Then from this intimity, this sacredness of feeling, the speaker passed gradually and finally into the challenge, the ringing yet brotherly challenge, it was in truth his mission to deliver. The note of battle—honourable, inevitable battle—pealed through the church, and when it ceased the immense congregation rose, possessed by one heat of emotion, and choir and multitude broke into the magnificent Modernist hymn, "Christus Rex"—written by the Bishop of the See, and already familiar throughout England.
The service was over. Out streamed the great congregation. The Close was crowded to see them come. Lines of theological students were drawn up there, fresh-faced boys in round collars and long black coats, who, as the main body of the Modernist clergy approached, began defiantly to chant the Creed. Meynell, with the old yet stately Bishop leaning on his arm, passed them with a friendly, quiet look. He caught sight for a moment of the tall form of Fenton, standing at their rear—the long face ascetically white, and sternly fixed.
He left the Bishop at the gates of the Palace, and went back quickly for Mary. Suddenly he ran into an advancing figure and found his hand grasped by Dornal.
The two men gazed at each other.
"You were not there?" said Meynell, wondering.
"I was." Dornal hesitated a moment, and then his blue eyes melted and clouded.
"And there was one man there—not a Modernist—who grieved, like a
Modernist, over the future!"
"Ah, the future!" said Meynell, throwing his head back. "That is not for you or me—not for the bishops, nor for that body which we call the Church—that is for England to settle."
* * * * *
But another meeting remained.