interposed a hand; the shock accidentally jerked the coin from hers. It rolled. The one-legged beggar threw himself prone, in order to seize it. But it rolled into the canal. An agony of despair and supplication mounted from the tatterdemalion's eyes.

"Oh, Hildebrand, give him another."

"Certainly not," he replied. "It's immoral to encourage mendicity."

She wept in the gondola. He thought her silly, and told her so. They landed at the Molo and he took her to drink chocolate at Florian's on the Piazza. She bent her meek head over the cup and the tears fell into it. A well-dressed Venetian couple who sat at the next table stared at her, passed remarks, and giggled outright with the ordinary and exquisite Italian politeness.

"My dear Eliza," said Hildebrand, "if you can't help being a victim to sickly sentimentality, at least, as my wife, you must learn to control yourself in public."

And meekly she controlled herself and drank her salted chocolate. In compliance with a timidly expressed desire, and in order to show his forgiveness, he escorted her into the open square, and like any vulgar Cook's tourist bought her a paper cornet of dried peas, wherewith, to his self-conscious martyrdom, she fed the pigeons. Seeing an old man some way off do the same, she scattered a few grains along the curled-up brim of her Leghorn hat; and presently, so still she was and gracious, an iridescent swarm enveloped her, eating from both hands outstretched and encircling her head like a halo. For the moment she was the embodiment of innocent happiness. But Hildebrand thought her notoriously absurd, and when he saw Lord and Lady Benham approaching them from the Piazzetta, he stepped forward and with an abrupt gesture sent the pigeons scurrying away. And she looked for the vanished birds with much the same scared piteousness as the one-legged beggar had looked for the lost two-lire piece.

After thirty years the memory of that afternoon flamed vivid, as he drew the strings of the idle scourge between his fingers. And then the puzzling darkness overspread his mind.

After a while he replaced the scourge in the cardboard box and summoned the club valet.