At length a happy thought came to Wentworth. His laundress, he knew, let lodgings. She lived in one of the small streets at the back of Clifford's Inn, and he would take his charge there for the night. The woman was glad to oblige him, though she thought it vastly queer; but that was no concern of hers, or of anyone else, she thought, as long as she got the rent. 'Mr. Wentworth,' she remarked to her husband as he attempted, as is the manner of men, some deprecating criticism, 'is a gentleman, and will behave himself as such;' and she was right, though Wentworth in town had altered a great deal from the Wentworth of the Sloville meeting-house: the man seemed not quite so hopeful, not quite so raw and inexperienced. The laundress had a heart that could feel for another, and she had connections that could aid her. By her help Rose was introduced to an establishment where her services, as a clever hand at dressmaking, were speedily recognised and in the consciousness that she was honestly earning her living, and in the daily routine of duty, she soon forgot the bitterness of her past. She was herself again, perhaps a trifle more serious, but a good deal more wise.

Wentworth went down to Sloville, and brought back Rose's mother, and she was happy and content. The mother could find no fault with her girl, as she saw how bravely she had trampled on her past follies, how steadily she worked for her happiness, and her cup of joy was full. It had almost killed her when Rose ran away. What she suffered then she could hardly say, as the dull days and the long nights were spent in anxious watching and waiting for the well-known step at the door. Now she could but thankfully say to herself, 'This, my precious one, was dead, but is alive again; was lost, but is found.' Happy the father or the mother who can say as much!

It was a pleasure to Rose to earn her own living; she was a very clever needle-woman, and got good wages in one of the grand emporiums of commerce in Regent Street. It was a pleasure to her to make her mother happy, and they never seemed as if they could do enough for one another.

The mother never knew why her daughter, of whose beauty she was so proud, had run away from home, or why she refused to go back to the old home.

Rose was young, and in due time recovered from what, for the time, was a crushing blow. She heard of the Baronet occasionally, for his family seat was near Sloville, and her mother loved to gossip of the place and people. He had married a rich wife, and paid all his debts. One son had been the result of the marriage, but that had died in a somewhat mysterious manner. The lady, whose health was very bad, chiefly resided at Elm Court, while her lord and master had returned to his evil courses in town-as a sow that had been washed, as the Bible coa.r.s.ely puts it, to her wallowing in the mire.

Fortunately, Rose never saw anything of him, and he was nothing to her now. Her mother was a little prying and inquisitive, but Rose, gentle and tender-hearted, had a way of keeping her mouth shut-somewhat rare in her s.e.x-and when she had made up her mind to be silent, no power on earth could make her talk. The old lady got about her in time some of her old friends, with the male part of whom the daughter was as popular as ever, in spite of her mysterious exit from Sloville.

All the young shopmen in the neighbourhood were ready to fall in love with her, but Rose gave them no encouragement, much to the grief of her mother, who was really anxious to see her daughter settled in life. Rose said she was quite comfortable as she was, and her mother had to give way. It was soon clearly understood that Rose was not in the matrimonial market at all, and admiring swains said no more. Rose, as we have seen, was of gentle birth, and that will a.s.sert itself in the blood.

Successful tradesmen have little time to study the graces of life, and Rose liked refinement; it had come to her hereditarily, as we all know it does. It was not her fault that she turned up her nose at vulgar commonplace admirers, however well off they might be as regards this world's goods.

It is needless to say that Rose, with her bright face, made many friends.

A leading theatrical, in search of attractions for his theatre, got hold of her, and found how full she was of dramatic power. Rose had always been fond of the stage, even as it appeared in such a humble form as that in which it was revealed to her at Sloville, and the finished acting of the London theatre gave her immense satisfaction. At first the pay was small, and her work was hard; excellence on the stage, as excellence everywhere, is not to be won without steady work, but she was an apt learner, and made rapid progress. One day she had, as all of us have at some time or other, a chance. One of the princ.i.p.al actresses was taken ill, and Rose had suddenly to perform her part. Her success was as complete as it was gratifying and unexpected.

As a critic, Wentworth had to record her triumph, and it not a little astonished him to find in the Miss Howard, the new star of the theatre, an old acquaintance. The meeting was mutually gratifying. If in her distress and poverty she needed his protection, much more did she need it in the hour of her triumph. If he admired her as a rustic beauty, much more did he admire her as she shone radiant on the stage.

Since then a couple of years had pa.s.sed, to both of them precious ones.

It is true they had seen little of each, other in the meanwhile; when he had walked with her under the stars from the dancing saloon, he was bent on realizing what pleasure, if any, is to be found in a life of gaiety and dissipation. He had fought his doubts and gathered strength; duty, not pleasure, was to be his aim. The utter dreary formalism of the old-fashioned Evangelical drove many a bold lad into dissipation. Youth fancies that sort of thing attractive, and especially does it come with a tenfold power to all who have lived in a strict home, and amongst strait-laced people. The game is hardly worth the candle. Solomon found it to be so in his time, when he tried the experiment on the most expensive scale, but youth does not care much for Solomon, and has over-weening confidence in self.

But Wentworth had seen in the rottenness of the surface gaiety, in the bitterness of its Dead Sea apples, in the hideousness of that laughter which is as the crackling of thorns under a pot, that it was not in that round of drunken revelry that happiness was to be found, or that man was to be elevated to his true sphere. The longer he lived in it the more intolerable it seemed. In his despair he became a cynic and a pessimist.

With what bitterness did he write against society and the world! It was all out of joint, he said, as writers of his cla.s.s ever will, forgetting that it was he who was out of joint. But one day there came to him a change; he thought in his wretchedness-for a man of pleasure is always wretched-of the prodigal son. The parable seemed to have a new meaning for him-to open his eyes to the fact that G.o.d is a G.o.d of love, full of pity for the sinner, ready to save to the utmost, and that in the person of Jesus Christ we have a revelation and a realization of Divine love and power. The call, 'Come unto Me, all ye that are weary and heavy-laden,'

sounded to his ear like that of a brother. Old Bunyan writes how when Christian escaped out of the Slough of Despond there came to him a man named Help, who drew him out. It was the great G.o.d Himself to whom Wentworth owed his escape. As the scales left his eyes, he saw in the heaven above, not an angry Jehovah, but a G.o.d of love-a Father, not a Judge. So it was with the great American preacher Ward Beecher, who, though studying for the ministry, was for awhile in doubt, in difficulty and despair. 'I think,' he writes, 'when I stand in Zion and before G.o.d, the brightest thing I shall look back upon will be that blessed morning in May when it pleased G.o.d to reveal to my wondering soul that it was His nature to love a man in his sins for the sake of helping him out of them.

He did not do it out of compliment to Christ, to a law or plan of salvation, but from the fulness of His great heart. That He was not made angry by sin, but sorry; that He was not furious with wrath toward the sinner, but pitied him; in short, that He felt toward me as my mother felt toward me, to whose eyes my wrong-doing brought tears, who never pressed me so close to her as when I had done wrong, and who would fain with her yearning heart lift me out of trouble.' And the change was as beautiful as sudden. All earth seemed fresher to Wentworth, the sun more bright, the earth more green, the flowers more fair, the songs of birds more musical, and life infinitely more great and grand. How hard and distasteful seemed his old idea of religion! how cold and dry and apart from ordinary life and daily duty! A mere matter of words, a performance to be carried on on Sunday, and chiefly by unpleasant men and women who held that the world was a waste, howling wilderness given over to the devil, and that heaven was only for the elect, as they deemed themselves to be. They said G.o.d would set aside the laws of nature-the laws He had made-and work miracles on their behalf; that they would prosper and become fat if they made a profession of religion. It was their intense selfishness which alienated him. h.e.l.l-fire was the lot of the sinners, and they became religious, not that they had the least idea of a G.o.d of mercy and love, but that they might not be sent to h.e.l.l. Their religion was a kind of fire-escape, that was all. He hated such blasphemy and such selfishness. When they sang,

'Lord, what a wretched land this is That yields us no supplies!'

or,

'My thoughts on awful subjects roll, d.a.m.nation and the soul;'

or,

'Lord, we're a garden walled around, Planted and made peculiar ground,'

he was alike distressed and shocked.

Once upon a time an old divine met Dr. Doddridge, of pious memory, as he was going to preach.

'I wish for you the presence of G.o.d in the chapel,' said the good doctor in his unctuous style.

'My dear doctor,' said the old divine, 'we have always the presence of G.o.d everywhere.'

That was the feeling that came at length to Wentworth-that G.o.d is everywhere present with us as a Father and a Friend. It was that that filled his heart with joy. It was enough for him that he was there to pity and succour and bless.

It was in a similar spirit that the actress had learned to realize the Divine presence and power.

And once more they are under the stars as he sees her to her comfortable home, where an aged mother with a bright smile awaits her coming. That walk of theirs under the stars had been the turning-point of their lives.

It was the girl trembling and sorrowful by his side who had helped to recall him to his better self. She had achieved success, and so had he.

Outcasts as they were in the eyes of the Church, they were children crying, and not in vain, for the light.

END OF VOL. I