下载掌阅APP，畅读海量书库
立即打开
Louis Hildreth lay upon a couch in the cool library the morning after his arrival at 'The Willows.' Evadne had been shocked at the change in him since she had seen him last. His eyes were sunken, while underneath purple shadows fell upon his pallid cheeks. He touched Evadne's hand as she sat beside him. It was his hand!
"What a splendid fellow Randolph is!" he exclaimed suddenly. "He is making himself felt in Marlborough, I tell you. Strange, how some men forge their way to the front, while the rest of us just float down the stream of mediocrity. No wonder we are not missed, when we drop out of the babbling conglomerate of humanity into silence," he added bitterly. "Who would miss a single pair of fins from amidst a shoal of herring!"
"I think it is because Doctor Randolph is not content to float, Louis," Evadne answered gently. "He must always be climbing higher. Like Paul, he is 'pressing towards the mark.'"
"He is a grand fellow! And the beauty of it is he never seems to think of himself at all. Most men would get to be top-lofty if they accomplished as much as he does every day."
Evadne's lips parted in a happy smile. "I think Doctor Randolph is too much occupied with Jesus to have time to waste upon himself."
"Upon my word, coz, you're a puzzle! You talk in an unknown tongue. Don't you know Self is the god we worship, and the aim of our existence is to have it wear purple and fine linen, and fare sumptuously every day?"
"It should not be!" cried Evadne. "Oh Louis, dear Louis, life can never be grand until we are able to say—'Self has been crucified with Christ!'"
* * * * *
Weeks rolled into months and Louis was still at 'The Willows.' His cynicism had come to have a strangely wistful ring. John Randolph's visits were frequent and they held long conversations together, these men, the one who had seized every opportunity and made the most of it, the other who had let his golden chances slip through his fingers one by one; then John Randolph would go bravely back to his life of toil, while Louis listened to Evadne's sweet voice as she sang in the gloaming, or watched his ring glisten as her deft fingers were busy with their deeds of love.
"How do you do it?" he exclaimed one evening when they were alone together. "You never rest! Your whole life seems to be centered in the lives of others, and there is nothing attractive about them, if there were I could understand. It looks like such drudgery to me. Tell me, little coz, what makes you give up all your ease to make these people happy?"
"When we love our Father it is our joy to do his will," she answered softly.
"If I could live like you and Randolph I should be perfectly satisfied.
I wish I had the courage to try."
"Mere outward living cannot save us, Louis. Nothing can but faith in the atoning blood and the name and the love of Christ. Then—when we believe, you know—all things become possible. We make an awful mistake when we think we know better than the Bible. Nicodemus lived a perfect outward life, yet Christ said to him, 'Except ye be born again—of the Word and the Spirit—ye cannot see the Kingdom of God.' We are running a terrible risk when we try to live without Jesus."
"That is what Randolph says. He is a one idea man, if ever there was one, and yet he is so many sided! He is the most uncompromising fellow I ever knew. I should as soon expect to see the stars fall from the sky as to see him do a shady thing. You would be amused, coz, to see the lady mother and Isabelle joining forces to lay siege to his affections."
What meant that sudden start and then the blush which flamed up over cheek and brow? Louis Hildreth closed his thin fingers over Evadne's ring with a long drawn sigh. He was beginning to realize that a hand, without a heart, is an empty thing.
Long after she had left him he lay motionless. This knowledge which had come to him so suddenly had a bitter taste.
* * * * *
"You ought to get well, Hildreth, and you ought to be a very happy man,"
John Randolph spoke the words suddenly as he rose to take his leave.
"I never expect to be either. When a man has all he has prided himself upon swept away from him, and all that he longs for denied him, how can it be possible?"
"'Count it your highest good when God denies you.' Is that too hard a gospel? We shall not read it so in the light of eternity. It is only that Christ may become to us the 'altogether lovely' One."
"Did you ever love—a woman?" Louis put the question suddenly, watching his friend's face with a jealous scrutiny.
"Yes." The answer was as simple and straightforward as the man. He knew of nothing to be ashamed of in this beautiful love of his life.
"And her name was?—"
"Evadne."
John Randolph spoke the name for the first time to another, looking up at the sky. When he turned to leave the room he saw that Louis' face was buried among his cushions and he drove away in a great wonderment. What could it all mean?
"Knocking, knocking, who is there?
Waiting, waiting, oh, how fair!
'T is a pilgrim, strange and kingly,
Never such was seen before.
Ah, my soul, for such a wonder,
Wilt thou not undo the door?"
Evadne sang the words softly in the twilight: sang them with a great note of longing in her pleading voice. She and her cousin were alone.
"Evadne, come here."
She crossed the room and knelt beside his couch.
"Little coz, I have let the Pilgrim in."
And Evadne buried her face in the cushions with a low cry. The crown of rejoicing was hers—at last!
* * * * *
"There is only one thing wanting between you two." Louis looked wistfully at John Randolph and Evadne, as they stood beside him, talking brightly of how he should help when he grew strong.
"And what is that?" Doctor Randolph asked the question with a smile.
Louis drew his ring from Evadne's finger and laid her hand in that of his friend. "Take her, Randolph, she is worthy of you. I would not say that of any other woman."
With a great joy surging in his heart, John Randolph held out his other hand. She must give herself. He could not take her from another's giving.
A lovely shyness flushed into the pure face, their eyes met, and Evadne laid her hand in his without a word.
"Evadne!" The rich, tender tones fell throbbing through the silence, enwrapping the name in a sweet protectiveness. "Life is—for us—to do the will of God!"