They were out in the quiet back street, and the young man was swaying as if he would fall. He felt an arm pass through his, and heard the deep, vibrating voice of the Teacher speaking.
"Come swiftly with me, for we have to meet a great company of people in another place, and to witness the marvellous ways of God."
CHAPTER XVI
THE BATTLE OF THE LORD
Among the audience, or rather the congregation, which had assembled to hear Joseph in St. Elwyn's Church, all those people who were intimately connected with him had been present.
It had been arranged beforehand, although Mr. Persse had known nothing of it, that Joseph's followers, Sir Augustus and Lady Kirwan, Marjorie, and Mary, accompanied by Sir Thomas Ducaine and Hampson, the journalist, should all have seats reserved for them by ticket in the church.
Accordingly they had all been there. After the Teacher's solemn exhortation to private prayer, the whole congregation had awoke as if from a dream. The influence, the magnetic influence of Joseph's presence, was removed. Every one sat up in their places with grave and tired eyes, wearing the aspect of people who had come back to life after a sojourn in that strange country of the soul which lies between this world and the next.
The vicar, very pale and agitated, had descended from the chancel in his surplice and biretta, and had gone among the people, whispering here and there, frowning, faintly smiling, and only too obviously upset and frightened in body, mind, and spirit.
Over all the great congregation of wealthy and fashionable people there had lain that same manner of uneasiness, that hidden influence of fear. After a few minutes the majority of them rose and went silently from the church. As they walked down the broad and lighted aisle it was obvious enough, both in their walk and in their faces, that they were trying to call back their self-respect and that mental attitude which ruled their lives, and was but an insolent defiance of all claims upon conduct, save only the imperial insistence of their own self-will.