Page 14 of If Looks Could Kill
She whirled about so fast, I almost collided with her. “She asked for directions,” she said angrily. “I immediately offered herThe War Cry. But youinsistedI direct her to Spring Street.”
I threw up my hands. “It’s common courtesy! Anybody would—”
“We aren’t called to be like ‘anybody,’?” she said. “We have a ministry. A very specific job. Nobody is just another person to us. Everyone is a soul in need of rescue.”
I backed away from her. “You sound like a fanatic.”
“Maybe I am.”
I realized then that her eyes were red.
“I can see it now,” Pearl said, her voice thick. “She comes to the city fora job. She’s probably running away from home because she’s angry at her parents. For something trivial. She doesn’t look poor, but she spends her last penny of pocket money to get here. Classic runaway.”
Pearl paused and looked away until she could find words to continue.
“She shows up at her job,” she continued. “She’s been promised something—a singing role in an opera. Or a position as a maid.” She swallowed hard. “But that’s not what happens.”
A shudder passed through her. She couldn’t go on.
Tabitha Woodward, for shame,I thought.You’re more angry right now about being wrongly blamed than you are about the horrid fate of that poor girl.
“I’m sorry,” Pearl said dejectedly. “This wasn’t your fault. This was mine.”
I blinked in bewilderment. Did I miss something? An apology? FromPearl?
“How do you mean?”
She started walking. “You’re new,” she said. “I’ve been doing this longer. I know better.”
What’s worse: being blamed or being patronized?
“I feel awful about the girl,” I told her, “but I don’t see how this is either of our faults. I think you’re being too hard on yourself.”
She sighed. “What if,” she said, “instead of giving her directions, I had succeeded in getting her to hear our message? What if, instead of going to the Lion’s Den, she had come back to the base with us? What if, instead of feeling she needed to walk through that saloon door to survive—she was probably counting on the ‘room and board’ they’d no doubt promised—she’d had a meal with us at the base and given her life to the Lord?”
I didn’t know what to say to this. That was a lot of ifs.
“And what if, when she explained to us what brought her to the city, we realized quickly how she’d been duped and warned her against going?” Shesniffed. “To a known bordello, where a life, a short life, of entrapment”—she swallowed—“and horror awaits?”
Ah.
“And what if we could’ve helped her make it safely home, before her life was ruined?”
I willed myself to speak gently. “You can’t live life that way, Pearl,” I said. “Torturing yourself with what-ifs. We can’t see the future. None of us knows what’s about to happen.”
“Exactly,” Pearl cried. “No one knows how much life is left to them. We get only one chance to talk to any particular person. Most people will never give us that chance. So when someone comes up and willingly talks to us, we need to seize that chance.”
I didn’t know what to say.
“This isn’t just religion,” Pearl said quietly. “Salvation isn’t only about heaven. To besavedis to besafe. To keep people safe from the clutches of all that would destroy them.”
The hollow look. The rouged cheeks and lips. The dark black lines about the eyes.
The fresh-faced girl in pigtail braids.
“Nothing,” Pearl continued, “not even polite manners or… or social convention should stop us from sharing the message we’ve been sent to give. To everyone. No matter what.” She cast me a sidelong look. “We’re here on a rescue mission, and we can’t forget it. A soul is worth so much more than… us looking silly.”
I took a deep breath. “I’ll try to do better,” I said. “To remember what we’re here to do.”
