Treasured Brides Collection (42 page)

“Of course, the great sin, the only sin, after all, that is terrible, is not believing in Him. Rejecting Him when He did so much for us. The Bible says that in God’s sight ‘all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.’ ”

“Of course, I’ve heard that line all my life, but down in my heart I never did see why so much emphasis was put on sin. Most respectable people are pretty good livers. I never had any real desire to be bad. I can’t really feel that I’m a great sinner, and I don’t see why I should try.”

Natalie was praying silently that she might be given the right answer, and now she said half shyly, “People never do feel they are sinners till they’ve had a vision of Jesus, do they? When you see what He is then you begin to know how far short you fall.”

“Oh!” said Chris blankly. Then after a moment—“How could you do that? He isn’t here. You can’t see a person that isn’t here.”

“Yes, you can. You can find Him in His Word. And you can find Him in prayer. The Holy Spirit has promised to reveal Him to us if we ask Him. But you’ve got to come believing. Belief is the key that unlocks the Word and makes us see things that we could not understand without it.”

Chris looked at her wonderingly.

“How could one believe something they
didn’t
believe? Something they were not convinced was true?”

“Belief is an act of the will,” said Natalie, “not an intellectual conviction. It is something you deliberately will to do. It is taking God at His Word and letting Him prove to you what He promises is true. That is the way it was put in Bible school the other night, and I’ve proved it is true.”

“
You
have?” he eyed her curiously in the soft darkness of the street.

“Oh yes! Ever since I was saved.”

“There it is again,” said Chris perplexedly. “You say it just the way he did tonight, as if it were some sort of charm. What does it mean? How do you get that way? What do you have to do?”

“Oh, you don’t have to
do
anything. Just accept it. Salvation is a free gift, and you’ve only to take it. The moment you accept it, you are saved, and nothing, not anything, can take you out of His hand. For you are His, and from that time forward you are under His care. And He says He is able to present you
faultless
before the presence of His glory, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. That’s not because you are without fault. That’s because He is faultless, and because He has given us a right to wear His
righteousness
. It is only through His righteousness that we could be faultless.” Natalie was talking earnestly now, herself filled with wonder that she had been given opportunity to say these things.

“But I don’t understand,” said Chris. “How does that make you know you’re saved, just to accept a thing? Just to believe?”

“Why,” said Natalie thoughtfully, praying that she might be led to the right words that would bring light to the questioner, “if you were a prisoner, condemned to die, and you were told that someone else had taken the death penalty for you and you might go free, all that would be left for you to do would be to accept his death for yours, to believe what you were told. He has said that the minute you accept His grace and believe His word, you are born again, and are one of His saved ones. He also says, ‘He that believeth
hath
everlasting life, and
shall not
come into condemnation, but is
passed
from death unto life.’ ”

“But I don’t just see how believing a thing could make any difference in the way you feel.”

“Well, you couldn’t see, because belief is the thing that makes it possible for you to see. It is the key that unlocks the mystery, and you can’t find out until you try it yourself. Nobody can make you see it. You have to take that key of belief and unlock it for yourself. You do it in other things. Why not trust God, as well as men? Suppose you are very much in need of something at the store, and you ask the manager about it, and he says he’ll get it right away. And then you don’t worry about it anymore. You just trust it to him. Yet you don’t really
know
he will do it. You haven’t
proved
him, perhaps, but you take it for granted he will keep his word. You will to believe him till he has disproved himself. Why not take God at His word?”

Chris was silent, pondering. At last he said, “But I’m a church member, you know. Doesn’t that make it all right?”

“No,” said Natalie sadly. “He didn’t say, ‘If you join the church you are saved—passed from death unto life.’ He said, ‘He that believeth.’ ”

They had reached the house now and were pausing at the door.

“Won’t you come in?” asked Natalie shyly, wondering if her mother would approve of her asking him.

“No,” said Chris, “it’s getting late, and you and I have to be up early. But—I’d like to know more about this. We’ll talk about it another time. Perhaps I’ll join that class. I like that bird. He’s sincere; you can see that. Well, good night!” And he left them abruptly.

“Strange,” he said to himself as he walked home. “I never knew she was a girl like that! How different she is from the other girls I used to know in school. Fancy any of them telling about how to be saved, or caring about it!”

He kept asking himself why he hadn’t known this lovely girl before. Why hadn’t he sought her out and taken her places, instead of some of the fool girls he used to go with?

Oh, those other girls weren’t all silly girls, of course. Janie Anderson and Marguerite Manning and Roxana White were sensible, bright, fine girls. He had sometimes taken them here and there. But no girl had ever stirred him as this sweet spirit who had sat by him tonight, listening to that most unusual message. He realized that much of the pleasure of the evening had come from watching her lovely, earnest face as she listened.

As he swung up to his own door, he told himself that a strong tie had been welded between that girl and himself that evening. Of course, they were both young, and it was not time yet to think of more serious things, but his heart felt that the friendship with Natalie Halsey had come into his life to stay. Here was a character with something more to it than froth. Something more even than a good education, pleasant manners, and a desire to please. Life had early sifted her and tested her. Her face bore the marks of experience that had not hardened her, but brought a lovely peace upon her brow and a charming light in her eyes. He felt a wistful longing to understand and have the same secret that she possessed.

T
he days that followed were full of hard work, but it was somehow very pleasant work to Chris. The fellows in the store were still a little belligerent, jealous of any word the manager spoke to him, ready to criticize and sneer behind his back. But there was always the boss now, liking him and saying nice things occasionally about his work, for he was selling now the rest and understood the stock as well as anyone. And there was always Natalie to watch when a moment of leisure came. Natalie, in her little glass cage, making change with her pale fingers, smiling to the women customers, gravely courteous to the men, sending the ghost of a little bright flash from her eyes to him across the store, now and then, when no one would be watching.

They were very careful not to let their friendship be known. It seemed too indefinite, almost too sacred to be dragged through the store and joked about as it inevitably would have been if it had become known. None of their fellow employees knew that Natalie had recommended Chris, he discovered. She went her quiet way among them, smiling shyly to each one, but holding aloof. Even the manager spoke most respectfully to her, and they all called her Miss Halsey, not Natalie.

Every night Chris lingered in some place agreed upon and they walked home together, he carrying whatever bundles she had. But they managed their meetings around the corner, or after the others had left. The tramp man who had troubled their first acquaintance seemed to have disappeared. He stood no longer at the corner of the street in the mornings when Natalie started out, and she was greatly relieved.

The weeks went swiftly by.

“Mother, I think Chris has a girl,” said Elise one evening when they were waiting for Chris to come to dinner. Sometimes he was unaccountably later than need be.

“Oh!” said his mother, looking up a little anxiously. “Do you think so? I—suppose—he—would—sometime, but—he seems so young.”

“He’s no younger than I was when I fell in love with you, Mother,” said her elderly lover, looking unexpectedly from his paper.

“Well, that was different,” said Mother, smiling. “You were—I was—that is—”

“Exactly so,” said Father with a twinkle. “I was just thinking that myself.”

“What makes you think he has a girl, Elise?” asked her mother.

“Well, I’ve seen him twice walking with her, very slowly, when I went down for Daddy’s paper. It’s just after the store closes.”

“Oh, I hope it’s not Anna Peters,” said the mother, with quick apprehension in her voice.

“No, it’s not Anna,” said the sister triumphantly. “Chris can’t bear her. He says she’s bold.”

“She is!” agreed the mother.

“It’s a girl around here,” announced Elise discreetly.

“Around
here
!” There was consternation in the mother’s voice.

“Yes, I think she lives over on Cromar Street. I thought I heard his voice the other night as I was crossing at the corner. If it’s the house where he was standing, her sister is in my class in school. And she used to be in Chris’s class in high school.”

“Who is she?”

“She is one of the Halsey girls. I think her name is Natalie. Her sister is Janice Halsey. Janice seems nice, only we don’t any of us know her very well. She always has to hurry home. Her mother’s been sick. Janice wears made-over dresses.”

“That’s nothing against her,” said the mother sharply. Her own daughter would probably come to that very soon.

“Well, she’s pretty, but the girls don’t invite her much.”

“Better get acquainted, daughter, and bring her around,” suggested Father. “It would be nice to know what the family are like. Of course, there may be nothing serious in carrying bundles. Chris is a gentleman, and it would be natural to walk with one who lived near here. But Mother, if Chris is getting acquainted with someone, you’d better find out who she is and invite her here. That will make a friendship safe and sane, you know. Chris is young, and of course the girls have already liked him. It’s natural he’ll want friends.”

“I will,” said Mother with a sigh. And just then Chris came whistling up the porch, his face the picture of happiness.

The next afternoon, as she was coming down the high school steps, Elise caught sight of Janice Halsey just turning out of the school pavement into the street, and called to her.

“Janice! Janice Halsey! Oh, I say, Janice, wait for me a minute!” she called, hurrying down the steps and after her, swift as a swallow.

Janice paused in surprise. She was accustomed to hurrying away as soon as school closed and not lingering to talk with the girls. Her mother had needed her for so long that it had become second nature with her, even when the need for haste was not quite so urgent. And the girls had fallen into the habit of not counting her in things when they planned for parties and festivities.

“Oh, she wouldn’t come!” someone would say if ever her name was mentioned by some newcomer in school. “She has to work or something. She’s always in a hurry!” And they let it go at that. So Janice, who used to play with them down in the primary grades, and knew them all, was no more one of them than her sister had been when she was in high school.

So now she stood and waited, gravely surprised, her eyes speculative. What could Elise Walton want of her? Only some message from the teacher probably, maybe about the essay she was to write for the Friday class. Or perhaps it was to tell her of the class banquet. They always went through the gesture of inviting her to it, though they knew she never accepted because she hadn’t the two dollars a plate that it cost.

She stood poised, half impatient, and waited until Elise caught up with her, breathless and friendly, with a real smile. She had always admired Elise from afar, especially had she admired her clothes. They were always so lovely, so exquisite, so perfect in every detail, with so many little touches of distinction about them. And Janice delighted to get a closer view of them that she might sometimes copy a little feature in her own made-over garments.

“I wondered,” panted Elise as she fell into step with Janice, just as if they had always been close friends, “if you wouldn’t take pity on me and explain that algebra problem that you did on the board this morning. You did it so beautifully, and so quickly, but the period was over almost as you finished, and I didn’t have time to see what you did. Where did you get that quotient? I simply can’t figure it out. I’ve been working for the last ten minutes over it. You see, there’s another almost like it in our lesson for tomorrow.”

“Why, of course I’ll show you,” said Janice in surprise. “But you are always quicker at algebra than I am. You wouldn’t have any trouble getting it if you took a little time.”

“But I haven’t the time,” said Elise, rather breathlessly. “You see”—she laughed half ashamedly—“I’m in a hurry today because Mother and I are going to try papering a room. We’ve never done one before, and I don’t know how it will come out. But I’m so excited about it, and I don’t know what to do. You see, it’s my brother’s room, and we want to surprise him with it. Did you ever do any paper hanging?”

“I certainly have.” Janice smiled in a superior way. “We always do ours. My sister is a clipper at it. She can put it on as smooth as the skin on your face. Only she’s busy all day. She works in the grocery store up on the avenue.”

“Oh!” said Elise, with a bit of a gasp at the thought. “Which sister is that?”

“I haven’t but one sister,” said Janice. “There are only three of us, Mother and Natalie and myself, since Father died.”

“Oh, I didn’t know your father died,” said Elise sympathetically. “How hard that must have been. My father almost died a few weeks ago. We didn’t know for days and days whether he was going to get well or not.”