Maurice, E. Forster [best historical biographies .TXT] 📗

Societies. Maurice's father was becoming a pillar of Church and Society when he died, and other things being alike Maurice would have stiffened too.

But other things were not to be alike. He had this overwhelming desire to impress Durham. He wanted to show his friend that he had something besides brute strength, and where his father would have kept canny silence he began to talk, talk. "You think I don't think, but I can tell you I do." Very often Durham made no reply and Maurice would be terrified lest he was losing him. He had heard it said, "Durham's all right as long as you amuse him, then he drops you," and feared lest by exhibiting his orthodoxy he was bringing on what he tried to avoid. But he could not stop. The craving for notice grew overwhelming, so he talked, talked.

One day Durham said, "Hall, why this thusness?"

"Religion means a lot to me," bluffed Maurice. "Because I say so little you think I don't feel. I care a lot."

"In that case come to coffee after hall."

They were just going in. Durham, being a scholar, had to read grace, and there was cynicism in his accent. During the meal they looked at each other. They sat at different tables, but Maurice had contrived to move his seat so that he could glance at his friend. The phase of bread pellets was over. Durham looked severe this evening and was not speaking to his neighbours. Maurice knew that he was thoughtful and wondered what about.

"You wanted to get it and you're going to," said Durham, sporting the door.

Maurice went cold and then crimson. But Durham's voice, when he next heard it, was attacking his opinions on the Trinity. He thought he minded about the Trinity, yet it seemed unimportant beside the fires of his terror. He sprawled in an armchair, all the strength out of him, with sweat on his forehead and hands. Durham moved about getting the coffee ready and saying, "I knew you wouldn't like this, but you have brought it on yourself. You can't expect me to bottle myself up indefinitely. I must let out sometimes."

"Go on," said Maurice, clearing his throat.

"I never meant to talk, for I respect people's opinions too much to laugh at them, but it doesn't seem to me that you have any opinions to respect. They're all second-hand tags—no, tenth-hand."

Maurice, who was recovering, remarked that this was pretty strong.

"You're always saying, 1 care a lot.'"

"And what right have you to assume that I don't?"

"You do care a lot about something, Hall, but it obviously isn't the Trinity."

"What is it then?"

"Rugger."

Maurice had another attack. His hand shook and he spilt the coffee on the arm of the chair. "You're a bit unfair," he heard himself saying. "You might at least have the grace to suggest that I care about people."

Durham looked surprised, but said, "You care nothing about the Trinity, any way."

"Oh, damn the Trinity."

He burst with laughter. "Exactly, exactly. We will now pass on to my next point."

"I don't see the use, and I've a rotten head any way—I mean a headache. Nothing's gained by—all this. No doubt I can't prove the thing—I mean the arrangement of Three Gods in One and One in Three. But it means a lot to millions of people, whatever you may say, and we aren't going to give it up. We feel about it very deeply. God is good. That is the main point. Why go off on a side track?"

"Why feel so deeply about a side track?"

"What?"

Durham tidied up his remarks for him.

"Well, the whole show all hangs together."

"So that if the Trinity went wrong it would invalidate the whole show?"

"I don't see that. Not at all."

He was doing badly, but his head really did ache, and when he wiped the sweat off it reformed.

"No doubt I can't explain well, as I care for nothing but rug-ger."

Durham came and sat humorously on the edge of his chair.

"Look out—you've gone into the coffee now."

"Blast—so I have."

While he cleaned himself, Maurice unsported and looked out into the court. It seemed years since he had left it. He felt disinclined to be longer alone with Durham and called to some men to join them. A coffee of the usual type ensued, but when they left Maurice felt equally disinclined to leave with them. He flourished the Trinity again. "It's a mystery," he argued.

"It isn't a mystery to me. But I honour anyone to whom it really is."

Maurice felt uncomfortable and looked at his own thick brown hands. Was the Trinity really a mystery to him? Except at his confirmation had he given the institution five minutes'

thought? The arrival of the other men had cleared his head, and, no longer emotional, he glanced at his mind. It appeared like his hands—serviceable, no doubt, and healthy, and capable of development. But it lacked refinement, it had never touched mysteries, nor a good deal else. It was thick and brown.

"My position's this," he announced after a pause. "I don't believe in the Trinity, I give in there, but on the other hand I was wrong when I said everything hangs together. It doesn't, and because I don't believe in the Trinity it doesn't mean I am not a Christian."

"What do you believe in?" said Durham, unchecked.

"The—the essentials."

"As?"

In a low voice Maurice said, "The Redemption." He had never spoken the words out of church before and thrilled with emotion. But he did not believe in them any more than in the Trinity, and knew that Durham would detect this. The Redemption was the highest card in the suit, but that suit wasn't trumps, and his friend could capture it with some miserable two.

All that Durham said at the time was, "Dante did believe in the Trinity," and going to the shelf found the concluding passage of the Paradiso. He read to Maurice about the three rainbow circles that intersect, and between their junctions is enshadowed a human face. Poetry bored Maurice, but