THE FANATIC
A Succession of incidents, that must have perturbed the doctor and his companion in earnest, had followed upon their departure from Chadlands, and Mary soon discovered that she was faced with a terrible problem.
For one young woman had little chance of winning her way against an old man and the religious convictions that another had impressed upon him.Sir Walter and the priest were now at one, nor did the common sense of a fourth party to the argument convince them.At dinner Septimus May declared his purpose.
"We are happily free of any antagonistic and material influence," he said."Providence has willed that those opposed to us should be taken elsewhere, and I am now able to do my duty without more opposition.""Surely, father, you do not wish this?" asked Mary."I thought you -" But the elder was fretful.
"Let me eat my meal in peace," he answered."I am not made of iron, and reason cuts both ways.It was reasonable to deny Mr.May before these events.It would be unreasonable to pretend that the death of Peter Hardeastle has not changed my opinions.To cleave to the possibility of a physical explanation any longer is mere folly and obstinacy.I believe him to be right.""This is fearful for me - and fearful for everybody here.Don't you see what it would mean if anything happened to you, Mr.May? Even supposing there is a spirit hidden in the Grey Room with power and permission to destroy us - why, that being so, are you any safer than dear Tom was or this poor man?""Because I am armed, Mary, and they were defenseless.Unhappily youth is seldom clothed in the whole armor of righteousness.My dear son was a good and honorable man, but he was not a religious man.He had yet to learn the incomparable and vital value of the practice of Christian faith.Hardcastle invited his own doom.He admitted-he even appeared to pride himself upon a crude and pagan rationalism.It is notsurprising that such a man should be called away to learn the lessons of which he stood so gravely in need.""I know that our dear Tom was bidden to higher work - to labor in a higher cause than here, to purer knowledge of those things that matter most to the human soul," said Mary."But that is not to say God chose to take him by a miracle.For what you believe amounts to a miracle.You know that I am bearing my loss in the same spirit as yourself, but, granted it had to be at God's will, that is no reason why we should suppose the means employed were outside nature.""How can you pretend they are inside nature, as we know it?" asked her father.
"We know nothing at all yet, and I implore Mr.May to wait until we are at least assured that science cannot find a reason.""Fear not for me, my child," answered Septimus May."You forget certain details that have assisted to decide me.Remember that Hardcastle had openly denied and derided the possibility of supernatural peril.He had challenged this potent thing not an hour before he was brought face to face with it.Tom went to his death innocently; this man cannot be absolved so easily.In my case, with my knowledge and faith, the conditions are very different, and I oppose an impregnable barrier between myself and the secret being.I am an old priest, and I go knowing the nature of my task.My weapons are such that a good spirit would applaud them and an evil spirit be powerless against them.Do you not see that the Almighty could never permit one of His creatures - for even the devils also are His - to defeat His own minister or trample on the name of Christ? It would amount to that.So armed one might walk in safety through the lowermost hell, for hell can only believe and tremble before the truth."Mary looked hopelessly at her father; but he offered her small comfort.Sir Walter still found himself conforming to the fierce piety and dogmatic assurance of the man of God.In this welter and upheaval his modest intellect found only a foothold here, and his judgment now firmly inclined to the confident assertions of religion.He was himself a devout and conventional believer, and he turned to the support of faith, and shared,with increasing conviction, the opinion of Septimus May, as uttered in a volume of confident words.He became blind to the physical danger.He even showed a measure of annoyance at Mary's obstinate entreaties.She strove to calm him, and told him he was not himself - an assertion that, by his inner consciousness of its truth, seemed to incense Sir Walter.
He begged her to be silent, and declared that her remarks savored of irreverence.Startled and bewildered by such a criticism, the woman was indeed silent for some time, while her father-in-law flowed on and uttered his conviction.Yet not all his intensity and asseverations could justify such extravagant assertion.At another time they might even have amused Mary; but in sight of the fact that her father was yielding, and that the end of the argument would mean the clergyman in the Grey Room, she could win nothing but frantic anxiety from the situation.Sir Walter was broken; he had lost his hold on reality, and she realized that.His unsettled intelligence had gone over to the opposition, and there was none, as it seemed, to argue on her side.
Septimus May had acted like a dangerous drug on Sir Walter; he ppeared to be intoxicated in some degree.But only in mind, not in manner.He argued for his new attitude, and he was not as excited as the priest, but maintained his usual level tones.
