A Second Coming

by Richard Marsh

In such cases women are apt to be regarded as representatives of a class; as abstractions, not concrete facts. The accident of her having had a bad husband was known to all the world; that she was herself the victim of a temperament was not. She was of the stuff out of which saints and martyrs may have been made, which is not necessarily good material out of which to make a wife. Enthusiasm was a necessity of her existence--not the frothy, fleeting frenzy of a foolish female, but an enduring possession of the kind which makes nothing of fighting with beasts at Ephesus. Although she herself might not be aware of it, the nature of her matrimonial experiences had given her what her instincts craved for: a creed--sexual reform.

She maintained that sexual intercourse was a thing of horror; the cause of all the evil which the world contains. Although she was wise enough not to proclaim the fact, in her heart she was of opinion that it would be better that the race should die out rather than that the evil should continue. She aimed at what she called universal chastity; maintaining that the less men and women had to do with each other the better. In pursuit of this chimera she performed labours which, if not worthy of Hercules, at least resembled those of Sisyphus in that they had to be done over and over again. The stone would not stay at the top of the hill.

At the outset she had been convinced--as the fruit of her own experience--that the fault lay with the men. Latterly she had been inclining more and more to the belief that the women had something to do with it as well. Indeed, she was beginning to more than suspect that theirs might be the major part of the blame. The suspicion filled her with a singular sort of rage.

This was the person to whose house the Stranger had come at this particular stage of her mental development. His advent had brought her to the verge of what is called madness in the case of an ordinary person of to-day; and spiritual exaltation in the case of saints and martyrs. She already knew that she was on a hopeless quest, and, although the fact did not daunt her for a moment, had realised that nothing short of a miracle would bring about that change in the human animal which she desired. Here was the possibility of a miracle actually at hand. Here was a worker of wonders--men said, the very Christ.

It was the reflection that what men said might be true which made her courage quail at last.

A miracle-monger she desired. But--the Christ! To formulate the proposition which was whirling in her brain to a doer-of-strange-deeds was one thing, but--to Him! That was another.

When she had come into His near neighbourhood she had shrunk back, a frightened creature. She had been afraid to look Him in the face. Ever since He had been beneath her roof she had been shaken as with palsy.

Dare she do this thing?

That was the problem which had been present in her mind the whole day long, and which still racked it in the silent watches of the night. To and fro she passed, from room to room, from floor to floor. More than once she approached the door behind which He was, only to start away from it again and flee. She did not even dare to kneel at His portal, fearful lest He, knowing she was there, might come out and see. In her own chamber she scanned the New Testament in search of words which would comfort and encourage her. In vain. The sentences seemed to rise up from off the printed pages to condemn her.

She had an idea. The lame man and the charcoal-burner were the joint occupants of a spare room. She would learn from them what manner of man their Master was--whether He might be expected to lend a sympathetic ear to such a supplication as that which she had it in her heart to make. But when she stood outside their apartment she reflected that they were common fellows. Her impulse had been to refuse them shelter, being at a loss to understand what connection there could be between her guest and such a pair. That they had thrust themselves upon Him she thought was probable; the more reason, therefore, why she should decline to countenance their presumptuous persistence. To seek from them advice or information would be an act of condescension which would be as resultless as undignified.