Vile Bodies

I

It was clearly going to be a bad crossing.

With Asiatic resignation Father Rothschild S.J. put down his suitcase in the corner of the bar and went on deck. (It was a small suitcase of imitation crocodile hide. The initials stamped on it in Gothic characters were not Father Rothschild’s, for he had borrowed it that morning from the valet-de-chambre of his hotel. It contained some rudimentary underclothes, six important new books in six languages, a false beard and a school atlas and gazetteer heavily annotated.) Standing on the deck Father Rothschild leant his elbows on the rail, rested his chin in his hands and surveyed the procession of passengers coming up the gangway, each face eloquent of polite misgiving.

Very few of them were unknown to the Jesuit, for it was his happy knack to remember everything that could possibly be learned about everyone who could possibly be of any importance. His tongue protruded very slightly and, had they not all been so concerned with luggage and the weather, someone might have observed in him a peculiar resemblance to those plaster reproductions of the gargoyles of Notre Dame which may be seen in the shop windows of artists’ colourmen tinted the colour of “Old Ivory,” peering intently from among stencil outfits and plasticine and tubes of watercolour paint. High above his head swung Mrs. Melrose Ape’s travel-worn Packard car, bearing the dust of three continents, against the darkening sky, and up the companionway at the head of her angels strode Mrs. Melrose Ape, the woman evangelist.

“Faith.”

“Here, Mrs. Ape.”