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Witness

<h2>CHAPTER XIV</h2> Suddenly, as Courtland stood in the narrow, dark street alone and in uncertainty, he was no longer alone. As clearly as if he felt a touch upon his sleeve he knew that One was there beside him, and that this errand he was upon had the sanction of that Presence which had met him once in the fiery way and promised to show him what to do. "God, show me where to find her!" he ejaculated, and then, as if one had said, "Come with me!" he turned as certainly as if a passer-by had directed him where he had seen her, and walked up the street. That is, they walked up the street. Always in thinking of that walk afterward he thought of it as "they walking up the street"—himself and the Presence. The first thing he remembered about it was that he had lost that sense of uncertainty and anxiety. How long the route was or where it was to end did not seem to matter. Every step of the way was companioned by One who knew what He was about. It came to him that he would like to go everywhere in such company; that no journey would be too far or arduous, no duty too unpleasant if all could be as this. He stepped into the telephone-office and began calling up hospitals. There were one or two that reported young women brought in, but the description was not at all like the girl of whom he was in search. He jotted them down in his note-book, however, with a feeling that they might be a last resort. As he turned the pages of the 'phone-book his eye caught the name of the city's morgue, and a sudden horror froze into his mind. What if something had happened to her and she had been taken there? What if she had ended the life which had looked so lonely and impossible to her? No, she would never do that, not with her faith in the Christ! And yet, if her vitality was low, and her heart was taxed with sorrow, she would perhaps scarcely be responsible for what she did. He rang up the morgue sharply and put tense, eager questions. Yes, a young woman had been brought in about an hour ago.... Yes, dressed in black—had long light hair and was slender. "Some looker!" the man who answered the 'phone said. Courtland shuddered and hung up. He felt that he must go to the morgue. When they entered the gruesome place of the unknown dead, although the Presence entered with him, yet he felt that it was there already, standing close among the dead; had been there when they came in! Courtland's face was white, and set as he passed between the silent dead laid out for identification. An inward shudder went through him as he was led to the spot where lay the latest comer, a slim young girl with long golden hair, sodden from the river where she had been found, her pretty face sharpened and coarsened by sin. He drew a deep breath of relief and turned away quickly from the sight of her poor drowned eyes, rejoicing that they had not been the eyes of Bonnie. It was terrible to think of Bonnie lying so, all drenched and her spirit put out. He was glad he might still think of her alive, and go on searching for her. But a dart of pain went through his heart as he looked again at this little wreck of womanhood, going out of a life that had dealt hardly with her; where she had reached for brightness and pleasure, and had found ashes and bitterness instead. Going into a beyond of darkness, hoping, perhaps, for no kindlier hands to greet her than those that had been withheld from her in this world! What would the resurrection mean to a poor little soul like that? What could it mean? Ah! Perhaps it had not all been her fault! Perhaps there were others who had helped push her down, smug in self-righteousness, to whom the resurrection would be more of a horror than to the pretty, ignorant child whose untaught feet had strayed into forbidden paths! Who knew? He was glad to look up and feel the Presence there! Who knew what might have passed between the soul and God? It was safe to leave that little sinful soul with Him who had died to save. It was good to go out from there knowing that the pretty, sinful girl, the hardened, grizzled sot, the poor old toothless crone, the little hunchback newsboy who lay in the same row, were guarded alike and beloved by the same Presence that would go with him. Around the little newsboy huddled a group of street gamins, counting out their few pennies, and talking excitedly of how they would buy him some flowers. There were tear-stains down their grimy cheeks and it was plain they were pitying him, they who had perhaps yet to tread the paths of sin and deprivation and sorrow for many long years. And the Presence there! So near them, with the pitying eyes! The young man knew the eyes were pitying! If the children could only see! He felt an impulse to turn back and tell them as he passed out into the street, yet how could he make them understand—he who understood so feebly and intermittently himself? He felt a great ache in himself to go out and shout to all the world to look up and see the Presence that was in their midst, and they saw Him not! He was entirely aware that his present mental state would have seemed to him little short of insanity twenty-four hours before; that it might pass again as it had done before; and a kind of mental frenzy seized him lest it would. He did not want to lose this assurance of One guiding through a world that was so full of sorrow as this one had recently revealed itself to him to be. And with the world-old anguished "Give me a sign!" the cry of the soul reaching out to the unknown, he spoke aloud once more: "God, if You are really there, let me find her!" And yet if any had asked him just then if he ever prayed he would have told them no. Prayer was to him a thing utterly apart from this cry of his soul, this longing for an understanding with God. He walked on through streets he did not know, passing men and women with worn and haggard faces, tattered garments, and discouraged mien; and always that cry came in his soul, "Oh, if they only knew!" There was the Presence by his side, and men passed by and saw Him not! He was walking in the general direction of the Good Samaritan Hospital, just as any one would walk with a friend through a strange place and accommodate his going to the man who was guiding him. All the way there seemed to be a sort of intercourse between himself and his Companion. His soul was putting forth great questions that he would some day take up in detail and go over little by little, as one will verify a problem that one has worked out. But now he was working it out, becoming satisfied in his soul that this was the only way to solve the great otherwise unanswerable problems of the universe. They had gone for perhaps three miles or more from the morgue, traveling for the most part through narrow streets crowded full of small dwelling-houses interspersed by cheap stores and saloons. The night lowered! the stars were not on duty. A cold wind from the river swept around corners, reminding him of the dripping yellow hair of the girl in the morgue. It cut like a knife through Courtland's heavy overcoat and made him wish he had brought his muffler. He stuffed his gloved hands into his pockets. Even in their fur linings they were stiff and cold. He thought of the girl's little light serge jacket and shivered visibly as they turned into another street where vacant lots on one side left a wide sweep for the wind and sent it tempesting along freighted with dust and stinging bits of sand. The clouds were heavy as with snow, only that it was too cold to snow. One fancied only biting steel could fall from clouds like that on a night so bitter. And any moment he might have turned back, gone a block to one side, and caught the trolley across to the university, where light and warmth and friends were waiting. And what was this one little lost girl to him? A stranger? No, she was no longer a stranger! She had become something infinitely precious to the whole universe. God cared, and that was enough! He could not be a friend of God unless he cared as God cared! He was demonstrating facts that he had never apprehended before. The lights were out in most of the houses that they passed, for it was growing late. There were not quite so many saloons. The streets loomed wide ahead, the line of houses dark on the left, and the stretch of vacant lots, with the river beyond on the right. Across the river a line of dark buildings with occasional blink of lights blended into the dark of the sky, and the wind merciless over all. On ahead a couple of blocks the light flung out on the pavement and marked another saloon. Bright doors swung back and forth. The intermittent throb of a piano and twang of a violin, making merry with the misery of the world; voices brokenly above it all came at intervals, loudly as the way drew nearer. The saloon doors swung again and four or five dark figures jostled noisily out and came haltingly down the street. They walked crazily, like ships without a rudder, veering from one side of the walk to the other, shouting and singing uncouth, ribald songs, hoarse laughter interspersed with scattered oaths. "O! Jesus Christ!" came distinctly through the quiet night. The young man felt a distinct pain for the Christ by his side, like the pressing of a thorn into the brow. He seemed to know the prick himself. For these were some of those for whom He died! It occurred to Courtland that he was seeing everything on this walk through the eyes of the Christ. He remembered Scrooge and his journey with the Ghost of Christmas Past in Dickens's Christmas Carol. It was like that. He was seeing the real soul of everybody! He was with the architect of the universe, noting where the work had gone wrong from the mighty plans. He suddenly knew that these creatures coming giddily toward him were planned to mighty things! The figures paused before one of the dark houses, pointed and laughed; went nearer to the steps and stooped. He could not hear what they were saying; the voices were hushed in ugly whispers, broken by harsh laughter. Only now and then he caught a syllable. "Wake up!" floated out into the silence once. And again, "No, you don't, my pretty little chicken!" Then a girl's scream pierced the night and something darted out from the darkness of the door-step, eluding the drunken men, but slipped and fell! Courtland broke into a noiseless run. The men had scrambled tipsily after the girl and clutched her. They lifted her unsteadily and surrounded her. She screamed again, and dashed this way and that blindly, but they met her every time and held her. Courtland knew, as by a flash, that he had been brought here for this crisis. It was as if he had heard the words spoken to him, "Now go!" He, lowering his head and crouching, came swiftly forward, watching carefully where he steered, and coming straight at two of the men with his powerful shoulders. It was an old trick of the football field and it bowled the two assailants on the right straight out into the gutter. The other three made a dash at him, but he side-stepped one and tripped him; a blow on the point of the chin sent another sprawling on the sidewalk; but the last one, who was perhaps the most sober of them all, showed fight and called to his comrades to come on and get this stranger who was trying to steal their girl. The language he used made Courtland's blood boil. He struck the fellow across his foul mouth, and then clenching with him, went down upon the sidewalk. His antagonist was a heavier man than he was, but the steady brain and the trained muscles had the better of it from the first, and in a moment more the drunken man was choking and limp. Courtland rose and looked about. The two fellows in the gutter were struggling to their feet with loud threats, and the fellow on the sidewalk was staggering toward him. They would be upon the girl again in a moment. He looked toward her, as she stood trembling a few feet away from him, too frightened to try to run, not daring to leave her protector. A street light fell directly upon her white face. It was Bonnie Brentwood! With a kick at the man on the ground who was trying to rise, and a lurch at the man on the sidewalk who was coming toward him that sent him spinning again, Courtland dived under the clutching hands of the two in the gutter who couldn't quite make it to get upon the curb again. Snatching up the girl like a baby, he fled up the street and around the first corner, and all that cursing, drunken, reeling five came howling after! <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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