“It comes to this, then,” said Clark frankly, “you will bankrupt the paper in thirty days.  We might as well face that future fact.”

“I don’t think we shall.  Will you stay by the news until it is bankrupt?” asked Norman with a strange smile.

“Mr. Norman, I don’t understand you.  You are not the same man this week that I always knew before.”

“I don’t know myself either, Clark.  Something remarkable has caught me up and borne me on.  But I was never more convinced of final success and power for the paper.  You have not answered my question.  Will you stay with me?”

Chapter Five

Sunday morning dawned again on Raymond, and Henry Maxwell’s church was again crowded.  Before the service began Edward Norman attracted great attention.  He sat quietly in his usual place about three seats from the pulpit.  The Sunday morning issue of the news containing the statement of its discontinuance had been expressed in such remarkable language that every reader was struck by it.  No such series of distinct sensations had ever disturbed the usual business custom of Raymond.  The events connected with the news were not all.  People were eagerly talking about strange things done during the week by Alexander Powers at the railroad shops, and Milton Wright in his stores on the avenue.  The service progressed upon a distinct wave of excitement in the pews.  Henry Maxwell faced it all with a calmness which indicated a strength and purpose more than usual.  His prayers were very helpful.  His sermon was not so easy to describe.  How would a minister be apt to preach to his people if he came before them after an entire week of eager asking, “How would Jesus preach?  What would He probably say?” It is very certain that he did not preach as he had done two Sundays before.  Tuesday of the past week he had stood by the grave of the dead stranger and said the words, “Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” and still he was moved by the spirit of a deeper impulse than he could measure as he thought of his people and yearned for the Christ message when he should be in his pulpit again.

Now that Sunday had come and the people were there to hear, what would the Master tell them?  He agonized over his preparation for them, and yet he knew he had not been able to fit his message into his ideal of the Christ.  Nevertheless no one in the First Church could remember ever hearing such a sermon before.  There was in it rebuke for sin, especially hypocrisy, there was definite rebuke of the greed of wealth and the selfishness of fashion, two things that First Church never heard rebuked this way before, and there was a love of his people that gathered new force as the sermon went on.  When it was finished there were those who were saying in their hearts, “The Spirit moved that sermon.”  And they were right.