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If only the facial expressions of Bertha’s two listeners had been captured at that moment! As sincere practising Christians, they surely believed in the Second Coming of the Christ, but it may never have occurred to them that the Second Coming would touch their own lives.

Lady Blomfield later said of that instant, ‘These amazing words struck a chord to which my inner consciousness instantly responded.’ Deep within her being, she knew Bertha spoke the truth. ‘Great awe and intense exaltation’ took hold of her ‘with an overwhelming force’.12 This brief encounter with Bertha set the Blomfields’ lives on a different path. It would have been appropriate if, at that moment, fireworks had exploded over London to mark the encounter, because, with little fanfare, Lady Blomfield would alter the future of Great Britain through her tireless work there to establish the Bahá’í community upon a firm foundation.13

It seems from the only account of the occasion that Bertha failed to mention the name of the newest Messenger of God, Bahá’u’lláh. She did, however, tell her two listeners about His Son, ‘Abbás Effendi, better known by the title He chose for Himself, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá – Servant of Bahá – who was at that moment a prisoner of conscience of the Ottoman Empire held in the prison-city ‘Akká in Palestine. She quoted His own words to them, ‘For the Cause of God, I am a prisoner.’

With such a forthright introduction, the Blomfields wanted to learn more. Bertha did not offer them any literature, only the address of a British artist who had just returned to Paris from a visit to ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. Her mission completed, Bertha rose to leave. While heading to the door, she turned around and returned to the Blomfields still seated on the sofa. Bertha had forgotten to exchange addresses in order to arrange an appointment. That accomplished, Bertha walked out of their lives. Lady Blomfield never mentions seeing Bertha again, despite the incalculable debt owed to her for the message she imparted to them.14

Did Bertha use a variation of this approach to introduce Horace and Irving to the Bahá’í Faith? It was Horace, not his more conventionally religious brother, who accepted the loan of the book.

As a first effort to write a biography of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in English, the book was lengthy. Flipping through it, Horace would have noted that it

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