"I don't know what you mean in the least," Ruth said, testily. "You are talking about something of which you know nothing."
"So are you. Oh, Ruthie, so are you! Yes, I know something about it; I know that you haven't reached the A, B, C, of it. Why, Ruthie, do you remember that story this afternoon? Do you remember that little boy in the garret, how he turned his face to the wall and asked God to save him? Have you done that? Do you honestly think that you, Ruth Erskine, have anything to be saved from? Don't you know the little fellow said, 'He answered.' Has He answered you? Why, Ruth, do you never listen to the church covenant? How does it read: 'That it is eminently fit and proper for those who believe that God made them to join the church?' Ruth Erskine, you can never take more solemn vows upon you than you will have to take if you unite with the church, and I beg you not to do it. I tell you it means more than that. I had a father who was a member of the church and he prayed—oh, how he prayed! He was the best man who ever lived on earth! Every one knew he was good; every one thought he was a saint; and it seems to me as though I could never love any God who did not give him a happier lot than he had as a reward for his holy life. But do you think he thought himself good? I tell you he felt that no one could be more weak and sinful and in need of saving than he was. Oh, I know the people who make up churches have more than this in them. I think it is all a deception, but it is a blessed one to have. I know these people at Chautauqua have it, hundreds of them. I see the same look in their faces that my father had in his, and if I could only get the same delusion into my heart I would hug it for my blessed father's sake; but don't you ever go into the church and subscribe to these things that they will ask of you until you have felt the same need of help and the same sense of being helped that they have. If you do, and there is a God, I would rather stand my chance with him than to have yours."
And Marion seized her hat and rushed out into the night, leaving Ruth utterly dumbfounded.
CHAPTER XXII.
ONE MINUTE'S WORK.
Marion struck out into the darkness, caring little which way she went; she had rarely been so wrought upon; her veins seemed to glow with fire. What difference did it make? she asked herself. If there was nothing at all in it, why not let Ruth amuse herself by joining the church and playing at religion? It would add to her sense of dignity, and who would be hurt by it?
There was a difficulty in the way. Turn where she would, it confronted Marion during these days. There was a solemn haunting "if" that would not be put down. What if all these things were true? She by no means felt so assured as she had once done: indeed, the foundations for her disbelief seemed to have been shaken from under her during the last week.
Remember, she had never spent a week with Christians before in her life; not, at least, a week during which she was made to realize all the time that they were Christians; that they stood on a different platform from herself.
Now, as she tramped about through the darkening woods, meeting constantly groups of people on their way home from the meeting, hearing from them snatches of what had been said and sung, she suddenly paused, and so vivid was the impression that for long afterward she could not think of it without feeling that a voice must certainly have spoken the words in her ear. Yet she recognized them as a sentence which had struck her from Dr. Pierce's sermon in the morning.
"God honors his gospel, even though preached by a bad man; honors it sometimes to the saving of a soul. But think of a meeting between the two! the sinner saved and the sinner lost, who was the means of the other's salvation." It had thrilled Marion at the time, with her old questioning thrill: What if such a thing were possible! Now it came again.