mountain full of horses and chariots," replied Mrs. Batterby. "But some
folk's eyes seem made not to open, like the stained-glass windows in
Summerglade Church."
"It is right to pray, but we must beware of presumptuousness in our
prayers," said Mrs. Veale sententiously.
"We'd much better beware of want of faith," retorted the hostess.
"But it is difficult to have faith when things seem going against us,"
said Matilda Skipworth.
"Stuff and nonsense, Matilda! It's when things seem going against us
that our faith is really any compliment to the Almighty. I can't see
anything very complimentary to Him when every morning I pray with faith,
'Give us this day our daily bread,' knowing all the time that it's in
the larder with a damp cloth over it. But it's when people pray that
particular prayer, with no bread in the house and no money to pay for
any, that their faith is any compliment to God or worthy of His
acceptance."
[Illustration]
"I know my faith is very feeble and my prayers are unworthy," sighed
Miss Skipworth, "but I do try to believe. Still, I cannot help envying
the Prophet's servant who _saw_ the horses and the chariots fighting on
his side. I wish we could _see_ the angel hosts fighting for us. I do so
wish that we had appearances of that kind nowadays: it would make faith
so much easier and life altogether so much more beautiful."
[Illustration]
"But it would not be in accordance with God's teaching in these later
times. Such assistance to faith as the appearance of saints and angels
would not be at all in accordance with our modern religious thought, and
I am sure that the Almighty would not permit it," said Mrs. Veale.
"I am not so sure of that," retorted Mrs. Batterby. "I think that
visions of angels are granted to-day to those that have eyes to see
them, just as they were in Old Testament times."
"Oh! Mrs. Batterby," exclaimed Matilda in excitement, "do you really
believe that?"
"I do. But I don't believe that the angels appear as you would expect
them, Matilda--all got up in harps and crowns and flaming swords. I
believe that when they come nowadays they look so commonplace and what
you might call ordinary-looking, that only those folks that have the eye
of faith can perceive them at all. They can _see_ them all right, mind
you! But they can't recognise them as the angels of God."
"How I should like to see somebody who had actually seen an angel!"
sighed Miss Skipworth.
"Did you ever come across any one who had enjoyed such an experience,
Mrs. Batterby?" asked Mrs. Veale in a sceptical tone.
"Yes, I did, Mrs. Veale--that is, if you can say that you ever came
across yourself."
"Oh, how interesting!--how very interesting!" cried Miss Skipworth. "But
you don't look at all the sort of person that would see angels and
spirits."
Mrs. Batterby took the last remark as a compliment; as indeed it was
intended. "That's just my point, Matilda. The real angels don't look
like the Scripture-picture sort of angels; and they don't appear to the
high-flown, star-gazing sort of people who are always looking for them."
"Do tell us what you saw, Mrs. Batterby," besought the emotional
Matilda.
"And also what calamity it foretold," added Mrs. Windybank. "I always
believe that supernatural appearances precede some terrible misfortune."
"Well, my experience, or whatever you call it, happened five-and-thirty
years ago, and no calamity has happened to me since. On the contrary, it
taught me that no calamity _could_ happen to me as long as I lay safe in
my Heavenly Father's Hand. That's just the lesson that I learnt from
it."
"Do tell us the story," urged Miss Skipworth.
"I will, Matilda, if you'll get on with your bed-jacket, and not leave
off your sewing whenever anybody speaks, as if your hearing lay in your
fingers, and you couldn't sew and listen at the same time.
"Well, when I was a young woman I lived with an aunt in Merchester who
kept a stationer's shop; and every Sunday I used to walk over to see my
mother who lived at a village about three miles off, she being a widow
and keeping the post-office there and my two little sisters as well.
"It was one Sunday in September--one of those deceitful sort of days
that look like summer, and then take you all of a heap by getting dark
before you can say _Jack Robinson_--and I had been spending the day with
my mother as usual; I stayed for the evening service, it being the
Sunday-school Anniversary and a special preacher for the occasion; quite
a young man, but one of the finest preachers I ever heard. Though it was
five-and-thirty years ago, I remember that sermon as if I'd heard it
last Sunday."
"What was it about?" asked Mrs. Windybank. "For my part, I always enjoy
funeral-sermons the most; but I've heard some very sweet ones in times
of war, and on the last Sundays in the Old Year."
"It was on the very subject that Matilda was speaking about--in fact, it
was her conversation that recalled the whole incident to my mind. The
text was, 'Jacob went on his way, and the angels of God met him'; and
the preacher said--what I've just being saying to you--that the angels
of God meet us far oftener than we think; only we are so busy looking
out for them to come in our own particular way that we don't recognise
them. Unless they are in their flowing robes with their harps and halos
and fiery swords, we don't know that they are angels at all: which is
just as stupid of us as if we didn't believe we'd seen the Queen, unless
we'd seen her with her crown on. I remember that this impressed us very
much: Queen Victoria had just been to Merchester to lay the
foundation-stone of some public building or other (I forget what), and
we had all cried at seeing her in a widow's bonnet; it seemed to make
her so much more real and human than if she'd had her crown on. I'm sure
that black bonnet brought her nearer to our hearts than all the Crown
Jewels out of the Tower of London could have done; and taught us to love
and reverence her as a woman as well as obey and serve her as a Queen.
And so, as the young minister said, it ought to be with the angels;
because when the Lord came among us, He came as One of ourselves, and
led us by the paths that we were used to.
"Well, the sermon was so grand, and the hymn after the sermon so
beautiful--I remember it was a six-lines-eight, sung to the tune called
_Stella_, and mother and I swayed to it till we kept bumping against
each other--that by the time we got out of chapel it was quite dark--so
dark that mother didn't like the idea of my walking to Merchester alone,
as it was three miles at the least, and along a very lonely road. But
there was nobody to go with me, and I was bound to get back to aunt's
that night, for some special reason that I forget now; so--like it or
not like it--I had to go, though I was very timid."
"Oh, how dreadful! I should have been terrified," groaned Miss
Skipworth. "I don't wonder that you were frightened."
"I shouldn't have minded if I'd been your age, Matilda: surely a woman
of five-and-forty is old enough to go anywhere by herself! But I was
only eighteen, and that makes all the difference."
Matilda returned a soft answer--or, to be more accurate, a soft
question.
"Then did you venture, Mrs. Batterby?"
[Illustration]
"Of course I did: there was nothing else to do; and I didn't want mother
to know I was frightened for fear of worrying her. But I didn't like it,
I can tell you; and I started with my heart in my mouth, ready to jump
at my own shadow. And then it came into my mind (I remember it as if it
had happened last night) that I was a poor sort of Christian to enjoy a
sermon and then make no sort of effort to put it into practice; in fact,
that I was only a hearer of the Word, and not a doer, letting God's
message go in at one ear and out at the other, leaving nothing behind
it. So I set to to pray that as I went on my way the angels of God might
meet me, as they met Jacob, and save me from all harm. And what with the
excitement of the sermon, and my own fears, and the darkness of the
road, I got worked up to such a pitch that I shouldn't have been
surprised if a white-robed angel with shining wings had flown over the
hedge and perched beside me."
"Which, of course, no angel did," interrupted Mrs. Veale.
"That is as may be," retorted Mrs. Batterby darkly. "In the middle of my
prayer I heard a rustle in the hedge on the side of the road, which, of
course, I thought was a thief lying in wait to waylay me and murder me,
and I prayed harder and harder. But then, in the fading light, I
perceived that it was no thief, but a huge yellow collie dog, such as
they have for minding sheep."
"Oh dear!" said Miss Skipworth; "I should have been as much afraid of a
strange dog as of a strange man, if I'd been you."
"Fortunately, however, you weren't me, nor ever likely to be, which
seems fortunate for all parties concerned," replied her hostess dryly.
"And as for being afraid of a dog--why! I'd been accustomed to dogs from
a child, though I'm not the one to deny that collies are uncertain in
temper and apt to snap at strangers unawares. So I spoke kindly to this
one, in case it should take me for a thief come after its master's
sheep; though where the sheep were I hadn't a notion, there being
nothing but cornfields ready for cutting on both sides of the road, the
harvest being very late that year."
"It was rather foolish, to my thinking, to speak to it at all," remarked
Mrs. Windybank. "I had a friend once who spoke to a strange collie; and
it bit her thimble finger so badly that she was never able to sew
properly again."
"Then she must have said the wrong thing to it," replied Mrs. Batterby;
"and it served her right. I know when folks say the wrong thing to me,
I'd give anything to be able to bite their thimble finger, and dogs feel
the same as we do. But to get on with my story. The dog came up to me
quite friendly-like, and didn't attempt to snap or anything; but though
it came close to me, it wouldn't let me touch or pet it. It shied away
the moment I put out my hand to fondle it. So--being accustomed to dogs
and their ways--I treated it as it evidently wished to be treated, and
just talked to it pleasantly as it trotted along by my side."
[Illustration: "For my part, I believe it was one of the angels of
God"]
"Then it followed you?" asked Miss Skipworth.
"Yes; all the way to Merchester, just as if it had been my own dog. When
there was nobody in sight, it ran backwards and forwards and scampered
about by itself; but whenever we met anybody--and we met some
nasty-looking tramps, I can tell you, that I should have been terrified
to meet alone--it came close to me, looking that big and fierce that the
tramps kept well to the other side of the road, as far away from us as
they could; and it stalked by me till they were out of sight, as is the
way of collies when they scent danger ahead. I can't tell you how
delighted I was to have found such a splendid pet; and I made up my mind
to take it home with me and keep it, unless some one claimed it; as aunt
and I had long wanted a house-dog to take care of the shop at nights.
And, besides, I thought it would be such a nice companion for me on all
the long country-walks which I was so fond of taking out of shop-hours."
"And did any one ever come and claim it?" asked Miss Skipworth with
breathless interest.
"No; never. It followed me all the way to Merchester, wagging its tail
whenever I spoke to it, and looking up at me with its soft brown eyes as
friendly as never was; but it never let me touch it, though I tried to
pat it once or twice."
"And you took it home with you, the dear creature?"
Mrs. Batterby shook her head. "It followed me right into Merchester; but
when I was safe in the town among all the gas-lamps and the people and
the traffic, it turned round and scampered back along the road by which
we had come. I whistled to it to come back, but it took no notice; and
the last I saw of it was its yellow coat disappearing into the
darkness."
Miss Skipworth gave a deep sigh. "And you never saw it again?"
"Never."
"And you never found out who it belonged to?"
A look came into Mrs. Batterby's eyes that was new to Miss Skipworth. "I
wouldn't say that. As a matter of fact, I believe I did find out Who it
belonged to."
"I suppose it was the sheep-dog of one of the neighbouring farmers,"
suggested Mrs. Veale.
"Some might suppose so; but I don't," replied Mrs. Batterby, still with
that wonderful smile in her sharp grey eyes. "For my part, I believe it
was one of the angels of God."
[Illustration]
A MODEL SOLDIER[1]
[Illustration]
BY CHARLES GARVICE
_Author of "Nance," etc._
_Drawings by_ J. H. HARTLEY
KITTY came into the studio and, dropping on to a stool, said, as she
drew the pins from her hat:
"Dad, I've had an adventure."
She made the assertion with seeming gravity, but her father glanced at
her dancing eyes with a mixture of interest and a suspicion of being
spoofed; for past experiences of his light-hearted, mischief-loving
daughter had taught him to be wary; so he said nothing, but continued to
chalk in the rough sketch on the easel.
"Behold in me a heroine of romance!" said Kitty, striking an attitude
and regarding the toes of her dainty boots with her head on one side;
and her father, as he glanced at her again, noted vaguely her pose and
expression for future use; for Kitty served frequently as a model, and
her pretty face and svelte figure had appeared in numerous magazines as
the heroine of all sorts of stories.
"Father, I have saved a fellow creature's life," she went on. "Told in
the language of popular fiction it would run thus: 'A young girl of
pleasing appearance was seen going down one of our leading
thoroughfares. She was of meek and modest demeanour----'"
"I thought you said the adventure happened to you, Kitty," said Mr.
Thorold.
"'The road was crowded with the carriages and motor-cars of the wealthy
and noble,'" continued Kitty, disregarding the mild sarcasm; "'the young
girl, lost "in maiden meditation, fancy-free," was startled suddenly by
a cry of anguished terror. Raising her downcast eyes, she saw a pretty
young thing running across the road right in front of an approaching
motor-car, from the occupant of which, a lady of mature age and buxom
form, the cry had arisen. Without a thought of her own fair young life,
the maiden rushed forward, seized the young thing in her arms and
carried it in safety to the pavement. The magnificent 2,000-h.p.
motor-car pulled up beside her, and the richly dressed lady, with a gasp
of relief and admiration, expressed her appreciation of the young girl's
heroism, demanded her name and address, and, handing her a card, desired
the rescuer to call. The heroine, murmuring something inaudible, blushed
sweetly and, making her way through the small but loudly cheering crowd
which had collected, modestly disappeared.'"
[Illustration]
"All very well," grumbled Mr. Thorold; "but you'll be brought home on a
stretcher some day, Kit. You're too venturesome by far. What became of
the child?"
"Oh, it wasn't a child; it was a collie pup."
"I thought you said 'fellow-creature,'" remarked her father plaintively.
"All dogs are my fellow-creatures," declared Kitty simply.
"I am a credulous as well as a sinfully indulgent parent," said Mr.
Thorold, stepping back to view his sketch; "but I don't believe a word
of your story."
"'Documentary evidence was instantly forthcoming,'" retorted Kitty,
extending a tiny paw with a card inserted delicately between her
fingers.
Her father took it, read aloud: "Lady Hawborough, 209, Belgrave Square,"
and then emitted a low whistle.
"My word, Kitty, you've gone and done it!" he said. "If this is _the_
Lady Hawborough--and Nature, with all her audacity, cannot have made two
of them--you've run up against a celebrity of the deepest dye."
"Oh?" said Kitty. "Never heard of her. What's she celebrated for?"
"For good works--which means, in most cases, a disposition and a
capacity for interfering in the affairs of other people. And her
ladyship is one of the biggest and most incorrigible interferers in this
crank of a world of ours. She is immensely rich; she is also 'powerful,'
as the novelists say; she is a tyrant to her relations, a terror to her
friends, and a well-meaning, charitable bugbear to the world in
general."
"Oh!" said Kitty, somewhat dismayed. "But how is it you are so
intimately acquainted with the history and characteristics of this lady
of lofty rank and goodly oof?"
"My dear Kitty, 'oof' is not nearly such a good word as 'wealth.'"
[Illustration: The Ant Lion
_Painted for
Princess Mary's Gift Book
by E. J. Detmold_]
"Maybe, but it's easier to pronounce," retorted Kitty.
"Oh, I don't know," said Mr. Thorold, as if he were weary of the
subject. "Heard some one at the Club talking about her; seen her name in
the papers. Take my advice and don't call. She'll enlist you in one of
her gangs of workers, hustle you into a hospital as a nurse, make you
into a district visitor, or turn you a lecturer on vegetarianism or some
other fad."
[Illustration]
"Oh no, she won't," said Kitty, with sublime confidence; "not that I
should object to being a nurse--that is, if I hadn't already to look
after an aged and infirm parent. Yes; much as I value your advice, Dad,
I think I'll call. I'll go to-morrow; and if I come back, say, in a
Salvation Army kit, and banging a tambourine--and, mind you! I might do
worse: I've a whole-hearted admiration for the S.A. and the uniform is
distinctly fetching--you can indulge in the exquisite pleasure of
exclaiming, 'I told you so!' What are you on this morning, Dad?" she
asked, going to him, putting her arm round his neck, and giving him a
little hug.
"Sketch for an illustration for the _Long Acre Magazine_," he said, with
a kind of resignation; for your most gifted artist has to do pot-boilers
nowadays: and generally he does them well.
"The girl's all right, anyhow," said Kitty. "Where's the man?"
"Oh, I'm going to stick him in directly," said Mr. Thorold. "He's to be
a soldier, and I've got a young fellow coming as a model presently. Ran
against him in a rather extraordinary way. He called on me yesterday
with an introduction from Bloxham: said he had never sat as model
before; but that he was hard up, and would do his best. Fine young
fellow, and a nice taking sort of chap altogether."
"Burglar in disguise, coming to inspect the premises, no doubt,"
surmised Kitty cheerfully.
"Well, he's welcome to anything he takes a fancy to," remarked Mr.
Thorold.
"Oh, well!" she said. "I'm off to consult Selinar-Ann as to whether it's
to be bread-and-butter pudding or a baked roly-poly; expect me back, or
what remains of me, in an hour."
Carefully rumpling her father's already disordered hair, she screwed up
his patient face between her hands, kissed him and ran out, singing as
she went.
In less than an hour she re-entered the studio, still singing; but the
song snapped off suddenly, and she stood just within the doorway,
staring with wide-open eyes at a young soldier in khaki who stood on the
model's dais, one arm in a sling, the other extended with a sword in the
hand, in the kind of attitude beloved by the populace, and forming the
picture which bears inevitably the legend, "Charge!"
[Illustration]
The young man turned his eyes--he dared not move anything else--and, at
sight of the stricken maiden, his tanned face grew the colour of a
healthy beetroot.
"Getting on famously, Kit," remarked Mr. Thorold in a preoccupied
manner. "Arm a little higher, if you please, Captain----Pardon, didn't
catch your name."
"Barnard," said the model, in a small voice quite inconsistent with his
fine and manly proportions.
"Ah, thank you! Could you--er--put on something of a scowl? You're
wounded, you know, and you're leading a forlorn hope, or something of
the sort."
The young man's good-looking face assumed as much of a scowl as it was
capable of doing, and Mr. Thorold dashed it on the paper.
"Capital! Now you can rest a minute. I've got to go and get some more
ochre. Perhaps you'd like a drink?"
"Thank you; I should," confessed the young man, with a slight huskiness.
"All right; I'll bring it," said Mr. Thorold; and, as he was leaving the
room, he said over his shoulder, "My daughter; Captain Barnard."
Kitty closed the door carefully; then, seating herself on the divan, she
rested her chin in her hand and, regarding the young man severely, she
demanded sternly:
"Perhaps you'll be kind enough to inform me of the--the meaning of
this?"
He had seated himself on the edge of the dais and was wiping his face,
as if he were just going through a dangerous action, with the enemy
pressing on all sides.
"I beg your pardon?" he faltered, with meekness in his voice, mien, and
eye.
"I asked you why you are masquerading here?" she said, uncompromisingly.
"Well, come to that, I'm not masquerading. This is my own kit; I'm a
soldier, as you know. This is a genuine wound, not a fake; and I'm
really hard up: had a run of bad luck lately. No harm in earning an
honest shilling."
"But why come to my father, this particular studio, to earn it?"
demanded Kitty, cutting short his feeble attempts at plausible
explanation.
"Oh, well," he replied desperately: "you see, when I met you at the
Thomsons' the other night, and asked you if I might have the honour of
calling on you, you said that your father was a very busy man and that
you yourself had no time for receiving visitors."
[Illustration]
"Well?" demanded Kitty, as icily as before.
"Well," he resumed, looking down and then up at her, as if he could not
keep his eyes from her face, stern and almost ferocious as it was,
"well, I asked the Thomsons who your father was, and when they told me,
I thought--I thought----Well, don't you know, it seemed to me that he
might want a model. War pictures are all the go now, aren't they? And
so----" He broke down, made a little gesture with his unwounded arm, and
blurted out, "Of course you know why I've come. I wanted to see you
again. I told you so the other night; like my cheek, of course, but--I
don't know how it is--I feel as if I'd _got_ to see you, to know you.
Look here, Miss Kitty--I beg your pardon, all the Thomsons call you
that--I hope you won't mind my saying that I've fallen in love with
you?"
"Excuse me; I mind it very much," Kitty informed him with distressing
promptitude; but her eyes wavered and the colour came into her face and
made it, in the unfortunate young man's opinion, more maddeningly
fascinating than ever.
"Oh, well, I'm sorry," he said, but without much penitence in his tone;
"but the truth should always be told, shouldn't it? And it is the
truth."
"Is it?" queried Kitty. "You've seen me only once before, and then only
for an hour or two."
"Two hours and three-quarters," he said, as if he were a stickler for
accuracy; "and I fell in love with you after the first quarter of an
hour. That being the case--as it certainly is--what was I to do? I shall
have to go back to the regiment as soon as this old arm of mine is
right; and it's getting right quickly; and I felt that I couldn't go
without at any rate telling you what--what was the matter with me."
"You speak as if--as if love were a disease," said Kitty, with an
attempt at mockery which was an abject failure.
"So it is," he declared, "and I've got it bad--very bad indeed. I'll ask
you to believe me, Miss Kitty--I mean Miss Thorold--that I haven't had
you out of my mind for one moment since we parted."
"It's a pity you haven't something better to think of," said Kitty.
"There I disagree with you," observed the young man stoutly. "I couldn't
have anything better to think of, and I don't want to. I shall think of
you for the rest of my natural life. One moment, Miss Kitty, before you
refuse me. I ought to tell you that I'm a poor young captain, in a
marching regiment, with no prospects."
"The allurement is irresistible----" began Kitty, with admirable
gravity.
"I'm delighted to hear it," he said. "So you accept me?"
"The politeness of a soldier should have compelled you to hear me out. I
was going to add, that it would be irresistible if I were in love with
you; but----"