The victories of faith are not only over inward foes: when the ways of a man are pleasing to the Lord, He maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him. Isa, in her gentleness and Christian sympathy, her uprightness, her obedience to the call of duty, had done more to lead her proud, erring heart to repentance than all the sermons which had fallen on the ear of Cora like seed on the trodden wayside. Cora had never realized how far she herself was from being a Christian, till she had seen exemplified in one of her own sex and station what a Christian should be. It was in the hour when Isa felt humiliated, covered with shame for the errors of a brother, that she had forced from proud lips that tribute to her character which was in itself an acknowledgment of inferiority such as no being had ever before wrung from Cora Madden. Isa had won a noble triumph—she had conquered the heart of her foe.
CHAPTER XXV.
There was much excitement in Wildwaste relative to the occurrences of that night. Various rumours spread, with more or less of truth in them, concerning Gaspar Gritton, and the strange way in which he had been discovered lying in a lifeless state in a mysterious vault full of treasure. As Lottie was reinstated in her place, and Cora was convalescent, the services of Mrs. Holdich were no longer required; the steward’s wife—after changing her infected garments—returned to her home, where she was besieged by curious inquirers. Rebekah smiled at the strange exaggerations which had spread around, like widening circles on a lake into which a pebble has been thrown. It was true, she said, that Lottie had performed an important service, had been the means of preserving her master’s life, for which she would be liberally rewarded; but as regarded the vault and its mysterious contents, Rebekah maintained a placid silence. She had a note from Isa to convey to the Castle, in which Arthur and Lina Madden were now residing as the baronet’s guests. The result of that note was, that Holdich appeared that afternoon at Wildwaste Lodge, equipped for a journey to London, part of his equipment being a pair of loaded revolvers. Crowds of workmen and their families thronged before the Lodge, curiously watching the door through which were borne iron boxes, very heavy in proportion to their size, and believed to contain treasures of plate and bullion sufficient to buy up the village. With emotions of intense relief and deep thankfulness Isa watched from the window the departure of the cart for the station, with the sturdy steward seated on one of the boxes within it, keeping faithful watch over his dangerous charge. It was not only because in that lawless part of the country the Lodge would scarcely have been a safe residence when known to contain a treasure, that Isa rejoiced in its departure; it was because she looked on that ill-gotten gold much as our ancestors looked upon the barrels of gunpowder buried in a vault beneath Parliament-house by an insidious and cruel foe. It had been placed there not to enrich, but to destroy; not as a blessing, but a curse;—an enemy hath done this. From the days of Achan unto our own, there is a woe for him who heapeth up riches unrighteously won.
No one from the Lodge appeared at the steward’s cottage on that evening, and he himself was absent on his mission to London; but Edith Lestrange and her guests came from the Castle to attend Mr. Eardley’s closing lecture on the “Triumph over Midian.”
LECTURE VII.—FAITH CROWNED.
The men of Ephraim, as was mentioned at our last meeting, had encountered some of the fugitives of Midian, had slain two of their princes, and brought their heads to Gideon. But the Ephraimites, men of a warlike tribe, were angry at having been appointed but a secondary part; they were indignant at the chief honour, as well as the chief danger, of the struggle having been assigned to Gideon’s three hundred heroes.