Silver Wings (15 page)

Diana, standing alone on the airstrip, watching them move rapidly down the slope of the hill toward the woods, felt a rising desire to laugh—or cry. When had she ever been dismissed by a young man whom she deigned to honor with her company, in this terse way? It was too vexatious! She simply would not stand such treatment! She would bend him to her power, or break him in the attempt. Such insufferable indifference! He had no right to be that way. He pretended to be a gentleman, yet no gentleman she knew would have done what he had done just now—walk off and leave her alone in a field. He should at least have escorted her back to the garden.

She looked up with a start to see Barry standing by her side, regarding her almost sternly.

“What have you to do with that fellow?” he asked roughly. “You haven’t two ideas in common.”

“Really?” she flashed at him, angry at once. “How in the world can you possibly know that?”

“Because he’s nothing but a country lout!”

“That’s not true!” flashed Diana again, half wondering at her own defense of the man whom she had set out to make the victim of a practical joke. “He’s wearing a Phi Beta Kappa key!”

She did not state that she had just discovered the key as he swung away to leave her and that she knew very little more about the stranger than he did.

“Well, he’s not your kind—not our kind,” Barry added sullenly. “Even if he may be a grind. Come! Forget him! And for heaven’s sake, lay off that kind of thing. Shall we walk or would you rather try my new car? We could take a drive and end up at the country club in time for tea.”

“Thanks! I have something else to do!” said Diana, now thoroughly angry, and she flung away and marched into the house.

For a while she hunted through the library shelves, and then, losing patience, she went in search of Christine and asked the way to Amory’s room. She remembered that she had seen the new secretary at church, and of course she would be able to help her find a Bible.

Amory was surprised on opening her door to find the golden girl standing there, with almost a friendly look upon her face.

“Pardon me,” said Diana, “could you tell me where to find a Bible? I want to look up something.”

“Why, yes,” said Amory good naturedly, handing Diana her own, which she held in her hand with her fingers between the leaves. “You may take mine. I was just through reading anyway.”

Diana took it half curiously. It seemed strange to her that this other girl should be reading a Bible.

“Thanks awfully,” she said. “I’ll return it in a little while,” and she sped away.

Amory went back into her room and sat down with a hysterical desire to laugh. Her Testament had sailed away in the air, and now her Bible had gone from her. Was she sent to this house to distribute Bibles to the rich heathen? Now what could that girl want with a Bible? Obviously, she had none of her own. Well, it was a puzzle. Perhaps it had something to do with the joke this girl was playing on the minister! She began to wish she had not so easily loaned her Bible. She did not wish to be a party to this outrage, even by so small a contact.

Meanwhile, Diana, in a becoming dressing gown, was reclining on a chaise lounge, fluttering through the leaves of Amory’s well-used Bible, trying to find the book of Romans. There did not seem to be any such book in the secretary’s Bible, and Diana was beginning to think it must be a different edition from the minister’s Bible, when she suddenly stumbled upon it. Almost as long it took her to find the chapter. And when she had read it, she closed the book with a puzzled look. What on earth did he mean by giving her a chapter like that to read? What could that possibly have to do with the return of Jesus Christ to earth?

Puzzling over this question she fell asleep and was awakened by Christine’s tap at her door.

“Please, Miss Dorne, Mr. Dunleith sent these books to you, and he says you’ll not need to return them, as he has other copies.”

When Christine was gone Diana sat up and examined the package of books curiously. Some of them had strange titles—startling ones, almost as strange as some of the things the minister had said in his sermon.
Our Blessed Hope
. Now what could that be? They were most of them small, thin books, with inviting print. They did not look at all deep. But they bore on their covers an air that was utterly new to her. She never had known there were such books in the world. Why did people bother to write them? Did other people want to know about such things? Did she? Of course, she had not really cared to find out, but now she felt idly curious to know what it was all about.

At the bottom of the pile she found a little worn Bible with limp black covers and the name “John Dunleith” and “Edinburgh University” with a recent date below. She opened her eyes wider and turned the leaves with deeper interest. Had the young man been to a foreign university? Curious his aunt had not mentioned it. But then, he was a silent fellow. Perhaps she did not know it, as she had owned that she had seen very little of him since he was sixteen. Well, that accounted for his general air of culture and refinement.

She felt a curious triumph in finding him out as a student, since Barry had tried to discount him. She felt a deeper interest in the young man.

She turned the pages and found bits of paper marking certain chapters, with the references written on the paper, and idly she glanced at them, but they meant little or nothing to her and she soon threw down the books and began to dress for the evening, this time donning a filmy turquoise chiffon. She resolved more than ever that she would not be ignored. She would win that man from his strange reticence. He was probably surrounded by a wall of reserve, and she must find a way to break through and bewitch him. She had never failed before when she had really tried, and of course she was not going to fail now. So she threw a string of gleaming crystals over her head and hurried down with a lovely bloom upon her cheeks and an uplifted dreamy look in her turquoise eyes. She stopped at Amory’s door on her way down and left the Bible, and Amory could not help admiring her loveliness. Could she have misjudged her? How lovely she was in that blue frock! It did not seem possible that she could be so false. But why had she wanted the Bible?

Amory had not been called down to tea on the terrace, much to her own relief, for she did not feel in the mood for small talk and filling in. Neither, she observed, was the young minister present. Diana held court with Barry and Fred and Clarence, though she cast occasional surreptitious glances toward the garden gate.

Amory’s tea was brought to her room, and afterward she sat till the long shadows outside had lengthened into twilight, having no urge to turn on her lights and read. She would have liked to go to church again, but the long mile and a half over the dark country road with great high hedges on either hand and only strangers living behind them made her hesitate. Perhaps when she had been here longer and gotten accustomed to the way in daytime, she might venture at night. Or perhaps, sometime when Christine was off duty she might persuade her to accompany her.

So she sat by her window watching the stars appear one by one, watching the purple mountains fade into velvet darkness, listening to the little sleepy insects and the tree toads down in the woods, and feeling terribly lonely. Perhaps, too, without knowing it, she was watching for the coming of a plane, listening for the hum of a great motor.

Downstairs the sound of music broke forth, jazz and laughter. How different it all was from home and the Sunday evenings Aunt Hannah and Aunt Jocelyn loved. Presently, while she sat alone and the darkness deepened, with only a luminous hint of the late-coming moon over the eastern mountain, she found the tears flowing softy down, and putting her head down on the arm of the chair, she had a good hard cry. It was in the midst of that that Christine tapped at her door and told her someone wanted her on the telephone.

With her heart in her mouth from quick alarm she hurried down the back stairs to the telephone behind the dining room. What had happened at home? Was Aunt Hannah worse? That was surely the only thing that would cause Aunt Jocelyn to waste money on long-distance telephoning! Oh, why had she ever come away?

With trembling hand she took up the receiver and called that frightened “Hello!” then heard that strong young voice greeting her across those hundreds of miles!

And while all this had been going on Diana had been in church! Yes, actually! No, the minister had not taken her. She had initiated the movement herself. After refusing more than once to ride with Barry, she told him she would go with him, providing he would take her where she wanted to go.

He readily agreed, although she did not tell him their destination until they arrived at the chapel.

Barry was astounded, but he acceded, for he knew Diana of old. When she was determined do something, she did it. Into the chapel they went. However, there was more than one way to thwart her purpose. Barry determined that Diana should have no opportunity to study her preacher during that evening. To that end he exerted himself as only he knew how to do. He sang at the top of his very fine tenor voice and invented clever paraphrases of the words that were irresistible. He drew clever caricatures of the minister and the worshippers in the flyleaf of the hymnbook. He put his arm around Diana rather openly; he reached for her hand and played with her rings. He talked almost out loud with a running fire of wit that was convulsing. If Diana had been spiritually inclined, these things would have been only annoying; as it was they annoyed her neighbors, and merely amused her, as Barry had meant they should. Diana had no standards by which to judge herself. She perhaps did not know how utterly obnoxious she was making herself to John Dunleith, nor how completely she was undoing any impression she had intended to make by coming to church.

Diana laughed and whispered a great deal herself, showing her utter indifference to the comfort of those about her so plainly that finally one gray-haired woman turned around and looked at her, whereupon the two aliens went off into ill-suppressed mirth that shook the seat and caused others to turn and look at them in scorn.

John Dunleith could not fail to notice all this. Perhaps both Diana and Barry meant that he should. But he went on with his preaching without seeming to look their way until he came to the close. Then he seemed to turn and look straight in their direction. Just one arresting sentence Diana heard—and suddenly she sobered, a startled look in her eyes. He spoke, and he seemed to be speaking to her soul.

“You, who were meant to be in the image of God, what will He say to you when you come to stand before the great white throne? Can anyone see God in you?”

Barry tried to distract her at this point, calling attention to an old man who had fallen asleep with his mouth open. But Diana did not look at him. She had her eyes on the minister. She was trying to turn over this remarkable question. She did not know why it seemed to pierce her heart like a sudden sword thrust. She did not want to feel what he was saying, but she did. Great white throne! Why should she have to stand before a great white throne? She had never been afraid of anything in her life, but she somehow felt afraid of those words.

“Let’s go!” she said suddenly, as the sermon closed with a brief prayer, and while the last hymn was being announced they crowded out past three people and left the church. The eyes of the minister as he announced the closing hymn had a sad, stern look, but his closing prayer was very tender. When the people crowded around to speak to him afterward, he was as cordial as usual. One of the old elders spoke about the strangers who had made a disturbance, and the minister’s eyes grew sad again.

“Yes,” said he regretfully, “I’m afraid they don’t know the Lord. They need praying for.”

“I fear they’re beyond that!” said the sharp old elder spitefully. “I think it would be wasted time.”

“Does anybody ever get past the need of prayer?” asked John Dunleith, and he went out thoughtfully into the starlight, with Neddy walking proudly by his side.

They came up through the driveway and skirted the house to get to the side entrance, and as they passed the long windows on the terrace a wave of jazz from the radio burst forth straight from some roof garden or cabaret in New York, and Dunleith could see Diana in Barry’s close embrace, dancing as if her whole soul were in the movement.

She would have been surprised if she had known that John Dunleith went up to his room and knelt to pray for her trifling little soul. Perhaps it would have frightened her if she could have seen into the future.

The moon rose, and the midnight came. The radio was turned off, and the guests at Briarcliffe Manor sought their beds, for there was a long day planned for the morrow, and they were all eager to be ready for it. Diana had been one of the first to yawn and say she had had enough of the day and was going to bed. And when Diana was gone somehow the spice of life was wanting, and they all trooped off after her.

The servants went about turning off lights, closing up the castle for the night, and the place grew silent. But still the young preacher knelt in his room and pleaded for the soul of the girl who had plotted to make a fool of him.

And in another part of the house a girl knelt beside a window looking up to the stars and the clear moonlit sky and prayed for a man who was sailing somewhere off beneath those stars, and her prayer kept time to the tune of her heart as it sang the one word darling.

T
he great bird set sail into a silver sea, and the heart of the flier was at peace. He laughed aloud as he thought what had come to him. The sacred drops on his brow that morning, that had seemed so mysterious when they were put there, so almost useless; the strange words “Child of God, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” had come to mean something, just with a half hour’s explanation. He was born into a new family now. He had become a child of God!

He looked down into the silver sea below him and saw the world he had left—twinkling little lights like pinpoints in bunches, those were cities. Great spaces of inky darkness—that was country, with the people all gone to bed. Isolated glowing points—those were landmarks, meant for his guidance.