A Changed Heart: A Novel

by May Agnes Fleming

It was directly in front of Mr. Blair's, facing the grand altar, and the jealous wife had an excellent chance of watching her husband and his companion.

Paul Wyndham was not a Catholic—he did not pretend to be anything in particular, a favorite creed with his countrymen, I think—but he was a gentleman; so he rose and sat and knelt as the worshipers about him did, and never once turned his back to the altar to stare at the choir.

Mrs. Wyndham, Senior, made no attempt to raise her vail during the whole service. She knelt most of the time with her face lying on the front rail of the pew, as if in prayer—a good deal to the surprise of those who saw her and imagined her not of their faith.

Olive never took her eyes off her—the Sisters of Charity, the swinging censers, the mitred bishop, the robed priests, the solemn ceremonies, the swelling music, were all unheard and unseen—that woman in front absorbed every sense she possessed. Even when the Jesuit mounted to the pulpit, she only gave him one glance, and saw that he was tall and thin and sallow, and not a bit oily and Jesuit-like, and returned to her watching of Mr. Wyndham's mother. That lady seemed to pay attention to the sermon, if her daughter-in-law did not, and a very impressive sermon it was, and one Olive Wyndham would have done well to heed. He took for his text that solemn warning of our Lord, "What will it avail a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" and the hearts of his hearers thrilled within them with wholesome fear as they listened to the discourse which followed. "You are here to-day, but you may be gone to-morrow. O my brethren!" the sonorous voice, which rang from aisle to aisle, like the trump of the last angel, cried; "the riches you are laboring so hard to amass you may never enjoy. The riches for which you toil by day and by night mean nothing if your poor span of existence permits you to accomplish them. Stop and think, oh, worldlings, while time remains. Work while it is yet day, for the night is at hand, and work for the glory which shall last for eternity. The road over which you are walking leads nowhere, but ends abruptly in the yawning grave. The fame for which you suffer and struggle and give up ease and rest, will be when over but a hollow sound, heard for one poor, pitiful moment, ere your ears are stilled in death, and your laurel crown dust and ashes. The great of this world—who made kings their puppets, and the nations of the earth their toys—have lived their brief space and are gone, and what avails them now the glory and the greatness they won? The fame of Shakespeare, of Alexander, of Napoleon of France, of a Byron, and a Milton, and all other great men—great in this life—remains to posterity, but what availed it all to them at the judgment-seat of God. There, at that awful tribunal, where we all must stand, nothing but their good works—if they ever did good works—could soften the rigor of Divine Justice. The world is like an express-train, rushing madly on, with a fathomless precipice at the end; and you laugh and sing on your way to it, consoling yourself with the thought, 'At the last moment I will repent, and all will be well.' But the Divine Justice has answered you beforehand—terribly answered you—'You shall seek me and you shall not find me, and you shall die in your sins!'"

The sermon was a very long one, and a very terrible one, likely to stir the dead souls of the most hardened sinner there. It was noticeable that Mr. Wyndham's mother never lifted her head all the time, but that it lay on the pew-rail, and that she was as immovable as a figure carved in ebony. Olive Wyndham had to listen, and her cheek blanched as she did so. Was this sermon preached for her? Was she bartering her immortal soul for dross, so soon to be taken from her? And then a wild terror took possession of her, and she dared think no longer. She could have put her fingers to her ears to shut out the inexorable voice, thundering awfully to her conscience: "You shall seek me and you shall not find me, and you shall die in your sins." There was a dead silence of dumb fear in the cathedral when the eloquent preacher descended, and very devout were the hearers until the conclusion of mass. Then they poured out, a good deal more subdued than when they had entered, and Olive had to go with the rest. Mr. Wyndham and his mother showed no sign of stirring, nor did they leave their pew until the last straggler of the congregation was gone. The carriage from Rosebush Cottage was waiting outside the gates, and Mr. Wyndham assisted his mother in, and they drove off.

Olive dined at Mr. Blair's that day, and heard them discussing the sermon, and the unexpected appearance of Mr. Wyndham and his mother. Olive said very little—the panic in her soul had not ceased. The shortness of time, the length of eternity—that terrible eternity!—had never been brought so vividly before her before. Was the express-train in which she was flying through life near the end—near that awful chasm where all was blackness and horror? Human things frittered away—earthly troubles, gigantic before, looked puny and insignificant seen in the light of eternity—so soon to begin, never to end! She had been awakened—she never could sleep again the blind, heathenish sleep that had been hers all her life, or woe to her if she could.

Mr. Blake and Miss Blair walked home with her in the hazy September moonlight. They found Mr. Wyndham sitting in one of the basket-chairs in the glass porch, looking up at the moon as seen through the smoke of his cigar, and Olive's inconsistent heart throbbed as if it would break from its prison and fly to him. Oh, if all this miserable acting could end; if he would only love her, and let her love him, she would yield forever the wealth that had never brought her happiness, and be his true and loving wife from henceforth, and try and atone for the sins of the past. She might be a good woman yet, if her life could only be simple and true like other women, and all this miserable secresy at an end. But, though the silken skirt of her rich robe touched him, they could not have been further apart if the wide world divided them. She could have laid her head down on the table there, and wept passionate, scalding tears, so utterly forlorn and wretched and lonely and unloved did she feel. She could not talk—something rose in her throat and choked her—but she listened to Mr. Wyndham telling in his quiet voice how he had persuaded his mother to go out that day to hear the famous preacher, and how he thought it had done her good.

Val and Laura did not stay long, but set out on their moonlit homeward way. Ann Nettleby sat in her own doorway, and Val paused to speak to her.

"No news of Cherrie, yet, Ann?"

Ann made the usual reply, "No," and they walked on, talking of lost Cherrie.