So we went across the garden, and through the place of roses, and through the gate on the far side, and through the field which bounded the churchyard. There was a great yellow moon just risen, and shadows were sharp-cut, so that there was no doubt when we came to the place that had been so newly dug. His uncle, Helen’s father, lay there; the two graves were side by side.
So we sat there in silence for some time, very still, for a rat ran on to the mound of earth by the graveside, and sat there, smartening itself up, brushing its face and whiskers with nimble paws. The shadow of the tower swung just clear of the place, and sharp-cut in the light was that oblong hole in the ground. There was nothing as yet to be said, for Helen was crying quietly to herself, and I could not stay those loving tears. Once she said to me: ‘Oh, let us buck up!’ But then she silently wept again.
You see, I know Helen. I knew that there was nothing of bitterness in her crying. Tears of that sort were not opposed to the bucking up. Legs did not mean that he wanted us not to miss his dear companionship. He only wanted us to stand up and be cheery, not be bitter or broken. But since Helen felt she could face to-morrow better if she faced the scene of it, why, that was all right; it was bucking up.
Then in a few little sentences we talked of the next day. There should be the A flat Fugue—no funeral march—and we would have no funeral hymns, but just one Psalm, ‘The Lord is my Shepherd,’ and one hymn after all that had to be done was over; so then we would sing ‘Adeste Fideles,’ Helen thought, for it is always Christmas since the first Christmas Day.
Helen just moved as she sat there on the edge of his grave when we had settled this as if to go home again, but——
And then I told her all that I had thought three mornings ago—all the doubts that merged into certainty, all the logical conclusions. Whether I then at that moment inclined more to the side of the Devil or of God I do not know, but in any case I told her all; and then she put her arms round me.
‘Yes, dear,’ she said, ‘but in hell He is there also. And we are all there sometimes, and it is but the lowest step of the beautiful stair to heaven.’
The moon had swung behind the tower, and we sat in the darkness of its shadow.
‘It is all so simple,’ she said. ‘It all depends upon what you believe, not what you think or what you reason about. Do you believe that we bury Legs to-morrow? Do you believe that he is dead, or that he has ceased to be an individual? You may reason about it, and ask me, as you asked yourself, how you will recognize him if his body has become grass and flowers? I am quite content to say that I have no idea. You see, one doesn’t know all God’s plans quite completely, and sometimes we are apt to think that if one doesn’t know plans about a certain thing He hasn’t got one. We put our intelligence above His. That is a mistake.’
And we sat in silence again; then Helen spoke asking me an extremely simple question.