The organ was playing--very softly. Carolyn was a skilful manipulator
of keyboards, and she had discovered that by carefully refraining from
the use of certain keys--discreetly marked by postage stamps--she could
produce a not unmusical effect of subdued harmony. This unquestionably
added very much to the impression of a churchly atmosphere, carried out
to the eye by the Christmas wreathing and twining of the heavy ropes of
shining laurel leaves, and by the massing of the whole pulpit-front in
the soft, dark green of hemlock boughs and holly. To the people who
entered the house with vivid memories of the burning July day when words
hardly less burning had seemed to scorch the barren walls, this lamp-lit
interior, clothed with the garments of the woods and fragrant with their
breath, seemed a place so different that it could hardly be the same.
But the faces were the same--the faces. And George Tomlinson did not
look at Asa Fraser, though he passed him in the aisle, beard to beard.
Miss Jane Pollock stared hard at the back of Mrs. Maria Hill's bonnet,
in the pew in front of her, but when Mrs. Hill turned about to glance up
at the organ-loft, to discover who was there, Miss Pollock's face became
as adamant, and her eyes remained fixed on her folded hands until Mrs.
Hill had twisted about again, and there was no danger of their glances
encountering. All over the church, likewise, were people who avoided
seeing each other, though conscious, all down their rigid backbones,
that those with whom they had fallen out on that unhappy July day were
present.
There was no vestry in the old meeting-house; no retiring place of any
sort where the presiding minister might stay until the moment came for
him to make his quiet and impressive entrance through a softly opening
pulpit door. So when the Reverend William Sewall of St. John's, of the
neighbouring city, came into the North Estabrook sanctuary, it was as
his congregation had entered, through the front door and up the aisle.
There was a turning of heads to see him come, but there was a staring
of eyes, indeed, when it was seen by whom he was accompanied. The erect
figure of the young man, in his unexceptionable attire, walked slowly,
to keep pace with the feeble footsteps of the very old man in his
threadbare garments of the cut of half a century ago, and the sight of
the two together was one of the most strangely touching things that had
ever met the eyes of the people of North Estabrook. It may be said,
therefore, that from that first moment there was an unexpected and
unreckoned-with influence abroad in the place.
Now, to the subdued notes of the organ, which had been occupied with
one theme, built upon with varying harmonies but ever appearing--though
perhaps no ear but a trained one would have recognized it through the
veil--was added the breath of voices. It was only an old Christmas
carol, the music that of a German folk song, but dear to generations
of Christmas singers everywhere. The North Estabrook people recognized
it--yet did not recognize it. They had never heard it sung like that
before.
"_Holy night! peaceful night!
All is dark, save the light
Yonder where they sweet vigils keep O'er the Babe, who in silent sleep
Rests in heavenly peace._"
It was the presence of Margaret Sewall Fernald which had made it
possible to attempt music at this service--the music which it seemed
impossible to do without. Her voice was one of rare beauty, her
leadership that of training. Her husband, Guy, possessed a reliable,
if uncultivated, bass. Edson had sung a fair tenor in his college
glee-club. By the use of all her arts of persuasion Nan had provided an
alto singer, from the ranks of the choir which had once occupied this
organ-loft--the daughter of Asa Fraser. Whether the quartette thus
formed would have passed muster--as a quartette--with the choir-master
of St. John's, may have been a question, but it is certain the music
they produced was so far above that which the old church had ever heard
before within its walls that had the singers been a detachment from the
choir celestial those who heard them could hardly have listened with
ears more charmed.
As "Holy Night" came down to him, William Sewall bent his head. But
Ebenezer Blake lifted his. His dim blue eyes looked up--up and up--quite
through the old meeting-house roof--to the starry skies where it seemed
to him angels sang again. He forgot the people assembled in front of
him--he forgot the responsibilities upon his shoulders--those bent
shoulders which had long ago laid down such responsibilities. He saw
visions. It is the old men who see visions. The young men dream dreams.
The young city rector read the Christmas Story--out of the worn copy of
the Scriptures which had served this pulpit almost from the beginning.
He read it in the rich and cultivated voice of his training, but quite
simply. Then Margaret sang, to the slender accompaniment of the little
organ, the same solo which a famous soprano had sung that morning at
the service at St. John's--and her brother William, listening from the
pulpit, thought she sang it better. There was the quality in Margaret's
voice which reaches hearts--a quality which somehow the famous soprano's
notes had lacked. And every word could be heard, too--the quiet
throughout the house was so absolute--except when Asa Fraser cleared
his throat loudly in the midst of one of the singer's most beautiful
notes. At the sound Mrs. George Tomlinson gave him a glance which ought
to have annihilated him--but it did not. She could not know that the
throat-clearing was a high tribute to the song--coming from Asa Fraser.
"_How silently, how silently,
The wondrous gift is given;
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessing of His heaven....
O Holy Child of Bethlehem!
Descend to us, we pray;
Cast out our sin, and enter in,
Be born in us to-day._"
Then William Sewall made a prayer. Those who had been looking to see old
Elder Blake take this part in the service began to wonder if he had been
asked into the pulpit simply as a courtesy. They supposed he could pray,
at least. They knew he had never ceased doing it--and for them. Elder
Blake had not an enemy in the village. It seemed strange that he
couldn't be given some part, in spite of his extreme age. To be sure, it
was many years since anybody had asked him to take part in any service
whatsoever, even a funeral service--for which, as is well understood,
a man retains efficiency long after he has ceased to be of use in the
pulpit, no matter how devastating may be the weather. But that fact did
not seem to bear upon the present situation.
A number of people, among them Miss Jane Pollock, were beginning to feel
more than a little indignant about it, and so lost the most of Sewall's
prayer, which was a good one, and not out of the prayer-book, though
there were phrases in it which suggested that source, as was quite
natural. The city man meant to do it all, then. Doubtless he thought
nobody from the country knew how to do more than to pronounce the
benediction. Doubtless that was to be Elder Blake's insignificant
part--to pronounce the----
Miss Jane Pollock looked up quickly. She had been staring steadily at
the back of Maria Hill's mink collar, in front of her, through the
closing sentences of the prayer. But what was this? Elder Blake had
risen and was coming forward. Was he going to read a hymn? But he had no
book. And he had taken off his spectacles. He could see better, as was
known, without his spectacles, when looking at a distance.
William Sewall's prayer was not ended. He could no longer be heard by
the people, but in his seat, behind the drooping figure of the old man,
he was asking things of the Lord as it seemed to him he had never asked
anything before. Could His poor, feeble, "superannuated" old servant
ever speak the message that needed to be spoken that night? William
Sewall felt more than ever that he himself could not have done it.
Could Ebenezer Blake?
"_Make him strong, O God,--make him strong_," requested William Sewall,
fervently. Then, forgetting even a likeness to prayer-book phrase, he
added, with fists unconsciously tight-clenched, in the language of the
athletic field where a few years back he himself had taken part in many
a hard-fought battle-- "_Help him to buck up!_"