[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
perhaps anxious about the storm in which his mysterious master
had vanished: anyway, he betook himself heavily in the Duke's tracks
through the trees. Father Brown had picked up one of the lemons and
was eyeing it with an odd pleasure.
"What a lovely colour a lemon is!" he said. "There's one thing
I don't like about the Duke's wig--the colour."
"I don't think I understand," I answered.
"I dare say he's got good reason to cover his ears, like King Midas,"
went on the priest, with a cheerful simplicity which somehow seemed
rather flippant under the circumstances. "I can quite understand
that it's nicer to cover them with hair than with brass plates or
leather flaps. But if he wants to use hair, why doesn't he make it
look like hair? There never was hair of that colour in this world.
It looks more like a sunset-cloud coming through the wood.
Why doesn't he conceal the family curse better, if he's really
so ashamed of it? Shall I tell you? It's because he isn't ashamed of it.
He's proud of it"
"It's an ugly wig to be proud of--and an ugly story," I said.
"Consider," replied this curious little man, "how you yourself
really feel about such things. I don't suggest you're either
more snobbish or more morbid than the rest of us: but don't you feel
in a vague way that a genuine old family curse is rather a fine thing
to have? Would you be ashamed, wouldn't you be a little proud,
if the heir of the Glamis horror called you his friend? or if Byron's
family had confided, to you only, the evil adventures of their race?
Don't be too hard on the aristocrats themselves if their heads are
as weak as ours would be, and they are snobs about their own sorrows."
"By Jove!" I cried; "and that's true enough. My own mother's family
had a banshee; and, now I come to think of it, it has comforted me
in many a cold hour."
"And think," he went on, "of that stream of blood and poison
that spurted from his thin lips the instant you so much as mentioned
his ancestors. Why should he show every stranger over such
a Chamber of Horrors unless he is proud of it? He doesn't conceal his wig,
he doesn't conceal his blood, he doesn't conceal his family curse,
he doesn't conceal the family crimes--but--"
The little man's voice changed so suddenly, he shut his hand
so sharply, and his eyes so rapidly grew rounder and brighter
like a waking owl's, that it had all the abruptness of a small explosion
on the table.
"But," he ended, "he does really conceal his toilet."
It somehow completed the thrill of my fanciful nerves that
at that instant the Duke appeared again silently among the glimmering trees,
with his soft foot and sunset-hued hair, coming round the corner of
the house in company with his librarian. Before he came within earshot,
Father Brown had added quite composedly, "Why does he really hide
the secret of what he does with the purple wig? Because it isn't
the sort of secret we suppose."
The Duke came round the corner and resumed his seat at the head
of the table with all his native dignity. The embarrassment of
the librarian left him hovering on his hind legs, like a huge bear.
The Duke addressed the priest with great seriousness. "Father Brown,"
he said, "Doctor Mull informs me that you have come here to make a request.
I no longer profess an observance of the religion of my fathers;
but for their sakes, and for the sake of the days when we met before,
I am very willing to hear you. But I presume you would rather
be heard in private."
Whatever I retain of the gentleman made me stand up.
Whatever I have attained of the journalist made me stand still.
Before this paralysis could pass, the priest had made a momentarily
detaining motion. "If," he said, "your Grace will permit me
my real petition, or if I retain any right to advise you, I would urge
that as many people as possible should be present. All over this country
I have found hundreds, even of my own faith and flock, whose imaginations
are poisoned by the spell which I implore you to break. I wish we could
have all Devonshire here to see you do it."
"To see me do what?" asked the Duke, arching his eyebrows.
"To see you take off your wig," said Father Brown.
The Duke's face did not move; but he looked at his petitioner
with a glassy stare which was the most awful expression I have ever seen
on a human face. I could see the librarian's great legs wavering
under him like the shadows of stems in a pool; and I could not banish
from my own brain the fancy that the trees all around us were
filling softly in the silence with devils instead of birds.
"I spare you," said the Duke in a voice of inhuman pity.
"I refuse. If I gave you the faintest hint of the load of horror
I have to bear alone, you would lie shrieking at these feet of mine
and begging to know no more. I will spare you the hint.
You shall not spell the first letter of what is written on
the altar of the Unknown God."
"I know the Unknown God," said the little priest, with an
unconscious grandeur of certitude that stood up like a granite tower.
"I know his name; it is Satan. The true God was made flesh
and dwelt among us. And I say to you, wherever you find men ruled
merely by mystery, it is the mystery of iniquity. If the devil
tells you something is too fearful to look at, look at it.
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]