“Start with that, then—He loves cradle faith.”
It took him some time, but presently he began with his mother’s prayer, “Jesus, tender Shepherd, hear me.” When he got to the third line there was a big lump in his throat and one in mine, and then he gave me a dig with his elbow and said, “You’ll have to finish”—and I finished.
I put my postscript to that letter. “God has saved him,” I wrote. “Believe him. Write and tell him you forgive him.”
And when that mother got that she knew that giving out note-paper was religion.
I was in a cemetery just behind the lines, walking among the graves of our dear lads who have fallen, and weeping for those at home who weep over graves that they will never see. There I found an old soldier who had been to the woods and had cut a big bundle of box trimmings. He was setting a little border of box round the graves.
“But,” I said to him, “they won’t strike. It’s not the right time of year—and the ground’s too dry.”
“I know, sir,” he said, “but it will look as if somebody cares.”
God’s jewels lie deep, and if you will dig deep enough you will find them—so I took the trouble to dig a little deeper. I said, “Nobody will see them here.”
“Yes, sir, the angels will. You taught me to think like this in one of the meetings in the huts, and since I can’t do any more in the fight”—for he was disabled—“I am putting in my time caring for the boys’ graves, and if the wives and mothers don’t see them—well”—and his face lit up with a radiance that I can’t put into words—“the angels will, sir.”