New Name (18 page)

The superintendent turned a keen, scrutinizing glance on Murray.

“Well, that’s up to you, Mr. Murray, of course. Which do you prefer to teach? The young ladies or the kids? Of course I’ve no wish to bias you if the girls have gotten their request in before me, but I certainly shall be disappointed. It isn’t everybody who can teach these boys.”

Murray was going to say eagerly that he had never taught young ladies in his life, nor anybody else, till it suddenly occurred to him that he did not know what reports of his exploits in Sunday school teaching had reached Marlborough. He must proceed carefully. He caught his sentence between his teeth and whirled it around.

“With all due apology to the young ladies,” he said gracefully, turning a look on Jane that almost made her forgive him for what he was saying, “I think I’d fit better with the kids, if I’m to teach at all. You see—I’m”—he floundered for an explanation—“I’m just crazy about kids, you know!”

“Oh, Mr. Murray!” pouted Jane stormily.

The superintendent brightened.

“Well, I certainly am thankful,” he said. “I didn’t know what to do with those little devils! They spoiled the whole service last Sunday. They had little tin pickles from some canning factory, and they sent them whizzing all over the room. One hit an old lady’s eye and made no end of trouble. I’ll be grateful forever if you can see your way clear to taking them right on this afternoon.”

“Oh!” gasped Murray. “Really, I—you know—I—”

“Yes, I know what you’re going to say. You haven’t had any chance this week to study the lesson. They all say that the first time, but it doesn’t matter in the least. You can tell them a story, can’t you? You can at least keep them from raising a mob or stealing the minister’s hat. I’m about at the end of my rope, so far as they are concerned. Perhaps I’m not giving them a very high recommendation, but I heard of you before you came, that you were eager for a hard job, so here it is! Will you come over and get acquainted with them? Let the lesson take care of itself. Anyhow, they will teach it to you, if you ask questions. They are bright little chaps, if they are bad, and they’ve been well taught.”

It was a strange thing, perhaps the strangest of all the strangethings that had yet happened to Murray Van Rensselaer, that fifteen minutes later he found himself sitting in front of a class of well-dressed, squirming, whispering lads who eyed him with a challenge and were prepared to “beat him to it,” as they phrased it.

What he was going to say to them, how he was going to hold them through the half hour for which he was responsible for their actions, he did not know, but he certainly was not going to let seven kids beat him, and besides, had he not a reputation connected with his new name which he must keep up? He wasn’t going to be under suspicion because he could not bluff a good Sunday school teacher’s line. That suggestion about letting the boys do the teaching had been a good thing. He would try that out.

During an interval when a hymn was announced, he overheard two of the boys talking about the football scores in the last night’s papers, and as soon as the superintendent announced that the classes would turn to the lesson, he collected the attention of his young hopefuls with one amazing offhand question.

“You fellas ever see a big Army and Navy game?”

This, perhaps, was not the most approved method for opening a lesson in Acts, but it got them. The seven young imps altogether dropped the various schemes of torment which they had planned for this first Sunday with their new teacher and leaned forward eagerly.

“Naw! D’jou?”

A moment later and Murray was launched on a vivid and exciting description of the last Army and Navy football gamehe had seen, and for twenty brisk minutes he had the undivided attention of the most “difficult” class in the Sunday school.

“He’ll do,” whispered Marlowe to the minister as they stood together on the platform looking toward Murray, with his head and shoulders down and the knot of seven heads gathered around him. “We picked the right man all right. He’s got ‘em from the word go.”

The minister nodded with shining eyes.

“It looks that way. It certainly does,” he beamed, and the two good men turned to other problems, fully satisfied that the seven worst little devils were well started on the way to heaven, led by this wonderful young Christian, who had not yet stopped at anything he had been asked to do. They began to plan how much more they could get him to do in places where they desperately needed help.

The superintendent’s warning bell rang before Murray suddenly came out of that football game and realized that something had been said about a “lesson”—that, in fact, the lesson was supposed to have been the principal thing for which they were here as teacher and pupils. It would not do to ignore that utterly. Some of these young scamps would be sure to go home and tell, and his good name, of which he was beginning to be a little proud, would be damaged if he made no attempt at all to teach something sort of ethical. That was his idea of Sunday school teaching. “Boys, you must grow up to be good citizens,” or something of that sort. He supposed there was some kind of a code, or formula, for the thing, and he recalled that he was to ask the boys to tell him, so hestraightened back and began: “But we must get at our lesson, kids; the time is almost up.”

“Aw shucks!” spoke up the boldest child impudently. “We don’t want ‘ny lesson. We want you to tell us more about that game.”

“I’ve talked enough; now it’s your turn. What’s your lesson about? Who can tell me? I’m a stranger here, you know.”

“‘Bout Paul,” said another boy, whom they called “Skid” Jenkins.

“No, ‘twas Saul,” said “Gid” Porter.

“It was Saul first,” explained Jimmy Brower. “He got diffrunt after a while. Then he got a new name.”

“I see,” said Murray, fencing for time. What a strange lesson. Who was this Paul, he wondered. Not Paul Revere, of riding fame? He searched his scant knowledge of history in vain. Of Bible lore he knew not the slightest shred.

“Well, he was Paul the longest, anyhow,” insisted Skid. “Everybody calls him Paul. You don’t never hear him called Saul.”

“Tell me more about him,” said Murray. “What did he do?”

“Why, he was fierce!” said Jimmy earnestly. “He
killed
folks!”

The teacher sat up sharply and drew a deep breath.
He
had killed some one.

“Yes,” said Skid, “he went right into their houses and took ‘em to the magistrates and had ‘em whipped and sent to prison, and burned their houses and took their kids’n everything, an’ he was the one that held the men’s sweaters when they was stoning Stephen, ya know. Gee, I’d like to a been living then! It musta beengreat! When they didn’t like what anybody said, they just stoned ‘em dead! We had Stephen last Sunday. And Saul—I mean Paul—but he was Saul then when he held the clothes—he was to blame, ya know. He coulda stopped ‘em stoning Stephen ef he’d wanted. He was some kinda officer, ya know. But he didn’t, ‘cause he didn’t wantta. Ya know he thought he’s doin’ right? That’uz before he was born again.” He looked at his new teacher for approval and found a flattering attention. Murray’s face was white, and beads of perspiration were standing on his brow, but he summoned a wan smile of approbation and murmured faintly: “Yes? How was that?”

Jerry Pettingill raised a smudgy hand.

“Lemme tell. He’s talked long enough. It’s my turn.”

Murray turned his eyes nervously to this new boy, and he continued with the tale.

“He was on his way t’rest a lotta folks, an’ the lightnin’ struck him blind, an’ the soldiers he had with him didn’t see no one, just heard a voice, an’ they didn’t know whatta think, an’ Saul—no, Paul—”

“He
wasn’t
Paul yet—”

“Well, he was right away then, ‘cause when he heard God he got borned again.”

“What is ‘born again’?” came from the lips of the unwilling teacher, almost without his own consent. He had no idea that these children could explain, and yet he somehow had to ask that question. He wanted to see what they would say.

“It’s givin’ yerself up to God!” said Skid cheerfully.

“It’s quit doin’ whatcher doin’ an’ doin’ the other thing. Sayin’ yer sorry an’ all that. Only Saul, he said he didn’t know. He thought he was doin’ good,” said another boy.

“Ya can’t born yerself,” broke in young Gideon. “The teacher said so last Sunday. He said God had to do it. God borned Saul all over and made him a new heart inside him when he said he wouldn’t do them things anymore.”

“Aw, well, what’s that? I didn’t say ya could, did I?” broke in Skid. “Saul, he was blind when he got up, an’ he had to go on crutches to the city—”

“Aw, git out! Whatcher givin’ us? They don’t havta go on crutches when they’re blind, and God sent a man to pray about him, and then he said, ‘Brother Saul, receive thy sight,’ an’ after that he wasn’t blind anymore, an’ he was born again. He was a new man then, ya know, an’ he didn’t kill folks anymore, an’ he went and got to be a preacher.”

The superintendent’s bell brought the narrative to a sharp close, and the new teacher sat back white and exhausted, the strength gone out of him. Even the kids were talking about killing people. What a lesson! How did the little devils learn all about it, anyway? Why had he ever stayed in this awful place? Why had he ever taken this terrible class?

“Well, you certainly are a winner, Murray,” said the superintendent, slapping him admiringly on the shoulder. “You had ‘em from the word
go
! I never saw the like of you!”

Murray turned a tired face toward Marlowe.

“You didn’t need a teacher for this class, man! They can teach circles around any man you’d put on the job. I never saw the like! What you’d better do is give each one of those little devils a class to teach. Then you could all quit. I didn’t teach that class; they taught it themselves.”

The superintendent grinned at the minister, who was standing just behind Murray, and the minister grinned back knowingly.

“We’re glad this young man has come to live among us,” he said with a loving hand on Murray’s shoulder, and somehow Murray felt suddenly like laying his head down on the minister’s shoulder and crying. When he finally got away from them all, he went to his room and buried his face in the pillow and slept. He felt all worn out. He had never taken a nap in the daytime before in his life, but he certainly slept that afternoon.

It was quite dark when he woke up and heard Mrs. Summers calling him to come down to supper.

She had a little tea table drawn up in front of the fire in the living room, with a big easy chair for him and the Morris chair for herself. There were cups of hot bouillon with little squares of toast to eat with it and sandwiches with thin slivers of chicken on a crisp bit of lettuce. There were more sandwiches with nuts and raisins and cream cheese between, and cups of delicious cocoa, and there were little round white frosted cakes to finish off with. Murray thought it was the nicest meal he ever tasted, eaten that way before the fire, with the flickering firelight playing over Mrs. Summers’ pretty white hair and the soft light from the deep shaded lampover the little white-draped table. Cozy and homey. He found himself longing for something like this to have been in his past.

Mrs. Summers talked about the Sunday school lesson, discussed two or three questions that had been brought up in her class of young men concerning Paul’s conversion, and Murray was surprised to find that he actually could make intelligent replies on the subject.

But then it all had to be broken up by the entrance of someone coming for him to go to Christian Endeavor. This time it was a stranger, the vice president of the Christian Endeavor, come to ask him to talk a few minutes. He really must do something about this. He was getting in too deep, going beyond his depth. It might be all well enough to pretend to teach a class of kids something he knew nothing about, but make an address in a religious meeting he could not—at least not yet. He had to draw the line somewhere.

So he summoned all his graces and made a most eloquent excuse. He had not been very well lately, had been overworking before he came here, and his physician had warned him he must go a little slower. Added to that had been the nervous strain of the wreck. If they would kindly excuse him from doing any public speaking for a month or so, at least until he had had a chance to pick up a little and get himself in hand. He felt that it was owed to the bank that he put his whole strength there for the present, till he was in the running and felt acquainted with his work, and so on and so on.

The young vice president smiled and regretted this was so, but said of course he understood. They would not bother him until he was ready, though everybody was crazy to hear him—they had heard so much about him. Didn’t he even want to lead a prayer meeting? Well, of course. Yes, it was fair to the bank that he give all his strength there at present. Well, he would come over to the meeting anyway, wouldn’t he?

And with a wistful glance at the easy chair and the firelight on Mrs. Summers’ hair, he allowed himself to be dragged away with the understanding that he would meet his landlady in her pew for the evening church service. Gosh! Four church services, with a prospect of five for the next Sunday if they carried out their suggestion about the Ushers’ Association! Could you beat it? He would have to bolt before next Sunday! He must manage it after he got his week’s salary next Saturday. That would give him a little more money to start with. He would work his plans with that end in view. It certainly was too bad to leave when his disguise seemed to be working so perfectly, and seemed likely to be permanent, but he could not keep on this way. It might have been all right if he had anything to go on, but one could not jump into new surroundings like this and take on the knowledge that belonged to them. That was out of the question. It was all bosh about being born again. You could not do it. Maybe if you worked at it for years and studied hard you could. But it seemed like a hopeless undertaking.

That evening the sermon was on the Atonement. He recognized the word and sat up eagerly to discover what it meant.