Chapter XIV: Dust and Doubt

THE scheme to visit the dingy church on Wednesday afternoon, and contribute somewhat to its attractiveness, was carried out to the very letter. Mrs. Morgan, senior, made sundry dry remarks about not being aware that any of her family had been hired to put the church in order; but Farmer Morgan declared that it certainly needed it as much as any place he ever saw—that he would be ashamed to have a barn look as that did; and John declared that he had promised to stop the squeak in that old organ, and he meant to do it, hired or not hired.

Louise, who had not heard him promise, and who had felt much anxiety lest he would refuse to perform, was so elated over this declaration that, with her husband's help, she parried her mother-in-law's thrusts with the utmost good-humour, helped by the fact that, whatever she might say, that strange woman actually felt glad over the thought of her young people going off together like other folks.

The efforts of Mrs. Morgan's life had been spent in keeping her children from being "like other folks," and yet, with strange inconsistency, she liked to see these approaches to other people's ways of doing things.

If she could have explained what her sore and disappointed heart had meant, it would have revealed the fact that she intended her children to be superior to; not isolated from, the society around them.

Wednesday afternoon proved a real gala time to Dorothy. She entered with zest into the lamp-cleaning, and after a few lessons from Louise, developed a remarkable talent for making the chimneys glitter in the sunlight. The surprised and smiling sexton had done his share, and the dust from the long unswept room lay thick on pulpit and seat-rail. The room was comparatively warm too, which, if Louise had but known it, was a rare thing on Wednesday evening. John swung the old organ around in a business-like manner, and applied a drop of oil here and another there, then gave himself to the mending of one of the stops; while Lewis tacked on the new binding for the desk, and whistled softly an old tune. Altogether, Louise's plans were working royally. She had managed a difficult bit of business in the shape of a lunch, which had been smuggled into the buggy with them.

"What on earth do you want of that!" had Mrs. Morgan exclaimed in astonishment, when she had been appealed to. "You don't expect to work so hard that you will get hungry before supper, do you?"

"Why, we want it for our supper," said Louise. "You know we shall not have time to come back before prayer-meeting, and that will make us late for supper."

"Prayer-meeting!" No words on paper can express to you the surprise in the questioner's voice. "Are you going to stay to prayer-meeting?"

"Why, certainly; we want to see whether the lamps are improved. If Dorrie leaves lint on the glass it will show splendidly when they are lighted. Besides, I want to hear how that organ will sound when it doesn't squeak."

"And what is going to become of John-while you are staying to meeting?"

Mrs. Morgan's face had taken on a deeper cloud of disapprobation, and her voice was glumness intensified.

"Why, John will stay to meeting with us, of course."

This from Louise, in positive tone, albeit she was painfully uncertain about that very thing; certain only of this, that if John would not stay, the rest would not. It was no part of her plan to carry him down to the village, simply to be tempted of Satan, as he always was, at the street corners.

"Humph!" said Mrs. Morgan, senior, and she went her way, giving no sign of relief or approval, save that the lunch she prepared and packed for their united suppers was bountiful and inviting.

So Louise dusted and advised as to lamps and pulpit, and prayed heartily meanwhile. How was she to prevail on John to stay to prayer-meeting? Was it a foolish scheme? Would it be better to abandon it and go home? What if, at the last moment, he should rebel, and go away and spend the evening in that horrid corner grocery? Recent though her introduction into the family was, she had already learned how they dreaded the influence of that corner grocery. She lingered near her husband and consulted.

"Lewis, how can we prevail on John to be willing to stay to-night until after the meeting?"

"Oh, he'll be willing enough; no danger of him. He hasn't had an opportunity to visit his friends at the corner for some time; he will catch at the chance."

"Oh, but we mustn't have that kind of staying. I mean how can we coax him to stay here at the prayer-meeting?"

Her husband regarded her curiously. "I don't believe even you can accomplish such a result as that," he said at last; "and I am willing to admit that you do accomplish some very extraordinary things."

"Lewis, why do you speak in that way, as though I were trying to do anything wonderful? Can any work be simpler than to seek to get one interested in prayer-meetings who has no natural interest in such things? I want you to ask him to stay. You said yesterday that you had never invited him to attend. Tell him we have a nice lunch, and want him to stay with us and enjoy the meeting. Perhaps all he is waiting for is an invitation."

"Louise clear, you don't know John. He would have no enjoyment from this meeting, even if he stayed, which he will not do; and now, in all sincerity, I believe he would be much less likely to stay if I were to ask him than he would under almost any other circumstances. It is a humiliating fact that he doesn't care to do anything to please me."

Louise turned away with a sigh. Her work was growing complicated. Meantime the dusting and cleansing went steadily on, and when all was accomplished the church was certainly improved.

A somewhat weary but gay little company gather under one of the renovated lamps just at nightfall, and having made their toilets by folding away large aprons and sweeping-caps and donning hats and shawls again, sat down to eat the generous lunch.

"Queer way of having a picnic," said John. "I've always supposed the woods was the place for such gatherings. We might as well go home for all I can see; our work is about done."

Lewis glanced significantly at his wife. Her face expressed doubt and anxiety. Certainly it would be better for them all to go home at once rather than that John should spend his evening at the corners. Just what should she say at this juncture? She hesitated but a moment, then said quickly,—

"Why, we are going to stay to prayer-meeting; don't you suppose we want to see the effect of these improvements on the people?"

"To prayer-meeting!" echoed John; then, beyond a low, suddenly suppressed whistle, he said no more.

Their departure for the church had been delayed, and the work there had taken longer than had been anticipated, so that as the short winter day drew rapidly to its close, the lunch had finally to be disposed of in haste, in order that two or three unfinished matters might be accomplished before the hour for prayer-meeting. With very little idea as to what she should say, or whether it would be wise to say anything, Louise followed John to the organ corner, while he struggled to make the organist's broken seat less objectionable.

"The idea of allowing a church to run into shabbiness in this fashion!" he said with energy, a sneer in his voice; "shows how interested the people are in it."

"Why doesn't the sexton light the lamps on the other side?" questioned Louise, unwilling to enter into a discussion concerning the inconsistencies of the church, and really curious to understand the movements of that worthy the sexton.

"More than I know. They are all filled and trimmed, I am sure; perhaps he doesn't know that. He probably economizes by using the lamps on one side until they are empty, and then taking the other row."

"No," said Louise; "I see what it is done for—to compel the people to sit close together, and not spread over the entire church. It is a good idea, too."

"Yes," said John; "shows how many they expect!"

What strange power John had to throw meaning into a few words. This simple sentence started Louise; she glanced over the large church. What a very small corner of it was lighted and made habitable. Yet she felt her own faith was equal to even less than that amount of room; she struggled for some satisfying explanation.

"But, John, you know this room has to be large enough for the entire congregation; and a great many of them are in the country, and could hardly be expected, I suppose, to attend prayer-meeting."

"I know it," said John; "twice as far down to the village on Wednesday evening as it is on Saturday. On Saturday evenings the stores have to be kept open until eleven o'clock, so many country people are in town; but none of them are affected in that way on Wednesday."

"Well," said Louise, trying to speak lightly, "our party will count four more than are usually here; that is one comfort."

John regarded her furtively from under lowering eyebrows.

"Have you any kind of a notion that I intend to stay to this meeting?" he asked at last, a curious mixture of sarcasm and sneer in his tones. There was something in John's voice that was constantly reminding one of sneers.

A sudden reaction of feeling swept over Louise, or rather the feeling that she had held in check rose to the surface. A vision of John at the corner, playing cards, smoking, drinking beer; of the mother at home, sick at heart, when she saw him and smelled his breath; of the father's anger and Lewis's gravity, appeared before her, and her voice faltered and her eyes were full of tears as she answered, from a full heart—

"No, I am afraid you are not going to; and I am so disappointed about it that I feel as though I could hardly—"

Here the words stopped, and the tears actually dropped—one of them on John's hand, that was outstretched just at the moment to grasp the hammer lying beside her. He withdrew it suddenly, a strange expression crossing his face; he looked at his hand doubtfully, gravely, then looked back at Louise.

"Why in the name of common sense do you care whether I stay to prayer-meeting or where I go?"

"I care," said Louise, brushing away the treacherous tears and raising earnest eyes to his face, "a great deal more than I can explain to you. I never had a brother; I have always wanted one, and I looked forward to having pleasant times together with my brother John. But you won't do anything to please me."

"How do you know I won't?" His voice was gruff now, gruffer than it had been during the day, and he seized the hammer and pounded so vigorously that she could neither speak nor hear. She turned from him in doubt and anxiety still, and immediately joined her husband, who had come to say that the pounding must cease—the people were beginning to come to prayer-meeting. Nevertheless the pounding did not cease until two more nails were in place. Then did John, without any effort at quiet, stalk down the uncarpeted aisle and seat himself in the Morgan pew, Dorothy edging along for the purpose, and looking her undisguised astonishment.

Louise tried to feel triumphant; but as the hour dragged its slow length along her heart was very heavy. What a strange meeting it was—strange, at least, to her who had been used to better things. In the first place, the number, all told, counting the four who filled the Morgan pew, amounted to twenty-three. Now, when twenty-three people are placed in a room designed for the accommodation of three hundred, the effect, to say the least, is not social. Then these twenty-three seemed to have made a study of seating themselves in as widespread a manner as the conditions of light and darkness would admit. Dorothy saw this, and lost herself in trying to plan where the congregation would have been likely to sit had the other lamps been lighted. That condition of inability to sing, which seems to be the chronic state of many prayer-meetings, was in full force here. Mr. Butler announced a hymn, read it, and earnestly invited a leader; but none responded. Louise felt her cheeks flushing in sympathy with the minister's embarrassment, and never more earnestly wished that she could sing. Even Dorothy, conscious that she could sing, was so far roused by sympathy that she felt the bumpings of her frightened heart, caused by the courageous question, "What if I should?" Not that she had the least idea of doing so, but the bare thought made her blood race through her veins at lightning speed. At last a quavering voice took up the cross, and made a cross for every one who tried to join in the unknown and uninviting melody.

This prayer-meeting does not need a lengthy description; there are, alas! too many like it:—Two long prayers, called for by the pastor, between two silences, which waited for some one to "occupy the time." A few dreary sentences from Deacon Jones, who is always in every meeting, detailing his weary story of how things used to be when Mr. Somebody Else was our pastor. Another attempt at a song of praise, which made John's lip curl more emphatically than the first one had; and then the pastor arose to make some remarks. How interesting he could be at the supper-table; how bright and pleasant he could be when roasting apples and popping corn! These things the Morgans knew; so did nearly every one of the other nineteen.

Why was he so uninteresting in the prayer-meeting? Louise tried to analyze it. What he said was true and good; why did it fall like empty bubbles on her heart or vanish away? His theme was prayer. Did he mean the words he was repeating, "If ye shall ask anything in my name, I will do it"? Did he understand what those words meant? If so, why did not he explain them to others? Dorothy wondered at this; she had not gotten so far as to doubt them—that is, she knew they were Bible words; she saw Mr. Butler open his Bible and read them from it; but, of course, it didn't mean what it said. "If it did," said poor Dorothy to herself, "I would ask—oh, I would ask for ever so many things." And then her mind went off in a dream of what it would ask for, if only those words meant what they said! And Mr. Butler talked, generalized, told wonderful and blessed, ay, and solemn truths, much as a boy might tell over the words of his spelling lesson. Did the pastor feel those words? Did he realize their meaning? Had he been asking? If so, for what? Had he received it? If he had not received, and still believed the words he read, why did not he set himself to find the reason for the delay? Poor Louise! Her mind roved almost as badly as Dorothy's, only over more solemn ground. As for John, his face told, to a close observer, just what he thought: he did not believe a word, not a word, of what had been read, nor of what was being said. More than that, he did not believe that the minister believed it. Was there any good in getting John to stay to prayer-meeting?