He did not care whether the trees stood or fell, whether the cement remained upon the walls or dropped from them; he didn't draw a penny of income from the place, and did not care a damn what became of it. He allowed her to live there, she got her jointure out of the property, and he didn't want to interfere with her, but what he could not stand was the snuffy little folk from the town coming round his house. The Barfields at least were county, and he wished Woodview to remain county as long as the walls held together. He wasn't a bit ashamed of all this ruin. You could receive the Prince of Wales in a ruin, but he wouldn't care to ask him into a dissenting chapel. Mrs. Barfield answered that she didn't see how the mere assembling of a few friends in prayer could disgrace a house. She did not know that he objected to her asking them. She would not ask them any more. The only thing was that there was no place nearer than Beeding where they could meet, and she could no longer walk so far. She would have to give up meeting.
"It seems to me a strange taste to want to kneel down with a lot of little shop-keepers…. Is this where you kneel?" he said, pointing to the long deal table. "The place is a regular little Bethel."
"Our Lord said that when a number should gather together for prayer that He would be among them. Those are true words, and as we get old we feel more and more the want of this communion of spirit. It is only then that we feel that we're really with God…. The folk that you despise are equal in His sight. And living here alone, what should I be without prayer? and Esther, after her life of trouble and strife, what would she be without prayer?… It is our consolation."
"I think one should choose one's company for prayer as for everything else. Besides, what do you get out of it? Miracles don't happen nowadays."
"You're very young, Arthur, and you cannot feel the want of prayer as we do—two old women living in this lonely house. As age and solitude overtake us, the realities of life float away and we become more and more sensible to the mystery which surrounds us. And our Lord Jesus Christ gave us love and prayer so that we might see a little further."
An expression of great beauty came upon her face, that unconscious resignation which, like the twilight, hallows and transforms. In such moments the humblest hearts are at one with nature, and speaks out of the eternal wisdom of things. So even this common racing man was touched, and he said—
"I'm sorry if I said anything to hurt your religious feelings."
Mrs. Barfield did not answer.
"Do you not accept my apologies, mother?"
"My dear boy, what do I care for your apologies; what are they to me? All I think of now is your conversion to Christ. Nothing else matters. I shall always pray for that."