Father Vassall laughed meaningly. "Come to supper," he said gaily. "It's p-p-pork and b-b-beans. But I can give you a glass of Sp-Sp-Spanish B-B-Burgundy!"
(2)
In the chapel that night Paul prayed his prayer for the first time. The priest walked in before him and showed him to his chair and a prayer-desk with a courtly little gesture. The three servants sat behind. A candle was already lit for Paul, and one burned also for the priest in his corner. There was a white sanctuary lamp before the altar, and a red one on the left. Otherwise there was no light.
Prayers began with Scripture reading. Father Vassall had announced the fact with his odd air of almost playing with the thing. "We read the B-B-Bible every night," he had said. "Do you m-m-mind? We read for t-t-ten m-m-minutes!"
Paul had said, smilingly, that he did not mind.
So now he sat back in his chair and composed himself to listen and to look. The priest opposite, a little black hunched-up figure, half turned on one side to allow the candlelight to fall on his book, had announced: "The Acts of the Holy Apostles" and begun in a matter-of-fact, rather rapid tone, to read. As when he preached, so when he read, he did not stammer, being shortly utterly engrossed in his subject. He read on, chapter after chapter, without break or division. Paul grew interested in the manner of it. The narrative rolled out before him as a whole, a simple, nervous, obvious story which singularly held even the attention of a listener who could have gone on, pretty well, wherever the reader had cared to stop. But after a while the boy allowed his eyes to rove. This story of Peter's doings—odd, how Peter dominated the early chapters—did not somehow seem out of place here. He began to apprise the details of the building and its furniture.
It was plainly a barn. It had a barn roof of ancient unstained timber, and a stone floor. The windows were irregular, uncurtained; he saw his little moon again, steady now, shining through the bare casement, just touching rough beams that spanned the irregular rectangle as a rood-screen. In the centre rose a cross with flanking figures. They were rudely carved, by the priest himself, but there was death in the white nude body of the Christ and passionate life in the upturned head of the Mary. John stood acquiescent; Paul wondered at his attitude. It hid him; perhaps there was conflict in his heart. Perhaps he understood. Perhaps, if one understood, conflict died down to peace.
The thin supports of the rood dropped down through the shadows to the floor. A little figure stood half-way up one of them. Oh, and in the corner, between the far support and the wall, stood another statue. Paul stared at it. Something writhed in the candlelight. Then he saw that it should do so. St. Michael trod down the dragon there.
Paul looked through the rood to the altar. High hangings ran up into the canopy, but it and they were lost in the shadows. In the centre, a cartoon was appliquéd upon them; a Madonna and Child; it was just visible. There were four candlesticks, silver; the candles were burned low in them. A silver figure hung on an ebony cross—or it looked like ebony. The tabernacle was a blur of white silk. A white cloth glimmered there; and below, under the altar, a row of painted carven shields. Paul could not distinguish more, but he knew them. He had seen Father Vassall at work upon them in his study at Cambridge. They emblazoned symbols of the Passion.
Then he began to concentrate on the gloom to the left, where the red light burned. The shadows were all confused and blurred. There were irregular outlines, streaks, shadowy lines. He puzzled out a small altar, with tiny candlesticks and a biggish case upon it, that shone fitfully. The lines radiated from the case, stuck through it, behind it, as though they were a bundle of spears. Spears! It was a spear; he could see, now, a gleam on the blade. Another was headed with a bunched object. And then he knew.