Sterling considered it a special providence that no intervening fence separated the two residences, and nearly every afternoon found him on the tennis grounds, an eager contestant in the game with Dorothy.
"Good-bye, Mr. Sterling," she said to him one afternoon at the close of the game. "I must hurry in and do some packing. I shall turn traveler tomorrow."
"What—going away?" he asked with a startled expression.
"Yes, I am going to Chicago for a few weeks to visit a girl friend."
The light fled from the sky for Sterling. For the next three weeks not only Dorothy, but the center of the universe seemed to him to be located in Chicago.
During Dorothy's visit a crisis occurred in her life. While attending a church service with her girl friend she heard a strange sermon. How new and startling it sounded. The preacher's theme was "Salvation Through Christ", and she heard things she had never dreamed of before. Wild questionings set her heart aflame and there was no rest for her that night. Her soul's destiny was a subject to which she had never given serious reflection.
She felt that the man whose sermon had thrown her into this dark confusion was the only one who might give her light. She sought him out. A father in Israel he was—Rev. Dr. Moreland, one of the most eminent ministers in that city. He saw that as a little child she was eagerly groping in the dark, and with the Bible as a lamp he led her step by step into the light. She saw herself in God's sight a sinner, guilty and condemned, and how helpless and hopeless to her seemed her condition.
The story of the Gospel sounded to her like music from Heaven. The love of Christ for sinners melted her heart and she yielded herself in child-like trust to him. In her own room at night the surrender was made and it was complete.
"Son, I could easily tell that Dorothy is coming tomorrow," said Mrs. Sterling.
"How do you know, mother?"