The chapel doors were open, and a bright light streamed across the gravelled enclosure on to the dreary street beyond. People were flocking in, talking and laughing, in eager anticipation of pleasures to come; and a number of hungry-eyed children clung to the railing, and gazed at the promise of good things within.
And indeed the promise was a very palpable one. Mona had scarcely entered the outer door when she was presented with a large earthenware cup and saucer, a pewter spoon, and a well-filled baker's bag.
"What am I to do with these?" she asked, aghast.
"Take them in with you, of course," said Rachel. "You can look inside the bag, but you mustn't eat anything till the interval."
Mona thought she could so far control her curiosity as to await the appointed time, but her strength of mind was not subjected to this test. A considerable proportion of the assembled congregation were children, and most of them were engaged in laying out cakes, sweet biscuits, apples, pears, figs, almonds, and raisins, in a tempting row on the book-board, somewhat to the detriment of the subjacent hymn-books.
"They ordered three hundred bags at threepence each," said Rachel, in a loud whisper. "It's wonderful how much you get for the money; and they say Mr Philip makes a pretty profit out of it too. I suppose it's the number makes it pay. The cake's plain, to be sure; I always think it would be better if it were richer, and less of it. But there's the children to think of, of course."
At this moment a loud report echoed through the church. Mona started, and had vague thoughts of gunpowder plots, but the explosion was only the work of an adventurous boy, who had tied up his sweets in a handkerchief of doubtful antecedents, that he might have the satisfaction of blowing up and bursting his bag. This feat was pretty frequently repeated in the course of the evening, in spite of all the moral and physical influence brought to bear on the offenders by Mr Stuart and the parents respectively.
The chapel was intensely warm when the speakers took their places on the platform, and Mona fervently hoped that Mr Stuart had failed to find a stopgap, as the programme was already of portentous length. It seemed impossible that she could sit out the evening in such an atmosphere, and still more impossible that the bloodless, neurotic girl in front of her should do so.
The first speaker was introduced by the chairman.
"Now for the moral windbags!" thought Mona resignedly.
She felt herself decidedly snubbed, however, when the speeches were in full swing. The gift of speaking successfully at a soirée is soon recognised in the world where soirées prevail, and the man who possesses it acquires a celebrity often extending beyond his own county. One or two of the speakers were men possessing both wit and humour, of a good Scotch brand; and the others made up for their deficiencies in this respect by a clever and laborious patchwork of anecdotes and repartees, which, in the excitement of the moment, could scarcely be distinguished from the genuine mantle of happy inspiration.
In the midst of one of the speeches a disturbance arose. The girl in front of Mona had fainted. Several men carried her out, shyly and clumsily, in the midst of a great commotion; and, after a moment's hesitation, Mona followed them. She was glad she had done so, for fainting-fits were rare on that breezy coast, and no one else seemed to know what to do. Meanwhile the unfortunate girl was being held upright in the midst of a small crowd of spectators.
"Lay her down on the matting," said Mona quietly, "and stand back, please, all of you. No, she wants nothing under her head. One of you might fetch some water—and a little whisky, if it is at hand. It is nothing serious, Mrs Brander and I can do all that is required."
All the men started off for water at once, much to Mona's relief. She loosened the girl's dress, while the matron produced smelling-salts, and in a few minutes the patient opened her eyes, with a deep sigh.
"Surely Kirkstoun is not her home," said Mona, looking at the girl's face. "Sea-breezes have not had much to do with the making of her."
"Na," said the matron. "She's a puir weed. She's visiting her gran'faither across the street. I'll tak' her hame."
"No, no," said Mona. "Go back to the soirée, I'll look after her."
"Ye'll miss your tea! They're takin' roun' the teapits the noo."
"I have had tea, thank you," and, putting a strong arm round the girl's waist, Mona walked home with her, and saw her safely into bed.
She hurried back to the chapel, for she knew Rachel would be fretting about her; but the night breeze was cold and fresh, and she dreaded returning to that heated, impure air. When she entered the door, however, she scarcely noticed the atmosphere, for the laughing and fidgeting had given place to an intense stillness, broken only by one rich musical voice.
"So my eye and hand,
And inward sense that works along with both,
Have hunger that can never feed on coin."
Mr Stuart's stopgap was filling his part of the programme.
Mona hesitated at the door, and then quietly resumed her place at the end of the pew beside Rachel. The reader paused for a moment till she was seated, a scarcely perceptible shade of expression passed over his face, as her silk gown rustled softly up the aisle, and then he went on.
It was a curious poem to read to such an audience, but even the boys and girls forgot their almonds and raisins as they listened to the beautiful voice. For Mona, the low ceiling, the moist walls, and the general air of smug squalor vanished like a dissolving view. In their place the infinite blue of an Italian sky rose above her head, the soft warm breeze of the south was on her cheek; and she stood in the narrow picturesque street listening to the "plain white-aproned man," with the light of the eternal in his eyes.
"'Tis God gives skill,
But not without men's hands: He could not make
Antonio Stradivari's violins
Without Antonio. Get thee to thy easel."
It was over. There was a long breath, and a general movement in the chapel. Dudley took an obscure seat at the back of the platform, shaded his eyes with his hand, and looked at Mona.
Again and again in London he had told himself that it was all illusion, that he had exaggerated the nobility of her face, the sensitiveness of her mouth, the subtle air of distinction about her whole appearance; and now he knew that he had exaggerated nothing. His eye wandered round the congregation, and came back to her with a sensation of infinite rest. Then his pulse began to beat more quickly. He was excited, perhaps, by the way in which that uncultured audience had sat spellbound by his voice, for at that moment it seemed to him that he would give a great deal to call up the love-light in those eloquent eyes.
"She is a girl," he thought, with quick intuition. "She has never loved, and no doubt she believes she never will. I envy the man who forces her to own her mistake. She is no sweet white daisy to whom any man's touch is sunshine. There are depths of expression in that face that have never yet been stirred. Happy man who is the first—perhaps the only one—to see them! He will have a long account to settle with Fortune."
And then Dudley pulled himself up short. Thoughts like these would not lead to success in his examination. And even if they would, what right had he to think them? Till his Intermediate was over in July, he must speak to no woman of love; and not until his Final lay behind him had he any right to think of marriage. And any day while he was far away in London the man might come—the man with the golden key——
Dudley turned and bowed to the speaker in considerable confusion. Some graceful reference had evidently been made to his reading, for there was a momentary pause in the vague droning that had accompanied his day-dreams, and every one was looking at him with a cordial smile.
"Who would have thought of Dr Dudley being here?" said Rachel, as the cousins walked home. "It is a great pity his being so short-sighted; he looks so much nicer without his spectacles. I wonder if he remembers what good friends we were that day at St Rules?—I declare I believe that's him behind us now."
She was right, and he was accompanied by no less a person than the Baptist minister.
"I would ask you to walk out and have a bachelor's supper with me, Stuart, by way of getting a little pure air into your lungs," Dudley had said, as he threw on his heavy Inverness cape; "but it is a far cry, and I suppose you have a guest at your house to-night."
The minister had accepted with alacrity. He was tired, to be sure, but he would gladly have walked ten miles for the sake of a conversation with one of his "intellectual peers."
"I have no guest," he had said eagerly; "it was my man who failed me. I would ask you to come home with me, but there are things we cannot talk of before my wife. 'Leave thou thy sister,'—you know."
A faint smile had flitted over Dudley's face at the thought of Mr Stuart's "purer air."
So they set out, and in due course they overtook Rachel and Mona.
Mr Stuart could scarcely believe his eyes when he saw Dr Dudley actually slackening his pace to walk with them. It was right and Christian to be courteous, no doubt, but this was so utterly uncalled for.
Dudley did not seem to think so, however. He exchanged a few pleasant words with Rachel, and then, regardless alike of her delight and of the minister's irritation, he very simply and naturally walked on with Mona in advance of the other two.
Many a time, when hundreds of miles had separated them, Mona and Dudley had in imagination talked to each other frankly and simply; but, now that they were together, they both became suddenly shy and timid. What were their mutual relations? Were they old friends, or mere acquaintances? Neither knew.
The silence became awkward.
"Your reading was a great treat," said Mona, somewhat formally at last.
Anybody could have told him that. He wanted something more from her.
"I am glad if it did not bore you," he said coldly.
She looked up. They were just leaving the last of the Kirkstoun street-lamps behind them, but in the uncertain light they exchanged a smile. That did more for them than many words.
"It is not poetry of course," he said. "It is only a magnificent instance of what my shaggy old Edinburgh professor would call 'metrical intellection.'"
"And yet, surely, in a broader sense, it is poetry. It seems to me that that magnificent 'genius of morality' produces art of a kind peculiarly its own. It is not cleverness; it is inspiration—though it is not 'poesie.' In any case, you made it poetry for me. I saw the sunny, glowing street, and the blue sky overhead."
"Did you?" he said eagerly. "Truly? I am so glad. I had such a vivid mental picture of it myself, that I thought the brain-waves must carry it to some one. It is very dark here. Won't you take my arm?"
"No, thank you; I am well used to this road in the dark. By the way, I must apologise for disturbing your reading. I would have remained at the door, but I was afraid some man would offer me his seat, and that we should between us kick the foot-board and knock down a few hymn-books before we settled the matter."
"I was so relieved when you came forward and took your own place," he said slowly, as though he were determined that she should not take the words for an idle compliment "I had been watching that vacant corner beside Miss Simpson. How is Castle Maclean?"
"It is pretty well delivered over to the sea-gulls at present. I am afraid it must be admitted that Castle Maclean is more suited to a summer than to a winter residence. I often run down there, but these east winds are not suggestive of lounging."
"Not much," he said. "When I picture you there, it is always summer."
"Oh," said Mona suddenly, "there is one thing that I must tell you. You remember a conversation we had about the Cooksons?"
"Yes."
"Matilda and I are great friends now, and I have had good reason to be ashamed of my original attitude towards her. I think it was you who put me right."
"Indeed it was not," he said warmly. "I, forsooth! You put yourself right—if you were ever wrong."
"I was wrong. And you—well, you took too high an estimate of me, and that is the surest way of putting people right. You have no idea how much good stuff there is in that child. She is becoming quite a German scholar; and she has read Sesame and Lilies, has been much struck by that quotation from Coventry Patmore, and at the present moment is deep in Heroes. What do you say to that?"
"Score!" he said quietly. "How did she come to know you?"
"Oh, by one of the strange little accidents of life. She has done me a lot of good, too. She is very warm-hearted and impressionable."
There was a lull in the conversation. Across the bare fields came the distant roar of the sea. They were still nearly half a mile from home, and a great longing came upon Mona to tell him about her medical studies. Why had she been such an idiot as to make that promise; and, having made it, why had she never asked her cousin to release her from it? She drew a long breath.
"My dear," said Rachel's voice behind them, "Mr Stuart wants to have a little conversation with you. Well, doctor, I hope Mistress Hamilton is not worse, that you are here just now?"
Mr Stuart's wrongs were avenged.
For one moment Dudley thought of protesting, but the exchange of partners was already effected, and he was forced to submit.
"Our conversation was left unfinished this morning, Miss Maclean," said the minister.
"Was it? I thought we had discussed the subject in all its bearings. You are to be congratulated on the substitute you found."
"Am I not?" he answered warmly. "It was all by accident, too, that I met the doctor, and he was very unwilling to come. He had just run down for one day to settle a little business matter for his aunt; but I put him near the end of the programme, so that he might not have to leave the house till near Mrs Hamilton's bedtime."
For one day! For one day!
The minister sighed. Miss Simpson had left him no choice about "speaking to" her cousin; but he did not feel equal to an encounter to-night; and certainly he could scarcely have found Mona in a less approachable mood.
"You are not a Baptist, Miss Maclean?"
"No."
"Have you studied the subject at all?"
"The Gospels are not altogether unfamiliar ground to me;" but her tone was much less aggressive than her words.
"And to what conclusion do they bring you?"
"I think there is a great deal to be said in favour of the Baptist view; but, Mr Stuart, it all seems to me a matter of so little importance. Surely it is the existence, not the profession, of faith that redeems the world; and the precise mode of profession is of less importance still."
"Do you realise what you are saying?" Mr Stuart began to forget his fatigue. "God has declared that one 'mode of profession,' as you call it, is in accordance with His will, but you pay no heed, because your finite reason tells you that it is of so little importance."
"It is God who is responsible for my finite reason, not I," said Mona; and then the thought of where this conversation must lead, and the uselessness of it, overwhelmed her.
Her voice softened. "Mr Stuart," she said, "it is very kind of you to care what I think and believe—to-night, too, of all times, when you must be so tired after that 'function.' I believe it is a help to some people to talk, but I don't think it is even right for me—at least at present. When I begin to formulate things, I seem to lose the substance in the shadow; I get interested in the argument for the argument's sake. Believe me, I am not living a thoughtless life."
Mr Stuart was impressed by her earnestness in spite of himself. "But, my dear young lady, is it wise, is it safe, to leave things so vague, to have nothing definite to lean upon?"
"I think so; if one tries to do right."
"It is all very well while you are young, and life seems long; but trouble will come, and sickness, and death——"
Rachel and Dudley had reached the gate of Carlton Lodge, and were waiting for the other two. But Mr Stuart did not think it necessary to break off, or even to lower his voice.
"——and when the hour of your need comes, and you can no longer grapple with great thoughts, will you not long for a definite word, a text——?"
Dudley's face was a picture. Mona underwent a quick revulsion of feeling. How dared any one speak to her publicly like that! She answered lightly, however, too lightly—
"'Denn, was man schwarz auf weiss besitzt,
Kann man getrost nach Hause tragen'"!
Of course she knew that Dr Dudley alone would understand, and of course Dudley keenly appreciated the apt quotation.
"Holloa, Stuart!" he said, "you seem to be figuring in a new and alarming rôle. I am half afraid to go in with you. I wish you could come and join in our discussion, Miss Maclean. 'Nineteenth Century Heretics' is our topic. Stuart takes the liberal side, I the conservative."
"Do you think it expedient," said the minister reproachfully, as the two men crunched the gravel of the carriage-drive beneath their feet, "to talk in that flippant way to women on deep subjects?"
"Oh, Miss Maclean is all right! She could knock you and me into a cocked-hat any day."
And he believed what he said—at least so far as the minister was concerned.
"She really is very intelligent," admitted Mr Stuart. "I quite miss her face when she is not at church on Sunday morning; but you know she does put herself forward a little. What made her go out after that fainting girl, when so many older women were present? Oh, I forgot, you had not arrived——"
"It was well for the fainting girl that she did," interrupted Dudley calmly. "When I was going to the vestry some one rushed frantically against me, and told me a woman had fainted. I arrived on the scene a moment after Miss Maclean, but fortunately she did not see me. By Jingo, Stuart, that girl can rise to an occasion! If ever your chapel is crowded, and takes fire, you may pray that Miss Maclean may be one of the congregation."
It gave him a curious pleasure to talk like this, but he would not have trusted himself to say so much, had it not been for the friendly darkness, and the noise of the gravel beneath their feet.
Mr Stuart suspected nothing. Dr Dudley and Rachel Simpson's cousin! People would have been very slow to link their names.
"Yes, she is very intelligent," he repeated. "I must try to find time to have some more talks with her."
"I wish you joy of them!" thought Dudley. "I should like to know how you tackle a case like that, Stuart," he said. "Tell me what you said to her, and what she said to you.”