He looked down at his book. On its page a black insect crept. He lifted
it off with his finger. Then he leaned on his elbow, watching its
quivering antennae and strange movements, smiling.
"Even you," he whispered, "shall not die. Even you He loves. Even you He
will fold in His arms when He takes everything and makes it perfect and
happy."
When the thing had gone he smoothed the leaves of his Bible somewhat
caressingly. The leaves of that book had dropped blood for him once; they
had taken the brightness out of his childhood; from between them had sprung
the visions that had clung about him and made night horrible. Adder-like
thoughts had lifted their heads, had shot out forked tongues at him, asking
mockingly strange, trivial questions that he could not answer, miserable
child:
Why did the women in Mark see only one angel and the women in Luke two?
Could a story be told in opposite ways and both ways be true? Could it?
could it? Then again: Is there nothing always right, and nothing always
wrong? Could Jael the wife of Heber the Kenite "put her hand to the nail,
and her right hand to the workman's hammer?" and could the Spirit of the
Lord chant paeans over her, loud paeans, high paeans, set in the book of
the Lord, and no voice cry out it was a mean and dastardly sin to lie, and
kill the trusting in their sleep? Could the friend of God marry his own
sister, and be beloved, and the man who does it today goes to hell, to
hell? Was there nothing always right or always wrong?
Those leaves had dropped blood for him once: they had made his heart heavy
and cold; they had robbed his childhood of its gladness; now his fingers
moved over them caressingly.
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