The Altar Steps by Compton MacKenzie

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The Father Superior then read a statement of the Order's financial
liabilities, and invited any Brother who wished, to speak his mind. All
waited for the Prior, who after a short silence rose:

"Reverend Father and Brethren, I don't think that there is much to say.
Frankly, I am not convinced that we ought to have spent so much on the
Abbey, but having done so, we must obviously try and put ourselves on a
sound financial basis. I should like to hear what Brother Dominic has to
say."

Brother Dominic was a slight man with black hair and a sallow
complexion, whose most prominent feature was an, immense hooked nose
with thin nostrils. Whether through the associations with his name
saint, or merely by his personality, Mark considered that he looked a
typical inquisitor. When he spoke, his lips seemed to curl in a sneer.
The expression was probably quite accidental, perhaps caused by some
difficulty in breathing, but the effect was sinister, and his smooth
voice did nothing to counteract the unpleasant grimace. Mark wondered if
he was really successful with the men at Shorncliffe.

"Reverend Father, Reverend Brother, and Brethren," said Brother Dominic,
"you can imagine that it is no easy matter for me to destroy with a few
words a house that in a small way I had a share in building up."

"The lion's share," interposed the Father Superior.

"You are too generous, Reverend Father," said Brother Dominic. "We could
have done very little at Sandgate if you had not worked so hard for us
throughout the length and breadth of England. And that is what
personally I do feel, Brethren," he continued in more emphatic tones. "I
do feel that the Reverend Father knows better than we what is the right
policy for us to adopt. I will not pretend that I shall be anything but
loath to leave Sandgate, but the future of the whole order depends on
the ability of brethren like myself," Brother Dominic paused for the
briefest instant to flash a quick glance at Brother Anselm, "to
recognize that our usefulness to the soldiers among whom we are proud
and happy to spend our lives is bounded by our usefulness to the Order
of St. George. I give my vote without hesitation in favour of closing
the Priory at Sandgate, and abandoning temporarily the work at
Shorncliffe Camp."

Nobody else spoke when Brother Dominic sat down, and everybody voted in
favour of the course of action proposed by the Father Superior.

Brother Dominic, in addition to his other work, had been editing _The
Dragon_, the monthly magazine of the Order, and it was now decided to
print this in future at the Abbey, some constant reader having presented
a fount of type. The opening of a printing-press involved housing room,
and it was decided to devote the old kitchens to this purpose, so that
new kitchens could be built, a desirable addition in view of the
increasing numbers in the Abbey and the likelihood of a further increase
presently.

Mark had not been touched by the abandonment of the Sandgate priory
until Brother Athanasius arrived. Brother Athanasius was a florid young
man with bright blue eyes, and so much pent-up energy as sometimes to
appear blustering. He lacked any kind of ability to hide his feelings,
and he was loud in his denunciation of the Chapter that abolished his
work. His criticisms were so loud, aggressive, and blatant, that he was
nearly ordered to retire from the Order altogether. However, the Father
Superior went away to address a series of drawing-room meetings in
London, and Brother George, with whom Brother Athanasius, almost alone
of the brethren, never hesitated to keep his end up, discovering that he
was as ready to stick up to horses and cows, did not pay attention to
the Father Superior's threat that, if Brother Athanasius could not keep
his tongue quiet, he must be sent away. Mark made friends with him, and
when he found that, in spite of all his blatancy and self-assertion,
Brother Athanasius could not keep the tears from his bright blue eyes
whenever he spoke of Shorncliffe, he was sorry for him and vexed with
himself for accepting the surrender of Sandgate priory so much as a
matter of course, because he had no personal experience of its work.

"But was Brother Dominic really good with the men?" Mark asked.

"Oh, Brother Dominic was all right. Don't you try and make me criticize
Brother Dominic. He bought the gloves and I did the fighting. Good man
of business was Brother D. I wish we could have some boxing here. Half
the brethren want punching about in my opinion. Old Brother Jerome's
face is squashed flat like a prize-fighter's, but I bet he's never had
the gloves on in his life. I'm fond of old Brother J. But, my word,
wouldn't I like to punch into him when he gives us that pea-soup more
than four times a week. Chronic, I call it. Well, if he doesn't give us
a jolly good blow out on my name-day next week I really will punch into
him. Old Brother Flatface, as I called him the other day. And he wasn't
half angry either. Didn't we have sport last second of May! I took a
party of them all round Hythe and Folkestone. No end of a spree!"

Mark was soon too much occupied with his duties as guestmaster to lament
with Brother Athanasius the end of the Sandgate priory. The Reverend
Father's drawing-room addresses were sending fresh visitors down every
week to see for themselves the size of the foundation that required
money, and more money, and more money still to keep it going. In the old
Chatsea days guests who visited the Mission House were expected to
provide entertainment for their hosts. It mattered not who they were,
millionaires or paupers, parsons or laymen, undergraduates or
board-school boys, they had to share the common table, face the common
teasing, and help the common task. Here at the Abbey, although the
guests had much more opportunity of intercourse with the brethren than
would have been permitted in a less novel monastic house, they were
definitely guests, from whom nothing was expected beyond observance of
the rules for guests. They were of all kinds, from the distinguished lay
leaders of the Catholic party to young men who thought emotionally of
joining the Order.

Mark tried to conduct himself as impersonally as possible, and in doing
so he managed to impress all the visitors with being a young man
intensely preoccupied with his vocation, and as such to be treated with
gravity and a certain amount of deference. Mark himself was anxious not
to take advantage of his position, and make friends with people that
otherwise he might not have met. Had he been sure that he was going to
remain in the Order of St. George, he would have allowed himself a
greater liberty of intercourse, because he would not then have been
afraid of one day seeing these people in the world. He desired to be
forgotten when they left the Abbey, or if he was remembered to be
remembered only as a guestmaster who tried to make the Monastery guests
comfortable, who treated them with courtesy, but also with reserve.

None of the young men who came down to see if they would like to be
monks got as far as being accepted as a probationer until the end of
May, when a certain Mr. Arthur Yarrell, an undergraduate from Keble
College, Oxford, whose mind was a dictionary of ecclesiastical terms,
was accepted and a month later became a postulant as Brother Augustine,
to the great pleasure of Brother Raymond, who said that he really
thought he should have been compelled to leave the Order if somebody had
not joined it with an appreciation of historic Catholicism. Early in
June Sir Charles Horner introduced another young man called Aubrey Wyon,
whom he had met at Venice in May.

"Take a little trouble over entertaining him," Sir Charles counselled.
And then, looking round to see that no thieves or highwaymen were
listening, he whispered to Mark that Wyon had money. "He would be an
asset, I fancy. And he's seriously thinking of joining you," the baronet
declared.

To tell the truth, Sir Charles who was beginning to be worried by the
financial state of the Order of St. George, would at this crisis have
tried to persuade the Devil to become a monk if the Devil would have
provided a handsome dowry. He had met Aubrey Wyon at an expensive hotel,
had noticed that he was expensively dressed and drank good wine, had
found that he was interested in ecclesiastical religion, and, having
bragged a bit about the land he had presented to the Order of St.
George, had inspired Wyon to do some bragging of what he had done for
various churches.

"If I could find happiness at Malford," Wyon had said, "I would give
them all that I possess."

Sir Charles had warned the Father Superior that he would do well to
accept Wyon as a probationer, should he propose himself; and the Father
Superior, who was by now as anxious for money as a company-promoter,
made himself as pleasant to Wyon as he knew how, flattering him
carefully and giving voice to his dreams for the great stone Abbey to be
built here in days to come.

Mark took an immediate and violent dislike to the newcomer, which, had
he been questioned about it, he would have attributed to his elaborate
choice of socks and tie, or to his habit of perpetually tightening the
leather belt he wore instead of braces, as if he would compel that
flabbiness of waist caused by soft living to vanish; but to himself he
admitted that the antipathy was deeper seated.

"It's like the odour of corruption," he murmured, though actually it was
the odour of hair washes and lotions and scents that filled the guest's
cell.

However, Aubrey Wyon became for a week a probationer, ludicrously known
as Brother Aubrey, after which he remained a postulant only a fortnight
before he was clothed as a novice, having by then taken the name of
Anthony, alleging that the inspiration to become a monk had been due to
the direct intervention of St. Anthony of Padua on June 13th.

Whether Brother Anthony turned the Father Superior's head with his
promises of what he intended to give the Order when he was professed, or
whether having once started he was unable to stop, there was continuous
building all that summer, culminating in a decision to begin the Abbey
Church.

Mark wondered why Brother George did not protest against the
expenditure, and he came to the conclusion that the Prior was as much
bewitched by ambition for his farm as the head of the Order was by his
hope of a mighty fane.

Thus things drifted during the summer, when, since the Father Superior
was not away so much, his influence was exerted more strongly over the
brethren, though at the same time he was not attracting as much money as
was now always required in ever increasing amounts.

Such preaching as he did manage later on during the autumn was by no
means so financially successful as his campaign of the preceding year at
the same time. Perhaps the natural buoyancy of his spirit led Father
Burrowes in his disappointment to place more trust than he might
otherwise have done in Brother Anthony's plan for the benefit of the
Order. The cloister became like Aladdin's Cave whenever there were
enough brethren assembled to make an audience for his luscious projects
and prefigurations. Sundays were the days when Brother Anthony was
particularly eloquent, and one Sunday in mid-September--it was the Feast
of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross--he surpassed himself.

"My notion would be to copy," he proclaimed, "with of course certain
improvements, the buildings on Monte Cassino. We are not quite so high
here; but then on the other hand that is an advantage, because it will
enable us to allot less space to the superficial area. Yes, I have a
very soft spot for the cloisters of Monte Cassino."

Brother Anthony gazed round for the approbation of the assembled
brethren, none of whom had the least idea what the cloisters of Monte
Cassino looked like.

"And I think some of our altar furniture is a little mean," Brother
Anthony continued. "I'm not advocating undue ostentation; but there is
room for improvement. They understood so well in the Middle Ages the
importance of a rich equipment. If I'd only known when I was in Sienna
this spring that I was coming here, I should certainly have bought a
superb reredos that was offered to me comparatively cheap. The columns
were of malachite and porphyry, and the panels of _rosso antico_ with
scrolls of _lumachella_. They only asked 15,000 lire. It was absurdly
cheap. However, perhaps it would be wiser to wait till we finish the
Abbey Church before we decide on the reredos. I'm very much in favour of
beaten gold for the tabernacle. By the way, Reverend Father, have you
decided to build an ambulatory round the clerestory? I must say I think
it would be effective, and of course for meditation unique. I shall have
to find if my money will run to it. Oh, and Brother Birinus, weren't you
saying the other day that the green vestments were rather faded? Don't
worry. I'm only waiting to make up my mind between velvet and brocade
for the purple set to order a completely new lot, including a set in old
rose damask for mid-Lent. It always seems to me such a mistake not to
take advantage of that charming use."

Father Burrowes was transported to the days of his youth at Malta when
his own imagination was filled with visions of precious metals, of rare
fabrics and mighty architecture.

"A silver chalice of severe pattern encrusted round the stem with blue
zircons," Brother Anthony was chanting in his melodious voice, his eyes
bright with the reflection of celestial splendours. "And perhaps another
in gold with the sacred monogram wrought on the cup in jacinths and
orange tourmalines. Yes, I'll talk it over with Sir Charles and get him
to approve the design."

The next morning two detectives came to Malford Abbey, and arrested
Aubrey Wyon alias Brother Anthony for obtaining money under false
pretences in various parts of the world. With them he departed to prison
and a life more ascetic than any he had hitherto known. Brother Anthony
departed indeed, but he was not discredited until it was too late. His
grandiose projects and extravagant promises had already incited Father
Burrowes to launch out on several new building operations that the Order
could ill afford.

Perhaps the cloister had been less like the Cave of Aladdin than the
Cave of the Forty Thieves.

After Christmas another Chapter was convened, to which Brother Anselm
and Brother Chad were both bidden. The Father Superior addressed the
brethren as he had addressed them a year ago, and finished up his speech
by announcing that, deeply as he regretted it, he felt bound to propose
that the Aldershot priory should be closed.

"What?" shouted Brother Anselm, leaping to his feet, his eyes blazing
with wrath through his great horn spectacles.

The Prior quickly rose to say that he could not agree to the Reverend
Father's suggestion. It was impossible for them any longer to claim that
they were an active Order if they confined themselves entirely to the
Abbey. He had not opposed the shutting down of the Sandgate priory, nor,
he would remind the Reverend Father, had he offered any resistance to
the abandonment of Malta. But he felt obliged to give his opinion
strongly in favour of making any sacrifice to keep alive the Aldershot
priory.

Brother George had spoken with force, but without eloquence; and Mark
was afraid that his speech had not carried much weight.

The next to rise was Brother Birinus, who stood up as tall as a tree and
said:

"I agree with Brother George."

And when he sat down it was as if a tree had been uprooted.

There was a pause after this, while every brother looked at his
neighbour, waiting for him to rise at this crisis in the history of the
Order. At last the Father Superior asked Brother Anselm if he did not
intend to speak.

"What can I say?" asked Brother Anselm bitterly. "Last year I should
have been true to myself and voted against the closing of the Sandgate
house. I was silent then in my egoism. I am not fit to defend our house
now."

"But I will," cried Brother Chad, rising. "Begging your pardon, Reverend
Father and Brethren, if I am speaking too soon, but I cannot believe
that you seriously consider closing us down. We're just beginning to get
on well with the authorities, and we've a regular lot of communicants
now. We began as just a Club, but we're something more than a Club now.
We're bringing men to Our Lord, Brethren. You will do a great wrong if
you let those poor souls think that for the sake of your own comfort you
are ready to forsake them. Forgive me, Reverend Father. Forgive me, dear
Brethren, if I have said too much and spoken uncharitably."

"He has not spoken uncharitably enough," Brother Athanasius shouted,
rising to his feet, and as he did so unconsciously assuming the attitude
of a boxer. "If I'd been here last year, I should have spoken much more
uncharitably. I did not join this Order to sit about playing with
vestments. I wanted to bring soldiers to God. If this Order is to be
turned into a kind of male nunnery, I'm off to-morrow. I'm boiling over,
that's what I am, boiling over. If we can't afford to do what we should
be doing, we can't afford to build gatehouses, and lay out flower-beds,
and sit giggling in tin cloisters. It's the limit, that's what it is,
the limit."

Brother Athanasius stood there flushed with defiance, until the Father
Superior told him to sit down and not make a fool of himself, a command
which, notwithstanding that the feeling of the Chapter had been so far
entirely against the head of the Order, such was the Father Superior's
authority, Brother Athanasius immediately obeyed.

Brother Dominic now rose to try, as he said, to bring an atmosphere of
reasonableness into the discussion.

"I do not think that I can be accused of inconsistency," he pointed out
smoothly, "when we look back to our general Chapter of a year ago.
Whatever my personal feelings were about closing the Sandgate priory, I
recognized at once that the Reverend Father was right. There is really
no doubt that we must be strong at the roots before we try to grow into
a tall tree. However flourishing the branches, they will wither if the
roots are not fed. The Reverend Father has no desire, as I understand
him, to abandon the activity of the Order. He is merely anxious to
establish us on a firm basis. The Reverend Brother said that we should
make any sacrifice to maintain the Aldershot house. I have no desire to
accuse the Reverend Brother of inconsistency, but I would ask him if he
is willing to give up the farm, which, as you know, has cost so far a
great deal more than we could afford. But of course the Reverend Brother
would give up the farm. At the same time, we do not want him to give it
up. We realize that under his capable guidance that farm will presently
be a source of profit. Therefore, I beg the Reverend Brother to
understand that I am making a purely rhetorical point when I ask him if
he is prepared to give up the farm. I repeat, we do not want the farm
given up.

"Another point which I feel has been missed. In giving up Aldershot, we
are not giving up active work entirely. We have a good deal of active
work here. We have our guest-house for casuals, and we are always ready
to feed, clothe, and shelter any old soldiers who come to us. We are
still young as an Order. We have only four professed monks, including
the Reverend Father. We want to have more than that before we can
consider ourselves established. I for one should hesitate to take my
final vows until I had spent a long time in strict religious
preparation, which in the hurry and scurry of active work is impossible.
We have listened to a couple of violent speeches, or at any rate to one
violent speech by a brother who was for a year in close touch with
myself. I appeal to him not to drag the discussion down to the level of
lay politics. We are free, we novices, to leave to-morrow. Let us
remember that, and do not let us take advantage of our freedom to impart
to this Mother House of ours the atmosphere of the world to which we may
return when we will.

"And let us remember when we oppose the judgment of the Reverend Father
that we are exalting ourselves without reason. Let us remember that it
is he who by his eloquence and by his devotion and by his endurance and
by his personality, has given us this wonderful house. Are we to turn
round and say to him who has worked so hard for us that we do not want
his gifts, that we are such wonderful fishers of men that we can be
independent of him? Oh, my dear Brethren, let me beg you to vote in
favour of abandoning all our dependencies until we are ourselves no
longer dependent on the Reverend Father's eloquence and devotion and
endurance and personality. God has blessed us infinitely. Are we to
fling those blessings in His face?"

Brother Dominic sat down; after him in succession Brother Raymond,
Brother Dunstan, Brother Lawrence, Brother Jerome, Brother Nicholas, and
Brother Augustine spoke in support of the Father Superior. Brother Giles
refused to speak, and though Mark's heart was thundering in his mouth
with unuttered eloquence, at the moment he should rise he could not find
a word, and he indicated with a sign that like Brother Giles, he had
nothing to say.

"The voting will be by ballot," the Reverend Father announced. "It is
proposed to give up the Priory at Aldershot. Let those brethren who
agree write Yes on a strip of paper. Let those who disagree write No."

All knelt in silent prayer before they inscribed their will; after which
they advanced one by one to the ballot-box, into which under the eyes of
a large crucifix they dropped their papers. The Father Superior did not
vote. Brother Simon, who was still a postulant, and not eligible to sit
in Chapter, was fetched to count the votes. He was much excited at his
task, and when he announced that seven papers were inscribed Yes, that
six were inscribed No, and that one paper was blank, his teeth were
chattering.

"One paper blank?" somebody repeated.

"Yes, really," said Brother Simon. "I looked everywhere, and there's not
a mark on it."

All turned involuntarily toward Mark, whose paper in fact it was,
although he gave no sign of being conscious of the ownership.

"_In a General Chapter of the Order of St. George, held upon the Vigil
of the Epiphany of our Lord Jesus Christ, in the year of Grace, 1903, it
was resolved to close the Priory of the Order in the town of
Aldershot._"

The Reverend Father, having invoked the Holy Trinity, declared the
Chapter dissolved.

CHAPTER XXVIII

DIVISION

Mark was vexed with himself for evading the responsibility of recording
his opinion. His vote would not have changed the direction of the
policy; but if he had voted against giving up the house at Aldershot,
the Father Superior would have had to record the casting vote in favour
of his own proposal, and whatever praise or blame was ultimately awarded
to the decision would have belonged to him alone, who as head of the
Order was best able to bear it. Mark's whole sympathy had been on the
side of Brother George, and as one who had known at first hand the work
in Aldershot, he did feel that it ought not to be abandoned so easily.
Then when Brother Athanasius was speaking, Mark, in his embarrassment at
such violence of manner and tone, picked up a volume lying on the table
by his elbow that by reading he might avoid the eyes of his brethren
until Brother Athanasius had ceased to shout. It was the Rule of St.
Benedict which, with a print of Fra Angelico's Crucifixion and an image
of St. George, was all the decoration allowed to the bare Chapter Room,
and the page at which Mark opened the leather-bound volume was headed:
DE PRAEPOSITO MONASTERII.

"_It happens too often that through the appointment of the Prior
grave scandals arise in monasteries, since some there be who,
puffed up with a malignant spirit of pride, imagining themselves to
be second Abbots, and assuming unto themselves a tyrannous
authority, encourage scandals and create dissensions in the
community. . . ._

"_Hence envy is excited, strife, evil-speaking, jealousy, discord,
confusion; and while the Abbot and the Prior run counter to each
other, by such dissension their souls must of necessity be
imperilled; and those who are under them, when they take sides, are
travelling on the road to perdition. . . ._

"_On this account we apprehend that it is expedient for the
preservation of peace and good-will that the management of his
monastery should be left to the discretion of the Abbot. . . ._

"_Let the Prior carry out with reverence whatever shall be enjoined
upon him by his Abbot, doing nothing against the Abbot's will, nor
against his orders. . . ._"

Mark could not be otherwise than impressed by what he read.

_Ii qui sub ipsis sunt, dum adulantur partibus, eunt in
perditionem. . . ._

_Nihil contra Abbatis voluntatem faciens. . . ._

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