Such Is My Beloved (5 page)

 

SIX

F
ather Dowling had one young friend named Charlie Stewart, who had always been a great joy to him. He was a medical student, a thin man with a narrow face and sharp restless eyes, who had no religion, but who loved to discuss social problems. Father Dowling had met him at a meeting of a league for social reconstruction. At first Father Dowling had tried to get the young man to join the Church. In this he was not successful, so he had come to love him for his passion and the violence of his opinions. He used to irritate the young man by smiling and saying, “Ah, Charlie, you don't realize it, but all your intuitions are Catholic.” He had dropped this kind of mockery only when Charlie began to insist he was thinking of joining the Communist party. It often puzzled Father Dowling to realize that Charlie, who had no faith and was a dreadful rationalist, had in many ways become his best friend. Of course, few people ever understood the terrible loneliness of a young parish priest, the dreadful necessity for him to have one friend to whose house he could go when he was tired and discouraged and take off his collar,
stretch his legs, and relax and laugh like a human being. So many of the people who talked to the young priest with such stiff politeness would have been ill at ease if they could have seen him laughing, without his collar on. They preferred to leave him alone or treat him with distant respect.

As Father Dowling went along the street with his hat on the back of his head at a ridiculous angle, he was thinking it was only the grace of God that had given him such a friend as Charlie Stewart. Night after night, sometimes till two o'clock in the morning, over many cups of coffee or a little beer, they had had fierce political arguments and gruelling philosophical discussions: they had talked of Karl Marx and the guilds of mediaeval times; they had spoken passionately about “beauty” in the abstract, and the general progress of the race toward the city of God. Father Dowling had got many themes for sermons out of these discussions.

Charlie Stewart's apartment was in a building overlooking a schoolyard. Charlie was in his shirt sleeves when Father Dowling came in, and his hair was hanging low over his thin, intellectual face. He took off his glasses and his eyes looked very red and tired. “Hello, Father. I was thinking about you yesterday,” he said. “You haven't come to see me all week. Sit down. Take off your coat.”

“I can't stay a minute,” Father Dowling said anxiously. “I won't even sit down. I'm in a great hurry, Charlie.” Father Dowling was twisting his hat nervously, looking very worried.

He was so quiet and ill at ease, so hesitant in his speech, that Charlie Stewart was silent, wondering what was the matter with him. The priest remained silent so long that Charlie imagined he was still offended over a discussion they had had the other night about celibacy. The priest had said that night, “I'm surprised a man of your intuitions can't appreciate the value of
celibacy.” And Charlie had jeered, “Faith, hope and celibacy, says St. Paul, and the greatest of these is celibacy.”

“You don't look well to-night, Father. Have you been working hard? You look pale and worried,” he said, and he thought, “What's bothering Father Dowling?”

“I've been feeling fine, Charlie.”

“There's something agitating you, I can see that.”

“I feel splendid. Listen, Charlie, this is very embarrassing. I'd mention it to no one but you. I need the loan of a little money. Have you got anything you can spare? Say fifteen dollars. Of course I'll square it off with you at the end of the month.”

Charlie was surprised, but he said, “I'll show you what I've got.” He took a small roll of bills out of his pocket. “I'm lucky to this extent. I just got money from my people. I can let you have twelve dollars. How's that?” As he offered the money, Father Dowling saw him frown slightly and look concerned, and he knew intuitively that Charlie was remembering he had a girl now whom he took out in the evenings. He was very much in love with this girl. That was one of the reasons why he and the priest had had fewer profound discussions during the last month.

Father Dowling felt humiliated to be taking this money. He drew in his breath, wetted his lips and looking very white-faced, he smiled and said, “God bless you, Charlie. God bless you. I'll say a little prayer for you as I go along the street.”

“I want you to promise to meet my girl, Father.”

“I will, Charlie. I'll like her, I know.”

And when he was outside, walking rapidly with his head down, he was making a fervent little prayer. Some of the finest prayers he had ever made had been made sometimes when he was hurrying along the street. He prayed that Charlie Stewart
might prosper because of his goodness. And he was thankful and proud that he had such a young friend. In all the city, he thought, no other priest had such an interesting friend, a man who was not only good-natured but full of his own wisdom, full of startling observation, speculative thought and, above all, a man with a simple heart.

He felt easier in his own mind. He took off his hat, wiped his perspiring forehead, and as he looked up eagerly at the stars he passed right by the Cathedral and kept on going around the block to the hotel.

 

SEVEN

F
ather Dowling went up the hotel stairs two steps at a time, rapped on the white door and waited, breathless, fearing no one would be in. But when the door was opened a few inches, Midge's round face peered out at him. She was puzzled. She hesitated almost as if she would close the door. It was time for her to go out. Her face had just been powdered carefully and her hair arranged and she was putting on her coat. She said doubtfully, “Were you coming in, Father?”

“Please, Midge,” he said, and he went in as if the room were his own and he was relieved to be there. Twice he walked the length of the floor, wondering how he could explain that he had failed to find work for them and wondering, too, if his gift of a few dollars would seem too small after his promises. Midge was watching him so restlessly, and tapping her toe so impatiently that he felt unwelcome and said, “Were you planning to do anything?”

“Oh, no, Father,” she said. “I was thinking maybe of going over to the store, but that doesn't matter at all.”

“I thought we might talk a while,” he said diffidently.

“I'm awfully glad to see you, Father,” she said. “You know that. You know, we often talk about you now.”

“That's splendid,” he said, and he smiled with relief and began to take off his coat. His lips were moving faintly as if he were preparing certain arrangements of words. Sometimes he smiled a bit and hesitated, as if the thought behind the words amused him. And when she saw that he intended to stay for some time, she shrugged and pursed her mouth and curled up on the bed, her head supported by her hand and elbow. By this time she was at ease with the priest and watched him with curiosity. It was only when he looked at her steadily and simply with his very candid blue eyes that she felt uneasy. Father Dowling was so pleased to see her lying there, smiling, that he became almost inarticulate. “Do you know,” he said suddenly, “you look now as if you would fit very easily into a decent home. That's the way I think of you. I pray that soon I shall see you in such a place. I was awfully glad to find you here when I called. That's the stuff. I'll soon be able to have the feeling that I'm calling here as I would on any other parishioner.” He laughed apologetically. “Some of them are very strange people. They mightn't like you, but you mightn't like them, either. Oh well, that's not the way to speak of them. Underneath the surface many of them have splendid Christian characters.”

“You're funny, Father. You think all people are nice, don't you?”

“Oh, no. To the contrary. I think many people are decidedly evil. It is sometimes necessary to pretend that they are nice. To make it more deplorable many are often evil of their own volition.”

“What's volition?”

“Of their own free will. Because they want to.”

“I'm glad you like me and Ronnie,” she said. “I guess because we have plenty of volition, eh? Wait till I pull that on Ronnie. When she comes in I'll say, ‘You've too much volition to-night,' and she'll think I'm insulting her.”

“You two girls are very precious to me, almost more than the rest of my work,” he said. “I want you to understand that. I think you do.” He saw her relaxing; he felt her lazy good humor. It seemed to him that she ought to have a slow drawling charm. It seemed to him that already she had a little more contentment in her face and he really loved the way she was apt to burst out laughing, as if the faintest incident touched her deeply, as if the sensation of the most fleeting moment had to be savored fully. “That attitude in her is really Christian in the best sense of the word,” he thought. “That desire to make each moment precious, to make the immediate eternal, or rather to see the eternal in the immediate.”

And she was watching him lazily, thinking, “If he keeps on staying, I won't be able to go out. What does he want to say? There's something on his mind. He's a very nice man. Maybe I don't really want to go out. Maybe I could get him to come over here and sit beside me.”

“Where's Ronnie?” he said at last. He had been trying not to seem worried. He had kept on pretending to himself that she would burst into the room in the way a girl comes rushing into the warmth from the cold night air. “Where's Ronnie?” he repeated. “Aren't you expecting her?”

“No. She's out with Lou.”

“Who is Lou, Midge?”

“Lou's her fellow. She goes around with him.”

“What kind of a fellow is he, a decent type, has he some character?”

“You'd better not take my word for it, Father. As far as I'm concerned he can go and jump in the lake. But then he doesn't like me.”

“Is she in love with him?”

“She's nuts about him.”

“Then I'd like to meet Lou some day.”

“Don't worry, you will if you keep hanging around here.”

“What time will she come?”

“Very late. Very, very late. You won't want to wait for her. You better forget about her for to-night.”

Father Dowling rose and began to walk up and down the room. Several times he took out his watch, looked at it and sighed. He kept thinking he ought to go home, but then he would whisper to himself, “I'll wait twenty minutes more.” He was almost afraid to go without seeing Ronnie, fearing that if he missed her he would lose track of her for a while and would not know what was happening to her. At last he stopped, smiled at Midge, took from his pocket an envelope containing the money he had borrowed, and with a strangely diffident apologetic nod, he slipped it under the cloth cover on the dresser. “I don't want you to have to worry about how you're going to live, do you see,” he said.

Midge stiffened and craned her neck, longing to look in the envelope, but she held herself there, full of wonder at him, following him with her eyes as he went up and down the floor with the worried expression growing more severe. He kept taking out his watch. Finally he said, almost humbly, “Midge, would you do a small favor for me? Come around to the church some time. Just of an evening when the church is full. Will you do that?”

“I guess so,” she said, looking upset and a bit resentful. He loved to have this response and see that indignant expression.
It made him feel there was a depth to her that could be touched, some kind of feeling, even if only resentment, and he was much encouraged. “There's passion still there,” he thought. “Just say you'll come,” he said.

“All right, Father,” she said awkwardly. “I'll do that for you. It won't cost me nothing, will it?”

“Bring Ronnie, too,” he said.

He wanted to wait till Ronnie came in. The longer he waited the more he wondered where she was and what she was doing. He began to make uneasy, sporadic conversation with Midge, but whenever she began to get interested he would become thoughtful and silent. He saw that Midge was getting sleepy. Once he yawned himself. They both lay back and began to doze. Then Father Dowling sat up abruptly, saw Midge's eyes closed, saw how long her lashes were, and how her lips were parted and her breast was softly swelling, and he went out without disturbing her.

 

EIGHT

T
he two girls often used to think that Father Dowling might actually be in love with them, he was so patient and tender. Sometimes he would pat one of them on the head, or hold out his hands to them. They used to try and sit on his knee or put their arms around him and looked puzzled when he pushed them away. They could not understand the nature of his feeling for them. They could not believe that sooner or later he would not want either one of them.

He met many of their friends, street girls, who came very late, regarded him with hostility and got used to him and talked as if he weren't there. There were two girls, Marge and Annie, who liked him and wanted to joke with him. Marge was a very heavy old blonde girl with wide hips and deep breasts and a loud, boisterous laugh that always startled him, and she used to say, “I'll bet you more men go to confession to me than to you. Sometimes you can't stop them telling the family dirt when they get into bed.” Annie was a slender, hot-eyed, bad-tempered Mulatto. She tried many times to arouse Father Dowling and refused to accept his celibacy. One night, growing vicious, she stood in front of him and lifted her
dark breast out of her dress and held it out to him, jeering and teasing. “Ain't that nice? Come on, change your luck, big boy,” she said. The blood surged into his face, he looked uneasy, but he stood up and said, “You'll have to go, Annie. You should not have done that.”

“You liked it, you know you liked it.”

“You must never do anything like that again, do you hear?”

“Leave him alone, Annie,” Midge said jealously. “Did no one ever turn you down before? You've been turned down by everybody in this burg that wears pants.”

Father Dowling had a man's passion, and as he sat there looking furtively at the dark girl, and at Midge and Ronnie, he suddenly saw them just as young women, making him full of longing as they used to do when he was a boy. He wanted to take their soft bodies and hold them while his arms trembled. He wanted to put his head down on white warm softness. The blood seemed to be swelling into his loins. Their laughter, their bawdily relaxed bodies which he saw now magnified by his longing into loveliness, brought a tension into his own limbs which he could not break. But then his forehead began to perspire, his whole body relaxed and he trembled and felt ashamed. “I ought not to be ashamed of being tempted,” he thought. “I am not a eunuch. The Church will not accept a eunuch for a priest. I'm a normal man and I wouldn't be normal if I wasn't tempted. But I'll never be tempted like this again.”

There were other nights when he dreamed and woke up feeling wretched, almost willing to decide not to go to the hotel again. But he always realized that to stay away for such a reason would be an act of weakness and lack of faith. Therefore, he remained patient and friendly with all these girls till
they all got used to him. They began to ask his advice on many matters. They had more problems than he had ever heard in the confessional. They used to like the way he reasoned with them considerately.

Lou would never believe Ronnie when she insisted that the priest was not getting something from the girls. He used to jeer and tell stories about tunnels that ran underground from monasteries to convents, and he hoped to come into the room some time and embarrass Father Dowling, whom he had never really met.

One night Lou came in when the priest was there, but he walked past him, with his derby hat far over on one side of his head, as if he had not seen him and stood idly at the window, whistling through his teeth and sometimes snapping his fingers. Father Dowling, who had not taken off his coat because he had come in a great hurry, sat in the chair regarding Lou shrewdly. Lou turned, stared at the priest's spotless, shining white collar and smiled sarcastically. Father Dowling smiled, too, so that the skin around his eyes was all wrinkled up, and Lou did not know what to say.

“This is Lou. You've heard me speak of Lou, my fellow,” Ronnie said. Looking at Lou, she pleaded with her eyes as she scraped her foot in a small circle on the carpet. Father Dowling got up and put out his hand with so much heartiness that Lou was surprised into shaking hands limply. The mildness in the priest's eyes and yet the strength in his big hands disturbed Lou. Lou respected strength. Father Dowling said, “I've heard all about you, Lou. You've got a splendid girl in Ronnie. Be good to her, eh? A man would never want a better girl.”

“Oh, I treat her pretty good as it is,” Lou said. “Of course, I don't give her jewels and take her horseback riding, but I always give her what I call a good break.”

“I'm glad to hear it. You're a good fellow, we'll be friends, I know.”

“All right with me,” Lou said. Then he added awkwardly, making a sharp swoop with his left hand, “But I don't want you interfering between me and the girl, see.”

“Of course not. I'm glad to hear you speak like that. Lots of fine manly fibre, eh? We'll see more of each other.”

As the priest turned to pick up his hat, Lou wanted to insult him. But Father Dowling had so much assurance, such an imperturbable smile that Lou felt it necessary to be careful. At last he blurted out the words he had been wanting to say. “How long have you been here with Ronnie?”

“About twenty minutes. Why?” Father Dowling asked.

Lou tried desperately to say, “Well, you're going to pay her something, aren't you? What do you think she does for a living?” but he faltered, his face reddened. “I was glad to meet you. That's all, Father.”

“There wasn't something else you wanted to say?”

“That's all.”

As Father Dowling went out he was thinking, “Lou's a bad actor, a bad character, I can see that.” But he felt, too, that Ronnie loved Lou, and he did not want to say anything to him in front of her that might hurt her.