PART 6 of 24 parts
Rachel was glad to escape and be by herself. She needed to be alone to carefully think through the plan taking form in her mind. So it was to her annoyance that before she had walked two blocks she became aware of Rollin Page walking beside her.
“Sorry to disturb your thought, Miss Winslow, but I happened to be going your way and had an idea you might not object. In fact, I’ve been walking beside you for a whole block and you haven’t objected.”
“I did not see you,” said Rachel.
“I wouldn’t mind that if you only thought of me once in a while,” said Rollin suddenly.
Rachel was surprised. She had known Rollin as a boy and there had been a time when they had used each other’s first names familiarly. Lately, however, something in Rachel’s manner had put an end to that. She was used to his direct attempts at compliment and was sometimes amused by them. Today she honestly wished him anywhere else.
“Do you ever think of me, Miss Winslow?” asked Rollin after a pause.
“Oh yes, quite often!” said Rachel with a smile.
“Are you thinking of me now?”
“Yes, that is—yes, I am.”
“What?”
“Do you want me to be absolutely truthful?”
“Of course.”
“Then I was thinking that I wished you were not here.”
Rollin bit his lip and looked gloomy.
“Now look here, Rachel. What makes you treat me so? You used to like me a little, you know.”
“Did I? Of course we used to get on very well as children. But we are older now.”
Rachel still spoke in the light, easy way she had used since her first awareness of his presence. She was still somewhat preoccupied with her thinking, which had been disturbed by Rollin’s appearance.
They walked along in silence a little way. The avenue was full of people. Among the persons passing was Jasper Chase. He saw Rachel and Rollin and nodded as they went by. Rollin was watching Rachel closely.
“I wish I were Jasper Chase; maybe I’d stand a chance then,” he said moodily.
Rachel reddened in spite of herself. She did not say anything, and quickened her pace a little. Rollin seemed determined to say something and Rachel seemed helpless to prevent him.
“You know well enough, Rachel, how I feel toward you. I could make you happy. I’ve loved you a good many years—“
“Why, how old to you think I am?” broke in Rachel with a nervous laugh.
“You know what I mean,” went on Rollin doggedly. “And you have no right to laugh at me just because I want you to marry me.”
“I’m not laughing at you. But it is useless for you to talk about it, Rollin,” said Rachel after a little hesitation. “The whole thing is just impossible.”
“Would—that is—do you think—if you gave me time I would—“
“No!” said Rachel. She spoke firmly. Perhaps, she thought afterwards, she had spoken harshly, although she had not meant to.
They walked on for some time without a word. They were nearing Rachel’s home and she was anxious to end the scene.
As they turned off the avenue into one of the quieter streets, Rollin spoke suddenly and with more vitality than he had yet shown. There was a dignity in his voice that was new to Rachel.
“Rachel, I ask you to be my wife. Will you consider this seriously?”
“No,” Rachel said decidedly.
“Will you tell me why?” He asked the question as if he had a right to a truthful answer.
“I do not love you, and I cannot.”
“Why?” That was another question and Rachel was a little surprised that he should ask it.
“Because—“ she hesitated for fear she might say too much in an attempt to speak the exact truth.
“Just tell me why. You can’t hurt me any more than you have already.”
“Well, I do not and cannot love you because you have no purpose in life. What do you ever do to make the world better? You spend your time in club life, in amusements, in travel, in luxury. What is there in such a life to attract a woman?”
“Not much, I guess,” said Rollin with a little laugh. “Still, I don’t know as I am any worse than the rest of the men around me. I’m not so bad as some. But I’m glad to know your reason.”
He suddenly stopped, took off his hat, bowed gravely and turned his back. Rachel went on home and hurried up the stairs to her room, disturbed in many ways by the whole experience.
When she had had time to think it all over, she found herself condemned by the very judgment she had passed on Rollin Page. What purpose had she in life? She had been abroad and studied music with one of the famous teachers in Europe. She had come home to Raymond and had been singing in the First Church choir now for a year. She was well-paid. Up to that Sunday two weeks ago she had been quite satisfied with herself and with her position. She had shared her mother’s ambition and anticipated growing triumphs in the musical world. What possible career was before her except the regular career of every singer?
She asked the question again and again and, in the light of her recent reply to Rollin, wondered if she had any very great purpose in life herself? What would Jesus do? There was a fortune in her voice. She knew it, not necessarily as a matter of personal pride or professional egotism, but simply as a fact. And she was obliged to acknowledge that until two weeks ago she had planned to use her voice to make money and win admiration and applause. Was that a higher purpose, after all, than Rollin Page lived for?
She sat in her room a long time and finally went downstairs resolved that before dinner, she would have a frank talk with her mother about the concert company’s offer and the new plan which was gradually shaping in her mind. She knew her mother expected her to enter into a career as a professional singer.
Mrs. Jennifer Winslow was a large, handsome woman, fond of entertaining, ambitious for distinction in society and devoted, according to her definition of success, to the success of her children. Her youngest boy, Lewis, two years younger than Rachel, was ready to graduate from a military academy in the summer. Meanwhile, she and Rachel lived at home together. Her husband had died several years before.
“Mother,” Rachel said, coming at once to the point, as much as she dreaded the interview, “I have decided not to go out with the concert company. I have a good reason for it.”
“You know the promise I made two weeks ago, Mother?”
“Mr. Maxwell’s promise?”
“No, mine. Remember what it was, Mother?”
“I suppose I do. Of course, all the church members mean to imitate Christ and follow Him as far as is consistent with our present-day surroundings. But what has that to do with your decision in the matter of the concert company?”
“It has everything to do with it. After asking, ‘What would Jesus do?’ and praying for wisdom, I have been obliged to say that I do not believe He would, in my case, make that use of my voice.”
“Why? Is there anything wrong about such a career?”
“No, I don’t know that I can say there is.”
“Do you presume to sit in judgment on other people who go out to sing in this way? Do you presume to say that they are dong what Christ would not do?”
“Mother, I wish you to understand me. I judge no one else. I condemn no other professional singers. I simply decide my own course. As I look at it, I have a conviction that Jesus would do something else.”
“What else?” Mrs. Winslow had not yet lost her temper. She did not understand the situation, nor Rachel in the midst of it, but she was anxious that her daughter’s course should be as distinguished as her natural gifts promised. And she felt confident that, when the present unusual religious excitement in the First Church had passed away, Rachel would go on with her professional life according to the wishes of the family.
“What else can I do? Something that will serve mankind where it most needs the service of song. Mother, I have made up my mind to use my voice in some way so as to satisfy my own soul that I am doing something better than pleasing fashionable audiences, or making money, or even gratifying my own love of singing. I am going to do something that will satisfy me when I ask, ‘What would Jesus do?’ I am not satisfied, and cannot be, when I think of myself as becoming a concert artist.”
Rachel spoke with a vigor and earnestness that surprised her mother, but Mrs. Winslow was angry now. And she never tried to conceal her feelings.
“It is simply absurd! Rachel, you are a fanatic. What can you do?”
“I shall continue to sing for the time being in the church. I am pledged to sing there through the spring. During the week I am going to sing at the White Cross meetings down in the Rectangle.”
“What! Rachel Winslow! Do you know what you are saying? Do you know what sort of people are down there?”
Rachel almost quailed before her mother. For a moment she was silent. Then she spoke firmly:
“I know very well. That is the reason I am going. Mr. and Mrs. Gray have been working there several weeks. I learned only this morning that they want singers from the churches to help them in their meetings. They use a tent. It is in a part of the city where Christian work is most needed. I shall offer them my help. Mother, don’t you see?” Rachel cried out with her first passionate utterance. “I want to do something worthwhile. What have we done all our lives for the suffering side of Raymond? How much have we denied ourselves or given of our personal ease and pleasure to bless the place we live or imitate the life of the Savior of the world? Are we always to go on doing as society selfishly dictates, moving on its narrow little round of pleasures and entertainments and never knowing the pain of things that cost?”
“Are you preaching to me?” asked Mrs. Winslow slowly.
“No, I am preaching to myself,” Rachel replied gently.
When she returned to her own room, she felt that, so far as her mother was concerned, she could expect no sympathy or understanding. She knelt. It is safe to say that within the two weeks since Henry Maxwell’s congregation had faced that shabby figure with the faded hat, more members of his parish had been driven to their knees in prayer than during all the previous years of his pastorate.
Rachel arose and her face was wet with tears. She sat thoughtfully a little while and then stood and walked over to her bedroom window. Later at dinner, she told her mother that she and Virginia were going down to the Rectangle that evening to see Mr. and Mrs. John Gray, the evangelists.
“Dr. West is going with us. The doctor is a friend of the Grays, and attended some of the meetings during the winter.”
Mrs. Winslow did not say anything. Her manner showed her complete disapproval.
The Rectangle was a barren dirt field used in the summer by circus companies and wandering showmen. It was shut in by rows of saloons, gambling halls and cheap boarding-houses and was bordered by railroad yards and packing houses. The slum and tenement districts of Raymond formed a wider congested area all about the Rectangle.
The First Church of Raymond had never really touched the Rectangle problem. It was too dirty, too sinful a place for close contact. There had been an attempt to cleanse this sore spot by sending down an occasional committee of singers, or Sunday school teachers, or gospel visitors from various churches. But the First Church of Raymond as an institution, had never done anything to make the Rectangle any less a stronghold of the devil as the years went by.
Into this heart of the sin of Raymond, a traveling evangelist and his brave little wife had pitched a good-sized tent and begun meetings. It was now the spring of the year and the evenings were beginning to be pleasant. The evangelists had asked for the help of Christian people and had received more than the usual amount of encouragement. But they felt a need of more and better music. During the meetings on the Sunday just past, the assistant at the organ had been taken ill. The volunteers from the city were few and the voices of ordinary quality.
“There will be a small meeting tonight, John,” said his wife, as they entered the tent a little after seven o’clock and began to arrange the chairs.
“Yes, I fear so.” Mr. Gray was a small, energetic man with a pleasant voice and the courage of a liontamer. He had already made friends in the neighborhood, and one of his converts, a heavy-faced man who had just come in, began to help in the arranging of the seats.
It was after eight o’clock when Alexander Powers opened the door of his office and started for home. He was going to take a streetcar at the corner of the Rectangle. But he was stopped by a voice coming from the tent, a voice he had heard many times before.
It was the voice of Rachel Winslow. It interrupted his mental groping over a problem that had sent him to his knees for an answer. He had not yet reached a conclusion. He was tortured with uncertainty. His whole previous course of action as a railroad man was the poorest preparation for anything sacrificial.
What was she singing? How did Rachel Winslow happen to be down here? Several nearby windows went up. Some men quarreling in a saloon stopped and listened. Other figures were walking in the direction of the Rectangle and the tent.
Rachel Winslow had never sung like that in the First Church. Again Alexander Powers, Superintendent of the Machine Shops, paused and listened.
Where He leads me I will follow
Where He leads me I will follow
Where He leads me I will follow
I’ll go with Him, with Him,
All the way.
The brutal, coarse, impure life around the Rectangle stirred itself as the song, as pure as the surroundings were vile, floated out into the night air. Someone stumbling hastily by Alexander Powers said in answer to a question:
“The Tent’s beginning to run over tonight. That’s what they call real music, eh?”
The superintendent turned toward the tent. Then he stopped. After a minute of indecision he went on to the corner and took the streetcar home. But before he was out of the sound of Rachel’s voice, he knew that he had settled for himself the question of what Jesus would do.
