I had a call to Brookville."
"So did I," she murmured. "Yes; I think that was the reason--if there
must be a reason."
"There is always a reason for everything," he urged. "But you didn't
understand me. Do you know I couldn't say this to another soul in
Brookville; but I'm going to tell you: I wanted to live and work in a
big city, and I tried to find a church--"
"Yes; I know," she said, unexpectedly. "One can't always go where one
wishes to go, just at first. Things turn out that way, sometimes."
"They seemed to want me here in Brookville," he said, with some
bitterness. "It was a last resort, for me. I might have taken a
position in a school; but I couldn't bring myself to that. I'd
dreamed of preaching--to big audiences."
She smiled at him, with a gentle sidewise motion of the head.
"God lets us do things, if we want to hard enough," she told him
quite simply.
"Do you believe that?" he cried. "Perhaps you'll think it strange for
me to ask; but do you?"
A great wave of emotion seemed to pass over her quiet face. He saw it
alter strangely under his gaze. For an instant she stood
transfigured; smiling, without word or movement. Then the inward
light subsided. She was only an ordinary young woman, once more, upon
whom one might bestow an indulgent smile--so simple, even childlike
she was, in her unaffected modesty.
"I really must go in," she said apologetically, "and help them cut
the cake."
Chapter VIII
Jim Dodge had been hoeing potatoes all day.
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