“I think you might have shown her more respect, man,” said Tubb. “Honour to whom honour is due, and she is honourable.”
“Why should I show respect to her? If she were a poor girl earning her bread, I would salute her with true reverence, for God hath chosen the poor, rich in faith. But is it not written that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for the rich to enter into heaven?”
“You’ve queer fancies, Cap’n.”
“They are not fancies,” answered Saltren; “as it is written, so I speak.” Then he hesitated. Something was working in his mind, and for a moment he doubted whether to speak it to one whom he did not regard as of the elect.
But Saltren was not a man who could restrain himself under an over-mastering conviction, and he burst forth in a torrent of words, and as he spoke his sombre eyes gleamed with excitement, and sparks lit up and flashed in them. Soft they usually were, and dreamy, but now, all at once they kindled into vehement life.
“I tell you, Tubb, the Lord hath spoken. The last days are at hand. I read my Bible and I read my newspaper, and I know that the aristocracy are a scandal and a burden to the country. Now the long-suffering of heaven will not tarry. It has been revealed to me that they are doomed to destruction.”
“Revealed to you!”
“Yes, to me, an unworthy creature, as none know better than myself, full of errors and faults and blindness—and yet—to me. I was wrestling in spirit near the water’s edge, thinking of these things, when, suddenly, I heard a voice from heaven calling me.”
“How—by name? Did it call you Cap’n?”
Saltren hesitated. “I can’t mind just now whether it said, Saltren, Saltren! or whether it said Mister, or whether Cap’n, or Stephen. I dare say I shall remember by-and-by when I come to turn it over in my mind. But all has come on me so freshly, so suddenly, that I am still dazed with the revelations.”