E-text prepared by Suzanne Shell, Project Gutenberg Beginners Projects,
Mary Meehan, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
by
Author of The Garden of Allah, Bella Donna, Egypt and Its
Monuments, The Holy Land, etc.
1911
When Evelyn Malling, notorious because of his sustained interest inPsychical Research and his work for Professor Stepton, first met theRev. Marcus Harding, that well-known clergyman was still in the fullflow of his many activities. He had been translated from his labors inLiverpool to a West End church in London. There he had proved hithertoan astonishing success. On Hospital Sundays the total sums collectedfrom his flock were by far the largest that came from the pockets ofany congregation in London. The music in St. Joseph's was allowed byconnoisseurs, who knew their Elgar as well as their Goss, their Perosias well as their Bach, and their Wesley, to be remarkable. Criticalpersons, mostly men, who sat on the fence between Orthodoxy and Atheism,thought highly of Mr. Harding's sermons, and even sometimes came downon his side. And, of all signs surely the most promising for a West Endclergyman's success, smart people flocked to him to be married, and Arumlilies were perpetually being carried in and out of his chancel, whichwas adorned with Morris windows. He was married to a woman who managedto be admirable without being dull, Lady Sophia, daughter of the lateEarl of Mansford, and sister of the present peer. He was comfortably off.His health as a rule was good, though occasionally he suffered from someobscure form of dyspepsia. And he was still comparatively young, justforty-eight.
Nevertheless, as Evelyn Malling immediately perceived, Mr. Harding wasnot a happy man.
In appearance he was remarkable. Of commanding height, with a big frame,a striking head and countenance, and a pair of keen gray eyes, he lookedlike a man who was intended by nature to dominate. White threads appearedin his thick brown hair, which he wore parted in the middle. But hisface, which was clean-shaven, had not many telltale lines. And he did notlook more than his age.
The sadness noted by Malling was at first evasive and fleeting, notindellibly fixed in the puckers of a forehead, or in the down-drawncorners of a mouth. It was as a thin, almost impalpable mist, that canscarcely be seen, yet that alters all the features in a landscape everso faintly. Like a shadow it traveled across the eyes, obscured theforehead, lay about the lips. And as a shadow lifts it lifted. But itsoon returned, like a thing uneasy that is becoming determined todiscover an abiding-place.
Malling's first meeting with the clergyman took place upon WestminsterBridge on an afternoon in early May, when London seemed, almost likea spirited child, to be flinging itself with abandon into the firstgaieties of the season. Malling was alone, coming on foot from Waterloo.Mr. Harding was also on foot, with his senior curate, the Rev. HenryChichester, who was an acquaintance of Malling, but whom Malling hadnot seen for a considerable period of time, having been out on his estatein Ceylon. At the moment when Malling arrived upon the bridge the twoclergymen were standing by the parapet on the Parliament side, lookingout over the river. As he drew near to them the curate glanced suddenlyround, saw him, and uttered an involuntary exclamation which attractedMr. Harding's attention.
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