by Pansy
CHAPTER VI.
LIFTED UP.
IT was a very quiet, cold-faced girl who presently obeyed the summonsto dinner. Had it not been for those suspiciously red eyes, and acertain pitiful droop of the eyelids, Mrs. Foster would hardly haveventured to break the casing of haughty reserve in which her youngmusic teacher had decided to wrap herself.
A rare woman was Mrs. Foster. I wish you knew her well; my pen pausesover an attempt to describe her. I believe descriptions of people neverread as the writer intended they should; and there never was a womanharder to put on paper than this same Mrs. Foster.
Ostensibly she was the principal of this little academy, which was atpresent engaged in reaping the results of years of mismanagement andthird-rate work. People shook their heads when she took the position,and said that she was foolish. She would never earn her living there inthe world; the academy at South Plains was too much run down ever torevive, and there never had been a decent school there anyway, and theydidn't believe there ever would be. And, of course, people of this minddid what they could, with their tongues and their apathy, so far asmoney and pupils were concerned, to prove the truth of their prophecies.
But Mrs. Foster, wise, sweet, patient woman that she was, quietly bidedher time, and worked her way through seemingly endless discouragements.She was after much more than bread and butter. In reality there wasnever a more persistent and patient and wise and wary fisher for_souls_ found among quiet and little known human kind than was Mrs.Foster. Had they but known it, there were communities which could haveafforded to support her for the sake of the power she would havebeen in their midst. Nay, there were fathers who could have affordedto make her independent for life, so far as the needs of this worldwere concerned, for the sake of the influence she would have exertedover their young and tempted sons and daughters. But they did not knowit, and she, being as humble as she was earnest, did not half know itherself, and expected nothing of anybody but a fair chance to earn herliving, and do all the good she could.
In point of fact, she had some difficulty in getting hold of thelittle, badly-used academy at South Plains. The people who thoughtshe was utterly foolish for attempting anything so hopeless, weresupplemented by the people who thought she could not be much, or shewould never be willing to come to South Plains Academy. So between themthey made it as hard for her as they could.
Claire Benedict did not know it until long afterwards, but the factwas, that during her father's funeral services she had been selectedas the girl whom Mrs. Foster wanted with her at South Plains. Ithappened, so we are fond of saying, that Mrs. Foster was spending afew days on business in the city that had always been Claire's home,and she saw how wonderfully large portions of that city were stirredby one death, when Sydney Benedict went to heaven. She speculatedmuch over the sort of life he must have led to have gotten the holdhe had on the people. She began to inquire about his family, abouthis children. Then she heard much of Claire, and grew interested inher, in a manner which seemed strange even to herself. And when at thefuneral she first caught a glimpse of the pale face and earnest eyesof the girl who looked only, and with a certain watchful air at hermother, as if she would shield her from every touch that she could,Mrs. Foster had murmured under her breath, "I think this is the girlI want with me." She prayed about it a good deal during the next fewdays, and grew sure of it, and waited only to make the way plain, sothat she could venture her modest little offer, and felt sure thatif the Master intended it thus, the offer would be accepted. And itwas, but in blindness, so far as Claire Benedict was concerned. I havesometimes questioned whether, if a bright angel had come down out ofheaven and stood beside Claire, and said: "The King wants you to gowith all speed to South Plains; he has special and important work foryou there; he has opened the way for you," the child would not havebeen more content, and had much less of the feeling that her work wasinterrupted. But I do not know, she might rather have said:
"Why in the world must I go to South Plains? I had work enough to do athome, and I was doing it; and now it will all come to nought becausethere is no leader! It stands to reason that I, in my poverty andobscurity, down in that out-of-the-way village, can not do as much asI, with my full purse, and leisure days, and happy surroundings, andlarge acquaintances could do here."
We love to be governed by reason, and hate to walk in the dark. Ihave always wondered what Philip said when called to leave his greatmeeting, where it seemed hardly possible to do without him, and gotoward the south on a desert road. That he went, and promptly, is, Ithink, a wonderful thing for Philip.
Well, the red eyes of the young music-teacher by no means escaped thewatchful ones of Mrs. Foster. Neither had her short, almost sharp,negative in reply to a somewhat timidly put question of a pupil,as to whether she was going out to church that evening. There werereasons why Mrs. Foster believed that it would be much better for hersad-hearted music-teacher to go to church than to remain glooming athome. There were, indeed, very special reasons on that particularevening. The Ansted girls' uncle was going to preach, she had heard,but should she go to this young Christian, of whom she as yet knew butlittle, and offer as a reason for church-going that a stranger was topreach instead of the pastor! However she managed it, Mrs. Foster wassure she would not do that. Yet it will give you a hint of the littlewoman's ways when I tell you that she was almost equally sure sheshould manage it in some way.
Half an hour before evening service there was a tap at Claire's door,and the principal entered, and came directly to the point: Would MissBenedict be so kind as to accompany Fanny and Ella Ansted to churchthat evening? Miss Parsons was suffering with sick headache, and sheherself could not leave her. There was no other available chaperonefor the young girls, who were not accustomed to going out alone in theevening, but who were unusually anxious to attend church, as theiruncle, who had been stopped over the Sabbath by an accident, was topreach.
Miss Benedict had her lips parted, ready to say that she was notgoing out, but paused in the act. What excuse could she give? No sickheadache to plead, and nobody to care for; the night was not stormy, ifit was sullen, and the church was not a great distance away. She hadbeen wont to accommodate people always, but she never felt so littlelike it as to-night. However, there stood Mrs. Foster quietly awaitingan answer, and her face seemed to express the belief that of course,the answer would be as she wished.
"Very well," came at last from the teacher's lips, and she began atonce to make ready.
"It is for this I was hired," she told herself bitterly. "I must notforget how utterly changed my life is in this respect as in all others.I am my own mistress no longer, but even in the matter of church-goingmust hold myself at the call of others."
As for the principal, as she closed the door with a gentle "Thank you,"she told herself that it was much better for the poor child to go; andthat she must see to it what she could do during the week to brightenthat room a little.
The stuffy church was the same; nay, it was more so, for every vilelamp was lighted now, and sent a sickly, smoky shadow to the ceiling,and cast as little light upon the surrounding darkness as possible.But the uncle! I do not know how to describe to you the differencebetween him and the dreary reader of the morning! It was not simplythe difference in appearance and voice, though really these weretremendous, but he had a solemn message for the people, and not onlyfor the people whose Sabbath home was in that church, but for ClaireBenedict as well.
She did not think it at first. She smiled drearily over the almostludicrous incongruity of the text as measured by the surroundings. "IfI prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy."
The folly of supposing that any sane person preferred such a desolate,modern Jerusalem as this above his chief joy! The very care with whichthe men brushed a clear spot for their hats on the dusty seats, and themanner in which the women gathered their dresses about them, to keepthem from contact with the floor, showed the place which the sanctuaryheld in their affections.
But as the preacher dev
eloped his theme, it would almost seem thathe had selected it for Claire Benedict's special benefit. It was notwhat had been done, or was being done, that he desired to impress, butrather what ought to be done.
The earthly Jerusalem, instead of being one particular church building,was any church of Christ where a Christian's lot was cast, even fora single Sabbath. He or she was bound by solemn covenant vows todo all for that church which lay in his or her power; as fully, asunreservedly, as though that church, and that alone, represented hisor her visible connection with the great Head. What solemn words werethese, breaking in on the flimsy walls of exclusiveness which thisyoung disciple had been busy all the afternoon building up about her!The church at South Plains her place of service! actually bound to itby the terms of her covenant!
Others had their message from that plainly-worded, intensely-earnestsermon. I have no doubt there was a special crumb for eachlistener--it is a peculiarity belonging to any real breaking of thebread of life--but Claire Benedict busied herself with none of them.Her roused and startled heart had enough to do to digest the solid foodthat was given as her portion.
The truth was made very plain to her that she had no more right tobuild a shell and creep into it, and declare that this church, and thischoir, and this Sunday-school, and this prayer-meeting, yes, and eventhis smoking stove and wheezing organ, were nothing to her because shewas to stay in South Plains but a few months, and her home was faraway in the city, than she had to say that she had nothing to do withthe people or the places on this earth, no sense or responsibilityconcerning them, no duties connected with them, because she was to behere only for a few years and her home was in heaven.
Gradually this keen-edged truth seemed to penetrate every fibre of herbeing. This very church, cobweb-trimmed, musty-smelling, was for thetime being her individual working ground, to be preferred above herchief joy! Nay, the very red curtain that swayed back and forth, blownby the north wind which found its way through a hole in the window, andwhich she _hated_, became a faded bit of individual property for whichshe was, in a sense, responsible.
She walked home almost in silence. The girls about her chattered ofthe sermon; pronounced it splendid, and admitted that they would justa little rather hear Uncle Eben preach than anybody else, and it wasno wonder that his people almost worshiped him, and had raised hissalary only last month. Claire listened, or appeared to, and answereddirectly put questions with some show of knowledge as to what was beingdiscussed; but for herself, Dr. Ansted had gone out of her thoughts.She liked his voice, and his manner, and his elocution, but the forcebehind all these had put them all aside, and the words which repeatedthemselves to her soul were these: "If I prefer not Jerusalem above mychief joy!" What then? Why, then I am false to my covenant vows, andthe possibilities are that I am none of His.
Mrs. Foster was in the hall when the party from the church arrived.Wide open as to eyes and mental vision, quiet as to voice and manner,she had staid at home and ministered to the victim of sick headache.She had been tender and low-voiced, and deft-handed, and untiring; butduring the lulls when there had been comparative quiet, she had bowedher head and prayed that the sad-hearted young music-teacher might meetChrist in his temple that evening, and come home up-lifted. She did notknow how it was to be done.
She knew nothing about the Ansted uncle save that he was an ambassadorof Christ, and she knew that the Lord _could_ use the shabbily-dressedambassador of the morning as well as he; she did not rely on theinstruments, except as they lay in the hand of God. She did not askfor any special thought to be given to Claire Benedict; faith leftthat, too, in the hand of the Lord. She only asked that she shouldbe ministered unto, and strengthened for the work, whatever it wasthat he desired of her. And she needed not to question, to discoverthat her prayer, while she had yet been speaking, was answered. Themusic-teacher did not bring home the same thoughts that she had takenaway with her.
She went swiftly to her room. The fire had been remembered, and wasburning brightly.
The first thing she did was to feed its glowing coals with the letterthat had been commenced to mamma and Dora during the afternoon. Notthat there had been anything in it about her heaped-up sorrows, or hermiserable surroundings, or her gloomy resolves, but in the light of thepresent revelation she did not like the tone of it.
She went to her knees, presently, but it would have been noticeablethere that she said almost nothing about resolves, or failures. Heruttered words were brief; were, indeed, only these: "Dear Christ, itis true I needed less of self and more of thee. Myself has failed meutterly; Jesus, I come to thee."
