Taste of Victory

by Sandra Dengler

  By chance might Echuca Charlene be in port? He walked the length of the wharf on its temporary plank catwalks. Several boats of different sizes bobbed in the water. Not Gus’s. He booked a ride on a little snagging steamer called the Industry that just happened to be working its way upstream.

  The Industry stopped at the second of several makeshift barge slips serving the Barmah Forest. Sloan stood in the rain two hours because the loggers he was talking to stood passively about in the rain. The bravado paid off. They introduced him to the mill boss. When Sloan casually dropped the name of his prior contact, the top gun, this chap sold him five thousand feet of box and two of red gum.

  Now if he just had some money to pay for it…

  For a few minutes more, until the Industry’s captain completed his tea, Sloan watched curious pontoon rafts—platforms floated by two rowboat hulls, it appeared—bring out the massive logs. Red gum, his new logger chums explained, was too dense to float. They cut the timber during the dry season and marked it with withes. Now they were hauling it out upside down, as it were, suspended beneath the pontoon rafts. One at a time, log by log, the bounty of the forest was loaded upon barges to be carried to the mills.

  Where was Gus? Sloan couldn’t wait to call him on his casual promise that the river never floods like this two years running. More important, infinitely more important, where was Sam?

  The Industry pushed out into channel, seeking snags and other navigational hazards. Woodlands lined the bank on both sides. But even in this shelter, the wind buffeted the husky boat about.

  Five thousand feet of box, two of red gum. The mental math involved was child’s play. All the wine in South Australia would not pay for that much lumber. The red gum he could sell in Sydney; he knew to whom; but five thousand board feet of box was four too many. What could he have been thinking of?

  As his shining-bright deal of an hour ago dulled to lead, Sloan’s spirit dropped, and dropped. Already he owed the world. Now he owed twice the world, and no clear way to recoup. So jaded was he that he could be taken for a drongo by a man with half his brain. That mill boss had just shellacked him.

  Did he fancy himself a prudent businessman? Where did he dig up that foolish notion? Every business decision he ever made came to no good. This was just the latest and most blatant example of all.

  He almost failed to recognize the temporary Barmah Mission slip. The flood was forcing it farther and farther back into the trees. No wonder Otis built so far from the river; had he built near shore, he’d be under water now.

  The Industry never did come to a complete stop. Sloan leaped from the moving deck onto the shaky little floating pier and almost dumped himself in the drink. He waved perfunctorily at the departing boat and started walking through the wind and rain. She had to be here. She wasn’t anywhere else.

  He blurted out a choice expletive as his hat left his head. Before he could grab it, it sailed in a graceful, tumbling arc right into the water. That hat was an old friend. Why didn’t he care more that it was lost?

  Slippery, gummy mud clung in big globs to his boots and made footing treacherous on this crude track up from the river. The treetops swayed high above him. Somewhere in the woodland to his right, a limb went crashing down. Cold, steely rain pelted his face. What a miserable evening! But it was worth it if he could find Sam.

  As the trees thinned, the wind’s fury picked up. And now Sloan trudged through a bared, open stump field, with no bushes higher than his waist. Almost certainly the next big gust would rip the hair right off his head. Possibly it would take his head the way it had taken his hat.

  The rain-slicked tin roofs up ahead reflected what little light the sky offered. They were the only bright new thing in the whole district. This place was a dump. Dismal. There were a thousand ways Otis could find glory easier than to put all that hard work into this rubbish pile of a place. Look at the makeshift buildings, the coarse-plowed ground. Their pea plants weren’t up more than a couple of inches.

  The wind shifted and renewed its determination to make Sloan’s life as miserable as possible. It drove the rain right through to his skin.

  He paused in the middle of the dooryard. The government house up ahead looked deserted. Nothing stirred around the outbuildings. Except for half a dozen sheep in a brake behind the summer kitchen, not a living thing moved. But wait! Four or five saddled horses stood dozing in the lee of that squarish stone building. With the wind buffeting his face, Sloan walked over.

  Try as it would, the wind could not sweep away the music growing louder as Sloan approached. This amateurish stone building, this mason’s nightmare, must be a church or chapel. The stonemasonry might not be the grandest, but their choir was second to none.

  Chapel, hymns—this must be a worship service. Sam had been talking lately about some sort of new experience of faith. If she were anywhere near, she’d surely be here. Cole stepped inside.

  It was a chapel, all right—a stark, colorless parody of a respectable church. No vestry linens, no ornamentation, no fine woodwork graced this interior. Peeled poles supported the rafters, for obviously no one was trusting the weight of the roof to these shaky walls. The tin sheeting had been nailed directly to the bare rafters. Nail holes leaked here and there. The choir, most of them abos, wore plain old clothes. No choir robes, not even a choir loft. They stood on risers behind the lectern.

  A dozen people formed the choir; they sounded like a hundred, clear and pure. That they competed successfully with the rain drumming on the tin roof was a miracle in itself.

  In the main room, three dozen abos with at least as many children sat on benches and stools in ragged rows. Sloan spotted seven white faces, and none of them was Sam.

  In spite of himself, Sloan practically memorized the words of the chorus; this was the third time the choir had repeated it; Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord! Let the earth hear His voice! Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord! Let the people rejoice! O come to the Father through Jesus the Son, and give Him the glory, great things He has done.

  Amid a cloud of enthusiastic “Amens” from the congregation, the choir wandered off rather willy-nilly and sat down. Otis stood up, beaming happiness the way the sun pours out light.

  He stepped to the lectern. “To God be the glory. Yes. The woman who wrote the words to that magnificent hymn of praise has been blind since infancy. Her name is Fanny Crosby. She’s written many songs, wonderful songs, and she does it all within her memory, for she cannot see to read or write. What she does see, friends, is God’s majesty. Beyond eyesight, and through His Son, that vision is available to any person. Let us pray.”

  All heads save Sloan’s bowed. Did Otis spot him? If he did, the missionary gave no sign. This was as good a time as any to leave. Sloan backed toward the door.

  The door opened behind him; a gust of wind cut through his wet clothes and reminded him he was getting chilled standing around. A black family—mum, father, and three small children—stepped inside and pushed the door shut. Then they just stood there like doorstops, blocking the way.

  Otis’s voice could probably charm a snake right out of its hole. In normal conversation the fellow’s enunciation was smooth enough. But when he raised the volume in order to fill the room, his voice took on a ringing clarity.

  “Our reading is from Jeremiah nine, verse one and following. This first verse is one of several that earned Jeremiah the nickname ‘Weeping Prophet.’”

  Sloan should just elbow his way through that family and leave. Suddenly Toby—bridegroom Toby—appeared from nowhere at his side. His teeth gleaming in a wide smile, he gripped Sloan by the arm. Still grinning, he piloted Sloan to a bench and sat him down. Polly smiled beside him just as happily. The bench was warm; Toby had just given up his own seat.

  The last thing in the world Sloan wanted was a seat. He wanted out. A whistling gust shook the tin roof; it thundered and rattled above the roar of the rain. On second thought, it was fairly snug and warm in here.

  It occur
red to Sloan he had been wrong. Otis could not possibly be in this for the glory. There was nothing glorious about this place. And yet, it wasn’t quite the dump Sloan first took it to be.

  Otis was still reading. “Take ye heed every one of his neighbor, and trust ye not in any brother; for every brother will utterly supplant, and every neighbor will walk with slanders. And they will deceive every one his neighbor, and will not speak the truth: they have taught their tongue to speak lies, and weary themselves to commit iniquity.”

  Get tired committing sin? Actually, the prophet wasn’t too far off there. Sloan had never thought of it that way before, but it was true. He knew, for he had committed sin more than once. It was not restful.

  “They refuse to know me, saith the Lord. Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts, Behold, I will melt them, and try them; for how shall I do for the daughter of my people…?”

  Not just don’t know me. He said refuse to know me. A considered decision.

  Otis held up a smudgy, unremarkable rock. “This is iron ore.” He held aloft a gleaming steel knife, the kind of all-purpose knife abos love. “To make this sharp, useful steel, you have to melt this rock. That is, you make it into a liquid that pours, like water. For that you need a special furnace that makes more heat than a campfire. The iron you want separates from the rock, the way cream separates out in milk. You pour off the molten iron and let it cool down into metal, and you throw away the useless rock. That useless rock is called dross.”

  Sloan smiled to himself. Of course Otis must explain it. Not only did these people know nothing of smelting, probably not a one of them had ever seen anything melt, except maybe some morning frost.

  Otis flipped to the back of his Bible and started quoting from first Cor—something, about building on the foundation of Jesus Christ and trying all the foundations with fire. Something like that. Like Otis said before, it all fit together. Jeremiah: I shall melt them and try them—the beleaguered prophet, weeping for his people who refused to know God. There was a beauty and poignancy to the Bible Sloan had not suspected before.

  Now Otis was re-reading the part about how no one can trust anyone else. When Sam had refused Sloan’s offer of marriage (it seemed like painful ages ago) she said, “I cannae trust ye.” She was right. Sloan proved her right. He could not be trusted. Neither did he dare trust Frobel, who might well be bent for retribution. Every person he knew, including himself, with the notable exception of Sam, was out to advance his or her own interests. He certainly could not trust shallow, selfish Hilary. Jeremiah had Cole Sloan pegged exactly.

  And Jeremiah condemned all untrustworthiness to destruction.

  “Those of you who are believers—those of you who embrace Jesus Christ as your Lord and master: Paul and Jeremiah are talking to you! They’re telling you that everything you do that isn’t grouse, that isn’t done for Jesus, is going to get burned up. And don’t you doubt a minute you aren’t going to get blisters from the heat. You’ll be tried, like this iron, until you’re pure. What? You lied? You can’t be trusted in everything? You change your ways! God doesn’t want that!”

  Otis was staring straight at Sloan. Out of this roomful of people, he singled out Sloan. “Now, for those of you who have not committed your lives to Jesus Christ—” He leaned on the lectern. “Somebody must have told those sheep out behind the kitchen what we had in mind for them because one of them bolted yesterday. Jumped the brake and headed for Queensland. There are two kinds of strays, you know—the kind that sort of wanders off accidentally, like a child wanders away from camp, and the kind that goes galloping off in a determined way.”

  Sloan had mentioned the stray sheep idea once, and he never said anything about it other than those two words. How did Otis manage to read his mind?

  “You’re both equally lost. Ah, but Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God, and the Lamb is going to take a bride. His church. Hear the invitation: ‘You are invited to the marriage feast of the Lamb, to be held in the King’s hall in His heavenly kingdom. Pure wedding garments will be provided.’”

  Sloan’s body, his mind, his spirit—all begged him, Get out of here! Now! Agitated. That’s how he felt. Agitated. Anxious. Upset. He didn’t want to hear this.

  Otis’s voice rang above the wind and the rattling roof. “That’s one invitation you want to RSVP right away! But believe it or not, there are some here today who will answer, ‘I decline your invitation to the wedding feast. I prefer being cast into outer darkness where I can wail and gnash my teeth. I don’t want your spotless wedding garment. Count me out!’ Would you ever respond to the King that way? Not if you know what’s good for you.”

  They refuse to know me.

  Sam had met Jesus Christ. She said so.

  Vinson and Otis knew Him. Marty and Pearl Frobel knew Him, though Sloan could not remember how Frobel phrased it in the stall at the track that day. Sam’s sister knew Him.

  The tin roof rattled and clanked. Rain came blopping down faster than a simple drip. No one seemed to care.

  Sloan had been so engrossed that he had not noticed the choir gathering behind Otis, back up on its risers. With the choir as his accompaniment, Otis lifted a solid, golden tenor voice in the loveliest song Sloan had ever heard. “Softly and tenderly, Jesus is calling” it began.

  The vibrant voice beckoned “Come home, come home, ye who are weary, come home” as the choir sang a sweet, echoing counterpoint. “Earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling, calling, O sinner, come home!”

  Weary. Of all the things Sloan was, including straying, he was weary. Intensely weary.

  “Though we have sinned He has mercy and pardon, pardon for you and for me….” The man’s voice seized Sloan, compelled him. The whole idea of rest, of pardon gripped him. What if it was true? Sloan needed pardon!

  As the choir repeated the last verse and chorus, Otis raised his hands in prayer. The music lifted the prayer and the prayer lifted the music, higher than either could go alone. Was it possible Sloan could pray, and that his prayer would get past the ceiling? He had never in his life prayed. Who’d listen?

  With a long, moaning shriek, the right half of the roof gave way. A whole sheet peeled back. It ripped loose the one beside it and clanged against the intact side of the roof, disappearing noisily on the straining wind. The sheet next to it banged, one side whanging loose against the rafters. Rain came cascading in by the bucket.

  No one seemed to notice. The building was being torn asunder and no one cared, least of all Otis. The prayer continued, for the saved and for the lost, for these people and for those. The wind howled, the rain came pelting in gleefully to drench the worshipers.

  As prayer and choir ended together, the whole congregation launched unbidden into another tune Sloan had never heard. “Blessed be the tie that binds,” they sang, “our hearts in Christian love.”

  The song ended. Instantly laughing and milling, the chapelful of celebrants mingled beneath the driving rain. Sloan sat. He could do nothing more. He wasn’t numb now; he was beaten, as if with a club. Too many sorrows weighed on him. Too many unexpected and unusual sensations had just assaulted him. Too many ideas clamored to be heard, ideas he had been resisting arduously for a lifetime. It all, all, all was pounding upon him at once.

  A brown presence hovered at his side. He extended his hand mechanically—not a handshake, but a reaching. “Otis. Help me.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Tangled Threads

  Rain and wind battered the roof of the government house, but somehow Sloan felt safer here. Maybe this roof had been nailed on by different carpenters. He listened to the steady drumming and considered how cold it sounded compared with the warm crackle of the fire before him. A gust of wind back-drafted the chimney, puffing smoke into the room.

  “You’ll have to add some more height to your chimney.” This box-frame-and-rawhide chair felt remarkably comfortable. Sloan stretched his legs out toward the gentle fire.

  “That and about seventy-eleven other projects
.” Reginald sobered. “I went through a deep, deep valley of doubt there for a while, when so many people took off on walkabout. I can’t express the joy I feel now that they’ve returned—a sense of wresting victory from defeat.”

  Sloan looked at the mild-bearded face, the warm eyes. “I can’t imagine you plagued by doubts. You’re supposed to be a man of God. Isn’t doubt beneath your dignity, so to speak?”

  Reginald’s laugh rang warm and genuine. “Uncertainty is human. You’ll never vanquish it completely. Expect it.”

  “I’m human, all right. When your roan went lame with that slice on its pastern, I—”

  “I never thanked you properly for that, to my shame. I’ve come to like that old roan, as humorless and sluggish as he is, not to mention that we need the horse desperately and could ill afford to lose him. We’re grateful.”

  “I didn’t do it for the roan, or even for Sam. I did it to get one up on you. It gave me great pleasure to show you up. Intense satisfaction. That’s hardly an attitude worth thanking me for.”

  “The fact that you confess it now is a beautiful testimony to your change of heart.”

  Change of heart. Sloan’s mind and emotions churned in such turmoil he didn’t know what his heart was changing to, or from. He was too smart, too modern, to fall for this religious nonsense. It must have been a moment of weakness. And yet, he knew that what he had just experienced was powerful and real. And that in itself confused him. What a mess he was inside!

  It would help if he could have some clear sign of some sort that this experience was genuine. All his life he had doubted God’s existence—or ignored it—and now God had put the hard word on him. He was either going to have to accept the Almighty or admit he had just been deceived. And yet, he was not one to believe in signs, not when random circumstance so clearly directed the fortunes of men. Or did it? More confusion.