Story of Chester Lawrence

CHAPTER XVIII.

The rea­son why Chester per­mit­ted Lucy and his fa­ther to set out for Ire­land with­out him was be­cause he trust­ed Un­cle Gilbert--and the Lord; how­ev­er, it was no easy mat­ter to be thus left be­hind. Sure­ly, he would be more of a help than a hin­drance on the jour­ney. He forced him­self to lie abed the morn­ing they were to be off, un­til af­ter the train left. Then, know­ing he was safe from do­ing that which his Un­cle had de­sired him not to do, he leisure­ly arose, very late for break­fast.

The prob­lem with the young man now was what to do while he was wait­ing. Lon­don sights, even those he had not seen be­fore, were tame now. The new­ly-​found fa­ther and sis­ter had al­ready left him. Had it not been a dream, and was he not now awake to the re­al­ity of his old life?

He found him­self once more at­tract­ed to the Mis­sion head­quar­ters. El­der Mal­by was at home that morn­ing. Chester told him the lat­est de­vel­op­ment.

“Has she--have they--de­sert­ed me, do you think?” asked Chester.

“No--I don't think so,” replied the el­der thought­ful­ly. “Lucy did not im­press me as a girl who would do that. I see no rea­son for such ac­tions, but per­haps Un­cle Gilbert was right. Your fa­ther need­ed to get away from you to read­just him­self to the new con­di­tion.”

“Well, per­haps,--but what can I now do? this wait­ing will be ter­ri­ble.”

“You'll come with me this morn­ing. I have some calls to make.”

And so all that day Chester re­mained with El­der Mal­by, vis­it­ing Saints and in­ves­ti­ga­tors, ad­just­ing dif­fi­cul­ties, and ex­plain­ing prin­ci­ples of the gospel. It was a splen­did thing for the young man, this get­ting his thoughts from self; and be­fore evening, he had ob­tained so much of the mis­sion­ary spir­it that he asked to be per­mit­ted to bear his tes­ti­mo­ny at the street meet­ing. “The loud­er the mob howls and in­ter­rupts, the bet­ter for me,” he de­clared. “You re­mem­ber the oth­er evening when a young fel­low stood with­in a few feet of you and kept re­peat­ing: 'Liars, liars, from Utah'?”

“Yes; I re­mem­ber.”

“I'd like to talk to that fel­low tonight.”

So Chester talked at the street-​meet­ing that evening, but to a very or­der­ly lot of peo­ple. Af­ter the ser­vices, many pressed around him and asked him ques­tions. One young man walked with him and the el­ders to the mis­sion of­fice. They talked on the gospel, and Chester for­got his own heartache in min­is­ter­ing to an­oth­er heart hun­ger­ing for the truth.

The next morn­ing, Chester tried again to re­main in bed, but this time with­out suc­cess. He was up in the gray awak­en­ing city, walk­ing in the park, lis­ten­ing to the birds near by and the rum­bling be­gin­nings of Lon­don life. Af­ter break­fast, he went again to the Church of­fice.

“You must ex­cuse me for thus be­ing such a both­er,” he ex­plained to El­der Mal­by, “but--but I can't keep away.”

“I hope you nev­er will,” replied the el­der, en­cour­ag­ing­ly. “It is when men like you keep away that there is dan­ger.”

“What's the pro­gram to­day?”

“Tract­ing. Do you want to try?”

“Yes; I want to keep go­ing. Yes­ter­day was not bad. I felt fine all day.”

That af­ter­noon Chester had his first tri­al in de­liv­er­ing gospel tracts from door to door. He ap­proached his task timid­ly, but soon caught the spir­it of the work. He had a num­ber of in­ter­est­ing ex­pe­ri­ences. One old gen­tle­man in­vit­ed him in­to the house, that he might more freely tell the young man what he thought of him and his re­li­gion, and this was by no means com­pli­men­ta­ry. An old la­dy, limp­ing to the door and learn­ing that the caller was from Amer­ica, told him she had a son there--and did he know him? Then there were doors slammed in his face, and some gra­cious smiles and “thank you”--al­to­geth­er Chester was so busy meet­ing these var­ious peo­ple that he had no time to wor­ry over those who now should be near­ly to Kil­dare Vil­la in green Ire­land.

While he was eat­ing sup­per with the el­ders, which El­der Mal­by said he had well earned, a mes­sen­ger came to the door. Was one Chester Lawrence there? Yes.

“A tele­gram for him, please.”

Chester opened the mes­sage and read:

“Come to Liv­er­pool in morn­ing. All well. Tell me when and where to meet you--Lucy.”

Chester hand­ed the mes­sage to El­der Mal­by.

“Once more, don't you see,” said the el­der, smil­ing, “all is well.”

“Yes; yes,” replied Chester in a way which was more of a prayer of thanks­giv­ing than com­mon speech.

Ear­ly the fol­low­ing morn­ing Cap­tain Brown was re­ward­ed for his gal­lant lack of in­quis­itive­ness re­gard­ing the send­ing and the re­ceiv­ing of tele­grams by Lucy com­ing to him with her sweet­est smile and say­ing:

“Cap­tain Brown, was that horse and car­riage you used yes­ter­day yours?”

“Oh no; that be­longs to my neigh­bor--on­ly when I am not us­ing it. Do you wish a drive this morn­ing?”

“I want to meet the noon train from Lon­don at Lime Street Sta­tion; and if it wouldn't be too much trou­ble--”

“Not at all. My neigh­bor is very glad to have me ex­er­cise the horse a bit. Can you drive him alone?”

“I'm a lit­tle ner­vous.”

“Will I do for coach­man?”

“If you would, Cap­tain?”

“Then that's set­tled. I'll go im­me­di­ate­ly and make ar­range­ments;” which he did.

“Pa­pa,” said Lucy to her fa­ther, “the cap­tain will drive me to the sta­tion. You'll be all right un­til we get back?”

“All right, yes; don't wor­ry more about me. I'm get­ting strong faster than I ev­er did be­fore. See.”

He paced back and forth with con­sid­er­able vim in his move­ments. “Why,” he con­tin­ued, stop­ping in front of Lucy and kiss­ing her gen­tly on the cheek, “I feel bet­ter right now than I have for a long time--bet­ter in­side, you know.”

Lucy did not un­der­stand ex­act­ly what he meant by the “in­side,” but she did not puz­zle her head about it. She was hap­py to know that her fa­ther was so well and that Chester was speed­ing to her. The day promised to be fair, and the drive to the sta­tion would be de­light­ful. She was look­ing out of the win­dow.

“Lucy,” said her fa­ther, plac­ing his hand on her shoul­der, “you need not tell Cap­tain Brown the lit­tle se­crets you have learned; and I think your Un­cle Gilbert need not know any more than he does. It is just as well for all con­cerned that these things re­main to out­ward ap­pear­ances just as they have in the past.”

“All right, pa­pa.”

“We--Chester and you and I will know and un­der­stand and be hap­py. What else mat­ters?”

“What, in­deed.”

“Now, there's the cap­tain al­ready. He's ear­ly; but per­haps he in­tends driv­ing you about a bit first.”

That was just it. The morn­ing air was so in­vig­orat­ing, Cap­tain Brown ex­plained, that it was a pity not to feel it against one's face. He knew of a num­ber of very pret­ty drives, round-​about ways, to the sta­tion, and the fields were de­light­ful­ly green just then.

In a short time away they rat­tled down the grav­eled road, the fa­ther wav­ing af­ter them. It was a good thing, said Lucy, that strong hands had the reins, for the horse was full of life. They sped over the smooth, hedge-​bor­dered roads, wind­ing about fields and gar­dens un­til they ar­rived at Calder­stone Park. Here the cap­tain point­ed out the Calder Stones, ru­ins of an an­cient Druid place of wor­ship or sac­ri­fice. Then they drove leisure­ly through Sefton Park, thence town­ward to the sta­tion.

They had a few mo­ments to wait, dur­ing which the driv­er stroked the horse's nose, talk­ing to him all the while not to be afraid of the noisy cars. The whis­tle's shrill pipe sound­ed and the train rolled in. The cap­tain stood by his horse, while Lucy went to the plat­form, and met Chester as he leaped from the car.

“Oh, ho,” said the cap­tain to his horse, when he saw the meet­ing. A par­tial ex­pla­na­tion was giv­en him of the “cer­tain young man” whom they were to meet.

The cap­tain held the car­riage door open to them like a true coach­man. “Take the back seat, please,” he com­mand­ed, af­ter the in­tro­duc­tion; “in these ve­hi­cles, the driv­er sits in front.”

The cap­tain drove straight home, so in a very-​short time they were set down at the steps.

“Go right in,” he said. “I'll take the horse back, and be with you short­ly.”

The house­keep­er met them in the hall, took wraps and hats, and di­rect­ed them up­stairs where the “gen­tle­man” was wait­ing. Lucy had had no op­por­tu­ni­ty to tell Chester the se­cret about her­self, so she would have to let his fa­ther do so. They walked qui­et­ly to the fa­ther's room and opened the door soft­ly. He ap­peared to be sleep­ing in his chair, so they tip-​toed in­to an­oth­er room.

“Is he bet­ter?” asked Chester.

“Near­ly well again.” They did not seat them­selves, but stood by the ta­ble. She came close to him, smil­ing up in­to his face and said, “_Ev­ery­thing's_ all right, Chester.”

“Yes, of course,” he replied. “You are look­ing so rosy and well, I for­get you are an in­valid.”

“Don't think of it. I'm go­ing to live a long, long time, Chester--with you. Lis­ten, dear, and don't look so wor­ried. Things have changed again. I don't need to break good news gen­tly, so I may tell you now, pa­pa--I mean, your fa­ther, has been telling me some­thing I nev­er dreamed of--Chester, lis­ten. I'm not your fa­ther's child--on­ly by adop­tion--you're not my broth­er, on­ly of course in the broth­er­hood of the faith.”

“Lucy, what are you say­ing?”

“I am telling you the truth--as I was told it. He adopt­ed me as a ba­by--I was an or­phan--I am not your sis­ter. Chester--I--”

He seized her hands, and held her at arms length, while his eyes seemed to de­vour her. She could not re­press the tears, and when he saw them, he drew her close and kissed her.

“Lucy, not my sis­ter, but my sweet­heart again, my lit­tle wife to be--what--does it all mean?”

There came a loud knock at the door, and the fa­ther en­tered with­out be­ing bid­den. He walked firm­ly up to them, placed a hand on each shoul­der, and said:

“My son, I have to ask your for­give­ness again. I in­tend­ed to tell you about Lucy as soon as you learned the truth about your­self, but I was hin­dered. Don't think, my boy, that I would pur­pose­ly cause you suf­fer­ing. What Lucy has told you is true, and I am so glad that the mis­un­der­stand­ing and the mix­ups no longer ex­ist be­tween us.”

The three now found seats and talked over the new sit­ua­tion in which they found them­selves, not for­get­ting the part Un­cle Gilbert had tak­en in re­cent events, un­til the stren­uous voice of Cap­tain Brown had to sup­ple­ment the house­keep­er's bell, be­fore the three would come down for lun­cheon.

Those were gold­en days to Chester, Lucy, and the Rev. Thomas Strong. Out of rest­less un­cer­tain­ty, doubts, fears, and heart-​aching ex­pe­ri­ences they now had come to a pe­ri­od of peace­ful cer­tain­ty. Out of straits they had come to a qui­et sun-​kissed har­bor.

Cap­tain Brown looked on all this hap­pi­ness ap­prov­ing­ly. His shore leave was go­ing splen­did­ly. The neigh­bor's horse and car­riage were of­ten brought in­to req­ui­si­tion, and the fa­ther would not be de­nied his share of these drives. The cap­tain's own boat, long since un­used, was put in­to com­mis­sion, and with the cap­tain at the tiller the whole fam­ily sailed over the placid Mer­sy. The moon grew rounder, and as the evenings were warm, the boat of­ten lin­gered in the moon­light. Then songs were sung, Chester and Lucy singing some which the fa­ther rec­og­nized as “Mor­mon,” but which the cap­tain knew on­ly as beau­ti­ful and full of sweet spir­it.

Dur­ing those days when the vis­itors re­mained with the cap­tain rather more for his own sake than for any oth­er rea­son, there was just one lit­tle cloud in Chester's and Lucy's sun­light. That was that the fa­ther took no abid­ing in­ter­est in the re­li­gion which now meant so much to them. Once or twice the sub­ject had been care­ful­ly broached by Chester, but each time the fa­ther had not re­spond­ed. He made no ob­jec­tions. The young man some­times thought there would be more hope if he did. How­ev­er, he and Lucy were not dis­cour­aged. They rea­soned, with jus­tice, that it was no easy mat­ter to change a life-​long habit of be­lief and prac­tice. They com­fort­ed each oth­er by the hope that all would be well in the end. Had they not al­ready am­ple ev­idence of God's prov­idence shap­ing all things right.

It was plain­ly to be seen, how­ev­er, that the fa­ther took great com­fort in his new-​found son; and well any fa­ther might, for Chester was a strong, open-​spir­it­ed, clean young man. Fa­ther and son strolled out to­geth­er, Lucy some­times peep­ing at them from be­hind the cur­tain, but deny­ing her­self of their com­pa­ny. Chester, by his fa­ther's re­quest, told him more of his life's sto­ry. The fa­ther wished to live as much as could be by word-​telling the years he had missed in the life of his son; and the fa­ther, for his part, ac­quaint­ed Chester with his more re­cent years. “I mar­ried quite late in life,” said the fa­ther, “a sweet girl who did much for me. That we had no chil­dren was a great dis­ap­point­ment to both of us, and when we saw that very like­ly we nev­er would have any of our own, we found and adopt­ed Lucy. She would nev­er have known the truth about that had not you come and com­pelled me to tell it. But it's all right now, and the Lord has been kinder to me than I de­serve.”

“'God moves in a mys­te­ri­ous way, His won­ders to per­form,'”

quot­ed Chester.

“'He plants his foot­steps in the sea And rides up­on the storm,'”

mused the fa­ther.

At an­oth­er time the fa­ther said to Chester:

“My boy, it would please me if you would take my name. You need not dis­card the one you al­ready have, but add mine to it--yours by all that's right.”

“Yes, fa­ther.”

“I have no great for­tune, but I have saved a lit­tle; and when I am gone, it will be yours and Lucy's--I'll hear no ob­jec­tions to that--for can't you see, all that I can pos­si­bly do for you will on­ly in part pay for the wrong I have done. You say you have no def­inite plans for the fu­ture. Then you will come with us to Kansas City, where I ex­pect to take up again my labors in the min­istry, at least for a time.”

Lucy came up­on them at this point.

“Chester has promised to take my name,” ex­plained the fa­ther.

“That will make it un­nec­es­sary for you to change yours,” said Chester, as he put his arm around her.

A week passed as rapid­ly as such gold­en days do. Chester sent the lat­est news to El­der Mal­by. Un­cle Gilbert, al­ways im­pa­tient, wrote from Kil­dare Vil­la, ask­ing when they were “com­ing home.” Cap­tain Brown had made a num­ber of trips of in­spec­tion to the docks to see how the load­ing of his ship was pro­gress­ing.

At the cap­tain's in­vi­ta­tion they all vis­it­ed the ves­sel one af­ter­noon.

“Why,” ex­claimed Lucy in sur­prise, when she saw the steam­er at the dock, “you have a reg­ular ocean lin­er here. I thought freight boats were small con­cerns.”

“Small! well, now, you know bet­ter. Come aboard.”

He led the way on deck, and then be­low.

“This ship is some­what old,” ex­plained Cap­tain Brown, “but she is still staunch and sea­wor­thy. As you see, she has once been a pas­sen­ger boat, and in fact, she still car­ries pas­sen­gers--when we can find some who would rather spend twelve days in com­fort than be rushed across in six or sev­en by the lat­est grey­hounds. I say, when we can find such sen­si­ble peo­ple,” re­peat­ed the cap­tain, as he looked cu­ri­ous­ly at his guests.

The din­ing room was spa­cious, the berths of the large, roomy kind which the grasp for econ­omy and ca­pac­ity had not yet cut down.

“This is a nicer state room than I had com­ing over,” de­clared Lucy. “Why can't we re­turn with Cap­tain Brown?”

“I should be de­light­ed,” said the cap­tain. “The book­ing of­fices are on Wa­ter Street.”

“When do you sail?” asked the fa­ther.

“In three days, I be­lieve we shall be ready.”

“And your port?”

“New York.”

“Your car­go?”

“Mixed.”

“Any pas­sen­gers?”

“A dozen or so--plen­ty of room, you see. We'll make you com­fort­able, more so than on a crowd­ed lin­er. Think about it, Mr. Strong.”

“We shall,” said Lucy and her fa­ther in uni­son.