“If your life were like Africa,” he began in an unsuggestive tone, “you would have a beaten track wherever you turned; no unmapped country in the world is better supplied with paths than this same Africa that your hedged-in life is like. Every village is connected with some other village by a path; you can follow ziz-zag paths from Zanzibar to the Atlantic; they are beaten as hard as adamant; they are made by centuries of native traffic.”
“I have learned something about Africa,” she answered, demurely, “if not about my life.”
“Oh, Africa, just now. I am not interested in my life at all.”
“Yes, as far as I am concerned. Not for you, dear old boy; it is splendid for you, and for Bensalem. Even Judith listens in church.”
“I know she does. I write my sermons for her.”
“For a girl? How do you expect to reach other people, then?” she inquired, surprised.
“The inspiration came to me, that Sunday she told me she was sorry for not listening, to begin all over again—to look at life from a fresh standpoint, from the standpoint of youth, ardent, hungry, sensation-loving youth—”
“Not in its usual acceptation; truth cannot but give you a sensation; I knew it would not hurt the old people and the middle-aged to begin again; to enter the Kingdom of Heaven as a little child, and I have attempted to teach the children in the Kingdom of Heaven; to talk simply about the grand old truths; to keep that girl before me as I thought out my sermons—a thoughtful girl who has had some experience in life, and when a thought or the expression of it was over her head, I struck it out.”
“Now I know your secret. ‘Simplicity and strength’ are your characteristics, David Prince, our literary blacksmith, who wrote Bensalem up for the Dunellen _News_, was pleased to say. Shall you keep this up?”
“Until I find a better way,” he said, contentedly.
“Even Miss Rody,” he said, smiling at the memory of Miss Rody’s face.
“And all the other old folks. Old folks and children. What about the young men and maidens?”
“Aren’t ‘simplicity and strength’ good enough for them?” he inquired, seriously.
“But I do not grow fast enough? Roger, I’ve stopped growing. I knew something was the matter with me, and that’s it.”
“I know that better than you can tell me. I wish Judith Grey Mackenzie—how Aunt Rody brings that out—would give _me_ an inspiration.”