After about twenty minutes he ceased. Then he read a short hymn, repeating each verse before they sang it, for there was no other hymn-book than his own. It was the simplest hymn, Hester thought, she had ever heard. He began the singing himself to a well-known tune, but when he heard the voice of Hester take it up, he left the leading to her, and taking himself to the bass, did his part there. When they heard her voice the people all turned to look, and some began to whisper, but presently resumed the hymn.

When it was ended, he prayed for two or three minutes, not more, and sent them away. Being near the door, Hester went out with the first ones, and walked home, filled with pleasure in the thought of such preaching. She did not yet know that Christopher taught them there every Sunday, and that this sermon, if such it could be called, was but one wave in the flow of a great river.

As she thought, Hester, like the true soul she was, turned to the questioning of herself—how much of her own self was awake? Had she been obedient only to that she had been taught, or obedient to the God himself? Of one thing she could be sure—that she had but the faintest knowledge of him whom to know is life eternal.

She was near the turning that led to the square when she heard a quick footstep behind her, and was presently overtaken by Mr. Christopher.

“I was so glad to see you come in!” he said. “It made me able to speak all the better, for I was then sure of some sympathy in the spiritual air. It is not easy to go on when you feel all the time a doubt whether anyone is hearing your words.”

“I do not see,” said Hester, “how anyone could misunderstand what you were saying.”

“Ah!” he returned, “the one incomprehensible thing is ignorance. To understand why another does not understand seems to me beyond the power of our humanity. I have been trying now for a good many months to teach these people, but I am not sure a single thought has passed from my mind to theirs. I sometimes wonder if I am just beating the air. But I must tell you how your singing comforted the poor woman at whose door you stopped this afternoon. I saw it in her face. She thought it was the angels. And it was one angel, for did not God send you? She died just a minute or two later.”

They walked some distance before either spoke again.

“I was surprised,” said Hester at length, “to find you taking the clergyman’s part as well as the doctor’s.”

“I hope I took no clergyman’s part,” returned Christopher. “I took but the part of a human being, bound to share with his fellows. What could make you think so? Did I preach like a clergyman?”

“Not very,” she answered.