Gideon freed himself and lurched away, turning blindly into Shaftesbury Avenue. He was resolved now to seek out whatever pitiful shelter was to be had in this place, even if he must find a carter’s yard and conceal himself under a heap of sacking. He looked about him for some quiet side street, but was drawn instead to a narrow alley that he might have overlooked but for its curiously ornate archway. A plaque was set into the stonework, whose inscription he paused to read.
ST. ANNE’S CHURCH
SOUTH ENTRANCE
The alley was unlit and indifferently cobbled, obliging him to pick his way with some caution, but he came at length to a narrow yard beneath the hulking flank of a church. The light was hardly better here, but after a moment Gideon made out a modest porch. It was covered, if nothing else, and enclosed on three sides. Venturing inside, and finding it passably dry in places, he concluded that he was likely to do no better.
He had paid no attention to the doorway itself, and only as he lowered himself to huddle against it did he discover that the door was unlocked—that in fact it stood very slightly ajar. Warily, he rose again and peered through the crack. A moth fluttered from it, and for a moment he felt the obscure thrum of its wings against his cheek, but there were no other signs of life. With the utmost gentleness, he pushed the door a little way inwards. It was heavy and stiff, and in spite of his efforts it yielded with a good deal of noise.
Gideon clamped a hand to his mouth but stood otherwise motionless. He listened intently, prepared to flee at the slightest sound.
But the silence seemed restored, and after an anxious interval he persuaded himself that he had disturbed no one. He slipped inside. For fear of the noise, he did not close the door behind him, keeping still once more as he took his bearings. The church lay in darkness, but a great arched window was set into its apse, admitting a feeble suffusion of gaslight from the street beyond. It was enough to orient himself by, and to make out the bulk of the altar and the orderly ranks of the pews.
He crept forward, keeping close to the wall as he sought out some quiet recess in which to settle. He meant to conceal himself without delay, not wishing to squander his good fortune. But St. Anne’s proved to be a parish church of the plainer kind, laid out to a simple plan. It offered no quiet side chapels or colonnaded aisles. Indeed, there was hardly even a transept to speak of. Growing anxious, he shuffled towards a narrow door by the chancel, where a vestry might commonly be found.
A faint sound stilled him, just as he was about to try the handle. It was dry and ragged, like the scrape of a straw broom against stone. Gideon scurried at once behind a pew. He heard it again, when his breathing quietened, repeating at unrushed intervals, like a slow measure followed by a rest. With that thought the recognition came to him, and he reproached himself for his dull wits. Breathing. It was the sound of someone breathing.
When he had mastered himself sufficiently, Gideon put his head out by a fraction. The sound seemed to be coming from somewhere near the altar, though it was hard to be certain. An empty church was apt to produce strange echoes. It was regular yet unsettled, as when a person is at rest yet not quite at ease. Gideon cleared his throat gently.
“Hello there,” he called out. “I hope I did not alarm you. It is a bitter night, and I came in only to have some respite from the cold.”
No answer came. The breathing continued just as before, quiet and undisturbed.
Rising from behind his pew, Gideon ventured closer. “Hello there,” he called again. “Have I the honour of addressing the rector of this parish? My name is Gideon Bliss, sir. I am the nephew of the Reverend Doctor Herbert Neuilly, with whom you are perhaps acquainted. I am a man of God myself, sir, at least in a small way. I will shortly return to Cambridge, preparatory to the taking of holy orders.”
Here Gideon departed from strict truthfulness, since he was by no means certain of his vocation, but he intended only to put the stranger’s mind at rest. He crept on, straining to make him out in the gloom, and kept up his intermittent attempts at conversation.
“Could I trouble you, sir, to raise an arm or give some other sign, so that I can come forward and make myself known? You may not have caught my name, I fear. I am Gideon Bliss, a reader in divinity at Selwyn College, Cambridge, where I hope to take my degree before casting my little boat onto the great waters of the—oh, my.”
Gideon halted, his arms slack at his sides. Before the altar, silent and unmoving, lay the figure of a young woman. He stood for a moment in bewilderment. His first thought was that she had crept in from the cold, just as he had, but she had made no effort to conceal herself, to say nothing of keeping warm. She lay on the cold stone flags before the altar itself, with no covering but her thin white shift, and in plain sight of anyone who might chance to come in. Perhaps she wished to be discovered, having taken shelter here after falling ill. Her breathing was laboured, certainly, yet her posture betrayed no obvious discomfort. Indeed, Gideon was struck by her peculiar stillness.
“Miss?” He approached her cautiously. “Forgive me, miss. I took you for a priest of the parish. We find each other in the same predicament, if I am not mistaken. I meant to pass the night here too, owing to a temporary difficulty in the arrangement of my lodgings. You will not take it amiss, I hope? I will settle down in some other part of the church, and make no sound if I can help it.”
Still she did not speak, or give any sign at all that she was aware of his presence. He listened again for her breathing, and was reassured by its faint persistence, but he was troubled nonetheless. How frail she was. How narrow her wrists appeared in the loose folds of her shift. He took another step towards her, raising his hands to show her that he meant no harm.
“Miss?”
He saw her face, since the shadow of the altar no longer hid it. He saw her face, and for a moment his reason faltered. He put a hand out, as if to steady himself, and all that surrounded him seemed to recede.
It could not be. It could not be.
He had seen her first at St. Magnus-the-Martyr by London Bridge, where his uncle had been given rooms on taking up a lecturing post. In the summer months, to ward off any rupturing of his tranquillity, it was the reverend doctor’s custom to find some occupation for his nephew that would keep him away from London. Since June, therefore, Gideon had been consigned to a bleak parsonage in the fens, where he was to undertake a course of private study. In his letters, however, his meek petitioning had grown more insistent, and at last his uncle had consented to receive him for a week.
Gideon’s welcome was not especially warm. His living quarters were modest, Neuilly explained, and his work left him little time for entertaining. Gideon might make use of the library, which was ample, and was otherwise free to amuse himself within respectable bounds. In practice, it was Gideon’s purse that limited his amusements, since it did not occur to his guardian to grant him any allowance beyond the ordinary. On one occasion, when it had stayed wet for the whole of the afternoon, he paid a penny to be admitted to a saloon near Victoria Station, where feats of daring were to be performed by a troupe of Cossacks. Gideon saw very little, however, being much jostled by other spectators, and he fled when a horse kicked over a brazier, setting fire to a painted backcloth and giving rise to a stampede. In the three days that followed, he did little more than walk the streets, wandering eastwards along the wharves as far as the tower or westwards to St. Paul’s Cathedral. By the fourth day of his visit, he had begun to think with fondness of Cambridge, and he resolved to lay out a pretext for returning that would give his uncle no offence.