It was in the paven kitchen, however, that the party now assembled, and taking their seats round the square deal table, which was spread with a clean table-cloth, began at once upon the dinner—a boiled leg of pork and potatoes.
With her little feet swinging to and fro, and her large blue wistful eyes roving wistfully about the room, Madeline sat and ate up her portion contentedly. The sun streaming through the back window caressed her bright cheek and dusty hair, and made her think of the glad light which had touched her only a short time ago, while she had been learning to dance upon the tombs. Suddenly a strange thought seemed to strike her.
‘Uncle Mark,’ she said, while Uncle Luke dropped his knife and fork in wonder, ‘can dead folk feel?’
‘No, my lass,’ returned Uncle Mark, with some little surprise in his mild blue eyes. ‘Dead men is dead as nails is—they can’t feel nothing. What put that into your head?’
But Madeline did not answer; a sense of great satisfaction had stolen over her at this brief assurance, and, with a glance of meaning at Uncle Luke, she said to herself that, for once in his life, the parson had been wrong.
Dinner being over, there was a general movement, and a great awe came over the family as the door of communication between the kitchen and parlour was thrown open, and the latter was seen in all its sepulchral splendour. Uncles Mark and Luke passed reverently in, and closed the door; but soon Madeline was made straight and clean, and sent in after them, while Aunt Jane, who seemed seized with unaccountable irritability, remained to tidy up the kitchen.
Once in the parlour, Madeline crept up to the window, and gazed with wistful dreamy eyes across the little garden on the great still river, which crept past flashing and darkening in the sun. Uncle Mark, seated on a very shiny and sticky horsehair sofa, was deep in the pages of the family Bible, while Uncle Luke, with a face as grave as a judge, was repeating in an undertone the words of an Easter hymn. All was quiet and still in the sepulchral chamber; but through the closed door they could distinctly hear the rattling of dishes, the clangour of pots and pans, from the kitchen. Presently this rattling and clangour became positively furious, and simultaneously a loud rat-a-tat was heard at the front door. Finally, to the same noisy accompaniment, the room door was opened, and a number of visitors came in one by one.
They consisted of a tall thin man, dressed in glossy black, with a long thin face, broad protruding forehead, and a bald head; followed by several very rough-looking figures in high hats and rude Sunday suits. Each as he entered doffed his hat, with a nod of solemn greeting to Uncles Mark and Luke. The tall man paused in the centre of the room and breathed heavily, while Uncle Mark rose to receive him. He was evidently expected.
The tall man in black, a retired tradesman, known in the neighbourhood as ‘Brother Brown,’ was the leader of the sect known as the ‘United Brethren,’ of which Uncles Mark and Luke were lowly members. He was a person of some importance and some property, but, having no wider field in which to practise his feats of piety, he was content every Sunday to visit the row of cottages, and, gathering his satellites together in one house or another, discourse to them on the lights and shadows of another world.
After the keen glance into the room, Brother Brown gave his whole hand to Uncle Mark, and the tips of his fingers to Uncle Luke, nodded grimly to Madeline, and sinking on the sofa, covered his face with large red hands, and sank into deep silence. This manoeuvre was followed by all the others present except Madeline. Each covered his face with his hand, and took a gentle header, so to speak, into himself. If we may continue the metaphor, all remained under water for many minutes. The effect was awe-inspiring.
At last Brother Brown uncovered his face and came up refreshed; the other men emerged one by one.
‘Brother Peartree,’ he said, addressing Uncle Mark, ‘are we all here?’
‘Yes, sir,’ answered Uncle Mark, while his blue eyes wandered over the group. ‘Here be Brother Strangeways, Brother Smith, Brother Hornblower, Brother Billy Horn-blower, Brother Luke Peartree, and myself. Not to speak of little Madlin—she axed to come in, and a child can’t begin too early.’
Brother Brown coughed heavily and looked at the kitchen door, through which came at intervals a dull clangour as of pots and pans.
‘Then I suppose,’ he said, ‘Sister Peartree is still obdurate. Will she not join our little gathering, and listen for once to the words of healing?’
Uncle Mark looked very red and uncomfortable, and jerked his thumb awkwardly towards the door.
‘Never mind the missus to-day, Brother Brown—she’s had a heap o’ worrit during the week, and the fact is, she ain’t just tidy enough to come into the best parlour.’
Brother Brown’s heavy brow darkened.
‘“Six days shalt thou labour,”’ he said. ‘Well, brother, you are the head of your own house, and I leave our unregenerate sister to you. Let us pray.’
Thereupon all, including Madeline, knelt down, while Brother Brown exercised his spirit in a long prayer, with variations and expressions of sympathy in the form of low groans and ejaculations from his companions—who had all again (to resume a former metaphor) retired under water. Emerging once more, and receiving a signal from Brother Brown, Brother Billy Hornblower, an overgrown young bargee of twenty, began a homely hymn, in which all the others gruffly joined.
Pilot the boat to the City of Jesus,
Up with the tide, though there’s danger afloat*
Far up the stream lies the City of Jesus,
Dark is the night, but we’ll pilot the boat.
Chorus.
Pilot the boat, mates! pilot the boat!
Hark, the wind rises—there’s danger afloat—
Courage! for up to the City of Jesus,
Steadily, safely, we’ll pilot the boat.
See, mates, the lights of the City of Jesus,
Steer for them lights, thro’ the dangers afloat—
Up to the wharves of the City of Jesus,
Ere the tide turns, we must pilot the boat.
Chorus.
Pilot the boat, mates! pilot the boat!
Hark, the wind rises—there’s danger afloat—
Courage! and up to the City of Jesus,
Steadily, safely, we’ll pilot the boat.
As the music grew louder, the clatter in the kitchen increased, to the obvious dissatisfaction of Brother Mark. The hymn ceased, and Brother Brown delivered a short sermon, founded on the text, ‘Those that go down to the sea in ships,’ which was felt to be especially suitable to those who went down the river in barges.
After this, Brother Mark rose, and in a few brief words, interspersed freely with Scriptural quotations, addressed the Brethren, taking for his theme the sacred character of the day, and greatly troubling the soul of little Madeline by gloomy references to dead sinners in their graves.
After a short address to the same effect from Brother Strangeways, a waterside worthy with a very weatherbeaten face and a very weather wise sort of oratory, and another hymn from Brother Billy Hornblower, the service was concluded.
Then, as a concluding solemnity, all shook hands, and the conversation suddenly grew secular.
‘Going down with the tide i’ the morning, mate?’ asked Brother Strangeways. ‘It be high water at four, and we be loaded since day afore yesterday.’
‘Where for, mate?’ asked Uncle Mark.
‘Down right away Southam,’ was the reply.
‘Well, mate, I be anchored at home with the old woman till Monday, and then I goes up with first flood to Crewsham Basin.’
‘Lime?’ asked Brother Strangeways, sententiously.
‘Lime it is,’ answered Brother Mark, and forthwith the talk became professional.
In the meantime, Brother Brown had drawn from his pocket several loose leaves or tracts, a species of torpedo which he was in the habit of dropping surreptitiously wherever he went, for the confusion of recalcitrant and unrepentant sinners. Selecting three of these, each of which had special reference to the forlorn spiritual condition of a person of the other sex, he proceeded to pin them on the parlour walls—one over the Shepherdess on the mantelpiece, a second under the picture of the Prodigal Son, a third under that of Susannah and the Elders. When this was done he shook hands with Uncle Mark, nodded to Uncle Luke, and passed out of the house; the other men, each with a ‘Good night, mate,’ for each of the two Pear-trees, immediately followed, solemnly, in single file.
No sooner had the street door closed than Mrs. Pear-tree, with the sleeves of her gown tucked up to the elbow, entered the precincts of the chamber. Scorn was in every lineament of her countenance, but directly her eyes fell on the parlour walls, the scorn deepened to wrath.
‘Brother Brown’s been at them walls again,’ she cried. I wonder at you, Mark Peartree, to sit still and see him do it. Tracts agin your own wedded wife, stuck on the walls of her own best parlour—oh, I’d “tract” him!’
As she spoke, she made a dash at each of the papers in succession, and tore them angrily away.
‘My lass,’ said Uncle Mark, gruffly, ‘read’em—they’re left for your convarsion.’
‘Stuff and rubbish!’
‘Salvation ain’t rubbish, mother, and this here earth’s a wale. A wale it is! And let me tell you, tho’ you are my missus, it don’t become you to put Brother Brown so much about. Why, while we was a-singing, I heard you clattering the dishes like a barge a-heaving anchor, and I see Brother Brown looking at the door out of the corner of his eyes. No, my lass, it don’t become you, and it ain’t settin’ a good example to little Madlin, who may be a wessel herself by and by.’
‘Never, if I can help it,’ answered the woman. ‘We’ve wessels enough in our family, what with you and Uncle Luke. Look at the mark o’ the dirty muddy feet on the clean carpet. I wish you’d meet outside, or in some other house but mine.’
‘And I wish you’d join us—it’d do you a power of good.’
Mrs. Peartree’s only answer was to toss her head and walk back into the kitchen. Uncle Luke followed very crestfallen and pitiful at the domestic disagreement; while Uncle Mark remained in the parlour, and showed the pictures in Foxe’s ‘Book of Martyrs’—a precious tome of tremendous antiquity—to Madeline. The child shuddered as she saw on every page flame consuming those who testified to the truth in evil times.
‘Uncle Mark,’ she said, ‘do they ever burn people now?’
‘Not in this here world, my lass; only in t’other. And even then only the wery bad ones—them as hates their neighbours, and can come to no manner o’ good without burning!’
Madeline did not answer, but she thought of Aunt Jane, who was the very essence of gentleness and good nature, but who was made utterly unregenerate by the intensity of her hate for Brother Brown.