The Dean's Watch

by Elizabeth Goudge

  He bowed, put on his hat, and turned away. Isaac went back into the shop, shut the door and began to put the clocks back in their places. Then he went to the door again, opened it and looked out. The Dean was walking so slowly and heavily that he had not got far up the street. He walked much more slowly now than he had been used to do. An impulse came to Isaac to run after him and say that he would go with him to the Cathedral, and he did crawl crabwise down the worn steps. Then he scuttled back into the shop again. No, he would not go to the Cathedral. If he did it would get him.

  3.

  On the day before Christmas Eve, at breakfast, Isaac suddenly found himself telling Emma about the celestial clock. It came into his head because tomorrow he was going to take it to the Deanery. This was the last day that the glorious thing would be with them in the shop. Tomorrow it would pass into the keeping of the Dean and on Christmas Day it would be Mrs. Ayscough’s. Isaac’s Adam’s apple felt too big for his throat whenever he thought of tomorrow. Yet he did not regret his gift. Deep inside himself he felt a profound satisfaction because of it, a new sort of stability. He felt more of a man because he had been able to do it. It was this new steadiness that had made him suddenly speak to Emma of his affairs in the sort of way a man speaks to his wife, taking it for granted that she will be interested. He was astonished at himself, and even more astonished at her, for she answered pleasantly. Isaac was a self-absorbed man yet even he had noticed that she had seemed happier lately. She had been consistently kind to Job and she had bought herself a new bonnet to wear when she drank tea with Miss Montague. This she had done twice already, meeting the precentor’s wife by special invitation upon the second occasion.

  “It must be a lovely clock, Isaac,” she said. “Will you take another cup of tea, my dear?”

  She never called him dear. He was so astonished that he dropped his fork on the tablecloth and she did not reprove him. He believed there had been a slight wistfulness in her voice. Surely she could not wish to see the clock? He could not ask her to come to the shop; she hated it and never came there. She had never forgiven him for disgracing them by going into trade.

  “Emma,” he said shyly, “would you like me to bring the clock back with me this evening so that you can see it? It will be quite safe here tonight and tomorrow I will take it to the Deanery.”

  “Has the Dean paid for it yet?” asked Emma. “If he has it would not be right to have it in the house tonight.”

  “Not yet,” said Isaac, for he had not told her, and would never tell anyone, that he had given the clock to the Dean.

  “Then I would like to see it,” said Emma. “Thank you, Isaac.”

  After breakfast she further astonished him by coming out into the passage to help him on with his coat. As she lifted her arm he saw that there was a split in the seam of her bodice and a ridiculous notion came to him that the hard black sheath of her dress was a chrysalis and something would presently burst out of it. The thought was so alarming that he bade her a hasty good-by and bolted out of the door and down Angel Lane with all possible speed. What sort of creature was likely to burst out of that cracking chrysalis? Would it be good or bad?

  A slight uneasiness remained with Isaac through the day and when the time came to shut the shop and go home he felt reluctant to take the clock with him. Job had already gone home to Mr. Penny and Ruth and he was alone in the workshop as he stood before it and wondered what to do. He could not bear to think of the lovely thing standing in the shadows of the parlor, of his sister’s long yellow fingers touching it, and his father’s dark glance resting upon it as he gazed out from his portrait in sour disapproval of all things that he saw. Yet he had told Emma that he would bring it. What would the Dean say? It was his clock now. Undoubtedly his great courtesy would not wish to disappoint Emma. Isaac lifted the clock and wrapped it gently first in the old silk handkerchief and then in a length of wine-colored velvet that he sometimes used in the shop window. Then he put on his hat and cloak and with the clock held like a child in the crook of his arm he went out into the street. He noticed as he came out that it was turning cold.

  He carried the celestial clock very carefully through the streets of the city, his head a little bent to catch the faint ticking from within the folds of velvet and silk. Now and then he murmured a few quiet words, speaking of the beauty of the night, of the lighted windows and the shadows of the children behind the blinds, of open doors spilling light across the pavements. The clock was a citizen of this city even as he was but they would not again walk its streets together. He would see it in future only for a few minutes on Saturdays, when he wound it and dusted its starry face with the old silk handkerchief.

  When he reached number twelve he took it into the parlor, unwrapped it and put it on the round plush-covered table beside the family Bible. All through supper it shone there in the lamplight and Emma was pleased that he had brought it and said it was very pretty. Polly, coming in and out with the dishes, was wide-eyed with delight. Isaac’s own uneasiness vanished as he ate tripe and onions and baked apples and gazed at the clock. There was not a thing wrong with it. Every bit of mechanism in it was hiddenly perfect, as lovely in its particular function as the swans’ wings and the slender arrowheaded hour and minute hands, moving imperceptibly from one exquisite star symbol to another around the azure heaven. There had been a tiny scratch on the clock face where Job had confessed that he had let his tool slip, but they had been able to smooth it away. It had been an extraordinary thing that so good a craftsman as Job had let his tool slip and Isaac had not been able to understand it.

  After supper he and Emma sat for a little while in front of the fire, Emma reading the evening chapter, and they were more at ease together than they had ever been. And then Isaac suddenly got to his feet.

  “I never locked the shop!”

  Emma clicked her tongue in disapprobation. “Isaac! Whatever made you so careless?”

  “I had the clock in my arms. I was thinking of that alone. I must go back at once.”

  “Put your muffler on,” said Emma. “Good night, dear. I expect I shall have gone to bed when you come back. I have a slight headache.”

  Isaac said he was sorry and hurried across the room. At the door he looked back once at the clock and the silver fish shone out against the golden sun behind it as though a lighthouse had flashed a message to him. All the city clocks were striking as he put on his cloak and muffler in the hall, and as he opened the front door the celestial clock also began to strike. He stood outside on the steps, and listened to it. He had never made a bell with a sweeter tongue. It seemed calling after him all the way down Angel Lane.

  Emma had just gone to her room and Polly was darning in front of the kitchen fire with Sooty at her feet when a knock came at the back door. She was surprised, for it was not Job’s night. Yet it was Job outside, bright-eyed and laughing.

  “Whatever are you doing there, Job Mooring? The mistress only lets you come on Wednesdays and that you very well know.”

  “Let me in, Polly,” pleaded Job. “I want to see you.”

  “No more than five minutes then,” said Polly severely. “The mistress is upstairs with a headache, and Mr. Peabody down at the shop, and I’m not one for more deceitful goings on than are necessary and that you very well know too. Wipe your feet on the mat and speak soft. I’ll not have the mistress disturbed, let alone she’d skin us alive if she found you here after dark and it not Wednesday. Wipe your feet on the mat, I said.”

  She spoke all the more severely because of the mad beating of her heart and the exquisite joy that was sweeping over her, like a wave over the ribbed sand in the sunlight, pouring over the rocks and filling the pools. Her sharp words came breathlessly and she did not look at Job as she pulled him in and shut the scullery door behind him. If she had looked at him she would have been on tiptoe in a moment, her mouth pressed to his and her hands clinging to his shoulders because her knees had turned to water and would no longer support her. For this growi
ng up of Job was doing extraordinary things to Polly. As his shoulders broadened and his height increased, lifting him away above her head who once had been a scared child at her shoulder, so her breasts rounded out and color came into her cheeks and all her hard tasks seemed light as air. At night she felt lonely in her bed and yet in bliss because in her dreams she ran and ran along the sparkling sand, or down green alleyways under flowering trees, and though she never caught up with Job she knew that he was just on ahead of her and that one night he would swing around and come speeding back to meet her, and then the whole green world, the whole curve of heaven, would belong to the two of them made one.

  She pushed him into the fireside chair, then bustled about getting him a drink of warm milk, an apple and two little tarts on a plate. With Ruth such a good cook there was now no need for her to save her own food for him, yet still she did it sometimes because of the joy it gave her. And there seemed no limit to what he could eat these days. His stomach, stretching and relaxing itself after the years of semistarvation, appeared to be bottomless. With Sooty draped like a muffler around his neck he absorbed the tarts as rapidly as though they were oysters and then crunched his strong white teeth into the apple. Polly watched him with profound satisfaction, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes as they followed his every movement making up for the time lost when she had not dared to raise them to look at him. While he enjoyed his food there was no danger that she would suddenly find herself with her mouth on his. Just now he wanted it for other purposes. His plate empty and the mug of milk drained, he sighed, happily replete, and after his sigh came the distant music of a bell ringing the half-hour in the next room.

  “That’s the celestial clock!” he ejaculated.

  “Mr. Peabody brought it home for the mistress to see,” said Polly. “It’s ever so pretty.”

  “Pretty?” snorted Job. “It’s the most beautiful clock that was ever made. You can’t have seen it properly just to call it ‘pretty.’ ” He lifted Sooty from his shoulders and picked up the lamp. “Come on, Polly. We’ll go and look at it together.”

  “Hush now,” she whispered as she opened the parlor door. “The mistress. What would she say if she found you in the parlor and it not Wednesday?”

  “I wouldn’t care what she said,” Job whispered back fiercely. In the parlor he placed the lamp on the high bookshelf so that its light fell full on the clock. “There!” he said.

  They stood together looking at the clock while in a whisper he told her about the signs of the zodiac, and the sun and the silver fish. The clock ticked sweetly and cheerily but the house, and the city beyond the house, were so still that they felt themselves alone in the world with the sun and moon and stars like Adam and Eve. Polly slipped her hand into Job’s and leaned a little closer, so that she felt the glowing warmth of his young body. Her hand tightened in his. “Why did you come tonight?” she whispered.

  “To bring you something,” he said. “I meant to keep it till Christmas but I can’t.”

  “Another bird?” asked Polly.

  “No, not a bird,” he said, and putting his free hand in his pocket he brought out the small heart-shaped case. He took his other hand gently from hers and opened the box. Inside was a small bright ring. He took it out and laid it on his palm. “I made it for you,” he whispered. Polly gasped, for words were beyond her. They leaned with their heads close together, bent over the ring. “The stones spell a word. Can you read it? Diamond. Emerald. Amethyst. Ruby. Emerald again. Sapphire. Topaz. They’re not real jewels, of course. I couldn’t afford that. But one day I’ll make you a ring with real jewels. Can you read it?” She shook her head; she was not yet such a fine scholar as he was. “Yes you can, Polly. Hold out your left hand and I’ll put it on. Dearest. You know that word, my dearest Polly.”

  Suddenly she cried out, a cry of young ecstasy, cut short as his mouth came down on hers and his arms went around her. The celestial clock ticked merrily on, sparkling in the lamplight, but the boy and girl did not hear it. Time had stopped for them. This is Job, thought Polly, and though she did not know it she was crying and there was a salt taste on their lips. It’s Polly, he thought. They had known each other so long, yet now each was made new for the other. The whole world was made new. Polly put up her hand to touch Job’s curly hair as his left arm strained more closely around her tiny waist. Neither of them heard the heavy footsteps floundering down the stairs or the opening of the parlor door, but the shrill voice frightened them by its sheer hideousness, as though all lovely things had suddenly turned to ugliness.

  Emma was shouting vile things as she stood with her candlestick in her shaking hand, her black shawl clutched about her shoulders, her face so old and distorted that for a moment Polly did not recognize her. When she did she was more terrified than ever, and clung shivering to Job. It was more fearful to see Emma, with whom she had lived for so long compassionately and companionably, turned as suddenly to this evil than it would have been to see Apollyon come up through the parlor floor. Then the candlestick in Emma’s hand lurched suddenly, spilling grease on the carpet, and instinctive duty sent Polly darting forward. “The candle, ma’am! Mind the candle!” Emma dropped the candle and boxed Polly’s ears, and she struck so hard that Polly cried out in pain as a short while ago she had cried out in joy.

  It was the contrast between the two cries that sent Job mad. A moment before he had been frozen with fear and horror, the next moment he had seized Emma’s wrists and flung her away from Polly. His strong fingers bit like steel into her flesh and his eyes blazed their hatred down into hers. For a moment she thought he was going to fling her into the fire as once she had flung his birds, and she screamed. Wrenching away one hand she clutched at the plush cloth on the table behind her. Trying to save her from falling he stumbled too and they went down together, Emma still clutching the cloth. The celestial clock crashed into the grate and was smashed on its marble slab.

  “Have you hurt yourself, Emma?” asked Isaac, and bending down he helped her up and put her weeping and shivering into her chair. Job and Polly gazed at him stupefied, for they had not heard him come in. He was quiet, and more composed than any of them, but his face was ashen and his eyes were like hard blue stones. Only Job was aware of his terrible anger, but Polly thought he looked dreadful and timidly stretched out a hand toward him. He pushed it away and turned to his sister. “Be quiet, Emma! You have done enough harm for one night. Go to bed.” Slumped in her chair, her face blotched with tears, she was to Job the most repulsive sight he had ever seen, and he looked away in miserable embarrassment. But Isaac gazed at her fixedly, as though, Polly thought in terror, he was seeing her clearly for the first time and hating what he saw. What a carry-on just because a clock’s been smashed, she thought with a sudden return of common sense, and loving Isaac and Job as deeply as ever her sympathy nevertheless swung so suddenly over to Emma that she went to her and put her arms around her.

  “Don’t take on so, ma’am,” she said. “It’s only a clock smashed. It can likely be mended. Come, ma’am, I’ll take you to bed.” She lifted her up and took her to the door where with her arms around Emma she looked back to Job, her eyes soft and bright. “There now, lad, don’t you take on either,” she said. “Mr. Peabody, he’ll understand when you tell him what happened.” Her eyes went to Isaac but he had his back to her. He was bending over the grate, picking up the pieces of the clock. She said to him pleadingly, “Mr. Peabody, it was because she never had a man,” but his back remained as implacable in hatred as his face had been. There was nothing she could do except take Emma away.

  Job fetched a box from the kitchen and kneeling beside Isaac he tried to help him pick up the bits of the clock. It was odd how silent the room seemed without its ticking. The Time and Death clock still ticked, but its heartbeat was slow and leaden and that of the celestial clock had been so merry. Job was so cold with misery that his fingers only fumbled at the bits as he tried to pick them up, and then dropped them again as though they
were slippery as the guts and heart of a dismembered body. “It’s only a clock,” Polly had said. But she did not understand about making things. And it was not only the clock. There was a blackness in his mind, a sickening sort of stench in the room that had nothing to do with any physical odor, and yet made him feel as sick as he had used to do when Albert Lee flogged him. And he was afraid, as though some appalling presence were here in the room with him and Isaac. The fear too was familiar, though lately he had imagined he had forgotten the choking blackness of the chimneys and the fire beneath his feet. Only imagined, because no man forgets hell. But this hell he was in now was worse than the others, for they had not emanated from himself and this one did. From himself and Isaac and Emma. Only Polly tonight had not hated.

  “I came to see Polly,” he said hoarsely to Isaac. “We came in here to look at the clock and I gave her the ring. She cried out, she was so pleased, and we kissed each other. Miss Peabody must have heard and she came in. She said things. They were not true, for I’ve never touched Polly till tonight. I can kiss her, can’t I, without foul things being said? I’m going to marry her. She boxed Polly’s ears and I pulled her away so roughly that she clutched at the tablecloth and we fell and the clock went over. I’ve hated her ever since she burned my birds. It’s my hating her that smashed the clock. I wouldn’t have smashed the clock if she hadn’t burned my birds. It’s her fault.”

  Isaac seemed not to hear a word. He said coldly, “You need not drop the only part of the clock that can still be given to the Dean. Pick it up again.”

  A shining thing had just dropped from Job’s fingers and lay in the ashes. It was the fret of the two swans. The clock face was smashed into a hundred pieces, and the delicate mechanism of the works was jarred and twisted, but the fret of the two swans was uninjured. Job picked it up and dusted it on his sleeve.