Margaret was seated on a ledge of rock by the brook. Her eyes were strained far off to the dim blue hills in the distance; her heart was torn with restless pain, and her life's hunger was in her face, but her soul was anchored safe and secure."Expiation!" she murmured. "Dear God, only keep me from day to day--keep me--keep your child." Softly over her memory floated a fragment of the words that Mrs. Thorpe had read that morning: "He that keeps thee will not slumber."The brook babbled at her feet and the curious droning voices of the woodland came to her. Every sense was alive; the wild seclusion of the place appealed to the turbulent passion within her, its peace and beauty enthralled her."Give unto me the strength of the towering forest pines," she whispered, "the humility of the woodland flowers, the steadfastness of the mist-hung hills."A squirrel, intent upon his winter's store, was making little journeys from an acorn-filled treetop to his home at the tree's gnarled root; from the woods came the muffled drumming of a partridge. The call of a bird-note, faint in the distance, the nearby chirp of a cricket and the whispering of the wind in the treetops mingled with the low, vague sounds of the forest and blended into a symphony soft and sweet, then weird and haunting, as the falling of a leaf or the snapping of a twig broke the harmony.The girl, with her eyes on the far-away hills, was bound by the spell of it all; yet to her finer sense there was wafted from the soft, thrilling melody and the fluttering breath of the forest a knowledge, vague, evanescent, yet so quickening and compelling that the past, the future, the present--life itself--trembled before it. A shower of leaves scattered by the provident squirrel fell at her feet; a twig snapped sharply and there was a rustling sound in the path beside her. But she did not move nor stir, and her eyes did not leave the hilltops--but she knew--she could not fail to know his presence, and when he came to her side, and stood close beside her, she shrank and shuddered, and yet her heart cried out with the exquisite pain of it."Margaret," he said, "Margaret, I have come over land and across seas. Have you no welcome for me? No word nor look?"He had left the church and passed through the crooked, unkept street of the Flat and on past the old Resort out to Cedar Brook. Exhausted with his long walk, he seated himself on the ledge of rock. Margaret sank down on the soft, clinging moss beside the rock and buried her face in her hands."Have you no word for me, Margaret? After all this time, not one word for me?" But he did not touch her; he dared not lay his hand on her. And she made no reply nor raised her face to his until she had gained complete control of herself; then she arose and stood before him.He had heard of her reformation; he expected to find her changed, but he was not prepared for that which had had its birth and growth since he last saw her; and in this first moment of their meeting no other characteristic seemed so patent to him. He regarded her in silence. Here was the girl that he had known, the passionate, turbulent Margaret, but blended with her, permeating her personality, guarding and protecting her, was this other self--the ideal enshrined in his heart. Whence had she obtained this unnamable quality which, unvoiced and without conscious effort, aroused the reverence in his manhood? Always before he had controlled her, dominated her, often against her will by his superior force; now her personality, her selfhood stood out before him, silent yet indomitable, subtle, intangible, yet absolute. Reverently he extended his hand to her, and his voice was deep with pleading."Margaret, speak to me, all unworthy though I am to hear your voice--trust me, though I did so abuse your girlish trust--forgive me, forgive me and let me prove myself to you."She took his proffered hand and looked unfalteringly into his eyes."You should not take all the blame," she said. "I, too, need to be forgiven."He held her hand between his palms, then raised it to his lips."Margaret," he said, "you are the only woman I have ever loved.""Max!" The word fell from her lips like a sob. "Max!"He drew her to him and kissed the dark hair where it lay smooth against her forehead."Will you be my wife, Margaret, my loved and honored wife?"Her eyes scanned his face; not a line of pain, not a mark of suffering escaped her. All his struggles, his rebellion, his victories, and all the soul within him lay bare before her deep-seeing eyes. She laid her hand on his face, that dear face so intense and strong, and wondered keenly in how many ages, how many worlds, how many lives, she had known him.The squirrel, disturbed by their presence, stopped midway on the tree trunk and chattered noisily; again the drumming of the partridge and the woodland voices blended, now rich and full in a glad song of triumph, praise, victory.CHAPTER XIX"WHERE IS YOUR FAITH?"Max and Margaret were quietly married in Mrs. Thorpe's little parlor. They made their home in a comfortable, roomy cottage which Max erected on the outskirts of the Flat not far from the old Resort.Now, as never before, Max devoted himself to his business affairs and took stock of the amount of his wealth. He was part owner of a manufacturing plant in Edgerly, and before the year was out he had sold his interest and announced his intention of building a factory on the Flat. From the man Bolton he obtained possession of the Flat district. To tear down the old, decaying buildings, to clear the ground of rubbish and lay off straight, square lots and build comfortable cottages was no small task; but all this was accomplished while the new factory was building. In planning and executing this great amount of work Max found Mrs. Thorpe's counsel and advice invaluable. There were many interests to be considered and some obstacles to be overcome, and her knowledge of the work and acquaintance with the people helped him to plan wisely and to use judgment and discretion in his work.He called at the school for Margaret one evening at the close of her day's work, and lingered for a talk with Mrs. Thorpe."I think we shall be able to have a regular school here another year," he said."I am sure all good things will come to the people here in time," she said. "What a world ours would be if every such place as this Flat had such a friend as you, Max.""The work is yours, Mrs. Thorpe; you must know that it is all yours," he replied; and then after a moment's silence he continued: "There are emotions that words seem to degrade, this is why I have never attempted to put into words my admiration for what you have done for the people on this Flat, nor my gratitude for what you have done for me. But, after all, it is not protestations, desires nor words, but the way he lives his life that proves a man. My work among these people, my life devoted to the alleviation of needy humanity, these must be my spokesmen, to you first, Mrs. Thorpe, and to my fellow men; these must testify to the transformation of the man, and stand as a monument to his faith, a thank-offering to his God."Mrs. Thorpe checked the sudden tears that sprang to her eyes. Years before she had believed that it was service that was demanded of her, and she had besought the Lord that she might see the fruit of her endeavor, the harvest of her labor; that a visible sign might be given her. Dare she doubt that her prayer was answered, or hesitate to recognize the answer? Dare she turn her eyes from this Infinite love, or escape this deluge of blessing, even though it overwhelmed and overpowered her? She thought of the children of Israel, how they had besought Moses to veil his face after he had talked with God. Was she, too, unable to bear the brightness of the light? Must she beseech the Lord to again draw the veil between her and His kingdom that the ecstasy of answered prayer might not become too great for her soul to bear?Margaret, who had been assisting a girl who had lingered over her task, now crossed the room and joined them."Come with us to tea, Mrs. Thorpe," she urged. "We love to have you with us. Mother and Jamie will expect you to-night, I am sure.""Yes, come with us, sister," added Max. "We are always wishing for your presence in our home.""Very well," Mrs. Thorpe replied, "your hospitality is sweet to me."After the evening meal was over they sat out on the broad cottage porch and discussed various aspects of their work. From adjoining cottages could be heard the chatter and laughter of children's voices. The air was sweet with the scent of flowers; the sun was nearing the horizon and its radiance lay over the Flat, no longer the unlovely Flat, but a collection of comfortable homes whose inmates, sure of employment and, more than this, sure of justice and equity, had in a measure fallen into harmony with the forces that make for righteousness.The air of peace and quiet that had fallen over the little group on the porch was broken by the arrival of a carriage at the gate. Dr. Eldrige assisted his wife to alight, and Margaret and Max went down the walk to meet them. There was cordial frankness in their greeting, sincere and whole-hearted. As they neared the steps Mrs. Thorpe came forward, and after greeting Geraldine, stooped and put her arms about the child; he put his chubby arms close about her neck and laid his soft, pink cheek against her face. How dear to her heart was the love of this child!The two men walked leisurely up to the house; Geraldine, in a simple white gown that caused her face with the golden hair above it to appear like the petals of some rare-tinted flower, stood against the dark outline of vines that screened the porch. All that her girlhood promised had blossomed into womanhood; maternity had developed all that was best and noblest in her.From a nearby cottage a ripple of childish laughter floated out on the evening air. Geraldine turned to her companions."Does earth contain sweeter music than the laugh of a child?" she said. "I often think that the transformation of this Flat is more wonderful than any of the fairy tales that enchanted our childhood.""It is a demonstration of the brotherhood of man, almost beyond belief," Dr. Eldrige replied."To do what lies before us, just that which comes to our hand to do, to be true to the best within us, is not so remarkable a thing to do," Max replied, and his eyes met Geraldine's honestly. "It is in the results that the wonder lies."After a time the two men fell into a discussion of ways and means concerning both the health and morals of the laborers on the Flat, and Margaret took Geraldine to see her garden. Mrs. Thorpe accompanied them, and Mrs. McGowan and Jamie joined them. The child, with Jamie for an escort, played about the garden paths and filled his hands with flowers, and Margaret and her companions made themselves comfortable on a rustic garden seat.Margaret had a gift of understanding that made it possible for her to read her husband's wishes and to know his needs; now she knew that he would join them, unless for some reason he wished to be alone with his friend. The loyal friendship of Dr. Eldrige Jr., freely given, had, she knew, been meat and drink to Max, and had been invaluable to him in his work.After the matter concerning the work on the Flat was disposed of, the two men continued their talk."Old Edgerly is still in throes of incredulity over your operations on this side of the hill, Max," the doctor said."Yes, I have heard her groanings from afar; queer why the old town should suffer so!""Yes, it is strange; father has been roaring like a lion, but he has taken to silence, absolute silence!"Max smiled at thought of the stormy old man reduced to silence."I had not supposed it was so bad as that," he said.There was the best of comradeship between the two men, although little had been said concerning the past. Events had run their course in such a manner that Dr. Eldrige Jr. felt that he had no grievance to cherish; and however slow one might be to accept the reformation in Max Morrison's character, the transformation in his life and work was patent to all.Max leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands back of his head."It's a queer world we live in, doctor," he said, "a queer old world."Dr. Eldrige Jr. regarded him in silence; he was not quite sure of Max's attitude toward conditions, as he had found them since his return to his native land, and he had no desire to probe an old wound nor to inflict a new one. And, at best, Dr. Eldrige was a man of few words."I used to live over in Edgerly," Max continued, ignoring the doctor's silence, "over in Christian Edgerly. I had, I think, the heart of a man in me, yet I was a villain--you know what I was--I ought to have been shot, shot like a cur--yet Edgerly favored me, sought and pampered me. But now that I have put my hand to an honest work--to help the needy, to feed and clothe the poor--the good old town has at least every other day a new motive, each more sinister than the other, to impute to my actions." He sprang to his feet and walked the length of the porch and back. "Eldrige," he said, "I had thought never to impose on your friendship by bringing up the past; but I feel to-night as though I may break my good resolutions.""Do not be afraid of imposing on my friendship, Max; speak of the past as freely as you like. You know me--we know each other.""You know my temperament, Eldrige; I have always been a devil of a fellow when aroused; and the attitude of those good people over there beyond the hill arouses me a bit. There is a little woman here on the Flat that chides me for this attitude, and tells me that I am wasting good strength fighting windmills. But I have not arrived at a place where I can view other people's unaccountable conduct and shortcomings in the calm, unruffled manner in which Mrs. Thorpe views them.""I find no difficulty in seeing Mrs. Thorpe's viewpoint, Max. She proves by her daily life and work that she is a follower of the one perfect Man; she heals the sick and reforms the sinner through her understanding of the Divine Law. This, to me, seems simple and natural, and she allows nothing to fret or trouble her. But I am going to be perfectly frank with you, and tell you that I cannot so readily understand your attitude. I think I have never deluded myself into believing that I understand you, Max; a man who has it in him to do the work that you are doing here on this Flat, aroused by adverse criticism--why man--""There, Eldrige, stop, please! I thought you understood me better than that. Why, man, criticism tones me up--puts me in good working order; antagonism exhilarates me, persecution inspires me. But what of those who criticise, antagonize and persecute? There's the rub--that's what arouses me. Why should professing Christian people hold up their hands and shout themselves hoarse because some fellow does an act of kindness to his fellow men? It's not criticism that I care for, but it does arouse the very devil in me to see Christian people stand in wide-eyed, open-mouthed astonishment before a Christian deed. You see, I have not the religion that Mrs. Thorpe has; in fact, I am not at all sure that I have any religion whatever. I think it possible, and I may say that I really hope it possible that I may some day come into the scientific understanding of life that Mrs. Thorpe has attained; but at present I am trying only to do the square thing by my fellow men."The doctor looked him over deliberately."If ever I am able to understand the man you are, Max, I think it will be when I am a better man myself than I am now. You may not call yourself a religious man, but there is a force back of your life, a force of some kind that I did not know that the universe contained; there is some secret here that I have not been able to find out.""I don't agree with you there, Eldrige; there's no secret about it, there's nothing hidden nor concealed; all is open and clear as the sun in mid-heaven. The trouble is our eyes are holden, we are blind and dumb and dead--I wish I could make you see things from my viewpoint--there are a thousand things I would tell you if I could."Max was not looking at the doctor now; his eyes were far away upon the distant horizon. "I would tell you something of the influence of my early bringing up," he said, "a pampered child of wealth; something of the force of Christianity, as it was taught and lived in my home; something of the time when I passed from boyhood to manhood, idle, with more money than I could spend--honestly; something of the day when I first looked into the eyes of the woman I love--innocent, beseeching--"He arose again and walked back and forth across the porch."I can't do it, Eldrige--I've no words to make you understand," he said, "you who have lived a clean life, you who have always worked--" He drew his chair up near to the doctor and sat down again. "I really think," he said, in a quieter tone, "that during that period of my life I was not so much bad as blind and dead--the man in me had never been born; I was a clod, a lump of clay, with the instincts of the beast. Our civilization! Our Christianity!--Damn!--I'll try not to be profane, doctor. But this is why I say I am not a religious man; I tell you I had as soon trust the chances of the brownest skinned, dumb beast of a man that I knew on those far islands of the sea as the chances of the son of the average wealthy Christian parents in this Christian land."I am not going to be profane, not if I can help it, and I am not going to allow myself to become unduly excited, but the rashest language that our vocabulary contains could not portray the fires of hell that burned within me when I left my native land, beaten and broken. I was furious--furious because I had missed the heart and center of life--why should I have missed it? I desired the beautiful, satisfying things of life; I had the base and unclean; and I was furious with myself, my family, society--the whole world."There was silence for a few moments. The doctor said nothing; then Max spoke again: "I know, Eldrige, and you know, that the truth and purity in your wife's heart was the whip and scourge that drove me to my manhood."The doctor extended his hand, and met Max's hand in a firm, keen clasp."When I found that truth and purity, uprightness and a clean soul are the real gems of life, the beautiful things, the lasting and abiding and satisfying things, I wanted them for myself," Max continued, "and no fires of hell can ever burn and sear as did the belief that I had lost them irrevocably; that through the conduct that my family had ignored and society had condoned I had with my own hand shut myself off from them forever. I think my indignation was directed not so much at myself as at the civilized world, the society, church, and family that had offered no resistance and put no check on my journey to perdition. But when I came back to my native land I had had some experiences that made another man of me. When a man goes down into the valley and stands on the border he sees things with a clearer vision. I had no desire then to shift the responsibility of my misspent life upon either people or institutions. I think I saw more clearly, perhaps, than I had before the faults and weaknesses in our institutions, and the lack of moral stamina in those who take upon themselves the training of the young; but these were not the things that counted with me then, not the things I cared about. No, I tell you I was face to face with my own soul then, and nothing else counted! The inexorability of it! There was no way to escape, no way to shift or turn, no excuses, no deceits, no subterfuges. Absolute, immovable Justice is the most grim-faced thing that a man can meet. It was not until after I had met this grim fellow, and laid my black life bare before him, asking nothing, deserving nothing, that any peace came to me. But after this I knew--I cannot tell you how I knew--but the knowledge came to me that over this sinning and suffering life there lies the great Life, tender, compassionate Love."When I came back to this Flat and found Margaret, and looked into her face, and saw the transformation there, then I knew that there is a God, and to know this, that there is a God, is to know that the whole duty, pleasure and profit of man is to serve Him by serving his fellow men, and this, without any meeting-house religion whatever, is what I have been trying to do."My mother and sister go every Sunday and worship in the beautiful church yonder on the hill. They have never recognized my wife, although my mother knows, as God knows, that the guilt was mine more than it was Margaret's. My mother is a Christian woman, according to accepted standards, and far be it from me to reproach or judge her, but the son that she reared had a long way to go and a hard battle to fight before he could see and know the purity of an honest love, the dignity of a human soul, whether it be in a high place or a lowly one. I have come to the conclusion that what we call the Christian world has in its social code and accepted standards of respectability a law of its own, the spirit of which never sprang from inspiration; a law that binds and holds absolutely, as the letter of the old Jewish law held the priests and scribes who cried 'Crucify, crucify the Truth unless it comes in the style and manner that we have marked out for its coming.' The simple, undressed truth is ignored, put aside and kept in the background; the so-called church of Christ keeps it there."You know, Eldrige, and I know, and every man in the world to-day knows, that there is something wrong, radically wrong, deep-seated and to the heart's core, with our church, society and home training when a man and woman, reared you might say, in the very shadow of the church, and having its precepts hurled at them from their infancy, yet can mistake passion, immorality and shame for the joy and pleasure of life; when to their young lives the hell-brewed poison of destruction appears like the rich, red wine of satisfaction."For what does the church over there on the hill stand? What is its mission? its object? its meaning? If there is anything in the power of the Son of Man there is everything--everything or nothing; and this attitude of people who call themselves Christians, standing between suffering, sin-sick mortals and the sinner's God is enough to make the angels weep--and mortals howl!""Well, well, Max, I believe you are aroused a bit; but I am afraid, my man, that you are probing to the heart and center of conditions that will never be righted in this world. Eternity alone, I think, will reveal the why and wherefore of some of the things that are troubling you.""No, Eldrige, it will not require the revelations of eternity to convince me why the Church is cankered, worm-eaten and corrupt. I verily believe I can give you the reason this minute: it is because its advocates arehearersof the Truth, but not followers of it. Over there in Christian Edgerly men and women profess to follow Christ, and in their hearts they know that they stop with the professing. Not one man in ten will read the words of Christ and admit that they can be taken as a rule of life and conduct."'Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you do ye even so to them.'"Where is the man who does this? The poor, the needy, the suffering, the down-trodden, the unfortunate, they circle the globe, they are in every land, every clime, every city, town and hamlet; the voice of their cries by day and their groanings by night is never still; naked, they are not clothed; hungry, they are not fed; thirsty, they are not given drink; and these are 'the others.' Where is the man who does unto them as he would be done by? Do you? Do I?"And where is the man who loves his neighbor as himself? Where would be the stress and strife of life, the wear and tear, the wrangle and scramble, the heartache and crime, the murder and suicide, if this precept were followed? Where would be all this agitation about labor and capital, the piling up of wealth on one hand and biting poverty on the other, if men--Christian men--loved their neighbors as themselves? Wise men of our generation are trying to devise ways and formulate plans to regulate the differences and disagreements among men; but even the reformers disagree among themselves and dissensions grow greater from year to year. Do men think that they are wiser than God? Do they think that if there is a better way Christ would have failed to tell us about it? Yet we are deaf to the simple words of the divine Teacher, the grandest precept ever given, the one and only panacea for the world's discord, 'Love thy neighbor as thyself.'""If only the world had such a religion as that, Max, Christianity would be Christian.""And Christianity never will be Christian until men believe what they profess to believe. I am not much of a Bible scholar, I was brought up to reverence the Bible, not to read it, but I know that we are told that faith without works is dead. There is faith enough in the world, if it were alive, to save the world--but it is dead, dead and buried, and the devil is dancing to his hornpipes over its burial place--the opaque hearts of men. A general may fight a battle with an army of men, if they are alive--but if they are dead, dead in the trenches, they will not put up much of a fight. Yet the absurdity of fighting a battle with dead men is not greater than the inconsistency of a religion with a dead faith."I have not yet learned to understand the scientific principle back of the kind of religion that has been at work on this Flat; but I know that the faith of a grain of mustard seed would remove mountains of sin and crime and unholy desire from our land. A grain of mustard seed is alive, pregnant; given favorable conditions it will expand and increase, and flower and produce again, demonstrating the power of the Invisible. This work here on this Flat started from a grain of mustard seed; a grain sown and tended and watered and tilled by a woman's hand. And the Christian city and the stately church marvel that God has given the increase. You and I have special cause to honor this woman and her work, Eldrige, and we both owe her an endless debt of gratitude."Again their hands met in silent companionship. Then Max arose. "I am afraid we have forgotten the ladies," he said. "Let us go and join them in the garden."The doctor followed his friend, and he no longer felt that he failed to understand him; he was just an honest man, nothing more--nothing less.CHAPTER XXTHE REVELATIONIn a small village at the foot of a Colorado mountain, the Reverend Maurice Thorpe pitched his tent--literally pitched his tent--for he resolved to try the open air treatment for his malady.He had tried the remedies that men have compounded and the devices that their skill have fashioned until the last one was tested and tried and found wanting; and when his faith in these was gone he resorted to the Nature cure--he resolved to let Nature have her way with him. So he set up his tent, lived in the open, bathed in the sunshine, breathed the mountain air; and he felt his strength returning. If there was something beside these things that helped his recovery he did not know of it at the time.The good Book tells us that "The prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up," and there are yet some people in God's world who believe it.The tent was pitched near the bank of a mountain stream. From far up the mountains it came, at times a turbulent, rushing stream and again narrowing to a silver rill. Part way down its course it came to a rocky formation which obstructed its flow and forced it into two different channels. During the summer months the larger of these two streams diminished in size and the other became dry. Following the dry course over stones and sand one was led through a region of wild and rugged grandeur. The circuitous course led through deep gorges and past great ledges of rock, and here and there huge stones stood out alone, like silent sentinels.Mr. Thorpe, in his long walks over the mountains, often followed this course until he reached the chasm, or cave-like opening, where it ended. The rocks were dry and bleached now, except for here and there a patch of moss or bit of grass which grew among the crevices. Some birds had chosen the cave for their nesting place, and their cries echoed shrilly among the rocks. This wild, isolated spot was far removed from the usual haunts of men, but it held a peculiar charm for Mr. Thorpe, and he fell into the way of taking his books and reading there. Some goat-skins spread on the rocks served for a couch and a ledge of rock answered for a table; and here, one by one, his favorite books and magazines found a place. Here, alone with his silent friends, he became a recluse. The world that had so bitterly disappointed him, the life that had so grieved and vexed him, the love that had bowed and broken him, all were left behind.The brook babbled noisily by the tent one rare morning in June; the birds called shrilly from the rocky ledges, and the sky was azure above the mountains. Mr. Thorpe looked over his letters and papers and laid aside those that he cared to take with him for the day. The canvas bag in which he carried his luncheon was packed and his water-bottle filled. He picked up his selection of papers, and as he did so his eyes fell on one that he had not noticed before. He examined it and saw that it was a copy of the Edgerly Times. Some headlines at the top of the page caught his eye: "The Transformation of the Flat. Once a Place of Vice and Want, Now a Thriving Factory Settlement." He glanced down the page and caught sentences that contained familiar names: "Mrs. Thorpe, former pastor's wife--Max Morrison, returned soldier--Dr. Eldrige Jr. and his young wife--"Mr. Thorpe's face set in grim lines and the blue veins stood out prominently on his forehead. He folded the paper and thrust it in his pocket, picked up the canvas bag and water-bottle and made his way down the rocky course to the rock-walled cavern. His attitude was that of a man bowed, broken, vanquished.When he reached the cavern he threw himself upon his goat-skins, drew the paper from his pocket and read the article carefully through to the finish. It dwelt at length on the factors that had brought about the change on the Flat.When he finished the article he folded the paper slowly, methodically, as one whose mind is far away. His eyes were upon the stones at his feet, and slowly the doors of memory swung open, and before him were the hopes and aspirations of his life, its trials and disappointments--the questioning anguish of failure.He had been so sure of his standards, so certain of the infallibility of his ideals. He felt that if the voice of the Lord had spoken to him, as it spoke to Moses from the burning bush it could not have brought to him more conviction than the ideals of his early manhood had afforded him--yet he had failed, his life was a wreck, a derelict stranded on the shore of time.His mind had been so filled with the convictions that had come to him with the stamp and seal of his forefathers upon them that he had not grasped the possibilities, nor realized the demands of the vital, ever-present and progressive forces about him. And as one who starts upon a race bound and handicapped from the start, the inevitable had come upon him. But these underlying causes that had made shipwreck of his hopes and a tragedy of his existence had been to him as an unwritten book, unseen and unknown. And always when his mind had gone back over the past he had seen only the strewn and broken wreckage of his hopes, and the future was black with a dumb agony that he had no heart to face.But one of the facts of this creation of ours and of the eternal verities that govern it is that sincerity never seeks in vain; when the sincerity of the soul asks, divine Love does not, could not, fail to respond. We must understand that there are many phases of mortal thought that parade under the mantle of sincerity which have little or no relation to that which is truly sincere. Sometimes we, as untutored children, ask for that which we would instantly cast from us were our requests granted; many times we beg and plead for that from which our very souls would shrink and cower; and very many times our motives are so obscure and our desires so warped and misshapen that we have no logical conception of that for which we ask. But the eternal fact remains: Man never yet asked for bread and was given a stone, never yet asked for an egg and was given a scorpion.Now the man's life, bare to the quivering quick, stripped of every hypothesis, analysis and subterfuge of philosophy, was asking, sincerely asking, why he had failed. His self-righteousness slipped from him and lay like a cast-off garment at his feet; prejudice, which had held him in so firm a grip, retreated and slunk back into the dim, illusory creation where its multiform delusions have their inception; pride, humbled and forsaken, trailed its glittering pageant out of the range of his vision.The branches of a tree outside the cave swayed in the wind and brushed against the rocks with a soft, rustling sound, and the birds called across the cavern and circled about the man's motionless figure. But outward conditions, location, surroundings and lapse of time were for the time no part of Mr. Thorpe's experience. The sun crept up in the heavens until it reached the meridian. The dog, the man's only companion in his rambles, came to his side and thrust his nose against the canvas bag, but receiving no attention, stretched himself again patiently beside his master.When Mr. Thorpe raised his eyes from the stones at his feet he was not surprised at that which he saw. That which he beheld was exactly that which he raised his eyes expecting to see. On one side of the cavern there stood a grim, relentless form, heavy-browed and strongly built. There were iron bands about the waist and thighs and iron circles on the ankles, arms and wrists. One hand held an iron sword, the other an iron pen. And branded deep into the forehead in letters of red-hot iron was the word INTOLERANCE. On the opposite side of the cavern stood a figure of less massive proportions, of easy grace and supple bearing, clothed in a simple, clinging garment of white. In one outstretched hand was held a burning torch, and in the other a pen of light, tipped with a diamond point. Glittering gems upon the forehead fashioned the word FREEDOM. From out of the past they came, years, centuries, ages were upon them.Now on the stones of the cavern walls each figure began to write, carefully, silently, remorselessly, until slab after slab stretching away into the dim recesses of the cave was filled with the history of the past. Every word that the iron pen recorded stood out clearly and distinctly, and there was no choice but to read. The silent spectator felt his senses shrink and quiver and his heart grow sick as the record passed before him, but he was not spared. His body grew rigid and every sense was in revolt, but the iron-bound hand did not waver nor relent. So vivid was the record that all the awful carnage and bloodshed, torture and persecution were as though actually transpiring before his tortured gaze, and the air was filled with the shrieks of the dying and groans and invectives of the tortured and tormented. But the physical horror of it did not compare with the agony of noble minds and fearless souls whose mental anguish the iron-bound hand did not hesitate to record.The silent man, alone with these strange creations of his brain, fell to tracing the work of this iron-bound monster back to its birth or beginning. And as he pondered and questioned, it came to him with a distinct shock that the first intolerance was that which opposed itself to God's creation in the Garden of Eden. Its first form was that of a sinuous serpent; its voice that of the subtle testimony of the senses! He found also that this monster had assumed a form, and found a voice in every age in which mortal man had lived. And it came to him straight as an arrow and as keen to his highly-wrought senses that the relentless iron pen was writing, along with the other records, the history of the Church, the Church which had seemed to him to be infallible, which had come to him fraught with the faith of his ancestors, steeped in the blood of martyrs, and which held within its sacred teachings the only possible redemption for mankind, the Church for which he had labored. But he was not yet spared; remorse and contrition were having their way with him, and the sweat of agony was on his brow. For the first time in his life he entertained a doubt as to a literal hell; for what could a quenchless fire do to the physical body, compared to this which the bigotry and intolerance of his life were uncovering before him?It was a relief to turn from this mental gloom, this verge of madness, from all this record of pain and woe, the history of the world's wrongs, to turn and behold the supple figure in white, writing with the diamond's flashing point. Here was a record of God's creation, untouched by mortal sense; a story of man untempted and woman unbeguiled; all things the image and reflection of the one God. Only that which is good and true and pure, that which is noble and righteous, was recorded by the flashing pen; the freedom which God gives to man can write no other record.The events of the ages passed as a panorama before the solitary observer. From the bookshelves of the world were selected volumes written by a master hand, books that had stood the test of time and lived through the years. And the fact stood out with distinctness that the souls of the men who wrote them were not shackled, they were not slaves to another's will, nor bound by another's power, but that the minds that conceived them stood in absolute freedom before God. He was made to feel the throb and pulse of freedom, unbound and unfettered, that surged through the life of the artists that have painted the world's famous pictures and fashioned its works of art. He saw man expanding beneath the touch of the Infinite, answerable to the Infinite only.Then the world's greatest singers stood before him, those to whom had been given the gracious gift of melody. And he knew that the possessor of this gift had arisen over difficulties, through trials and endeavor, until he reached the height where for him there sounded the supreme harmonies of the universe, and that he stood alone, exultant in the freedom of his power.The flashing pen went back over the past and noted the world's reformers, men of staunch and steadfast character, who have stood for righteousness, for purity and truth, men who resisted despotism, put down superstition, stamped out ignorance and made possible the progress of science, even though their footsteps were stained with blood and led to the dungeon and the guillotine.And this record of light, traced with the diamond's point, made it clear beyond question that in the small things as well as the great, only that which has been done in the freedom of the soul has made the world better. It is soul-freedom that has uplifted, transformed and glorified life. Every act of charity, of love, of Christian kindness, the cup of water given in the Master's name, the garment to the naked, the bread to the hungry, the visit to the prison if of any worth, of any efficacy or power, have been done in the freedom of the soul, prompted by the heart-spirit, the desire of the individual unhampered by another's will.Now before the smitten man there rolled the long years, uncompromising and relentless as he believed the Judgment-day to be, the years in which he had held a fair, frail woman, soul and body in subjection to his wishes, dominated and controlled her by the superior force of his will. He had held to the belief that he had chosen to live apart from this woman that he loved because of her infidelity to the Church; now he was face to face with the conviction that he had deserted her because she had not subscribed unconditionally to scholastic theology.Mr. Thorpe was aroused from his trance-like condition by the whimpering of his dog. The animal thrust his nose against the canvas bag and looked pleadingly into his master's face. Mr. Thorpe put out his hand and patted the dog's head; he gave him a biscuit from the bag and poured some water from the bottle for him to drink. Then he arose, stretched his stiffened limbs and walked to the entrance of the cave. The sun was nearing the horizon; the day had passed. He gathered his papers together, took up the untasted food and made his way back to the tent.Pauline, who lived with her brother, and who still exercised a watchful care over her cousin, had been watching for him, and saw him when he came into sight. She was surprised at his appearance; his shoulders were squared to meet the bracing wind, and he swung along with the stride of a strong man, physically and mentally vigorous.CHAPTER XXITHE LAW OF LIFEJune was drawing to a close. The sun rode high in the heaven, and at evening seemed loath to leave the verdant earth in darkness. From the rows of neat cottages on the Flat came the scent of perfume-laden flowers. The garden beds, bathed in the glowing sun and watered from heaven, grew and throve; and the vines and shrubs lately planted vied with each other in growth and beauty.Mrs. Thorpe had spent the day as usual in the school. All day she labored among the children, and at evening sent them glad and happy to their homes. There was something about her patience and loving kindness that touched the hearts of those about her; her presence was an inspiration, as well as a help and comfort.At the close of school this June day Margaret asked Mrs. Thorpe to go with her to tea."You refused last night and the night before," she said."And I think it better for me not to go to-night, dear. I have some exercises to look over and some work to prepare for to-morrow. Another time, perhaps, but not to-night." And so Margaret left her and went her way alone.The work that required her attention was examined and preparations for the morrow completed, and still Mrs. Thorpe lingered in the empty room. She walked back and forth through the room where all was silent save the sound of her footsteps; but she was not lonely; she loved the quiet of the deserted room and the memories that lingered about it. She loved the children among whom she worked, and she was hopeful and ambitious for them. She longed to see them in the way of honor and virtue, in the way of self-respect and independence; and she believed that this way lay before them. Her life was full of hopes and plans for their future, and she worked willingly, gladly, whole-heartedly, for the fulfillment of these plans.Yet this woman had never tried to deceive herself. She knew that there was a room in her heart silent and empty, where memories, sad and silent, lingered among the shadows. She was not unhappy because of this; her happiness lay in accepting it and fashioning her life superior to it.There had been a time when she believed that, like the chords of a harp, the sweetest strains of her life had been broken. She recognized the generally accepted view that if the union between a man and a woman be broken, the lives affected by the dissolution must necessarily be crippled and their usefulness impaired. But this view of life had gradually changed as she came into a larger, more scientific view of life. Now she believed that nothing but a violation of the life Principle could mar a life or rob it of its legitimate rights. She had come to understand that there is a Law back of Life, a Law to which all the children of creation must conform, and that nothing but an infringement of God's law can hurt or destroy in all His holy mountain. And the natural deduction followed that all relationships between individuals must be honest, sincere and pure. And that any law, written or unwritten, that fosters or favors the domination or control of one person over another is a mortal law, and invariably an immoral one. Man in the image and likeness of God is governed by righteousness and not by his fellow men.Mrs. Thorpe was no longer a frail woman; her physical development had come about gradually and naturally. Her form that had remained slender and girlish long after her girlhood days had passed, was now rounded out into full contour of womanhood. Her eyes that had been too large and bright for her colorless face, now blended harmoniously with her soft, warm color. No stimulants nor artificial means had been employed to bring about this change; it had come naturally with her changed attitude toward life, her scientific understanding of life harmonious, as the reflection of the Infinite. Where once she had been irrational, ignorant and ill, now she was sensible, wise and well; the one following the other in natural sequence in the physical as well as in the mental condition.Yet she was always frank with herself; she missed the love and companionship that had once been hers. She walked over to one of the windows and seated herself on the window-seat. The wind came in softly and touched the tendrils of brown hair about her face. She looked far off to the distant blue hills. "Maurice," she called, softly; "Maurice." Deep in her heart she knew that the old relationship could never exist between them again. They were both children of the one God, answerable to Him only. It was a violation of this law of life, a conception derived from tradition, and tainted with paganism that had brought about their downfall. "But oh, Maurice," she whispered, "I love you, love you!"The flowers outside the window nodded and swayed in the gentle wind, and a bird whose happy secret lay concealed within reach of her hand, twittered, unafraid, on a swaying bough; and the twilight settled down about her.When Mrs. Thorpe arose she shook herself free from the memories that had clung about her, and walked out into the semi-darkness. Wholesome and whole-souled, she was little given to retrospection or introspection, but chose to live her life in the fruitful present.As she neared her home she saw that a light was burning inside."It is Jamie," she thought. Dear little Jamie; how many times he had remembered her, and lighted her home and laid her fire.With a light heart she ascended the steps and entered the house. She glanced through the rooms to the little kitchen, where she expected to see the boy fixing the fire, or laying the table, perhaps."Jamie," she called, gently. "Jamie."There was no response from the room beyond, but from a seat near her a man arose and confronted her--a man bronzed and bearded, who showed the impress of mountain life and contact with nature.The light in the room was dim, but the recognition was instantaneous."Evelyn! Evelyn, my wife!" His arms were about her, and she lifted her face to his, as she had done on their bridal morn."Evelyn," he whispered, "can you forgive--forgive the wrong--the cruel years?"She put out her hand and laid it against his face."There is nothing to forgive, Maurice--nothing to forgive--love is everything.""And I have loved you, Evelyn; you have been near me, with me always.""Always, Maurice."
Margaret was seated on a ledge of rock by the brook. Her eyes were strained far off to the dim blue hills in the distance; her heart was torn with restless pain, and her life's hunger was in her face, but her soul was anchored safe and secure.
"Expiation!" she murmured. "Dear God, only keep me from day to day--keep me--keep your child." Softly over her memory floated a fragment of the words that Mrs. Thorpe had read that morning: "He that keeps thee will not slumber."
The brook babbled at her feet and the curious droning voices of the woodland came to her. Every sense was alive; the wild seclusion of the place appealed to the turbulent passion within her, its peace and beauty enthralled her.
"Give unto me the strength of the towering forest pines," she whispered, "the humility of the woodland flowers, the steadfastness of the mist-hung hills."
A squirrel, intent upon his winter's store, was making little journeys from an acorn-filled treetop to his home at the tree's gnarled root; from the woods came the muffled drumming of a partridge. The call of a bird-note, faint in the distance, the nearby chirp of a cricket and the whispering of the wind in the treetops mingled with the low, vague sounds of the forest and blended into a symphony soft and sweet, then weird and haunting, as the falling of a leaf or the snapping of a twig broke the harmony.
The girl, with her eyes on the far-away hills, was bound by the spell of it all; yet to her finer sense there was wafted from the soft, thrilling melody and the fluttering breath of the forest a knowledge, vague, evanescent, yet so quickening and compelling that the past, the future, the present--life itself--trembled before it. A shower of leaves scattered by the provident squirrel fell at her feet; a twig snapped sharply and there was a rustling sound in the path beside her. But she did not move nor stir, and her eyes did not leave the hilltops--but she knew--she could not fail to know his presence, and when he came to her side, and stood close beside her, she shrank and shuddered, and yet her heart cried out with the exquisite pain of it.
"Margaret," he said, "Margaret, I have come over land and across seas. Have you no welcome for me? No word nor look?"
He had left the church and passed through the crooked, unkept street of the Flat and on past the old Resort out to Cedar Brook. Exhausted with his long walk, he seated himself on the ledge of rock. Margaret sank down on the soft, clinging moss beside the rock and buried her face in her hands.
"Have you no word for me, Margaret? After all this time, not one word for me?" But he did not touch her; he dared not lay his hand on her. And she made no reply nor raised her face to his until she had gained complete control of herself; then she arose and stood before him.
He had heard of her reformation; he expected to find her changed, but he was not prepared for that which had had its birth and growth since he last saw her; and in this first moment of their meeting no other characteristic seemed so patent to him. He regarded her in silence. Here was the girl that he had known, the passionate, turbulent Margaret, but blended with her, permeating her personality, guarding and protecting her, was this other self--the ideal enshrined in his heart. Whence had she obtained this unnamable quality which, unvoiced and without conscious effort, aroused the reverence in his manhood? Always before he had controlled her, dominated her, often against her will by his superior force; now her personality, her selfhood stood out before him, silent yet indomitable, subtle, intangible, yet absolute. Reverently he extended his hand to her, and his voice was deep with pleading.
"Margaret, speak to me, all unworthy though I am to hear your voice--trust me, though I did so abuse your girlish trust--forgive me, forgive me and let me prove myself to you."
She took his proffered hand and looked unfalteringly into his eyes.
"You should not take all the blame," she said. "I, too, need to be forgiven."
He held her hand between his palms, then raised it to his lips.
"Margaret," he said, "you are the only woman I have ever loved."
"Max!" The word fell from her lips like a sob. "Max!"
He drew her to him and kissed the dark hair where it lay smooth against her forehead.
"Will you be my wife, Margaret, my loved and honored wife?"
Her eyes scanned his face; not a line of pain, not a mark of suffering escaped her. All his struggles, his rebellion, his victories, and all the soul within him lay bare before her deep-seeing eyes. She laid her hand on his face, that dear face so intense and strong, and wondered keenly in how many ages, how many worlds, how many lives, she had known him.
The squirrel, disturbed by their presence, stopped midway on the tree trunk and chattered noisily; again the drumming of the partridge and the woodland voices blended, now rich and full in a glad song of triumph, praise, victory.
CHAPTER XIX
"WHERE IS YOUR FAITH?"
Max and Margaret were quietly married in Mrs. Thorpe's little parlor. They made their home in a comfortable, roomy cottage which Max erected on the outskirts of the Flat not far from the old Resort.
Now, as never before, Max devoted himself to his business affairs and took stock of the amount of his wealth. He was part owner of a manufacturing plant in Edgerly, and before the year was out he had sold his interest and announced his intention of building a factory on the Flat. From the man Bolton he obtained possession of the Flat district. To tear down the old, decaying buildings, to clear the ground of rubbish and lay off straight, square lots and build comfortable cottages was no small task; but all this was accomplished while the new factory was building. In planning and executing this great amount of work Max found Mrs. Thorpe's counsel and advice invaluable. There were many interests to be considered and some obstacles to be overcome, and her knowledge of the work and acquaintance with the people helped him to plan wisely and to use judgment and discretion in his work.
He called at the school for Margaret one evening at the close of her day's work, and lingered for a talk with Mrs. Thorpe.
"I think we shall be able to have a regular school here another year," he said.
"I am sure all good things will come to the people here in time," she said. "What a world ours would be if every such place as this Flat had such a friend as you, Max."
"The work is yours, Mrs. Thorpe; you must know that it is all yours," he replied; and then after a moment's silence he continued: "There are emotions that words seem to degrade, this is why I have never attempted to put into words my admiration for what you have done for the people on this Flat, nor my gratitude for what you have done for me. But, after all, it is not protestations, desires nor words, but the way he lives his life that proves a man. My work among these people, my life devoted to the alleviation of needy humanity, these must be my spokesmen, to you first, Mrs. Thorpe, and to my fellow men; these must testify to the transformation of the man, and stand as a monument to his faith, a thank-offering to his God."
Mrs. Thorpe checked the sudden tears that sprang to her eyes. Years before she had believed that it was service that was demanded of her, and she had besought the Lord that she might see the fruit of her endeavor, the harvest of her labor; that a visible sign might be given her. Dare she doubt that her prayer was answered, or hesitate to recognize the answer? Dare she turn her eyes from this Infinite love, or escape this deluge of blessing, even though it overwhelmed and overpowered her? She thought of the children of Israel, how they had besought Moses to veil his face after he had talked with God. Was she, too, unable to bear the brightness of the light? Must she beseech the Lord to again draw the veil between her and His kingdom that the ecstasy of answered prayer might not become too great for her soul to bear?
Margaret, who had been assisting a girl who had lingered over her task, now crossed the room and joined them.
"Come with us to tea, Mrs. Thorpe," she urged. "We love to have you with us. Mother and Jamie will expect you to-night, I am sure."
"Yes, come with us, sister," added Max. "We are always wishing for your presence in our home."
"Very well," Mrs. Thorpe replied, "your hospitality is sweet to me."
After the evening meal was over they sat out on the broad cottage porch and discussed various aspects of their work. From adjoining cottages could be heard the chatter and laughter of children's voices. The air was sweet with the scent of flowers; the sun was nearing the horizon and its radiance lay over the Flat, no longer the unlovely Flat, but a collection of comfortable homes whose inmates, sure of employment and, more than this, sure of justice and equity, had in a measure fallen into harmony with the forces that make for righteousness.
The air of peace and quiet that had fallen over the little group on the porch was broken by the arrival of a carriage at the gate. Dr. Eldrige assisted his wife to alight, and Margaret and Max went down the walk to meet them. There was cordial frankness in their greeting, sincere and whole-hearted. As they neared the steps Mrs. Thorpe came forward, and after greeting Geraldine, stooped and put her arms about the child; he put his chubby arms close about her neck and laid his soft, pink cheek against her face. How dear to her heart was the love of this child!
The two men walked leisurely up to the house; Geraldine, in a simple white gown that caused her face with the golden hair above it to appear like the petals of some rare-tinted flower, stood against the dark outline of vines that screened the porch. All that her girlhood promised had blossomed into womanhood; maternity had developed all that was best and noblest in her.
From a nearby cottage a ripple of childish laughter floated out on the evening air. Geraldine turned to her companions.
"Does earth contain sweeter music than the laugh of a child?" she said. "I often think that the transformation of this Flat is more wonderful than any of the fairy tales that enchanted our childhood."
"It is a demonstration of the brotherhood of man, almost beyond belief," Dr. Eldrige replied.
"To do what lies before us, just that which comes to our hand to do, to be true to the best within us, is not so remarkable a thing to do," Max replied, and his eyes met Geraldine's honestly. "It is in the results that the wonder lies."
After a time the two men fell into a discussion of ways and means concerning both the health and morals of the laborers on the Flat, and Margaret took Geraldine to see her garden. Mrs. Thorpe accompanied them, and Mrs. McGowan and Jamie joined them. The child, with Jamie for an escort, played about the garden paths and filled his hands with flowers, and Margaret and her companions made themselves comfortable on a rustic garden seat.
Margaret had a gift of understanding that made it possible for her to read her husband's wishes and to know his needs; now she knew that he would join them, unless for some reason he wished to be alone with his friend. The loyal friendship of Dr. Eldrige Jr., freely given, had, she knew, been meat and drink to Max, and had been invaluable to him in his work.
After the matter concerning the work on the Flat was disposed of, the two men continued their talk.
"Old Edgerly is still in throes of incredulity over your operations on this side of the hill, Max," the doctor said.
"Yes, I have heard her groanings from afar; queer why the old town should suffer so!"
"Yes, it is strange; father has been roaring like a lion, but he has taken to silence, absolute silence!"
Max smiled at thought of the stormy old man reduced to silence.
"I had not supposed it was so bad as that," he said.
There was the best of comradeship between the two men, although little had been said concerning the past. Events had run their course in such a manner that Dr. Eldrige Jr. felt that he had no grievance to cherish; and however slow one might be to accept the reformation in Max Morrison's character, the transformation in his life and work was patent to all.
Max leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands back of his head.
"It's a queer world we live in, doctor," he said, "a queer old world."
Dr. Eldrige Jr. regarded him in silence; he was not quite sure of Max's attitude toward conditions, as he had found them since his return to his native land, and he had no desire to probe an old wound nor to inflict a new one. And, at best, Dr. Eldrige was a man of few words.
"I used to live over in Edgerly," Max continued, ignoring the doctor's silence, "over in Christian Edgerly. I had, I think, the heart of a man in me, yet I was a villain--you know what I was--I ought to have been shot, shot like a cur--yet Edgerly favored me, sought and pampered me. But now that I have put my hand to an honest work--to help the needy, to feed and clothe the poor--the good old town has at least every other day a new motive, each more sinister than the other, to impute to my actions." He sprang to his feet and walked the length of the porch and back. "Eldrige," he said, "I had thought never to impose on your friendship by bringing up the past; but I feel to-night as though I may break my good resolutions."
"Do not be afraid of imposing on my friendship, Max; speak of the past as freely as you like. You know me--we know each other."
"You know my temperament, Eldrige; I have always been a devil of a fellow when aroused; and the attitude of those good people over there beyond the hill arouses me a bit. There is a little woman here on the Flat that chides me for this attitude, and tells me that I am wasting good strength fighting windmills. But I have not arrived at a place where I can view other people's unaccountable conduct and shortcomings in the calm, unruffled manner in which Mrs. Thorpe views them."
"I find no difficulty in seeing Mrs. Thorpe's viewpoint, Max. She proves by her daily life and work that she is a follower of the one perfect Man; she heals the sick and reforms the sinner through her understanding of the Divine Law. This, to me, seems simple and natural, and she allows nothing to fret or trouble her. But I am going to be perfectly frank with you, and tell you that I cannot so readily understand your attitude. I think I have never deluded myself into believing that I understand you, Max; a man who has it in him to do the work that you are doing here on this Flat, aroused by adverse criticism--why man--"
"There, Eldrige, stop, please! I thought you understood me better than that. Why, man, criticism tones me up--puts me in good working order; antagonism exhilarates me, persecution inspires me. But what of those who criticise, antagonize and persecute? There's the rub--that's what arouses me. Why should professing Christian people hold up their hands and shout themselves hoarse because some fellow does an act of kindness to his fellow men? It's not criticism that I care for, but it does arouse the very devil in me to see Christian people stand in wide-eyed, open-mouthed astonishment before a Christian deed. You see, I have not the religion that Mrs. Thorpe has; in fact, I am not at all sure that I have any religion whatever. I think it possible, and I may say that I really hope it possible that I may some day come into the scientific understanding of life that Mrs. Thorpe has attained; but at present I am trying only to do the square thing by my fellow men."
The doctor looked him over deliberately.
"If ever I am able to understand the man you are, Max, I think it will be when I am a better man myself than I am now. You may not call yourself a religious man, but there is a force back of your life, a force of some kind that I did not know that the universe contained; there is some secret here that I have not been able to find out."
"I don't agree with you there, Eldrige; there's no secret about it, there's nothing hidden nor concealed; all is open and clear as the sun in mid-heaven. The trouble is our eyes are holden, we are blind and dumb and dead--I wish I could make you see things from my viewpoint--there are a thousand things I would tell you if I could."
Max was not looking at the doctor now; his eyes were far away upon the distant horizon. "I would tell you something of the influence of my early bringing up," he said, "a pampered child of wealth; something of the force of Christianity, as it was taught and lived in my home; something of the time when I passed from boyhood to manhood, idle, with more money than I could spend--honestly; something of the day when I first looked into the eyes of the woman I love--innocent, beseeching--"
He arose again and walked back and forth across the porch.
"I can't do it, Eldrige--I've no words to make you understand," he said, "you who have lived a clean life, you who have always worked--" He drew his chair up near to the doctor and sat down again. "I really think," he said, in a quieter tone, "that during that period of my life I was not so much bad as blind and dead--the man in me had never been born; I was a clod, a lump of clay, with the instincts of the beast. Our civilization! Our Christianity!--Damn!--I'll try not to be profane, doctor. But this is why I say I am not a religious man; I tell you I had as soon trust the chances of the brownest skinned, dumb beast of a man that I knew on those far islands of the sea as the chances of the son of the average wealthy Christian parents in this Christian land.
"I am not going to be profane, not if I can help it, and I am not going to allow myself to become unduly excited, but the rashest language that our vocabulary contains could not portray the fires of hell that burned within me when I left my native land, beaten and broken. I was furious--furious because I had missed the heart and center of life--why should I have missed it? I desired the beautiful, satisfying things of life; I had the base and unclean; and I was furious with myself, my family, society--the whole world."
There was silence for a few moments. The doctor said nothing; then Max spoke again: "I know, Eldrige, and you know, that the truth and purity in your wife's heart was the whip and scourge that drove me to my manhood."
The doctor extended his hand, and met Max's hand in a firm, keen clasp.
"When I found that truth and purity, uprightness and a clean soul are the real gems of life, the beautiful things, the lasting and abiding and satisfying things, I wanted them for myself," Max continued, "and no fires of hell can ever burn and sear as did the belief that I had lost them irrevocably; that through the conduct that my family had ignored and society had condoned I had with my own hand shut myself off from them forever. I think my indignation was directed not so much at myself as at the civilized world, the society, church, and family that had offered no resistance and put no check on my journey to perdition. But when I came back to my native land I had had some experiences that made another man of me. When a man goes down into the valley and stands on the border he sees things with a clearer vision. I had no desire then to shift the responsibility of my misspent life upon either people or institutions. I think I saw more clearly, perhaps, than I had before the faults and weaknesses in our institutions, and the lack of moral stamina in those who take upon themselves the training of the young; but these were not the things that counted with me then, not the things I cared about. No, I tell you I was face to face with my own soul then, and nothing else counted! The inexorability of it! There was no way to escape, no way to shift or turn, no excuses, no deceits, no subterfuges. Absolute, immovable Justice is the most grim-faced thing that a man can meet. It was not until after I had met this grim fellow, and laid my black life bare before him, asking nothing, deserving nothing, that any peace came to me. But after this I knew--I cannot tell you how I knew--but the knowledge came to me that over this sinning and suffering life there lies the great Life, tender, compassionate Love.
"When I came back to this Flat and found Margaret, and looked into her face, and saw the transformation there, then I knew that there is a God, and to know this, that there is a God, is to know that the whole duty, pleasure and profit of man is to serve Him by serving his fellow men, and this, without any meeting-house religion whatever, is what I have been trying to do.
"My mother and sister go every Sunday and worship in the beautiful church yonder on the hill. They have never recognized my wife, although my mother knows, as God knows, that the guilt was mine more than it was Margaret's. My mother is a Christian woman, according to accepted standards, and far be it from me to reproach or judge her, but the son that she reared had a long way to go and a hard battle to fight before he could see and know the purity of an honest love, the dignity of a human soul, whether it be in a high place or a lowly one. I have come to the conclusion that what we call the Christian world has in its social code and accepted standards of respectability a law of its own, the spirit of which never sprang from inspiration; a law that binds and holds absolutely, as the letter of the old Jewish law held the priests and scribes who cried 'Crucify, crucify the Truth unless it comes in the style and manner that we have marked out for its coming.' The simple, undressed truth is ignored, put aside and kept in the background; the so-called church of Christ keeps it there.
"You know, Eldrige, and I know, and every man in the world to-day knows, that there is something wrong, radically wrong, deep-seated and to the heart's core, with our church, society and home training when a man and woman, reared you might say, in the very shadow of the church, and having its precepts hurled at them from their infancy, yet can mistake passion, immorality and shame for the joy and pleasure of life; when to their young lives the hell-brewed poison of destruction appears like the rich, red wine of satisfaction.
"For what does the church over there on the hill stand? What is its mission? its object? its meaning? If there is anything in the power of the Son of Man there is everything--everything or nothing; and this attitude of people who call themselves Christians, standing between suffering, sin-sick mortals and the sinner's God is enough to make the angels weep--and mortals howl!"
"Well, well, Max, I believe you are aroused a bit; but I am afraid, my man, that you are probing to the heart and center of conditions that will never be righted in this world. Eternity alone, I think, will reveal the why and wherefore of some of the things that are troubling you."
"No, Eldrige, it will not require the revelations of eternity to convince me why the Church is cankered, worm-eaten and corrupt. I verily believe I can give you the reason this minute: it is because its advocates arehearersof the Truth, but not followers of it. Over there in Christian Edgerly men and women profess to follow Christ, and in their hearts they know that they stop with the professing. Not one man in ten will read the words of Christ and admit that they can be taken as a rule of life and conduct.
"'Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you do ye even so to them.'
"Where is the man who does this? The poor, the needy, the suffering, the down-trodden, the unfortunate, they circle the globe, they are in every land, every clime, every city, town and hamlet; the voice of their cries by day and their groanings by night is never still; naked, they are not clothed; hungry, they are not fed; thirsty, they are not given drink; and these are 'the others.' Where is the man who does unto them as he would be done by? Do you? Do I?
"And where is the man who loves his neighbor as himself? Where would be the stress and strife of life, the wear and tear, the wrangle and scramble, the heartache and crime, the murder and suicide, if this precept were followed? Where would be all this agitation about labor and capital, the piling up of wealth on one hand and biting poverty on the other, if men--Christian men--loved their neighbors as themselves? Wise men of our generation are trying to devise ways and formulate plans to regulate the differences and disagreements among men; but even the reformers disagree among themselves and dissensions grow greater from year to year. Do men think that they are wiser than God? Do they think that if there is a better way Christ would have failed to tell us about it? Yet we are deaf to the simple words of the divine Teacher, the grandest precept ever given, the one and only panacea for the world's discord, 'Love thy neighbor as thyself.'"
"If only the world had such a religion as that, Max, Christianity would be Christian."
"And Christianity never will be Christian until men believe what they profess to believe. I am not much of a Bible scholar, I was brought up to reverence the Bible, not to read it, but I know that we are told that faith without works is dead. There is faith enough in the world, if it were alive, to save the world--but it is dead, dead and buried, and the devil is dancing to his hornpipes over its burial place--the opaque hearts of men. A general may fight a battle with an army of men, if they are alive--but if they are dead, dead in the trenches, they will not put up much of a fight. Yet the absurdity of fighting a battle with dead men is not greater than the inconsistency of a religion with a dead faith.
"I have not yet learned to understand the scientific principle back of the kind of religion that has been at work on this Flat; but I know that the faith of a grain of mustard seed would remove mountains of sin and crime and unholy desire from our land. A grain of mustard seed is alive, pregnant; given favorable conditions it will expand and increase, and flower and produce again, demonstrating the power of the Invisible. This work here on this Flat started from a grain of mustard seed; a grain sown and tended and watered and tilled by a woman's hand. And the Christian city and the stately church marvel that God has given the increase. You and I have special cause to honor this woman and her work, Eldrige, and we both owe her an endless debt of gratitude."
Again their hands met in silent companionship. Then Max arose. "I am afraid we have forgotten the ladies," he said. "Let us go and join them in the garden."
The doctor followed his friend, and he no longer felt that he failed to understand him; he was just an honest man, nothing more--nothing less.
CHAPTER XX
THE REVELATION
In a small village at the foot of a Colorado mountain, the Reverend Maurice Thorpe pitched his tent--literally pitched his tent--for he resolved to try the open air treatment for his malady.
He had tried the remedies that men have compounded and the devices that their skill have fashioned until the last one was tested and tried and found wanting; and when his faith in these was gone he resorted to the Nature cure--he resolved to let Nature have her way with him. So he set up his tent, lived in the open, bathed in the sunshine, breathed the mountain air; and he felt his strength returning. If there was something beside these things that helped his recovery he did not know of it at the time.
The good Book tells us that "The prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up," and there are yet some people in God's world who believe it.
The tent was pitched near the bank of a mountain stream. From far up the mountains it came, at times a turbulent, rushing stream and again narrowing to a silver rill. Part way down its course it came to a rocky formation which obstructed its flow and forced it into two different channels. During the summer months the larger of these two streams diminished in size and the other became dry. Following the dry course over stones and sand one was led through a region of wild and rugged grandeur. The circuitous course led through deep gorges and past great ledges of rock, and here and there huge stones stood out alone, like silent sentinels.
Mr. Thorpe, in his long walks over the mountains, often followed this course until he reached the chasm, or cave-like opening, where it ended. The rocks were dry and bleached now, except for here and there a patch of moss or bit of grass which grew among the crevices. Some birds had chosen the cave for their nesting place, and their cries echoed shrilly among the rocks. This wild, isolated spot was far removed from the usual haunts of men, but it held a peculiar charm for Mr. Thorpe, and he fell into the way of taking his books and reading there. Some goat-skins spread on the rocks served for a couch and a ledge of rock answered for a table; and here, one by one, his favorite books and magazines found a place. Here, alone with his silent friends, he became a recluse. The world that had so bitterly disappointed him, the life that had so grieved and vexed him, the love that had bowed and broken him, all were left behind.
The brook babbled noisily by the tent one rare morning in June; the birds called shrilly from the rocky ledges, and the sky was azure above the mountains. Mr. Thorpe looked over his letters and papers and laid aside those that he cared to take with him for the day. The canvas bag in which he carried his luncheon was packed and his water-bottle filled. He picked up his selection of papers, and as he did so his eyes fell on one that he had not noticed before. He examined it and saw that it was a copy of the Edgerly Times. Some headlines at the top of the page caught his eye: "The Transformation of the Flat. Once a Place of Vice and Want, Now a Thriving Factory Settlement." He glanced down the page and caught sentences that contained familiar names: "Mrs. Thorpe, former pastor's wife--Max Morrison, returned soldier--Dr. Eldrige Jr. and his young wife--"
Mr. Thorpe's face set in grim lines and the blue veins stood out prominently on his forehead. He folded the paper and thrust it in his pocket, picked up the canvas bag and water-bottle and made his way down the rocky course to the rock-walled cavern. His attitude was that of a man bowed, broken, vanquished.
When he reached the cavern he threw himself upon his goat-skins, drew the paper from his pocket and read the article carefully through to the finish. It dwelt at length on the factors that had brought about the change on the Flat.
When he finished the article he folded the paper slowly, methodically, as one whose mind is far away. His eyes were upon the stones at his feet, and slowly the doors of memory swung open, and before him were the hopes and aspirations of his life, its trials and disappointments--the questioning anguish of failure.
He had been so sure of his standards, so certain of the infallibility of his ideals. He felt that if the voice of the Lord had spoken to him, as it spoke to Moses from the burning bush it could not have brought to him more conviction than the ideals of his early manhood had afforded him--yet he had failed, his life was a wreck, a derelict stranded on the shore of time.
His mind had been so filled with the convictions that had come to him with the stamp and seal of his forefathers upon them that he had not grasped the possibilities, nor realized the demands of the vital, ever-present and progressive forces about him. And as one who starts upon a race bound and handicapped from the start, the inevitable had come upon him. But these underlying causes that had made shipwreck of his hopes and a tragedy of his existence had been to him as an unwritten book, unseen and unknown. And always when his mind had gone back over the past he had seen only the strewn and broken wreckage of his hopes, and the future was black with a dumb agony that he had no heart to face.
But one of the facts of this creation of ours and of the eternal verities that govern it is that sincerity never seeks in vain; when the sincerity of the soul asks, divine Love does not, could not, fail to respond. We must understand that there are many phases of mortal thought that parade under the mantle of sincerity which have little or no relation to that which is truly sincere. Sometimes we, as untutored children, ask for that which we would instantly cast from us were our requests granted; many times we beg and plead for that from which our very souls would shrink and cower; and very many times our motives are so obscure and our desires so warped and misshapen that we have no logical conception of that for which we ask. But the eternal fact remains: Man never yet asked for bread and was given a stone, never yet asked for an egg and was given a scorpion.
Now the man's life, bare to the quivering quick, stripped of every hypothesis, analysis and subterfuge of philosophy, was asking, sincerely asking, why he had failed. His self-righteousness slipped from him and lay like a cast-off garment at his feet; prejudice, which had held him in so firm a grip, retreated and slunk back into the dim, illusory creation where its multiform delusions have their inception; pride, humbled and forsaken, trailed its glittering pageant out of the range of his vision.
The branches of a tree outside the cave swayed in the wind and brushed against the rocks with a soft, rustling sound, and the birds called across the cavern and circled about the man's motionless figure. But outward conditions, location, surroundings and lapse of time were for the time no part of Mr. Thorpe's experience. The sun crept up in the heavens until it reached the meridian. The dog, the man's only companion in his rambles, came to his side and thrust his nose against the canvas bag, but receiving no attention, stretched himself again patiently beside his master.
When Mr. Thorpe raised his eyes from the stones at his feet he was not surprised at that which he saw. That which he beheld was exactly that which he raised his eyes expecting to see. On one side of the cavern there stood a grim, relentless form, heavy-browed and strongly built. There were iron bands about the waist and thighs and iron circles on the ankles, arms and wrists. One hand held an iron sword, the other an iron pen. And branded deep into the forehead in letters of red-hot iron was the word INTOLERANCE. On the opposite side of the cavern stood a figure of less massive proportions, of easy grace and supple bearing, clothed in a simple, clinging garment of white. In one outstretched hand was held a burning torch, and in the other a pen of light, tipped with a diamond point. Glittering gems upon the forehead fashioned the word FREEDOM. From out of the past they came, years, centuries, ages were upon them.
Now on the stones of the cavern walls each figure began to write, carefully, silently, remorselessly, until slab after slab stretching away into the dim recesses of the cave was filled with the history of the past. Every word that the iron pen recorded stood out clearly and distinctly, and there was no choice but to read. The silent spectator felt his senses shrink and quiver and his heart grow sick as the record passed before him, but he was not spared. His body grew rigid and every sense was in revolt, but the iron-bound hand did not waver nor relent. So vivid was the record that all the awful carnage and bloodshed, torture and persecution were as though actually transpiring before his tortured gaze, and the air was filled with the shrieks of the dying and groans and invectives of the tortured and tormented. But the physical horror of it did not compare with the agony of noble minds and fearless souls whose mental anguish the iron-bound hand did not hesitate to record.
The silent man, alone with these strange creations of his brain, fell to tracing the work of this iron-bound monster back to its birth or beginning. And as he pondered and questioned, it came to him with a distinct shock that the first intolerance was that which opposed itself to God's creation in the Garden of Eden. Its first form was that of a sinuous serpent; its voice that of the subtle testimony of the senses! He found also that this monster had assumed a form, and found a voice in every age in which mortal man had lived. And it came to him straight as an arrow and as keen to his highly-wrought senses that the relentless iron pen was writing, along with the other records, the history of the Church, the Church which had seemed to him to be infallible, which had come to him fraught with the faith of his ancestors, steeped in the blood of martyrs, and which held within its sacred teachings the only possible redemption for mankind, the Church for which he had labored. But he was not yet spared; remorse and contrition were having their way with him, and the sweat of agony was on his brow. For the first time in his life he entertained a doubt as to a literal hell; for what could a quenchless fire do to the physical body, compared to this which the bigotry and intolerance of his life were uncovering before him?
It was a relief to turn from this mental gloom, this verge of madness, from all this record of pain and woe, the history of the world's wrongs, to turn and behold the supple figure in white, writing with the diamond's flashing point. Here was a record of God's creation, untouched by mortal sense; a story of man untempted and woman unbeguiled; all things the image and reflection of the one God. Only that which is good and true and pure, that which is noble and righteous, was recorded by the flashing pen; the freedom which God gives to man can write no other record.
The events of the ages passed as a panorama before the solitary observer. From the bookshelves of the world were selected volumes written by a master hand, books that had stood the test of time and lived through the years. And the fact stood out with distinctness that the souls of the men who wrote them were not shackled, they were not slaves to another's will, nor bound by another's power, but that the minds that conceived them stood in absolute freedom before God. He was made to feel the throb and pulse of freedom, unbound and unfettered, that surged through the life of the artists that have painted the world's famous pictures and fashioned its works of art. He saw man expanding beneath the touch of the Infinite, answerable to the Infinite only.
Then the world's greatest singers stood before him, those to whom had been given the gracious gift of melody. And he knew that the possessor of this gift had arisen over difficulties, through trials and endeavor, until he reached the height where for him there sounded the supreme harmonies of the universe, and that he stood alone, exultant in the freedom of his power.
The flashing pen went back over the past and noted the world's reformers, men of staunch and steadfast character, who have stood for righteousness, for purity and truth, men who resisted despotism, put down superstition, stamped out ignorance and made possible the progress of science, even though their footsteps were stained with blood and led to the dungeon and the guillotine.
And this record of light, traced with the diamond's point, made it clear beyond question that in the small things as well as the great, only that which has been done in the freedom of the soul has made the world better. It is soul-freedom that has uplifted, transformed and glorified life. Every act of charity, of love, of Christian kindness, the cup of water given in the Master's name, the garment to the naked, the bread to the hungry, the visit to the prison if of any worth, of any efficacy or power, have been done in the freedom of the soul, prompted by the heart-spirit, the desire of the individual unhampered by another's will.
Now before the smitten man there rolled the long years, uncompromising and relentless as he believed the Judgment-day to be, the years in which he had held a fair, frail woman, soul and body in subjection to his wishes, dominated and controlled her by the superior force of his will. He had held to the belief that he had chosen to live apart from this woman that he loved because of her infidelity to the Church; now he was face to face with the conviction that he had deserted her because she had not subscribed unconditionally to scholastic theology.
Mr. Thorpe was aroused from his trance-like condition by the whimpering of his dog. The animal thrust his nose against the canvas bag and looked pleadingly into his master's face. Mr. Thorpe put out his hand and patted the dog's head; he gave him a biscuit from the bag and poured some water from the bottle for him to drink. Then he arose, stretched his stiffened limbs and walked to the entrance of the cave. The sun was nearing the horizon; the day had passed. He gathered his papers together, took up the untasted food and made his way back to the tent.
Pauline, who lived with her brother, and who still exercised a watchful care over her cousin, had been watching for him, and saw him when he came into sight. She was surprised at his appearance; his shoulders were squared to meet the bracing wind, and he swung along with the stride of a strong man, physically and mentally vigorous.
CHAPTER XXI
THE LAW OF LIFE
June was drawing to a close. The sun rode high in the heaven, and at evening seemed loath to leave the verdant earth in darkness. From the rows of neat cottages on the Flat came the scent of perfume-laden flowers. The garden beds, bathed in the glowing sun and watered from heaven, grew and throve; and the vines and shrubs lately planted vied with each other in growth and beauty.
Mrs. Thorpe had spent the day as usual in the school. All day she labored among the children, and at evening sent them glad and happy to their homes. There was something about her patience and loving kindness that touched the hearts of those about her; her presence was an inspiration, as well as a help and comfort.
At the close of school this June day Margaret asked Mrs. Thorpe to go with her to tea.
"You refused last night and the night before," she said.
"And I think it better for me not to go to-night, dear. I have some exercises to look over and some work to prepare for to-morrow. Another time, perhaps, but not to-night." And so Margaret left her and went her way alone.
The work that required her attention was examined and preparations for the morrow completed, and still Mrs. Thorpe lingered in the empty room. She walked back and forth through the room where all was silent save the sound of her footsteps; but she was not lonely; she loved the quiet of the deserted room and the memories that lingered about it. She loved the children among whom she worked, and she was hopeful and ambitious for them. She longed to see them in the way of honor and virtue, in the way of self-respect and independence; and she believed that this way lay before them. Her life was full of hopes and plans for their future, and she worked willingly, gladly, whole-heartedly, for the fulfillment of these plans.
Yet this woman had never tried to deceive herself. She knew that there was a room in her heart silent and empty, where memories, sad and silent, lingered among the shadows. She was not unhappy because of this; her happiness lay in accepting it and fashioning her life superior to it.
There had been a time when she believed that, like the chords of a harp, the sweetest strains of her life had been broken. She recognized the generally accepted view that if the union between a man and a woman be broken, the lives affected by the dissolution must necessarily be crippled and their usefulness impaired. But this view of life had gradually changed as she came into a larger, more scientific view of life. Now she believed that nothing but a violation of the life Principle could mar a life or rob it of its legitimate rights. She had come to understand that there is a Law back of Life, a Law to which all the children of creation must conform, and that nothing but an infringement of God's law can hurt or destroy in all His holy mountain. And the natural deduction followed that all relationships between individuals must be honest, sincere and pure. And that any law, written or unwritten, that fosters or favors the domination or control of one person over another is a mortal law, and invariably an immoral one. Man in the image and likeness of God is governed by righteousness and not by his fellow men.
Mrs. Thorpe was no longer a frail woman; her physical development had come about gradually and naturally. Her form that had remained slender and girlish long after her girlhood days had passed, was now rounded out into full contour of womanhood. Her eyes that had been too large and bright for her colorless face, now blended harmoniously with her soft, warm color. No stimulants nor artificial means had been employed to bring about this change; it had come naturally with her changed attitude toward life, her scientific understanding of life harmonious, as the reflection of the Infinite. Where once she had been irrational, ignorant and ill, now she was sensible, wise and well; the one following the other in natural sequence in the physical as well as in the mental condition.
Yet she was always frank with herself; she missed the love and companionship that had once been hers. She walked over to one of the windows and seated herself on the window-seat. The wind came in softly and touched the tendrils of brown hair about her face. She looked far off to the distant blue hills. "Maurice," she called, softly; "Maurice." Deep in her heart she knew that the old relationship could never exist between them again. They were both children of the one God, answerable to Him only. It was a violation of this law of life, a conception derived from tradition, and tainted with paganism that had brought about their downfall. "But oh, Maurice," she whispered, "I love you, love you!"
The flowers outside the window nodded and swayed in the gentle wind, and a bird whose happy secret lay concealed within reach of her hand, twittered, unafraid, on a swaying bough; and the twilight settled down about her.
When Mrs. Thorpe arose she shook herself free from the memories that had clung about her, and walked out into the semi-darkness. Wholesome and whole-souled, she was little given to retrospection or introspection, but chose to live her life in the fruitful present.
As she neared her home she saw that a light was burning inside.
"It is Jamie," she thought. Dear little Jamie; how many times he had remembered her, and lighted her home and laid her fire.
With a light heart she ascended the steps and entered the house. She glanced through the rooms to the little kitchen, where she expected to see the boy fixing the fire, or laying the table, perhaps.
"Jamie," she called, gently. "Jamie."
There was no response from the room beyond, but from a seat near her a man arose and confronted her--a man bronzed and bearded, who showed the impress of mountain life and contact with nature.
The light in the room was dim, but the recognition was instantaneous.
"Evelyn! Evelyn, my wife!" His arms were about her, and she lifted her face to his, as she had done on their bridal morn.
"Evelyn," he whispered, "can you forgive--forgive the wrong--the cruel years?"
She put out her hand and laid it against his face.
"There is nothing to forgive, Maurice--nothing to forgive--love is everything."
"And I have loved you, Evelyn; you have been near me, with me always."
"Always, Maurice."