Poor old dear, she
cried bitterly after you were gone; she said she had made up her mind
not to stay any longer in Uncle Robert's house, and she didn't know
where to go, or what would become of her, if we refused to take her in. She quite broke down.' 'Well, well; we will try it for a year, anyhow. It may be as you say; we
shan't find it quite so bad as it seems now. Shall we go in?' He stooped for his pipe, which lay as it had fallen, on the grass. He
could not find it, and lit a wax match which showed him the pipe, and
close beside it, under the seat, something that looked like a page torn
from a book. He wondered what it could be, and picked it up. The gas was lit in the drawing-room, and Mrs. Darnell, who was arranging
some notepaper, wished to write at once to Mrs. Nixon, cordially
accepting her proposal, when she was startled by an exclamation from her
husband. 'What is the matter?' she said, startled by the tone of his voice. 'You
haven't hurt yourself?' 'Look at this,' he replied, handing her a small leaflet; 'I found it
under the garden seat just now.' Mary glanced with bewilderment at her husband and read as follows:--

    THE NEW AND CHOSEN SEED OF ABRAHAM

    PROPHECIES TO BE FULFILLED IN THE PRESENT YEAR

    1. The Sailing of a Fleet of One hundred and Forty and Four Vessels
    for Tarshish and the Isles. 2. Destruction of the Power of the Dog, including all the
    instruments of anti-Abrahamic legislation. 3. Return of the Fleet from Tarshish, bearing with it the gold of
    Arabia, destined to be the Foundation of the New City of Abraham. 4. The Search for the Bride, and the bestowing of the Seals on the
    Seventy and Seven. 5. The Countenance of FATHER to become luminous, but with a greater
    glory than the face of Moses. 6. The Pope of Rome to be stoned with stones in the valley called
    Berek-Zittor. 7. FATHER to be acknowledged by Three Great Rulers. Two Great Rulers
    will deny FATHER, and will immediately perish in the Effluvia of
    FATHER'S Indignation. 8. Binding of the Beast with the Little Horn, and all Judges cast
    down. 9. Finding of the Bride in the Land of Egypt, which has been
    revealed to FATHER as now existing in the western part of London. 10. Bestowal of the New Tongue on the Seventy and Seven, and on the
    One Hundred and Forty and Four. FATHER proceeds to the Bridal
    Chamber. 11. Destruction of London and rebuilding of the City called No,
    which is the New City of Abraham. 12. FATHER united to the Bride, and the present Earth removed to the
    Sun for the space of half an hour. Mrs. Darnell's brow cleared as she read matter which seemed to her
harmless if incoherent. From her husband's voice she had been led to
fear something more tangibly unpleasant than a vague catena of
prophecies. 'Well,' she said, 'what about it?' 'What about it? Don't you see that your aunt dropped it, and that she
must be a raging lunatic?' 'Oh, Edward! don't say that. In the first place, how do you know that
aunt dropped it at all? It might easily have blown over from any of the
other gardens. And, if it were hers, I don't think you should call her a
lunatic. I don't believe, myself, that there are any real prophets now;
but there are many good people who think quite differently. I knew an
old lady once who, I am sure, was very good, and she took in a paper
every week that was full of prophecies and things very like this. Nobody
called her mad, and I have heard father say that she had one of the
sharpest heads for business he had ever come across.' 'Very good; have it as you like. But I believe we shall both be sorry.' They sat in silence for some time. Alice came in after her 'evening
out,' and they sat on, till Mrs. Darnell said she was tired and wanted
to go to bed. Her husband kissed her. 'I don't think I will come up just yet,' he
said; 'you go to sleep, dearest. I want to think things over. No, no; I
am not going to change my mind: your aunt shall come, as I said. But
there are one or two things I should like to get settled in my mind.' He meditated for a long while, pacing up and down the room. Light after
light was extinguished in Edna Road, and the people of the suburb slept
all around him, but still the gas was alight in Darnell's drawing-room,
and he walked softly up and down the floor. He was thinking that about
the life of Mary and himself, which had been so quiet, there seemed to
be gathering on all sides grotesque and fantastic shapes, omens of
confusion and disorder, threats of madness; a strange company from
another world. It was as if into the quiet, sleeping streets of some
little ancient town among the hills there had come from afar the sound
of drum and pipe, snatches of wild song, and there had burst into the
market-place the mad company of the players, strangely bedizened,
dancing a furious measure to their hurrying music, drawing forth the
citizens from their sheltered homes and peaceful lives, and alluring
them to mingle in the significant figures of their dance. Yet afar and near (for it was hidden in his heart) he beheld the glimmer
of a sure and constant star. Beneath, darkness came on, and mists and
shadows closed about the town. The red, flickering flame of torches was
kindled in the midst of it. The song grew louder, with more insistent,
magical tones, surging and falling in unearthly modulations, the very
speech of incantation; and the drum beat madly, and the pipe shrilled to
a scream, summoning all to issue forth, to leave their peaceful hearths;
for a strange rite was preconized in their midst. The streets that were
wont to be so still, so hushed with the cool and tranquil veils of
darkness, asleep beneath the patronage of the evening star, now danced
with glimmering lanterns, resounded with the cries of those who hurried
forth, drawn as by a magistral spell; and the songs swelled and
triumphed, the reverberant beating of the drum grew louder, and in the
midst of the awakened town the players, fantastically arrayed, performed
their interlude under the red blaze of torches. He knew not whether they
were players, men that would vanish suddenly as they came, disappearing
by the track that climbed the hill; or whether they were indeed
magicians, workers of great and efficacious spells, who knew the secret
word by which the earth may be transformed into the hall of Gehenna, so
that they that gazed and listened, as at a passing spectacle, should be
entrapped by the sound and the sight presented to them, should be drawn
into the elaborated figures of that mystic dance, and so should be
whirled away into those unending mazes on the wild hills that were
abhorred, there to wander for evermore. But Darnell was not afraid, because of the Daystar that had risen in his
heart.