Part 23 (1/2)

It was midnight before this excited group settled down into anything like quiet. But the strain had been so great, and the relief so complete, that a sleep so heavy that it was almost a stupor at last held the tired workers.

Now, what of it all? Why did this foolish mistake of bottles, which might have been a tragedy, and was nothing but a causeless excitement, reach so far with its results?

Let me tell you of one to whom sleep did not come. That was the one who but half an hour before had believed herself face to face with death!

What mattered it to her that it was a mistake, and death no nearer to her, so far as she knew, than to the rest of the sleeping world?

Death was not annihilated--he was only held at bay. She knew that he _would_ come, and that there would be no slipping away when his hand actually grasped hers. She believed in death; she had supposed herself being drawn into his remorseless grasp. To her the experience, so far as it had led her, was just as real as though there had been no mistake.

And the result? _She had been afraid_! All her proper resolutions, so fresh in her mind, made only that very afternoon, had been of no more help to her than so much foam. She had not so much as remembered in her hour of terror whether there _was_ a church to join. But that there was a G.o.d, and a judgment, and a Savior, who was not hers, had been as real and vivid as she thinks it ever can be, even when she stands on the very brink.

Oh, that long night of agony! when she tossed and turned and sought in vain for an hour of rest. She was afraid to sleep. How like death this sleeping was! Who could know, when they gave themselves up to the grasp of this power, that he was not the very death angel himself in disguise, and would give them no earthly awakening forever?

What should she do? Believe in religion? Yes. She knew it was true. What then? What had Marion said? Was that all true? Aye, verily it was; she knew that, too. Had she not stood side by side with death?

The hours went by and the conflict went on. There was a conflict. Her conscience knew much more than her tongue had given it credit for knowing that afternoon. Oh, she had seen Christians who had done more than join the church! She had imagined that that act might have a mysterious and gradual change on her tastes and feelings, so that some time in her life, when she was old, and the seasons for her were over, she might feel differently about a good many things.

But that hour of waiting for the messenger of death, who, she thought, had called her, had swept away this film. ”It is not teaching in Sunday-school,” said her brain. ”It is not tract distributing; it is not sewing societies for the poor; it is not giving or going. It is _none_ of these things, or _any_ of them, or _all_ of them, as the case may be, and as they come afterward. But _first_ it is this question: Am I my own mistress? do I belong to myself or to G.o.d? will I do as I please or as he pleases? will I submit my soul to him, and ask him to keep it and to show me what to do, or when and where to step?”

The night was utterly spent, and the gray dawn of the early sweet summer morning was breaking into the grove, and still Ruth lay with wide-open eyes, and thought. A struggle? Oh dear, yes! Such an one as she had never imagined. That strong will of hers, which had led not only herself but others, yield it, submit to other leaders.h.i.+p, always to question: Is this right? can I go here? ought I to say that? What a thing to do! But it involved that; she knew it, felt it. She might have been blind during the week past, but she was not deaf.

How they surged over her, the sentences from one and another to whom she had listened! They were not at play, these great men. What did it mean but that there was a life hidden away, belonging to Christ? She felt no love in her heart, no longing for love, such as poor little Flossy had yearned for. She felt instead that she was equal to life; that the world was sufficient for her; that she wanted the world; but that the world was at conflict with G.o.d, and that she belonged to G.o.d, and that she _should_ give herself utterly into his hands.

Moreover, she knew there was coming a time when the world, and Saratoga, and the season, with its pleasures, would not do. There was grim death!--he would come. She could not always get away. He was coming every hour for somebody around her. She must--yes, she _must_ get ready for him. It would not do to be surprised again as she had been surprised last night. It was not becoming in Ruth Erskine to live so that the sound of death could palsy her limbs and blanch her cheek and make her shudder with fear. She must get where she could say calmly: ”Oh, are _you_ here? Well, I am ready.”

It was just as the sun which was rising in glory forced its smiles in between the thick leaves of the Chautauqua birds' nests, and set all the little birds in a twitter of delight, that Ruth raised herself on her elbow and said aloud, and with the force that comes from a determined will that has decided something in which there has been a struggle:

”I _will_ do it.”

CHAPTER XXIII.

”I'VE BEEN REDEEMED.”

”What about Saratoga?” was Eurie's first query as she awoke to life and talk again on that summer morning. ”Do you think you will take the 10:50 train, Ruth?”

Ruth gave nothing more decided than a wan smile in answer, and in her heart a wonder as to what Eurie would think of her if she could have known the way in which her night was pa.s.sed.

”She is more likely to stay in bed,” Marion said, looking at her critically. ”You will never think of trying to travel to-day, will you, Ruth? Dear me! how you look! I have always heard that hair oil was weakening, but I did not know its effects were so sudden and disastrous!” And then every one of these silly girls laughed. The disaster of the night before had reached its irresistibly comic side--to them. Only Ruth s.h.i.+vered visibly; it was not funny to her.

It was a very eventful day. She by no means relished the character of invalid that the girls seemed determined ought to be forced upon her and at the same time she had not the least idea of going to Saratoga.

Strangely enough, that desire seemed to have utterly gone from her. She had not slept at all, but she arose and dressed herself as usual, with only one feeling strong upon her, and that was a determination to carry out the decision to which she had so recently come, and she had not the least idea how to set to work to carry it out. She went with the rest to the large tent to hear Mrs. Clark's address to primary cla.s.s teachers.

”I'm not a primary cla.s.s teacher, and not likely to be, but I am a woman, and gifted with the natural curiosity of that s.e.x to know what a woman may have to say in so big a place as this. I don't see how she dares to peep.” This was Eurie's explanation of her desire to go to the reception.

Ruth went because to go to meeting seemed to be the wisest way that she knew of for carrying out her decision, and a good time she had. She had not imagined that teaching primary cla.s.ses was such an art, and involved so much time and brain as it did. She listened eagerly to all Mrs. Clark had to say; she followed her through the blackboard lessons with surprise and delight, and she awoke at the close of the hour to the memory that, although she had been interested as she had not imagined it possible for her to be on such a theme, she had done nothing toward her determination to make a Christian of herself, and that she knew no more how to go to work than before.

”When I _do_ find out how to be one I know I will go to work in the Sabbath-school; I have changed my mind on that point.” This she told herself softly as they went back to dinner.

It was a strange afternoon to her. She became unable to interest herself heartily in the public services; her own heart claimed her thought. It was noticeable also that for the first time Chautauqua chose this day in which to be metaphysical and scientific, to the exclusion of personal religion. Not that they were irreligious, not that they for a moment forgot their position as a great religious gathering; but there was an absence of that intense personal element in the talk which had so offended Ruth's taste heretofore, and she missed it.

She wandered aimlessly up and down the aisles, listening to sentences now and then, and sighing a little. They were eloquent, they were helpful; she could imagine herself as being in a state to enjoy them heartily, but just now she wanted nothing so much as to know what to do in order to give herself a right to members.h.i.+p with that great religious world. Why should Chautauqua suddenly desert her now when she so much needed its help?