Part 54

Clark nodded. "Perhaps."

"Put it this way; you deal with many kinds of men, but do you not always feel better disposed toward a simple soul, say like our friend Fisette, than toward some shrewd person who arms himself at every conceivable point?"

"Yes, I do."

"Well, that's what I feel about my people. Most of them are unarmed and they trust me, and anything I can do seems small in comparison to that trust. You've got a trust too, my friend."

Clark smiled. "That's what my directors lose no opportunity of telling me."

"But who or what is your Director?" asked the bishop, leaning forward earnestly. "You needn't be anxious, I'm not going to sermonize. Your Director is the same as mine, the great Force, call it what you will. It drove me into the church and drove you to what you are, and our first trust is to ourselves--you'll agree with me there--and with that undischarged nothing else can be carried out. Just at this moment I wish I were as competent for my job as you are for yours."

"But, bishop, you're--"

The big man raised his hand. "Not a word, for tonight I feel like Browning's Bishop Blougram who 'rolled him out a mind long crumpled, till creased consciousness lay smooth.' It does me good to rub out the wrinkles occasionally. Now tell me, looking back at the last few years in St. Marys, do you appreciate what you've done?"

"I haven't had much time to look back," said Clark thoughtfully. "The opportunity was there and I took it, then I was fortunate enough to enlist the necessary support. Since that time the district seems to have responded to every conceivable need, and we have been able to fall in step with a natural scheme for developing natural resources, that's all."

The bishop shook his head. "Not quite: it's a great drama you're enacting up there, with the rapids for a setting. They run through it all, don't they?--the changeless, elemental background before which man climbs up on the stage, makes his bow, enacts his part and gives place to some one else. You are sending out multitudes of influences that will never be determined or traced to their result. You once told me that it all began when you overheard a conversation in a train."

"Yes," Clark paused, then added with a laugh, "an example of the importance of small things. You've made your point, bishop."

"Thank you, but I've never been able to decide whether a thing is small or not. Some of the things that you and I prize very highly may actually be of small account."

For a while Clark did not answer. Ever since coming on board the Evangeline he had been conscious of a new atmosphere, tenanted by the spirit of her master, and of a new language which, though its tones were familiar, seemed to be the vehicle of a novel wisdom and understanding. He was impressed with the utter candor of his host, but chiefly with his superlative sympathy with all men. The visitor fell under the influence of a benign nature which, intensely human in all its attributes, proffered its solace to all alike. It was, he concluded, the life function of the bishop to give himself in royal abandonment.

He did not often put himself in the place of other men, but that night, after the Evangeline had slid into a moon spilt harbor amongst the hills, and the bishop explained that he had come here because poor people were apt to overtax themselves in entertaining, the visitor lay on the cock pit cushions and stared long at the starry sky. Nothing important was to be attached to this trip, and yet he felt it to be momentous. He knew he would always remember it, and that the memory would hereafter assert itself in unexpected moments. He admitted being influenced by the bishop and yet felt equipped for all that he had to do without any such influence. But there crept over him the slow conception that life might unexpectedly change, and that under hitherto unimagined conditions he might turn to these hours for the comfort of remembrance.

Three more days of missionary work and the Evangeline turned homeward, Clark took the wheel for an hour, with the bishop beside him.

"I hope," said the latter, "that the trip has been a success for you?"

The amateur pilot gave an involuntary start. The question pitched his mind forward to the works, and he realized that for five days he had forgotten all about them.

"It has been a very great pleasure to me," went on the prelate quietly. "I'm apt to have too much broadcloth and not enough gray tweed in my life. Most of us are in the same case, and one's love of one's work does not suffer by an interest in other things."

"My dear sir, I've benefited enormously. I'm a new man and ready for anything--even the worst." How little did he dream that at that very moment Lachesis was spinning her invisible web.

"Ah! that's what we must always be ready for--or the best, which is sometimes the same thing. Keep her to port a little."

The yacht rounded a long point and came in sight of the works, while Clark experienced a throb of thankfulness that his host had attempted no missionary work on him. He was as good as his word. There had been no proselytizing.

As the vessel reached the dock, they said good-by, each ready to do his job over again, and Clark, with his hand enveloped in the warm clasp, realized much of the secret of the prelate's life, which was no secret at all but just the benignity of a great and tender soul. He stepped over the yacht's side and glanced at his secretary who advanced to meet him with a telegram in his hand, noting that the young man's face was pale and his eyes unusually brilliant.

"This came an hour ago, sir."

With an impatient gesture he opened the folded sheet and read, his heart slowly contracting:

Regret unable to accept first cargo of rails being five thousand tons. These not up to your guarantee and our specifications. Full information this mail with the result of physical and chemical tests.

UNITED RAILWAY COMPANY.

Involuntarily he raised his head. The yacht was backing out, and the bishop, coiling a rope in her bows, straightened up to wave farewell. Automatically Clark waved back, then, with the telegram crumpled in his palm, turned and walked slowly toward his office. Something the bishop had said began to sing in his brain. Could the best and the worst ever be the same thing?

XX.--THE CAR OF PROGRESS HALTS