The congregation was soon seated—a hardy race, reared on the hills, and disciplined in the straitest of creeds. Stolid and self-complacent, theirs was an unquestioning faith, accepting, as they did, the Divine decrees as a Mohamedan accepts his fate. What was, was right—all as it should be; elect, or non-elect, according to the fore-knowledge, it was well. Sucking in their theology with their mothers' milk, and cradled in sectarian traditions, they loved justice before mercy, and seldom walked humbly before God. And yet these Rehoboth mothers had borne and reared a strong offspring—children hard, narrow, and self-righteous, yet of firm fibre, and of real grit withal.
The mothers of Rehoboth were famous women, and bore the names of the great Hebrew women of old. Among them were Leahs, Hannahs, Hagars, and Ruths, yet none held priority to Deborah Heap, the mother of Matt. Tall, gaunt, iron-visaged, with crisp, black locks despite her threescore years, she was a prophetess among her kindred—mighty in the Scriptures, and inflexible in faith.
Hers was the illustrious face of that afternoon's congregation—the face a stranger would first fasten his eye on, and on which his eye would remain; a face, too, he would fear. History was writ large on every line, character had set its seal there, and a crown of superb strength reposed on the brow. She guarded the door of her pew, which door she had guarded since her husband's death; and her deep-set eyes, glowing with suppressed passion, never flinched in their gaze at the preacher. Now and again the thin nostrils dilated as Mr. Penrose smote down some of her idols; but for this occasional sign her martyrdom was mute and inexpressive.
No one loved Deborah Heap, although those who knew her measured out to her degrees of respect. She was never known to wrong friend or foe; and yet no kindly words ever fell from her lips, nor did music of sympathy mellow her voice. Her life had been unrelieved by a single deed of charity. She was, in old Mr. Morell's language, ‘a negative saint.’ Mr. Penrose went further, and called her ‘a Calvinistic pagan.’ But none of these things moved her.
The grievance of her life was Matt's marriage with an alien; for Miriam was a child of the Established Church. Great, too, was the grievance that no children gladdened the hearth of the unequally yoked couple; and this the old woman looked on as the curse of the Almighty in return for her son's disobedience in sharing his lot with the uncovenanted.
And yet Matt loved his mother; not, however, as he loved his wife, for whom he held a tender, doating love, which the old woman was quick to see, though silent to resent, save when she said that ‘Matt were fair soft o'er th' lass.’ Nothing so pleased him as to be able to respect his mother's wish without giving pain to his wife. Always loyal to Miriam, he sought to be dutiful to Deborah, and, though the struggle was at times hard and taxing, few succeeded better in holding a true balance of behaviour between the twin relations of son and husband.
Now that Miriam had confided to him her secret, he felt sure his mother's anger would be somewhat turned away when she, too, shared it. And all through the afternoon service he moved restlessly, eager for the hour when, at her own fireside, he could convey the glad news to her ears.
And when that hour came, it came all too soon, for never were Matt and Miriam more confused than when they faced each other at the tea-table of Deborah. A painful repression was on them; ominous silence sealed their lips, and they flushed with a heightened colour. Matt's carefully-prepared speech forsook him—all its prettiness and poetry escaped beyond recall; and Miriam was too womanly to rescue him in his dilemma.
‘It's some warm,’ said Matt, drawing his handkerchief over his heated brow.