Story of Chester Lawrence

CHAPTER V.

All Mon­day forenoon, Chester sat on deck read­ing a book which he had ob­tained from the ship's li­brary. It was a most in­ter­est­ing sto­ry, and yet the world of gray-​green wa­ter and chang­ing clouds drew his at­ten­tion from the print­ed page. He was be­gin­ning to re­al­ize what the fas­ci­na­tion for the sea was which took hold of men. It would have been dif­fi­cult for him to an­alyze or ex­plain this feel­ing, but it was there; and it seemed to him that he would have been con­tent to live out his life on that bound­less ocean which pre­sent­ed a sym­bol of eter­ni­ty con­tin­ual­ly be­fore his eyes.

“Good morn­ing.”

Chester start­ed, then turned. It was Lucy's fa­ther who found a chair and drew it up to Chester's.

“Is the book in­ter­est­ing?” in­quired the min­is­ter.

“Not so in­ter­est­ing as this won­der­ful sea and sky,” was the re­ply.

“You are right,” said the oth­er, fol­low­ing the young man's gaze out to the dis­tance. “Our uni­verse is now but wa­ter and air, and we are but specks float­ing be­tween the two lay­ers.”

“But we know that ocean and air are not all. We know there are plains and moun­tains, forests and grow­ing fields; so af­ter all our uni­verse must in­clude not on­ly all we can see with our eyes, but all that comes with­in view of our com­pre­hen­sion. Do you know,” re­sumed Chester af­ter a pause, “I have come to this con­clu­sion, that our uni­verse is lim­it­ed on­ly with­in the bounds of our faith. As we be­lieve, and strive to con­vert that be­lief in­to a liv­ing faith, so shall we know and re­al­ize.”

The preach­er looked keen­ly at the “Mor­mon,” as if he would see the foun­tain of these thoughts. Chester con­tin­ued:

“But you, as a min­is­ter of the gospel, un­der­stand all these things. How­ev­er, I like to think about them and ex­press them to those who will lis­ten”--and as the min­is­ter was lis­ten­ing, the young man went on:

“I rea­son it out this way: The Spir­it of God--that is, His pres­ence in in­flu­ence and knowl­edge and pow­er, as you so beau­ti­ful­ly put it yes­ter­day at the ser­vices, is ev­ery­where in the uni­verse. There is no place in heav­en or hell, or in the ut­ter­most bounds of space but God is there. As you al­so stat­ed, we may not ful­ly un­der­stand this in­fi­nite mag­nif­icence of God, but this has been done to help us: the Fa­ther has re­vealed Him­self to us through his Son. The Son we can com­pre­hend, for He was one of us. We learn from scrip­ture that this Son had all pow­er both in heav­en and earth giv­en him; that He was, in fact, 'heir of all things.' Now, when that fact is fixed in my mind, I con­nect this oth­er with it, that we, God's chil­dren al­so, are joint heirs with Christ; and in fact, if we con­tin­ue on in the way He trod, we shall be like Him. Now, then, what does this chain of ar­gu­ment lead us to? That we may fol­low in the foot­steps of God, and where He has gone, or shall go, we may go. Think of it--no, we can't. On­ly for an in­stant can our minds dwell up­on it, then we drop to the com­mon lev­el again, and here we are, a speck on the sur­face of the deep.”

“What is that book you are read­ing?” asked the min­is­ter. He had ev­ident­ly al­so dropped to the “com­mon lev­el;” or per­haps he had not soared with his com­pan­ion.

“This? O, this is Kipling's 'Plain Tales from the Hills.' I like Kipling, but I wish he hadn't writ­ten some very un­truth­ful things about my peo­ple.”

“Has he?”

“Yes. It seems he made a fly­ing vis­it through Salt Lake City, and took for gospel truth the lurid sto­ries hack drivers tell to tourists so that they may get their mon­ey's worth.”

“Well, I don't know;--but that brings me to the point of my er­rand. I sought you out es­pe­cial­ly to­day to ask you not to talk re­li­gion to my daugh­ter. I un­der­stand she and you had a dis­cus­sion on 'Mor­monism' last evening, and she slept very lit­tle all night as a re­sult.”

“You are mis­tak­en, sir; I said noth­ing to her about 'Mor­monism.' She told me a lit­tle about--”

“Well, what­ev­er it was, she was and is still ill over it. Let me tell you,--and I am sure you will be­lieve me,--my lit­tle girl is all I have. She has been ail­ing for years, heart trou­ble most­ly, with com­pli­ca­tions. A com­fort­able voy­age with no over-​ex­cite­ment might help, the doc­tors said; and that's the main rea­son for this trip. She has al­ways been in­ter­est­ed in re­li­gious ques­tions, which I nat­ural­ly en­cour­aged her in; but when she got mixed up some­what with the 'Mor­mons,' that was quite an­oth­er mat­ter.”

“Why, may I ask?”

“Well, it ex­cit­ed her. It brought her in con­tact with un­de­sir­able peo­ple, peo­ple not of her class and stand­ing--”

“Like me, for in­stance.”

“I did not say that.”

“You in­ferred it. But par­don me. I would not, for the world, do any­thing that would un­fa­vor­ably af­fect your daugh­ter.”

“I knew you would look at the mat­ter sen­si­bly. Per­haps it would be for the best if you did not meet her of­ten­er than pos­si­ble. I know it is dif­fi­cult on ship-​board, but for her sake you might try.”

“For her sake, why cer­tain­ly, I'll do any­thing--for I want to tell you, Mr. Strong, you have a good, sweet daugh­ter.”

“I'm glad you think so.”

“And I think a whole lot of her, I may just as well tell you. We have met but a few times, but some souls soon un­der­stand each oth­er.”

“What! You don't mean--!”

“That we have been mak­ing love to each oth­er,” laughed Chester. “O, no; not that I know; but there is such a thing as true affin­ity of souls, nev­er­the­less, the affin­ity which draws by the Spir­it of God. And so I say again plain­ly, that you may un­der­stand, I re­gard your daugh­ter high­ly.”

“Young man, I thank you for your open man­ner and speech, but I be­seech of you not to en­cour­age any deep­er feel­ing to­wards my daugh­ter. She can nev­er mar­ry. She lives, as it were, on the brink of the grave. Now, I have been plain al­so with you.”

“I ap­pre­ci­ate it, sir; be­lieve me; I am pro­found­ly sor­ry for her and for you; but, let me say this, see­ing we are speak­ing plain­ly, if I loved your daugh­ter, and we all knew she would die to­mor­row, or next month, that knowl­edge would make on­ly this dif­fer­ence, that my love would be­come all the holi­er. If she re­turned that love, we would be hap­py in know­ing that in the life be­yond we would go on and bring that love to a per­fect con­sum­ma­tion.”

The min­is­ter looked close­ly again at the young man. Then, giv­ing voice to his thoughts, asked: “Have you stud­ied for the min­istry? Are you now a 'Mor­mon' mis­sion­ary?”

“I am not an au­tho­rized 'Mor­mon' mis­sion­ary. My study­ing has been no more than is ex­pect­ed of ev­ery 'Mor­mon.' Ev­ery mem­ber of our Church is sup­posed to be able to give a rea­son for the hope that is with­in him,--and I think I can do that.”

“Do you live in Utah?”

“No, sir; my home is in Chica­go.”

“Chica­go!--well, I--are there 'Mor­mons' in Chica­go?”

“A few, as I sup­pose there are a few in Kansas City. I joined the 'Mor­mon' Church in Chica­go, but I was con­vert­ed in Utah.”

“You have been to Utah, then?”

“O, yes; I spent some time there and got very well ac­quaint­ed with the peo­ple; and they are a good peo­ple, I tell you, sir. I know--”

“Yes, well, Mr.----, Lucy did tell me your name, but I have for­got­ten it.”

“My name is Lawrence--Chester Lawrence.”

The min­is­ter had arisen as if about to go, but he now sat down again. Chester did not un­der­stand the strange twitch­ing of the min­is­ter's lips or the pal­lor of his face. What had he said or done to ag­itate the man so much?

“Chester Lawrence!” re­peat­ed Mr. Strong un­der his breath.

“You have nev­er met me be­fore, have you? Per­haps--”

“No; I have nev­er met you be­fore. No, no; of course not. There was just some­thing come over me. I'm not very well, and I sup­pose I--”

He stopped, as if he lacked words.

“May I get you any­thing, a drink of wa­ter?” sug­gest­ed Chester.

“No, no; it was noth­ing. Sit down again”--for Chester al­so had arisen--“and tell me some more about your­self. I am in­ter­est­ed.”

“Well, my life has been very un­event­ful, and yet in a way, I have lived. As a boy in Chica­go, I sup­pose, my young days passed as oth­ers; but it was when I went out west and met the 'Mor­mons' that things hap­pened to me.”

“Yes, yes.”

“I don't mean that I had any ad­ven­tures or nar­row es­capes in a phys­ical way. I lived in the moun­tains as a min­er for a time, but there are no wild an­imals or In­di­ans there now, so my ad­ven­tures were those of the spir­it, if I may use that ex­pres­sion,--and of the heart. Isn't that your daugh­ter com­ing this way?”

Sure enough, Lucy had found them, and came up to them beam­ing. Chester failed to see in her any symp­toms for the worse, as her fa­ther had in­di­cat­ed. In fact, there cer­tain­ly was a spring to her step which he had not seen be­fore.

“Well, I've found you at last, you run-​away pa­pa. Good morn­ing,” she nod­ded to Chester, who re­turned the greet­ing. “Don't you know, pa­pa, you have kept me wait­ing for half an hour or more to fin­ish our game.”

“I'll go right now with you,” said the fa­ther, ris­ing.

“Well, I don't care so much now, whether it's fin­ished or not. I be­lieve some­one else has it any­way.”

“Oh, we'll go and fin­ish the game,” per­sist­ed Mr. Strong.

“Per­haps Mr. Lawrence will come along,” sug­gest­ed the girl, as it seemed very prop­er to do.

“Not now, thank you,” replied Chester. “I must fin­ish my book be­fore the lunch gong sounds.”

The min­is­ter took his daugh­ter's arm and they went along the deck to where a group was laugh­ing mer­ri­ly over the de­feat and vic­to­ry in the games. Chester watched them min­gle with the com­pa­ny, then he opened his book again; but he did not com­plete his sto­ry at the time he had ap­point­ed.

To those who can pos­sess their souls in peace, life on ship-​board in pleas­ant weath­er is rest­ful, and may be thor­ough­ly en­joyed. A lit­tle world is here com­pact­ly put to­geth­er, and hu­man na­ture may be stud­ied at close range. From the el­egant apart­ments of the sa­loon to the ill-​smelling quar­ters of the steer­age, there is va­ri­ety enough. Rep­re­sen­ta­tives are here from near­ly “ev­ery na­tion un­der heav­en:” ev­ery creed, ev­ery col­or; ev­ery grade of in­tel­li­gence and world­ly po­si­tion, from the prince who oc­cu­pies ex­clu­sive­ly the finest suite of rooms, to the be­grimed half-​naked stok­er in the fur­nace room in the depths of the ves­sel; ev­ery oc­cu­pa­tion; ev­ery dis­po­si­tion. And yet, even in this com­pact city in a shell of steel, one may se­clude him­self from his fel­lows and com­mune sole­ly with his own thoughts or his books.

The three “Mor­mon” el­ders, ret­icent and qui­et, had made few ac­quain­tances. The Rev. Mr. Strong and his daugh­ter, not be­ing very well, had not been ac­tive in the so­cial pro­ceed­ings of the ship's com­pa­ny.

Chester Lawrence had formed an ac­quain­tance which seemed to him to fill all re­quire­ments, so that he cared not whether he learned to know any more of his fel­low trav­el­ers. And now fur­ther as­so­ci­ation with this pleas­ant ac­quain­tance must stop. Well, once again he said to him­self, he would be glad at sight of Liv­er­pool, and again some deeply hid­den voice protest­ed.

Chester tried to keep his word with Mr. Strong. He made no ef­forts to see Lucy or talk with her, and he even evad­ed her as much as pos­si­ble. This he could not whol­ly do with­out act­ing un­man­ner­ly. All were on deck dur­ing those beau­ti­ful days, and twice on Tues­day Lucy and Chester and the el­ders had played deck quoits, the fa­ther join­ing in one of them. Lucy beamed on Chester in her qui­et way un­til she not­ed the change in his con­duct to­wards her. The pained ex­pres­sion on the girl's face when she re­al­ized this change, went to Chester's heart and he could have cried out in ex­pla­na­tion.

That evening Lucy found Chester in a cor­ner of the li­brary pre­tend­ing to read. There was no es­cape for him as she ap­proached. What a sweet crea­ture she was, open-​heart­ed and un­afraid! His heart met her half way.

“What is the mat­ter with you, Broth­er Lawrence?” she asked.

“There is noth­ing the mat­ter with me.”

“Then what have _I_ done?” She seat­ed her­self, and Chester laid his book on the ta­ble. He would be plain and open with this girl. In the end noth­ing is gained by mys­tery and si­lence. He told her plain­ly what had tak­en place be­tween him­self and her fa­ther. She lis­tened qui­et­ly, the tears welling in her eyes as he pro­gressed. Then for a mo­ment she hid her face in her hands while she cried soft­ly.

“I shall not ask you to break your promise,” she said at last, “but I did so want to learn more of the gospel--the true re­stored gospel. It isn't true that a dis­cus­sion of these things af­fects me un­fa­vor­ably. I am nev­er so well as when I am hear­ing about and think­ing of them. Per­haps fa­ther thinks so, how­ev­er; I shall not mis­judge him.”

“So I shall keep my word,” said he, “and if I keep it strict­ly, I should not now pro­long my talk with you. But I have a way out of your trou­ble. You know El­der Mal­by. He is a wise man and knows the gospel much bet­ter than I. He will glad­ly talk to you.”

“Thank you. That's a good sug­ges­tion; but you--”

“I shall have to be con­tent to look from afar off, or per­chance to lis­ten in si­lence. Good night.”

And so it hap­pened that the very next morn­ing when the pas­sen­gers were look­ing ea­ger­ly to the near ap­proach to Queen­stown, Lucy and El­der Mal­by were seen sit­ting on deck in earnest con­ver­sa­tion. Chester prom­enad­ed at a dis­tance with some en­vy in his heart; but he kept away. For ful­ly an hour the girl and the el­der­ly mis­sion­ary talked. Then the min­is­ter, com­ing on deck saw them. He, no doubt, thought she was well out of harm's way in such com­pa­ny, for he did not know El­der Mal­by. When he caught sight of Chester he went up to him, took him by the arm and fell in­to his stride.

Their con­ver­sa­tion be­gan with the com­mon ship-​board top­ics. Then the min­is­ter asked his com­pan­ion more about him­self and his life. It seemed to Chester that he pur­pose­ly led up to his per­son­al af­fairs, and he won­dered why. There were some parts of his his­to­ry that he did not de­sire to talk about. What did this man wish to know?

“How long did you live in Utah?” asked the min­is­ter, af­ter re­ceiv­ing lit­tle in­for­ma­tion about Chester's birth and parent­age.

“Al­to­geth­er, about a year.”

“And you liked it out there?”

“Very much. The moun­tain air is fine; and that is tru­ly the land of op­por­tu­ni­ty.”

The two swung around the deck, keep­ing in step. Chester pressed his com­pan­ion's arm close. They reached in their or­bit the point near­est to Lucy and El­der Mal­by, then with­out stop­ping went on around.

“I knew a man once by the name of Lawrence,” said the min­is­ter. “I won­der if he could be re­lat­ed to you.”

Chester did not re­ply.

“I don't know whether or not he ev­er went to Utah.”

“My par­ents were not with me in Utah. I went alone, af­ter I was a grown man. My moth­er had lived there many years be­fore, but had left. She lived in Chica­go the lat­ter part of her life; but she made a trip to Utah when she was old and fee­ble,--and she died there. * * * * Her grave is there now.”

The min­is­ter now was silent. His lips twitched again. Chester once more won­dered why such things should af­fect him. The man's arm clung to Chester firm­ly as if he wished sup­port; and Chester's heart warmed to him. Was he not Lucy's fa­ther? Should he not know all he de­sired to know about the man who had ex­pressed deep re­gard for his daugh­ter?

“I think you are tired,” said Chester. “Let's sit here and rest.”

“Yes; all right.”

“The man Lawrence whom you knew was not my fa­ther,” con­tin­ued Chester. “That was my moth­er's maid­en name. I don't know--I nev­er knew my fa­ther; and shall I say, I have no wish to know a man who could treat my moth­er and his child the way he did. No; much as I have longed to know a fa­ther's love and care, I can­not but de­spise a man who be­comes a fa­ther, then shirks from the re­spon­si­bil­ity which fol­lows--who leaves the bur­den and the dis­grace which fol­low par­ent­hood out­side the mar­riage re­la­tion to the poor wom­an alone. Such base­ness, such cow­ardice, such de­spi­ca­ble lit­tle­ness of soul!--do you won­der why I don't want to know my fa­ther?”

Well, he had done it. Lucy's fa­ther knew the truth of his dis­hon­or­able be­gin­ning. This high­ly cul­tured Chris­tian min­is­ter was no doubt shocked in­to si­lence by his out­burst of con­fi­dence. But he must know al­so that this oc­curred among a Chris­tian com­mu­ni­ty, long be­fore ei­ther of the par­ties con­cerned knew of or were con­nect­ed with the “Mor­mons.” So Chester ex­plained this to the man at his side, who sat as if deaf to what was be­ing said. His gaze was fixed far out to sea. His lips did not now quiver, but the lines in his face were rigid.

Chester beck­oned to the daugh­ter, and when she came, he said:

“I think your fa­ther is not well. Per­haps he ought to go be­low and rest.”

“Fa­ther,” cried the some­what fright­ened girl, “what is it? Are you ill?”

The fa­ther shook him­self as if to be freed from some bind­ing pow­er, looked at Chester and then at Lucy, smiled faint­ly, and said:

“Oh, I'm all right now, but per­haps I ought to rest a bit. Will you go down with me, Lucy?”

The daugh­ter took his arm and was about to lead him away. He stopped and turned again to Chester.

“Ex­cuse me,” he said, “but what was your moth­er's full name?”

“An­na Lawrence.”

“Thank you. All right, Lucy. Let's be go­ing.”

Chester watched them dis­ap­pear down the com­pan­ion­way, then looked out to sea at the black smoke made by a steam­er crawl­ing along the hori­zon, from Liv­er­pool out­ward bound.