The Carmichaels ’
house was, as Aidan had predicted, nothing compared to the McNeill residence. It
was a low, blockish structure, built of several different shades of brickwork. It
had one rickety door and two windows, covered now with wooden shutters which
had been drawn tight against the gathering chill of the evening.
“Let’s hope the minister is in good
spirits,” Ruben said. “Sometimes these religious men can be a bit uptight.”
“Compared to you, Rube, the entire
world is marvelously uptight. Go on, do the honors.”
Ruben rapped sharply on the wooden
door. It opened, and there stood Patience, beaming the same bright smile that
had provided a warming light in the darkness of the previous night. She had let
down her long brown hair, and it hung about her shoulders in a most attractive
way. But Aidan had been right again—she was wearing a long blue skirt and a
white blouse, which, although they gave her an air of simple grace, would have seemed
very much out of place amid the grandeur of Anna Nelson’s ball.
“Gentlemen,” she said with a curtsy.
“Welcome to our home.”
The two friends bowed low.
“You look wonderful,” Ruben said
with a smile.
Victor nodded his assent. “Very
nice indeed.”
She laughed. “It’s been too long
since I heard shameless flattery. Thank you both.”
Ruben gave her a broad grin. “You’re
quite welcome, Miss Carmichael.”
“Please, call me Patience. I, um… I
think I might stand out a bit at the ball with these dreary clothes, but there
wasn’t a great deal else I could go with at the last minute.”
“We thought the invitation was
rather quick as well,” said Ruben. “So we brought you a gift. Victor’s father
is a tailor, and he was more than happy to provide it. So if you would like,
you’re welcome to try this.” He thrust the package toward her, wrapped in plain
brown paper.
She blushed and accepted it with
thanks. Opening up the paper, she let out a little gasp of delight. “It’s
beautiful,” she breathed, holding her new gown up in the fading light of the
dimming sun. “Thank you so much.”
“Our pleasure, Patience,” Ruben
replied with another bow.
“Patience!” a deep voice called out
from inside the house. “Are you going to keep those poor lads standing on the
doorstep all night long? Bring them on in!”
She smiled and stepped aside,
ushering Ruben and Victor inside. If the outside of the house looked as though
they were in the depths of poverty, the interior managed to improve on the
impression a bit, with a quaint sort of simplistic charm. The furnishings were
austere, to be sure, but there was definite evidence of a woman’s refining
touch to it all. The house was divided into just three rooms—two to the left,
which provided separate chambers for the minister and his daughter, and one on
the right, which served as a kitchen, dining room, parlor, and study all
combined into one cramped space.
As they rounded the corner from the
narrow entryway, Victor and Ruben were greeted by a large, powerful man—not
quite as big as Ruben, but impressive nonetheless. He had great, muscled arms
that bespoke more years of turning soil with a plow than turning the pages of a
Bible. He looked to be about fifty, with a balding head crowned in a wild
tonsure of silvery hair. But his eyes, more than anything else about the man,
were what seized their attention. Large eyes, and gray, they seemed to dance
and sparkle with a joyous intensity, a frenetic energy that caught them both off-guard.
He stood up and offered his hand to
both young men, nearly crushing Victor’s hand in the process. His smile was
broad, and, despite being gap-toothed, it reflected the same powerful joy that radiated
from his daughter’s presence.
“We’re glad to have you with us,
lads,” he said, motioning to two straight-backed wooden chairs, which they
took. Patience made the introductions and then turned around to tend to the
food while the men talked.
The minister eased his considerable
mass onto a similar chair, which offered a creak of complaint under the stress.
“Well, boys,” he grinned, “you’re
in for a treat. Patience has been cooking for you all afternoon, and she can
cook as well as her Mum, if not better!”
They nodded in agreement, for
already the succulent aroma of roasted lamb and freshly-baked bread was filling
the air. Victor wondered with a flash of guilt at what expense they had gone to
provide that kind of meal for them.
“Patience told me a bit about what
happened last night,” he said, continuing on in his grand, open style. “It
looks like you two came out not too poorly after all, save for your eye, Mister
McNeill.”
“I’m just glad we were able to drive
them away in time,” he replied.
“Yes,” said Patience, turning away
from the kitchen table for a moment. “How is your servant?”
“He’s awake, and that’s a blessing.
It looks like he’ll make his recovery, but I doubt he’ll ever be able to use
his leg quite as well again.”
“No doubt the time of prayer was
efficacious for his healing,” Ruben noted, at which the minister nodded.
Victor smiled slightly. His friend
was trying to win the approval of Patience’s father, for rather obvious
reasons.
“Yes, and a noble cause, that,” the
minister said as he crossed one leg onto his knee. “To save the life of a
servant. Noble cause. Christ gave his life to save the least of these, our
brethren.”
“Reverend Carmichael,” Victor
began, at which the minister held up his hand.
“I haven’t been ordained by the Church
of England, lad, and Methodist ordinations don’t proffer much credit for most
people hereabouts. Call me John.”
“John,” he continued, “tell us a
little bit about the work you’ll be doing here.”
The big man nodded in appreciation
of the request. “Have you lads heard much about the Methodists?”
“You take after John Wesley, don’t
you?”
“After a fashion. We prefer to say
that we take after Jesus Christ and his disciples, but you’re right—John Wesley
was the spark that God used to light the fire. Canterbury is not an easy city to do this
kind of work in, you know.”
“I wouldn’t think so,” Ruben
chuckled. “Most of the folks around these parts are woven into the grain of the
established Church—always have been, always will be. What with the archbishop
here, and the added fact that this was where Christianity began in England .
They’re proud of their heritage here.”
“True. But in actuality, I’m not
trying to win anyone away from the Church of England. It might work out that
way in some cases, but that’s not the goal. In fact, Wesley himself stood
firmly against separating from the state church. So I look on my ministry more
as one within the existing church—reaching out to those of the parish that, for
one reason or another, haven’t sought to be woven into the grain of their local
church. I’m not building anything new, but I’m trying to breathe life onto the
spark of Christian spirituality in the hearts of the men and women of these
parts.”
“And how do you go about that?”
asked Ruben.
“Well, by encouraging them to
follow the disciplines. Here in England ,
many are afforded remarkable luxury, and that can lead to laxity in the
spiritual life. People don’t have to depend on God for day-to-day life, so God
becomes a sort of add-on to life rather than the underlying foundation. Christianity
becomes a Sunday experience rather than the meaning of life. I’m here to fight
that kind of laxity and to remind people that although the Christian life is a
blessing and gift of God through His grace, it is something that must be worked
at. We must persevere. Christians today miss so much of the abundant life the
Christ offered. So I help people by encouraging them to continue in their
personal devotional life—in reading the Bible and in persistent prayer. Only in
such things will we really begin to see the face of God and know His will for
our lives.”
As John spoke, Victor felt his
heart begin to rise. There was something special about this man, something
captivating. Something that made him want to embrace that abundant life with
everything he had within him. If it was anything like the joy that radiated
from John and Patience, he wanted that deeper experience of the faith.
“But you don’t have your own
church, do you?” Ruben asked. “How do you plan to go about this—in a practical
sense?”
“No, I don’t have a church,” he
replied, leaning back in his seat. “But the rector at St.
Martin ’s chapel has been gracious enough to allow me to help him
in his ministry there. He has agreed that since I’m not trying to pull members
away from his flock, there is nothing in my message with which he can find
fault. So for the time being, I will be encouraging and uplifting the flock
there.”
“Ah,” Ruben laughed. “If the rector
tells you any interesting stories about the two of us, use a discerning ear. I
think he may yet harbor a grudge, though I suppose as an upstanding churchman
he has probably forgiven us by now.”
“Why would he hold a grudge against
you?”
“Well,” Ruben said, glancing over
at Victor, “in our younger days most of the rectors of the city predicted that
we would become the most unregenerate, filthy sinners in the city—damned in
life before ever seeing the Judgment Seat.”
“But,” Victor added, “our
reputation was not entirely undeserved. It’s merely that what we saw as
harmless fun, the clerics took as evidence of rank sinfulness in our hearts. You
see, we would play pranks on them to—well, to liven up the meetings a bit. We
had a band of friends about our age—probably twelve of us—and we would pull of
some rather intricate schemes, but none of it came across favorably to them. They
particularly disliked our re-enactments of certain biblical scenes in the
cathedral yard. We were dubbed ‘the Hellfire Brigade,’ and the name stuck. So I
fear we may not be seen in the most favorable light by most of the clergymen in
this town.”
“Ah, yes,” John smiled, tapping a
finger thoughtfully against his cheek. “Let’s see—you drink, you brawl in the
street, you dance. And I might add,” he grinned coyly, “you invite a strange,
pretty girl to go with you. On top of all that, you’ve been known to show
blatant disrespect for churchmen. Not a recipe for acclamation by men wearing
the robe of the church, is it?”
Victor and Ruben exchanged another
glance, and John laughed.
“In fact, John Wesley himself would
have undoubtedly condemned you and called you to repentance! But to be honest,
lads, I’ve grown up with a faith that told me not to judge men—that it’s the
heart that counts. And as I think on it, the Lord we follow was known to drink,
to start a brawl of sorts in the Temple, to speak to strange women in a way
completely off-limits for the customs of his time, and he certainly wasn’t
overly concerned with impressing the religious men of his day. So all in all, I
couldn’t pass judgment on you without passing the same judgment against the
Savior of the world. From where I sit, lads, you’re in good company.”
By that time, both young men were
beaming at him. Here was a churchman whom they could grow to love—a man not
tinged by pride or false decorum, and thoroughly concerned with portraying the
love and joy of a life surrendered to Christ. For both Victor and Ruben, who despite
their good-natured pranks had grown up in strong religious families, their
faith was the foundation of their lives. And to hear it so marvelously put from
his lips of this simple, impoverished minister was as moving as listening to a
breathtaking piece of music.
The conversation continued on from
there, and Victor talked for a while about his time at the London School of
Medicine and his plans to return there to work in Dr. Taylor’s practice. Ruben
also spoke for a time, talking about his family and their daily routine of work
on the farm. After a while the conversation turned to politics—the one subject
that every man in Europe was well-versed in. As Napoleon continued his march
across the Continent virtually unchecked, tensions were rising in Britain, and
there wasn’t a soul in England who didn’t know a thing or two about the
situation.
They hadn’t spent more than ten
minutes on the subject, however, before Patience announced that the food was
ready. Picking up their chairs, they moved over to the simple wooden table,
which was decked out with ordinary pewter ware. But the food itself seemed
incredible, and Patience was practically glowing with delight as all three men
voiced their hearty compliments. Joining hands around the table, John led them
in a short, heartfelt prayer, and they quickly fell to consuming as much of the
lamb and potatoes as they could. Even Ruben was able to sate his appetite, and
by the end all three men were leaning back in their rickety wooden chairs,
smiling contentedly.
After the dishes and remaining food
had been cleared away, John announced that he would take over washing the
dishes for the night, and Patience planted a grateful kiss on his cheek.
“Why don’t you go see how that new
dress looks?” he suggested. After she withdrew to her room, he turned to Victor
and Ruben. “You know, lads,” he said softly, “that girl has been my light and
joy since her mother passed on five years ago. I’m trusting you to take care of
her tonight.”
“You have the word of our honor,” said
Ruben.
Within a few minutes Patience had
reappeared, now wearing the beautiful blue gown, which seemed to draw out the
fire and warmth of her eyes. All three men stared at her for a long moment,
then her father let out a low chuckle.
“Patience, darling,” he breathed,
“you are beautiful. All the boys in town will be wanting to dance with you
tonight. Don’t let it pull you down the road of pride. For my part, though,
looking at you…well, pride is just about the best word for it, I guess.”
“Stop it, Daddy,” she blushed.
It was nearing time for them to be
on their way, and just as they were bidding goodnight to the minister, there
came the sound of a horse’s hoofs drawing close to the house. Victor threw open
the door, and there in the lane was Phaeton, the family’s stallion, hitched up
to the black carriage. Julius, of course, was in no condition to drive, so
Aidan sat perched on the front bench, and Clara was sitting in the coach, a
picture of grace and elegance in her frilly gown. Ruben offered his hand as
Patience stepped into the coach, and the two young men clambered up after her.
It took a good fifteen minutes to
drive to the Nelson estate, and the air was warm and sweet that night as the
dew settled onto the fields. Victor breathed deeply, hoping and praying that
somehow the night would end without significant heartache for him.
The Nelson manor was grand, on a
scale that easily dwarfed the McNeill home, and as they disembarked from the
carriage a flood of memories overwhelmed Victor’s mind. So many times he had
joyfully frequented these halls, and now his return was something of a question
mark.
They entered in, first Aidan and
Clara McNeill, followed closely by their son, and then Ruben and Patience,
arm-in-arm. Oliver greeted them at the door in his usual somber tone and led
them down the resplendent hallway into the grand ballroom, a vast open area lit
above by two crystal chandeliers. The sweet music of a string quintet filled
the air, and already several of the guests were dancing in time to a lively
waltz. The eyes of Patience and Ruben, unaccustomed to such opulence, were open
wide to take it all in.
At the far end of the room, Anna
sat on a chair of mahogany and rich red velvet, behind which stood her parents
and Lieutenant Green, who was decked out in all the resplendent trappings of
his dress uniform. Anna herself was an image of beauty—she was dressed in a
bright green gown, the color of springtime, and her dark, curly hair fell
attractively around the curves of her high cheekbones. She watched the people
at the ball with pleasure and grace, often rising from her seat to trade a few
words of greeting. It was the evening of her nineteenth birthday, and she was
the paragon of womanly charm and splendor, and so all the brash young men made
bold to tell her. There were, in fact, a number of them there—mostly naval men,
seeking to win the heart of the beautiful niece of Admiral Lord Nelson, hero of
Trafalgar.
Oliver marched directly up to Anna
with the five newly arrived guests close behind. Bowing low, he presented them
each by name. She smiled graciously at Aidan and Clara, thanking them for the
gift of the dress which she was wearing. Victor had managed to drop to the rear
of the group, so Ruben and Patience were presented next, and she rose and
embraced Ruben with a grin. The Irishman lifted her off her feet and twirled
her around, drawing out a merry laugh.
“Happy birthday, old friend,” he
beamed as he set her down. “For a lady with one foot in the grave, you don’t
look too bad.”
“Thanks, Ruben!” she smiled. “You’re
looking pretty good yourself. And this must be Miss Carmichael.”
“Please call me Patience,” she
said, curtsying.
“Of course. Welcome, and thank you
for coming.”
They moved on, and Victor stood
alone before her. They gazed at each other for a long moment, and then Victor
bowed low, took her hand, and pressed her slender fingers to his lips. Straightening,
he gave her an easy smile.
“Happy Birthday, Anna.”
Immediately, she rushed forward and
caught him in an embrace, as much to hide from him the tears welling up in her
eyes as to hold him in her arms. Victor caught the glances of surprise on the
faces of Lord and Lady Nelson, but he had no choice but to raise his arms and
complete the embrace. And holding her there, in the midst of the crowd, it felt
for just an instant like the hard years of separation were gone, and they were
together again, friends through childhood and now friends once more.
Victor glanced up again and now saw
the hard glare he was receiving from both the Lieutenant and Lord Nelson, so he
cleared his throat and released her. She looked at him, her dark eyes still a
bit watery, and she smiled.
“I’m glad you came, Victor.”
“It is good to see you again,
Anna,” he replied, barely above a whisper.
He made to move away, but she
caught his elbow. “You must save at least one dance for me tonight. For old
times’ sake, at the very least.”
“The pleasure will be mine,” he
said with a respectful incline of his head.
The evening seemed to go by fairly
swiftly at first—both Ruben and Victor danced with Patience several times, who,
despite being a Methodist, proved to be fairly skilled at it. Anna danced as
well—mostly with Elijah Green, the stunningly handsome young naval officer who,
it was commonly known, had won the approval of Lord Nelson. It was a light,
merry time for the most part, with the musicians keeping the mood cheerful as couples
danced about on the ballroom floor. Later in the evening, Lieutenant Green and
several of his midshipmen cornered Victor and Ruben, trying to convince them
that the state of the world demanded of their consciences that they enlist in
the war effort. It was a pleasant talk for the most part, but neither of the
two young men made any promises to join His Majesty’s navy.
Anna did get her dance with
Victor—two, in fact. On the second dance, the musicians asked Anna for her
choice, and once the piece was selected, all of the other guests dropped back
from the dance floor in order to watch. So there, with all of their Canterbury friends looking
on, Victor and Anna danced together, making their way gracefully around the
floor. And in his heart, Victor believed it would be the last time in his life
when he would dance with that lovely young lady who had been his faithful friend
for as long as he could remember.
The dance ended, they parted with a
smile, and Victor began to look for an opportunity to withdraw from the party. But
at that moment, he heard his mother’s voice rising over the murmur of the crowd
in the silence between songs.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Clara
McNeill called out, “I am pleased to be able to announce to you that my son,
Victor McNeill, has a special birthday gift which he has prepared for Miss Anna
Nelson. This is a song that he composed, and he will play it for you now.”
Victor was frozen in shock. His
mother asked for a violin from the musicians and carried it over to him. Placing
the instrument in his hands, she looked deep into his eyes.
“You wrote it for her, Victor. Play
it with everything that’s in your heart.”
He walked over to where Anna was
standing, bowed to her, and set the violin to his chin. Carefully drawing the
horsehair bow across the taut strings, he began to play, filling the room with
the melody. It came more easily than he thought it would—as he gazed into
Anna’s eyes, the song seemed to come to life on its own. And as the melody filled
the room and built to its crescendo, there came that familiar array of notes. And
when he played them, he saw Anna’s eyes grow bright with tears. It was their
song—the one they had sung together from childhood days. As the melody traced
gently over those notes, her lips formed the silent words. The resolution of
the piece was quick, but beautiful, and as he lowered the violin he was greeted
with a thunderous round of applause.
Blushing slightly, he turned and
bowed to the crowd, then turned back and faced Anna. She was crying openly, but
smiling through her tears, and she rushed up and threw her arms around his
neck.
“Thank you,” she whispered.
By that time, Victor didn’t know
what to make of it all, and he retreated quickly from the attention of the
crowd, which returned to Anna. He slipped out of the ballroom and made his way
toward the door, where Oliver stood, tall and proper.
“Headed home, Master McNeill?” he
wondered aloud.
“Not home,” he breathed. “I’m going
to St. Martin ’s. I need some time to think. You
can tell my family that I’ll come home on my own.”
Oliver nodded. “There are few
better spots for thinking than the chapel of St. Martin .
Thank you for coming, Master McNeill, and may God bless you.”
Victor smiled slightly. “And you
also, Oliver. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight, sir,” he said, opening
wide the door.
Victor stepped out, took one look
at the star-lit heavens, and disappeared into the night.