so come along, young fellow, and do your talking to-morrow morning with
the rest of the drunks and disorderlies."
"Stop!" cried Robert Hardy. "This is my son! Do you understand? What
are you going to do?"
"Well, governor, that's a pretty question at this time o' day. Do!
I'm going to jug him for assault with intent to commit highway robbery.
It's an affair for the 'pen,' I can tell you."
"But you heard him say it was all a joke."
"A pretty joke to try to hold a man up on the highway and demand his
money! Oh, no! That's carrying a joke too far. I'm bound to obey
orders. We've been after this gang of young chaps for a month now."
"But, officer, you don't understand; this is my son!"
"Well, what of that? Don't we jug sons every day for some deviltry or
other? Do you suppose you are the only father whose son is going to
the devil?"
"O God, no!" cried Mr. Hardy with sudden passion. "But this is my
older boy. It would kill his mother to have him arrested and put in
jail for trying to rob his own father. Yet he was once innocent--
What am I saying? He might be now if I had done my duty."
Mr. Hardy confronted the officer with a certain sorrowful dignity which
even that hardened defender of the law understood.
"Officer, let the boy go. I will answer for it if any blame falls on
you. He was not at fault in this matter. He was not the one who
assaulted me. He did not touch me. You could not get a particle of
testimony against him. And besides that, it is necessary that he
return with me. This is a case for the law of God; it belongs to a
higher than human court."
The officer hesitated; Mr. Hardy stepped nearer his son.
"George," he said, as if forgetting for a moment that the officer was
present, "did you know that Clara and Bess and Will were in the
accident last night?"
George turned pale, and tremblingly replied, "No, father. Were they
hurt? Was Bess--" The boy seemed moved as his father had not yet seen
him.
"No; they were not; that is, Bess was not hurt at all. But Will was
severely bruised, and Clara still lies in a state of stupor or
unconsciousness, and we do not know what the end will be. I was on my
way just now to get some needed articles from the doctor's house. You
must come back with me; the law has no hold on you."
"Maybe, the law hasn't any hold on him, but Michael Finnerty has. I
don't just like the idea, mister, of letting the boy go," replied the
stubborn and unusually dutiful officer.
Mr. Hardy began to appeal to the man's love of his own children. It
did not seem to move him in the least, until he mentioned the fact that
it was cruelty to keep the suffering girl at home waiting for her
father's return.
Mr. Finnerty finally loosened his hold on George and said slowly and
painfully, "An' if I lose me job I'll be knowin' who was to blame for
it. I always told Michael Finnerty that he was too soft-hearted to go
on the force!"
"You won't suffer, officer. Many thanks! Come, George."
Father and son moved off together, while the defender of the law stood
irresolute, watching them disappear through the storm, and muttering to
himself, "I'm a soft-hearted fool. I ought to 'a' been born a female
hospital nurse, I had."
During that walk home, after Mr. Hardy had gone around by the doctor's
with George, not a word was exchanged. The storm was increasing. The
two walked along in silence; but when George walked into the hall at
home he turned and saw a look on his father's face that smote him to
the heart, for he was not yet a hardened soul. Mr. Hardy had lived
years in that experience. No one could tell how he had been tortured
by what he had endured that night; but the mark of it was stamped
indelibly on his face, and he knew that he would bear it to his grave.
Mrs. Hardy came running downstairs as the two came in. When George
turned and faced her she held out her arms crying, "My boy! my boy! We
have been so anxious about you!"
What! not one word of reproach, of rebuke, of question as to what he
had been doing all this time that the family had been suffering! No;
not one word. Ah, mother love! It is the most wonderful thing on
earth, next to the love of God for the sinner. It is even that, for it
is the love of God expressing itself through the mother, who is the
temple of the loving God.
George dashed away a tear; then going up to his mother he laid his
cheek against hers, while she folded her arms about him and cried a
little and asked no questions. After a moment's silence he stammered
out a few words of sorrow at having caused her pain. She joyfully
accepted his broken explanation of how he had not known of the accident
to Clara and the others. It was true that he had gone out the evening
before, fully intending to go down to the scene of the accident; but
coming across some of his old companions he had gone off with them, and
spent the night in a disgraceful carouse. Throughout the day he had
been more or less under the influence of liquor, dimly conscious that a
great disaster had happened, but not sober enough to realise its
details or its possible connection with those of his own home.
The sudden meeting with his father had startled him out of the drowsy
intoxication he had fallen into as the day progressed. Now, as he felt
his mother's arms around him, and realised a little what the family had
been enduring, he felt the disgrace of his own conduct.
Mr. Hardy went upstairs and consulted with the doctor, who wondered at
his protracted absence. There was no change in Clara yet. She lay in
a condition which could not be called a trance or a sleep. She did not
seem to be in any great pain; but she was unconscious of all outside
conditions.
After a little talk with his mother, George came up and inquired after
Bess and Will. They were both sleeping, and after the doctor had gone
out the father and mother and son sat down together in the room where
Clara lay.
Mr. Hardy did not say a word to George about the incident of the
evening. The shame of it was too great yet. When men of Mr. Hardy's
self-contained, repressed, proud nature are pained, it is with an
intense, inward fire of passion that cannot hear to break out into
words.
George had sense enough to offer to relieve his parents of the burden
of watching through the night, and during the exchange of watchers
along toward morning, as Mrs. Hardy slipped into the room to relieve
the boy, she found him kneeling down at a couch with his face buried in
the cushions. She raised her face in thanksgiving to God and went
softly out.
The morning dawned gray with snow which still whirled in wreaths about
the sorrowing homes of Barton; but Robert Hardy thought of the merciful
covering it would make for the ghastly piles of ruin down under the
bridge and along the banks of the river. He said to himself, "This is
my fourth day; how can I best spend it? What shall I do?" He kneeled
and prayed, and rose somewhat refreshed.
The forenoon went rapidly by, and before he knew it noon was near. The
time had passed in watching Clara, visiting with Bess and Will; and
doing some necessary work for the company in his little office
downstairs. He did not feel like saying anything to George yet. James
Caxton had been in, and the first thing he had mentioned had been his
own act in the meeting the night before. Mr. Hardy thanked God for it,
and a prayer went out of his heart for his own son, that the Spirit
might touch him in his sin, and bring him into the light of Christ.
A little after noon the storm cleared up, and Robert prepared to go
down to the shops. Clara had not yet come out of her stupor. The
doctor had called and done what he could. There was nothing in
particular that Mr. Hardy could do in the case, so he went out about
one o'clock and entered his office, hoping as he went in that he would
have no trouble with the men.
Mr. Burns reported everything quiet, and the manager, with a sigh of
relief, proceeded with the routine duties of the business. Nothing of
any special interest occurred through the afternoon. The storm had
ceased entirely, and the sun had come out clear and warm. People were
clearing off the walks, and the ringing of sleigh bells was distinct in
the office, even over the incessant hum of the big engine.
Toward three o'clock one of Mr. Hardy's old friends, an officer of the
road, came in and said there was a general movement on foot throughout
Barton to hold a monster mass meeting in the Town Hall for the benefit
of the sufferers, both in the railroad accident and in the explosion of
the Sunday before in the shops. It was true the company would settle
for damages, but in many cases the adjustment of claims would not be
made until much suffering and hardship had been endured. There was a
feeling on the part of the townspeople that a meeting for public
conference would result in much good, and there was also, as has been
the case in other large horrors, a craving to relieve the strain of
feeling by public gathering and consultation.
"Can you come out to the meeting, Hardy?" asked his friend.
Mr. Hardy thought a minute and replied, "Yes; I think I can." Already
an idea had taken shape in his mind which he could not help feeling was
inspired by God.
"It might be a good thing if you could come prepared to make some
remarks. I find there is a disposition on the part of the public to
charge the road with carelessness and mismanagement."
"I'll say a word or two," replied Mr. Hardy; and after a brief talk on
business matters his friend went out.
Robert immediately sat down to his desk, and for an hour, interrupted
only by an occasional item of business brought to him by his secretary,
he jotted down copious notes. The thought which had come to him when
his friend suggested the meeting was this: he would go and utter a
message that burned within him, a message which the events of the past
few days made imperative should be uttered. He went home absorbed in
the great idea. He had once in his younger days been famous for his
skill in debate, so he had no fear of his power to deliver a message of
life at the present crisis in his own. He at once spoke of the meeting
to his wife.
"Mary, what do you say? I know every minute is precious. I owe to you
and these dear ones at home a very sacred duty; but no less, it seems
to me, is my duty to the society where I have lived all these years,
doing literally nothing for its uplift toward God who gave us all life
and power. I feel that He will put a message into my mouth that may
prove a blessing to this community. It seems to me this special
opportunity is providential."
"Robert," replied his wife, smiling at him through happy tears, "it is
the will of God. Do your duty as He makes it clear to you."
It had been an agitating week to the wife. She anticipated its close
with a feeling akin to terror. What would the end be? She was
compelled to say to herself that her husband was not insane; but the
thought that he was really to be called out of the world in some
mysterious manner at the end of the rapidly approaching Sunday, had
several times come over her with a power that threatened her own
reason. Nevertheless the week, so far, in spite of its terror and
agitation, had a sweet joy for her. Her husband had come back to her,
the lover as he once had been, only with the added tenderness of all
the years of their companionship. She thanked the Father for it, and
when the hour came for Robert to go down to the meeting, she blessed
him and prayed heaven to make his words to the people like the words of
God.
"Father, what do you want me to do? Shall I stay here?" asked George,
who had not stirred out of the house all day. He had watched by Clara
faithfully. She was still in that mysterious condition of
unconsciousness which made her case so puzzling to the doctor.
Mr. Hardy hesitated a moment, then said: "No, George; I would like to
have you go with me. Alice can do all that is necessary. But let us
all pray together now before we go out. The Lord is leading us
mysteriously, but we shall some time know the reason why."
So in the room where Clara lay they all kneeled down, except Will, who
lay upon a lounge near his unconscious sister. Mr. Hardy, as he
clasped his wife's hand in his own, poured out his soul in this
petition:
"Dear Lord, we know Thou dost love us, even though we cannot always
know why Thou dost allow suffering and trouble; and we would thank Thee
for the things that cannot be destroyed, for the loves that cannot
suffer death, for the wonderful promises of the life to come. Only we
have been so careless of the things that belong to Thy kingdom! We
have been so selfish and forgetful of the great needs and sufferings
and sins of earth. Pardon us, gracious Redeemer! Pardon me, for I am
the chief offender! Yea, Lord, even as the robber on the cross was
welcomed into Paradise, welcome Thou me. But we pray for our dear
ones. May they recover! Make this beloved one who now lies unknowing
among us to come back into the universe of sense and sound, to know us
and smile upon us again. We say, 'Thy will be done.' Grant wisdom,
for Thou knowest best; only our hearts will cry out for help, and Thou
knowest our hearts better than anyone else. Bless me this night as I
stand before the people. This is no selfish prayer, dear Lord. I
desire only Thy glory; I pray only for Thy kingdom. But Thou hast
appointed my days to live. Thou hast sent me the message, and I cannot
help feeling the solemn burden and joy of it. I will say to the people
that Thou art most important of all in this habitation of the flesh.
And now bless us all. Give us new hearts. Make us to feel the true
meaning of existence here. Reveal to us Thy splendour. Forgive all
the past, and make impossible in the children the mistakes of the
parent. Deliver us from evil, and Thine shall be the glory for ever.
Amen."
When Mr. Hardy and George reached the town hall they found a large
crowd gathering, and they had some difficulty in gaining entrance. Mr.
Hardy at once passed up to the platform, where the chairman of the
meeting greeted him and said he would expect him to make some remarks
during the evening. Robert sat down at one end of the platform and
watched the hall fill with people, nearly all well known to him. There
was an unusually large crowd of boys and young men, many of his own
employés from the shops, and a great number of citizens and business
men--a representative audience for the place, brought together under
the influence of the disaster and feeling somewhat the breaking down of
artificial social distinctions in the presence of the grim leveller
Death, who had come so near to them the last few days.
There were the usual opening exercises common to such public
gatherings. Several well-known business men and two or three of the
ministers, including Mr. Jones, made appropriate addresses. The
attention of the great audience was not laboured for, the occasion
itself being enough to throw over the people the spell of subdued
quiet. When the chairman announced that "Mr. Robert Hardy, our
well-known railroad manager, will now address us," there was a movement
of curiosity and some surprise, and many a man leaned forward and
wondered in his heart what the wealthy railroad man would have to say
on such an occasion. He had never appeared as a speaker in public, and
he passed generally in Barton for the cold, selfish, haughty man he had
always been.
Mr. Hardy began in a low, clear tone:
"Men and women of Barton: To-night I am not the man you have known
these twenty-five years that I have been among you. I am, by the grace
of God, a new creature. As I stand here I have no greater desire in my
heart than to say what may prove to be a blessing to all my old
townspeople and to my employés and to these strong young men and boys.
Within a few short days God has shown me the selfishness of a human
being's heart. That heart was my own; and it is with feelings none of
you can ever know that I look into your faces and say these words."
Robert paused a moment as if gathering himself up for the effort that
followed, and the audience, startled with an unexpected emotion by the
strange beginning, thrilled with excitement, as, lifting his arm and
raising his voice, the once cold and proud man, his face and form
glowing with the transfiguration of a new manhood, exclaimed:
"There is but one supreme law in this world, and it is this: Love God
and your neighbour with heart, mind, soul, strength. There are but two
things worth living for: the glory of God and the salvation of man.
To-night I, who look into eternity in a sense which I will not stop to
explain, feel the bitterness which comes from the knowledge that I have
broken that law and have not lived for those things which alone are
worth living for. But God has sent me here to-night with a message to
the people which my heart must deliver. It is a duty even more sacred
in some ways than what I owe to my own kindred. I am aware that the
hearts of the people are shocked into numbness by the recent horror. I
know that more than one bleeding heart is in this house, and the shadow
of the last enemy, has fallen over many thresholds in our town. What!
did I not enter into the valley of the shadow of death myself as I
stumbled over the ghastly ruins of that wreck, my soul torn in twain
for the love of three of my own dear children? Do I not sympathise in
full with all those who bitterly weep and lament and sit in blackness
of horror this night? Yea; but, men of Barton, why is it that we are
so moved, so stirred, so shocked by the event of death, when the far
more awful event of life does not disturb us in the least? We shudder
with terror, we lose our accustomed pride or indifference, we speak in
whispers, and we tread softly in the presence of the visitor who smites
but once and then smites the body only: but in the awful presence of
the living image of God we go our ways careless, indifferent, cold,
passionless, selfish.
"I know whereof I speak, for I have walked through the world like that
myself. But death cannot be compared for one moment with life for
majesty, for solemnity, for meaning, for power. There were
seventy-five persons killed in the accident. But in the papers this
morning I read in the column next to that in which the accident was
paraded, in small type and in the briefest of paragraphs, the statement
that a certain young man in this very town of ours had been arrested
for forging his father's name on a cheque, and was a fugitive from the
law. Every day in this town and in every town all over the world
events like that, and worse than that, occur. Nay, in this very town
of ours more than seventy-five souls are, at this very moment, going
down into a far blacker hell of destruction than the one under that
fated bridge, and the community is not horrified over it. How many
mass meetings have been held in this town within the last twenty-five
years over the losses of character, the death of purity, the
destruction of honesty? Yet they have outnumbered the victims of this
late physical disaster a thousandfold. And what does mere death do?
It releases the spirit from its house of earth. Aside from that,
death does nothing to the person. But what does life do? Life does
everything. It prepares for heaven or for hell. It starts impulses,
moulds character, fixes character. Death has no kingdom without end.
Death is only the last enemy of the many enemies that life knows.
Death is a second; life is an eternity. O men, brothers, if, as I
solemnly and truly believe, this is the last opportunity I shall have
to speak to you in such large numbers, I desire you to remember, when I
have vanished from your sight, that I spent nearly my last breath in an
appeal to you to make the most of daily life, to glorify God and save
men!
"The greatest enemy of man is not death; it is selfishness. It sits on
the throne of the entire world. This very disaster which has filled
the town with sorrow was due to selfishness. Let us see if that is not
so. It has been proved by investigation already made that the
drunkenness of a track inspector was the cause of the accident. What
was the cause of that drunkenness? The drinking habits of that
inspector. How did he acquire them? In a saloon which we taxpayers
allow to run on payment of a certain sum of money into our town
treasury. So, then, it was the greed or selfishness of the men of this
town which lies at the bottom of this dreadful disaster. Who was to
blame for the disaster? The track inspector? No. The saloon keeper
who sold him the liquor? No. Who, then? We ourselves, my brothers;
we who licensed the selling of the stuff which turned a man's brain
into liquid fire, and smote his judgment and reason with a brand from
out the burning pit. If I had stumbled upon the three corpses of my
own children night before last, I could have exclaimed in justice
before the face of God: 'I have murdered my own children,' for I was
one of the men of Barton to vote for the license which made possible
the drunkenness of the man in whose care were placed hundreds of lives.
"For what is the history of this case? Who was this wretched track
inspector? A man who, to my own knowledge, trembled before temptation;
who, on the testimony of the foreman at the shops, was, and always had
been, a sober man up to the time when we as a municipality voted to
replace the system of no license with the saloon, for the sake of what
we thought was a necessary revenue. This man had no great temptation
to drink while the saloon was out of the way. Its very absence was his
salvation. But its public open return confronted his appetite once
more, and he yielded and fell. Who says he was to blame? Who are the
real criminals in the case? We ourselves, citizens; we who, for the
greed of gain, for the saving of that which has destroyed more souls in
hell than any other one thing, made possible the causes, which led to
the grief and trouble of this hour. Would we not shrink in terror from
the thought of lying in wait to kill a man? Would we not repel with
holy horror the idea of murdering and maiming seventy-five people? We
would say 'Impossible!' Yet, when I am ushered at last into the
majestic presence of Almighty God, I feel convinced I shall see in His
righteous countenance the sentence of our condemnation just as
certainly as if we had gone out in a body and by wicked craft had torn
out the supporting timbers of that bridge just before the train
thundered upon it. For did we not sanction by law a business which we
know tempts men to break all the laws; which fills our jails and
poorhouses, our reformatories and asylums; which breaks women's hearts
and beggars blessed homes and sends innocent children to tread the
paths of shame and vagrancy; which brings pallor into the face of the
wife and tosses with the devil's own glee a thousand victims into
perdition with every revolution of this great planet!
"Men of Barton, say what we will, we are the authors of this dreadful
disaster. If we sorrow as a community, we sorrow in reality for our
own selfish act. And oh, the selfishness of it! That clamouring greed
for money! That burning thirst for more, and more, and more, at the
expense of every godlike quality, at the ruin of all that our mothers
once prayed might belong to us as men and women! What is it, ye
merchants, ye business men, here to-night, that ye struggle most over?
The one great aim of your lives is to buy for as little as possible and
sell for as much as possible. What care have ye for the poor who work
at worse than starvation wages, so long as ye can buy cheap and sell at
large profits? What is the highest aim of us railroad men in the great
whirl of commercial competition which seethes and boils and surges
about this earth like another atmosphere, plainly visible to the devils
of other worlds? What is our aim, but to make money our god and power
our throne? How much care or love is there for flesh and blood when
there is danger of losing dollars? But oh, mighty Saviour! it was not
for this that we were made! We know it was not.