The Pillars of the House; Or, Under Wode, Under Rode, Vol. 1 (of 2)

'I remember now,' said Felix, in a very different tone. 'It was Jehoshaphat, Lancey boy. I'll find it for you in the book of Chronicles. Did you want it for anything?'

Lance made an uneasy movement.

'It was to show poor Fernando Travis, wasn't it?' said Cherry; and as Lance wriggled again, she added, 'He seems to have been taught nothing good.'

'Now, Cherry,' broke out Lance, 'I told you to say not a word.'

'I know a little about it, Lance,' said Felix, sitting down on the window-seat and lifting Lance on his knee, as he said, in a tone very unlike his intended expostulation, 'You must not let him do you harm, Lance.'

'He wouldn't; but he does not know anything about anything,' said the little boy. 'They never taught him to say his prayers, nor sing hymns, nor chant, and he thinks it is only good for niggers. So I told him that singing psalms once beat an army, and he laughed; and I thought Cherry was sure to know where it was—but girls will always tell.'

'Indeed you never told me not,' said Cherry, humbly.

'She has done no harm,' said Felix. 'Mr. Audley has just been talking to me about that poor boy. He really is as untaught as that little scamp at the potteries that we tried to teach.'

'He's a stunning good fellow,' broke in Lance; 'he has seen an alligator, and ridden mustangs.'

'Never mind that now, Lance; I dare say he is very amusing, but—'

'Don't hinder me from going to him,' broke in the younger boy vehemently.

'If,' said Felix gravely, 'you can be quite sure my father would not mind it.'

Lance was nestling close up to him in the dark, and he was surprised to find that round face wet with tears. 'Papa would not let him lie dull and moped all day long,' he said. 'O Fee, I can't keep away; I am so sorry for him. When that terrible cramp comes, it is of no use to say those sort of things to him.'

'What sort of things?'

'Oh, you know; verses such as Papa used to have said to him. They weren't a bit of good. No, not though I did get the book Papa marked for Cherry.'

'You did!' gasped Cherry, who little thought that sacred possession of hers was even known to Master Lance.

'You'd have done it yourself, Cherry,' said the little boy, 'if you had only seen how bad he was; he got quite white, and had great drops on his forehead, and panted so, and would not let out a bit of a cry, only now and then a groan; and so I ran to get the verse Papa used to say over and over to you when your foot was bad. And I'm sure it was the right one, but—but—it did him no good, for, oh! he didn't know who our Saviour is;' and the little fellow clung to his brother in a passion of tears, while Felix felt a pang at the contrast.

'Have you been telling him, Lancey?' he asked.

'I wanted him to ask Mr. Audley, but he said he was a parson, and his father said that there would be no parsons if men were not fools. Now, Fee, I've told you, but don't keep me away.'

'It would be hard on a poor sick fellow,' said Felix, thoroughly softened. 'Only, Lance, you know I can't be with you; will you promise to go away if ever you think Papa would wish it?'

'Oh yes; one has to do that, you know, when our own fellows get blackguardly,' said little Lance, freely; whereat Cherry shuddered somewhat. 'And, Fee,' he added, 'if you would only come and make him understand about things.'

'Mr. Audley must do that,' said Felix; 'I can't.'

'You teach the boys in the Sunday-school,' said Lance. 'And he'd mind you, Blunderbore. He says you are the grandest and most splendiferous fellow he ever did set eyes on, and that he feels something like, when you've just looked in and spoken to him.'

'You little ass, he was chaffing you.'

'No, no, indeed he wasn't. I told him all about it, because he liked your face so much. And he does care so very much when you look in. Oh! do, do, Fee; he is so jolly, and it is so lonely and horrid for him, and I do so want Papa for him;' and the child cried silently, but Felix felt the long deep sobs, and as Geraldine, much moved, said, 'Dear little Lancey,' he carried him over to her as she sat up in bed, and she kissed and fondled him, and murmured in his ear, 'Dear Lance, I'm sure he'll get good. We will get Mr. Audley to talk to him, you know, and we will say a prayer every day for him.'

Lance, beginning to recover, put his arms round Cherry's neck, gave her a tremendous hug, released himself from his brother's arms, and ran off to bed. Felix remained a few moments, while Cherry exclaimed, 'Oh! the dear good little fellow!'

'Better than any of us,' said Felix. 'I was quite savage with Mr. Audley when I found out about it. I must go down and tell him. I never thought all that was in the little chap! I'm glad he came to you, Cherry. Good-night.'

'And you will try to teach this poor boy, Felix?'

'I don't say that. I don't in the least know how; but I shall not dare to hinder Lance, now I see how he goes on.'

On his way down he heard voices in the sitting-room, where, in fact, Mr. Audley had joined Wilmet, to explain to her how vexed he was to have so much annoyed Felix, and perhaps also something of his own annoyance at the manner in which Felix took it. Wilmet, partly from her 'growing on the sunny side of the wall,' partly from her early authority, was in some ways older than her brother, and could see that there was in him a shade of boyish jealousy of his prerogative; and as she sat, in her pretty modest gravity, with her fair hair and her Sunday frock, she was softly but earnestly telling Mr. Audley that she was sure Felix would not mind long, and that he was very sorry for the poor boy really, only he was so anxious about Lance, and he did like to be consulted. Both looked up, startled, as Felix opened the door, and they saw that his eyes were full of tears. He came up to Mr. Audley, and said, 'I beg your pardon, sir; I'd no business to grumble, and that little fellow has been—'

'Beforehand with us?' asked Mr. Audley, as Felix broke down. 'The nurse has been just telling me how he sat on his bed saying bits of psalms and verses to him when he had that bad fit of cramp, "so pretty," she said; but I was afraid it must have been rather like a spell.'

Felix told his story, feeling it too much not to make it lame, and with the tearfulness trembling in his voice and eyes all the time.

'Our little gamin has the most of the good Samaritan in him,' said Mr. Audley. ''Tis not quite the end I should have begun at, but perhaps it may work the better.'

'Dear little boy, that he should have remembered that sermon!' exclaimed Wilmet.

'I am afraid it is more than I do,' said Felix; 'all last summer the more I tried to listen, the more I saw how he was changing. Do you remember it, Wilmet?'

'Yes; the text was, "The joy of the Lord is your strength," and he said how praising God, and going on thinking about His goodness and thankfulness, was the way to make our adversaries dissolve before us, and never trouble us at all, just like the bands of the Moabites and Ammonites before Jehoshaphat.'

'I recollect it well, and how I thought it such a likeness of himself,' said Mr. Audley; 'he was walking over his troubles, scarcely seeing them, as if they could not dim the shine of his armour while he went on looking up and being thankful. I fancy little Lance has a good deal of that kind of bright fearless way.'

'He has,' said Felix in a grave thoughtful tone that made the Curate look at him and sigh to think how early care and grief had come to make that joyous buoyancy scarce possible to the elder boy, little more than seventeen though he was.

'He is very idle, though,' added Wilmet; 'such caricatures as there are all over his books! Edgar's were bad enough, but Lance puts pig-tails and cocked hats to all Edgar's.'

So Lance's visits to the sick stranger remained unobstructed. He had no notion of teaching him; but the foreign boy in his languor and helplessness curiously fascinated him, perhaps from the very contrast of the passive, indolent, tropical nature with his own mercurial temperament. The Spaniard, or perhaps the old Mexican, seemed to predominate in Fernando, as far as could be guessed in one so weak and helpless. He seemed very quiet and inanimate, seldom wanting or seeking diversion, but content to lie still, with half-closed eyes; his manner was reserved, and with something of courteous dignity, especially when Lady Price came to visit him; and the Yankeeisms that sometimes dropped from his tongue did not agree with the polish of the tone, and still less with the imperious manner in which he sometimes addressed the nurse. He seemed, though not clever, to be tolerably well cultivated; he had been at the schools of whatever cities his father had resided in, and his knowledge of languages was of course extensive.

However, he never talked freely to Mr. Audley. He had bitterly resented that gentleman's interference, one day when he was peremptorily commanding the nurse to place him in a position that had been forbidden, and the endeavour to control him had made him fearfully angry. There was a stormy outbreak of violent language, only checked by a severe rebuke, for which he did not forgive the Curate; he was coldly civil, and accepted the attentions he could not dispense with in a grave formal manner that would have been sulky in an English lad, but had something of the dreary grandeur of the Spanish Don from that dark lordly visage, and made Mr. Audley half provoked, half pitying, speak of him always as his Cacique. He only expanded a little even to Lance, though the little boy waited on him assiduously, chattering about school doings, illustrating them on a slate, singing to him, acting Blondin, exhibiting whatever he could lay his hands on, including the twins, whom he bore down one after the other, to the great wrath of Sibby, not to say of little Stella herself, while Theodore took the exhibition with perfect serenity.

As to Felix, he was, as Lance said, the subject of the sick lad's fervent admiration. Perhaps the open, fair, cheerful, though grave countenance, fresh complexion, and strong, steadfast, upright bearing had something to do with the strange adoration that in his silent way Fernando paid to the youth, who looked in from time to time, bringing a sort of air of refreshment with his good-natured shy smile, even when he least knew what to say. Or else it was little Lance's fervent affection for Felix which had conduced to the erection of the elder brother into the idol of Fernando's fancy; and his briefest visit was the event of the long autumnal days spent in the uncurtained iron bed in the corner of the low room. The worship, silent though it was, was manifest enough to become embarrassing and ridiculous to the subject of it, whose sense of duty and compassion was always at war with his reluctance to expose himself to it. Not another word passed on any religious subject. Mr. Audley was not forgiven enough to venture on the attempt; the Rector was shy and frightened about it, and could make no beginning; and Mr. Mowbray Smith, who found great fault with them for their neglect, had been fairly stared down by the great black eyes, which, when the heavy lids were uplifted, proved to be of an immense size and force; and Felix was so sure that it could not be his business while three clergymen were going in and out that he had never done more than describe the weather, or retail any fresh bit of London news that had come down to the office.

At last, however, one November day, he found Fernando sitting up in bed, and Lance, perched on the table, talking so earnestly as not to perceive his entrance, until Fernando broke upon his words: 'There! it's no use!'

'Yes, it is,' cried Lance, jumping down. 'O Fee, I am glad you are come; I want you to tell him the rights of it.'

'The rights of what, Lance?'

'Tell him that it is all the devil's doing, and the men he has got on his side; and that it was the very thing our Saviour came for to set us free, only everybody won't,' said Lance clinging to his brother's hand, and looking up in his face.

'That's about right, Lance,' said Felix; 'but I don't quite know what you are talking about.'

'Just this,' said Fernando. 'Lance goes on about God being merciful and good and powerful—Almighty, as he says; but whatever women may tell a little chap like that, nobody can think so that has seen the things I have, down in the West, with my own eyes.'

'Felix!' cried Lance, 'say it. You know and believe just as I do, as everybody good does, men and all.'

'Yes, indeed!' said Felix with all his heart.

'Then tell me how it can be,' said Fernando.

Felix stood startled and perplexed, feeling the awful magnitude and importance of the question, but also feeling his own incompetence to deal with it; and likewise that Wilmet was keeping the tea waiting for him. He much wished to say, 'Keep it for Mr. Audley,' but he feared to choke the dawning of faith, and he likewise feared the appearance of hesitation.

'Nobody can really explain it,' he said, 'but that's no wonder. One cannot explain a thunderstorm, but one knows that it is.'

'That's electricity,' said Fernando.

'And what's electricity?'

'A fluid that—'

'Yes; that's another word. But you can't get any further. God made electricity, or whatever it is, and when you talk about explaining it, you only get to something that is. You know it is, and you can't get any further,' he repeated.

'Well, that's true; though science goes beyond you in America.'

'But no searching finds out all about God!' said Felix reverently. 'All we know is that He is so infinitely great and wise, that of course we cannot understand why all He does is right, any more than a private soldier understands his general's orders.'

'And you—you,' said Fernando, 'are content to say you don't understand.'

'Why not?' said Felix.

There was a silence. Fernando seemed to be thinking; Lance gazed from one to the other, as if disappointed that his brother was not more explicit.

'And how do you know it is true?' added Fernando. 'I mean, what Lance has been telling me! What makes you sure of it, if you are?'

'If I am?' cried Felix, startled into indignation. 'To be sure I am!'

'But how?'

'I know it!' said Felix.

'How?'

'The Bible!' gasped Lance impatiently.

'Ay; so you have said for ever,' broke in Fernando; 'but what authenticates that?'

'The whole course of history,' said Felix. 'There is a great chain of evidence, I know, but I never got it up. I can't tell it you, Fernando; I never wanted it, never even tried to think about the proofs. It is all too sure.'

'But wouldn't a Mahometan say that?' said Fernando.

'If he did, look at the Life of our Lord and of Mahomet together, and see which must be the true Prophet—the Way, the Life, the Truth.'

'That one could do,' said Fernando thoughtfully. 'I say,' as Felix made a movement as if he thought the subject concluded, 'I want to know one thing more. Lance says it is believing all this that makes you—any one I mean—good.'

'I don't know what else should,' said Felix, smiling a little; the question seemed to him so absurd.

'Is it really what makes you go and slave away at that old boss's of yours?'

'Why, that's necessity and my duty,' said Felix.

'And is it what makes this little coon come and spend all his play-hours on a poor fellow with a broken leg? I've been at many schools, and never saw the fellow who would do that.'

'Oh! you are such fun!' cried Lance.

'All that is right comes from God first and last,' said Felix gravely.

'And you—you that are no child—you believe all that Lance tells me you do, and think it makes you what you are!'

'I believe it; yes, of course. And believing it should make me much better than I am! I hope it will in time.'

'Ah!' sighed Fernando. 'I never heard anything like it since my father said he'd take the cow-hide to poor old Diego, if he caught him teaching me nigger-cant.'

They left him.

'Poor fellow!' sighed Felix; 'what have you been telling him, Lance?'

'Oh, I don't know; only why things were good and bad,' was Lance's lucid answer; and he was then intent on detailing the stories he had heard from Fernando. He had been in the worst days of Southern slavery ere its extinction, on the skirts of the deadly warfare with the Red Indians; and the poor lad had really known of horrors that curdled the blood of Wilmet and Geraldine, and made the latter lie awake or dream dreadful dreams all night.

But the next day, Mr. Audley was startled to hear the two friends in the midst of an altercation. When Lance had come in for his mid-day recreation, Fernando had produced five shillings, desiring him to go and purchase a Bible for him; but Lance, who had conceived the idea that the Scriptures ought not to be touched by an unchristened hand, flatly refused, offering, however, to read from his own. Now Lance's reading was at that peculiar school-boy stage which seems calculated to combine the utmost possible noise with the least possible distinctness; and though he had good gifts of ear and voice, and his reciting and singing were both above the average, the moment a book was before him, he roared his sentences between his teeth in horrible monotony. And as he began with the first chapter of St. Matthew, and was not perfectly able to cope with all the names, Fernando could bear it no longer, and insisted on having the book itself. Lance shook his head and refused; and matters were in this stage when Mr. Audley, not liking the echoes of the voices, opened the door. 'What is it?' he asked anxiously.

'Nothing,' replied Fernando, proudly trying to swallow his vexation.

'Lance!' said Mr. Audley rather severely; but just then, seeing what book the child was holding tight under his arm, he decided to follow him out of the room and interrogate.

'What was it, Lance?'

'He ought not to touch a Bible—he sha'n't have mine,' said Lance resentfully.

'Was he doing anything wrong with it?'

'Oh no! But he ought not to have it before he is christened, and I would have read to him.'

Mr. Audley knew what Lance's reading was, and smiled. 'Was that all, Lance? I like your guardianship of the Bible, my boy; but it was not given only to those who are Christians already, or how could any one learn?'

'He sha'n't touch mine, though,' said Lance, with an odd sturdiness; stumping upstairs with his treasure, a little brown sixpenny S. P. C. K. book, but in which his father had written his name on his last birth-day but one.

Mr. Audley only waited to take down a New Testament, and present himself at Fernando's bedside, observing gladly that there was much more wistfulness than offence about his expression.

'It was a scruple on the young man's part,' said Mr. Audley, smiling, though full of anxiety; 'he meant no unkindness.'

'I know he did not,' said Fernando quietly, but gazing at the purple book in the clergyman's hands.

'Did you want this?' said Mr. Audley; 'or can I find anything in it for you?'

'Thank you;' and there was a pause. The offended manner towards Mr. Audley had been subsiding of late into friendliness under his constant attentions, and Fernando's desire for an answer prevailed at last. 'Felix told me to read the Life of Christ,' he said, not irreverently, 'and that it would show me He must be True.'

'I hope and trust that so it may be,' said Mr. Audley, more moved than he could bear to show, but with fervour in his voice far beyond his words.

'Felix,' said Fernando, resting on the name, 'Felix does seem as if he must be right, Mr. Audley; can it be really as he says—and Lance—that their belief makes them like what they are?'

'Most assuredly.'

'And you don't say so only because you are a minister?' asked the boy distrustfully.

'I say so because I know it. I knew that it is the Christian faith that makes all goodness, long before I was a minister.'

'But I have seen plenty of Christians that were not in the least like Felix Underwood.'

'So have I; but in proportion as they live up to their faith, they have what is best in him.'

'I should like to be like him,' mused Fernando; 'I never saw such a fellow. He, and little Lance too, seem to belong to something bright and strong, that seems inside and outside, and I can't lay hold of what it is.'

'One day you will, my dear boy,' said Mr. Audley. 'Let me try to help you.'

Fernando scarcely answered, save by half a smile, and a long sigh of relief: but when Mr. Audley put his hand over the long brown fingers, they closed upon it.