The Pope went on to the reception room to fetch Cardinal Carvale. Not to neglect the superiors, (although He was very tired) He allowed them to show Him rather dubious and very ugly treasures; and tolerated half-an-hour of vapid conversation. They thought Him so nice. He was bored to death. After conferring the usual favours, He obtained a whole playday for the college: notified the rector that He was carrying off a student: arranged for Mr. Jameson to visit Cardinal Sterling; and took His departure. He put His acquisition into a victoria, and bade him drive to the obelisk in St. Peter’s Square.
“Dreadful place!” Hadrian ejaculated to Carvale as they turned down Tritone. “Do you think you could make it decent if you were rector?”
“I would try, Holiness.”
“Well: We do not see how We can make you rector, because of Monsignor What’s-his-name. But you might do something as protector—”
“Gentilotto is protector, Holiness. St. Andrew’s is subject to the Cardinal-Prefect of Propaganda.”
“Only for the present, Carvale. You will find that dear old Gentilotto is quite willing. And you yourself are a Kelt. Yes, that’s right! A Keltic college should have a Keltic protector. Carvale, you are Protector of St. Andrew’s College from this moment, and you shall have your breve directly We get back to Vatican. Now, first of all, go to Oxford and ask Dr. Strong to put you up for a week in coll.: and keep your eyes open. Do that with your first spare fortnight. Then come back and turn your rivers Peneios and Alpheios through that Aygeian stable. Give them baths and sanity, for goodness’ sake; and try to get them into cleanly habits. You might make that shrubbery into a gymnasium and swimming bath with a lovely terrace on the top. And, O Carvale, do make friends with them, and see what you can do to take that horrible secretive suppressed look out of their young eyes. Understand?”
“I think so, Holiness.”
“We give you a year. If We live as long as this day twelvemonth, We will go again to mark your progress. Remember, you have a free hand. Now here’s something else. Tell Sterling that a—but no—We Ourself will tell him.”
At the obelisk they picked up Hamish Macleod. Hadrian marched him straight up to the quarters of the gentlemen of the secret chamber. Sir John and Sir Iulo, stripped to the buff were punching a bag.
“John,” said the Pope, “Mr. Macleod will be your guest for the present. Get him a room near your own and make him comfortable.” He drew the young man outside while Sir Iulo was lavishing his lovely English on the visitor. “And John, reorganize his wardrobe on the scale of your own; and teach him your business.”
To Cardinal Sterling, who came to the secret chamber, Hadrian explained the case of William Jameson.
“You have your opportunity,” He said to His Eminency.
“And one will not repeat one’s previous mistake, Holiness,” was the remarkable and thankful reply.
“No, for mercy’s sake, don’t. And now listen. The Treasurer will pay you on this order the sum of £10,500. You will invest it in the Bank of England on these terms. The transaction is to be secret. The interest on £10,000 is to be paid quarterly to William Jameson as long as he lives. On his death the capital is to revert to the Treasurer for the time being of the Apostolic See. Instruct the bank instantly to send £500 and the vouchers to Jameson, with a statement that it is his patrimony; and to give him no further information.”
Then Hadrian shut-up Himself and rested, smoking and reading the “Reviews of Unwritten Books” in some old numbers of the Monthly Review. One of them caused Him to think. It was called “Thucydides’ Report of Pericles’ Oration at the Incoronation of King Edward the Seventh.”
XVI
Jerry Sant gnawed his rag of a moustache for a fortnight or so, till it was dripping and jagged. He began to have a notion that Mrs. Crowe would like to have him elsewhere. That did not disturb him: for he knew that he always could compel her services, when he wanted them, by means of a pull on the purse-strings. The mildly elegant exiguity of the circle in which she moved, had no attraction for him. There were not many saxpences there; and he felt out of his depth in a company which he could not lead by the nose. “In the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.” He knew himself to be “a one-eyed man”; and, in the kingdom of the Liblabs, he naturally had been one of the kings. Here, among the English and Keltic Catholics in Rome, he was no more than tolerated—and awfully worried by people who offered him tracts, of which, for the life of him, he could make neither head nor tail. Further he really seriously was annoyed that the Pope had not accepted his handsome offer—had not even answered his letter. He thought it most rude. It is a fatal and futile thing to leave letters unanswered, especially impertinent letters. Silence does not “choke off”: in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, it breeds bile which is bound to be spurted sooner or later. It is a poor kind of a man who cannot indite a letter which is a guillotine, a closure about which there can be no possible mistake. By this means, uncertainty and its vile consequences are prevented. Hadrian perfectly knew how to deliver Himself. His faculty for finding-out other people’s thumbscrews had provided Him with blasting powder, if He had desired to be dynamic; and He possessed Bishop Bagshawe’s celebrated three-line formula, which never has been known to fail of throttling an importunate correspondent. But He no more could have touched Sant, even with a letter, than He could have touched tripe with tongs. His feeling for the man was ultimate antipathy, which led Him to commit the common error of ignoring
