Miss Irvine’s mission room was a bright, cheerful place, and was very prettily decorated for one festive occasion. Texts cut out in red and in white paper, and wreaths of holly and ivy ornamented the walls; and the long tables, covered with white cloths, were spread with a most beautiful repast, which was arranged as prettily and tastefully as if it had been set out for a wedding breakfast.
The guests had all arrived when we went in, and were sitting at the tables, quietly admiring all around them. Poor tired mothers, many of them with babies in their arms; husbands, whose faces bore marks of care and toil, and many of whom showed plainly that drink and sin were bearing them down, and ruining their health and their homes; children, with pinched and unchildlike faces, were all gathered round the pretty tea-tables, looking forward to a happy evening in their unhappy lives. Most of the men were in working clothes, for they possessed no others in which to come; but they had all made themselves as clean and tidy as they could, and seemed shyly and quietly happy.
They began to feel more at their ease when a blessing was asked, the tea was poured out, and we all sat down together. Then the tongues began to be busy; and their poor, careworn faces looked glad and happy.
Lord Moreton was there, working busily, looking after the wants of every one of the poor people, and talking pleasantly to them all the time. He was a tall man, with dark hair; and I thought him very handsome indeed, in spite of the slight east in his eye of which Evelyn had complained so much. But it was so very slight that it was not at all unpleasant, and I wondered that she had considered it such a drawback to his face.
He came up to us as soon as we entered the room, and seemed very pleased to meet Sir William and Evelyn. But we had little time for conversation till the work of the evening was over.
After tea came Lord Moreton’s address. It was very simple, and very much to the point, and I could see that the poor people felt it. He spoke to them of the love of Jesus, and how He was longing and yearning to save them; how He was following them like the shepherd after the lost sheep, seeking them by night, seeking them by day, seeking them in sickness, seeking them in health, seeking them in their sin and trouble and misery, ever seeking them, ever longing for them to turn round and let Him find them.
And then Lord Moreton begged them to turn round to Him that very night, to leave drink behind, to leave sin behind, to leave shame behind, to turn their back on Satan and all his ways, to turn round to the Good Shepherd, and to say to Him, “Lord Jesus, save me.”
There were very few dry eyes when Lord Moreton had finished. He did not show his nervousness at all when he was speaking. I fancied that his hand trembled a little, but his voice was clear and steady, and he spoke so naturally and unaffectedly that you forgot the man altogether, and became engrossed only with what he was saying. There was something in his quiet, persuasive, pleading manner which it would require a hard heart to withstand. I could see that Evelyn felt it very much, though she made no remark upon it afterward.
When the poor people had left, and only the helpers remained in the room, we had more time for conversation. Then, for the first time, I saw that Lord Moreton was indeed a very nervous man. He was so shy and reserved when he first came up to us, that I could hardly believe he was the man who had spoken so easily and naturally to the poor people.
But Sir William soon set him at ease, by telling him of our journey to the East and of some of our adventures whilst we were there.
“You met a friend of mine in Jerusalem, I think,” Lord Moreton said.
“Oh yes, you mean Mr. Stanley,” said Sir William, as if he had never doubted, for a moment, Mr. Stanley’s friendship with Lord Moreton. “He proved a capital guide to us; we were sorry he had to leave so abruptly.”
“Yes, poor fellow,” said Lord Moreton; “it was a very great shock to him.”
“What was a great shock to him?” asked Sir William; “we never heard why he left Jerusalem so suddenly.”
“Oh, did you not?” said Lord Moreton; “he told me that he had written to you, and I think he was a little disappointed that he did not get an answer. It was on account of his father’s illness. I sent him a telegram to tell him how dangerously ill his father was, and he left Jerusalem immediately he received it. But he was too late; his father had been dead some days when he arrived. Poor fellow, it was a terrible time for him!”
“I am really very sorry,” said Sir William; “I had no idea that he was in such trouble; it seemed strange to us, as you may imagine, his disappearing so suddenly, and without any reason, so far as we knew.”
“Yes, of course it would,” said Lord Moreton; “he will be very vexed when he finds his letter did not reach you. He is such a nice fellow; he is just like a brother to me. The Stanley’s place is close to ours, so we see a great deal of each other, and of course we shall be more than ever together now that Howard has come into the property; for he will be still more at home now.”
“I am very sorry to hear of his father’s death.” said Sr; William again.
“Yes,” answered Lord Moreton; “and you would have felt it very much if you had seen his grief when he arrived, and I had to tell him that his father was gone; it was very sad. His mother died a few years ago, and there were no other children, so he and his father have been all in all to each other. Howard was very unwilling to go abroad this year, for he fancied his father was failing a little; but the old man insisted on his going, for Howard had a severe illness just this time last year, and the doctors said he would not be strong again until he had had a complete change. It was very sad, was it not, that it ended as it did?”
“Poor fellow!” said Sir William; “can you give me his address? I should like to write to him, and express my sympathy, and explain why I did not write before.”
“Yes, I will give it to you at once,” said Lord Moreton, as he took a leaf from his pocketbook, wrote the address, and handed it to Sir William. “Stanley is very busy now, of course, settling his affairs, but in a month’s time I have persuaded him to go with me for a run in the Highlands; I am sure it will do him good.”
“In the Highlands!” said Sir William; “then you will, of course, come to us on the way, both of you. And remember, we shall not be content with a three days’ visit; you must spare us a week or ten days at least.”
“Oh, thank you,” said Lord Moreton; “that will be very nice!”
“I will write to Mr. Stanley about it tomorrow; just name your own day when your plans are formed; we are expecting no visitors at present.”
So it was all settled, and Lord Moreton said goodbye to us, for he was to leave town by the early train the next day.
“Well, papa,” said Evelyn, as we drove home, “Mr. Stanley was not an escaped convict after all.”
“I never said he was, my dear; I always thought him a remarkably nice fellow; only, of course, his sudden disappearance was a little puzzling and somewhat mysterious. If we had only got his letter it would have been all right!”
Then Sir William changed the subject, by complimenting Miss Irvine on the success of her entertainment, and speaking very highly of Lord Moreton’s forcible address.
We went back to Alliston the following week, and, to my great joy, Sir William proposed that I should go at once to the old Manor House at Branston to see Maggie. The aunts were delighted to have me, so I went there the day after I had received their letter. I found everything in the house and around it just the same as when I had left it. The same neatness and order and punctuality and regularity reigned everywhere, and the same kindly feeling pervaded the whole place.
My dear little Maggie was on the platform to welcome me, and John and the comfortable horses were waiting for me at the entrance to the station. The sisters received me with open arms, and with tears in their eyes, and Miss. Jane returned thanks at family prayers that night, “for the marvelous escapes, and wonderful preservation in the midst of many and great dangers, which had been vouchsafed to one of their number, during her residence in the land of the infidel and the heretic.”
I had much to tell and they had much to hear, and the fortnight passed away all too quickly.
During the second week Maggie and I went for a two days’ visit to the Parsonage at Acton. Miss Richards was very anxious to see us again, and wrote me a very touching letter, saying, that if we would not mind spending a quiet day or two with her she would feel it a real kindness, and it would be a great cheer and comfort to her. She did not think her time on earth would be very long, she said; the doctor had told her that she might linger for a few months, but that she was suffering from a complaint which must end in death. “So he says, my dear,” wrote the good old lady; “but I would rather say, it must end in life—life in His presence, where alone is fullness of joy.”
We found Miss Richards very much altered, weak and ill, and fearfully thin; yet still able to go about a little, to look after her housekeeping, and to sit in her easy chair in the garden, with her work or her book.
We had many quiet, happy talks together, and I felt it a great privilege to be speaking to one, who was, as it were, close on the threshold of heaven itself.
Mr. Ellis was very much aged, and looked careworn and depressed. He was exceedingly kind to us; but he seemed as if a heavy weight were resting on him, which he could not shake off.
Whilst we were at Acton, Maggie and I went and peeped through the gate of our old home. It looked just the same; it was not altered at all. The rabbits were nibbling the grass on the lawn, the stream was trickling peacefully along, and every bush, and tree, and flowerbed looked just as they had done on that memorable day when I had sat by my bedroom window with Claude’s unanswered letter in my hand.
But the home was no longer ours, and even as we looked at it little children’s faces appeared at the window of my old room and reminded me of this.
I thought of Miss Irvine’s words as I turned away: “What a comfort that there is one home where there will be no parting, and no going away.”
That evening, after Maggie was in bed, Miss Richards called me into her room and spoke to me about Claude.
“May, dear, you remember our last talk together before you went away,” she said; “you were indeed right, and I was wrong. I would not have you Claude’s wife now for the world. You had, indeed, a very happy escape.”
“I think I told you we met them in Jerusalem, Miss Richards.”
“Yes, and they are still abroad, spending what money they have. It will all be gone soon, and then they will be obliged to return home, and the crash will come.”
“What do you mean, Miss Richards?” I asked; “I thought they were very rich.”
“So we thought, my dear, and so they thought; but Alice’s money has proved a mere bubble. Her father has speculated a great deal, and the whole of her money has gone now, every penny of it. They did not know that when you saw them in Jerusalem; it has come out since. And Claude, you know, has not very much money of his own. It would have been a nice little sum yearly if he had been careful. But oh, the bills, my dear! Scores of them are waiting for him; they send a great many here to be forwarded. I believe that is why he does not come home. But he must come, some time or other; and then his father thinks that more than the whole of Claude’s capital will be swallowed up in order to pay his debts. And what will they do then, my dear?”
“I am very sorry to hear it,” I said.
“Yes,” said Miss Richards, “and this trouble is just crushing the life out of his poor father. I try to comfort him; and I tell him that I hope this trial will be the means, by God’s blessing, of bringing Claude to the Saviour. But, though I tell Mr. Ellis so, my dear, I feel very doubtful about it, for Claude has so hardened his heart against all religion, and has so shut his eyes and refused to believe the truth, that I am very much afraid there is not much hope for him. I don’t tell his father so; but I have great fears myself that even this trouble will not bring him any nearer to God.”
“I was afraid his views were the same,” I said, “when I met them in Jerusalem.”
“Oh yes, they are even more pronounced,” said Miss Richards; “and he has made his poor little wife almost as great a doubter as himself. She is a nice little thing, very affectionate and good to me; and I feel for her terribly in this trouble. I am afraid it will make great unhappiness between them. I quite dread their coming home.”
That was the last time I ever saw Miss Richards. She took a loving farewell of me the next morning, and we both of us knew that, when next we met, it would be in the land where partings are unknown. I heard of her death, or rather of her entrance into life, only a few weeks after our visit to Acton.
Maggie’s aunts were very anxious that I should spend another week with them, before going back to Alliston Hall; but Evelyn had written to me, saying that Lord Moreton and Mr. Stanley were expected on the very day that I had already fixed to return, and she hoped that I should not fail to appear, as she wanted us all to have a good talk together about Jerusalem and our adventures there. I told Maggie and the aunts that I did not like to disappoint Evelyn, but felt that as she wished it I ought to go back at once. I did not say anything of my own feelings in the matter.
I arrived at Alliston Hall just as Evelyn was dressing for dinner. She welcomed me with great joy, and told me that the visitors had arrived, and that I must get ready with all haste, as the gong would soon sound for dinner.
When I was dressed I went into the library, thinking that I was late, and that everyone would have assembled, but I found no one there except Mr. Stanley.
I do not know how it was, but I suddenly turned very shy and nervous, and, after shaking hands with him, I was on the point of making an excuse about wanting to get my work, and by this means leaving the room, when he began to ask me many questions about Jerusalem, and I was obliged to stay.
“So I was put down as a suspicious character,” he said, smiling, “when I disappeared so suddenly.”
“Sir William thought it very strange,” I said; “and he began to doubt a little if you were what you said you were.” Mr. Stanley laughed.
“And you?” he asked.
“Oh, I knew it would be all right.”
“You did not doubt me then?”
“No, not at all,” I said.
“Thank you.”
There was a pause after this, and then he said gravely, “The chisel has been very busy since I saw you last.”
“Yes,” I said, “I was very sorry to hear of it.”
“We must not be sorry,” he said, gently; “for him it is great gain, and for me—”
“For you?” I asked, for he seemed as if he did not like to go on.
“For me, it is a hard bit of discipline; the Master Builder’s tools have cut very deep, but it is all right. I ought not to be sorry, ought I?”
“I see what you mean,” I said; “but are we not told to be ‘sorrowful, yet always rejoicing?’ Don’t you think it is a comfort that the two are put together?”
“Yes,” he said, thoughtfully, “I see; He does not blame us for being sorry, so long as we sorrow not as others which have no hope. ‘Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing;’ thank you so much for the thought.”
I fancied that he had a tear in his eye as he spoke, but I could not be sure, for a minute afterward Sir William entered the room, and then he seemed as cheerful and full of spirits as he had always been whilst we were traveling together.
“So you never got my letter!” he said, to Sir William. “I am very sorry; but I gave it to a dragoman whom I knew pretty well, and whom I met at the Jaffa Gate. He was not a Jerusalem dragoman, but one who had come with some people from Cairo, and he promised me to deliver it at once. He must either have forgotten it, or, Arab-like, he conveniently lost it, but took care not to lose the baksheesh I gave him at the same time. Well, it does not signify now!”
“Oh no,” said Sir William, “of course not; only that fellow deserves to hear of it again! But how was it they knew nothing of your telegram at the Convent?”
“I met the man in the street bringing it, just after I left you, Miss Lindsay. He knew me by sight, and handed it to me at once, and then I just hurried back to the Convent and told them I must leave that morning; but I had neither time nor inclination to enter into particulars with them.”
When the gentlemen came into the drawing-room after dinner, Mr. Stanley brought out a number of splendid photographs of Jerusalem and its neighborhood which he had bought in London, and had brought with him to show us.
Sir William was engrossed for some time in an interesting debate which he had just found in the Times newspaper; but Evelyn explained the Jerusalem photographs to Lord Moreton, and Mr. Stanley sat by me and pointed out the different places that we had visited together.
There was one beautiful view taken from the Mount of Olives, just at the turn of the hill where we had stood to look down upon Jerusalem.
We looked at this photograph a long time; I thought it more beautiful than any of the others. Jerusalem stood out clear and bright in the sunshine, each house, each mosque, each dome was standing out before us almost as distinctly as we had seen it on that lovely evening when, like our Lord and Master, we had beheld the city and wept over it.
“I shall never look at that photograph,” said Mr. Stanley, “without thinking of those words: ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which I had lost.’ Do you remember who said them to me there?”
“Yes,” I said; “that was a very pleasant ride.”
“Are the olive leaves safe yet?” he asked, in a low voice.
“Oh yes,” I said; “did you think I would lose them?”
“No, I did not think so; but I wanted you to tell me, that was all.”
How much there was to talk of during those few days, and how many times we said the words. “Do you remember?” I have heard it said that when we use those three words it is a proof that we are talking to friends and not to strangers. To strangers we can never say, “Do you remember?” but to friends, to those who have gone side by side with us along any part of the pathway of life, how often we say to them, “Do you remember this?” “Do you remember that?” And how pleasant it is to recall first one thing and then another in the past, and to talk it over together!
I think this will be one of the pleasures of heaven. We shall often there, I think, use those three words, “Do you remember” as we go over together in memory all the way that the Lord our God has led us, and as we recall the many proofs of His love, His goodness, and His wisdom, that we enjoyed together on earth.
It was the last evening of Lord Moreton’s and Mr. Stanley’s visit; the next day they were to leave us for the North.
We were wandering about the lovely gardens of Alliston Hall, gathering fresh flowers for Evelyn’s sitting room, for I would never let anyone else arrange the flowers there.
Lord Moreton was very anxious to see a new and very rare shrub that Sir William had had planted at the other side of the gardens, and Evelyn went to show it to him.
Mr. Stanley and I stopped behind, for he complained of feeling tired, and I had not finished gathering my flowers.
“I am so sorry we are going tomorrow,” he said.
I did not answer him, but bent over the bed to gather a beautiful white lily of the valley.
“But I shall not disappear so suddenly and mysteriously this time,” he said.
“No, that is a comfort,” I said, involuntarily, and then felt very angry with myself for having said it.
“Why is it a comfort?” he asked; “was my leaving Jerusalem any trouble to you?”
“Yes,” I said; “of course I was sorry. I did not like Sir William to doubt you.”
“I am very glad you trusted me through it all,” he said.
I was gathering some more lilies, so I did not look up till he spoke again, and then he only asked me a question, and I do not remember that I ever answered it:
“Will you trust me through life, May?” he said.