“Well, yes, there have been a good many false gods toppled over, and a good many groves of Baal cut down, since the Saxon Kings ruled over the Seven Kingdoms. You don’t want Baal and the rest of them stuck up again, do you, Mr. Kempster?”
“Mr. Ramsay, there are times and seasons when I would to God I could wake up in the morning and find myself a subject of King Egbert. Yes, when I see the rising tide of anarchy—the advancing legions of unbelief—the Upas Tree of sensual science,” said Kempster, slipping airily from metaphor to metaphor, “I would gladly lay hold upon all that was most rigid and uncompromising among the bulwarks of the past. I would belong to the Church of Wolsey and A’Becket. I would lie prostrate before the altar at which St. Augustine was celebrant. I would grovel at the feet of Dunstan.”
“Ah, Mr. Kempster, we can’t go back. That’s the plague of it, for romantic minds like yours. I am afraid we have done with the picturesque in religion and in everything else. We are children of light—or the fierce white light of science and common sense. We may regret the scenic darkness of mediævalism, but we cannot go back to it. The clouds of ignorance and superstition have rolled away, and we stand out in the open, in the searching light of truth. We know what we are, and whom we serve.”
At Mrs. Porter’s invitation they all followed her into the cottage parlour, where the tea-table stood ready, and much more elegantly appointed than that modest board which the curate’s wife was wont to spread for her friends. Here there appeared both old china and old silver, and the tea which Mrs. Porter’s slender white hands dispensed was of as delicate an aroma as that choice Indian pekoe which Theodore occasionally enjoyed in Lady Cheriton’s boudoir.
Mrs. Porter placed herself with her back to the window, but Cuthbert’s keen eyes were able to note every change in her countenance as she listened to the conversation going on round her, or on rare occasions took part in it. He observed that she was curiously silent, and he was of opinion that Theodore’s presence was in some manner painful to her. She addressed him now and then, but with an effort which was evident to those studious eyes of Cuthbert Ramsay’s, though it might escape any less keen observer.
The conversation was of politics and of the outer world for the first ten minutes, and was obviously uninteresting to Mrs. Kempster, who fidgeted with her teaspoon, made several attempts to speak, and had to wait her opportunity, but finally succeeded in engaging Theodore’s attention.
“Have you seen Lady Carmichael lately, Mr. Dalbrook?” she inquired.
“I saw her three days ago.”
“And how did you find her? In better spirits I hope? She hardly ever comes to Cheriton now, and her old friends know very little about her. I am told she has a horror of the place, though she was once so fond of it. Poor thing, it is only natural! You found an improvement in her, I hope?”
“Yes, I saw at least the beginning of improvement,” answered Theodore. “Her child gives a new interest to her life.”