Iris Murdoch - The Bell

Near the middle of the alley Michael stopped under a tree. They stood there in silence, listening to the inaudible yet somehow living and stirring quietness of the darkening wood. They stood there for a long time, not looking at each other, lulled at last in a kind of coma. Then from nearby among the trees, seeming like a signal, there came a hollow clapping sound. The clapping was followed shortly by a low bubbling churr, then by more clapping; and in the thickening twilight of the alley the birds were suddenly present. They flitted to and fro between the trees, turning and returning in an insistent bat-like circular dance. It was impossible to see how many there were, but it seemed like a multitude as they fluttered and poised in the granular darkness, making a very soft whirring noise with their long pointed wings. Deep in the wood the hollow clapping continued.

Soon it was almost too dark to see. The birds could still be vaguely apprehended, close overhead, like great leaves that fluttered but never fell, until at last they disappeared, gathered up into the obscurity of the coming night. Michael began to pace slowly back down the middle of the avenue. He did not turn towards Toby, who kept step with him, putting his feet down softly in the longish grass. Michael felt now an extraordinary peace in which he felt sure that Toby shared. It was as if they had been present together at some esoteric and liberating rite. In a way, it was a pity to break the spell by vulgar explanations. But at last he spoke, seeming to utter something that he had learnt by heart.

“Toby, about what happened yesterday evening. I did something foolish and wrong – and something I assure you that I’m not at all in the habit of doing. I was almost as surprised at it as you were. I don’t want to make a drama about this. I won’t say‘forget it’ because we can’t do that; but I suggest we set it aside and don’t brood on it or give it an exaggerated importance. In so far as it was a wrong action, that concerns me and not you. I just wanted, well, to apologize to you and to ask you to bury the matter. I know I needn’t appeal to your discretion. But I was anxious in case you should be worrying about it. I’m deeply sorry that you’ve been upset and bothered in this way – and I hope you’ll make a real effort not to let this thing spoil your time at Imber.”

They stopped and turned to face each other. It was almost completely dark now, even in the more open space of the avenue, and the trees were almost invisible, opaque presences of deeper black on either side. Toby looked at the ground and then with an obvious effort raised his head to look at Michael. He said in a low voice, “Of course, it’s all right. I’m sorry. It’s all right. It was good of you to talk to me like this. I quite understand. As far as I’m concerned, I’ll bury the matter completely.”

Looking at his darkened countenance Michael had suddenly a strange sense of déjà vu . Where had this scene, with its inevitable ending, happened before? And even as he spoke and moved he remembered the fading light in his room at school when he and the boy had sat for so long quite still and face to face.

“Thank you,” said Michael, also very softly. No power on earth could have prevented him at that moment from touching Toby. He Beached his hand out blindly toward the boy – and as if drawn magnetically Toby’s hand met his in a strong grip. They stood silently together in the darkness.

IT was the next morning. The sun was still faithfully shining, but a certain dullness and bleakness in the air at breakfast-time made known the season, and then the eye was more quick to see the signs of autumnal decay. Toby spent the earlier part of the morning with Patchway, who was anxious to teach him how to use the cultivator. Toby found himself surprisingly uninterested in the thing and clumsy with it. After eleven he was dispatched, as usual, to the packing shed, but found there was nothing for him to do there. Mrs Mark, rushing off herself to the house to do the laundry, told him to go back to the garden. But instead Toby slunk away by himself. He wanted to think.

He decided to go and sit for a while in the visitors’ chapel, and crossed the causeway, careless of observation. He had never been in the chapel except during Mass, and he found it now, empty and silent, an awe-inspiring place. The curtains were drawn back and the altar and the dim sanctuary light could be seen through the grille. The visitors’ chapel was lighted by two small windows of greenish glass and was rather dark. The nuns’ chapel, or what could be seen of it, was darker still, lit no doubt by late Victorian stained-glass windows. Inside there it was desperately silent and yet somehow attentive.

Toby stood for a while near the door of the visitors’ chapel, listening. He had been told that, between the hours, day and night, there was always a nun at prayer in the main chapel. He could hear nothing. He advanced on tiptoe towards the grille and stopped at the low communion rail which was about three feet in front of it. There was something very odd about being placed sideways on to the altar and not being able to see the body of the chapel which faced the altar. He did not venture to step inside the communion rail; but, looking nervously behind him, he edged up as far as he could toward the left wall of the chapel, and peered through the bars from there. He could see very little more of what lay beyond: only the altar steps, some coloured tiling on the floor, and a further piece of the opposite wall. The nave remained relentlessly hidden.

Looking through into the greater darkness Toby was suddenly reminded of the obscurity of the lake, where the world was seen again in different colours; and he was taken with a profound desire to pass through the grille. When he had had this thought he was immediately shocked at it and rather frightened. Here he stood, and in a way, nothing prevented him from opening the little gate in the grille and walking through into the chapel and standing there, just for a moment perhaps, looking down the nave. He wondered what he would see. A great expanse of empty benches and a solitary nun, perhaps, kneeling somewhere near the back, regarding him sombrely; or, and the thought made his flesh creep, perhaps the entire community was in there at this moment, a few yards from him, sitting in complete silence. In a way nothing prevented him from going through. In a way it was something entirely impossible, and he could not even bring himself to step over the rail.

He retired quickly to the back of the visitors’chapel, feeling shame at the idea of being caught peering, and sat down. He felt irritated and confused and upset. Yesterday he had felt shock and a sort of horror, and then that feverish need to talk to Michael. But at least yesterday he had felt detached, yesterday he had been a spectator. Today he felt involved. He had suffered violence and then somehow been made privy to it; he was no longer a victim but an accomplice. He realized that in a way he was being unfair to Michael. What Michael had said yesterday had been perfectly sensible and cool; and after that very brief conversation in the alley they had walked back to the house, talking with careful casual-ness about other matters. But what lingered chiefly in Toby’s mind was the way in which Michael had seized his hand, and the long moment when they had stood with their hands tightly clasped. If only it hadn’t been for that; for the fact was that Toby knew that he himself had been just as anxious for the contact as Michael had been. He too had been brimming over with emotion. In spite of the words, it had been like a scene between lovers; and looking back, it seemed as if the words were merely straw, flying upward to destruction in the fierce heat of the encounter. Toby felt himself caught in something messy and emotional and he hated it.