Burned Bridges

"Tell me," Thompson said abruptly, after a momentary silence, "how it

happens that the men who have been here before me left no trace of

any--any--well, anything? There have been other missionaries. They had

funds. They were stationed here. What did they do? I have been going to

ask your father. I daresay you can tell me yourself."

The girl laughed, whether at the question or at his earnestness he could

not say.

"They did nothing," she answered in an amused tone. "What could they do?

You haven't begun to realize yet what a difficult job you've tackled.

The others came here, stayed awhile, threw up their hands and went away.

Their idea of doing good seemed to consist of having a ready-made church

and a ready-made congregation, and to preach nice little, ready-made

religiosities on a Sunday. You can't preach anything to a people who

don't understand a word you say, and who are mostly too busy with more

pressing affairs to listen if they did understand. And you see for

yourself there's no church."

"But what did these fellows do?" he persisted. That had been puzzling

him.

"Nothing," she said scornfully "nothing but sit around and complain

about the loneliness and the coarse food and the discouraging outlook.

Then they'd finally go away--go back to where they came from, I

suppose."

"The last man," Thompson ventured doubtfully. "The factor at Pachugan

told me Mr. Carr assaulted him. That seems rather odd to me, after what

I've seen of your father. Was it so?"

"The last missionary wasn't what you'd call a good man, in any sense,"

Sophie answered frankly. "He was here most of one summer, and toward the

last he showed himself up pretty badly. He developed a nasty trick of

annoying little native girls. Dad thrashed him properly. Dad took it as

a sort of reflection on us. Even the Indians don't approve of that sort

of thing. He left in a hurry, after that."

Thompson felt his face burn.

"Things like that made a bad impression," he returned diffidently. "I

suppose in all walks of life there are wolves in sheep's clothing. I

hope it hasn't prejudiced you against churchmen in general."

"One single incident?" she smiled. "That wouldn't be very logical, would

it? No. We're not so intolerant. I don't suppose dad would actually have

gone the length of thrashing him, if the preacher hadn't taken a high

and mighty tone as a sort of bluff. That particular preacher happened to

be a local nuisance. I suppose in a settled, well-organized community,

public opinion and convention is a check on such men. They keep within

bounds because there's a heavy penalty if they don't. Up here where law

and conventions and so on practically don't exist, men of a certain

stamp aren't long in reverting to pure animalism. It's natural enough, I

dare say. Dad would be the last one to set himself up as a critic of any

one's personal morality. But it isn't very nice, especially for

preachers, who come here posing as the representatives of all that is

good and pure and holy."