There was, in the bishop"s voice, a note almost pathetic. "Oh, I do not mean to ask you anything you may deem too personal. And G.o.d forbid, as I look at you, as I have known you, that I should doubt your sincerity. I am not your inquisitor, but your bishop and your friend, and I am asking for your confidence. Six months ago you were, apparently, one of the most orthodox rectors in the diocese. I recognize that you are not an impulsive, sensational man, and I am all the more anxious to learn from your own lips something of the influences, of the processes which have changed you, which have been strong enough to impel you to risk the position you have achieved."
By this unlooked-for appeal Hodder was not only disarmed, but smitten with self-reproach at the thought of his former misjudgment and underestimation of the man in whose presence he sat. And it came over him, not only the extent to which, formerly, he had regarded the bishop as too tolerant and easygoing, but the fact that he had arrived here today prepared to find in his superior anything but the att.i.tude he was showing. Considering the bishop"s age, Hodder had been ready for a lack of understanding of the step he had taken, even for querulous reproaches and rebuke.
He had, therefore, to pull himself together, to adjust himself to the unexpected greatness of soul with which he was being received before he began to sketch the misgivings he had felt from the early days of his rectorship of St. John"s; the helplessness and failure which by degrees had come over him. He related how it had become apparent to him that by far the greater part of his rich and fashionable congregation were Christians only in name, who kept their religion in a small and impervious compartment where it did not interfere with their lives. He pictured the yearning and perplexity of those who had come to him for help, who could not accept the old explanations, and had gone away empty; and he had not been able to make Christians of the poor who attended the parish house. Finally, trusting in the bishop"s discretion, he spoke of the revelations he had unearthed in Dalton Street, and how these had completely destroyed his confidence in the Christianity he had preached, and how he had put his old faith to the test of unprejudiced modern criticism, philosophy, and science...
The bishop listened intently, his head bent, his eyes on he rector.
"And you have come out--convinced?" he asked tremulously. "Yes, yes, I see you have. It is enough."
He relapsed into thought, his wrinkled hand lying idly on the table.
"I need not tell you, my friend," he resumed at length, "that a great deal of pressure has been brought to bear upon me in this matter, more than I have ever before experienced. You have mortally offended, among others, the most powerful layman in the diocese, Mr. Parr, who complains that you have presumed to take him to task concerning his private affairs."
"I told him," answered Holder, "that so long as he continued to live the life he leads, I could not accept his contributions to St. John"s."
"I am an old man," said the bishop, "and whatever usefulness I have had is almost finished. But if I were young to-day, I should pray G.o.d for the courage and insight you have shown, and I am thankful to have lived long enough to have known you. It has, at least, been given one to realize that times have changed, that we are on the verge of a mighty future. I will be frank to say that ten years ago, if this had happened, I should have recommended you for trial. Now I can only wish you G.o.dspeed. I, too, can see the light, my friend. I can see, I think, though dimly, the beginnings of a blending of all sects, of all religions in the increasing vision of the truth revealed in Jesus Christ, stripped, as you say, of dogma, of fruitless attempts at rational explanation. In j.a.pan and China, in India and Persia, as well as in Christian countries, it is coming, coming by some working of the Spirit the mystery of which is beyond us. And nations and men who even yet know nothing of the Gospels are showing a willingness to adopt what is Christ"s, and the G.o.d of Christ."
Holder was silent, from sheer inability to speak.
"If you had needed an advocate with me," the bishop continued, "you could not have had one to whose counsel I would more willingly have listened, than that of Horace Bentley. He wrote asking to come and see me, but I went to him in Dalton Street the day I returned. And it gives me satisfaction, Mr. Holder, to confess to you freely that he has taught me, by his life, more of true Christianity than I have learned in all my experience elsewhere."
"I had thought," exclaimed the rector, wonderingly, "that I owed him more than any other man."
"There are many who think that--hundreds, I should say," the bishop replied.... "Eldon Parr ruined him, drove him from the church.... It is strange how, outside of the church, his influence has silently and continuously grown until it has borne fruit in--this. Even now," he added after a pause, "the cautiousness, the dread of change which comes with old age might, I think, lead me to be afraid of it if I--didn"t perceive behind it the spirit of Horace Bentley."
It struck Holder, suddenly, what an unconscious but real source of confidence this thought had likewise been to him. He spoke of it.
"It is not that I wouldn"t trust you," the bishop went on. "I have watched you, I have talked to Asa Waring, I have read the newspapers. In spite of it all, you have kept your head, you have not compromised the dignity of the Church. But oh, my friend, I beg you to bear in mind that you are launched upon deep waters, that you have raised up many enemies--enemies of Christ--who seek to destroy you. You are still young. And the uncompromising experiment to which you are pledged, of freeing your church, of placing her in the position of power and influence in the community which is rightfully hers, is as yet untried.
And no stone will be left unturned to discourage and overcome you. You have faith,--you have made me feel it as you sat here,--a faith which will save you from bitterness in personal defeat. You may not reap the victory, or even see it in your lifetime. But of this I am sure, that you will be able to say, with Paul, "I have planted, Apollos watered, but G.o.d gave the increase." Whatever happens, you may count upon my confidence and support. I can only wish that I were younger, that my arm were stronger, and that I had always perceived the truth as clearly as I see it now."
Holder had risen involuntarily while these words were being spoken. They were indeed a benediction, and the intensity of his feeling warned him of the inadequacy of any reply. They were p.r.o.nounced in sorrow, yet in hope, and they brought home to him, sharply, the n.o.bility of the bishop"s own sacrifice.
"And you, sir?" he asked.
"Ah," answered the bishop, "with this I shall have had my life. I am content...."
"You will come to me again, Hodder? some other day," he said, after an interval, "that we may talk over the new problems. They are constructive, creative, and I am anxious to hear how you propose to meet them. For one thing, to find a new basis for the support of such a parish. I understand they have deprived you of your salary."
"I have enough to live on, for a year or so," replied the rector, quickly. "Perhaps more."
"I"m afraid," said the bishop, with a smile in his old eyes, "that you will need it, my friend. But who can say? You have strength, you have confidence, and G.o.d is with you."
II
Life, as Hodder now grasped it, was a rapidly whirling wheel which gave him no chance to catch up with the impressions and experiences through which it was dragging him. Here, for instance, were two far-reaching and momentous events, one crowding upon the other, and not an hour for reflection, realization, or adjustment! He had, indeed, after his return from the bishop"s, s.n.a.t.c.hed a few minutes to write Alison the unexpected result of that interview. But even as he wrote and rang for a messenger to carry the note to Park Street, he was conscious of an effort to seize upon and hold the fact that the woman he had so intensely desired was now his helpmate; and had, of her own freewill, united herself with him.
A strong sense of the dignity of their relationship alone prevented his calling her on the telephone--as it doubtless had prevented her. While she remained in her father"s house, he could not...
In the little room next to the office several persons were waiting to see him. But as he went downstairs he halted on the landing, his hand going to his forehead, a reflex movement significant of a final attempt to achieve the hitherto unattainable feat of imagining her as his wife.
If he might only speak to her again--now, this morning! And yet he knew that he needed no confirmation. The reality was there, in the background; and though refusing to come forward to be touched, it had already grafted itself as an actual and vital part of his being, never to be eliminated.
Characteristically perfecting his own ideal, she had come to him in the hour when his horizon had been most obscure. And he experienced now an exultation, though solemn and sacred, that her faith had so far been rewarded in the tidings he now confided to the messenger. He was not, as yet, to be driven out from the task, to be deprived of the talent, the opportunity intrusted to him by Lord--the emanc.i.p.ation of the parish of St. John"s.
The first to greet him, when he entered his office, was one who, unknown to himself, had been fighting the battle of the G.o.d in Christ, and who now, thanks to John Hodder, had identified the Spirit as the transforming force. Bedloe Hubbell had come to offer his services to the Church. The tender was unqualified.
"I should even be willing, Mr. Hodder," he said with a smile, "to venture occasionally into a pulpit. You have not only changed my conception of religion, but you have made it for me something which I can now speak about naturally."
Hodder was struck by the suggestion.
"Ah, we shall need the laymen in the pulpits, Mr. Hubbell," he said quickly. "A great spiritual movement must be primarily a lay movement.
And I promise you you shall not lack for opportunity."
III
At nine o"clock that evening, when a reprieve came, Hodder went out.
Anxiety on the score of Kate Marcy, as well as a desire to see Mr.
Bentley and tell him of the conversation with the bishop, directed his steps toward Dalton Street. And Hodder had, indeed, an intention of confiding to his friend, as one eminently ent.i.tled to it, the news of his engagement to Alison Parr.
Nothing, however, had been heard of Kate. She was not in Dalton Street, Mr. Bentley feared. The search of Gratz, the cabinet-maker, had been fruitless. And Sally Grover had even gone to see the woman in the hospital, whom Kate had befriended, in the hope of getting a possible clew. They sat close together before the fire in Mr. Bentley"s comfortable library, debating upon the possibility of other methods of procedure, when a carriage was heard rattling over the pitted asphalt without. As it pulled up at the curb, a silence fell between them. The door-bell rang.
Holder found himself sitting erect, rigidly attentive, listening to the m.u.f.fled sound of a woman"s voice in the entry. A few moments later came a knock at the library door, and Sam entered. The old darky was plainly frightened.
"It"s Miss Kate, Ma.r.s.e Ho"ace, who you bin tryin" to fin"," he stammered.
Holder sprang to his feet and made his way rapidly around the table, where he stood confronting the woman in the doorway. There she was, perceptibly swaying, as though the floor under her were rocked by an earthquake. Her handsome face was white as chalk, her pupils widened in terror. It was curious, at such an instant, that he should have taken in her costume,--yet it was part of the mystery. She wore a new, close-fitting, patently expensive suit of dark blue cloth and a small hat, which were literally transforming in their effect, demanding a palpable initial effort of identification.
He seized her by the arm.
"What is it?" he demanded.
"Oh, my G.o.d!" she cried. "He--he"s out there--in the carriage."
She leaned heavily against the doorpost, shivering.... Holder saw Sally Grover coming down the stairs.
"Take her," he said, and went out of the front door, which Sam had left open. Mr. Bentley was behind him.
The driver had descended from the box and was peering into the darkness of the vehicle when he heard them, and turned. At sight of the tall clergyman, an expression of relief came into his face.
"I don"t like the looks of this, sir," he said. "I thought he was pretty bad when I went to fetch him--"
Holder pushed past him and looked into the carriage. Leaning back, motionless, in the corner of the seat was the figure of a man. For a terrible moment of premonition, of enlightenment, the rector gazed at it.
"They sent for me from a family hotel in Ayers Street," the driver was explaining. Mr. Bentley"s voice interrupted him.
"He must be brought in, at once. Do you know where Dr. Latimer"s office is, on Tower Street?" he asked the man. "Go there, and bring this doctor back with you as quickly as possible. If he is not in, get another, physician."