For a month Sam lingered in Caxton. It seemed to him there was something
that wanted doing there. He sat with the men at the back of Wildman's, and
walked aimlessly through the streets and out of the town along the country
roads, where men worked all day in the fields behind sweating horses,
ploughing the land. The thrill of spring was in the air, and in the
evening a song sparrow sang in the apple tree below his bedroom window.
Sam walked and loitered in silence, looking at the ground. In his mind was
the dread of people. The talk of the men in the store wearied him and when
he went alone into the country he found himself accompanied by the voices
of all of those he had come out of town to escape. On the street corner
the thin-lipped, brown-bearded minister stopped him and talked of the
future life as he had stopped and talked to a bare-legged newsboy.
"Your mother," he said, "has but gone before. It is for you to get into
the narrow path and follow her. God has sent this sorrow as a warning to
you. He wants you also to get into the way of life and in the end to join
her. Begin coming to our church. Join in the work of the Christ. Find
truth."
Sam, who had listened without hearing, shook his head and went on.
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