Angels and Insects Read Online Free PDF Page B

been inherited by Harald’s elder brother, also Robert, who had also married a rich woman—the daughter of a minor earl—who had borne him twelve children, all of whom had died in infancy. Harald, a conventional second son, had taken Holy Orders, and had had a living in the Fens, where he had spent his spare time on botany and entomology. He had been poor in those days—Robert the first’s wealth was tied up in Bredely, which had gone to Robert the second. Harald had married twice. His first wife, Joanna, had borne him two sons, Edgar and Lionel, and died in childbed. Gertrude, the present Lady Alabaster, had married him immediately after his widowing. Gertrude Alabaster, too, had brought along a fat dowry—she was the granddaughter of a mine owner who was given to charitable benefaction and also to shrewd investment. She had survived maternity withrepetitive complaisance. William had initially supposed that the five children he met were all there were but discovered that there were at least three more in the schoolroom—Margaret, Elaine and Edith, and twins in the nursery, Guy and Alice. Also part of the community were various dependent spinsters of various ages, relatives of the Alabasters, or of their wives. A Miss Fescue was always at meals, chomping her food very loudly, never speaking. There was a thin Miss Crompton, usually known as Matty, who, although not the governess—that was Miss Mead—nor the nursery nurse—that was Dacres—seemed to be in some way employed in the care of the younger members of the family. There were visiting young men, friends of Edgar and Lionel. Then there were the servants, from the butler and housekeeper to the scullery maids and boot and bottle boys in the dark depths behind the servants’ door.
    His days began with morning prayers in the chapel. These took place after breakfast, and were attended by those members of the family who had risen, and a varying gathering of quiet servants, maids in black dresses and spotless white aprons, menservants in black suits, who sat at the back, men on the right, women on the left. The family occupied the front rows. Rowena came often, Eugenia rarely, the children always, with Matty and Miss Mead. Lady Alabaster came only on Sundays, and had a tendency to drowse in the front corner, purple in the light of the stained-glass window. The chapel was very plain, and not very warm. The seating was hard oak benches, and there was nothing to look at except the high windows, with their glassy blue grapes and creamy lilies, and Harald. In the early days of William’s presence, Harald would preach succinct little sermons. William was interested in these. They bore no relation at all to the threats and ecstasy of the religion he had grown up in, the red caverns of eternal fire, the red floods of spilt sacrificial blood. Their note was kindly, their subject matter love, family love, as was appropriate to the occasion, the love of God the Father, who watched the fall of every sparrow withinfinite care, who had divided His infinity into Father and Son, the more to make His love comprehensible to human creatures, whose understanding of the nature of love began with the natural ties between the members of the family group, the warmth of the mother, the protection of the father, the closeness of brothers and sisters, and was designed to move outwards in emulation of the divine Parent and embrace the whole creation, from families to households, from households to nations, from nations to all men, and indeed, all living beings, wondrously made.
    William watched Harald’s face attentively during these addresses. When Eugenia was present, he watched her face, when he dared, but her eyes were always modestly cast down, and she had a great capacity for stillness, sitting with her hands quiet in her lap. Harald changed aspects. At times, with his head up, and the white fronds of his beard catching the light, he had a look of God the Father himself, piercing-eyed,