The Fall of Doctor Onslow (15 page)

Term began to draw to a close, and as it did so, the rigid form of life at Charton started to dissolve. Lessons were learned in a perfunctory manner even by good pupils. Boys talked of what they were to do in the holidays, and of arrangements for next term, and were less unkind to each other than usual. Lovers promised to write to each other. Those who were to leave the school said farewell to Onslow and received their leaving-presents, while Onslow himself received from the Sixth Form an edition of the Aeneid, bound in vellum, as a token of their respect. Those who were to stay speculated about the new headmaster, who was not yet chosen, and wondered whether he would be more strict than Onslow.

August 11th, 1859, was the last day of term, and on that day, at a special morning service, Onslow preached his farewell sermon. While outside the chapel sweating porters struggled with boys’ trunks, he preached on the subject of loneliness to an audience of pupils, former pupils, and parents. The carriages of boys’ parents wanting to attend the service had inundated the village of Charton Underhill, for Onslow was a much admired headmaster, and had been recommended by
The
Times
for the bishopric of Shrewsbury almost as soon as the news of his surprising resignation was made public.

Mounting the pulpit, Onslow said to his mixed congregation:

‘My text is taken from the Book of Isaiah, chapter fifty-three, verse three – “I have trodden the winepress alone”.’ Then he paused, and massaged the sides of the pulpit with
his hands. ‘Brethren,’ he said, ‘in this morning’s second lesson you heard the well-known history of our Saviour’s sufferings. In the light of my chosen text, I wonder whether you have stopped to think that perhaps the chief among them was His loneliness. Remember His cry from the cross:
My
God,
my
God,
why
hast
Thou
forsaken
me
? At that hour God seemed to have forsaken Him, and man had done so. His own disciples forsook him and fled. In that hour He tasted the fullness of solitude towards both God and man. But was loneliness not the greatest of His sorrows throughout His earthly life? Was He not always alone – most of all when the multitude crowded round Him, but also in the society of the chosen few whom He condescended to call His friends? Truly, He trod the winepress alone.’

Onslow saw a father at the back nodding sagely. ‘And so must we sometimes do so. I wonder how often you have thought what it means to be alone?’ he said, leaning forward. ‘Perhaps you may think that solitude is a great good. In youth you know little of it, and in manhood too you may lead a very busy life, and thus be glad of those rare moments when you are able to be alone, able to refresh your minds in peace. Yet this solitude which is voluntary and occasional is but half solitude. Solitude which we can exchange at will for the society which we love is a widely different thing from that solitude which is either the consequence of bereavement, or the punishment of a crime, or the result of a protracted illness. From the second solitude a merciful Providence has yet kept you, but of the first and third some among you may know something. Some among you may have suffered the bitter sorrow of bereavement. Others may at some time have been confined to a sickroom, where you have been almost as much cut off from the companions of school as from the more tender solaces of a loving home. At such times have you not felt a heavy demand made upon your cheerfulness? Have you not found disagreeable reflections and painful forebodings more likely to occupy your mind than visions of hope and thoughts of thankfulness?

‘Then there are those among you who have returned here today from the outer world, who, I am sure, have experienced at times the sudden sense of isolation and even desolation which may come to a man when he finds himself alone in his lodging, his chambers, his college rooms, with no one to share with him the pleasures and trials of life. In such circumstances a young man, for all his love of new independence, may feel he would give the world to be once more the object of care and affection to others around and above him. And if this can be, how hard is the lot of the man who must leave his very country in the pursuit of fortune or at the call of duty! What a sense of loneliness he must have – the loneliness, if not precisely of solitude, yet of separation, of severance, of isolation! He will surely retain a lifelong recollection of that moment when the last farewells have been exchanged and the removal of the gangway has finally separated the going from the staying. What an impression he will have then of the religious trial of solitude, which reveals what manner of spirit we have, reveals to us whether we have any vitality in ourselves, or are only the creatures of society and circumstance. Yes, some of you may one day know how hard it is to remove ourselves from familiar surroundings and face a new life in solitude.’

Onslow paused again. He had decided not to refer directly to his leaving Charton, but he hoped his audience had taken the point – it seemed to him that a lady on his left was smiling encouragement.

‘And,’ he said gently, his voice descending the scale, ‘there is the loneliness of sorrow. Is it not the feeling of loneliness which gives its sting to bereavement? In the terrible loss of a sister or a mother, a wife or a husband, is not the heart’s loneliness the heaviest and bitterest part of the sorrow?

‘But none of these is the most painful form of solitude. More painful by far is the loneliness of sin: not sin committed, for too often we have companions in sin, but sin felt in our hearts. For sin by its very nature separates us from God, who is present in the sickroom, in the prison,
in far countries, and even in bereavement. And yet despite this, when the sense of sin is upon us, then God must be our one refuge. And He is so, if we will only repent. At such times we must seek to be alone with God. No other man can help us – by the sense of sin we are separated from the world about us, and cast upon the bosom of our almighty Father.

‘Such is the loneliness of repentance, but what must be the loneliness of remorse, which is repentance without God, without Christ, and therefore without hope? If repentance is loneliness, remorse is desolation. Repentance makes us lonely towards man, remorse makes us desolate towards God. That is indeed to be alone, when (to use the inspired figure) not only earth is iron, but also heaven brass. From such loneliness may God in His mercy save us all through His Son Jesus Christ.’

Onslow spoke these words clearly, but inwardly he was in turmoil. When writing the sermon yesterday, he had been perfectly calm, and had not consciously applied it to his own case, his own sense of sin. But hearing his own voice he did so now. He struggled on to his next paragraph, but the struggle was not visible to his audience.

‘I have spoken of loneliness through which we shall probably all pass, before we leave the world. But there remain one or two through which we must undoubtedly all pass, whatever we are.

‘There is the loneliness of death. In death we shall be alone, and shall feel ourselves to be so. Friends may be around us, they will not be with us. The soul is already alone with God, viewing itself as in His sight, and preparing for a yet closer access. The words of a Christian friend may suggest thoughts of solemnity or hope; his prayers may encourage, comfort, and help us; but he is no longer with us as he once was.’ Onslow thought of Primrose, who was sitting at the back of the chapel.

‘Can we then follow the soul one step further, and see it standing in judgement before the throne of God? At that moment we shall be alone, alone for the last time before we enter forever into the society of the good or the evil. In the
one case, there is no such thing as a separate existence because all are gathered together and lost in God – while in the other there can be no separate existence because evil is at last gathered to its kind. Not for sympathy, for there can be no sympathy, amongst the evil, but for the mutual repulsion and unceasing discord which is everywhere where God is not. That discord and repulsion may be regarded as one half of the future punishment which awaits the despisers of an offered mercy in another world.’ Onslow gripped the pulpit and went on a little more loudly than before, seeing that some of those beneath him were looking as unhappy as he felt.

‘If you are to die alone, and if you are to be judged alone, be not afraid to think alone, and to pray alone, and if necessary to act alone. What good will it do any of us to have had a whole multitude with us in doing wrong? for the beloved company of others is all too often an evil influence. What will that excuse be worth at a judgement seat before which we are standing alone – the excuse that others said so, that everyone did so? That is not the question. The question is was it right to do so? was your conscience satisfied that it was right to do so? My brethren, we would not be such servile followers of one another if we could only realise and remember the fact that we must stand alone before God. Far better to be singular now than to be condemned then, far better to face God alone now in prayer, however difficult it may be, than to incur the wrath of Him who is able to destroy soul and body in Hell.

‘Perhaps the view of life I have presented to you seems dreary, even grim,’ he said to the bowed heads of some of his pupils, whom he would never see again. ‘Yet let any who think so remember that though we must pray and think alone, and die and be judged alone, there is still a reality of sympathy which we may find and rejoice in if we wish. It is a sympathy unchangeable and eternal, sympathy with Him who so loved us that He died for us, and who is the same yesterday and today and forever. My brethren, He is with us in all our lonely trials, and He will save us, if we will but hearken to His voice within us.’

As he spoke these words, Onslow came close to tears. He raised his head proudly. Looking down at those below him, nearly all of whom he supposed would side with Anstey-Ward, he thought: yes, I still have Thee. Thou art with me. Thou wilt extend Thy mercy to a sinner who has repented. Lord, now permit Thy servant to depart in peace!

When it became known that Dr Onslow of Charton had turned down both the bishopric of Shrewsbury and the deanery of Launceston, and wished to spend the rest of his life in the obscurity of a country parsonage, considerable astonishment was felt by the many people who had never suspected him of undue humility. Some of them wondered whether anything could be behind it, but for the most part they concluded that surprising though it was, Onslow was struggling with the demon of worldly ambition, which most clergymen in his position would never have recognised, let alone fought. Onslow allowed this to be known: he told one person that he was indeed afraid of ambition, and waited for the news to spread. He became an even more highly respected figure than he used to be, and was soon offered the choice of three suitable livings. One was in Surrey, one in Devon, and one, by a slender margin the most generously endowed, was in Derbyshire. He chose the Derbyshire rectory, though Louisa, who had never been north of Warwick in her life, wanted the Surrey vicarage in spite of the fact that it was worth only six hundred a year. She believed it would be a comfort to both of them to be close to London and Primrose in their poverty, but, perversely she thought, Onslow opted for the more absolute exile of Hinterton in Derbyshire. It was almost as though he really were fighting an internal demon of worldly ambition.

Hinterton was situated four miles north of Ashbourne, in the southern foothills of the Pennine Chain, and the surrounding countryside was in a bleak way very beautiful.
The village was built round a crossroads. It consisted of some forty cottages, a public house, a small shop, a church, and three gentlemen’s houses including the rectory. It resembled Charton in that it was built on a slope, and from the rectory and church at the top of the gentle hill it was possible to look down and see the descending row of houses which formed the main street, just as it had been possible at Charton to look down from the railway station and see the builded fruits of Onslow’s activity.

The Onslows moved into the rectory late in November, 1859. They furnished it almost exactly as they had furnished Charton, and then, settled at last, they looked out from it into the unchanging future. At Hinterton, they had the peace for which Onslow had asked God when he preached for the last time in the school chapel.

*

One afternoon in February 1860, Louisa was entertaining the wife of the rector of Tudbury, a parish which lay south of Ashbourne. She had not met the woman before. Mrs Lucas’s ninth pregnancy and the subsequent childbirth had kept her at home while the rest of the neighbouring clergy and gentry were making the acquaintance of the Onslows. Now Mrs Lucas was hastening to make up for lost time. She asked good-humoured questions as though she had known Louisa for years.

‘Do you not find us very dull, after Charton, Mrs Onslow?’

‘What can I possibly say to that?’ said Louisa, smiling a little. She was soberly dressed today, as she always was now, and she had aged a little since the summer. She was thinner, and her cheeks were hollow.

‘Very true!’ said Mrs Lucas. ‘What a foolish question to ask – pray forget it.’

Louisa did not choose to forget it. She said seriously:

‘I do not think Dr Onslow finds it dull, or at all events a little comparative dullness has been what he was looking
for. And as for me’ – she hesitated – ‘I assure you, I am enjoying my new surroundings very much.’

‘I am sure Dr Onslow must be quite worn out after fifteen years, was it, of caring for naughty boys.’

‘Oh, quite so.’

There was a pause.

‘Do you plan to make many changes in the parish?’ said Mrs Lucas, who had already heard of certain changes from her husband, who was the rural dean.

‘Dr Onslow has instituted monthly communion. And he is planning to take up the box pews in the church. I hope no one will think ill of him for that,’ said Louisa.

‘Villagers are so conservative. But for my part I think it is an excellent scheme to remove those old pews. Horrid things, like great bathing-machines! Mr Lucas removed them at Tudbury when he first came.’

‘I am glad you approve. I hope all our neighbours will do so.’

‘Oh, they will! Mr Johnson was so very set in his ways, very old-fashioned. Not even a Sunday school! Of course he had no wife to help him.’

‘Something must be done about that,’ said Louisa. ‘But I have no experience of setting up schools. I daresay I shall contrive.’

Mrs Lucas laughed.

‘Oh Mrs Onslow, you and Dr Onslow surely cannot say you have no experience of schools!’

‘But there is a difference,’ said Louisa, ‘between Charton and a Sunday school for labourers’ children.’

‘So there is!’ Mrs Lucas seemed to think Louisa had made a joke. She glanced at the clock on the drawing-room mantelpiece, and saw that she had already stayed a little longer than was proper on a first call. Getting to her feet, she said:

‘I must take my leave of you, Mrs Onslow. But first, do you and Dr Onslow care to dine with us on Wednesday of next week? Mr Lucas and I are giving a dinner-party, and my father is coming to it. He lives in Italy, you know, and
rarely visits England, but I know he will be most interested to meet Dr Onslow.’

Mrs Lucas’s father was Lord Burnam, the owner of Tudbury. Louisa already knew this, though she was not yet a person with whom her new neighbours would gossip about Lord Burnam’s loose manner of living.

‘I think we shall be delighted, Mrs Lucas.’

Louisa thought of how everyone was most interested to meet Dr Onslow. She and her husband had enjoyed quite a little social life since coming to Hinterton, among those whose faces would soon grow as familiar as the view from the rectory drawing-room had already become. Few of them were disagreeable people, but no more could be said of them by the Onslows. None of the clergymen in the district was either a notable scholar or connected with the higher reaches of the church, and most of the lay people whom they had met were chiefly interested in hunting. But all these neighbours were curious to know why such a rising star as Onslow had chosen to fall to earth among them, just as a few months earlier, the Onslows’ old acquaintance had been astonished by their retirement.

When Mrs Lucas was gone, Louisa took out her embroidery. She would work at it solidly till dinner-time. There was nothing else to do, and Louisa, as she worked at it, forgot that at Charton too she had had many empty hours. The emptiness felt quite different now, because her husband, who had had little free time in the old days, was now almost as leisured as she was, and this somehow emphasised her own boredom.

*

The parish of Hinterton had been run by a curate for the past five years, ever since the Onslows’ predecessor became too infirm for his duties. Onslow had not dispensed with this curate’s services, though he told himself he ought to, in order to give himself more to do and thus distract his mind. But he did not, for it was with difficulty that he forced himself to do anything at all, even on Sundays. Only
pride made him act, as he had done in instituting monthly communion, and in deciding to remove the old box pews from the village church. These acts, he knew, were such as would be expected of him.

There was one duty of a clergyman which Onslow longed to shirk, but felt he could not altogether even though he had a diligent curate: visiting his poorer parishioners in their homes.

On the day Mrs Lucas called on Louisa, Onslow made himself go down to the other end of the village to visit a family called Roberts. Their cottage was one of the most unpleasant in the locality: a little, old building with two tiny rooms upstairs and one small room down, and in this lived a family of seven, including a grandfather who was gradually dying. When Onslow entered the cottage after knocking at the door he was assailed by the smell of humanity and of cabbage – Mrs Roberts had been stirring a black pot suspended by chains over an open fire. A baby was crawling near the hearth, a three year old and a five year old were sitting at a battered, stained deal table. The last two stared at Onslow as their mother ushered him in.

‘Mrs Roberts, is it not? I hope I have not come to call on you at an inconvenient time.’

‘Oh no, sir,’ she replied, taking off her apron as she spoke. Mrs Roberts, having been in service, did not speak with quite so thick a Derbyshire accent as some of the villagers.

‘It is my wish to make the acquaintance of all my parishioners,’ said Onslow. The curate had told him that the Roberts family did not attend church regularly; neither did they visit the dissenting chapel. They were merely indifferent. Onslow supposed that perhaps, as a priest, he ought to seek to remedy this, yet he felt he could not question the woman about her churchgoing, not yet. At one moment he felt that to do so would be almost a kind of impertinence, at the next that it was hard to believe that a woman in her circumstances was a human soul in need of priestly care. He wondered what to say, and remembered
how he had never been at a loss for words in his old life, in which he had never spoken to a poor person.

‘I hope I find you in good health?’ he said, as Mrs Roberts dusted the seat of a chair and offered it to him.

‘A’m middling, thank you sir.’

‘Good!’ said Onslow. ‘And your children – what a fine little fellow this baby is.’ The baby had crawled to his feet. Its face was very dirty.

‘Aye, he’s well enough.’

‘Do you go on prosperously? Is your pig well?’ Onslow had learnt from the curate that the villagers’ pigs, kept in sties behind the cottages, were very important to them, being their only source of meat.

‘He’s not very clever just now, the pig.’

‘I am sorry to hear that,’ said Onslow. ‘Your husband is a shepherd, I believe, Mrs Roberts?’

‘Aye, he is.’

‘I hope he is well?’ Onslow had never felt so foolish in his life.

‘Aye, sir.’

‘Have you other children besides these I see?’

‘Oh aye, sir. A’ve seven all told.’

‘At work in the fields with their father, I presume? Are your older girls in service?’

‘Aye, our Polly went into service in the back-end.’

‘How old is she?’ said Onslow, who thought that the back-end meant not the autumn, but some unknown place.

‘Twelve, sir.’

‘Twelve. She is your eldest?’

‘Aye, sir.’

‘Is her place in service far from here?’ he said.

‘Oh no. In Wirksworth.’

‘It must be agreeable to have her so close.’

‘Oh, it is sir.’

Wearily Onslow thought of the struggle it would be to write a sermon suitable for the ears of Mrs Roberts. It was a task he found impossible, he had not even attempted it. Since coming to Hinterton he had preached his old Charton sermons, with minor variations, to a congregation which
contained hardly anyone capable of understanding them but the local squire and his family.

‘I believe Mrs Onslow brought some calves’-foot jelly for your father-in-law, Mrs Roberts.’

‘Aye, three days since. We’re grateful, sir.’

‘Is your father-in-law a little improved?’

‘Not to speak of, sir.’

‘Would he care to have me visit him?’

‘Oh yes, I’m sure.’

‘Good, good.’

‘Shall I take you upstairs, sir?’

‘If you will be so good.’

Mrs Roberts led the way up the narrow, rickety staircase, and opened the door of a frowsty little room. Onslow stepped in, and looked at a bed heaped with clothes, inside which there was an old, slack-mouthed man. He supposed he would have to ask the old man whether anything was troubling his spirit, as was surely likely now he was close to death. The conscience, Onslow thought, must become active at such a time even in an unbeliever.

He could only wish that he were close to death himself, and not likely to spend more than thirty years in making visits of this kind, pretending to be a better, humbler Christian than he was or ever would be.