Mary Truman called for Athalie Greeves to take her to Sunday school.
She did not want to go. She had told all the girls at the school picnic
the day before that she didn’t intend to do it. She had cried for two
hours and begged both father and mother to let her off, but they had
insisted, and so with her neat blue serge suit and her blue straw
sailor, her hair tied with a fresh ribbon, and her hands and feet
encased in simple girlish fittings, she reluctantly swung the Greeves’
gate open and slowly made her way up the path.
It was early. The first bell had only begun to ring. Mrs. Truman had
insisted that she must give the stranger plenty of time to get ready.
She had also, unknown to her daughter, telephoned Mr. Greeves that Mary
was coming.
Patterson Greeves, having come down to breakfast in much better frame of
mind than since he had returned to Silver Sands, had forgotten entirely,
that it was the Sabbath day or that there was such a thing as Sabbath
school to be dealt with. Indeed, left to himself he might have been
persuaded to forget it altogether for this time, but when Mrs. Truman
offered an escort he jumped at it eagerly, and Athalie heard herself
promised as a new scholar in the class with “that frumpy little Truman
girl.”
However, Athalie was going to be a good sport. When her father turned
from the telephone and informed her that she must get ready for Sunday
school she looked up with just a flicker of a gasp and stared, but that
was all. Quite like a lady she arose from the table and went to her
room. When she came down dressed in her brown tweed suit, gloves, hat,
and shoes as she had dressed the day before for her trip to the city her
father looked her over almost with approval and when he saw her go down
the path beside Mary Truman he sighed with relief. Perhaps she was going
to be amenable to reason after all.
Mindful of her triple promise to her father Athalie was quite polite,
but in a lofty way, like a lion condescending to walk with a lamb.
“So kind of you to come for me,” she said haughtily, “I never went to
Sunday school before in my life. What do they do?”
“You—never went—to _Sunday school_!” Mary paused in horrified
astonishment. “Why! Where have you lived? Didn’t they _have_ any Sunday
school?”
“Why, I really don’t know. I never enquired. Perhaps they had, but
nobody said anything about it. I’m curious to see it! Is it as dull as
day school?”
“Oh, day school isn’t dull! We have lovely times. Silver Sands is said
to have the best school in Silver County. We have the darlingest
teachers! And debating society! And contests, and athletics! Oh, it’s
great! I feel dreadfully when I’m sick and have to miss a day. I haven’t
missed a day now in two years, not since I had the measles.”
“Dear me!” said Athalie. “I should think you’d be bored to death! Do all
those girls you brought to see me go to Sunday school?”
“Oh, yes, of course. Everybody goes to Sunday school in Silver Sands.
Most of them go to our church. Only Emily Bragg, she’s a Methodist, but
they have a nice Sunday school too, only not so large. I was allowed to
go with her once when she was going to speak on Children’s Day. We have
a lovely teacher. Her name’s Pristina Appleby. She lives right across
the street from you. She tells us very interesting things about the
pyramids and the tablets they’ve dug up and things like that you know.
Sometimes she brings us pictures to help understand the lesson.”
“Lesson? Do you have lessons? Mercy! I hate lessons.”
“Oh, you won’t hate this,” laughed Mary, “she just talks. We call her
Miss Prissie!”
“Oh! And this Miss Pussy! Is she an old maid?”
“Miss _Prissie_ I said. No, oh no, she isn’t an old maid. Her aunts are
that. She has three aunts and a grandmother and a great grandmother and
they all live together in that brick house across the street from you.”
“Oh! I hadn’t noticed. Then she’s a young girl.”
“Well, not exactly young. She’s not as young as your sister. I think
_she’s_ lovely. We girls are all crazy about her. I’m so sorry you
couldn’t have come to the fudge party the other night. We had such fun.
Your sister was wonderful! She started all the games—”
Athalie’s face darkened but she kept her stiffly polite manner, a trifle
more haughty perhaps.
“Yes, it was a pity!” she drawled. “Is this your church? What are they
ringing that bell for?”
“Why for Sunday school.”
“Oh! I thought somebody might be dead! I’ve read of that! You never can
tell what curious thing they may do in a strange place you know.”
Mary started to giggle and then looked at her questioningly and grew red
instead. Was this rude girl trying to make fun of her again?
“Especially in the country,” added Athalie.
Mary said no more. Other girls and boys were standing around the
entrance as they went up the path. Athalie stared at everyone as if she
had come to a show and that was what was expected of her. Bannard came
down the street from the other direction and lifted his hat gravely to
Athalie. She dimpled and smiled.
“So he goes to Sunday school too!” she remarked complacently.
“Why, yes of course,” said Mary somewhat shortly. “He’s the minister.
Why shouldn’t he come!” She was getting tired of the publicity of
escorting this strange girl. She wished Sunday school were well over.
Athalie was much entertained all through Sunday school. She stared at
everybody’s clothes, kept her eyes wide open during prayer watching the
contortion of the superintendent’s lips as he prayed. The other girls,
duly devout, stole curious glances at her between their fingers. Her
conduct of the day before had been carefully discussed at the dinner
tables and a general taboo placed upon her as far as an associate for
daughters was concerned. To find her in Sunday school was therefore a
surprise. The more so as a rumor had been started by Pristina Appleby’s
essay at the club that Patterson Greeves was one of the new thinkers and
had left the faith of his fathers to wander in dangerous speculations.
But when Sunday school was out there was Patterson Greeves coming up the
walk with Silver by his side, her sweet face smiling to every one, her
smile almost like a part of the sunshine, her eyes as blue as the dress
she wore and the little hat with its black wing.
Athalie stood by the door with Mary Truman and watched them approach,
noted her father’s fine presence with pride, heard the whispered remarks
about him, then heard: “Isn’t she sweet!” and saw that all eyes were
directed toward Silver. The sullen fires came back to her eyes. She
looked around like a hunted thing and for an instant thought of bolting
straight through the graveyard. Then her father’s grave glance was upon
her pleasantly and her face lighted up. He was not displeased with her
then. She experienced a sudden surprised pleasure in it. Fiercely did
she desire to belong to someone, to have someone care for her, to be
able to please. All her life she had met with impatience and curbing.
This father she had come determined to win to herself or die in the
attempt. Deeply had she longed for a home and parents like other girls
and had not had them. Perhaps she had, down deep in her heart, the
thought that maybe somehow she might draw hers together. All her young
life she had showered upon her selfish mother a degree of devotion, one
might almost say adoration such as few real mothers get, and it had only
returned upon itself in bitterness. The mother had regarded her lightly,
tolerantly, gaily, yet if that mother had asked of her any sacrifice, no
matter how great, the fierce young soul would have given it, gladly,
freely. So now Athalie regarded her father with eyes of pride and of
possession.
Another face just then picked itself out from the throng of churchgoers,
a young face, strong and manly, vaguely familiar. He was standing under
the willow tree near the gravestones, bare headed, cleanly shaven, neat
and trim in a much brushed suit, talking to a group of other boys.
Presently they sauntered over toward the steps nodding to the girls who
came by, calling out a pleasant word. Mary Truman stepped down below
Athalie and spoke:
“Why, hello, Barry. Where were you Friday night? Didn’t Mr. Bannard give
you my invitation to the fudge party?”
Barry turned quickly and pleasantly.
“Sorry Mary, I didn’t get home till late. Had an errand that kept me.
Hear you had a great time. Save some fudge for me?”
Then he lifted his eyes and recognized Athalie. He did not speak. It was
rather a lighting of the eyes, a pleasant understanding that gave her
heart that warm glow and she knew him for her captor of the midnight
ride. After that Athalie was satisfied to stay and see this thing called
church through to the finish.
Oh, she had been to church before of course. At school those things were
compulsory. But there was something about this church, like a big family
gathering of people who all liked each other and enjoyed being there
that was new to the girl. She stared about and wondered at it. Funny old
women in queer bonnets, coats that were antique of cut; a few of
recognized culture and education, though that counted very little as yet
with Athalie; one or two with stylish clothes. She watched the
Vandemeeter tribe file into the pew, grandma, first, slowly with a cane,
mother just behind, Henrietta helping grandma, Maria in the same black
broadcloth coat and black felt hat with the coque feather band she had
worn for the last seven years. Maria was never one to put on summer
clothes until summer was really there. Harriet and Cordelia with pink
velvet roses wreathed around their last year’s dyed straws. She eyed
them curiously. Each a replica of the other in a different stage of
life. What tiresome people. How did they endure life? She noted
grandma’s bent head, mother’s closed eyes, the squarely folded
handkerchiefs, the little tremble of the feathered bonnet when Henrietta
handed grandma the hymn book. Everything was strange and unusual to
Athalie. She wondered why such common people wanted to _be_, why they
seemed to take an _interest_ in being? Why did her father stay in a
place like this when there were cities where things were going on, wild,
gay life for which she thirsted?
She was surprised to see Barry sitting in the back row of the choir. How
queer for a boy like that to be willing to waste his time this way!
Suddenly Bannard’s voice arrested her attention. He was telling a story,
though he seemed to have a small leather book open in his hand as if he
were about to read. He painted a picture with his words. She forgot the
sunny church with its bright carpet and unfashionable congregation. She
was seeing a walled city in a strange land, under a blazing sky with
hungry faces looking out from little slits of windows in towers and
turrets, and an army camped around on every hand. They had been there
days and days and had starved out the stronghold. The people were
reduced to eating loathsome things. An ass’s head, something that would
not be thought of as food at another time, sold for about forty dollars,
coarse chick peas were selling at a prohibitive price. Even the king and
his court were starving.
The king was walking on the wall, visiting his sentries. You could see
his face, lined with anxiety, as he shaded his eyes and looked out
across the sea of enemies’ tents. There was no sign of discouragement on
the part of that enemy. They had come to stay until the city
surrendered. They knew it would not be long. They had spies who had
discovered its state. They were well supplied with food themselves and
had nothing to do but eat and drink and make merry until they had worn
out the resources of the people and there was nothing left for them but
to surrender. The king sighed and passed on, as he went someone reached
out and caught his robe with claw like hands, a woman from the doorstep
of one of the little hovels on the wall. There were deep hollows under
her eyes and in her cheeks. She looked more like a skeleton than a
woman. “Help!” she cried, “help, my lord, O king!”
The king drew away impatiently. So many cried for help and what could he
do. “Curse you!” he said impatiently, “with every barn floor bare and
every wine press empty, what can I do?” and he turned as if to pass on.
But the woman continued her strange weird cry, and began a terrible
story. Another woman appeared crouching frightened against the doorway.
“This woman promised if I would kill my baby boy yesterday and cook and
eat him that she would kill hers today, but we ate my son yesterday and
now she has hid hers today. I pray you O king, speak to her. Make her
give up her son that she has hid.”
Athalie’s eyes were wide with horror. She had never heard a story like
that.
The speaker depicted the horror on the face of the king as he listened
to the tale, and watched the faces of the hunger-crazed women, realized
that he was powerless to aid, that things could only grow worse rather
than better, that the Lord in whom he had put at least a little of his
trust had apparently deserted him, and then he laid hold on his kingly
robe and tore it.
Like a company of children the listening congregation attended, not an
eye looked dreamy, not a brain was planning out tomorrow’s work, nor
calculating the sum of yesterday’s mistakes. The Bible lived and
breathed before them as Bannard spoke. They saw that king reach down and
tear his robe as he passed on, they were among those who looked beneath
and saw the sackcloth next his skin, oriental symbol of humiliation, of
repentance, of prayer. They caught a glimpse of King Jehoram’s past, his
mother the wicked queen Jezebel, his father of whom it was written,
“there was none like unto Ahab, which did sell himself to work
wickedness in the sight of the Lord.”
One saw that Jehoram was not quite so bad as his father and mother. He
put away the image of Baal which his father had set up for worship to
please his mother, but he wrought evil in the sight of the Lord.
The king on the wall in the torn robe, with the sackcloth showing
beneath suddenly turned and swore a terrible oath that he would have the
head of God’s prophet that day, the prophet who had been promising day
after day that God would deliver them from the enemy; and now they were
come to the great extremity and God was not helping. Why should he wait
for God any longer?
The king walked to his palace and sent a messenger to the little house
where Elisha lived. One saw the soldier from the palace hurry along with
sword in hand down the narrow streets of queer flat-topped oriental
houses, and Elisha sitting quietly in his door talking to some of the
old men, and suddenly lifting his eye to his servant and saying in a
quiet voice: “The king is sending a soldier to behead me. Shut the door
and lock it. The king will be here presently. Keep the soldier out till
he comes.”
The hurrying feet, the hastily shut door, the altercation. Athalie sat
breathless with glowing eyes of wonder. The impudent air of the king as
he came, the parley: “Behold, this evil is of the Lord; why should I
wait any longer for Him to help me?” and Elisha’s quiet voice answering:
“Hear ye the word of the Lord. The time is up! Tomorrow about this time
shall a measure of fine white flour be sold at less than pre-war
prices.”
“Ha!” the laugh of the servant on whom the king leans, “if God were
opening windows in heaven just now this might be!”
The quiet rebuke: “You shall see it but not eat thereof.”
Night drops quickly, suddenly in that eastern land. Twilight on the
white parched city where skulking shadows pass on the wall and huddled
human beings sleep and forget for a little while their sufferings. The
king in his palace asleep. No faith whatever in what Elisha promised.
Twilight outside the wall in the little leper village, four lepers
waiting at the gate, starving, talking it over. Shall they throw
themselves on the mercy of the enemy, and beg something to eat? “If they
kill us we shall but die anyway!” The hesitant approach, peering like
white ghosts into the first tent, the pause, the eager going forward. No
one there! The table spread. They snatch the food and devour it, and
move on to the next, and suddenly are struck with the silence throughout
the great camp. The hurrying investigation, then the hastening back to
the city to tell, the waking of the unbelieving king, the five men sent
to verify the story, the garments strewn in the way as the enemy fled,
the rejoicing, the crowding out of the city to spoil the tents of the
enemy, crushing out the life of the astonished servant who had laughed
the day before! The wonderful reason of the enemy’s flight, that the
Lord had caused a sound of horses to be heard by them!
Athalie looked around the church to see if anybody was really believing
it. Where did they get a strange story like that? The Lord! _The Lord!_
How strange that sounded as if the Lord was a real person! Did her
father believe that? She glanced at him as he sat with stern listening
attitude, his gloved hands on his knee. She could not tell whether he
were astonished at it or not. She listened again. The minister was
talking now about world problems. He said the world was waiting today as
then for the Lord to deliver them from a state of siege into which their
own sin and folly had placed them, and blaming God that He did not come.
They were tired of wearing sackcloth and ready to do murder. When all
the time God’s wonderful tomorrow was waiting, just over the way,
waiting for them to reach the limit of their own possibilities that God
might show His power and grace. He said that the troubles of the world
would never be solved and peace never come until Christ came into human
hearts, and that all these things pointed to a time close at hand when
some tomorrow about this time Christ Himself was coming back to relieve
His own forever from a state of siege.
Athalie never took her eyes from the face of the speaker during this
closing talk. She had never heard anything like it in her life before.
It made realities out of what had been vague mythical stories, like
fairy tales, before. Was there really a Jesus Christ then? He died,
didn’t He, long ago? On a cross? What did they mean, _coming again_?
She was silent and thoughtful all that day. Her father looked at her
relieved. She wandered around the house, played a few little jazzy tunes
on the piano which scandalized the Vandemeeters and Lizette who both
made it a point to listen intently for any sign of a hymn tune, then
drifted away to her room and her fast disappearing stock of chocolates
and literature.
Silver had gone to the Mission school at the Flats. The house was silent
all the afternoon, with a Sabbath stillness Athalie had never known
before. Sabbath meant nothing to her but a gayer day than usual, the
focus of the gaiety of the week.
Mary Truman, still under parental pressure called for her to go to
Christian Endeavor that evening, and because Athalie saw nothing else to
do, and her father and Silver were talking in the library before the
fire, she went. She wondered if the strange boy would be there. Barry.
What a nice name!
He was there. He passed her a hymn book and looked pleased when she came
into the bright little chapel room where they met. He sang in a
quartette, growling a nice low bass. She watched him wonderingly,
remembering how he had held her like a vice when she tried to get the
wheel away from him. Remembering how gently he had lifted her and
carried her.
It seemed a queer meeting. The girls and boys spoke, just like a frat.
meeting at school, only they said queer things. They referred to the
sermon of that morning as if they were altogether familiar with the
story of that siege. They spoke of Mr. Bannard as if he were a brother
and comrade. Mr. Bannard was there among them, just like one of them. It
was rather interesting, only it was embarrassing when they prayed. She
didn’t know what to do with her eyes so she watched them all.
That boy Barry gave a notice about a committee meeting after service.
Two others jumped up and spoke about socials that were being planned.
They all seemed so eager and friendly. Athalie felt lonely and outside
everything.
When they went in the church again there was Silver sitting with her
father. Mary asked her politely to come in their seat and she went. She
did not want to sit beside Silver again.
Mr. Bannard spoke about the coming of Christ again. He made it plain
that He was really coming, and that some people, good people presumably
for Athalie didn’t understand that language about “believers” were to be
taken away and the world would wonder where they had gone. Athalie
looked over at Silver. She thought Silver would be one that would be
taken away. Well, that would be good. She hated good people and she
would be left with her father. It was reasonably sure a noted man of the
world like her father wouldn’t be taken away from earth like that. He
didn’t have that spirit-look that Silver wore as a garment. It
frightened her a little this talk about the Son of God coming back to
earth. She hoped on second thought that it wouldn’t come till she was
old, very old and didn’t care about living any more. It stayed with her
after she got home, and when she went to bed and thought of Lilla in a
little boat on the great ocean she cried a few tears sorrowfully. Lilla
was the only god she had ever had.
On the whole she was rather docile about going to school the next
morning when her father suggested that she enter high school and finish
out the spring term. She remembered what Barry had said about athletics
and resolved not to eat any more chocolates for a week after this last
box was gone.
So she polished her nails to a delicate point and betook herself
languidly to school to see how she liked it. She was astonished to see
how little impression she made on the wholesome atmosphere of high
school. The teacher, a placid faced elderly woman with a firm chin, said
to be the finest school principal in the county, smiled at her
pleasantly and put her in the front seat directly before the desk. None
of the boys gave her a glance, save Barry who showed mere recognition.
The girls she had met smiled politely and went on with study. Whenever
she looked up she was met with that pleasant challenge of a smile. There
was absolutely no opportunity to get away with anything unless one first
crossed that friendly smile, and Athalie wasn’t just exactly ready to do
that yet until she had tried things out. There had not been any too many
smiles in her life. She took the book that was handed her to read until
the principal should have time to examine her and place her in the
classes where she fitted, and was surprised to find it was an
interesting novel. The teacher explained it was the book the English
class were reading for review and conversation that week.
Her father glanced into the study-hall half an hour later, after an
inspection of the building led by an old friend who was the Latin
teacher, and saw her absorbed in the book. He went home with a sigh of
relief, comforted.
But that very night Athalie wrote eleven invitations to six boys and
five girls for a house party that week-end, and mailed them early in the
morning before she went to school. But that no one in her family knew.