There was a knocking at the door which led into the small courtyard at the back of the church.

The vicar called out "Come in!" in a voice that rang with uncertainty and hope, and Joseph himself entered.

The Teacher was very pale and worn. His face was marked and lined as if he had quite recently pa.s.sed through some rending and tearing experiences, some deep agony of the soul. So Jacob might have appeared after he had wrestled with the Angel of the Lord, or Holy Paul when at last the scales fell from his eyes, and he received sight forthwith and arose.

"Ah, here you are," Mr. Persse said in tones of immeasurable relief. "We had almost given you up! There is a very large congregation, and some of the most important people in London are here. I hope you are prepared!"

"G.o.d will give me words," Joseph answered quietly, though he did not look at the priest as he spoke.

"Oh, ah, yes!" Mr. Persse replied; "though, for my own part, I confess to anxious preparation of all my sermons. Have you a surplice and a ca.s.sock? No? Oh well then we can fit you out very well from the choir cupboard."

A surplice was found for him, the vicar knelt and said a prayer, and then the three men, the two priests and the evangelist, walked into the church.

There was a stir, a rustle, and then a dead silence.

Mr. Persse and the curate sat in their stalls, and Joseph ascended the stone steps to the pulpit, which was set high on the left side of the chancel arch.

He looked down from his high place upon the faces below. Row after row of faces met his eye. Nearly all the electric lights, save only those which gleamed on the pulpit ledge and illuminated a crucifix behind his head, were lowered. He saw a sheen of black and white, the dull glitter of jewels, and the innumerable faces.

Still standing, he lifted his hands high above his head, and in a loud voice cried upon G.o.d--

"Father, give me a tongue to speak to these Thy children. Lord Jesus, guide me. Holy Ghost, descend upon this church, and speak through the mouth of Thy servant."

The voice rang like a bugle through the arches, and echoed in the lofty roof.

And now the words of the text: "Oh, consider this, ye that forget G.o.d; lest I pluck you away, and there be none to deliver you."

The second terrible warning to London had begun.

CHAPTER XIII

THE CONSPIRATORS OF ST. JOHN"S WOOD

At precisely the same hour on the Sunday evening when Joseph ascended the pulpit of St. Elwyn"s Church a large red Napier motor-car stopped before the gate of a smart little villa in St. John"s Wood.

The villa stood in its own grounds, and was surrounded by a high wall.

It had a general air of seclusion and retirement, though it was obviously the property or in the tenancy of people of wealth.

The wall was clean and newly pointed, the gate was painted a dark green, the short drive which led to the front door was made of the finest white marl.

The motor-car stopped, and two men descended from it, clearly defined in the radiance from two electric globes that were mounted on each pillar of the villa gate. Both wore opera hats, white scarves round their throats and black overcoats.

One was tall, slim, and clean-shaven. His age was about twenty-six, his hair was a pale golden color, and his face, too young as yet to be permanently spoilt and damaged, nevertheless bore the unmistakable imprint of a fast life.

The young man, evil though his countenance was, conveyed a certain impression of birth and breeding.

His companion, on the other hand, was just as unmistakably dest.i.tute of both. He was short and fat in figure. His face boasted a modic.u.m of impudent good looks, and was of a strongly Hebraic cast. The fine dark eyes, the hooked nose, the large lips--red like a ripe plum--all shouted the prosperous Jew.

The younger man gave an order to the chauffeur. The automobile swung away towards Hampstead, and the companions walked up the approach to the villa, the door of which was opened to them by a servant.

They entered a small hall, luxuriously furnished in the Eastern style, and lit with shaded electric lamps. As they did so, a manservant hurried up to them from behind some heavy Moorish curtains.

"Where is your mistress?" said the younger of the two men.

"My mistress is in the drawing-room, my lord," the servant answered.

"Oh, all right! Take our coats. We will go and find her at once."

The servant took the coats and hats, and the two men walked down a wide-carpeted pa.s.sage, brilliantly lit by globes in the roof, which made their stiff white shirt-fronts glitter like talc, and opened a heavy door of oak.

The villa was the home of Miss Mimi Addington, the leading musical comedy actress of London--the star of the Frivolity.

The young man with the light hair and the dissipated expression was Lord Bellina, an Irish viscount.

He had succeeded to the t.i.tle some three years before, and to a very large fortune, which had come into the impoverished Irish family owing to a marriage with the daughter of a wealthy Liverpool manufacturer.

The short Jewish-looking man who accompanied him was Mr. Andrew Levison, the theatrical _entrepreneur_ and leesee of the Frivolity Theatre, in which Lord Bellina had invested several thousand pounds.

Lord Bellina opened the door of the room and entered, followed by Mr.

Levison.

Upon one of the divans, wearing a long tea-gown of Indian red, Mimi Addington was lounging. Her face was very pale, and on this occasion quite dest.i.tute of the little artistic touches with which she was wont to embellish it. The expression was strained and angry, and the beautiful eyes shone with a hard, fierce glitter.

There had been no performance at the Frivolity Theatre on the night after Joseph"s sudden appearance there.

Mimi Addington had been taken away in a state of wild and terrified hysteria. It was impossible for her to play upon the Sat.u.r.day night, and her understudy, who should have sustained the part in the illness of her princ.i.p.al, had disappeared, and could not be found. Moreover, several other members of the cast had sent in their resignations, and many of the ticket offices of the West End of town had reported that the gilded gang of young men who were accustomed to take stalls for considerable portions of the run of a popular piece had withdrawn their applications.

"Well, Mimi, my dear," said Mr. Levison, with anxious geniality, "and how are you to-day?"

"Bad," the girl answered in one single bitter word.

Mr. Levison made a commiserating noise.

"Tut, tut!" he said; "you must try and bear up, Mimi, though I must own this abominable and unprecedented occurrence has been enough to try any one--this Joseph."

At the word the woman sprang from her couch with a swift feline movement of rage.

"Him!" she screamed, in a voice from which all the usual melody and sweetness had entirely departed. "If I had him here I"d murder him! No, that would be too good for him! I"ve thought of worse things than that to do!"

Lord Bellina went up to her and put his arm round her shoulder.

"And serve him right," he said; "but try and be quiet, Mimi, you"ll only make yourself worse."

She pushed the young man roughly away, in a blaze of pa.s.sion so lurid and terrible that it frightened the two men.