Authors: Grace Livingston Hill
“No, Bill; don't you dare to stir or answer me back. I have just one thing to say to you. I want you to understand that the young woman you were talking about just now is my sister and that you will be sorry if you ever mention her name in my presence again. You are not fit to be in the same world with such as she. Remember, I mean what I say, and you will be sorry if I hear of you ever mentioning her again in any but a respectful manner. And you'd better look out how you even do that!”
Then Joseph walked away and there was silence in Summerton grocery till he had well turned the corner and was out on the pike toward home. Bill Brower managed to pull his scattered senses together after a few minutes and talked a little in a threatening way, saying he would “have it back on Benedic',” but the others only laughed at him. They were easily turned this way or that and had ever despised Bill Brower and held Joe Benedict high in their estimation. It did them good to see a blow well deserved and well planted.
The records of the remainder of that evening in the grocery would not be interesting. The postmaster and storekeeper yawned and shut up store earlier than usual by a half-hour, for his usual entertainers and story-tellers had dropped out one by one. Nevertheless, the story of what had happened hastened on fleet wings about the village, a scrap of it here and a scrap of it there, pieced together by the village gossips who attend to such affairs, till it got all mixed up and meant an entirely different meaning from the truth.
Meanwhile Ruth was being borne by four strong arms upstairs, and the brothers and sister were taking together a complete survey of Joseph's new room. They established Ruth on the green sofa, while David took his younger brother about showing him this and that feature of the new room as though he had been a fancy house furnisher and upholsterer from the city. Joseph admired in words stronger than his brother had ever heard him use before in praising anything. He told Ruth it was too good for him and she must have it all and let him take some other room, that it just fitted her; but she, with happy face, told him all her plans for the house, and together they arranged to complete the work begun. Joseph was intensely interested. He had never been in a room like this before. He had not had even David's experience of the time when he went to the city to see his aunt and take that message before their father died. His highest ideal of a room was the stiff haircloth and ingrain of the Summerton parlors to which he had access.
Ruth selected one of Frank Stockton's incomparable stories and read to her brothers a little while to finish the evening, and they both declared they never had had such a good time in their lives. They laughed over the book and made interested comments, which showed they were no fools, and Ruth enjoyed the reading as much as they. Then as it grew late they planned to go at the new work in the morning, while Ruth should lie on her sofa and direct and read to them.
Ruth, as she closed her eyes to sleep that night, thanked God and took courage. A sprained ankle was not so bad if it was the price of another brother.
THE Reverend Robert Clifton, pastor of a month's standing to the principal
church of Summerton, was in consultation with his deacons. He had not really been at work for more than a few days, for though he had preached Sundays in his new charge he had been away during the week most of the time making arrangements to move his mother and young sister to the parsonage from their old home in a neighboring city. Now, at last, the parsonage was habitable and the mother and sister would arrive in a few days. He was anxious to get to work. It was his first charge and he meant to do his best in every way. He must be a good pastor as well as preacher.
They were meeting in the gloomy little room back of the church known formerly as the “lecture room,” now in process of being rechristened by the title of “ladies' parlor,” at the suggestion of Mrs. Brummel. The Brummels were rich and had their own way. Their only son owned the only bicycle in town until Ruth's came, and was off getting a college education. Mrs. Brummel had given a rocking-chair with one spring broken, a marble-topped table for which she had no use, and a set of “Lives of the Martyrs” in an ancient hanging bookcase, which was apt to collapse at some critical moment if the books were not balanced just so; these to carry out the illusion necessary to a parlor. She also cut up her old piano spread that the moths had eaten, and had her daughter Georgiana embroider crewel sunflowers in Kensington stitch in the corners, to spread over the reading desk when the ladies met to sew.
The minister sat in the broken rocking-chair. It had been given to him out of deference to his office. As a matter of fact not one of the deacons enjoyed the broken spring. The minister was uncomfortable, but he took it as a part of the ills of life. He was trying to get at the boundary of his parish and find out "who was who." He had early discovered that the Brummels, and Browers, and one or two other families, were people to whom the deacons thought it well to pay a great deal of attention, and that the Barneses did not matter so much. It gave him a desolate feeling to find so mercenary a spirit among the chief men of his church. What if the Brummels were worth more money than the Barneses, were not their souls of just as much value in the sight of the Master?
“Now then, there are one or two other places I want to know about, Brother Chatterton. There is a house just a little back from the road, about a mile I should say beyond your house, up toward the Barnes place. Who lives there? Do they belong to us or to the other church? I can't find out about them.”
“Why, that mus' be Benedic's,” responded Deacon Chatterton, without much interest in his voice. “You needn't trouble about them. Oh, they go to our church when they go anywhere, but they haven't been for a long spell back now, not much since the old aunt died. They're mostly dead, all 'twas any 'count, anyway. There's only the two boys left now and they ain't like other young men. One of 'cm's gone to the dogs, I guess, pretty much, and the other might as well be for all the account he'll ever be to the church. Oh yes, they've got a good farm, and I guess they're doin' pretty well at it, but they never go anywhere and they live there alone. You can't do nothin' with 'em. They used to come to Sunday-school awhile back, but they grew out o' that.”
“They live entirely alone? Does no one keep house for them?” The minister was curious about them. For some reason they interested him. He had a passion for going after lost sheep and bringing them back. Part of his seminary training had been work among young men in the slums of a city. He would like to try for these two, but he must know more about them before he went.
“Oh well, no, they ain't egzackly alone now,” spoke up Deacon Haskins. “There's a sister o' theirs come on from way off somewhere. I don' know how long she mends to stay, but I should say she's set her stakes pretty deep, for she brought a whole raft of things along with her. She's livin' with them and she has a garl to do her work, so they ain't alone now.”
“They might a good deal better be, in my opinion,” put in Deacon Chatterton with emphasis. “Ef there was any ruin left to 'em, they'll go to it now. From what I hear she's a regular piece. She's one o' those new bicycle girls." He spoke the words in a low convicting tone, much as you would speak of a ballet-dancer in some low theater, and they conveyed to the new minister a meaning deeper and darker than even the good-hearted, narrow-minded deacon had any conception.
“Yes,” said Deacon Hobbs, shaking his head regretfully and sighing a funereal sigh; “I'm afraid she's pretty bad. There's a story come straight from headquarters about her and those Brower boys, and we all know what they are. I'm sorry for the sake of the young women of this locality—yes, and the young men too—that she's come among us.” And he sighed again.
“Now, brethren, don't be too hasty. We don't know her as yet. Let us wait till we see more of her.” It was Deacon Meakins, kind, sweet-spirited, always ready with a good word for somebody, everybody, who spoke. He was a thorn in the flesh to this body of good men, for they loved a little gentle gossip as well as did their sisters, and he was forever putting in with some meek reminder of mercy, or a word in favor of the one who was being discussed. They rose and began to button their coats, for the evening was chilly. It was time to depart if Deacon Meakins had begun.
But Deacon Chatterton felt that he was called upon to have the last word, in this case especially. “Brother Meakins,” he said severely, “isn't it enough that she has been an inhabitant of this town for now over two months, and not once has she made her appearance inside a church? I have it on good authority from two or three members of the other church that she has not been there.”
“Yes,” said Deacon Hobbs, “it is a pity, a great pity. Her folks were very good, respectable people. Her father was once a deacon in this church.”
“Well, brethren,” said Deacon Meakins apologetically, “you know she has been confined to the house by a sprained ankle. Dr. Stormer seems to have a very good opinion of her, so far as I have heard him say. Perhaps she might be helped in some way, you know, brethren.”
“Yes, and how did she get her ankle sprained, Brother Meakins?” said Deacon Chatterton with a severity that he evidently expected to be convincing.
“Dr. Stormer never says much about his patients. It is not to be expected,” said Deacon Hobbs, and then he turned the lights out and they all went out into the crisp autumn evening.
The minister walked along in the starlight silently. He was puzzled and troubled. Here was this case of the Benedicts in whom he had been so interested. It was complicated sadly by this wild, gay sister. From what these men said, she was evidently one whose influence was to be dreaded, to say the least. It would not do for him to allow his name to be mixed up with hers. He must move very cautiously. It was a case where a woman would be a great help. His mother was a shy, quiet woman, who had always been sheltered, and who had loved to stay at home with her children. She could not help in a case like this. And his sister! He sighed. She was bright and gay and pretty, but she had no wish to help. She was not even a Christian; she must be sheltered from evil influences herself She must yet be won to Christ, and he had no earthly help apparently. If he only had a wife, one who would love the work as he did, and would know just how to go to work for such a girl as the Benedict sister, one like—here he stopped and would not go on, even in his thoughts. She was far away, and far above him. But how strange that this name should be Benedict! Well, life was a queer puzzle, anyway. It was no use to try to think it out. He fitted his night key to the parsonage door and tried to shut out his troubled thoughts as he shut himself in. He sat down in his study chair and drew his hand wearily across his eyes. He had started out that evening eager and interested, his spirit glad, rested, ready for work, but somehow he had lost his enthusiasm already. What was the matter? He reached his hand to his study table for the Bible and it opened of itself to the first chapter of Joshua, perhaps because that was a favorite place of his. He wanted help and here it was.
“Be strong and of a good courage: for unto this people thou shalt divide for an inheritance the land, which I sware unto their fathers to give them . . . Be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest.”
Surely he was not presuming to take these words to himself, for if he believed anything in life he believed firmly that the Lord had called him to the ministry as much as he ever called Joshua to take Moses' place at the head of the children of Israel. If this were not so he was committing sacrilege to try to preach at all. The words comforted him. The Lord who was leading would provide a way and would keep his promise. He was with him, even if he had no earthly helper. God would take the place of mother and sister and wife if need be. God would care for it all. There came to him the words of a hymn or a poem, he could not tell which, that he had heard recited in a young people's prayer meeting by a sweet girlish voice. He had met the girl once or twice and talked with her for a few moments, and he knew that her life must fit such words, and so they had meant more to him than they would have done otherwise, and when he had chanced to find those words in print he had committed them to memory.
He was not in love with the girl. He had never given time to thinking of such things, nor indeed to knowing girls very much. She was very young, and he had met her only once or twice and talked but very little with her. That was four years ago, before he was through the seminary. He could not tell if she even knew his name. But she had seemed like an ideally happy Christian, and had left a pleasant fragrance in his memory which he had used occasionally for a womanly ideal when it had been necessary for his thoughts to have one to fill in with somewhere. But he was not at all sentimental, nor did he often think of her. The words of the verse were these:
Bear not a single care;
One is too much for thee.
Mine is the work, and mine alone;
Thy work—to rest in me.
It was strange—and yet nothing is ever strange that happens to God's people, for he knows the whys and wherefores—that he was reminded of her again the very next morning as he stood at the front window of the parsonage looking idly out at the village street that stretched away into blue misty mountains whose feet were already wreathed with the last autumnal tints. He was wondering whether he should venture to call at the Benedict farm that day or wait until his mother came and try to persuade her to go with him. He had just made up his mind that he would pray about the matter a little while and see if any light came, and perhaps he would be guided to go there that afternoon or the next day. He was sure he would be shown the way.
A lady was walking slowly along the street, stopping now and then to gather a lovely crimson leaf from the flagging. She walked as if she was waiting for some one and was not in a hurry. Now and then she turned her head in the direction of the stores as if looking for something. She glanced up curiously at the houses as if they were new to her; not with a steady stare like a person who had never been there before, but with a well-bred interested glance, that had such a touch of pleasant admiration for all she saw. The minister hardly knew that he was watching her till as she came nearer she turned her face and looked full up at the upper windows of the parsonage. In truth she was admiring the dainty ruffled curtains which the minister's mother had selected with great care, and thinking to herself, “Some little woman with good taste lives there, I'm sure, and perhaps she and I will be great friends,” and then she turned her face away and looked for more leaves and walked slowly on and did not see the minister at all.
And Robert Clifton looked at her full face and thought how like it was to that other face he had remembered, in purity of outline and with clear earnest eyes. He made up his mind with the moment's glance he had that the woman looked as she would look when she grew up. She had been a girl with floating hair four years ago, and dresses not quite touching the ground in a full-grown fashion. By and by she would be a woman, and then she would look like this woman and he would like to meet her then. Would she keep her childlike trust in Jesus, he wondered? And then he began pondering where she might be and what her life was now, and half forgot to wonder who the passer-by had been, so brief had been his sight of her. He noticed in a moment that a surrey went by with a young man driving, and that farther up the road it stopped and picked up the lady and that they drove on. “Some one from West Winterton,” he murmured to himself and turned to go to his almost completed sermon. A sermon was still an arduous and serious undertaking with him. He wanted this one to reach hearts. Without knowing it he had written it with the Benedict boys in mind. He did not know them, but he had imagined what they were. He did not expect to have them present, and yet his sermon was an earnest plea for Jesus Christ to just such 'young men as he imagined they were. But there were young men who were like that, and they would be present in some numbers to hear the new minister preach, and the sermon was not written in vain, in spite of the fact that it did not fit the real Benedict brothers.