The Courage of Marge ODoone | Page 5

voice acted on him as a tonic. For the first time
he asked himself what he would do. Stronger and stronger grew the
desire in him to return, to face again that situation in his home. I
believe that he would have done this--I believe that the red blood in
him would have meted out its own punishment had he not turned just in
time, and at the right place. He found himself in front of The Little
Church Around the Corner, nestling in its hiding-place just off the
Avenue. He remembered its restful quiet, the coolness of its aisles and
alcoves. He was exhausted, and he went in. He sat down facing the
chancel, and as his eyes became accustomed to the gloom he saw that
the broad, low dais in front of the organ was banked with great masses
of hydrangeas. There had been a wedding, probably the evening before.
My friend told me of the thickening that came in his throat, of the
strange, terrible throb in his heart as he sat there alone--the only soul in
the church--and stared at those hydrangeas. Hydrangeas had been their

own wedding flower, Father. And then----"
For the first time there was something like a break in the younger man's
voice.
"My friend thought he was alone," he went on. "But some one had
come out like a shadow beyond the chancel railing, and of a sudden,
beginning wonderfully low and sweet, the great organ began to fill the
church with its melody. The organist, too, thought he was alone. He
was a little, old man, his shoulders thin and drooped, his hair white. But
in his soul there must have been a great love and a great peace. He
played something low and sweet. When he had finished he rose and
went away as quietly as he had come, and for a long time after that my
friend sat there--alone. Something new was born in him, something
which I hope will grow and comfort him in the years to come. When he
went out into the city again the sun was shining. He did not go home.
He did not see the woman--his wife--again. He has never seen her since
that night when she stood up in her dishevelled beauty and laughed at
him. Even the divorce proceedings did not bring them together. I
believe that he treated her fairly. Through his attorneys he turned over
to her a half of what he possessed. Then he went away. That was a year
ago. In that year I know that he has fought desperately to bring himself
back into his old health of mind and body, and I am quite sure that he
has failed."
He paused, his story finished. He drew the brim of his hat lower over
his eyes, and then he rose to his feet. His build was slim and clean-cut.
He was perhaps five feet ten inches in height, which was four inches
taller than the Little Missioner. His shoulders were of good breadth, his
waist and hips of an athletic slimness. But his clothes hung with a
certain looseness. His hands were unnaturally thin, and in his face still
hovered the shadows of sickness and of mental suffering.
Father Roland stood beside him now with eyes that shone with a deep
understanding. Under the sputter of the lamp above their heads the two
men clasped hands, and the Little Missioner's grip was like the grip of
iron.

"David, I've preached a strange code through the wilderness for many a
long year," he said, and his voice was vibrant with a strong emotion.
"I'm not Catholic and I'm not Church of England. I've got no religion
that wears a name. I'm simply Father Roland, and all these years I've
helped to bury the dead in the forest, an' nurse the sick, an' marry the
living, an' it may be that I've learned one thing better than most of you
who live down in civilization. And that's how to find yourself when
you're down an' out. Boy, will you come with me?"
Their eyes met. A fiercer gust of the storm beat against the windows.
They could hear the wind wailing in the trees outside.
"It was your story that you told me," said Father Roland, his voice
barely above a whisper. "She was your wife, David?"
It was very still for a few moments. Then came the reply: "Yes, she was
my wife...."
Suddenly David freed his hand from the Little Missioner's clasp. He
had stopped something that was almost like a cry on his lips. He pulled
his hat still lower over his eyes and went through the door out into the
main part of the coach.
Father Roland did not follow. Some of the ruddiness had