The Christian Part 21

"It is useless," said Glory. "Polly will refuse to go. She expects Lord Robert to come for her, and she wants me to call on Mr. Drake."

"But I have seen the man myself."

"Lord Robert?"

"Yes. He will do nothing."

"Nothing!"

"Nothing, or worse than nothing."

"Impossible!"

"Nothing of that kind is impossible to men like those."

"They are not so bad as that though, and even if Lord Robert is all you say, Mr. Drake----"

"They are friends and housemates, Glory, and what the one is the other must be also."

"Oh, no. Mr. Drake is quite a different person."

"Don't be misled, my child. If there were any real difference between them----"

"But there is; and if a girl were in trouble or wanted help in anything----"

"He would drop her, Glory, like an old lottery ticket that has drawn a blank and is done for."

She was biting her lip, and it was bleeding slightly.

"You dislike Mr. Drake," she said, "and that is why you can not be just to him. But he is always praising and excusing you, and when any one----"

"His praises and excuses are nothing to me. I am not thinking of myself.

I am thinking----"

He had a look of intense excitement, and his speaking was abrupt and disconnected.

"You were splendid this morning, Glory, and when I think of the girl who defied that Pharisee, being perhaps herself the victim--The man asked me what my standing was, as if that--But if I had really had a right, if the girl had been anything to me, if she had been somebody else and not a light, shallow, worthless creature, do you know what I should have said to him? 'Since things have gone so far, sir, you must marry the girl now, and keep to her and be faithful to her, and love her, or else I----"

"You are flushed and excited, and there is something I do not understand----"

"Promise me, Glory, that you will break off this bad connection."

"You are unreasonable. I can not promise."

"Promise that you will never see these men again."

"But I must see Mr. Drake at once and arrange about Polly."

"Don't mention the man's name again; it makes my blood boil to hear you speak it!"

"But this is tyranny; and you are worse than the canon; and I can not bear it."

"Very well; as you will. It's of no use struggling--What is the time?"

"Six o'clock nearly."

"I must see the canon before he goes to dinner."

His manner had changed suddenly. He looked crushed and benumbed.

"I am going now." he said, turning aside.

"So soon? When shall I see you again?"

"G.o.d knows!--I mean--I don't know," he answered in a helpless way.

He was looking around, as if taking a mental farewell of everything.

"But we can not part like this," she said. "I think you like me a little still, and----"

Her supplicating voice made him look up into her face for a moment.

Then he turned away, saying, "Good-bye, Glory." And with a look of utter exhaustion he went out of the room.

Glory walked to a window at the end of the corridor that she might see him when he crossed the street. There was just a glimpse of his back as he turned the corner with a slow step and his head on his breast. She went back crying.

"I could fancy a fresh herring for supper, dear," said Polly. "What do you say, housekeeper?"

John Storm went back to the canon's house a crushed and humiliated man.

"I can do no more," he thought. "I will give it up." His old influence with Glory must have been lost. Something had come between them--something or some one. "Anyhow it is all over and I must go away somewhere."

To go on seeing Glory would be useless. It would also be dangerous. As often as he was face to face with her he wanted to lay hold of her and say, "You must do this and this, because it is my wish and direction and command, and it is _I_ that say so!" In the midst of G.o.d's work how subtle were the temptations of the devil!

But with every step that he went plodding home there came other feelings. He could see the girl quite plainly, her fresh young face, so strong and so tender, so full of humour and heart's love, and all the sweet beauty of her form and figure. Then the old pain in his breast came back again and he began to be afraid.

"I will take refuge in the Church," he thought. In prayer and penance and fasting he would find help and consolation. The Church was peace--peace from the noise of life, and strength to fight and to vanquish. But the Church must be the Church of G.o.d--not of the world, the flesh, and the devil.

"Ask the canon if he can see me immediately," said John Storm to the footman, and he stood in the hall for the answer.

The canon had taken tea that day in the study with his daughter Felicity. He was reclining on the sofa, propped up with velvet cushions, and holding the teacup and saucer like the wings of a b.u.t.terfly in both hands.

"We have been deceived, my dear" (sip, sip), "and we must pay the penalty of the deception. Yet we have nothing to blame ourselves for--nothing whatever. Here was a young man, from Heaven knows where, bent on entering the diocese. True, he was merely the son of a poor lord who had lived the life of a hermit, but he was also the nephew, and presumably the heir, of the Prime Minister of England" (sip, sip, sip).

"Well, I gave him his t.i.tle. I received him into my house. I made him free of my family--and what is the result? He has disregarded my instructions, antagonized my supporters, and borne himself toward me with an att.i.tude of defiance, if not disdain."

Felicity poured out a second cup of tea for her father, sympathized with him, and set forth her own grievances. The young man had no conversation, and his reticence was quite embarra.s.sing. Sometimes when she had friends, and asked him to come down, his silence--well, really----

"We might have borne with these little deficiencies, my dear, if the Prime Minister had been deeply interested. But he is not. I doubt if he has ever seen his nephew since that first occasion. And when I called at Downing Street, about the time of the sermon, he seemed entirely undisturbed. 'The young man is in the wrong place, my dear canon; send him back to me.' That was all."

"Then why don't you do it?" said Felicity.