|THAT afternoon Paul went to Grayson, noting few changes in the place.
The sun was fiercely beating down on the streets of the Square. Two or
three lawyers, a magistrate, the county ordinary, and the clerk of the
court sat in chairs on the shaded side of the Court House. Some were
whittling sticks, others were playing checkers, all were talking
politics. Under the board awnings in front of the stores the merchants
sat without their coats, fighting the afternoon heat by fanning
themselves and sprinkling water on the narrow brick sidewalks. A group
of one-horse drays, on which idle negroes sat dangling their legs and
teasing one another, stood in the shade of the hotel. The only things
suggesting coolness were the towering mountains, the green brows of
which rose into the snowy, breeze-blown clouds overhead.
Paul found Silas Tye at his bench in his shop. He was scarcely changed
at all. Indeed, he seemed to be wearing exactly the same clothing, using
the same tools, mending the same shoes. On his bald pate glistened
beads of sweat which burst now and then and trickled down to his bushy
eyebrows. Paul had approached noiselessly, and was standing looking in
at him from the doorway, when the shoemaker glanced up and saw him. With
an ejaculation of delight he dropped his work and advanced quickly, a
grimy hand held out.
“Here you are, here you are!” he cried, drawing the young man into the
shop. “Bearded and brown, bigger an' stronger, but the same Paul I used
to know. How are you? How are you?”
“I'm all right, thank you,” Paul answered, as he took the chair near the
bench and sat down. “How is Mrs. Tye?”
“Sound as a dollar, and simply crazy to see you,” Silas replied, with a
chuckle. “If you hadn't come in we'd 'a' got a hoss an' buggy from Sid
Trawley's stable an' 'a' rid out to see you. Jim Hoag this mornin'
was tellin' about you gittin' back, an' said he'd already hired you
to manage for him. Good-luck, good-luck, my boy; that's a fine job.
Cynthy's just stepped over to a neighbor's, an' will be back purty soon.
Oh, she was tickled when she heard the news--she was so excited she
could hardly eat her dinner. She thought a sight of you. In fact, both
of us sort o' laid claim to you.”
“Till I disgraced myself and had to run away,” Paul sighed. “I'm ashamed
of that, Uncle Si. I want to say that to you first of all.”
“Don't talk that way.” Silas waved his awl deprecatingly. “Thank the
Lord for what it's led to. Hoag was tellin' the crowd how you come back
to give yourself up. Said he believed it of you, but wouldn't of anybody
else. Lord, Lord, that was the best news I ever heard! Young as you
are, you'll never imagine how much good an act o' that sort will do in a
community like this. It is a great moral lesson. As I understand it, you
fought the thing with all your might and main--tried to forget it, tried
to live it down, only in the end to find that nothin' would satisfy
you--nothin' but to come back here and do your duty.”
“Yes, you are right,” Paul assented. “I'll tell you all about it some
time. I'm simply too happy now to look back on such disagreeable things.
It was awful, Uncle Si.”
“I know, and I don't blame you for not talking about it,” the old man
said. “Sad things are better left behind. But it is all so glorious!
Here you come with your young head bowed before the Lord, ready to
receive your punishment, only to find yourself free, free as the winds
of heaven, the flowers of the fields, the birds in the woods. Oh, Paul,
you can't see it, but joy is shining out o' you like a spiritual fire.
Your skin is clear; your honest eyes twinkle like stars. It's worth
it--your reward is worth all you've been through, an' more. Life is
built that way. We have hunger to make us enjoy eatin'; cold, that we
may know how nice warmth feels; pain, that we may appreciate health;
evil, that we may know good when we see it; misery, that we may have
joy, and death, that we may have bliss everlasting. I've no doubt you've
suffered, but it has rounded you out and made you strong as nothing
else could have done. I reckon you'll look up all your old acquaintances
right away.”
Paul's glance went to the littered floor. “First of all, Uncle Si, I
want to inquire about my mother.”
“Oh, I see.” The cobbler seemed to sense the situation as a delicate
one, and he paused significantly. “Me an' Cynthy talked about that this
momin'. In fact, we are both sort o' bothered over it. Paul, I don't
think anybody round here knows whar your ma an' Jeff moved to after they
got married. But your aunt went with 'em; she was bound to stick to your
ma.”
“They married”--Paul's words came tardily--“very soon after--after
Warren recovered, I suppose?”
“No; she kept him waitin' two years. Thar was an awful mess amongst 'em.
Your ma an' your aunt stood for you to some extent, but Jeff was awful
bitter. The trouble with Jeff was that he'd never been wounded by
anybody in his life before, an' that a strip of a boy should shove 'im
an inch o' death's door an' keep 'im in bed so long was a thing that
rankled. Folks about here done 'em both the credit to think you acted
too hasty, an' some thought Jim Hoag was back of it. The reason your ma
kept Jeff waitin' so long was to show the public that she hadn't done
nothin' she was ashamed of, an' folks generally sympathized with 'er.
Finally she agreed to marry Jeff if he'd withdraw the case ag'in' you.
It was like pullin' eye-teeth, but Jeff finally give in an' had a lawyer
fix it all up. But he was mad, and is yet, I've no doubt.”
“I understand.” Paul was looking wistfully out of the window into the
street. “And would you advise me, Uncle Si, to--to try to find them?”
“I don't believe I would,” Silas opined slowly, his heavy brows meeting
above his spectacles; “at least not at present, Paul. I'd simply wait
an' hope for matters to drift into a little better shape. Jeff is a
bad man, a fellow that holds a grudge, and, late as it is, he'd want
a settlement o' some sort. I've talked to him. I've tried to reason
with him, but nothin' I'd say would have any weight. I reckon he's been
teased about it, an' has put up with a good many insinuations. Let 'em
all three alone for the present. You've got a high temper yourself, an'
while you may think you could control it, you might not be able to do it
if a big hulk of a man like Jeff was to jump on you an' begin to pound
you.”
“No; I see that you are right,” Paul sighed; “but I am sorry, for I'd
like my mother to understand how I feel. She may think I still blame her
for--for fancying Warren, even when my father was alive, but I don't.
Rubbing up against the world, Uncle Si, teaches one a great many things.
My mother was only obeying a natural yearning. She was seeking an
ideal which my poor father could not fulfil. He was ill, despondent,
suspicious, and faultfinding, and she was like a spoiled child. I am
sure she never really loved him. I was in the wrong. No one could know
that better than I do. When I went away that awful night I actually
hated her, but as the years went by, Uncle Si, a new sort of tenderness
and love stole over me. When I'd see other men happy with their mothers
my heart would sink as I remembered that I had a living one who was dead
to me. Her face grew sweeter and more girl-like. I used to recall how
she smiled, and how pretty and different from other women she looked
wearing the nice things Aunt Amanda used to make for her. I'd have
dreams in which I'd hear her singing and laughing and talking, and I'd
wake with the weighty feeling that I had lost my chance at a mother. It
seemed to me that if I had not been so hasty”--Paul sighed--“she and I
would have loved each other, and I could have had the joy of providing
her with many comforts.”
Silas lowered his head toward his lap. The pegs, hammer and awl, and
scraps of leather jostled together in his apron. He was weeping and
valiantly trying to hide his tears. He took off his spectacles and laid
them on the bench beside him. Only his bald pate was in view. Presently
an uncontrollable sob broke from his rugged chest, and he looked at the
young man with swimming eyes.
“You've been redeemed,” he said. “I see it--I see it! Nobody but a Son
of God could look and talk like you do. My reward has come. I don't
take it to myself--that would be a sin; but I want you to know that I've
prayed for you every day and night since you left--sometimes in much
fear an' doubt, but with a better feelin' afterward. You may not believe
it, but I am sure there are times when I actually know that things are
happenin' for good or ill to folks I love--even away off at a distance.”
“That is a scientific fact.” Paul was greatly moved by his old friend's
tone and attitude. “It is a spiritual fact according to the laws of
telepathy or thought-transference. Most scientists now believe in it.”
“You say they do?” Silas was wiping his flowing eyes and adjusting his
spectacles. “Well, many and many a time I've had proof of it. I could
tell wonders that I've experienced, but I won't now--that is, I won't
tell you of but one thing, an' that concerned you. Last Christmas Eve
me'n Cynthy had cooked a big turkey for the next day, an' made a lot o'
other preparations. We had toys an' little tricks to give this child and
that one. We had laid in things for pore neighbors to eat and wear, an'
both of us was in about as jolly a mood as ever we was in all our lives.
We set up rather late that night, an' sung an' read from the Bible, an'
prayed as usual, an' then we went to bed. But I couldn't sleep. I got
to thinkin' about you an' wonderin' whar you was at an' what sort o'
Christmas you was to have. I rolled an' tumbled. Cynthy was asleep--the
pore thing was awful tired--an' I got up an' went to the fireplace,
where I had buried some coals in the ashes to kindle from in the momin'
and bent over, still thinkin' o' you. Then all at once--I don't know how
to describe it any other way than to say it was like a big, black, soggy
weight that come down on me. It bore in from all sides, like a cloud
that you can feel, an' I could hardly breathe. Then something--it wasn't
a voice, it wasn't words spoke out of any human mouth, it was
just knowledge--knowledge plainer and deeper than words could have
expressed--knowledge from God, from space--from some'r's outside
myself--that told me you was in a sad, sad plight. I couldn't say what
it was, but it was awful. It seemed to me that you was swayin' to an'
fro between good an' evil, between light and darkness--between eternal
life an' eternal death. I never felt so awful in all my life, not even
when my own boy died. I got down on my knees there in the ashes, and I
prayed as I reckon never a man prayed before. I pleaded with the Lord
and begged 'im to help you--to drag you back from the open pit or abyss,
or whatever it was, that you was about to walk into. For awhile the
thing seemed to hang an' waver like, and then, all at once, it was
lifted, an' I knowed that you was safe. I _knowed_ it--I _knowed_ it.”
Silas ceased speaking, his mild, melting glance rested on the young
man's face.
Paul sat in grave silence for a moment, his features drawn as by painful
recollection.
“Your intuition was right,” he said. “On that night, Uncle Si, I met and
passed through the greatest crisis of my life. I was tempted to take
a step that was wrong. I won't speak of it now, but I'll tell you all
about it some day. Something stopped me. Invisible hands seemed pushed
out from the darkness to hold me back. Your prayers saved me, I am sure
of it now.”