Authors: Iris Murdoch
The Bell (41 page)
âI'm so sorry,' said Dora, not knowing whether to leave her or not.
âYou see,' said Catherine, âit
was
because of me. You didn't know, did you? It was a sign.' She began to walk on.
was
because of me. You didn't know, did you? It was a sign.' She began to walk on.
Dora, seeing her face thought: Catherine has gone mad. This was the thought which had struck her at once when she had been rudely pushed aside, but which had seemed too fantastic to entertain. Catherine had seemed quite normal on the previous day. Surely people don't go mad suddenly. Dora, who had had no experience of mad people, stood frozen with fear and horror while the white figure of Catherine disappeared along the path.
When she had vanished between the trees Dora's instinct was to rush back to the Court for help. But then she decided that is was more important to pursue Catherine and persuade her to return. In that condition she might wander away into the woods and not be found. Dora was also moved by a desire not to make a fool of herself or make any more trouble. She might after all be quite wrong about Catherine, and to raise a false alarm when there was so much else for everyone to think about would be more than tiresome. She hurried forward and soon saw Catherine's white dress ahead of her.
It then occurred to Dora that they would soon be in the vicinity of the barn, and that Paul might still be there. This encouraged her and she ran on, once more calling Catherine's name. Catherine paid no attention and when Dora caught up with her the second time she seemed to be murmuring things to herself. Looking at that flushed distracted face Dora felt no doubt that her first instinct had been right. She seized Catherine's dress and at the same time began to shout for Paul. They came out into the open space by the ramp, Catherine hurrying and Dora holding on to her and shouting. There was no response from the barn. Paul must have left it; as it turned out later he had gone back by the concrete road to the Court to telephone a London colleague. Dora and Catherine were alone in the wood.
Dora gave up her shouting and said to Catherine, âDo come back to the house now, please do.'
Catherine, without looking round, pushed Dora away from her, and said in a clear voice, âFor Christ's sake leave me alone.'
Dora, who was beginning to be a little incensed as well as alarmed, said âLook here, Catherine, you're being silly. You come along with me.'
Catherine turned back at her, grinning suddenly with a smile that resembled the harsh unfading smiles her brother used. She said to Dora, âGod has reached out His hand. A white garment cannot conceal a wicked heart. There is no passing through that gate. Good-bye.'
They had passed the ramp now and reached a place where the path was very close to the edge, fringed on the lake side by tall rushes. An area of mud and green weeds lay between the bank and the clear water. Catherine turned away from Dora and began to walk into the lake.
She moved so quickly, plunging directly through the wall of rushes, that Dora was left standing, staring at the place where she had disappeared from view. A loud squelching sound came from beyond the rushes. Dora gave a scream and followed. Without hesitation she plunged through the greenery and gave another scream as she felt the ground give way beneath her. She sank in mud almost to her knees. Catherine had managed to take another two steps and was farther out. Almost with deliberation, like a timid bather, she subsided into the gluey mess of weeds and muddy water, struggling to get farther from the shore. She lay sideways, the shoulder of her dress still strangely clean and white above the surface.
Dora called to Catherine, and then screamed again. But who would hear? Everyone was so busy and so far away. She reached out, trying to reach Catherine, lost her balance, and fell forward into the deeper water. The water splashed up over her face. Frenziedly struggling to keep her head up, she felt the slimy weeds dragging at her limbs. With a frantic effort she managed to draw her feet under her and sit in the mud with the water almost to her neck. Ahead of her Catherine was splashing. She had now sunk well into the water and seemed to be caught in the weeds, whose strands could be seen bound round one of her flailing arms. Dora reached forward and managed to catch Catherine by the hand. She shouted her name over and over again, and then screamed as loudly and piercingly as she could. She tried to pull Catherine back towards her.
The next moment she found herself being dragged forward. Catherine, resisting her grip, was pulling her out into the deeper water. Dora let go, but it was too late. She was now well way from the bank. Her feet trampled vainly in a bottomless morass of watery mud and weed. She beat the surface with her hands, shrieking and swallowing water, her head thrown back, her arms half entangled. Something dark was unravelling on the water before her. It was Catherine's hair. As in a dream she saw Catherine's shoulder disappearing in the black ooze, her staring eyes cast upward, her mouth open. Fear of death came upon Dora. She fought desperately, gasping for air, but the weeds held her, seeming to drag her down, and the water was at her chin.
Then she heard a distant cry. Dimly, across the surface of the lake, she saw a black figure standing by the wall at the corner of the Abbey grounds, which ended a little way to the left on the opposite bank. Dora, in the last throes of terror, called again. She saw the figure beginning to disrobe. The next moment there was a splash. Dora saw no more; her own fight was near its end. Water streamed into her gasping mouth and the weeds now held one arm pinioned beneath the surface. Her feet trampled deeper in the gluey mud. She uttered a moaning cry of despair. A black tunnel seemed to open below her into which she was slowly being drawn.
âDon't struggle,' said a cool voice. âKeep quite still and you won't sink any deeper. Try to breathe slowly and evenly.'
Dora saw, level with her face and strangely near, a head bobbing in the water, a boyish close-cropped head with a fresh freckled complexion and blue eyes. She stared at it, seeing it with a sort of mad clarity, and for the first moment she thought it really belonged to a boy.
Dora stopped struggling and found to her surprise that she was not sinking. The water lapped the bottom of her chin. She tried to breathe through her nose, but her mouth kept opening in terrified gasps. She saw with amazement, now that she was for a moment still, the two heads breaking the surface in front of her, the rounded head of the nun, who was swimming in the clearer water just beyond the weeds and cautiously edging in towards Catherine, and the head of Catherine, tilted over, her mouth and one cheek now submerged, her eyes glazed. With the same strange clarity Dora noticed that the nun's face was almost dry.
The nun was speaking to Catherine and was now trying to get a hold on her shoulders from behind and pull her out beyond the weeds. Catherine did not struggle. She was limp, as if unconscious. Dora watched. Catherine was being turned on her back. Her chin rose above the surface, her hair floated out behind her, and the nun was thrusting a white arm through it to hold her more firmly. A ripple reached Dora's mouth and she began to scream again. Her struggles recommenced, her breath came in staccato gasps. She was sinking now. The water seemed to pour into her, she began to suffocate.
She felt the warm muddy water rising upon her cheek. Then the next moment she heard voices, and two strong hands had seized her from behind. She was lifted from under the armpits. Rising a little from the water and turning, still struggling and gasping, she saw Mark Strafford's face close above her. He hauled her land-wards, waist deep himself in the mud. Other hands took her there. She lay exhausted on the ground, the water running from her mouth. The shouts continued, and sitting up a moment later she saw James and Mark, both struggling well out, keeping a footing somehow in the mud, and raising the form of Catherine between them. Helpers plunging, linked together, from the shore, dragged them all to land. There seemed to be half a dozen people now squelching about on the muddy verge. Further out the head of the nun could be seen bobbing. She had relinquished Catherine and propelled herself back into the open water. She shouted something and began to swim round towards the ramp.
Dora collapsed again, lying face downwards on the grass. She coughed, spluttered, and moaned quietly with relief. Someone was asking her if she was all right, but she was still in another world. She listened without thinking that she might be able to answer, absorbed in the wonder of finding herself alive. Suddenly someone leaned upon her and began pressing rhythmically on her back. Dora gurgled and sat upright. Giddiness overcame her and she covered her eyes, but remained sitting up, supported by one arm.
âShe's O.K.,' said Mark Strafford. He transferred his attention to Catherine, but someone was already giving her artificial respiration. As Dora watched, Catherine rolled over with a moan, pushing her benefactor away, and sat up too. Her eyes were vacant, her white dress clung transparently to her body, her long wet hair coursed down over her breasts. She looked about her.
A grotesque figure was pressing forward. Dora stared at it in amazement: a short-haired woman, apparently naked to the waist, and dressed in black from the waist down. Then she realized that it was the nun in her underclothing. The nun leaned over Catherine, asking how she was, and then turned to smile at Dora. She was totally unembarrassed and accepted with a polite nod the coat which Mrs Mark was offering her. She seemed a young woman. Her freckled face was still almost dry.
âThis is Mother Clare,' said Mark. âYou two seem destined to meet after all.'
Catherine had risen to her knees and was staring about as if looking for something. At that moment more voices were heard in the wood, and several more people appeared, uttering questions and cries of amazement. Among them was Michael.
It was certainly a strange scene: most of the men muddied to the waist, two half-drowned women, and Mother Clare swinging the coat over her shoulders. Michael looked at it with the expression of someone who has had enough surprises and feels that this ought to be the last. But it was not the last.
As he advanced towards the centre of the group and began to say something, Catherine staggered to her feet. She advanced, grotesque with her long stripes of black hair, her mouth hanging open. Everyone fell silent. Then with a moan she ran at Michael. It seemed for a moment as if she were going to attack him. But instead she hurled her arms about his neck and seemed to cling to him with the whole of her wet body. Her head burrowed into the front of his jacket as in tones of frantic endearment she uttered his name over and over again. Michael's arms closed automatically about her. Over her bowed and nestling head his face was to be seen, blank with amazement and horror.
CHAPTER 24
PAUL PAID THE TAXI-DRIVER. He spent a moment or two working out the exactly appropriate tip. They went into the station. Paul bought the morning papers. They had arrived far too early for the train, as usual. They sat side by side on the platform, Paul reading the papers and Dora looking out across the railway. The sun shone upon a yellow mustard field and there was a haze over the low green tree-fringed horizon beyond. It was sunny again, but chill; the dusty illusions of late summer were giving place to the golden beauties of autumn, sharper and more poignantly ephemeral.
Dora had spent the rest of the previous day in bed. Everyone had been very nice to her; everyone, that is, except Paul. But the general concern had been for Catherine. Carried back to the Court, Catherine had remained throughout the day in a completely distracted condition. The doctor had been called. After administering sedatives he had shaken his head, spoken of schizophrenia, and mentioned a clinic in London. Late in the evening, after much debate and indecision, arrangements were made for Catherine to go as soon as possible.
Paul, in a condition not far from schizophrenic himself, had divided his energies between studying the bell and reproaching his wife. Fortunately for Dora's repose, the bell had claimed the larger part of his time; and very early that morning, after a long telephone call to someone at the British Museum, he had decided to travel to London by the ten o'clock train. This haste left no time for packing, and it had been decided that Dora should travel the following day, bringing the luggage. The larger suitcase, filled with Paul's notebooks, travelled with him. Dora was to do what she could with brown paper and string, and take a taxi from Paddington if necessary. The bell itself, the old bell, was also going to London, by road-rail container, for examination by experts.
Dora saw out of the corner of her eye that there was something about Imber in the paper. She did not want to see it. She stared ahead of her at the mustard field. Paul was reading it avidly.
After a little while he said, âRead this,' and handed her the paper.
Dora glanced at it unseeingly for a moment, and then said, âYes, I see.'
âNo, read it properly,' said Paul. âRead every word.' He kept the paper held up in front of her.
Dora began to read. The article was headed - FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD - and read as follows:
Few days in the history of religious communities, lay or otherwise, can have been quite so eventful as the last twenty-four hours at Imber Court, home of an Anglican lay community tucked away in the wilds of Gloucestershire. Event number one was the discovery, by two visiting members of the community, of an antique carved bell which had lain for many centuries sunk in the ornamental lake which surrounds the house. This bell is alleged to be the property of nearby Imber Abbey, Anglican Benedictine convent, which by an odd coincidence was just about to instal a modern bell. Rumour had it that the antique bell was to be âmiraculously' substituted for the modern bell at a quaint baptismal ceremony outside the Abbey. The miracle however did not occur, and those not in the secret were given a different surprise instead by (event number two) the pealing of the bell at dead of night, summoning them to a gathering in the woods more reminiscent of a witches' sabbath than of the sober goings on of the Anglican church.
More surprises were to follow. Next day, Friday, began ceremoniously, no witches in evidence. Blessed by a mitred Bishop the new bell processed slowly along the picturesque causeway which leads across Imber lake to the gates of the nunnery. Event number three took place, with dramatic suddenness, half-way across the causeway. The bell suddenly overturned into the water and sank without trace. Subsequent investigation suggested that sabotage, and not accident, was responsible for this disaster; and the finger of suspicion was pointed at one of the brothers.
Scarce, however, had this mystery been allowed to thicken when event, or catastrophe, number four ensued. One of the brothers, a sister this time, since the brotherhood embraces both sexes, who was shortly to proceed herself across Imber causeway to nunhood, became deranged and threw herself into the lake. Happily she was rescued quite unhurt by Miss Dora Greenfield, a visitor to the Abbey, with the help of an aquatic nun, who provided a unique spectacle by doffing her habit and diving in in her underclothes. The unfortunate would-be suicide is receiving medical attention.
The Imber brotherhood, designed to allow laymen to have the benefits of the religious life while remaining in the world, has been in existence for less than a year. When not engaged in religious exercises it cultivates a market-garden. Why this recent outbreak of drama? A spokesman closely connected with the community mentioned schisms and emotional tensions, but members of the brotherhood were not anxious to comment, and assured us that life at Imber is normally peaceful.
The brothers are a self-governing body, subject to no defined ecclesiastical authority. They make no vows of chastity or of poverty. Who supports them? Voluntary contributors. An appeal for contributions is shortly to be issued, to be followed by a swelling of the numbers of brothers and sisters. The community occupies a charming eighteenth-century house in extensive grounds.
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