Brother Copas | Page 8

of strength. He
walked in his priestly black with the gait and carriage proper to a heavy
dragoon.
"A fine evening, indeed. Are you disengaged?"
"Certainly, certainly"--in comparison with Mr. Colt's grave voice the
Master's was almost a chirrup--"whether for business or for the
pleasure of a talk. Nothing wrong, I hope?"

For a moment or two the Chaplain did not answer. He seemed to be
weighing his words. At length he said--
"I should have reported at once, but have been thinking it over. At
Early Celebration this morning Warboise insulted the wafer."
"Dear, dear, you don't say so!"
--"Took it from me, held it derisively between finger and thumb, and
muttered. I could not catch all that he said, but I distinctly heard the
words 'biscuit' and 'Antichrist.' Indeed, he confesses to having used
them. His demeanour left no doubt that he was insolent of set
purpose. . . . I should add that Ibbetson, who was kneeling next to him
and must have overheard, walked back from the altar-rail straight out of
chapel; but his wife assures me that this was purely a coincidence, and
due to a sudden weakness of the stomach."
"You have spoken to Warboise?"
"Yes, and he is defiant. Says that bread is bread, and--when I pressed
him for a definition--asked (insolently again) if the Trustees had
authorised our substituting biscuit for bread in the Wayfarers' Dole.
Advised us to 'try it on' there, and look out for letters in the Merchester
Observer. He even threatened--if you'll believe me--to write to the
Press himself. In short, he was beyond all self-control."
"I was afraid," murmured the Master, flushing a little in his distress,
"you would not introduce this--er--primitive use--or, I should say,
restore it--without trouble. Brother Warboise has strong Protestant
prejudices; passionate, even."
"And ignorant."
"Oh, of course, of course! Still--"
"I suggest that, living as he does on the Church's benefaction, eating the
bread of her charity--"

The Chaplain paused, casting about for a third phrase to express
Brother Warboise's poor dependence.
The Master smiled whimsically.
"'The bread'--that's just it, he would tell you . . . And Alberic de
Blanchminster, moreover, was a layman, not even in any of the minor
orders; so that, strictly speaking--"
"But he left his wealth expressly to be administered by the Church. . . .
Will you forgive me, Master, if I repeat very respectfully the suggestion
I made at the beginning? If you could see your way to be celebrant at
the early office, your mere presence would silence these mutineers. The
Brethren respect your authority without question, and, the ice once
broken, they would come to heel as one man."
The Master shook his head tremulously, in too much of a flurry even to
note the Chaplain's derangement of metaphors.
"You cannot guess how early rising upsets me. Doctor Ainsley, indeed,
positively forbids it. . . . I can sympathise, you see, with Ibbetson . . .
and, for Brother Warboise, let us always remember that St. Hospital
was not made, and cannot be altered, in a day--even for the better. Like
England, it has been built by accretions, by traditions; yes, and by
traditions that apparently conflict--by that of Brother Ingman, among
others. . . .
"We who love St. Hospital," continued the Master, still tremulously,
"have, I doubt not, each his different sense of the genius loci. Warboise
finds it, we'll say, in the person of Peter Ingman, Protestant and martyr.
But I don't defend his behaviour. I will send for him to-morrow, and
talk to him. I will talk to him very severely."
CHAPTER III.
BROTHER COPAS HOOKS A FISH.
"Well," said Brother Copas, "since the fish are not rising, let us talk. Or

rather, you can tell me all about it while I practise casting. . . . By what
boat is she coming?"
"By the Carnatic, and due some time to-morrow. I saw it in the
newspaper."
"Well?--" prompted Brother Copas, glancing back over his shoulder as
Brother Bonaday came to a halt.
The bent little man seemed to have lost the thread of his speech as he
stood letting his gentle, tired eyes follow the flight of the swallows
swooping and circling low along the river and over the
meadow-grasses.
"Well?--" prompted Brother Copas again.
"Nurse Branscome will go down to meet her."
"And then?--"
"I am hoping the Master will let her have my spare room," said Brother
Bonaday vaguely.
Here it should be explained that when the Trustees erected a new house
for the Master his old lodgings in the quadrangle had been carved into
sets of chambers for half a dozen additional Brethren, and that one of
these, differing only from the rest in that it contained a small spare
room, had chanced to be allotted to