The grocer’s boy at the telephone was telling his story in loud tones, “You see how ’tis. I was up ta Harrisses’ waitin’ fer the check as you tol’ me, an’ the kid clumb in the wagon. He often does. He’s allus crazy ta ride when I got up there, an’ I kid him a lot. Wha’s that? No sir. I didn’t let him get in. No sir, I don’t never ‘low him ta get in. I ain’t got tha time. No sir, he jus’ clumb in of hisself after I was gone in the house, see? Yessir, I was standin’ right where I could see the wagon, an’ I called to the kid ta get out, see? But he jus’ laughed and kep a-jerkin’ the reins, an’ jus’ then the missus she sent down the check, an’ I heard a car come up. It was a d’livery truck, ice er somethin’, an’ it blew it right in that hoss’s ear, an’ she ups and clips it. I knowed what would happen when I see that car a-comin’ an’ I flew down them steps, yessir, but I couldn’t get a holt of the lines, they was on the other side of her, an’ she was makin’ fer round the house and down through the other gateway. So I turns around to head her off at the front, but they was diggin’ some kind of a ditch fer a drain pipe or a water pipe or a gas pipe or somethin’, an’ I fell plumb in an almos’ broke my ankle, and stunned myself, so when I got up that there hoss was dashing outta the front gate, an’ up the road, an’ I hadn’t got no chancet, see? Yessir, I know. Yessir, I did. I saw a feller comin’ on a motorbike, an’ I hailed him an’ he brung me along. An’ I got here almos’ as soon ez she did, but some plucky girl on a bike had stopped the hoss. Yessir. No sir, the kid ain’t hurt none, jus’ scared. Yessir, he’s playin’ about big as life. Yessir. The doctor’s come an’ says he’s all right. No sir, the mother ain’t come yet but she’ll be here in a minute. Yessir, I will. I’ll come along back as soon as she gets here. Yessir, the meat’s all delivered ‘cept Mrs. Buckingham’s over on the pike, an’ she won’t kick; she’s a lady, she is. Yessir! All right, sir. Good-bye!”
Effie took the doctor’s examination of her with something of resentment. Of course there was nothing the matter with her, but she submitted to having her pulse taken and her heart listened to with something of her old belligerent air. It was only when Earle smiled at her that she lost her strained attitude and relaxed into a normal creature. Her face lit up once more with that sweet wonder that anybody should care to be so nice and pleasant to her, and she remembered the wonderful words her new friend had just repeated, with something like a thrill in her heart. Was this going to be a way out of her difficulty, she wondered? It sounded unpractical, but it also sounded beautiful—“think on these things”—it was something to hide in her heart and study out, anyway. Where did he get those words? They were somewhere in the Bible, she felt sure. It seemed as if she could remember her Sunday school class droning the verse out in concert sometime back through the years, but she couldn’t be sure. They were strangely familiar, yet she never remembered to have thought they meant anything in particular before.
But another surprise was in store for Effie. Another great car presently drew up before the farmhouse steps, driven by a uniformed chauffeur. A slim, stylish lady in beautiful black satin, with a long string of pearls around her neck, got out and rushed at the little boy.
She held the child in a long embrace, and when she finally put him down and turned back to speak to them all, there were tears on her face and she was pale around her mouth.
“Where is the girl who saved my son’s life?” she asked, searching the group with the bluest eyes Effie thought she had ever seen.
And then she rushed at Effie and kissed her, and Effie felt as if an angel had touched her. Such soft lips, like Mother’s, only softer and younger. Such delicate perfume, like violets. Such a sweet voice. Effie was thrilled again. What wonderful things were happening to her all at once.
“Why, I didn’t do anything at all,” stammered Effie, honest and frank as ever. “I only held on till Mr. Earle came. He really did it, you know.”
But the lady only said, “Oh, you dear child! But suppose you hadn’t held on!” And then she kissed Effie and cried again. And after that she turned around and tried to thank Lawrence Earle, and cried some more. Effie stood in awe and wondered what all those girls who had criticized her would think if they knew where she was now. They would likely blame her, somehow, for being there. And then and there, she resolved that they should never know, if she could help it.
Then the whirl and excitement of it all began to make her feel sick and giddy. And all at once, she found Lawrence Earle’s eyes upon her, and he said very pleasantly that he really must take Miss Martin home now, and unless there was something else he could do, they would go at once.
All at once the bottom seemed to have dropped out of things for Effie. She began to look around for Miss Martin. Was she then to have no further opportunity to ask her new friend where to find that Bible verse? Most likely she would never see him again, either. Somehow, the chair by which she was standing seemed to rise up and shake off her unsteady hand, and all the people in the room got dim and misty and whirled into one mass. Then she heard the doctor’s voice saying something about more air, and the next thing she knew, she was out on the driveway, being helped into Lawrence Earle’s beautiful car. His arm was around her, and a voice was saying—it was the sweet voice of the baby’s mother—“Oh, I do hope she isn’t going to suffer any ill effects from this. Are you sure, doctor, that’s she’s all right?”
When they brought the child to say good-bye and thank her, she realized they had been talking about her, and she managed to smile in her old swaggering manner and declared there was nothing at all the matter with her.
Out on the road at last, she found her companion was looking at her anxiously.
“You are perfectly sure you are all right?” he asked.
And then she found herself smiling at him.
“Why yes,” she said. “I just felt a little strange in there. I’m all right, now I’m out in the air. Isn’t this car grand?”
“Do you like it? So do I,” he said. “Now will your mother worry if we don’t go right home? It’s after twelve o’clock, and you ought to have something to eat at once. Then you’ll feel better. There’s a tea room over here, a mile or so. Shall we go and get a bite? I’m hungry as a bear myself. I would have urged you to eat something in there when the woman offered it, but I thought it would be better for you to get off where it was quiet to eat. You have been through a lot of excitement, you know.”
Effie laughed.
“Why nobody minds how much excitement I go through. That never made any difference with me,” she said brightly.
“But you don’t make a practice of making flying leaps from bicycles at runaway horses every day, you know. And you did faint clear away, you know, and almost did it again just now.”
“Well, I guess that was because I forgot to eat any breakfast,” said Effie apologetically. “I was busy, and then I was in a hurry to get away.”
“Ah!” said Earle. “I thought you were hungry. Now we’ll have some good, hot soup and perhaps a cup of tea or coffee, and whatever else we can find. We’re out for a good time, you know. Shall I telephone your mother that you won’t be home for lunch?”
“Oh no,” said Effie in surprise, “they never expect me till I get there. They never worry about me.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” said Earle, looking at her thoughtfully. “People don’t always tell all they are feeling, you know. Here’s our tea room. Now, do you feel like getting out?”
Effie sprang out, quite like her old self, only wondering a little at the weak feeling in her muscles and the wan feeling around her lips.
She sat at the dainty table in the wayside tea room, wondering at herself. To think that she was here, being taken to lunch by a young man! What would those hateful girls say if they knew! A pang, almost of pity for their disappointment, shot through her. They would never forgive her for having the young man they coveted, when they could not get him! But, of course, they need never know. She would tell her mother som
etime, perhaps. But it was enough that she should enjoy it all to herself. They would somehow manage to spoil it all for her by some catty remark if they found out. Why have it desecrated?
So Effie ate her delicious lunch, ordered with a view to giving her strength, and enjoyed every mouthful of it, feeling every bit herself when it was finished. Soup and salad and ice cream, delicious tea and delicate crackers, creamed chicken on toast! Somehow such feasts had seldom come her way, lacking in modest luxuries on occasion. But this was wonderful. And the feeling of comradeship. It was so new and sweet to the girl that it made her throat sting and her eyes smart to think about it.
After the lunch was over, they drove around by a new road that even Effie, with her habit of scouring the country on her bicycle, had not known. It was a crossroad through a lovely wood, with ferns and maidenhair and wildflowers in profusion as if this was their special secret hiding place from the world, where they only blossomed for God and those who came to seek His special treasures.
They stopped and picked some of them. Effie was laughing and cheerful and at ease, all the bitterness gone out of her voice, a lilt in it like other girls.
“You don’t know how much you are like your sister Margaret,” said the young man impulsively, as he helped her back into the car again, and his eyes lingered on her face pleasantly, bringing the happy color into her cheeks. “Your sister Margaret was one fine girl, I thought,” he added earnestly.
Effie looked thoughtful.
“I wish she hadn’t got married,” she said impulsively. “We always had good times when she was at home. She was the only one who never got impatient with me. She—seemed to understand how I felt.”
“She had straight, fine brows like yours,” mused the young man, looking at her again with a pleasant smile. “I think you must be like her.”
“Oh no! I’m not,” disclaimed Effie frankly. “I’m not a bit sweet-tempered like her. I get angry and impatient at everything, and I’m untidy, and homely, and lazy, and selfish. I know, for everybody tells me, and I can see it’s true.”
“Oh, now look here,” said Earle, laughing. “That’s not the way to give yourself a good report. Don’t go to work and blacken your character like that. I don’t believe it. See? I know you are not any of those things. I know you are not going to be, either. I can read your character better than that. Besides, you know you can have a Helper anytime when you see those tendencies cropping out. He is always ready to help.”
“I think you are wonderful!” burst out Effie. “I didn’t know young men ever talked like that. What made it? Was it your mother bringing you up that way? I know she is sweet and dear. My mother likes her a lot. But I never heard the other girls tell about your being this way, almost like a minister. They told how you were a great athlete, and had wonderful parties and all sorts of doings at your house and were a wonderful tennis player and awfully kind and all that, but they never said you were—well—this way. I wanted someone to help me awfully, but never would have thought of coming to you. I didn’t know young men and boys ever thought much about God.”
It was Earle’s turn to look thoughtful now.
“You see, there is something the matter with my report, too, sister,” he said at last.
“Oh no,” began Effie, deeply chagrined at what she had said. “I didn’t mean that. I meant—”
“I know you didn’t, little Euphemia,” he said gently. “You didn’t mean it at all, but it was there all the same. Well, I’ll tell you. I guess you never got the report that I was much of a Christian because when these people here knew me, I wasn’t. That’s the truth. I hadn’t found God yet. I didn’t know that He wanted me to live as close to Him and realize Him as I would an earthly friend. I didn’t realize Jesus Christ at all as a factor in my daily life. Oh, I believed what I had been taught—that Christ was my Savior from sin in a general way. But I didn’t feel much of a sinner, and I didn’t spend much of my time thinking about what it meant to have a Savior. Why should I when I didn’t realize I needed Him? I didn’t read the Bible, either, very much. Of course I knew a lot of it. Mother saw to that, but it was only in my head, not in my heart. But all that is changed now. Everything is different. Last winter I met Jesus Christ!”
“What do you mean?” asked Effie with bated breath. “How could you meet Him?”
“Do you remember the story of Saul on his way to persecute Christians in Damascus? Well, it was something like that. Oh, no light or anything. And I wasn’t trying to put over anything like a persecution, but I guess I’d been pretty much against a little crowd of fellows in the college whom I used to call fanatics. And then, one night, one of them got run down by a truck as he was crossing the road to our car to find out the score on a game we had played. And it fell to my lot to take him back to the dormitory and stay with him all that night while he was dying, and the next day when his folks came, too late. And I tell you I never experienced anything like it. That fellow just lay there in all that terrible suffering and talked to us with his failing strength, told us how great it was to serve his God, and looked death in the face with a smile. I’ll never forget it. I saw God with my heart that night, and I resolved I’d try to take his place after he was gone and let my life witness for God the way his had done. It was a great life! It was just Christ living in him!”
Earle was talking now, more as if Effie were an older person and he had to justify himself in her eyes, prove his case, and bring her to see as he saw. And she listened with wonder as to a story in a book that had suddenly walked out and become true.
He drew up then, in front of a pretty country home, and looked at her.
“I’m due here to get my mother. Do you mind?” he asked with a smile. “I meant to ask if you would rather I took you home first, but we’ve talked so hard I forgot it.”
They had stopped once on their way and left the bicycle at the repair shop and had driven on, talking so intently that Effie had not noticed which way they were going. Now she started and became instantly self-conscious and uncomfortable.
“Oh, of course not,” she stammered, but she did mind, exceedingly. To have Earle’s beautiful, well-bred mother see her here in her son’s car, as if she had tried to get his attention! She remembered also the tear in her dress and tried to smooth it down and cover it up. What would Mrs. Earle think when she found little, disreputable Effie Martin riding around with her son? The minute or two that they waited for Mrs. Earle to come out to the car were most painful to the girl as she sat silent and distraught, wishing she dared climb out and run away. But that was like the old Effie, and she was done with that Effie forever, she hoped. The new Euphemia must sit still and face whatever came, and try to be a woman.
She came to herself sufficiently to offer to get into the backseat and let Mrs. Earle occupy the front seat with her son, but the lady declined with the loveliest smile.
“Indeed, no, dear! I always sit in the backseat and love it. I would rather you sat right still where you are. Besides, I have a lot of baskets and things to pile in beside me and must have plenty of room. Lawrence, all those things on the step are to go in. Can you manage to stow them away?”
Then Mrs. Earle leaned forward and asked Effie about her mother and the baby, whom she had heard was not well, and Effie found she could open her mouth and speak quite naturally in answer. In a moment more, Lawrence had jumped in beside her, slammed the car door shut, and they were off again into the sunny afternoon. What a day she had had! She sat still and let the wonder of it roll over her while Mrs. Earle asked her son how he had occupied his time.
“Why, Mother, I ran right into an adventure as soon as I left you.”
“You don’t mean it,” said his mother in a voice that entered into her son’s adventure with the zest of his own age.
“Yes,” he said cheerfully. “I was hesitating which way to turn when I saw this young lady whirl by on a bicycle, and I was tempted to follow down the road she had taken, for it looked a pleasant way. And the firs
t thing she did was to chase after a runaway horse and save a baby’s life, and get herself almost killed in the bargain, and so that was where I came in. We picked ourselves up and got some lunch after a while, and took the bicycle to the repair shop, and here we are. What do you think of Euphemia, Mother? Doesn’t she look like her sister Margaret?”
“Why, I believe she does,” said Mrs. Earle, looking at Effie with the friendliest smile. “I never thought of it before, but she really does.”
“Well, you ought to have seen her catch that horse! It was great!”
Effie’s cheeks burned with shyness and joy over the kindly words of Mrs. Earle, and she was so pleased and dazed with all their praise that she was quite subdued and sweet when they put her down at her own door. Mrs. Earle said she hoped she would suffer no ill effects from the adventure, and they whirled away.
Effie turned and walked into the house, as if she had suddenly stepped out of a dream into reality.
There was no one in sight. Well, then no one had seen her return. That was good. She need not tell anyone. She might keep this precious experience to herself and not have the life of it ridiculed out of her by the teasing of her family.
She went upstairs to her room, shut and locked the door, and went and stood in front of her mirror, looking into her own eyes with steady glance.
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