Nogales international., 1929-11-29
Final Instalment

che Mississippi and into Calverly
AS they stepped down from their
car, both gasped and clutched.
The Reverend Doctor Steddon
was a few yards away from them,
studying the of-gstting passengers.
Lets see if he knows US" snick-
cred Mrs. Steddon, with relapse
20 girlishness.
"Let'sP" said Mem.
They knew him instantly, OF
course. He wore the same suit
they had left him in, and the only
change they could descry was a
little more white in little less
hair.
But he did not know them at all.
It amused them to pass him by and
note his casual glance at the smart
hat and the polite travelling suit of
his wife. He had expected change
in his daughter, but he was prob
ably braced for something loud and
saudy.
So her father passed her by.
When Mrs. Steddon turned and
hailed him in a voice that was
Rladder and more tender than she
knew, he whirled with his heart
bounding. and they heard his
hungry, feasting heart groaning.
II thank Thee, o God! Now let
test Thou Thy servant depart in
peace"
But neither the Lord nor his
family granted that prayer. His
wife had turned time far back.
Poor thingl She had never known
till this year the rapture of being
fashionable; had never dared, never
understood how, to look her best.
Hiding under his high chin, Mem
begged his forgiveness for all the
heartaches she had caused him.
She wept on his white bow tie,
twisting a button on his coat and
pouring out her regret for dragging
his wife away from him and caus-
ing them to quarrel over her. She
said that it was a crime for her to
have taken her mother on East and
left him alone, but he protested:
'D'you suppose wanted my
little girl travelling in those wicked
cities all by herself?"
This gladdened Mem exquisitely.
II showed that, for all her wanton
career, she was still in her fathers
eyes an innocent child who must
Be protected from the world OF
course. it was, rather, the world
that needed to be protected from
her. But she would not disturb his
sweet delusion.
The mayor had come down to
give Mem welcome, as soon as he
could push through the mob of
Steddon children that devoured
Mem and their mother.
The manager of the Calverly
Capitol, with its capacity of two
hundred, brushed the mayor aside
and claimed Mrs. Steddon and his
prize. He had car waiting for her,
and a room at the hotel in case the
parsonage was over-crowded.
Doctor Steddon grew Isaiah as he
stormed back:
my daughter stays in her own
home!'
This brought Mem smuggling to
his elbow.
AS their car moved off, with a
sudden stab she remembered FL
wood Farnaby and the far-off girl
that he had loved too madly we'll in
that moonlit embrasure. How little
and pitiful that Mem had been.
There was a toyish unimportance
in her very fall, the debacle of
marionette world. But Elwood
Farnaby was great by virtue of his
absence and his death. He was a
hero now with Romeo and Leander
and Abelard and the other geniuses
of passion whose shadows had
grown gigantically long in the
sunset of a tragic punishment for
their ardors.
A horrifying thought came to
Mem: if he had not died, she would
have become his wife and the
mother of his premature child. She
would have been a laughing-stock,
material for ugly whispers about
the village. And she would have
been the shabbicst of wives even
here. She would never have known
fame or ease or wealth.
After lunch she found DR.. Breth-
GIICk anu IldQ ilIIt uIlVC HCI 10 TIC
cemetery. And" she said, ~ want
to give you the installment / for
got, of the conscience money.
Please get it to papa as soon as
you can. And here's a little extra"
The doctor took the bills with
curious smile. She seemed to feel
his sardonic perpleA;ty as she
unused aloud along wel!-thought
path.
"If I hadn't been fallen woman
/ couldn't have saved Hapa's church
from ruin. How do vor explain it?
What's the right and wrong of it
aIl?"
The old doctor shook his head:
I'm no longer fool enough,
honey. to try to explain anything
that happens to rs here. Accord
ing to one line of thinking, your
missteI was the divine plan. Ac-
eording to another, good can never
come out of evil. OF course we
know it does. every day; and evil
out Of good. So let's be as human
rs we can. and i guess that's about
as divine as we'll ever get Down
Here"