May, 1942
THE K I N G ’ S BUS I NE SS
168
When Don Maxwell Was Aroused
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A True Story of Soul-Winning on a High School Campus
“Have you heard about Bud?” How ard gasped. “No. W-wfcat is it?” Don asked jerkily, a cold hand closing tightly on his heart. “Bud committed suicide last night,” Howard said abruptly. “He . . .” But Don heard no more. He felt his face go white and he staggered as under a physical blow. “Not Bud,” he tried to say, but his lips were stiff and cold and he could only cry from his heart, “No, Bud! You couldn’t do that. Bud—Bud. . Minutes later, Don found himself still standing there in the empty hall. Classes had begun, he knew, but he didn’t care that he was late. It didn’t seem important now. A heavy numb ness had taken possession of him. The poplar tree visible through the open door at the end of the hall seemed to beckon him, and he moved slowly for ward and stood on the steps again, his eyes on the spot under the tree where he and Bud had sprawled, re laxed, just two days ago. It seemed much longer. And it couldn’t be true that Bud was gone. But it was true, and Don grew older in that moment as he faced the fact that Bud was gone and that he had missed—forever—the opportunity the Lord had given him to make sure that Bud knew the way of salvation. It was too late, now. All his regrets could hot bring Bud back. There would be no other time. If ever a fellow had had an opportunity to speak to an other aboutJiis soul, that opportunity had been his. . “And I muffed it,” he whispered bitterly. He wished he could forget, but his mind, like a cruel tormentor, relent-
b e e n p a 1 s, through the ele mentary school, Junior High, and now, when the two boys were still t o g e t h • er in B-10, he never had felt this queer fore boding if Bud w e r e a b s e n t from s c h o o l . W h a t w a s wrong with him, anyway?
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The first bell already had sounded its shrill warning, but Don lingered a moment longer, still hoping to See Bud’s tall, familiar figure swing up the walk. He tried to throw off the sense of disaster that chilled him. Bud must be sick. Maybe that was what had been wrong with him on Tuesday. That would account for the queer way he had acted. Don straightened impatiently, de termined to forget the disturbing question Bud had asked that day, de termined, too, to put out of Ms mind his own sense of failure because his lips had been sealed. Why was it so hard for a Christian to talk about his Lord, he wondered. The next time he and Bud were alone, he’d make up for that failure. With this decision he turned and went inside. But halfway down the hall, a hand grasping his shoulder stopped him. He spun about to see Howard Grant staring at him, an ex pression of horror on his face. In stantly all of Don’s fear crystallized into a still certainty that something was wrong.
■ ^HE SOUND of laughter echoed through the wide h a l l s and I about the grounds of a Califor nia high school as the students, gath ering for another day at school, ex changed gay greetings. But there was no answering laughter^ in Don Max well’s heart. His usually clear, friend ly eyes were shadowed, now, with anxiety. From his vantage point at the top of the steps to the main building, he watched the hurrying students. The taut feeling in the pit of his stomach seemed to shut him far away from the gay crowd around him, and ati the same time it made him more aware of them. And the vague un easiness that had hung like a cold weight on his mind since Tuesday afternoon, deepened. Bud was not coming. Somehow, Don had known he would not, known it with a sickening certainty even as he wondered at himself for that knowl edge. In all the years that they had [Fictitious names have been^ substituted for the actual names of the students whose story is told on these pages. — E ditor .]
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