CHAPTER XVIII

GOD, MY EXCEEDING JOY

A heavy cloud hung over the house for days.  Mr. Gray was silent and sad.  All attempts to renew the conversation of that painful Thursday morning were waived aside.  Hubert was at a loss to know how to proceed with his project, but he and Winifred gave themselves to diligent prayer.  As to the latter, sharp as was her grief at the thought of parting with her brother, her love for God was stronger, and she did not hesitate for a moment in her consent that he should go.

“I do not know any other answer to give to God,” she said.  “Surely I have nothing too precious for Him, when He has given all to me.  And you know,” she said with a radiant smile, “Hubert and I can never lose each other!  We cannot lose what is in Christ!”

She made these remarks to Adele Forrester, to whom the matter of Hubert’s call to foreign service was communicated.  Her friend listened very quietly.

Adele had been steadily growing in God’s grace since the day when His way of salvation dawned so brightly upon her.  She was the same merry-hearted young woman as before, but a certain womanly sweetness, never really lacking beneath the gay exterior, developed in ever-increasing winsomeness.  A capacity for intense enjoyment found new sources for its filling in the knowledge of Jesus Christ, and she pursued faithfully and happily the ways she saw of serving Him.  To-day she received Winifred’s news with evident sympathy, but with a reserve of feeling not expressed.

“Our Bishop preached a splendid missionary sermon two weeks ago,” she remarked.  “He made things very plain indeed.  I think we all felt that we had been almost traitors in not rallying to the Lord’s standard better than we had done.  Even Dick paid some attention, for he said after church—­you know what a tease he is—­’now I hope you see where you ought to be!’”

“Oh, Adele,” said Winifred, “I haven’t thought to ask you in months how the choir is getting along.  The mention of Dick reminds me.  Do you still enjoy your singing?”

Adele laughed.  “My ‘occupation’s gone,’” she said.  “We are supplanted by a boy choir.  The present minister likes that better.  A saucy little fellow who brings our evening paper and fights his business competitors once in a while is one of our successors.  He looks quite cherubic in a surplice.”

“And you?”

“I sing praises in the congregation, and what is left over I sometimes offer in the mission.”

“So you still keep up your service at the mission?”

“Oh, yes!”

Adele did not add how much appreciated were those services, nor how she had added visitation amongst the families represented at the mission to the evident blessing of not a few.

Their conversation drifted back to the subject of Hubert’s leaving, and Adele entered a compact of prayer for the right development of all things relating to it.