When the races were done and hands had been clasped in congratulations, Otto turned to Eric and said, “You know, with training, you could be the world’s greatest at the 800.”
“Oh, no,” Eric said. “I don’t think so.”
“You should do it. Train and then enter the 800 meters in the next Olympic Games. They’re being held in Los Angeles in America.”
“America? Won’t that cost the Olympics in competitors?” Remembering how financially skinned he’d been during the 1924 Games, he added, “Most European athletes won’t be able to afford the trip.”
“Could be, but the Games are worldwide, you know, not just European.”
Eric nodded in agreement.
“So, you’ll do it?” Otto teased.
“No,” Eric answered, his head dipping shyly. “I’m much too old now.”
Otto laughed. “Oh, but I’m older than you,” he said, “and I’m entering!”
On November 25, 1929, Florence celebrated her eighteenth birthday.
Shortly after, she and Eric took another of the long walks they’d both come to look forward to, this one because Eric sensed a burgeoning anxiety growing in her.
“Talk to me,” he said.
“I’m not sure of what’s ahead,” she told him. “I have always wanted to go into nursing—that much I know—but the entrance to the school I want to attend in Canada is extremely competitive.” She sighed. “In only a few weeks I’ll have to take my exams, and I’m worried I won’t do so well.”
He took a deep breath and held it. He would pray for her, of course, but what if his prayer for her meant losing her? What if she went to Canada and never came back? With a sudden exhale, he said, “What I’ve really been hoping for quite some time is that you’ll come back here and marry me.”
Florence stopped and turned to him, her eyes wide. “What?” She blinked. “What did you say?”
Eric chuckled deep in his throat. “I’ve hoped—for quite some time—that you would marry me.”
Florence’s lips broke into a generous smile. “Are you sure?”
“I’m sure,” he said. “What about you?”
“I—I—gracious, Eric. I’ve nearly worshiped the ground you’ve walked upon but you are ten years older and I didn’t want anyone to think badly of you . . . because you shouldn’t have to endure that and—oh, Eric. I do love you . . . and if you’re sure . . .”
“Is that a yes?”
Florence nodded. “That’s a yes!”
For the first time, Eric gave his new bride-to-be a chaste kiss, then said, “We’ll have to keep this to ourselves. I must speak to your father first.”
“Of course,” she agreed. “Yes, of course.”
Eric contacted Jenny in Scotland, asking her to send an engagement ring via a missionary friend headed to Tientsin. As he waited for its arrival, he spoke with Mr. MacKenzie, who gave his blessing but insisted that Florence complete her training to be a nurse first.
Eric agreed.
When it arrived, Eric placed the five-diamond token of his love on Florence’s ring finger. Their engagement became official. They had a long, arduous wait before them, but at least they could openly declare their love for each other.
Florence, along with her sister Margaret, made arrangements to leave for Canada the following summer.
In March 1930, Eric asked the LMS for a two-year furlough to Scotland that would begin the same month Florence departed for school in Canada. His plan was to spend his time furthering his studies at the Scottish Congregational College. He would then return to China to teach at TACC and wait for Florence’s return.
In early April, A. P. Cullen and Eric Scarlett left Tientsin for Pei Tai Ho to make certain the LMS cottages were ready for the summer’s vacationing missionaries and their families. After arriving by train, they climbed on top of donkeys to ride the five miles from the station to the cottages. Cullen and Scarlett had barely gotten on their way when three men stepped out from behind bushes and demanded that the missionaries hand over their money.
Cullen, slightly ahead of Scarlett on the road and speaking in Chinese, demanded that they be allowed to pass.
The men pulled pistols from their waistbands and commanded that Cullen and Scarlett give them what they wanted.
“Now wait a minute,” Cullen said, hoping to reason with them.
One of the bandits fired his gun. A sudden thud behind Cullen caused him to turn. Scarlett lay on the ground, face up.
The three men panicked. One grabbed Cullen, pulled him from the donkey, and stripped him of his wallet and gold watch while the other two opened the suitcases Cullen and Scarlett had brought with them, riffling through them in search of valuables.
“Hurry, hurry!” one of the Chinese men called out. They turned to go, but not before firing another shot, this one barely missing Cullen.
As soon as he was able, Cullen hurried over to Scarlett. “Stay with me,” he urged as he ripped the shirt of his friend open to find blood pouring from a bullet wound just above the heart. Cullen felt for a pulse and attempted to apply pressure to the hole in Scarlett’s chest. The pulse was weak, but at least it was still there. “Stay with me, Scarlett.”
Cullen jerked his head up at the sound of footsteps. Townspeople, curious at the echoing of gunshots, now gathered around him. “Go get help!” Cullen called to some of the boys.
Again he felt for a pulse in search of a sign that Scarlett held on to life.
But there was none.
Two days later, Eric and his future father-in-law met the train carrying Scarlett’s body at the Tientsin station. On Saturday, Eric helped carry the casket from the funeral service held at Taku Road Church to the Canton Road Cemetery. There A. P. Cullen led the graveside service.
Five days later, Eric Liddell sat at his desk and wrote another letter to the LMS foreign secretary:
Since I last wrote you a good deal has happened so that my plans have had to be altered. The death of Mr. Scarlett means that
