Job was silent for a while, after finishing his story and relighting his pipe, and his silence gave me a chance of looking at him closely. Physically he was none the worse for his adventure; mentally, spiritually, he was a new man. The fear of death had gone from his eyes, and in its place was the joy of life, together with a sure faith in the triumph of personality when, to use his own coursing phrase, he had slipped the leash. His vision of heaven was somewhat too material to satisfy me, but there could be no doubt that it had brought to his terror-swept soul the peace of mind which passeth all understanding.
After a while Job rose, knocked the ashes from his pipe, and took his leave. I accompanied him to the door and watched him as he walked down the street. There was something buoyant in his tread, and his gigantic shoulders rolled from side to side like a seaman's on the quarter-deck. Soon he started whistling, and I smiled as I caught the tune. It was one of his chapel hymns, and there was a note of exultation in the closing bars:
"O grave! where is thy victory?
O death! where is thy sting?"
My mind was full of Job's story all that day. I somehow refused to believe that what he had related was mere imagination, and it was evident that he could not have invented the story of the inner voice, for this remained a mystery to him. The inner voice haunted me all the time, and, as I lay in bed that night, I asked myself again and again the question: Why must we wait for a future life to hear this inner voice?
B.A.
They met at the smithy, waiting for "The Crooked Billet" to open for the evening. There was Joe Stackhouse the besom-maker, familiarly known as Besom-Joe, William Throup the postman, Tommy Thwaite the "Colonel," so called for his willingness to place his advice at the service of any of the Allied Commanders-in-Chief, and Owd Jerry the smith, who knew how to keep silent, but whose opinion, when given, fell with the weight of his hammer on the anvil. He refuted his opponents by asking them questions, after the manner of Socrates. The subject of conversation was the village school-mistress, who had recently been placed in charge of some thirty children, and was winning golden opinions on all sides.
"Shoo's a gooid 'un, is schooil-missus, for all shoo's nobbut fower foot eleven," began Stackhouse; "knows how to keep t' barns i' their places wi'out gettin' crabby or usin' ower mich stick."
"Aye, and shoo's gotten a vast o' book-larnin' intul her heead," said Throup. "I reckon shoo's a marrow for t' parson, ony day."