Absolute Truths (89 page)

As Jon sat down again at the table with us I thought how mysticism
always streamed forth in a tide of renewal whenever the liberals
and the conservatives of the Church had fought
themselves
to a
standstill.

‘
You should each explain your decision to resign,’ he said, ‘so
that the other can fully understand it. Then if understanding is
present I doubt if discernment will be denied us.’

Aysgarth said cautiously: ‘Shall we toss another coin?’

‘
Not this time, I think. As your bishop, Charles does have the
right to know exactly why you wish to resign.’

I said to Aysgarth: ‘I’m not interested in passing judgement on
you. I just want to understand.’

Aysgarth fidgeted with his empty glass but I thought he was no
longer reluctant to confide; it seemed more likely that he was
unable to decide where to start.

‘
Try revealing to Charles that you’ve been considering resignation for some time,’ said Jon at last.

This certainly surprised me. To Aysgarth I exclaimed: ‘But I always took it for granted that you’d never resign!’

‘
No, I knew after the mess I’d made of everything in 1963 that
I ought to go, but the trouble was that I couldn’t see how to
do it without upsetting my wife and triggering another of her breakdowns.’ He lapsed into silence again.

Jon murmured delicately, steering him on: ‘This could be the moment to explain why your determination to care for her is so powerful. If Charles is fully to understand your story —’ But Ays
garth did not wait for the end of this sentence; it seemed he was
already of the same opinion.

‘
A long time ago,’ he said, looking straight at me with his tired
blue eyes, ‘I did a great wrong to a woman who loved me, and later,
at the beginning of my second marriage, I came to understand that
by never treating Dido as I’d treated that other woman, I could
put everything right. It was atonement — redemption — insanity —
call it what you like, but it enabled me to be at peace with myself
and continue my work as a clergyman. Indeed I worked much better as a clergyman once I realised I was called to look after Dido and care for her.’

There was a pause while he decided what to say next. In the
end, adopting a studiously casual voice which masked his feelings,
he added: ‘That was why 1963 was a disaster for me. I lost touch
with reality and failed to look after Dido. Of course I can see now
I was suffering from years of strain — but I don’t want to make
excuses for myself, and I don’t want you to think I’m complaining
about my marriage either. It’s the proof that even my most horrific
mistakes can be redeemed and transformed into something of value. I have my children and I have a wife who loves me. I’m immensely fortunate and privileged.

‘However, having said all that ... well, it would be foolish,
wouldn’t it, to pretend my private life’s overflowing with unalloyed
bliss, particularly when you know about my bouts of hard drink
ing. Sometimes life’s not so easy, but no matter how difficult it is
I know I have to do whatever’s necessary to make sure Dido’s all
right. Which is why I’m currently in a slightly tighter corner than
usual.’ He had ceased to look at me and was gazing at the leaping
flames in the fireplace.

‘
He’s been a hero, hasn’t he, Charles?’ said Jon, giving him time
to gather strength for the next stage of his explanation. ‘Standing
by that difficult marriage, doing his best not only for his wife but for all those children, toiling away at the Cathedral —’

‘Oh, don’t drivel on in that sentimental fashion!’ interrupted Aysgarth crossly. ‘What an old Victorian you are sometimes! Of
course I’m no hero — think of all the times I’ve fallen short of my
ideals!’

‘But think of all the times you’ve tried to live up to them.’

‘
Well, what on earth’s the point of having ideals unless one tries
to live up to them? One might as well be a mindless bundle of fur
like that cat over there!’

I said hastily before Jon could take offence: ‘Now that you’ve set the scene by explaining why Dido’s welfare is so crucial to you —’ But Aysgarth needed no further prompting.

‘Now that I’ve done that, you can see why I didn’t resign in ‘sixty-three,’ he said. ‘We were already living on a knife-edge at
the time as the result of my mistakes, and she was displaying all
the breakdown symptoms: the migraines, the erratic moods,
the spending sprees in London ... I just didn’t dare risk de
priving her of her home in the Close and her role as the wife of the Dean.’

‘That role meant a great deal to her, didn’t it?’ said Jon. ‘She found it rewarding.’

Remembering both Lyle and Sheila I said: ‘I understand.’

‘
In the end I felt in such a muddle about the whole mess,’ said
Aysgarth, ‘that I was glad when you ordered me to consult the old magician here. I trotted along in the hope that he’d wave a magic wand, and lo and behold, much to my surprise, he did
succeed in helping me to achieve a valuable insight. He started off
by asking what meaning could be drawn from the mess I’d made
that summer, and I said: "The only meaning I can see is that I behaved like a stupid old fool who deserved to be defrocked."
Then Jon said: "Yes, yes, yes, but
why
did you behave in this way,
flirting with Harriet March at a cocktail party, commissioning (as
a result) a most unsuitable sculpture, quarrelling (in consequence)
with your Chapter and your Bishop, and indulging (as if all that weren’t quite enough) in further behaviour which was utterly
verboten?"

‘
Well, naturally I began to drone on about the strain of living with Dido, but Jon just said: "Quite so. Clearly your private life has its shortcomings. But is your professional life as fulfilling for
you as God would wish it to be?" And I was so surprised by that
question that I couldn’t answer it at all — in fact I’d never even
dreamed that such a question could exist. When I was offered the Deanery back in 1957 I just thought: Dean of Starbridge, success,
glamour, nice salary, beautiful home, splendid for Dido, perfect for me, the ideal way to serve God to the best of my ability, I’ll love every minute of it. But you know, Charles, when I reviewed
my position in 1963 — aided and abetted by the old magician here
— I came to rather a different conclusion.

‘The truth is I’m at my best when I’m playing a lone hand and being innovative, and in retrospect I think my biggest success
was as Archdeacon of Starbridge — not Alex Jardine’s archdeacon,
because he resigned so soon after he appointed me, but Ernest
Ottershaw’s. Bishop Ottershaw hated all administration and gave
me carte blanche to do as I thought fit. There was no teamwork
involved, just a boss who was perpetually benign. Teamwork was
never my style. When I became a Canon of Westminster after the
war I quickly got bored with working as one of a team, and that boredom should have been a warning to me, but I ignored it. I
was too busy with my outside activities: fund-raising, working on
my own, being innovative — just up my street. And then came the
Starbridge deanery.

‘
Well, I was no good, was I? I hadn’t the patience to deal with that ill-assorted Chapter and nurse them along so that we all developed into a harmonious team. I found myself restricted on
all sides — by the Cathedral statutes, by tradition, by the prejudices
of people I didn’t like, until it seemed to me that every time I tried to be innovative I met resistance and every time I tried to stick to
tradition — keep matins, for instance, as the main Sunday service
— I met criticism. As for you and I ... well, we were doomed
from the start. Someone said to me once that I can really only work with bishops who are mild and pliable, like Dr Ottershaw,
and perhaps you can really only work with deans who know all about team spirit and "playing the game".

‘
It’s a strain being in the wrong job, and the strain was exacer
bated because for so long I refused to recognise that the job was
wrong for me. It all seemed such a prize — a consolation prize,
perhaps, for the difficulties of my private life — and the Cathedral
itself was so very beautiful . ..’ His voice trailed away. For a long
moment he stared down at his clasped hands, and when at last he said simply: ‘I do so love that Cathedral,’ I saw his tired eyes shine
with tears.

EIGHT

‘
We must put our confidence in
truth.
But that doesn’t mean
sitting back, and waiting for the truth to shine from above,
as one might sit back and wait for the day to break. It means
following with devoted obedience the truth
we have seen
as
true, with an entire confidence in God, that he will correct, clear and redirect our vision, to the perception of a freer and
deeper truth. Go with the truth you have, and let it carry
you into collision with the hard rocks of fact, and then you’ll learn something.’

AUSTIN FARRER

Warden of Keble College, Oxford,

1960-1968

The End of Man

‘
So as the result of the disasters of 1963,’ said Jon, effortlessly
taking over the conversation to allow Aysgarth time to recover, ‘Neville was able for the first time to face up to the fact that he
wasn’t suited to be Dean of Starbridge. This was a most helpful
development because it enabled him to ask himself: "Can I serve
God more effectively elsewhere?" and the possibility of a new life
was opened up. However, in spite of the fact that he was willing
to contemplate a new life, it became clear to us as we continued to examine the situation that there were insuperable obstacles which prevented him leaving Starbridge at that time. Neville’s already
mentioned the difficulty of depriving his wife of a life which made
her happy and tolerably stable. But that wasn’t the only problem.’

‘
I came to see,’ resumed Aysgarth, having mastered his emotion,
‘that the other problem was financial. I did think Dido could adjust
to a new life, but I saw clearly that it would have to be the right new life – and the right new life would take money to establish
and maintain. If Dido had no compelling reason to stay in the
provinces she’d have to be either in or near London, and since a
smart townhouse in Chelsea was out of the question I knew I’d
have to aim for the smartest county nearby. But Surrey’s not cheap.
I wasn’t too worried about getting a job; of course after the mess
I’d made I knew I’d no hope of another top post, but I was
confident that I could wangle my way on to the pay-roll of some
Church organisation in London and do fund-raising. The only
trouble was that I had no hope of free accommodation and no
capital to use to buy a house.’

Recalling Loretta’s information I demanded: ‘What about the
legacy from your uncle?’

‘Oh, that’s all gone! The last of it went to meet some particularly
heavy expenses I incurred in 1963. I suppose I should merely be
grateful that despite numerous children and an extravagant wife
I’ve managed to avoid bankruptcy, but I really did regret not
having the money to leave Starbridge after the 1963 disasters.

‘
Fortunately for my morale, Jon took a positive attitude, said
we should regard this as a useful sign about what I was required
to do, and eventually we worked out that because I couldn’t afford
to do anything except stay where I was, God for some reason was
determined that I should remain at the Cathedral. So then the
question became: what’s so important that I have to remain to do
it? And the answer, of course, was –’

‘– running the West Front Appeal.’

‘Exactly! And suddenly I saw an encouraging future; I saw that
although I’d made a hash of the job I was being given the chance to redeem it – and by fund-raising, the thing I do really well. For
the first time in months I felt happy. I thought: I’ll stay in office until the Appeal’s wound up and then I’ll sweep away in a cloud
of glory to some nice little country cottage which Dido can convert
into a
Homes and Gardens
dream – exposed beams, chintz, roses
growing around the front door –’

‘
Most alluring,’ I said politely, repressing a shudder. I knew
exactly what I thought of the nouveaux riches who inflicted wall-
to-wall carpets and too many bathrooms on houses in Surrey’s few
unspoilt rural outposts, but now was obviously not the time to
complain about the despoliation of my native county. ‘And where
was the money going to come from?’

‘
That was the big question.’ Aysgarth began to gaze meditatively
at a distant point on the ceiling. ‘I thought that with Dido’s income
and my own earnings we could probably live there without
inducing chronic dyspepsia in my bank manager,’ but as I couldn’t
afford a high rent or mortgage payments I knew I had to have
the capital to buy the place outright.’ After another moment of
meditation he turned to Jon and said: ‘I’m not sure how to phrase
the next bit.’

Responding to this appeal Jon said carefully: ‘The spiritual side
of Neville’s nature said: "God will provide." But the secular side
– the side formed early in life by his Uncle Willoughby, a gentleman not noted for his spirituality – said: "God helps those who help themselves." I’m afraid it was at this juncture that Neville
thanked me for accompanying him through the crisis of 1963 and
went on his way alone.’

The point to grasp,’ said Aysgarth hurriedly to me, ‘is that I
did it for my wife. And it wasn’t wrong. It was just a little innovative, that’s all.’

Striving to match Jon’s delicacy I said: ‘Perhaps the most painless
way of continuing is just to tell me in one sentence what "it" was.’

‘
Oh, it was nothing really,’ said Aysgarth, examining his empty glass as if he had never seen anything quite like it before. ‘After all, I never even considered embezzlement, larceny or fraudulent
conversion. In fact I went to the library and read up all those
crimes just to make sure I didn’t commit them. The very last thing
I wanted was for there to be any little awkwardness as the result of my innovative thinking.’

Jon eventually said to break the ear-splitting silence: ‘You did
actually have the power to invest the Appeal money as you thought
fit, didn’t you, Neville?’

‘Certainly I did! The Appeal Fund was a revamped version of
the Dean’s Fund which I used to control in the old days. The only
difference was that I used to put the Dean’s Fund money into
investments which paid low rates of interest but which were completely safe. With the money from the Appeal Fund, on the other
hand, I was rather more ...’

‘Innovative,’ I said.

‘
Yes, but legally there was nothing to say I couldn’t be as inno
vative as I liked! The point to grasp, Charles, is that I had
no intent
to defraud –
and without that intent there can be no crime. All I
aimed to do was invest the money, receive a high return and make
sure the ultimate net benefit to the fund was at least
as
much as the interest the sum would have earned if it had been merely left
to moulder on deposit at the bank. Of course I had to follow this
procedure several times in order to cream off enough money for myself, but –’

‘
My dear Stephen!’

‘
– but the point is
I’m innocent!
I must be! I looked it all up in
a book on criminal law!’

‘But did it never occur to you that there might be other law
books which were relevant to your activities? And how could you
be so confident that you’d interpreted the law correctly?’

‘
Oh, a Balliol man with a first in Greats can always read any text-book and find out what he wants to know in double-quick
time! Besides, the idea that only lawyers can understand the law
is just a myth put out by the legal profession to make sure their fees don’t dry up.’

‘
But what about the law of trusts? What about the law of equity?
What about –’

‘
All that matters,’ said Aysgarth firmly,
‘is
that at the end of the
day – and I’m glad to tell you the sun’s just about to set on my activities – the accounts will be straight as a die and we’ll all live happily ever after. I’ve just been living a little riskily for some months, that’s all.’

Finding myself speechless at this point I turned to Jon who promptly said to Aysgarth in his most austere voice: ‘I’m sure Charles wants to take a charitable view of your activities, Neville,
but you must allow him his moment of horror. Now tell him how
you set about manufacturing your cream.’

‘
My first step was to change the accountants as soon as the new
financial year started,’ said Aysgarth rapidly, seizing the
^-
chance to shift the discussion from the morality to the mechanics of his m
anoeuvres. ‘Possibly I would have changed them anyway – Bob Carey’s never been at ease with my innovative style. Anyway I got
hold of this nice little firm in London – a one-man show even though there are two names on the letterhead, and the one man
himself is an old chum of mine, I met him years ago when I was
fund-raising after the war, and I knew I could just say to him:
"Nothing much for you to do here, old boy — just cast a quick
eye over the figures once a year, sign your name and leave the rest
to me." He knows my talent for fund-raising, just as he knows a
clergyman never commits a crime, so he was quite happy to oblige.
I take him out to lunch at the Athenaeum occasionally and send
him some good claret at Christmas and he’s been happy as a lark,
I’m glad to say, right from the start. I never believe in upsetting accountants.

‘Well,’ said Aysgarth, having embarked on a second prolonged
examination of his empty glass, ‘having so
^l
ved the problem of
the accountant — I really couldn’t have borne to have Bob Carey breathing down my neck and periodically having hysterics — I then
got down to work. I’d dreamed up this marvellous scheme. I knew
it was no good turning to the stock-market; I didn’t know any
broker who would give me the kind of first-class undivided atten
tion which would guarantee success. But I did have a brilliant
alternative in mind.

‘
I decided to play the art-market. Of course it’s not a game for
the faint-hearted, but if you have an eye for art — which I do — and
if you have a clever accomplice with all the right connections —’

‘
So that’s why your friendship with Harriet revived!’

‘
Wasn’t it useful that I’d got to know her in ‘sixty-three? Natu
rally I thought of her as soon as I realised I needed someone with the inside knowledge to back up my flair. I wasn’t fool enough to
tell her everything; in those days I didn’t quite know how discreet
she was, and I didn’t want word to leak to the press that the
Dean of Starbridge had embarked on —’ He paused to concoct an inoffensive phrase.

‘A gambling scheme,’ I said.

— an innovative investment policy,’ said Aysgarth imaginatively.
‘So I told her I had a little money left over from my Uncle Wil
loughby’s legacy and that I wanted to increase it in order to realise
my dream of a little country cottage with exposed beams, an ingle
nook fireplace, roses growing around the door —’

‘
I’m sure she was enchanted. So with the aid of this glamorous accomplice —’

‘
— I set out on the road to riches. I must say, it
was
all rather
hair-raising, but I loved it, the excitement cheered me up no end,
and it was such fun being conspiratorial with Harriet — what a marvellous girl! And quite safe too because she had a lover up in London — well, as a matter of fact I think she had several — so she
wasn’t going to waste any amorous energy on a battered old wreck
like me. We bucketed along and did pretty well until a couple of
months ago when I thought for a terrible moment that my flair
had led me astray —’

I had to say: ‘You must have nerves of steel.’

‘
A steel stomach is actually what’s required. Harriet got such
indigestion she thought she had an ulcer, but we soldiered on,
buying and selling with terrific panache, until eventually I had an off-day and fell in love with a Brooking —’

‘
A what?’ I said.

‘
What a philistine you are, Charles! Are you trying to tell me
you’ve never heard of Brooking’s seascapes?’

‘
I’ve never heard of them either,’ said Jon, ‘but that hardly mat
ters. Go on, Neville. You fell in love with this painting —’

‘
I should never have let my heart rule my head. I paid too much
— prices for a Brooking can range from around nine hundred
guineas to over five thousand pounds and it’s not always so easy
to get it right when one’s buying. But now, thank God, there are
two Americans fighting to pay a most inflated price for it, so
everything’s going to fall into place — and once I’ve set myself
straight after this sale I shall have accumulated enough cream to set me on the road to my Surrey cottage. Ideally I’d have liked a
little more, but one can’t have everything, can one, and since now
is obviously the time to quit, I’m willing to call it a day.