Piccadilly Part 15

The struggles which that young gentleman's conscience was having with his affections were manifestly portrayed on his countenance, and Wild Harrie evidently was amusing herself by shocking his feelings. I must do her the justice to say that I don't think she could play the hypocrite if she tried; and I began to hope, as I looked at her frank reckless face, that her sins were more on the surface than in the heart. "I suppose you mean a form of worship," said Broadhem; "I wish you would not talk in this way. Whenever I try to have a little serious conversation with you, you turn it off with a joke. I must say," he added, sententiously, "that the style of young ladies' conversation in the present day is open to great improvement."

"I tell you what, Lord Broadhem," she retorted, "we will put each other through a course of training; you shall improve my conversation and 'style of going' generally, while I try to bring you into a little harder condition than you are at present. You have no idea of his innocence, Lord Frank, considering that he is a rising statesman upon whom the hopes of the Liberal party are fixed. I asked him just now, apropos of the speech he threatens us with, 'if he felt fit,' and he blushed to that degree that I felt quite shy. There was no harm in my saying that, was there?"

"None that I know of," said I; "but we are attracting general attention by talking so loud. Good-bye, Miss Wylde. I am afraid I must disturb you, Broadhem; your sister can't hear where she is, and wants your place;" and I walked off the young gentleman, to Wild Harrie's disgust, and saw with satisfaction that Lady Ursula took his vacated seat.

"What a curious thing it is," said Broadhem, "that I should find in Miss Wylde something which is to me so attractive! I daresay you think it odd my taking you so much into my confidence; but, except Ursula, I have no one to whom I can speak openly, and it is such a relief sometimes."

"On these occasions specially," said I.

"Do you know, I think that if I had her all to myself I could cure her faults, for I am quite alive to them. Don't you think there is something very fresh and natural about her?"

"Fresh, certainly, in what she would call the 'skittish' sense. As for the natural part of it, I should require to know her better before giving my opinion."

"You know," he went on, "she is the last person in the world with whom I imagined it possible I could have been in love: she says the most dreadful things sometimes--and I am afraid they amuse me more than they should; there is no doubt about her being immensely clever, but she is quite taken up with the world as yet."

"Not more than you are, my dear Broadhem; come and walk home with me: you will be back in time to put the Wyldes into their carriage, and I want to speak to you." I led him unresistingly to his coat and hat in the hall, and braved the stern gaze of a butler who apparently dressed after Mr Beevy, and who, when I arrived, had smiled blandly upon me as being 'one of us,' for all the servants in Lady Broadhem's establishment were guaranteed converted. "No servants, whose principles are not strictly Evangelical, and who are unable to produce unexceptionable testimony as to their personal piety, need apply"--that was the form of the advertis.e.m.e.nt, and the consequence was, that every menial in the house had brought a certificate of his or her entire change of heart from their last place. Lady Broadhem was also very particular about the theological views of the family they had just left.

The butler frowned severely upon me now, for he had been standing in the doorway with the curacoa when I was addressing the meeting, no doubt sympathising keenly with Mr Beevy (I found out afterwards that Lady Broadhem was educating his son for the "work"), and said to Broadhem, "Does her ladyship know you are going away, my lord?"

"No," said Broadhem, with some hesitation; "I don't think she does. I am coming back again soon."

"I think, my lord, I shall have to let her ladyship know--perhaps your lordship will wait. James, mind the door." This meant that James was not to open it.

"Stop, my friend," I said; "your conscience tells you that you should not be a party to this irregularity on the part of his lordship,--is not that so?" I asked.

"Yes, my lord," said the butler, rigidly.

"I will accompany you to Lady Broadhem, then, to explain the circ.u.mstances. Be good enough to follow me," and I led the way up-stairs.

Now it so happens that I have a remarkable faculty of remembering faces, and I had been conscious for some weeks past of being familiar with the particularly ill-favoured countenance of Lady Broadhem's butler; but it was not until now that the circ.u.mstances under which I had first seen it flashed upon me. Not many years have elapsed since I achieved considerable renown in Australia as an amateur hunter of bushrangers.

The sport exhilarated me, combining, as it did, an exciting physical with a wholesome moral exercise. I now remembered distinctly having caught Lady Broadhem's butler with a la.s.so. Indeed I had good reason not to forget it, for a shot he fired at me at the moment killed my favourite horse. That he should have failed to recognise in Lord Frank Vanecourt the notorious Mr Francis who had been the means of capturing not only himself, but a good many of his fraternity, was not wonderful.

The discovery tickled me, and restored my good temper, which had been slightly ruffled.

"What a delightful change you must find it to be in the society of all these good people after having pa.s.sed so many years in the bush!" I said, and my tone of anger suddenly became one of easy familiarity, as I turned sharply upon him, and, leaning against the banisters, benevolently scanned his distorted physiognomy. The play of his facial muscles, and changes of hue, interested me, so I continued--"But I will venture to say that you have never since paid such attention to any sermon as you did to mine that Sunday morning when I had you and your seven friends strapped to eight trees in a semicircle, and concluded my remarks, you may remember, with a few strokes of 'practical application.' I should like to hear the story of your escape from prison."

"Oh, my lord," he groaned, and his teeth chattered and his knees trembled, "I'm a reformed character--I am indeed. Perhaps if your lordship would kindly please to walk this way," and he opened a side door off the landing. "Knowing your lordship's generosity, and your lordship's interest in the family, and my own unworthiness, your lordship wouldn't be too hard upon a poor man whose repentance is genuine, and I could tell your lordship something of the very highest importance to her ladyship, and to Lady Ursula, and to your lordship, and to the whole family."

I knew the man to be a clever scoundrel, and saw that he evidently had some information which might prove of value. A mystery did exist--of that I had had abundant evidence. Was I justified in refusing to find the key?--besides, if this man really possessed some secret, could it be in more dangerous hands? This last consideration decided me, and I followed the returned convict to a little sanctum of his own, which opened off the pantry, from which I emerged five minutes later a wiser if not a better man.

"What a time you have been!" said Broadhem. "I suppose you have been arguing the point with my mother?"

"No, I left that to Drippings here." I did not know his name, but my spirits were high, and I gave him the first my imagination suggested.

"You have no idea what a treasure your mother has got in this man. I a.s.sure you there is no knowing what you may not owe to the influence for good of one devoted Christian servant of this kind--the proof of it is, as you see, that Lady Broadhem is perfectly willing that you should do what you like for the rest of the evening. Good-night, Drippings," and I pa.s.sed the bewildered James, who evidently thought that both I and the terrified-looking butler had gone suddenly mad.

"Broadhem," said I, "I have hit upon an entirely new and original idea.

I am thinking of trying it myself, and I want you to try it too."

"Well," said Broadhem, "I am never surprised at anything you say or do; what is it?"

"It has been suggested to me by what I have seen at your mother's this evening--and you may depend upon it there is a great deal to be said in its favour; it is an odd thing it has not occurred to anybody before, but that leaves all the better opening for you and me."

"Go on," said Broadhem, whose curiosity was getting excited.

"Don't be in a hurry; it is possible you may not like the idea when you hear it, and under no circ.u.mstances must you tell it to anybody."

"All right," said Broadhem, "but I hope it has nothing to do with companies--I hate dabbling in companies. I believe one does more harm to one's name by making it common than one gets good through the money one pockets."

"Well, there is more truth than elegance of expression in that remark: it needs not have to do with companies unless you like."

"Now, if it has anything to do with politics, I am your man."

"You would make a great _coup_ in politics with it; it is especially adapted for politics, and has never been tried."

"You don't say so," said Broadhem, delighted; "don't go on making one guess as if it was a game. Has it anything to do with the suffrage?"

"It has to do with everything," I said; "I don't think I can do it myself; I made a lamentable failure just now by way of a start," and I paused suddenly--"Who am I," I thought, "that I should venture to preach? What act have I done in life which should give weight to my words?" but the fervour was on me, and I could no more check the burning thoughts than the trumpet can control the sound it emits.

"Well," he said impatiently.

"LIVE THE LIFE."

"I don't understand you," said Broadhem.

"If you did," I said, "do you suppose I should feel my whole nature yearning as it is? What better proof could I desire that the life has yet to be lived than that you don't understand me? Supposing, now, that you and I actually put into practice what all these friends of your mother profess, and, instead of judging people who go to plays, or play croquet on Sunday, or dance, we tried to live the _inner_ life ourselves. Supposing, in your case, that your own interest never entered your head in any one thing you undertook; supposing you actually felt that you had nothing in common with the people around you, and belonged neither to the world of publicans and sinners, nor to the world of scribes and Pharisees, but were working on a different plane, in which self was altogether ignored--that you gave up attempting to steer your own craft any longer, but put the helm into other hands, and could complacently watch her drive straight on to the breakers, and make a deliberate shipwreck of every ambition in life,--don't you think you would create rather a sensation in the political world? Supposing you could arrive at the point of being as indifferent to the approval as to the censure of your fellow-men, of caring as little for the highest honours which are in their power to bestow now, as for the fame which posterity might award to you hereafter; supposing that wealth and power appeared equally contemptible to you for their own sakes, and that you had no desire connected with this earth except to be used while upon it for divine ends, and that all the while that this motive was actuating you, you were striving and working and toiling in the midst of this busy world, doing exactly what every man round you was doing, but doing it all from a different motive,--it would be curious to see where you would land--how you would be abused and misunderstood, and what a perplexity you would create in the minds of your friends, who would never know whether you were a profound intriguer or a shallow fool. How much you would have to suffer, but what a balance there would be to the credit side! For instance, as you could never be disappointed, you would be the only free man among slaves. There is not a man or woman of the present day who is not in chains, either to the religious world or the other, or to family or friends, and always to self. Now, if we could get rid of the bonds of self first, we could snap the other fetters like packthread. What a grand sensation it would be to expand one's chest and take in a full, free, pure breath, and uplift the hands heavenward that have been pinioned to our sides, and feel the feeble knees strong and capable of enabling us to climb upwards! With the sense of perfect liberty we should lose the sense of fear, no man could make us ashamed, and the waves of public opinion would dash themselves in vain against the rock upon which we should then be established. The nations of the earth are beating the air for freedom, and inventing breech-loaders wherewith to conquer it, and they know not that the battlefield is self, and the weapons for the fight not of fleshly make. Have you ever been in an asylum for idiots, Broadhem?" I asked, abruptly.

"No," he said, timidly.

"Then you are in one now. Look at them; there is the group to which you belong playing at politics. Look at the imbecile smile of gratified vanity with which they receive the applause that follows a successful hit. That poor little boy has just knocked a political tobacco-pipe out of Aunt Sally's mouth, and he imagines himself covered with a lasting glory. There is another going to try a jump: he makes a tremendous effort before he gets to the stick, but balks, and carries it off in his hand with a grin of triumph. Look, there is a man with a crotchet; he keeps on perpetually scratching his left ear and his right palm alternately, and then touching the ground with the tips of his fingers.

He never varies the process. Look at the gluttons who would do nothing but eat if they were allowed, like men who have just got into office, and see how spiteful they are, and what faces they make at each other, and how terribly afraid they are of their masters, and how they cringe for their favour, and how naughty they are when their backs are turned.

Look, again, at these groups drawing, and carpentering, and gardening, imagining that they are producing results that are permanently to benefit mankind; but they are drawing with sticks, and carpentering with sham tools, and planting stones. And see, there is a fire-balloon going up; how delighted they all are, and how they clap their hands as the gaudy piece of tissue-paper inflated with foul gas sails over their heads. Is there one of the noisy crowd that knows what its end will be or that thinks of to-morrow? Is there one of them, I wonder, that suspects he is an idiot? If you find out, Broadhem, that you are not one of them, they will call you an idiot--be prepared for that. The life of a sound and sane man in such company cannot be pleasant. Every act of it must be an enigma to those around him. If he is afraid of them, they will turn and rend him; if he is fearless, they will hate him, because 'he testifies of the evil.' His life will be a martyrdom, but his spirit will be free, his senses new-born; and think you he would exchange the trials and labours which his sanity must entail upon him for the drivelling pleasures which he has lost? Tell me, Broadhem, what you think of my idea?"

"It is not altogether new to me, though I did not exactly understand what you meant at first," said Broadhem, who spoke with more feeling than I gave him credit for possessing. "I have never heard it put in such strong language before, but I have seen Ursula practise it, and I was wondering all the time you were talking whether you did."

"I never have yet," I said. "I began by telling you that the idea only occurred to me lately in its new form. I had often thought of it as a speculation. I began by a.s.suming that purely disinterested honesty might pay, because an original idea well applied generally succeeds; but when I came to work the thing out, I found that there was a practical difficulty in the way, and that you could not be unselfish from a selfish motive a bit more than you could look like a sane man while you were really still an idiot. And so the fact is, I have talked the notion out to you as it has been suggested to me, though Drippings nearly drove it out of my head. I think the reason I felt impelled to do so was, that had it not been for your sister I should never have thought upon such subjects as I do now. I know her love for you, and the value of her influence over you. Even now she is devoting herself to guarding your interests in the most important step of a man's life, and I seem instinctively to feel how I can best please her. Don't you think she agrees in what I have said to-night, and would approve of the conversation we have had?"

"Yes," said Broadhem. "Do you know you are quite a different sort of fellow from what I imagined. I always thought that you did not believe in anything."

"That was because I lived exactly like my neighbours, without adding to my daily life the sin of professing belief in a religion to which it was diametrically opposed. Most of the sceptics of the present day are driven to their opinions by their consciences, which revolt against the current hypocrisy and glaring inconsistencies that characterise the profession of the popular theology. As a cla.s.s I have found them honester, and in every way better men than modern Christians."

"Do you know why?"

"No," said Broadhem.

"Because modern Christians don't really believe much more than sceptics--a man's life is the result of his internal, not his external belief. There can be no life separate from internal belief, and the lives of men are imperfect because their belief is external. The right thing believed the right way must inevitably produce the perfect life.

Either, then, the civilised world believes the wrong thing, or it believes the right thing the wrong way. In other words, faith and charity are inseparable, and when one is perfect the other is too. That is what I mean by 'living the life.'"

"According to that, you would make out that n.o.body rightly believes the Christian religion who is not perfect; that, you know, is ridiculous,"

said Broadhem.