Free The Complete Symphonies of Adolf Hitler by Reggie Oliver Page B

an extravagant tip. As he struggled to rise from the table, he grimaced with pain, so I helped him to his feet. He acknowledged my assistance with a smile and a movement of the hand that was like the blessing of a dying pontiff.
    ‘My dear Ellwood,’ said Oscar, ‘a gentleman knows but never tells.’ Absently he patted the waistcoat pocket in which reposed the sad remnants of my one thousand francs.

AMONG THE TOMBS

    ‘I don’t think the Church of England will ever take kindly to the idea of sainthood,’ said the Archdeacon. ‘No. It won’t do. It’s not in our nature.’ The Archdeacon is one of those people who has decided views about absolutely everything, a useful if exhausting quality.
    It was the first night of our annual Diocesan Clergy Retreat at St Catherine’s House. Most of the participants had gone to bed early after supper and Compline, but a few of us had accepted Canon Carey’s kind offer of a glass of malt whisky in the library. It was a cold November evening and a fire had been lit. Low lighting, drawn damask curtains, and a room whose walls were lined from floor to ceiling with faded theology and devotion contributed to an intense, subdued atmosphere.
    I suppose whenever fellow professionals get together there will tend to be a mood of conspiracy and competition, and clerics are no exception to the rule. Serious topics are proposed so that individuals can demonstrate their prowess and allegiances. The Archdeacon, in any case, does not do small talk.
    ‘But there are people in our tradition whom we do revere as saints,’ said Bob Mercer, the Vicar of Stickley.
    ‘Name them!’ said the Archdeacon belligerently.
    ‘George Herbert, Edward King of Lincoln. . . . What about the martyrs Latimer and Ridley? And Tyndale?’
    ‘Yes, yes. But these are figures from the past. Anyway, ask the average man or woman in the pew what they know about Edward King. I mean that we have no living and popular tradition, no equivalent to Mother Teresa or Padre Pio.’
    ‘What about Meriel Deane who started the Philippians?’ said Canon Carey.
    A young curate who had just crept in confessed he had never heard of Meriel Deane. I would have said so myself had I been less timid about showing my ignorance. Rather condescendingly the Archdeacon enlightened us. Meriel Deane, he said, had founded the Philippian Movement to help the rehabilitation of long term, recidivist prisoners who had just left gaol. They could spend their first six months of freedom at a Philippian House, usually in a remote country spot, supervised by one or two wardens. The regime pursued there was at once austere and easy-going. Inmates could come and go as they liked, and had no work to do apart from minor household chores, but there were regular meals and periods of silence and meditation. People were given space to reflect on their lives. The charity was named after the town of Philippi where St Paul had been imprisoned. The Philippians were still in existence and doing good work though their founder was now dead.
    The Archdeacon concluded his lecture by saying ‘I met Meriel Deane on several occasions. The woman was nuts. No doubt a good person in her way, but completely off her head, so not in my view a candidate for sanctification.’
    ‘Oh, yes, she was rather disturbed at the end, but she wasn’t always like that,’ said a voice none of us recognised.
    The speaker was an elderly priest whom I noticed had been placidly silent all through supper. He wore a cassock rather like a soutane which put him on the Anglo-Catholic wing of the church, an impression which was confirmed when I heard him being addressed as ‘Father Humphreys’. He must have been past retiring age, a small, stooped man with a wrinkled head, like a not very prepossessing walnut; but, as he spoke, his face gradually assumed character, even a certain charm.
    ‘So you knew her, Father?’
    ‘Very well, for a time. One of her first ‘Philippian’ houses was in my