"How old are you, Douglas?" asked Mr. Fowler.
"Twenty-three. I just want to say this one thing more, then I'm through. When things like that happen to Jimmy and Little Marion, they aren't doing the right thing by Lost Chief, and"—rising with sudden restless fire—"I'd like to see Lost Chief be the kind of place my grandfather Douglas wanted it to be!"
Charleton yawned. "We'd better be moving along."
"Don't go for a minute," pleaded Mr. Fowler. "Douglas was right when he said that the whole world is hungry for a belief in immortality. And as long as the world exists it will have that hunger. And religion is God's answer to that hunger. Civilization without religion is the body without a soul. Religion brings a spiritual peace that man perpetually craves and that riches or women or horses or the hunt never brought and never can bring. At heart, there's not an unhappier man than you, Falkner. Why? Because you have no belief in immortality."
"Great God, Fowler, how can I believe in it when I can't?" shouted
Charleton.
"Exactly! How can you?" returned Fowler, deliberately. "No foul-minded man ever yet had an ear for the word of the living God."
Charleton jumped to his feet. "What do you mean, you bastard cleric, you!"
"Aw, come off, Charleton!" exclaimed Douglas. "I've learned more dirt from you than I bet Judith ever has from Inez. Come on, let's go get the horses. Thanks for the grub, Mr. Fowler."
"You are very welcome. Don't go away angry with me, Falkner. If I called you foul-minded, you called me by a foul name."
"I guess we're even," agreed Charleton. "I'm obliged to you for the meal." He swung out of the wagon, mounted his horse and was off, Douglas following.
Charleton had hobbled his capture of horses in a little draw, several miles from the sheep camp. In the excitement and hard work of herding the creatures into the camp and re-hobbling them, there was no opportunity to discuss the visit with the preacher sheep-herder. Nor did Douglas wish to bring the matter up when, long after dark, they sat down to their supper of venison and biscuits. He kept Charleton firmly to the story of his capture of each horse and when this was done and the dishes washed, he went to bed.
But long after Charleton had crawled in beside him, Doug lay awake thinking of Judith and of the preacher. He wondered what influence a man like Fowler would have on a girl like Judith. He wondered if Judith would come out with him to call on the preacher. He thought it highly improbable. And then he thought of Peter and what Peter might have said that day had he and not Charleton interrupted Doug and the preacher. For the thousandth time, he thought of Peter's love for his mother and he wondered how his mother had kept herself fine as Peter said she had. Perhaps she had had some sort of religious faith.
"I wish Grandfather Douglas had put the church up with the schoolhouse," he said to himself. "Maybe it would have saved Judith as well as Scott Parsons."
Then he gasped. An idea of overwhelming importance had come to him. He lay for an instant contemplating it, then he crept from the bunk and the sheep wagon into the open. It was a frosty, star-lit night. The river rushed like black oil, silver cakes of ice grinding above the roar of the current. The Moose was munching on a wisp of alfalfa. Douglas saddled him and led him softly out of hearing of the wagon, then sprang upon his back and put him to the canter.
Two hours later, Douglas was banging on the door frame of Fowler's sheep-wagon.
"It's just me, Douglas Spencer," he replied to the preacher's startled query. "I had to come over to ask you something."
A light flashed through the canvas. Then the door opened. "Come in! Come in! Light the fire while I pull my boots on. This is like the days when I was saving souls and marrying couples."
Douglas quickly had a fire blazing and pulled the coffee-pot forward. He pushed his hat back on his head and the candle-light threw into sharp relief the firm set of his lips. His six-shooter banged on the bench as he sat down and put one spurred boot on the hearth. The preacher perched blinking on the edge of the bunk. Through the canvas came the endless restless movement of myriad sheep.
"Mr. Fowler," said Douglas, "I own some land that came to me from my mother when I was twenty-one. If I build you a little church on it, will you come to Lost Chief and live there and preach? I'll be responsible for your wages."
Fowler's face was inscrutable. "Why do you want me to come, Douglas?"
For the first time, Doug's voice thickened. "I want you to help Lost
Chief and to save Judith."
"Tell me about Judith."
Douglas hesitated, then he asked, "Catholics have a thing they call the confessional, haven't they? Well, it's a good idea if the chap they confess to is the right kind. I don't believe a word of your religion and yet I have a feeling that you are the right kind. Judith! She's twenty-one now. I'm six foot one. She's about two inches shorter. Weighs, I guess, fifty pounds lighter. Finest gray eyes you ever saw. Red cheeks. Her mouth used to be too big, but now it's perfect. Rides and breaks a horse better than any man in the Valley, bar none. Loves animals and can tame and train anything. A great reader."
Douglas paused.
"She sounds very attractive. What's the trouble?" asked the preacher.
Douglas twisted his hands together. "You know who Inez Rodman is. Well, she is Jude's best friend! And she has formed all of Judith's ideas about love and marriage."
"Yet you say Judith is straight?"
"She sure-gawd is! But how can it last? She's restless and discontented and Inez is brilliant, feeds Judith's mind."
"Has her mother any influence over her?"
"None at all."
"How about her father?" asked the preacher.
"Of course, he's only her foster-father. She likes him and she hates him.
He certainly couldn't help her."
"And you are sure there is no hope in Judith's mother?"
"O she's just broken, like a patient fool horse. Good as gold, you know, but with about as much influence over Jude as a kitten. Judith hasn't any one to tie to, not any one. Peter is all right but he jaws too much. She hasn't any one."
"Doesn't she care for you?"
"She says she's fond of me. Fond of me! I'd rather she hated me. I'd as soon have a dish of cold mush from a woman like Jude, as fondness."
"And do you think I could influence Judith?"
"I don't know. But I want you to try. And it isn't all Judith with me. I love Lost Chief. I never want to live anywhere else. And I'd like to see it the kind of a place my grandfather Douglas wanted it to be. No, it honestly isn't all for Judith, though she's the beginning and the end of it."
There was something almost affectionate in the preacher's deep-set eyes as he watched Douglas.
"Do you realize, my boy, what you are asking? When you bring a preacher into Lost Chief, you are going to rouse an antagonism against yourself that will astound you. These people are of New England stock. There is no more intelligent stock in America, nor stock that is more conceited, more narrow, more obstinate, nor more ruthless. And the farther a New Englander gets from religion, the more brutal his virtues become. If you take me into Lost Chief, you are going to start a depth of strife of which we cannot foresee the end."
"I hadn't thought of that," said Douglas. He rested his chin on his palm and eyed the glowing stove thoughtfully. "I guess you are right," finally; "nothing makes Lost Chief folks so mad as to have some one hint they aren't perfect." Then he chuckled. "It'll be a real man's fight. I wonder what Jude will say! Are you afraid, Mr. Fowler?"
"Afraid? Yes! I'm not as young as I was once and I am not over-anxious for such a struggle. But this thing isn't in my hands. If ever the Almighty showed Himself a directing force, He is showing it here. This is what He ordained from the day you drove me out of the schoolhouse. Do you remember what I said to you?"
"You quoted the Bible, I think. I don't remember what it was."
"I said, 'Ye shall find no place to repent you, though ye seek for it with tears.'"
Douglas murmured the words over to himself. His face worked a little. "It's true! It's the living truth!" he exclaimed unevenly. "Not that I've got anything to repent—" he hesitated. "What is repentance? What is life? Where is God, if there is a God? What does it all mean, anyhow?"
The preacher said slowly, "'There is a Divinity that shapes our ends, rough hew them as we will.' That's what it all means. When shall you be ready for me, Douglas?"
"I think the fall would be best. Suppose we say right after the round-up.
I'll look for you on the twentieth of September."
"That will suit me. I can then give my boss ample notice."
"What pay will you want, Mr. Fowler?"
"Just enough to feed and clothe me. We'll arrange that after we get a church established."
Douglas rose with a broad grin. "I sure-gawd have let myself in for something now," he said. "But I'll take care of you, Mr. Fowler."
"All right, young Moses," returned the preacher, smiling into Doug's eager face. "Good-night."
Charleton was still sound asleep when Douglas at dawn lay down beside him and slipped into dreamless slumber.
CHAPTER XI
THE LOG CHAPEL
"Don't take any responsibility that you don't have to. That's my idea of a happy life."
—Young Jeff
By eight o'clock the next morning they had broken camp and had started homeward, with their kicking, squealing herd of wild horses. The little black mare alone led docilely. It was a difficult trip back to the valley and Douglas was grateful for this, for it kept Charleton from airing the cynical comments Douglas knew he was evolving in regard to the preacher. And Douglas was filled with a new purposefulness that was almost happiness. He did not want Charleton to obtrude himself upon this new-found content.
They reached Lost Chief late one afternoon and Douglas found himself and the trembling mare at home in time for supper. The family came out to the corral to examine the prize.
"She's got some mighty good points," said John; "but I doubt if you'll ever be able to do anything with her. She's wild. And she'll die of homesickness for the range. Once in a while you see 'em like that."
"She has an intelligent eye." Judith was going over the horse eagerly.
Douglas smiled a little. The range horse, with its slender, hard-muscled beauty, was no finer drawn than Judith circling carefully about the corral, the wind whipping her black hair across her thin, vivid face.
"I don't believe she'll eat with us all watching her," said Mary. "Let's go in to our own supper."
"She'll have to eat pretty soon or give up." Douglas followed Judith into the kitchen. "She hasn't eaten a pound since I caught her."
"Poor little thing!" exclaimed Judith.
At supper Douglas gave the details of the hunt, which were greeted by the family with considerable hilarity.
"One no-account horse to show for a week's hard work!" laughed John.
But Douglas was not perturbed.
"I don't mind," he said. "Wild horses was the least of what I went after and, as it turned out, the least of what I got. I met Mr. Fowler."
"The old preacher?" exclaimed Judith. "Where was he?"
"He starved out at preaching and is herding sheep down in the Green
Thimble country. He fed Charleton and me and we had a long talk."
"You had nerve to eat with him after what you did to him!" John was grinning.
"I felt that way myself," agreed Douglas. "But he didn't hold a grudge against me. He's not that kind. And I think he was so lonely he'd have been glad to feed the Old Nick himself."
"Who is he herding for?" asked Mary.
"Some one in Denver. He's going to give it up in the fall."
"What for? Got a church?" John was still grinning.
Douglas nodded slowly. "Yes, he's got a church."
"Did he tell you where?" asked Mary.
"Yes; it's in Lost Chief," replied Douglas.
"Lost Chief!" roared John. "What are you giving us?"
"I'm giving it to you straight. I asked him if he would come if I'd build him a little church up on my part of the ranch and he said he would."
There was a stunned silence while the audience of three considered this reply. Judith eyed Doug intently, then said, "I bite! What is the joke, Douglas?"
"No joke. I asked him to come. I want to hear what he has to say."
"What did Charleton say about it?" asked Mary.
"Charleton doesn't know. I certainly wouldn't give him a chance to spoil the trip." Douglas tossed the thick yellow hair from his forehead and waited for his father's comment. He could not recall ever having carried on a more difficult conversation than this. There were beads of sweat on his upper lip. Old Fowler had warned him of the antagonism he would meet. And here it was. The air was black with it before a hundred words had been spoken.
John scratched his head. "You mean you actually asked that old fool to come here and preach in Lost Chief?"
Douglas nodded over a piece of pie. "Only," he added, "he's not a fool. Far from it. We may not agree with him, but he's a wise man. A very wise old man."
"And you are going to build a church for him?" John went on.
Again Douglas nodded.
"Are you plumb loco?" John's voice began to rise.
Douglas' color was deepening but he had himself well in hand. "Maybe I am loco. But it can't hurt any one to have Fowler here, can it?"
"I guess he won't stay long enough to do any actual harm!" Judith laughed.
"He's going to stay quite a spell," returned Doug. "I'm going to see that he does."
"But everybody will make fun of him and of you too," volunteered Mary.
"Probably," agreed Douglas. "But even at that I doubt if they have as much fun as I do. My sense of humor is my strong point!"
"Huh!" sniffed Judith. "You'll need more than what you have, Douglas, in this campaign."
"Look here, Doug," urged his father with an obvious effort to be patient, "just what is the joke?"
"Now listen, Dad! It's not a joke. I'm in deadly earnest. I haven't got a particle of religion in me but I'm interested in that line of talk to see if I can discover what other folks get out of it. Peter Knight is not a fool. He knows the world and he says Lost Chief needs a church. All right, it's going to have one."
"Peter Knight is some advocate, all right!" growled John. "He's always saying he had a religious up-bringing, and look at him! Fourth-class postmaster in a cow valley!"
"I don't suppose his religious up-bringing had a thing to do with that," said Douglas.
"Then what's the good of a religion?" John's voice was triumphant. Douglas said nothing and his father went on. "You'll be the laughing-stock of the Valley. You can let on you won't care, but I know you will."
"Yes, I'll care," admitted Douglas. "But that can't be helped. It seems to be a part of the game."
"Well, he can't come to this house!" roared John. "I wouldn't have one of that breed on the place. Mind you keep him off this ranch, Doug."
"I expected you to say that." Douglas' jaw was set. "That's why I plan to build him a cabin up on my section. Grandfather's old cabin isn't worth fixing up."
He did not look at Judith as he spoke. Had he done so he would have been puzzled by the wistfulness in her eyes.
"I sure wonder, Doug," said John irritably, "where you get your crazy notions!"
"He's exactly like his grandfather Douglas!" exclaimed Mary.
"His grandfather Douglas!" cried John. "Why, the old man would kick the stones off his grave if he knew what his grandson was up to. He used to boast that he came West just to get rid of the Presbyterians and the Allopaths. Nothing he hated like a sky pilot!"
Douglas rose and shrugged his shoulders. "Well," he said, "if I'm as popular with the rest of the Valley as I am with my family, I'm liable to have my head turned before this thing is over," and he went out to attend to his chores.
As he paused by the corral fence to watch the little wild horse standing motionless over the untasted hay, Judith joined him.
"Looks as if Dad might be right about her," he said.
"I'd like to try my hand at her, Douglas." Judith's voice was eager.
"You may have her, Jude. I was hoping to bring you in two or three, but
Fate said otherwise."
"I'm much obliged to you, Douglas," said Judith soberly. "You are always mighty generous—" She hesitated for a moment. "I wish you weren't going in for this thing with the preacher, Doug."
"O well, let's drop the matter!" said Douglas wearily, and without a word further Judith turned away.
The next morning at breakfast, John was irritable and would not let the subject of Fowler's coming rest.
"What did Charleton say?" he asked.
"Charleton doesn't know," replied Douglas, patiently. "He wasn't there when I talked it over with the preacher."
"I'll bet he wasn't or you never would have gotten away with it," growled John.
"Sure! I'm a nervous man about Charleton," grinned Douglas. "Come now,
Dad! Why should you be sore at the idea?"
"Lots of reasons! I hate a man who thinks he's enough superior to me to tell me how to behave. And I feel sore as a pup that my son should be bringing such a man into the Valley. All the folks will say you are criticizing them. I'm not going to let you do it, Douglas!"
Douglas gave a short laugh, which was echoed by Judith.
John grew red. "My father would have thrashed me when I was a grown man if I'd laughed at him like that!"
"O well, look at the man he was!" chuckled Judith.
"Don't you speak that way to me!" roared John. "The children of this generation certainly are a bad lot! But one thing you two will remember. I'm master of this house and as long as you stay here you'll obey me! And you just let me hear you telling anybody, Doug, of your crazy plan and you'll learn for the first time what I am!"
"Then you won't help me put up my buildings?" asked Douglas.
"Not for the use of any fool preacher!" shouted his father.
Douglas lighted a cigarette and went out. For the first time a sense of disappointment marred the beauty of the plan he had perfected with the preacher. He realized now that he had counted on Judith's being interested even were she antagonistic. But she was indifferent. He would have preferred that she be resentful like his father. There was nothing tangible there to struggle against. One could neither fight nor urge indifference. Then he set his jaws. Judith should see! He knew whither he was going now. He had found the fine straight line of which Peter had spoken, long ago, and he would hew to it, at whatever cost. And Judith could not, must not fail him. If only he knew the things she really thought! His jaw was still set as he watched the little wild mare, now ceaselessly circling the corral fence, her face to the hills. Judith crossed to the bars and Douglas turned away.
There still was too much frost in the ground for spring work on the ranch and it would be a month before the cattle could be driven up into the Reserve. It was during this month that Douglas had planned to put up two cabins on his ranch, one for the church, the other for himself and Fowler to occupy. He had accumulated a sufficient number of logs to more than supply his needs and he had counted on his father's help in erecting the buildings. He wondered now if Peter would help him, and old Johnny Brown. That afternoon he rode down to the post-office.
Peter was breathlessly interested. "You'd better keep it quiet, Doug, till the old man gets here," he said. "If you get old Johnny up there, don't give him an inkling."
Douglas nodded. "Then I can count on you, Peter?"
The postmaster eyed the young rider keenly. John Spencer had never been the man his son had grown to be!
"Do you mean count on me for the plan or the cabins?" asked Peter.
"Both!"
"Yes, you can, Douglas! I don't know whether the plan is a good one or not. But I'm delighted to see you taking a step like this. It's gratifying to me, Doug. It is indeed; and I know your mother would have been delighted." Peter's voice broke, and he said harshly, "Now, get along, Doug. I've got to sort the mail."
For the first time that day, Douglas' lips wore a little smile. He whistled to Prince, who had grown too lazy of late to propitiate Sister as he had in his younger days and who was keeping that growling old Amazon at her distance by snapping at her viciously. Prince lunged over to Pard's heels and Doug started off for his call on Johnny Brown.
"I deponed I'd come, didn't I?" asked old Johnny. "It's been a gregus long time and I'm only half-muscled as well as half-witted now. But I'll come. I'd help you build a cabin in hell if you wanted me to. Honest, I would, Doug."
Douglas did not laugh. "Thanks, Johnny! Then I'll look for you to-morrow."
"I deponed I'd come, didn't I?" repeated the old fellow, and he was still deponing when Douglas started homeward.
Peter inveigled Young Jeff into taking the post-office for a couple of weeks. Post-office keeping did not accord at all with the ideas of pleasant living of the native-born of Lost Chief. Undoubtedly if Peter had not offered his services year after year there would have been, a great part of the time, no post-office in the Valley. But Peter had means of his own with which to piece out the salary and for some inscrutable reason he clung to the sort of prestige he enjoyed in the community as a Federal employee. His friends always protested violently at substituting for him, but always gave in, fearful lest Peter carry out his threat of giving up the job. So he appeared at Douglas' ranch, bright and early, bringing a graphic account of Young Jeff's despair over a pile of second-class mail.
Lost Chief Creek bordered one edge of Douglas' acres. Dead Line Peak pushed an abrupt shoulder into the stream at the northwest corner. Below this shoulder lay a grove of silvery aspens and of blue spruce, dripping with great bronze cones. Just above the flood line of the creek, Douglas trimmed out enough trees from the grove to give elbow-room for the cabins and corrals. By the end of Peter's two weeks, the heaviest part of the building had been done.
On the last day of the fortnight—it had been a very pleasant fortnight for Peter—he and Douglas dawdled long over their noon meal while old Johnny began the work he loved, the chinking of the log walls. Leaning against a log at the edge of the clearing, Lost Chief Valley sloped below them. A blue line of smoke rose from the Spencer chimney.
"Dad is sure sore at me this time," said Douglas. "He's hardly spoken to me for a week."
"About Fowler, I suppose."
"Yes. He feels that I am disgracing him. He's sure I'm going to turn religious. I can't make him believe that that is not why I'm bringing Fowler in."
"What is your real reason, Doug?" asked Peter, taking a huge bite of cold fried beef.
"I don't want to turn religious. I don't want to be anything that's queer or unreasonable. What I want is to get to believe—in a future life."
Peter laughed. "Isn't that religion?"
"I don't think so! You can believe in immortality without believing in miracles and that Eve was made out of a man's rib, and without being goody-goody."
Peter made no comment for a moment. He finished his beef and lighted his pipe before he said, "I have an idea that the kind of a mind that can believe in the soul's floating around in space can swallow the rib story without much choking. What I want to see in Lost Chief is the kind of ethics that Christ taught."
"Ethics! Ethics!" scoffed the younger man. "Who gives a hang about ethics if they aren't going to help us live again? You can bet I don't! Ethics may do for a cold-blooded guy like you, Peter. But me! I want something as big and as real and as warm-looking as Fire Mesa."
"Poor old Fowler!" groaned Peter.
Douglas glanced at the postmaster questioningly; then his eyes wandered back toward the ranch house. A tiny figure in blue leaped on a horse and was off at a gallop.
"Judith's going to Inez' place," said Douglas.
"She sees too much of Inez!" Peter scowled. "Her mind is getting exactly
Inez' twist to it."
"There was a time when you told me Inez could give Judith good advice."
Doug's voice was bitter.
"So she could. But I never said Inez and Jude should be buddies, did I?"
Douglas threw his cigarette into the creek and rolled over on his face with a groan. "I'm sick of worrying about it!" he said.
"Does she still talk about going the round of the rodeos with a string of buckers?"
"No. She says that was just kid stuff. She has an idea now she'll breed thoroughbred horses." Douglas turned over on his back and gazed up into the heavens, where an eagle hung, motionless.
"Lord! Breeding horses is no work for Jude!" cried Peter.
Douglas did not reply. Peter eyed the young man's clean, hawk-like profile and went on. "What does she say about you and Fowler?"
"She laughs at me."
"Do you think you can get her in touch with Fowler?"
Douglas sat up with a jerk. "Get her in touch with him? Say, what do you think I'm bringing that sky pilot in here for? You can bet she'll get in touch with him! I'll show that girl I haven't played all my cards yet!"
Peter stared long and unblinkingly at Douglas. "Well, I'll be damned!" he muttered and filled his pipe again.
The summer passed for Douglas with extraordinary rapidity. Profiting by the experience of the previous winter, every rancher put in as heavy a grain crop as he could handle and there was little leisure in the Valley during July and August. Lost Chief was, of course, immensely interested in Doug's building operations. He was accused of planning to be married and conjecture ran rife. When he began work in the interior of the log chapel, he hung burlap bags over the windows and locked the doors. But his precautions were futile. By the middle of June, every ranch in the valley was talking about Douglas Spencer's motion-picture hall and wondered why he was building it so far from the center of the community. The truth came out in an entirely unexpected manner.
About a week before he expected the preacher, Douglas rode down in the evening for his mail. Peter had gone to Mountain City on a rare visit and Young Jeff was acting as postmaster again. Scott Parsons was helping him sort the mail and it was Scott who fell upon a battered suitcase, tied with frayed rope.
"What's this mess?" he exclaimed. "Let's see this tag." He shoved the suitcase close to the lamp. "'The Rev. Mr. James Fowler. Care of Douglas Spencer.'" Scott looked up with an oath. "What do you know about this!" he gasped.
Douglas, standing with his back to the cold stove, said nothing.
Young Jeff dropped the handful of letters he was distributing, and examined the tag for himself. "Old Fowler, eh? Thought he was dead long ago. What's he coming to see you for, Doug? Going to preach—" He paused and his eyes grew round. "Doug's motion-picture theater! The sky pilot! That cabin is a church!"
Scott gave a gasp, followed by a shout of laughter. "How about it,
Doug?"
Douglas grinned.
"What are you doing, Douglas? Starting a ranch for broken-down sky pilots?" asked Young Jeff.
Still Douglas made no reply. He strode over to the table and put his hand on the suitcase.
"Hold on!" protested Scott. "Answer a few questions. What are you trying to put over on us, Douglas?"
"You'll know, pretty soon," answered Doug.
"Well, you always were loco but I never thought you'd get real dangerous, till now!" exclaimed Young Jeff. "Listen, don't try to put that guy over on us, Doug!"
Scott stood eying Douglas with a mixture of curiosity and impatience in his hard eyes. He had just parted his lips to speak when the door opened and Charleton and Jimmy came in.
"Look at here, Charleton!" roared Young Jeff. "Look at the address on this bag!"
The two newcomers scrutinized the tag. "Well," said Jimmy, "I'll be everlastingly dehorned, vaccinated and branded!"
Charleton's mouth twisted. "So the old fool got you, Doug! You've got hard nerve, that's all I have to say!"
"Nerve! I'll say so!" cried Scott. "What's the great idea, Doug? Going to bring Lost Chief up to your level, huh?"
Douglas' cheeks were burning. He jerked the suitcase from the table and started for the door.
"Believe me, cowman," called Scott after him, "you and the sky pilot have laid out a course of trouble for yourselves."
Douglas paused with his hand on the latch. "You are a pack of coyotes!" he said and he slammed the door after himself.
And so the secret was out! Nothing that had occurred in the Valley for years had stirred the ranchers so deeply. There was much joking and derisive laughter but beneath this was a sense of resentment that grew day by day. Grandma Brown, Peter of course, and Frank Day were sympathetic to the idea. Some of the older women wondered if it might not be a good thing in giving the young fry a place to go on Sundays. But the young fry, with huge enjoyment not untinged with malice, planned to run the preacher out of the Valley in short order and to mete out such treatment to Douglas as would prevent his making a like fool of himself again.
Douglas had set up housekeeping in the new cabin now, and on the night before he expected Mr. Fowler, Judith rode up to see his new home. Old Johnny had gone down to the post-office and Douglas finished his supper and was sitting on the doorstep when Judith galloped up, with the Wolf Cub under the heels of her mount.
"This is my first real ride on the little wild mare," she said, dropping from the saddle.
"Has she gotten over her homesickness, yet?" asked Douglas.
"I think so. At least, she follows me around about as close as Wolf Cub does."
"You are a wonder, Judith! I wish you thought as much of me as you do of your horses and dog."
"You wouldn't let me train you, Doug," said Judith plaintively.
Douglas laughed. "A whole lot you'd think of a man you could train!"
Judith laughed, too, sitting down on the step beside Douglas. For a moment she was silent, then she said softly: "How you must love it up here!"
"I do! But I'll be glad when old Johnny can be with me all the time. I don't like this bachelor stuff."
"You and Scott ought to join forces," Judith's voice was mischievous. "By the way, Scott's heard of a standard bred mare he can get me for five hundred dollars."
"I wouldn't trust Scott to pick a horse for me," grunted Douglas.
"And you'd be foolish if you did," agreed Judith. "But he'll play fair enough with me."
"He will if it's to his interest to do so. If he can make anything off you by being crooked, he'll be crooked. But I suppose there's no use in me warning you. Have you got the money for the mare?"
"Only half of it. All the stock I've been able to raise and sell in the last five years amounts to about two hundred and fifty-six dollars."
"I'll lend you the rest," offered Douglas.
"Dad said he'd let me have it, and so did Inez. But I'd rather borrow from you."
Douglas flushed with pleasure. "Had you, Judith? Tell me why!"
"I don't like to be under obligations to Dad; and Inez' money—well, I don't feel keen about her money. As for you—Doug, it's queer, but I'd just as soon ask you for anything. I don't know whether it's a compliment to you or not."
"I consider it a compliment," said Douglas softly. "I had no idea you had that sort of confidence in me."
"O, I'm not such a wild woman that I don't know a real man when I see one, Doug,—even if you are making an idiot of yourself just now! You should have planned to be more tactful about bringing your old sky pilot in here."
"Tactful! What a word!" exclaimed Douglas, "For heaven's sake, Jude, don't you get the idea better than that? This is a matter of—" He hesitated, at a loss for a moment for a word that should tell Judith something of the yearning conflict that obsessed him. "This is a battle," he said finally, "a fight to the finish for—for—" then he blurted out the word that in Lost Chief was taboo—"for souls!" exclaimed Douglas.
Judith looked at him quickly; but to Douglas' vast relief she did not laugh. Instead, her eyes were deep with some emotion he could not name.
"I don't think I understand you, Doug," she said at last. "I couldn't get so worked up over anything that had to do with religion. But I do see that it means a lot to you and I think you're foolish to trust to a man like Fowler to put anything over in this valley for you."
"You don't know my old sky pilot like I do," insisted Doug.
"Yes, you must have got a deep knowledge of him in one night!"
"I sure did!" said Douglas simply.
"You are sure that you realize how bitterly the Valley resents your doing this?"
"Yes. And the Valley had better realize, if it plans trouble, that I'm neither soft, nor easy."
"I just wish you weren't trying to do it," repeated Judith.
"What do you want me to do?" asked Douglas.
"Why, be a first-class rancher, make money, and travel and learn something about life."
"That's what I plan to do. But I want to do more than that. I want to fix Lost Chief so that a couple of kids like you and me don't have to learn all they know about real things from a woman like Inez and a man like Charleton. And if a sky pilot can answer those questions right, why I'm going to have one in here if I have to mount guard on him, day and night. My kids are going to grow up right here in Lost Chief and they aren't going round like little wild horses when it comes to asking questions about love and death. No, ma'am!"
"Oh! What does old Fowler know about such things?" cried Judith.
"That's what I aim to find out," replied Doug.
Twilight was up on the valley, though Falkner's Peak still glowed crimson in outline, and the Forest Reserve to the east was silver blue, shot with lines of flame. The evening star trembled above Fire Mesa. Up on Dead Line Peak behind them, a pack of coyotes barked.
"We miss you down at the house," said Judith suddenly.
Douglas' heart suddenly lifted. There was a sweetness in Judith's voice that he never before had heard there.
"I miss you, Judith! Every moment of the day I'm missing you. The ache for you in my heart is as much a part of my life as my very heart-throbs."
"I wish you wouldn't, Douglas! I wish you wouldn't! I'm not ready to talk of those things!"
"What do you mean, Judith?"
"I mean that I don't see love as you see it; that even if I did care for any one, I'm not ready to give way to it."
She paused as if she too were struggling to express the inarticulate. "O, I am so disappointed in life! It isn't at all what I thought it would be! People aren't what I dreamed they were. Everything is hard and rough and difficult. I don't like life a bit!"
"I don't like it as it is, either," agreed Douglas. "That's why I'm trying to change it, here in Lost Chief. But I wouldn't change my love for you, no matter how it hurts. That's the one beautiful thing in Lost Chief and in me."
He turned to the face, so dimly rebellious, so vaguely sweet in the dark, and his whole soul was in his steady deep voice.
"Judith, won't you marry me? You are my whole life!"
Judith's voice rose passionately. "Don't talk about it! Don't! I don't believe in marriage. I tell you I don't, Douglas!"
"Why not?"
"I've told you again and again. Marriage is too hard on a woman. Why should I want to cook your meals and darn your socks and wash your clothes for you the rest of my life? Yes, and listen to you swear and lay down the law and spit tobacco juice? And when I'm a little older and beginning to get knotty with the hard work, see you take notice of girls who are younger and prettier than I. No, Doug!"
"O, love isn't like that!" exclaimed Douglas vehemently.
"My love won't be like that, I can tell you!" The excitement still was evident in Judith's voice. "I'm not going to kill it, by marrying."
"I wish that Inez were dead and in hell!" cried Douglas, with such an accumulation of bitterness in his voice that Judith drew a quick breath. "And I wish I could quit loving you! I tried my best to, all the time I was at Charleton's. But I can't! It just grows as I grow and every day it's a bigger pain and trouble to me. I wish I could have peace!"
"I wish I could have it myself!" ejaculated the girl. She rose suddenly. "I'm so tired of this burning struggle. But I won't settle down to being an old horse on a ranch. I will do something that gives me a chance to use my brain. I will!"
She leaped into the saddle.
Douglas seized the mare's bridle. "Just what do you mean by being tired of a burning struggle?" he demanded tensely. "Are you caring for somebody, Jude?"
"Let me go, Douglas," said Judith.
For a moment, the two stared at each other in the fading light, then
Douglas released the bridle and Judith galloped away.
He stood very still for a long time, gazing down the dim line of the trail. How lonely, how very lonely Judith appeared to be! How lonely, for that matter, were most people, pondering in the solitude of their own minds on all the matters of life that really counted. And how utterly impossible it seemed to be for him and Judith to cross the threshold of each other's reticences. More difficult perhaps for Judith than for him. That, perhaps, was because she did not love him. Or perhaps, because she was not capable of feeling sympathy for spiritual hunger. But he put aside this thought, impatiently. No one could have lived with Judith and not have learned that below her tempestuous nature must be deeps greater than even she herself had realized. Why, O why, could he never have more than a glimpse of those deeps! Evidently something more than love was demanded as a password.
He had been able, quickly enough, at her request to formulate his own demands on life. What were Judith's demands? Were they only for a love that should be unhampered by the ordinary facts of life? He knew that this could not be so. Yet, he had grown up with Judith, had asked her to marry him, and had no idea of what her actual mental and spiritual needs might be. Perhaps they were such that he never could satisfy them. Perhaps Judith recognized this. Of course, she recognized it!—as a bitter memory of her picture of marriage in Lost Chief returned to him. With a groan he bowed his head against the smooth trunk of an aspen. How utterly inexplicable women were! How bitter and how beautiful was this scourging fire, called love!
CHAPTER XII
THE FIRST SERMON
"I ain't able to think. That's why I'm pretty generally happy."
—Old Johnny Brown.
By dawn the next morning Douglas was half-way up the trail to the Pass. He did not know at what hour the preacher would arrive, but he did not propose that the old man should enter Lost Chief without his protection. When he reached the crest, he unsaddled the Moose and settled himself against a gigantic jade rock beside the trail and prepared to wait patiently.
The sun lifted slowly over the unspeakable glory of the ranges and poured its glory down upon the Pass, then swung westward, leaving a chill shadow beside the rock where Douglas was camping. It was mid-afternoon when the stage came through from the half-way house. Old Johnny Brown was driving.
As he pulled up the horses for a rest, he saw Douglas and smiled delightedly.
"Waiting for me, Douglas?"
Douglas shook his head. "I came up to meet a friend, Johnny."
The little old man stared at Douglas; then he said fretfully, "I don't see why Grandma Brown had to go and make me drive the gregus old stage for a week. I deponed to her that I had to get up there and take care of you. When that preacher comes, you'll need me, Doug. There's lots of trouble brewing, boy."
"What kind, Johnny?"
"They always shut up and look rejus when I come round. But I know enough to sabez that bunch even if I am a half-wit."
"I'm not so sure you are a half-wit, Johnny," said Douglas sincerely.
The old man's face brightened. "That's just the way I feel about it too, Douglas. You're the only person in the Valley understands me. You could have my shirt, Doug."
Douglas nodded. "You get through with the stage as soon as you can,
Johnny. Tell Grandma I expect you on Monday."
Johnny clucked firmly at his team. "I'll be there. Nothing can't propone me," and he was gone in a cloud of dust.
It was an hour later that the preacher rounded the curve to the crest. Douglas threw the saddle on the Moose and Fowler pulled up his bony blue roan in surprise. He was thinner and grayer than ever and his blue jumper was patched with pieces of burlap. But his eyes were bright as he shook hands with Douglas.
"I'm the Committee on Welcome!" said the young rider.
"How long have you been waiting for me, Douglas?" asked Fowler.
"Since daybreak. I couldn't be sure when you'd come. And I didn't want you to come into Lost Chief alone."
"Are you expecting trouble immediately?" asked the preacher.
"Well," replied Douglas frankly, "the folks are just about as enthusiastic as if I were bringing a Mormon into the Valley. And I just don't aim to give them a chance to start anything till we get a little bit settled."
The old man's jaw set, under his beard. "Humph! They'll find the Lord and me both ready for them. I have an idea they are going to be surprised before they are through with this."
Douglas nodded and they rode down into the Valley. When they trotted past the post-office, the usual group was gathered on the steps. Doug and the preacher nodded but did not draw rein. Old Sister came out sedately and growled at Prince, but Peter did not leave the doorstep.
"What's your hurry, old-timers?" shouted Jimmy Day.
"A long way to go," called Douglas.
"Your hazer needs a shave!" said some one else.
"We'll do it for him Sunday!" cried another voice.
"Oil up your cannon, Doug," laughed Charleton, "and unchain the dogs of war."
Douglas trotted sedately on.
"I wonder why it is! I wonder why!" said Fowler, very real pain in his voice.
"They think we're criticizing them," answered Douglas; adding, with his pleasant grin, "which we are!"
It was dark when they reached Douglas' ranch. Before they had unsaddled, Fowler insisted on lighting a lantern and inspecting the chapel. Douglas, not at all adverse, for he was very proud of this work of his hands, followed the old man in his microscopic inspection of the little building. It was small and dim, with a smell of new cedar. To Douglas, already there was something hallowed about the quiet interior as if somehow the yearning with which he had builded it had given the insensate wood a curious high purposefulness.
Fowler examined the benches and sat for a moment on several of them. He flashed the lantern along the carefully chinked walls, the rose tints of the cedar glowing warmly back at him. He walked slowly up and down the center aisle and paused before the platform, on which was a table and chair. For a long time he stood with one hand on the table. Then he said:
"It's beautiful, Douglas! Beautiful! A chapel for me! Built by a young man that has faith in me. Wonderful! And built with such free-hearted care! For me to preach in! Why, a minister of a great metropolis might well envy me such a gift!"
He paused again, turning the lantern so that the tapestried colors of the walls again flashed forth.
"Stained glass!" half whispered the old man. "Already it has the air of a church. Douglas, we'll consecrate it now."
He knelt before the platform and Douglas bowed his head.
"O God, my Father and my Shepherd," said Fowler, "You have led my wandering steps to this fragrant evidence of a young man's heart. How beautiful it is, O God, and how holy, You know. Help me to keep it so, Heavenly Father, and help me to make Lost Chief find it so. And, O God, put Your great arm about this young man and keep it there until he realizes that it is Your arm supporting him. I thank You, O Everlasting Mercy, for leading me to this resting-place for my soul. Amen."
And it seemed to Douglas, bowing his head in the dusk, that the chapel itself was listening in a brooding peace.
After a moment, the old man rose and led the way out the door, which
Douglas locked, then turned the key over to the preacher.
"It's yours, now," he said with a little, embarrassed, laugh. "I'm only the guard."
Fowler put the key carefully into his pocket. "If anything should happen to that chapel, it would break my heart," he said.
"We mustn't let anything happen to it. That's our job," returned Douglas stoutly.
The next morning, Saturday, Douglas left the preacher while he went down to his father's place for his day's work. He was as nervous as a mother with her first baby all day and he galloped the Moose back up the trail long before sunset. When Mr. Fowler waved at him from the door of the cabin, he gave a gusty sigh of relief.
While Doug was cooking the bacon for supper he asked the preacher what was to be the subject of the morrow's sermon.
"I was going to preach on the Golden Rule," replied Mr. Fowler.
"No," said Douglas decidedly. "You give 'em a talk on the hereafter and why you think there is one." He lighted a cigarette and cut more bacon.
"Young man, are you presuming to dictate to me how to preach the word of
God?"
"I sure am!" grinning with the cigarette between his white teeth. "I'm in this thing up to my horns and I don't aim to make any false moves that I can help. I've been reading the New Testament this summer. So far, the most I've got out of it is that Christ was the most diplomatic preacher that ever lived. Let's be as diplomatic as we can. What's the use of preaching slush to a lot of sensible, hard-thinking folks who don't believe in anything."
The preacher bit his knuckles and took a turn or two up and down the cabin. Douglas noted with a little sense of pity the extreme thinness of the rounded shoulders under the denim jumper. Douglas dished the bacon and put a loaf of Mary's bread beside the fried potatoes.
"Show us that our souls go marching on like old John Brown's," said the young man, persuasively, "and you'll have all Lost Chief eating out of your hand."
"You talk of faith," cried Fowler impatiently, "as if it were a problem in algebra."
Douglas hesitated. "Maybe I do." His voice suddenly trembled.
Fowler paused as he was about to seat himself at the table. "I hear a horse!" he said.
Douglas went to the door.
"It's just me!" called Grandma Brown's voice. "Come and help me down. I was up to see your mother this afternoon," she went on as Douglas helped her dismount, "and I thought I'd come along up and have a visit with the preacher."
"That's fine!" exclaimed Douglas. "Come in, Grandma. We're just drawing up to the table."
"Good," sighed the old lady; "I'm half starved. Howdy, Mr. Fowler!
Haven't had enough of Lost Chief yet, huh?"
The preacher rose and shook hands. "Not yet, Mrs. Brown! Will you draw up?"
The old lady plumped down at the table and Douglas, loaded her plate and poured her a cup of coffee. "The older folks," she said abruptly, "won't make you any trouble. Charleton Falkner and some of his pals will be smarty, but the young fry will sure try to break up every meeting you have."
"The modern youngster is pretty rough!" sighed the preacher.
"Here in Lost Chief," agreed Grandma promptly, "they are the most rough-and-tumble, catch-as-catch-can batch of young coyotes that ever lived. They don't respect God, man, nor the devil. And why should they? That's educated into children, not born into them."
"How do you feel about my coming back, Mrs. Brown?" asked Fowler.
Grandma hesitated; then she said, "I'm too old to be polite, James Fowler. I'm a religious woman, myself, and I've often said we'd ought to have a church in Lost Chief. But it isn't men like you can start a church here. You are too religious and too goody-goody."
The preacher winced. Douglas came to his rescue. "We're going to show
Lost Chief that he's not goody-goody."
Grandma shook her head. "I wish you luck, but, with all the nerve in the world, you can't preach to them that won't hear."
"Do you know what deviltry they've planned for to-morrow?" asked
Douglas.
Grandma shook her head. "All I know is, Scott Parsons is the leader. He sees a chance to get back at you."
Douglas finished his bacon thoughtfully. "All right," he said finally; "let 'em come. I'm waiting."
"Well," said Grandma briskly, "I didn't come up here to give advice. I wanted a gossip with an old-timer. Mr. Fowler, you was up in Mountain City when that Black Sioux outbreak took place. Did you know Emmy Blake, she that was stolen by old Red Feather?"
"Yes," replied Fowler, with a sudden clearing of his somber face. "I saw her when—" and he plunged into a tale that, matched by one from Grandma, consumed the evening.
At nine o'clock the old lady rose.
"I'll ride down the trail with you," said Douglas.
"You fool!" sniffed the old lady. "Since when have folks begun nursing me over these trails?"
"That's not the point," returned Doug. "I want to see Peter."
"Well, come along, then," conceded Grandma. She pulled on her mackinaw and buttoned it. The nights were very cold.
The next morning, a placard on the post-office door announced to Lost Chief that a meeting would be held in the log chapel on Sunday at two o'clock; and by that hour every soul in Lost Chief capable of moving was packed into the little cabin.
After his talk with Peter, Douglas had changed his program. The postmaster, not the preacher, sat at the table. He wore a black coat over a blue flannel shirt, a coat that Lost Chief never saw except at funerals or weddings. His denim pants were turned up with a deep cuff over his riding-boots. The preacher sat on a chair, just below the platform. Douglas occupied a rear pew where he could keep an eye on Scott Parsons. There was very little talking among the members of the congregation, but much spitting of tobacco juice into the red-hot stove.
Promptly at two o'clock, Peter rose and cleared his throat. "Well,
folks, Douglas says he's trying to put into practice some of the stuff
I've been preaching to him. So I suppose I'm to blame for this meeting.
Now, there isn't anybody can accuse me of being religious."
"A fourth-class postmaster couldn't be religious," remarked Charleton
Falkner.
"They always go crazy about the second year of office," volunteered John
Spencer.
Everybody laughed, even Peter. Then he went on:
"So when I say I'm going to back Doug up in this experiment you none of you can say it's because I'm pious. It's because I think Lost Chief ought to have a church to help the young people decide the right and wrong of things."
"How come, Peter?" demanded Jimmy Day. "Ain't the young folks round here pleasing to your bachelor eye?"
"To my eye, yes!" answered the postmaster. "Best-looking crowd I ever saw. But to my mind, no! And there isn't one of you over fifteen who doesn't know what I mean when I say it. Now, Doug's idea seems sensible enough to me. He says he'd be happier if he could believe in a life after death. He says if any preacher can prove to him that the soul is immortal, he is willing to play the game so as to win that future if it is proved that you have to follow rules to win it. Folks, if there is anything sissy about that, I'd like to have one of you rear up and say so."
"There isn't a preacher in the world can prove that," said Mrs. Falkner.
"If there was, he'd be greater than Christ."
"Didn't Christ prove it?" cried Mr. Fowler quickly.
"No!" replied Mrs. Falkner. "He believed it Himself and He lived like He believed it, but He didn't prove it."
Fowler jumped to his feet. "He proved it over and over; by fulfilling the prophecies, by the miracles He performed and by returning after death."
"How do you know He returned after death?" asked Mrs. Falkner.
"The Bible says so."
"Nonsense!" exclaimed Mrs. Falkner. "The Bible is just history, most of it hearsay. And I read in the Atlantic the other day that Napoleon said that history was just a lie agreed upon."
"This is blasphemy!" shouted Mr. Fowler. "This is—"
"Wait!" Peter interrupted with a firm hand. "Every one is to say what they decently please. You'll never get anywhere in this valley, if you show yourself shocked by anything anybody says."
"I don't want to shock the preacher, Peter,"—Mrs. Falkner's beautiful face was wistful—"I'd like to have his faith. I sure-gawd would! But! I just want to make him see that to folks like us in Lost Chief who read and think and look at these hills a lot, the Bible never could prove a hereafter to us."
"But the Bible is the inspired word of God," insisted Fowler.
"Who says so?" asked Mrs. Falkner.
"The Bible."
"Good heavens, isn't that childish?" she appealed to the congregation. "Seems to me only God could prove that and we don't even know He exists."
There was silence in the room. Douglas, looking over the backs of many familiar heads, felt a curious yearning affection for these neighbors who so far had met his experiment so kindly. Then his eyes turned to the aspens without the window and beyond these to the far red clouds over Fire Mesa. The first snow of the season was beginning to sift through the trees. He wished that he had the courage to ask Mrs. Falkner what she thought of Inez' poem:
A fire mist and a planet,
A crystal and a cell—
but he would rather have cut out his tongue than repeat the verse before this audience.
Mr. Fowler was running his fingers through his beard, glancing hesitatingly from Douglas to Peter.
"Well, is it the sense of this meeting," asked the postmaster, "to let the preacher tell us how he feels about it?"
"Go to it, old wrangler," said Charleton. "I can spout the Persian Poet to 'em if you run short of Bible stuff."
"Baa—a—a!" bleated a small boy in the back of the room.
"I'm going to give the first young one that makes a disturbance a dose of aspen switch," said Grandma Brown.
There was a general chuckle that quieted as Mr. Fowler began to speak.
"Religion doesn't rest on proof. It rests on Faith. And faith is something every human being possesses. If you plant a seed, you have faith that it will produce a plant. No power of yours can bring the plant. But you have faith—in what?—that the plant will appear. Every night that you go to bed you believe that a new day will come. You cannot bring that day but you have absolute faith that to-morrow will be brought by—what? The stars come nightly to the sky, the moon and the earth whirl in their appointed places. You have absolute confidence that they will continue to float in the heavens. On what do you place that confidence?
"Friends, I cannot prove to you that there is a God. But if you will be patient with me, I will give you a faith that asks no proof." He opened his Bible and began to read.
"And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life; he that cometh to me shall never hunger and he that believeth in me shall never thirst….
"If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth in me, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water….
"He that believeth in me, believeth not in me but in Him that sent me. And he that seeth me, seeth Him that sent me. I come a light unto the world, that whosoever believeth in me should not abide in darkness.
"I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die."
Mr. Fowler paused and closed the book.
"Words!" said Charleton. "Just poetry!"
"You are speaking of the living words of the Almighty!" shouted the preacher. "You—" But he was interrupted. There was a sudden unearthly uproar of dogs without. The door burst open and old Sister, howling at the top of her lungs, bolted straight up the aisle to Peter. A can was tied to her tail. Prince, similarly adorned, and ably seconding his old friend's outcry, followed her. Several cats, all dragging tin cans, were flung spitting and yowling through a window.
Chaos reigned. Douglas seized Prince. Peter grabbed Sister. A dozen people took after the cats. They were not as easy to capture as the dogs; and during the progress of the chase, a sudden noxious odor filled the room. Douglas saw a thick black vapor rising from a bubbling mess on the top of the stove. The congregation bolted, leaving the field to one lone cat who climbed the wall to the window and disappeared with a final yowl.
There was no attempt to bring the audience back, and shortly the trail was dotted with riders. But that evening as he sat alone with Douglas, the preacher was not at all sad.
"You were right," he said to the young man, "in having Peter open the meeting. The older people were interested. No doubt they were interested; and in spite of the mischief that broke us up, I feel as if a start had been made. It's a rarely intelligent group of people. I admit that."
Douglas nodded. "We'll wear 'em down. See if we don't. The kids certainly put it over on me. I was feeling safe as long as I could watch Scott and Jimmy, and they had Grandma Brown's grandson doing the work for them." He chuckled and shook his head. "I just can't head them off on that kind of work. All we can do, as I say, is to wear them down. And maybe we can win Judith and one or two of the others, right soon."
Mr. Fowler sighed. "We can certainly interest some of the older people for a while with a discussion like we had this afternoon. But not the young people. Beauty and emotion and mystery must make the religious appeal to young folks. A church can't exist as a debating society."
Douglas turned this over in his mind, finally focussing his thoughts on
Inez; she who loved beauty and dragged her emotions in the mire.
"Mr. Fowler," he said finally, "I'll bet Inez would have been a very religious person if she'd been started with the beauty and emotion and mystery!"
"That's a queer thing to say!" The preacher's voice was a little resentful.
Douglas went on as if he had not heard. "But you can't get Judith that way. She hasn't any emotions except temper and a sense of humor!"
"There isn't a woman born who isn't full of emotion," said Mr. Fowler, dryly. "And the deeper they conceal it, the more they have. I think I'll go to bed, Douglas. I feel as if I'd come through a hard day."
"Same here," agreed Douglas, and shortly the cabin was in darkness.
For a day or so the preacher stayed quietly in and about the cabin. He swept the chapel and cleaned out the stove and polished the windows and each day made a little fire. Douglas frequently found him there at night, on his knees. At least once a day he said, "It was a wonderful thing, Doug, for a young man like you to build me this little chapel, in my old age." He insisted on grace before meals and a chapter aloud from the Bible before bed. Douglas was embarrassed but entirely acquiescent. Mr. Fowler was to have a free hand with his spiritual development.
About the middle of the week, Judith rode down to the post-office with
Douglas. "Well, how's the sky pilot and his disciple?" she asked.
"I believe the old boy is almost happy," replied Douglas. "He thinks that little old church I built is pretty fine."
"Inez says it looks like a big cow stable."
"That's nice of Inez. Why didn't she tell me how to make it better looking?"
"What does Inez care about it? Honest, Doug, you are making an awful fool of yourself. A man like Fowler can't preach to us."
"Why, he never had a chance to preach here yet!" exclaimed Douglas. "And, what do you expect in a place like Lost Chief, a ten-thousand-dollar-a-year sky pilot? Besides, I don't want preaching from him. I want just the one thing like Peter said. And Fowler has that in him just as strong as the highest paid preacher in the world. Give him a show, Judith. Come up, every Sunday. You might back me that much."