Lucy Montgomery - Emily Climbs

Emily sat in the Murray pew, near the top of the church by the window that looked out into the grove of fir and maple that surrounded the little white church. This prayer-meeting was not the ordinary weekly sprinkling of a faithful few. It was a "special meeting," held in view of the approaching communion Sunday, and the speaker was not young, earnest Mr. Johnson, to whom Emily always liked to listen, in spite of her blunder at the Ladies' Aid Supper but an itinerant evangelist lent by Shrewsbury for one night. His fame brought out a churchful of people, but most of the audience declared afterwards that they would much rather have heard their own Mr. Johnson. Emily looked at him with her level, critical gaze, and decided that he was oily and unspiritual. She heard him through a prayer, and thought,

"Giving God good advice, and abusing the devil isn't praying."

She listened to his discourse for a few minutes and made up her mind that he was blatant and illogical and sensational, and then proceeded, coolly, to shut mind and ears to him and disappear into dreamland... something which she could generally do at will when anxious to escape from discordant realities.

Outside, moonlight was still sifting in a rain of silver through the firs and maples, though an ominous bank of cloud was making up in the north-west, and repeated rumblings of thunder came on the silent air of the hot summer night... a windless night for the most part, though occasionally a sudden breath that seemed more like a sigh than a breeze brushed through the trees, and set their shadows dancing in weird companies. There was something strange about the night in its mingling of placid, accustomed beauty with the omens of rising storm, that intrigued Emily, and she spent half the time of the evangelist's address in composing a mental description of it for her Jimmy-book. The rest of the time she studied such of the audience as were within her range of vision.

This was something that Emily never wearied of, in public assemblages, and the older she grew the more she liked it. It was fascinating to study those varied faces, and speculate on the histories written in mysterious hieroglyphics over them. They had all their inner, secret lives, those men and women, known to no one but themselves and God. Others could only guess at them, and Emily loved this game of guessing. At times it seemed veritably to her that it was more than guessing... that in some intense moments she could pass into their souls and read therein hidden motives and passions that were, perhaps, a mystery even to their possessors. It was never easy for Emily to resist the temptation to do this when the power came, although she never yielded to it without an uneasy feeling that she was committing trespass. It was quite a different thing from soaring on the wings of fancy into an ideal world of creation... quite different from the exquisite, unearthly beauty of "the flash;" neither of these gave her any moments of pause or doubt. But to slip on tiptoe through some momentarily unlatched door, as it were, and catch a glimpse of masked, unuttered, unutterable things in the hearts and souls of others, was something that always brought, along with its sense of power, a sense of the forbidden... a sense even of sacrilege. Yet Emily did not know if she would ever be able to resist the allure of it... she had always peered through the door and seen the things before she realized that she was doing it. They were nearly always terrible things. Secrets are generally terrible. Beauty is not often hidden... only ugliness and deformity.

"Elder Forsyth would have been a persecutor in old times," she thought. "He has the face of one. This very minute he is loving the preacher because he is describing hell, and Elder Forsyth thinks all his enemies will go there. Yes, that is why he is looking pleased. I think Mrs. Bowes flies off on a broomstick o' nights. She LOOKS it. Four hundred years ago she would have been a witch, and Elder Forsyth would have burned her at the stake. She hates everybody... it must be terrible to hate everybody... to have your soul full of hatred. I must try to describe such a person in my Jimmy-book. I wonder if hate has driven ALL love out of her soul, or if there is a little bit left in it for any one or any thing. If there is it might save her. That would be a good idea for a story. I must jot it down before I go to bed... I'll borrow a bit of paper from Ilse. No... here's a bit in my hymn-book. I'll write it now.

"I wonder what all these people would say if they were suddenly asked what they wanted most, and HAD to answer truthfully. I wonder how many of these husbands and wives would like a change? Chris Farrar and Mrs. Chris would... everybody knows that. I can't think why I feel so sure that James Beatty and HIS wife would, too. They SEEM to be quite contented with each other... but once I saw her look at him when she did not know anyone was watching... oh, it seemed to me I saw right into her soul, through her eyes, and she hated him... and feared him. She is sitting there now, beside him, little and thin and dowdy, and her face is grey and her hair is faded... but she, herself, is one red flame of rebellion. What SHE wants most is to be free from him... or just to STRIKE BACK ONCE. That would satisfy her.

"There's Dean... I wonder what brought him to prayer-meeting? His face is very solemn, but his eyes are mocking Mr. Sampson... what's that Mr. Sampson's saying?... oh, something about the wise virgins. I hate the wise virgins... I think they were horribly selfish. They MIGHT have given the poor foolish ones a little oil. I don't believe Jesus meant to praise them any more than He meant to praise the unjust steward... I think he was just trying to warn foolish people that they must not BE careless, and foolish, because if they were, prudent, selfish folks would never help them out. I wonder if it's very wicked to feel that I'd rather be outside with the foolish ones trying to help and comfort them, than inside feasting with the wise ones. It would be MORE INTERESTING, too.

"There's Mrs. Kent and Teddy. Oh, SHE wants something terribly... I don't know what it is but it's something she can never get, and the hunger for it goads her night and day. That is why she holds Teddy so closely... I know. But I don't know what it is that makes her so different from other women. I can never get a peep into HER soul... she shuts every one out... the door is never unlatched.

"What do I want most? It is to climb the Alpine Path to the very top,

"And write upon its shining scroll A woman's humble name.

"We're all hungry. We all want some bread of life... but Mr. Sampson can't give it to us. I wonder what HE wants most? His soul is so muggy I can't see into it. He has a lot of sordid wants... he doesn't want ANYTHING enough to dominate him. Mr. Johnson wants to help people and preach truth... he really does. And Aunt Janey wants most of all to see the whole heathen world Christianized. Her soul hasn't any dark wishes in it. I know what Mr. Carpenter wants... his one lost chance again. Katherine Morris wants her youth back... she hates us younger girls BECAUSE we are young. Old Malcolm Strang just wants to live... just one more year... always just one more year... just to live... just not to die. It must be horrible to have nothing to live for except just to escape dying. Yet he believes in heaven... he thinks he will go there. If he could see my flash just once he wouldn't hate the thought of dying so, poor old man. And Mary Strang wants to die... before something terrible she is afraid of tortures her to death. They say it's cancer. There's Mad Mr. Morrison up in the gallery... we all know what HE wants... to find his Annie. Tom Sibley wants the moon, I think... and knows he can never get it... that's why people say he's not all there. Amy Crabbe wants Max Terry to come back to her... nothing else matters to her.