CHAPTER XIV

PREPARATION

On the morning of the third day after the dinner, Montrose received a letter from Dr. Eberstein saying that he was arriving in Perchton that same evening. At once the young man decided to see his friend at the watering-place and stay there for the night. He was anxious to tell the doctor how Enistor's character had been misunderstood, and what an agreeable man he was to live with. Also he asked the Squire if he could bring back Eberstein for a few hours' visit, to which Enistor heartily agreed. The schemer was looking forward to meeting the man—if he was simply a man and not something greater—whom Narvaez called "The Adversary." Confident of receiving support from Don Pablo, the Squire was anxious to come to grips with the opposing power that wished to thwart his plans. The suspense of the delay in any decided action being taken chafed Enistor considerably, and he wished to arrive at the desired conclusion as swiftly as possible. Narvaez advised waiting and Enistor rejected the advice. He had not the inexhaustible patience of his master.

Alice suggested that as Hardwick was going on that day to Perchton to consult a doctor about his health, Douglas should accompany him. The artist as usual had borrowed his rich friend's motor-car, and when a message was sent to him, replied that he would be delighted to have Montrose with him. To avoid the necessity of the car climbing the hill to Tremore, Douglas went down to Polwellin with a medium-sized bag, containing what necessaries he required for his night's absence. Alice walked with him, and they left the bag at Hardwick's lodgings, where the car was to arrive some time during the afternoon. It was already long after midday, and having to get rid of an hour of waiting, the girl proposed that they should call on Dame Trevel.

"You said you would help her, Douglas," she reminded him.

"Of course. I should have seen her on the morning after the dinner, when I told Mr. Sparrow that I would give her money. It was wrong of me not to keep my promise. The vicar will think that I am like every one else, and say much but do little."

"I don't think the vicar will think anything about the matter," said Alice candidly. "Mrs. Trevel is a heretic in his eyes!"

"Simply because she won't believe blindly against her better reason. There is a great want of logic about priestly authority. With the teachers of exoteric knowledge it is 'Obey or be damned!' which is something like the reported motto of the French Revolution: 'Be my brother, or I'll kill you.'"

"But Mr. Sparrow is a good man, Douglas."

"I admitted long ago that he was a good man, my dear. But a good man with a limited understanding can do more harm than a bad man. There are other ways of teaching a child than by boxing his ears until he is stupid with pain."

"I don't think Dame Trevel would like to be called a child," said Alice, with an amused laugh.

"My dear, the majority of human beings are children. The longer I live, the more I see that. I am a child myself in many ways, although, as Eberstein is widening my limitations, I am beginning to grow up. Children," Montrose spoke half to himself and half to his companion, "what else? Instead of cake and toys, we want gold and lands, and power and pleasure. Whether we deserve them or not we clamour for them, just like a child. We become cross when things don't go as we wish them, and slap the bad naughty table that has hurt baby in the shape of anything which impedes our getting what we desire. Good Lord, how can any man be angry with another man, when he knows that his enemy is but a child? But to know that one must be more than a child oneself."

"Do you call me a child?" asked Alice, pouting.

At the very door of Dame Trevel's cottage Montrose bent to kiss her. "A very charming child, who shall never be put into the corner by me."

"You talk as though you were the only wise man in existence."

"Yes!" assented Montrose, laughing. "I speak as though I were the judge of the earth instead of being a denizen. La Rochefoucauld says that. Go in, Alice, and let us get our interview over. We haven't overmuch time."

Mrs. Trevel received her visitors in a clean little room, poorly furnished but fairly comfortable. She was a gaunt old creature, London born and London bred, so she did not speak in the Cornish way. But indeed, thanks to the authority of school-boards, the local dialects are fast disappearing, and the girl idly remembered at the moment how ordinary was the wording of Rose Penwin and her fisherman-lover. The sight of Dame Trevel seated in her big chair suggested the names, as the absence of the West Country shibboleth in her speech suggested the thought of the younger generation whose dialect had been, so to speak, wiped out. The old woman was glad, as usual, to see her nursling and highly approved of the handsome young man who was to marry her, as all Polwellin knew by this time.

"I hope it will be all sunshine with you two," said Mrs. Trevel, when her visitors were seated. "And that you'll live to see your children's children playing about your knees, my dears."

"With Alice beside me it is bound to be sunshine," replied Douglas heartily. "She is an angel."

"Ah, my young sir, men always call women so before marriage; but what do they call them afterwards?"

"That depends mainly on the woman, I fancy," said Montrose dryly. "A wife can make her husband whatever she chooses."

"A silk purse out of a sow's ear," retorted Miss Enistor saucily. "But Douglas and I understand one another, nurse, and there will be no cause for quarrels."

"I wish I could say the same about my lad and the girl he has set his heart on marrying," sighed Dame Trevel, laying down her knitting and removing her spectacles. "It's more her fault than his, though. Rose is a flighty piece."

"She won't listen to reason," said Alice, shaking her head wisely.

"Does any woman ever listen to reason?" inquired Montrose with a shrug.

"From a man she won't; but from a woman she will. Don't be cynical. But I have talked to Rose without success," ended Alice, turning to her nurse.

"So have I, my dearie, and then she told me to mind my own business; as if it wasn't my business to see that my lad got a decent wife."

"There's no real harm in Rose," cried Alice hastily.

"I'm not saying there is. But why she should take jewels from that foreign gentleman and make Job wild, I don't understand."

"Women are fond of jewels," suggested Douglas.

"And why not if they get them in the right way?" snapped Mrs. Trevel ungraciously. "But Rose is to marry my lad, and he don't want her visiting that old gentleman and taking presents."

"Old is the word, nurse," said Alice swiftly. "Job can't be jealous."

"But he is, and his jealousy is dangerous, just as his father's was before him, dearie. And the foreign gentleman puzzles me," added the old woman, taking up her knitting again. "They did say he was to marry you, my love—by your father's wish, I swear, and never by your own will. December and May. Ha! A pretty match that would be."

"I marry Douglas and no one else, nurse, whatever my father may say or do."

"He's a dour gentleman is the Squire," said Mrs. Trevel, shaking her head, "and not pleasant to cross. He never treated your mother well, and she faded like a delicate flower blown upon by cold winds. To me, dearie, he behaves cruel in the way of rent, for all my bringing you up."

"He doesn't mean to," said Alice, distressed, and driven to defending her father, although she knew only too well his high-handed methods with tenants who could not or would not pay.

"Out of the fullness of the heart the mouth speaketh," quoted Mrs. Trevel in a sour way. "If he doesn't mean it, why does he do it?"

"Do what?"

"Says he'll turn me out bag and baggage if I don't pay the rent," cried the old woman excitedly. "How can I when the fishing's been bad and Job can't earn enough to keep things going? I make a trifle by my knitting, but that won't boil the pot. And winter's approaching too. Oh, what's to be done?"

Montrose glanced at Alice and handed a piece of paper to the speaker. "Pay the rent with that, and use what is over to buy food and coal."

Mrs. Trevel grasped the banknote, with a vivid spot of colour on each faded cheek, and could scarcely speak in her excitement. "What is it: oh, what is it?"

"The answer to your prayer," said Alice, rising and looking solemn.

"My prayer! Why, it's a fifty-pound note. Oh, sir, I can't take such a large sum of money from you."

"It is not from me," said Montrose hastily. "I am merely the instrument. God sends the money because you asked Him to help you."

The tears fell down the worn old face. "And I told the passon as it wasn't no use praying," she moaned regretfully.

"Well, you see it is. He takes His own time and means, but in the end every petition receives the answer He deems best. Thank Him, Mrs. Trevel."

"I thank Him, and I thank you too, sir. Bless you, how the sight of this money do set my mind at rest. If it wasn't for Job and the contrary ways of that silly girl I'd be as happy as an angel."

"Pray for Job and Rose," advised Alice gently.

"Well, it do seem worth it, dearie. If He sends me this, He may turn Rose into a reasonable girl, which she isn't at present." Mrs. Trevel was about to put away her treasure-trove when she hesitated. "Should I take it, Miss Alice?"

"Yes. Of course you must take it. Mr. Montrose is rich and can well afford to give it to you."

"And the riches I have," said Douglas quietly, "are but given to me as a steward of Christ to dispense according to His will."

He did not say this priggishly, although to an ordinary man of the world such a way of regarding wealth would seem priggish. Nine people out of ten would have considered the speech as one made for effect, but Alice was the tenth and knew the absolutely impersonal way in which her lover looked at the money. With joyful tears Dame Trevel showered blessings on the young couple when they left her house, and was a happy woman for the rest of the day. Even the prospect of Rose's behaviour rousing Job's jealousy to the extent of leading to serious trouble ceased to cause her anxiety for the moment. Angels had come and left their gifts behind them. The old woman resolved to go to the vicarage and confess with penitent tears that she had been wrong to doubt the efficacy of prayer.

"Do you really regard yourself as Christ's steward?" asked Alice, when the two were on their way to Julian's lodgings, more from curiosity than because she doubted.

"Yes. I thought you knew me well enough to believe so, darling. Of course when you are my wife I shall use the money to make us both comfortable, and we shall have even the luxuries of life. But we must share our good fortune with less fortunate people."

"Why not sell all we have and give it to the poor?"

"I suppose there comes a stage when one does that," mused Montrose, more to himself than to the girl. "But I have not yet reached that point. I know what poverty is in its most sordid aspect, and I don't wish to undergo the experience again. The most I can do is to share——" he paused, then went on in a doubtful manner: "I expect the Blessed One knew that the young man who had great possessions, to whom He said that, was a miser. He was perfect in all ways, but he loved money."

"The Bible doesn't say so," insisted Alice quickly.

"I am reading between the lines, dear. And if Christ gives any one wealth to administer as a steward, what would be the use of the steward nullifying his office by getting rid at one sweep of what he has to administer? It's a hard saying in any case, Alice. I must ask Eberstein what he thinks about the matter. Besides, my dear——" he hesitated and closed his lips.

"Well?" asked the girl, curiously.

"Nothing," answered Douglas, as Alice had answered on a previous occasion, but there was a puzzled and rather pained look in his eyes as he spoke the word.

The car was already standing at the door of Julian's lodgings and Julian himself was already in the vehicle. While Montrose bundled in beside him, Alice stared at the artist and laughed at his healthy looks, for he seemed to have entirely recovered from his experience on the moors.

"What a fraud you are, Julian, talking about your heart being weak," she said in a jesting manner. "You look big and strong and healthy. Your eyes are bright, your colour is ruddy and you are the picture of a Samson."

Julian nodded gaily. "I feel like a Samson to-day," he said, tucking the rug about his companion's legs and his own. "Sometimes, as at present, I could jump over the moon. At other times you could knock me down with a feather."

"How strange," said the girl thoughtfully.

"Man's a queer animal," cried Douglas lightly, and waved his hand as the big car got under way. "I'll be back to-morrow, dear. Think of me!" and he smiled at Miss Enistor's bright face, little guessing what it would look like when he next set eyes on its beauty.

Shortly they were clear of the village and spinning along the winding levels towards the watering-place. Julian, as Alice had noted, was full of life, and chatted a great deal about this thing and that. Also he asked Montrose questions about the teaching of Eberstein, since his curiosity had been aroused long since by some of the apparently odd things which the young man said so simply and serenely. It was not the first time that they had conversed on the subject of reincarnation and its kindred associations. Julian was not prepared to accept what he termed the theory of successive lives as gospel, and wanted physical proof for super-physical knowledge. This, as Montrose assured him, was absurd.

"When you are able to leave your body consciously and enter into the Unseen World, you will be given positive proof regarding the truth of Reincarnation and the Law of Cause and Effect, which is termed Karma by Eastern teachers. But until that time comes you must accept both laws on logical grounds, since they alone explain without a flaw the riddles of life."

"Can you leave your body consciously?" asked the artist with scepticism.

"No! I shall some day, as Eberstein is training me. But you can't hurry the hour and you can't delay the hour. You have just to wait."

"It requires immense patience."

"Immense," assented Douglas, "but if you want a big thing you have to do big things to get it. Only by living the life of Christ can you attain to the Christ-like powers. Love, purity, unselfishness, serenity, kindness of thought and word and action: these things arouse the latent faculties which, inherent in every man, enable him to come into contact with other worlds. These are the laws of the Kingdom of Heaven by which one acquires the powers."

Julian thought for a few moments. "I had a talk with Narvaez the other day," he said after a pause, "and he offered to cast my horoscope. He seems, so far as I can judge in my limited way, to have powers beyond the reach of the ordinary man. Does he practise love and unselfishness and all the rest of the necessary requirements?"

"No!" said Montrose decidedly. "I don't think Narvaez is a good man, although I have no positive reason to say that he is a bad one. But an evil man—I am not speaking of Don Pablo, understand—can gain some of the power of the Kingdom by sheer force of will. Christ says: 'He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber!' So those who get in otherwise than through Christ the Door of the sheep—the door of love, that is—are the evil people who acquire super-physical powers by strength of will, and make use of them selfishly. It is black magic to do that. But those who follow the Master and enter through Him, as the Door, by living the prescribed life to which I have referred, get the powers. But these use them for the benefit of others and not to aggrandise themselves. That is white magic."

"It seems strange to use the word 'magic' in connection with Christ."

"The word has become polarised," said Montrose indifferently, "you can call anything that happens by working an unknown law of Nature 'a miracle,' or 'a wonder,' or 'a magical performance.' The one who performs such exceptional things, of course, can exercise the unknown law I speak of."

"Christ, being superhuman, could," argued Hardwick seriously, "because He had wisdom without measure. But the ordinary man——"

"If the ordinary man loves Christ and keeps His commandments and walks in His footsteps, he can gain knowledge of the power to work what are termed miracles. The Master said so Himself, when His disciples marvelled at His doings, and told them that if they followed Him they would do greater things. As you know, some of the apostles did work miracles in His name. They learned by living the life how to use the laws rightly, by means of the power of Love which came through the Blessed One."

"You appear to know a lot about these things, Montrose?"

"Indeed, I know very little. Eberstein can give much, but I cannot take all he is willing to give, because my understanding is yet limited. But everything will come in time. I must wait patiently."

This interesting conversation was necessarily ended when the car reached Perchton, and the young men parted for the time being. Douglas sought out the hotel where Eberstein was staying, while Hardwick went in search of his doctor. The artist arranged to meet Eberstein later, as Montrose was anxious he should do so, if only to gain an answer to certain questions. The young man being a neophyte could not explain much that Julian desired to know. But he was positive that Eberstein could and would answer all questions, as he never withheld any knowledge from a sincere inquirer.

In a quiet hotel, high up on the cliffs, the doctor occupied a light and airy sitting-room, delightfully peaceful and cheerful and bright. Through the expansive windows could be seen the calm waters of the bay, with little wavelets breaking on the crescent of yellow sand, and the tall white column of the lighthouse shooting up from the reddish-hued rocks of the promontory. Montrose, after early greetings had taken place, noted none of these things, but flung himself into the nearest chair, feeling unaccountably weary. Eberstein, who had welcomed his young friend in his usual sincere and kindly manner, looked at him keenly, as he observed the boy's wilted appearance.

"You seem to be tired," he remarked gently.

"Well, I am," admitted Montrose, with a perplexed expression. "I don't know why I should be, as I slept all right last night and came here in a comfortable motor-car."

"Whom did you come with?"

"A fellow called Hardwick, who is an artist. A really capital chap, who is a first-rate friend. He got the car from some one he knows and gave me a lift."

"Is he ill?" asked Eberstein, after a pause.

"Strange you should ask that. He isn't ill, and he isn't well; that is, he suffers from a weak heart—not enough vitality. He is seeing a doctor."

"I understand."

"You understand what?" Montrose stared.

"Why you look tired. In quite an unconscious way, this Hardwick has been drawing the vitality out of you."

"Can that be done?"

"Oh, yes! The weaker body frequently replenishes its life forces from any stronger body that is at hand. You have heard it said how old age eats up youth. That is a great truth."

"David and Abishag," murmured Montrose wearily. Then he opened his eyes with an astonished look. "I am growing stronger."

Eberstein smiled in an understanding manner. "I am giving you strength, and strength you will need very shortly, I assure you."

"You said in London that trouble was coming. But so far everything is all right. Enistor is an extremely pleasant man, who quite approves of my marriage with Alice. We get on capitally together."

"Was your first impression of him pleasant?"

"No! I disliked him no end when we first met. But as there was no reason for me to do so I grew to like him."

"Ah!" said the doctor with a world of meaning, "second thoughts are not always best. Have you met the man who wanted to marry Alice?"

"Narvaez? Yes! He's a beast. I shall never get over my dislike for him."

"You must not dislike him or any one," corrected Eberstein softly. "Pity Narvaez and pity Enistor, but be on your guard against both."

"What can they do?" asked Montrose, with the disdainful confidence of youth.

"Enistor can do nothing alone. Directed by Narvaez he can do much. And he will," concluded the doctor with emphasis.

"Does the trouble you predicted come from that quarter?"

"Yes!"

"Well, it is two against two. Alice and I can fight her father and Narvaez."

"Don't be over-confident, or you will invite disaster," said the doctor dryly. "There is much doing of which you know nothing. That is why I am here to aid you, my friend. I cannot do everything, as a great deal has to be done by you and Alice with what intuition and strength you possess. With Alice the ordeal has already commenced."

Montrose started to his feet. "Is she in danger?" he asked excitedly. "If so, I must go back to Tremore at once."

"There is no need. What she has to do must be done alone, and you would do her more harm than good by going to her assistance. Hitherto I have protected her with my strength, which has increased her own. Now for a certain time that strength has been withdrawn. Narvaez will know the moment I cease to guard her."

"What will he do?" demanded the young man, clenching his fists.

"Nothing that physical strength can deal with, so don't get ready to fight, my friend. Narvaez will not hurt the girl, but he will endeavour to learn from her something he has long wished to know. It is necessary that he should know and that his pupil should know also. Therefore, for a time he is permitted to work his will. There! There! He will only make use of her clairvoyant powers, so she will suffer little."

"I don't want her to suffer at all."

"Unless she does in some degree, she will not progress."

"Narvaez is such a beast."

"No. He is only a man blinded by pride in his intellectual knowledge. You must pity him for his blindness and do your best to help him. Hate only ceases when Love is used to vanquish it. Calm yourself, Montrose. What must be must be if the Will of God is to be done."

"I wish you hadn't told me," cried the young man, greatly agitated.

"That is a weak thing to say. I told you purposely, so that you may develop faith and patience. Can you not trust me?"

"Yes! Yes! Yes!"

"Then show it by waiting quietly here until I tell you to return to Tremore, my friend. This is the time of preparation to meet and baffle the trouble I warned you against. Stand in the strength of Christ and not in your own strength. He never fails those who trust in Him. To-morrow morning you must come with me to early celebration. By partaking of the Body and Blood of The Blessed One"—Eberstein made the sign of the cross—"you will gain the necessary strength to stand up bravely against the Powers of Darkness."

"Narvaez?"

Eberstein bowed his stately head. "God pity him and save him," he murmured, with infinite compassion.