Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli (Illustrated) (Delphi Series Eight Book 22)

by Marie Corelli

  “Quite!” she answered, whereupon he made a sign to the men who were busy filling the balloon with gas, to hasten the completion of their work. The scattered people in the grounds of Hurlingham now began to collect in groups, which speedily extended till there was a considerably large crowd watching, like curious children, the turning off of the gas and the removal of the India-rubber pipe which had supplied the balloon with its soaring power. Preparations were now made to fix the wicker car to the bottom of the balloon — and while this business was going on, several persons entered into conversation with both Ferrers and Jacynth, and Everton was left for a moment alone and apart. A vague sense of pain and foreboding crept over him as he looked round upon the brilliant scene; he wondered how it was that no one present appeared to entertain the slightest anxiety as to the safety of the voyagers who were about to sail the seas of space. It seemed to be taken for granted that to go up in a balloon was as simple and ordinary as to drive in a carriage. And while he was yet considering the various probabilities of risk in the undertaking, Jacynth came up to him with outstretched hand and said:

  “Good-by!”

  “Are you going now?” he said.

  “At once.”

  “Do you know where you are going?”

  She laughed.

  “Ah, that is never quite certain! It depends on Mr. Ferrers.”

  “Are you alone with him? Does no one else accompany you?”

  She opened her large eyes in smiling wonder.

  “Certainly not! Why should any one go with us? We have traveled in the sky together scores of times!”

  “And you have no fear?”

  “None!”

  His face expressed a certain anxiety, and she saw it.

  “Why, you surely don’t mind what becomes of me, do you?” she said, lightly— “This is our long good-by, you must remember! You wish it to be so.”

  “Yes, I wish it to be so,” — he repeated, almost mechanically.

  “You wish me to do nothing more at any time to make the world listen to you?”

  “Nothing more! Never, never at any time!”

  “Well, if I never speak to you again or attempt to help you in any way, will you try and think more kindly of me some day?”

  A thrill of compassion and regret moved him — he gently pressed her hand.

  “I will, Jacynth! I will do my best.”

  “That’s right!” and all suddenly she moved up closely to him and spoke in swift low accents— “Parson Everton, it is only your God that stands between us! — the God of the Churches — not the God of Nature! It is your religion that makes you narrow and miserable! — a religion that was not strong enough to save Dan or me! Think of that! Think that we both heard you preach of Christ every Sunday, and that neither of us was a bit the better for it! Think of that, I say, when I am gone! For it wants thinking about!”

  And with this she turned and obeyed the beckoning hand of Claude Ferrers, who had been for the past few minutes supervising the final preparations for the ascent of his ‘Shooting Star.’ Everything was now ready, — and Jacynth, amid some cheering and handclapping from the concourse of spectators who had gathered round the balloon in a circle, entered the wicker car and waved her hand smilingly to her various acquaintances. Ferrers took his place beside her, and gave the signal to let go. The cords were loosened, and the balloon rose, floating over the surface of the ground in a light wind. Once more Jacynth waved her hand —

  “Parson Everton, good-by!”

  He pressed to the edge of the crowd, watching her fair face as it was borne upward into the translucent light and air of which it seemed a part.

  “Good-by!” he called.

  And like a silver note of music played afar off and dropping liquidly through space, came the farewell echo of her voice once more —

  “Good-by!”

  Up — up — still up, and ever higher the ‘Shooting Star’ soared; and every eye in the crowd was strained to follow its progress till it looked no bigger than a child’s kite straying in the sky. Then it began to travel swiftly towards the southwest, with almost as much steadiness as a vessel traversing the ocean, and within less than a quarter of an hour had entirely disappeared. The spectators began to disperse; the men and women laughing and chatting and laying bets on the distance the balloon would travel, and on the probable point of its descent, while Everton, with a sense of unreality upon him as though he had been, and were still moving in a wild dream, made his way to the spot where Jacynth’s motor-car, by her orders, waited to take him back to his hotel. As he walked slowly along his attention was suddenly riveted by some words spoken among a group of persons who were leaving Hurlingham by the same exit as himself.

  “Yes, Ferrers was drunk,” — said one man; “Not a doubt of it! But the air will sober him.”

  “I’m not so sure of that!” — said another; “If he throws out too much ballast by mistake—”

  There was a laugh.

  “Then it will be all U. P.,” said the first man— “And no great loss.”

  “But the lovely Mrs. Nordstein—”

  “Oh, she’ll take care of herself, you bet! She’ll bring him down to earth with a bang!”

  Everton could no longer restrain himself.

  “I beg your pardon,” — he said, courteously, addressing one of the party; “But did I hear you say that Mr. Ferrers, the owner of the balloon that has just gone up, was — was—”

  “Not quite as he should be?” finished the man spoken to, with a good-humored smile. “Yes. I said he was drunk, and he is. But Mr. Ferrers lives in that condition for the most part; so it is nothing unusual.”

  “But— “and Everton looked troubled— “he seemed perfectly sober —— —— —”

  “Oh, he always seems! That’s the worst part of it. He stands straight, looks straight and talks straight; but he’s drunk, — and his talk is most clever when he’s most drunk.”

  “Then the lady with him, — should she not have been told — ?”

  “I presume the lady with him knew all about it,” was the careless reply; “She ought to if she doesn’t!”

  He laughed again, and Everton drew back.

  “There’s no danger, I suppose?” he said, as a last word. “Oh, not the least in the world! If there were, no one could help it!”

  The group passed on. He felt he could ask no more questions; and entering with reluctance Jacynth’s luxurious motor-car, he was driven at something of a rush back to his hotel, with the sickening consciousness upon him all the time that the chauffeur who raced the car along at such a rate was the very man who had swept the life out of Dan Kiernan. Surely fate had an unkind way of entangling him in unforeseen meshes, and of bringing him into contact with all that he most sought to avoid! And he who had at one time been disposed to regret the limitation of his ministering efforts to one small field of work — he of whom a whispering demon of discontent had so often asked:— “Are you going to pass all your life in Shadbrook?” now longed for Shadbrook as ardently as though the dull little Cotswold village were a paradise on earth. He longed for the quiet of it, — for the murmur of the trees, the scent of the flowers; he had only been absent from it a bare three days, and those three days seemed a century! A century of strange impressions, and bitter memories, and drifting visions, the last and most vivid of all these being the exquisite face of Jacynth, floating wondrously away into the rose and amber glory of the sunset with a softly called ‘Good-by!’

  CHAPTER XXII

  NEXT day when he woke from sleep, he felt as though he had been through a sharp attack of fever, in which every nerve had been stretched on a rack and tortured to the last point of endurance, but that now, thanks to some unknown spirit of healing, the suffering was past, and health was rapidly returning. A great peace was upon him; a sense of relaxation and ease; and as he reviewed the experience of the past three days point by point, he saw that his visit to London had been a matter of the Higher Guidance rather than
his own choice and volition. For not only had he come, ostensibly to plead for a charitable public cause, but he had been brought to discover the undesirable means whereby his temporary ‘celebrity,’ such as it was, had been gained; and he had been able to put a stop to this fictitious ‘boom,’ as also to Jacynth’s intended patronage of him, which to his mind would have been an intolerable indignity. That she, for whose sake and memory his innocent wife had been brutally murdered, should now presume to boast of her ‘influence’ in making him known to the world, was a thought too horrible to be borne. Better a thousand times the obscurity of Shadbrook for all the days of his life than such fame, owed to such a woman! And the impression of her brilliant beauty began to grow dim and to fade from his inward view, even as her face had faded away into the air and light with the balloon which had carried her aloft among the illimitable reaches of the sky, — a mode of leave-taking which he felt sure she had designed purposely for ‘sensational’ effect. Her keen desire that he should go with her to witness her ascent from Hurlingham was simply to gratify her vanity; that he might see her among her ‘society’ lovers and friends, and perhaps be led to report her triumphs among her former neighbors when he returned to Shadbrook — or that he might, at any rate, note how much she was admired, and in turn admire, and compliment her on the nerve and daring she displayed in committing herself to a voyage in mid-air with but one companion, and that companion a drunkard! For it was not likely she could be ignorant of the vices of Claude Ferrers. She had said he was her ‘great friend’; possibly a sort of ‘gentleman’ Dan Kiernan! With a thrill of disgust Everton for a moment wondered at what hour the reckless and strangely assorted pair had returned, or would return from their aerial wanderings; then he resolutely dismissed the incident from his mind and turned his thoughts to other things, — things grave and sorrowful affecting the safety and stability of the Church, — things scandalous and terrible touching the honor of one at least of the Church’s high dignitaries, — and, acting on a sudden impulse, he wrote a letter expressing something of his feeling to the Bishop with whom he had lunched on the previous day. And the letter was as follows:

  “MY LORD, —

  “If but half your hint of yesterday respecting the Bishop of — conveyed any truth, then surely it would be more honest of the clergy, as servants of Christ, to search out and verify the facts; and, when verified, to submit them in private to the Primate of England, urging him to depose from office one who is criminally unfit to officiate at the altars of God. To shield and defend such an one, and above all, to permit him to rule over and instruct others in their sacred duties, is a disgrace to the election and ordainment of all ministers of the Gospel. And though you, my Lord, hold no jurisdiction over me, and probably have no sympathy with my poor efforts to be faithful in the work I have undertaken to perform, I still venture to approach you with a most solemn appeal on behalf of the laity, whose religious beliefs are being undermined and shaken by evil influences from all quarters of the world in these ‘last days,’ that it shall not be made possible for them to feel that a known criminal has been permitted to lay hands in holy Confirmation on the heads of the innocent, without one protest from the Church he defiles. I understand from you that both Church and Throne dread publicity in this affair; but there is no need for a wide blazoning of the offense. The offender should, and could be persuaded to resign his post quietly, — and to this end, I hope you, my Lord, and your colleagues will work; and not leave it for me, a mere country cleric, to show a greater boldness than should be my portion, and denounce not only the criminal in question, but also the monstrous apathy of the Church that shelters his crime. This letter is, I know, unusual, unconventional, and out of all rule and order, wherefore your Lordship may — from the rule and order point of view, — condemn me for writing it. But if Church conventionality can be used to cover Church corruption, I shall not regret that I have tried to break through the barrier which too often fences in a Bishop from the righteous representations of such honest clergy who, aware of scandals in the Church, are given no chance of saving the situation because of the restrictions and formalities imposed upon them by their frequently lax and indolent superiors. — I am, my Lord, Your Lordship’s obedient servant, “RICHARD EVERTON.”

  A weight was lifted from his soul with the writing of these plain and audacious words, though he knew the man to whom they were addressed would probably fling them aside with contempt and forget them. Yet he felt he ought to write them: he was convinced that a Bishop ought to be in earnest about more important matters than the shapeliness of his own legs. He went out and posted the letter himself, and on returning to the hotel for breakfast, was met by his American acquaintance, Clarence Howard, with the morning’s paper in his hand.

  “Here’s news that will very likely interest you,” — he said— “Isn’t this near your place?”

  He held out the paper, pointing to a prominent headline.

  Everton stared hard, scarcely believing his eyes.

  “GREAT FIRE ON THE COTSWOLDS.

  “BREWERY BURNT TO THE GROUND.”

  Eagerly, almost breathlessly, he scanned every word. Was it — could it be true?

  “The extensive premises of Messrs. Minchin and Co.”

  No, no, not possible! Minchin’s Brewery burnt to the ground! Then was the great Curse of the neighborhood lifted? Could Heaven be so kind? The printed pages swam before him, — his pulses thrilled.

  “Hullo, what’s up?” ejaculated Howard— “You look as if you’d been given a fortune!”

  Everton raised his head. His eyes shone with a great gladness.

  “So I have!” he answered; “If this be true, it means more to me than millions of money! It means the health and safety, the thrift and honor and peace of the people of my parish, — the people I have devoted my life to serve! It means, — why, you cannot imagine what it means! The greatest obstacle to my work is removed, — do you know I can hardly believe it! For the influence of that Brewery in the neighborhood was as that of a devil in a paradise! — and that the devil should be so suddenly cast out is something of a positive miracle!”

  Howard smiled.

  “The devil may come back again,’’ — he said— “That is to say Minchin may re-build!”

  Everton shook his head.

  “They haven’t the money. The company has paid no dividends for some time; the business has been steadily failing since— “he paused, and a shadow crossed his face, “since my wife was murdered.”

  Howard looked at him with kindly sympathy.

  “I haven’t heard the story,” — he said, in a low tone. “The murderer was a brewery hand,” — went on Everton, slowly— “He had been one of my parishioners — but — he left the village to work for Mr. Minchin. I can only suppose he was drunk when he committed the crime. He was always more or less in that condition — and Mr. Minchin had been warned that he was dangerous. But I believe— “he paused, “that so far from heeding the warning, he gave the miserable man every possible opportunity to drink all the more. Mr. Howard, there are more causes for evil than are generally supposed! It is very often not the actual sinner who is most to be blamed, but the man — or woman — who leads that sinner into sin!”

  Howard was silent.

  “Now if I were a rich man,” — said Everton, with a sudden smile, glancing again at the newspaper— “I would buy the land on which that brewery stood—”

  “Would you?” Howard looked up quickly— “And why?”

  “I would build there a picturesquely gabled School of Arts and Crafts; a kind of Guild, formed on the ethics of Ruskin, and it should have a Social Club, where both men and women who were working at their various trades could meet together; it should have its own orchestra, — its own folklore society — its concerts, its amusements, and a garden where husbands and wives and children could go and sit in the summer-time when work was done, and have their tea or coffee as they do on the Continent, listening to the music; where they could
even have their beer — yes! — provided it were pure beer and non-intoxicant, such as is sold to the people in Germany. The Germans drink much more beer than the English, yet it does not make them drunk. But we, for a paltry and wicked profit, would rather poison our working-men than see to it that they get wholesome stuff for their money, — and as if poisoned beer were not bad enough, we permit the sale of spirits which are often so heavily adulterated that one glass taken raw would almost kill a man whose system was not accustomed to drugging. Yes! If I were a rich man I would do something that would prove of more practical help towards the general sobriety of the nation than all the talking in Parliament!”

  Howard listened with keen interest. Here was a clergyman who accepted his ‘Holy Orders’ in the true spirit of a high command, — who saw in those ‘Orders’ a responsibility resting upon himself for the care of the bodies, as well as the souls of those human beings over whom he exercised a pastor’s control. And he wondered, supposing that every clergyman in every parish of Great Britain were to take up the Drink question from Everton’s practical and earnest point of view, whether greater reforms might not result than from any Government statute? He said something to this effect, but Everton shook his head.

  “Our hands are tied,” — he said— “That is what I want you, and every one else to understand. Our hands are tied. Wherever a brewery or a distillery dominates any particular section of a country, the clergy can seldom do anything to check the drink habits of the community. To begin with, there are the men who work at the brewery or the distillery. These fellows get a certain quantity of ‘free’ beer and spirit. What are you to do against that? Then, there is another point which is never sufficiently considered — the want of method and the thriftlessness of British workingmen’s wives, who never feed their husbands properly for the hard work of the day. Very few of these women can cook, — efforts have been made to teach them, but they will not learn, — and the majority of working-men, especially agricultural laborers, start off in the early dawn with a mere crust of bread and a jug of badly-made tea or coffee, halfcold, — which is not sufficient to keep up their strength for several hours of hard manual labor. Naturally they feel the want of nourishment long before noon, and if there’s a public-house handy, they get some beer. The stuff sold to them destroys their appetites for the poor noonday meal their wives send out to them, and it creates an unnatural thirst which must be quenched by more and still more beer. And so the mischief goes on, and will go on. If I had my way there should be movable half-way houses in every part of the country where agricultural labor is employed—”