my friend of theories,” she said mockingly. “There is a stranger there, the young man who walks so swiftly. To which of your two orders does he belong?”
Deyes looked out of the window—a brief, careless glance.
“To neither,” he answered. “His time has not come yet. But he has the makings of both.”
CHAPTER III
FIRST BLOOD
A footman entered the room a few minutes later, and obedient, without a doubt, to some previously given command, waited behind his mistress’ chair until a hand had been played. When it was over, she spoke to him without turning her head.
“What is it, Perkins?” she asked.
He bent forward respectfully.
“There is a young gentleman here, madam, who wishes to see you most particularly. He has no card, but he said that his name would not be known to you.”
“Tell him that I am engaged,” Wilhelmina said. “He must give you his name, and tell you what business he has come upon.”
“Very good, madam!” the man answered, and withdrew.
He was back again before the next hand had been played. Once more he stood waiting in respectful silence.
“Well?” his mistress asked.
“His name, madam, is Mr. Victor Macheson. He said that he would wait as long as you liked, but he preferred telling you his business himself.”
“I fancy that I know it,” Wilhelmina answered. “You can show him in here.”
“Is it the young man, I wonder,” Lady Peggy remarked, “who came up the avenue as though he were walking on air?”
“Doubtless,” Wilhelmina answered. “He is some sort of a missionary. I had him shown in here because I thought his coming at all an impertinence, and I want to make him understand it. You will probably find him amusing, Mr. Deyes.”
Gilbert Deyes shook his head quietly.
“There was a time,” he murmured, “when the very word missionary was a finger-post to the ridiculous. The comic papers rob us, however, of our elementary sources of humour.”
They all looked curiously towards the door as he entered, all except Wilhelmina, who was the last to turn her head, and found him hesitating in some embarrassment as to whom to address. He was somewhat above medium height, fair, with a mass of wind-tossed hair, and had the smooth face of a boy. His eyes were his most noticeable feature. They were very bright and very restless. Lady Peggy called them afterwards uncomfortable eyes, and the others, without any explanation, understood what she meant.
“I am Miss Thorpe-Hatton,” Wilhelmina said calmly. “I am told that you wished to see me.”
She turned only her head towards him. Her words were cold and unwelcoming. She saw that he was nervous and she had no pity. It was unworthy of her. She knew that. Her eyes questioned him calmly. Sitting there in her light muslin dress, with her deep-brown hair arranged in the Madonna-like fashion, which chanced to be the caprice of the moment, she herself—one of London’s most beautiful women—seemed little more than a girl.
“I beg your pardon,” he began hurriedly. “I understood—I expected——”
“Well?”
The monosyllable was like a drop of ice. A faint spot of colour burned in his cheeks. He understood now that for some reason this woman was inimical to him. The knowledge seemed to have a bracing effect. His eyes flashed with a sudden fire which gave force to his face.
“I expected,” he continued with more assurance, “to have found Miss Thorpe-Hatton an older lady.”
She said nothing. Only her eyebrows were very slightly raised. She seemed to be asking him silently what possible concern the age of the lady of Thorpe-Hatton could be to him. He was to understand that his remark was almost an impertinence.
“I wished,” he said, “to hold a service in Thorpe on Sunday afternoon, and also one during the week, and I wrote to your agent asking for the loan of a barn, which is generally, I believe, used for any gathering of the villagers. Mr. Hurd found himself unable to grant my request. I have ventured to appeal to you.”
“Mr. Hurd,” she said calmly, “decided, in my opinion, quite rightly. I do not see what possible need my villagers can have of further religious services than the Church affords them.”
“Madam,” he answered, “I have not a word to say against your parish church, or against your excellent vicar. Yet I believe, and the body to which I am attached believes, that change is stimulating. We believe that the great truths of life cannot be presented to our fellow-creatures too often, or in too many different ways.”
“And what,” she asked, with a faint curl of her beautiful lips, “do you consider the great truths of life?”
“Madam,” he answered, with slightly reddening cheeks, “they vary for every one of us, according to our capacity and our circumstances. What they may mean,” he added, after a moment’s hesitation, “to people of your social order, I do not know. It has not come within the orbit of my experience. It was your villagers to whom I was proposing to talk.”
There was a moment’s silence. Gilbert Deyes and Lady Peggy exchanged swift glances of amused understanding. Wilhelmina bit her lip, but she betrayed no other sign of annoyance.
“To what religious body do you belong?” she asked.
“My friends,” he answered, “and I, are attached to none of the recognized denominations. Our only object is to try to keep alight in our fellow-creatures the flame of spirituality. We want to help them—not to forget.”
“There is no name by which you call yourselves?” she asked.
“None,” he answered.
“And your headquarters are where?” she asked.
“In Gloucestershire,” he answered—“so far as we can be said to have any headquarters at all.”
“You have no churches then?” she asked.
“Any building,” he answered, “where the people are to whom we desire to speak, is our church. We look upon ourselves as missioners only.”
“I am afraid,” Wilhelmina said quietly, “that I am only wasting your time in asking these questions. Still, I should like to know what induced you to choose my village as an appropriate sphere for your labours.”
“We each took a county,” he answered. “Leicestershire fell to my lot. I selected Thorpe to begin with, because I have heard it spoken of as a model village.”
Wilhelmina’s forehead was gently wrinkled.
“I am afraid,” she said, “that I am a somewhat dense person. Your reason seems to me scarcely an adequate one.”
“Our belief is,” he declared, “that where material prosperity is assured, especially amongst this class of people, the instincts towards spirituality are weakened.”
“My people all attend church; we have no public-house; there are never any scandals,” she said.
“All these things,” he admitted, “are excellent. But they do not help you to see into the lives of these people. Church-going may become a habit, a respectable