'Why he wanted us to stop from church, asked me to let off the poor little coon; and when I said we couldn't, because we were in the choir, wanted to know what we were paid, then why we did it at all; and so it turned out that he thinks churches only meant for women and psalm-singing niggers and Methodists, and has never been inside one in his life, never saw the sense of it, wanted to know why I went.'
'What did you tell him?'
'I don't know; I was so taken aback. I said something about our duty to God, and it's being all we had to get us through life; but I know I made a dreadful mess of it, and the bell rang, and I got away. But he seems a sheer heathen, and there's Lance in and out all day.'
'Yes, Felix, I am afraid it is true that the poor lad has been brought up with no religion at all-a blank sheet, as his father called him.'
'Wasn't his father English?'
'Yes; but he had lived a roving, godless life. I began, when I found the boy must stay here, by asking whether he were of his father's or his mother's communion, and in return heard a burst of exultation that he had never let a priest into his house. His father-in-law had warned him against it, and he had carried his wife out of their reach long before the child's birth; he has not even been baptized, but you see, Felix, I could not act like Abraham to the idolater in the Talmud.'
Felix did not speak, but knocked one foot against the other in vexation, feeling that it was his house after all, and that Mr. Audley should not have turned this young heathen loose into it to corrupt his brother, without consulting him.
'I told Travis,' continued the Curate, 'that if I undertook the charge as he wished, it must be as a priest myself, and I must try to put some religion into him. And, to my surprise, he said he left it to me. Fernando was old enough to judge, and if he were to be an English squire, he must conform to old-country ways; besides, I was another sort of parson from Yankee Methodists and Shakers or Popish priests-he knew the English clergy well enough, of the right sort.'
'So he is to learn religion to make him a squire?'
'I was thankful enough to find no obstruction.'
'And have you begun?' asked Felix moodily.
'Why-no. He has been too ill and too reserved. I have attempted nothing but daily saying a short prayer for him in his hearing, hoping he would remark on it. But you know the pain is still very absorbing at times, and it leaves him exhausted; and besides, I fancy he has a good deal of tropical languor about him, and does not notice much. Nothing but Lance has roused him at all,'
'I would never have let Lance in there by himself, if I had known,' said Felix. 'He is quite bewitched.'
'It would have been difficult to prevent it. Nor do I think that much harm can be done. I believe I ought to have told you, Felix; but I did not like denouncing my poor sick guest among the children, or its getting round all the town and to my Lady. After all, Lance is a very little fellow; it is not as if Edgar or Clem were at home.'
'I suppose it cannot be helped,' sighed Felix; 'but my father-' and as he recollected the desire to take his brothers away from Mr. Ryder, he felt as if his chosen guardian had been false to his trust, out of pity and enthusiasm.
'Your father would have known how to treat him,' sighed Mr. Audley. 'At any rate, Felix, we must not forget the duties of hospitality and kindness; and I hope you will not roughly forbid Lance to go near him, without seeing whether the poor fellow is not really inoffensive.'
'I'll see about it,' was all that Felix could get himself to say; for much as he loved Mr. Audley, he could not easily brook interference with his brothers, and little Lance, so loyal to himself, and so droll without a grain of malice, was very near to his heart. 'A young pagan,' as he thought to himself, 'teaching him all the blackguard tricks and words he has learnt at all the low schools in north or south!' and all the most objectionable scenes he had met with in American stories, from Uncle Tom onwards, began to rise before his eyes. 'A pretty thing to do in a fit of beneficence! I'll order Lance to keep away, and if he dares disobey, I'll lick him well to show him who is master.'
So he felt, as he swung himself upstairs, and halted with some intention of pouring out his vexed spirit to Wilmet, because Mr. Audley had no business to make it a secret; but Wilmet was putting her mother to bed, and he went on upstairs. There he found all the doors open, and heard a murmuring sound of voices in Geraldine's room. In a mood to be glad of any excuse for finding fault, he strode across the nursery, where Angela and Bernard slept, and saw that Lance, who ought to have gone at once to bed on coming in, was standing in his sister's window, trying to read in the ray of gas- light that came up from a lamp at the brew-house door.
'Go to bed, Lance,' he said; 'if you have not learnt your lessons in proper time, you must wake early, or take the consequences. I won't have it done on Sunday night.'
Lance started round angrily, and Cherry cried, 'O Felix, it is no such thing! Only would you tell us where to find about the king and his priests that defeated the enemy by singing the 'mercy endureth for ever' psalm?'
'In the Bible!' said Felix, as if sure it was a blunder. 'There's no such story.'
'Indeed there is,' cried Lance, 'for Papa (the word low and reverently) took out his blue poly-something Bible and read it out in the sermon. Don't you remember, Fee, a hot day in the summer, when he preached all about those wild robbers-horrid fellows with long spears-coming up in the desert to make a regular smash of the Jews?'
'Lance!' cried Cherry.
'Well, he did not say that, of course, but they wanted to; and how the king sent out the priests without a fighting man, only all in white, praising God in the beauty of holiness, and singing, 'His mercy endureth for ever.' I saw him read that, though he told us all the rest without book; how all the enemy began to quarrel, and all killed one another, and the Jews had nothing to do but to pick up the spoil, and sing another psalm coming back.'
'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
