“I pray for that day, Glendyne. I never thought to see it; but I go on my knees many times daily and pray that it may come soon. Some of my people I know will be stedfast; but the contagion attacks the younger ones with an awful swiftness.”
“Collective hysteria. I know. Keep them indoors as much as possible, especially the girls. You can do nothing more.”
“I suppose not. Anyway, I’ll do what I can, if only I can hold out till the end myself. And to think that once I used to imagine that a minister’s life circled round through sermons, prayer-meetings and visiting the sick! Why, I didn’t know the beginnings of it!”
“Don’t worry about the past. I’m speaking as a medico now. Get on with your work and leave the thinking till you have time for it. Eternity’s pretty long, you know.”
“Well, if I take your advice I must be getting back to my work. Good-night, both of you. I’ll see you next week again, perhaps, Glendyne.”
He walked on, leaving us to continue our exploration. Glendyne was silent for some minutes. When at last he spoke, it was in a graver tone than I had heard him use before.
“That’s a splendid chap,” he said, looking back over his shoulder at the tall figure behind us. “I don’t envy him, though. His awakening has been a rude one in this affair. Six months ago he knew absolutely nothing of life. He was earnest and all that; but a perfect child in things of the world. The result was that when the blow came he was absolutely helpless. He fought for a time with the old platitudes—and he fought well, I can tell you, for he has a tremendous personality. But he was out of court from the first. I’ve seen things done under his very eyes without his even noticing what was happening. At last I gave him a few pointers from my own experience; and now he has some vague ideas what the temptations really are and how he can best counter them. And he works like a Trojan. A splendid chap. What a chance he has, if he had only had the knowledge; and how he regrets it now, poor beggar. You know, at the very first, he simply led his people down the slope without knowing it. Worked up their religious emotion, you see, until they were simply gunpowder for the flame. What a mess! And all with the best intentions too.”
It was an extraordinarily long speech from Glendyne; and it gave me some measure of his liking for the clergyman. I gathered that they often met in the course of their work.
By this time we had emerged into Oxford Street. Glendyne was about to cross the road, when suddenly he caught sight of a train of figures, about a hundred and fifty in all, I should say, who were advancing up the middle of the street. Each had his hands on the shoulders of the person in front of him and the procession advanced towards us slowly, whilst I heard again the air with which I had become familiar.
“The Dancers!” muttered Glendyne. “Keep a grip on yourself, now, Flint. No hysteria, if you please.”