First greetings over he announced Bauer just as Paul steps into the front room.
"Professor Felix Bauer, F. R. G. S., F. S. S. K. L. G. X. Y. Z. and others. Isn"t he great?"
Esther simply says, "Felix, welcome. I do not know how to say "professor.""
Bauer lifts her hands to his lips. Helen looks at him as if she were seeing some new vision at a distance. Felix Bauer smiles in the old way and says:
"Mrs. Douglas, I don"t care for these t.i.tles. I would gladly give a bushel of them for one kind word from Walter"s mother."
He looks at Helen as he speaks and Helen notes his clear, strong accent and the self-control and ease of a man who has met the world and looked it in the face without fear and without shame.
It is only when they are seated at the table that Helen has opportunity to note Bauer"s strong face and figure, and wonder at the transformation time and testing have made in him. He still speaks in the slow deliberate fashion of the other days, but he is a full grown man now, conscious of power and Helen has to readjust her picture of him as she last saw him.
As the talk goes on, Paul"s probing questions, aided by Walter and his mother, bring out the facts about Bauer which his own modesty would keep in the background.
Sent to Berlin to make special studies of new methods in lighting, he had made the startling discovery of the formula of the fire fly"s secret, and revolutionised the entire system of city lighting. He had been careless of wealth. Walter drops a hint of thousands given to pay off old family indebtedness, or charities aided, of new enterprises fostered until Bauer blushingly begs him to stop.
"Really, Mr. Douglas, I am no millionaire as Walter would make out. Only I have been permitted to help some this great tuberculosis movement that has been a great joy to me."
Helen catches the vision of consecrated wealth and looks at Bauer again.
Then later when they are seated in front of the old hearth and the lights have been turned on while a heavy snow falls outside, Bauer in his turn receives a surprise from her.
He has referred to the old days and recurred to the many kindnesses shown to him by Esther and Helen and the mission workers at Tolchaco. He is delighted to hear of the marriage of Clifford and Miss Gray, but in all the reminiscent talk he is evidently preoccupied and looks often at Helen as a hungry and thirsty man would eye the full table from which he may be debarred.
The clock strikes a late hour. He makes a feeble excuse to go and mutters something about not having observed the time.
"Die Uhr schlagt keinem Glucklichen?" Helen smilingly observes.
Bauer starts in surprise and leans over towards her.
"You speak German?" he asks with a strange look on his face.
"I have had plenty of time to learn it since you left us."
He looks up and sees that the other members of the family have in some way become much interested in Walter"s new plans of electrical dock openers which are spread out on the dining room table.
"You mean since I left you sitting on that log at Tolchaco?"
"Maybe that is what I mean," Helen says, and she is more agitated than she has for years thought she could be.
"Then you know what "Loben ist nicht Lieben" means now?"
"Yes, I know that and--
"The world has praised me much since that time, but it is an empty thing. I am a lonesome man, sitting alone with honour. "Loben ist nicht lieben?" Is it not so?"
The tears are in Helen"s eyes. This man will win her yet. Bauer mutters again.
"Was vonHerzen kommt, geht zu Herzen," and then forgetting that Helen understands he says as if talking to himself, ""What comes from the heart goes to the heart." May I come to-morrow or soon and--tell you what is in my heart?"
Helen smiles as she notes the old sign of distrust in himself that used to mark the old young Bauer she used to know. But she says with a new note of life in her own voice: "Yes, come to-morrow."
"There will be much for my heart to tell thine," he says dropping inevitably into the endearing p.r.o.noun.
And as he rises and goes away Helen follows his stalwart figure out of the doorway and then goes and sits down by the fire again.
Her mother finds her there.
"Mr. Bauer, Felix, is coming here to-morrow, mother. I know what he is coming to say."
Esther pauses. Helen answers her unspoken question.
"I am going to find my happiness, mother. It is the highest voice I have heard. I am not afraid to answer it."
So with all who have fought and prayed and yearned for the overcoming life in this story, may they all say, "I am not afraid to answer the call when it sounds to me, the sound of "The High Calling.""
THE END