"I"m sorry for ye," she said, lifting herself from the coffin to which she clung, and turning upon the widow of the drowned man, "and ye can be just as sorry for me! He loved us both, and why should we quarrel! A man is ever like that--just chancy and changeful--but he tried his honest hardest not to love me--yes, he tried hard!--it was my fault!
for I never tried!--I loved him!--and I"ll love him, till I go where he is gone! And we"ll see who G.o.d"ll give his soul to!"
This was too much for the curate.
"Woman!" he thundered, "Be silent! How dare you boast of your sin at such a time, and in such a place! Take her away from that coffin, some of you!"
So he commanded, but still not a man moved. The curate began to lose temper in earnest.
"Take her away, I tell you," and he advanced a step or two, "I cannot permit such a scandalous interruption of this service!"
"Patience, patience, measter," said one of the men standing by, "When a woman"s heart"s broke in two ways it ain"t no use worrying her. She"ll come right of herself in a minute."
But the curate, never famous for forbearance at any time, was not to be tampered with. Turning to his verger he said,
"I refuse to go on! The woman is drunk!"
But now the widow of the dead man suddenly took up the argument in a shrill voice which almost tore the air to shreds.
"She"s no more drunk than you are!" she cried pa.s.sionately, "Leave her alone! You"re a nice sort of G.o.d"s serving man to comfort we, when we"re all nigh on losing our wits over this mornin" o" misery, shame on ye! Mary Bell, come here! If so be as my husband was your sweetheart, G.o.d forgive him, ye shall come home wi" me!--and we"ll never have a word agin the man who is lying dead there. Come wi" me, Mary!"
With a wild cry of anguish, the girl rushed into her arms, and the two women clung together like sisters united in the same pa.s.sionate grief.
The curate turned a livid white.
"I cannot countenance such immorality," he said, addressing the verger, though his words were heard by all present, "Enough of the service has been said! Lower the coffins into the earth!" and turning on his heel he prepared to walk away. But Aubrey Leigh stopped him.
"You will not finish the service, sir?" he asked civilly, but with something of a warning in the flash of his eyes.
"No! The princ.i.p.al part of it is over. I cannot go on. These women are drunk!"
"They are not drunk, save with their own tears!" said Aubrey, his rich voice trembling with indignation. "They are not mad, except with grief!
Is it not your place to be patient with them?"
"My place! My place!" echoed the curate indignantly, "Man, do you know to whom you are talking?"
"I think I do," answered Aubrey steadily, "I am talking to a professed servant of Christ,--Christ who had patience and pardon for all men! I am talking to one whose calling and vocation it is to love, to forgive, and to forbear--whose absolute protestation has been made at the altar of G.o.d that he will faithfully obey his Master. Even if these unhappy women were drunk, which they are not, their fault in conduct would not release you from the performance of your duty,--or the reverence you are bound to show towards the dead!"
Trembling with rage, the curate eyed him up and down scornfully.
"How dare you speak to me about my duty! You common lout! Mind your own business!"
"I will," said Aubrey, fixing his eyes full upon him, "And it shall be my business to see that you mind yours! Both your rector and bishop shall hear of this!"
He strode off, leaving the curate speechless with fury; and joining the little crowd of mourners who had been startled and interrupted by this unexpected scene, drew a prayer book from his pocket, and without asking anyone"s permission read with exquisite gravity and pathos the concluding words of the funeral service,--and then with his own hands a.s.sisted the grave-diggers to lay the coffined dead tenderly to rest.
Awestruck, and deeply impressed by his manner the fisher-folk mechanically obeyed his instructions, and followed his movements till all the sad business was over, and then they lingered about the churchyard wistfully watching him, while he in turn, standing erect and bare-headed near the open graves, looked at them with a strange pity, love and yearning.
"It"ll be all right when our owld pa.s.son comes back," said one of the men addressing him, "It"s just this half eddicated wastrel of a chap as doesn"t know, and doesn"t care for the troubles of common folk like we."
Aubrey was silent for a s.p.a.ce. "Common folk like we!" The words were full of pathetic humility, and the man who spoke them was a hero of no mean type, who had often buffeted the winds and waves to save a human life at the risk of his own. "Common folk like we!" Aubrey laid his hand gently on his "mate"s" shoulder.
"Ben, old boy, there are no common folk in G.o.d"s sight," he said, "Look there!" and he pointed to the graves that were just beginning to be filled in, "Every creature lying there had as much of G.o.d in him as many a king, and perhaps more. In this majestic universe there is nothing common!"
Ben shuffled one foot before the other uneasily.
"Ay, ay, but there"s few as argify the way o" life in they lines!" he said, "There"s a many that think--but there"s a main few that speak."
"That is true," said Aubrey, still keeping his hand on Ben"s shoulder, "there"s a main few that speak! Now, _I_ want to speak, Ben,--I want to have a talk to you and the rest of our mates about--well!--about the dangers of the sea and other things. Will you meet me on the sh.o.r.e this evening near the quay and listen to a word or two?"
Ben looked surprised but interested, and a puzzled smile came into his eyes.
"Be ye a goin" to preach to us like the pa.s.son?" he said, "Or like the fellers in the porter"s caps as calls themselves Salvationists?"
Aubrey smiled.
"No! I only want to say a few parting words to you all."
"Parting words!" echoed Ben with a stupefied air.
"Yes--I am going away to-morrow--going for good. I have got some other work to do. But I shall not forget you all . . . and you will hear of me often,--yes, you will hear of me!--and some day I will come back.
But to-night . . . I should just like to say good-bye."
Ben was secretly much distressed. "Gentleman Leigh" as he was sometimes called, had greatly endeared himself to their little community, and that he should leave them was not at all a desirable thing, and would, as Ben well knew, cause universal regret. But there was no time just now for either argument or protestation, so Ben accepted the blow as he accepted all buffetings of fate, and merely said,
"All right! We"ll be there to-night for sure!" And then Aubrey, gravely content, walked slowly out of the little churchyard still bare-headed, his eyes dark with thought,--and the reluctant sun came out of the gray sky and shone on his pale face and bright hair--and one or two of the widowed women timidly touched his arm as he pa.s.sed, and murmured, "G.o.d bless you!" And Mary Bell, the sorrowful and sinning, clinging to the waist of the woman she had wronged, looked up at him appealingly with the strained and hunted gaze of a lost and desperate creature, and as he met her eyes, turned shudderingly away and wept. And he, knowing that words were useless, and that even the kindliest looks must wound in such a case, pa.s.sed on in silence, and when he reached his own lodging took some of the newspapers which spoke of himself and his book, and after marking certain pa.s.sages, tied them up in a packet and sent them to the curate with whom he had crossed swords that morning, accompanied by a note which briefly ran thus:--
"You asked me how I "dared" to speak to you about your duty. I reply--By the force of truth and the power of the pen I dare!--and I shall be ready to answer to G.o.d for it, as you must answer to him for leaving any part of YOUR duty undone.
"AUBREY LEIGH."
And the day pa.s.sed on, half in drifting clouds, half in glimpses of sunshine, till late afternoon, when the sky cleared altogether, and the waves sank to a dead calm;--and with the night a shield-like moon, all glistening pearl and silver, rose up out of the east with a royal air of white and wondering innocence, as though she proclaimed her entire blamelessness for any havoc wrought by storm. And in the full radiance of that silvery splendour Aubrey Leigh, leaning against the sea-weed covered capstan of the quay, round which coils of wet rope glistened like the body of a sleeping serpent, told to an audience of human hearers for the first time the story of his life, and adventures, and the varied experiences he had gone through in order to arrive at some straight and clear comprehension of "the Way, the Truth, and the Life"
of the Gospel of Love and Mutual Labour. His practised voice, perfect in all modulation, inflexion, and expression, carried each simple, well-chosen word home to the hearts of his hearers,--not one so ignorant as not to understand him--not one so blind as not to see the beauty of work and creative effort as he depicted them,--not one so insensate as not to feel the calm, the grandeur, and repose of the strong soul of a man in complete sympathy with his fellow-men. They listened to him almost breathlessly--their bronzed weather-beaten faces all turned towards his; forgetting to smoke, they let their pipes die out and drop from their hands--and no interruption broke the even flow and cadence of his earnest language, save the slow ripple of the water beating against the quay, and the faint, occasional sigh of a stirring wind. Silhouetted black against the radiant sky were the masts of the fishing fleet, and the roofs of the fishermen"s cottages--dwellings so often made desolate by death--and as Aubrey noted the fascinated attention with which these rough men heard him, his heart grew strong.
"If a few listen, so will many," he said to himself, "The Master of our creed first taught His divine ethics to a few fishermen,--to them the message was first given . . . and by them again delivered,--and it is through our having departed from the original simplicity of utterance that all the evil has crept in. So let me be content with this night"s work and await the future with patience." Then lifting up his voice once more he said,--
"You think your lot a hard one--you, friends and brothers, who set the brown sails out to sea on a night of threatening storm, and bid farewell to your homes built safe upon the sh.o.r.e. You must meet all the horror of white foam and cloud-blackness, to drag from the sea its living spoil, and earn the bread to keep yourselves and those who are dependent upon you,--you MUST do this, or the Forces of Life will not have you,--they will cast you out and refuse to nourish you. For so is your fate in life, and work ordained. Then where is G.o.d?--you cry, as the merciless billows rise to engulf your frail craft,--why should the Maker of man so deliberately destroy him? Why should one human unit, doing nothing, and often thinking nothing, enjoy hundreds of pounds a day, while you face death to win as many pence? Is there a G.o.d of Love who permits this injustice? Ah, stop there, friends! There is no such thing as injustice! Strange as it sounds to this world of many contradictions and perplexities, I repeat there is no such thing as injustice. There is what SEEMS injustice--because we are all apt to consider the material side of things only. That is where we make our great mistake in life and conduct. We should all remember that this world, and the things of this world, are but the outward expression of an inward soul--the Matter evolved from Mind--and that unless we are ourselves in harmony with the Mind, we shall never understand the Matter. Your millionaire is surrounded with luxuries,--your fishermen has dry bread and herring,--your millionaire dies, with a famous doctor counting his pulse-beats, and a respectable clergyman promising him heaven on account of the money he has left to the church in his will; your fisherman goes down in a swirl of black water, without a prayer--for he has no time to pray--without leaving a penny behind him, inasmuch as he has no pence to leave; and for both these different creatures we judge the end is come? No,--the end is NOT come! It is the beginning only! If the millionaire has died with a thousand selfish sores in his mind,--if his life"s privileges have been wasted in high feeding and self-indulgence,--if he has thought only of himself, his riches, his pride, his position, or his particular form of respectability, he will get the full result of that mental att.i.tude! If the fisherman has been content with his earnings, and thanked G.o.d for them,--if he has been honest, brave, true, and unselfish, and has shared with others their joys and sorrows, and if at the last he goes down in the waves trying to save some other life while losing his own,--depend upon it he will rise to the full splendour of THAT mental att.i.tude! For both millionaire and fisherman are but men, made on the same lines, of the same clay, and are each one, personally and separately responsible to G.o.d for the soul in them,--and when both of them pa.s.s from this phase of being to the next, they will behold all things with spiritual eyes, not material ones. And then it may be that the dark will be discovered to be the bright, and the fortunate prove to be the deplorable, for at present we "see through a gla.s.s darkly, but then, face to face." The friends whom we have buried to-day are not dead,--for death is not Death, but Life. And for those who are left behind it is merely a time of waiting, for as the Master said, "There shall not a hair of your head perish. In your patience possess ye your souls.""
He paused a moment,--the moon rays illumined his delicate features, and a half sorrowful smile rested on his lips.
"I am no clergyman, my friends! I have not been "ordained". I am not preaching to you. I will not ask you to be good men, for there is something effeminate in the sound of such a request made to brawny, strong fellows such as you are, with an oath ready to leap from your lips, and a blow prepared to fly from your fists on provocation. I will merely say to you that it is a great thing to be a Man!--a Man as G.o.d meant him to be, brave, truthful, and self-reliant, with a firm faith in the Divine Ordainment of Life as Life should be lived. There is no disgrace in work;--no commonness,--no meanness. Disgrace, commonness, and meanness are with those who pretend to work and never do anything useful for the world they live in. The king who amuses himself at the expense and ruin of his subjects is the contemptible person,--not the labourer who digs the soil for the planting of corn which shall help to feed his fellows. And the most despicable creature of our time and century, is not the man who doubts Christ, or questions G.o.d--for Christ was patient with the doubter, and G.o.d answers, through the medium of science, every honest question--it is the man who pretends to believe and lives on the pretence, while his conduct gives the lie to his profession! That is why you--and why thousands of others like you, are beginning to look upon many of the clergy with contempt, and to treat their admonitions with indifference. That is why thousands of the rising generation of men and women will not go to church. "The parson does not do anything for me," is a common every-day statement. And that the parson SHOULD do something is a necessary part of his business. His "doing" should not consist in talking plat.i.tudes from the pulpit, or in sending round a collection plate. And if he has no money, and will not "sell half that he has and give to the poor" as commanded, he can at any rate give sympathy. But this is precisely what he chiefly lacks.
The parson"s general att.i.tude is one of either superiority or servility,--a "looking down" upon his poor parishoners--a "looking up"
to his rich ones. A disinterested, loving observation of the troubles and difficulties of others never occurs to him as necessary. But this was precisely the example Christ gave us--an unselfish example of devotion to others--a supreme descent of the Divine into man to rescue and bless humanity. Now I know all your difficulties and sorrows,--I have worked among you, and lived among you--and I feel the pulse of your existence beating in my own heart. I know that when a great calamity overwhelms you all as it has done this week, you have no one to comfort you,--no one to a.s.sure you that no matter how strange and impossible it seems, you have been deprived of your a.s.sociates for some GOOD cause which will be made manifest in due season,--that they have probably been taken to save them from a worse fate than the loss of earth-consciousness in the sea. For that, scientifically speaking, is all that death means--the loss of earth-consciousness,--but the gain of another consciousness, whether of another earth or a heaven none can say. But there is no real death--inasmuch as even a grain of dust in the air will generate life. We must hold fast to the Soul of things--the Soul which is immortal, not the body which is mortal. "What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul!" That is what each man of us must find, and hold, and keep,--his own soul! Apart from all creeds, and clergy, forms and rituals--that is the vital matter. Stand clear of all things,--all alone if need be, surrounded by the stupendous forces of this great universe,--let us find,--each man of us--his own soul; find and keep it brave, truthful, upright, and bound straight on for the highest,--the highest always!
And the very stars in their courses will help us--storms will but strengthen us--difficulties but encourage us--and death itself shall but give us larger liberty."
He ceased, and one by one the men drew closer to him, and thanked him, in voices that were tremulous with the emotion he had raised in them.
The instinct which had led them to call him "Gentleman Leigh" had proved correct,--and there was not a man among them all who did not feel a thrill of almost fraternal pride in the knowledge that the dauntless, hard-working "mate" who had fronted tempests with them, and worked with them in all weathers, had without any boast or loquacious preparation, made his name famous and fit for discussion in the great world of London far away, a world to which none of them had ever journeyed. And they pressed round him and shook his hand, and gave him simple yet hearty words of cheer and goodwill, together with unaffected expressions of regret that he was leaving them,--"though for that matter," said one of them, "we allus felt you was a scholard-like, for all that you was so handy at the nets. For never did a bit of sh.e.l.l or weed come up from the sea but ye was a lookin" at it as if G.o.d had throwed it to yer for particular notice. And when a man takes to obsarvin" common things as if they were special birthday presents from the Almighty, ye may be pretty sure there"s something out of the ordinary in him!"
Aubrey smiled, and pressed the hand of this roughly eloquent speaker,--and then they all walked with him up from the sh.o.r.e to the little cottage where he had lived for so many months, and at the gate of which he bade them farewell.
"But only for a time," he said, "I shall see you all again. And you will hear of me!"