Jim’s heavy face brightened for a moment. He saw that Mrs. Leslie had called him “dear” without knowing it—just as naturally as she said it to Johnny, and a wave of happy feeling went over his heart.
“Away out in the country, down a lane,” he said, “but I don’t know just where. I walked further than I’ve ever gone yet, this afternoon, straight out into the fields. I meant to go to church, but I felt full of walk, somehow, and as if my legs wouldn’t keep still, and I got to thinking, as I went along, and first thing I knew, I was about half a mile beyond the church! So I just kept right on, and I don’t see what folks live in cities for, anyhow—even little cities like this. I was under a big tree, lying on the grass, for an hour or so, and—”
Jim stopped suddenly, for want of words that exactly suited him.
Mrs. Leslie thanked him again for the roses, and Tiny ran to fill the “very prettiest” vase with water. And then they settled down to their talk about the Sunday-school lesson which they had all recited that morning. It was the story of Nicodemus; his “coming by night” to the Saviour, and hearing about the “new birth unto righteousness.”
For these Sunday evening talks, they always sat in the library, and, unless the evening was quite too warm, a little wood fire sparkled on the hearth, and no other light disputed its right to make the room cheerful. Tiny and Johnny had become skilful in building these little fires, in a way to make them give light, rather than warmth, so to-night, although the windows were open to the soft summer-twilight air, three or four pine-knots blazed upon the hearth, and sent dancing shadows about the room. Mrs. Leslie had noticed that, in this close companionship and half light, the reserve and restraint which sometimes tied Jim’s tongue seemed taken away.
The cause of the trouble which showed so plainly in his face came out by degrees, as the lesson was discussed.
“I felt somehow, when Taffy died,” he said, “as if I’d been walking the other way, and I’ve been trying to turn ’round, and travel towards where I hope he is. And I don’t mean, either, that I’ve been trying just by myself; I’ve been asking, you know, for help, and it seemed to me I got it, whenever I asked in dead earnest. And then, when I was going over the lesson for to-day, it seemed to mean that people who got religion got it all of a sudden, and didn’t want to do, or say, or think any of the bad things they’d been full of, any more, and down I went, right there, for no matter how I try, and ask, and mean, to keep straight, I don’t do it; in fact, it’s seemed to me lately, that the more I try the more I don’t, and—and—if it wasn’t for Taffy, and all of you, Mrs. Leslie, I’d just give the whole thing up, and try to forget it, and be comfortable! It’s too much to ask of anybody, if it’s that way!”