WHEN the second post came in one morning I saw a letter addressed to the
priest, in the trembling large characters of an old man’s hand, lying
upon the slab in the hall. When I came in to lunch I found the old
clergyman with an open letter in his hand, and his face full of almost
childish happiness.
“I have heard from my oldest friend,” he said, making a little movement
with the letter. “It is months since he has written. I have known him
ever since we were boys.”
We sat down to lunch, but he kept on referring to his friend, and to the
pleasure the letter gave him.
“We are always planning to meet,” he said to me presently. “But we never
can manage it. We are both so old. He is much more active than I am,
however. He is full of good works, while I, as you know, lead an idle
life. I could not take charge of a church. It is all I can do now to
serve my own little chapel upstairs.”
“Where is he working?” I asked.
“I think perhaps you fancy he is in Holy Orders, but he is not. He has
been on the Stock Exchange till a few years ago, and now he is living in
the country, getting ready to die, as he tells me. But he is full of
good works; his letter here has news about the village, and of a man
whose acquaintance he has made in the reading-room there, which he
himself built a year ago; but he is full of plans too, and asks my
advice.”
“It is not often you come across a business man like that,” I said.
“No, he is wonderful, but he has been like that for years. He has done a
great deal all his life among poor people in London. For years he never
missed his two or three nights a week in some club, or on some
committee, or visiting sick people.”
I began to think that it might have been through the friendship of the
priest that this man had been such a worker. But presently he began
again.
“Perhaps the most wonderful thing was the way he first began to do such
work. Let me see, have I mentioned his name? No? Then I can tell you,
otherwise it would not be discreet; that is––” he added, “if you would
care to hear.”