Part 32 (1/2)

Mr. Grier was a tall, thin man, with watery blue eyes, and a spa.r.s.e sandy beard growing like a fringe under his chin from ear to ear. He moved his jaws nervously as he waited for her answer, and plucked at his beard with long, lean fingers.

Helen smiled. ”Did you think I should be a large contributor to foreign missions, Mr. Grier?”

”No, ma'am,” he answered solemnly, ”I was not thinking of any benefit to the heathen. I had somewhat to say which I felt might be for the good of your own soul.”

Helen flushed, and flung her head back with a haughty look. ”Ah,--you are very good, I'm sure,” she said, ”but”--

Mr. Grier interrupted her, wagging his head up and down upon his breast: ”Brother Ward will forgive me for saying so, ma'am, but I had your welfare at heart. Brother Ward, you have my prayers for your dear wife.”

”I--I thank you,” John said, ”but you must not feel that my wife is far from the Lord. Have you been told that the truth is not clear to her eyes? Yet it will be!”

”I hope so,--I hope so,” responded Mr. Grier, but with very little hope in his voice; and then, shaking the reins, he jogged on down the shadowy road.

”What does he mean?” cried Helen, her voice trembling with anger, and careless whether the retreating minister overheard her. John gave her a long, tender look.

”Dearest,” he said, ”I am sorry he should have spoken as he did, but the prayers of a good man”--

”I don't want his prayers,” she interrupted, bewildered; ”it seems to me simply impertinence!”

”Helen,” he said, ”it cannot be impertinence to pray for a soul in danger, as yours is, my darling. I cannot tell how he knew it, but it is so. It is my sin which has kept you blind and hidden the truth from you, and how can I be angry if another man joins his prayers to mine for your eternal salvation?”

”You say this because I do not believe in eternal punishment, John?” she asked.

”Yes,” he answered gently, ”first because of that, and then because of all the errors of belief to which that leads.”

”It all seems so unimportant,” she said, sighing; ”certainly nothing which could make me claim the prayers of a stranger. Ah, well, no doubt he means it kindly, but don't let us speak of it any more, dearest.”

Their horses were so close, that, glancing shyly about for a moment into the twilight, Helen laid her head against his arm, and looked tenderly into his face.

He started, and then put a quick arm about her to keep her from falling.

”No,” he said, ”no, I will not forget.” It was as though he answered some voice in his soul, and Helen looked at him in troubled wonder.

The rest of the ride was very silent. Once, when he stopped to tighten her saddle-girth for her, she bent his head back, and smiled down into his eyes. He only answered her by a look, but it was enough.

CHAPTER XIX.

Gifford Woodhouse was not quite honest with himself when he said that he felt it was time to go back to Ashurst to make his aunts a visit. He had been restless and absent-minded very often since that flying trip in the early spring. In spite of his sternest reasoning, hope was beginning to grow up in his heart again. d.i.c.k Forsythe had not come to Ashurst, and Helen said plainly that she knew Lois was not engaged to him. So why should not Gifford himself be on the spot?

”Not that I would bother Lois,” he argued in his own mind, ”but just to know if”--And besides, he really ought to see the two little ladies.

He left Lockhaven a few days after John Ward had preached his sermon on foreign missions at Chester. It was reported to have been ”powerful,”

and Elder Dean said he wished ”our own people could have been benefited by it.”

”I thought the heathen were expected to be benefited by such sermons,”

Gifford said, twisting a cigarette between his fingers, as he leaned over the half-door of the elder's shop, lazily watching a long white shaving curl up under his plane. ”I thought the object was a large contribution.”

The elder looked up solemnly, and opened his lips with vast deliberation.