Maurice Hinchford felt exceedingly uncomfortable under these continued attacks; still there was a novelty in all this dispraise and plain-speaking. A brusque young woman this, whose character interested him, and whose warmth in his cousin"s service he respected, despite the darts with which she transfixed him.
He did not flinch from the purpose he had formed, however. He _was_ anxious to see his cousin, to receive the attack in full, and defend himself; to prove to Sidney, if it were possible, that he was not quite the unprincipled villain that was generally supposed. So he kept on his way, and this first little dash of the waters of opposition against him did not affect him much. Mattie"s energetic advice puzzled him, certainly; she spoke warmly in Sidney"s cause--as if she were interested in him, and had a right to take his part--was there any reason for that brisk attack upon him, save her own outraged dignity at the slander which, by his means, had indirectly fallen upon her? He kept pace with her, but did not speak again. She was not inclined to reply with any "graciousness" to his questions; he saw that he had annoyed her already by the object of his mission, and that it was the better policy, the truer act of courtesy, to maintain a rigid silence.
Mattie spoke first.
"This is the house," she said, stopping before a shop already closed for the night. "You are still of the same mind?"
"Yes."
"You cannot do good here--you may do harm."
"Your pardon, but I am of a different opinion."
"Very well then."
Mattie gave a little impetuous tug to the bell; Ann Packet opened the door, and Mattie and her unwilling escort pa.s.sed into the shop, the latter the object of immense attraction from the round-eyed, open-mouthed serving-maid. Events flowed on so regularly and monotonously in that quarter of the world, that the advent of a tall, well-dressed stranger, was a thing to be remarked, and, Ann Packet hoped, to be explained.
Mattie ran at once into the parlour, where her father was sitting over his work. He looked up with a bright smile as she entered.
"Where"s Sidney, father?"
"In his own room."
"Here is his cousin. Sidney must be prepared to see him, or to deny himself to him."
"What cousin is that?" Mr. Gray asked, a little irrelevantly, being taken aback by the news.
Mattie explained, and ran up-stairs. Mr. Gray pushed aside the stone upon which he had been writing, turned up his coat-cuffs, and b.u.t.toned his black coat to the chin. He knew the story in which that cousin had played his part perfectly well; had he forgotten it, his remembrance of old faces would not have betrayed him in this instance. Here was the man to whom he had administered a fugitive lecture in the dead of night at Ashford railway station, once more before him; here was a chance of touching the heart of a most incorrigible sinner--a sinner worthy of _his_ powers of conversion. He would tackle him at once; he would warn him of the errors of his ways, and of the infallible results of them, if he did not listen to the warning voice. He was just in the mood for delivering a sermon, and there was no time like the present. Now for it!
Mr. Gray turned the handle of the parlour door and skipped into the shop.
CHAPTER II.
MAURICE RECEIVES PLENTY OF ADVICE.
Maurice Hinchford had been told by Mattie to wait in the shop until she returned; and, obedient to her mandate, he had taken his seat on a very tall, uncomfortable stool, on which he could have remained perched more at his ease had a balance-pole been provided. Here he had remained, looking round the shop, and taking stock of its manifold contents--glancing askance now and then at Ann Packet, whose curiosity was not entirely satiated until Mr. Gray intruded on the scene.
At the first click of the door-handle, Maurice looked round expecting to see his cousin, but was disappointed by the presence of a small and agile man in black, who leaped on to a second chair beside him, and commenced nodding his head vigorously.
"Good evening, sir," said Maurice. "Mr. Gray, I presume?"
"We have met before, sir--my name is Gray."
"Really!--I do not remember----"
"Possibly not, sir; there are many unpleasant reminiscences we are always glad to escape from," said Mr. Gray. "I am connected with one.
You and I met on the platform of the Ashford railway station, one winter"s night, when Miss Wesden claimed my protection from a snare that had been laid for her."
"Oh!"
Maurice had dropped into a hornet"s nest. Whom next was he to confront before his cousin Sidney came upon the scene?--from whom else was he to hear a sharp criticism on those actions of the past, which no one regretted more than he. Luck was against him that night.
"You remember me?" said Mr. Gray. "Before the train departed I gave you a little counsel for your future course in life--a warning as to whither a persistence in your evil habits would lead you--you remember?"
"Oh! yes--I remember."
"Have you taken that warning to heart?--I fear not. Have you been any wiser, better, or more honest from that day?--I fear not. Have you not rather proceeded on your evil course, despising the preaching of good men, the warning of G.o.d"s word, and gone on, on--down, down, without a thought of the day when all your actions in this life would have to be accounted for?"
Bang came Mr. Gray"s hard hand on the counter, startling Maurice Hinchford"s nerves somewhat, and causing innumerable articles in the gla.s.s cases thereon to jump spasmodically with the shock.
"I--" began Maurice.
"Don"t interrupt me, sir--I will not be interrupted!--you have come hither of your own free will, seeking us out, and fearing not the evidence of our displeasure, and now, sir, you must hear what is wrong in your acts, and what will be good for your soul. Do you know, oh!
sinner, that that soul is in deadly peril?"
"I know--"
"Sir, I will not be interrupted!" cried Mr. Gray again; "I am not accustomed to be interrupted when I am endeavouring to awaken a hardened conscience to a sense of its condition, and I will not be now. And I call upon you at this time--now is the accepted time, sir, now is the day of salvation--to amend, amend, amend! You have been a spendthrift, profligate, everything that is bad; you have studied yourself in every action of life, and neglected the common duties due to your neighbour as well as to your Maker. You have gone on smiling in your sinful course, heeding not the outcry of religious men against your hideous career, recking not of the abyss into which you must plunge, and on the brink of which, you--a man, with an immortal soul committed to your charge--are standing now! One step more, perhaps, one wilful step forward, and you are lost for ever. _Lost!_" he shouted, with the frenzy of a fanatic, as well as the vehemence of a good man carried away by his subject; and the shrill cry made the gla.s.ses round the gas lamps ring again, and vibrated unpleasantly through Maurice"s system. This was becoming unendurable.
"If you will allow me--" began Maurice.
"Sir, I will not be interrupted!" shouted Mr. Gray, with more hammering upon the counter; "I know what is good for you, and I insist upon a patient hearing. You are a man in danger of destruction, and I cannot let you go blindfold into danger, without bidding you stop whilst time is mercifully before you. Let me divide the subject, in the first place, into three heads."
Maurice groaned inwardly, and stared at the preacher. There was no help for it; there was no escape. He might jump to the floor and fly for his life; or he might tip up Mr. Gray"s chair, upset that gentleman, and then gag him; but neither method would bring him nearer to that purpose for which he had ventured thither; and until Sidney appeared there was nothing to do but sit patiently under the infliction and listen to the full particulars of his dangerous state. He put his hands on his knees, surveyed the speaker, and submitted; in all his life he had never heard such a bad opinion of himself, or listened to so sweeping a condemnation of all his little infirmities. Mr. Gray ran on with great volubility, pitching his voice unpleasantly high; Maurice"s blood curdled, once he was sure his hair rose upon his head, and more than once cold water running down the curve of his back bone could not have more forcibly expressed the sensations of the moment. And then those horrid bangs upon the counter--always coming when least expected, and going off like cannon shots in his ears; and the gesticulatory flourishes, and the falsetto notes when more than usually excited, and, above all, the unceasing flow of invective and persuasion--an unintermittent shower-bath of the best advice, powerful enough to swamp a congregation.
Maurice"s head ached; his eyes watered; the shop grew dizzy; the books and prints revolved slowly round him; the ceiling might be the floor, and the floor the ceiling, with the gas branch screwed upside down in it, for what he knew of the matter; he lost the thread of the discourse, and found the heads thereof inextricably confused; he understood that he was a miserable sinner--the worst of sinners--or he should not be sitting there with all those horrible noises in his ears; the figure in the chair before him, heaved up and down, moved its arms right and left, possibly threw double summersaults; it was all over with the listener--he was going silly, he scarcely knew now with what object he had come thither--oh! his head!--oh! this never-ending, awfully rapid Niagara of words!
He made one feeble effort at resistance.
"Look here, old fellow--if you"ll let me off--I"ll--I"ll build a tabernacle," he burst forth; and again that terrible "Sir, I will not be interrupted!" stopped all further intrusion upon the subject of discourse.
Mr. Gray was delighted with that subject, with that listener--one of the finest specimens of iniquity he had encountered for many years!--and he did not think of stopping yet awhile. Where was the hurry?--time, although valuable, could not be better spent than on that occasion--his heart was in the task he had set himself, and he would do his very best!
Mattie came to the rescue at last; she had been watching the delivery of the sermon for some time over the parlour blind, informing Sidney, who had entered the parlour, of the energy of the father, and the patient endurance of his cousin.
Disturbed as he had been by his cousin"s arrival, and undecided for some time as to the expediency of granting him an interview or not, Sid could not refrain from a smile at Maurice"s unenviable position. He remembered Mr. Gray"s first charge upon his sins, and the unsparing length to which he had extended his remarks upon them; he could imagine the position of Maurice Hinchford at that juncture, and realize the feelings with which that gentleman heard and suffered.
"I think I"ll go to him now, Sidney," said Mattie.
It had been Sidney and Mattie--as between brother and sister--for a long time now.
"Will your father admire the intrusion?" asked Sid, drily.
"Perhaps he _is_ doing good," said Mattie, who regarded matters akin to this more seriously than the blind man; "I"ll wait a while."