Dan found the Doctor sitting on the porch just as he had left him. Was it only an hour before?

CHAPTER XVII.

THE TRAGEDY

"Now, for the first time, he was face to face with existing conditions.

Not the theory but the practice confronted him now. Not the traditional, but the actual. It was, indeed, a tragedy."

Dan went heavily up the path between the roses, while the Doctor observed him closely. The young minister did not sit down.

"Well?" said the Doctor.

Dan's voice was strained and unnatural. "Will you come over to my room?"

Without a word the old man followed him.

In the privacy of his little study the boy said, "Doctor, you had a reason for telling me to ask Miss Farwell if the church could do anything for--for that poor girl. And the nurse told me to ask you about the case.

I want you to tell me about her--_all_ about her. Why is she living in that wretched place with those negroes? Why did she attempt to kill herself? I want to know about this girl as you know her--as Miss Farwell knows."

The old physician made no reply but sat silent--studying the young man who paced up and down the room. When his friend did not speak Dan said again, "Doctor you must tell me! I'm not a child. What is this thing that you should so hesitate to talk to me freely? I must know and you must tell me now."

"I guess you are right, boy," returned the other slowly.

To Big Dan, born with the pa.s.sion for service in his very blood and reared amid the simple surroundings of his mountain home, where the religion and teaching of the old Shepherd had been felt for a generation, where every soul was held a neighbor--with a neighbor's right to the a.s.sistance of the community, and where no one--not even the nameless "wood's colt"--was made to suffer for the accident of birth or family, but stood and was judged upon his own life and living, the story of Grace Conner was a revelation almost too hideous in its injustice to be believed.

When the Doctor finished there was a tense silence in the minister's little study. It was as though the two men were witnessing a grim tragedy.

Trained under the influence of his parents and from them receiving the highest ideals of life and his duty to the race, Dan had been drawn irresistibly by the theoretical self-sacrificing heroism and traditionally glorious ministry of the church. Now, for the first time, he was face to face with existing conditions. Not the theory but the practice confronted him now. Not the traditional, but the actual.

It was, indeed, a tragedy.

The boy's face was drawn and white. His eyes--wide with that questioning look--burned with a light that his old friend had not seen in them before--the light of suffering--of agonizing doubt.

In his professional duties the Doctor had been forced to school himself to watch the keenest suffering unmoved, lest his emotions bias his judgment--upon the accuracy of which depended the life of his patient.

He had been taught to cause the cruelest pain with unshaken nerve by the fact that a human life under his knife depended upon the steadiness of his hand. But his sympathy had never been dulled--only controlled and hidden. So, long years of contact with what might be called a disease of society, had accustomed him to the sight of conditions--the revelation of which came with such a shock to the younger man. But the Doctor could still appreciate what the revelation meant to the boy. Knowing Dan from his childhood, familiar with his home-training, and watching his growth and development with personal, loving interest, the old physician had realized how singularly susceptible his character was to the beautiful beliefs of the church. He had foreseen, too, something of the boy's suffering when he should be brought face to face with the raw, naked truths of life. And Dan, as he sat now searching the rugged, but kindly face of his friend, realized faintly why the Doctor had shrunk from talking to him of the sick girl.

Slowly the minister rose from his chair. Aimlessly--as one in perplexing, troubled thought--he went to the window and, standing there, looked out with unseeing eyes upon the cast-iron monument on the opposite corner of the street. Then he moved restlessly to the other window, and, with eyes still unseeing, looked down into the little garden of the crippled boy--the garden with the big moss and vine-grown rock in its center. Then he went to his study table and stood idly moving the books and papers about. His eye mechanically followed the closely written lines on the sheets of paper that were lying as he had left them that morning. He started. The next moment, with quick impatient movement, he crushed the pages of the ma.n.u.script in his powerful hands and threw them into the waste basket. He faced the Doctor with a grim smile.

"My sermon on 'The Christian Ministry.'"

CHAPTER XVIII.

TO SAVE A LIFE

"It was not Hope Farwell's way to theorize about the causes of the wreck, or to speculate as to the value of inventions for making more efficient the life-saving service, when there was a definite, immediate, personal something to be done for the bit of life that so closely touched her own."

"Nurse!"

Miss Farwell turned quickly. The girl on the bed was watching her with wide wondering eyes. She forced a smile. "Yes, dear, what is it? Did you have a good sleep?"

"I was not asleep. I--oh nurse, is it true?"

Hope laid a firm, cool hand on the hot forehead, and looked kindly down into the wondering eyes.

"You were awake while the minister was here?"

"Yes I--I--heard it all. Is it--is it true?"

"Is what true, child?"

"That you care, that anyone cares?"

Miss Farwell's face shone now with that mother-look as she lowered her head until the sick girl could see straight into the deep gray eyes. The poor creature gazed hungrily--breathlessly.

"Now don't you know that I care?" whispered the nurse, and the other burst into tears, grasping the nurse's hand in both her own and with a reviving hope clinging to it convulsively.

"I'm not bad, nurse," she sobbed. "I have always been a good girl even when--when I was so hungry. But they--they talked so about me, and made people think I was bad until I was ashamed to meet anyone. Then they put me out of the church, and n.o.body would give me work in their homes, and they drove me away from every place I got, until there was no place but this, and I was so frightened here alone with all these negroes in the house. Oh nurse, I didn't want to do it--I didn't want to do it. But I thought no one cared--no one."

"They did not mean to be cruel, dear," said the nurse softly. "They did not understand. You heard the minister say they would help you now."

The girl gripped Miss Farwell's hand with a shudder.

"They put me out of the church. Don't let them come, don't! Promise me you won't let them in."

The other calmed her. "There, there dear, I will take care of you. And no one can put you away from G.o.d; you must remember that."

"Is there a G.o.d, do you think?" whispered the girl.

"Yes, yes dear. All the cruelty in the world can't take G.o.d away from us if we hold on. We all make mistakes, you know, dear--terrible mistakes sometimes. People with the kindest, truest hearts sometimes do cruel things without thinking. Why, I suppose those who crucified Jesus were kind and good in their way. Only they didn't understand what they were doing, you see. You will learn by-and-by to feel sorry for these people, just as Jesus wept over those who he knew were going to torture and kill him. But first you must get well and strong again. You will now, won't you dear?"

And the whispered answer came, "Yes, nurse. I'll try now that I know you care."

So the strong young woman with the face of the Mother Mary talked to the poor outcast girl, helping her to forget, turning her thoughts from the sadness and bitterness of her experience to the gladness and beauty of a possible future, until--when the sun lighted up the windows on the other side of the square with flaming fire, and all the sky was filled with the glory of his going--the sick girl slept, clinging still to her nurse's hand.

In the twilight Miss Farwell sat in earnest thought. Deeply religious--as all true workers must be--she sought to know her part in the coming scenes of the drama in which she found herself cast.

The young woman felt that she must leave Corinth. Her experience with Dan had made the place unbearable to her. And, since the scene that afternoon, she felt, more than ever, that she should go. She had no friends in Corinth save her patient at Judge Strong's, Mrs. Strong, the two doctors, Deborah and Denny. At home she had many friends. Then from the standpoint of her profession--and Hope Farwell loved her profession--her opportunities in the city with Dr. Miles were too great to be lightly thrown aside.

But what of the girl? This girl so helpless, so alone--who buffeted and bruised, had been tossed senseless at her very feet by the wild storms of life. Miss Farwell knew the fury of the storm; she had witnessed before the awful strength of those forces that overwhelmed Grace Conner.

She knew, too, that there were many others struggling hopelessly in the pitiless grasp of circ.u.mstances beyond their strength--single handed--to overcome.