He retreated into his thoughts for a moment. Then, “Guess I was hard on my boys,” he said. “Never sent them to church. They don’t know about praying either. Hard kind of life for all of us; in the early days I kept the boys home from school; just didn’t have the money to buy them shoes and clothing. Pete, what did you pray?”
He raised his eyes to me in the full light of the morning, and they brimmed with seeking. “You think maybe there’s a God, Pete? You think He maybe cares for me?”
“Yes,” I said, and I was surprised at the certainty in my voice. “He cares for all of us.”
He took off his wide-brimmed hat and shook his head. “How could He like a man like me, Pete? Sure, I had it hard, and I did hard things; I got into the habit of it. Money was something I didn’t see much of until I got that job when I was fifteen. Worked ten hours a day, six days a week. So when I bought the farm, and then the money began to come in, I wanted to hold on to it. Didn’t care how I got it. I guess I was scared. Pete, you say you know God cares for me, too?”
I nodded, unable to speak. He leaned against the harrow and studied me with that strange humility. “You do think there’s a God, Pete?” Again I nodded. Hesitatingly he held out his hand to me, and I shook it.
“Then why the devil did He send these damn weeds to kill us?”
“I don’t know. You’ll have to ask my dad. He seems to have the answer.” We laughed together, softly.
“Say,” he said, “I’m coming right over and talk with your dad. And, say, we got a good milch cow, and no children at home these days. I’ll bring the cow over, for your kids.” He scratched his chin. “What did you pray, Pete?”
“I told you, I don’t remember which prayer it was, Johnny. When I do I’ll tell you.”
But he was pointing at the weedless patch, and his hand was shaking. I looked where he was pointing. A faint and lovely green was spreading slowly over the vital earth; you could see the grass grow under your very eyes.
CHAPTER SIX
The minister of my parents’ church was a young man, Mr. Warfield Herricks. He was about thirty-two, a year or so older than I, the son of a prosperous farmer. He had the muscles and frame of a hard-working countryman, and the fresh face of a schoolboy. He had served his time as a chaplain in the Army, and those years had not obliterated the bright hope in his gray eyes. Nevertheless, as he sat now in our parlor, he was troubled.
“I am the last one in the world to deny the power of faith, the power of prayer,” he said slowly. “But Pete—well, Pete, you never seemed the kind of a fellow to have any religion; you never came to church—” He hesitated, helplessly. “I never saw you there with your parents.”
“I was wrong,” I answered, somewhat impatiently.
He became grave. He looked at my parents, at my brother, at Lucy and Jean, and then at Johnny Carr.
“Maybe I’m not very bright, Mr. Herricks,” Johnny said. “But even if Pete hasn’t been to church lately, what’s that got to do with him saying a prayer, and the prayer being answered? Look, I know a lot of folks who go to church regular, and I wouldn’t trust them with a barrel of lard. They could pray their heads off and—God—” he faltered and blushed—“wouldn’t hear a blasted word of it. Pete, here, prayed and he got answered, and I guess you’re kind of mad, in a way, that all your own prayers didn’t kill a single weed.”
“Don’t talk to the parson that way, Johnny,” said my father, and tried not to smile.
But Mr. Herricks said simply, “I deserved that, I suppose. Yes, I prayed for the end of the visitation; I had faith.” He smiled. “I’ve heard that even among the saints there is a kind of jealousy.”
“Did you have faith that we’d be able to get rid of the weeds and plant crops again?” asked Johnny Carr, staring at our minister.
“Of course, eventually.” The young man was obviously unhappy. “After all, it’s just a local thing.”
“It is?” said Johnny. “I’ve got friends all over the country; met ’em at stock shows. I raise prize bulls, and we keep writing to each other. Know what they’ve been writing lately? The weeds are all over. They heard from relatives in Canada, too, that there’s the weeds there. Keeping it all quiet, though God knows why.”
Then my father told the minister what he had seen in January. Mr. Herricks listened politely and tried not to show his incredulity. He was more unhappy than ever, though he made no remark. Then my father asked pointedly: “Have you read Matthew Twenty-four lately, Mr. Herricks?”
Mr. Herricks was what was known among our simpler neighbors as an educated minister. He had been graduated from one of the more famous divinity colleges in the country, and he was much concerned in his sermons with ethical and social problems. He was almost embarrassed at my father’s question, and before he could reply my father went on somberly: “It seems as though a lot of you younger parsons consider the Bible a fine collection of poetry and folk literature—a frame of reference, as they say. You talk politics in your pulpit; you give lectures, and not sermons. You discuss the education of children, the place of women in society, civil liberties, the merits of good citizenship and so on. Now, I’m not saying these aren’t important things, you understand. We do need good schools, and we do need women taking more interest in politics and community affairs, and minorities should have their just rights, and nobody should hate his neighbor because he’s black or brown or green or red or has another religion other than his own.”
He pointed his pipe at the minister. “Good things, all of them. But I say also that you should save them for the parish hall, or the Wednesday night parish meetings. That’s the time for lectures. I don’t want to hurt your feelings, my boy, but I’ve noticed that the only time you mention the name of God is when you pray and give the benediction. What do people go to church for, after five or six days of struggling to make a living and worrying about their families and being confused about the world? I can tell you this, they don’t go to hear a fine, polished lecture. They go for consolation; they go to be reconciled with God; they go to be assured that God loves them and is waiting to receive their love. They want to know that above the sound and fury of this infernal world there is an everlasting peace, a love that never fails, a mercy that is full of understanding. They want their souls refreshed, not their tired minds belabored.”
Mr. Herricks said nothing, but he looked at my father with pain in his eyes.
“Do you believe in miracles?” asked my father, bluntly. “In other words, do you think that God is still capable of performing them or do you think He’s sort of gotten over that childishness?”
Mr. Herricks still could not speak. My father spoke louder, moving in his chair indignantly. “I’ve heard you talk about the Sermon on the Mount as if it was just another Declaration of Independence. When you pray, you speak to God politely, and remind Him that we’d like to have a little peace on this earth. You mentioned once that the parables of Jesus are excellent examples of profound human psychology. That was the Sunday when you devoted your whole lecture to the ‘science of psychiatry,’ and what it can do for disturbed minds.” His voice became even louder and was touched with anger. “You mentioned God in passing, but there was a hell of a lot more of Freud in your lecture! Disturbed minds! You’re damned right we’ve got disturbed minds. And why? Because our parsons think it primitive to talk about an ever-present God in the affairs of men. It never occurs to them that a human soul is thirsting for the living God, and hungering to know He is there for the asking.” His voice softened and deepened. “They come to you in grief and bewilderment and pain and you quote textbooks at them, and deny them the bread of life.”
“George,” said my mother gently.
But Mr. Herricks lifted his head. “You are right. And I have been wrong, wickedly wrong.” His eyes were stricken and ashamed. “You asked me if I believed in miracles. A week ago I might have laughed and answered that the age of miracles has passed, and that a man’s strength stems from self-confidence and sel
f-esteem. That’s more psychiatry, I’m afraid.” He smiled miserably. “I might have told you about adjustment to environment. I might have referred casually to God, and reminded you that the law and order of nature were miracles enough for any man. But not now. I’ve seen with my own eyes that the law and order of nature can be upset in a moment. I’ve seen that God cannot be mocked.”
Edward very rarely spoke during one of my father’s more strenuous arguments with anyone. He was not timid; it was just that he had the faculty of listening and absorbing. He spoke now. “I think we’ve come to the end. I think that God is sick of us.”
“No,” said my father. “It’s true He is punishing us, but more than anything else I believe He is calling our attention to Him in the last hours of the world.” Then he looked at me. “But Pete prayed, and the weeds were driven back. We’ve seen that ourselves. We’ve seen, these past few days, the grass growing thick and tall, and we’ve cut it and the cattle have eaten it without fear. What the prayer was I don’t know; even Pete doesn’t know. But a miracle occurred.” He grinned at Johnny Carr. “And another one happened right along with it.”
The news of the miracle traveled fast in our area. There was not an hour when dozens of men did not come to stand in mute wonder about our ten-yard circle of flourishing grass, and touch it, and run it reverently through their fingers. They came from Arbourville and Canton and Hillsdale; they came from as far away as a hundred miles. Some of them knelt in the grass and prayed without embarrassment. They were gaunt and frightened men, but when they saw the grass, the green and lovely grass, they smiled at each other.
Photographers and reporters came, but local newspapers did not publish a word about it. We did not tell them about my prayer, for I could not remember it.
My father had questioned me, at first quietly and reasonably, and then with frantic insistence. “Look here, Pete,” he would say, “You’ve got to remember. Try to think, think!”
“I don’t remember,” I would answer despairingly. “I think I must have sat there for nearly an hour. There were a lot of prayers. I didn’t have much faith they would be answered. I think I insulted God a few times. And I don’t know when the weeds backed away. Perhaps it wasn’t a miracle, after all. I don’t know.”
“It was a miracle,” said my father. “There is still something a man can say to God that He wants to hear. And when He hears it, perhaps He will spare us—but He wants the whole world to say it.”
A month later a long black car with Government plates arrived at our house, wallowing and heaving through the weeds. My father and I went outside at the sound of voices. “Well, the news has finally got to Washington!” he said.
One of the men was our Senator, and he shook my father’s hand heartily and scrutinized him. “Well, George,” he said in his rich voice, “we’ve been hearing things about your farm.”
“And I suppose it’s got you all excited, Henry.”
“Well, now, our state is very important to me, George. We’ve heard about the trouble you’ve been having hereabouts with these damned weeds.”
My father laughed. “Just hereabouts—in this state? Henry, you wouldn’t try to fool me, would you?”
“What the devil do you mean, George?” The Senator’s florid face was bland, but there was fear in his eyes. “After all, I’m interested. This is my home.”
“Don’t get folksy, Henry. Save that for the next election, if there ever are any more elections. You know as well as I do that the weeds are all over the nation, and probably all over the world. Don’t grin at me, Henry, I’m not a fool.”
The Senator hastily introduced his five companions. Their names meant nothing to us, but I gathered that they were officials, and that one or two of them were botanists.
“Botanists?” My father raised his eyebrows. One of the men answered smoothly: “You’ve been having trouble with this—infestation. And we’ve heard that you’ve raised a patch of grass.” He cleared his throat. “We want to take samples, if you’ll allow us.”
“Do you think you can clear away the weeds from all over the country and plant this grass instead?” My father laughed sadly. He turned to me. “This is my son, Pete. He prayed early one morning and the weeds shrank back and the grass came.”
They eyed me doubtfully, as sane men eye a crank. “Well, now,” said the Senator, “we all believe in prayer, don’t we? Maybe Pete can give us a little demonstration. Just for the scientific records.”
“You can’t keep the truth from the country much longer, can you?” asked my father. “Scientific records! By God! And I mean that reverently; I’m not cursing. What explanation has science for what is happening?”
One of the botanists, an older man, answered him seriously: “Frankly, it hasn’t any. We refuse to admit that this isn’t just a local disturbance. So would you mind taking us to that patch of grass?”
“We’ll be very careful,” said the younger scientist. “We won’t trample on it. We need only an inch or two of it, with the earth attached.”
My father looked at them thoughtfully, and then, in the hot noonday sun, we went in silence to the mysterious and leaping grass. The visitors stood about it, gazing at it thirstily. They knelt down and put their hands in it, as men put their hands in cool water. One of the botanists took notes; the other carefully cut out a section and wrapped it in a piece of chemically treated paper.
“You’ve fed it to your cattle?” asked the older man. “And it hasn’t poisoned them?”
“They eat it as if they’re starved,” said my father. “I’ve been feeding them hay and corn, but when they smell the grass they almost go out of their minds. And there’s a funny thing about it; we can cut it every day, bushels of it, but it grows like mad overnight.”
Another of the men turned to me. “Could it be possible that your harrow’s gasoline fumes killed the weeds?”
“That’s a stupid question,” my father said angrily. “Probably millions of tractors all over the country have been trying to plow them under, and they come back as fast as they’re crushed and turned under the sod. Gasoline fumes!”
“Well, then,” said the Senator patiently, “what explanation do you have, George?”
“It’s so simple you wouldn’t believe it. Pete prayed. He doesn’t remember just what prayer did it, but all at once the weeds were gone and they’ve never come back.”
The Senator put his hand on my shoulder. “Pete, how about a demonstration? Start praying again, and we’ll watch. I understand that the weeds shrank away in the space of a few seconds.”
“Yes, pray, Pete,” said my father, ironically.
“I don’t remember,” I answered with weariness. “Don’t you think I’ve been trying?”
“One of these days Pete will remember. Perhaps the whole world will remember the prayer,” my father said. “Until then, this will go on until we all starve and die.”
The young scientist said impatiently: “There is no problem science cannot solve eventually. It’s just a matter of time. Would you let us examine the machine your son used? Perhaps there is a chemical ingredient in the gasoline that killed the weeds.”
They took samples of the gasoline and poured them carefully into little tubes. And then they went away, the weeds waving malignantly at the wheels of their car.
That night a new disaster struck.
Lucy, who had the only fiery temperament in the family—if one overlooked my powerful and dominant father—had hysterics suddenly, right after our meager dinner. It was rare, however, for even Lucy to lose control of herself in our disciplined household. I remember that she had just fed her younger boy his last spoonful of mashed potato and he had objected to it, and without much cause he had burst into tears. Lucy caught his little flailing arm impatiently, and when his sleeve fell back she saw a rash on his flesh. It looked, at first, like a scratch which was festering in tiny yellow dots along its length. She showed it anxiously to my mother, and when my mother tentatively touched the thing the b
oy squalled as if she had burned him. “He must have scratched himself some way,” she said. And then she looked attentively at his small, tear-wet face and felt his forehead. “He’s feverish,” she added with more concern.
“The weeds!” cried Lucy desperately.
“But the children are never out,” said Jean. “We watch them every moment.”
Lucy lifted the boy to her lap and literally tore the clothing from him. He had half a dozen other such rashes on his body. She turned very pale, and it was then that she began to weep and to scream, and her older boy burst into tears. My mother, in silence, examined the latter and mutely showed my father and the rest of us that he, too, had those strange rashes. “What is it? What’s wrong?” asked Edward, fumbling his way to his wife.
My father forced the children’s mouths open, and we saw that all over their tongues the tiny yellow dots of pus had broken out. “Tell me, what is it?” begged Edward, alarmed at Lucy’s cries.
“The children have some sort of skin eruption,” said my mother faintly. “I don’t know what it is. Perhaps it’s impetigo. We must call the doctor.”
Suddenly Jean sprang to her feet and raced from the room. We heard her rapid footsteps on the stairs like a tattoo. I started to follow her to our baby’s room, and then Lucy bent her head over her wailing children and wrung her hands, with a gesture of despairing violence. “Don’t be frightened,” my mother begged, trying to calm her. Perhaps it’s only an allergy of some sort. Children are always getting mysterious sicknesses. Perhaps the better milk we are having now because of the grass is too rich for them. George, please don’t stand there like a figure of doom and quote the Bible!” Her usually amiable voice took on a thin, high pitch. “I just can’t bear it if you do that. Call the doctor!”