The Cathedral: A Novel

by Hugh Walpole

When an hour later he sallied forth to the Chapter Meeting he had recovered his equanimity. His mind now was nailed to the business on hand. Most innocently as he crossed the Cathedral Green he strutted, his head up, his brow stern, his hands crossed behind his back. The choristers coming in from the choir-school practice in the Cathedral passed him in a ragged line. They all touched their mortar-boards and he smiled benignly upon them, reserving a rather stern glance for Brockett, the organist, of whose musical eccentricities he did not at all approve.

Little remained now of the original Chapter House which had once been a continuation of Saint Margaret's Chapel. Some extremely fine Early Norman arches which were once part of the Chapter House are still there and may be seen at the southern end of the Cloisters. Here, too, are traces of the dormitory and infirmary which formerly stood there. The present Chapter House consists of two rooms adjoining the Cloisters, once a hall used by the monks as a large refectory. There is still a timber roof of late thirteenth century work, and this is supposed to have been once part of the old pilgrims' or strangers' hall. The larger of the two rooms is reserved for the Chapter Meetings, the smaller being used for minor meetings and informal discussions.

The Archdeacon was a little late as, I am afraid, he liked to be when he was sure that others would be punctual. Nothing, however, annoyed him more than to find others late when he himself was in time. There they all were and how exactly he knew how they would all be!

There was the long oak table, blotting paper and writing materials neatly placed before each seat, there the fine walls in which he always took so great a pride, with the portraits of the Polchester Bishops in grand succession upon them. At the head of the table was the Dean, nervously with anxious smiles looking about him. On the right was Brandon's seat; on the left Witheram, seriously approaching the business of the day as though his very life depended upon it; then Bentinck-Major, his hands looking as though they had been manicured; next to him Ryle, laughing obsequiously at some fashionable joke that Bentinck-Major had delivered to him; opposite to him Foster, looking as though he had not had a meal for a week and badly shaved with a cut on his chin; and next to him Ronder.

At the bottom of the table was little Bond, the Chapter Clerk, sucking his pencil.

Brandon took his place with dignified apologies for his late arrival.

"Let us ask God for His blessing on our work to-day," said the Dean.

A prayer followed, then general rustling and shuffling, blowing of noses, coughing and even, from the surprised and consternated Ryle, a sneeze-- then the business of the day began. The minutes of the last meeting were read, and there was a little amiable discussion. At once Brandon was conscious of Ronder. Why? He could not tell and was the more uncomfortable. The man said nothing. He had not been present at the last meeting and could therefore have nothing to say to this part of the business. He sat there, his spectacles catching the light from the opposite windows so that he seemed to have no eyes. His chubby body, the position in which he was sitting, hunched up, leaning forward on his arms, spoke of perfect and almost sleepy content. His round face and fat cheeks gave him the air of a man to whom business was a tiresome and unnecessary interference with the pleasures of life.

Nevertheless, Brandon was so deeply aware of Ronder that again and again, against his will, his eyes wandered in his direction. Once or twice Brandon said something, not because he had anything really to say, but because he wanted to impress himself upon Ronder. All agreed with him in the complacent and contented way that they had always agreed....

Then his consciousness of Ronder extended and gave him a new consciousness of the other men. He had known for so long exactly how they looked and the words that they would say, that they were, to him, rather like the stone images of the Twelve Apostles in the niches round the West Door. Today they jumped in a moment into new life. Yesterday he could have calculated to a nicety the attitude that they would have; now they seemed to have been blown askew with a new wind. Because he noticed these things it does not mean that he was generally perceptive. He had always been very sharp to perceive anything that concerned his own position.