Tears came into her eyes as she spoke, and David drew her close in his arms.
"Do you, sweetheart? It seems a terrible thing to stand up there before a houseful, of people, most of them good, and clean, and full of faith, and try to direct their steps in the broader road. I sometimes feel that men are not fit for it. There ought to be angels from Heaven."
"But there are angels from Heaven watching over them, David, guiding them, showing them how. I believe good white angels are guiding every true minister,—not the bad ones— Oh, I know a lot about ministers, honey,—proud, ambitious, selfish, vainglorious, hypocritical, even amorous, a lot of them,—but there are others, true ones,—you, David, and some more. They just have to grow together until harvest, and then the false ones will be dug up and dumped in the garbage."
For a while they were silent.
Finally he asked, smiling a little, "Are you getting cramped, Carol? Are you getting narrow, and settling down to a rut? Have you lost your enthusiasm and your sparkle?"
Carol laughed at him. "David, do you remember the first night we were married, when we knelt down together to say our prayers and you put your arm around my shoulder, and we prayed there, side by side? Dearest, that one little fifteen minutes of confidence and humility and heart-gratitude was worth all the sparkle and fire in the world. But have I lost it? Seems to me I am as much a shouting Methodist as ever."
David laughed, coughing a little, and Carol bustled him off to bed, sure he was catching a brand new cold, and berating herself roundly for allowing this foolish angel of hers to get a chill right on her very hands.