August 1930
T h e
K i n g ’ s
B u s i n e s s
386
She had hardly reached the main entrance of the Hotel when Eleanor’s party came in, bearing with them on a shutter the princeling. They were almost a yearly oc currence—-these Alpine fatalities, they were all saying! There had been a dare, lightly given by the provocative Eleanor, and gaily taken up by the princeling. There had been a crevasse in the ice—even Eleanor’s poise vanished as she told it, and she shuddered from head to foot, and covered her face with her hands. Oh, yes! His arm was fractured, but it was his poor head! Had Constance seen his head? No? Well, better not! And they feared for his back, too. As Eleanor talked nervously on, it became in creasingly clear to the astonished Constance that it was the publicity that her cousin chiefly dreaded. Horrible! Head lines, probably! Mother absolutely furious—but she would go to Lucerne for the week-end! If they’d only had a chap»erone! In America it didn’t matter, but over here! And finally: “Wish I’d stayed with you, Connie!” In the meanwhile the princeling twisted and turned among his pillows. His arm was painful and his head hurt. “ It’s the little one with gray eyes, I wish to see. She calls me ‘Josef,’ because she likes him in the Bible.” “ Oh, mon prince! I am here; it is I who attend you.” It was an archducal plea, almost a groan, but it failed to quiet the poor princeling. “ It will be perhaps better—a Bible believer, that is good !” murmured the little Swiss doctor whose forebears had sat under Calvin in Geneva. Constance was still with Eleanor when they came for her. “ Don’t g o !” gasped Eleanor, clutching her arm. “ But Eleanor—you come with me!” “ I should say not! Let’s get away from here imme diately. We can pack tonight and leave for northern Italy in the morning. As soon as Mother comes in I ’ll persuade her. Don’t go, Connie!” “ It is heartless not to go, Eleanor.” “ If you don’t help me to keep out of this! . . . . . I ’ve been in the papers enough, speeding in Rhode Island last summer, and now—” “ But Eleanor, this poor boy may be dying, and he’s only nineteen and I am twenty. I must go—I must.” As Constance turned, her cousin said in a threatening tone, “ If you go, you’ll regret it.” “Now Lord !” whispered Constance, as she sped down the corridor and into the crowded hotel lobby. “Now, Lord, I’m relying on Thee.” Someone grasped her hand in true American style. “ O h ! At last I ’ve found you ! The page says it’s you, and you look like the picture Althea showed me, and— ” Connie found herself looking into a face that in some way reassured her. It was the very good, square-jawed, blue-eyed countenance of none other than Bill the Bril liant, now on his way to distant Abyssinia and his chosen mission field. “ Althea said I must not fail to see you, because you were in reality an outpost of the Thin Red Line. And she wants me to persuade you to come to her in California for a year. Here’s her letter . . . ” Constance felt very humble. Had she doubted, a lit tle? Perhaps! “ I thank God for sending you.” In a few words she told the story of her immediate need. “ You are right! You are here on the King’s business. He will never forsake you ; He’s promised! If you like, I ’ll go with you—a life-long friend of your cousin’s fam- '(Continued on page 387)
Christ and to acknowledge His Saviourhood. He had lis tened and refrained from argument, but he made one com ment that troubled Constance. “ I experience pleasure in hearing you. But as a re viewer in the London ‘ Times’ has said, of a play that sets forth the simple negro’s conception of God, I experience this'‘through the medium of a pious, childlike and ecstatic imagination.’ However, you cannot expect many enlight ened modems to follow along with you. We know too much—we feel that we know better! But I hope that you will never awaken from your dream.” This was too much! To hear anyone speak so patron izingly, and not to be able to answer as she should! Con stance longed for a deeper knowledge of the Bible. She knew, she was radiantly sure that her faith was founded upon a certainty. A deep inner security possessed her. But, oh, to make someone else know, to o ! “ You really do not care to go?” he was inquiring with the gentle courtesy Constance so liked. “ I really want and need a few hours to myself,” she answered with a smile. “ Please do not wait—er”— ought she to use his name and its “ handle” too? “ Call me Franz Josef— or just Franz, in your good American way.!’ He was gone and Constance looked ruefully after him. One did not receive much encouragement from the great world in reminding them of Christ, she reflected. And then some beloved words came to her: “ I f ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not o f the world, but I have chosen you out o f the world, therefore the world hateth you.” Out came the precious Testament, and there by the blue lake waters Constance read through the fifteenth and sixteenth chapters of John ending with the verse: “ These things have I spoken unto you that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.” “ Lord keep me true—true to Thee in all this distract ing, exciting world about me,” Constance prayed. She had felt alone when the glacier climbers left, and had longed a little for Armand, and the Personage, and her cousin Althea, but she was not alone now; Someone was with her, and she was glad she had had this quiet time alone with H im ; glad she had cared enough about it to turn aside from the continued companionship of people who did rtot know her Saviour and who tended to make her feel far from Him. Their conversation and many of their witticisms troubled her. A little flutter of joy shook her heart as the realization came upon her that she must, after all, really love this Christ whom she tried so humbly and honestly to serve. If she had not truly loved Him, she reasoned, she would not have desired this time alone with Him. “ It’s just like the bride wishing to be alone with the Bridegroom,” she said softly, as she watched the snowy bosom of the Jungfrau, and the eternal white of the Ber ner Alpen, turn golden, and then rosy, as if with a deep virginal blush before the westering sun. * H< * H« ^ H< The realization came to Constance, while she was dressing for dinner, that Eleanor and the rest were hours overdue. Where were they? What had happened? So she questioned herself, and hurried downstairs. “ I’d rather call you Josef.” “ You prefer Josef ? Why?” “ Because of Joseph in the Bible.” “ A ch !”
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