Vivian's Lesson

by Elizabeth W. Grierson

Vivian made no answer, so Ronald knelt down and said some simple prayers for both of them—the prayers he had learned to say at his mother’s knee when he was a little fellow, and which he had never changed: ‘Our Father,’ and then the Collect for protection from danger, and then he hesitated, and added a little broken prayer in his own words that Isobel might be made better, then came the Benediction.

The solemn words brought a curious feeling of strength and safety to Ronald, and he rose from his knees with fresh hope and trust. The same loving Master who had healed the little Galilean maiden so many hundreds of years ago was as near and as powerful to-day, only Vivian and he could not see Him, but they had told Him their trouble, and already to Ronald’s boyish heart came the promise of relief.

But Vivian felt none of this. The words which had comforted Ronald only made him feel more miserable. How could he pray to ‘be kept from sin, and from falling into any kind of danger,’ or how could he expect God to hear him or to answer his prayer for Isobel’s recovery when a burden of falsehood and theft lay on his conscience, which he had not the courage to confess, and for which innocent people were suffering?

No, Ronald’s prayer might be heeded, for Ronald was always true and loving and dutiful, even although he was a trifle slow at times; but there was no chance whatever of God hearing, or at least paying any attention to, the prayers of a liar and a thief.

Poor little miserable boy! he could not imagine that the mere fact that he had faced his sin, and called it by its right name, and had not tried to make excuses even to himself, was the first step towards that repentance and confession which at present seemed so impossible to him.

Presently Mary came quietly in to tell them that dinner was ready; and although they all protested that they could not eat anything, it is wonderful how a boy’s appetite comes back at the sight of roast turkey and a rolly-polly pudding. Afterwards, however, when the table was cleared, and Mary had disappeared downstairs with the dishes, time hung heavily enough.

Ralph, as usual, took refuge from his troubles in a book; and Ronald, acting on a remark which Mary had made, that if Dr Armitage returned home that night he would probably take the two boys with him, went back to his room to put his own clothes and his brother’s in something like order, in case his father decided to do this. So Vivian was left to his own thoughts, and very sad and sorrowful ones they were.

The long afternoon wore slowly away. Now and then a door opened or shut, but the watchers by Isobel’s bed were far too anxious to spare a thought for the three lonely boys in the schoolroom. At half-past three Mason wheeled the carriage out, and began to get it ready for the station. Vivian could see him from the schoolroom window; could see, too, Monarch’s empty kennel, and the great round hole in the glass of the conservatory which the burglars had cut last night. The sight sent his thoughts back to the summer-house and the man with the green patch over his eye. Could it have been only yesterday morning he had spoken to him? What a long, long time ago it seemed! Even the burglary seemed an old story, something that happened long ago, before the awful news had been told to him that Isobel was dying, that God was going to take her away as a punishment for his wickedness. Poor little mistaken lad, how the Great Father must have pitied him as He looked down and saw the image of Himself which Vivian was forming in his heart, an image so different from the Perfect Love which the Christ had come to earth to declare.

At last the carriage rolled out of the yard, and everything was quiet again, and presently Ronald came back and joined him at the window.

‘I have packed everything except our brushes and combs and our sleeping suits,’ he said. ‘They can be put in in a moment if father wants us to go home; but somehow I fancy he will wait till to-morrow to hear what the big doctor says. He can’t come till late this evening. He has had to go into the country. Anne told me so; I met her on the stairs.