Constance Forbes had been one of the students who found a haven on the free benches at St. Stephen's. Almost at once Mr. Prentiss noticed her and, struck by her interesting face, he sent the church deaconess, Mrs. Hammond, to visit her at her lodgings. She was invited to join a Bible class of young women of her own age, and welcomed to the social parlor in the vestry provided for girls who, like herself, were strangers in Benham. Here there were magazines, writing materials, and afternoon tea. While availing herself of these privileges, Constance frequently met her rector. He inquired sympathetically concerning her work and aspirations, and showed afterward that he kept her distinctly in mind. She felt that she could freely consult him if she were in need of advice; once or twice she did consult him about her reading; and she was gratified by the interest which he took in her marriage.
Consequently, the idea of not attending morning service was distressing to her. She felt sure that Mr. Prentiss would notice it and be disappointed. Yet, what were Mr. Prentiss and his feelings in comparison with her obligation to her husband? Emil's Sundays were spoiled because she would not accompany him to the country instead of going to church. His attitude was unreasonable and absurd, but the fact remained that he did not go alone, and lounged at home instead. After all, she was no longer a girl, and her religious faith would not be imperilled were she to miss church now and then. Moreover, though she held fast to her creed and deplored Emil's radical views, she knew in her heart that she was more critical than formerly of what she heard in church, and that she was sometimes driven by her doubts as to the possibility of supernatural happenings to seek refuge behind the impenetrable fortress of a righteous life. There she was safe and happy, and free, it seemed to her, from the responsibility of harassing her young housewife's brains with non-essentials. Might it not be for her own advantage to take a respite from religious functions? Certainly her companionship to Emil seemed more important at the moment than her own habit of public worship.
She began by staying away from church occasionally. Emil expressed delight at her reasonableness and carried out with zest his plan of a Sunday outing. It was a simple matter on their bicycles, or by a few minutes in the train, to reach country air and sylvan scenes, and he was entirely satisfied to spend the day in tramping through the woods and fields, stopping to fish or to lie in the sun as the humor seized him. The working-man's Sabbath, he termed it. The programme was restful and alluring to Constance also. Her husband on these occasions seemed less at odds with the world, and willing to enjoy himself without rancor or argument. After their luncheon he would smoke complacently for awhile and then take up his fiddle and practise upon it with genuine content for an hour or more, while she sat with her back against a tree or a bank, reading. He still drank his bottles of beer, but if he slumbered, it was only for a brief period. He never neglected his fiddle, and its influence appeared, as it were, to soothe his savage breast, and to make him good-humored and agreeably philosophic. He was too fond of theorizing to neglect altogether these opportunities for the enunciation of his grievances against civilization, but he was lively instead of bitter, a distinction which meant much to his wife.
When their first baby was born, these Sunday excursions were temporarily discontinued; but Constance was eager to renew them, for Emil, after going alone a few times, relapsed into his old habits. Accordingly, as soon as the little one was able to toddle, a child's wagon was procured, which Emil was ready to draw, and by avoiding fences and other barriers, the difficulties presented by this new tie were overcome. By the time the child was a year and a half old, Constance realized that she had been to church but once in the last twelve months.
This had been partly due to the action of the rector of St. Stephen's, for Constance knew within a few weeks of her first absences from church that her conduct had been noticed. The curate, Mr. Starkworth, inquired at the door if there had been illness in the family. Later the deaconess made a call of friendly observation, in the course of which it transpired that Mr. Prentiss had observed that Mrs. Stuart no longer occupied her seat. The culprit did not attempt to explain, and within a fortnight she received a visit from the rector himself. No one could have been more affable and reassuring. He established himself in an easy chair and accepted graciously the cigar which Emil proffered him. He was a large man of dignified mien and commanding person, clerical as to his dress and visage, but with a manner of conversation approximating that of men of the world—an individual manifestation which was intended to reveal a modern spirit. He was clearly a person with whom liberties could not be taken, and yet evidently one who desired to divest his point of view of cant, and to put religion on a man to man, business basis so far as was consistent with his sacred calling. He asked genial questions concerning their domestic welfare, and the progress of the new lumber firm, spoke shrewdly of local politics in which he supposed that Stuart was engaged, and sought obviously to give the impression that he was an all-round man in his sympathies, and that he took an active interest in temporal matters. When at last there was a favorable pause in the current of this secular conversation, Mr. Prentiss laid his hands on his knees, and, bending forward and looking from one to the other in a friendly way, said with decision:
"I have missed you two young people at church lately."
"I have missed you two young people at church lately."
Constance winced at the inquiry, and her eyes fell beneath the clergyman's searching gaze. She could not deny the impeachment, which was embarrassing. At the same time the color had scarcely mounted to her cheeks before she felt the force of her defence rising to her support, and she looked up. She appreciated that it was incumbent on her, as the active church member, to respond, and she became suddenly solicitous lest Emil might, and so make matters worse. In truth, Emil's first impulse had been toward anger. It was one of his maxims not to submit to browbeating. But what he regarded as the humor of the proceeding changed his wrath into scorn, and he closed his teeth on his pipe with the dogged air of a master of the situation willing to be amused withal. Mr. Prentiss divined in a flash, from the insolence of this expression, that he had to deal with a hopeless case—so far as the human soul can ever seem hopeless to the missionary—a contemptuous materialist, and his own countenance grew grave as he turned back to the wife.