Books: A Laodicean

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'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.

IX.

Somerset returned to the top of the great tower with a vague
consciousness that he was going to do something up there--
perhaps sketch a general plan of the structure. But he began
to discern that this Stancy-Castle episode in his studies of
Gothic architecture might be less useful than ornamental to
him as a professional man, though it was too agreeable to be
abandoned. Finding after a while that his drawing progressed
but slowly, by reason of infinite joyful thoughts more allied
to his nature than to his art, he relinquished rule and
compass, and entered one of the two turrets opening on the
roof. It was not the staircase by which he had ascended, and
he proceeded to explore its lower part. Entering from the
blaze of light without, and imagining the stairs to descend as
usual, he became aware after a few steps that there was
suddenly nothing to tread on, and found himself precipitated
downwards to a distance of several feet.

Arrived at the bottom, he was conscious of the happy fact that
he had not seriously hurt himself, though his leg was twisted
awkwardly. Next he perceived that the stone steps had been
removed from the turret, so that he had dropped into it as
into a dry well; that, owing to its being walled up below,
there was no door of exit on either side of him; that he was,
in short, a prisoner.

Placing himself in a more comfortable position he calmly
considered the best means of getting out, or of making his
condition known. For a moment he tried to drag himself up by
his arm, but it was a hopeless attempt, the height to the
first step being far too great.

He next looked round at a lower level. Not far from his left
elbow, in the concave of the outer wall, was a slit for the
admission of light, and he perceived at once that through this
slit alone lay his chance of communicating with the outer
world. At first it seemed as if it were to be done by
shouting, but when he learnt what little effect was produced
by his voice in the midst of such a mass of masonry, his heart
failed him for a moment. Yet, as either Paula or Miss De
Stancy would probably guess his visit to the top of the tower,
there was no cause for terror, if some for alarm.

He put his handkerchief through the window-slit, so that it
fluttered outside, and, fixing it in its place by a large
stone drawn from the loose ones around him, awaited succour as
best he could. To begin this course of procedure was easy,
but to abide in patience till it should produce fruit was an
irksome task. As nearly as he could guess--for his watch had
been stopped by the fall--it was now about four o'clock, and
it would be scarcely possible for evening to approach without
some eye or other noticing the white signal. So Somerset
waited, his eyes lingering on the little world of objects
around him, till they all became quite familiar. Spiders'-
webs in plenty were there, and one in particular just before
him was in full use as a snare, stretching across the arch of
the window, with radiating threads as its ribs. Somerset had
plenty of time, and he counted their number--fifteen. He
remained so silent that the owner of this elaborate structure
soon forgot the disturbance which had resulted in the breaking
of his diagonal ties, and crept out from the corner to mend
them. In watching the process, Somerset noticed that on the
stonework behind the web sundry names and initials had been
cut by explorers in years gone by. Among these antique
inscriptions he observed two bright and clean ones, consisting
of the words 'De Stancy' and 'W. Dare,' crossing each other at
right angles. From the state of the stone they could not have
been cut more than a month before this date, and, musing on
the circumstance, Somerset passed the time until the sun
reached the slit in that side of the tower, where, beginning
by throwing in a streak of fire as narrow as a corn-stalk, it
enlarged its width till the dusty nook was flooded with
cheerful light. It disclosed something lying in the corner,
which on examination proved to be a dry bone. Whether it was
human, or had come from the castle larder in bygone times, he
could not tell. One bone was not a whole skeleton, but it
made him think of Ginevra of Modena, the heroine of the
Mistletoe Bough, and other cribbed and confined wretches, who
had fallen into such traps and been discovered after a cycle
of years.

The sun's rays had travelled some way round the interior when
Somerset's waiting ears were at last attracted by footsteps
above, each tread being brought down by the hollow turret with
great fidelity. He hoped that with these sounds would arise
that of a soft voice he had begun to like well. Indeed,
during the solitary hour or two of his waiting here he had
pictured Paula straying alone on the terrace of the castle,
looking up, noting his signal, and ascending to deliver him
from his painful position by her own exertions. It seemed
that at length his dream had been verified. The footsteps
approached the opening of the turret; and, attracted by the
call which Somerset now raised, began to descend towards him.
In a moment, not Paula's face, but that of a dreary footman of
her household, looked into the hole.

Somerset mastered his disappointment, and the man speedily
fetched a ladder, by which means the prisoner of two hours
ascended to the roof in safety. During the process he
ventured to ask for the ladies of the house, and learnt that
they had gone out for a drive together.

Before he left the castle, however, they had returned, a
circumstance unexpectedly made known to him by his receiving a
message from Miss Power, to the effect that she would be glad
to see him at his convenience. Wondering what it could
possibly mean, he followed the messenger to her room--a small
modern library in the Jacobean wing of the house, adjoining
that in which the telegraph stood. She was alone, sitting
behind a table littered with letters and sketches, and looking
fresh from her drive. Perhaps it was because he had been shut
up in that dismal dungeon all the afternoon that he felt
something in her presence which at the same time charmed and
refreshed him.

She signified that he was to sit down; but finding that he was
going to place himself on a straight-backed chair some
distance off she said, 'Will you sit nearer to me?' and then,
as if rather oppressed by her dignity, she left her own chair
of business and seated herself at ease on an ottoman which was
among the diversified furniture of the apartment.

'I want to consult you professionally,' she went on. 'I have
been much impressed by your great knowledge of castellated
architecture. Will you sit in that leather chair at the
table, as you may have to take notes?'

The young man assented, expressed his gratification, and went
to the chair she designated.

'But, Mr. Somerset,' she continued, from the ottoman--the
width of the table only dividing them--'I first should just
like to know, and I trust you will excuse my inquiry, if you
are an architect in practice, or only as yet studying for the
profession?'

'I am just going to practise. I open my office on the first
of January next,' he answered.

'You would not mind having me as a client--your first client?'
She looked curiously from her sideway face across the table as
she said this.

'Can you ask it!' said Somerset warmly. 'What are you going
to build?'

'I am going to restore the castle.'

'What, all of it?' said Somerset, astonished at the audacity
of such an undertaking.

'Not the parts that are absolutely ruinous: the walls
battered by the Parliament artillery had better remain as they
are, I suppose. But we have begun wrong; it is I who should
ask you, not you me . . . . I fear,' she went on, in that low
note which was somewhat difficult to catch at a distance, 'I
fear what the antiquarians will say if I am not very careful.
They come here a great deal in summer and if I were to do the
work wrong they would put my name in the papers as a dreadful
person. But I must live here, as I have no other house,
except the one in London, and hence I must make the place
habitable. I do hope I can trust to your judgment?'

'I hope so,' he said, with diffidence, for, far from having
much professional confidence, he often mistrusted himself. 'I
am a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and a Member of the
Institute of British Architects--not a Fellow of that body
yet, though I soon shall be.'

'Then I am sure you must be trustworthy,' she said, with
enthusiasm. 'Well, what am I to do?--How do we begin?'

Somerset began to feel more professional, what with the
business chair and the table, and the writing-paper,
notwithstanding that these articles, and the room they were
in, were hers instead of his; and an evenness of manner which
he had momentarily lost returned to him. 'The very first
step,' he said, 'is to decide upon the outlay--what is it to
cost?'

He faltered a little, for it seemed to disturb the softness of
their relationship to talk thus of hard cash. But her
sympathy with his feeling was apparently not great, and she
said, 'The expenditure shall be what you advise.'

'What a heavenly client!' he thought. 'But you must just give
some idea,' he said gently. 'For the fact is, any sum almost
may be spent on such a building: five thousand, ten thousand,
twenty thousand, fifty thousand, a hundred thousand.'

'I want it done well; so suppose we say a hundred thousand?
My father's solicitor--my solicitor now--says I may go to a
hundred thousand without extravagance, if the expenditure is
scattered over two or three years.'

Somerset looked round for a pen. With quickness of insight
she knew what he wanted, and signified where one could be
found. He wrote down in large figures--

100,000.

It was more than he had expected; and for a young man just
beginning practice, the opportunity of playing with another
person's money to that extent would afford an exceptionally
handsome opening, not so much from the commission it
represented, as from the attention that would be bestowed by
the art-world on such an undertaking.

Paula had sunk into a reverie. 'I was intending to intrust
the work to Mr. Havill, a local architect,' she said. 'But I
gathered from his conversation with you to-day that his
ignorance of styles might compromise me very seriously. In
short, though my father employed him in one or two little
matters, it would not be right--even a morally culpable thing-
-to place such an historically valuable building in his
hands.'

'Has Mr. Havill ever been led to expect the commission?' he
asked.

'He may have guessed that he would have it. I have spoken of
my intention to him more than once.'

Somerset thought over his conversation with Havill. Well, he
did not like Havill personally; and he had strong reasons for
suspecting that in the matter of architecture Havill was a
quack. But was it quite generous to step in thus, and take
away what would be a golden opportunity to such a man of
making both ends meet comfortably for some years to come,
without giving him at least one chance? He reflected a little
longer, and then spoke out his feeling.

'I venture to propose a slightly modified arrangement,' he
said. 'Instead of committing the whole undertaking to my
hands without better proof of my ability to carry it out than
you have at present, let there be a competition between Mr.
Havill and myself--let our rival plans for the restoration and
enlargement be submitted to a committee of the Royal Institute
of British Architects--and let the choice rest with them,
subject of course to your approval.'

'It is indeed generous of you to suggest it.' She looked
thoughtfully at him; he appeared to strike her in a new light.
'You really recommend it?' The fairness which had prompted
his words seemed to incline her still more than before to
resign herself entirely to him in the matter.

'I do,' said Somerset deliberately.

'I will think of it, since you wish it. And now, what general
idea have you of the plan to adopt? I do not positively agree
to your suggestion as yet, so I may perhaps ask the question.'

Somerset, being by this time familiar with the general plan of
the castle, took out his pencil and made a rough sketch.
While he was doing it she rose, and coming to the back of his
chair, bent over him in silence.

'Ah, I begin to see your conception,' she murmured; and the
breath of her words fanned his ear. He finished the sketch,
and held it up to her, saying--

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