The High Calling Part 38

"And the turkey is the biggest of all," said Elijah, who was doing it full justice. "We all hope Mr. Bauer's incubator will continue to head the list of the six best sellers. And say, Bauer, why not get out a special ill.u.s.trated Thanksgiving edition incubator made to hatch out nothing but turkeys. At the price you must have paid over at Flagstaff for this one, it wouldn't take long before you could make Van Shaw's railroads look like a blind trail through the Grand Canyon."

That Thanksgiving Day dinner was a memorable one at Tolchaco. Everyone was in fine spirits. Clifford kept everyone in a roar with his remarks.

Bauer surprised the company by telling two funny stories from the Fliegende Blaetter. Clifford's sister laughed so hard she almost choked on a bone. Mr. and Mrs. Masters grew unusually witty. And Lucy Gray, while not in any way distinguished for any brilliant remarks, glowed with a quiet happiness all through the meal and looked so attractive that Elijah Clifford more than once shot an approving glance at her as she sat by Mrs. Masters and insisted on filling up Clifford's plate whenever a spot on it showed any signs of being uncovered.

After the dishes had been washed by the gentlemen who gallantly offered to do that task, the ladies sauntered up the river to inspect the new site for the new school house which Mr. Douglas thought he could secure for the Mission.

It was a desert day, clear and warm in the sun. Masters and Bauer went out to inspect some pottery recently found near an excavation for a well. Elijah Clifford busied himself at the little barn with some plans for an improved hobble to use on an unusually cunning and inventive pony.

When he stepped out of the barn and looked over to the river bank he saw Miss Gray sitting on the old cottonwood log. The other ladies had gone back to the mission buildings.

Clifford stopped where he was a minute and then slowly walked over to the log and sat down.

"That was a good dinner," he said, a little awkwardly, as he looked first at Miss Gray and then at the river.

"Wasn't it?" said Miss Gray with even more enthusiasm than the subject called for. "Did you enjoy it?"

"Did I? I haven't got over it yet. Somehow I feel as if it would be wrong to eat any canned goods for quite a while. A sort of uncomplimentary reflection on Bauer. I wouldn't have eaten so much only I didn't want to hurt his feelings by appearing not to appreciate his treat. Isn't he a fine fellow?"

"Yes," said Miss Gray. She did not seem very talkative and appeared very nervous for a young woman who had figured as a life saver on various occasions.

"I wish the Douglases had been here, don't you?" asked Clifford. He had his knife out and, Yankee-like, was busy shaving pieces off the old log.

It seemed to help him in keeping up what seemed to promise to be a one-sided talk. "Yes. I--I've had a letter from Milton. Would you like to read it?"

"Sure. I always did enjoy Miss Helen's talk. I expect her letters are as interesting."

"This isn't from Helen. It's from her brother," Miss Gray blushed as Clifford quickly looked up at her. "But I would like to have you read it and give me your advice."

Clifford took the letter without a word. He opened it slowly and read it. Then he looked at Miss Gray with a puzzled look.

"The young man seems to want to open a correspondence with you. That is certainly all right. But you don't want my advice about that, do you?"

"Oh! I meant to give you this letter. It is the second one I received."

Miss Gray handed Clifford another letter, and he gravely read that through slowly.

"He seems to be making good progress," was Elijah's comment. "In the first letter he wants to know if he can write, and in the second he wants to know if you will be Mrs. Douglas some time. I call that going some. But it's no more than I expected."

Miss Gray was almost crying.

"Isn't it absurd? What do you think I ought to do? What would you say to him?"

Elijah Clifford looked at Lucy Gray strangely. And then he said very, very quietly:

"Miss Gray, do you think you ought to ask me such a question? Answer it out of your own heart. I have no business to advise you in such a matter."

Lucy Gray gave him one searching look, as her face flamed.

"Give me the letter," was all she said.

Elijah handed it to her, and in some way their fingers touched as Lucy took the letter, and then she deliberately tore it into bits and scattered the pieces down upon the top of the log.

A sudden light came into Elijah Clifford's eyes.

"Is that your answer to it?" he said, moving over on the log a little nearer to Lucy.

"Yes," she answered, and it is a historical fact that she did not move back any. But she said afterwards that she was sitting near the end of the log and couldn't have moved far without falling off and that Elijah knew it.

"Then you don't need my advice? What made you ask for it?"

Lucy Gray, prim school ma'am as she had called herself, answered between crying and laughing, "Oh, I don't care for him. Why, he is only twenty-four and I am twenty-eight. And I can never leave these people here. I am so in love with them."

"With all of them?" asked Elijah desperately.

"Yes. But with some more than others."

Again a light came into Clifford's face as he moved up a little nearer.

The bits of paper which had been poor Walter's letter began to fall over the sides of the log. But Elijah Clifford was pale as he said:

"Lucy, I don't want to make another mistake. I have not been able to conceal my feeling for you and I realise the great distance between us when it comes to education. I'm not college bred. And no one feels it more than I do. But I'm not too old to learn. I'm only thirty. And I find my brain works pretty well when I have a motive. I can almost read Herrmann und Dorothea. And I've committed no end of Heine. I can say 'Die schonste die Jungfrauen sitszet, Dort oben wunderbar' and a lot more. But--I don't dare ask you again to be my wife unless--unless--I can be sure that the differences between us will not make you unhappy.

But, oh, if this happiness could be mine! You cannot love these people more than I do. Or yearn over them more. And we are not so far apart after all."

"I'm sure," said Lucy Gray, looking up at him, tears flowing down her cheeks. "I'm sure, Elijah, that we are not so very far apart in any way.

And if you want to be happy I am sure------"

She did not need to say any more. Elijah Clifford saw happiness looking into his eyes out of hers and he would have been very much lacking in education if he had not then and there claimed his own.

They did not hear Mr. and Mrs. Masters approach because sand does not echo under peoples' feet, but they heard Mr. Masters say to his wife:

"I'm sorry we left the kodak up at the house. I've been hoping and praying for this for the last two years. And now my prayers have been answered, I would like to have some record of the fact."

Elijah Clifford and Lucy Gray stood up side by side. They were not embarra.s.sed nor confused. The light of heaven seemed to s.h.i.+ne on them out of that Thanksgiving Day glow in the desert sky. Their happiness had a sacred divine atmosphere about it that checked even as joyful a word of congratulation as Mr. Masters was about to speak. Ansa had come running down from the Mission and seeing Miss Gray and Clifford there she had come up and put her little hands one in each of theirs.

"Ah!" cried Masters. "This is the picture we want!" while Lucy and Elijah standing there by Ansa spoke of the years they were now to live together in the sacred union of husband and wife, consecrated heart and mind to the love of a neglected people, their human happiness intensified and purified by the service they were to give as one in answer to that which spoke to them even louder than their own earthly love--the sound of the High Calling.

If, as is easy for the writer and reader, we agree to let a few years slip by, as they have a way of doing whether we wish to let them or not, we shall find ourselves again in Milton at the home of the Douglases.

It is Thanksgiving Day again and Esther seems to have even more than the usual happy look on her face as she says to Helen:

"Isn't it remarkable that Walter coming up from the Isthmus is going to bring Bauer with him from Berlin? The world is getting smaller every day."

"We must learn to say 'Professor' Bauer, mother. You know Walter wrote that he has several honorary degrees conferred on him for his inventions. I understand he is held in high respect at all the universities."

"He will never be anything but plain Felix Bauer to me, Helen. And I hope his honours have not spoiled him. I don't believe they could."

Helen is silent as she sits down by the window which commands a view of the front walk. Time has dealt generously and kindly with her. The girlhood has ripened into the stately strong womanhood. Many suitors have come and gone, among them some n.o.ble gentlemen who have received their answers from her with sore hearts, but Helen still has not seen her ideal of the romantic days and her heart is yet--she says to herself--free--at least she has refused both wealth and high character for the vision she has cherished all these years of the nameless one who, so far, she says, has never appeared to her. And all through this testing, refining process of growth, she has developed into a spirit of rare strength and grace, of whom Paul and Esther have been increasingly proud.

Two young men come briskly up the walk. Mrs. Douglas opens the door and rushes out on the porch as Helen rises to tell her they are coming.

Walter laughingly lifts Esther off her feet as he kisses her and then turns to Helen. Evidently he has not broken his heart over that romance in the desert.