The young man looked up. His face flashed into a broad smile. "Hello! Brad Talcott, by thunder! Well, well. When'd you get back?"
"Last night. Yours?" he inquired, nodding toward the children.
"Yep. Well, how are you, old man? You look well. Couldn't fool me with that beard. Come in and sit down, won't yeh?"
"No, I'm on my way to church. Can't you come?"
"Great Cæsar, no! not with these young hyenas to attend to." He had grown fat, and his chin beard made him look like a Methodist minister; but his sunny blue eyes laughed up into Bradley's face just as in the past. "Say!" he exclaimed, "you struck it with the old Judge, didn't you? He's goin' to run you for governor one of these days. County treasurer ain't good enough for you. But say," he said, as a final word, "I guess you'd better not wear that suit much; it's too soft altogether. Stop in when you come back. Eileen'll be glad to see you," he called after him.
The audience had risen to sing as he entered, and he took his place without attracting much attention. As he stood there listening to the familiar Moody and Sankey hymn, there came again the touch of awe which the church used to put upon him. He was not a "religious" man. He had no more thought of his soul or his future state than a powerful young Greek. His feeling of awe arose from the association of beauty, music, and love with a church. It was feminine, some way, and shared his reverence for a beautiful woman.
The churches of the town were the only things of a public nature which had any touch of beauty or grace. They were poor little wooden boxes at best; and yet they had colored windows, which seemed to hush the dazzling summer sun into a dim glory, transfiguring the shabby interior, and making the bent heads of the girls more beautiful than words can tell. It was the one place which was set apart for purposes not utilitarian, and a large part of what these people called religious reverence was in fact a pathetic homage to beauty and poetry, and rest.
When they all took their seats, and while the preacher was praying, Bradley was absorbing the churchy smell of fresh linen, buoyant perfumes, (camphor, cinnamon, violets, rose) and the hot, sweet odor of newly-mown grass lying under the sun just outside of the windows. The wind pulsed in through the half-swung window, a bee came buzzing wildly along, a butterfly rested an instant on the window sill, and the preacher prayed on in an oratorical way for the various departments of government.
Bradley felt a sharp eye fixed upon him, and, turning cautiously, caught Nettie looking at him. She nodded and smiled in her audacious way. Two or three of the young fellows saw him and nodded at him, but mainly the people sat with bowed heads, feeling some presence that was full of grace and power to banish, for a short time at least the stress of the struggle to live.
The young fellows were mainly in the back seats; and while they were decorously quiet, it was evident that they had very little interest in the prayer. Death and hell and the grave! Why should one trouble himself about such things when the red blood leaped in the heart, and the June wind was flinging a flickering flight of leaf shadows across the window pane? There sat the girls with roguish eyes, the rounded outline of their cheeks (as tempting as peaches), displayed with miraculous skill at just their most taking angle. Their Sunday gowns and gloves and hats transfigured them into something too dainty and fine to be touched, and yet every glance and motion was an invitation and a lure.