Part 26 (2/2)
”Oh, Mother Hubbard!” I said, ”there are all sorts of imperfections and flaws in your logic, and I know people who would shake it to pieces in a moment.”
”Well, love, perhaps so; but they would not shake my faith:
”'To one fixed ground my spirit clings, I know that G.o.d is good.'”
”Stick to that, Mrs. Hubbard,” said the squire earnestly; ”never let go that belief. Faith is greater far than logic. I would sooner doubt G.o.d's existence than His goodness. Problems of sin and suffering have oppressed my brain and heart all my life, but like you I have got clearer vision during these later days. The clouds often disperse towards the sunset, and my mental horizon is undimmed now. You and I cannot explain life's mysteries, but G.o.d can, and meanwhile I hold
”'That nothing walks with aimless feet; That not one life shall be destroyed, Or cast as rubbish to the void, When G.o.d hath made the pile complete.'”
”Tennyson was not Paul,” I remarked.
”Why should he have been?” he asked. ”He was a Christian seer, none the less, and he had the heavenly vision.”
”But you cannot call his theology orthodox,” I persisted; ”is it in any sense Biblical?”
”Whence came his vision and inspiration if not from G.o.d?” he replied.
Then he turned to Mother Hubbard: ”Thank you, thank you much,” he said; ”I shall not forget your parable of the heather.”
CHAPTER XXIV
ROGER TREFFIT INTRODUCES ”MISS TERRY”
I had a letter from Rose this morning. The lucky girl has got another holiday and is apparently having a fine time at Eastbourne. She says the chief insisted that her trip north was not a holiday, but a tonic.
If so, it was a very palatable one, I am sure, from the way she took it. Whilst, therefore, I am exposing plates and developing negatives, she is enjoying refres.h.i.+ng sea-breezes, and listening to good music.
It appears her chief recommended Eastbourne, and I gather from her letter that he is there himself with his family.
So is the Cynic! The courts are closed for the most part, but he told me a while ago that there were one or two Old Bailey cases in which he was interested which would prevent him from going very far away, and he is taking week-ends on the south coast. It is curious that he should have hit upon Eastbourne--quite by accident, Rose a.s.sures me--and that they should have met so early. I am not surprised that they should have been together for a long ramble over the downs, though I imagine they would have liked it better without the presence of a third party.
Rose is not very clear about it, but apparently there were three of them. What a nuisance for them both!
The Cynic does not expect to be in Windyridge again before the end of this month. I always think September seems a particularly long month, and yet it has only thirty days.
Meantime the village is affording me further opportunities of studying Mother Hubbard's theories of human nature and discovering the germ of goodness in things evil. It is a difficult hunt!
Little Lucy Treffit's father has come home, and the fact has a good deal of significance for Lucy and her mother. I cannot bear the sight of the silly man. He struts about the village as though he were doing us a favour to grace it with his presence. He puts a thumb in each arm-hole of his waistcoat, wears a constant smile on his flabby face when in public, and nods at everybody as he pa.s.ses, in the most condescending way imaginable.
He is quite an under-sized man, but broad all the way down; it looks as though at some time in his life, when he may have been very soft and putty-like, a heavy hand had been placed on his head, and he had been compressed into a foot less height. What gives reality to the impression is the extreme length of his trousers, which hang over his boots in folds.
The delight of his eyes and the joy of his heart is neither wife nor child, but a smooth-haired terrier which brings in the living, such as it is.
During the summer months Roger and his dog frequent the popular seaside resorts and give beach entertainments of ”an 'igh-cla.s.s character” to quote Roger himself. In the winter months they secure engagements at music-halls, bazaars, school-entertainments and the like, when the income is more precarious.
Ordinarily the man is not home until October, but unfortunately the dog's health broke down in the latter part of August, and Roger came home to save the cost of lodgings, and to get drink on credit. For, almost alone among the villagers, this man gets drunk day by day with marked consistency; and if he is irritating when sober he is nothing less than contemptible when intoxicated. He then becomes more suave than ever, and his mouth curves into a smile which reaches his ears, but he is more stupid and obstinate than the proverbial mule. And the worst of it is he drinks at home, for the nearest inn is above a mile away, so his unhappy wife has a rough time of it. Yet he is not actively unkind to her; he does not beat her body--he merely starves and wounds her soul.
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