“I ask to be allowed to work at the other extreme of our social life,” said a young man, “and be on the Children’s Play Committee. We ought to have every child of the parish in one or other of our Sunday-schools. There are some who are not, but I think we shall find no difficulty in getting every child into our play-places. First of all, we must see that they have good times; and, secondly, we must, while giving them the utmost liberty, endeavour to influence them. And we must not rest until we get all our lads enrolled among the Boy Crusaders.”
In this way, and others, the idea of brotherly kindness was spreading; indeed, there was scarcely a church or chapel in connection with which there was not some new activity; and, what was better still, that New Year’s Day was, by common consent, devoted to self-examination on the part of those who professed to be the servants and followers of Jesus Christ; and not only where men and women were assembled together, but in the quietude of their own rooms thousands were asking and answering, as in the presence of God, the question which had haunted Dr. Stapleton, “Am I a Christian?”
For the Doctor himself the answer had been found by many people in Scourby, who had decided in the negative. He was so woefully altered, he looked so miserable and ill, he had aged so greatly in a few months, he was so utterly unlike his former self, that, forgetful of the charity which thinketh no evil, some who had been his friends had convinced themselves that only a guilty conscience could account for the change in him, and had treated him accordingly.
Quite how the scandal grew no one could tell; but Stapleton had the bitterness of knowing himself entirely unpopular and disregarded. Ladies passed him in the public ways without recognition. Men, if they saw him coming, turned into side streets; and things came to such a pass with him that at last he wondered if he had a real and staunch friend left in the town where, less than a year ago, he could have counted them by hundreds.
The people of Scourby were feeling bad-tempered with everything and every one, because they considered themselves disgraced. The example set by the town had been followed in other places, and Mr. Richard Lavender had three men likeminded with himself to keep him in countenance, since they also had been sent to Westminster, not as either Conservatives or Liberals, but, as they themselves said, as Anarchists, and in opposition to Religion and Respectability.
These four men unwittingly did more for their country than they intended.
At Scourby there was much bickering between Churchmen and Dissenters, who each blamed the other for what had happened. But they were united in declaring that something must be done, so that at the next general election that which was intolerable to them should be avoided.
Mr. Whitwell came to the rescue. It occurred to him that this might be an opportunity for a common ground of meeting between all sections of the Church of Scourby. He, therefore, called on the Nonconformist ministers and the clergymen, and succeeded in getting from them a promise that for once they would sink their differences, and meet together in the interests of the town. What he had to go through that day, what arguments he found it necessary to use before he could accomplish his object, he never told any one; but his favourite daughter guessed it when he threw himself into a chair on his return, and said, “Tom, play me something soothing, for I have never had such a day’s work in my life.”
Tom was an excellent musician, and knew well what her father liked, so she gave him one exquisite strain after another until at last he was ready to talk. “The ministers of Scourby,” he said, “have agreed to call their people together to consider the present crisis, and to suggest plans. First of all they are to have a meeting among themselves. The vicar of the parish church wanted it in his schoolroom, but the Congregational minister objected; he said his people would not go to the church school, they would not trust the vicar enough for that, and he suggested his own schoolroom. The vicar did not think his people would go there, and eventually it was settled to have the preliminary meeting here, so you and I are to drive into Scourby to-morrow, and fetch them all to luncheon.”
“Hornby Hall is acknowledged to be neutral ground, then? How glad I am. Will the parsons let me be present at the meeting?”