by Paul Merton
Such was the Rev. Stanley Brandon. And yet it was to the daughter of this formidable man that Augustine Mulliner had permitted himself to lose his heart. Truly, Cupid makes heroes of us all.
Jane was a very nice girl, and just as fond of Augustine as he was of her. But, as each lacked the nerve to go to the girl’s father and put him abreast of the position of affairs, they were forced to meet surreptitiously. This jarred upon Augustine who, like all the Mulliners, loved the truth and hated any form of deception. And one evening, as they paced beside the laurels at the bottom of the vicarage garden, he rebelled.
‘My dearest,’ said Augustine, ‘I can no longer brook this secrecy. I shall go into the house immediately and ask your father for your hand.’
Jane paled and clung to his arm. She knew so well that it was not her hand but her father’s foot which he would receive if he carried out this mad scheme.
‘No, no, Augustine! You must not!’
‘But, darling, it is the only straightforward course.’
‘But not tonight. I beg of you, not tonight.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because father is in a very bad temper. He has just had a letter from the bishop, rebuking him for wearing too many orphreys on his chasuble, and it has upset him terribly. You see, he and the bishop were at school together, and father can never forget it. He said at dinner that if old Boko Bickerton thought he was going to order him about he would jolly well show him.’
‘And the bishop comes here tomorrow for the Confirmation services!’ gasped Augustine.
‘Yes. And I’m so afraid they will quarrel. It’s such a pity father hasn’t some other bishop over him. He always remembers that he once hit this one in the eye for pouring ink on his collar, and this lowers his respect for his spiritual authority. So you won’t go in and tell him tonight will you?’
‘I will not,’ Augustine assured her with a slight shiver.
‘And you will be sure to put your feet in hot mustard and water when you get home? The dew has made the grass so wet.’
‘I will indeed, dearest.’
‘You are not strong, you know.’
‘No, I am not strong.’
‘You ought to take some really good tonic.’
‘Perhaps I ought. Goodnight, Jane.’
‘Goodnight, Augustine.’
The lovers parted. Jane slipped back into the vicarage, and Augustine made his way to his cosy rooms in the High Street. And the first thing he noticed on entering was a parcel on the table, and beside it a letter.
He opened it listlessly, his thoughts far away.
‘My dear Augustine.’
He turned to the last page and glanced at the signature. The letter was from his Aunt Angela, the wife of my brother, Wilfred Mulliner. You may remember that I once told you the story of how these two came together. If so, you will recall that my brother Wilfred was the eminent chemical researcher who had invented, among other specifics, such world-famous preparations as Mulliner’s Raven Gipsy Face Cream and the Mulliner Snow of the Mountains Lotion. He and Augustine had never been particularly intimate, but between Augustine and his aunt there had always existed a warm friendship.
My dear Augustine (wrote Angela Mulliner],
I have been thinking so much about you lately, and I cannot forget that, when I saw you last, you seemed very fragile and deficient in vitamins. I do hope you take care of yourself.
I have been feeling for some time that you ought to take a tonic, and by a lucky chance Wilfred has just invented one which he tells me is the finest thing he has ever done. It is called Buck-U-Uppo, and acts directly on the red corpuscles. It is not yet on the market, but I have managed to smuggle a sample bottle from Wilfred’s laboratory, and I want you to try it at once. I am sure it is just what you need.
Your affectionate aunt,
Angela Mulliner.
P.S. – You take a tablespoonful before going to bed, and another just before breakfast.
Augustine was not an unduly superstitious young man, but the coincidence of this tonic arriving so soon after Jane had told him that a tonic was what he needed affected him deeply. It seemed to him that this thing must have been meant. He shook the bottle, uncorked it, and, pouring out a liberal tablespoonful, shut his eyes and swallowed it.
The medicine, he was glad to find, was not unpleasant to the taste. It had a slightly pungent flavour, rather like old boot-soles beaten up in sherry. Having taken the dose, he read for a while in a book of theological essays, and then went to bed.
And as his feet slipped between the sheets, he was annoyed to find that Mrs Wardle, his housekeeper, had once more forgotten his hot-water bottle.
‘Oh, dash!’ said Augustine.
He was thoroughly upset. He had told the woman over and over again that he suffered from cold feet and could not get to sleep unless the dogs were properly warmed up. He sprang out of bed and went to the head of the stairs.
‘Mrs Wardle!’ he cried.
There was no reply.
‘Mrs Wardle!’ bellowed Augustine in a voice that rattled the window panes like a strong nor’-easter. Until tonight he had always been very much afraid of his housekeeper and had both walked and talked softly in her presence. But now he was conscious of a strange new fortitude. His head was singing a little, and he felt equal to a dozen Mrs Wardles.
Shuffling footsteps made themselves heard.
‘Well, what is it now?’ asked a querulous voice.
Augustine snorted.
‘I’ll tell you what it is now,’ he roared. ‘How many times have I told you always to put a hot-water bottle in my bed? You’ve forgotten it again, you old cloth-head!’
Mrs Wardle peered up, astounded and militant.
‘Mr Mulliner, I am not accustomed—’
‘Shut up!’ thundered Augustine. ‘What I want from you is less backchat and more hot-water bottles. Bring it up at once, or I leave tomorrow. Let me endeavour to get it into your concrete skull that you aren’t the only person letting rooms in this village. Any more lip and I walk straight round the corner, where I’ll be appreciated. Hot-water bottle ho! And look slippy about it.’
‘Yes, Mr Mulliner. Certainly, Mr Mulliner. In one moment, Mr Mulliner.’
‘Action! Action!’ boomed Augustine. ‘Show some speed. Put a little snap into it.’
‘Yes, yes, most decidedly, Mr Mulliner,’ replied the chastened voice from below.
An hour later, as he was dropping off to sleep, a thought crept into Augustine’s mind. Had he not been a little brusque with Mrs Wardle? Had there not been in his manner something a shade abrupt – almost rude? Yes, he decided regretfully, there had. He lit a candle and reached for the diary which lay on the table at his bedside.
He made an entry.
The meek shall inherit the earth. Am I sufficiently meek? I wonder. This evening, when reproaching Mrs Wardle, my worthy housekeeper, for omitting to place a hot-water bottle in my bed, I spoke quite crossly. The provocation was severe, but still I was surely to blame for allowing my passions to run riot. Mem: Must guard agst. this.
But when he woke next morning, different feelings prevailed. He took his ante-breakfast dose of Buck-U-Uppo: and looking at the entry in the diary, could scarcely believe that it was he who had written it. ‘Quite cross’? Of course he had been quite cross. Wouldn’t anybody be quite cross who was for ever being persecuted by beetle-wits who forgot hot-water bottles?
Erasing the words with one strong dash of a thick-leaded pencil, he scribbled in the margin a hasty ‘Mashed potatoes! Served the old idiot right!’ and went down to breakfast.
He felt amazingly fit. Undoubtedly, in asserting that this tonic of his acted forcefully upon the red corpuscles, his Uncle Wilfred had been right. Until that moment Augustine had never supposed that he had any red corpuscles; but now, as he sat waiting for Mrs Wardle to bring him his fried egg, he could feel them dancing about all over him. They seemed to be forming rowdy parties and sliding down his spine.
His eyes sparkled, and from sheer joy of living he sang a few bars from the hymn for those of riper years at sea.
He was still singing when Mrs Wardle entered with a dish. ‘What’s this?’ demanded Augustine, eyeing it dangerously.
‘A nice fried egg, sir.’
‘And what, pray, do you mean by nice? It may be an amiable egg. It may be a civil, well-meaning egg. But if you think it is fit for human consumption, adjust that impression. Go back to your kitchen, woman; select another; and remember this time that you are a cook, not an incinerating machine. Between an egg that is fried and an egg that is cremated there is a wide and substantial difference. This difference, if you wish to retain me as a lodger in these far too expensive rooms, you will endeavour to appreciate.’
The glowing sense of well-being with which Augustine had begun the day did not diminish with the passage of time. It seemed, indeed, to increase. So full of effervescing energy did the young man feel that, departing from his usual custom of spending the morning crouched over the fire, he picked up his hat, stuck it at a rakish angle on his head, and sallied out for a healthy tramp across the fields.
It was while he was returning, flushed and rosy, that he observed a sight which is rare in the country districts of England – the spectacle of a bishop running. It is not often in a place like Lower Briskett-in-the-Midden that you see a bishop at all; and when you do he is either riding in a stately car or pacing at a dignified walk. This one was sprinting like a Derby winner, and Augustine paused to drink in the sight.
The bishop was a large, burly bishop, built for endurance rather than speed; but he was making excellent going. He flashed past Augustine in a whirl of flying gaiters: and then, proving himself thereby no mere specialist but a versatile all-round athlete, suddenly dived for a tree and climbed rapidly into its branches. His motive, Augustine readily divined, was to elude a rough, hairy dog which was toiling in his wake. The dog reached the tree a moment after his quarry had climbed it, and stood there, barking.
Augustine strolled up.
‘Having a little trouble with the dumb friend, bish?’ he asked, genially.
The bishop peered down from his eyrie.
‘Young man,’ he said, ‘save me!’
‘Right most indubitably ho!’ replied Augustine. ‘Leave it to me.’
Until today he had always been terrified of dogs, but now he did not hesitate. Almost quicker than words can tell, he picked up a stone, discharged it at the animal, and whooped cheerily as it got home with a thud. The dog, knowing when he had had enough, removed himself at some forty-five mph; and the bishop, descending cautiously, clasped Augustine’s hand in his.
‘My preserver!’ said the bishop.
‘Don’t give it another thought,’ said Augustine, cheerily. ‘Always glad to do a pal a good turn. We clergymen must stick together.’
‘I thought he had me for a minute.’
‘Quite a nasty customer. Full of rude energy.’
The bishop nodded.
‘His eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated. Deuteronomy xxxiv. 7,’ he agreed. ‘I wonder if you can direct me to the vicarage? I fear I have come a little out of my way.’
‘I’ll take you there.’
‘Thank you. Perhaps it would be as well if you did not come in. I have a serious matter to discuss with old Pieface – I mean, with the Rev. Stanley Brandon.’
‘I have a serious matter to discuss with his daughter. I’ll just hang about the garden.’
‘You are a very excellent young man,’ said the bishop, as they walked along. ‘You are a curate, eh?’
‘At present. But,’ said Augustine, tapping his companion on the chest, ‘just watch my smoke. That’s all I ask you to do – just watch my smoke.’
‘I will. You should rise to great heights – to the very top of the tree.’
‘Like you did just now, eh? Ha, ha!’
‘Ha, ha!’ said the bishop. ‘You young rogue!’
He poked Augustine in the ribs.
‘Ha, ha, ha!’ said Augustine.
He slapped the bishop on the back.
‘But all joking aside,’ said the bishop as they entered the vicarage grounds, ‘I really shall keep my eye on you and see that you receive the swift preferment which your talents and character deserve. I say to you, my dear young friend, speaking seriously and weighing my words, that the way you picked that dog off with that stone was the smoothest thing I ever saw. And I am a man who always tells the strict truth.’
‘Great is truth and mighty above all things. Esdras iv. 41,’ said Augustine.
He turned away and strolled towards the laurel bushes, which were his customary meeting-place with Jane. The bishop went on to the front door and rang the bell.
Although they had made no definite appointment, Augustine was surprised when the minutes passed and no Jane appeared. He did not know that she had been told off by her father to entertain the bishop’s wife that morning, and show her the sights of Lower Briskett-in-the-Midden. He waited some quarter of an hour with growing impatience, and was about to leave when suddenly from the house there came to his ears the sound of voices raised angrily.
He stopped. The voices appeared to proceed from a room on the ground floor facing the garden.
Running lightly over the turf, Augustine paused outside the window and listened. The window was open at the bottom, and he could hear quite distinctly.
The vicar was speaking in a voice that vibrated through the room.
‘Is that so?’ said the vicar.
‘Yes, it is!’ said the bishop.
‘Ha, ha!’
‘Ha, ha! to you, and see how you like it!’ rejoined the bishop with spirit.
Augustine drew a step closer. It was plain that Jane’s fears had been justified and that there was serious trouble afoot between these two old schoolfellows. He peeped in. The vicar, his hands behind his coat-tails, was striding up and down the carpet, while the bishop, his back to the fireplace, glared defiance at him from the hearthrug.
‘Who ever told you you were an authority on chasubles?’ demanded the vicar.
‘That’s all right who told me,’ rejoined the bishop.
‘I don’t believe you know what a chasuble is.’
‘Is that so?’
‘Well, what is it, then?’
‘It’s a circular cloak hanging from the shoulders, elaborately embroidered with a pattern and with orphreys. And you can argue as much as you like, young Pieface, but you can’t get away from the fact that there are too many orphreys on yours. And what I’m telling you is that you’ve jolly well got to switch off a few of these orphreys or you’ll get it in the neck.’
The vicar’s eyes glittered furiously.
‘Is that so?’ he said. ‘Well, I just won’t, so there! And it’s like your cheek coming here and trying to high-hat me. You seem to have forgotten that I knew you when you were an inky-faced kid at school and that, if I liked, I could tell the world one or two things about you which would probably amuse it.’
‘My past is an open book.’
‘Is it?’ The vicar laughed malevolently. ‘Who put the white mouse in the French master’s desk?’
The bishop started.
‘Who put jam in the dormitory prefect’s bed?’ he retorted.
‘Who couldn’t keep his collar clean?’
‘Who used to wear a dickey?’ The bishop’s wonderful organ-like voice, whose softest whisper could be heard throughout a vast cathedral, rang out in tones of thunder. ‘Who was sick at the house supper?’
The vicar quivered from head to foot. His rubicund face turned a deeper crimson.
‘You know jolly well,’ he said, in shaking accents, ‘that there was something wrong with the turkey. Might have upset anyone.’
‘The only thing wrong with the turkey was that you ate too much of it. If you had paid as much attention to developing your soul as you did to developing your tummy, you might by now,’ said the bishop, ‘have risen to m
y own eminence.’
‘Oh, might I?’
‘No, perhaps I am wrong. You never had the brain.’
The vicar uttered another discordant laugh.
‘Brain is good! We know all about your eminence, as you call it, and how you rose to that eminence.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You are a bishop. How you became one we will not inquire.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘What I say. We will not inquire.’
‘Why don’t you inquire?’
‘Because,’ said the vicar, ‘it is better not!’
The bishop’s self-control left him. His face contorted with fury, he took a step forward. And simultaneously Augustine sprang lightly into the room.
‘Now, now, now!’ said Augustine. ‘Now, now, now, now, now!’
The two men stood transfixed. They stared at the intruder dumbly.
‘Come, come!’ said Augustine.
The vicar was the first to recover. He glowered at Augustine.
‘What do you mean by jumping through my window?’ he thundered. ‘Are you a curate or a harlequin?’
Augustine met his gaze with an unfaltering eye.
I am a curate,’ he replied, with a dignity that well became him. ‘And, as a curate, I cannot stand by and see two superiors of the cloth, who are moreover old schoolfellows, forgetting themselves. It isn’t right. Absolutely not right, my old superiors of the cloth.’
