Judith of the Godless Valley Part 49

"The Bible."

"Good heavens, isn't that childish?" she appealed to the congregation.

"Seems to me only G.o.d could prove that and we don't even know He exists."

There was silence in the room. Douglas, looking over the backs of many familiar heads, felt a curious yearning affection for these neighbors who so far had met his experiment so kindly. Then his eyes turned to the aspens without the window and beyond these to the far red clouds over Fire Mesa. The first snow of the season was beginning to sift through the trees. He wished that he had the courage to ask Mrs. Falkner what she thought of Inez' poem:

A fire mist and a planet, A crystal and a cell--

but he would rather have cut out his tongue than repeat the verse before this audience.

Mr. Fowler was running his fingers through his beard, glancing hesitatingly from Douglas to Peter.

"Well, is it the sense of this meeting," asked the postmaster, "to let the preacher tell us how he feels about it?"

"Go to it, old wrangler," said Charleton. "I can spout the Persian Poet to 'em if you run short of Bible stuff."

"Baa--a--a!" bleated a small boy in the back of the room.

"I'm going to give the first young one that makes a disturbance a dose of aspen switch," said Grandma Brown.

There was a general chuckle that quieted as Mr. Fowler began to speak.

"Religion doesn't rest on proof. It rests on Faith. And faith is something every human being possesses. If you plant a seed, you have faith that it will produce a plant. No power of yours can bring the plant. But you have faith--in what?--that the plant will appear. Every night that you go to bed you believe that a new day will come. You cannot bring that day but you have absolute faith that to-morrow will be brought by--what? The stars come nightly to the sky, the moon and the earth whirl in their appointed places. You have absolute confidence that they will continue to float in the heavens. On what do you place that confidence?

"Friends, I cannot prove to you that there is a G.o.d. But if you will be patient with me, I will give you a faith that asks no proof." He opened his Bible and began to read.

"And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life; he that cometh to me shall never hunger and he that believeth in me shall never thirst....

"If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth in me, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water....

"He that believeth in me, believeth not in me but in Him that sent me.

And he that seeth me, seeth Him that sent me. I come a light unto the world, that whosoever believeth in me should not abide in darkness.

"I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die."

Mr. Fowler paused and closed the book.

"Words!" said Charleton. "Just poetry!"

"You are speaking of the living words of the Almighty!" shouted the preacher. "You--" But he was interrupted. There was a sudden unearthly uproar of dogs without. The door burst open and old Sister, howling at the top of her lungs, bolted straight up the aisle to Peter. A can was tied to her tail. Prince, similarly adorned, and ably seconding his old friend's outcry, followed her. Several cats, all dragging tin cans, were flung spitting and yowling through a window.

Chaos reigned. Douglas seized Prince. Peter grabbed Sister. A dozen people took after the cats. They were not as easy to capture as the dogs; and during the progress of the chase, a sudden noxious odor filled the room. Douglas saw a thick black vapor rising from a bubbling mess on the top of the stove. The congregation bolted, leaving the field to one lone cat who climbed the wall to the window and disappeared with a final yowl.

There was no attempt to bring the audience back, and shortly the trail was dotted with riders. But that evening as he sat alone with Douglas, the preacher was not at all sad.

"You were right," he said to the young man, "in having Peter open the meeting. The older people were interested. No doubt they were interested; and in spite of the mischief that broke us up, I feel as if a start had been made. It's a rarely intelligent group of people. I admit that."

Douglas nodded. "We'll wear 'em down. See if we don't. The kids certainly put it over on me. I was feeling safe as long as I could watch Scott and Jimmy, and they had Grandma Brown's grandson doing the work for them." He chuckled and shook his head. "I just can't head them off on that kind of work. All we can do, as I say, is to wear them down. And maybe we can win Judith and one or two of the others, right soon."

Mr. Fowler sighed. "We can certainly interest some of the older people for a while with a discussion like we had this afternoon. But not the young people. Beauty and emotion and mystery must make the religious appeal to young folks. A church can't exist as a debating society."

Douglas turned this over in his mind, finally focussing his thoughts on Inez; she who loved beauty and dragged her emotions in the mire.

"Mr. Fowler," he said finally, "I'll bet Inez would have been a very religious person if she'd been started with the beauty and emotion and mystery!"

"That's a queer thing to say!" The preacher's voice was a little resentful.

Douglas went on as if he had not heard. "But you can't get Judith that way. She hasn't any emotions except temper and a sense of humor!"

"There isn't a woman born who isn't full of emotion," said Mr. Fowler, dryly. "And the deeper they conceal it, the more they have. I think I'll go to bed, Douglas. I feel as if I'd come through a hard day."

"Same here," agreed Douglas, and shortly the cabin was in darkness.

For a day or so the preacher stayed quietly in and about the cabin. He swept the chapel and cleaned out the stove and polished the windows and each day made a little fire. Douglas frequently found him there at night, on his knees. At least once a day he said, "It was a wonderful thing, Doug, for a young man like you to build me this little chapel, in my old age." He insisted on grace before meals and a chapter aloud from the Bible before bed. Douglas was embarra.s.sed but entirely acquiescent.

Mr. Fowler was to have a free hand with his spiritual development.

About the middle of the week, Judith rode down to the post-office with Douglas. "Well, how's the sky pilot and his disciple?" she asked.

"I believe the old boy is almost happy," replied Douglas. "He thinks that little old church I built is pretty fine."

"Inez says it looks like a big cow stable."

"That's nice of Inez. Why didn't she tell me how to make it better looking?"

"What does Inez care about it? Honest, Doug, you are making an awful fool of yourself. A man like Fowler can't preach to us."

"Why, he never had a chance to preach here yet!" exclaimed Douglas. "And, what do you expect in a place like Lost Chief, a ten-thousand-dollar-a-year sky pilot? Besides, I don't want preaching from him. I want just the one thing like Peter said. And Fowler has that in him just as strong as the highest paid preacher in the world. Give him a show, Judith. Come up, every Sunday. You might back me that much."

"And have everybody in the crowd laughing at me like they are at you?

I won't do anything against the old man, Douglas, for your sake. But that's all I'll promise."

"I'm not going to let you off that easy, Jude. Come up to supper to-night. I won't let him talk religion. Honest, he's as interesting as a book when he gets to telling some of his experiences."

Judith shook her head. "I'd rather stay at home with 'Pendennis.'"

"If I get Inez to come, will you?" urged Douglas.

Judith grinned impishly. "Yes, I'd come with Inez."

They returned from the post-office via the west trail and stopped at Inez' place. She was eating a belated dinner in her slatternly kitchen, and waved a hospitable hand over the table.

"Thanks, no," said Doug. "I just stopped by to see if you and Judith wouldn't come up and have supper with the sky pilot and me. I won't let him talk religion and he's got some good stories to tell."

Inez looked Douglas over. He and the tall Judith seemed to fill the kitchen. Doug finally had covered his big frame with muscles and he was a larger and handsomer man than his father.

"Doug," said Inez, "I am truly flattered. What are you trying to do?

Convert me?"