A Prince of Sinners

by E. Phillips Oppenheim

There was an intense and breathless silence. This was an assembly amongst whom excitement was a very rare visitant. But there were many there now who sat still and spellbound with eyes riveted upon the speaker. To those who were personally acquainted with him a certain change in his appearance was manifest. A spot of colour flared in his pale cheeks. There was a light in his eyes which no one had ever seen there before. After years of self-repression, of a cynicism partly artificial, partly inevitable, the natural man had broken out once more, stung into life by time smooth platitudes of the great churchman against whom his attack was directed. He was reckless of time fact that Lady Caroom, Brooks, and many of his acquaintances were in the Strangers' Gallery. For the motion before the House was one to obtain legal and ecclesiastical control over all independent charities appealing to the general public for support, under cover of which the Church, in the person of the Bishop of Beeston, had made a solemn and deliberate attack upon Brooks' Society, Brooks himself, its aims and management.

As the words fell, deliberately, yet without hesitation, from his lips, vivid, scathing, forceful, there was not one there but knew that this man spoke of the things which he had felt. The facts he marshalled before them were appalling, but not a soul doubted them. It was truth which he hurled at them, truth before which the Bishop sat back in his seat and felt his cheeks grow paler and his eyes more full of trouble. A great deal of it they had heard before, but never like this—never had it been driven home into their conscience so that doubt or evasion was impossible. And this man, who was he? They rubbed their eyes and wondered. Ninth Marquis of Arranmore, owner of great estates, dilettante, sportsman, cynic, latter-day sinner—or an apostle touched with fire from Heaven to open men's eyes, gifted for a few brief minutes with the tongue of a saintly Demosthenes. Those who knew him gaped like children and wondered. And all the time his words stung them like drops of burning rain.

"This," he concluded at last, "is the Hell which burns for ever under this great city, and it is such men as his lordship the Bishop of Beeston who can come here and speak of their agony in well-rounded periods and congratulate you and himself upon the increasing number of communicants in the East End—who stands in the market-place of the world with stones for starving people. But I, who have been down amongst those fires, I, who know, can tell you this: Not all the churches of Christ, not all the religious societies ever founded, not all the combined labours of all the missionaries who ever breathed, will quench or even abate those flames until they go to their labours in the name of humanity alone, and free themselves utterly from all the cursed restrictions and stipulations of their pet creed. Starving men will mock at the mention of a God of Justice, men who are in torture body and soul are scarcely likely to respond to the teachings of a God of Love. Save the bodies of this generation, and the souls of the next may be within your reach."

They thought then that he had finished. He paused for an unusually long time. When he spoke again he seemed to have wholly regained his usual composure. The note of passion had passed from his tone. His cheeks were once more of waxen pallor. The deliberately-chosen words fell with a chill sarcasm from his lips.

"His lordship the Bishop of Beeston," he said, "has also thought fit, on the authority, I presume, of Mr. Lavilette and his friends, to make slighting reference to the accounts of the Society in question. As one of the largest subscribers to that Society, may I be allowed to set at rest his anxieties? Before many days the accounts from its very earliest days, which have all the time been in the hands of an eminent firm of accountants, will be placed before the general public. In the meantime let me tell you this. I am willing to sign every page of them. I pledge my word to their absolute correctness. The author of this movement has from the first, according to my certain knowledge, devoted a considerable part of his own income to the work. If others who are in the enjoyment of a princely stipend for their religious labours"—he looked hard at the bishop—"were to imitate this course of action, I imagine that there are a good many charitable institutions which would not now be begging for donations to keep them alive."

He sat down without peroration, and almost immediately afterwards left the House. The first reading of the bishop's Bill was lost by a large majority.

Arranmore sat by himself in his study, and his face was white and drawn. A cigarette which he had lit on entering the room had burnt out between his fingers. This sudden upheaval of the past, coming upon him with a certain spasmodic unexpectedness, had shaken his nerves. He had not believed himself capable of anything of the sort. The unusual excitement was upon him still. All sorts of memories and fancies long ago buried, thronged in upon him. So he sat there and suffered, striving in vain to crush them, whilst faces mocked him from the shadows, and familiar voices rang strangely in his ears. He scarcely heard the softly-opened door. The light footsteps and the rustling of skirts had their place amongst the throng of torturing memories. But his eyes—surely his eyes could not mock him. He started to his feet.

"Catherine!"

She did not speak at once, but all sorts of things were in her eyes. He ground his teeth together, and made one effort to remain his old self.

"You have come to offer—your sympathy. How delightful of you. The bishop got on my nerves, you know, and I really am not answerable for what I said. Catherine!"