V.
"MICHAEL," said Orville, after a long and tiresome climb over a steep part of the Road, "these rocks are sharp and treacherous, and I have toiled hard and have made but very little progress."
"I know, master," said Michael, "but these rocks are the little faults of our lives. Such rocks cover the mountain at this spot and are constantly growing more numerous, yet one meets only one's own. The Plain is not far away now. We are just reaching it, and these stones are the only way to it."
"What Plain is it, Michael?" asked Orville.
"It is called, master," said Michael, "The Plain of Sinful Things. It is between us and the foot of the Cross."
"Is it hard to pass over, Michael?" again asked Orville.
"It is very hard to most men, sir," said Michael. "No one knows how hard who has not been on it; and yet when one has been over, one remembers nothing, for all is forgotten when The Flaming Cross is reached."
They stood now at the top of the stones, and on the edge of the vast Plain, which lay white and scorching before them. Multitudes, as far as the eye could see, were upon it. They struggled painfully along; but none stopped to rest, for all faces were turned to The Flaming Cross.
Michael took but one step and a great change came over him. Orville looked at him again and again, but Michael did not seem to notice the change in himself. His face shone with a marvelous beauty. His garments became robes of brilliant white. About his head a light played, the like of which Orville had never seen. It was more wondrous than dreams of Paradise. His bleeding feet were healed and shone like his visage. Orville thought that he heard sweet voices about Michael, but voices which spoke to Michael only.
"Michael, my brother," he said, "what is this; tell me?" and Orville's voice sounded soft, as if he were praying. "Michael, who are you?"
But Michael only smiled kindly and humbly. "I am none other than your servant, sir," he answered. "He who serves, reigns; for his glory is in the service. I will be with you to the foot of the Cross. In life you were a good master. You will need me until you reach your own Master there." Michael pointed to where the Cross shone out over the blistering Plain.
Then they went on, but the heat penetrated to Orville's very marrow and he seemed to faint under it, yet he always kept struggling forward. The burning sands cooked his bleeding feet, but the anguish did not halt him. Torrents of tears and sweat rolled down from him, but his hunger for the Cross made him forget. To his pain-racked body it felt as if the Cross gave out the great heat, but Orville was more grateful than ever for it.
"Does this heat really come from the Cross, Michael?" he asked.
"Yes, from the Cross, master," said Michael, "for this is The Plain of Sinful Things, and the Cross is the Sun of Justice."
Then like a flash Orville began to understand, even as Michael had understood from the beginning. Michael saw the change in him. His face became more radiant before he spoke.
"Master," he said, "my service is almost over. It was my prayer constantly that I could return your goodness to me and mine; but on earth you were rich and I was poor. Here, master, in The Land of the Dead, I am rich and you are poor. God let me make my pilgrimage with you. The child you buried when I had nothing, bore you over The Chasm of Neglected Duties, where your hardest lot was to be found. You did not even see another Chasm, which almost all meet, The Chasm of Forgotten Things, for the prayers gathered in a little chapel which you builded in a wilderness, a charity you forgot the day after you did it, filled up the Chasm before you came to it. Here on The Plain of Sinful Things we would naturally separate, for I had never wilfully sinned against God. But you needed me, and He let me stay. Master, your burden has fallen from you."
It was true. Orville was standing erect, with his eyes looking straight at The Flaming Cross, which did not blind him. His burden had vanished, and his face had almost the radiance of Michael's.
"The Cross is near you now, master. Look, It comes toward you. Your pilgrimage is ending."
Orville could see It coming, gently and slowly. The Plain was now all behind him, and yet it seemed as if he had scarcely gone over more than a few yards of it. The harping of a thousand harps was not sweet enough for the music that filled the air. Like the falling of many waters in the distance came the promise of coolness to Orville's parched throat and his burning lips. His breast heaved and he felt his heart, full of Love, break in his bosom; but with it broke the bond of Sin, and he knew that he was dead, indeed, to earth, as out from the stainéd cover came his purified soul.
The Cross was close to him now. With his new spiritual vision he saw that in form it was One like himself, but One with eyes that were soft and mild and full of tenderness, with arms outstretched and nail-prints like glittering gems upon them, with a wounded side and out from it a flood pouring which cooled the parched sands, so that from them the flowers sprang up, full panoplied in color, form and beauty, and sweetly smelling. Around The Flaming Cross fluttered countless wings, and childish voices made melody, soft and harmonious beyond all compare. All else that Orville ever knew vanished before the glance of the Beloved; faces and forms dearest and nearest, old haunts and older affections, all were melted into this One Great Love that is Eternal. The outstretched arms were wrapped around them. The blood from the wounded side washed all their pains from them. On their foreheads fell the Kiss of Peace, and Orville and Michael had come home.
THE VICAR-GENERAL
THE Vicar-General was dead. With his long, white hair smoothed back, he lay upon a silk pillow, his hands clasped over a chalice upon his breast. He was clad in priestly vestments; and he looked, as he lay in his coffin before the great altar with the candles burning on it, as if he were just ready to arise and begin a new "Introibo" in Heaven. The bells of the church wherein the Vicar-General lay asleep had called his people all the morning in a sad and solemn tolling. The people had come, as sad and solemn as the bells. They were gathered about the bier of their pastor. Priests from far and near had chanted the Office of the Dead; the Requiem Mass was over, and the venerable chief of the diocese, the Bishop himself, stood in cope and mitre, to give the last Absolution.
"The Bishop himself stood in cope and mitre to give the last absolution."
The Bishop had loved the Vicar-General—had loved him as a brother. For was it not the Vicar-General who had bidden His Lordship welcome, when he came from his distant parish to take up the cares of a diocese. With all the timidity of a stranger, the Bishop had feared; but the Vicar-General guided his steps safely and well. Now the Bishop, gazing at the white, venerable face, remembered—and wept. In the midst of the Absolution, his voice broke. Priests bit their lips, as their eyes filled with hot tears; but the Sisters who taught in the parochial school and their little charges, did not attempt to keep back their sobs. For others than the Bishop loved the Vicar-General.
There was one standing by the coffin, whom neither the Bishop, priests nor people saw. It was the Vicar-General, himself. He still wore his priestly vestments. Was he not a priest forever? His arms were folded and his face was troubled. He knew every one present; but none of them knew that he was so near. He scanned the lines of the Bishop's face and seemed to wonder at his tears. He was quite unmoved by the sorrow around him, did not seem to care at all. Yet in life the Vicar-General had cared much about the feelings of others toward him. His eyes wandered over the great congregation and rested on the children, but without tenderness in them. This, too, was very unlike the Vicar-General. Then the eyes came back and rested on the priestly form in the coffin, and the trouble of them increased.
The Absolution was over and the coffin was closed when the Vicar-General looked up again, and knew that Another Unseen besides himself was present. The Other was looking over the coffin at the Vicar-General; looking steadily, with eyes that searched down deep and with lashes that were very, very still. He wore a long robe of some texture the Vicar-General had never seen in life. It shimmered like silk, shone like gold, and sparkled as if dusted with tiny diamonds. The hair of the Other was long, and fell, bright and beautiful, over his shoulders. His face seemed to shine out of it, like a jewel in a gold setting. His limbs seemed strong and manly in spite of his beardless face. The Vicar-General noticed what seemed like wings behind him; but they were not wings, only something which gave the impression of them. The Vicar-General could not remove his eyes from the Other. Gradually he knew that he was gazing at an Angel, and an Angel who had intimate relation to himself.
The body was borne out of the church. The Angel moved to follow, and the Vicar-General knew that he also had to go. The day was perfect, for it was in the full glory of the summer; but the Vicar-General noticed little of either the day or the gathering. The Angel did not speak, but his eyes said "come": and so the Vicar-General followed—whither, he did not know.
The Vicar-General was not sure that it was even a place to which the Angel led him; but he felt with increasing trouble that he was to be the center of some momentous event. There were people arriving, most of whom the Vicar-General knew—men and women of his flock, to whom he had ministered and many of whom he had seen die. They all smiled at the Vicar-General as they passed, and ranged themselves on one side. The Silent Angel stood very close to the Vicar-General. As the people came near, the priest felt his vestments grow light upon him, as if they were lifting him in the air. They shone very brightly, too, and took on a new beauty. The Vicar-General felt glad that he was wearing them.
The Silent Angel looked at him, but spoke not a word; yet the Vicar-General understood at once, knew that he was to answer at a stern trial, and that these were his witnesses—the souls of the people to whom he ministered, to whom he had broken the Bread of Life. How many there were! They gladdened the Vicar-General's heart. There were his converts, the children he had baptized, his penitents, the pure virgins whose vows he had consecrated to God, the youths whom his example had won to the altar. They were all there. The Vicar-General counted them, and he could not think of a single one missing.
On the other side, witnesses began to arrive and the Vicar-General's look of trouble returned. He felt his priestly vestments becoming heavy. Especially did he feel the weight of the amice, which was like a heavy iron helmet crushed down over his shoulders. The cincture was binding him very tightly. He felt that he could scarcely move for it. The maniple rendered his left arm almost powerless. The stole was pulling at him, and the weight of the chasuble made him very faint.
He knew some of the witnesses, but only a few. He had seen these few before. They were his neglected spiritual children. He remembered each and every case. One was a missed sick-call: his had been the fault. Another was a man driven from the church by a harsh word spoken in anger. The Vicar-General remembered the day when he referred to this man in his sermon and saw him arise in his pew and leave. He did not return. Another was a priest—his own assistant. The Vicar-General had no patience with his weaknesses. From disgust at them his feelings had turned to rancor against the man—and the assistant was lost. The Vicar-General trembled; for these things he had passed by as either justified by reason of the severity necessary to his office, or as wiped out by his virtues—and he had many virtues.
The Vicar-General's eyes sought those of the Silent Angel, and he lost some of his fear, while the weight of his vestments became a little lighter. But the Silent Angel's gaze caused the Vicar-General again to look at the witnesses. Those against him were increasing. The faces of the new-comers he did not know. The Vicar-General felt like protesting that there must be some mistake, for the new-comers were red men, brown men, yellow men and black men, besides white men whose faces were altogether strange. He was sure none of these had ever been in his parish. The new-comers were dressed in the garbs of every nation under the sun. They all alike looked very sternly at the Vicar-General, so that he could not bear their glances. Still he could not understand how he had ever offended against them, nor could he surmise why they should be witnesses to his hurt.
The Silent Angel still stood beside the Vicar-General; but the troubled soul of the priest could find no enlightenment in his eyes. All the while witnesses kept arriving and the multitude of them filled him with a great terror.
At last he saw a face amongst the strangers which he thought familiar, and he began to understand. It was the face of a priest he had known, who had been in the same diocese, somewhat under the Vicar-General's authority. On earth this priest had been one of the quiet kind, without ambition except to serve in a very humble way. He had always been in a parish so poor and small, that the priest himself had in his manner, his bearing, even his clothes, reflected its humility and its poverty. The Vicar-General remembered that the priest had once come to him as a matter of conscience to say that, while he was not complaining, nevertheless he really needed help and counsel. He said that his scattered flock was being lost for the want of things which could not be supplied out of its poverty. He told the Vicar-General what was needed. The Vicar-General remembered that he had agreed with him; but had informed him very gently that it was the policy of the diocese to let each parish maintain and support itself. The Vicar-General had felt justified in refusing his aid, especially since, at that time, he was collecting for a new organ for his own church, one with three banks of keys—the old one had but two. The Vicar-General now knew that his slight feeling of worry at the time was not groundless; but while then he had felt vaguely that he was wrong in his position, now he was certain of error. His eyes sought all through his own witnesses, but they found no likelihood of a testimony in his favor based on the purchase of that grand organ. Then it all came to the Vicar-General, from the eyes of the Silent Angel, that he had received on earth all the reward that was due to him for it.
The presence of the men of all colors and of strange garbs was still a mystery to the Vicar-General; but at last he saw among them a bent old priest with a long beard and a crucifix in his girdle. At once the Vicar-General recognized him and his heart sank. Too well he remembered the poor missionary who had begged for assistance: money, a letter, a recommendation—anything; and had faced the inflexible official for half an hour during his pleading. The Vicar-General had felt at that time, as he felt when his poor diocesan brother had come to him, that there was so much to be done at home, absolutely nothing could be sent out. There was the Orphanage which the Bishop was building and they were just beginning to gather funds for a new Cathedral. The Bishop had acquiesced in the Vicar-General's ruling. The diocese had flourished and had grown strong. The Vicar-General had always been its pride. He was humbled now under the gaze of the Silent Angel, whose eyes told him wherein he had been at fault. He knew that the fault was not in the building of the great and beautiful things, which of themselves were good because they were for God's glory; but rather was it in this: that he had shut out of his heart, for their sakes, the cry of affliction and the call of pleading voices from the near and far begging but for the crumbs which meant to them Faith here and Life hereafter.
Now, O God! there were the red men, the brown men, the yellow men and the black men; not to speak of these white men whose faces were so strange; and they were going to say something—something against him. He could guess—could well guess what it was they would say. The Vicar-General knew that he had been wrong, and that his wrong had come into Eternity. He doubted if it ever could be made right, for he knew now the value of a soul even in a black body. He knew it, but was it too late? His vestments were as heavy as lead.
Trembling in every limb, the Vicar-General looked for his Judge; but he could not see Him. He only felt His Presence. The Silent Angel had a book in his hand. The Vicar-General could read its title. There was a chalice on the cover, as if it spoke of priests, and under it he read:
THE LAW BY WHICH THEY SHALL BE JUDGED.
The Silent Angel opened the book and the Vicar-General saw that it had but one page. Shining out from the page he read:
"THOU ART A PRIEST FOREVER."
And under it:
"GO YE, THEREFORE, AND TEACH ALL NATIONS."
Sorrow was over the soul of the priest. Only the hope in the eyes of the Silent Angel gave him hope, as he bowed his head before the judgment.
THE RESURRECTION OF ALTA
FATHER BROIDY rushed down the stone steps and ran toward the Bishop's carriage which had just stopped at the curb. He flung open the door before the driver could alight, kissed the ring on the hand extended him, helped its owner out and with a beaming face led the Bishop to the pretty and comfortable rectory.
"Welcome! welcome to Alta, Bishop," he said as they entered the house, "and sure the whole Deanery is here to back it up."
The Bishop smiled as the clergy trooped down the stairs echoing the greeting. The Bishop knew them all, and he was happy, for well was he aware that every man meant what he said. No one really ever admired the Bishop, but all loved him, and each had a private reason of his own for it that he never confided to anyone save his nearest crony. They were all here now to witness the resurrection of Alta—the poorest parish in a not too rich Diocese, hopeless three years ago, but now—well, there it is across the lot, that symphony in stone, every line of its chaste gothic a "Te Deum" that even an agnostic could understand and appreciate; every bit of carving the paragraph of a sermon that passers-by, perforce, must hear. To-day it is to be consecrated, the cap-stone is to be set on Father Broidy's Arch of Triumph and the real life of Alta parish to begin.
"I thought you had but sixteen families here," said the Bishop as he watched the crowd stream into the church.
"There were but eighteen, Bishop," the young priest answered, with a happy smile that had considerable self-satisfaction in it. "There are seventy-five now."
"And how did it come about, my lad?" questioned the Bishop.
"Mostly through my mission bringing back some of the 'ought-to-be's,' but I suppose principally because my friend McDermott opened his factory to Catholics. You know, Bishop, that though he was born one of us he had somehow acquired a bitter hatred of the Church, and he never employed Catholics until I brought him around."
There was a shadow of a smile that had meaning to it on the Bishop's face, as he patted the ardent young pastor on the arm, and said:
"Well, God bless him! God bless him! but I suppose we must begin to vest now. Is it not near ten o'clock?"
Father Broidy turned with a little shade of disappointment on his face to the work of preparation, and soon had the procession started toward the church.
Shall I describe the beauty of it all?—the lights and flowers, the swinging censers, with the glory of the chant and the wealth of mystic symbolism which followed the passing of that solemn procession into the sanctuary? That could best be imagined, like the feeling in the heart of the young pastor who adored every line of the building. He had watched the laying of each stone, and could almost count the chips that had jumped from every chisel. There had never been so beautiful a day to him, and never such a ceremony but one—three years ago in the Seminary chapel. He almost forgot it in the glory of the present. Dear me, how well Kaiser did preach! He always knew it, did Father Broidy, that young Kaiser had it in him. He did not envy him a bit of the congratulations. They were a part of Father Broidy's triumph, too. It was small wonder that the Dean whispered to the Bishop on the way back to the rectory:
"You will have to put Broidy at the top of the list now. He has surely won his spurs to-day."
But again the shadow of the meaning smile was on the Bishop's face, and he said nothing; so the Dean looked wise and mysterious as he slapped the young pastor on the back and said:
"Proficiat, God bless you! You have done well, and I am proud of you, but wait and listen." Then his voice dropped to a whisper. "I was talking to the Bishop about you."
The dinner? Well, Anne excelled herself. Is not that enough to say? But perhaps you have never tasted Anne's cooking? Then you surely have heard of it, for all the Diocese knows about it, and everyone said that Broidy was in his usual good luck when Anne left the Dean's and went to keep house for the priest at Alta.
Story followed story, as dish followed dish, and a chance to rub up the wit that had been growing rusty in the country missions for months never passed by unnoticed.
The Dean was toastmaster.
"Right Reverend Bishop and Reverend Fathers," he began, when he had enforced silence with the handle of his fork, "it is my pleasure and pride to be here to-day. Three years ago a young priest was sent to one of the most miserably poor places in the Diocese. What he found you all know. The sorrowful history of the decline of Alta was never a secret record. Eighteen careless families left. Bigotry rampant. Factories closed to Catholics. Church dilapidated. Only the vestry for a dwelling place. That was three years ago, and look around you to-day. See the church, house and school, and built out of what? That is Father Broidy's work and Father Broidy's triumph, but we are glad of it. No man has made such a record in our Diocese before. What have we others done by the side of his extraordinary effort? Yet we are not jealous. We know well the good qualities of soul and body in our young friend, and God bless him. We are pleased to be with him, though completely outclassed. We rejoice in the resurrection of Alta. Let me now call upon our beloved Bishop, whose presence among us is always a joy."
When the applause subsided the Bishop arose, and for an instant stood again with that meaning smile just lighting his face. For that instant he did not utter a word. When he did speak there was a quiver in his voice that age had never planted and in spite of the jokes which had preceded and the laughter which he had led, it sounded like a forerunner of tears. He had never been called eloquent, this kindly-faced and snow-crowned old man, but when he spoke it was always with a gentle dignity, and a depth of sympathy and feeling that compelled attention.
"It is a great satisfaction, my dear Fathers," he began, "to find so many of you here to rejoice with our young friend and his devoted people, and to thus encourage the growth of a priestly life which he has so well begun in Alta. No one glories in his success more than I. No one more warmly than I, his Bishop, tenders congratulations. This is truly a day the Lord has made—this day in Alta. It is a day of joy and gladness for priest and people. Will you pardon an old man if he stems the tide of mirth for an instant? He could not hope to stem it for long. On such an occasion as this it would burst the barriers, leaving what he would show you once more submerged beneath rippling waters and silver-tipped waves of laughter. It seems wrong even to think of the depths where lie the bodies of the dead and the hulks of the wrecked. But the bottom always has its treasure as well as its tragedy. There are both a tragedy and a treasure in the story I will tell you to-day."
"You remember Father Belmond, the first pastor of Alta? Yes! Then let me tell you a story that your generous priestly souls will treasure as it deserves."
The table was strangely silent. Not one of the guests had ever before known the depth of sympathy in the old Bishop till now. Every chord in the nature of each man vibrated to the touch of his words.
"I asked him how he lived on the pittance he had received."
"It was ten years ago," went on the Bishop—"ah, how years fly fast to the old!—a friend of college days, a bishop in an Eastern State, wrote me a long letter concerning a young convert he had just ordained. He was a lad of great talents, brilliant and handsome, the son of wealthy parents, who, however, now cast him off, giving him to understand that he would receive nothing from them. The young man was filled with zeal, and he begged the bishop to give him to some missionary diocese wherein he could work in obscurity for the greater glory of God. He was so useful and so brilliant a man that the bishop desired to attach him to his own household and was loath to lose him, but the priest begged hard and was persistent; so the bishop asked me to take him for a few years and give him actual contact with the hardships of life in a pioneer state. Soon, he thought, the young man would be willing to return to his larger field. The bishop, in other words, wanted to test him. I sadly needed priests, so when he came with the oil still wet on his hands, I gave him a place—the worst I had—I gave him Alta. Some of you older men know what it was then. The story of Alta is full of sorrow. I told it to him, but he thanked me and went to his charge. I expected to see him within a week, but I did not see him for a year. Then I sent for him, and with his annual report in my hand I asked him how he lived on the pittance which he had received. He said that it took very little when one was careful and that he lived well enough—but his coat was threadbare and his shoes were sadly patched. There was a brightness in his eyes too, and a flush on his cheek that I did not quite like. I asked him of his work and he told me that he was hopeful—told me of the little repairs he had made, of a soul won back, but in the conversation I actually stole the sad tale of his poverty from him. Yet he made no complaint and went back cheerfully to Alta.
"The next month he came again, but this time he told me of the dire need of aid, not for himself, but for his church. The people, he said, were poor pioneers, and in the comfortless and ugly old church they were losing their grip on religion. The young people were falling away very fast. All around were well ordered and beautiful sectarian churches. He could see the effect, not visible to less interested eyes but very plain to his. He feared that another generation would be lost and he asked me if there was any possibility of securing temporary aid such as the sects had for their building work. I had to tell him that nothing could be done. I told him of the poverty of my own Diocese, and that, while his was a poor place, there were others approaching it. In my heart I knew there was something sadly lacking in our national work for the Church, but I could do nothing myself. He wrote to his own State for help, but the letters were unanswered. Except for the few stipends I could give him and which he devoted to his work, it was impossible to do anything. He was brave and never faltered though the eyes in him shone brighter and in places his coat was worn through. A few days later I received a letter from his bishop asking how he did and saying that he would appoint him to an excellent parish if he would return home willingly. I sent the letter to Alta with a little note of my own, congratulating him on his changed condition. He returned the letter to me with a few lines saying: 'I can not go. If I desert my people here it would be a sin. There are plenty at home for the rich places but you have no one to send here. Please ask the bishop to let me stay. I think it is God's will.' The day I received that letter I heard one of my priests at the Cathedral say: 'How seedy that young Belmond looks! for an Eastern man he is positively sloppy in his dress. He ought to brace up and think of the dignity of his calling. Surely such a man is not calculated to impress himself upon our separated brethren.' And another chimed in: 'I wonder why he left his own diocese?'"
"I heard no more for two years except for the annual report, and now and then a request for a dispensation. I did hear that he was teaching the few children of the parish himself, and every little while I saw an article in some of the papers, unsigned but suspiciously like his style, and I suspected that he was earning a little money with his pen.
"One winter night, returning alone from a visitation of Vinta, the fast train was stalled by a blizzard at the Alta station. I went out on the platform to secure a breath of fresh air, but I had scarcely closed the door when a boy rushed up to me and asked if I were a Catholic priest. When I nodded he said: 'We have been trying to get a priest all day, but the wires are down in the storm. Father Belmond is sick and the doctor says he will die. He told me to look through every train that came in. He was sure I would find some one.' Reaching at once for my grip and coat I rushed to the home of the Pastor. The home was the lean-to vestry of the old log church. In one corner Father Belmond lived; another was given over to the vestments and linens. Everything was spotlessly clean. On a poor bed the priest was tossing, moaning and delirious. Only the boy had attended him in his sickness until the noon of that day when two good old women heard of his condition and came. One of them was at his bedside when I entered. When she saw my collar she lifted her hands in that peculiarly Hibernian gesture that means so much, and said:
"'Sure, God sent you here this night. He has been waiting since noon to die.'
"The sick priest opened his eyes that now had the brightness of death in them and appeared to look through me. He seemed to be very far away. But slowly the eyes told me that he was coming back—back from the shadows; then at last he spoke:
"'You, Bishop? Thank God!'"
"He made his simple confession. I anointed him and brought him Viaticum from the tabernacle in the church. Then the eyes went wild again, and I saw when they opened and looked at me that he had already turned around, and was again walking through the shadows of the Great Valley that ends the Long Road.
"Then I learned—old priest and bishop as I was—I learned my lesson."
"Through the night we three, the old woman, the boy and myself, watched him and listened to his wanderings. Then I learned—old priest and bishop as I was—I learned my lesson. The lips that never spoke a complaint were moved, but not by his will, to go over the story of two terrible years. It was a sad story. It began with his great zeal. He wanted to do so much, but the black discouragement of everything slowly killed his hopes. He saw the Faith going from his people. He saw that they were ceasing to care. The town was then, as it is to-day, McDermott's town, but McDermott had fallen away when his riches came, and some terrible event, a quarrel with a former priest who had attended Alta from a distant point, had left McDermott bitter. He practically drove the pastor from his door. He closed his factory to the priest's people and one by one they left. Only eighteen families stayed. The dying priest counted them over in his dreams, and sobbed as he told of the others who had gone. Then the bigotry that McDermott's faith had kept concealed broke out under the encouragement of McDermott's infidelity. The boys of the town flung insults at the priest as he passed. The people gave little, and that grudgingly. I could almost feel his pain as he told in his delirium how, day after day, he had dragged his frail body to church and on the round of duty. But every now and then, as if the words came naturally to bear him up, he would say:
"'It's for God's sake. I am nothing. It will all come in His own good time.'
"Then I knew the spirit that kept him to his work. He went over his visit to me. How he had hoped, and then how his hopes were dashed to the ground. Oh, dear Lord, had I known what it all meant to that sensitive, saintly nature, I would have sold my ring and cross to give him what he needed. But my words seemed to have broken him and he came home to die. The night of his return he spent before the altar in his log church, and, Saints of Heaven, how he prayed! When I heard his poor, dry lips whisper over the prayer once more I bowed my head on the coverlet and cried as only a child can cry—and I was only a child at that minute in spite of my white hair and wrinkles. He had offered a supreme sacrifice—his life. I gleaned from his prayers that his parents had done him the one favor of keeping up his insurance and that he had made it over to his church. So he wanted to die at his post and piteously begged God to take him. For his death he knew would give Alta a church. He seemed penetrated with the idea that alive he was useless, but that his death meant the resurrection of Alta. When I heard that same expression used so often to-day I lived over again the whole story of that night in the little vestry. All this time he had been picking the coverlet, and his hands seemed, during the pauses, to be holding the paten as if he were gathering up the minute particles from the corporal. At last his hand found mine. He clung to it, and just an instant his eyes looked at me with reason in them. He smiled, and murmured, 'It is all right, now, Bishop.' I heard a sob back of me where the boy stood, and the old woman was praying. He was trying to speak again, and I caught the words, 'God's sake—I am nothing—His good time.' Then he was still, just as the morning sun broke through the windows.
"That minute, Reverend Fathers, began the resurrection of Alta. The old woman told me how it happened. He was twenty-five miles away attending one of his missions when the blizzard was at its height. McDermott fell sick and a telegram was sent for the priest—the last message before the wires came down. Father Belmond started to drive through the storm back to Alta. He succeeded in reaching McDermott's bedside and gave him the last Sacraments. He did not break down himself until he returned to the vestry, but for twenty-four hours he tossed in fever before they found him.
"McDermott grew better. He sent for me when he heard I was in town. The first question he asked was: 'Is he dead?' I told McDermott the story just as I am telling you. 'God forgive me,' said the sick man, 'that priest died for me. When he came here I ordered him out of my office, yet when they told him I was sick he drove through the storm for my sake. He believed in the worth of a soul, and he himself was the noblest soul that Alta ever had.'
"I said nothing. Somebody better than a mere bishop was talking to McDermott, and I, His minister, was silent in His presence. 'Bishop,' said McDermott, after long thought, 'I never really believed until now; I'm sorry that it took a man's life to bring back the Faith of my fathers. Send us a priest to Alta—one who can do things: one after the stamp of the saint in the vestry. I'll be his friend and together we will carry on the work he began. I'll see him through if God spares me.'
"Dear Fathers, it is needless to say what I did.
"Father Broidy, on this happy day I have not re-echoed the praises that have been showered upon you as much as perhaps I might have done, because I reserved for you a praise that is higher than all of them. I believed when I sent you here that you were of his stamp. You have done your duty and you have done it well. I am not ungrateful and I shall not forget. But your best praise from me is, that I firmly believe that you, under like circumstances, would also have willingly given your life for the resurrection of Alta."
THE MAN WITH A DEAD SOUL
YEARS ago there lived a man whose soul had died; and died as only a soul may die, by the man's own deed. His body lived still for debauchery, his mind lived still to ponder on evil, but his soul was stifled in a flood of sin. So the man lived his life with a dead soul.
When the soul died the man's dreams changed. The fairy children of his youth came no more to play with him and his visions were of lands bare and desolate, with great rocks instead of green trees; and sandy, dry and arid plains instead of bright grass and flowers. But out of the rocks shone fiery veins of virgin gold and the pitiless sun that dried the plain reflected countless smaller suns of untouched diamonds. Hither in dreams came often the man with the dead soul.
The years passed and the man realized with his mortal eyes the full of his dreams and touched mortal foot to the desert that now was all his own. Greedily he picked and dug till his weary body cried "enough." Then only he left, when his strength could dig no more. So he began to live more evilly because of his new power of wealth; and his soul was farther than ever from resurrection.
Now it happened that the man with the dead soul soon found that he had become a leper because of his sins, and so with all his gains was driven from among men. He went back to the desert and watched the gold veins in the rocks and the shining of the diamonds, all the time hoping for more strength to dig. But while waiting, his musings turned to hateful thoughts of all his kindred, and abhorrence of all good. So he said: "I have been driven from among men because they love virtue, henceforth I will hate it; because they loved God, henceforth I will love only evil; because they use their belongings to work mercy, henceforth I will use mine to inflict revenge. I may not go to men, so I will go to those who do men harm."
So the man with the dead soul went to live among the beasts. He dwelt for a long time in the forests and the most savage of the brutes were his friends. One day he saw a hermit at the door of his cave. "How livest thou here?" he asked.
"From the offerings of the raven who brings me bread and the wild bees who give it sweetness and the great beasts who clothe me," answered the hermit. Then the man with the dead soul left the beasts because they did good and were merciful.
Out of the forest the North Wind met the man and tossed him upon its wings and buffeted him and chilled him to the marrow. In vain he asked for mercy, the North Wind would give none. Half frozen and sore with blows the man gasped—
"'Tis well! I will dwell with thee for thou givest nothing but evil." So he went to dwell in the cave of the North Wind and the chill of the pitiless cold was good to him on account of his dead soul.
One day he saw the clouds coming, headed for his own desert, and the North Wind went to meet them and a mighty battle took place in the air; but the North Wind was the victor. White on the ground where the chill had flung them lay the clouds in snow crystals; and the man laughed his joy at the sight of the ruin—for he knew that the rain-clouds would have greened his desert and made it beautiful. But he heard the men who cultivated the land on which the snow had fallen bless the North Wind that it had given their crops protection and promised plenty to the fields of wheat. Then the man with the dead soul cursed the North Wind and went to dwell in the ocean.
The waters bade him stay and daily he saw their work of evil. Down in the depths dead men's bones whitened beside the wealth of treasure the ocean had claimed. He walked along the bottom for years exulting in destruction before he came to the surface to watch the storms and laugh at the big waves eating the great ships. But there was only a gentle breeze blowing that day, and he saw great vessels laden with treasure and wealth passing from nation to nation. He saw the dolphins play over the bosom of the waters and the sea-gulls happy to ride the waves. Then afar off he saw the bright columns where all day long the sun kept working, drawing moisture to the sky from the waters to spread it, even over the man's barren desert, to make it bloom.
Cursing again, the man with the dead soul left the waters and buried himself beneath the earth, to hide in dark caves where neither light nor sound could go. But a glowworm that lived in the cave made it all too bright. By its lantern he saw the hidden mysterious forces working. Through tiny paths warmth and nourishment ran to be near the surface that baby seeds might germinate, live and flourish for man's benefit. He saw great forests draw their strength from the very Earth into which he had burrowed, to fall again in death into its kindly arms and so to change into carbon and remain stored away for man's future comfort. Then the man with the dead soul could live in earth no longer, and neither could he go to the beasts, to the air, or to the waters.
"I will return to my desert," he said, "for there is more of evil in the gold and diamonds than anywhere else."
So he went back where the gold still shone from the veins in the cliffs and the diamonds twinkled in the pitiless sun rays. But a throne had been raised on a hillock and a king sat thereon with a crown on his head and a trident in his hand.
"Who art thou who invadest my desert?" asked the man.
"Thy master," answered the king.
"And who is my master?" asked the man.
"The spirit of evil."
"Then would I dwell with thee," said the man.
"Thou hast served me well and thou art welcome," said the king. "Behold!"
He stretched forth the trident and demons peopled the desert.
"These are thy companions. Thou shalt dwell with them, and without torture, unless thy evil deeds be turned to good to torture me. Know that thou hast passed from mortal life, and thy deeds of evil have brought thee my favor. If thou hast been successful in reaping the evil thou has sown, thou shalt be my friend. But know that for every good thing that comes from it, thou shalt be tortured with whips of scorpions."
So the man with the dead soul walked through rows of demons with whips in their hands; but no arm was raised to strike, for he had sown his evil well and the king did not frown on him.
Then one day a single whip of scorpions fell upon his shoulders. Pain-racked he looked at the king and saw that his face was twisted with agony: then he knew that somewhere an evil deed of his own had been turned to good. And even while he looked the whips began to fall mercilessly from all sides and the king, frantic with agony, cried out:
"Tear aside the veil. Let him see."
In an instant the whips ceased to fall and the man with the dead soul saw all the Earth before him—and understood. A generation had passed since he had gone, but his keen eye sought and found his wealth. The finger of God had touched it and behold good had sprung from it everywhere. It was building temples to the mighty God where the poor could worship; and the hated Cross met his eye wherever he looked, dazzling his vision and blinding him with its light. Wherever the Finger of God glided the good came forth; the hungry were nourished, the naked clothed, the frozen warmed and the truth preached. Before him was the good growing from his impotent evil every moment and multiplying as it grew; and behind him he heard the howls of the tortured demons and the impatient hisses of the whips that hungered for his back.
Shuddering he closed his eyes, but a voice ringing on the air made him open them again. The voice was strangely like his own, yet purified and sweet with sincerity and goodness. It was singing the "Miserere," and the words beat him backward to the demons as they arose.
He caught a glimpse of the singer, a young man clad in a brown habit of penance with the cord of purity girt about him. His eyes looked once into the eyes of the man with the dead soul. They were the eyes of the one to whom he had left his legacy of hate and wealth and evil—his own and his only son.
Shuddering, the man with the dead soul awoke from his dream, and behold, he was lying in the desert where the gold tempted him from out of the great rocks and the diamonds shone in the sunlight. He looked at them not at all, but straightway he went to where good men sang the "Miserere" and were clad in brown robes. And as he went it came to pass that his dead soul leaped in the joy of a new resurrection.
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A DOLLAR
I was born in a beautiful city on the banks of a charming river, the capital of a great nation. Unlike humans, I can remember no childhood, though it is said that I had a formative period in the care of artists whose brains conceived the beauty of my face and whose hands realized the glory of their dreams. But to them I was only a pretty thing of paper with line and color upon it. They gave me nothing else, and I really began to live only when some one representing the Great Nation stamped a seal upon me. Though a bloodless thing, yet I felt a throb of being. I lived, and the joy of it went rioting through me.
I remember that at first I was confined in a prison, bound with others by an elastic band which I longed to break that I might escape to the welcoming hands of men who looked longingly at me through the bars. But soon one secured me and I went out into a great, wide and very beautiful world.
Of the first months of my life I can remember but very little, only that I was feverishly happy in seeing, and particularly in doing. I was petted and admired and sought after. I went everywhere and did everything. So great was my popularity that some even bartered their peace of mind to obtain me, and others, forced to see me go, shed tears at the parting. Some, unable to have me go to them otherwise, actually stole me. But all the time I cared nothing, for I was living and doing—making men smile and laugh when I was with them and weep when I went away. It was all the same to me whether they laughed or cried. I only loved the power that was in me to make them do it and I believed that the power was without limit.
I was not yet a year old when I began to lose my beauty. I noticed it first when I fell into the hands of a man with long hair and pointed beard, who frowned at me and said: "You poor, faded, dirty thing, to think that I made you!" But I did not care. He had not made me. It was the Great Nation. Anyhow I could still do things and make even him long for me. So I was happy.
I was one year and a half old when I formed my first great partnership with others of my kind, and it came about like this: I had been in the possession of a poor woman who had guarded me for a week in a most unpleasant smelling old purse, when I heard a sharp voice ask for me—nay, demand me, and couple the demand with a threat that my guardian should lose her home were the demand refused. I was given over, I hoped, to better quarters, but in this I was sadly disappointed, for my new owner confined me in a strong but ill-favored box where thousands like myself were growing mouldy and wrinkled, away from the light of day. Sometimes we were released at night to be carefully counted by candle-light, but that was all. Thus we who were imprisoned together formed a partnership, but even then we were not strong enough to free ourselves. One night the box was opened with a snap and I saw the thin, pale face of my master looking down at us. He selected me and ninety-nine of my companions and placed us outside the box.
"There's the money," he said, "as I told you. It's all yours. Are you satisfied now?" I looked across the table at a young girl with a white, set face that was very, very beautiful. She did not answer.
"If you want it why don't you take it?" he snarled at her. "I can tell you again that there is nothing else for you."
The girl had something in her hand that I saw. I see more than most men. The thing she had made a sharp noise and spit a flame at him. He fell across the table and something red and warm went all over me. I began to be unhappy, for I thought I saw that there was something in the world that could not be bought. For him I cared nothing.
It was strange that after my transfers I was at last used to pay the judge who tried the girl. I was in the judge's pocket when he sentenced her to death. He said: "May the Lord have mercy on your soul." But I knew, for I told you I could see more than most men, that he didn't believe in the Lord or in souls. He left the court to spend me at a ——, but I think that I will not mention that shameful change. There was nothing strange about my falling into the hangman as part of his pay. I had been in worse hands in the interim.
I saw her die. Not a word did she say about the man she killed, though it might have saved her to tell of the mock marriage and the other things I knew she could reveal. She thought it better to die, I suppose, than be shamed. So she died—unbought. It made me still more unhappy to think of it at all. The dark stain never left me, but I cared nothing for that. What troubled was that I knew she wanted me, was starving for what I could buy, but spurned me and died rather than take me. There was something that had more power than I possessed.
I made up my mind to forget, so my next effort was the greatest I had yet made—my partnership with millions of others. I traveled long distances over and over again. I dug gold from the earth and so produced others like myself. I built railroads, skyscrapers, steamships and great public works. I disguised myself, in order to enhance my power, under new forms of paper and metal, coin, drafts, checks, orders and notes. Indeed I scarcely knew myself when I returned to the bill with the red stain upon it. My partners were nearly all with us one day when the master came in with a man and pointed us out to him. The man shook his head. It was a great, massive head, good to look at. My master talked a long time with him but he never changed. Then he placed a great roll of us in his hand. He threw us down, kicked us, and went out without a look back. I was more unhappy than ever. He had spurned me, though I knew by his look that he wanted me. I felt cursed. I had not much power at all. There was another thing I could not buy.
But a curse came in good earnest two days later. The terror of that has never left me. I saw a man die who loved me better than his honor or his God. He refused, dying, to give me back to the man from whom he had stolen me. The priest who stood by his bed implored him. He refused and the priest turned from him without saying the words of absolution. When the chill came on him he hissed and spit at us, and croaked his curses, but the death rattle kept choking them back into him, only to have him vomit them into our faces again and again till he died. The priest came back and looked at him.
"Poor fool!" he said to him, but to me and my companions he said: "YOU sent him to Hell."
Ah! What a power that was, but while I rejoiced in it I was not glad enough. He could have conquered had he only willed it. I knew he was my master long before I mastered him.
His dissipated and drunken children fought for us beside his very bed. I was wrenched from one hand to the other, falling upon the dirty floor to be trampled on again and again. When the fight ended I was torn and filthy, so that, patched and ugly, my next master sent me back to the great capital to be changed; to have the artists work again on me and restore my beauty. They did it well, but no artist could give me new life.
Again I went forth and fell into the hands of a good man. I knew he was good when I heard him speak to me and to those who were with me. "God has blessed me," he said, "with riches and knowledge and strength, but I am only His steward. This money like all the rest shall be spent in His service." Then we were sent out, thousands of us, returning again and again, splitting into great and small parties, but all coming and going hither and thither on errands of mercy.
Now I felt my love of doing return. Never did I now see a tear that I did not dry. Never did I hear a sigh that I did not change to a laugh; never a wound that I did not heal; never a pain that I did not soothe; nor a care I did not lighten. Where the sick were found, I visited them; where the poor were, I bought them bread. Out on the plains and in the desert I lifted the Cross of Hope and the Chalice of Salvation. To the dying I sped the Minister of Pardon. Into the darkness and the shadow of death I sent the Light of love and hope and truth, till, rich in the deeds of mercy I did in my master's name, I felt the call to another deathbed—his own. I saw my companions flying from the bounds of the great earth to answer the call. They knew he needed them now with the rich interest of good deeds they had won for him. Fast they came and the multitude of them filled him with wonder. The enemy who hated him pointed to them in derision. "Gold buys hell, not heaven," he laughed, but we stood around the bed and the enemy could not pass us. Then we, and deeds we did for him at his command, began to pray and the prayer was like sweetest music echoing against the very vault of heaven; and other sounds, like the gentle tones of harps, were wafted over us, swelling louder and louder till all seemed changed to a thousand organs, with every stop attuned to the praying. They were the voices of the children from parts and regions where we had lifted the Cross. One by one they joined the mighty music till on the wings of the melody the master was borne aloft, higher and higher as new voices coming added of their strength. I watched till he was far above and still rising to heights beyond the ken of dreams.
An Angel touched me.
"Be thou clean," he said, "and go, I charge thee, to thy work. Thy master is not dead, but only begins his joy. While time is, thou shalt work for him and thy deeds of good shall be his own. Wherever thou shalt go let the Cross arise that, under its shadow, the children may gather and the song find new strength and new volume to lift him nearer and nearer the Throne."
So I am happy that I have learned my real power; that I can do what alone is worth doing—for His sake.
LE BRAILLARD DE LA MAGDELEINE[1]
THIS is the story that the old sailor from Tadousac told me when the waves were leaping, snapping, and frothing at us from the St. Lawrence, and over the moan of the wind and the anger of the waters rose the wail of the Braillard de la Magdeleine.
"You hear him? Every storm he calls so loud. I think of my own baby when I hear him, always the same, always so sorrowful. Poor baby!
"Yes, it is a baby. Across there you might see, but the storm darkens everything, yonder toward Gaspe, where the little mother lived—pauvre mêre. She was only a child, innocent and good and happy, when he came—the great lord, the Grand Seigneur, from France—came with the Commandant to Quebec and then to Tadousac.
"She loved him, loved him and forgot—forgot her father and mother—forgot the good name they gave her—forgot the innocence that made her beautiful—forgot the pure Mother and the good God, for him and his love. She went to Quebec with him, but the Curé had not blessed them in the church.
"Then the baby came. That is the baby who cries out there in the storm. The Grand Seigneur killed the little baby, killed it to save her from disgrace, killed it without baptism, and it cries and wails out there, pauvre enfant.
"The mother? She is here, too, in the storm. She has been here for more than two hundred years listening to her baby cry. Poor mother. The baby calls her and she wanders through the storm to find him. But she never sees, only hears him cry for her—and God. Till the great Day of Judgment will the baby cry, and she—pauvre mêre—will pay the price of her sin, pay it out of her empty mother heart and hungry mother arms, that will not be filled. You hear the soft wind from the shore battle with the great wind from the Gulf? Perhaps it is she, pauvre mêre—perhaps.
"The Grand Seigneur? He never comes, for he died unrepentant and unpardoned. The lost do not return to Earth and Hope. He never comes. Only the mother comes—the mother who weeps and seeks, and hears the baby cry."