THE CONSPIRATORS
Mr. Andrew Levison, the lessee and part proprietor of the Frivolity
Theatre, sat in his private office, which led out of the foyer, one damp
and foggy afternoon, a fortnight after Joseph's now famous sermon at St.
Elwyn's.
Since that momentous occasion, much water had run under the bridge.
Joseph and his companions had become the question of the hour. What, in
the first instance, had been mere excitement and surmise, was now an
accepted and revolutionary fact. Except by hearsay, London in reality
was divided into two camps--those who were for, and those who were
against the Teacher.
And the hostile party was infinitely greater than the friendly one.
In the first instance, the attitudes of the religious bodies were
extremely varied.
Mr. Persse himself, whose church had become suddenly emptied of its
congregation, and whose personal prestige had suffered an irremediable
injury, headed a most virulent and persistent antagonism.
But the really fine brains and spiritual natures in the Anglican
Church--including those noble men who live the lives of paupers among
paupers, and work like galley-slaves--were much more friendly. They
noticed that the Teacher made no personal assumptions. He did not say
that those whose sins he remitted were cleansed. He baptized none; he
called himself an ambassador, but not a priest of God.
That, in His inscrutable providence, the Father had richly endowed this
man with the Holy Spirit, that he did indeed walk under the direct
guidance of God, seemed to these good men impossible to doubt. They
were, despite the certain restrictions of thought to which their
training and temperament inclined them, ready to believe that because
the advent of one directly inspired by the Holy Ghost in the sense with
which the Apostle Paul was inspired was outside their personal
experience, it was not to be rejected upon that account.
As far as in them lay, in the measure of their opportunities and
possibilities, they held out the welcoming hand.
But, as was inevitable, it was the Free Sects who were in the front of
the Teacher's army--as far as definitely Christian people went.
During the last few days of the fortnight which had intervened between
the present moment and the sermon in St. Elwyn's, Dissent, with the
exception of the Unitarians, had spoken in no uncertain way in favor of
Joseph's mission. They saw, with a singular unanimity, that here was a
deeply spiritual revival of religion upon true evangelical lines. Here
was a greater than Wesley even, a force and a personality which could
not be explained away by any accusations of charlatanism or
self-interest, a man with a personal magnetism, a power over the human
soul, a power even over the material things of life which was verily
without precedent or likeness since the times of the holy apostles
themselves!
That much of his teaching was definitely Catholic in tone, that he sent
people to the true channels of grace--the Sacraments of the Church--did
not alienate them as it might have done in another. It was now known
that in his youth Joseph was a baptized and confirmed member of the
Church of England, that he in no way repudiated it nor stood outside it,
that he constantly received the Blessed Sacrament. But Nonconformity was
not hostile.
The word "miracle," so long derided and discredited by the materialists
and scientists who denied the immanence of God in all things, was now
once more in the air.
The whole of England was awaking to the realization of strange new
happenings. Men who had never thought or spoken of such things before
now talked in low voices, one with the other, of the Holy Ghost. "God is
a Spirit"--once more men said this to each other.
The healing of the verger's son was known to all the world. It was a
fact beyond possibility of doubt, more authenticated and certain, more
easily capable of proof than any of the Roman Catholic wonders of
Lourdes or Treves. The colder analysis of the Anglo-Saxon temperament
had been brought to bear upon the event. Evidence was weighed and
sorted as the impulsive, emotional Latin temperament is incapable of
doing.
And, in the event, even the most sceptical were forced to admit that
there was no doubt at all.
The thing had really happened!
Eric Black had put it upon record. His vivid and powerful description
had touched the heart of the nation. Then it was the turn of the
investigators, and they had been unable to discover a single flaw in the
sequence of cause, operation, and effect.
It was said also, and hinted everywhere, that a certain famous family
had brought an afflicted daughter to the Teacher. Nothing was known
definitely, but the generally believed story was this:--
The Lady Hermione ---- was the third daughter of the Duke of ----. The
family, one of the most famous in the historical annals of England, was
still rich in power and wealth. But it was a physical ruin. Sons and
daughters for the last three generations had been born feeble in brain
and stunted in body.
A mysterious taint was on the ancient house, that Nemesis for past
grandeur that Thackeray has drawn for us in the picture of the Marquis
of Steyne in _Vanity Fair_.
The young and lovely lady had been seized with a mysterious and
incurable disease of the mind. She had disappeared from society. It was
said that her condition was terrible; that at times even the doctors and
nurses who watched over her impenetrable seclusion shrunk back from her
in fear.
It was as though she was possessed of an evil spirit--so the tale had
long been whispered.
And now it was abroad and upon the lips of every one that the poor
living body inhabited by some evil thing had been brought to the
Teacher, and that all was once more well with the maid--the soul
returned, health and simplicity her portion once more.
These things had made a most lasting and powerful impression upon the
public mind. Who Joseph was, what were the reality and extent of his
powers, what was to be the outcome of his mission: these were the
questions of the day, and all the world was asking them.
The non-religious world sneered. The majority in "Christian" England was
also divided in unequal portions. Most people said that Joseph was a
marvellous trickster and cheat--a cheat and impostor such as England had
probably never seen before, but still a rogue of rogues.
But among the last and poorest sections of the London community a very
different opinion obtained.
They didn't know anything about religious matters, they cared still
less. "God" was a word which gave point and freedom to an oath. The
churches were places in which one was adjured to give up even the
miserable pleasures which made life possible to be endured. The Bible
was the little black Book you kissed in the police courts.
But Joseph was a friend.
Great things were going to happen in the congested districts of the
lost. A material Saviour seemed to have risen up. A man who rebuked the
rich and powerful, who poured words of fire upon the tyrant and the
oppressor, had come to London. There was help then! A light was to dawn
in the sky, there was a little patch of hope in the sombre environment
of lost and degraded lives.
Joseph and his brethren were coming to help!
So all London was stirred to its depths.
Vested interests were threatened in innumerable ways, a revolution in
public thought and sentiment was imminent, in some way or other, for all
classes of society; things were going to be changed.
Things were going to be changed.
And, whether it knew it or not, the Modern Babylon was in the throes of
a spiritual revolution.
The Holy Ghost brooded over the waters.
* * * * *
Mr. Andrew Levison sat in his private office at the Frivolity Theatre.
It was a richly furnished and comfortable place.
The walls were decorated with large photographs of the popular actors
and actresses of the day. A heavy Turkey carpet covered the floor, a
great writing-table of carved oak was littered with papers, electric
lights in little silver shells glowed here and there; it was the luxury
of a business room.
Andrew Levison's theatre had remained closed since the night when Joseph
had first appeared in London and denounced the place. The attendance at
many other theatres of the same class was dwindling enormously. It was
exactly as the shrewd Jew had foreseen--the advent of the evangelist
bade fair to ruin, or, at any rate, terribly embarrass, his unscrupulous
enterprises.
He sat in his big arm-chair of green leather and smiled. A light
yellow-colored cigar was between his firm white teeth. He drummed gently
upon the writing-table with fat white fingers. No more happy-looking and
prosperous person, at peace with the world and with himself, could have
been seen anywhere--upon the surface.
It is a great mistake to imagine that the most evil passions of the
heart show themselves in the face. Criminals, with the exception of
those unhappy people who live _continuously_ by crime, are no monsters
in aspect. Your murderer is, as often as not, a mild and
pleasant-looking man. Mr. Levison looked what he was--a good-natured,
shrewd and money-loving Hebrew, no more. Yet, as he sat there, he was
planning murder, and waiting the arrival of an assassin!
It is always thus, though many people have neither sufficient
imagination nor knowledge of life to realize it. A man may be a panderer
like Levison, or a robber like any successful rascal in the City, and
yet he may still be a kind husband and father and a generous friend.
The Son of God, Who hung upon the shameful tree of Calvary, knew this.
"This day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise" was not said idly. Man is
made in God's image, however marred or defaced the Divine imprint may
be.
It is well to remember this sometimes, though it is fatal to allow our
appreciation of its truth to make us kind to sin or tolerant of it. But
may we not hope that no single son or daughter of God is ever entirely
lost?
The theatrical manager's secretary, a pale and tired-looking girl, who
took down his letters in shorthand and typed them upon her machine,
knocked at the door and entered.
"Oh, Miss Campbell, what is it?" Levison said, making a pretence of
looking up from a pile of papers.
"A man has come," the girl said, "who tells me that he is one of the
supers in the last play. There is another man with him, and he says that
he thinks you will see him. His name is Harris, and he states that he is
one of the regular people here."
"Well, that's nothing to do with me," Levison answered. "They ought to
see the stage-manager. He looks after all those things. However, you may
tell them to come in. I suppose they're hard up, and want a shilling or
two? I shan't disappoint them, I dare say."
He smiled, a flashing, good-humored smile of strong white teeth; and the
girl went out, thinking that under a brusque exterior her employer had a
heart of gold, after all.
In a moment or two more the carefully arranged comedy was over, the door
of the office was carefully closed, and two seedy-looking, clean-shaven
men stood in front of Mr. Levison's writing-table.
"This is my pal, Mr. Levison," one of the men said, in a hoarse and
furtive voice.
He spoke softly and in the way of one who shared a confidential secret.
Levison looked the other man up and down with a keen and comprehensive
regard. The fellow was shorter and stouter than his companion. His face
was like a mask. It betrayed nothing whatever, although its obvious
concealment of what lay behind--the real man, in short--was rather
sinister. The light, red-flint eyes kept flickering and shifting from
side to side, and that was the only betrayal of uneasiness apparent.
"What's your name?" Levison said; and then, with a sudden wave of his
hand, he corrected himself. "No, I don't want to know your name, after
all. That matters nothing to me. But what I am going to ask you is just
this: Has Harris explained to you what you are going to be paid to do?"
"'E 'ave, gov'nor," said the man.
"He's told you exactly?"
The fellow nodded, without further waste of words.
"Very well, then," Levison answered--"then there is no need of any
explanations on my part. At the same time, I will say just this: A
certain person has got to be put out of the way. That you already
understand. But there need not necessarily be anything more than that.
An injury that would incapacitate the person we know of, would put him
on the shelf for a long time, would be quite enough."
The man smiled. The whole ghastly immobility of the mask was suddenly
transformed into a hideous and mocking countenance. The tool of the arch
criminal betrayed his superiority to scruple, and in that moment the
hired assassin was contemptuous of the greater scoundrel and the weaker
man.
"As you like, gov'nor," he said, in a low, oily voice. "It's all one to
me and my pals--give you my word. There's lots of ways of putting a cove
through it wivout doin' of 'im entirely like. But the whole thing's just
as easy."
Levison, whose face had suddenly grown very white, made him an impatient
and terrified movement with his hand.
It was one thing to call up one of the foul creeping things of London,
it was quite another to hear hideousness voicing horror in a quiet and
accustomed room.
"I want to hear nothing at all!" he said, in a high-pitched and unsteady
voice. "Don't tell me! Don't tell me! I don't want to know!"
Once more the assassin smiled--dreadfully.
"Very well, gov'nor," he whispered. "That's all O.K. Leave it to me, and
it'll be safe as 'ouses. Day after ter-morrer this 'ere Joseph is going
down into Whitechapel wiv a lot of 'is swell pals. Sort of explanatory
tour, it is. 'E's a-goin' to show them 'ow the pore live. Tike 'em over
the rookeries and preach the Gospel. We'll 'ave lots of chances, and no
one won't know 'oo done it. It's a question of terms, that's all. You're
a gen'leman, you are, sir; and Mr. 'Arris 'ere, an old pal of the boys,
is a gentleman, too. Guv'nor, what are you a-goin' to hoffer?"
Levison's hand trembled as he opened a drawer of the big writing-table.
He withdrew ten sovereigns in gold.
"Take this," he said, "and when the thing is done, I'll give you twenty
more of the same. Harris will give them to you from me. And now, for
God's sake, get out of my sight!"
The last words burst from him in a high, almost feminine note, and as
the two men shuffled away into the fog of the empty foyer, the fat,
white hand of the Jew went up to his throat, clutching at it in sick
hysteria.
"In the name of God, get out of my sight!"
Was there ever a more blasphemous parody and mockery than this? He who
taketh the name of the Lord God in vain--