But the words which meant much to him conveyed nothing to Frithiof. He listened, and wondered how a man of his own age could possibly get up and say such things. What was it he had found? How had he found it? If the speaker had shown the least sign of vanity his words would have been utterly powerless; but his quiet positiveness impressed people, and it was apparent to every one that he believed in a strength which was not his own. There followed much that seemed to Frithiof monotonous and undesirable; about thirty people on the platform, one after another, got up and spoke a few words, which invariably began with “I thank the Lord I was saved on such and such a night.” He wondered and wondered what the phrase meant to them, and revolved in his mind all the theological dogmas he had ever heard of. Suddenly he was startled to find that some one was addressing him, a hymn was being sung, and there was a good deal of movement in the hall; people went and came, and an elderly woman had stepped forward and taken a place beside him.
“Brother,” she said to him, “are you saved?”
“Madame,” he replied coldly, “I have not the slightest idea.”
“Oh, then,” she said, with a little gesture that reminded him of Miss Charlotte, “let me beg you to come at once to Christ.”
“Madame,” he said, still in his coldly polite voice, “you must really excuse me, but I do not know what you mean.”
She was so much surprised and puzzled by both words and manner that she hesitated what to reply; and Frithiof, who hated being questioned, took his hat from the bench, and bowing formally to her, left the hall. In the street he was joined by Miss Charlotte.
“Oh!” she exclaimed, “I am so sorry you said that. You will have made that poor woman so terribly unhappy.”
“It is all her own fault,” said Frithiof. “Why did she come meddling with my private affairs? If her belief was real she would have been able to explain it in a rational way, instead of using phrases which are just empty words.”
“You didn’t leave her time to explain. And as to her belief being real, do you think, if it were not real, that little, frail woman would have had courage to go twice to prison for speaking in the streets? Do you think she would have been able to convert the most abandoned thieves, and induce them to make restitution, paying in week by week what they could earn to replace what they had stolen?”
