Michael Malone - Weebly

With such easy adaptability, Highwick had moved
through life, alone only when he slept.
All the other solitary people in Dingley Falls were
proof of that truism of human nature which the rector
chanced to avoid. For all of them thought they would be
happier if they did not live alone.
Indeed, they saw in their solitude the very source of
everything that kept them from utter and lasting
satisfaction with life. Among those on whom the
untimed silence and unchanged space of loneliness
weighed so heavily that they felt they must keep in
continual motion to escape being numbed, the most
frightened were Evelyn Troyes and Walter Saar. An
odd pair, the elegant headmaster and the petite widow,
though they shared the added coincidence of escaping
solitude with music while wishing to escape it in the
company of the curate, Jonathan Fields, who spent far
more time with Father Highwick than with either of
them. Of course, Jonathan was scared, too, and knew
that Highwick was safer: he was demanding, but his
demands could be met, for the rector wanted time, not
love, which costs more. Jonathan earnestly believed that