So the westering sun shone full into the bare, whitewashed chapel when
Morris Pugh, as a preliminary to his final appeal, stepped forward,
and the Reverend Hwfa Morgan stepped back for the moment.
There was the difference of two worlds between their faces. As Morris
gave out a well-known Welsh hymn, a little sudden thrill seemed to
vibrate in the humanity-burdened air of the packed chapel.
What was it?
The quaint modulations rose and fell in wide compass, now high, now
low. Would the Spirit of the Lord speak in a singing voice?
The thought was no new one; it had been in Morris Pugh's mind as he
had listened of late to the oft-told tale--which grew in the telling--
of the mysterious music in the church on Trinity Sunday.
But no! The hymn died away to its Amen, and there was no sign. So he
began his address.
And then suddenly his eye caught a figure by the door, a figure in
black, close veiled. Surely it was Gwen--Gwen the sinner?
And then he spoke again. He had passed the night in prayer; he had
eaten nothing; the whole body and soul of him was in deadly earnest.
Whether there was something more than this or not, that in itself has
to be reckoned with, especially with an emotional audience.
So, as he spoke of the dead child, an old woman, her face seamed with
wrinkles, seemed to feel a half-forgotten tug at her breast and began
to weep; an old man, straining with almost sightless eyes for some
glimpse which might make the young, flexible, lamenting voice more
earthly, less heavenly, followed suit. Then the golden haze which
filled the chapel seemed to hold a radiance, and close to the speaker,
Alicia Edwards gave a little half-suffocated cry and tore, as if for
breath, at the laces round her throat.
And still the insistent, strenuous voice held to its high protesting
pitch of passionate reproof. Its cadence was the only sound----
No! What was that?
From the figure by the door a sound--the merest shadow of a sound!
'Just as I am without one plea.'
The Welsh translation of a sinner's joy was familiar, and a thrill,
individual yet collective, ran through the chapel as, turning, every
one in it saw Gwen, her whole face, sodden with tears, transfigured
into angelic light and peace and joy as she sang--
'Save that Thy Blood was shed for me.'
The strenuous man's voice failed suddenly before the exquisite
sweetness of the woman's, but only for a moment. A voice less
strenuous, yet still a man's, joined in the singing, then another
woman's.
So, by ones and twos and threes, the message of certain salvation grew
from a whisper to a storm of sound.
'O Lamb of God, I come!'
And then?
Then, while Morris Pugh stood white, trembling, almost appalled, the
Reverend Hwfa Morgan sprang forward with a shout of "Hallelujah!"
It swept away the last barrier of reserve. With cries and groans the
congregation leapt to its feet or grovelled in the dust.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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