Authors: Grace Livingston Hill
Before he took up his pen he settled one matter. He would go and call on those two young men before the week was out. He would do it for the sake of that sweet girl face, a vision of which he had just beheld. She had once said to him that she thought God gave us our fancies and preferences for some real reason, and that if we could disconnect them thoroughly from our own way, we would usually find that they led to some work for him when we were on the lookout for it. She had not expressed it in just that way, but more simply and girlishly. It had impressed him at the time as being a very unusual thing for one who was not more than a little girl to say, but he had heard that her mother was an unusual woman. That might explain it. At any rate he made up his mind to try and follow out this fancy.
Here the minister resolutely locked the door of those thoughts and dipped his pen in the ink.
THROUGH many perplexities and prayers Robert Clifton had arrived at a decision with regard to his proposed visit to the Benedict farm, viz., that before another Sunday passed it should be accomplished; and so the first bright afternoon he took his way down the long, dusty country road lit up along its edges with faded autumn tints and a few late, brave, scarlet leaves. He was going in fear and trembling, yet he hoped much from this visit. He had planned it with a view to reaching the entire household if possible, and yet not at a time when there might be danger of his meeting that bug-bear of a sister alone. It would be best not to do anything which might make talk in a country village. He had wisely learned that fact early in his career. The two young men he was reasonable sure to find at or near the house at this time of the day. He had been utterly unable to decide what he should say to them when he reached there. He had planned conversation after conversation, but the unknown quantity represented by what the Benedict brothers would probably respond to his first sentences was so uncertain that he finally gave it up, and with a prayer that his lips might be guided and that his cars might hear a voice behind him saying, “This is the way, walk ye in it,” he started on his errand.
Arrived at the place he was surprised to find as he walked up the front path to the door, that painters seemed to be preparing to paint the house. He had understood that things were somewhat run down and that the young men did not care to keep them up. Perhaps his sister had money; and he sighed to think of the possibilities of what that sister might be. The old-fashioned knocker did not give back the empty comfortless echo he had somehow expected, but it sounded forth his arrival as if from cheerful, well-filled rooms that had no need to shrink and be sad at the approach of a stranger.
Sally the cook responded to his knock. It had not been exactly within the range of her province in the city to answer the door, but things were different out here, where none of her associates would know of her condescension, and besides there were so few visitors. So she smoothed her hair before the little glass in the kitchen and tied on a wide, long white apron which hung on the identical hook which poor Aunt Nancy's had adorned for so long and went with quiet, trained footsteps to the door.
Robert Clifton was somewhat taken aback at the sudden appearance before him of a city-trained servant. For the instant he thought she must be the sister, though her age was somewhat more advanced than he had been given to suppose Miss Benedict's to be, and he afterward remembered finding something incongruous in the thought of Sally's dignified proportions mounted on a bicycle.
It must be owned that he was somewhat embarrassed, and just escaped addressing Sally as Miss Benedict, but caught himself in time and asked if Mr. Benedict could see him for a few moments.
Now Sally had determined in the depths of her soul that if she was obliged to be door maid as well as kitchen maid, she would make the most of her opportunities and impress this country village with a sense of high station of her young mistress, so that she really succeeded in quite overawing the young minister with her airs, as she told him that Mr. Benedict was not in, but she would see if Miss Benedict knew if he would be back soon, and would he give her his card? Then from a tiny stand she produced the silver salver, and the Reverend Robert Clifton could scarcely find a card, so astonished was he at the difference between what he had expected and what he had found.
While he waited in the lovely reception room which had once been the cold and deserted parlor of haircloth and red-and-green ingrain, he had ample opportunity to observe the many evidences of refinement and taste spread all about him. Everything was beautiful, luxurious, comfortable; evidently purchased by one who knew how to do such things. Mechanically his eye took in the fact that the heavy rugs spread in the wide oak hall were real Oriental. He could see an upright piano through a veil of fine bead
portières
and a glimpse of an inviting couch with pillows, in the room opening out of the parlor, and across the hall a pleasant vista, a library furnished with luxurious leather-upholstered couch and chairs, with a large reading table and shaded lamps, books, a low bookcase running around the wall. He could hear a canary singing in the room beyond the library. He wondered vaguely what sort of young woman would appear and rapidly began to change his mental picture of her. She must be a woman of the world, and if so, she would be doubly hard to reach and help, and he would need to take the more earnest care of his own good name. He began to fear he had done wrong in coming alone and to wish he had heeded the advice of Deacon Chatterton. Then there came the soft rustle of a dress down the stairs, and a light step at the door, and Ruth Benedict stood before him.
Ruth had looked at the card curiously when it was brought to her. Had her servant been one from the village she would at once have been informed that the visitor was the new minister; but Sally did not move in Summerton society and shunned gossip of all sorts. Ruth recognized the name at once as belonging to a young theological student whom she had met several times at the home of friends during a summer visit. He had interested her because he seemed in earnest, and had also disappointed her in some respects because he had not seemed to have thought seriously about a great many questions which to her were very important ones. Now her quick brain at once jumped to the conclusion that this student had finished his educational course and was a full-fledged minister, and was probably occupying the position of pastor in Summerton. She had heard David say that there was a new minister and that he was a young man, and she had hoped that he would call on her brothers and would have a good influence over them. Indeed she had planned it all out nicely how he and his wife would be such helpers in her schemes, and would perhaps invite them to the parsonage and make friends of them. She was very anxious for her brothers to meet some earnest, Christian, cultured young men. But she looked doubtfully at the card.
Would this young Mr. Clifton be the one to do them good? He was bright, She knew; indeed some had called him brilliant. He was a Christian—she had felt sure of that when she met him—and that he had chosen his profession because he felt that God had called him to it, but—she drew a sigh and went downstairs breathing a prayer. Perhaps after all Mr. Clifton had changed some of his theories. She remembered very distinctly how it had troubled her to know that a young man, who was so soon to be a minister, had deliberately sat himself down to read a comic story in one of the current magazines on his return from the Sunday morning service, and how later in the day, when the subject had come up for discussion, he had defended his action by saying that he did not believe the Lord wanted us to be long-faced, and that the “sabbath was made for man and not man for the sabbath.” He also said that his mother and several of his dearest Christian friends always read whatever they pleased on Sunday, and so long as it was a good thing it did not seem to him that the Heavenly Father could object. He added that their professor in theology in the seminary told the students that he had often read novels on Sunday evening after his most earnest services, in order to give his mind as entire a relaxation as possible.
Ruth had sat quietly in a corner, a very young girl, not supposed to be taking any part at all in the conversation; but her eyes must have expressed wonder, and perhaps disapproval, for as he raised his eyes he caught her clear gaze, and with his pleasant smile had appealed to her with, “What do you think about it, Miss Ruth? Isn't that a wise position I have taken?”
She had not expected to be asked her position, but, though taken by surprise, she answered quietly as she had been taught to do, just what was in her heart. "I cannot judge for any one else,” she had said simply. “For myself I feel as if God made the Sabbath for me to enjoy him in, and not to enjoy myself. There is a verse in Isaiah that settled the question for me two years ago.”
The young theologue was pleasantly interested. He asked for the verse and listened respectfully to her answers to his questions. She had repeated the verse in a matter-of-fact tone much as if she had been reading a bit of a letter from a dear friend. It seemed to have a new light to the young man as she spoke it: “If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.” He had hinted that these words belonged to the old dispensation and that we were no more under the law but under love, and she had laughed a happy laugh. “Oh, I don't feel that it is a law at all,” she said, “because I love him. It is merely a statement of what he would like to have me do. When my mother asks me to do something or says, 'Ruth, it would please me very much if such and such a thing were done,' I don't feel like going around saying my mother has made me do this thing, or commanded me to do that. But it is just as binding on me as if it were a law, for I know it is what she would like to have me do. Besides it seems to me as if God had put the words in just that way to make us see that it is meant for a law of love as well as written in tables of stone. It says not 'if you don't do these things I will punish you,' but 'if you do them then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord.' I should think that must be the highest, most restful happiness there could be, to be perfectly delighted in the Lord and have him delighted in us.”
Their conversation had been interrupted just then and they had not seen each other since, but Ruth had carried away a troubled feeling. Her reference for and her ideal of the high calling of the ministry had been very great. It troubled her that one who professed to believe that in Jesus Christ alone could true rest be found, would try to rest his own brain from preaching the message to others by reading worldly papers and books, some of which were written by men who did not believe in Jesus at all. It seemed to her that a minister should know the way to find true rest from anything in Jesus, else he could not point it out to others. There had been other discussions too, during those few weeks when she had seen him occasionally, that gave her a feeling that he was worldly in a great many ways. But the Ruler of all was leading and she could trust it with him.
Ruth had the advantage of her visitor, for she was reasonably sure who he was before she saw him, while it had not occurred to him that she and the other Miss Benedict could be identical.
“Mr. Clifton, this is a pleasant surprise, to meet one who is not a stranger when I am in a strange land.”
There was sweetness and modest grace in tone and movement. The young minister was utterly bewildered for a moment. She stood just as he had planned she would stand in the years to conic, his ideal of Christian young womanhood. How had she attained to it so soon? She ought to be but a little girl yet.
But she was standing there to welcome him and he must gather his scattered faculties. All thought of the Benedict brothers, so hard to reach in hermitage and isolation with their wild, worldly, bicycling sister, drifted away from him. The surroundings were such as to make him forget. He greeted her warmly. He was eager to know how she came here and what it all meant, and he must answer her questions about their mutual friends. It took him some time to understand the situation, and he began to wax indignant in his heart at his deacons and their wicked gossip. Surely some one must be greatly at fault that such terrible things could be said. He wondered what her brothers could be about that they allowed it, and what indeed could have started it in the first place, and then wondered again if he had not made some great mistake and gotten into the wrong house; and vet it was scarcely possible that he could have made such a mistake. Presently Ruth gave some light on the subject, however.
“I am sorry my brothers arc neither of them in,” she said. “They told me they had not met the new minister. I want them to meet you. I am sure you can help them”; here she looked anxiously at his face to be sure whether she was sure. “They are neither of them Christians,” she added sadly. There was an answering sympathetic light in the minister's face which reassured her, however, as she went on. “I have been so sorry not to go to church. Day before yesterday was the first time I have been outside of the yard since my accident. I had the misfortune to fall from my bicycle and sprain my ankle.”
Ah! here was the key to the story. He would ferret out the rest and have it explained fully. He asked a few questions about the matter, and then, that she might not think he had a special reason for his earnest inquiries, he changed the subject.
“Miss Benedict,” he said earnestly, “I have always thought I would like you to know that you once helped me very much on a certain subject, and indeed I am not sure but on more than one, for I found it reached to many things when I once began to think about it. Do you remember a certain brief discussion on the subject of Sunday reading and conversation? And do you remember repeating to me that verse in Isaiah as your answer to my question what you thought about the subject? Well, that verse stayed with me. I could not get away from it, and in spite of the fact that I had settled in long before that I had good ground for the position I then held, I could not get rid Of the feeling that I was doing wrong and grieving my Saviour every time I gave myself over to enjoying a secular book or paper on Sunday. In vain I used my former arguments. In vain I told myself I was reading this or that for the spiritual good I could get from it. I could not help seeing that that was merely an excuse I was hiding behind, and that the reading was being done for my own pleasure, more than anything else. I was brought to see then that I did not love my Bible so much as I ought to do, and that my excuse used heretofore that I had not time to devote to its study as I ought, was a flimsy one, for I did have some time on Sunday, if not for study, at least to read, and get rest and refreshment and joy and new strength. Then I saw that the Bible had not been all those things to me at all, and I set about changing the matter. Now I stand in an entirely different position from what I did. I do not say nor think that it is wrong to read anything other than the Bible or some strictly religion book on Sunday, but I do say that I have not time enough for my Bible now and cannot afford to lose one moment of the precious rest it brings me on Sunday, when I am weary with my work, and I believe that was what He intended the book and the day should be to us. I want to thank you for bringing that message to me.”