第81章

For three days Dick made steady progress toward health, but his progress was slow. Any mental effort produced severe pain in his head and sufficed to raise his temperature several points. As he gained in strength and became more and more clear in his thinking his anxiety in regard to his work began to increase. His congregations would be waiting him on Sunday, and he could not bear to think of their being disappointed. With no small effort had he gathered them together, and a single failure on his part he knew would have disastrous effect upon the attendance. He was especially concerned about the service at Bull Crossing, which was at once the point where the work was the most difficult, and, at the present juncture, most encouraging. Under his instructions Barney sought to secure a substitute for the service at Bull Crossing, but without result. Preachers were scarce in that country and every preacher had more work in sight than he could overtake. And so Dick fretted and wrought himself into a fever, until the doctor took him sternly to task.

"I don't see that it's your business to worry, Dick," he said. "I suppose you consider yourself as working under orders, and it is your belief, isn't it, that the One who gives the orders is the One who has laid you down here?"

"That's true," said Dick wearily, "but there's the people. A lot of them come a long way. It's been hard to get them together, and I hate to disappoint them."

"Well, we'll get someone," replied Barney. "We're a pretty hard combination to beat, aren't we, Margaret? There will be a man to take the service at Bull Crossing if I have to take it myself--a desperate resort, indeed."

"Why not, Barney?" asked Dick. "You could do it well."

"What? Did you ever hear me talk? I can talk a little with my fingers, but my tongue is unconscionably slow."

"There was a man once slow of speech," replied Dick quietly, "but he was given a message and he led a nation into freedom."

Barney nodded. "I remember him. But he could do things."

"No," answered Dick, "but he believed God could do things."

"Perhaps so. That was rather long ago."

"With God," replied Dick earnestly, "there is no such thing as long ago."

"All the same," said Barney, "I guess these things don't happen now."

"I believe they happen," replied his brother, "where God finds a man who will take his life in his hand and go."

"Well, I don't know about that," replied Barney, "but I do know that you must quit talking and sleep. Now, hear me, drop that meeting out of your mind. I'll look after it."

But Saturday came and, in spite of every effort on Barney's part, he found no one for the service at Bull Crossing next day. There was still a slight hope that one of the officials of the congregation would consent to be a stop-gap for the day.

"I guess I'll have to take that service myself, Margaret," said Barney laughingly. "Wouldn't the crowd stare? They'd hear the sermon of their lives."

"It would be a good sermon, Barney," replied Margaret quietly.

"And why should you not say something to the men?"

"Nonsense, Margaret!" cried Barney impatiently. "You know the thing is utterly absurd. What sort of man am I to preach? A gambler, a swearer, and generally bad. They all know me."

"They know only a part of you, Barney," said Margaret gently. "God knows all of you, and whatever you have been you are no gambler today, and you are not a bad man."

"No," replied Barney slowly, "I am no gambler, nor will I ever be again. But I have been a hard, bad man. For three years I carried hate in my heart. I could not forgive and didn't want to be forgiven. And that, I believe, was the cause of all my badness.

But--somehow--I don't deserve it--but I've been awfully well treated. I deserved hell, but I've got a promise of heaven. And I'd be glad to do something for--" He paused abruptly.

"There, you've got your sermon, Barney," said Margaret.

"What do you mean?"

"'Forgive and ye shall be forgiven.'"

"It's the sermon someone wants to preach to me, but it's not for me to preach. The thing is preposterous. I'll get one of those fellows at the Crossing to take the meeting."

On Saturday evening Dick again reverted to the subject.

"I'm not anxious, Barney," he said, "but who's going to take the meeting to-morrow night at Bull Crossing?"

"Now, look here," said Barney, "Monday morning you'll hear all about it. Meantime, don't ask questions. Margaret and I are responsible, and that ought to be enough. You never knew her to fail."

"No, nor you, Barney," said Dick, sinking back with a sigh of satisfaction. "I know it will be all right. Are you going down to-morrow evening?" he inquired, turning to Margaret.

"I?" exclaimed Margaret. "What would I do?"

"Of course you are going. It will do you a lot of good," said Barney. "You may have to preach yourself or hold my coat while I go in."

A sudden gleam of joy in the eyes, a flush of red upon the cheek, and the quick following pallor told Dick the thoughts that rushed through Margaret's heart.

"Yes," said Dick gravely, "you will go down, too, Margaret. It will do you good, and I don't need you here."

Many anxious days had Barney passed in his life, but never had he found himself so utterly blocked by unmanageable circumstances and uncompromising facts as he found facing him that Sunday morning.

He confided his difficulty to Tommy Tate, whom he had found in "Mexico's" saloon toning up his system after his long illness, and whom he had straightway carried off with him.

"I guess it's either you or me, Tommy."

"Bedad, it's yersilf that c'd do that same, an' divil a wan av the bhoys will 'Mexico' git this night, wance the news gits about."