He chose a quiet evening early in the week. Why he came has never been quite clear. It was not curiosity, for he had none; nor was it a desire to study the kind of culture which Angela had introduced among her friends, for he had no knowledge of, or desire for, culture at all. Nor does the dressmakers' workshop afford a congenial place for the exercise of that soldier's gifts. He came, perhaps, because he was passing on his way from a red-hot prayer meeting to a red-hot preaching, and he thought he would see the place which among others, the Advanced Club for instance, was keeping his brother from following in his own steps, and helping him to regard the world, its pleasures and pursuits, with eyes of affection. One knows not what he expected to find or what he proposed by going there, because the things he did find completely upset all his expectations, if he had any. Visions, perhaps, of the soul-destroying dance, and the red cup, and the loud laughter of fools, and the talk that is as the crackling of thorns, were in his mind.
The room was occupied, as usual, with the girls, Angela among them. Captain Sorensen was there too; the girls were quietly busy, for the most part, over "their own" work, because, if they would go fine, they must make their own fineries; it was a frosty night, and the fire was burning clear; in the most comfortable chair beside it sat the crippled girl of whom we know; the place was hers by a sort of right; she was gazing into the flames, listening lazily to the music—Angela had been playing—and doing nothing, with contentment. Life was so sweet to the child when she was not suffering pain, and was warm, and was not hungry, and was not hearing complaints, that she wanted nothing more. Nelly, for her part, sat with hands folded pensively, and Angela wondered what, of late days, it was that seemed to trouble her.
Suddenly the door opened, and a man, dressed in a tight uniform of dark cloth and a cap of the same, with "S. S." upon it, like the Lord Mayor's gold chain, stood before them.
He did not remove his cap, but he looked round the room, and presently called in a loud, harsh voice:
"Which of you here answers to the name of Kennedy?"
"I do," replied Angela; "my name is Kennedy. What is yours, and why do you come here?"
"My name is Coppin. My work is to save souls. I tear them out of the very clutches and claws of the devil; I will have them; I leave them no peace until I have won them; I cry aloud to them; I shout to them; I pray for them; I sing to them; I seek them out in their hiding-places, even in their dens and courts of sin; there are none too far gone for my work; none that I will let go once I get a grip of them; once my hand is on them out they must come if the devil and all his angels were pulling them the other way. For my strength is not of myself; it is——"
"But why do you come here?" asked Angela.
The man had the same black hair and bright eyes as his brother; the same strong voice, although a long course of street-shouting had made it coarse and rough; but his eyes were brighter, his lips more sensitive, his forehead higher; he was like his brother in all respects, yet so unlike that, while the Radical had the face of a strong man, the preacher had in his the indefinable touch of weakness which fanaticism always brings with it. Whatever else it was, however, the face was that of a man terribly in earnest.