Chapter XVII: A Rich Reward

Walter, with the eagerness of one who has succeeded in an object on which his heart has been set, was impatient to reach the Eagle's Nest; but he had to slacken his pace to suit a companion not accustomed, like himself, to ascend mountains with almost the agility of the chamois. The way was often too narrow to admit of the two men walking abreast; but, in other parts, its comparative breadth permitted conversation between them. Mr. Coldstream heard, with great interest, particulars of the fate of poor Dermot Denis.

"I never saw a man with a finer _physique_," he observed; and then, glancing at the noble form and fine face of his guide, he mentally added "but one."

For the slender, delicate-looking youth had developed into a powerful man, with mustachio on lip, and beard on chin,--one so altered and improved in appearance that those who had known him seven years before would scarcely have recognised him. The turban which Walter wore surmounted features regular and aristocratic, to which the singularly animated and intelligent hazel eyes gave character and expression.

"I am surprised that during all the years that you have passed in the mountains, you have never communicated the fact of your existence to friends in India," remarked the Chaplain.

"I could not, though most anxious to do so," replied Walter. "I was a kind of prisoner on parole. Had I not pledged my honour as an Englishman to do nothing of the kind, I should have been chained up, as a dog, by the chief."

"And how were you released from your promise?"

"I was released by the death of the chief, Assad Khan, which occurred not many weeks ago," replied Walter. "His relative and successor is a Christian, one whom I shall have the joy of presenting to you to-day."

"And have you indeed, in this most wild and weed-choked corner of the mission-field, been privileged to gather in seven sheaves?" asked the Chaplain.

"Not through my efforts were the seven brought in," replied Walter with a smile. "The first convert made the more successful missionary. She was the means of winning for Christ her husband, her grandmother, and two female friends."

"What, a woman--and an Afghan!" exclaimed the Chaplain.

"A woman with the ardour of a Martha, and the faith of a Mary; an Afghan--with her naturally proud spirit softened and subdued by the love of Christ which constraineth."

"Most wonderful!" ejaculated the Chaplain.

"Dear sir," said Walter Gurney, "if we could have seen the painted savages who roamed in old times through our Britain, with their rude idols and barbarous rites, we might have thought that the Afghan suffers little by comparison with his brothers in the West. What is it that has made old England glorious and free but the Gospel? and what does Afghanistan need but the Gospel to make her the same!"

Walter spoke with the enthusiasm of one who has devoted seven of the best years of his life to the evangelisation of a despised race, and who sees of what that race is capable.

"You must have encountered immense difficulties," observed Mr. Coldstream, after a break in the conversation, caused by the extreme steepness of the rocky way, which at this part necessitated actual climbing.

"I could never have surmounted them in my own strength," said Walter. "When I look back, it is as I see that you are now doing, on the path which we have traversed,--wondering how I ever was enabled to gain the point which I have reached. God has led me step by step."

"And are your robbers actually transformed into anything like Christians?" inquired Mr. Coldstream.

"I own that some of the converts remind me of Lazarus, when called from the grave; they are living, but with their grave-clothes clinging around them. It is difficult to persuade men to whom theft has been a profession, and revenge a virtue, that these are sins to be repented of and forsaken. I have been under a great disadvantage; I have only had the New Testament with me; for whatever related to the older Scriptures I have had to trust my memory."

"This has been a serious disadvantage, indeed," said the missionary. "The law is our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ; both Jew and Christian have had its teachings from childhood, and even where conversion has not followed, it has raised the moral tone. To the heathen and Moslem we preach Christ crucified, and we do well, for the very sum and substance of the Gospel is contained in these two blessed words. But this seed of Truth, when received by those previously ignorant of the requirements of God's holy law, often springs up as I have seen an early crocus in England, when called forth by the beams of the sun, from ground on which snow still lingers. There is the bright blossom, and its very existence proves that it has a root; but it is destitute of leaves or stalk. Thus its beauty is often marred, and its purity soiled by earth."

"I see your meaning," said Walter, "and my own small experience confirms it. There is the flower of love, the root of faith; but the strong upright stem of conscientiousness appears to be wanting."

"It is on account of this," observed Mr. Coldstream, "that amongst converts from heathenism there is often conversion without any deep conviction of sin,--without the knowledge of the law we know not what sin is. In England, when the drunkard, the blasphemer, or the thief is brought to the light, his first feeling is usually horror at the blackness of his own sins. He abhors himself, and pours out his soul in penitent sorrow; he regards himself as a brand plucked from the burning, and dreads the flames of sin in which he so nearly has perished. As far as my experience goes, this deep sense of guilt is rare in our converts. The heart is touched, but not the conscience. They who have never listened to the thunders of Sinai have the love of Christ, but the fear of God is wanting. The missionary can no more leave such converts to themselves, than a mother can leave her babe. He rejoices at first in their simple faith, he thanks God for a new-born soul--till startled by some strange inconsistency which makes him, perhaps, doubt that faith, and fear that spiritual life itself is wanting. The pendulum of his feelings then may sway from the one extreme of excessive hope, into the opposite--and more dangerous one--of discouragement, if not despair."

"And what should the missionary learn from this painful experience?" asked Walter.

"Much patience, much watchfulness, and much prayer. Patience with those who never in childhood had the clear outlines which divide right and wrong marked out before their eyes--those who have breathed, as it were, a polluted atmosphere from their earliest days, and are therefore scarcely sensible of its evil. Watchfulness, to guard the weak ones as far as possible from temptation, and, by careful teaching, try to supply the want of early training. With these, earnest prayer for the Holy Spirit, who alone can purify the human heart--that long desecrated and polluted temple."

"How refreshing it is to talk over these difficulties with one who has experienced, and can therefore enter into them fully!" cried Walter. "As regards all human help, I have been so utterly alone; I have had to teach when I myself required to learn. I feel more strongly than ever the necessity of leaving my Afghan children for a-while, to become by study, and intercourse with the experienced, a less unworthy shepherd of souls."

The companions had now come within sight of the fort, which was not visible from a distance, but which nestled, as it were, between steep crags, partly clothed with brushwood.

"Most picturesquely situated!" exclaimed Mr. Coldstream.

"Its name of Eagle's Nest suits it well," observed Walter. "You see a party of Afghans thronging round the gate to receive us."

"Yes; and they look as if they were eagles with sharp claws and beaks," said the Chaplain, surveying the wild and not altogether friendly-looking group through which he was to pass. For the first time Mr. Coldstream doubted his own prudence in coming amongst them.

"Mustapha Khan! why have you brought your gun? You know that it is against orders," said Walter sternly; and with a wave of his hand he sent the offender to the rear.

"I should doubt _that_ eagle being turned into a dove," observed Mr. Coldstream, as he passed through the gate.

"Oh, Mustapha has given some trouble," said Walter.

"And will give more, I suspect," added the Chaplain.

But the sight that met his eyes in the courtyard put from the missionary's mind all thoughts but those of surprise and joy. Around the well stood the candidates for baptism; the men on one side, the women on the other; the latter arrayed in white. Sultána was there in her radiant beauty, the bud expanded to the beautiful rose, supporting her aged silver-haired grandmother, whose face expressed the peace which the spirit had found, the light which at even-time had shone upon her soul. Two shy-looking women stood rather in the back-ground, shrinking from the gaze of a stranger. Opposite was Ali Khan, with two companions. The young chief came forward to greet the Chaplain with a frank friendliness which made Mr. Coldstream reproach himself for having for a moment entertained doubts.

"Welcome to the Eagle's Nest," cried the chief; "welcome in the name of the Lord!"

"Will you question the candidates?" suggested Walter. "I will translate for you sentence by sentence."

Mr. Coldstream's questions were few, and entirely confined to the men--save, when turning towards Sultána, he asked simply, "Do you love the Lord Jesus? Do you look for salvation only through Him?" The beaming look on the lovely countenance of the chieftain's wife, as she gave her brief reply, was, as the Chaplain afterwards said, like the smile on an angel's face.

With varied expressions on their swarthy features, the yet unconverted Afghans looked on as the holy service of baptism was performed before them. Curiosity was perhaps the most prevalent feeling; but here and there a Moslem was seen scowling with undisguised displeasure. Once or twice the Chaplain's ear caught an angry murmur of "Kafir!" but there was no open opposition. The missionary thought of the lion-tamer in his cage of wild beasts, and wondered at the power by which a single unarmed man had been able to subdue or overawe such savage natures.

The simple rite was now over; Ali Khan and his companions were now welcomed as members of Christ's visible Church upon earth. The Chaplain's heart was warm within him, but his pleasure was small compared to that of Walter. In the scene of former sufferings and perils, the young evangelist tasted what is perhaps the most exquisite draught of joy which is given to man on earth, for it is a foretaste of heaven itself. Who can tell the bliss expressed in the words,--"_Lo, I and the children whom Thou hast given me._" That hour gave to Walter for all his past difficulties, trials, and dangers "an overpayment of delight."

Mr. Coldstream, seated on a charpai overspread with a leopard's skin, partook of some refreshment prepared and brought by Sultána herself, Walter, Ali Khan, and the two Christian men sharing the meal. Mr. Coldstream admired the simple modest grace of the chieftain's wife, but remarked to Walter that she looked dejected.

"She feels--we all feel--the coming parting," was Walter's reply; "needful it is, but painful. I have had considerable difficulty in obtaining the chief's consent to my departure."

The hospitable meal was soon concluded. Mr. Coldstream could not linger long in the Eagle's Nest; the road being so difficult, he wished to retrace his steps before night.

"I must not, however, leave the fort," said the clergyman, "without seeing the prison from which poor Dermot Denis tried to make his escape."

Walter led the way up the ladder-staircase so often mentioned, into what had been his former prison.

"This is still my room," he observed, as he entered the small apartment, clean, but very scantily furnished. "I have made but few alterations, except that of transferring the strong lock from the outside to the inside of the door. I have now the advantage of being able to shut out intruders, instead of being myself locked in."

Mr. Coldstream went up to the aperture through which poor Denis had passed to his doom, and shuddered as he looked down through it on the precipice below.

"What an act of daring--or rather of madness--to attempt such a descent!" he exclaimed. "The idea of it renders one dizzy!"

"My poor friend was one who never knew fear!" observed Walter, and he sighed as he remembered the heroic, noble-looking horseman in whose company he had first entered the country of the Afghans.

In silence the two Englishmen quitted the room and descended into the court-yard. They found it crowded, not only by the inmates of the fort, but by Afghans who dwelt in scattered hamlets, but still belonged to the clan, and paid allegiance to its chief.

The time for parting had arrived. Walter could not quit a place where he had done and suffered so much, nor the spiritual children whom he loved, without a sore pang of regret. First in a few soul-stirring words he exhorted the Afghans to maintain their fidelity to Ali Khan, and stand by him, through weal or woe. Walter then turned towards the brave chief, and, after the manner of the country, locked him in a hearty embrace.

"The Lord be with you, and bless you, brother! and be your strong rock and fortress!" he cried.

"And bring you back to us soon!" exclaimed the chief.

"Mirza, you also are one of us," said Walter to another of the newly baptised; and embracing him the young evangelist added, "let my parting words to you be the exhortation of our Lord to His disciples--_Watch and pray that ye fall not into temptation._"

"You may trust me," said the Afghan; "my faith is as strong as my sword."

"Mir Ghazan, my friend," and again Walter's arms enfolded a burly-looking Afghan, "never forget the promise--_Be thou faithful unto death and I will give thee a crown of life._"

Mir Ghazan responded to the embrace, but uttered no word in reply.

Then Walter turned to the aged woman, and reverentially raised the withered hand to his lips. "Bless me, mother," he said, gently; "_the hoary head is a crown of glory_. We shall meet, if not in this world, in a better." The old widow melted into tears.

Oriental propriety forbade even a parting pressure of the hand between the Englishman and the younger women. But Sultána followed her spiritual guide as far as the gate, there to bid him farewell. She did not weep, but her pale cheek and quivering lip betrayed her emotion on the departure of him to whom she owed life, and what she valued much more than life.

"The God who guided you here, and guarded you here, and made you a blessing to us all, be with you wherever you go!" she faltered. Sultána added in a softer tone, "You will not forget your Afghan children when far, far away?"

"Forget you, Sultána? never! night and day my prayers will rise for you all."

"And you will come back to the Eagle's Nest?" said Sultána, with a sad, wistful look in her blue eyes, as she raised them to Walter's face.

"God permitting, I will surely come back," said Walter. He could not trust his voice to say more, but turned and rapidly strode down the hill in silence, which the sympathising Chaplain did not attempt to break. He noticed that Ali Khan and some of the Afghans were following at a little distance, to see the last of their English friend.

At the last point from which the Eagle's Nest was visible from the road, Walter Gurney paused, turned, and looked up. On the roof of the fort, in her white garments, stood Sultána; a cloud crimsoned with the sunset glow behind her head showed like a glory. It would hardly have seemed strange had white wings expanded behind her.

"A child of light!" murmured Walter Gurney. He stood still for a few moments as if fixed to the spot; not another word passed his lips, but his soul was pouring forth his silent thanksgiving. How marvellously had the fiery pillar, of which that cloud reminded him, led him through the dark night of affliction, suffering, and danger! His trials had turned into blessings; his troubles had worked together for lasting good. Walter Gurney had left memorials behind him on his pilgrim-path through the desert, living stones of priceless value that should, through all eternity, find a place in the heavenly city above.