Then a noisy old lady swooped down upon her, and I drifted away into a
corner, where I tried to look as if I were enjoying myself, and failed.
Later on, feeling it time to go, I sought my friend, and found him
talking to her in a corner. I approached and waited. They were
discussing the latest east-end murder. A drunken woman had been killed
by her husband, a hard-working artizan, who had been maddened by the ruin
of his home.
"Ah," she was saying, "what power a woman has to drag a man down or lift
him up. I never read a case in which a woman is concerned without
thinking of those beautiful lines of yours: 'A good woman's arms round a
man's neck is a lifebelt thrown out to him from heaven.'"
* * * * *
Opinions differed concerning her religion and politics. Said the Low
Church parson: "An earnest Christian woman, sir, of that unostentatious
type that has always been the bulwark of our Church. I am proud to know
that woman, and I am proud to think that poor words of mine have been the
humble instrument to wean that true woman's heart from the frivolities of
fashion, and to fix her thoughts upon higher things. A good Churchwoman,
sir, a good Churchwoman, in the best sense of the word."
Said the pale aristocratic-looking young Abbe to the Comtesse, the light
of old-world enthusiasm shining from his deep-set eyes: "I have great
hopes for our dear friend. She finds it hard to sever the ties of time
and love. We are all weak, but her heart turns towards our mother Church
as a child, though suckled among strangers, yearns after many years for
the bosom that has borne it. We have spoken, and I, even I, may be the
voice in the wilderness leading the lost sheep back to the fold."
Said Sir Harry Bennett, the great Theosophist lecturer, writing to a
friend: "A singularly gifted woman, and a woman evidently thirsting for
the truth. A woman capable of willing her own life. A woman not afraid
of thought and reason, a lover of wisdom. I have talked much with her at
one time or another, and I have found her grasp my meaning with a
quickness of perception quite unusual in my experience; and the arguments
I have let fall, I am convinced, have borne excellent fruit. I look
forward to her becoming, at no very distant date, a valued member of our
little band. Indeed, without betraying confidence, I may almost say I
regard her conversion as an accomplished fact."