Father Payne | Page 9

as the minister says in Kidnapped." "But who is
to judge if it is immaterial?" said Lestrange rather pertinaciously. "It
mostly is," said Father Payne. "Anything is better than being shocked!
It's better to be ashamed afterwards of not speaking up than to feel you
have made a circle uncomfortable. You must not rebuke people unless
you really hate doing it. If you like doing it, you may be pretty sure that
it is vanity; a Christian ought not to feel out of place in a
smoking-room!"
The whole thing did not take more than three-quarters of an hour.
Coffee was brought in, very strong and good. Some of the party went
off, and Father Payne disappeared. I went to the smoking-room with
two of the men, and we talked a little. Finally I went away to my room,
and tried to commit my impressions of the whole thing to my diary
before I went to bed. It certainly seemed a happy life, and I was struck
with the curious mixture of freedom, frankness, and yet courtesy about
the whole. There was no roughness or wrangling or stupidity, nor had I
any sense either of exclusion, or of being elaborately included in the
life of the circle. I would call the atmosphere brotherly, if brotherliness
did not often mean the sort of frankness which is so unpleasant to
strangers. There certainly was an atmosphere about it, and I felt too that
Father Payne, for all his easiness, had somehow got the reins in his
hands.
The next morning I went down to breakfast, which was, I found, like
breakfast at a club, as Vincent had said. It was a plain meal--cold bacon,
a vast dish of scrambled eggs kept hot by a spirit lamp and a hot-water
arrangement. You could make toast for yourself if you wished, and
there was a big fresh loaf, with excellent butter, marmalade, and
jam--not an ascetic breakfast at all. There were daily papers on the table,
and no one talked. I did not see Father Payne, who must have come in
later.
After breakfast, Barthrop showed me the rooms of the house. The
library was fitted up with bookshelves and easy-chairs for reading, with
a big round oak table in the centre. The floor was of stained oak boards
and covered with rugs. There was also a capacious smoking-room, and
I learned that smoking was not allowed elsewhere. It was, in fact, a
solid old family mansion of some dignity. There were three or four oil

paintings in all the rooms, portraits and landscapes. The general tone of
decoration was dark--red wall-papers and fittings stained brown. It was
all clean and simple, and there was a total absence of ornament, I went
and walked in the garden, which was of the same very straightforward
kind--plain grass, shrubberies, winding paths, with comfortable wooden
seats in sheltered places; one or two big beds, evidently of
old-fashioned perennials, and some trellises for ramblers. The garden
was adjoined by a sort of wilderness, with big trees and ground-ivy,
and open spaces in which aconites and snowdrops were beginning to
show themselves. Father Payne, I gathered, was fond of the garden and
often worked there; but there were no curiosities--it was all very simple.
Beyond that were pasture-fields, with a good many clumps and
hedgerow trees, running down to a stream, which had been enlarged
into a deep pool at one place, where there was a timbered bathing-shed.
The stream fed, through little sluices, a big, square pond, full, I was
told, in summer of bulrushes and water-lilies. I noticed a couple of
lawn-tennis courts, and there was a bowling-green by the house. Then
there was a large kitchen-garden, with standards and espaliers, and
box-edged beds. The stables, which were spacious, contained only a
pony and the little cart I had driven up in, and a few bicycles. I liked
the solid air of the big house, which had two wings at the back,
corresponding to the wings in front; the long row of stone pedimented
windows, with heavy white casements, was plain and stately, and there
were some fine magnolias and wisterias trained upon the walls. It all
looked stately, and yet home-like; there was nothing neglected about it,
and yet it looked wholesomely left alone; everything was neat, but
nothing was smart.
I was strolling about, enjoying the gleams of bright sunshine and the
cold air, when I saw Father Payne coming down the garden towards me.
He gave me a pleasant nod: I said something about the beauty of the
place; he smiled, and said "Yes, it is the kind of thing I like--but I am
so used to it that I can hardly even see it! That's the worst of habit; but
there is nothing about