A Second Coming

'What have I done to them, save healing those that were sick?'

'I'm not here to answer such questions. All I know is some queer ideas are getting about the town. If you knew anything about a London mob, you'd understand that the less you had to do with it the better.'

Someone called to the Stranger out of one of the little gardens which were in front of the houses.

'Come in here, sir, come in here! don't stand on ceremony; give those rascals the slip.' The speaker came down to the gate, shouting at the people. 'A lot of cowards I call you-yes, a lot of dirty cowards! What has he done to you that you hound him about like this? Nothing, I'll be bound. If the police did their duty, they'd mow you down like grass.' He held the gate open. 'Come in, sir, come in! I can see by the look of you that you're an honest man; and it shan't be said that an honest man was chivied past George Kinloch's door by such scum as this without being offered shelter.'

The Stranger said:

'I thank you. I have here with Me two friends.'

'Bring them along with you; I can find room for three.'

The Stranger and His two disciples entered the gate. As they passed into the house the people groaned; there were cat-calls and cries of scorn. Mr. Kinloch, standing on his doorstep, shouted back at them:

'You clamouring curs! It is such creatures as you that disgrace humanity, and make one ashamed of being a man. Back to your kennels! herd with your kind! gloat on the offal that you love!' To the Stranger he exclaimed: 'I must apologise to you, sir, for the behaviour of these vagabonds. As a fellow-citizen of theirs, I feel I owe you an apology. I've no notion what you've done to offend them, but I'm pretty sure that the right is on your side.'

'I have done nothing, except heal some that were sick.'

'Heal some that were sick? Why, you don't mean to say- Are you he of whom all the world is talking? Ada! Nella! Lily!' The three whom he called came hastening. 'Here is he of whom we were speaking. It is he whom that swarm of riff-raff has been chivying. Bid him welcome! Sir, I am glad to have you for a guest, though only for a little.'

When He had washed and made ready He found them assembled in the best room of the house. The lamps were lit, the curtains drawn; within was peace. But through the window came the voices of the people in the street. Mr. Kinloch did his utmost to entertain his guest with conversation.

'These are my three daughters, as you have probably supposed. Their mother is dead.'

'I know their mother.'

'You knew her? Indeed! When and where? It must have been before she was married, because I don't seem to recognise your face.'

'I knew her before she was married, and after, and I know her now.'

'Now? My dear sir, she's dead!'

'Such as she do not die.'

Mr. Kinloch stared. The girl Ada touched him on the arm:

'Mother is in heaven; do you not understand?' She went with her sisters and stood before Him. 'It is so good to look upon Your face.'

'You have seen it from of old.'

'Then darkly, not as now, in the light.'

'Would that all the world saw Me in the light as you do! Then would My Father's brightness shine out upon all men, as does the sun. But yet they love the darkness rather than the light.'

Mr. Kinloch inquired, being puzzled:

'What is this? Have you met this gentleman before? Is he a friend of yours as well as of your mother's? I thought I knew something of all your acquaintance. I've always tried to make a rule of doing so. How comes it that you womenfolk have had a friend of whom I've been told nothing?'

Ada replied to his question with another.

'Father, do you not know Christ?'

'My dear girl, don't speak to me as if you were one of those women who go about with tracts in their hands! Haven't I always observed your mother's wishes, and seen that you went regularly to church? What do you mean by addressing your father as if he were a heathen?'

'This is Christ.'

'This? Girl, this is a man!'

'Father, have you forgotten that Christ was made man?'

'Yes, but that-that's some time ago.'

'He is made man again. Don't you understand?'

'No, I don't. Sir, I'm not what you might call very intellectual, and it's taken me all my time to find the means to bring these girls up as young women ought to be brought up. I suppose it's because I'm stupid, but, while I'll write myself down a Christian with any man, there's a lot of mystery about religion which is beyond my comprehension. There's a deal about you in the papers. I'm told you've been doing a wonderful amount of good to many who were beyond the reach of human help. For that I say, God bless you!'

The Stranger said: 'Amen.'

'At the same time there's much that is being said which I don't understand. I don't know who you are, or what you are, except that it's pretty clear to me that a man who has been doing what you have can't be very far from heaven; and if I ought to know, I'm sorry. God gave me a good wife, and she gave me three daughters who are like her. She's in heaven-I don't need anyone to tell me that; and if they'll only let her know, when they meet her among the angels, that I loved her while I'd breath, so long as she and they have all they want for ever and for ever, I don't care what God thinks it right to do with me. The end and aim of my life has been to make my wife and her children happy. If they're happy in heaven I'll be happy, too. That's a kind of happiness of which it will not be easy to deprive me, no matter where I am.'

'You are nearer to Me than you think.'

'Am I? We'll hope so. I like you; I like your looks; I like your voice; I like your ways; I like what you have brought into the house with you-it's a sort of a kind of peace. As Ada says-she knows; God tells that girl things which perhaps I'm too stupid to be told-it's good to look upon your face. Whatever happens in the time to come, I never shall be sorry that I've had a chance to see it.'

'You never shall.'

A voice louder than the rest was heard shouting in the street:

'Show us another miracle!'

Ada said:

'You hear that? Why, father, I do believe that a miracle is beginning to be worked in you!'

She smiled at him. He took her in his arms and kissed her.

CHAPTER XX

THEY THAT WOULD ASK WITH A THREAT

There was a meeting of Universalists. This was a society whose meeting-place was in Soho. It called itself a club, using the word in a sense of its own, for anyone was admitted to its membership who chose to join; and, as a rule, all comers, whether members or not, were free to attend its meetings. It was a focus for discontent. To it came from all parts of the world the discontented, examples of that huge concourse which has a grudge against what is called Society-not of the silent part, which is in the majority, but of that militant section whose constant endeavour it is to goad the dumb into speech, in the hope and trust that the distance between speech and action will not be great.

The place was packed. There were women there as well as men-young and old-representatives of most of the nations which describe themselves as civilised; their common bond a common misery. The talk was old. But in the atmosphere that night was something new. Bellows had given vitality to the embers which smouldered in their hearts.

Henry Walters was speaking. They listened to him with a passionate eagerness which suggested how alluring was the dream which he proposed to wrest out of the arena of visions.

'I said to a policeman as I was coming in that I believed we were going to have our turn. He laughed. The police have had all the laughing. We'll laugh soon. We've been looking for a miracle, recognising that a miracle was the only thing that could help us. The arrival of a worker of miracles is a new factor in the situation with which the police, and all they represent, will have to reckon. It's just possible that they mayn't find him an easy reckoning. He who can raise a woman from the dead with a word can just as easily turn London upside down, and the police with it.