Allegories; Christian fiction; Clergy -- Fiction; Ozark Mountains -- Fiction
With the coming of the evening, the shepherd returned to his guest. Dr.
Coughlan heard first the bells on the leaders of the flock, and the
barking of the dog coming nearer and nearer through the woods. Soon the
sheep appeared trooping out of the twilight shadows into the clearing;
then came Brave followed by his master.
The countenance of the old scholar wore again that look of calm
strength and peace that had marked it before the coming of his friend.
“Have you had a good rest, David? Or has your day been long and
tiresome? I fear it was not kind of me to leave you alone in this
wilderness.”
The doctor told how he had passed the time, reading, sleeping and
roaming about the clearing and the nearby woods. “And you,” he said,
looking the other over with a professional eye, “you look like a new
man; a new man, Daniel. How do you do it? Some secret spring of youth
in the wilderness? Blast it all, wish you would show me. Fool Sarah and
the girls, fool them, sure.”
“David, have you forgotten the prescription you gave me when you
ordered me from the city? You took it you remember from one of our
favorite volumes.” The shepherd bared his head and repeated,
“If thou art worn and hard beset,
With sorrows, that thou wouldst forget;
If thou wouldst read a lesson, that will keep
Thy heart from fainting and thy soul from sleep,
Go to the woods and hills! No tears
Dim the sweet look that Nature wears.”
“David, I never understood until the past months why the Master so
often withdrew alone into the wilderness. There is not only food and
medicine for one’s body; there is also healing for the heart and
strength for the soul in nature. One gets very close to God, David, in
these temples of God’s own building.”
Dr. Coughlan studied his old friend curiously; “Change; remarkable
change in you! Remarkable! Never said a thing like that in all your
life before, never.”
The shepherd smiled, “It’s your prescription, Doctor,” he said.
They retired early that evening, for the physician declared that his
friend must need the rest. “Talk to-morrow,” he said; “all day; nothing
else to do.” He promptly enforced his decision by retiring to his own
bunk, leaving the shepherd to follow his example. But not until the
doctor was sure that his friend was sleeping soundly did he permit
himself to sink into unconsciousness.
It was just past midnight, when the shepherd was aroused by the doctor
striking a match to light the lamp. As he awoke, he heard Pete’s voice,
“Where is Dad? Pete wants Dad.”
Dr. Coughlan, thinking it some strange freak of the boy’s disordered
brain, and not wishing to break his friend’s much needed rest, was
trying in low tones to persuade the boy to wait until morning.
“What does Pete want?” asked the shepherd entering the room.
“Pete wants Dad; Dad and the other man. They must sure go with Pete
right quick.”
“Go where with Pete? Who told Pete to come for Dad?” asked Mr. Howitt.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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