It means nothing to me. It is a beautiful fable, that is all. And I cannot pretend, Mr. Hampson--I would not if I could. To gain the woman I love for my wife I would do anything except live a lie. No union founded on a fundamental deceit can be a happy one. If I pretended to believe I should never know a moment"s peace. Mary would soon find it out by that marvellous sixth sense of hers, and both our lives would be ruined beyond recall."

"I fear," Hampson answered sadly, "that there are many people who profess and call themselves Christians who would have no such scruples, Sir Thomas. They do you honor."

"Oh, no," the baronet answered. "It"s temperament with me, that"s all.

Well, again and again I have returned to the attack, but it has been useless. Nothing will move her. However much she loved me, so she stated, she would never marry me unless I gave up everything and followed Christ. Those were her very words. And that I cannot do, for Christ is nothing to me, and does not touch my heart at all. I can"t believe in Him. It is an impossibility. And I am rich, very rich. I love my life; I am fond of beautiful things; I shrink from pain and sorrow and poverty. And yet I don"t think I am a bad man, as men go. I have no particular vices. When you saw me at that filthy play to-night it was quite an accident. I hate that sort of thing; the life that the Frivolity type of man leads is absolutely disgusting to me. I felt unhappy and bored; it happened that I had no engagement to-night, and I turned into the first place I came to, without a thought. But Mary wants me to give up everything and work among the poor--as a very poor man myself. How can I give it up--my houses, estates, my yacht, and pictures, all the things that make life pleasant? I can"t do it! And now, after to-night, Mary will be further away from me than ever."

He spoke with grief and despair in his fresh, young voice. Obviously he was deeply stirred and moved. But there was doubt in his voice also. He seemed to be talking in order to convince himself. There was a struggle going on within his mind.

"What a wonderful man your friend Joseph must be," he said suddenly.

"There cannot be any one else like him in the world. There seems something almost supernatural about him--only, of course, the supernatural does not exist."

Then Hampson spoke.

"I know that you will believe what I am going to tell you," he said quietly. "First, I must say a few words about myself. All my thinking life--since I was a very young man--I have been a convinced Christian.

Even in the darkest hours my faith has not wavered, whatever my sins and errors may have been. Joseph, on the contrary, has been as convinced an atheist as you say that you yourself are. A hundred times in my hearing he has derided Jesus Christ and mocked at G.o.d. He threw up a great career at Cambridge because he felt it his duty to express his convictions in public. Only a few weeks ago he was exactly of the same way of thinking. To-night you heard him sway and move hundreds of sinful men and women directly inspired by G.o.d. Like a prophet of old--even as Jesus Himself--he preached the truth in the places of the unG.o.dly. You, yourself, were profoundly stirred. Now, I ask you, what does this mean?"

Sir Thomas had been gazing at his guest with deep interest and wonder.

"You startle me, sir," he said. "You overwhelm me with what you tell me.

I must believe you. I do indeed! But what had changed him? Tell me that!"

"The power of the Holy Ghost," said the journalist.

There was a silence.

Sir Thomas leant back in his chair with an abstracted gaze. He had eaten nothing, though his guest, wiser than he, had made a sufficient and recuperative meal.

The little j.a.panese spaniel rose from his sleep before the glowing fire, and put his nose into his master"s hand. Sir Thomas stroked the tiny creature absently.

"The Holy Ghost?" he said, fixing his eyes upon Hampson. "What is that?

Who can say?"

"The Holy Ghost, proceeding from the Father and the Son, is of one substance, majesty, and glory with the Father and the Son, very and eternal G.o.d."

"I would," the young man said, with great sadness--"would that the Holy Ghost would come to me also."

He had hardly finished the sentence--probably the first prayer he had ever made since he lisped "Our Father" at his mother"s knee--when the door opened, and the butler entered the room.

"A note, Sir Thomas," the man said. "A note from Miss Lys. The bearer awaits an answer."

The young man took the note with trembling fingers and tore it open.

This was what he read:--

"I saw you in the theatre to-night, and I knew that you were disturbed about me. Have no fear. I am writing this from my aunt"s house, where I went immediately when we left the theatre. But I want you to come and see me here to-morrow, quite early. Would ten o"clock be too soon? I have something of the highest importance to say to you. Send back an answer to say that you can come. I have been here for an hour, and I have been thinking of you the whole time. I have a premonition about you--a happy one!

"MARY."

CHAPTER IX

A LINK CHAPTER

Joseph, his followers, and Mary Lys, had pa.s.sed out of the theatre without hindrance in the dark. They encountered no one in their pa.s.sage, and found themselves in Shaftesbury Avenue as people pa.s.s from one dream into another. The faces of all of them were pale and set, but no one spoke.

It is a well-known fact that hardly any one attracts attention in the streets of London unless because of noise or eccentric behavior. This is quite true of the daytime, and especially true at night. So cosmopolitan is the modern Babylon, so intent upon their own business or pleasure are the inhabitants, that a Chinaman in full native costume or an admiral in full-dress would do no more than excite the merest pa.s.sing regard.

When, therefore, Joseph and his companions walked up the busy pleasure-street, they were almost unnoticed. A man with a soft felt hat pressed down upon his forehead, a bearded man wearing a black cloak of a somewhat peculiar cut--what was there in that? A hospital nurse and a few grave-faced men in country-clothes and obviously from the country--who was to give them any notice?

It happened, therefore, that the little party were well on their way towards Oxford Street before the first member of the audience had left the Frivolity. As far as any knowledge of their whereabouts was concerned, they might have vanished into thin air.

They walked on in silence, Joseph leading the way with Mary, the half-dozen men following behind.

When Oxford Street was reached, Joseph hailed a cab.

"You have been with us long enough for to-night, sister," he said; "your aunt and uncle must be anxious about you, and you owe them a duty after you have fulfilled your duty to the Lord. Truly, the Holy Spirit has been with us on this night, during the first few hours we have been here. May He always be with us and bless and prosper our great undertaking! Good-night, and G.o.d bless you, my dear sister. If it be G.o.d"s will we shall all meet again on the morrow. It may be that even before then some one of us will receive a sign or a revelation."

His eyes shone with mystical fire as he said this, and watched the cab drive away into the roar of lighted traffic.

Then he turned to his companions.

"Brethren," he said, "I feel, I know not why or how, that my work to-night is not yet ended. But go you to your lodgings. I will be with you for prayer and to break the fast not long after dawn. You trust me still? You believe in our great work? You are not terrified by the noise and the glitter of this wicked, mighty city? If there is one among you who would even now draw back, and once more seek the quiet hills of Wales, then he may yet do so on this very night."

"We have no home, Master," one of the men said, Owen Rees by name, and obviously speaking in the name of his companions. "We have no home but the Kingdom of G.o.d. We have set our hand to the plough, and will not turn back. The Lord is with us," he concluded simply--"whatever and why should we fear?"

"Then, brethren," Joseph answered, "G.o.d be with you. That omnibus there will take you to the door of the place by the station where we have taken our lodging. David Foulkes knows the number, and has the money.

Pray for us all."

With these words he turned and strode away westward. They gazed after him until the tall, black figure was swallowed up by the crowd.

On and on went Joseph, regardless of all around him. His mind was full of doubt and fear, despite the calm words he had spoken to his disciples. All the saints of G.o.d have known dark and empty moments, wherein all seems hopeless and sad, and the great world seems closing round, shutting them off from the Almighty. It is always thus. We are tried and tempted to the last. We also must know faintly some of those hours of agony which the Man of Sorrows Himself knew and suffered.

It was thus with Joseph now. During the tremendous effort in the theatre he had been conscious that G.o.d was with him, and speaking through the mouth of His servant. He was the vessel of the Unseen and Awful Power.

In a flash of Divine inspiration he had known of the lives of the men who sat below him.

But when it was all over, a reaction set in. He was filled with gloomy and troubled thoughts. Had his words been right words after all? Was the impulse which had drawn him to the theatre with irresistible strength an impulse from on high? And who was he, after all, that he should lead others in a new crusade against the sin and wickedness of this great city?

He felt exactly as if some actual personality which had been animating him was now withdrawn.

To his left, Park Lane stretched away towards Piccadilly, the palaces there all blazing with light. It was typical of what he had come to denounce, to warn, and to save.

And how was it possible that he, a weak man, could do this thing?

He walked on. Half-way down Park Lane he saw that a coffee-stall stood in the shadow of the Park railings, drawn up close to the curb. The sight reminded him that he had not eaten for many hours, and he crossed the road towards it.

There were no customers but himself, and in a moment or two a steaming cup of coffee and two great wedges of bread-and-b.u.t.ter stood before him.