Maradick at Forty: A Transition

by Hugh Walpole

He let the wind beat about his face as he watched the mists in great waves and with encircling arms sweep about the cove. There came to him as he watched, suddenly, some lines from end of “To Paradise.” He could not remember them exactly, but they had been something like this:

To Tressiter, as to every other human being, there had come suddenly his time of revelation, his moment in which he was to see without any assistance from tradition, without any reference to things or persons of the past. He beheld suddenly with the vision of some one new-born, and through his brain and body into the locked recesses of his soul there passed the elemental passions and movements of the world that had swayed creation from the beginning. The great volume of the winds, the tireless beating of waves upon countless shores, the silent waters of innumerable rivers, the shining flanks of a thousand cattle upon moorlands that stretch without horizon to the end of time—it was these things rather than any little acts of civilisation that some few hundred years had seen that chimed now with the new life that was his. He had never seen before, he had never known before. He saw now with unprejudiced eyes, he knew now with a knowledge that discounted all man-made laws and went, like a child, back to Mother Earth. . . . But with this new knowledge came also its dangers. Because some laws seemed now of none effect it did not mean that there must be no laws at all. That way was shipwreck. Only, out of this new strength, this new clarity of vision, he must make his strength, his restraint, his discipline for himself, and so pass, a new man, down the other side of the hill. . . . This is the “middle-age” that comes to every man. It has nothing to do with years, but it is the great Rubicon of life. . . .

And so Lester. Fine talk and big words, and a little ludicrous, perhaps, if one knew what Lester was, but there was something in it. Oh! yes! there was something in it!

And now this time, this “middle-age,” had come upon him.

He found that his steps had led him back again to the little church where he had been already that day. He thought that it might be a good place to sit and think things out, quiet and retired and in shelter, if the rain came on again.

The dusk was creeping down the little lane, so that the depths of it were hidden and black; but above the dark clumps of trees the sky had begun to break into the faintest, palest blue. Some bird rejoiced at this return of colour and was singing in the heart of the lane; from the earth rose the sweet clean smell that the rain leaves. From behind the little blue windows of the church shone a pale yellow light, of the same pallor as the faint blue of the sky, seeming in some intimate, friendly way, to re-echo it. The body of the church stood out grey-white against the surrounding mists. It seemed to Maradick (and this showed the way that he now credited everything with vitality) to be bending forward a little and listening to the very distant beating of the sea; its windows were golden eyes.

The lights seemed to prophesy company, and so he was surprised, on pushing the door softly back and entering, to find that there was no one there. But there were two large candles on the altar, and they waved towards him a little with the draught from the door as though to greet him. The church seemed larger now in the half light. The great box-like family pew was lost in the dark corners by the walls; it seemed to stretch away into infinite space. The other seats had an air of conscious waiting for some ceremony. On one of them was still an open prayer-book, open at the marriage service, that had been left there that afternoon. And at the sight of it the memories of Tony and Janet came back to him with a rush, so that they seemed to be there with him. Already it seemed a very, very long time since they had gone, another lifetime almost. And now, as he thought of it, perhaps, after all, it was better that they had gone like that.

He thought over the whole affair from the beginning. The first evening in Treliss, that first night when he had quarrelled with her, and then there had been Tony. That dated the change in him. But he could not remember when he had first noticed anything in her. There had been the picnic, the evening in their room when he had nearly lost control of himself and shaken her. . . . Yes, it was after that. That placed it. Well, then, it was only, after all, because he had shown himself firm, because, for once, he had made her afraid of him. Because, too, no doubt, she had noticed that people paid him attention. For the first time in their married life he had become “somebody,” and that perhaps had opened her eyes. But then there had been that curious moment the other night when she had spoken to him. That had been extraordinarily unpleasant. He could feel again his uncomfortable sensation of helplessness, of not in the least knowing how to deal with her. That was the new Mrs. Maradick. He had therefore some one quite new to reckon with.

And then he saw suddenly, there in the church, the right thing to do. It was to go back. To go back to Epsom, to go back to his wife, to go back to the girls. He saw that she, Mrs. Maradick, in her own way, had been touched by the Admonitus Locorum—not that he put it that way; he called it the “rum place” or “the absurd town.” She was going to try (she had herself told him so) to be better, more obliging. He could see her now, sitting there on the end of the bed, looking at him so pathetically.

The shadows gathered about the church, creeping along the floor and blotting out the blue light from the windows, and only there was a glow by the altar where the candles seemed to increase in size, and their light, like a feathery golden mist, hung in circles until it lost itself in the dusky roof.