CHAPTER IX

 

 

On April 7 Dr. Dowie and his retinue sailed for Colombo on the Peninsular & Oriental liner Mongolia. They were in gay company among Australian and English society people bound for England and the Continent for spring and sum­mer. There were Lord This and That, Lady So and So, a sprinkling of governors, generals, colonels, rear­-admirals, and commanders, a swarm of spruce young subalterns and gentlemen of leisure, and a bevy of debutantes. Professional singers, actors, and actresses added spice. Several unattached ladies were like a spike of strong spirits. Herbert eyed them askance-­attracted, yet vaguely afraid. Tournaments of deck sports, evening concerts, dances, fancy dress balls, and vaudeville shows had been arranged.

Into all this the General Overseer entered joyously. Upon his partners and opponents in shuffle-board, deck quoits, bean bags, and other games, he lavished the charm of his many-sided personality. Quickly he became popular, especially with ladies. When not playing in tournaments, he cruised around the sunny or moonlit decks, coming to anchor for an hour or two now and then beside some favorite or in the midst of some bevy of dames. With Elsie Daniels, loveliest of the young actresses, as partner, he won a prize at shuffle-board and had his photograph taken

 

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smiling at her. Long-drawn-out family prayers for the party were strangely forgotten.

Before they arrived at Colombo, the General Over­seer decided that it was now too late in the season to visit India-that country would be too hot-and Herbert was directed to arrange at once for contin­ued passage on the Mongolia to Marseilles.

While their ship took on freight they found strange thrills in Colombo, at Kandy, and in the botanical gardens at Peredinia. After two days and nights they were away again, to spend a week crossing the Arabian Sea, a day in Aden, another week in the Red Sea and Suez Canal, and a final week on Mediterranean waters.

It was a gorgeous four weeks.

At Colombo the General Overseer somehow con­vinced himself that his arch-enemy, secret ruler of Masonry, had sent two assassins on board to murder him. This kept either Herbert or Colonel Erdman by his side every moment of the day and sitting up watching his state-room door at night.

At sunrise on May 7 the Mongolia nosed her way into the harbor of Marseilles. Dr. Dowie and his com­panions lined her rail. To Herbert the scene was dreamlike in its beauty. Pale mountains shimmered in sunlight, a white port spread along the water's edge, queer craft and varicolored sails dotted sparkling blue water.

As the ship neared her dock, friends were seen among the waving throng.

"Why," cried Nancy, "I do believe I see Mrs.

 

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Brelin and Edith! Yes, sir, it's them-they I mean. See, Herbert, right behind Elder Rejaine."

Herbert saw, but a riot of his pulses forbade a reply. He waved his yachting cap to Mrs. Brelin and Edith, his face eagerly alight, and they responded, smiling.

"Gosh!" he thought, "I'd forgotten how lovely she is!"

He took one hand in the other and shook it, bow­ing low. They imitated the gesture, laughing. The ship crept closer. Leaning as far over the rail as he could, he made a trumpet of his hands and shouted, "My eyes are cured."

They looked mystified for a moment, then laughed again" while the color of Edith's cheeks grew deeper.

Soon the ship was close alongside, and, while she was being made fast, Herbert hung over the rail and talked with Edith and her mother looking up at him from below.

"Listen," he said; "you go where we go, don't you?"

"Oh, no, we've an apartment at Nice."

"Not going to stay there all summer, are you?"

"No, only another month."

"Fine, we'll be in Europe just about that long. Pack up and come along with us."

The going-ashore bugle sounded and everybody flocked to the gang-plank. There was handshaking all around. Then everybody else took carriages for the hotel, leaving Herbert to see their carload of baggage through the customs.

 

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Arriving just in time for luncheon, he was cross to find that Edith was between the General Overseer and Overseer Hebb.

Sitting between colonel Erdman and Overseer Spengler, Herbert learned that Nancy, Harold, the colonel, the Brelins, and Overseer Spengler would leave immediately for Zurich, by way of the Italian lakes, while Dr. and Mrs. Dowie and Gladstone, tak­ing him with them, would spend ten days at Cannes and a week in Paris before going to Zurich.

"Why do you go to Switzerland and I stay with the G. O.?" Herbert asked the colonel.

"I'm fourteen years older than you are, young man, and I'm about bushed with all this sitting up nights. Besides, I've seen Paris and you haven't, and he's taken a notion to cut down expenses."

Desperately Herbert tried for a talk with Edith before she left for Nice that afternoon, but Dr. Dowie kept her close at his side until she boarded her train. There was some comfort for him in Mrs. Brelin, who was frankly delighted to walk to the sta­tion with him instead of going in a carriage with her daughter and the General Overseer.

"'I'm quite furious at leaving Nice," she told him. "I don't want to tramp around Europe with a crowd, attending meetings and dodging brickbats. But, for some reason, Doctor Dowie insists, so what can we do? I wish now I'd never come to Marseilles to meet you; but how could I even dream that he would want to drag us through his mobs and riots?"

"Well that is tough," agreed Herbert. "I can sym­pathize with you, although I guess I like the mobs

 

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and riots best of all-they're more fun than a football game. But your loss is our gain-I wouldn't miss hav­ing you with us in Switzerland for a Shiloh Boulevard corner lot."

"Oh, that's no good, compared to my plan. Elder Rejaine thought the General Overseer and his family might rest a few days somewhere on the Riviera, so I thought you might not be needed and we could have you with us a little while at Nice. We came to Marseilles especially to invite you. Wasn't that a per­fectly pious plan?"

"Made in heaven, Mrs. Brelin, by the loveliest of all the angels."

"Now do I blush over that speech, young man, or do you refer to my ungrateful daughter?"

"Well, you know better than I do who made the plan."

"Still a diplomat, I see," she laughed.

Mrs. Brelin and her daughter were to pack, dis­pose of their apartment, and be ready to join the others when they passed through Nice on their way to Italy on the night train. Dr. Dowie, his family, and Herbert went as far as Cannes on this train.

It was well that Herbert awoke next morning in calmness and strength, for the General Overseer had read his mail and was raging. He told Herbert that Overseer Darling, Judge Shelbrace, and Deacon Gaines had signed a letter criticizing his financial policies and virtually calling a halt on his expendi­tures. Striding about like a fighting bully seeking an enemy, he roared at Herbert. What unspeakable in­solence! The intrepid three were cowards, traitors,

 

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rebels, fools, meddlers, destroyers, usurpers, and mischief -makers.

Who was the head of Zion anyway-he or they? Who knew Zion's finances-its founder and head, or these glorified clerks, with their petty, cheese-paring souls, counting pennies while he virtually had his hand on millions? He was not fooled, even if he was four thousand miles away. He saw through their dastardly conspiracy. They schemed to get the tre­mendous assets and unparalleled possibilities of Zion away from him for themselves. But he would show them that John Alexander Dowie was more power­ful than ever-that they would be as rotten straw before his might.

After this outburst, Dr. Dowie became his charm­ing self again. It was springtime on the Riviera and fields of roses were in full bloom. He and his wife, with Gladstone and Herbert, drove up and down the coast, into the hills, to the top of La Californie, to Nice, Monaco, and Monte Carlo. They visited pot­teries and jewelers, where the General Overseer showed his defiance of critics in the home office by buying lavishly.

They spent a week in Paris. Herbert found Deacon Jondier waiting for them. Dr. Dowie preached one sermon, through an interpreter, before a small audi­ence.

What the great man enjoyed most, however, was to array himself in a Prince Albert suit of white, cream, or lavender flannels, with hat and shoes to match, and ride through Paris streets and parks in an open carriage. With his rosy cheeks, flashing dark

 

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eyes, and great silver white beard, he was a show for even that sated city. As they bowled along over boule­vards and through the Bois de Boulogne, he and his wife seated facing Gladstone and Herbert, he kept looking to right and left, smiling delightedly. Oc­casionally he said, playfully, "Mama, you must be unusually beautiful to-day. All the people stop and look at you."

Dutiful wife that she was, she would laugh and answer, "I guess they are looking at you, John."

This would please him and he would pose and simper like a flattered girl.

They made the rounds of galleries, shops, cathe­drals, and churches. Dr. Dowie spent hours studying relics of Napoleon and maps of his battles in Hotel des Invalides.

Just after the middle of May the General Overseer and Herbert went to Zurich, his wife and son having decided that they preferred Paris to Switzerland.

 

 

CHAPTER X

 

 

On the day of his arrival in Zurich, Herbert saw Edith for a few minutes, but only in company with the General Overseer. She was at the railroad station with fifty others, including many Swiss and German members of the Church. The preacher took her under his wing at once, in­viting her and her mother to ride with him to the Belvue, and taking them directly to his room. Later, he gave an elaborate luncheon to his party, Over­seer and Elder Spengler, and prominent members of Zion in Europe. Edith was his guest of honor.

That night, after Herbert and Harold, who roomed together, had gone to bed, Colonel Erdman came in.

"Boys," he said, "the General Overseer sent me to tell you that he wants you to keep hands off Edith Brelin. He has some very special plans for her. She don't want to be bothered and he don't want her bothered by attentions."

Herbert's heart sank. What was this?

"Keep hands off!" snorted Harold, who never looked at a girl; ”I wouldn't put my feet on!"

The colonel laughed in huge glee.

"I guess it won't be so easy for you, will it?" he asked, poking the silent man in the ribs. Getting no answer, he laughed knowingly and went out.

Next day Zion meetings began in Zurich every

 

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afternoon and evening. There were no riots and, for the first time since leaving Zion City, Herbert did a fair business in Zion City lots and Zion securities.

The General Overseer dined in his suite at the hotel, Edith Brelin and her mother usually joining him. Nancy, Harold, and Colonel Erdman ate in the main dining-room. Edith always went to and from Zion Tabernacle with the General Overseer in his carriage, and sat near him on the platform. Herbert, by maneuvering cleverly, had managed to start con­versation with her twice, but Dr. Dowie swooped down and carried her off each time before they had said half a dozen sentences.

Zurich meetings ended, the whole party started off on a round of sightseeing and religious services. They visited the Rigi, Lucerne, Interlaken, Grundel­-wald, Geneva, Chillon, Lausanne, Neuchatel, and Berne. On trains the General Overseer kept Edith and Mrs. Brelin in the compartment with him. Occasion­ally Edith would complain that she was tired sitting and wanted to stand in the corridor. Herbert would meet her there and they would talk. But he cursed himself because he could think of nothing to say to her that would change the intolerable status. He needed time and opportunity to feel his ground, test her sentiments, lead her-and himself-to a place of mutual understanding. In the short conversations they snatched, she was as friendly as ever-gave no hint that there was any barrier between them. But these talks were brief. Dr. Dowie always made some excuse to call her within a few minutes.

At Berlin, their next stop, the General Overseer

 

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was incensed to find that the American Ambassador had not even taken the trouble to ask for a much­-brandished interview with the Kaiser. He threatened his party with what he would do to that ambassador in influential quarters in America and ended up by accusing him of being a Mason.

He held two meetings there, at which several police were on guard, two of them taking down everything he said in shorthand. On leaving his second meeting, he invited Nancy and Herbert into the carriage with Edith and himself. It was usual on such occasions for his companions to vie with one another in praising his sermon. But Edith seemed distrait, Nancy was cross because Herbert had absently left the hotel to go to the meeting without calling for her, and that harassed young man was ill because his revered leader had Edith beside himself. Thus they began their ride to the hotel in silence.

"Well," inquired Dr. Dowie, smirking expectantly, "and what did you think of your little General Over­seer to-night?"

After a pause, Nancy stepped into a breach that threatened a minor disaster.

"It seemed to me," she said, "that you had mastered wonderfully the difficult art of speaking through an interpreter."

"I guess, too, you marveled at the adroitness of my message to the Kaiser. But of course you could not know, as I did, that he was present and heard me speak."

All three young people exclaimed their surprise.

"Yes, I noticed that one box was partly curtained

 

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and seemed to be empty. But I kept watching it. Presently I saw the keen, dominating eye and spiked mustaches of Wilhelm the Second peeking at me around the edge of the curtain. He seemed to feel that I was looking at him, for he dodged behind the curtain quickly. But he did not leave the box. I saw the curtain move several times after that. So now he has my message. We will wait with interest to see what he will do."

"Gosh-all-Friday," Herbert adjured himself, "let 'im alone-the notion gives him a lot of pleasure and doesn't harm anybody."