Part 4

“Meg, you here?” exclaims her mistress.

“You surely didn’t think I was going to abandon you?” comes the calm reply.

“But what will your husband say?” I question wonderingly, opening my eyes at this startling development in honeymoon etiquette, “and who is going to keep house for him and Bahloo?”

“Oh, I can easily manage that if the mistress will let me off for an hour or two in the morning.... Noo, Miss Joan,” lapsing into the vernacular, “gang to bed yer ain sel’. Ye can sleep quite peacefully, the mistress will want for naught.”

I make my exit, leaving the two old friends--friends in sooth, despite the difference of their station--to resume the even tenor of their ways, which no incident so frivolous as Meg’s marriage could interrupt.

XI

The Letter Kills

D’où viennent l’intolérance, les haines religieuses, la polémique et le fanatisme? Ils tiennent tous à une fausse conception de l’essence et du but de la Religion. C. WAGNER (Justice).

The inquisitor was sometimes conscientious when he racked and burned his brother man for the glory of God and the salvation of the souls of others who might be inclined to follow that heretical brother; he acted with a clear conscience, honestly believing himself to be doing service both to God and to man. ANNIE BESANT.

* * * * *

His letter has arrived....

A cold chill has passed over my heart. Can it really be Hector who, ignoring the spirit of the Gospel, has written these words, with their sophistry and fanatical respect for the letter of the Jewish Bible?

“... If you deny Revelation everything crumbles under your feet.... It is your duty to accept and believe the truth taught by the Church. Has not the Saviour promised that He will always be with his Church even to the end of the world, to guide it in the path of Truth?... The Bible is the directly inspired word of God, and we must bow before its teaching without presuming to judge it.... All Faith rests on the doctrine of the Redemption, of Predestination, of the Day of Judgment.... Many of our clergy themselves ignore these subjects. They are spiritual heretics, freethinkers under the garb of the Church....”

Then follows an exhortation:

“Beloved, cease your doubts. Prostrate yourself before the Cross, stained with the blood of Christ, that blood shed in order to efface the sins of the world. Come, before the justice of an angry God bars the way.”

He finishes with these words, which in his sincere but blind faith he believes must touch me:

“Pray for the Light! Oh, my life, may our Saviour enlighten you with his Grace!”

* * * * *

No, no, I cannot pray. I do not want this unjust Grace which would single me out arbitrarily. Rather would I remain in doubt, in negation, even, than admit this conception of a partial Creator who cannot be appeased but by the abasement of Conscience and intelligence, the greatest gifts bestowed by him.

* * * * *

Hector is here. For a week he has tried all means, arguments, persuasion, tenderness, to break what he calls my intellectual pride.

He makes me read Pusey, Stanley, Weldon.... In vain he cites the great minds, the lofty spirits who have accepted unmurmuringly the dogmas which revolt me--above all, that of an eternal Hell. This is the one upon which he is most inflexible.

“Then those you term pagans,” I argue, “you condemn them also to this eternal punishment?”

“We have no right to judge God. In his immutable justice He separates the sheep from the goats.”

“If He is cruel enough to condemn those who have no means of knowing Him, I should prefer to be with them in Hell rather than in Heaven with your God.”

These controversies, which leave me utterly broken and exhausted, only increase the gulf between us.

* * * * *

Hector has adjured me by the regard I have for him, by the submission I owe him as priest, by our love for each other, to make an act of intellectual humility and come to the Communion Table to-morrow morning.

I could have done so once. In the little Paris oratory of Pasteur Wagner I sometimes partook of the Communion. But he never preached this God of Vengeance, this Father appeased only by the blood of his own Son!... Now, this act of Communion would be sheer hypocrisy, a blasphemy against my conscience. No, even though I lose Hector’s love, sunder our lives, I must be honest with myself and him.

The evening has passed apparently as usual, dinner en famille, followed by bridge, but the atmosphere is charged with suppressed emotion. My aunt, sensitive like all nervous natures to external influences, suspects that something is wrong. She is troubled and looks at us anxiously. My guardian asks me to sing. I cannot. My throat is constricted as though in a vice.

As I look up from the book I have taken I encounter Hector’s gaze.

His eyes are fixed upon me, seeking to impose his will on my soul. Thought is really a force. I feel his beating against my brain, seeking to break down my resistance, to absorb my personality, stupefying me as with an anaesthetic....

* * * * *

The night has been one long struggle.

My tortured heart has striven to convince my reason.

I have retraced again and again all the old theological arguments, the problems remain unsolved. I endeavour to pray; the words halt on my lips. I see before me only a precipice, a void, ready to engulf me....

I have no courage to appear at breakfast. I even hesitate whether I shall go to matins, but it looks too cowardly to stay away. Besides, who knows? A flash of Faith, a spark from the Divine Light may descend upon me and dissipate my doubts.

When I enter the little improvised chapel Hector is already at the altar.

For one moment his eyes seek mine with devouring intensity. Then he turns and gives himself wholly to his office.

His voice, more sonorous than usual, has deep notes in it which go straight to my soul as he pronounces the words of the solemn ritual.

“I bid you in the name of God, I call you in Christ’s behalf, I exhort you as ye love your own salvation, that ye will be partakers of this holy Communion.” My whole being rushes towards him. I rise to follow the communicants. A force greater still holds me back. The voice of my conscience cries so loudly that I seem to actually hear it within my heart. “You no longer believe, you no longer believe. It is a crime towards him, towards God, to yield to a momentary emotion. Better to separate than live a life of lies.”

* * * * *

My engagement is broken.

Hector has gone, never to come back.

Here is the letter which was brought to my room where, almost unconscious, I returned after the service.

“Jeanne,--God has not granted my prayer and enlightened your heart. There is only one means to propitiate Him--the sacrifice of my life, the sacrifice of my love. I submit to His will. An atheist (my heart bleeds in giving you that name) who denies Revelation, the authority of the Divine Book, cannot be the wife of a minister of God. To continue to see you, to feel the charm of your presence, would be impossible.... I am only a man, a man who loves you with all his heart, and soul and body.... From afar as near, O my loved one, my prayers shall follow you, my supplications shall mount to the God of Justice who is also the God of Mercy. He will break down the barrier of your pride and lead you to His feet. I am writing to my mother to explain my departure. Love her, my dear mother, who loves me so dearly; soften by your affection the grief she will feel ... be to her the daughter she hoped to find indeed in you.

“Adieu, Jeanne, my beloved. I confide you to His care.

“HECTOR.”

* * * * *

My poor Aunt Molly! Her heart will be broken!

PART II

XII

Storm Signals

Nous nous imaginons, Pauvres fous que nous sommes, Que personne avant nous n’a connu la Douleur.

ALFRED DE MUSSET.

How shall I recount the long months of gloom and sadness following Hector’s departure for Molokai?

After reading the letter which ended everything between us, I ran to my guardian imploring him to let me return to France.

“The Directrice of the Lycee where I was educated was my mother’s friend. I know she will receive and aid me to obtain a position in the administration of which she is the head.”

But my uncle was unwilling for me to go.

Mrs. Deslandes, whom I sought afterwards, drew me into her arms.

“It would be useless, little Jeanne. Hector will never return,” she said, with her sweet, melancholy smile. “It was only my selfish affection that kept him here preventing entire devotion to his calling. Yes, it is better so,” she added, with that pious resignation which enables her to support all blows unmurmuringly. “God calls him; I will not dispute possession.”

How beautiful is this Christian Faith animating mother and son! How profound, despite the narrowness of its principles! How comforting and sustaining in the dark hours of tribulation!

* * * * *

My uncle has touched the right chord to make me remain at Gwylata.

“Jeannette, your presence here may be really helpful. Bad times threaten, my poor little girl. Almost all my speculations have turned out badly.... The bank holds a mortgage on the station and is pressing me.... Perhaps we shall need you, if we have to economise and discharge some of the servants.

“The cook goes first,” he resumed, smilingly. “Why, we shall have a French ‘chef,’ who will prepare for us some dainty little dishes,” his unquenchable cheerfulness reasserting itself at once.

“Don’t be frightened. I am only joking. We shall not be so poor as all that. I am counting on the Golden Egg mine to put things right. If dividends are forthcoming we shall soon be richer than before.... Oh, yes! there still remain some ‘beaux jours’ for us, Jeannette.”

And my poor uncle, comforted already by his optimistic hopes in the great mine, begins to build airy castles.

* * * * *

Life on the station has resumed its monotonous course, broken only by Hector’s letters from his far-off island in the South Seas, that leper station, with which Father Damien’s name is so indissolubly connected.

He writes of his work among the miserable pariahs, of the devoted band of helpers--Catholics, priests and sisters, ministers, and American doctors, all united in the great work of Charity.

* * * * *

Daisy’s visits prove a great distraction. She alone has the power to draw me out of my melancholy. She is so bright and fresh, brimful of health and happiness. Her marriage is to take place shortly, sooner than was anticipated. By what she calls “good luck,” the bank was broken into by burglars. Dick, hearing a suspicious noise, fired several shots from the revolver he always kept near him--“without hitting anyone,” as Daisy naïvely remarked, very glad not to have a “spook” between her lover and herself. The neighbours, awakened by the shots and the noise of the struggle, secured one of the assailants.

Dick escaped with only a scratch on the temple, where a bullet grazed the skin. Daisy is quite proud of the wound, and prouder still of the congratulations showered on the hero of the hour for his courage and presence of mind. As a tangible recognition of his services he is to be promoted.

“Perhaps he’ll be manager, instead of clerk. The salary will be doubled,” says the girl, with an important air.

I tease her for being so mercenary. She opens her clear blue eyes, the hue of wet periwinkles, and answers in a tone which reduces me to silence.

“If Dick is promoted, we can be married sooner.”

Meg also does her best to divert my thoughts. She has asked me to look after Bahloo in the mornings, as she is obliged to be in closer attendance on her mistress. In spite of her fine, unflagging courage, her son’s absence and the danger he incurs from the dread disease around him have seriously affected my poor aunt’s health. So I undertake Bahloo’s education. I find the funny “petit noir” has quick intelligence, and an excellent memory, especially for figures. He is astonishingly quick at mental arithmetic. I am told that it is only a flash of intellectual activity, that towards the age of 10 or 12, the faculties of the aboriginal begin to diminish and finally atrophy, rendering it impossible to go far with the mental training that begins so promisingly. The more man rises in the scale of human development, the more necessary becomes time for his nascent intelligence to evolve. A little chick or a duckling is so much more lively than a babe.

My little native charge amuses and interests me with his chatter. He knows so many legends of his tribe--that of the laughing jack, the dingo, and the Pleiades, that mysterious constellation which plays so great a part in the mythology of primitive races.

* * * * *

The expected catastrophe has arrived, more sudden and overwhelming than anyone could have foreseen.

Two letters were brought to Mr. Deslandes one day just as we had finished lunch. The first, from the bank, brought the frown I know so well on his face; the second bore the heading of the unfortunate mine. After perusing the latter, my uncle uttered a groan, staggered, and fell heavily to the ground.

Our efforts to restore consciousness were unavailing. The doctor, summoned from Strathalbyn, arrived only to find life extinct.

The blow was too sudden. My dear aunt sank under the shock, and we had the sad consolation of laying in the same tomb these two beings so united in life.

* * * * *

I shall not dwell on this mournful period--the only things which sustain me in my grief are the sympathy and affection of those around me.

Mr. Brown and Dick have spared me the ordeal of the necessary formalities. A cable from Hector, who could not have arrived in time, had he been able to start at once, has given me full powers.

Daisy and her mother have been tenderness itself. The grief of all who work on the station, some grown old in the service of their beloved master and mistress, has affected me deeply, and been a great consolation in my distress.

* * * * *

The station is sold. The price covers the mortgage and the debts contracted during the last years of my uncle’s life, when all his credit was used to pay up the calls of the miserable mine. A small sum remains, sufficient to assure the future of some of the old servants, of Meg and her husband, on whom Mrs. Deslandes had intended to settle a small annuity.

Mr. Saunders, the lawyer engaged in liquidating the estate, thinks it madness on my part to give up this money, but the obligation is as sacred to me as a debt. How can I permit these poor souls to go to the Destitute Asylum while I enjoy the money promised to them?

Hector has devoted his small patrimony to the work to which he has consecrated his life. In his last letter he speaks of his experiments about to be tried in the laboratory which he has had fitted up in order to seek a remedy to the frightful disease. I will not trouble him with these worldly cares, from which he seems to be gradually detaching himself.

Many proffers of assistance reach me. Daisy, married during those wearying months occupied in the settling of my uncle’s affairs, has entreated me to make my home with her. A room is always ready for me in the pretty cottage at Wellington.

* * * * *

I have been staying with Daisy’s parents. They insisted on my leaving the great empty house. But I do not want to tax their hospitality. Their own future is precarious. Perhaps the new owner of Gwylata may not retain the old manager? If so, it may be difficult to find another position at his age.

Other friends of my uncle have written, offering an asylum and material help. People are warm-hearted and generous in Australia, where life is easy. But I am young and strong, and I shall find some means of gaining a livelihood in this new land to which I am becoming daily more attached.

Mr. Saunders, the lawyer, who still retains his interest in me, in spite of what he calls my foolishness, has just brought me a letter from his niece, Mrs. Clarke, whom I met at Strathalbyn, during the Hunt Club meet. It was she, I remember, who defended Mr. Russell so warmly.

She offers me a position as governess to her small children, if the journey to New South Wales does not frighten me.

“The house is very modest,” says Mr. Saunders; “the place is really only a large farm. My niece is not rich, but you know her, and she will make you happy. Your business methods are about on a par, so you should suit each other admirably!”

* * * * *

I have bidden a tender “adieu” to all my Gwylata friends, including little Bahloo, who weeps bitterly. Dick and Daisy are to escort me as far as Murray Bridge, where I take the Melbourne Express.

Once again we three glide along the smooth waters of the great river. My thoughts return to the first time I saw the noble waterway of Australia, the day I fled from Gwylata to escape Allan Russell’s visit.

How far off it all seems! What trouble have I not been through since then!!!

* * * * *

Away with sad thoughts! A new life is beginning, unknown, but full of possibilities.

XIII

At Anchor

The alternative of light and darkness must continue as long as we live in this world of illusion. --“On the Threshold.”

Gum trees!!! For two days and nights I have been flying past their serried ranks, as the train rushes on through Victoria and New South Wales. I begin to sympathise with the little Globe-Trotter whom my uncle could never persuade to go for a walk or, indeed, any sort of excursion.

“Go out! What for? Just to look at your old gum trees. Thanks! One gum is rather interesting; it has even a certain distinction and individuality, but thousands upon thousands, millions upon millions, and nothing else but your everlasting gum trees!”

Can it be really true, as I have been assured, that the eucalypti, like the pines, are reservoirs of the vital force of the sun which they radiate in torrents of rose-coloured atoms, pouring strength and vitality into the atmosphere surrounding them. How precious they would be were the idea accepted!

What a sanatorium Australia would become for the poor anaemic humanity of the old world! What an inexhaustible storehouse of health and energy!

* * * * *

Mrs. Clarke, who meets me at Oberon, is indeed a charming woman. Simple and unaffected, she treats me at once as a friend. She is happy in her homely life on the big farm, which she manages in her husband’s absence. Mr. Clarke had been obliged to go to England to settle a question of succession.

The children are darlings: Lucille, an angel of six; Jack, a little demon of five, dowered with an inexhaustible energy and mischievousness which keep us breathless until he is safely tucked up in his cot at night. The mother is bringing them up in true Australian fashion, which certainly has the merit of allowing individuality to develop unhampered.

Just now they are very interested in the Bible stories their nursemaid tells them every morning, and in their enthusiasm they dramatize them, which leads occasionally to unexpected catastrophes.

The other day at lunch time Lucille was missing.

After an hour’s fruitless search, Jack confessed that she was in the old dry well.

“In the well?” we exclaimed, horrified.

“Ye-e-e-s; we was playin’ Joseph and his brudders. I was de _only_ brudder,” added the young rascal, regretfully. “I made her go down de well and den I pulled up de rope, so she tuddn’t det out.”

Leaving nurse to exhaust her vocabulary on the youthful reprobate, we hurried to the well, not very deep, happily.

To Kate’s call a small voice came up:

“Is you the ’Gyptian merchants?”

One of the farm hands descended, and picked up the child enveloped in an Indian curtain of many colours.

Mrs. Clarke put her histrionic offspring to bed without further ado, Lucille to get warm, for she was shivering with cold, and Master Jack to punish him.

He looked so angelic in his long white nightgown that one could never suspect the diabolical ideas which enter his little brain.

With hands meekly folded and innocent eyes raised heavenward, he lisped: “Pease take care of father, mamma, Lulu, and Jeanne--but not nurse,” he added, with a resentful glance at the maid.

* * * * *

For some days Lucille has been playing a rather mysterious game. While Jack is having his afternoon sleep, she sits down in a certain corner of the room to play with her dolls.

Entering unperceived a day or two ago, I heard her put questions and give answers, as though she were talking to a companion. She made gestures, nodded and seemed very interested in her conversation.

Catching sight of me, she made a sign to arrest my advance. Then, running towards me, said:

“Betty is very shy. She won’t say a word when anyone is here.”

“Betty?” I replied, inquiringly, lending myself to the game.

“Yes, my little friend. She comes every day to play with me when Jack is asleep. She does not like Jack; he is too rough,” she explains, shaking her little head. “Betty loves you, pretty well, but she always hides when anybody comes into the room. That’s her hiding place,” pointing to a crack in the panelling, which had given a little with the heat.

The child evidently has too much imagination. I must speak to her mother about it.

To-day I find Lucille in tears when I enter the day nursery to give her a French lesson. Nurse is angry, and is scolding her severely.

“It’s wicked of you, Miss Lucille, to tell stories like that.”

“It isn’t a story,” protests the child; “Betty was there just now, and you made her go when you began to scold me.”

“Look, Miss Jeanne,” continues the maid, turning towards me, “this naughty little girl declares that there was another child in the room with her. Isn’t it wicked of her to tell such stories. God will punish her.”

Lucille’s body stiffens. She says nothing more, but rebellious sobs shake her small frame.

I try to pacify nurse, and when she has gone away, muttering that I spoil the child, I take Lulu on my knees. She nestles lovingly into my arms and whispers:

“You _do_ believe me, don’t you? Betty _was_ there, and ... why, there she is again,” holding her little arms, her face brightens, her large eyes shine with excitement.

She is not lying; she really does see some one.

I try to explain that grown-ups cannot always see what children see.

“You must not blame nurse, darling; tell me what your little playmate says.”

Then follows a strange converse wherein Lucille acts as interpreter to a little child invisible to all except herself....

When the children have been put to bed, I tell Mrs. Clarke what has passed. She seems less surprised than I had expected.

“Yes, I have noticed that Lulu is not quite as other children. Her soul is too evolved for its frail tenement. At times it breaks the veil between the astral and spiritual worlds. Lucille then finds herself in communion with the beings who live and move on the plane which interpenetrates ours.”

My blank look of amazement betrays my utter ignorance of Kate’s meaning. She proceeds to tell me of the psychical studies which in the last decade have pulled down the barriers between the material and the invisible world. She quotes the words of Sir Oliver Lodge: “We are beginning to hear now and again, the strokes of the pick-axes of our comrades on the other side.” She hands me some Theosophical reviews and articles on Psychical Research.

I exclaim: “What, you! a sensible woman, believe in theosophy, that mixture of old superstitions and new-fangled notions, as my uncle used to term it.”

“It is because I _am_ a sensible woman,” Kate replies, “that I am a theosophist. If you had studied this science as much as I have, you would speak of it with more consideration.”

For the next hour, she talks on until the strange words, Re-incarnation, Karma, astral bodies, and Devachan begin to dance in my poor brain like a juggler’s balls.... My eyes close, I lose the thread....

“Please excuse me, dear; I forget everything once I am on this topic. It is getting late, and you are dead tired.” Kissing me, she adds:

“To-morrow, we will consider what to do with Lucille. Perhaps together we may evolve some means of minimising the influence of the phenomena which over-excites her brain. When she reaches the age of seven, the door now half-open to the invisible world will probably close outright. Meanwhile, take this little book, written by Will Canton, ‘The Invisible Playmate,’ wherein you will find an analogous case.”

In my room, Kate’s words return to me. Can it be true? Does another world, invisible to our grosser perceptions interpenetrate this?

The idea fascinates and scares me at the same time.

But no, no, I will not dwell on these religious questions. They have cost me too dear in the past. Neither will I read the books.

After a troubled night, wherein astral bodies, elementals and various sorts of “spooks” indulge in terrific combats, I am brought abruptly back to realities.

In the weekly paper, “The Australasian,” which I open after breakfast, is an account of a sensational divorce suit. A name catches my eye, and makes my heart beat almost, it would seem, before my brain could register the impression.

What is this strange sub-consciousness which acts on the human organism, often in spite of ourselves, making the blood recede and the knees tremble at the sight of a name, the memory of a glance?