“ ‘WHO IS IT?’ HE ASKED, SHARPLY AND SUSPICIOUSLY.”
“It’s me, Mr. Stanley; Joe Andrews. You ain’t forgot me yet, I know. And this one’s my friend, Bert; you know him all right too. May we come in here? We don’t want to go to the front door and make trouble with the door bell and see folks; we thought maybe you’d just let us come in where you was. We hung around till we found your room. We knowed the new part was yours, ‘cause your father told the committee, you know, when they went to tell about the picture.”
Light began to dawn on the young man. Certainly he remembered Joe Andrews, and had meant to hunt him up some day and tell him he was glad to hear he was doing well and living right, but he was in no mood to see him to-night. Why could he not have waited until to-morrow night when the others were to come? Was not that enough? But of course he wanted to get a word of thanks all his own. It had been on his tongue to tell Joe he was unusually busy to-night, and would he come another time, or wait till to-morrow, but the remembrance of the picture made that seem ungracious. He would let them in a few minutes. They probably wished to report that they had seen the picture in the room before the general view should be given, so he unfastened the heavy French plate window and let the two in, turning up as he did so the lights in the room, so that the picture might be seen.
They came in, lank and awkward, as though their best clothes someway hurt them, and they did not know what to do with their feet and the chairs. They did not sit down at first, but stood awkwardly in single file, looking as if they wished they were out now they were in. Their eyes went immediately to the picture. It was the way of that picture to draw all eyes that entered the room, and John Stanley noted this with the same growing irritation he had felt all day. But over their faces there grew that softened look of wonder and awe and amaze, and to John Stanley’s surprise, of deep-seated, answering love to the love in the eyes of the picture. He looked at the picture himself now, and his fancy made it seem that the Master was looking at these two well pleased. Could it be that he was better pleased with these two ignorant boys than with him, John Stanley, polished gentleman and cultured Christian that he trusted he was?
He looked at Joe again and was reminded of the softened look of deep purpose the night Joe had told him beneath the vines of his intention to serve Christ, and now standing in the presence of the boy again and remembering it all vividly, as he had not done before, there swept over him the thrill of delight again that a soul had been saved. His heart, long unused to such emotions, felt weak, and he sat down and motioned the boys to do the same. It would seem that the sight of the picture had braced up the two to whatever mission theirs had been, for their faces were set in steady purpose, though it was evident that this mission was embarrassing. They looked at one another helplessly as if each hoped the other would begin, and at last Joe plunged in.
“Mr. Stanley, you ben so good to us we thought ’twas only fair to you we should tell you. That is, we thought you’d like it, and anyway, maybe you wouldn’t take it amiss.”
John Stanley’s heart was kind, and he had been deeply interested in this boy once. It all came back to him now, and he felt a strong desire to help him on, though he wondered what could be the nature of his errand.
Joe caught his breath and went on. “You see she don’t know about it. She’s heard so much of you, and she never heard that, not even when they was talking about the den and all at the store, she was just lookin’ at the picture and Him,” raising his eyes reverently to the picture on the wall, “and we never thought to tell her afore, and her so set against it. And we thought anyway afterward maybe you’d quit. Some do. We all did, but that was her doin’s. But we thought you’d like to know, and if you had quit she needn’t never be told at all, and if you hadn’t, why we thought maybe ‘twouldn’t be nothin’ for you to quit now, ‘fore she ever knew about it.”