“Yes, please do,” she urged. “They’re just going into meeting now. Just tell them how he laughs and talks and cuts up!”
“Fine recommendations for a pastor!”
“Well, they are,” insisted Azalea. “Of course they are. He wants everyone to be as good and happy as he is, and if they aren’t, he’ll find out why.”
Haystack Thompson brought his huge brows together and regarded Azalea with his sharp eyes. Neither spoke for a moment. Then: “Yes-sum,” he said, and moved toward the front to join the representative members of the congregation.
So it came about that a month later Azalea had the great happiness of knowing that her friends, the Reverend Absalom Summers and his wife and baby were coming to Lee as the result of her suggestion. It was rather a joke among those who knew of it. “Azalea’s choice” they called the new minister. But it was no joke to Azalea. It meant more to her than she ever could explain.
“You see,” she said to Carin, “it’s ideas that count—right ideas. Now, I’m a person of no importance whatever. But because I happened to have the right idea, those men listened to me and did what I wanted them to do.”
“And the point of it all is,” laughed Carin, “that if you have enough right ideas and can find enough persons to listen to them, you’ll be important, see?”
“Don’t laugh,” said Azalea. “If you knew what it meant for me to have the Summerses come—”
“I know well enough—know too well. After they come, what chance will I have of getting your attention?”
“Carin, how can you? No one can take your place. My friends are all separate. I can’t spare one, and not one can take the place of another.”