CHAPTER XIV
A FRIEND IN NEED
Mr. Thorpe went to Colorado for his health. A cousin of his, a brother of Pauline's, lived there, and Mr. Thorpe had a standing invitation to come and try the effect of the climate on his health. Pauline accompanied him; she had become so used to caring for him and watching over him as a mother watches over an ailing child, that she could not bring herself to part with him now, when she believed his condition to be more critical than it had ever been before. Then, too, she knew that all was not well between him and his wife, and, knowing this, she had no desire to remain with Mrs. Thorpe.
The pastor who was called in Mr. Thorpe's place was an unmarried man, and had no use for the parsonage, and Mr. Thorpe, by courtesy of the church committee, had been permitted to retain the use of it. But now, left alone, Mrs. Thorpe felt the necessity of finding a home for herself.
Some years previous she had, by the death of an uncle, come into possession of a small legacy. This her husband had insisted that she keep intact against a day of need.
On the Flat side of the church-crowned incline there was a small cottage set in a bit of ground, somewhat back from the rambling street. On either side of it were smaller houses, with ill-kept yards in which neglected children played and where untidy women talked across broken down fences and quarreled over petty grievances. Mrs. Thorpe had often noticed this cottage on her way to and from the Flat. The fact that it stood a little back from the street had given her the impression that the builder of it had desired more privacy, was more retiring, perhaps, than were those who had built their houses against the street; and she had planned in her mind how flowers and shrubs might be grown in the yard and vines trained over the windows and the place made to take on a homelike appearance, if the owner desired it. Now, confronted with the problem of finding a home for herself, her thoughts went directly to this cottage.
Alone in the world, broken-hearted, strong in spirit, yet all at sea as to the future, the thought of a cottage on the Flat was not distasteful to her. Perhaps her work lay there; she meant to work, and it made little difference to her what the work should be or where it took her. She knew that the place was for sale, and when she found that the price was within the limit of her possessions she hesitated no longer, and the cottage became hers. Deep within her heart she knew that she was influenced by the fact that from its location she could see the church--might almost feel that she lived within the shadow of it--the church that her husband had loved. In the morning she would see it, as she had so often seen it from the parsonage, with the sun rising over the hills and mantling it with roseate splendor; and in the evening she could see the long shadow of the church spire; and on the Sabbath she could hear the bell as it called the worshipers to its altars. Full well she knew that she loved the church, knew that she must always love it and reverence that for which it stands. The fact that it is profaned by the hollow-hearted and ungodly does not change its sacred character nor destroy its spiritual significance, any more than the making "my Father's house a place of merchandise" destroyed the spiritual significance of the Temple.
Sometimes in her ever-vivid imagination she saw the whole Christianity-professing world as an Edgerly, and the poor, the ignorant and the unfortunate in the world as this great Edgerly's Flat; and always the church-crowned prominence with its prosperous, complacent money-changers between. And always she was glad that henceforth her home was to be on the Flat side, with those who needed her. Had her Master ever chosen to walk in the high places with the great ones of earth?
It was a day in early winter when Mrs. Thorpe had her possessions moved from the parsonage to the cottage on the Flat. She engaged the services of a strong woman to assist her with her work and in putting her new home in order. When this was done she paid the woman her hire and allowed her to go; her income would not warrant her keeping a servant nor a companion; she would live alone, and frugally.
When sorrow, or pain, or disappointment knocks at our door we struggle and strive, sometimes we faint and fail, yet always the knowledge comes to us that we may be strong if we will. There is no time nor place nor circumstance in life stronger than the central force within us.