He glided into one of his gentle silences. Curtin pondered that matter of re-membering, re-collecting, re-storing.
Said Mr. Morrowcombe, "I knew Marget Land when she was a little girl and came to Sunday school. She was baptized in our church, but she ain't now one of our church members. That used to grieve and puzzle me—make me a little angry, too, I reckon! Now I don't bother about it. She's in the Living Church, all right."
He looked up into the bronze and silver sycamore. "I've sat on this bench in old Major Linden's time, when John Land was overseer and lived in the house yonder. His wife, Elizabeth, was just the salt of the earth. Those children used to be playing around this tree. I remember Marget, a bare-legged, big-eyed little thing. She's sat by me often on this bench and made me tell her stories. Now it seems a long time ago, and now it seems yesterday!"
His voice sank again into the October sunshiny stillness. His lips closed, but Curtin felt him speaking on in thought and consciousness. It came to him, in another of those revelational flashings: "That is the ultra-violet of speech, the high, subtle, inaudible, continual speech! When we begin to catch it, when we begin to hear thought—" He felt again the shock of going together, of rivers pouring into ocean.
Mr. Morrowcombe's lips parted. "The war turned me serious, and I found religion two years after the surrender. I'd tell her Bible stories. I had a kind of gift that-a-way. Roger Carter, that's my nephew as well as my son-in-law, has got the same gift, though it ain't always Bible stories that he tells—except I reckon as all true stories are Bible stories! I used to tell her about David and Jonathan, and Joseph and his brethren, and Ruth and Naomi, and Mary and Martha and Lazarus, in Bethany.... Mary and Martha in yourself, and Lazarus who was long dead but could be raised, and Christ, who could judge and portion and raise, all in yourself! She used to listen, sitting just there. She had mind then, and she's got mind now—more'n I have in a lot of ways. She and him. Mind and goodness, and spirit that is power, and a body that you love to look at! They're the kind of folk that ought to be. Yes, sir, I was thinking when you came along of Marget sitting there, a little thing, and saying, 'Now tell me about the children of Israel'—or 'about Bethlehem,' as it might be."
With distinctness Curtin felt that which the old man also seemed to feel, for he turned his head, lowering it and his eyes a little, and smiling. The movement was precisely that of turning and smiling into a child's eyes. Again through Curtin poured that thrill of a freshness of knowledge. If this tree, this place, were strongly in a consciousness, in a memory, surely then that conscious spirit itself might in some sort be felt here! At any rate, he was aware of Marget, though to all outward senses appeared only the warm-colored October air. He had again the sense of etheric life. He lost it. It was so bright, it was so transient! The unquenchable desire was to bring it lasting.
He presently walked back to Sweet Rocket House. Drew was on the porch. "I'm going to stay. I'll write to Brown, and ride to Rock Mountain to-morrow to tell Mr. Smith and Randall, and pack up my things."