He had never enjoyed a meal so much, he thought idly--no, not even in the recent days of starvation in Whitechapel, when an unexpected windfall had provided him and Hampson with food.

Whitechapel! What a lifetime of experience had been his since those days! Wales, the mystical life with Lluellyn Lys--

A flush of shame and sorrow came over him. Why had he doubted even for a single moment the power and guidance of G.o.d! Had not the Holy Ghost been always with him--always, from the very first?

"O Lord," he cried, in his heart, "forgive Thine unworthy servant his weak doubts and fears! I know that Thou art with me, now, and forever more!"

He had concluded the short and unspoken prayer when he was startled by a voice.

He had not noticed that when the coffee-stall proprietor--an old man with snow-white hair, and large, horn-rimmed spectacles--had given him the coffee, he had returned to a large book he was reading.

Now Joseph looked round suddenly, and realized that the old fellow was saying the sentences aloud to himself.

"He shall call upon Me, and I will hear him; yea, I was with him in trouble. I will deliver him, and bring him to honour."

Joseph put down his pennies upon the counter. The answer to his prayer had come, once more G.o.d had spoken.

"Thank ye!" said the old man, in a strong Scotch accent. "I doot but I startled ye with me reading. I read aloud to my wife, who can nae mair see to read for hersel", and sae I"ve got in the way o"t. But they"re gran" words, lad."

"Thank you for them, and G.o.d bless you!" Joseph answered; and with the old fellow"s kindly "Good nicht!" ringing in his ears, resumed his walk.

He was immeasurably comforted and helped, and his whole soul went up in a burst of praise and adoration.

No thought of sleep came to him. He no longer felt physically weary. He was impelled to walk and pray for sleeping London.

"Lord, grant that they will hear me! Lord, send down Thy Holy Spirit upon me, and give me Thy grace! Raise up great and powerful helpers for the work, for I am weak and poor."

He was in Piccadilly now, and as he prayed he walked more slowly.

Oh, that those great people who lived in this wonderful street--now so dark and silent--would open the doors of their hearts that Christ might enter in!

The dark was suddenly illuminated.

A great door swung slowly open, and two men in evening dress stood together upon the threshold.

He turned instinctively and looked them full in the face.

There was a startled cry of "Joseph!" And as if in a dream he mounted the steps and pa.s.sed under the lintel.

The door closed quietly behind him.

CHAPTER X

THE COUSINS

It was midnight when Mary Lys arrived at her aunt"s house in Berkeley Square. Lady Kirwan had gone to bed; but it happened, so the butler told her, that Miss Kirwan was sitting up in her boudoir, in the hopes that her cousin might yet arrive that night.

The greeting between the two girls was warmly affectionate. Marjorie had always loved Mary as a sister, loved her and reverenced her deeply. The pretty society girl was certainly of a b.u.t.terfly nature, loving the bright and merry side of life, and unwilling to look upon its darker aspects. Yet she was unspoiled at heart, and the constant spectacle of Mary"s devotion to the suffering and poor of the world, her steadfast pursuit of a hard and difficult path, always touched the younger girl.

"Oh, you poor dear," she said, "I am so glad you have arrived at last!

We have all been so anxious about you. Mother has been actually crying, and father is in a great way. Mr. Owen, the solicitor who went with you to poor Lluellyn"s funeral, has been here, and there has been something in the paper, too! We have all been so upset!"

While Marjorie was speaking, her maid had entered and taken Mary"s nurse"s cloak from her. Mary sank into a chair.

"Dear Marjorie," she said, "I"m so sorry! I blame myself very much. I ought, of course, to have sent auntie a telegram. But such wonderful things have happened and are happening that my mind has been taken from everything else. It was very wrong of me."

"Never mind now, dear! But how pale you are! You have gone through so much, poor dear, of course! You must have something to eat at once, and afterwards you shall tell me everything. Antoinette shall get you something--would some soup or some chicken-jelly do?"

Mary asked for a bowl of bread-and-milk, and while she was waiting gazed round her cousin"s pretty sanctum with a sense of rest and ease which was most grateful to her overstrung nerves, her utterly exhausted body and mind. Marjorie went into her bedroom, which opened into the boudoir, unwilling to tire Mary by questions until she was refreshed by food.

It was a beautiful place, this nest of the wealthy, happy maiden of society, though it had individuality and character also. It was thought out, the expression of a personality, and no mere haphazard collection of costly and beautiful things flung together anyhow, without regard to fitness or arrangements.

How peaceful and cultured it all was!

For some moments the tired girl abandoned herself to the gracious influence of the place, enjoying a moment of intense physical ease.

Then, swiftly, her thoughts sprang over London from West to East. She saw the huge, gaunt hospital, its dim wards full of groaning sufferers, lying there in night-long agony that the rich and fortunate might build themselves just such "lordly pleasure-houses" as this. She thought of the flaring gin-palaces of Whitechapel, at this hour full of the wretched and the lost. The noise, the hideous oaths, the battered, evil faces of vile men and women--men and women made in G.o.d"s image, men and women whom Jesus came to save, but who had never had a chance. It all came to her with sudden vividness: the sounds, the smells, the crude raw coloring.

A pa.s.sionate fervor of love welled up in her pure heart, a pa.s.sionate rejection of the soft and pleasant things of life. Oh, that she could do something, something, however small, to help all this sorrow and pain, to purge London of its sores, to tell those who lived in high places and wore soft raiment of the terrible Nemesis they were laying up for themselves in another world!

Marjorie Kirwan only saw a pale-faced and beautiful girl, whom she loved, sitting at a little octagonal table sipping a bowl of milk. But if there were any of G.o.d"s angels in that room--and may we not suppose that the Almighty Father had given so high and pure a spirit into especial charge?--if there were, indeed, august and unseen presences there, they saw a saint praying to G.o.d for the conversion of London and for success in the great battle which she had come to wage with Joseph and his companions.

"That"s better, dear!" Marjorie said, her pretty face all alight with sympathy, and, it must be said, with curiosity also. "Now, do please tell me what all these mysterious things mean? What is all this in the newspaper? And your Joseph, the man with the wonderful eyes, the man we saw in the cab some weeks ago, before poor dear Lluellyn"s death, what is he doing? Why were you with him?"

"I don"t know how I can tell you, dear," Mary said, suddenly alive to the extreme difficulty of the task which lay before her, for how could she hope to explain the deep solemnness and import of the coming mission?

"Oh, but I am sure I shall understand!" Marjorie answered. "And I am certain it is awfully interesting!"

Mary winced. The light words jarred upon her mood of deep fervor and resolve; but, gathering her powers together, she did her best.

"I believe," she said, in grave, quiet tones, "that a special revelation is to come to London in the person of Joseph. Strange and, indeed, miraculous things have happened. G.o.d has spoken in no uncertain way, and the Holy Spirit has manifested Himself as He has never done before in our time. I cannot now go into all the circ.u.mstances attending my dear brother"s death. That they were supernatural and G.o.d-sent no one who witnessed them can have any manner of doubt. But, briefly, I can tell you just this. The Holy Ghost has descended upon this man Joseph in full and abundant measure, even as He descended upon the Apostles of old.

Joseph and a few devoted companions have come to London. I have come with them. We are about to wage a holy war against the wickedness of London, and the Spirit is with us.

"I cannot measure or define Joseph"s new nature. It is all beyond me.

But I have thought deeply about it, and this is what I think. Joseph seems to be two persons, at different times. It almost appears to be a case of what the French doctors who are experimenting with hypnotism call "dual control." Yet both these natures are quite distinct from his old one. He was an atheist, you know, until he went to Wales, but now he is the most sincere, and convinced believer that I have ever met. So far he is no more than a brilliant and high-minded man who is trying to live a holy life, a man such as one has met before, now and then. But the other side of him is quite different again. At times he seems to one almost supernatural--or perhaps _supernormal_ is the better word.

Something comes into him. He is filled with the Holy Ghost. And there were such strange circ.u.mstances about his change of character and dear Lluellyn"s death.... Do you know, dear, I sometimes wonder if it mightn"t be that an angel of G.o.d inhabits him at times! People can be possessed by evil spirits, why couldn"t they be controlled by good ones?"

Marjorie listened earnestly, the light fading out of her bright face as she did so.

"I don"t think I quite understand," she said, with a little shudder.

"Anyhow, it all seems very strange and--What can Joseph do--what can you do? Surely there will be a great deal of trouble and scandal! And, Mary darling, you mustn"t be mixed up in anything of this sort. Oh, it would never do! What would father and mother say? Why, it"s like"--she hesitated for a simile. "Why, it"s like being a member of the Salvation Army! You can"t go about dressed like that, dear--and in the streets, too, with a trombone. You are not your dear sweet self to-night, dear, so we won"t talk about it any more now. You have been through so much, no wonder you are tired. Go to bed now, and you will be better in the morning. They will have taken your boxes to your room, and I will send Antoinette to you at once."

Mary rose.

"I do need sleep," she said, with a faint smile. "I do need it dreadfully badly. But about my boxes, Marjorie dear. I only had one, and I have forgotten all about it, I"m afraid. I suppose it"s at the station or somewhere. Joseph led us straight from the station to the theatre."