The Master-Christian. Marie Corelli

violet eyes glowed.

      "He was not allowed to remain President," she said.

      "No, he was not. He died. Certainly! And I know you think he would not have died if he had done his best to clear the character of an innocent man. To women of your type, it always seems as if God—the Large Person up above—stepped in exactly at the right moment. It would really appear as if it were so at times. But such things are mere coincidences."

      "I do not believe in coincidences," said Angela decisively, "I do not believe in 'chance' or 'luck', or what you call 'fortuitous' haphazard arrangements of any sort. I think everything is planned by law from the beginning; even to the particular direction in which a grain of dust floats through space. It is all mathematical and exact. And the moving Spirit—the Divine Centre of things, whom I call God,—cannot dislodge or alter one particle of the majestic system without involving the whole in complete catastrophe. It is our mistake to 'chance' things—at least, so I think. And if I exclaim against you and say,—"Why do you remain in the Church?' it is because I cannot understand a man of conscience and intellect outwardly professing one thing while inwardly he means another. Because God will take him in the end at his own interior valuation, not at his outward seeming."

      "Uncomfortable, if true," said the Abbe, still smiling. "When one has been at infinite pains all one's life to present a charmingly virtuous and noble aspect to the world, it would be indeed distressing if at the last moment one were obliged to lift the mask . . ."

      "Sometimes one is not given the chance to lift it," interposed Angela, "It is torn off ruthlessly by a force greater than one's own. 'Call no man happy till his death,' you know."

      "Yes, I know," and the Abbe settled himself in his chair more comfortably;—he loved an argument with "the Sovrani", and was wont to declare that she was the only woman in the world who had ever made him wish to be a good man,—"But that maxim can be taken in two ways. It may mean that no man is happy till his death,—which I most potently believe,—or it may mean that a man is only JUDGED after his death, in which case it cannot be said to affect his happiness, as he is past caring whether people think ill or well of him. Besides, after death it must needs be all right, as every man is so particularly fortunate in his epitaph!"

      Angela smiled a little.

      "That is witty of you," she said, "but the fact of every man having a kindly-worded epitaph only proves goodness of heart and feeling in his relatives and friends—"

      "Or gratitude for a fortune left to them in his will," declared the Abbe gaily, "or a sense of relief that the dear creature has gone and will never come back. Either motive, would, I know, inspire me to write most pathetic verses! Now you bend your charming brows at me,—mea culpa! I have said something outrageous?"

      "Not from the point of view at which YOU take life," said Angela quietly, "but I was just then thinking of a cousin of mine,—a very beautiful woman; her husband treated her with every possible sort of what I should term civil cruelty,—polite torture—refined agony. If he had struck her or shot her dead it would have been far kinder. But his conduct was worse than murder. He finally deserted her, and left her penniless to fight her own way through the world. Then he died suddenly, and she forgot all his faults, spoke of him as though he had been a model of goodness, and lives now for his memory, ever mourning his loss. In her case the feeling of regret had nothing to do with money, for he spent all her fortune and left her nothing even of her own. She has to work hard for her living now,—but she loves him and is as true to him as if he were still alive. What do you say to that?"

      "I say that the lady in question must be a charming person!" replied the Abbe, "Perfectly charming! But of course she is deceiving herself; and she takes pleasure in the self-deception. She knows that the man had deserted her and was quite unworthy of her devotion;—but she pretends to herself that she does NOT know. And it is charming, of course! But women will do that kind of thing. It is extraordinary,—but they will. They all deceive themselves in matters of love. Even you deceive yourself."

      Angela started.

      "I?" she exclaimed.

      "Yes—you—why not?" And the Abbe treated her to one of his particularly paternal smiles. "You are betrothed to Florian Varillo,—but no man ever had or ever could have all the virtues with which you endow this excellent Florian. He is a delightful creature,—a good artist—unique in his own particular line,—but you think him something much greater than even artist or man—a sort of god, (though the gods themselves were not impeccable) only fit to be idealised. Now, I am not a believer in the gods,—but of course it is delightful to me to meet those who are."

      "Signor Varillo needs neither praise nor defence," said Angela with a slight touch of hauteur, "All the world knows what he is."

      "Yes, precisely! That is just it,—all the world knows what he is,—" and the Abbe rubbed his forehead with an air of irritation, "And I am vexing you by my talk, I can see! Well, well!—You must forgive my garrulity;—I admit my faults—I am old—I am a cynic—I talk too much—I have a bad opinion of man, and an equally bad opinion of the Forces that evolved him. By the way, I met that terrible reformer and socialist Aubrey Leigh at the Embassy the other day—the man who is making such a sensation in England with his 'Addresses to the People.' He is quite an optimist, do you know? He believes in everything and everybody,—even in me!"

      Angela laughed, and her laughter sweet and low, thrilled the air with a sense of music.

      "That is wonderful!" she said gaily,—"Even in you! And how does he manage to believe in you, Monsieur l'Abbe? Do tell me!"

      A little frown wrinkled the Abbe's brow.

      "Well! in a strange way," he responded. "You know he is a very strange man and believes in very strange things. When I treat humanity as a jest—which is really how it should be treated—he looks at me with a grand air of tolerance, 'Oh, you will progress;' he says, 'You are passing through a phase.' 'My dear sir,' I assure him, 'I have lived in this "phase", as you call it, for forty years. I used to pray to the angels and saints and to all the different little Madonnas that live in different places, till I was twenty. Then I dropped all the pretty heaven-toys at once;—and since then I have believed in nothing—myself, least of all. Now I am sixty—and yet you tell me I am only passing through a phase.' 'Quite so,' he answered me with the utmost coolness, 'Your forty years—or your sixty years, are a Moment merely;—the Moment will pass—and you will find another Moment coming which will explain the one which has just gone. Nothing is simpler.' And when I ask him which will be the best Moment,—the one that goes, or the one that comes—he says that I am making the coming Moment for myself—'which is so satisfactory' he adds with that bright smile of his, 'because of course you will make it pleasant!' 'Il faut que tout homme trouve pour lui meme une possibilite particuliere de vie superieure dans l'humble et inevitable realite quotidienne.' I do not find the 'possibilite particuliere'—but this man assures me it is because I do not trouble to look for it. What do you think about it?" Angela's eyes were full of dreamy musing.

      "I think Mr. Leigh's ideas are beautiful," she said, slowly, "I have often heard him talk on the subject of religion—and of art, and of work,—and all he says seems to be the expression of a noble and sincere mind. He is extraordinarily gifted."

      "Yes,—and he is becoming rather an alarming personage in England, so I hear,—" returned the Abbe—"He writes books that are distinctly dangerous, because true. He wants to upset shams like our Socialist writer Gys Grandit. Gys Grandit, you know, will never be satisfied till, like Rousseau, he has brought about another French Revolution. He is only a peasant, they say, but he writes with the pen of a prophet. And this Englishman is of the same calibre,—only his work is directed against religious hypocrisies more than social ones. I daresay that is why I always feel so uneasy in his presence!" And Vergniaud laughed lightly. "For the rest, he is a brilliant creature enough, and thoroughly manly. The other evening at the Club that little Vicomte de Lorgne was chattering in his usual offensive manner about women, and Leigh astonished everyone by the way in which he pulled him up. There was almost a very pretty quarrel,—but a stray man happened to mention casually,—that Leigh was