The Bars of Iron, Ethel May Dell [my reading book .TXT] 📗

stand hammering at the bars, breaking your heart in the dark. Wasn't that the sort of picture our kindly parson drew for us on Sunday? It's a pretty theme--the tortures of the damned!"
"My dear Piers!" Avery spoke quickly and vehemently. "Surely you have too much sense to take such a discourse as that seriously! I longed to tell the children not to listen. It is wicked--wicked--to try to spread spiritual terror in people's hearts, and to call it the teaching of religion. It is no more like religion than a penny-terrible is like life. It is a cruel and fantastic distortion of the truth."
She paused. Piers was listening to her with that odd hunger in his eyes that had looked out of them the night before.
"You don't believe in hell then?" he said quietly, after a moment.
"As a place of future torment--no!" she said. "The only real hell is here on earth--here in our hearts when we fall away from God. Hell is the state of sin and all that goes with it--the fiery hell of the spirit. It is here and now. How could it be otherwise? Can you imagine a God of Love devising hideous tortures hereafter, for the punishment of the pigmies who had offended Him? Tortures that were never to do them any good, but just to keep them in misery for ever and ever? It is unthinkable--it's almost ludicrous. What is the good of suffering except to purify? That we can understand and thank God for. But the other--oh, the other is sheer imagery, more mythical than Jonah and the whale. It just doesn't go." Again she paused, then very frankly held out her hand to him. "But I like your picture of the Open Heaven, Piers," she said. "Show it me again some day--when I'm not as tired and stupid as I am to-day."
He bent over her hand with a gesture that betrayed the foreign blood in him, and his lips, hot and passionate, pressed her cold fingers. He did not utter a word. Only when he stood up again he looked at her with eyes that burned with the deep fires of manhood, and suddenly all-unbidden the woman's heart in her quivered in response. She bent her head and turned away.


CHAPTER XIV
A MAN'S CONFIDENCE

"Aren't you going to kiss Aunt Avery under the mistletoe?" asked Gracie.
"No," said Piers. "Aunt Avery may kiss me if she likes." He looked at Avery with his sudden, boyish laugh. "But I know she doesn't like, so that's an end of the matter."
"How do you know?" persisted Gracie. "She's very fond of kissing. And anyone may kiss under the mistletoe."
"That quite does away with the charm of it in my opinion," declared Piers. "I don't appreciate things when you can get 'em cheap."
He moved over to Jeanie's sofa and sat down on the edge. Her soft eyes smiled a welcome, the little thin hand slipped into his.
"I've been wishing for you all day long," she said.
He leaned towards her. "Have you, my fairy queen? Well, I'm here at last."
Avery, from the head of the schoolroom table, looked across at them with a feeling of fulness at her heart. She never liked Piers so well as when she saw him in company with her little favourite. His gentleness and chivalry made of him a very perfect knight.
"Yes," said Jeanie, giving his hand a little squeeze. "We're going to have our Christmas Tree to-night, and Dr. Tudor is coming. You don't like him, I know. But he's really quite a nice man."
She spoke the last words pleadingly, in response to a slight frown between Piers' brows.
"Oh, is he?" said Piers, without enthusiasm.
"He's been very kind," said Jeanie in a tone of apology.
"He'd better be anything else--to you!" said Piers, with a smile that was somewhat grim.
Jeanie's fingers caressed his again propitiatingly. "Do let's all be nice to each other just for to-night!" she said.
Piers' smile became tender again. "As your gracious majesty decrees!" he said. "Where is the ceremony to be held?"
"Up in the nursery. We've had the little ones in here all day, while Mother and Nurse have been getting it ready. I haven't seen it yet."
"Can't we creep up when no one's looking and have a private view?" suggested Piers.
Jeanie beamed at the idea. "I would like to, for I've been in the secret from the very beginning. But you must finish your tea first. We'll go when the crackers begin."
As the pulling of crackers was the signal for every child at the table to make as much noise as possible, it was not difficult to effect their retreat without exciting general attention. Avery alone noted their departure and smiled at Jeanie's flushed face as the child nodded farewell to her over Piers' shoulder.
"You do carry me so beautifully," Jeanie confided to him as he mounted the stairs to the top of the house. "I love the feel of your arms. They are so strong and kind. You're sure I'm not too heavy?"
"I could carry a dozen of you," said Piers.
They found the nursery brilliantly lighted and lavishly adorned with festoons of coloured paper.
"Aunt Avery and I did most of that," said Jeanie proudly.
Piers bore her round the room, admiring every detail, finally depositing her in a big arm-chair close to the tall screen that hid the Christmas Tree. Jeanie's leg was mending rapidly, and gave her little trouble now. She lay back contentedly, with shining eyes upon her cavalier.
"It was very nice of you to be so kind to Gracie last night," she said. "She told me all about it to-day. Of course she ought not to have done it. I hope--I hope Sir Beverley wasn't angry about it."
Piers laughed a little. "Oh no! He got over it. Was Gracie scared?"
"Not really. She said she thought he wasn't quite pleased with you. I do hope he didn't think it was your fault."
"My shoulders are fairly broad," said Piers.
"Yes, but it wouldn't be right," maintained Jeanie. "I think I ought to write to him and explain."
"No, no!" said Piers. "You leave the old chap alone. He understands--quite as much as he wants to understand."
There was a note of bitterness in his voice which Jeanie was quick to discern. She reached up a sympathetic hand to his. "Dear Sir Galahad!" she said softly.
Piers looked down at her for a few moments in silence. And then, very suddenly, moved by the utter devotion that looked back at him from her eyes, he went down on his knees beside her and held her to his heart.
"It's a beast of a world, Jeanie," he said.
"Is it?" whispered Jeanie, with his hand pressed tight against her cheek.
There was silence between them for a little space; then she lifted her face to his, to murmur in a motherly tone, "I expect you're tired."
"Tired!" said Piers with gloomy vehemence. "Yes, I am tired--sick to death of everything. I'm like a dog on a chain. I can see what I want, but it's always just out of my reach."
Jeanie's hand came up and softly stroked his face. "I wish I could get it for you," she said.
"Bless you, sweetheart!" said Piers. "You don't so much as know what it is, do you?"
"Yes, I do," said Jeanie. She leaned her head back against his shoulder, looking up into his face with all her child's soul shining in her eyes. "It's--Aunt Avery; isn't it?"
"How did you know?" said Piers.
"I don't know," said Jeanie. "It just--came to me--that day in the schoolroom when you talked about the ticket of leave. You were unhappy that day, weren't you?"
"Yes," said Piers. He added after a moment, "You see, I'm not good enough for her."
"Not good enough!" Jeanie's face became incredulous and a little distressed. "I'm sure--she--doesn't think that," she said.
"She doesn't know me properly," said Piers. "Nor do you. If you did, you'd be shocked,--you'd be horrified."
He spoke recklessly, almost defiantly; but Jeanie only stretched up a thin arm and wound it about his neck. "Never!" she told him softly. "No, never!"
He held her to him; but he would not be silenced. "I assure you, I'm no saint," he said. "I feel more like a devil sometimes. I've done bad things, Jeanie, I can't tell you how bad. It would only hurt you."
The words ran out impulsively. His breathing came quick and short; his hold was tense. In that moment the child's pure spirit recognized that the image had crumbled in her shrine, but the brave heart of her did not flinch. Very tenderly she veiled the ruin. The element of worship had vanished in that single instant of revelation; but her love remained, and it shone out to him like a beacon as he knelt there in abasement by her side.
"But you're sorry," she whispered. "You would undo the bad things if you could."
"God knows I would!" he said.
"Perhaps He will undo them for you," she murmured softly. "Have you asked Him?"
"There are some things that can't be undone," groaned Piers. "It would be too big a job even for Him."
"Nothing is that," said Jeanie with conviction. "If we are sorry and if we pray, some day He will undo all the bad we've ever done."
"I haven't prayed for six years," said Piers. "Things went wrong with me. I felt as if I were under a curse. And I gave it up."
"Oh, Piers!" she said, holding him closer. "How miserable you must have been!"
"I've been in hell!" he said with bitter vehemence. "And the gates tight shut! Not that I was ever very great in the spiritual lines," he added more calmly. "But I used to think God took a friendly interest in my affairs till--till I went down into hell and the gates shut on me; and then--" he spoke grimly--"I knew He didn't care a rap."
"But, dear, He does care!" said Jeanie very earnestly.
"He doesn't!" said Piers moodily. "He can't!"
"Piers, He does!" She raised her head and looked him straight in the eyes. "Everyone feels like that sometimes," she said. "But Aunt Avery says it's only because we are too little to understand. Won't you begin and pray again? It does make a difference even though we can't see it."
"I can't," said Piers. And then with swift compunction he kissed her face of disappointment. "Never mind, my queen! Don't you bother your little head about me! I shall rub along all right even if I don't come out on top."
"But I want you to be happy," said Jeanie. "I wish I could help you, Piers,--dear Piers."
"You do help me," said Piers.
There came the sound of voices on the stairs, and he got up.
Jeanie looked up at him wistfully. "I shall try," she said. "I shall try--hard."
He patted her head and turned away.
Mr. Lorimer and Miss Whalley entered the room. The former raised his brows momentarily at the sight of Piers, but he greeted him with much geniality.
"I am quite delighted to welcome you to the children's Christmas party," he declared, with Piers' hand held impressively in his. "And how is your grandfather, my dear lad?"
Piers contracted instinctively. "He is quite well, thanks," he said. "I haven't come to stay. I only looked in for a moment."
He glanced towards Miss Whalley whom he had never met before. The Vicar smilingly introduced him. "This is the Squire's grandson and heir, Miss Whalley. Doubtless you know him by sight as well as by repute--the keenest sportsman in the county, eh, my young friend?" His eyes disappeared with the words as if pulled inwards by