True to his sarcastic instinct, Cholmondeley added, ‘Of course I know the little woman has a hump, and has only just got over her grande passion for Montepulciano the opera singer. But a duke’s daughter—think of that!’
George Craik only ground his teeth and made no reply.
Shortly afterwards the two men separated, Cholmondeley strolling to his office, Craik (whom we shall accompany) hailing a hansom and driving towards St. John’s Wood.
Before seeking, in the young man’s company, those doubtful regions which a modern satirist has termed
The shady groves of the Evangelist,
let us give a few explanatory words touching the subject of the above conversation. It had all come about exactly as described. Yielding to Alma’s intercession, and inspired, moreover, by the enthusiasm of a large circle in London, Bradley had at last consented to open a religious campaign on his own account in the very heart of the metropolis. A large sum of money was subscribed, Alma heading the list with a princely donation, a site was selected in the neighbourhood of Regent’s Park, and a church was built, called by its followers the New Church, and in every respect quite a magnificent temple. The stained windows were designed by leading artists of the æsthetic school, the subjects partly religious, partly secular (St. Wordsworth, in the guise of a good shepherd, forming one of the subjects, and St. Shelley, rapt up into the clouds and playing on a harp, forming another), and the subject over the altar was an extraordinary figure-piece by Watts, ‘Christ rebuking Superstition’—the latter a straw-haired damsel with a lunatic expression, grasping in her hands a couple of fiery snakes. Of course there was a scandal. The papers were full of it, even while the New Church was building. Public interest was thoroughly awakened; and when it became current gossip that a young heiress, of fabulous wealth and unexampled personal beauty, had practically created the endowment, society was fluttered through and through. Savage attacks appeared on Bradley in the religious journals. Enthusiastic articles concerning him were published in the secular newspapers. He rapidly became notorious. When he began to preach, the enthusiasm was intensified; for his striking presence and magnificent voice, not to speak of the ‘fiery matter’ he had to deliver, carried everything before them.
It may safely be assumed that time had at last reconciled him to the secret trouble of his life. Before settling in London he had ascertained, to his infinite relief, that Mrs. Montmorency had gone to Paris and had remained there with her child, under the same ‘protection’ as before. Finding his secret safe from the world, he began unconsciously to dismiss it from his mind, the more rapidly as Alma’s relations towards him became more and more those of a devoted sister. Presently his old enthusiasm came back upon him, and with it a sense of new power and mastery. He began to feel an unspeakable sacredness in the tie which bound him to the woman he loved; and although it had seemed at first that he could only think of her in one capacity, that of his wife and the partner of his home, her sisterhood seemed indescribably sweet and satisfying. Then, again, her extraordinary belief in him inspired him with fresh ambition, and at last, full of an almost youthful ardour, he stepped out into the full sunshine of his London ministry.
In the least amiable mood possible, even to him, George Craik drove northward, and passing the very portals of Bradley’s new church, reached the shady groves he sought. Alighting in a quiet street close to the ‘Eyre Arms,’ he stood before a bijou villa all embowered in foliage, with a high garden wall, a gate with a wicket, and the very tiniest of green lawns. He rang the bell, and the gate was opened by a black-eyed girl in smart servant’s costume; on which, without a word, he strolled in.
‘Mistress up?’ he asked sharply; though it was past twelve o’clock.