Both the article of Eric Black and that written by the editor of the Sunday Friend finally summed up the difference that the arrival of Joseph in the Modern Babylon had made to existing conditions.
The theatres of the bad sort, which pandered to the lower instincts of those who patronized them, were almost empty. Several of them were closed, "for the production of a new play." A strong agitation was going on in Parliament to make it prohibitive for women to be employed in the drinking saloons and bars of London. In vast areas the preachers of the Brotherhood had reduced the gambling evil among the poorer classes to a most appreciable extent.
The working man was being taught by the direct agency of the Holy Spirit, as manifested in Joseph's followers, and by the inexorable law of quiet logic and common-sense, to turn his attention from the things of to-day and the immediate amusement of the moment, to the future of his soul. The greatest work of all was, perhaps, accomplished in this direction, and it was found that once the ordinary intelligence was convinced of the existence of a future state, the ordinary intelligence saw immediately the necessity for preparing for eternity during this short and finite life.
London, day by day, hour by hour almost, was growing more serious. The churches were filling once more, especially and markedly those in which there was a daily celebration of the Eucharist. A great wave of religious feeling was sweeping over the metropolis. And on all sides the cry of the ignorant and the desirous was heard—
"What shall we do to be saved?"
Some two days after the month which had elapsed since the murder of Sir Augustus, Sir Thomas Ducaine sat in his library, talking earnestly to Hampson the journalist.
Ever since the first night when the two strangely opposite natures had met at the Frivolity Theatre the friendship between the millionaire baronet and the humble journalist had grown and strengthened. Then had come Sir Thomas' conversion to the truth, his public confession of Christ, which had welded the bond of friendship between the two men into something that only death itself could end in this world, but to renew it in the next.
Lady Kirwan had retired to the great family country-house in Hertfordshire, a broken and unhappy woman. She had refused to see Joseph or even Sir Thomas Ducaine again, persisting in her attitude of absolute hostility to the Teacher and all his friends. Marjorie Kirwan had become quietly engaged to the Duke of Dover.
Lady Kirwan—and this was the worst of all—had turned against her niece, Mary Lys. The will of Sir Augustus had come as an enormous surprise to the world. No one had realized how wealthy the financier was, and his testamentary dispositions had startled everybody. Trustees were placed in the possession of a million of money, which was to be handed over to his daughter upon her marriage. Lady Kirwan had a life interest in almost an equal sum. When she died this vast property was to go to her niece, Mary Lys, without any conditions whatever. Two hundred thousand pounds had been left to the influential committee of trustees which now administered the great sums of money which had been given or left to Joseph and his brethren.
The position of Mary was, therefore, a very strange one. She had become one of the greatest heiresses in England, she was engaged to Sir Thomas Ducaine, but nothing would induce her aunt to see her or hold any communication with her. At first the poor girl had thought of returning to the hospital in the East End for a time, but another way had been found out of the difficulty.