But Mrs. Pigeon shook her head. It was the first cloud that had risen on the firmament of Salem Chapel, so far as Mr. Vincent was concerned.
CHAPTER IX
streets. All the shops were closed, a policeman marched along with heavy tread, and the wet pavement glimmered round his solitary figure. Nothing more uncomfortable could be supposed after the warmth and light of a snug interior, however humble; and the minister turned his face hastily in the direction of his lodging. But the next moment he turned back again, and looked wistfully in the other direction. It was not to gaze along the dark length of street to where the garden-walls of Grange Lane, undiscernible in the darkness, added a far-withdrawing perspective of gentility and aristocratic seclusion to the vulgar pretensions of George Street; it was to look at a female figure which came slowly up, dimming out the reflection on the wet stones as it crossed one streak of lamplight after another. Vincent was excited and curious, and had enough in his own mind to make him wistful for sympathy, if it were to be had from any understanding heart. He recognised Mrs. Hilyard instinctively as she came forward, not conscious of him, walking, strange woman as she was, with the air of a person walking by choice at that melancholy hour in that dismal night. She was evidently not going anywhere: her step was firm and distinct, like the step of a person thoroughly self-possessed and afraid of nothing but it lingered with a certain meditative sound in the steady firm footfall. Vincent felt a kind of conviction that she had come out here to think over some problem of that mysterious life into which he could not penetrate, and he connected this strange walk involuntarily with the appearance of Lady Western and her careless companion. To his roused fancy, some incomprehensible link existed between himself and the equally incomprehensible woman before him. He turned back almost in spite of himself, and went to meet her. Mrs. Hilyard looked up when she heard his step. She recognised him also on the spot. They approached each other much as if they had arranged a meeting at eleven oclock of that wet January night in the gleaming, deserted streets.
It is you, Mr. Vincent! she said. I wonder why I happen to meet you, of all persons in the world, to-night. It is very odd. What, I wonder, can have brought us both together at such an hour and in such a place? You never came to see me that Monday nor any Monday. You went to see my beauty instead, and you were so lucky as to be affronted with the syren at the first glance. Had you been less fortunate, I think I might have partly taken you into my confidence to-night.
Perhaps I am less fortunate, if that is all that hinders, said Vincent; but it is strange to see you out here so late in such a dismal night. Let me go with you, and see you safe home.
Thank you. I am perfectly safe nobody can possibly be safer than such a woman as I am, in poverty and middle age, said his strange acquaintance. It is an immunity that women dont often prize, Mr. Vincent, but it is very valuable in its way. If anybody saw you talking to an equivocal female figure at eleven oclock in George Street, think what the butterman would say; but a single glimpse of my face would explain matters better than a volume. I am going down towards Grange Lane, principally because I am restless to-night, and dont know what to do with myself. I shall tell you what I thought of your lecture if you will walk with me to the end of the street.
Ah, my lecture? never mind, said the hapless young minister; I forget all about that. What is it that brings you here, and me to your side? what is there in that dark-veiled house yonder that draws your steps and mine to it? It is not accidental, our meeting here.
You are talking romance and nonsense, quite inconceivable in a man who has just come from the society of deacons, said Mrs. Hilyard, glancing up at him with that habitual gleam of her eyes. We have met, my dear Mr. Vincent, because, after refreshing my mind with your lecture, I thought of refreshing my body by a walk this fresh night. One saves candles, you know, when one does ones exercise at night: whereas walking by day one wastes everything time, tissue, daylight, invaluable treasures: the only light that hurts nobodys eyes, and costs nobody money, is the light of day. That illustration of yours about the clouds and the sun was very pretty. I assure you I thought the whole exceedingly effective. I should not wonder if it made a revolution in Carlingford.
Why do you speak to me so? I know you did not go to listen to my lecture, said the young minister, to whom sundry gleams of enlightenment had come since his last interview with the poor needle-woman of Back Grove Street.
Ah! how can you tell that? she said, sharply, looking at him in the streak of lamplight. But to tell the truth, she continued, I did
actually go to hear you, and to look at other peoples faces, just to see whether the world at large so far as that exists in Carlingford was like what it used to be; and if I confess I saw something there more interesting than the lecture, I say no more than the lecturer could agree in, Mr. Vincent. You, too, saw something that made you forget the vexed question of Church and State.