“My dear little woman,” said Mr. Haldane, taking both her hands in one of his, “you have no cause to be wretched. I have no wish to deprive you of your belief in a heavenly Father. With women the illusions of the heart last longer than with men; and perhaps, in these days of change and innovation, it is as well that women have still a creed to find comfort in. For my part, I confess I hardly understand what it is attracts you in your religion. The civilized world, so far as I can see, has outgrown the golden age of worship, and latria is one of the lost arts.”
The presence of the master of Foxglove Manor created considerable surprise and curiosity among the congregation at St. Cuthbert’s. Though he had lived in the neighbourhood for the last twelve years, this was the first time he had been seen inside a church. Much more attention was paid during the service to the beautiful lady of the Manor, and the grim, powerful man who sat beside her, than was in keeping with the sacred character of the occasion. Mr. Haldane, on his part, though he did his best by imitating the example of his wife to conform to the ritual, was keenly critical of the whole service. The dim religious light of the painted windows pleased his eye, but failed to exercise any influence on his feelings. The decorations of the church seemed to him insincere and artificial. He missed in the atmosphere that sense of reverence which he had experienced in the old cathedrals in Spain and Italy. The ceremonies appeared dry, joyless, and uninteresting, and as he watched the congregation bowing, kneeling, praying, singing, pageants of the jubilant mythic worship of the ancient world crowded upon his imagination.
“What are you thinking of?” his wife once whispered, as she caught a sidelong glance at his abstracted face.
“Diana at Ephesus!” he replied, with a curious twinkle in his keen gray eyes.
Once or twice during the sermon a saturnine smile passed across his face, and Mrs. Haldane pressed his foot by way of warning; but otherwise he listened gravely throughout, with his large, strongly marked features turned to the preacher.
“Well, have you been interested, dear?” asked Mrs. Haldane, when the service was over, and they were waiting in the churchyard for the vicar.
“Yes,” he replied drily; “your vicar is interesting.”
“Now, what do you mean by that?”
“He will repay study, my dear.”
Mrs. Haldane looked sharply into her husband’s face, but was dissatisfied with her scrutiny.
“You don’t like him?”
“I have no reason yet to like or dislike him. In a general way, I should prefer to say that I do like him.”
“But what do you mean by your remark that he will repay study?”
“Perhaps you will not understand me,” he answered thoughtfully. “Your vicar has a soul, Nell.”
“So have we all, I suppose.”
“At least he believes he has one,” said Mr. Haldane, with a slight shrug of his shoulders.
“Well!”
“And he is trying to save it.”
“We all are, I hope.”
“I beg your pardon, Nell; the phenomenon in these days is a psychological rarity, and, being rare, is naturally interesting. It is one of the obscure problems of cerebration. Ah! here comes your vicar.”
With a bright smile Mrs. Haldane advanced to meet him, and cordially shook hands with him. “You must allow me to introduce you to my husband. George, Mr. Santley.”
“My wife tells me,” said Mr. Haldane, as they shook hands, “that she was an old pupil of yours.”
“Yes,” said the vicar, with an uneasy glance towards her, “many years ago.”
“It is a little curious,” continued Mr. Haldane, “how people lose sight of each other for years, and then are unexpectedly thrown together into the same small social circle, after they have quite forgotten each others existence.”
The vicar winced at the last words, but replied with a faint smile, “The great world is, after all, a very little world.”
“Ah, my dear sir, I see I have started a familiar train of thought—the littleness of the world,” said Mr. Haldane, with a dry light in his eyes.
“And you fear I may improve the occasion?” asked the vicar a little coldly.
“Pray do not misunderstand my husband,” interposed Mrs. Haldane. “He was delighted with your sermon to-day; and I do not wonder, for you have the power of appealing to the heart and raising the mind beyond earthly things. It was only a few moments ago that he told me he was deeply interested.”
“I perceived that he was amused once or twice,” replied the vicar, with a smile.
“I confess that I may have smiled at one or two points in your discourse.”
“Excuse my interrupting you,” said Mrs. Haldane; “will you not walk? You can spare time to accompany us a little way?”
Mr. Santley bowed, and Mrs. Haldane signed to the coachman to drive on slowly towards the village.
“For example,” resumed Mr. Haldane, “I see you still stick to the old chronology and the mythic Eden.”
“Certainly I do.”
“And yet you should be aware that at least a thousand years before the date you fix for the creation of Adam, tribes of savage hunters and fishers peopled the old fir-woods of Denmark, and set their nets in the German Ocean.”
“It may eventually prove necessary to revise the chronology of the Bible,” replied the vicar; “but there is at present too much conflict of opinion among your archaeologists to decide on the absolute age of these tribes. After all, the question is one of minor importance.”
“Granted. But you cannot say the same of the efficacy of prayer.”
Mrs. Haldane laid her hand on her husband’s arm, and stopped abruptly. “Ask Mr. Santley to dinner, George, and then you can discuss as long and as profoundly as you like; but I will not allow you to argue now. Besides, I want to talk to Mr. Santley.”
Mr. Haldane laughed good-naturedly. “Just as you please, my dear. If Mr. Santley will favour us with his company, I shall be very glad. Your predecessor was a frequent visitor at our house. A jovial, rubicund fellow, whose troubles in this life were less of the world and the devil than of the flesh! A fat, ponderous man and a Tory, as all fat men are; a sort of Falstaff in pontificalibus; a man with a wit and a shrewd palate for old port. Poor fellow! he was snuffed out like a candle. One could have better spared a better man.”
“Will you come to-morrow?” asked Mrs. Haldane; “and, if your sister can accompany you, will you bring her? You will excuse our informality and so short a notice.”
“I shall be very happy to call tomorrow.”
“Then, if you can spare me a few moments I will have a better opportunity of speaking to you. I must learn all about the parish, and I have a whole catechism of questions to ask you. You will come to-morrow, then?” she concluded, with one of those flashing looks from her great dark eyes.
He watched them drive away with that look burning in his brain and the pressure of her hand tingling through every nerve. He stood gazing after her with a passionate light in his eyes and an eager, yearning expression on his pale, agitated face. This was the woman he had lost, and now they were again thrown together in the same small social circle, after she had completely forgotten his existence! Those words of her husband