CHAPTER IV
A VISIT
The Special Teachers' Meeting to which Willie Price had referred was one of the final preliminaries to a Revival—that is, a revival of godliness and Christian grace—about to be undertaken by the Wesleyan Methodist Society in Bursley. Its object was to arrange for a personal visitation of the parents of Sunday-school scholars in their homes. Hitherto Anna had felt but little interest in the Revival: it had several times been brought indirectly before her notice, but she had regarded it as a phenomenon which recurred at intervals in the cycle of religious activity, and as not in any way affecting herself. The gradual centring of public interest, however—that mysterious movement which, defying analysis, gathers force as it proceeds, and ends by coercing the most indifferent—had already modified her attitude towards this forthcoming event. It got about that the preacher who had been engaged, a specialist in revivals, was a man of miraculous powers: the number of souls which he had snatched from eternal torment was precisely stated, and it amounted to tens of thousands. He played the cornet to the glory of God, and his cornet was of silver: his more distant past had been ineffably wicked, and the faint rumour of that dead wickedness clung to his name like a piquant odour. As Anna walked up Trafalgar Road from Price's she observed that the hoardings had been billed with great posters announcing the Revival and the revivalist, who was to commence his work on Friday night.
During tea Mr. Tellwright interrupted his perusal of the evening 'Signal' to give utterance to a rather remarkable speech.
'Bless us!' he said. 'Th' old trumpeter 'll turn the town upside down!'
'Do you mean the revivalist, father?' Anna asked.
'Ay!'
'He's a beautiful man,' Agnes exclaimed with enthusiasm. 'Our teacher showed us his portrait after school this afternoon. I never saw such a beautiful man.'
Her father gazed hard at the child for an instant, cup in hand, and then turned to Anna with a slightly sardonic air.
'What are you doing i' this Revival, Anna?'