So Mark was sent in his
place. It was a hot August evening with thunder clouds lying heavy on
the Malford woods when Mark drove down the deep lanes to the junction,
wondering what Brother Anselm would be like and awed by the imagination
of Brother Anselm's thoughts in the train that was bringing him from
Aldershot to this momentous date of his life's history. Almost before he
knew what he was saying Mark was quoting from _Romeo and Juliet_:
_My mind misgives_
_Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars,_
_Shall bitterly begin his fearful date_
_With this night's revels._
"Now why should I have thought that?" he asked himself, and he was just
deciding that it was merely a verbal sequence of thought when the first
far-off peal of thunder muttered a kind of menacing contradiction of so
easy an explanation. It would be raining soon; Mark thumped the pony's
angular haunches, and tried to feel cheerful in the oppressive air.
Brother Anselm did not appear as Mark had pictured him. Instead of the
lithe enthusiast with flaming eyes he saw a heavily built man with
blunted features, wearing powerful horn spectacles, his expression
morose, his movements ungainly. He had, however, a mellow and strangely
sympathetic voice, in which Mark fancied that he perceived the power he
was reputed to wield over the soldiers for whose well-being he fought so
hard.
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