When It Was Dark Part 30

"In the present, the gain is ours. We shall hear less of the cultus of the 'Sacred Heart' in future. The blasphemous mimicry of the Ma.s.s will perish from amongst us.

"No man, in England at least, will dare to affirm that the flesh in which the Saviour bore our sins upon the Cross is exposed for adoration on the so-called 'altar.'

"As Matthew Arnold put it, on the true grave of Jesus 'the Syrian stars look down,' but the risen Christ, glorious in His _Spiritual_ Body, reigns over the hearts of his true followers, and we look forward in faith to our departure from the earthly tabernacle, which is dissolved day by day, knowing that we also have a spiritual house not made with hands eternal in the heavens."

As he read the clever tr.i.m.m.i.n.g article and marked the bitterness of its tone, the priest's face grew red with anger and contempt.

This facile acceptance of the Great Horror, this insolent conversion of it to party ends, this flimsy pretence of reconciling statements, which, if true, made Christianity a thing of nought, to a novel and trumped-up system of adherence to it, filled him with bitter antagonism.

But, useful as the article was as showing the turn many men's minds were taking, there was no time to trouble about it now.

To-morrow the great meeting of those who still believed Christ died and rose again from the dead was to be held.

The terrible "Report" had been issued. During the forty hours of its existence everything was already beginning to crumble away. To-morrow the Church Militant must speak to the world.

It was said, moreover, that the great wave of infidelity and mockery which was sweeping hourly over the country would culminate in a great riot to-morrow....

Everything seemed dark, black, hopeless....

He picked up the Report once more to study it, as he had done fifty times that day.

But before he opened it he knelt in prayer.

As he prayed, so sweet and certain an a.s.surance came to him, he seemed so very near to the Lord, that doubt and gloom fled before that Presence.

What were logic, proofs of stone-work, the reports of archaeologists, to This?

Here in this lonely chamber Christ was, and spoke with His servant, bidding him be of good comfort.

With bright eyes, full of the glow of one who walks with G.o.d, the priest opened the pamphlet once more.

CHAPTER VII

THE HOUR OF CHAOS

Although, during the first days of the Darkness, hundreds of thousands of Christian men and women were chilled almost to spiritual death, and although the lamp of Faith was flickering very low, it was not in London that the far-reaching effects of the discovery at Jerusalem were most immediately apparent.

In that great City there is an outward indifference, bred of a million different interests, which has something akin to the supreme indifference of Nature. The many voices never blend into one, so that the ear may hear them in a single mighty shout.

But in the grimmer North public opinion is heard more readily, and is more quickly visible. In the great centres of executive toil the vital truths of religion seem to enter more insistently into the lives of men and women whose environment presents them with fewer distractions than elsewhere. Often, indeed, this interest is a political interest rather than a deeply Christian one, a matter of controversy rather than feeling. Certain it is that all questions affecting religious beliefs loom large and have a real importance in the cities of the North.

It was Wednesday evening at Walktown.

Mr. Byars was reading the service. The huge, ugly church was lit with rows of gas-jets, arranged in coronae painted a drab green. But the priest's voice, strained and worn, echoed sadly and with a melancholy cadence through the great barn-like place. Two or three girls, a couple of men, and half a dozen boys made up the choir, which had dwindled to less than a fifth of its usual size. The organ was silent.

Right down the church, those in the chancel saw row upon row of cushioned empty seats. Here and there a small group of people broke the chilling monotony of line, but the worshippers were very few. In the galleries an occasional couple, almost secure from observation, whispered to each other. The church was warm, the seats not uncomfortable; it was better to flirt here than in the cold, frost-bound streets.

Never had Evensong been so cheerless and gloomy, even in that vast, unlovely building. There was no sermon. The vicar was suffering under such obvious strain, he looked so worn and ill, that even this lifeless congregation seemed to feel it a relief when the Blessing was said and it was free to shuffle out into the promenade of the streets.

The harsh trumpeting of Mr. Philemon, the vestry clerk's final "Amen,"

was almost jubilant.

As Mr. Byars walked home he saw that the three great Unitarian chapels which he had to pa.s.s _en route_ were blazing with light. Policemen were standing at the doors to prevent the entrance of any more people into the overcrowded buildings. A tremendous life and energy pulsated within these buildings. Glancing back, with a bitter sigh, the vicar saw that the lights in St. Thomas were already extinguished, and the tower, in which the illuminated clock glowed sullenly, rose stark and cold into the dark winter sky.

The last chapel of all, the Pembroke Road Chapel, had a row of finely appointed carriages waiting outside the doors. The horses were covered with cloths, the grooms and coachmen wore furs, and the breaths of men and beasts alike poured out in streams of blue vapour. These men stamped up and down the gravel sweep in front of the chapel and swung their arms in order to keep warm.

On each side of the great polished mahogany doors were large placards, printed in black and red, vividly illuminated by electric arc lights.

These announced that on that night Mr. Constantine Schuabe, M.P., would lecture on the recent discovery in Jerusalem. The t.i.tle of the lecture, in staring black type, seemed to Mr. Byars as if it possessed an almost physical power. It struck him like a blow.

THE DOWNFALL OF CHRISTIANITY

And then in smaller type,

ANTHROPOMORPHISM AN EXPLODED SUPERSt.i.tION

He walked on more hurriedly through the dark.

All over the district the Church seemed tottering. The strong forces of Unitarianism and Judaism, always active enemies of the Church, were enjoying a moment of unexampled triumph. Led by nearly all the wealthy families in Walktown, all the Dissenters and many lukewarm Church people were crowding to these same synagogues. At the very height of these perversions, when Christianity was forsworn and derided on all sides, Schuabe had returned to Mount Prospect from London.

His long-sustained position as head of the antichristian party in Parliament, in England indeed, his political connection with the place, his wealth, the ties of family and relationship, all combined to make him the greatest power of the moment in the North.

His speeches, of enormous power and force, were delivered daily and reported _verbatim_ in all the newspapers. He became the Marlborough of a campaign.

On every side the churches were almost deserted. Day by day ominous political murmurs were heard in street and factory. The time had come, men were saying, when an established priesthood and Church must be forced to relinquish its emoluments and position. The Bishop of Manchester, as he rolled through the streets in his carriage, leaning back upon the cushions, lost in thought, with his pipe between his lips, according to the wont and custom which had almost created a scandal in the neighbourhood, was hissed and hooted as he went on his way.

With a sickness of heart, an utter weariness that was almost physical nausea, the vicar let himself into his house with a latch-key.

There was a hushed, subdued air over the warm, comfortable house, felt quite certainly, though not easy to define. It was as though one lay dead in an upper chamber.

Mr. Byars turned into his study. Helena rose to meet him. The beautiful, calm face was very pale and worn as if by long vigils. Minute lines of care had crept round the eyes, though the eyes themselves were as calm and steadfast as of old.

"Basil feels much stronger to-night, Father," she said. "He is dressing now, and will come down to supper. He wishes to have a long talk with you, he says."

For two weeks Gortre had lain prostrate in the house of his future father-in-law.

It was as though he had watched the waters gradually rising round him until at last he was submerged in a merciful unconsciousness. The doctor said that he was enduring a very slight attack of brain-fever, but one which need cause no one any alarm, and which was, in fact, nothing at all in comparison to his former illness.

His fine physical strength a.s.serted itself and helped him to an easy _bodily_ recovery.

To Basil himself, with returning health and a clearer brain came a renewal of mental power. A great strain was removed, the strain of waiting and watching, the tension of a sick antic.i.p.ation.

"It was almost as if I was conscious of this terrible thing that has happened," he said to Helena. "I am sure that I felt it coming instinctively in some curious psychic way. But now that we know the worst, I am my own man again. Soon, dear, I shall be up and about again, ready to fight against this blackness, to take my place in the ranks once more."

To her loving solicitude he seemed to have some definite plan or purpose, but when she questioned him his reserve was impenetrable, even to her.