“Punish me, then. Give me penance. Let me be the lowest of the low and the meanest of the mean. Only tell me what I am to do and I will do it.”
“Go back to the door and resume your duty as doorkeeper.”
John looked at the Father with an expression of bewilderment.
“I thought you had done with it, my son, but Heaven knew better. And promise that when you are there you will pray for our wandering brother, that he may not be allowed to fulfil the errand on which you sent him out; pray that he may never find his sister, or anybody who knows her and can tell him where she is and what has become of her; pray that she may never cross his path to the last hour of life and the first of death's sundering; promise to pray for this, my son, night and day, morning and evening, with all your soul and strength, as you would pray for God's mercy and your soul's salvation.”
John did not answer; he was like a man in a stupor. “Is it possible?” he said. “Are you sending me back to the door? Can you trust me again?”
The Father stepped to the side of the bed and took the key of the gate from its place under the shelf. “Take this key with you, too, because for the future you are to be the keeper of the gate as well.”
John had taken the key mechanically, hardly hearing what was being said.
“Is it true, then—have you got faith in me still?”
The Father put both hands on his shoulders again and looked into his face. “God has faith in you, my child, and who am I that I should despair?”
When John Storm returned to the door his mind was in a state of stupefaction. Many hours passed during which he was only partly conscious of what was taking place about him. Sometimes he was aware that certain of the brothers had gathered around, with a tingling, electrical atmosphere among them, and that they were asking questions about the escape, and whispering together as if it had been something courageous and almost commendable, and had set their hearts beating. Again, sometimes he was aware that big Brother Andrew was sitting by his side on the form, stroking his arm from time to time, and talking in his low voice and aimless way about his mother and the last he saw of her. “She followed me down the street crying,” he said, “and I have often thought of it since and been tempted to run away.” Also he was aware that the dog was with him always, licking the backs of his stiff hands and poking up a cold snout into his downcast face.