experience.”
“No, Miss Madison, I’m not interested in your God. David Hoffmann believes only in David Hoffmann.” He scowled. Then his face softened, and for a moment he seemed to want desperately for her to understand. “You were raised in a family that believed in an omniscient, loving higher being. It’s easy for you to believe as your parents do. You Christians say something is an answer to prayer. I take the same circumstance and say it’s coincidence. Prove to me a prayer was answered in your neat little religious way. I’ll show you it was not.”
Gabriella was silent, contemplating his challenge. Why was this man she barely knew challenging her with such angry intensity? Finally she spoke. “M. Hoffmann, I cannot prove that prayers are answered or that God is above if you do not want to believe it. But that isn’t my business anyway. It is God’s. He’s the one who changes hearts. I dare you to ask Him to prove Himself to you.”
M. Hoffmann laughed loudly. “Miss Madison, you are rarely at a loss for words, are you?” He reached out and touched her hand.
She met his gaze and pulled her hand away. Ironically she could think of nothing more to say, and so again they sat in silence.
Presently he spoke, “‘I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.…’” He continued reciting. “‘The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.’ Aren’t you impressed, Miss Madison? I know that psalm and many others by heart. But you will wait a very long time if you hope to hear me claim it as my own prayer.”
Gabriella had been put on the defensive long enough. “I thought you asked me here to talk of my life in Senegal, not to criticize my religion,” she snapped.
“Forgive me, that was my original intention. It was thinking of the poor Huguenots that got me on another tangent. And now I’m afraid it’s time to go back. I wouldn’t want your landlady to disapprove.” For a moment he seemed genuinely disappointed. “But never mind. We’ll be seeing each other often. You’ll have plenty of time to tell me all about your life on the Dark Continent.” He got to his feet, then took Gabriella’s arm to help her up.
She brushed away his hand. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll stay here a little longer.” With a touch of sarcasm, she added, “And don’t worry about my getting home. I’m a big girl.”
He kept his composure. “As you wish. Good afternoon, Miss Madison.” He walked across the wide, open square and turned down an adjoining street toward the bus stop.
If he asks me to do something again, I’ll say no , she promised herself. But she knew it was a promise she wouldn’t keep. The heat of the sun began to fade and shadows spread out along the Comédie, but she did not move from her seat at the café until she was sure that David Hoffmann was a long way away.
Gabriella sat at the small wooden desk in her room, books spread out in front of her. In her mind she saw again David Hoffmann’s dark eyes taunting her and heard his voice reciting Psalm 121 with all the conviction of a true believer.
The man was so angry. Still, Gabriella was convinced that there was something more to him, behind his cynical eyes and proud exterior. Something worth discovering.
She imagined again the French Protestants being tortured and killed for their faith, and she pulled the cross out from under her blouse. Holding it gently in her hand, she traced its outline with her fingers. The points of four thick arrows turned inward toward the center, with a fleur-de-lis embedded within each corner of the cross. A small dove dangled below the bottom arrow. In Montpellier had lived the people who wore this cross. And wearing it, they had lived and died for their faith.
She opened her Bible and leafed through the pages until she found Psalm 121. In the margin Gabriella had scribbled the words This is Your promise to me, God