It was a “dead end street” with a deep ravine at the end of it. At the bottom of the steep forty-foot drop were double railroad tracks.
And down there by the tracks was Larry’s little red wagon, smashed and broken.
Where was Larry?
Dreadful fear ran swiftly through the neighborhood. With shaking hands a neighbor took down her telephone receiver and called her husband at work. “Oh, Henry—can you come home quickly? Little Larry next door can not be found anywhere, and his mother is so upset. Maybe you can find him. They found his wagon smashed to pieces near the tracks at the bottom of the ravine—and one shoe! And, oh Henry—they think—”
In a few moments Henry was home. Down by the tracks he studied the broken wagon and the little shoe. A short distance away he found Larry’s cap. Further on there was a mitten. But that was all. Where was four-year-old Larry?
After scanning the tracks once more for clues Henry climbed the steep bank and sat in his car a few moments, thinking.
“Hm-m-m,” he mused to himself. “If I were a four-year-old boy again, and living in this neighborhood, what would be the most fascinating, the most exciting place to me?” And a few seconds later, “I believe I know!”
Starting his car he drove to the coal yards four blocks away. A coal truck was being loaded by a big chain belt, and the air was filled with noise and coal dust. There in the center of it all sat Larry, watching the big belt with its load of coal making its continuous round. Now and then a lump would fall off, and Larry would carefully pick it up and put it back upon the belt.
“Hi, Unc’ Henry. Do I havta go?” he asked reluctantly.
As they drove quickly home to the anxious mother Henry explained how frightened everyone had been when they could not find Larry. “Don’t you know, Larry, that you can’t go where you want to without telling your mother? Even the police are out looking for you, Larry!”
Larry’s eyes grew big with serious thought. “Honest? I’m glad you found me first, Uncle Henry.”
As they neared Larry’s home Henry began honking his horn. Before the car was stopped, Larry’s mother in her lovely clean dress fairly flew to meet them with outstretched hungry arms. Without hesitation she caught the dirty little figure to herself, and pressed her clean cheek against his coal streaked face.
After work that evening Henry found a clean Larry in fresh clothes playing quietly in his own front yard.
“Hi, there, Larry boy!” he called. “Say, tell me, does it hurt to sit down? Did your mother spank you awfully hard?”
“Well, I’ll tell you, Unc’ Henry,” answered his small friend, “Mother didn’t spank me ‘t all! She took me in the house an’ gave me a bath. Then she put clean clothes on me. ‘N then she sat down and hugged an’ kissed me for an hour an’ a half!”
Henry smiled as he went into his own door. He was thinking of another boy—a prodigal boy, lost in sin in a far country. The mind, the heart, the soul of that boy became filthy with sin.
Then the boy came home. Did the Father punish him? He ran to meet him with hungry, outstretched arms of loving welcome, and kissed him!
Yes, and he knew the story well in his own heart, for had he not, too, been a boy lost in sin, who one day found that the Lord Jesus had died for him upon the cross of Calvary? How good it has been to be made clean through the precious blood by believing and receiving Christ as his own personal Savior. How lovingly the Heavenly Father had welcomed him!
Henry glanced at the lighted window next door. Thank God, there was joy in Larry’s home that night, instead of tragedy.
And thank God, there had been joy in the very presence of the angels when Henry had come home!