The next morning, therefore, I journeyed to the west side and finally found him quite alone, as it chanced, the other members of the family then living with him having gone out. I shall never forget how old he looked after my year’s absence, how his eyelids twitched. After a slightly quizzical and attempted hard examining glance at me his lips twitched and tears welled to his eyes. He was so utterly done for, as he knew, and dependent on the courtesy of his children and life. I cried myself and rubbed his hands and his hair, then told him that I was doing well and had come to take him to see the Fair, that I had tickets—a passbook, no less—and that it shouldn’t cost him a penny. Naturally he was surprised and glad to see me, so anxious to know if I still adhered to the Catholic faith and went to confession and communion regularly. In the old days this had been the main bone of contention between us.
“Tell me, Dorsch,” he said not two minutes after I arrived, “do you still keep up your church duties?”
When I hesitated for a moment, uncertain what to say, he went on: “You ought to do that, you know. If you should die in a state of mortal sin——”
“Yes, yes,” I interrupted, making up my mind to give him peace on this score if I never did another thing in this world, “I always go right along, once every month or six weeks.”
“You really do that, do you?” he asked, eyeing me more in appeal than doubt, though judging by my obstinate past he must have doubted.
“Yes,” I insisted, “sure. I always go regularly.”
“I’m glad of that,” he went on hopefully. “I worry so. I think of you and the rest of the children so much. You’re a young man now and out in the world, and if you neglect your religious duties——” and he paused as if in a grave quandary. “When you’re out like that I know it’s hard to think of the church and your duties, but you shouldn’t neglect them——”
“Oh, Lord!” I thought. “Now he’s off again! This is the same old story—religion, religion, religion!”
“But I do go,” I insisted. “You mustn’t worry about me.”
“I know,” he said, with a sudden catch in his voice, “but I can’t help it. You know how it is with the other children: they don’t always do right in that respect. Paul is away on the stage; I don’t know whether he goes to church any more. A—— and E—— are here, but they don’t come here much—I haven’t seen them in I don’t know how long—months——”