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Title: A new graft on the family tree
Author: Pansy
Release date: September 4, 2023 [eBook #71567]
Language: English
Original publication: London: T. Nelson and Sons, 1902
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A NEW GRAFT ON THE FAMILY TREE ***
Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.
[Illustration: "Will you have a card, please?"]
A NEW GRAFT
ON THE FAMILY TREE.
BY
P A N S Y
[ISABELLA ALDEN]
AUTHOR OF "A HEDGE FENCE," "SIDE BY SIDE,"
"STRIVING TO HELP," ETC.
[ILLUSTRATION]
London:
T. NELSON AND SONS, PATERNOSTER ROW.
EDINBURGH; AND NEW YORK.
1902
Contents.
Chapter
I. WILL IT BLOOM, OR WITHER?
II. THE TREE
III. INTRODUCED
IV. FROM DAWN TO DAYLIGHT
V. BEDS AND BUTTON-HOLES
VI. A NEW SERVICE FOR THE SABBATH
VII. A NEW SABBATH CLASS
VIII. NEW LIGHT
IX. A NEW CHAMPION
X. FISHING
XI. GRACE SUFFICIENT
XII. DIFFERENT SHADES
XIII. BUDS OF PROMISE
XIV. DUST AND DOUBT
XV. OPPORTUNITIES
XVI. THE REASON OF THINGS
XVII. FIRST FRUITS
XVIII. BIRDS OF PROMISE
XIX. "WHATSOEVER"
XX. CLOUDS
XXI. HEDGED IN
XXII. CORDS UNSEEN
XXIII. "FORBID THEM NOT"
XXIV. STORM
XXV. UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER
XXVI. DORRIE'S AMBITION
XXVII. HEART-THROBS AND COMMONPLACES
XXVIII. "I DON'T KNOW"
XXIX. THE OLD AND THE NEW
A NEW GRAFT
ON THE FAMILY TREE.
CHAPTER I.
WILL IT BLOOM, OR WITHER?
"WHAT in the world are you ever going to do with all those tidies?"
The speaker was a girl of sixteen—a fair, bright creature, with dancing
eyes, and that alert expression which we find on the faces of those to
whom the future is an interesting and exciting puzzle which they long
to solve.
She was watching with curious interest the absorption of her sister,
who knelt before a half-packed trunk, studying the disposal of packages
so as to solve that old problem, "How to get twice as much into a trunk
as it will reasonably hold."
She made no answer to the young questioner, having just taken up a
closely written sheet of paper, the contents of which absorbed her
attention. The question was repeated.
"Louise, what do you expect to do with all those tidies?"
"Put them on chairs and sofas—" with a far-away expression and dreamy
tone, and eyes only for the paper before her.
The young girl laughed slightly, then her face grew sober.
"Louise," she said, hesitating as one who might be on doubtful ground,
"has Lewis told you anything about his home and its surroundings?"
"Somewhat, dear—" still only half attending to the speaker.
"Well, Addie Dunlop says they live very plainly indeed. She visits the
Wheelers, you know, in that vicinity, and she was at their house on two
different occasions. She says it is quite isolated from neighbours, and
is a regular country farmhouse."
This brought a laugh.
"What would you have a country farmhouse but a country farmhouse?"
"Oh well, Louise, you know what I mean."
If she did she kept the knowledge in silence; and her young sister,
after regarding her with a curious look for a moment, drew a heavy sigh.
"It doesn't seem to me that you belong to country farmhouses," she
said boldly, "with your education and talents. What will you do with
them buried among commonplace—hills?" She had nearly said people, but
checked herself. "Why should Lewis hide himself in that out-of-the-way
place?"
"Well, dear, you know it is a question of health with him. Nearly all
his plans in life had to be changed to meet the demands of a failing
body. Farm life agrees with him."
"I don't believe it will with you. I don't like to think of you away
off there, miles away from anything to which you are accustomed.
Louise, honestly, aren't you afraid you will be homesick?"
Thus solemnly questioned, Louise dropped her engrossing paper, and
turning from the trunk, gave the questioner the full benefit of her
laughing eyes.
"My dear little grandmother, have you gone and gotten your yourself
into a fever of anxiety over your young and giddy sister? I'm not a bit
afraid of a farmhouse. As for homesickness, of course I shall have that
disease. What sort of a heart would it be that could leave such a home
as mine without longing for it, and the dear faces that belong to it,
sometimes many times a day? But having looked at the matter fairly, it
seems to be the right thing to do. And, my troubled little sister, you
want to fully realize this. I am not going 'away off there' alone, but
with Lewis Morgan; and if I did not love him enough to be absolutely
certain that I could go to the ends of the earth with him as well as
not, if it should seem best to do so, I assuredly ought not to marry
him."
"And leave papa and mamma!"
It was impossible not to laugh at the startled, tragic tone in which
these words were spoken, as the elder sister repeated them—
"And leave papa and mamma! And also, which is a very important matter,
leave my dear little troubled sister Estelle. Positively, dear,
though it has its sad side, of course, it does not seem too much of a
sacrifice for me to make in order to be with Lewis. If it did, I should
think myself unworthy of him."
"How strange!" said the younger sister, though she was wise enough this
time to say it to herself. "I'm sure I don't see how she can do it.
Besides papa and mamma, there is our beautiful home, and all the girls,
and the lectures, and the circles, and—oh, well, everything. According
to Addie Dunlop she will just be buried alive, surrounded by snow in
winter and haying and harvesting in summer. What is there in Lewis
Morgan that should make her want to go? I wouldn't like to go anywhere
with him. He is nice enough; he is very nice indeed, for that matter.
I like him as well, if not better, than any of the young men who call
on us. But liking a man and enjoying a half-hour's talk with him, and
going to a lecture or concert with him, is one thing, and going away
from one's father and mother to spend a lifetime with him is another."
The conclusion of her soliloquy was that she said aloud, in tones more
dismayed than before—
"I don't understand it at all! I never could go away with Lewis Morgan,
and leave papa and mamma and everybody."
Whereupon the bride-elect leaned over her open trunk and laughed
immoderately. Her young sister's perplexity seemed so funny to her.
"Of course you couldn't, you dear child," she said, when she could
speak. "You are not expected to want to go away from papa and mamma
and live with Lewis Morgan, though I am sure I hope you will come and
live with us half the time. Farmhouses are very nice places in which to
spend summer, Estelle. But you mustn't wear a woe-begone face over me,
and think of me as making a sacrifice. If you ever give your heart to a
good, true man, you will be entirely willing to go away with him, and
until you are you must never think of taking marriage vows. Meantime,
dear, of course you don't understand it; you are much too young. I hope
it will be many a year before the thing will seem possible to you."
"It will never seem possible," Estelle said stoutly. "If I have got to
love any man enough to be willing to go away from papa and mamma before
I can be married, I shall have to be an old maid; for that is all
nonsense. I know no man on earth could tempt me to do it."
"Very well," said the bride in much composure, "I am glad you think
so; it is the best way to feel. To be sure, people change their minds
sometimes; but at your age it is much the nicest thing to think.
Meantime, dear, don't you worry about those tidies. I shall find places
for them, where they will set the nice old-fashioned rooms aglow with
their beauty. I am glad I have so many. Now, do you suppose that ebony
box would fit in this niche? I would like to have it here, because we
shall keep this trunk with us all the time."
"She hasn't the least idea how farmhouses look, especially that one. I
wonder if she has the slightest notion how her future brother-in-law
looks? Lewis Morgan indeed! I wish he had stayed in Australia!" And
with another long-drawn sigh the troubled young sister went in search
of the ebony box.
This was not the first time that Louise Barrows, the bride-elect, had
been called upon to vindicate the comforts of her future home. Her
father had demurred and hesitated, and argued the question with his
prospective son-in-law, and the mother had shed some tears in secret
over the thought that the daughter of whom she was so proud had chosen
so obscure and prosaic a future.
"Think of her getting-up at four o'clock in the morning to look after
the butter and milk, and get breakfast for the workmen!" she had said
to her husband in their confidential talks; and he had answered—
"There are worse lots in life than that, I suppose."
But he had sighed as heavily as the young daughter always did when she
thought about it, and he had wished from his inmost heart that things
had shaped differently. Still he essayed to comfort his wife.
"He is Louise's own choice, and he is a good Christian man, with
strong, solid principles. It might have been much worse."
"Oh yes," the mother assented, "he is a Christian man;" and the tone in
which she said it might almost have justified you in expecting her to
add: "But that doesn't amount to much." What she did say was: "But what
can Louise do for herself or others, buried alive out there? She is
eminently fitted for usefulness. You know as well as I that she would
grace any circle, and that she is a leader among her set; she leads in
the right direction, too, which is more than can be said of most girls:
but what chance will she have to develop her talents?"
"That is true," the father said, and then he sighed again. Yet these
Christian parents had prayed for their daughter every day since she
was born, and professed assured confidence in the belief that God
guides his children and answers prayer. Still their faith did not reach
high enough to get away from a lurking belief that the Guide of their
daughter's life had made a mistake in setting her future among such
surroundings. Not that they put the thought into such words—that would
have been irreverent; but what did their sighings and regrettings mean?
It was rather hard on the prospective bride, even though her parents
were wise enough to say almost nothing about their regrets, now that
the question was settled. But she felt it in the atmosphere. Besides,
she had to encounter a like anxiety from another source. It was only
the evening before Estelle's cross-questioning occurred that Lewis
Morgan himself, getting-up from one of the luxurious easy-chairs which,
repeated in varying patterns, abounded in Mr. Barrows' parlours,
crossed over to the mantel, and, resting his elbow on its edge and his
forehead on his hand, looked down from his fine height on Louise as she
nestled in a brown-tinted plush chair that harmonized perfectly with
her soft, rich dress, and contrasted perfectly with her delicate skin,
and made to the gazer a lovely picture, which seemed but to heighten
his perplexity.
"After all, Louise," he said, "I don't know but we made a mistake in
planning as we did. Someway, out in Australia, where my planning was
done, the contrast between your present home and our future one was not
so sharply defined before me as it is here."
"Shut your eyes, then," said Louise, "and imagine yourself back in
Australia, when you have any planning to do. That is quite as near as I
want you to get to that barbarous country again."
Lewis Morgan laughed, and then immediately his brow clouded.
"But, Louise, there is a fitness in things, and you fit right in here.
Everything matches with you." And his eyes gave a swift journey up
and down the room, taking in its soft and harmonizing furnishings—the
richness and glow of the carpet, the delicacy and grace of the lace
curtains, the air of ease and elegance in the disposal of the elegant
furniture, the rare paintings looking down on him from the walls,
glowing in the gas-light, then back to the small, graceful figure in
the brown chair.
"Louise, you are entirely unfamiliar, you know, with country life, and
I don't believe I can give you the least idea of the sharp and trying
contrasts."
"Then don't try. Wait, and let me see them for myself."
"Yes, but—what if we wait until it is too late to rectify mistakes?
Though, for that matter, we can change, of course, should the thing
prove unbearable. But I am really afraid it is a mistake. I seem to
feel it more to-night than ever before."
"Lewis," said the little brown figure, "do you really think I am a bird
of bright plumage, that must have a gilded cage and downy nest, and
nothing else?"
He looked down on her with unutterable admiration in his eyes.
"Oh, you know very well," he said, half smiling, "that I think you
are everything that any mortal woman can be—possibly a little more.
But—well, it is not only the house and surroundings, though they are
rude and plain enough. I am afraid that you and my mother will not
understand each other. She is old-fashioned and peculiar—she is a
good mother, and I love and respect her; but, Louise, she is not in
the least like yours, and I am not sure that she will have an idea in
common with you."
"Yes she will. We shall both bestow an undue amount of admiration on,
and take an absurd degree of comfort in, your tall self."
He laughed again, and then shook his head.
"I doubt whether even there you will not be disappointed. My mother has
a strong, warm love for her family; but she does not show it in the way
to which you have been accustomed. She is reserved, pent-up. She will
sit up with my little sister Nellie six nights in succession; but she
never caresses and kisses her as your mother does Lora."
"Never mind," said Louise; "it is not natural for some people to kiss
and caress. The sitting up is the most important matter after all,
especially when one is sick; though I will own that I am sorry for poor
Nellie, without the kisses. Perhaps we can work together: your mother
will do the patient caring for, and I will do the kissing. How will
that work?"
"I see you are bent on making everything shine with the brightness
of your own spirit. But, really and truly, I am afraid I have been
dreaming a wild dream in supposing that I could transplant you to
such a rough atmosphere. It was ridiculous in my father to put in
the proviso that we must live at home. I ought to have resisted it.
Because I must spend my days out of doors, travelling over a farm, is
no reason why we shouldn't have a home of our own. I think my father is
abundantly able to give me a separate start, if he only saw the matter
in that light."
"But since he doesn't, we must, like dutiful children, try to see it
in his light, until such time as we can win him over to our notions or
become full converts to his. I know all about it, Lewis. I don't expect
to walk in a garden of roses all the time. I know, too, that to go into
farm life is a trial to you. All your plans were in another channel.
Yet I am more than glad to give up all those rose-coloured plans for
the sake of seeing you look at this moment as strong and well es your
summer on a farm has made you. I fully intend to be happy on that farm.
I shall have to make a confession to you. Papa talked seriously to me
about trying to rent a farm and stock it for us, and do you know I
controverted it?"
"I should think so," said Lewis Morgan hastily. "He ought not to spare
the money from his business. And, besides, it would be unjust as he is
situated."
"Well, I didn't enter into that part of it. I simply said that I
thought duty to your father obliged you to yield to his very decided
wishes in this matter, and that you and I were both resolved on a
thorough trial of it. And, really, I don't apprehend any dreadful
consequences. I want to try the experiment of living with my
mother-in-law and having a thoroughly good time in doing it. And,
Lewis, there is one subject on which we surely can agree. You forget
the most important one of all."
He shook his head, and his voice was low and sad.
"No, I don't, Louise. You are mistaken: not one of the family, save
myself, is a Christian."
The first shadow that he had seen on his bride's face, when this
subject was being discussed, flitted across it now. At last he had
startled her.
CHAPTER II.
THE TREE.
"APPEALING to your Father in heaven to witness your sincerity, you,
Lewis, do now take this woman whose hand you hold, choosing her alone
from all the world, to be your lawfully wedded wife? You trust her as
your best earthly friend; you promise to love, cherish, and protect
her; to be considerate of her happiness in your plans of life; to
cultivate for her sake all manly virtues, and in all things to seek her
welfare as you seek your own? You pledge yourself thus honourably to be
her husband in good faith, so long as God in his providence shall spare
you to each other?"
"In like manner, looking to your heavenly Father for his blessing,
you, Louise, do now receive this man, whose hand you hold, to be your
lawfully wedded husband? You choose him from all the world, as he has
chosen you; you pledge your trust to him as your best earthly friend;
you promise to love, to comfort, and to honour him; to cultivate for
his sake all womanly graces; to guard his reputation and to assist him
in his life-work, and in all things to esteem his happiness as your
own? You give yourself thus trustfully to him to be his wife in good
faith so long as the providence of God shall spare you to each other?"
The old story, repeated so many hundred times since the world was new,
and yet so new a story to each one who becomes an actor in it that it
quickens the pulses and pales the cheek.
Estelle Barrows, alert, eager, keen-eared, listened with flushing
cheeks and quickened breathing to the interchange of solemn vows, and
shivered over the closeness of the promises, and marvelled at the clear
steadiness of her sister's voice as she answered, "I do." The same
sceptical spirit was in Estelle that had governed her during her talk
with her sister. She could not yet see how such things were possible.
It was all very well for Lewis to promise to trust Louise as his "best
earthly friend,"—of course she was; to promise to love, cherish, and
protect her—it was the least he could do after she had given up so much
for him. "To be considerate for her in his plans for life." Estelle
almost thought that he ought to have hesitated over that promise. Had
he been considerate? Did he think that home in the far-away farmhouse
would be conducive to her happiness? Still he doubtless meant his best,
and it was right enough for him to ring out his "I do" in a strong
manly voice. But for Louise, how could she say he was her best earthly
friend, with papa looking down on her from his manly height and mamma
struggling to hold back the tears? How could she promise to assist
him in his life-work? Suppose his entire life had to be spent on that
hateful farm, must Louise bury herself there and assist him? How would
she do it? Would he expect her, sometimes, to even milk the cows!
She had heard that farmers' wives did these things. Or could she be
expected to churn the butter, or work it, or mould it ready for market,
and then to drive into town on a market-waggon and barter her rolls of
butter for woollen yarn to knit him some socks? She had stood with a
sort of terrified fascination at one of the busy corners of the city
only the day before, and watched a market-woman clamber down from her
height and take a pail of butter on one arm and a basket of eggs on the
other, and tramp into the store. She had told it to Louise afterward,
and she had laughed merrily over the discomforted face, and had asked
if the woman did not look rosy-cheeked and happy.
All these and a hundred other commingling and disturbing thoughts
floated through Estelle's brain as she watched the quiet face of her
sister during the ordeal of marriage. Even after the hopelessly binding
words, "I pronounce you husband and wife," had been spoken, she still
stood, gazing and wondering. She could never, never do it. Marriage was
nice enough in the abstract, and she liked to go to weddings, at least
she had always liked to before this one. But to single out one man and
make him the centre of all these solemn and unalterable vows! And that
man to be Lewis Morgan!
Louise seemed entirely unconscious of the necessity for any such
turmoil of brain on her account. She looked as serenely sweet and
satisfied in her white silk robes as she had in the simple gold-brown
that had been one of her favourite home dresses. Oh yes; she was in
white silk and bridal veil and orange blossoms, and the blinds were
closed, and the heavy curtains dropped (although it was mid-day), and
the blaze of the gas lighted up the scene; and there was a retinue of
bridesmaids, in their white robes and their ten-buttoned kids, and
there were all the et ceteras of the modern fashionable wedding!
All these things fitted as naturally into the everyday life of the
Barrows family as hard work and scanty fare fit into the lives of
so many. They had not discussed the question at all, but had merely
accepted all these minor details as among the inevitables, and made
them ready. Mrs. Barrows came from an aristocratic and wealthy family;
so also did the father; and all the surroundings and associations of
the family had been connected with wealth and worldliness to such a
degree that, although they were reckoned among their set as remarkably
plain and conscientiously economical people, viewed from Lewis Morgan's
standpoint they were lavish of their expenditures to a degree that he
knew his father would have denounced as unpardonable.
Is not it a pity that in this carping world we cannot oftener put
ourselves in other people's places, mentally at least, and try
to discover how we should probably feel and talk and act were we
surrounded by their circumstances and biased by their educations?
Something of this Lewis Morgan had done. He might almost be said to
occupy half-way ground between the rigid plainness of his country
home life and the luxurious ease of his wife's city home life. He had
been out into the world, and had seen both sides, and his nature was
broad enough and deep enough to distinguish between people and their
surroundings. Therefore, while he admired and respected Mr. Barrows, he
respected and loved his father, who was the very antipodes of his city
brother.
Hundreds of miles away from the gas-lights and glamour of orange
blossoms, and bridal veils, and wedding favours, on a bleak hillside,
was a plain two-story frame house, surrounded by ample barns, which
showed in their architecture and design a more comfortable finish for
the purposes for which they were intended than the plain unpainted
house had ever shown. There was even a sense of beauty, or at least of
careful neatness, in the choosing of the paints and the general air of
the buildings, that the house lacked. Whatever Jacob Morgan thought of
his family, it was quite apparent that he had a high opinion of his
stock.
Within this square, plain, solemn-looking house, on a certain dull and
solemn autumn evening, sat the Morgan family, gathered apparently for
a special occasion; for though every one of them, down to the gray
old cat purring behind the great wood stove, tried to act as usual,
a general air of expectancy, indescribable and yet distinctly felt,
pervaded the room.
The room, by the way, deserves a passing description. It was at once
the sitting-room, dining-room, and kitchen of the Morgans. It was large
and square, and scrupulously clean. There was a large old-fashioned
table, with its great leaves turned down, and itself pushed up against
the north side of the house; and it had a dark, flowered, shiny
oil-cloth spread all over its surface, reaching down nearly to the
floor. On the oiled surface a large-sized, old-fashioned candlestick
held a substantial tallow candle, which served to show Mother Morgan
where to put the point of the great darning-needle as she solemnly wove
it in and out of the gray sock drawn on her large, labour-roughened
hand. The old-fashioned tray and snuffers stood beside the candlestick,
and a dreary-faced girl, in a dark calico dress, closely buttoned at
the throat and guiltless of a collar, occupied herself in applying the
snuffers at regular intervals to the black wick that rapidly formed.
Occasionally the mother hinted that it was a very shiftless way to
spend her time, and that she would do better to get out her mending or
her knitting. But the girl, with a restless sort of half-sigh, replied
that she "couldn't mend or knit to-night."
"And why not to-night as well as any time?" questioned Mrs. Morgan in
a half-vexed tone, as one who was fully prepared to combat sentiment
or folly of any sort that might have arisen in her daughter's mind.
But the daughter only answered, "Oh, I don't know!" and snuffed the
candle again; and the darning-needle gleamed back and forth in the
candle-glow, and no sound broke the stillness for the next ten minutes.
The other furnishings of the room can be briefly given. A square stand
in the corner held the "Farmer's Companion," a weekly paper highly
prized; a small copy of "Webster," very much abridged, and with one
cover gone. A tack in the wall, over the stand, held the "Farmer's
Almanac;" and near it a pasteboard case, somewhat gaily decorated with
fancy pictures, held the family hairbrush and comb. The great stove,
capable of taking in large pieces of wood at a time, was aglow, both
with fire-light and with polish, and was really the only bright and
pleasant thing in the room. The floor was painted a good, clear yellow,
and was guiltless of even a rug to relieve its bareness.
Behind the stove, with his feet on the hearth, and his slouched hat
pushed on the back of his head, and his pants tucked carefully into his
barn-yard boots, sat the younger son of the family, John Morgan, his
hands in his pockets, and his eyes fixed somewhat gloomily on the fire.
Just across from him, occupying the other corner of the fireplace, was
the father of the family, a prematurely old, bent man. His gray hair
stood in disorder on his head—"stood" being the exact word to apply
to it, as even vigorous brushing never coaxed it into quietness for
any length of time. He was tilted slightly back in his straight-backed
wooden arm-chair, which boasted of a patchwork cushion, and was the
only bit of luxury that the room contained. A few chairs, yellow
painted like the floor, wooden-bottomed, keeping themselves in orderly
condition in the three unoccupied corners of the room, completed its
furnishings—unless a shelf at the back of the stove, and in somewhat
alarming proximity to the aforesaid barn-yard boots, where a row of
milk-pans were stationed waiting for the cream to "set," and a line on
which hung certain towels used in cleansing and drying the pans, and a
hook at a little distance holding the family hand-towel, can be called
furnishings.
Sundry other hooks were empty—the sixteen-year-old daughter having
taken counsel with herself for a little, and then quietly removed two
coats and a pair of overalls to the back kitchen closet.
A door leading into the small, square, bare-floored bedroom of Jacob
Morgan and his wife stood open, and revealed the six-year-old baby of
the family, fair-haired, soft-eyed Nellie Morgan, her eyes at this
time being wide-open and aglow with an excitement which she could not
control. But for the solemn rule that seven o'clock must find her in
bed, whether the town three miles away was on fire, or whatever was
happening, she would have begged to stay out of that trundle-bed, on
this particular evening, just one hour more.
John Morgan winked and blinked, and nodded assent to his dream-thoughts
with his mouth wide-open, then came down on the four legs of his chair
with a sudden thud that made him wide-awake and rather cross. He looked
at the tall, loud-voiced old clock in the corner, which was certainly
part of the furniture, and the most important part; it is strange I
should have forgotten it. At this moment it was making up its mind to
announce the advent of the next hour.
"It seems a pity that Lewis couldn't have got around at a little more
seasonable hour," Farmer Morgan said at last, rubbing his eyes and
yawning heavily, and gazing at the solemn-faced clock. "I can't see why
he couldn't just as well have taken an earlier train and got here this
afternoon. It will be getting-up time before we fairly go to bed."
"I don't see any occasion for being very late to bed," Mrs. Morgan
said; and she drove the gleaming needle through the sock as though she
were vexed at the yawning hole. "We needn't sit up till morning to
talk, there will be time enough for that; and so long as Lewis went
to the expense of getting supper at the village, we won't have to be
hindered on that account."
"I'm most awful glad he did," interposed the candle-snuffer. "I
couldn't bear to think of getting supper and washing dishes right
before her."
"I wonder why not? She most likely has been used to dishes, and she
knows they have to be washed. It isn't worth while to go to putting
on airs before her so long as you can't keep them on. The dishes will
probably have to be washed three times a day, just as they always have
been. Because Lewis has got married the world isn't going to stop
turning around."
How fast the darning-needle slipped through the hole, shrinking it at
every turn and stabbing its sides with great gray threads!
"I most wonder why you didn't put a fire in the front room, being it
was the first night; it would have been less—well, less embarrassing
like," the farmer said, hunting in his brain for the right word and
apparently not finding it.
"I don't know as there is any call to be embarrassed," Mrs. Morgan
said, and the furrows in her face seemed to grow deeper. "I thought it
was best to begin as we meant to end; and I didn't s'pose we would be
likely to have fires in the front room of evenings now any more than we
have had. This room has always been large enough and good enough for
Lewis, and I suppose we can make a place for one more."
But she looked that moment as though the "one more" were a sore trial
to her, which she endured simply because she must, and out of which she
saw no gleam of comfort.
During this family discussion, John Morgan kept his feet in their
elevated position on the upper hearth, and continued his steady, gloomy
gaze into the fire. He was a young man, not yet twenty, but already his
face looked not only gloomy but spiritless. It was not in every sense
a good face; there were lines of sullenness upon it, and there were
lines which, even thus early, might have been born of dissipation. Mrs.
Morgan had been heard to say many a time that Lewis was a good boy, had
always been a good boy, but who John took after she could not imagine;
he was not a bit like the Morgans, and she was sure he did not favour
her side of the house.
But, truth to tell, Lewis Morgan had at last disappointed his mother.
Of course, he would get married some time—it was the way with young
men; but he was still quite a young man, and she had hoped that he
would wait a few years. And then she had hoped that, when the fatal
day did come, he would choose one of the good, sensible, hard-working
farmers' girls with which the country abounded, any one of whom would
have esteemed it an honour to be connected with the Morgan family.
But to go to town for a wife, and then to plunge right into the midst
of aristocracy, and actually bring away a daughter of Lyman Barrows,
whose father once occupied a high position in the Government! Mrs.
Morgan felt aggrieved. Farmers and farmers' wives and daughters had
always been good enough for her; why were they not for her son?
This matter of family pride is a very queer thing to deal with. I doubt
if you will not find it as strongly developed among the thrifty and
intelligent classes of farmers as anywhere in this country. To be sure,
there are different manifestations of pride. Assuredly Mrs. Morgan knew
how to manifest hers.
"There they come!" declared the candle-snuffer; and her face grew red,
and she dropped the snuffers into the tray with a bang. It was just as
the old clock had made up its mind to speak, and it solemnly tolled out
eight strokes.
"Dorothy!" said she of the darning-needle, severely. "I am ashamed of
you. There is no occasion for you going into hysterics if they have
come."
The feet on the upper hearth came down on the brick hearth with a
louder bang than the snuffers had made. "I'm going to the barn," said
their owner promptly. "Lewis will want to have his horse took care of;
and I don't want to see none of 'em to-night. You needn't call me in,
for I ain't coming."
And he dodged out at the back door just as the front one opened,
and a shoving of trunks sounded on the oil-cloth floor of the great
old-fashioned hall, and Lewis Morgan's voice said cheerily, "Where are
you all?" and the mother rolled up the stocking, and stabbed it with
the darning-needle, and shook out her check apron, and stood up to give
them greeting; and Louise Morgan had reached her home.
CHAPTER III.
INTRODUCED.
Now Louise, despite all her previous knowledge of the Morgan family,
had done just as people are always doing—planned their reception at
the old homestead quite after the manner of life to which she had been
accustomed, instead of arranging things from the Morgan standpoint. In
imagination, she had seen her husband folded in his mother's arms, his
bearded face covered with motherly kisses. "It is not reasonable to
suppose that she will care to kiss me," she had said to herself, "but
I will give her one little, quiet kiss, to show her how dear Lewis's
mother is to me, and then I will keep myself in the background for the
first evening. They will be so glad to get Lewis back that they will
not have room for much notice of me."
Kisses! Hardly anything could be more foreign to Mother Morgan's life
than those. It was actually years since she had kissed her grown-up
son. She held out her hard old hand to him, and her heart beat quickly,
and she felt a curious tremble all over her that she would have been
ashamed to own, but with a mighty effort she controlled her voice, and
said—
"Well, so you have got back safe, with all your rampaging around the
world; I should think you had had enough of it. And this is your wife?"
And then Louise had felt the quick grasp and release of her hand, and
had not realized the heart-beats; and Lewis had shaken hands with his
father and his sister Dorothy, and had said—
"Father, this is my wife."
And the premature old man, with the premature gray hairs standing up
over his head, had nodded to her, without even a hand-clasp, and said—
"I'm glad you are safe at home. You must be tired out; travelling is
worse than ploughing all day. I never could see why folks who hadn't
got to do it should take journeys."
And this was the home-coming! Two nights before, they had been in the
old home, stopping there over night, after a two weeks' absence in
another direction. How the mother had clasped her to her heart and
cried over her! How the father had called her his "precious daughter,"
and wondered, with a quiver in his lips and a tremble in his voice, how
they could let her go again! How Estelle—bright, beautiful, foolish
Estelle—had hugged and caressed and rejoiced over her darling sister!
What a contrast it was! It all came over her just then, standing
alone in the centre of that yellow painted floor—the tremendous, the
far-reaching, the ever-developing contrast between the home that had
vanished from her sight and the new home to which she had come. She
felt a strange, choking sensation, as if a hand were grasping at her
throat; the dim light in the tallow candle gleamed and divided itself
into many sparks, and seemed swinging in space; and but for a strong
and resolute determination to do no such thing, the bride would have
made her advent into the Morgan household a thing of vivid memory, by
fainting away!
"Lewis!" called a soft, timid voice from somewhere in the darkness.
Looking out at them from that bedroom door, poor little Nellie, with
her shining eyes and her beating heart, could endure it no longer; and
although frightened at her boldness, and dipping her yellow head under
the sheet the minute the word was out, she had yet spoken that one low,
eager word.
"O Nellie!" Lewis had exclaimed. "Are you awake? Louise, come and see
Nellie."
Indeed she would; nothing in life looked so inviting to his young
wife at that moment as the darkness and comparative solitude of that
inner room. But Lewis had seized the tallow candle as he went—Dorothy,
meantime, having roused sufficiently to produce another one; and as
Louise followed him she caught a glimpse of the shining eyes and the
yellow curls. A whole torrent of pent-up longing for home and love and
tenderness flowed out in the kisses which were suddenly lavished on
astonished little Nellie, as Louise nestled her head in the bed-clothes
and gathered the child to her arms.
"She looks like you, Lewis," was the only comment she made; and Lewis
laughed and flushed like a girl, and told his wife she was growing
alarmingly complimentary; and Nellie looked from one to the other of
them with great, earnest, soulful eyes, and whispered to Lewis that she
"loved her almost as much as she did him!" with a long-drawn breath
on the word "almost" that showed the magnitude of the offering at the
shrine of his new wife. On the whole, it was Nellie that sweetened the
memory of the home-coming, and stayed the tears that might have wet
Louise Morgan's pillow that night.
As for John, he stayed in the barn, as he had planned, until the
new-comers were fairly out of sight above stairs.
"He is a queer fellow," explained Lewis to his wife, as they went about
their own room. "I hardly know how to take him. I don't think I have
ever understood his character; I doubt if anybody does. He is pent-up;
there is no getting at his likes or dislikes, and yet he has strong
feelings. He has given my father a good many anxious hours already; and
sometimes I fear there are many more in store for him from the same
source."
And Lewis sighed. Already the burden of home life was dropping on him.
Louise was by this time so divided between the sense of loneliness
that possessed her and the sense of curiosity over every article in
and about her room, that she could not give to John the interest which
the subject demanded. It was utterly unlike any room that she had
ever seen before. A brilliant carpet, aglow with alternate stripes of
red and green, covered the floor. Louise looked at it with mingled
feelings of curiosity and wonder. How had it been made, and where? How
did it happen that she had never seen a like pattern before? It did
not occur to her that it was home-made; and if it had, she would not
have understood the term. The two windows to the room were shaded with
blue paper, partly rolled, and tied with red cord. There was a wood
fire burning in a stove, which snapped, and glowed, and lighted up the
strange colours and fantastic figures of the wall-paper; there were two
or three old-fashioned chairs, comfortable, as all old-fashioned chairs
are; and there was a high-post bedstead, curtained at its base by what
Louise learned to know was a "valance," though what its name or use
she could not on this evening have told. The bed itself was a marvel
of height; it looked to the bewildered eyes of the bride as though
they might need the services of a step-ladder to mount it; and it was
covered with a tulip bed-quilt! This also was knowledge acquired at a
later date. What the strangely-shaped masses of colour were intended
to represent she had not the slightest idea. There was a very simple
toilet-table, neatly covered with a towel, and its appointments were
the simplest and commonest. A high, wide, deep-drawered bureau, and a
pine-framed mirror, perhaps a foot wide and less than two feet long,
completed the furnishings, save a couple of patchwork footstools under
the windows.
Lewis set down the candlestick, which he had been holding aloft,
on the little toilet-table, and surveyed his wife with a curious,
half-laughing air, behind which was hidden an anxious, questioning gaze.
"My mother has an intense horror of the new invention known as
kerosene," was his first explanatory sentence, with a comical side
glance toward the blinking candle.
"Kerosene!" said Louise absently, her thoughts in such confusion that
she could not pick them out and answer clearly. "Doesn't she like
gas?" And then the very absurdity of her question brought her back to
the present, and she looked up quickly in her husband's face, and,
struggling with the pent-up tears, burst instead into a low, sweet,
ringing laugh, which laugh he joined in and swelled until the low
ceilings might almost have shaken over their mirth.
"Upon my word, I don't know what we are laughing at," he said at last:
"but she is a brave little woman to laugh, and I'm thankful to be able
to join her;" and he pushed one of the patchwork footstools over to
where she had sunk on the other and sat down beside her.
"It is all as different as candle-light from sunlight, isn't it? That
blinking little wretch over there on the stand furnished me with a
simile. I haven't done a thing to this room, mainly because I didn't
know what to do. I realized the absurdity of trying to put city life
into it, and I didn't know how to put anything into it; I thought you
would. In fact, I don't know but it fits country life. It has always
seemed to me to be a nice, pleasant home room, but—well—well, the
simple truth is, Louise, there is something the matter with it all, now
that you are in it,—it doesn't fit you; but you will know how to repair
it, will you not?" An anxious look was in his eyes, there was almost
a tremble in his voice, the laughter had gone out of them so soon. It
nerved Louise to bravery.
"We will not rearrange anything to-night," she said brightly; "we are
too tired for planning. That great bed is the most comfortable thing I
can think of; if we can only manage to get into it. What makes it so
high, Lewis?"
Whereupon he laughed again, and she joined, laughing in that
immoderate, nervous way in which people indicate that the laughter,
hilarious as it appears, is but one remove from tears. And it was thus
that the first evening under the new home-roof was spent.
John, coming from his hiding-place and going in stocking feet up
the stairs, heard the outburst, and, curling his sour-looking lip,
muttered: "They feel very fine over it; I hope it will last."
And the poor fellow had not the remotest idea that it would. Boy that
he was, John Morgan was at war with life: he believed that it had
ill-treated him; that to his fortunate elder brother had fallen all the
joy, and to him all the bitterness. He was jealous because of the joy.
He was not sure but he almost hated his brother's wife. Her low, clear
laugh, as it rang out to him, sounded like mockery: he could almost
make his warped nature believe that she was laughing at him, though she
had never seen, perhaps never heard of him. If she had seen his face at
that moment, doubtless her thoughts would have been of him; as it was,
they revolved around the Morgan family.
"What about your sister Dorothy?" she asked her husband, diving into
the bewilderments of the large trunk, in search of her toilet case.
"Dorothy is a good, warm-hearted girl, who has no—well—" and then he
stopped; he did not know how to finish his sentence. It would not do to
say she had no education, for she had been the best scholar in their
country school, and during her last winter was reported to have learned
all that the master could teach her.
She had been disappointed, it is true, that he had not known more;
and Lewis had been disappointed, because he wanted her to go on, or
go elsewhere, and get—what? He did not know how to name it. Something
that his wife had to her very finger-tips, and something that Dorothy
had not a trace of. What was the name of it? Was it to be learned from
books? At least he had wanted her to try, and she had been willing
enough, but Farmer Morgan had not.
"She has book-learning enough for a farmer's daughter," he had said
sturdily. "She knows more about books now than her mother ever did; and
if she makes one-half as capable a woman, she will be ahead of all the
women there are nowadays."
So Dorothy had packed away her books, and settled down at her churning
and baking and dish-washing; she took it quietly, patiently. Lewis did
not know whether the disappointment was very great or not; in truth
he knew very little about her. Of late he had known almost nothing of
home, until within the last year failing health and the necessity for
outdoor life had changed all his plans and nearly all his hopes in life.
Louise waited for a completion of the unfinished sentence, but her
husband seemed unable to add to it. He bent over the valise and gave
himself to the business of unpacking, with a puzzled air, as though he
were trying to solve a problem that eluded him. His wife tried again.
"Lewis, why is she not a Christian?"
Now, indeed, he dropped the coat that he was unrolling, and, rising
up, gave the questioner the full benefit of his troubled eyes. He was
under the impression that he was pretty well acquainted with his wife;
yet she certainly had the fashion of asking the most strange-sounding
questions, perplexing to answer, and yet simple and straightforward
enough in their tone.
"Why is it?" he repeated. "I do not know; my dear Louise, how could I
know?"
"Well, doesn't it seem strange that a young lady, in this age of the
world, surrounded by Christian influences, should go on year after year
without settling that question?"
Her husband's answer was very thoughtfully given. "It seems exceedingly
strange when I hear you speak of it, but I do not know that I ever
thought of it in that sense before."
Then the unpacking went on in silence for a few minutes, until Louise
interrupted it with another question.
"Lewis, what does she say when you talk with her about these matters?
What line of reasoning does she use?"
It was so long before she received an answer that she turned from her
work in surprise to look at him; then he spoke.
"Louise, I never said a word to her on this subject in my life. And
that seems stranger to you than anything else?" he added at last, his
voice low and with an anxious touch in it.
She smiled on him gently. "It seems a little strange to me, Lewis, I
shall have to own; but I suppose it is different with brothers and
sisters from what it is when two are thrown together constantly as
companions. I have no brother, you know."
Do you know what Lewis thought of then? His brother John.
CHAPTER IV.
FROM DAWN TO DAYLIGHT.
IT was by the light of the blinking tallow candle that they made their
toilets next morning. Louise roused suddenly, not a little startled at
what she supposed were unusual sounds, issuing from all portions of the
house, in the middle of the night.
"Do you suppose any one is sick?" she asked her husband. "There has
been a banging of doors and a good deal of hurrying around for some
minutes."
"Oh no," he said, reassuringly. "It is getting-up time. John is a noisy
fellow, and Dorothy can make considerable noise when she undertakes. I
suspect they are trying to rouse us."
"Getting-up time! why, it must be in the middle of the night."
"That depends on whether one lives in town or in the country. I
shouldn't be greatly surprised if breakfast were waiting for us."
"Then let us hurry," said Louise, making a motion to do so; but her
husband remanded her back to her pillow, while he made vigorous efforts
to conquer the old-fashioned stove, and secure some warmth.
"But we ought not to keep them waiting breakfast," Louise said in
dismay. "That is very disagreeable when everything is ready to serve.
We have been annoyed in that way ourselves. Lewis, why didn't you waken
me before? Haven't you heard the sounds of life for a good while?"
"Yes," said Lewis, "longer than I wanted to hear them. If they don't
want breakfast to wait they shouldn't get it ready at such an unearthly
hour. There is no sense in rousing up the household in the night.
During the busy season it is a sort of necessity, and I always succumb
to it meekly. But at this date it is just the outgrowth of a notion,
and I have waged a sort of silent war on it for some time. I suppose I
have eaten cold breakfasts about half the time this autumn."
"Cold breakfasts! Didn't your mother keep something warm for you?"
"Not by any manner of means did she. My mother would not consider that
she was doing her duty to her son by winking at his indolent habits in
any such fashion; she believes that it is his sacred duty to eat his
breakfast by early candle-light, and if he sins in that direction it is
not for her to smooth the punishment of the transgressor."
Louise laughed over the serio-comic tone in which this was said, albeit
there was a little feeling of dismay in her heart; these things sounded
so new, and strange, and unmotherly!
"Louise dear, I don't want to dictate the least in the world, and I
don't want to pretend to know more than I do; but isn't that dress just
a trifle too stylish for the country—in the morning, you know?"
This hesitating, doubtful sort of question was put to Mrs. Morgan
somewhat later, after a rapid and apparently unpremeditated toilet.
She gave the speaker the benefit of a flash from a pair of roguish eyes
as she said—
"Part of that sentence is very opportune, Lewis. You are evidently
'pretending to know more than you do.' This dress was prepared
especially for a morning toilet in the country, and cost just fivepence
a yard."
"Is it possible!" he answered, surveying her from head to foot with a
comic air of bewilderment. "Then, Louise, what is it that you do to
your dresses?"
"Wear them," she answered demurely. "And I shall surely wear this this
morning; it fits precisely."
Did it? Her husband was in great doubt. He would not have liked to own
it; he did not own it even to himself; but the truth was, he lived in
a sort of terror of his mother's opinions. She was easily shocked,
easily disgusted; the whole subject of dress shocked her, perhaps,
more than any other. She was almost eloquent over the extravagance,
the lavish display, the waste of time as well as money exhibited in
these degenerate days in the decorations of the body. She even sternly
hinted that occasionally Dorothy "prinked" altogether too much for
a girl with brains. What would she think of Mrs. Lewis Morgan? The
dress which troubled him was one of those soft neutral-tinted cottons
so common in these days, so entirely unfashionable in the fashionable
world that Louise had already horrified her mother, and vexed
Estelle, by persisting in her determination to have several of them.
Once purchased, she had exercised her taste in the making, and her
selections of patterns and trimming "fitted the material perfectly," so
Estelle had told her, meaning anything but a compliment thereby.
It was simplicity itself in its finishings; yet the pattern was
graceful in its folds and draperies, and fitted her form to perfection.
The suit was finished at the throat with a rolling collar, inside of
which Louise had basted a very narrow frill of soft yellowish lace.
The close-fitting sleeves were finished in the same way. A very tiny
scarlet knot of narrow ribbon at the throat completed the costume, and
the whole effect was such that her husband, surveying her, believed
he had never seen her better dressed, and was sure his mother would
be shocked. The bewilderment on his face seemed to strike his wife as
ludicrous.
"Why, Lewis," she said gaily, "what would you have me wear?"
"I don't know, I am sure," he answered, joining her laugh. "Only, why
should fivepence goods look like a tea-party dress on you?" Then they
went down to breakfast.
Almost the first thought that the young wife had, as she surveyed the
strange scene, was embodied in a wonderment as to what Estelle would
say could she look in on them now.
That great, clean kitchen; the kettle steaming on the cook-stove,
and the black "spider" still sizzling about the ham gravy that was
left in it; the large-leaved table, spread; old-fashioned, blue
earthenware dishes arranged on it, without regard to grace, certainly,
whatever might be said of convenience. In the middle of the table sat
the inevitable tallow candle, and another one blinked on the high
mantlepiece, bringing out the shadows in a strange, weird way.
Seated at the foot of the table was John, in his shirt-sleeves, the
mild winter morning having proved too trying for his coat. His father
was still engaged in putting the finishing touches to his toilet by
brushing his few spears of gray hair before the little glass in the
further end of the room. Dorothy leaned against the window and waited,
looking both distressed and cross.
"Come! Come! Come!" said the mother of this home, directly the
stair-door had closed after the arrival of her new daughter. "Do let
us get down to breakfast; it will be noon before we get the dishes
out-of-the-way. Now, father, have we got to wait for you? I thought you
were ready an hour ago. Come, Lewis; you must be hungry by this time."
The rich blood mounted to Lewis's cheeks. This was a trying greeting
for his wife; he felt exactly as though he wanted to say that he
thought so; but she brushed past him at that moment, laying a cool
little hand for an instant on his. Was it a warning touch? Then she
went over to the young man in the shirt-sleeves.
"Nobody introduces us," she said, in a tone of quiet brightness. "I
suppose they think that brother and sister do not need introduction. I
am Louise, and I am sure you must be John; let's shake hands on it."
And the small, white hand was outstretched and waiting. What was to be
done?
John, who was prepared to hate her, so well prepared that he already
half did so—John (who never shook hands with anybody, least of all a
woman; never came in contact with one if he could possibly help it)
felt the flush in his face deepen until he knew he was the colour of
a peony, but nevertheless slowly held forth his hard red hand, and
touched the small white one, which instantly seized it in a cordial
grasp. Then they sat down to breakfast.
Louise waited with bowed head, and was thrilled with a startled sense
of unlikeness to home as she waited in vain. No voice expressed
its thankfulness for many mercies; instead, the clatter of dishes
immediately commenced. "Not one in the family save myself is a
Christian." She remembered well that Lewis had told her so; but was
he of so little moment in his father's house that the simple word of
blessing would not have been received among them from his lips? It had
not occurred to her that, because her husband was the only Christian in
the household, therefore he sat at a prayer-less table.
Other experiences connected with that first meal in her new home were,
to say the least, novel. Curiously enough, her imaginings concerning
them all connected themselves with Estelle. What would Estelle think of
a young lady who came collarless to the breakfast table; nay, more than
that, who sat down to eat, in her father's and mother's presence, with
uncombed hair, gathered into a frowzly knot in the back of her neck?
What would Estelle have thought of Mrs. Morgan's fashion of dipping her
own spoon into the bowl of sugar and then back again into her coffee?
How would she have liked to help herself with her own knife to butter,
having seen the others of the family do the same with theirs? How would
she manage in the absence of napkins and would the steel forks spoil
her breakfast? And how would she like fried ham, and potatoes boiled in
the skin, for breakfast anyway?
The new-comer remembered that she had but three weeks ago assured
Estelle that farmhouses were delightful places in which to spend
summers. Was she so sure of that, even with this little inch of
experience? To learn to appreciate the force of contrasts, one would
only need a picture of the two breakfast tables which presented
themselves to the mind of this young wife.
Aside from all these minor contrasts, there were others which troubled
her more. She had resolved to be very social and informal with each
member of this family; but the formidable question arose, what was she
to be social about? Conversation there was none, unless Farmer Morgan's
directions to John concerning details of farm work, and his answers
to Lewis's questions as to what had transpired on the farm during his
absence, could be called conversation.
Mrs. Morgan, it is true, contributed by assuring Dorothy that if
she did not clean out the back kitchen this day she would do it
herself, and that the shelves in the cellar needed washing off this
very morning. Whatever it was that had occurred to put Dorothy in
ill-humour, or whether it was ill-humour or only habitual sullenness,
Louise did not know; certainly her brows were black. Would it be
possible to converse with her? As the question put itself to her mind,
it called up the merry by-play of talk with which Estelle was wont to
enliven the home breakfast table, so sparkling and attractive in its
flow that her father had accused her of setting a special snare for
him, that he might miss his car.
If Estelle were at this table what would she talk about? It was
entirely a new and strange experience to Louise to be at a loss what to
talk about. Books! What had Dorothy read? She did not look as though
she had read anything, or wanted to. Sewing! Well, the new sister was
skilled with her needle. Suppose she said, "I know how to make my own
dresses, and I can cut and fit my common ones; can you?" How abrupt
it would sound, and what strange table talk for the pleasure of the
assembled family! She caught herself on the verge of a laugh over
the absurdity of the thing, and was as far as ever from a topic for
conversation.
Meantime Lewis had finished his questionings and turned to her.
"Louise, did you ever see any one milk? I suppose not. If it were not
so cold you would like to go out and see Dorothy with her pet cow; she
is a creature—quite a study."
Did he mean Dorothy, or the pet cow? It was clear to his wife that
he was himself embarrassed by something incongruous in the breakfast
scene; but she caught at his suggestion of a subject even while his
mother's metallic voice was saying—
"Cold! If you call this a cold morning, Lewis, you must have been
getting very tender since you were in the city. It is almost as mild as
spring."
"Can you milk?" Louise was saying, meantime, eagerly to Dorothy. The
eagerness was not assumed; she was jubilant, not so much over the idea
of seeing the process of milking as over the fact that she had finally
discovered a direct question to address to Dorothy, which must be
answered in some form.
But, behold! Dorothy, flushing to her temples, looked down at her plate
and answered, "Yes, ma'am," and directly choked herself with a swallow
of coffee, and the avenue for conversation suddenly closed.
What was she to do? How it was to call such distorted attempts at
talk by the pleasant word conversation! What "familiar interchange
of sentiment" could she hope to get up with Dorothy about milking
cows? What did people say about cows, anyway? She wished she had some
knowledge, even the slightest, of the domestic habits of these animals;
but she was honestly afraid to venture in any direction, lest she
should display an ignorance that would either be considered affected or
sink her lower in the family estimation. Suppose she tried some other
subject with Dorothy, would she be likely to choke again?
Mrs. Morgan tried to help. "Dorothy milked two cows when she was not
yet twelve years old!"
Whether it was the words, or the tone, or the intention, Louise could
not tell; but she immediately had a feeling that not to milk two cows
before one was twelve years old argued a serious and irreparable
blunder in one's bringing up. She was meek and quiet-toned in her
reply:—
"I never had the opportunity of even seeing the country when I was a
little girl, only as we went to the sea-side, and that is not exactly
like the country, you know. All mamma's and papa's relatives happened
to live in town."
"It must be a great trial to a woman to have to bring up her children
in a city. Ten chances to one if they don't get spoiled."
Mrs. Morgan did not say it crossly, nor with any intention of
personality, but again Louise felt it to be almost a certainty that she
was thought not to belong to that fortunate "one chance" which was not
spoiled.
Mother Morgan startled her out of her wandering by addressing her
directly—
"I hope you will be able to make out a breakfast. I suppose our style
of living is not what you have been used to."
What could Louise say? It certainly was not, and she certainly could
not affirm that she liked it better.
Her husband turned a certain troubled look on her. "Can't you eat a
little?" he asked in an undertone.
Did she imagine it, or was he more anxious that his mother should not
be annoyed than he was that her appetite should not suffer? Altogether,
the young bride was heartily glad when that uncomfortable meal was
concluded and she was back in that upper room. She went alone, her
husband having excused himself from his father long enough to go with
her to the foot of the stairs and explain that father wanted him a
moment.
Do you think she fell into a passion of weeping directly the door
of her own room shut her in, and wished that she had never left the
elegancies of her city home or the sheltering love of her mother? Then
you have mistaken her character. She walked to the window a moment and
looked out on the stubby, partly frozen meadows that stretched away
in the distance, she even brushed a tender tear, born of love for the
old home and the dear faces there; but it was chased away by a smile
as she bowed to her husband, who looked back to get a glimpse of her;
and she knew then, as she had known before, that it was not hard to
"forsake all others and cleave to him." Moreover, she remembered that
marriage vows had brought her more than a wife's responsibilities. She
was by them made a daughter and a sister to those whom she had not
known before. They were not idle words to her, these two relationships.
She remembered them each one: Father Morgan, with his old, worn face,
and his heart among the fields and barns; Mother Morgan, with her cold
eyes, and cold hand, and cold voice; Dorothy and John, and the fair,
yellow-haired Nellie, whom a special touch of motherliness had left
still sleeping that morning; and remembering them each, this young wife
turned from the window, and, kneeling, presented them each by name and
desire to her "elder Brother."
CHAPTER V.
BEDS AND BUTTON-HOLES.
How to fit in with the family life lived at the Morgan farmhouse was
one of the puzzles of the new-comer. For the first time, Louise was
in doubt how to pass her time, what to do with herself. Not that she
had not enough to do. She was a young woman having infinite resources;
she could have locked the door on the world downstairs, and, during
her husband's absence in field or barn, have lived a happy life in her
own world of reading, writing, sewing, planning. But the question was,
would that be fulfilling the duties which the marriage covenant laid
upon her? How, in that way, could she contribute to the general good
of the family into which she had been incorporated, and which she had
pledged herself before God to help to sustain? But, on the other hand,
how should she set about contributing to the general good? Every avenue
seemed closed.
After spending one day in comparative solitude, save the visits that
her husband managed to pay, from time to time, to the front room
upstairs, she, revolving the problem, lingered in the large kitchen
the next morning, and, with pleasant face and kindly voice, said to
Dorothy, "Let me help!" and essayed to assist in the work of clearing
the family table—with what dire results!
Dorothy, thus addressed, seemed as affrighted as though an angel
from heaven had suddenly descended before her and offered to wash
the dishes; and she let slip, in her amazement, one end of the large
platter, containing the remains of the ham, and a plentiful supply
of ham gravy—which perverse stuff trickled and dripped, in zigzag
lines, over the clean, coarse linen which covered the table. Dorothy's
exclamation of dismay brought her mother quickly from the bedroom; and,
then and there, she gave a short, sharp lecture on carelessness.
"What need had you to jump because you were spoken to?" she said, in
severe sarcasm, to the blazing-cheeked Dorothy. "I saw you. One would
think you had never seen anybody before, nor had a remark made to you.
I would try to act a little more as though I had common sense if I were
you. This makes the second clean table-cloth in a week! Now, go right
away and wash the grease out, and scald yourself with boiling water to
finish up the morning."
Then, to Louise: "She doesn't need your help; a girl who couldn't clear
off a breakfast table alone, and wash up the dishes, would be a very
shiftless sort of creature, in my opinion. Dorothy has done it alone
ever since she was twelve years old. She isn't shiftless, if she does
act like a dunce before strangers. I'm sure I don't know what has
happened to her, to jump and blush in that way when she is spoken to;
she never used to do it."
It was discouraging, but Louise, bent on "belonging" to this household,
tried again.
"Well, mother, what can I do to help? Since I am one of the family
I want to take my share of the duties. What shall be my work after
breakfast? Come, now, give me a place in the home army, and let me look
after my corner. If you don't, I shall go out to the barn and help
father and Lewis!"
But Mrs. Morgan's strong, stern face did not relax; no smile softened
the wrinkles or brightened the eyes.
"We have always got along without any help," she said—and her voice
reminded Louise of the icicles hanging at that moment from the sloping
roof above her window. "Dorothy and I managed to do pretty near all the
work, even in summer time, and it would be queer if we couldn't now,
when there is next to nothing to do. Your hands don't look as though
you were used to work."
"Well, that depends," said Louise, looking down on the hands that were
offending at this moment by their shapely whiteness and delicacy;
"there are different kinds of work, you know. I have managed to live
a pretty busy life. I don't doubt your and Dorothy's ability to do it
all, but that isn't the point; I want to help; then we shall all get
through the sooner, and have a chance for other kinds of work." She had
nearly said "for enjoyment," but a glance at the face looking down on
her changed the words.
Then they waited; the younger woman looking up at her mother-in-law
with confident, resolute eyes, full of brightness, but also full of
meaning; and the older face taking on a shade of perplexity, as if
this were a phase of life which she had not expected, and was hardly
prepared to meet.
"There's nothing in life, that I know of, that you could do," she said
at last, in a slow, perplexed tone. "There's always enough things to be
done; but Dorothy knows how, and I know how, and—"
"And I don't," interrupted Louise lightly. "Well, then, isn't it your
bounden duty to teach me? You had to teach Dorothy, and I daresay she
made many a blunder before she learned. I'll promise to be as apt as
I can. Where shall we commence? Can't I go and dry those dishes for
Dorothy?"
Mrs. Morgan shook her head promptly.
"She would break every one of 'em before you were through," she said
grimly; "such a notion as she has taken of jumping, and choking, and
spilling things! I don't know what she'll do next."
"Well, then, I'll tell you what I can do. Let me take care of John's
room. Isn't that it just at the back of ours? I saw him coming from
that door this morning. While you are at work down here, I can attend
to that. May I?"
"Why, there's nothing to do to it," was Mrs. Morgan's prompt answer,
"except to spread up the bed, and that takes Dorothy about three
minutes. Besides, it is cold in there; you folks who are used to
coddling over a fire would freeze to death. I never brought up my
children to humour themselves in that way."
Louise, not wishing to enter into an argument concerning the advantages
and disadvantages of warm dressing-rooms, resolved upon cutting this
interview short.
"Very well, I shall spread up the bed then, if there is nothing else
that I can do. Dorothy, remember that is my work after this. Don't you
dare to take it away from me."
Lightly spoken, indeed, and yet with an undertone of decision in it
that made Mrs. Morgan, senior, exclaim wrathfully, as the door closed
after her daughter-in-law,—
"I do wish she would mind her own business! I don't want her poking
around the house, peeking into places, under the name of 'helping!' As
if we needed her help! We have got along without her for thirty years,
and I guess we can do it now."
But Dorothy was still smarting under the sharpness of the rebuke
administered to her in the presence of this elegant stranger, and did
not in any way indicate that she heard her mother's comments, unless an
extra bang of the large plate she was drying expressed her disapproval.
As for Louise, who will blame her that she drew a little troubled sigh
as she ascended the steep staircase? And who will fail to see the
connection between her thoughts and the action which followed? She went
directly to an ebony box resting on her old-fashioned bureau, and drew
from it a small velvet case, which, when opened, revealed the face of a
middle-aged woman, with soft, silky hair, combed smooth, and wound in a
knot underneath the becoming little breakfast cap, with soft lace lying
in rich folds about a shapely throat, with soft eyes that looked out
lovingly upon the gazer, with lips so tender and suggestive, that even
from the picture they seemed ready to speak comforting words.
"Dear mother!" said Louise, and she pressed the tender lips again and
again to hers. "'As one whom his mother comforteth.' Oh, I wonder if
John could understand anything of the tenderness in that verse?" Then
she held back the pictured face and gazed at it, and something in the
earnest eyes and quiet expression recalled to her words of help and
strength, and suggestions of opportunity; so that she closed the case,
humming gently the old, strong-souled hymn, "A charge to keep I have,"
and went in search of broom, and duster, and sweeping-cap, and then
penetrated to the depths of John's room; the development of Christian
character in this young wife actually leading her to see a connection
between that low-roofed back corner known as "John's room," and the
call to duty which she had just sung—
"A charge to keep I have,
A God to glorify."
What, through the medium of John's room! Yes, indeed. That seemed
entirely possible to her. More than that, a glad smile and a look of
eager desire shone in her face as she added the lines—
"A never-dying soul to save
And fit it for the sky."
What if—oh, what if the Lord of the vineyard had sent her to that
isolated farmhouse to be the link in the chain of events which he
designed to have end in the saving and fitting for glory of John
Morgan's never-dying soul!
Possibly you would have thought it was a sudden descent into the
prosaic, if you could have stepped with her into the low-roofed room.
Can I describe to you its desolation, as it appeared to the eyes of
the cultured lady? She stopped on the threshold, stopped her song, and
gazed with a face of dismay! Bare-floored; the roof on the eastern side
sloping down to within three feet of the floor; one western window,
small-paned, curtainless; one wooden-seated chair, on which stood the
inevitable candlestick, and the way in which the wick of the candle had
been permitted to grow long and gutter down into the grease told a tale
of dissipation of some sort indulged in the night before that would not
fail to call out the stern disapproval of the watchful mother. There
was not the slightest attempt at anything like appointments, unless an
old-fashioned, twisted-legged stand that, despite its name, would not
"stand" without being propped, having a ten-inch square glass hung over
it, might be called an attempt. The bundle of very much twisted and
tumbled bed-clothes in the corner, resting on the four-post bedstead,
completed every suggestion of furniture which that long, low, dark room
contained!
"Poor fellow!" said Louise, speaking her thoughts aloud, as the scene
grew upon her. "Why shouldn't he 'give his father some troubled hours'?
What else could they expect? How absolutely pitiful it is that this
room and that downstairs kitchen are really the only places where the
young man can spend a leisure hour! How has Lewis submitted to it?"
Yet, even as she spoke that last sentence, she felt the cold eyes, and
remembered the stern mouth, of his mother, and realized that Lewis was
powerless.
At the same moment I shall have to confess to you that the little
new-comer into the home set her lips in a quiet, curious fashion that
she had, which read to those well acquainted with her this sentence: "I
shall not be powerless; see if I will." And, somehow, you couldn't help
believing that she would not. She had a very curious time restoring
order to that confused bed. It must be borne in mind that she had never
before made up a chaff bed. The best quality of hair mattress had to
do with all her experience of bed-making. This being the case, the
initiated will not be surprised to hear that she tugged off the red and
brown patchwork coverlet three times before she reduced that bed to the
state of levelness which comported with her ideas. Then the pillows
came in for their share of anxiety. They were so distressingly small!
How did John manage with such inane, characterless affairs? She puffed
them, and tossed them, and patted them, with all the skilled touches
which a good bed-maker knows how to bestow, but to very little purpose.
They were shrinking, shame-faced pillows still. The coarse factory
sheet, not yet "bleached," was first made smooth, and then artistically
rolled under the red and brown coverlet; and, while it looked direfully
unlike what Louise would have desired, yet, when the whole was
finished, even with such materials, the bed presented a very different
appearance from what it did after undergoing Dorothy's "spreading up."
Then, when the sweeping was concluded, Louise stood and thought. What
was to be done with that room? How much would she dare to do? She had
determined to make no sort of change in her own room at present; she
would not even change the position of the great old bedstead, though
this was a sacrifice on her part only to be appreciated by those who
are able, on their first entrance into a room, to see, by a sort of
intuition, the exact spot where every article of furniture should be
in order to secure the best effects, and to whom the ill arrangement
is a positive pain. Louise had seen, even on her first entrance into
her room, that the most awkward possible spot for the bedstead had been
chosen; nevertheless she heroically left it there. But she looked with
longing eyes on that twisted table in John's room. How she would have
enjoyed selecting one of those strong, white, serviceable tidies, and
overspreading the marred top with it, and placing there a book or two,
and a perfume bottle, or some delicate knick-knack, to give the room a
habitable air. For fully five minutes she stood shivering in the cold,
trying to determine the important question. Then she resolutely shook
her head, and said aloud, "No, it won't do; I must wait," and went
downstairs with her dust-pan.
During her short absence the dishes had been whisked into their places,
the kitchen made clean, and both mother and daughter were seated at
their sewing. Mrs. Morgan eyed the trim figure in sweeping-cap and
gloves, a broom and dust-pan in hand, with no approval in her glance.
"I should think you were a little too much dressed up for such work,"
she said, producing at last the thought which had been rankling for two
days. This was Louise's opportunity.
[Illustration: "I am dressed just right for work."]
"Oh no," she said pleasantly. "I am dressed just right for ordinary
work. Why, mother, my dress cost less than Dorothy's; hers is part
woollen, and mine is nothing but cotton."
This remark brought Dorothy's eyes from her work; and fixed them in
admiring wonder on the well-dressed lady before her. Being utterly
unacquainted with materials and grades of quality, and judging of
dress only by its effects, it was like a bewildering revelation that
the dress which to her looked elegant, cost less than her own. There
flashed just then into her heart the possibility that some day she too
might have something pretty.
Louise did not wait for her revelation to be commented upon, but drew
nearer to the workers. Mrs. Morgan was sewing rapidly on a dingy calico
for herself.
"Oh, let me make the button-holes," said, or rather exclaimed, the new
daughter, as though it were to be counted a privilege. "I can make
beautiful ones, and I always made mother's and Estelle's."
Now, it so happened that Mrs. Morgan, with all her deftness with the
needle, and she had considerable, was not skilled in that difficult
branch of needle-work, the making of button-holes. Moreover, though
she considered it an element of weakness, and would by no means have
acknowledged it, she hated the work with an absolute hatred, born of a
feeling, strong in such natures as hers, of aversion toward anything
which they cannot do as well, if not better, than others. The thought
of securing well-made button-holes, over which she had not to struggle,
came with a sense of rest to her soul, and she answered, more kindly
than Louise had heard her speak before,—
"Oh, I don't want you to bother with my button-holes."
"I shall not," said Louise brightly. "Button-holes never bother me; I
like to work them as well as some people like to do embroidery."
Then she went to the sink in the kitchen, and washed her hands in the
bright tin basin, and dried them on the coarse, clean family towel.
Presently she came, thimble and needle-case in hand, and established
herself on one of the yellow wooden chairs, to make button-holes in the
dingy calico; and, with the delicate stitches in those button-boles,
she worked an entrance-way into her mother-in-law's heart.
CHAPTER VI.
A NEW SERVICE FOR THE SABBATH.
"AT what hour do you have to start for church?"
This was the question which Louise asked of her husband on Saturday
evening, as she moved about their room making preparations for the next
morning's toilet.
"Well," he said, "it is three miles, you know. We make an effort to get
started by about half-past nine, though sometimes we are late. It makes
hurrying work on Sunday morning, Louise. I don't know how you will like
that."
"I shouldn't think there would be room in one carriage for all the
family. Is there?"
"Room for all who go," Lewis said gravely.
"All who go! why, they all go to church, don't they?"
"Why, no; in fact, they never all go at one time; they cannot leave the
house, you know."
Louise's bewildered look proved that she did not know.
"Why not?" she asked, with wonderment in tone and eyes. "What will
happen to the house?"
Despite a desire not to do so, her husband was obliged to laugh.
"Well," he said hesitatingly, "you know they never leave a farmhouse
alone and go to church."
"I didn't know it, I am sure. Why don't they?"
"I declare I don't know," and he laughed again. "Possibly it is a
notion; there are ugly-looking fellows prowling around sometimes,
and—well, it's the custom, anyhow."
"Don't they ever close the house and all go away?"
Then was Lewis Morgan nonplussed. Distinct memories rose before his
eyes of Good Fridays and Christmas days, and gala days of several
sorts, when the house had been closed and darkened, and left to itself
from early morning late into the afternoon. How was he to explain why
a thing that was feasible for holidays became impracticable on the
Sabbath?
"I'm not sure but that is one of the things that 'no f-f-fellow can
f-f-find out,'" he said, with a burst of laughter. "Do you know 'Lord
Dundreary'?" Then: "Seriously, Louise, our family has fallen into
the custom that obtains of not closing a farmhouse save on special
occasions. I suspect the custom sometimes grows out of indifference for
church. You remember that none of the family have a real love for the
service. It is a source of sorrow to me, as you may suppose. I hope for
better things."
Then the talk drifted away into other channels; but in Louise's heart
there lingered a minor tone of music over the thought that the next day
would be the Sabbath. Shut away, for the first time in her life, from
the prayer-meeting, from the hour of family worship, from constant and
pleasant interchange of thought on religious themes, she felt a hunger
for it all such as she had never realized before, and closed her eyes
that night with this refrain in her heart, "To-morrow I shall go to
church."
The first conscious sound the next morning was the dripping of the
rain-drops from the eaves.
"Oh dear!" Lewis said, dismay in his voice. "We are going to have a
rainy day!"
A careful, critical look at the prospect from the eastern window
confirmed this opinion, and he repeated it with a gloomy face, adding,—
"I don't know when the weather has succeeded in disappointing me so
much before."
"Never mind," Louise said cheerily. "It will not make much difference.
I don't mind the rain. I have a rainy day suit, that mamma used to call
my coat of mail. It is impervious to all sorts of weather; and, with
your rubber coat, and a good-sized umbrella, we shall do almost as well
as though the sun shone."
But her husband's face did not brighten.
"It is not personal inconvenience that I fear for you," he said
gravely, "but disappointment. The truth is, Louise, I am afraid we
can't go to church. This looks like a persistent storm, and my father
has such a love for his horses, and such a dread of their exposure
to these winter storms, that he never thinks of getting them out in
the rain unless it is absolutely necessary; and you know he doesn't
consider church-going an absolutely necessary thing. Could you bear to
be disappointed, and stay at home with me all day?"
"Why, yes," said Louise slowly, trying to smile over those two words,
"with me." "That is, if it is right. But, Lewis, it seems so strange a
thing to do, to stay at home from church all day on account of a little
rain that would hardly keep us from a shopping excursion."
"I know, looking at it from your standpoint it must seem very strange;
but all the education of my home has been so different that I do not
suppose it even seems as strange to me as to you. Still I by no means
approve; and, as soon as I can make arrangements for a horse of my own,
we will not be tried in this way. Indeed, Louise, I can manage it now.
Of course, if I insist on it, my father will yield the point, but he
will offer very serious objection. What do you think? Would it be right
to press the question against his will?"
"Certainly not," his wife said hastily. "At least," she added, with
a bright smile, "I don't suppose the command to obey one's parents
is exactly annulled by the marriage service. Anyhow, the 'honour thy
father and thy mother' never is."
And she put aside her church toilet, and made her preparations to do
that which was to her an unprecedented thing—stay at home from church
in full health and strength.
The question once settled that, under the circumstances, it was the
proper thing to do, it was by no means a disagreeable way of spending
Sabbath morning. Her husband had been so constantly occupied since
their home-coming in carrying out his father's plans for improvements
on the farm, that Louise had seen but little of him; and when, after
breakfast, they returned to their own room, and he, in dressing-gown
and slippers, replenished the crackling wood fire, and opened the
entire front of the old-fashioned stove, letting the glow from it
brighten the room, Louise admitted that the prospect was most inviting.
She drew in her own little rocker, which had travelled with her
from her room at home, and settled beside him, book in hand, for a
delightful two hours of social communion, such as they had not enjoyed
for weeks before.
The reading and the talking that went on in that room, on that rainy
Sabbath morning, were looked back to afterward as pleasant hours to be
remembered. Occasionally the fact that it was Sunday, and she not at
church, and a picture of the dear church at home, and the dear faces
in the family pew, and the seat left vacant in the Sunday school room,
would shadow Louise's face for an instant; but it brightened again. She
had chosen her lot, guided, as she believed, by the hand of her Lord.
It was not for a face realizing this to be in shadow.
It was not until the Sunday dinner had been eaten, and they were back
again, those two, in the brightness of their enjoyed solitude, that
the grave, preoccupied look on Louise's face told that her thoughts
were busy with something outside of their surroundings—something that
troubled her.
"Lewis, what shall we do this afternoon?" she asked him, interrupting a
sentence in which he was declaring that a rainy Sunday was, after all,
a blessing.
"Do!" he repeated. "Why, we will have a delightful Sunday afternoon
talk, and a little reading, and a good deal of—well, I don't know just
what name to give it; heart-rest, perhaps, would be a good one. Aren't
you enjoying the day, dear?"
She turned toward him a smiling face.
"Yes, with a thoroughly selfish enjoyment, I am afraid. I was thinking
of the family downstairs; what can we do to help them, Lewis?"
"Oh!" said her husband, and his face clouded; he seemed to have no
other suggestion to offer.
"They did not look as though they were enjoying the day. I think
it must be dreary for Dorothy and John. I wish we could contribute
something to make the time seem less lonely to them. Suppose we go
down, Lewis, and try what we can do."
Her husband looked as though that was the thing, of all others, which
he had the least desire to do.
"My dear Louise," he began slowly, then stopped, and, finding that she
waited, began again. "The trouble is, wife, I don't know how we can
help any of them. They are not good at talking, and the sort of talk
in which John and Dorothy indulge wouldn't strike you as being suited
to the Sabbath day; in fact, I don't believe you would join in it.
They are used to being at home on the Sabbath; we are always home from
church by this time, and the afternoon is the same to them it always
is. I don't believe we can do anything, dear."
Mrs. Morgan did not look in the least convinced.
"The afternoon ought not to be the same to them it always has been,
should it, Lewis? We have come home, a new element in the family. We
ought, surely, to have some influence. Can't we find something to say
that will do for the Sabbath? What have you talked about with the
family before I came? How did you spend Sunday afternoons?"
"Up here, in my room, when it wasn't too cold; and sometimes, when it
was, I went to bed, and did my reading and thinking there. I rarely
go downstairs on Sunday until milking time. You see, Louise, I really
don't know my own family very well. The early age at which I left home,
being only back for a few weeks at a time during vacations; then my
exile, with Uncle John, to Australia—all this has contributed to making
me a sort of stranger among them. I doubt whether John and Dorothy feel
much better acquainted with me than they do with you. They were both
little things when I went away; and, during this last year, I hardly
know what is the matter. Perhaps I haven't gone about it in the right
way, but I haven't seemed to make any advances in their direction."
"To be very frank with you, Louise, John is always sullen toward me;
and Dorothy acts as though she were half afraid of me, and her foolish
jumpings and blushings seem so out of place, when one remembers that
she is my own sister, that, I will confess to you, I sometimes feel
utterly out of patience with her. As for my mother and father, while
I honour them as true, unselfish, faithful parents, there are many
subjects upon which we do not think alike; and I am often at a loss to
know how to get along without hurting their feelings. The result is,
that I shirk the social a good deal, and devote myself to myself, or
did. Now that I have you to devote myself to, I am willing to be as
social as you please."
The sentence, begun in seriousness, he had purposely allowed to assume
a lighter tone; but Louise held with sweet gravity to her former topic.
"Even Christ pleased not himself," she quoted gently. Then added, "You
may imagine how pleasant it is to me to sit here with you for a whole
quiet day. Nevertheless, Lewis, let us go downstairs to the family, and
see if we cannot, as a family, honour the day together."
She had risen as she spoke, and drawn her little rocker away from
the stove, preparatory to leaving the room. Very slowly her husband
followed her example, reluctance on every line of his face.
"I will go down with you, if you say so; but, honestly, I never dreaded
to do anything more in my life! I can imagine that it seems a very
strange thing to you, but I really and truly don't in the least know
what to say when we got down there—I mean, that will be in keeping with
our ideas of the Sabbath, and will help anybody."
"Neither do I," said Louise quietly. "Since we both feel our unfitness,
let us kneel down before we go, and ask for the Spirit's guidance.
Don't you know he promises: 'Thine ears shall hear a word behind thee
saying, This is the way, walk ye in it'? I cannot help thinking that he
points us down to that family room; why should not we ask him to fill
our mouths?"
Without another word, and with a strange sense of solemnity about him,
the young husband turned and dropped upon his knees beside his wife.
A few minutes thereafter they of the kitchen were startled by the
unexpected entrance of the young couple into their midst. Almost any
movement would have startled the quiet that reigned therein.
The kitchen, on a dull day, with its scarcity of windows, was a dark
and dingy spot, the clean and shining stove being the only speck of
brightness. The family group was complete; yet Louise, as she glanced
around her, taking in their occupations, or want of occupations,
could not forbear feeling the sense of dulness which their positions
suggested. Farmer Morgan, with his steel-bowed spectacles mounted on
his forehead, winked and blinked over the columns of the weekly paper.
Mrs. Morgan sat bolt upright in her favourite straight-backed chair,
and held in her hands an old-fashioned family Bible, in which Nellie
had dutifully been spelling out the words until her restlessness had
gotten the better of her mother's patience, and she had been sent to
the straight-backed chair in the corner, to sit "until she could learn
to stand still, and not twist around on one foot, and hop up and down
when she was reading!" How long will poor Nellie have to "sit" before
she learns that lesson?
Dorothy, without the hopping, was not one whit less restless, and
lounged from one chair to another in an exasperatingly aimless way,
calling forth from her mother, several times, a sharp—
"Dorothy, why can't you sit still when you get a chance? If you
worked as hard as I do all the week, you would be glad enough of a
day of rest." But poor Dorothy was not glad; she hated the stillness
and inaction of the Sabbath; she breathed a sigh of relief when the
solemn-voiced clock clanged out another hour, and looked forward with a
sort of satisfaction even to the bustle of the coming wash-day morning.
John was there, as silent and immovable as a statue, sitting in his
favourite corner, behind the stove; in his favourite attitude, boots
raised high to the stove-hearth; slouched hat on, drawn partly over his
eyes; hands in his pockets, and a deeper shade of sullenness on his
face. So it seemed to Louise. "Poor fellow!" she said, in compassionate
thought. "It is a surprise to me that he doesn't do something awfully
wicked. He will do it, too; I can see it in his face; unless—"
But she didn't finish her thought, even to herself. These various
persons glanced up on the entrance of the two, and looked their
surprise. Then Farmer Morgan, seeing that they proposed to take seats,
moved his chair a little and motioned Lewis nearer the stove, with the
words—
"A nasty day; fire feels good."
"Yet it hasn't rained much," Lewis said, watching Louise, and finding
that she went over to the unoccupied chair nearest Nellie, he took the
proffered seat.
"Rained enough to make mean going for to-morrow; and we've got to go
to town in the morning, rain or shine. I never did see the beat of
this winter for rain and mud; I don't believe it will freeze up before
Christmas."
"You can't get started very early for town," remarked Mrs. Morgan.
"There was so much to do yesterday that I didn't get around to fixing
the butter, and it will take quite a little spell in the morning; and
Dorothy didn't count over the eggs, and pack 'em, either. Dorothy's
fingers were all thumbs, by the way she worked yesterday; we didn't get
near as much done as common."
"She and John were about a match, I guess," Farmer Morgan said,
glancing at the sullen-browed young man behind the stove. "Yesterday
was his unlucky day. About everything you touched broke, didn't it,
John?"
"That's nothing new."
John growled out this contribution to the conversation between lips
that seemed firmly closed. Lewis glanced toward his wife. How would she
think they were getting on? What would she think of butter, and eggs,
and accidents as topics for Sabbath conversation?
But Louise had put an arm around little Nellie, and was holding a
whispered conversation with her, and at this moment broke into the talk.
"Mother, may this little maiden come and sit on my lap, if she will be
very good and quiet? My arms ache for the little girlie who used to
climb into them at about this hour on Sunday."
CHAPTER VII.
A NEW SABBATH CLASS.
"NELLIE is too big to sit on people's laps," her mother said; "but she
can get up, if she wants to, and can keep from squirming about like a
wild animal, instead of acting like a well-behaved little girl."
"Too big" though she was considered, Nellie, poor baby, gladly availed
herself of the permission, and curled in a happy little heap in her new
sister's arms; when commenced a low-toned conversation. Lewis watched
her and struggled with his brain, striving to think of some way of
helping.
"Have you got acquainted with Mr. Butler, father?"
Now Mr. Butler was the new minister; and Louise, who had heard his
name mentioned, was interested in the answer. Farmer Morgan laid down
his newspaper, crossed one leg over the other, tilted his chair back a
trifle, and was ready to talk.
"Acquainted with him? No, I can't say that I am; he knows my name, and
I know his; and he says, 'How do you do?' to me when he meets me on the
street, if he isn't in too brown a study to notice me at all. I reckon
that as about as near as I shall get to an acquaintance. I ain't used
to any great attention from ministers, you know."
"I thought possibly he had called during my absence."
"No, he hasn't. When it comes to making a friendly call, we live a
good way out, and the road is bad, and the weather is bad, and it is
tremendously inconvenient."
"We always live a good way out of town, except when there is to be a
fair or festival, or doings of some kind, when they want cream, and
butter, and eggs, and chickens; then we are as handy to get at as
anybody in the congregation." This from his mother.
Lewis could not avoid a slight laugh; the social qualities of the
little church in the village, or at least its degree of social
intercourse with its country neighbours, was so clearly stated by that
last sentence.
"Oh, well," he said, "it is a good way out for those who have no horses
to depend on, and many of the church people are in that condition. As
for Mr. Butler, he has been here but a short time; of course he hasn't
gotten around the parish yet."
"No," said his father significantly. "It takes a dreadful long time to
get around a small field, especially when there's no special motive for
going. But we don't care; a body would think, to hear us talk, that we
were dreadful anxious for a call. I don't know what he would call for;
'pears to me it would be a waste of time."
"You like his preaching, don't you, father?"
The farmer tore little strips from the edge of his paper, and rolled
them thoughtfully between his thumb and finger for a little before he
answered.
"Why, his preaching is all well enough, I suppose; I never heard
any preaching that wouldn't do pretty well, considering; it's the
practising that I find fault with. I can't find anybody that seems to
be doing what the preachers advise. What is the use in preaching all
the time, if nobody goes and does it?"
This was Farmer Morgan's favourite topic, as indeed it seems to be a
favourite with a great many people—the inconsistencies of the Christian
world. A fruitful topic, certainly; and it is bitterly to be regretted
that there is cause for such unending sarcasm on that subject.
Lewis had heard the same sentiment often before, and being met—as,
unfortunately, so many of us are—by an instant realization of his own
inconsistencies, his mouth had been stopped at once. To-day he rallied
his waning courage, and resolved upon a point-blank question.
"Well, father, why don't you, who understand so well how a Christian
ought to live, set us an example, and perhaps we will succeed better
when we try to copy you?"
This question astounded Farmer Morgan. Coming from a minister, he would
have considered it pretty sharp; have laughed at it good-naturedly, and
turned it aside. But from his own son, and spoken in such a tone of
gravity and earnestness as left no room for trifling, it startled him.
Lewis had never spoken to him in that direct fashion before. In truth,
Lewis had been, during all his Christian life at home, comforting his
heart and excusing his conscience with the belief that, in order not
to prejudice his father against religion, he would do well to make
no personal appeals of any sort. To-day, in the light of the brief
conversation which he had held with his wife, and, more than that, in
the light of the brief prayer in which they had asked the guidance of
the Holy Spirit, he began to conclude that he had been a coward.
"Well," his father said, after a moment of astonished silence, "that
is a fair question, maybe; but then, after all, it is easily answered.
There's folks enough trying at it, and making failures, without me to
swell their number. Till I see somebody who is succeeding a little
better than any one I know, I haven't got the courage to begin."
"Leaving us an example, that ye should fellow His steps," quoted Lewis
Morgan solemnly. "After all, father, the true pattern is certainly
perfect; why not follow that? Who ever asks the school-boy to imitate
the scrawl of some fellow-pupil, so long as the perfect copy is just
before his eyes, at the top of the page?"
His father regarded him meditatively. Was he touched at last—impressed
by the thought of the wonderful life waiting for him to follow? Lewis
Morgan's breath came quickly, and he waited in trembling eagerness for
the reply. It was the first time that he had attempted anything like a
personal conversation on this subject with his father.
Slowly, and with apparent great seriousness, the answer came at last:—
"It is almost a pity that your health didn't hold out; I ain't sure,
after all, but you would have made as good a minister as the rest of
them. Sometimes I'm a trifle afraid that you have got a little too much
learning to make a downright good farmer."
The quick bounds of hope that the son's blood was making receded in
dull, heavy throbs, and he counted his first attempt a failure. He
looked over to Louise. Was not she ready to give up this hopeless
attempt at spiritualizing the tone of the conversation downstairs? He
thought he would give almost anything to hide his sore heart just then
in the quiet of their own room, with the sympathy of her presence to
soothe him.
But Louise was telling Nellie a story; and as he listened and watched
her, it became evident to him that both Dorothy and John were
listening. Dorothy had ceased her restless fidgetings, and settled into
absolute quiet, her arm resting on the broad, low window-seat, and her
eyes fixed on Louise. John had drawn his hat lower, so that his eyes
were hidden entirely; but something in the setting of his lips told
Lewis that he heard. Very quietly Louise's voice told the story; very
simply chosen were the words.
"Yes, there He was in the wilderness, for forty days, without anything
to eat, and nowhere to rest, and all the time Satan tempting him to do
what was wrong. 'Come,' he said to him; 'if you are the Son of God, why
do you stay here hungry? What good will that do anybody? Why don't you
make bread out of these stones? You can do it—you could make a stone
into a loaf of bread in an instant; why don't you?"
"And could he?" Nellie asked, her eyes large and wondering.
"Oh yes indeed. Why not? Do you suppose it would be any harder to turn
a stone into bread than it would be to make a strawberry, or a potato,
or an apple?"
"Strawberries and apples and potatoes grow," said this advanced little
sceptic.
"Yes; but what makes them grow? And why does a strawberry plant always
give us strawberries, and never plums or grapes? It never makes a
mistake. Somebody very wise is taking care of the little plant. It is
this same person whom Satan was trying to coax to make bread out of
stones."
"Well, why didn't he do it? I don't think it would have been naughty."
"I'll tell you. It is very hard to be hungry; it was a great
temptation; but Jesus had promised his Father that he would come here
and bear everything that any man could have to—that he would just be a
man. Now a man couldn't make bread out of stones, you know, so Jesus
wouldn't be keeping his promise if he did it; and then, another thing,
if he had used his great power and gotten himself out of this trouble,
all the poor hungry boys and girls, who are tempted to steal, would
have said: 'Oh yes, Jesus don't know anything about how it feels to
be hungry; he could turn stones into bread. If we could do that we
wouldn't steal either.' Don't you see?"
"Yes," said Nellie, "I see. Go on, please; he didn't make any bread,
did he?"
"Not at that time; he told Satan it was more important that he should
show his trust in God than to show his power by making stones into
bread. Then Satan coaxed him to throw himself down from a great high
steeple, so that the people below would see him, and see that he wasn't
hurt at all. He reminded him of a promise that God made about the
angels taking care of him."
"I wish he had done that!" Nellie said, with shining eyes. "Then the
people would all have believed that he was God."
"No, they wouldn't; for afterward he did just as wonderful things as
that. He cured deaf people and blind people, and raised dead people to
life, and they didn't believe in him; instead, some of them were angry
with him about these very things. He told Satan that to put himself in
danger, when there was nothing to be gained by it, was just tempting
God. Dear me! How many boys and girls do that. Then Satan told him that
he would give up the whole world to him if he would just fall down and
worship him. I suppose Jesus thought then all about the weary way that
he would have to travel—all the things he would have to bear."
"Did the world belong to Satan?" Nellie asked; at which question John
was betrayed into a laugh.
"Well, yes, in a sense it did. Don't you see how much power Satan has
over people in this world? They seem to like to work for him. Some of
them are doing all they can to please him, and he is always at work
coaxing them to give themselves entirely to him, promising them such
great things if they only will. I suppose if he had kept that promise
to Jesus, and given up leading the world in the wrong road, it would
have been much easier for Jesus."
"But Jesus didn't do it."
"No, indeed. Jesus never would do anything wrong to save himself from
trouble or sorrow. He said, 'Get thee hence.' What a pity that little
boys and girls don't refuse, in that way, to listen to Satan, when he
coaxes them and offers them rewards! Think of believing Satan! Why, the
first we ever hear of him he was telling a lie to Eve in that garden,
you know; and he has gone on cheating people ever since."
"He never cheated me," said Nellie positively.
"Didn't he? Are you sure? Did he never make you think that it would be
so nice to do something that you knew mother wouldn't like? Hasn't he
made you believe that you could have a really happy time if you could
only do as you wanted to? And have you never tried it, and found out
what an untrue thing it was?"
"Yes," said Nellie, drooping her head. "One time I ran away from school
and went to the woods—I thought it would be splendid—and I got my feet
wet, and was sick, and it wasn't nice a single bit."
"Of course not; and that is just the way Satan keeps treating people.
Shouldn't you think, after he had deceived them a great many times, as
they grew older they would decide that he was only trying to ruin them,
and would have nothing more to do with him?"
"Yes," said Nellie, nodding her wise little head, "I should. But, then,
maybe they can't get away from him."
"Oh yes, they can; don't you see how Jesus got away from him? And what
do you think he suffered those temptations for, and then had the story
written down for us? Just that we might see that he knew all about
temptations and about Satan, and was stronger than he, and was able to
help all tempted people. He says he will not let people be tempted more
than they can bear, but will show them how to escape."
"Then why doesn't he?"
"He does, dear, every single time; he has never failed anybody yet, and
it is hundreds and hundreds of years since he made that promise."
"But then I should think that everybody would be good, and never do
wrong."
"Ah, but you see, little Nellie, the trouble is, people won't let him
help them. I mean he takes care of all who trust in him to do so. But
if you think you are strong enough to take care of yourself, and won't
stay by him, nor obey his directions, nor ask his help, how can you
expect to be kept out of trouble? When I was a little bit of a girlie
I went to walk with my papa. He said: 'Now, Louise, if you will keep
right in this path I will see that nothing hurts you.' We were going
through the woods. For a little while I kept beside him, taking hold of
his hand. Then I said: 'O papa, I'm not afraid; nothing will hurt me.'
And away I ran into the thickest trees, and I got lost, and was in the
woods nearly all night! Do you think that was my papa's fault?"
"No," said Nellie gravely. "But—I wish there wasn't any Satan. Does he
ever bother you?"
Louise's head dropped lower; the talk was becoming very personal.
"Not often now," she said, speaking low. "He comes to me and whispers
thoughts that I don't like, and I say—"
"Oh!" said Nellie, loud-voiced and eager, "I know—you say, 'Get thee
behind me, Satan.'"
"No," said Louise firmly, "not that. I heard a lady say once that she
was as much afraid of having Satan behind her as she was of having him
anywhere else. So am I. Instead, I ask Jesus to send him away. I just
say, 'Jesus keep me;' and at the name of Jesus, Satan goes away. He
knows he cannot coax Jesus to do any wrong. But, oh dear! How hard he
fights for those people who will not have Jesus to help them. He keeps
whispering plans in their ears, and coaxing them, they thinking all the
time that the plans are their own, and they follow them, expecting to
have good times, and never having them; and all the while Satan laughs
over their folly. Isn't it strange they will not take the help that
Jesus offers?"
"Yes," said Nellie, slowly and gravely, with intense earnestness in
voice and manner. "I mean to."
Louise drew her closer, rested her head against the golden one, and
began to sing in low, sweet notes:—
"Take the name of Jesus ever
As a shield for every snare;
When temptations round you gather,
Breathe that holy name in prayer."
All conversation, or attempts at conversation, had ceased in the room
long before the singing. Some spell about the old, simply-told story of
temptation and struggle and victory had seemed to hold all the group as
listeners. John's face, as much of it as could be seen under his hat
and shading hand, worked strangely. Was the blessed Holy Spirit, whose
presence and aid had been invoked, using the story told the child to
flash before this young man a revelation of the name of the leader he
had been so faithfully following, so steadily serving, all the years of
his young life? Did he begin to have a dim realization of the fact that
his unsatisfying plans, his shattered hopes, were but the mockery of
his false-hearted guide? Whatever he thought he kept it to himself, and
rose abruptly in the midst of the singing and went out.
"Come," said Farmer Morgan, breaking the hush following the last line,
"it is milking time, and time for a bit of supper, too, I guess. The
afternoon has been uncommon short."
He tried to speak as usual, but his voice was a trifle husky. He could
argue, but the story told his child had somehow subdued him. Who shall
say that the Spirit did not knock loudly, that Sabbath afternoon, at
the door of each heart in that room? Who shall say that he did not use
Louise Morgan's simple efforts to honour the day in stirring the rust
that had gathered about the hinges of those long-bolted doors?
CHAPTER VIII.
NEW LIGHT.
THE little, old-fashioned square "stand" was drawn up in front of the
stove, which last was opened to let a glow of brightness reach across
the room, and beside it were Lewis and Louise Morgan, seated for an
evening of good cheer. She had a bit of needle-work, in which she was
taking careful stitches; and her husband held in his hand, open to a
previously set mark, a handsomely bound copy of Shakespeare. He was one
of those rare persons—a good reader of Shakespeare; and, in the old
days at home, Louise had delighted to sit, work in hand, and listen to
the music of his voice in the rendering.
He had not commenced the regular reading, but was dipping into bits
here and there, while he waited for her to "settle," as he called the
bringing of her small work-basket, and the searching out her work. Now,
although she was "settled," and looking apparently thoughtful enough
for the saddest scenes from the great writer, he still continued his
glancings from page to page, breaking out presently with—
"Louise, do you remember this?"
"'I never did repent for doing good,
Nor shall not now; for in companions
That do converse and waste the time together,
Whose souls do bear an equal yoke of love,
There must be needs a like proportion
Of lineaments, of manners, and of spirit.'"
"Do you remember what a suggestive shrug of her shoulders Estelle gave
over the line—"
"'That do converse and waste the time together'?"
"I suspect she thought it fitted us precisely."
"Yes," Louise said, smiling in a most preoccupied way. That her
thoughts were not all on Shakespeare, nor even on that fairer object,
Estelle, she presently evinced by a question.
"Lewis, how far did Dorothy get in her studies?"
"Dorothy?" repeated her husband, looking up in surprise, and with
difficulty coming back from Shakespeare; "I don't know, I am sure. As
far, I remember hearing, as the teachers in our district school could
take her. That is not saying much, to be sure; though, by the way, I
hear they have an exceptionally good one this winter. Poor Dorothy
didn't have half a chance; I tried to manage it, but I couldn't. Hear
this, Louise,—"
"'How he glistens through my rust!
And how his piety does my deeds make the blacker!'"
"Isn't that a simile for you?"
"Very," said Louise; and her husband glanced at her curiously. What was
she thinking of, and how did that brief "very" fit in with Leontes'
wonderful simile?
"Well," he said, "are your thimbles and pins and things all ready,
wife? Shall I commence?"
"Not just yet, dear; I want to talk. What do you think about it; was
she disappointed at not having better opportunities?"
"Who? Oh, Dorothy! I thought you were talking about Hermione; she
fainted, you know. Yes, Dorothy was disappointed. She wanted to go to
the academy in town, and she ought to have had the opportunity, but we
couldn't bring it to pass. I was at home but a few weeks, or I might
have accomplished more. What is the trouble, Louise dear? How does it
happen that you find poor Dorothy more interesting than Shakespeare
to-night?"
"Well," said Louise, laughing, "it is true; I cannot get away from her;
her life seems so forlorn, somehow. I can't help being sorry for her.
She is losing her girlhood almost before it is time for it to bloom.
I have been wondering and wondering all day what there was that we
could do for her; and I find the real life being worked out before our
eyes so engrossing, that it is hard to come back to the dead lives of
Shakespeare."
Her husband closed the book, putting his finger between the leaves to
mark the place.
"I have studied that problem somewhat, Louise," he said earnestly, "in
the days gone by. I didn't succeed in making much of it. It is true,
as you say, that she is slipping away from girlhood, almost without
knowing that she has been a girl. Sometimes I think that she will have
only two experiences of life—childhood and old womanhood. Mother cannot
realize that she is yet any more than a child, to be governed, and to
obey; and one of these mornings it will be discovered that she is no
longer a child, but has passed middle life. Her future looks somewhat
dreary to me, I confess."
"We must not let it grow dreary," Louise said, with a determined tone,
and a positive setting of her small foot—a curious habit that she had
when very much in earnest. "What sense is there in it? She is young,
and in good health, and has a sound brain; why should she not make her
life what it ought to be? Why shouldn't we help her in a hundred ways?"
"Yes; but come down to actual, practical truth. What is there that
she can do for herself, or that we can do for her? You see, Louise,
our family is peculiar; there is no use in shutting one's eyes
to that fact. It is not because father is a farmer that we find
ourselves situated just as we are; other farmers have very different
experiences. We are surrounded on all sides with men who get their
living by cultivating the fields, whose sons and daughters are in
college, or seminary, and in society, and who, in every way, take as
good a position, and have as many advantages, as town-bred people—at
the expense, it is true, of some inconvenience and special labour. Of
course, it is also true that some of the sons and daughters do not
choose to accept all the advantages for cultivation; and equally, of
course, there are some who are unable to furnish the means for what
they would like their children to enjoy; but no greater proportion of
that class in the country than in town, I think. My father does not
belong to any of these classes; he is, as I said, peculiar."
At this point both husband and wife stopped to laugh over the
associations connected with that word "peculiar;" it bringing to the
minds of both reminders of Gough and Dickens, as well as many more
common characters which those two geniuses have caricatured.
"It is true, nevertheless," Lewis said, the laugh over. "Let me see
if I can explain. In the first place, both father and mother had, in
their youth, lives of grinding toil and poverty. Both were shrewd,
clear-headed people, with, I think, much more than the average share
of brains. The result is that, despite drawbacks and privations, they
made their way, acquiring, not thorough educations, it is true, but a
very fair degree of knowledge on all practical subjects. The amount
of information which my mother, for instance, possesses about matters
concerning which she would be supposed to know nothing would surprise
you. Perhaps the result of all this is natural; anyhow, it is evident.
They believe that the rubbing process is decidedly the best way to
secure education or anything else needed in this world. If one makes
his way in spite of obstacles, they believe it is because the grit is
in him, and must find its end."
"Had Dorothy, for instance, pushed her determination to attend school
in town, and get a thorough education; pushed it persistently—what you
would call doggedly—against argument and opposition, and everything
but absolute command—she would have won the prize, and both father and
mother would have, in a certain sense, respected her more than they do
now. But Dorothy was not of that mould. She wanted to go on with her
studies. Had everything been smooth before her, she would, doubtless,
have gone on, and made a fair scholar; but to stem a current, with so
much against her, required more effort of a certain kind than she knew
how to make."
"I conclude," said his wife, smiling brightly on him, "that you were
one of those who can push persistently."
He answered her smile, partly with a laugh, and partly with a shrug of
his handsome shoulders.
"I did push—most vehemently some of the time; worked my way part of the
time besides, as you know; but in the end I gained. Both father and
mother have a degree of pride in my persistence; it reminds them of
their own rugged natures."
"I wonder that Dorothy, crossed in her natural ambitions, did not run
into the extremes, on the question of dress and society, and, well—and
aimless going generally, without regard to quality or consequence. That
is the rock on which so many girls shipwreck."
"I think she would have done just that thing had she been given
opportunity. I think it is what both my father and mother were afraid
of. It has made them draw the reins of family government very tightly.
They simply commanded that singing-schools, and country school debating
societies, and social gatherings, should be ignored. We were all under
that command; so that the consequence is, we are almost as isolated
from our neighbours as though we had none. My mother did not feel the
need of society. She could not understand why any one should feel that
need; consequently, she has no society. There are good and pleasant
people around us, people whom it would be a pleasure to you to meet;
but they never come near us, because we have, as a family, given them
to understand that we have nothing to do with common humanity."
"What a strange idea! Do you know, I have wondered why it was that your
neighbours didn't call on me? I thought it must be that they had a
preconceived dislike for me, somehow."
"They have a preconceived belief that you will not care to see them.
You would be amused to see how this withdrawal from all friendships has
been translated. If father were a poor man, having a struggle to get
along, it would be set down as a dislike to mingling with those who
were better off in this world's goods than ourselves; but with his farm
stretching before their eyes in so many smiling acres, and with his
barns the finest and best stocked in the neighbourhood, we are looked
upon as a family too aristocratic to mingle with country people; which
is simply funny, when you take into consideration the fact that we
have never been other than country people ourselves, and that we live
much more plainly than any of our neighbours. But you can readily see
the effect on Dorothy; she has, in a degree, dropped out of life. The
occasional going to church on a pleasant Sunday, and going to market
with mother when both can, on rare occasions, be spared from home,
being her two excitements. She has hardly a speaking acquaintance with
the neighbours about us, and no associates whatever."
"Poor girl!" said Louise, and there was more than compassion in her
voice; there was a curious undertone of determination, which made her
husband smile, and wonder what this little woman, in whose capabilities
he thoroughly believed, would do.
"Haven't I established the validity of our claim to being 'peculiar'?"
he asked her.
"I should think you had! What has been the effect of the
'peculiarities' on John?"
Her husband's face instantly sobered, and there was a note of pain in
his voice.
"John has broken loose from the restraints in a degree—in a painful
degree. He has made his own associates; and they are of a kind that he
wouldn't care to bring home, if he had an opportunity. He is away very
frequently of evenings, it is difficult to tell where; but the daily
decrease of anything like manliness attests the unfortunate result. I
am more than suspicious that he is learning to drink something stronger
than cider; and I am sure that he occasionally, at least, smokes—two
vices that are my father's horror. He looks on with apparently mingled
feelings of anger and dismay. His pet theories of family government
have failed. He honestly desired to shield his children from evil
influences; he is comparatively satisfied with the result both in
Dorothy's case and mine. He doesn't know what to think of John. He has
spells of great harshness and severity connected with him, thwarting
everything that he undertakes in what must seem to John an utterly
unreasonable way; and yet I believe it is done with a sore heart, and
with an anxious desire for his good. And when my mother's face is most
immovable, I have learned to know that she is trying to quiet the
frightened beatings of her heart over the wrong-doings of her youngest
boy."
"Lewis," his wife said, interrupting the next word, and with intense
earnestness and solemnity in her voice, "we must save John for Christ,
and his father and mother."
"Amen. But how, dear, how?"
"Lewis, let's go right downstairs. They are all at home; I noticed it
as I came through the room; and they look so gloomy. Why shouldn't we
all have a pleasant evening together? Did you ever read anything to
them? I thought not. Now, don't you know they can't help enjoying your
reading? I mean to try it right away."
"Read Shakespeare?" her husband asked dryly, albeit there was also
dismay in his voice. To talk earnestly over a state of things, to
wish that all was different, was one thing; and to plunge right into
the midst of existing things, and try to make them differ, was quite
another. His wife answered his question with a bright little laugh.
"No, I don't believe they would enjoy Shakespeare yet, though I am by
no means sure that we can't have some good readings from him some time.
But let me see; I have a book that I am certain they will all like.
You never read it, and you ought to; it is worth any one's while to
read it." And she let fall spool and scissors, and went in eagerness to
the old-fashioned swinging-shelves, where she had arranged some of her
favourite books, selecting one from among them. "Here it is," she said;
"Estelle and I enjoyed this book wonderfully; so did papa. We read it
while mamma was away one winter, when we were dreary without her. John
will certainly be interested in the bear hunt; being a boy, he can't
help it; and I know mother will like to hear about that poor mother
down behind the beans."
"Behind the beans! What an extraordinary place for a mother to be! What
was she doing there?"
"Wait until you read it, my dear. You will like the book; people of
good sense always do."
"Thank you. But, Louise dear, do you think it a wise thing to try?
Remember what a disastrous failure I made on Sabbath. I don't believe I
am fitted for aggressive movements."
"I don't believe anybody but Christ knows yet whether your Sabbath
effort was all a failure, Lewis; and I don't believe that you and I
have any right with the results, if we did what we could. Besides, this
is different. I know you can read. Come."
"I can't see to read from the light of a tallow candle; I always
despised them."
"We will take the lamp," she said, with a defiant little nod of her
head toward the pretty bronze figure that held a shapely kerosene
lamp of newest pattern and improved burner, Lewis having searched the
lamp-stores over for just the right sort of offering for his bride. "We
will set it right beside mother, where it will throw just the right
angle of light on her work, and yet be shaded from her eyes; and we
will not hint, by word or glance, that she may possibly see better than
she does by her candle. Come, Lewis, carry it; it is too heavy for me.
I will bring the book and my work-basket."
"Mother despises dressing-gowns," her husband said, rising slowly,
and casting regretful looks at Shakespeare, the open fire, and his
lounging-chair, though it was neither the chair nor yet the book that
held him, but a horrible shrinking from this attempt at innovation, and
an almost certainty of disastrous failure.
"No, she doesn't; she only thinks so, because she isn't used to them,
and doesn't realize how much they save coats. I'm going to make John
one for Christmas, and a pair of slippers like those Estelle gave you
last year, and she will like them very much; you see if she doesn't.
Now we're ready."
CHAPTER IX.
A NEW CHAMPION.
IF the Sunday callers to the kitchen had astonished the family group,
this descent upon them with work-basket, book, and, above all, lamp,
fairly took from them the power of utterance—at least after Dorothy's
first startled exclamation, when she retired into flushed silence.
"Lewis was going to read to me," explained Louise, in a tone intended
to convey the idea that their proceeding was the most natural and
ordinary one imaginable, "and I thought it was a pity to waste a new
book on one person; so we came down for you all to hear. May I sit by
you, mother?"
Without waiting for answer, the artful daughter-in-law took her pretty
bronze lamp from her husband's hand, and, setting it in "just the right
angle," drew one of the wooden-seated chairs, and settled herself near
it before the audience had time to recover from its surprise.
"Now, Lewis, we're ready," she added, in complacent tone. She had
resolved not to venture on the doubtful question as to whether they
desired to hear any reading. If their consent was taken for granted,
what could they do but listen?
Nevertheless John seemed resolved not to be taken by guile; he drew
himself up, with a shuffling noise, and was evidently making ready for
flight. Her husband telegraphed a significant glance at Louise, which
said, as plainly as words could, that encouraging sentence, "I told you
so; John won't stay." But she saw the whole, and, while her heart beat
for the success of her scheme, her voice was prompt and assured.
"O John! Have you got to go to the barn so soon? Well, never mind,
we'll wait for you. I selected this book on purpose, because I was so
sure you would like it; it is a special favourite of mine."
Thus addressed, John, who had had no intention of going to the barn,
but simply of escaping, sat down again, for very astonishment;
and Lewis, who was both amazed and amused at his wife's boldness,
promptly seized the opportunity to commence his book without further
introduction.
It was nearly eight o'clock when the reading commenced, the usual hour
for the family to separate, but for an unbroken hour Lewis Morgan's
voice went steadily on. The shade of embarrassment which he felt at
first speedily lost itself in his genuine interest in the book, new
to him; and perhaps he never showed his reading powers to better
advantage. Louise, to whom the story was an old one, had leisure to
watch its effect on the group, and was more than satisfied with the
hushed way in which Mother Morgan laid down her great shears on the
uncovered stand, and finally transferred them to her lap, that their
clatter might not make her lose a word; at the knitting which dropped
from Dorothy's fingers, and lay unheeded, while she, unchid by mother,
fixed what were certainly great hungry eyes on the reader, and took
in every sentence; at the unwinking eyes of Father Morgan, who did
not interrupt the hour by a single yawn; but, above all, at the gleam
of intense satisfaction in John's face when the young minister came
off victor. Besides, did she, or did she not, hear a quick, suddenly
suppressed sigh coming from the mother's heart, as she listened to the
story of that other mother's wrestlings in prayer in her closet, "down
behind the beans." The loud-spoken clock, as it clanged out the hour of
nine, was the first interruption to the reading since it struck eight;
and Louise, mindful of the unwisdom of carrying her experiment too far,
hastened to change the programme.
"Why, Lewis, it is nine o'clock! It won't do to read any more."
And Lewis, who had many an evening read until ten, and occasionally
until eleven, to that other family group in the old home, looked up
with obtuseness exactly like a man, and was about to ask, "Why not?"
but the warning look in her eyes brought him back to the level of
present experiences; and, despite Dorothy's hungry eyes and John's
utter stillness indicating that he was entirely willing to hear more,
the book was promptly closed.
"Well," said Farmer Morgan, drawing a long breath, "that minister in
the book was a most likely chap as ever I heard of; if more of 'em
acted like that, I should have a higher opinion of them than I do. It's
a very well told story; now, that's a fact."
"A pack of lies, the whole of it." This from Mother Morgan; not said
severely, but in a deprecatory tone, as though she felt herself obliged
to say it, as a sort of punishment for having allowed herself to become
interested.
"Well, now," said Farmer Morgan, dropping his head to one side, with
a thoughtful air, "I don't know about that; there is nothing so
dreadfully unlikely about it. And that smart chap had a streak of good
luck and a streak of common sense; and I've known, myself, exactly
such a family as that set of boys, father and all, hard as they were.
Whether it is lies or not, it is told exactly as though it all might
have happened. I don't object to hearing it, anyhow. It takes up the
time, though; I had no idea it was nine o'clock."
"Nine o'clock isn't late," ventured Dorothy. "Stuart's folks sit up
till ten nearly every evening; I always see a light in their front room
when I go to bed."
"Yes, and they don't get up till long after daylight, and don't have
breakfast until it's almost time for dinner. I never brought my
children up to habits of that kind, thank fortune."
There was a good deal of sharpness in the mother's tone by this time.
The reaction was coming over her; she was growing vexed to think she
had allowed her heart to throb in sympathy with the trials of a mother
whose experience was only a "pack of lies," forgetting for the moment
that touches of the bitterness of that mother's experience over her
youngest born had already come to her. If only she would make the
experience of prayer her own!
Louise arose promptly; she was satisfied with her experiment, and
judged it wise to beat an immediate retreat.
"Come, Lewis," she said, her hand on the pretty lamp; "if I am late to
breakfast to-morrow morning, father will think it is a bad book. Isn't
that a dainty design for a lamp-handle, mother?"
"It's a dangerous thing to carry around," the mother said grimly,
meaning the lamp, and not the handle. "I never take up the paper that
I don't read about an accident of some sort with kerosene lamps. If I
could have had my way, there should never one of them have come into
this house."
"Oh, but this is a new patent; if Lewis should stumble and drop it, the
light would go instantly out. Look I just a little motion, such as, of
course, the lamp would get if it fell, and the light is gone." Suiting
the action to the word, the flame was instantly extinguished.
"There!" Lewis said, "now we are in darkness."
"I didn't mean to have it go quite out," Louise answered, laughing. "I
was only going to move it a little, to show mother. Never mind, John
will get us a candle; won't you, John?"
Thus appealed to, John arose slowly from his corner, went slowly to the
high mantel, where shone several beautifully polished candlesticks,
took from the paper-holder a paper match, applied it to his mother's
candle, solemnly lighted the other candle, and as solemnly handed it to
Louise; really performing the first act of simple courtesy for a lady
that he had ever done in his life.
"Thank you," she said, quite as a matter of course; yet it was actually
the first "thank you" of his grown-up life!
There were certainly two sides to John's gruffness. Louise would have
been amazed to know how that simple "thank you" thrilled him! He looked
after the bright vision on which the stair-door closed, and had strange
stirrings in his heart, the name of which he did not know.
"If I had dared," began Louise, as soon as they were in the privacy of
their own room, "I would have substituted that big, old Bible for this
book during the last ten minutes, and asked you to read a chapter, and
pray with us all. I believe your father would have liked it. I don't
believe he is as indifferent to these things as he seems."
"It is well you don't dare," her husband said gravely; "I am afraid I
should have disappointed you. Louise, I don't believe I could have done
that; it looks to me like an almost impossible thing."
"Why, Lewis, you led at family worship at home right before papa and
mamma and Estelle; and, sometimes, when the house was full of company!"
"That was a very different thing," he answered earnestly. "I felt then
that the head of the house was in sympathy with me, and joined in the
reading and the praying. It was like a company of brothers and sisters
talking together with their father; but here it is different. My
father's tendency would be to make light of the whole thing."
"I don't believe it," she said positively. "I can't believe that he
would make light of an earnest, simple prayer, such as you would offer.
It is the profession of godliness, and an absence of the fruit that
he naturally expects to see in lives, which inclines him to ridicule.
That sounds harsh, Lewis, but I don't mean harshness. What I mean is,
that he evidently expects great things of Christians, and their lives,
naturally enough, disappoint him. How do you know, dear, but that your
very silence, or reserve, toward him on these subjects leads him to
question the degree of anxiety you have for his conversion?"
Whatever Lewis Morgan thought of this direct question he made no
definite answer, and the subject dropped.
All things considered, Louise was well pleased with the result of one
evening's sacrifice; for to give up the delightful privacy of their
own room, and their own plans, and listen to a book that she had read
before, was of course somewhat of a sacrifice. Its result elated her;
she felt that her position in the family was on a more assured footing,
and looked forward to the accomplishment of other little plans with a
greater degree of certainty of success than she had felt heretofore.
What a pity that her complacent feelings should have been put to rout
through the intervention of a boiled dinner!
A victim to old-fashioned dinners of that type once explained to a
novice the method of making them after this fashion: "You take a few
of everything that grows in the garden, and dump them all together,
with some slab-sided beef and a little pork, and let them boil for
hours and hours, sending a remarkable odour through the house, which
penetrates through every tightly-closed door and window; and then
serve with quarts of slush!" Whether this recipe would be acknowledged
by the lovers of such dinners or not, it exactly describes the state
of nerves with which a few people sit down to them. Now, I beg you
will not fall into the mistake of supposing my friend Louise to be
an epicure, or of being unreasonably dainty as to the food which she
ate. On the contrary, if her friends had but known it, she had the
comfortable natural appetite which a healthy condition of stomach and
brain are likely to produce. She was not one of those unhappy beings
to whom the sight and smell of food which they do not happen to like
is positive torture; on the contrary, Mother Morgan might have had a
boiled dinner three days out of every week, had she chosen; and so long
as the bread-tray was piled high with generous slices of good, sweet,
home-made bread, and the butter-dish held its roll of hard, yellow,
glistening butter, and the generous-sized pitcher brimmed with creamy
milk, Louise would have made a dinner fit for a queen, in her own
estimation. For when was a healthy city maiden other than rejoiced over
real country butter and cream?
The trouble lay in the fact that poor Mother Morgan herself had
nerves. Albeit she despised the name, and considered all such matters
as modern inventions of fashionable society, it was just as surely an
over-wrought and undisciplined state of nerves which caused her to
visit hard-voiced displeasure on certain innocent tastes differing from
her own, as though she had expressed it with a burst of tears. Did
you ever have for a hostess one who accepted it as a personal insult
if you declined any dish of her preparing? If not, you are fortunate.
But just such an one was Mother Morgan: Her family had, for years and
years, partaken, with a fair degree of relish, of cabbage and turnip
and potato and beets and beef and parsnips and pork, all dwelling in
friendly nearness in the same large pot. Nay, they had appreciated
sometimes in addition, little round, yellow balls, known to the
initiated to be meal balls, but tasting to the ignorant like nothing so
much as sawdust wetted up with a little pork gravy.
With a feeling nearly akin to dismay did Louise watch the lading of the
plate which she knew was intended for her. How was she ever to dispose
of that mass, which, from the unmeshed turnip down to the yellow
cannon-balls, she disliked? If she might only say, "No, thank you," and
betake herself to the inviting-looking bread and butter and milk! Why
need people have nerves leading straight to their palates, and, in this
world of infinite variety, take the trouble to be aggrieved because
tastes differ? Meekly she received the well-laden plate, meekly she
sliced bits of potato and minced at the turnip, even taking delicate
nibbles of the stump of cabbage, which she detested. All to no purpose.
Mrs. Morgan was watching her with jealous eyes. What right had she to
presume to dislike so savoury a dinner? Presently her indignation found
vent in words.
"I don't see but we shall have to set a separate table for you; it
seems you can't stand the dishes we are used to. I don't want you to
starve on our hands, I'm sure."
Despite the fact that Louise had just received a letter full of
tenderness from the dear mother at home—a tenderness which made this
mother a sharp contrast—she was enabled to laugh, as she answered,
pleasantly,—
"Oh, mother, I'm in no danger of starving. It seems to me that I like
your bread and butter better than any I ever tasted. I suppose I am
somewhat peculiar in my tastes; but I always find plenty to eat."
If people could see into each other's hearts, or if people could keep
still when they ought, it might yet have been well. But it chanced that
life had gone awry with the young husband that morning. A discussion
had arisen between his father and himself concerning certain farming
plans, and a decided difference of opinion had developed, during which
the son expressed himself warmly and positively; and the father,
waxing indignant, had sharply informed him that going to college and
Australia, and marrying a fine lady for a wife, didn't make a farmer.
Had Lewis found a moment's leisure and privacy with his wife, and he
had spoken his thoughts, they would have been somewhat after this
fashion:
"I am discouraged with the whole thing; we never can assimilate. If it
were not for you, I should be miserable; you are the joy of my heart,
and my rest." Then Louise would have comforted and encouraged him.
As it was, believing in her wholly, and being just then desirous that
she should appear perfect in the eyes of his father, he addressed her
in a disturbed, not to say almost vexed tone, albeit it was a low one,—
"Do, Louise, pretend to eat something, whether you accomplish it or
not."
Louise could never understand how it was; she had not supposed herself
one of the nervous sort; but just then and there arose such a lump
in her throat, that to have taken another mouthful would have been
impossible; and, to her dismay and chagrin, there rushed into her eyes
actual tears!
Then up rose John to the emergencies of the situation.
"Why, in the name of common sense, can't you all let folks eat what
they like, without nagging at them all the time? I never touch cabbage,
and won't no more than I will touch a frog, and you let me alone; why
can't you her?"
Whereupon Dorothy was so amazed, that she continued pouring milk into
the bowl long after it had brimmed, her eyes fixed, meantime, on her
younger brother's face. As for Lewis, he seemed stricken with remorse
for his words, apparently realizing at this moment how they sounded.
But Louise was so pleased with John's evident desire to champion her,
and so amused that it should seem to be necessary to shield her on a
question of cabbage or not cabbage, that the ludicrous side of the
matter came uppermost, and, as she laughed, the lump in her throat
vanished.
"Thank you," she said gaily to John; "don't you like cabbage, either?
I'm glad of it. We'll form a compact to stand by each other for freedom
without cabbage."
Something approaching to a smile hovered over John's face, and Dorothy
giggled outright.
CHAPTER X.
FISHING.
SUNDAY morning dawned at last, with as bright a sunshine as ever May
produced. The air was crisp and clear, and the level road was frozen
hard. Look which way he would, Farmer Morgan would have found it hard
to produce an excuse why the family should not appear in church. To
be sure, he often said that he didn't "feel like going;" and as John
wouldn't go, that had heretofore settled the matter for the mother and
Dorothy, whether they would or not. But on this morning, Louise and
Lewis came from their room evidently dressed for the day; and Louise,
with confident air, remarked—
"What a nice morning for a ride! if one didn't care for church-going,
it would be pleasant to get out to-day."
In Lewis's mind were some doubts as to who of the family could go,
as the small spring-waggon would not accommodate more than four; but
Farmer Morgan settled it by saying in positive voice—
"You'll have to go to-day, John, and drive. I've got a stiff neck, and
I don't feel like going out."
"I guess Lewis hasn't forgot how to drive," John began sullenly: "I
ain't going to church."
"You can go to church or not, just as you like, when you get down
there, I s'pose; but you will have to drive the horses, for the colt
has got to go, and she isn't used to Lewis, and I won't have him drive
her. It would look more decent to go to church, I think; but you've got
so you don't care much about decency, and I s'pose you'll do as you
please.—You going, mother?"
"No!" said Mrs. Morgan promptly; "I'll get the dinner. Dorothy can go,
if she likes."
And the instant glow on Dorothy's cheek told that she "liked." Only
John was sullen; he did not recover during the entire ride; spoke only
to the horses, save when Dorothy gave little frightened jumps when the
colt seemed to her not to be moving with propriety; then the driver
snappishly directed her to "sit still and not act like a simpleton."
Arrived at the church door, he sat still, allowing Lewis to alight and
wait on the ladies.
"Let us wait for John," Louise said, as her husband turned from the
waggon; "it is nicer to all go in together."
John opened his lips, and if ever lips were going to say, "John isn't
coming," his were; but he hesitated, looked down at the young, earnest
face turned with a confident air toward him, then turned away, snapped
his whip, and said nothing.
"You'll be here in a minute, won't you, John?"
"Yes," he said, or rather snapped, as though he was disgusted with
himself for the answer; then giving the colt a smart touch with the
whip, she curveted around the corner in a style which would surely have
made Dorothy scream had she been behind her.
"That is only a little short of a miracle," Lewis said in surprise. "I
never knew John to compromise his dignity by going to church after he
had announced that he wasn't going, and that announcement is the rule
rather than the exception."
"I felt as though he must come to church this morning, somehow," Louise
made answer in a low tone. "I couldn't give it up; it has been the
burden of my prayer all the morning."
To which remark Lewis Morgan had no reply to make; he remembered, with
a sudden sting of conscience, that he had not so much as thought of
his brother's name in prayer that morning. Reasoning upon common sense
principles, how much could he have desired his presence in the church?
It was a quiet little village church, looking natural enough to the
eyes of the usual worshippers; but what a strange feeling it gave
Louise! She was accustomed to broad, soft-carpeted aisles; richly
carved and upholstered seats; costly pulpit furnishing; massive
organ, with solemn tones filling the church. Here her feet trod on
bare floors, and the old-fashioned pew, to which she was ushered, had
neither footstool nor cushion, though it was high enough to demand the
one and hard enough to suggest the other. The red and yellow tassels,
which depended from the pulpit cushion, were frayed and faded; the
sun streamed in unpleasantly from windows that boasted of neither
shades nor blinds; and there was a general air of dilapidation about
everything. She looked around with curious eyes on the congregation:
their appearance was not in keeping with the surroundings; they looked
well-dressed and well-bred, as if the most of them might have come out
from comfortable homes to spend this hour together. To all such, what
a painful contrast between the comforts and the luxuries of their own
homes must the house of God have presented; while to those who came
from desolate homes, if there were any such, what attractions did the
place offer? "It isn't even clean," the new-comer said to herself,
her lip almost curling as she saw the stray bits of paper and card
scattered over the floor, and the dust lying loosely everywhere. "If
they care for the church at all, why don't they keep it in order?"
When the service commenced the feeling of discomfort was not removed.
The little choir, perched high in air away at the back of the church,
would not at that distance and height have been able to "lead the
congregation," had they been so disposed. Their voices were clear and
in fair tone, and the little parlour organ was originally sweet-voiced,
but the whole was so marred by a high-keyed, distressing squeak,
that Louise found it difficult to keep back the frowns. She bowed
her head during the prayer, and succeeded in getting into the spirit
of communion; then waited eagerly for the sermon. The words of the
text rang with a suggestive thought: "The life is more than meat, and
the body more than raiment." But alas for the sermon! What was the
matter with it? It was true; it was well written and well read; it was
carefully logical; it sought to impress upon the minds of his hearers
what a wonderful and glorious and endless thing was life. And John and
Dorothy, those two for whom Louise had most anxious desire, listened—or
appeared to listen—to the wonderful possibilities of this life and the
wonderful certainties of the future, and were as indifferent to the one
as the other, neither serving to lift the bored look from their faces.
As Louise watched, and saw how little they were getting, Satan appeared
to her, suggesting to her heart that perplexing and harassing question
with which he delights to weary those who have tried: "What good," said
he, "will it do to have those two young people come to this church and
listen to this sermon? Do you believe they have gotten a single new
idea or aspiration? Don't you feel nearly certain that they will go
home less impressible than they came? Because you must remember that
every presentation of the truth either helps or hardens. Of what use
were all your plans and prayers? What availed your little thrill of
thanksgiving over the success of your scheme? Don't you see it will
amount to less than nothing?" Is not it strange that the followers of
Christ will go on, year after year, bending a listening ear to Satan,
while he rings the changes of that old, long ago vanquished falsehood,
"If thou be the Son of God"? "If the Lord had cared anything about
your efforts to serve him," said the tempter on this Sunday morning,
"wouldn't he have planned this whole service differently? You believe
that he could have done it; why didn't he? You know very well that
there hasn't been a thing said that would be in the least likely to
help these two persons."
What should Louise do? Here she was, in the house of God, and here was
this tempting demon at her elbow. Who was it that said, "Whoever else
stays away from church, Satan never does"? Whoever said it, the thought
flashed over this tried soul suddenly, and she bowed her head to speak
a word to that triumphant Conqueror who passed through the conflict
centuries ago, and is "able to succour them that are tempted." Did he
speak again the word of command, "Get thee hence, Satan"? Assuredly he
came himself and stood beside her, and she was enabled to remember that
her part was to plant and water as she could, the fruit thereof being
God's part, and his unchangeable "doubtless" was added to the promise
of success. In the hymn and prayer that followed heart and spirit
joined, and as Louise Morgan raised her head after the benediction, she
felt that this was indeed the house of God and the gate of heaven. He
had verified his promise yet again, and met her in his temple.
Nevertheless, her first spoken words after the service would not have
seemed to many to be in keeping with the hour—
"John, what on earth is the matter with that organ?"
Despite the habitual frown on John's face, he was betrayed into a
laugh, there was so much intensity in the questioner's voice.
"Why, it needs a drop or two of oil," he said promptly; "and has needed
it ever since I can remember. Anybody would think they considered the
squeak an addition to the music, by the way they hang on to it."
"Is it possible that a little oil is all that is needed to stop that
horrible sound? Why don't you fix it?"
"I?" said John, turning full, astonished eyes on her, surprised out of
his reserve and his frowns.
"Why, certainly; how can you endure it for so long? Do, John, fix it
before next Sunday; it spoils the music. I could hardly enjoy even the
words, because of that dreadful sound. How many things there are that
ought to be done here. Why do they leave the church in this shape?
Isn't there a sexton?"
"Why, yes," said John, "I suppose so. Of course there must be; he rings
the bell and makes the fires."
"But never sweeps," added Louise, smiling, "nor dusts. John, if you can
prevail on him to do some sweeping this week, I'll come down with you,
when you come to oil that organ, and do the dusting. Wouldn't that be
an improvement?"
"When you come to oil that organ!" The sentence had so strange a sound
that John repeated it to himself. Was it possible that he was coming to
oil the church organ? She spoke very confidently, quite as though it
were a settled matter. And yet he would almost as soon have expected to
see himself coming to preach the sermon! What would the people think of
his going into the church on a week day? No one remembered better than
he that of late his presence on the Sabbath had been a rarity. He had
been on the verge of telling her that he had not been hired to keep the
church in order, but neither had she been hired to dust it; and he was
quick-witted enough to see that after the dusting scheme was proposed
his subterfuge would not do.
"Oh well," he said to himself, "she'll forget it. Catch me oiling the
church organ! If it groaned loud enough to be heard ten miles off I
wouldn't touch it!" And he honestly thought he would not; he had a
vindictive feeling for that old organ.
This conversation had consumed much less time than it has taken me to
give it. They were passing down the aisle, John having been withheld
from his usual habit of rushing out the instant the Amen was spoken
by the sudden question that had been put to him. Now Louise turned
his thoughts into another channel. Her husband had been waylaid by a
gentleman who seemed anxious to have his opinion on some church matter;
she was therefore at leisure to fish for John.
"I don't want to go home without being introduced to the minister," she
said. "There he comes now. Will you introduce me, John?"
"I don't know him," answered John shortly. The tone added, "And I don't
want to."
"Don't you? Oh, he's a new-comer. Well, then, let's introduce
ourselves."
He was just beside them now, and aided her plans, holding out his hand
with a genial "Mrs. Morgan, I believe." He was a young, bright-faced
man, cheery of voice and manner, and more winning, apparently, anywhere
else than he was in the pulpit. Louise returned his hand-clasp
cordially, and hastened to say—
"My brother, Mr. Morgan; my sister, Miss Morgan. We are all strangers
together, I believe. You have been here but a short time, I understand?"
"Why, yes," the minister said, flushing slightly—he was comparatively
a new-comer—remembering, meantime, the embarrassing fact that he had
been there quite long enough to get acquainted with that portion of his
flock which seemed to him worth cultivating. "I have not gotten out to
Mr. Morgan's yet, but I hope to do so this week. What day will you be
most at leisure, Mrs. Morgan?"
"Oh," said Louise brightly, "we shall be glad to see you at any time;
suppose you come on Tuesday," thinking, meantime, of one or two
little pet schemes of her own. "Shall we expect you to tea?—John, we
would like to have him take tea with us, wouldn't we? You haven't an
engagement for Tuesday, have you?"
Thus appealed to, what was there for John but to stammer out an answer,
over which he ruminated half the way home. Was it possible that he
had engaged to be at home on Tuesday, to meet the minister, and had
actually seconded his invitation to tea? How came he to do it? What
were the words he said? How happened he to say them? He felt very much
bewildered, somewhat vexed, and just a very trifle interested. There
was certainly nothing in the minister to like, and he did not like
him; moreover, he did not mean to like him. What was it, then, that
interested him? He did not quite know. He wondered what loophole of
escape he could find for Tuesday; also he wondered whether he really
and truly was determined to escape. Altogether, John did not understand
his own state of mind.
"O Lewis," said Mrs. Morgan, just as they were nearing home, "do you
suppose anybody would object if you were to cut those dreadful-looking
yellow tassels from the pulpit and tack a neat little braid, such as
upholsterers use, around it? John and I are going down there, some day
this week, to fix up things, and you may go along and upholster the
pulpit if you want to."
"John and you!"
The astonishment in her husband's voice made Louise's eyes laugh; but
her tones were steady. "Yes, he is going to stop that dreadful squeak
in the organ; isn't that terrible? It just spoiled the music, and it
would have been good but for that. I've promised to dust if there can
be some sweeping done. O John, did you speak to the sexton? No? Well, I
am not sure that it is very Sunday work; but when can you see him?"
Then Dorothy roused to the occasion—
"The sexton comes every morning to get a can of milk for some of his
customers at the village."
"Oh, does he? Then you can see him. John, you will attend to it
to-morrow morning, won't you? And have it done before Wednesday,
because then the church will be warmed for prayer-meeting, and we can
get it ready more comfortably. I wonder if those lamps don't smoke?
They look as if they might."
"They used to smoke fiercely enough when I knew them last," her husband
said. "I haven't been down in the evening since I came home from
Australia."
Here was certainly a revelation to Louise. Her husband had not been to
the church prayer-meeting since he came from Australia, eight months
before! But she made no comment. Dorothy, having once determined to
speak, had more to say—
"They look as though they hadn't been washed for forty years! I never
saw such black things in my life!"
"Suppose you enlist with us, Dorothy? Go down on Wednesday, and let's
put the lamps in order. We'll let Lewis buy some wicks and chimneys for
his share. I saw that two of the chimneys were broken; those two lamps
will smoke, of course."
John laughed outright.
"I believe you saw every crack and corner of the church," he said,
speaking almost good-naturedly.
And Dorothy spoke her troubled thought—
"I don't know anything about kerosene lamps. I don't suppose I could
fix one to save my life."
"I know all about them; papa used to have one in his office that I took
care of, and mamma used one for sewing. I can show you all about them
in five minutes. Will you go?"
"Well," said Dorothy, veiling her eagerness as well as she could, "I'd
be willing, but I don't believe mother will."
"Yes, she will; I'll look out for that."
It was neither Lewis nor Louise that made this startling promise, but
John himself!
"Was it quite according to Sunday observance to make all those
plans?" Louise asked her husband, smiling, but a shade of trouble,
nevertheless, in her voice. "Sometimes those things trouble me. I had
Sunday plans at heart, but I'm afraid they didn't show very plainly."
"Well, I don't know: to brighten the church, so that it shall be a more
tolerable spot, is important, certainly. It is a very desirable thing
to accomplish, Louise. But I don't see how you coaxed John into it."
"I want the church to look better, it is true," Louise said,
thoughtfully; "but, after all, that is secondary. Lewis, I want John
and Dorothy."
CHAPTER XI.
GRACE SUFFICIENT.
MRS. MORGAN, senior, with her long check apron, reaching to within an
inch of the hem of her dress, her sleeves rolled to her elbow, her arms
akimbo, stood in the kitchen door, and regarded Dorothy with an air of
mute astonishment for about two minutes, then her thoughts found vent
in words:—
"And did she invite him to tea her own self?"
"Yes," said Dorothy, a curious mixture of satisfaction and glumness in
her tones; "she did, with her own lips. I didn't say a word, and Lewis
wasn't there; he was talking with Deacon Spalding, just behind us; and
John didn't speak, of course, till he spoke to him."
"Well, I never!" said Mrs. Morgan; then, after a somewhat lengthy
pause, "Seems to me she is taking things into her own hands most
amazing fast: nothing but a stranger herself, and gone to inviting
company! Without even waiting to see if it would be convenient, either!
There's extra work, too. I suppose, though, she thinks she can sit in
the front room and entertain him, and we can do the work."
"I s'pose she is so used to company that she don't think anything about
it, and doesn't know that other folks do. It isn't a dreadful thing to
have the minister come to tea; for my part, I'm glad he is coming."
After this sudden marvellous outburst from Dorothy, her mother turned
and surveyed her again, in bewildered fashion. Who had ever before
heard Dorothy express an outright opinion contrary to her mother's?
While she was meditating how to treat this strange development, the
hall door opened, and Louise, broom and dust-pan in hand, a quaint
little sweeping-cap set on her head, appeared on the scene. She dashed
into the subject in mind at once:—
"Mother, has Dorothy mentioned that Mr. Butler is coming to tea? We
didn't think about the extra ironing or we might have chosen some other
night.—Why didn't you remind me, Dorrie?—You must let me do all the
extra work, to pay for my carelessness. I have come down now to put the
front room in order; or shall I help in the kitchen first?"
What was a woman to do who had managed her own household with a high
hand for more than thirty years, thus unceremoniously taken by storm?
She turned her gaze from Dorothy to Louise, and stood regarding her for
a second, as if in no doubt what to say; then, with a bitterness of
tone that Louise did not in the least understand, said—
"Do just exactly what you please; which I guess is what you are in the
habit of doing, without asking permission."
Then she dashed into the outer kitchen, and set up such a clatter with
the pots and kettles there that she surely could not have overheard a
word had many been said.
Louise, with honest heart, desiring to do what was right, was by no
means infallible, and yet was quick-witted she discovered that she had
blundered. It flashed before her that Mother Morgan thought she was
trying to rule the household and reorganize the home society—trying,
indeed, to put her, the mother, aside. Nothing had been further from
her thoughts. She stood transfixed for a moment, the rich blood rolling
in waves over her fair face at thought of this rude repulse of her
cheery effort to play that she was at home and act accordingly. It was
as Dorothy said: she was so accustomed to the familiar sentence, "Come
in and take tea," that it fell from her lips as a matter of course;
especially had she been one of those trained to a cordial heartiness
as regarded her pastor. Her invitation to Mr. Butler had been
unpremeditated, and, she now believed, unwise. Yet how strange a sense
of loneliness and actual homesickness swept over her as she realized
this. How difficult it was to step at all! How she must guard her words
and her ways; how sure she might be of giving offence when nothing
in her past experience could foreshadow such an idea to her! Was it
possible that in her husband's home she was not to feel free to extend
hospitalities when and where she chose? Could she ever hope to grow
accustomed to such a trammelled life? She stood still in the spot where
her mother-in-law had transfixed her—the dust-pan balanced nicely, that
none of its contents might escape; the broom being swayed back and
forth slowly by a hand that trembled a little; the fair, pink-trimmed
cambric sweeping-cap, that was so becoming to her, and so useful in
shielding her hair from dust, heightening now the flush on her face. If
she had but known it, in the new mother's eyes that sweeping-cap was
one of her many sins.
"The idea of prinking up in a frilled cap to sweep!" had that lady
exclaimed, the first time she saw it, and she drove the coarse comb
through her thin gray hair as she spoke, regardless of the fact that
much dust had settled in it from that very morning's sweeping.
"It keeps her hair clean, I'm sure," had Dorothy interposed; "and you
are always for keeping things most dreadfully clean."
"Clean!" had the mother exclaimed, vexed again, at she hardly knew
what; "so will a good washing in soap and water, and look less
ridiculous besides. What do you catch me up in that way for whenever I
say anything? Attend to the dishes, and don't waste your time talking
about hair; and if you ever stick such a prinked-up thing on your head
as that, I'll box your ears."
What could there have been in the little pink cap to have driven the
mother into such a state? She rarely indulged in loud-voiced sentences.
It was unfortunate for Louise that this episode had occurred but a
short time before; and it was fortunate for her that she did not and
could not guess what the innocent cap, made by Estelle's deft fingers,
had to do with Mrs. Morgan's state of mind. Had she known that such
a very trifle had power over the new mother's nerves, it might have
appalled her. We grieve sometimes that we cannot know other people's
hearts, and foresee what would please and what would irritate.
Sometimes in our blindness we feel as if that certainly would have been
the wiser way; yet I doubt if Louise's courage would not have utterly
forsaken her could she have seen the heart of her husband's mother as
she rattled the pots and kettles in the outer kitchen. Hearts calm
down wonderfully sometimes; what need then to know of their depths
while at boiling-point? But what sights must the all-seeing God look
down upon—sights, in tenderness, shut away from the gaze of his weak
children.
Poor Louise! It was such a little thing, and she felt so ashamed for
allowing herself to be ruffled. Several states of feeling seemed
knocking for admittance. She almost wished that she could go to that
outer kitchen and slam the door after her, and set the dust-pan down
hard before the cross lady, and say to her,—
"There! take your broom and your dust-pan, and do your own sweeping up
in John's room after this, and let Lewis and me go home to mother. You
are not a mother at all; the name does not fit you. I know what the
word means; I have had a mother all my life, and I begin to think Lewis
has never had."
What if she should say something like that? What a commotion she could
make! It was not that she had the least idea of saying it; it was
simply that she felt, "What if I should?"—Satan's earliest and most
specious form, oftentimes, of presenting a temptation. Also, there was
that unaccountable tendency to a burst of tears; she felt as though
she could hardly keep them back, even with Dorothy's gray eyes looking
keenly at her. Just a little minute served for all these states of
feeling to surge by; then Dorothy broke the silence, roused out of her
timidity by a struggling sense of injustice.
"You mustn't mind what mother says; she speaks out sometimes sharp.
Anybody who didn't know her would think she was angry, but she isn't;
it is just her way. She isn't used to company either, and it kind of
flurries her; but she will be real glad to have had Mr. Butler here
after it is all over."
Such a sudden rush of feeling as came to Louise, borne on the current
of these words—words which she knew cost Dorothy an effort, for she
had been with her long enough, and watched her closely enough, to
realize what a painful hold timidity had gotten on her. But these
eager, swiftly-spoken words, so unlike her usual hesitation, evinced a
kindly tenderness of feeling for Louise herself that the lonely young
wife reached after and treasured gratefully. The tears rolled down her
cheeks, it is true—they had gotten too near the surface to control, and
were determined for once to have their way; but she looked through them
with a smile at Dorothy, nay, she set down her dust-pan suddenly and
dropped her broom, and went over to the astonished girl and kissed her
heartily.
"Thank you," she said brightly, "you good sister Dorrie; you have
helped me ever so much. Of course mother doesn't mean to scold me;
and if she did, mothers are privileged, and should be loved so much
that little scoldings can be taken gratefully, especially when they
are deserved, as mine is. I ought to have asked her whether it would
be convenient to have company. But never mind; we'll make the best of
it, and have a good time all round. And, Dorothy, let us be real true
sisters, and help each other, and lore each other. I miss my sister
Estelle."
It was the last word she dared trust herself to speak; those
treacherous tears desired again to choke her. She turned abruptly from
Dorothy and ran upstairs, leaving the dust-pan a central ornament of
the kitchen floor. Hidden in the privacy of her own room, the door
locked on the world below, Louise sat down in the little home-rocker
and did what would have thoroughly alarmed her own mother because of
its unusualness—buried her head in her hands and let the tears have
their way.
She had managed to control herself before Dorothy, to smile brightly on
her, and to feel a thrill of joy over the thought that she had touched
that young person's heart. But all this did not keep her from being
thoroughly roused and indignant toward her mother-in-law. What right
had she to treat her as though she were an interloper? Was not she the
wife of the eldest son, who toiled early and late, bearing burdens
at least equal to, if not greater than, his father? "What that woman
needs," said a strong, decided voice in her ear, "is to realize that
there are other people in this world beside herself. She has been a
tyrant all her life. She manages everybody; she thinks she can manage
you. It is for her good as well as your own that you undeceive her. You
owe it to your self-respect to go directly down to that outer kitchen,
where she is banging the kettles around, and say to her that you must
have an understanding. Are you one of the family, with rights, as a
married daughter, to invite and receive guests as suits your pleasure,
or are you a boarder simply?—in which case you are entirely willing to
pay for the trouble which your guests may make."
Every nerve in Louise's body seemed to be throbbing with the desire
to help her carry out this advice. It was not merely the sting of
the morning, but an accumulation of stings which she felt had been
gathering ever since she came into the house. But who was the bold
adviser? It startled this young woman not a little to realize that her
heart was wonderfully in accord with his suggestions. As usual, there
was war between him and another unseen force. Said that other,—
"It is a trying position, to be sure. You have many little things to
bear, and it is quite probable, your life having been so shielded
heretofore, that they seem to you great trials. But, you will remember,
I never promised you should not be tried; I only pledged myself that
your strength should be equal to your day. And, really, there has no
temptation taken you but such as is common to men. And I am faithful: I
will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able."
Surely she knew this voice, and recognized this message sent to her so
long ago, and proved true to her experience so many times.
"But," said that other one, "you really are not called upon to endure
insults. It is a perfectly absurd position. If you had gone out
as a home missionary, or were among uncouth people who had had no
advantages, and to whom you were not in any sense related, it would
do to talk of bearing trials; but in this case what right have your
husband's family to put trials of this sort upon you? You have a
perfect right to please yourself, and they ought to know it."
"Yes," said that other voice, "there are undoubtedly some things that
they ought to know; but then 'even Christ pleased not himself.'"
"But it is so absurd! She is evidently vexed because you have invited
her own pastor to take tea with her—the most natural and reasonable
thing in the world. She ought to want him to come. The idea of having
trouble over such a trifle as that!"
"Yes; but, after all, are there not two sides to even that? How did you
know but it would be extremely inconvenient for your new mother to see
her pastor just at the time you set?"
"I never thought of such a thing. In our house it was always convenient
to see people."
"Why not tell her that you didn't think of it, omitting the reference
to the different conditions of your own home? Because, you know, you
never like to have people suggest uncomplimentary comparisons to you;
therefore, by the rule which you profess to have accepted, you must not
hint them to others."
"But," said that other one, "it is an unnecessary humiliation for you
to go to her and apologize, as though you had done something wrong.
The idea! You should certainly have some regard to your position.
Because you came here full of schemes for usefulness, eager to do her
good, is no reason why you should tamely submit to such treatment as
this—least of all, offer an apology for what you had no idea would be
disagreeable; besides, you almost apologized, and how did she receive
it?"
Then that other voice,—
"Remember the word that I said unto you—'The servant is not greater
than his lord.'"
And straightway there surged over Louise Morgan's soul such a sense of
"remembrance" of that other's patience, and meekness, and forgiveness,
and humiliation, such a remembrance of his thirty years of sorrowful
cross-bearing for her, that there surely was verified to her another
of the promises: "He shall bring all things to your remembrance."
Moreover, her eyes being opened by the searching Spirit, she saw who
that counsellor was, with his suggestion of self-respect and wounded
dignity and position—always at variance with that other one, always
directly contradicting, always eagerly putting "self" between Christ
and his work. The tears came down in showers; but they were shed in a
lowly attitude, for this troubled young soul sank on her knees.
"O Christ," she said, "thou didst conquer him years ago. He desires to
have me; but, thou mighty One, bid him leave me, for thou art pledged
that thou wilt with the temptation provide a way of escape. And now,
dear Christ, help me to show such a spirit of meekness and unfaltering
cheerfulness of spirit before Lewis's mother that she shall be led, not
to me, but to thyself."
It was a very peaceful face which presented itself in the kitchen not
many moments thereafter, and the voice that spoke seemed to Dorothy,
who looked on and listened, the very essence of the morning sunshine.
"Mother, it was certainly very careless in me to invite anybody to tea
without first learning whether it would be convenient for you. If you
will forgive me this time I won't do it a 'bit more.' That is what my
little sister says when she gets into trouble. Now, I want to know if
you will let me hang some of my pictures in the parlour; I've been
unpacking them, and I don't know what to do with half of them."
"Of course," said Mother Morgan. "Fix the parlour as you want it. It
never was called a parlour before in its life; but I daresay that is
as good a name as any. The extra ironing is no consequence anyhow; we
always have enough to eat. He might as well come to-day as any time,
for all I know."
Then she dashed out at that end door again, and set the outer kitchen
door open, and stood in it looking off toward the snowy hills. Nobody
over apologized to her before; it gave her a queer feeling.
"Well," said Dorothy, addressing the dust-pan after Louise had vanished
again, "I never could have said that in the world. After what mother
said to her too. I don't care; I like her first-rate. There now."
CHAPTER XII.
DIFFERENT SHADES.
THAT front room was square and bare; at least that last word expresses
the impression which it made upon Louise as she stood surveying it.
There were several things that she felt sure she could do to brighten
it, but the question turned on expediency. How much would it be wise to
undertake?
It is a curious fact that the people who, from choice or necessity,
have contented themselves with paper window-shades, have also been the
people fated to choose for these ungainly creations colours that would
fight with the shades of carpet and wall-paper. Those in the Morgan
household were the ugliest of their kind, and the initiated know that
is saying a great deal. The ground-work was blue. Who ever saw a tint
of blue that would harmonize with a cheap ingrain carpet? They were
embellished by corner pieces, done in dingy brown, with streaks of
red here and there; the design looking like nothing with sufficient
distinctness to be named—the whole being grotesque; while in the centre
was a bouquet of flowers so ugly that it was a positive relief to
remember that nature never produced anything in the least like them.
An old-fashioned piece of furniture, known as a settle, suggested
possibilities of comfort if it had not been pushed into the coldest
corner of the room and been disfigured by a frayed binding and a broken
spring. The chairs, of course, were straight-backed and stiff; and set
in solemn rows. But the table, with its curious clawed legs and antique
shape, filled Louise's heart with delight.
"What a pity," she said aloud, "that they couldn't have put some of
the grace into the old-fashioned chairs which they lavished on those
delightful old tables! How that bit of artistic twisting would delight
Estelle's heart!"
This deliberate survey of her present field of operations was being
taken after the sweeping and dusting were over, and she was trying to
settle the momentous question of "What next?"
The door leading into the kitchen was swung open, and Mother Morgan
presented herself in the doorway, her arms still in their favourite
reflective attitude, holding to her sides.
"The curtains do look scandalous," she said, her eyes lighting on them
at once. "I've been going, for I don't know how long, to get new ones,
but I never seem to get at such things. I declare I didn't know they
was so cracked."
Instantly Louise's wits sprang to grasp this opportunity. Who could
have expected such an opening in accord with her present thoughts?
"Oh, I hope you won't get new ones. I have a set of curtains that my
mother gave me for my room, so I might have a reminder of home, and
they are altogether too long for my windows; but I think they will just
fit here. I should so like to see them in use. May I put them up?"
What was the mother to say? She possessed that unfortunate sort of
pride which is always hurt with the suggestion of using other people's
things. Yet she had herself opened the door to this very suggestion.
How was she to close it?
"Oh, it isn't necessary to bring your curtains down here. I mean to get
new ones, of course. I've just neglected it, that's all; there's been
no need for it."
"I'm so glad then that you have neglected it," Louise said quickly.
"It has made me feel sort of lonely to see those curtains lying idle
in my trunk. I wanted to put them somewhere. How fortunate it is that
they are just the right colour to match nicely with the carpet. You are
really good to let me have them up here."
Whereupon Mrs. Morgan, with a vague feeling that she had been "good"
without in the least intending it, kept silence.
Louise gave her little chance for reflection.
"You can't think how much I like that sofa. Wouldn't it be nice if they
made such shaped ones nowadays, so long and wide? It suggests rest to
me right away. I can't think of anything more comfortable than this
corner when the fire is made, with that nice, hospitable sofa wheeled
into it."
This sentence brought Dorothy from the kitchen, to gaze, with wide-eyed
wonder, first at the lounge and then at the speaker. The object of her
intensified hatred, for many a day, had been that old, widespread,
claw-footed settle. Not being accustomed to seeing such an article
of furniture anywhere else, and being keenly alive to the difference
between her home and that of the few other homes into which she had
occasionally penetrated, she had, unconsciously to herself, singled out
the old lounge and the old table, and concentrated her aversion to the
whole upon them.
There was something about Louise that gave to all she said the stamp
of sincerity. Dorothy found herself believing implicitly just what had
been said; therefore this surprising eulogy of the old settle was the
more bewildering. Louise's next sentence completed the mystification.
"But the prettiest thing in this room is that table. I never saw
anything like that before; it must be very old, isn't it? And it looks
like solid mahogany."
There was no resisting the impulse. Mother Morgan's heart swelled with
a sense of gratified pride (if it were not a nobler feeling than pride).
"It is solid," she said quickly, "every inch of it; it belonged to my
mother; it was one of her wedding presents from my grandfather. There
isn't another table in the country as old as this."
"Isn't that delightful?" said Louise, genuine eagerness in tone and
manner. "To think of your having one of your own mother's wedding
presents! My sister Estelle would like to see that; she has such a
wonderful feeling of reverence for old things, especially when she can
hear about the hands that have touched them long ago. Did your mother
die a good many years ago?"
"She died when I was a girl like Dorothy there," said Mrs. Morgan, her
voice subdued, and she gathered a corner of her large apron and carried
it to her eyes.
"I always set great store by that table. I've seen my mother rub it
with an old silk handkerchief by the half-hour, to make it shine. She
thought a great deal of it on grandfather's account, let alone its
value, and it was thought to be a very valuable table in those days.
I have always thought I would keep it for Dorothy. But she don't care
for it; she thinks it is a horrid, old-fashioned thing. She would
have it put into the barn-loft, along with the spinning-wheel, if she
could. Your sister must be different from other girls, if she can stand
anything old."
Poor Dorothy, her cheeks aflame, stood with downcast eyes; too honest
was she to deny that she had hated the claw-footed table as one of the
evidences of the life to which she was shut up, different from others.
Louise turned toward her with a kindly smile.
"I think Estelle is different from most girls," she said gently.
"Our grandmother lived until a short time ago, and we loved her very
clearly, and that made Estelle like every old-fashioned thing more than
she would. Mother says that most girls have to get old and gray-haired
before they prize their girlhood or know what is valuable."
"That is true enough," said Mother Morgan emphatically.
Then Louise—
"I wonder if I can find John anywhere? I want him to help me to hang
pictures and curtains. Do you suppose father can spare him a little
while?"
"John!" said the wondering mother. "Do you want his help? Why, yes,
father will spare him, I daresay, if he will do anything; but I don't
suppose he will."
"Oh yes," said Louise gaily, "he promised to help me; and besides, he
invited the minister here himself, or at least seconded the invitation
heartily, so of course he will have to help to get ready for him."
"Well, there he is now, in the shed. You get him to help if you can;
I'll risk his father. And move things about where you would like to
have them; I give this room into your hands. If you can make it look as
pleasant as the kitchen, I'll wonder at it. It was always a dreadful
dull-looking room, somehow."
And the mollified mother went her way. An apology was a soothing sort
of thing. It was very nice to have the long-despised old settle and
table (dear to her by a hundred associations, so dear that she would
have felt it a weakness to own it) not only tolerated but actually
admired with bright eyes and eager voice; but to engage, in any
enterprise whatever, her youngest son, so that there might be hope of
his staying at home with the family the whole of Tuesday evening—an
evening when, by reason of the meeting of a certain club in the
village, he was more than at any other time exposed to temptation and
danger—was a thought to take deep root in this mother-heart. She did
not choose to let anybody know of her anxiety concerning this boy; but
really and truly it was the sore ache in her heart, and the thinking
of the brightness of Louise's care-free face in contrast with her own
heavy-heartedness, that developed the miseries of the morning. After
all, to our limited sight, it would seem well, once in a while, to have
peeps into each other's hearts.
Greatly to his mother's surprise, and somewhat to his own, John strode
at first call into the front room, albeit he muttered as he went: "I
don't know anything about her gimcracks; why don't she call Lewis?"
"Are you good at driving nails?" Louise greeted him with; "Because
Lewis isn't. He nearly always drives one crooked."
"Humph!" said John disdainfully. "Yes, I can drive a nail as straight
as any of 'em; and I haven't been to college either."
"Neither have I," said Louise, accepting his sentence in the spirit of
banter; "and I can drive nails, too. If I were only a little taller
I'd show you. But how are we going to reach away up to the ceiling? Is
there a step-ladder anywhere?"
"Yes; make one out of the kitchen table and the wood-box."
And he went for them. Then the work went on steadily. John could not
only drive nails, but could measure distances with his eye almost as
accurately as with a rule, and could tell to the fraction of an inch
whether the picture hung "plum" or not. Louise, watching, noted these
things, and freely commented upon them, until, despite himself, John's
habitual gruffness toned down.
"Who is this?" he asked, and he, perched on his table and wood-box,
stopped to look at the life-size photograph of a beautiful girl.
"That," said Louise, pride and pleasure in her voice, "is my sister
Estelle; isn't she pretty? With the first breath of spring I want her
to come out here; and I want you to get ready to be real good to her,
and show her all the interesting things in field and wood."
"I!"
"Yes, you. I look forward to your being excellent friends. There are
a hundred delightful things about nature and animal life of which she
knows nothing, and she is eager to see and hear and learn. I look to
you for help."
At this astounding appeal for "help" John turned and hung the picture
without a word. What was there to say to one who actually expected help
from him for that radiant creature!
Louise, apparently busy in untangling cord and arranging tassels,
watched him furtively. He studied the picture after it was in place;
he had difficulty in getting it to just the right height, and tied and
untied the crimson cord more than once in his precision. The bright,
beautiful, girlish figure, full of a nameless witchery and grace that
shone out at you from every curve! She hardly knew how much she wished
for the influence of the one over the other. If Estelle could help,
would help him in a hundred ways, as she could; and if he would help
her! Yes, Louise was honest; she saw ways in which this solemn-faced
boy could help her gay young sister, if he only would.
"Oh!" she said to herself, with great intensity of feeling, "if people
only would influence each other just as much as they could, and just as
high as they could, what a wonderful thing this living would be!"
It was for this reason among others that she had selected from her
family group, hanging in her room, this beautiful young sister, and
sacrificed her to hang between the windows in the front room. There
were other pictures, many of them selected with studied care, with an
eye to their influence. Among others, there was a brilliant illuminated
text worked in blues and browns, and the words were such as are rarely
found in mottoes. In the centre was a great gilt-edged Bible, and
circling over it: "These are written that ye might believe on the Son
of God." Then underneath, in smaller letters: "And that believing, ye
might have life through his name."
"That is Estelle's work," his companion said. "Isn't it pretty?"
"I suppose so. I don't know anything about pretty things."
"Oh yes you do; you know perfectly well what you think is pretty. I
venture to say that you know what you like, and what you dislike, as
well as any person in this world."
He laughed, not ill pleased at this; and Louise, with no apparent
connection, branched into another subject.
"By the way, where is that church social that was announced for Friday
night? Far-away?"
"No; just on the other hill from us, about a mile, or a trifle more."
"Then we can walk, can't we? I'm a good walker, and if the evening is
moonlight, I should think it would be the most pleasant way of going."
And now John nearly lost his balance on the wood-box, because of the
suddenness with which he turned to bestow his astonished gaze on her.
"We never go," he said at last.
"Why not?"
"Well," with a short laugh, "that question might be hard to answer. I
don't, I suppose, because I don't want to."
"Why don't you want to? Aren't they pleasant gatherings?"
"Never went to see. I grew away from them before I was old enough to
go. Mother and father don't believe in them, among other things."
There was a suspicion of a sneer in his voice now. Louise was a
persistent questioner.
"Why don't they believe in them?"
"Various reasons. They dress, and mother doesn't believe in dressing.
She believes women ought to wear linsey-woolsey uniform the year round.
And they dance, and neither mother nor father believe in that; they
think it is the unpardonable sin mentioned in the Bible."
"Do they dance at the church socials?"
"Yes," an unmistakable sneer in his tones now, "I believe they do; we
hear so anyhow. You will look upon the institution with holy horror
after this, I suppose?"
"Does Mr. Butler dance?"
"Well, reports are contradictory. Some say he hops around with the
little girls before the older ones get there, and some have it that he
only looks on and admires. I don't know which list of sinners he is in,
I'm sure. Do you think dancing is wicked?"
"I think that picture is crooked," said Louise promptly; "isn't it?
Doesn't it want to be moved a trifle to the right? That is a special
favourite of mine. Don't you know the face? Longfellow's 'Evangeline.'
Lewis don't like the picture nor the poem; but I can't get away from my
girlhood liking for both. Don't you know the poem? I'll read it to you
some time and see if you don't agree with me. Now, about that social:
let's go next Friday, and see if we can't have a good time—you and
Lewis, and Dorothy and I. It is quite time you introduced me to some of
your people, I think."
"You don't answer my question."
"What about? Oh, the dancing? Well, the truth is, though a short
question, it takes a very long answer, and it is so involved with
other questions and answers that I'm afraid if we should dip into it
we shouldn't get the curtains hung by tea-time. Let me just take a
privilege and ask you a question. Do you expect me to believe in it?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because—well—because you religionists are not apt to."
"Don't you know any religionists who seem to?"
"Yes; but they are the counterfeit sort."
"Then you think real, honest Christians ought not to believe in
dancing?"
"I didn't say any such thing," returned John hotly; then, being
quick-witted, he realized his position, and despite his attempt not to,
laughed. "I think we had better go after those curtains now," he said,
significantly. And they went.
CHAPTER XIII.
BUDS OF PROMISE.
"WELL," said Dorothy, and she folded her arms and looked up and down
the large room, a sense of great astonishment struggling with one of
keen satisfaction on her face, "who ever thought that she could make
this look like this!"
Which mixed and doubtful sentence indicates the bewilderment in
Dorothy's mind. Yet there had been no wonderful thing done. But Dorothy
belonged to that class of people who do not see what effects little
changes might produce. Still, she belonged, let us be thankful, to
that class of people who can see effects when the changes have been
produced. There are not a few in this world who are as blind as bats
about this latter matter.
The place in question was the large square front room of the Morgan
family. The heavy crimson curtains, of rare pattern and graceful
finish, hung in rich waves about the old-fashioned windows, falling
to the very floor, and hiding many a defect in their ample folds. The
walls were hung with pictures and brackets and text-cards. The brackets
were furnished—one with a pretty antique vase, hiding within itself a
small bottle of prepared earth, which nourished a thrifty ivy. One held
a quaint old picture of Dorothy's mother's mother, for which Louise's
deft fingers had that morning fashioned a frame of pressed leaves and
ferns. The old-fashioned settee was drawn into exactly the right angle
between the fire and the windows. The torn braid had been mended, and
John, of his own will, had repaired the broken spring.
The heavy mahogany table rejoiced in a wealth of beautifully bound
and most attractive-looking books; while a little stand, brought from
Louise's own room, held a pot of budding and blossoming pinks, whose
old-fashioned spicy breath pervaded the room. Perhaps no one little
thing contributed to the holiday air which the room had taken on
more than did the tidies of bright wools and clear white, over which
Estelle had wondered when they were being packed, Louise thought of her
and smiled, and wished she could have had a glimpse of them as they
adorned the two rounding pillow-like ends of the sofa, hung in graceful
folds from the small table that held the blossoming pinks, adorned
the back and cushioned seat and arms of the wooden rocking-chair in
the fireplace corner, and even lay smooth and white over the back
of Father Morgan's old chair, which Louise had begged for the other
chimney-corner, and which Mrs. Morgan, with a mixture of indifference
and dimly-veiled pride, had allowed to be taken thither.
Little things were these, every one, yet what a transformation they
made to Dorothy's eyes. The crowning beauty of the scene to Louise was
the great old-fashioned artistic-looking pile of hickory logs which
John built up scientifically in the chimney-corner, the blaze of which,
when set on fire, glowed and sparked and danced, and burnished with a
weird flame every picture and book, and played at light and shade among
the heavy window drapery in a way that was absolutely bewitching to the
eyes of the new-comer.
"What a delightful room this is!" she said, standing with clasped hands
and radiant face, gazing with genuine satisfaction upon it when the
fire was lighted. "How I wish my mother could see that fire! She likes
wood fires so much, and she has had to depend on 'black holes in the
floor' for so long a time. I do think I never was in a more home-like
spot."
It was fortunate for Louise that her education had been of that genuine
kind which discovers beauty in the rare blending of lights and shades
and the tasteful assimilation of furnishings, rather than in the
richness of the carpet or the cost of the furniture. It was genuine
admiration which lighted her face. The room had taken on a touch of
home and home cheer. Mrs. Morgan, senior, eying her closely, on the
alert for shams, felt instinctively that none were veiled behind those
satisfied eyes, and thought more highly of her daughter-in-law than she
had before.
As for Dorothy, she was so sure that the fairies had been there and
bewitched the great dreary room that she yielded to the spell, nothing
doubting.
It seemed almost strange to Louise herself that she was so deeply
interested in this prospective visit from the minister. She found
herself planning eagerly for the evening, wondering whether she could
draw John into the conversation, whether Dorothy would rally from
her shyness sufficiently to make a remark; wondering whether the
bright-eyed young minister would second her efforts for these two.
During a bit of confidential chat which she had with her husband at
noon, she said,—
"I can't help feeling that there are serious interests at stake. Mr.
Butler must get hold of the hearts of these young people; there must be
outside influences to help us or we cannot accomplish much. I wonder if
he has his young people very much at heart?"
"I may misjudge the man," Lewis said, leisurely buttoning his collar
and speaking in an indifferent tone; "but I fancy he hasn't a very deep
interest in anything outside of having a really good comfortable time."
"O Lewis!" and his wife's note of dismay caused Lewis to turn from the
mirror and look at her inquiringly. "How can you think that of your
pastor? How can you pray for him when you are composedly saying such
things?"
"Why," Lewis said, smiling a little, "I didn't say anything very
dreadful, did I, dear? He really doesn't impress me as being thoroughly
in earnest. I didn't mean, of course, that he is a hypocrite. I think
him a good, honest-hearted young man; but he hasn't that degree of
earnestness that one expects in a minister."
"What degree of earnestness should a minister have, Lewis?"
"More than he has," said her husband positively. "My dear wife, really
you have a mistaken sort of idea that because a man is a minister
therefore he is perfect. Don't you think they are men of like passions
with ourselves?"
"Yes, I do; but from your remark I thought you were not of that
opinion. No, really, I think I am on the other side of the argument. I
am trying to discover how much more earnest a minister should be than
you and I are, for instance."
"Rather more is expected of him by the Church," her husband answered,
moving cautiously, and becoming suddenly aware that he was on slippery
ground.
"By the Church possibly; but is more really expected of him by the
Lord? Sometimes I have heard persons talk as though they really thought
there was a different code of rules for a minister's life than for the
ordinary Christian's. But, after all, he has to be guided by the same
Bible, led by the same Spirit."
"There's a bit of sophistry in that remark," her husband said laughing;
"but I shall not stay to hunt it up just now. I expect father is
waiting for me to help about matters that he considers more important."
"But, Lewis, wait a moment. I don't want to argue; I just want this:
Will you this afternoon pray a good deal about this visit? I do feel
that it ought to be a means of grace to our home and to the pastor; for
there should certainly be a reflex influence in visits between pastor
and people. I have been for the last two hours impressed to almost
constant prayer for this, and I feel as though I wanted to have a union
of prayer."
Her husband lingered, regarding her with a half-troubled, half-curious
expression.
"Sometimes," he said slowly, "I am disposed to think that you have gone
away beyond me in these matters, so that I cannot understand you. Now,
about this visit. I can see nothing but an ordinary social cup of tea
with the minister. He will eat bread and butter, and the regulation
number of sauces and cakes and pickles, and we will keep up a flow of
talk about something, it will not matter much what to any of us, so we
succeed in appearing social; then he will go away, and the evening will
be gone, and, so far as I can see, everything will be precisely as it
was before."
"No," she said, with a positive setting of her head. "You are ignoring
entirely the influence which one soul must have over another. Don't you
believe that all of our family, by this visit, will have been drawn
either to respect religion more, to feel its power more plainly, or
else will have been repelled from the subject? They may none of them be
aware that such is the case, yet when they come in contact with one so
closely allied to the church and prayer-meeting, I think, that either
one influence or the other must have its way."
"New thought to me put on that broad ground. But if it is true,
it proves, I think, that the minister has more influence over the
community than private Christians have; because, certainly, it is
possible for you and me to go out to tea and have a pleasant social
time, and not change any person's opinion of religion one-half inch."
She shook her head. "It proves to me that the outward position helps
the minister by the law of association to make a more distinctly
realized impression; but, dear Lewis, the question is, is it right for
any servant of the King to mingle familiarly for an afternoon with
others, who either are or should be loyal subjects, and not make a
definite impression for the King?"
"I don't know," he said slowly, gravely; "I don't believe I have
thought of social gatherings in that light."
And Louise, as he went away, realized, with a throb of pain, that she
wanted the minister to make a definite impression for good, not only
on Dorothy and John, but on her husband. Perhaps she never prayed more
constantly for the success of any apparently small matter than she did
for this tea-drinking. Her interest even extended to the dress that
Dorothy wore. She knew well it would be a somewhat rusty black one; but
the door of that young lady's room being ajar, and she being visible,
in the act of adding to her toilet an ugly red necktie that set her
face aflame, Louise ventured a suggestion.
"O Dorrie, if you would wear some soft laces with that dress, how
pretty it would be!"
"I know it," said Dorothy, snatching off the red tie as she spoke. "But
I haven't any. I hate this necktie; I don't know why, but I just hate
it. Mother bought it because it was cheap!"—immense disgust expressed
in tone and manner. "That is surely the only recommendation it has."
"I have some soft laces that will be just the thing for you," Louise
said in eagerness, and she ran back to her room for them.
"These are cheap," returning with a box of fluffy ruchings. "They cost
less than ribbon in the first place, and will do up as well as linen
collars."
New items these to Dorothy. The idea that anything so white and soft
and beautiful could also be cheap! A mistaken notion had this young
woman that everything beautiful was costly.
"Let me arrange them," Louise said in a flutter of satisfaction,
lifting her heart in prayer as she worked.
Praying about a lace ruffle! Oh yes, indeed; why not? If they are
proper to wear, why not proper to speak of to the Father who clothes
the lilies and numbers the very hairs of our head? Actually praying
that the delicate laces might aid in lifting Dorothy into a reasonable
degree of self-appreciation, and so relieve, somewhat, the excessive
timidity which Satan was successfully using against her. I wonder, has
it ever occurred to young people that Satan can make use of timidity as
well as boldness?
"There," said Louise, as she arranged the puffy knots, giving those
curious little touches which the tasteful woman understands so well and
finds so impossible to teach.
"Aren't they pretty?" And she stood back to view the effect.
The pink glow on Dorothy's cheeks showed that she thought they were.
With the details of the supper Louise did not in the least concern
herself; she knew that food would be abundant and well prepared, and
the linen would be snowy, and the dishes shining. What more need mortal
want?
As for the minister, truth to tell, he spent his leisure moments during
the day in dreading his visit. He had heard so much of the Morgans—of
their coldness and indifference, of their holding themselves aloof
from every influence, either social or spiritual. The few sentences
that had ever passed between himself and Farmer Morgan had been so
tinged with sarcasm on the latter's part, and had served to make him
feel so thoroughly uncomfortable, that he shrank from all contact
with the entire family, always excepting the fair-faced, sweet-voiced
stranger; not her husband, for something about the grave, rather
cold face of Lewis Morgan made his young pastor pick him out as
merciless intellectual critic. However, it transpired that most of his
forebodings were unrealized.
It suited Mrs. Morgan, senior, to array herself in a fresh calico,
neatly made, relieved from severe plainness by a very shining linen
collar; and though her manner was nearly as cold as the collar, yet
there was a certain air of hospitality about it that made the minister
feel not unwelcome. Dorothy, under the influence of her becoming laces,
or some other influence, was certainly less awkward than usual. And
fair, curly-haired, sweet-faced Nellie caught the young man's heart at
once, and was enthroned upon his knee when Farmer Morgan came to shake
hands before proceeding to supper. If there was one thing on earth more
than another that Farmer Morgan did admire, it was his own beautiful
little Nellie. If the minister saw that she was an uncommon child, why,
in his heart, he believed it to be a proof positive that the minister
was an uncommon man. Altogether, Mr. Butler's opinion of the Morgan
family was very different by six o'clock from what it had been at four.
Just a word alone with him Louise had, when Farmer Morgan suddenly
remembered an unforgotten duty and went away, while Mrs. Morgan and
Dorothy were putting the finishing touches to the supper-table. Lewis
was detained with a business caller at one of the large barns, and John
had not presented himself at all. This was one of her present sources
of anxiety. She turned to the minister the moment they were alone.
"We need your help so much," she began eagerly. "My husband and I are
the only Christians in this family. I am specially and almost painfully
interested in both John and Dorothy; they need Christ so much, and
apparently are so far from him. Is the Christian influence of the young
people decided in this society?"
"I hardly know how to answer you," he said hesitatingly. "If I were to
tell you the simple truth, I seem better able to influence the young
in almost any other direction than I do in anything that pertains to
religion." And if the poor young man had but known it, he was more
natural and winning in regard to any other topic than he was with that
one. "I have hardly a young man in my congregation on whom I can depend
in the least," he continued sadly, "and I do not see any gain in this
respect."
"He is in earnest," said Louise mentally, in answer to this. "He wants
to help them; he doesn't quite see how. But if he is willing to be
enough in earnest his Master can teach him." Then, before there was
opportunity for the half-dozen other things that she wanted to say,
they were summoned to the tea-table.
John was there in his Sunday coat and his hair brushed carefully; it
was more than could have been expected. Moreover, almost immediately,
by one of those chance remarks that seem of no importance, an item
of political news was started for discussion, and behold the father
and Lewis were stanchly on one side, and the minister and John on the
other. John, roused by a nettlesome speech of his brother, gave bold
utterance to opposing views, and was strongly approved and supported
by Mr. Butler. The interest deepened and the arguers waxed earnest;
but all the while there was in Farmer Morgan's face, veiled to any but
a close observer, such as Louise was that day, a sense of surprised
satisfaction over the fact that his boy John had such clear views of
things, and could talk as well as the minister; and the minister,
whether he was to win souls or not, surely knew one step of the way—he
was winning hearts. They went, all of them together, to the bright
parlour again, and when presently the discussion calmed, and the
subject changed to the delights of corn-popping and apples roasted in
the ashes, Mr. Butler said with zest,—
"John, let's try some. Suppose you get the apples and superintend the
roasting; and, Miss Dorothy, can't you and I pop some corn?"
Dorothy's cheeks were aflame; but the corn was brought, and the evening
waned before even Nellie knew it was late. "He's a good deal likelier
chap than I thought from his sermons," was Farmer Morgan heard to
remark to his wife when the minister had finally bade them good-evening
and departed.
"O Lewis," said Louise, when they were alone again, "if he had only
asked to read a few verses in the Bible and offered prayer before he
went. I certainly thought he would do it; isn't it strange that he did
not?"
"Why, yes," said Lewis. "As a minister it would have been entirely in
keeping. I wonder he did not suggest it."
"Why didn't you suggest it, Lewis? I was hoping you would; that was
what I meant by all those telegraphic communications I was trying to
make."
"My dear Louise," said her husband, "that was my father's place, not
mine."
CHAPTER XIV.
DUST AND DOUBT.
THE scheme to visit the dingy church on Wednesday afternoon, and
contribute somewhat to its attractiveness, was carried out to the very
letter. Mrs. Morgan, senior, made sundry dry remarks about not being
aware that any of her family had been hired to put the church in order;
but Farmer Morgan declared that it certainly needed it as much as any
place he ever saw—that he would be ashamed to have a barn look as that
did; and John declared that he had promised to stop the squeak in that
old organ, and he meant to do it, hired or not hired.
Louise, who had not heard him promise, and who had felt much anxiety
lest he would refuse to perform, was so elated over this declaration
that, with her husband's help, she parried her mother-in-law's thrusts
with the utmost good-humour, helped by the fact that, whatever she
might say, that strange woman actually felt glad over the thought of
her young people going off together like other folks.
The efforts of Mrs. Morgan's life had been spent in keeping her
children from being "like other folks," and yet, with strange
inconsistency, she liked to see these approaches to other people's ways
of doing things.
If she could have explained what her sore and disappointed heart had
meant, it would have revealed the fact that she intended her children
to be superior to; not isolated from, the society around them.
Wednesday afternoon proved a real gala time to Dorothy. She entered
with zest into the lamp-cleaning, and after a few lessons from Louise,
developed a remarkable talent for making the chimneys glitter in the
sunlight. The surprised and smiling sexton had done his share, and the
dust from the long unswept room lay thick on pulpit and seat-rail. The
room was comparatively warm too, which, if Louise had but known it, was
a rare thing on Wednesday evening. John swung the old organ around in a
business-like manner, and applied a drop of oil here and another there,
then gave himself to the mending of one of the stops; while Lewis
tacked on the new binding for the desk, and whistled softly an old
tune. Altogether, Louise's plans were working royally. She had managed
a difficult bit of business in the shape of a lunch, which had been
smuggled into the buggy with them.
"What on earth do you want of that!" had Mrs. Morgan exclaimed in
astonishment, when she had been appealed to. "You don't expect to work
so hard that you will get hungry before supper, do you?"
"Why, we want it for our supper," said Louise. "You know we shall not
have time to come back before prayer-meeting, and that will make us
late for supper."
"Prayer-meeting!" No words on paper can express to you the surprise in
the questioner's voice. "Are you going to stay to prayer-meeting?"
"Why, certainly; we want to see whether the lamps are improved. If
Dorrie leaves lint on the glass it will show splendidly when they are
lighted. Besides, I want to hear how that organ will sound when it
doesn't squeak."
"And what is going to become of John-while you are staying to meeting?"
Mrs. Morgan's face had taken on a deeper cloud of disapprobation, and
her voice was glumness intensified.
"Why, John will stay to meeting with us, of course."
This from Louise, in positive tone, albeit she was painfully uncertain
about that very thing; certain only of this, that if John would not
stay, the rest would not. It was no part of her plan to carry him down
to the village, simply to be tempted of Satan, as he always was, at the
street corners.
"Humph!" said Mrs. Morgan, senior, and she went her way, giving no sign
of relief or approval, save that the lunch she prepared and packed for
their united suppers was bountiful and inviting.
So Louise dusted and advised as to lamps and pulpit, and prayed
heartily meanwhile. How was she to prevail on John to stay to
prayer-meeting? Was it a foolish scheme? Would it be better to abandon
it and go home? What if, at the last moment, he should rebel, and go
away and spend the evening in that horrid corner grocery? Recent though
her introduction into the family was, she had already learned how they
dreaded the influence of that corner grocery. She lingered near her
husband and consulted.
"Lewis, how can we prevail on John to be willing to stay to-night until
after the meeting?"
"Oh, he'll be willing enough; no danger of him. He hasn't had an
opportunity to visit his friends at the corner for some time; he will
catch at the chance."
"Oh, but we mustn't have that kind of staying. I mean how can we coax
him to stay here at the prayer-meeting?"
Her husband regarded her curiously. "I don't believe even you can
accomplish such a result as that," he said at last; "and I am willing
to admit that you do accomplish some very extraordinary things."
"Lewis, why do you speak in that way, as though I were trying to do
anything wonderful? Can any work be simpler than to seek to get one
interested in prayer-meetings who has no natural interest in such
things? I want you to ask him to stay. You said yesterday that you had
never invited him to attend. Tell him we have a nice lunch, and want
him to stay with us and enjoy the meeting. Perhaps all he is waiting
for is an invitation."
"Louise clear, you don't know John. He would have no enjoyment from
this meeting, even if he stayed, which he will not do; and now, in all
sincerity, I believe he would be much less likely to stay if I were to
ask him than he would under almost any other circumstances. It is a
humiliating fact that he doesn't care to do anything to please me."
Louise turned away with a sigh. Her work was growing complicated.
Meantime the dusting and cleansing went steadily on, and when all was
accomplished the church was certainly improved.
A somewhat weary but gay little company gather under one of the
renovated lamps just at nightfall, and having made their toilets by
folding away large aprons and sweeping-caps and donning hats and shawls
again, sat down to eat the generous lunch.
"Queer way of having a picnic," said John. "I've always supposed the
woods was the place for such gatherings. We might as well go home for
all I can see; our work is about done."
Lewis glanced significantly at his wife. Her face expressed doubt and
anxiety. Certainly it would be better for them all to go home at once
rather than that John should spend his evening at the corners. Just
what should she say at this juncture? She hesitated but a moment, then
said quickly,—
"Why, we are going to stay to prayer-meeting; don't you suppose we want
to see the effect of these improvements on the people?"
"To prayer-meeting!" echoed John; then, beyond a low, suddenly
suppressed whistle, he said no more.
Their departure for the church had been delayed, and the work there had
taken longer than had been anticipated, so that as the short winter
day drew rapidly to its close, the lunch had finally to be disposed
of in haste, in order that two or three unfinished matters might be
accomplished before the hour for prayer-meeting. With very little idea
as to what she should say, or whether it would be wise to say anything,
Louise followed John to the organ corner, while he struggled to make
the organist's broken seat less objectionable.
"The idea of allowing a church to run into shabbiness in this fashion!"
he said with energy, a sneer in his voice; "shows how interested the
people are in it."
"Why doesn't the sexton light the lamps on the other side?" questioned
Louise, unwilling to enter into a discussion concerning the
inconsistencies of the church, and really curious to understand the
movements of that worthy the sexton.
"More than I know. They are all filled and trimmed, I am sure; perhaps
he doesn't know that. He probably economizes by using the lamps on one
side until they are empty, and then taking the other row."
"No," said Louise; "I see what it is done for—to compel the people to
sit close together, and not spread over the entire church. It is a good
idea, too."
"Yes," said John; "shows how many they expect!"
What strange power John had to throw meaning into a few words. This
simple sentence started Louise; she glanced over the large church. What
a very small corner of it was lighted and made habitable. Yet she felt
her own faith was equal to even less than that amount of room; she
struggled for some satisfying explanation.
"But, John, you know this room has to be large enough for the entire
congregation; and a great many of them are in the country, and could
hardly be expected, I suppose, to attend prayer-meeting."
"I know it," said John; "twice as far down to the village on Wednesday
evening as it is on Saturday. On Saturday evenings the stores have to
be kept open until eleven o'clock, so many country people are in town;
but none of them are affected in that way on Wednesday."
"Well," said Louise, trying to speak lightly, "our party will count
four more than are usually here; that is one comfort."
John regarded her furtively from under lowering eyebrows.
"Have you any kind of a notion that I intend to stay to this meeting?"
he asked at last, a curious mixture of sarcasm and sneer in his tones.
There was something in John's voice that was constantly reminding one
of sneers.
A sudden reaction of feeling swept over Louise, or rather the feeling
that she had held in check rose to the surface. A vision of John at the
corner, playing cards, smoking, drinking beer; of the mother at home,
sick at heart, when she saw him and smelled his breath; of the father's
anger and Lewis's gravity, appeared before her, and her voice faltered
and her eyes were full of tears as she answered, from a full heart—
"No, I am afraid you are not going to; and I am so disappointed about
it that I feel as though I could hardly—"
Here the words stopped, and the tears actually dropped—one of them on
John's hand, that was outstretched just at the moment to grasp the
hammer lying beside her. He withdrew it suddenly, a strange expression
crossing his face; he looked at his hand doubtfully, gravely, then
looked back at Louise.
"Why in the name of common sense do you care whether I stay to
prayer-meeting or where I go?"
"I care," said Louise, brushing away the treacherous tears and raising
earnest eyes to his face, "a great deal more than I can explain to you.
I never had a brother; I have always wanted one, and I looked forward
to having pleasant times together with my brother John. But you won't
do anything to please me."
"How do you know I won't?" His voice was gruff now, gruffer than it had
been during the day, and he seized the hammer and pounded so vigorously
that she could neither speak nor hear. She turned from him in doubt
and anxiety still, and immediately joined her husband, who had come to
say that the pounding must cease—the people were beginning to come to
prayer-meeting. Nevertheless the pounding did not cease until two more
nails were in place. Then did John, without any effort at quiet, stalk
down the uncarpeted aisle and seat himself in the Morgan pew, Dorothy
edging along for the purpose, and looking her undisguised astonishment.
Louise tried to feel triumphant; but as the hour dragged its slow
length along her heart was very heavy. What a strange meeting it
was—strange, at least, to her who had been used to better things. In
the first place, the number, all told, counting the four who filled the
Morgan pew, amounted to twenty-three. Now, when twenty-three people are
placed in a room designed for the accommodation of three hundred, the
effect, to say the least, is not social. Then these twenty-three seemed
to have made a study of seating themselves in as widespread a manner
as the conditions of light and darkness would admit. Dorothy saw this,
and lost herself in trying to plan where the congregation would have
been likely to sit had the other lamps been lighted. That condition
of inability to sing, which seems to be the chronic state of many
prayer-meetings, was in full force here. Mr. Butler announced a hymn,
read it, and earnestly invited a leader; but none responded. Louise
felt her cheeks flushing in sympathy with the minister's embarrassment,
and never more earnestly wished that she could sing. Even Dorothy,
conscious that she could sing, was so far roused by sympathy that she
felt the bumpings of her frightened heart, caused by the courageous
question, "What if I should?" Not that she had the least idea of doing
so, but the bare thought made her blood race through her veins at
lightning speed. At last a quavering voice took up the cross, and made
a cross for every one who tried to join in the unknown and uninviting
melody.
This prayer-meeting does not need a lengthy description; there are,
alas! too many like it:—Two long prayers, called for by the pastor,
between two silences, which waited for some one to "occupy the time." A
few dreary sentences from Deacon Jones, who is always in every meeting,
detailing his weary story of how things used to be when Mr. Somebody
Else was our pastor. Another attempt at a song of praise, which made
John's lip curl more emphatically than the first one had; and then the
pastor arose to make some remarks. How interesting he could be at the
supper-table; how bright and pleasant he could be when roasting apples
and popping corn! These things the Morgans knew; so did nearly every
one of the other nineteen.
Why was he so uninteresting in the prayer-meeting? Louise tried to
analyze it. What he said was true and good; why did it fall like empty
bubbles on her heart or vanish away? His theme was prayer. Did he mean
the words he was repeating, "If ye shall ask anything in my name, I
will do it"? Did he understand what those words meant? If so, why
did not he explain them to others? Dorothy wondered at this; she had
not gotten so far as to doubt them—that is, she knew they were Bible
words; she saw Mr. Butler open his Bible and read them from it; but,
of course, it didn't mean what it said. "If it did," said poor Dorothy
to herself, "I would ask—oh, I would ask for ever so many things." And
then her mind went off in a dream of what it would ask for, if only
those words meant what they said! And Mr. Butler talked, generalized,
told wonderful and blessed, ay, and solemn truths, much as a boy might
tell over the words of his spelling lesson. Did the pastor feel those
words? Did he realize their meaning? Had he been asking? If so, for
what? Had he received it? If he had not received, and still believed
the words he read, why did not he set himself to find the reason for
the delay? Poor Louise! Her mind roved almost as badly as Dorothy's,
only over more solemn ground. As for John, his face told, to a close
observer, just what he thought: he did not believe a word, not a word,
of what had been read, nor of what was being said. More than that, he
did not believe that the minister believed it. Was there any good in
getting John to stay to prayer-meeting?
CHAPTER XV.
OPPORTUNITIES.
A CHURCH social had been one of the places against which the senior
Morgans had set their faces like flints. Not that there had been much
occasion for peremptory decisions. John, when he arrived at the proper
age for attending, had grown away from the church into a lower circle,
and Dorothy was frightened at the mere thought of going anywhere
alone. So occasional sharp criticisms as to the proceedings, reports
of which floated to them from time to time, was the extent of their
interference. But Louise had weighed the matter carefully, and was bent
on an attendance at the church social. Had she taken time to notice it,
she might have been amused over the various forms of objection that met
her plans.
"I'm afraid they will think the Morgan family have turned out en
masse," had her husband said when he listened to the scheme. "I'm in
favour of our going, because I think the people will like to meet you,
and you will like some of them very well; but wouldn't it be better to
get acquainted with them ourselves before getting Dorothy into society?
She will be frightened and awkward, and will be very far from enjoying
it. John won't go, of course."
"Lewis," his wife said impressively, "I believe John will go; I am very
anxious to have him, and I feel impressed with the belief that God
will put it into his heart." The curious look on her husband's face
emboldened her to ask a question which had been troubling her. "Lewis,
you sometimes act almost as though you didn't believe such matters were
subjects of prayer at all. Are these things too small for His notice,
when he himself refers us to the fading wild flowers for lessons?"
Lewis studied his answer carefully; he admitted that, of course, we had
a right to pray about everything; but then—well, the truth was, she
certainly had a way of attaching importance to matters which seemed to
him trivial. Take, for instance, that tea: he had not understood then,
did not now, why she should have been so anxious about it; and as for
this matter, what particular good was it going to do to take John to
the church social?
"Don't you see," his wife asked earnestly, "that we must get John into
a different circle, if we would draw him away from the one he has
fallen into?"
Yes, he admitted that; in fact, he admitted everything that she could
possibly desire, and yet she knew he went away feeling that it was,
after all, of exceeding little consequence whether John went or stayed.
Nevertheless her desire for the accomplishment of this matter remained
firm. She studied many ways for winning John's consent to the plan,
seeking counsel on her knees, and wondering much that no way opened
to her, until she discovered, on the day in question, that there was
no need for an opening. John, for reasons best known to himself, had
settled the matter, and himself broached the subject by inquiring
whether she still believed that the pleasantest thing she could do was
to walk.
"Walk where?" questioned the mother, and the subject was before them.
"Why, to the social this evening," explained Louise quickly. "I propose
a walk. The evenings are perfect now, and I'm a first-class walker; I
feel anxious to show my skill in that line."
"To the church fiddlestick!" said Father Morgan, with more than usual
asperity; and Mother Morgan added—
"I wonder if you and Lewis are going to countenance those gatherings?"
"Why," said innocent Louise, "of course we must sustain the social
gatherings of our church; I think them very important aids."
"Aids to what, I'd like to know? They are just dancing parties, and
nothing else. I'm not a church member, to be sure, but I know what
church members ought to be; and to see them standing up for the world
in that way, and helping it along, is sickening, to say the least."
This from Farmer Morgan.
Then Mrs. Morgan, senior—
"They stay until near morning, and dress, and gossip, and giggle, and
dance; if that is sustaining the church, the less it is sustained the
better, according to my notion."
Then Louise—
"May not part of the trouble be that those who do not approve of such
management stand aloof and let Satan manage it his own way, and lead
the young people whither he will?"
"Humph!" said Farmer Morgan (and there is hardly in our language one
syllable more expressive than that in the mouths of some people). "The
minister goes."
"I know, but he cannot do much alone."
"In my opinion," said Mrs. Morgan firmly, "he enjoys it all too well to
want to do anything." Her firm lips and eyes said as plainly as words
could have done: "You will do as you like, no doubt, but you won't get
my Dorothy to help to sustain any such thing."
"Well, mother, we are going to-night, to see what we can do toward
sustaining, or something else. I hardly know what we are going for, I'm
sure; but I know this much, we are going."
Perhaps of all the group no one was more surprised than Louise at this
statement from John's lips.
She hesitated, and her heart beat high with anxiety and doubt. John
meant to go, then; but ought he to speak so to his mother? And ought
she to seem to approve of such speaking? Only a second of thought, then
she said—
"O John, we wouldn't go if mother disapproved, would we? Lewis says he
always minds his mother, and I'm sure I always minded mine."
This sentence, half-laughing, yet inwardly wholly earnest, was sent
forth in much anxiety, the speaker remembering the fifth commandment,
even though she wished most earnestly, just then, that it were not made
so difficult a duty by the mother in question.
But a change had suddenly come over that mother. To have the boy John
even at a church social, disreputable as she believed those places to
be, was much better than to have him at the corner grocery, or in any
of his favourite haunts. The moment there dawned upon her the idea that
he really meant to go, her objections softened.
"Oh, I don't want to keep any of you from going, sure. Go if you want
to, of course. A church gathering ought to be a nice place, and if it
isn't what it ought to be; it isn't your fault, I suppose. I shan't
make any objections."
Which was a remarkable concession when we consider the woman who made
it. So they went to the social; also they walked—Lewis and Louise
stepping briskly along together over the moon-lighted earth, and
enjoying every step of the way, as only those can who have little
opportunity for long, quiet walks together, even though they are bound
by the closest ties.
The large modern farmhouse where the gathering was held was a
surprise to Louise; unconsciously she had gauged all farmhouses by
her father-in-law's. But here she was introduced to one of those fair
country homes with which our land abounds—bright and tasteful, and,
in its free and easy, home-like way, beautiful. The large rooms were
carefully arranged, and little works of art and souvenirs of celebrated
spots and scenes were freely scattered, and the books, displayed
lavishly, spoke of cultured tastes and leisure for their indulgence. A
large company was gathered, and the scene was social in the extreme.
The new-comers were very heartily greeted, it being evident to all but
herself that Mrs. Lewis Morgan was looked upon as an acquisition to
the society much to be desired. As for that lady, she was so engrossed
in making Dorothy feel at home and have a good time, and so anxious
that John should not slip away in disgust before the evening was over,
that she forgot her position as a stranger, and, with an end in view,
made acquaintances eagerly and searchingly, looking everywhere for the
helpers that she hoped to find in these young people.
Meantime she studied the actual scene, trying to fit it to the reports
which had come to her. The company was very merry. They talked a good
deal of nonsense, no doubt, and it was possible that a sort of giggly,
good-natured gossip came in for its share; and they were, at least
the younger portion, too much dressed for a church social; but though
the evening was advancing, she had as yet seen no indications of the
amusement which Father and Mother Morgan found so objectionable.
During a moment's leisure Mr. Butler came over to her. He had been
among the young people all the evening, the favourite centre of the
merriest circles. It was evident that these young people enjoyed their
pastor at a church social, whatever opinion they might have of him
elsewhere.
"I am so glad you came out to our gathering," he said to her cordially.
"It was very kind in you to overlook our lack of courtesy in the matter
of calls and come at once. Our ladies will call on you promptly enough
now. Some of them had the impression that you might not care to make
new acquaintances."
"I wonder why?" said Louise in surprise. "My old friends are too
far-away to be made available. Mr. Butler, what a great company of
young people! Do these all belong to your congregation Where were they
on Wednesday night?"
"Well," said Mr. Butler, "the plain and painful truth is, that wherever
they are on Wednesday evenings, at one place they are not, and that is
the prayer-meeting. Some of them are church members, but it never seems
to be convenient for country people to come to town on Wednesdays,
nor to be out so late as is necessary in order to attendance at
prayer-meeting."
"Yet they come to the church socials?"
"Oh yes, indeed. That is another matter; they have no objection to
being social."
"Then, what a pity it is that we couldn't have our prayer-meeting
social, isn't it?"
Mr. Butler laughed, then grew grave.
"Well, but, Mrs. Morgan, you do not suppose it is possible to make
prayer-meetings into places where those who have no love for Christ
will like to come?"
"Perhaps not; though more might be done for even that class, I suspect,
than is. But some of these young people belong to Christ, do they not?"
He shook his head.
"Very few. I never knew a church with such a large class of indifferent
young people in it. Oh, some of them are members, to be sure; but the
large majority of those here to-night, the young ones, have no sympathy
with the church, except in its socials."
"Then what a doubly important opportunity this church social is," said
Louise, with kindling eyes. "This is really almost your only chance
with the young people, then, save in calls. How do you manage the work?
Or is that too close a question to answer?"
The bright eyes of the young minister dropped before her. He felt, in
truth, that the question was too close, though not in the sense that
she meant it. He wished, in his truthful heart, that he could just
leave her to think that his ways of working were too intermingled to be
explained; but whatever faults he may have had, deception was not one
of them.
He hesitated and flushed, then met her gaze squarely, as he said—
"The simple truth is, Mrs. Morgan, I am doing just nothing with these
young people, and I don't know what to do."
"I know," she said quickly; "the work is immense, and little patient
efforts sometimes seem like 'just nothing.' But, after all, how can
you tell? The earnest words dropped here and there, even in such soil
as this, may spring up and bear fruit; so long as you meet your people
in this way, once a week, and can gather them about you as you do, I
shouldn't allow myself to get discouraged."
Evidently she did not understand him. He was leaving her to suppose
that he was moving quietly around among them dropping seed, when, in
reality, he had been chatting with them about the skating and the
sleighing, and the coming festival, and the recent party, and had
dropped no earnest, honest seed of any sort. His honest heart shrank
from bearing unmerited approval.
"I am literal in my statement," he said earnestly, "though you are kind
enough to translate it figuratively. I do not feel that I am saying
anything to help these young people, save as I am helping them to have
a pleasant evening. I don't know how that is going to tell for the
future, and I don't know what I can do to tell toward that. I cannot
get one into a corner and preach a sermon to him at such a time as
this; now, can I?"
"I shouldn't think it would be a good place in which to read sermons,"
said Louise, with smiling eyes and grave mouth. "But, then, we who
never preach at all will not allow you to profess that the sermon is
the only way of seed-sowing."
"I did not mean literal preaching, of course," he said, a trifle
annoyed; "but what I mean is, there is no opportunity here for personal
effort of any sort. I am always afraid to attempt anything of the kind,
lest I may prejudice people against the whole subject. Don't you think
there is danger of that?"
"Well, I don't know," Louise said thoughtfully. "If I were to talk with
one of my friends who is not acquainted with you, and tell her how kind
you were, and how interested in all young people, and how pleasant
and helpful you were, it doesn't seem to me that I should prejudice
that friend against you. Why should I feel afraid of prejudicing them
against my Saviour?"
He looked at her doubtfully.
"Don't you think that young people look upon this question with
different eyes from that which they give to any other? Aren't they more
afraid of hearing it talked about?"
"Aren't they more unaccustomed to hearing it talked about?" was
Louise's earnest answer. "Have we, as Christians, tried the experiment
fully of talking freely, brightly, socially about this matter, about
our joys and hopes and prospects? What do you suppose the effect would
be? Suppose, for instance, Mr. Butler, you and I were in the midst
of that circle across from us where there is just now a lull in the
conversation, and you should say to me: 'Mrs. Morgan, what have you
found to-day that affects our plans?' and I should answer: 'Why, I
found that our Father loves us even better than I had supposed. I found
to-day that he says he blots out our transgressions for his own sake!'
I did find that to-day, Mr. Butler, and it is as news to me. He really
loves us so much that, for his own sake, he forgives us. What if I
should say that to you in the presence of these others?"
"They would consider us a couple of fanatics," said Mr. Butler quickly.
"Well," said Louise, with bright eyes and smiling mouth, "that,
certainly, wouldn't hurt us. But why should we be called fanatics? I
heard you telling what Professor Proctor says he has recently decided
in regard to a scientific matter, and the young men about you listened
and questioned, and didn't act as though you were a fanatic at all."
CHAPTER XVI.
THE REASON OF THINGS.
JOHN came over to her, speaking abruptly, recognizing the presence of
the pastor only by a nod:—
"They want to know whether you dance."
The minister flushed over the question, as though it had been personal;
but Louise laughed.
"Can't you tell them, John?"
"How should I know?" given in his gruffest tones.
"Now, John! didn't you tell me only a few days ago what you expected of
me in that regard? Do you think I want to disappoint your expectations?"
"Well, then, what is the reason that you don't?"
"Mr. Butler, think of my being called upon to answer such an immense
question as that at a church social. John, you will have to be my
champion, and explain, if you are hard pressed, that the reasons are
too numerous to be given now and here. Meantime, you may vouch for me
that I have excellent ones."
John turned away, a grim smile on his face. Louise, looking after him,
feeling much less bright and undisturbed than she appeared, saw that
he was not displeased with her answers, but wondered uneasily what he
might be enduring, in the way of banter, for her sake. She had grown
to have that degree of confidence in him; she believed that he would
endure something for her sake. She need not have been disturbed; there
had been no bantering; Mrs. Lewis Morgan was at present held in too
great respect for that. Still, John had been surprised into some abrupt
admissions, which he had felt obliged to have corroborated by her.
"Does your sister dance?" had been asked him abruptly by one of
the pretty visions in curls whom his eyes had been following half
the evening. He had given a confused little start, and glanced
instinctively at the corner where Dorothy sat, being kindly talked to
by a nice old lady.
"Dorothy!" he exclaimed, a surprise note in his voice. How absurd it
seemed to suppose such a thing! "No; she never dances."
"Oh, I don't mean Dorothy," and the pretty vision echoed his surprise
in her voice; "I mean your brother's wife."
Then did John turn and look at her as she stood a little at one
side, conversing animatedly with the minister. How pretty she was;
how unlike any one that he knew! What a strange sound it had to him,
that sentence, "your sister," when he applied it to this fair young
woman! She was his acknowledged sister, then, in the eyes of all his
people. He had not realized it before—to be sure she had called him
her brother, and it had pleased him; but, at the same time, the idea
that other people so spoke had not before occurred to him. It certainly
was by no means an unpleasant idea. He was in danger of wandering off
over the strangeness of this relation and its possible pleasantness,
unmindful of the small questioner who waited.
"Well," she said inquiringly, a little laugh closing the word, "are you
trying to decide the momentous question?"
"No," he said with emphasis, "she doesn't dance."
"Never!"
"Of course not."
"Dear me! Why 'of course'? You speak as if it were the unpardonable
sin!" The very words that John had used in speaking of this very
subject, yet he disliked this speaker for these words which slipped so
smoothly from her pretty lips. All unconscious of this, however, she
continued: "I shall be greatly surprised if you are not mistaken. She
is from the city, and in cities all the young people dance; the old
country ideas on that subject are thought to be absurd. I believe she
would like a little refreshment from this dulness, and really I think
she looks too sensible to have any such silly notions as some of our
deacons indulge. I don't suppose you ever asked her point-blank, did
you?"
John did not choose to tell how nearly he had done just this, did not
choose to be catechised longer, so he turned from her with this parting
sentence—
"If you are anxious about the matter, it is easy enough to ask her; she
can speak for herself." And his mental addition was, with a curling
lip—"She is one of their Christians!" Though why John Morgan should
have any right to pass judgment upon her for disgracing a profession in
which he did not believe is more than I can understand. This, however,
I know—they nearly all do it.
No sooner was he left to himself than it occurred to him that he had
been very emphatic; after all, what ground had he for his positive
statements? He recalled the brief conversation which he had held with
Louise on the subject; what had she said? Not much besides asking
him a question or two. He did not believe that she ever joined in
that amusement; he felt positive about it; at the same time he could
not have told why he felt so. Suppose he should be mistaken? Suppose
they should get up a dance here and now, and she should join them?
He grew hot over the thought. "She needn't try to cajole me into her
prayer-meetings or organ-mendings after that," he told himself in
indignation. But then, John Morgan, why not? You believe in dancing;
you know you have sneered at your mother for her views on this subject.
Never mind; whatever he believed, he assuredly did not believe in
having this new sister of his take such a position before this public.
A desire to have the proof of her own words, added to his feelings,
sent him across the room to interrupt that conversation between her and
the minister. And though she certainly did not say much, he had turned
from her satisfied that "city lady though she was, that pert little
yellow-curled girl would find herself mistaken."
Meantime Mr. Butler regarded the lady with a curious blending of
amusement and anxiety on his face.
"Your brother has evidently assumed your defence," he said lightly;
and then, as if with a sudden resolution to be earnest, he added; "I
could find it in my heart to repeat and press the question that has
just been asked you if I thought you were willing to enter into the
discussion with me. Not—" he added, with a slightly flushing face, as
she turned surprised eyes on him, "not as to why you do not dance, for
of course your position and mine are answer enough to this question,
but as to what reasons you give to others for taking such views of the
question. I confess to you frankly that it puzzles me beyond almost
any other that I meet, how to explain to those bright young girls and
pleasant-faced boys, who gather in this congregational capacity every
two weeks, and who are well acquainted with each other, that there is
any harm in having a promenade together, for really that is all that
the sort of dancing in which they indulge amounts to. Positively,
when they say to me, 'What is the harm?' I am nonplussed. I feel the
inconsistency, but am at an utter loss how to explain it. Now, may I
ask you what you do with such questions when they are asked you?"
"Well," said Louise thoughtfully, "it depends upon the standpoint from
which I am to talk; by which I mean there are various presentations of
the subject. You do not expect to influence one who has no love for
Christ with the same motives that you do an earnest Christian, you
know."
"Certainly not; but it is from a Christian standpoint that I want
you to speak now. I have some young Christians here who say to me,
'Now, Mr. Butler, what harm can there be in our dancing together
occasionally, we boys and girls who know each other so well? We don't
go to balls or large parties, but when we meet in this way, please tell
us the harm?' And while it may be a very humiliating confession, I
have never been able to answer them satisfactorily to myself. Suppose
that a young girl who professed to belong to Christ should ask you the
question, what would you say?"
"I should say, 'Whether, therefore, ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye
do, do all to the glory of God.' And then I should ask her to tell me
how dancing could be made subservient to his glory."
"But, Mrs. Morgan, isn't that very high ground?"
"Certainly it is; is it higher than a follower of Christ ought to take?"
"Well, but the difficulty with such reasoning is that it condemns so
many things which we consider innocent; for instance, that corn which
Miss Dorothy and I popped the other evening, would it be possible to
fit that to God's glory?"
"I find it by no means difficult," Louise said, giving him a bright
smile. "I am not sure but that, while the corn popped, avenues were
opened in the family which may lead to hearts, and make a road for
you to lead them to your Master. I assure you that I believe even
such trivialities as kernels of corn may tend to his glory. But then,
if we became, as a family, infatuated with corn-popping, so that we
spent our evenings away into the midnight, if not away beyond it, in
popping corn, and unfitted ourselves for the next day's duties; and if
some people, or occasionally one person, had been led by the popping
of corn into temptation and danger and death, I should feel that you
ought to use your influence against our amusement in that direction.
And this world is in such a cranky state of mind that in order to use
your influence against my excesses, you would have to refrain from ever
popping one single kernel. Now, wouldn't you?"
"I might say," he answered, laughing, "that if you were so extremely
foolish as to be led astray by such an innocent amusement as that, it
was your own fault, and I was not responsible."
"And I should ask, 'Shall the weak sister perish for whom Christ died?'"
"But, Mrs. Morgan, seriously, many of our young people, or at least
some of them, have so slight a knowledge of the world that they really
cannot realize the possibility of persons being led astray by such
causes; and where they have not wise mothers and tender fathers to
influence them, in whose superior wisdom they can trust, how can I
reach such?"
"There is one line of argument that ought to reach all such, I think.
Take, for instance, my brother John; isn't it evident, Mr. Butler, that
he doesn't consider dancing consistent with a Christian profession?"
"Oh, of course," said Mr. Butler promptly; "there is hardly an
unconverted man or woman in the world who does. We are sure to find
sneerers among that class, but I had always supposed that was rather
because they had caught the impression from some advanced Christians,
and, being always ready to sneer, were glad to have this to sneer
about."
"Now, we might go off on a side issue, and try to discover where these
advanced Christians got their views. But suppose we do not; suppose
we grant that such is the case, what then? Have I, as a Christian,
any right to indulge in that which is not in itself a duty, and which
may cause me to be a stumbling-block in the way of another? Why, the
argument is very old: 'By meat destroy not the work of God.' If I may
not do it for meat, can I possibly see a right to do it for amusement?"
"Well," said Mr. Butler, after a long pause, "I see the line of
argument; it is capable of covering very broad ground. What do you say
to an unconverted person on this subject?"
"Various things," said Louise, smiling; "among others I try to persuade
them to love the Lord Jesus, and then when he makes it plain to them
that there are greater pleasures in store than these can give, they
will be enabled even to give up dancing for his sake! If the Christian
world were a unit on this question, do you really think it would give
us much trouble, Mr. Butler?"
"No," said Mr. Butler gravely; "the trouble grows out of a divided
host. Yet there are arguments against dancing on the side of morals and
propriety, but it is exceedingly difficult to make pure-hearted young
girls understand this."
"I know, and herein lies so much of the mischief; because, Mr. Butler,
young men like my brother John know only too well the arguments which
might be advanced in that direction.—Now, tell me, please, who is that
young man who seems to stand aloof? I have noticed him several times
this evening; he appears like a stranger; he is standing now, near the
sitting-room door, quite alone."
"I don't know who he is," said Mr. Butler; "I have noticed him at the
socials once or twice before, but I don't know his name, and can't
imagine where he belongs."
"Won't you please find out for me, if you can, and introduce us?"
Thus commissioned, the minister turned away with heightened colour. Not
a word had Mrs. Morgan said as to the strangeness of having a young man
appear in his church socials two or three times without discovering
who he was. Nevertheless an uncomfortable sense of having appeared
indifferent to his flock haunted the minister as he looked about for
ways and means of making the acquaintance of the stranger.
"That?" said Deacon Shirley's son, to whom he appealed. "Oh, that is
young Martyn; he is a farm hand in summer, and a—well, anything he can
find to be in winter. He is doing odd jobs for Mr. Capron now, on the
farm, working for his board, I believe, and attending the school in the
village. I don't know him. Keeps himself to himself."
"Hasn't he been to our socials before?"
"Oh yes; twice, I think. Jennie Capron has to depend on him for an
escort; and so he comes in the line of his work, just as he does
everything else. He doesn't seem to enjoy them much."
"Suppose you introduce me?" said the minister; and young Shirley, much
amazed, complied.
Meantime, while they were making their way to his side, little Minnie
Capron, who had been standing near them, sped away to the young man,
who was a friend of hers, and whispered—
"Callie! O Callie! Mr. Butler has been asking Ben Shirley all about
you, and he wants to be introduced to you, and they are coming now."
"All right, little one," said the young man cheerily; "only don't tell
them we know it," and he received the promised introduction with a
broad smile on his face.
Nobody knew better than Mr. Butler how to be genial when he chose, or,
more properly speaking, when he thought of it; so young Carey Martyn,
who had felt somewhat sore over the thought that even the minister
had overlooked him, thawed under the bright and cordial greeting, and
was presently willing to cross the room to Louise and receive another
introduction.
"Mrs. Morgan wants to meet you," said the minister as they went toward
her. "She specially desired an introduction."
And the young fellow's heart warmed at the idea: he was not to be quite
left out in the cold, then, if he did drive Mr. Capron's horses and
work for his board. That is the way in which he had interpreted the
thoughtlessness of the young people. He was proud, this young man—a
good many young men are, intensely and sensitively proud, about a
hundred little things of which no one save themselves is thinking; and
thus they make hard places in their lives which might just as well be
smooth.
Mr. Butler, having performed his duty, immediately left the two to make
each other's acquaintance, and went himself to hunt out a new face that
he had seen in the crowd. He was beginning to feel that there were ways
of making church socials helpful.
A little touch of pride, mingled with a frank desire not to sail into
society under false colours, made young Martyn say, in answer to
Louise's kindly cross-questioning—
"Oh no, I don't live here; my home is a hundred miles away; I am,
really, only a servant."
"To be a servant, under some masters, is a very high position," Louise
answered quickly. "May I hope that you are a servant of the great King?"
Then you should have seen Carey Martyn's gray eyes flash.
"I believe I am," he said proudly. "I wear his uniform, and I try to
serve him."
"Then we are brother and sister," said Louise. "Let us shake hands in
honour of the relationship," and she held out her fair hand and grasped
the roughened one, and the young man's heart warmed, and his face
brightened as it hardly had since he left his mother.
CHAPTER XVII.
FIRST FRUITS.
"LEWIS," said his wife, as she came to him in the hall, robed for
walking, "I have a little plan: I want you to walk home with Dorothy
to-night, and let me go with John; I would like to have a talk with
him. But more than that, I want you to have a talk with Dorothy, and
you never get opportunity to see her alone."
"O Louise!" said her husband, undisguised dismay in voice and manner;
yet he tried to disguise it—he did not want her to know how entirely he
shrank from such a plan.
"I don't think, dear, that it will be wise. Dorothy is at all times
afraid of me, and a long walk alone with me would be a terrible
undertaking in her eyes; and, besides, Louise dear, I am not like you—I
cannot talk familiarly with people on these topics as you can."
"Don't talk any more than you think wise; get acquainted with Dorrie,
and drop one little seed that may spring up and bear fruit. I want you
to try it, Lewis."
There was something in her face and voice when she said such things
that had often moved Lewis before to go contrary to his own wishes. It
worked the same spell over him now; without another word of objection
he turned away—though the walk home in the starlight had been a
delightful prospect—and went to do what was a real cross to him.
What had he and Dorothy in common? What could they say to each other?
"What is all this?" John questioned sharply as Lewis strode out of the
gate with the frightened Dorothy tucked under his arm. He suspected
a trap, and he had all a young man's horror of being caught with
cunningly-devised plans. He was quick-witted; if this were one of
Louise's schemes to lecture him under pretence of enjoying a walk, she
would find him very hard to reach.
Fortunately for her, Louise was also quick-witted. He was not one to be
caught with guile, at least not guile of this sort. She answered his
question promptly and frankly.
"It is a plan of mine, John: I wanted to talk with you, and it seemed
to me this would be a good opportunity. You do not mind walking with
me, do you?"
Thus squarely met, what was John to say? He said nothing, but he
reasoned in his heart that this was a straightforward way of doing
things, anyhow—no "sneaking" about it.
"Well," he said, as, after offering his arm, they walked over the
frozen earth for a little in silence, "what have you got to say to me?
Why don't you begin your lecture?"
"O John! It isn't in the least like a lecture; it is a simple thing,
very easily said: I wish you were a Christian man; that comprises the
whole story."
What a simple story it was! What was there in it that made John's heart
beat quicker?
"What do you care?" he asked her.
"Why, isn't that a singular question? If I love my King, don't I want
all the world to be loyal to him? Besides, if I love my friends, don't
I desire for them that which will alone give them happiness?"
"What do you mean by 'being a Christian'?"
"I mean following Christ."
"What does that mean? I don't understand those cant phrases, and I
don't believe anybody else does."
"Never mind 'anybody else;' what is there in that phrase which you
don't understand?"
"I don't understand anything about it, and never saw anything in any
one's religion to make me want to; I believe less in religion than I do
in anything else in life. It is a great humbug. Half your Christians
are making believe to their neighbours, and the other half are making
believe not only to their neighbours but to themselves. Now you have my
opinion in plain English."
And John drew himself up proudly, after the manner of a young man who
thinks he has advanced some unanswerable arguments.
"Never mind 'other people's religion' just now, John; I don't want you
to be like a single person whom you ever saw. I am not anxious just now
to know whether you believe in religion or not. Do you believe there is
such a person as Jesus Christ?"
Then there was utter silence. John, who had a hundred ways of twisting
this subject, and was ready with his lancet to probe the outer covering
of all professions, and who believed that he could meet all arguments
with sneers; was silenced by a name. He did not believe in religion,
nor in churches, nor in ministers, nor in the Bible; at least he had
sharply told himself that he did not. But was he prepared to say
plainly, here in the stillness of the winter night, under the gaze of
the solemn stars, that he did not believe there was such a person as
Jesus Christ?
Foolish disciple of a foolish infidel though he thought he was,
something, he did not know what, some unseen, unrealized power, kept
him from speaking those blasphemous and false words; yes, for he knew
in his heart that to deny his belief in the existence of such a person
would be as false as it was foolish.
He would have been glad to have had Louise advance her arguments, press
the subject, be as personal as she pleased—anything rather than this
solemn silence; it made him strangely uneasy.
But Louise only waited; then presently she repeated her question.
"Why, of course, I suppose so," was at last John's unwilling admission.
"Are you very familiar with his history?"
Another trying question. Why could not she argue, if she wanted to,
like a sensible person? He was willing to meet her half-way; but these
short, simple, straightforward questions were very trying.
"Not remarkably, I guess," he answered at last with a half-laugh.
What an admission for a man to have to make who was expected to prove
why he did not believe in anything!
But Louise had apparently no intention of making him prove anything.
"Well," she said simply, "then we have reached our starting-point. I
wished that you were a follower of Christ; in order to follow him, of
course, you will have to know him intimately."
"Who follows him?"
The question was asked almost fiercely. Oh, if Louise could only
have reminded him of his mother, could have brought her forth as an
unanswerable argument against this foolish attempt at scepticism!
She knew mothers who could have been so brought forward, but, alas
for him! John Morgan's mother was not one of them. The minister? She
thought of him quickly, and as quickly laid his name aside. He was a
"good fellow," a genial man; John already half fancied him; but it
would not do to bring him forward as a model of one who was following
Christ. Alas, again, for John that his pastor could not have been a
satisfactory pattern! She thought of her husband, and with a throb of
wifely pain realized that she must not produce his name. Not, indeed,
because he was not a follower, but because this unreasonable boy could
so readily detect flaws, and was fiercely claiming a perfect pattern.
She must answer something.
"O John!" she said, and her voice was full of feeling, "very many are,
in weakness and with stumblings; but what has that to do with the
subject? Suppose there is not a single honest follower on earth, does
that destroy you and Christ? To point out my follies to Jesus Christ
will not excuse you, for he does not ask you to follow me. John, don't
let us argue these questions that are as plain as sunlight. You believe
in Jesus Christ; will you study him, and take him for your model?"
"Not until I see somebody accomplish something in the world who
pretends to have done so."
He said it with his accustomed sneer; he knew it was weak and
foolish—was in a sense unanswerable because of its utter puerility;
yet, all the same, he repeated it in varied forms during that walk,
harping continually on the old key—the inconsistencies of others. In
part he believed his own statements; in fact he was at work at what he
had accused Christians of doing—"making believe" to himself that the
fault lay all outside of himself.
Louise said very little more; she had not the least desire to argue.
She believed that John, like many other young men in his position,
knew altogether too little about the matter to be capable of honest
argument. She believed he was, like many another, very far from being
sincerely anxious to reach the truth, else he would not have had to
make that humiliating admission that he was unacquainted with the
character of Jesus Christ.
He talked a good deal during the rest of the way; waxed fierce over the
real or fancied sins of his neighbours; instanced numerous examples,
and seemed surprised and provoked that she made not the slightest
attempt to controvert his statements.
"Upon my word!" he said at last, "you are easily vanquished. You have
never lived in such an interesting community of Christians as this, I
fancy. So you haven't a word to say for them?"
"I didn't know we were talking about them," she answered quietly; "I
thought we were talking about Jesus Christ. I am not acquainted with
them, and in one sense they are really of no consequence; but I do know
Jesus, and can say a word for him, if you will present anything against
him. Still, as you seem very anxious to talk of these others, I want
to ask one question—Do you believe these traits of character which you
have mentioned were developed by religion?"
"Of course not, at least I should hope not; it is the absurdity of
their professions, in view of such lives, to which I was trying to call
your attention."
"Well, suppose we grant that their professions are absurd, what have
you and I gained what has that to do with the personal question which
rests between us and Christ?"
"Oh well," he said, sneering, "that is begging the question. Of course
if the life is such an important one, the fruit ought to be worth
noticing. Anyhow, I don't intend to swell the army of pretenders until
they can make a better showing than they do now."
It was precisely in this way that he swung around the subject, always
glancing away from a personal issue. You have doubtless heard them,
these arguers, going over the same ground, again and again, exactly as
though it had never been touched before. Louise was sore-hearted; she
began to question, miserably, as to whether she had made a mistake. Was
not this talk worse than profitless? Was he not even being strengthened
in his own follies? She had so wanted to help him, and he really seemed
farther away from her reach than when they had started on this walk.
She was glad when they neared their own gate. John had relapsed into
silence, whether sullen or otherwise she had no means of knowing. They
had walked rapidly at last, and gained upon Dorothy and Lewis, who were
now coming up the walk.
"Good-night," said Louise gently.
"Good-night," he answered. Then, hesitating, "I'm rather sorry, on
your account, that I am such a good-for-nothing. Perhaps, if I had
had a specimen of your sort about me earlier, it might have made a
difference; but I'm soured now beyond even your reach. I'd advise you
to let me go to decay as fast as possible;" and he pushed past her into
the hall, up the stairs, leaving her standing in the doorway waiting
for her husband.
Meantime, in silence and embarrassment, Lewis and Dorothy had trudged
along. At least he was embarrassed; he had no means of knowing what she
was feeling, save that the hand which rested on his arm trembled. This
very fact disturbed him; why had she need to be afraid of him? Was he a
monster, that she should shrink and tremble whenever he spoke to her?
Still, conscience told him plainly that he had never exerted himself
greatly to make her feel at ease with him. Then he fell to thinking
over her emotionless weariness of a life. What was there for her
anywhere in the future more than in the present? She would, probably,
stagnate early, if the process were not already completed, and settle
down into hopeless listlessness. Much he knew about life, especially
the life of a girl not yet nearly out of her teens!
Still his view of it gave him a feeling of unutterable pity for the
sister of whom he had hitherto thought but little connectedly, except
to admit a general disappointment in her. Now he began to say to
himself, "What if she should awaken to a new life in Christ? What a
restful, hopeful life it might give her! She will never be able to do
much for him, but what wonderful things he could do for her!" This was
a new standpoint from which to look at it. Heretofore he had thought of
her as one who would be nothing but a passive traveller to heaven, even
if she were converted, and therefore not of much consequence! Was that
it? Oh no; he shrank from that way of putting it. He had really not
been so indifferent as he had been hopeless. If he had put the thought
into words, he would have had to admit that there had not seemed to
him enough of Dorothy for Christ to save! Something very like that,
at least. Still he had honestly meant to try to say a word to her.
Not so much for her sake, nor even for the Master's sake, but because
of his wife's eager face and earnest voice. He had determined to talk
pleasantly to her, to tell her some bright and interesting thing
connected with his long absences from home, and then, when he got her
self-forgetful and interested, drop just a word for Christ in a very
faint and faithless sort of hope that it might, possibly some time,
bear fruit.
He did nothing of the sort. Some feeling, new and masterful, took
possession of him, made him have a desire for fruit; made him anxious,
for the sake of this desolate outlook in her life, to brighten it with
Christ. So the first words he spoke, and they were spoken very soon
after the walk commenced, were,—
"Do you know, Dorothy, I can't help wishing with all my heart that you
belonged to Christ!"
Then the hand on his arm trembled violently; and while he was thinking
how he should quiet her tremor, and chiding himself for having been so
abrupt, Dorothy made answer with a burst of tears,—
"O Lewis, I never wished anything so much in my life! Will you show me
how?"
"Did you know how Dorothy felt?" Lewis said, beginning the moment the
door of their room closed on himself and wife. There was a new look on
his face, an eager, almost an exalted look, and a ring in his voice
that made Louise turn and regard him half curiously as she said,—
"Nothing beyond the fact that she has seemed to me very impressible for
a day or two, and that I have had strong faith in praying for her. Why?"
"Why, Louise, she melted right down at the first word. She is very
deeply impressed, and wonderfully in earnest; and I half believe she
is a Christian' at this moment. I found her in bewilderment as to just
what conversion meant, but she grasped at my explanation like one who
saw with the eyes of her soul. I was so surprised and humiliated and
grateful!"
All these phases of emotion showed in his prayer. Louise, who had
believed him much in earnest for years, had never heard him pray as he
did that evening for his sister Dorothy. As she listened and joined in
the petitions, her faith, too, grew strong to grasp the thought that
there was a new name written in heaven that night and rejoiced over
among the angels. And yet her heart was sad. In vain she chid it for
ungratefulness, and dimly suspected selfish motives at the bottom. But
it did seem so strange to her that John, for whom she had felt such a
constantly increasing anxiety, for whom she had prayed as she could not
pray even for Dorothy, held aloof, and was even farther away to-night
than she had felt him to be before; and Dorothy, at a word from the
brother who had hardly given her two connected thoughts for years, had
come joyfully into the kingdom!
Was Louise jealous? She would have been shocked at the thought; and
yet, in what strange and subtle ways the tempter can lend us unawares,
even when we believe ourselves to be almost in a line with Christ.
CHAPTER XVIII.
BIRDS OF PROMISE.
"ONE moment, Mr. Butler," said Louise, detaining the minister, as,
having given her cordial greeting in the church-aisle, and bowed to
Dorothy, and shaken hands with Father Morgan, he was turning away; "we
have something to tell you, something that will make you glad; our
sister Dorrie has decided for Christ."
Simple words enough; I suppose even Dorothy, though her cheeks glowed,
and her eyes were bright with joy, did not recognize the tremendous
import of their meaning; and Louise was surprised at their effect on
Mr. Butler. He was a young minister, you will remember; and while he
had not been doing all that he could, he had scarcely realized that he
could do more—at least not until very lately. This was really his first
experience in greeting a new-born soul among his flock. It came to him
with all the joy of a glad, an almost overwhelming, surprise. True, he
had prayed that he might have "souls for his hire." Yet he had prayed,
as many another does, without realizing that possibly his prayer would
be answered, and actually souls would come into the kingdom, whom he
could welcome to his Father's table!
There was an instant flush over his handsome face, an eager flash in
his eyes, and he turned to Dorothy again, and held out his hand.
"Welcome!" he said.
Not a word more, but the quiver in his voice told that words were
beyond him just then; and Dorothy turned from him with the belief
that it certainly meant a great deal to the minister to have a person
"decide for Christ." She was very much surprised, and not a little
confused. It had not occurred to her that others, outside of Lewis and
Louise, would ever know about her new hopes and intentions. I am not
sure that it had before occurred to her that any one would care! She
had seen very little demonstration of this sort in her life. So it was
another surprise to her when Deacon Belknap shook her hand heartily, as
he said,—
"So you have experienced religion, have you? Well, now, that's good,
that's good!"
And his face shone, and he shook the hand until it ached.
Poor Dorothy did not really know whether to laugh or cry. She
had always been a good deal afraid of Deacon Belknap; he was a
solemn-faced, slow-toned man, and she had not known that his face could
shine, or that he believed anything anywhere was good. Moreover, she
was not sure that she had "experienced religion;" indeed, she was by no
means sure what those words meant. It was true that she had decided for
Christ, or—no, was that it? It almost seemed to Dorothy that, instead,
it should be said that Christ had decided for her! How wonderfully he
had called her. How almost she had heard his voice. How tenderly he had
waited. How he loved her. And how sure was she that she loved him. But
to "experience religion" was some wise and solemn thing that it did not
seem to her she understood. But Deacon Belknap had something further to
say,—
"You are very happy now, I suppose? Yes. Well, young converts always
are. But I want to warn you: you mustn't expect to have that feeling
last. It is like 'the morning cloud and the early dew.' You must expect
trials and crosses and disappointments and unhappiness. It is a hard
world. Some people expect to be 'carried to the skies on flowery beds
of ease.' But I tell you it is a 'straight and thorny road, and mortal
spirits tire and faint."
And Deacon Belknap either forgot, or had never learned, the very next
line in that grand old hymn; but with an assurance that the sooner she
realized that this world was full of troubles and conflicts the easier
it would be for her, went away to his waiting class.
Then Dorothy's brow clouded; she was troubled. She felt so innocently
glad and happy, so sure of a Friend, so certain that he loved her and
that she loved him. Was it possible that she must lose this feeling,
and be lonely and dreary and unsatisfied, as she had been ever since
she could remember? Was that what was the trouble with Christians, that
the feeling didn't last? Almost Dorothy felt as though, somehow, she
had been deceived! Her face was not nearly so bright as before when
Carey Martyn came toward her.
He had been introduced at the church social, and had not seen her
since, but he grasped her hand as eagerly as Deacon Belknap had.
"I hear good news of you," he said simply, with a glad look on his
face. Something in his tones made Dorothy understand what he meant.
"Is it good news?" she asked him doubtfully.
"Is it? The very best in the world. You don't doubt it, I hope? Are you
going to stay to Sunday school? Come over and join our class. We are
getting-up a new class, and we are going to ask Mr. Butler to take it.
I never thought I should care to have him; but it seems to me now just
as though he would be a good teacher. Do you believe he will take a
class?"
Then Dorothy, remembering his hand-clasp and the light in his eyes,
said,—
"Yes; I should think he would. But I can't stay, I suppose. Oh, how I
should like to!"
"Like to what?" Louise questioned, just at her side. "Oh, you are
talking about Sunday school. I think we can manage it. Lewis has been
asked to take a class, and I am wanted to supply a vacancy; and father
said stay if we wanted to—he was in no hurry."
Then Dorothy went over to the new class that was forming; and the
minister came presently and shook hands with them all, and said he felt
honoured by being chosen as their teacher, and wondered that none of
them had ever thought of it before. And to Dorothy it seemed as though
the millennium were coming, or it would have so seemed had she known
anything about that word or its meaning. It was a matter of surprise
to many where that new class suddenly came from, or who started it;
but the simple truth was, that what had been lingering in a sort of
homesick way in Carey Martyn's heart for weeks took shape and form
along with the hand-clasp of his pastor at that church social. He was
used to Sabbath school, and his old class had been taught by his old
pastor.
Taken all in all, it was a white day to Dorothy Morgan. Her first
Sunday in a new world; a Sunday in which she had received greetings
from the brethren and sisters of the kingdom, and been counted in; a
Sunday in which she had actually joined in the hymns and the prayers
and the readings, and attempted to follow the sermon, though, truth to
tell, Dorothy had gotten very little from the sermon. Try as she would
to become interested, her thoughts would wander; but they wandered
constantly to the hymn that had just been sung, the words of which
she felt, and to the prayer of the pastor, the spirit of which she
understood.
"Why can't ministers preach just as they pray?" wondered Dorothy.
The ride home in the brightness of the winter day was not unpleasant.
Father Morgan, whether subdued by his long waiting, or by the white
world glistening in the sunlight, certainly had nothing to say that
was jarring, and seemed not dissatisfied with the condition of things.
Dorothy stole little glances at him from under her wrappings, and
wondered whether he would ever know that everything was different to
her from what it had been last Sunday, and what he would say if he ever
did know. And then suddenly, like the leap of a new emotion into her
heart, came the desire that he knew for himself what it all meant. Oh,
how she wished that father was a Christian!
Where did the sudden, intense desire come from? She had never felt
anything like it before. Sometimes, indeed, she had drearily wished
that they were more like other people—went to church regularly, even
went occasionally of an evening as the Stuarts did, who lived no
farther away, and had the social appointed at their house. But it had
been a dreamy, far-away sort of wish, little desire about it, nothing
in the least like this sudden longing.
Then there rolled over Dorothy the sweetness of the thought that she
could actually pray for her father, and that may be—oh, may be!—because
of her prayer, the father would, some day, when she had prayed for
him a great many years, come to know of this experience by personal
knowledge. Will there ever be more happiness put into Dorothy's life
than surged over her with the possibilities involved in that thought?
Still, Deacon Belknap troubled her. When was she to expect all this
brightness to go away? And, also, why must it go? Why had not Lewis
said something to her about it—warned her, when she frankly admitted
to him this morning that she had never been happy before in her life?
And oh, how long had the feeling stayed with him? He knew about it, for
he had told her that he understood just how she felt; he remembered
well his own experience. Then a sudden, bewildering doubt of Deacon
Belknap's theories came over Dorothy, for she was confronted with the
thought that she did not believe the feeling ever left Louise; it was
this which made her different from others. Still, Deacon Belknap ought
to know. And, besides, what might not Louise have had to go through
before the joy came to stay? Dorothy's brain was in a whirl. Well for
her that Louise, standing at one side, had heard every word of Deacon
Belknap's well-meant and honest caution. She saw the instant clouding
of Dorothy's face, and watched for her chance to remove the thorn. It
came to her just after dinner, when Dorothy was upstairs hunting for
her apron. Louise, meeting her in the hall, said,—
"So Deacon Belknap thought he ought to caution you against being happy
in Christ?"
"What did he mean?" Dorothy asked, her cheeks glowing. "Does the happy
feeling all go away? Must it?"
"What does it spring from, Dorrie dear?"
"Why, I think," said Dorothy, hesitating and blushing violently, "it
seems to me that it comes because I love Jesus and because he loves me."
"Yes. Well, if Deacon Belknap had told me that I must not expect to be
as happy with my husband in the future as I am now, because there would
be trials and difficulties of one sort and another to encounter, and
that therefore his love and mine would not burn as brightly, I think I
should have considered myself insulted."
"I should think so! Do you mean—O Louise, I mean do you think they are
a little alike?"
"He calls the Church his bride, dear; it is his own figure; but of
course it falls far below the real, vital union that there may be
between us and Christ."
"Then what did Deacon Belknap mean?"
"Why, if I should treat Lewis very coldly and indifferently, forget to
notice him sometimes, go for days without talking with him, neglect
his suggestions, disregard his advice, and all that sort of thing, I
imagine that we should not be very happy together."
"Well?" said Dorothy, in bewilderment.
"Well, don't you know, dear, that that is just the way in which many
Christians actually treat Christ? And then Satan blinds their hearts
into thinking that it is not their own fault that their joy in him is
gone, but a necessity, because of this troublesome world. If I were you
I would not tolerate any such insinuations; it is an insult to Jesus
Christ, who deliberately says he will keep you in 'perfect peace,' if
your mind is stayed on him."
"Then all that isn't necessary?"
"No more necessary than that I should have days of gloom and
disappointment over my husband. Oh, it is lowering the power and
love of Christ to make that comparison, because, Dorrie, his love is
infinite, and he says everlasting."
Dorothy went through the hall below singing,—
"Mine is an unchanging love;
Higher than the heights above,
Deeper than the depths beneath;
Free and faithful—strong as death."
She had found that hymn in the morning, while Mr. Butler was preaching,
and had rejoiced in it for a little until Deacon Belknap had banished
it from her heart. Now it came back in strength, and it will take more
than Deacon Belknap to shake it, for it has taken root.
That Sabbath day had one more experience to be remembered. If Louise's
little plan for the walk home from the social had been made with a view
to rousing Lewis, she could not more successfully have accomplished it.
He had walked ever since in a new atmosphere; he had risen to the
glory of the possibilities of his life; he had heard Dorothy say—she
had said it that very morning, when he met her early, out in the back
kitchen woodshed, where the kindlings were kept—that he had shown her
the way to Jesus, and now she had found rest in him. Was a man ever to
forget the sweetness of words like that?—a Christian, honoured of God
in showing another soul the entrance-way! Shall he sink to the level of
common things after that, and forget that he has a right to work with
God, on work that will last to all eternity? Lewis Morgan, Christian
man though he had been for years, had never heard those words before;
but do you think that something of the honour which he had lost, and
something of the shame of having tamely lost such honours, did not
sweep over him? Surely it should not be the last time that he should
hear such words—at least it should be through no fault of his if it
were.
Low motive, do you say? I am not sure of that. There is a higher one,
it is true; and every Christian who can feel the lower will, sooner
or later, grasp the higher. But since God has called us to honourable
positions, even to be "co-labourers," shall we not rejoice in the
honour?
Well, Lewis Morgan had worked all day in the light of this new
experience. He thirsted for more of it; he felt roused to his very
finger-tips; he longed to be doing; he had taught that class of girls
put into his care as he had not supposed that he could teach. Now he
walked up and down their room, while the Sabbath twilight gathered,
thinking.
Louise, who had been reading to him, kept silence, and wondered what
was the question which he was evidently deciding. She knew his face so
well, that she felt sure there was being made a decision. At last he
came to her side.
"Louise, I believe in my soul that we ought to go downstairs and try to
have prayers with the family. Father might object to it; he thinks all
these things are a species of cant, and I have been especially anxious
to avoid anything that looked in the least like it. I have been too
much afraid of what he would think. I believe I ought to try. What do
you say?"
Of course he knew just what she would say, and she said it. Soon
after that they went downstairs. Lewis possessed one trait worthy of
imitation; when he had fairly determined on a course, he went straight
toward it with as little delay as possible. So, directly they were
seated in the clean and orderly kitchen, Nellie cuddled in Louise's
lap—a spot which was growing to be her refuge—Lewis commenced,—
"Father, we have been thinking that perhaps you would have no objection
to our having family worship together downstairs. We would like it very
much, if it would not be unpleasant."
Mrs. Morgan seemed suddenly seized with the spirit of uncontrollable
restlessness. She hopped from her chair, drew down the paper shade with
a jerk, then, finding that she had made it disagreeably dark, drew
it up again, set back two chairs, opened and shut the outer kitchen
door, and took down a towel and hung it on another nail; then she came
back to her seat. As for Father Morgan, he sat, tongs in hand, just
as he had been when Lewis addressed him, and gazed unwinkingly into
the glowing fire for the space of what seemed to Lewis five minutes,
but, in reality, was not more than one; then he said, slowly and
impressively,—
"I'm sure I have no manner of objections, if it will do you any good."
It was Dorothy who rushed into the other room, before her father's
sentence was concluded, and brought therefrom Grandmother Hunt's old
family Bible; and in the Morgan household, after forty years of life
together, father and mother met for the first time at the family altar.
Howbeit, neither father nor mother bowed the knee, but sat bolt upright
in their chairs. But Dorothy knelt and prayed, and dropped some happy
tears on her wooden-seated chair the while.
As for John, he would not go to church; would not come to dinner with
the family, but took what he called a "bite" by himself when he chose
to come for it; would not stay in the room during the reading and the
prayer, but strode off toward the barn the moment the subject was
suggested by Lewis.
Yet, despite these drawbacks, the voice of prayer went up from the
Morgan kitchen from full and grateful hearts.
CHAPTER XIX.
"WHATSOEVER."
I AM not sure that I can explain to you the state of mind in which
Dorothy opened her eyes to the world on Monday morning. Unless you
have had a like experience you will not understand it. She had always
been a repressed rather than an indifferent girl. Under the apparently
apathetic exterior there had boiled a perfect volcano of unsettled
longing. She had not known what she wanted; she had not felt the least
hope of ever discovering how her thoughts had taken new shape; she
was in another world; she was another person; old things had passed
away; all things had become new. She stood before her bit of mirror,
and tried to arrange her heavy braids of hair as Louise wore hers;
and, meantime, she was in a very eager, very unsettled state of mind.
What was she to do? Where commence? The bare walls of her uninviting
little room had always seemed to shut her in, and she had always
hated them. Now it seemed to her that she had a right to get away
from them—get outside, somewhere, and do something. How was it all to
be accomplished? She looked with disdain upon her life; she felt her
years, thus far, to have been wasted ones. Now she was ready to make a
fresh start, only she could not imagine which stop to take first. You
see her danger. Many a young life has shipwrecked its usefulness on
just such rocks.
She threw down the covering of her bed, opened the window to let in the
crisp winter morning, smelled of the frosty, sunlighted air, and looked
abroad over her little world, shut in by hills and far-stretching
meadows and home-like farms, and wondered just what she should do; and
the sense of longing to get away from all this, whore there seemed
nothing to do, was the strongest feeling that possessed her, unless the
determination to accomplish it was a shade stronger.
She stepped out into the narrow little hall, and came face to face with
Louise, who was fresh and smiling in a fresh calico and ruffles.
"Louise," said Dorothy, a whole world of repressed eagerness in her
voice, "what am I going to do?"
"Ever so many things, I hope, dear," was Louise's prompt and cheery
reply, and she emphasized it with a kiss.
"Yes," said Dorothy, with shining eyes, "I mean to, oh, I mean to;
but—I don't know where to commence. What is there to do?—I mean for a
beginning—and how shall I get to the first thing?"
"I think," said Louise, with smiling mouth and eyes, and sweet, decided
voice, "I think, my dear, if I were you, I would begin with that black
kettle."
Then you should have seen the sudden changing of Dorothy's face.
Surprise, disappointment, intense mortification, all struggling with a
sense of being misunderstood, being wronged, spoke in her eyes and the
quiver of her lips.
"You think I am teasing you, Dorrie," and her new sister's voice was
very tender. "Nothing is further from my intention. I honestly mean
what I say. That very kettle which gives you Monday morning trouble
can help you to a first victory; and it is a symbol of all the other
things, small in themselves but amounting to much counted together,
that can be made to serve you to-day."
"I did mean to try to do right; but I wanted to do something for
Christ."
Dorothy's voice was subdued.
"And you think that Jesus Christ has nothing to do with the black
kettle, or the boiler, or the sink, or a dozen other things with which
you will come in contact to-day? That is such a mistake. Don't you
begin your Christian life by supposing that all these duties which fall
upon us in such numbers consume just so much time that must be counted
out, and with the piece that is left we are to serve him. Remember it
is he who said, 'Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye
do, do all to the glory of God.' Doesn't that 'whatsoever' cover the
pudding-kettle too, Dorrie?"
New light was struggling on Dorrie's face—just a glimmer, though,
shadowed by bewilderment.
"It sounds as though it ought to," she said slowly. "And yet I cannot
see how. What can my dish-washing have to do with serving Jesus? It
seems almost irreverent."
"It can't be irreverent, dear, because he said it himself. 'Diligent in
business, serving the Lord.' There is no period dividing these. I long
ago discovered that I could make a bed and sweep a room for his sake
as surely as I could speak a word for him. It is my joy, Dorrie, that
he has not separated any moment of my life from him, saying, 'Here, so
much drudgery each day, from which I must be entirely separated; then,
when that is done, you may serve me.' Work so divided would be drudgery
indeed. I bless him that I may constantly serve, whether I am wiping
the dust from my table or whether I am on my knees."
"Well, how?" said Dorothy. She had a habit of occasionally flashing
a question at one, a direct, firm way that meant business. The tone
of this one said, "This is all new to me, but I mean to get at it, I
intend to understand it and do it." "Louise, how could I be doing one
thing for Jesus while I was washing the pudding-kettle?"
"Did you ever hear of the young servant-girl who was converted, and
presented herself to the pastor desiring to be received into the
Church? He asked her what proof she had that she was a Christian, and
she answered, 'I sweeps the corners clean now.' I always thought that
the poor girl gave good evidence of a changed purpose. I don't know
whether she knew that verse, 'By their fruits ye shall know them;' but
it is true, Dorrie, with pudding-kettles as well as with everything
else."
I suppose that that simple little talk in that upper hall, on that
Monday morning, actually changed the whole current of Dorothy Morgan's
future life. Hitherto religion had had nothing whatever to do with
pudding-kettles, or Monday mornings in the kitchen, or with the
thousand little cares of everyday life. She had regarded them as so
many nuisances, to be pushed aside as much as possible for actual
work. I may as well frankly own to you that this young girl hated the
neatly-painted kitchen in which most of her life was spent. She hated
the dish-pan and the sink and the dishtowels with a perfect hatred. She
hated brooms and dusters and scrub-brushes, and all the paraphernalia
of household drudgery. It was literally drudgery to her.
Her new sister's wise eyes had singled out the thing which she perhaps
hated most with which to illustrate this germ of truth that she had
dropped into the soil of Dorothy's heart. An old-fashioned, heavy,
black kettle, which had been handed down as an heirloom in the Morgan
family for generations, and in which the favourite Sunday evening dish,
hasty-pudding, was invariably cooked. Simmering slowly over the fire
all Sunday afternoon, the pudding eaten at supper-time, the kettle
filled with water and left to soak over night, and appearing on the
scene with relentless regularity every Monday morning to be scraped and
scrubbed by Dorothy's disgusted fingers. Dorothy hated hasty-pudding.
Dorothy almost never washed that kettle with the degree of nicety that
Mother Morgan demanded. She almost invariably left little creases
of scorched pudding clinging to the sides, and a general greasiness
of appearance about it that was fruitful of many sharp words on the
mother's part and sullen defiance on Dorothy's. The idea that her
religion actually had to do with this pudding-kettle came to Dorothy
like a revelation. She went downstairs thinking it over. She realized
that the thought gave new interest to life. If the fruits of Christian
living were actually to be looked for in pudding-dishes, then what
place was there where they could not show? There was a dignity in
living, after all. It was not simple drudgery, and nothing else. She
thought of it when the foaming milk was brought in, John setting down
the pail with a thud, and saying,—
"Tend to that, and give us the pail; and don't be all day about it
either."
I shall have to admit that Dorothy was more or less accustomed to this
form of address, and yet that it always irritated her, and she was
apt to reply, "I shall be just as long as I please; if you want it
done quicker, do it yourself." Then would follow other cross or sullen
words, neither person meaning to the full the words used, yet both
feeling crosser when they parted. A sad state of living, truly, yet
it had actually become a habit with these two, so much so that John
looked at his sister in surprise when she lifted the pail silently, and
presently returned it to him, with no other remark than the statement
that Brownie was giving more milk than before. He made no answer to
this, and went away actually surprised at the quietness of the kitchen.
It is not my purpose to let you follow Dorothy closely through that day
in the kitchen.
Monday morning is a time, you will remember, that tries the souls
of many women. Mrs. Morgan was no exception. For some reason, best
known to herself, she was particularly tried this morning. Nothing
went right, and nothing could be made to go right. The fire at first
would not burn enough; and then it burned too much, and sent the suds
from the boiler sputtering over on the bright tins that Dorothy had
arranged on the hearth to dry; and Mrs. Morgan was betrayed into saying
that a child ten years old would have known better than to have put
tins in such a place. And, despite Dorothy's earnest care, the starch
presently lumped; and, worse than that, certain cloudy-looking streaks,
coming from no one knew where, mixed with its clearness, and the
mother affirmed that Dorothy ought to have her ears boxed for being so
careless. Try as the daughter would, the mother was not to be pleased
that morning. And Dorothy did struggle bravely. She made the smooth,
black sides of the hated pudding-kettle shine as they had not before on
any Monday morning on record. She scoured every knife, not forgetting
the miserable little one with a notch in the end and a rough place in
the handle, a knife that she had longed to throw away, and to which
the mother pertinaciously clung; she rubbed at the hated sink until it
shone like burnished steel; she rubbed at the dish-cloth, for which she
had a separate and special feeling of disgust, until it hung white and
dry on its line; she neglected no cup, or spoon, or shelf-corner, and
she moved with brisk step and swift fingers, only to hear the metallic
voice say, as it made its entrance from the outer kitchen where the
rubbing and rinsing were going on,—
"I wonder if you are going to be all day washing that handful of
dishes! I could have had them all put away and the kitchen swept an
hour ago. I can't see how I came to have such a dawdler as you!"
Dear me! Have you been so fortunate as never to have heard mothers
speak in this way? Good, honest mothers too. Mothers who would have
sat with unwinking eyes and patient hands, night after night, caring
for the wants, real and imaginary, of their sick daughters, who yet
will stab them with unthinking words all day long. Words not true; for
Mrs. Morgan knew perfectly well that she could not have finished all
this work an hour before. Yet be just to her; she actually believed,
energetic woman as she was, that she could have accomplished it all in
much less time. For the matter of that, I suppose she could. Certainly
Dorothy had not her mother's skill. The wonder was that the mother
should have expected young hands to be as deft as her own.
So the day wore on. A trying one at every turn to poor young Dorothy,
who had just enlisted, and was trying to buckle her armour on, and who
kept up a brave struggle, and went steadily from one duty to another,
doing not one of them as well as her mother could have done, but doing
each one of them as well as she could. Could an angel do more? A hard
day, both over the dishes and the dust and at the wash-tub; yet not by
any means so hard as it might have been but for that bit of talk in
the upper hall in the morning—a new idea that made a song in her heart
despite all the trials—so much of a song that occasionally it flowed
into words, and Dorothy's untrained voice was sweet and clear. She
rarely used it over her work, but on this Monday twice she sang clear
and loud,—
"Mine is an unchanging love;
Higher than the heights above."
Mrs. Morgan heard it—heard the tune; caught no words—wanted to hear
none. The spirit of song was not in her heart that morning. All she
said was,—
"Don't, for pity's sake, go to singing over the dish-pan. I always
thought that was a miserable, shiftless habit. There is a time for all
things."
And Dorothy, wondering much when was her time to sing, hushed her
voice and finished the melody in her heart. So it seemed to her, when
the day was done, that really it had been an unusually hard one. Many
steps added to the usual routine. A dish broken; a leaking pail sending
water all over the clean floor; John's muddy feet tracking through the
kitchen just after the mopping was done; John's hands—traces of them on
the clean towel; and then, by reason of trying to do two things at once
at the mother's bidding, she actually allowed the starch to scorch. So
that, in truth, when she sat down in the wooden-seated chair of her
own room for a moment's breathing space, before it was time to set the
table for tea, she looked back over the day with a little wondering
sigh. What had she done this day for the glory of God? How could he
possibly get any glory out of her honest efforts to do her whole duty
that day? True, she had resisted the temptation to slam the door hard,
to set down the tea-kettle with a bang, to say, in an undertone, "I
don't care whether it is clean or dirty," when her attention was called
to some undone task. Yet what had been the result? Mother certainly had
never been so hard to please.
"She has found more to blame to-day than she ever did in the days when
I only half tried," said poor Dorothy to herself.
So where was there any glory for the Master to be found in the day?
Even then came the mother's voice calling,—
"Well, are we to have any supper to-night? or must I get it, with all
the rest?"
Then Dorothy went down, and I am afraid that she set the cups and
saucers on the table with more force than was needed. Life looked full
of pin-pricks that hurt for the time being as much, or at least she
thought they did, as though they had been made with lancets.
What was the trouble with Mother Morgan?
I do want you to understand her. She did not understand herself,
to be sure; but that is no reason why you should not show more
discrimination. It had been an unusually trying day to her. Apart
from the pressure of domestic cares, which she, in common with many
other housekeepers, made always twice as heavy as they should be, her
nerves, or her heart, or her conscience, or all these combined, had
been stirred within her by the words of prayer in the twilight of the
Sabbath. Memory took her back to an old hillside farmhouse, surrounded
by fields less rich and fruitful than those near which she dwelt; to
an old arm-chair, in which an old man sat night and morning, by his
side another chair, in which an old woman sat night and morning; and
together they read out of the same Bible, together they knelt and
prayed, and this cold-faced mother had heard herself prayed for many
a time, not only by that old man, but by the gray-haired woman. And
they were her father and her mother, both sleeping now, side by side,
under the snow; and being dead, yet speaking—speaking loudly to her on
that very Monday. As she looked at Dorothy she felt as though she were
wronging her of a birthright. Dorothy had never heard her mother pray
as she had heard her old mother many a time. Dorothy's mother had never
said to her,—
"Dorothy, I want you to be a servant of God more than I want anything
else."
That was what leer mother had said to her when she was Dorothy's age,
and many a time afterward; and she was not a servant of God yet, and
her conscience reproached her; and her child had never heard such
words, and her heart reproached her. As truly as I write it, she pitied
Dorothy. Yet, can you understand that this very feeling actually made
her voice sharper and her words more impatient when she spoke to her?
The human heart unchanged is a very strange and contradictory thing.
But I want to tell you what Dorothy Morgan does not know.
Her mother did discover the immaculate condition of the pudding-kettle,
and said aloud—
"I declare, for once this is clean!"
CHAPTER XX.
CLOUDS.
I HAVE been tempted to linger over these first weeks connected with
Louise Morgan's home-coming in order that you might get a clear view
of the surroundings and a true idea of the family life. Now, however,
I shall have to take you away into the spring. The long, cold, busy
winter, with its cares and opportunities, had passed away, and the buds
and blossoms, foretelling of the coming summer, had begun to appear on
every hand.
Many changes, subtle and sweet and strong, had been going on in the
Morgan household. Dorothy had held steadily on her course; the first
lesson in her Christian experience being ever present with her, that in
the very smallest matters of life her light might shine for Christ. She
was learning the important lesson to be "faithful over a few things."
Little realized she the importance of this faithfulness. Not an idea
had she of the number of times in which the mother had regarded her
curiously, as she looked in vain for careless ways or forgotten duties,
and admitted to herself that "something had come over Dorothy, and she
only hoped it would last." Oh yes, it would last. Dorothy believed
that. She had anchored her soul after the first hours of unrest on the
sure promise of His "sufficient grace," and had no idea of doubting
him. Not much outside work had she been able to take up. Yet, little by
little, came changes. Carey Martyn was full of schemes.
"See here, let us do thus and so," was a favourite phrase of his, and
he was growing more and more fond of saying it to Dorothy.
The bright curtains in the parlour had not been taken down again; the
old-fashioned sofa still held its place in the coziest corner; and
now that the sun was getting around the corner, peeping in at the
pleasantest window, the room took a still more cheery look, and Dorothy
had fallen into the habit of touching a match to the carefully laid
fire almost every evening just after tea, and one by one the different
members of the family dropped in.
The long-neglected old-fashioned brass knocker often sounded during
these days. People who had never called on the Morgans, chiefly because
of the fear that they would be coldly received, began to discover that
Mrs. Lewis Morgan was a very pleasant woman, very glad to see her
friends; and the mother was not so disagreeable as they had supposed;
and, "really, that shy, silent Dorothy had improved wonderfully."
Thus it was when the spring opened, only a few months since the
new-comer's first entrance; and nothing very remarkable, so far as
outward eyes could see, had transpired, and yet in a hundred little
ways things were different.
But on this particular May morning when I bring you into the family
circle the prevailing atmosphere was gloom.
In the first place it rained—a soft, sweet spring rain, when the buds
swell, and leaves almost seem to increase in size while you watch, and
the spring flowers nod at one another, and the world, though in tears,
seems to the happy heart to be keeping holiday. Yet, as Louise Morgan
stood at her window and watched the dripping eaves, and listened to the
patter on the roof, and saw the low gray clouds sail by, a rainy day
seemed to her a dreary thing.
The truth was, the Morgan family were in trouble. During these passing
months Louise and her husband, reinforced by Dorothy, and afterward by
Carey Martyn, had carried John Morgan about on their hearts as special
subject of constant prayer. Louise had been often eager, persistent,
steadfast for a soul before; yet it seemed to her that the desire had
never been so intense as in this instance; and as she looked over the
past, it seemed to her that she had never had so little encouragement.
From the time when she took that walk home with him in the moonlight,
and tried to speak earnest words, John Morgan had seemed to withdraw
more utterly into himself. He carefully avoided Louise; he refused,
positively, all invitations to attend church on the Sabbath. He plainly
informed Lewis that he was wasting words in trying to talk religion
at him, and might consider himself honourably excused from any such
attempts; and to Dorothy, who, with tearful eyes and trembling lips,
said simply to him one night in the darkness, "O John, won't you give
yourself to Jesus?" he unceremoniously and roughly answered, "Shut up."
In every respect John had seemed, during the last few months, to travel
rapidly backward. The corner grocery now saw him more frequently
than ever before; indeed, almost every evening, late into the night,
was passed there. The smell of tobacco and of liquor lingered more
constantly now about his clothing, and pervaded the atmosphere of his
room. In vain did Louise struggle to keep that room pure. Gradually
it had changed its outward appearance. Christmas and Now Year, and
then John's birthday, had been helpful anniversaries to her plans.
The bed was spread in spotless white; the twisted-leg stand had its
scratched and pointless top concealed under a white and delicately
crocheted tidy; a little rocker occupied the corner by the window,
with a bright-coloured tidy fastened securely to its back. The space
between the hall door and the clothes-press was occupied by a neat
toilet-stand, with all the convenient accessories of the toilet
carefully disposed on it; the walls were hung with two or three
choice engravings and an illuminated text; and on the white-covered
stand there daily blossomed, in a small pure vase, a rose, or a bunch
of lilies of the valley, or a spray of delicate wild flower—some
sweet-breathed treasure from the woods or garden, which struggled with
the tobacco-scented air—placed there by Louise's tasteful fingers.
Once she ventured on a gift in the shape of a nicely-bound Bible,
containing John's name and her own on the fly-leaf, and she made a
place for it on the white-covered stand; but found that the very next
morning it had been placed on the highest shelf in the clothes-press
along with a pile of old agricultural papers that reposed there from
one house-cleaning to another. All of these patient little efforts
had been greeted hitherto with nothing but frowns or sneers or total
indifference.
John Morgan seemed to have deliberately determined to ruin his
prospects for this life and the next, and to forbid any one to hold him
back. Yet they did not give him up, these four. The more hopeless the
case seemed to grow, the more steadily did they try to hold their grasp
on the arm of power.
But on this rainy morning of which I write, not one of the four but had
been plunged into more or less anxiety and gloom. Apparently, not only
had all their efforts failed, but the subject of them had resolved to
remove himself from all further influence or molestation from them. The
threat that he had often and often made, to leave his home and go where
he pleased, he had now determined to put into execution. A week before
he had suddenly and fiercely announced his decision, and no amount of
persuasion had effected the least change. He was indifferent alike to
his father's advice or threats.
"You needn't give me a copper if you haven't a mind to," he had said
sullenly during one of the stormy talks. "I'll risk but that I can
take care of myself. I can beg or can drown myself, if I feel like it.
Anyhow, I'm going, and there's no kind of use in talking."
"But where are you going?" pleaded the mother.
One less indifferent than John could not have failed to notice that her
face was pale and her voice husky with pent-up feeling.
"Just exactly where I like, and nowhere else. If I knew where that was
I might tell you, but I don't. I never did as I pleased an hour since I
was born, and I mean to do it now."
What was the use of talking to one in such a mood? Yet they talked, and
argued, and threatened, and used sharp words, and bitter words, and
words that were calculated to leave life-long scars on hearts; and the
talks were frequently renewed, and lasted away into the midnight; and
at last John had declared that he would not stand this sort of thing
another hour, and he would not take any money—not a copper of it, even
if it was offered; and he would not take his clothes along—not a rag.
"You can sell them to the first rag-man that comes along, and build
another barn with their value, for all I care," he said to his father,
in a pitiful attempt at sarcasm.
And then, without another word or a glance at his mother or a pretence
at good-bye, he strode out of the room, closing the door after him
with a bang. That was the evening before, just at supper-time, and
though his mother did that night what she had never done before in her
life—put some of the supper down, carefully covered to keep warm for
John—he came not. The next morning's milking was done without him, and
as the long rainy day waned it became evident to each heart that John
was gone.
Now I have not told you the worst of this. For the past week the
mother's heart had been wrung with such anxiety that she had humbled
herself in a manner that she, a few days before, would not have
imagined possible. She had followed Louise one morning up to her room,
coming with slow and doubtful tread, closing the door after her, and
looking behind her in a half-frightened way, as if to be sure that
there were no other listeners to her humiliation than this one, and had
said to Louise, catching her breath while she spoke,—
"You know how I feel about John. I have heard you talk about praying
over everything; if you believe that it does any good, why don't you
pray to have him kept at home?"
"Mother," said Louise, coming close to her, taking the hard old hand in
hers, "I do pray for him, every hour in the day, almost every minute
it seems to me, and I believe it will do good; I believe He will hear
our prayer. But there is no one who could pray for John as his mother
could. I do so desire to have his mother's prayers infold him like a
garment. Won't you pray for him?"
"I'm not a praying woman," said Mrs. Morgan, trying to keep her voice
steady. "Still, if I believed in it as you do, I would pray now if I
never did again."
Then she turned and went swiftly away. She had actually humbled her
proud heart to ask her daughter-in-law to pray for John! She could not
get away from the feeling that Louise's prayers would be likely to
avail if any would. More than that—but this at the time was known only
to her own heart, and to the One who reads the heart—in the silence and
darkness of her own room, after Nellie was asleep, and before Farmer
Morgan had drawn the last bolt preparatory to coming to his bed, she
had got down on her knees and had offered what, in her ignorance, she
thought was prayer. "O God," she said, "if thou hearest human beings
in their need, hear me, and keep John from going away." There was no
submission in her heart to the divine will, no reference to the name
which is the only name by which we can approach God, no realization of
anything save John's peril and a blind reaching out after some hand
that had power. Yet it was a nearer approach to prayer than that mother
had made for fifty years!
Neither could she help a feeling, which she told herself was probably
superstition, that something somehow would prevent John from carrying
out his designs. Yet the days went by, and no unseen arm stretched out
its hand of power to arrest John. Instead, the rainy day wore on with
the feeling settling down hopelessly on the mother's heart that her son
had gone from her with hard words on his lips, and with the echo of
hard words from her sounding in his heart. For, so strange a thing is
this human heart, Mrs. Morgan had actually never seemed more hard or
cold to her son than she did during the week that her heart was torn
with anxiety for him.
But I have not told you the worst of this. The days moved on, and it
became evident to all that John had carried out his threat and was
gone. Then the mother's grief and dismay found vent in hard and cruel
words. She turned in bitterness from Louise, yes, and from Dorothy,
indeed from every one. To Louise she said plainly it was not strange
that John had wanted to get away; she had given him no peace since
she had been there; always tormenting him to go to church or to
prayer-meeting, or to do something that he did not want to do. For her
part, she did not see but he was quite as good as those who were always
running off to meeting. He could not even have any peace in his own
room; it must be cluttered up with rubbish that any man hated—vases to
tip over, and tidies to torment him!
And she flung the tidies on a chair in Louise's room, and folded and
packed away the cover which she said she had been "fooled into buying,"
and restored every corner of that little hall chamber to its original
dreariness. And, worse than all, she declared that she hoped and
trusted she would hear no more cant about prayers in that house. She
had not been able to see for many a year that the kind of praying that
was being done in these days accomplished any good.
To Dorothy she declared that if she had had the spirit of a mouse she
might have exerted herself, as other girls did, to make a pleasant spot
for her brother; that she had never tried to please him in anything,
not even the mending of his mittens when he wanted them; she would
rather dawdle over the fire roasting apples with Carey Martyn than give
any thought to her own brother.
Now all this was bitterness itself to poor Dorothy, whose own heart
reproached her for having been so many years indifferent to her
brother's welfare, but who had honestly tried with all the force of her
heart to be pleasant and helpful to John ever since she had been doing
anything from a right motive.
Neither did Mrs. Morgan spare her husband. She would not have let a boy
like that go off without a penny in his pocket, she said,—no, not if
she had to sell all the stock to get him ready money. He had as good a
right to money as Lewis ever had, and he had been tied down to the five
barns all his life. No wonder he ran away. He showed some spirit, and
she was glad he had.
Do you suppose Farmer Morgan endured this in silence? Not he. And sharp
words grow sharper, and bitter feelings ran high, until the once quiet
kitchen was transformed into a Babel of angry words, and poor Louise
could only go away and weep.
But I have not told you the worst of this: actually the worst was in
this Christian woman's own sore heart. The awful question, "Why?" had
crept in and was tormenting her soul. She had been sincere in her
prayers; she had been honest in her desires; she had been unwavering
in her petitions. Why had God permitted this disastrous thing to come?
Had she not tried—oh had she not tried with sincere desire ever since
she came into this home to live Christ in it? Why, then, had she been
allowed to so utterly fail? Would it not be to God's glory to save
John Morgan's soul? Was it not evident that through him the mother
might possibly be reached? Was it not perfectly evident that John, at
home, under her influence and Lewis's and Dorothy's, would be in less
danger than away among strangers, wandering whither he would? Was it
not perfectly evident that this conclusion to their prayers had caused
Mrs. Morgan to lose faith in prayer—to grow harder and harder in her
feelings toward God and toward Christians? Why was all this allowed?
She had prayed in faith—or, at least, she had supposed she had; she
had felt almost sure that God would answer her prayer. She had said to
Dorothy, only the night before John went away—said it with steady voice
and a smile in her eye—"I don't believe John will go away; I don't
think God will let him go."
And Dorothy, half-startled, had answered: "O Louise, I don't mean to be
irreverent, but I don't understand. How can God keep him from going, if
he will go?"
And Louise, smiling outright now, so sure was she of her trust, had
answered: "I don't know, dear; he has infinite resources; I only know
that I believe he will do it."
Now what had become of her faith? It grieves my heart to have to
confess to you that this young servant of Christ, who had felt his
"sufficient grace" in her own experience again and again, allowed Satan
to stand at her elbow and push before her that persistent and faithless
"Why?"
It was that word in all its changes which was crowding into her heart,
on that May morning, as she looked out at the dripping eaves and the
leaden clouds.
CHAPTER XXI.
HEDGED IN.
As for John, perhaps he was quite as much astonished at the turn of
events as was any of the family. It is true he had been threatening for
many weeks to turn his back on the old homestead, but it is doubtful if
he had really, during that time, a well-defined intention of doing any
such thing.
No plans as to where he should go or what he should do had taken shape;
only a vague unrest, and a more or less settled determination to some
time get away from it all.
Therefore, as he turned his back on the familiar barns and
long-stretching fields, and went out from them in the darkness of that
May evening, not one of the family was more in fog as to what he would
do next than was John himself. Instinctively he turned his steps to the
village, spending the evening in his old haunt, showing only by a more
reckless manner than usual that there had been any change in his life.
In fact he realized no change; he never turned toward the family road
leading homeward as he came out from that corner grocery at a later
hour than usual; but he stopped abruptly before he reached the top of
the hill, considered a moment, then turned and retraced his steps, and
presently struck out boldly on the road leading cityward. The great
city, only sixty miles away, was of course the first point for an
enterprising young man about to start out in life for himself.
About midnight he reached the station where the express train stopped.
By the station lamps he discovered that the eastern-bound train would
be due in five minutes. He drew from his pocket the handful of silver
and copper that constituted his available means, slowly counted them,
lounged into the station, and inquired the price of a ticket to the
city, then smiled grimly to himself to discover that after purchasing
one he should have just fivepence left. "I guess I can live on that for
a week or so," he muttered; "father could. If I can't I can starve. I'm
going to the city anyhow." And the ticket was bought. Presently came
the train, and our reckless young traveller sauntered into it, selected
the best seat he could find, settled himself comfortably, and went
to sleep, apparently indifferent to the fact that his mother was at
that moment shedding bitter tears for him. No, he was not indifferent;
would not have been, at least, had he known the fact. Nothing in
all his young life's experience would have amazed him more. He did
not understand his mother, which is not strange, perhaps, when one
considers that she had spent years in learning how to hide her heart
away from the sight of those she loved best. John Morgan actually did
not believe that he had ever caused his mother to shed one tear; he did
not believe that she loved him. What did he know about mother love,
save as she revealed it to him?
It is not my purpose to take you wandering with John Morgan. Even if
we had time for it, the experience would be anything but pleasant. He
went into many places where you would not like to follow; he did many
things that were better left undone, and are much better left untold.
Yet I will be just to poor, silly, wicked John. He held back, or rather
was held back by a force which he did not in the least understand, from
many a place that otherwise he would have entered. There were depths
of sin and folly into which he had abundant chance to sink, and from
which nothing in his own depraved heart kept him from sinking, and yet
into which he did not sink. He would have smiled in superior scorn
over the thought that the incense of prayer, which had been rising
day and night concerning him during the passing weeks, had anything
to do with the unseen force that held him when he would have plunged
headlong. Still he was held. He is not the first one who has been saved
from self-shipwreck by a power outside of himself, unrecognized and
unthanked.
Still it must be confessed that John Morgan took long enough strides
in the road to shipwreck, and did what he could for his own overthrow,
goaded meantime by an exasperating and ever-increasing sense of
failure. Here was he at last, his own master, able to work, if he
could find anything to do, or to let it alone, just as he pleased;
no one to direct, or, as he had always phrased it, to "order." No
one to complain, no one to question—a life of freedom at last. Was
it not for this he had pined? It was humiliating to discover that it
did not satisfy him. He could not, even for an hour, cheat himself
into believing that he was happy in the life that he had chosen. A
very vagabond of a life he led. He tried working and lounging and
starving, and the time hung heavily. It was more than humiliating, it
was exasperating; but the fact remained that he could no more get away
from the memory of that clean, sweet-smelling, sweetly kept room, in
which he had lately passed his nights, than he could get away from his
own miserable self. Nay, the very smell of the wild-wood violets which
had nodded on him from the tiny vase that last morning at home, and
which he had affected to despise, seemed to follow and haunt him. How
perfectly absurd it was in him here, in the very centre of this great
centre of life, to actually long for a whiff of those wild violets! He
sneered at himself, and swore at himself, and longed for them all the
same.
So passed the days, each one bearing him steadily downward, and yet
each one holding him back from the downward depths into which he might
have plunged. And the summer heats came in all their fierceness and
wilted him with their city-polluted breath; he had been used all his
life to the free, pure air of the country. At times it was hard for him
to believe that this crowded, ill-smelling city could belong to the
same earth on which the wide-stretching harvest-fields lay and smiled.
And the summer waned, and the rich, rare October days, so beautiful
in the country, so barren of all interest to the homeless in a great
city, came to him, and John Morgan had actually become a tramp! The
work which he had at first despised and hated he now could not find;
and if he would not carry his early threat into execution and literally
starve, he must tramp and beg. Now starving had lost its charms
somewhere among the parchings of those summer months; he had so nearly
tried that way as to shudder over it; to ask for a bite at the back
door of country-looking houses was more to his mind.
One never-to-be-forgotten October day he shook himself out from the
shelter of a wrecked car, near which he had passed the night, and
resolved upon a breakfast of some sort. I wish I could give you a
picture of him. His own mother would not have recognized him. His
clothing in the old days had been none of the finest, but whatever
passed through Mother Morgan's hands was clean, and carefully mended.
Now this bundle of rags and dirt would have been in danger of being
spurned from her door without a second glance. "There is no excuse for
filth!" she was wont to say grimly. Her son John had heard her say it
many a time. He thought of it this morning as he shook himself; yet how
could he help the filth? He had no clothes, he had no place in which
to wash, he had nothing with which to brush, and very little left to
brush! True, he had brought himself into this very position, but of
that he did not choose to think; and besides, everybody knows it is
easier to get into certain positions than to get out of them. I wish I
could tell you how he felt. He did not understand his own mood. He was
not repentant, not in the least; if anything, he was more bitter and
defiant than ever. But he was disappointed: assuming control of one's
own actions was by no means so comfortable or desirable a lot as he had
imagined. There were days in which he believed that to have milked the
gentle cows, and cared for the fine horses, would have been a positive
relief. It was not work that John had shirked. Yet he had no idea of
going home; his proud spirit and defiant nature would not let him even
suggest that thought to himself.
On this particular morning he had resolved to try again for work. He
managed to get on the last car of an outgoing goods train, and was
thus whirled a few miles into the country. At the first station he
jumped off, and began his search for work. He found a farmer who was
compassionate, and gave him wood to carry into the already well-stocked
shed by way of earning his breakfast. Presently the farmer came to the
door and called:
"We are about ready for breakfast now. You can come in while we have
prayers and then have breakfast."
"I don't want prayers," said John, stopping short midway between the
door and the wood-pile, his arms full. "I asked for something to eat,
not for praying."
"I know that, and you shall have the something to eat; but a little
praying won't hurt you. Why, man, you can afford to be thankful that
you have found a chance to eat again!"
"No, I can't," said John fiercely. "If I can't have the breakfast
without the praying, I'll go without the breakfast."
"Very well," said the sturdy farmer, "I'm bound you shall then. I
declare, if a fellow has got so far that he can't even listen to a word
of prayer, he doesn't deserve to eat."
"Then I'll starve," said John in anger, and he threw the wood on the
floor and strode away.
"Oh, I don't know about that, father," said a motherly voice, and a
motherly face looking out after angry John. "Seems to me I'd have given
him some breakfast if he didn't want to come to prayers. Maybe he was
ashamed to, he looks so much like a rag-bag."
"Why didn't he say so then!" said the disturbed farmer. "Who expected
him to fly off in a passion at the mention of a prayer? He's a hard
case, I'm afraid."
That was true enough; and yet the incident was not so much against
John as it sounds. Poor John! he was angry at his own heart for
remembering, with a certain lingering touch of tenderness, that prayer
in the kitchen at home in the Sabbath evening twilight; he wanted no
experience that would call it up more plainly. Breakfastless, and
supperless last night, John Morgan! There had always been plenty to eat
in his father's house. What a bitterness it was to think that, now he
was independent, he was actually a dependent on the chance charities of
the world!
He tramped on; he was growing hungrier; he felt that he really could
not work now until he had a chance to eat; it was actual pauperism this
time. A neat-looking house, a neat kitchen door; he knocked at it and
asked for a bit of bread. A trim old lady answered it,—
"Yes, to be sure. Come in. And so you're hungry? Poor fellow! It must
be hard to be hungry. No home, I suppose?"
John shook his head.
"Poor fellow! You look young too. Is your mother dead, did you say?"
All the while she bustled about, getting a savoury breakfast ready for
him—a cup of steaming coffee, and a bit of meat, and generous slices
of bread and butter—bread that looked and butter that smelled like his
mother's. And this was a farmhouse, and a neat, clean kitchen, and a
yellow painted floor.
At that last question a strange feeling came over John Morgan. Was his
mother dead? "No," he almost said. He would not have liked to nod his
head to that. And yet, here he was among the October days, and it had
been early May when he left her. How many funeral processions he had
passed on the streets since, and he had had no word from his mother.
Down in the pasture meadow one day his father had said to him, "Don't
plough that bit up; I've never made up my mind to it. In spite of me,
it looks as if it was meant for a kind of family burying-ground."
There was a great tree there and a grassy hillside, and a small clear
stream purled along very near. How did he know but a grave had been
dug on that hillside since he went away? His heart gave a few sudden
thuds, and then for a minute almost seemed to stop beating. Could it be
possible that John Morgan really loved his mother! He was eating his
breakfast now—a good breakfast it was, and the trim old lady talked on.
"Well, there are a good many homeless people in the world. It must be
hard; but then, you know, the Master himself gave up his home, and
had not where to lay his head—did it for our sakes too. Wasn't that
strange? Seems to me I couldn't give up my home. But he made a home by
it for every one of us. I hope you've looked after the title to yours,
young man."
No answer from John. The old lady sighed, and said to herself, as she
trotted away for a biscuit for him,—
"He doesn't understand, poor fellow. I suppose he never has had any
good thoughts put into his mind. Dear me! I wish I could do something
for him besides feeding his poor, perishing body."
But John did understand perfectly. What was the matter with all the
people this morning? Why were they so persistently forcing that subject
at him? He had been wandering almost six months, and had never met so
many straightforward words concerning it in all the months as he had
this morning. Is not it possible, John Morgan, that God's watching
Spirit knows when to reach even your heart? The little old lady trotted
back, a plate of biscuits in one hand and a little card in the other.
"Put these biscuits in your pocket; maybe they'll come good when you
are hungry again. And here is a little card; you can read, I suppose?"
The faintest suspicion of a smile gleamed in John Morgan's eyes as he
nodded assent.
"Well, then, you read it once in a while just to please me. Those are
true words on it; and Jesus is here yet trying to save, just the same
as he always was. He wants to save you, young man, and you had better
let him do it now. If I were you I wouldn't wait another day."
As he tramped down the street, his inner man so wonderfully refreshed
by the good coffee and bread and butter, he could not help looking at
the card, which, also, after that breakfast, he could not help taking,
although he wanted to put it into the cheery fire. It was a simple
enough card, and printed on it in plain letters were these words, "It
is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus
came into the world to save sinners." Then underneath, "I am the bread
of life. He that believeth on me shall never hunger." Still lower on
the card, in ornamented letters, the words, "The Master is come, and
calleth for thee." Then a hand pointing to an italicized line, "I that
speak unto thee am he."
"Queer mess that," said John, and he thrust the card into his pocket
and strode toward the village depot. He meant to board the next train
and get a little farther into the country, and continue his search
for work. The train arrived, and he succeeded in slipping into it.
But it was hardly fairly under way when he discovered that he had
miscalculated, and was being borne back toward the great city, instead
of farther into the country.
"I don't care," he said. "I don't know what I want of the country.
On the whole, I may as well try my chances in the city. I'll go up
Greenwich Street and try my luck in the warehouses. I can roll boxes
about now since I've had another breakfast."
But the train presently switched off and ran into another station,
into another part of the city, wherein John was as total a stranger as
though he had just dropped from the clouds.
"Where on earth am I?" he said bewildered, swinging himself down from
the top of the car and looking around. "Just my luck. I'm nowhere.
East, west, north, south,—which way shall I go? I'll go north. Which is
north? Or no, I won't; it's coming winter. I guess I'll go south, and
walk as long as it looks interesting, and see where I'll bring up. What
difference does it make which way I go?"
All the difference in the world, John Morgan. It is a link in the chain
which is narrowing around you. It is one of the apparently trivial
movements which will have its silent, unnoticed, unthought-of part in
helping you to decide which way you will go during all your future, and
at what station you will finally land.
CHAPTER XXII.
CORDS UNSEEN.
THE morning service was just over in the great church on Lexington
Avenue. A large company of men and women lingered in the broad aisles,
shaking hands with each other, saying a word here and there in subdued
happy tones. A looker-on, who was familiar with religious meetings,
and who yet had not been present at this one, would have known by the
atmosphere lingering in the church that the worshippers had been having
a happy time. They were loath to leave; they gathered in little knots,
at convenient standing-places, and discussed the events of the hour and
the prospects of the evening. Large numbers of the ladies had packages
of white cards in their hands—not unlike calling-cards in size and
texture, and quite as carefully written on as ever calling-cards were.
The handwriting was peculiar—delicate, gracefully rounded letters,
skilful flourishes. Somebody had considered the work important, and had
bestowed time and skill.
"Estelle dear, won't you go forward and get some of the cards? I see
very few here who will go up Fairmount Street, and you may be able to
reach some who will be otherwise neglected."
So spoke one of the lingerers, a fair-faced woman, with silver-tinted
hair, to a very graceful young woman, who was evidently her daughter,
and who evidently lingered, not so much from personal interest in the
scene as because her mother did. She turned full, wondering, and yet
deprecating eyes on her mother at the question.
"O mamma! I cannot offer those cards to people. I am not one of the
workers, you know; it isn't expected of me. You have some, and that
will be sufficient for our family."
"I am not going up Fairmount Street," the mother answered quietly.
"I have only enough cards to meet my own opportunities, daughter. If
Louise were here, dear, can't you think how she would scatter those
little white messengers?"
"Louise is good, mamma, and I am not, you know; you mustn't expect me
to be Louise. I can no more take her place in that way than I can in a
hundred others."
"Oh yes, you can, my child; it doesn't require any special skill to
hand a card of invitation to a passer-by, or even to speak a word of
encouragement to the half persuaded."
"But, mamma, how would it look for me to invite people to the meetings?
I am not one of the church members. It wouldn't be very consistent, I
think."
The mother's eyes were sorrowful and questioning as they rested on the
face of her fair young daughter. She seemed not to know just what would
be well to answer to this. At last she said,—
"Estelle dear, even though you refuse Christ yourself, don't you wish
that many others might come to him? Poor, sad hearts who have not your
opportunities, nor know the way as you do—shouldn't they have their
chance to choose, and aren't you willing to extend the invitation?"
The young girl's cheeks flushed a deeper pink, and her eyes drooped,
but she answered steadily,—
"Certainly I am, mamma."
Then she went forward and received from the pastor a package of the
beautiful cards, turning them over curiously in her hand, wondering
much how it would seem to pass them out to people, and whether the
cards would be accepted or refused.
Simple little cards they were; nothing pretentious or formidable about
them; just an announcement of daily religious services, giving the
hours of meetings and the name of the preacher; then, on the reverse
side, in the most exquisite penmanship, this simple quotation, "The
Master is come, and calleth for thee." Estelle read it, and the glow on
her cheeks did not lessen. There was certainly something very solemn in
the suggestion. Estelle could hardly help giving a moment's attention
to the inquiry whether the Master really were calling for her. Could
she have brought her heart to the point of believing that such was the
case, it would have been well with Estelle, for she could not have
said the Master nay. The sin in her case was that she would not study
the subject long enough to be able to believe that she was personally
included in the call. Nevertheless she went her way up Fairmount Street
on her unusual errand, a little touch of vexation in her face over the
thought that Louise would have done all this so well, and would so have
delighted in it, while she must bunglingly try to supply her place. It
was about this time that John Morgan turned into Fairmount Street, much
wondering where he was and what he could be expected to do next.
"Will you have a card, please?" And a vision of loveliness fell on his
astonished gaze, and a delicately-gloved hand was stretched forth with
the fair bit of pasteboard. "It is just an invitation to the meetings;
we hope you will come." And still the card was outstretched, and still
John stood and stared. What was there about that face and voice that
seemed familiar to him as one whom he had met in a dream or in the
far-away unreality of some other existence? It bewildered him to the
extent that he forgot either to decline or accept the card, but stood
looking and wondering. Estelle felt the importance of saying something
further to this silent starer. "They have very good singing, and great
crowds come every evening. I think you will like it. Will you take the
card?"
Thus petitioned, John, roused from his bewilderment, put forth his hand
for the proffered card, because for the moment he could not decide what
else to do.
Then Estelle, her mission accomplished and her embarrassment great,
flitted away from him around the corner. "What a strange-acting
fellow!" was her comment. "How he did stare! One would suppose he had
never seen a lady before. Dear me! He looks as though he needed a
friend. Somehow I can't help feeling sorry for him. I really hope he
will go to the meeting; but of course he won't." And Estelle Barrows
actually realized that for such a dreary, friendless-looking person as
he the love of Christ would be a great transformation. She did not mean
that she, Estelle Barrows, in her beauty and purity, surrounded by the
safeguards of her high position, had no need of Christ; neither did she
realize that this was the logical conclusion of her reasoning.
"What in the name of common sense has got into all the people to-day?
They are running wild on cards." This was John Morgan's comment. He
was ashamed and vexed to think he had so forgotten his sullenness and
indifference as to stare at the fair young face. He read the card
carefully, more to get away from his present thoughts than from any
interest in it; but the verse on the reverse side held his attention
for a few minutes, from the fact that the words were the very same
as those on the card given him by the old lady who had supplied his
breakfast. It struck him as a strange coincidence. Presently he thrust
the bit of pasteboard into his pocket, and dismissed the incident from
his mind.
Not again did it recur to him until he was passing, during that same
evening, a brightly-lighted building, from whence there issued sounds
of music. Something in the strains recalled, he knew not how or why,
the incident of the morning and the card of invitation. "I wonder if
this is the place?" he queried. "It would be rather queer if I had
blundered on the very building, without the least notion of doing any
such thing." He paused before the door, listening to the roll of the
organ as it sounded on the quiet air. "That organ doesn't squeak,
anyhow," he said grimly, recalling the organ scene in the old church
at home, and Louise's pleasure in its improved condition after he had
taken hold of it. Thoughts of her suggested the card again, and he
brought it forth from his pocket, and by the light of a friendly lamp
compared the name on the card with the name on the building before him.
Yes, they agreed; chance or Providence, according as you are accustomed
to view these matters, had led him to the very spot. Still he had no
intention of going in. "Pretty-looking object I am to go to church,"
he said, surveying himself critically, something between a smile and
a sneer on his face. "I would create a sensation, I fancy. I wonder
if the bit of silk and lace that gave me the card is in there? And I
wonder if she expects to see me? And I wonder where I have seen her
before, and why her face haunts me?"
The organ had been silent for some minutes; now it rolled forth its
notes again, and voices, that to John seemed of unearthly sweetness,
rang out on the quiet:—
"Come home! Come home! You are weary at heart;
And the way has been long,
And so lonely and wild!
Oh, prodigal child, come home! Oh, come home!"
Was John Morgan homesick? He would have scorned the thought. Yet at
the sound of these tender words a strange choking sensation came over
him, and something very like a mist filled his eyes. He felt, rather
than realized, how long and lonely and wild the way had been; still he
had no intention of going in. He would step nearer and listen to that
music; those voices were unlike anything he had ever heard before. He
drew nearer under the light of the hall lamp. He could see into the
church. The doors stood invitingly open; the aisles even were full.
Some were standing, not well-dressed people all of them, by any means;
but some were so roughly clad that even he would not attract attention
by the contrast. A young man, well-dressed, with an open hymn-book in
his hand, stood by the door, almost in the hall. He turned suddenly,
and his eyes rested on John; he beckoned him forward, then stepped
toward him.
"Come right in, my friend; we can find standing-room for you, and the
sermon is just about to commence."
"I'm not dressed for such places," said John, imagining that he spoke
firmly.
"Oh, never mind the dress; that is not of the least consequence; there
are plenty of men in here in their rough working-clothes. Come right
in."
"Come home, come home," sang out the wonderful voices. And John Morgan,
still with no intention of going in, yet impelled by a force which he
no more understood than he understood his own soul, stepped forward and
followed the young man into the crowded church. The singing ceased, and
the minister arose and immediately announced his text, "Friend, how
camest thou in hither, not having on a wedding garment?"
The sentence was spoken so like a personal question that John looked
about him, startled. Could it be possible that the man was addressing
him—actually referring to his uncouth dress? This only for an instant;
then he discovered that no one was paying the least attention to him,
and that his dress, rough enough, was not worse than that of some
by whom he was surrounded. But the preacher's manner was so new and
strange, so unlike anything that John Morgan had ever met before,
that, despite his own half-formed determination to get out of this, he
stayed, and looked, and listened.
If I could I would tell you about that sermon; but sermons on paper,
reported by a second party, are so very different from the words that
come burning hot from the heart of the preacher, that on second thought
I have deemed it unwise to make the attempt.
To John Morgan the entire service was like a revelation of mysteries.
That which had seemed to him bewildering and contradictory, and finally
actually exasperating in the plan of salvation, was made as clear as
the sunlight, and one by one his own daring subterfuges were swept from
him, so that before the sermon closed he felt that he indeed stood
unclothed and speechless before the King. What next? Where should he go
now? Whither flee? Was he not sufficiently wretched before? Had he need
to feel these truths in order to make his condition less endurable?
The sermon closed, the few words of solemn prayer followed, and the
choir took up the service. Strangely clear, at least to John's ears,
were the voices that spoke the tenderly solemn words:—
"Oh, do not let the word depart,
And close thine eyes against the light;
Poor sinner, harden not thine heart;
Thou wouldst be saved, why not to-night?"
Among the singers he had no difficulty in singling out one face and
voice. It was a voice of unusual sweetness and power, and it was a face
that haunted him. He could not yet tell why. There she was, the fair
young beauty who had given him his card. How strange it was that he
had accepted her invitation after all! After the song, instead of the
benediction which John expected, came another invitation.
"Now I know," said the preacher, "there are some in this room to-night
who feel that they are without the wedding garment, and who believe
that if the King should ask them why they would be speechless. Do
not all such wish to settle the question? You mean to settle it some
time. You do not mean to go up to that guest-chamber unclothed. Why
not settle it to-night? Why not come up here, all of you who think the
question unsettled, and who believe that it is important enough to be
attended to? Come, and let us ask the Holy Spirit to help you to settle
it to-night."
Did John Morgan intend ever to settle the question? He looked the
thought, for almost the first time, squarely in the face. He believed
that the man who had been speaking was in earnest. He believed that
he knew what he was talking about. Somehow the network of unbelief in
which this foolish young wanderer had intrenched himself so long would
not bear the piercing light of one solemn Bible question, one gospel
sermon; it slipped away from him and left him refugeless.
"Come," said the preacher. "Be men now and be women. Be worthy of
your position as reasonable beings. Take steps toward the better
understanding of this important matter. Do what you can. Rest assured
that the King will see to it that the rest is done for you. Come now."
Had John Morgan the least idea of going? He told himself that he had
not. He told himself that he did not believe in these things, that
they were not for him, and even while he said so his heart said back
to him, "That is not true." How came he to leave his station away back
by the door, and to follow the throng who were moving up the aisle,
and to kneel down there before that gray-haired man? Neither then nor
afterward did John Morgan understand it. He had not intended to go—at
least he supposed he had not; and yet he went. He did not believe
that he had any feeling on the subject; he believed that he hated
religion and all religionists. No, not all; there was Louise—he had
tried to hate her, and failed. There was that fair girl who gave him
the card, and that wrinkled old woman who had given him the card. What
was the use in hating them? He did not believe that he did. Then this
gray-haired, earnest, clear-brained preacher. No, he found nothing like
hatred in his heart for him. But what was the use of going up there? He
did not want to be prayed for. Yes he did, or at least he was not sure
but he did. He wanted something; he could not be certain what it was;
and before it was reasoned out, or before he understood what motive
impelled him or quite what he meant, he had been slowly impelled—he
could almost have said "pushed forward"—by a something, or by some one,
stronger than himself, to whom he felt impelled to yield.
It was just as the city clocks were striking the hour of nine. He
did not know that at that hour four people, in three separate rooms,
were kneeling and presenting his name before the King, begging for
him the wedding garment—Louise and Lewis in the quiet of their own
room, Dorothy in John's own hall chamber, Carey Martyn in his own room
over the kitchen, each, according to the covenant into which they had
entered, breathing the same name, united in the same desire. "While
they are yet speaking, I will hear." Did the King say that of them
that night? Did a message go from the palace that night, "Clothe John
Morgan in the wedding garment, and write his name among the guests who
have accepted the invitation"? There are those, even in the so-called
Christian world, who would fail to see the connecting link between this
conference held nightly with the King and these strange leadings which
John Morgan had called chance.
Yet is it not blessed, after all, to remember that the witnesses are
daily increasing who can testify to just such claims as these—chains
reaching even to the Infinite Arm, and moving that Arm to reach down
and pluck some stranded, sin-surrounded soul, lifting its feet from the
mire and setting them firmly on the Rock, even the Rock of Ages?
CHAPTER XXIII.
"FORBID THEM NOT."
To the Morgan family the long golden summer months moved slowly. The
first actual break in the household had come to them; none of the
family had realized how hard it would be until it was met. I suppose
it is a fact, many times proved by experience, that trial either
softens or hardens the human heart. Certainly Mrs. Morgan's heart was
not undergoing the softening process; she brooded over her first great
anxiety until at times it seemed to her that no sorrow was like unto
her sorrow, and she chafed under it as a cruel thing.
Farmer Morgan, though saying little, had aged under the trouble, and
seemed at times like a broken-down man; yet he steadily resisted any
effort at comfort, and sternly forbade any attempts to make search
for the missing boy. "He has chosen to cut himself off from us," he
would say coldly; "let him get the full benefit of it." Yet there were
times when he hinted, in the presence of the mother, that had the home
atmosphere been less hard and cold John might have been kept; and she
more than hinted, in the coldest of voices, that if his father had
not treated John like a little boy, and made him work like a slave,
there need have been no trouble: so of course these two could not help
each other, and only grew further apart in their common sorrow. Taken
altogether, the summer was one full of bitterness to the new bud that
had been grafted on to the gnarled old tree.
There were times when Louise's brave heart sunk within her, and she
cried in tears to the Lord for relief. It was not that she was not
willing to bear the heat and burden of the day, but the poor heart so
longed for fruitage. Was her Christian effort in vain she questioned.
Then her thoughts went away from the old farmhouse, back to her own
lovely home and her lovely sister Estelle; how long she had prayed for
her! How earnestly she had striven to bring her as a trophy to the
Master! Yet the bright, winsome girl was fast blushing into womanhood,
her life still uncrowned by this consecration. Thinking of her and of
John, and of the steadily aging father and the hard mother in this new
home, could Louise be other than sad sometimes? "If ye had faith as a
grain of mustard seed." Yes, I know; it was true, her faith was weak.
But whose is strong?
There were bright spots. It was strange that with the illustration ever
before her she should so often forget it.
Dorothy moved steadily on her upward way. She had given herself
entirely to the Master's service, and he was daily showing her that
he accepted the gift. Occasionally Louise found heart for admiration
over the rapid strides that Dorothy had taken and the avenues for work
opening on every hand. There had been, during the summer months, a
Sabbath school organized in the little brown school-house just above
them. No one quite remembered how it started into growth, save Louise,
who knew it was born of Dorothy's sudden, startled, "What a pity
that those children are not being taught anything!" as she watched
half-a-dozen playing together in an uproarious manner one Sunday
afternoon. Now the school had been in progress three months, and was
flourishing. Lewis was superintendent, much to his own astonishment;
and Louise, and Dorothy, and Carey Martyn, and the young lady whose
father employed him, were the teachers. Louise had organized a Bible
class composed of some of the mothers, and was working faithfully among
them, yet not seeing the fruit that she longed for. Mr. Butler had of
late fallen into the habit of walking out on Sabbath afternoon and
talking a few minutes to the children. Once he overheard a remark of
Dorothy's not by any means intended for his ears.
"Mr. Butler's talk to the children was really good, wasn't it?" Carey
Martyn said to her; and she had answered heartily—
"Yes, it was; when he talks without having it put on paper, it sounds
as though he meant it. I wonder why it makes such a difference to read
things off?"
And the minister, just at their elbow, intending to join them for a
little talk, turned away with heightened colour, and went home to
ponder the question. Perhaps that had somewhat to do with the fact that
two Sundays thereafter he talked to the people who gathered in the
dreary little church. I do not know that they discussed the sermon much
during the week, but I know that one and another said to himself: "I
must try to get to prayer-meeting on Wednesday evening; I declare it is
a shame to have so small an attendance. We ought to go, if for nothing
else than to sustain the minister; he seems really in earnest." Yet he
had not preached about the prayer-meeting. Still its evident growth the
next Wednesday evening encouraged his heart, and had to do with certain
earnest thoughts that he worked up in his next morning's sermon,
which was simply "talked" again, not read. Perhaps he would have been
discouraged had he known that this wise people, not used to the work of
making sermons, did not call these efforts of his, over which he had
toiled as he never had over written work, sermons at all. They imagined
him to have been belated in his preparations, and simply to have opened
his mouth and let the words flow out.
"We haven't had a sermon for two weeks now," said one wise head to
another.
And surely the minister who had sat late nearly every night, thinking
out and trying to get accustomed to what he meant to try and say, would
have been discouraged had he heard it; especially if he had not heard
the answer—
"No; but the fact is, I like these talks better than the real sermons.
I get better hold of them; and they seem, somehow, to do me more good.
I don't care how many times he leaves out the sermon, I'm sure!"
Now this was one of the most thoughtful minds belonging to the little
company which gathered once a week in the old church. On the whole,
might not the minister have felt somewhat encouraged had he known it
all?
But I commenced this chapter with the special intention of telling
you about little Nellie Morgan. She has been kept very much in the
background of the story; and she was a quiet, old-fashioned sort of
a child, who kept herself much out of hearing, at least, though she
listened well.
On this particular autumn afternoon of which I write the world was in
gloom. The glory which had had possession of the country for the few
weeks past seemed to have departed in a night, leaving in its place
clouds and wind, and dull, withered leaves flying about, and presently
a chill, depressing rain. The Morgan household felt the depression.
Mrs. Morgan, senior, knew, when first she opened her eyes on the
dreariness, that it was one of her black days—John's birthday. She was
sorry that she thought of it; she struggled all day with the memories
of the past. She saw John's curly head nestled in her arms; she saw him
trotting, a beautiful two-year-old bit of mischief, always at her side;
she saw his little shoes—though they were laid away in the bottom of
her old trunk in the attic, yet they seemed to stare at her all day,
haunting her with the dreams that she had had and that had faded. Every
hour in the day her heart grew heavier, and her outward demeanour grew
harder. Why could not those about her have realized that she bitterly
suffered? Whether the knowledge had helped her or not, it would have
made the day easier to them.
Nellie, soon after the early dinner, took refuge in her new sister's
room; and drawing the small rocker close to the cheery fire, turned
over, for the hundredth time, a volume brightened with many pictures,
and maintained silence, leaving Louise to the sadness of her thoughts.
They were sad; the atmosphere of the house was growing at times almost
too much for her. She did not seem to be gaining on her mother-in-law.
Yet she felt that, on Dorothy's account, she would not be elsewhere.
Presently Nellie's soft voice broke the silence.
"Sister Louise, what do you think He said to them, when he took them in
his arms?"
She was bending her fair head over a familiar picture, which she seemed
to love to study—Jesus, with a fair, sweet-faced child in his arms and
many others clustering around him.
Louise tried to call in her thoughts enough to answer—"Why, you know,
dear, he blessed them."
"Yes, I know; but just what do you think he said—the exactly words? I
wish I could have heard him."
There was intense pathos in the voice, but Louise's preoccupied heart
did not notice.
"I don't know, Nellie, just the words; only I suppose he prayed for
them, that his Father would take care of them and make them his own
children."
Silence again in the room. Louise went on with her broken thread of
thought, and the child's eyes were still riveted on the picture.
Suddenly she spoke again, and this time the voice was so eager, so
intense, that it called her sister back keenly and entirely from all
wandering.
"If I could only have been there."
It was the echo of more than a passing fancy of a child; and Louise,
looking at her, saw that her fair blue eyes were brimming with tears,
and the large drops were staining the page before her.
"Why, my darling little sister, what is the trouble?" Her voice was
full of sympathy now, and she dropped the work she had been listlessly
sewing, and, drawing the little rocker toward her, put loving arms
around Nellie.
"What makes the tears come, little darling sister?"
"O Louise, I don't know quite; but I think and I think about it, and
wish I could see him and hear him speak. If he would only say, 'Nellie,
come here,' I would run so fast; and I can't make it seem as though
he cared now for me. My teacher in the Sunday school says I must give
my heart to him; but I don't know how. If I could see him and ask him
about it, as they had a chance to do, I think it would be so nice; and
then I can't help crying."
"Jesus said, 'Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto
me.' But his disciples rebuked them."
"Is it possible," thought Louise, "that I have been one of those
faithless disciples, rebuking, or at least ignoring, the presence of
one of his little ones, while I reached out after fruit that I dared to
think was of more importance!"
I cannot explain to you with what a chill her heart took in this
thought, and she gathered Nellie to her, and her voice was tenderness
itself.
"You poor little lonely lammie. Would no one show you the way to the
Shepherd? It is just as easy, darling, as it was when he was on earth,
and he calls you just as surely. You don't know how to give your heart
to him? I shouldn't wonder if you had done it without knowing how. Do
you think you love the dear Saviour, Nellie, and want to try to please
him?"
"I'm sure I do," said Nellie, brushing back the tears and looking with
earnest eyes into her questioner's face. "I do want to, but I keep
forgetting and doing naughty things, and then am sorry, and I think I
won't ever again, and then I do; and, oh dear! I don't know what to do."
The old sad cry of the awakened human heart: "That which I do, I allow
not; for what I would, that do I not, but what I hate, that do I." And
the sad little heart had not learned the triumphant chorus, "'Thanks be
to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.'"
"Poor darling!" said Louise, and she held her close. "I know all
about it. But see here: if you love him, then you have given him your
heart—whoever you love has a piece of your heart—and if you love him
very much, so that you are determined to please him just as well as you
can, then you belong to him, and he has blessed you. Nellie dear, I
know what you have been thinking about: you would have liked if you had
been there so that he could pray for you."
"Yes, I would!" said Nellie, the emphasis of a strong desire in her
voice.
"Well, now, let me tell you. I felt just so when I was a little girl,
and a lady found for me a verse in the Bible which showed me that
he prayed for me while he was here on the earth. Then I was glad.
Listen:—Once when Jesus was praying, and had asked his Father to take
care of his disciples, and keep them from sin, he said: 'And, Father, I
do not pray only for these; I pray for every one who shall ever believe
on me, because my disciples have told them about me.'"
"That means me," said Nellie, with a flash of intelligence in her
bright eyes. "O Louise, that does mean me!"
"Of course it does, my darling little sister. Now, let me tell you
what I said when I was a little girl, not much older than you. I
determined that I would belong to Jesus all my life, and that I would
try in everything to please him; and my papa taught me a little prayer
to speak to him, telling him what I meant to do. This was the prayer:
'Here, Lord, I give myself away; 'tis all that I can do.' Do you want
to give yourself to Jesus, Nellie,—to belong to him for ever?"
"Yes," said the child, with grave face and earnest eyes, from which the
tears had passed, leaving only solemn resolve, "I do."
And they two knelt down beside the little rocker, and the rain pattered
from the eaves outside, and the fire crackled in the stove inside, and
aside from these sounds, and the low murmured words of prayer from
young lips, a solemn silence filled the room, and the deed of another
human soul was "signed, sealed, and delivered" to its rightful owner.
It was a radiant face that was raised to Louise a few moments
thereafter, and the child's voice had a note of triumph in it.
"He took me," she said, simply. "I belong to him now. I did not
understand it before; but it is very easy. He took me."
Could any elaboration make the story of the mysterious change simpler?
How do you think that older disciple felt about the matter of fruitage?
Here had she been looking right and left of her for sheaves to take to
the Master, and behold, just at her feet, a bud had grown and swelled
and burst into bloom before she had even discovered signs of life! It
taught her a lesson that she put often into practice among the lambs
thereafter. It led her to remember that possibly his disciples of
to-day often occupy unwittingly the position of rebukers, even while
the Master's voice is calling, "Suffer the little children, and forbid
them not."
Two hours thereafter they were down in the kitchen, Louise and Nellie;
Louise had been called down by a message from a neighbour, and Nellie
had followed. The errand despatched, the daughter-in-law lingered in
the kitchen, her hungry heart looking for a bit of cheer.
Changes in the kitchen arrangements had involved the clearing out
and reordering of a certain corner cupboard that day, and Dorothy,
perched on a chair, was settling the upper shelves. Her mother, with
a face that every hour in the day had grown harder, because of the
conflict within which she was determined nobody should suspect, was
sorting over boxes of spices, bags of dried seeds, papers of treasures.
Dorothy found a niche which she believed would just receive one of
the treasures, a large, old-fashioned, covered dish of china, dating
back in its pattern for nearly a hundred years, and valued in the
household, as such pieces generally are, for a dozen times their worth.
She glanced about her. Louise had moved to the distant window, and was
looking out upon the dull sky and earth. Her mother was absorbed and
forbidding-looking. Little Nellie was standing very near the treasured
dish, and her quick eye saw what was wanted, and her quick and eager
fingers grasped the treasure.
"I'll hand it to you, Dorrie; you needn't get down."
"Oh no!" said Dorothy aghast, but not quickly enough. The small hands
that were so anxious to help had seized it, and were safely bearing it
forward, when the metallic voice of the mother came startlingly upon
her.
"Nellie Morgan, put that dish down on the table this instant!"
Poor, startled Nellie, eager to obey, anxious to show her mother and
Dorothy, and, above all, Louise, that she meant to do right, turned to
obey; but, alas her nervous little hand measured falsely the height
of the table, and she hit the rare blue dish against its edge, the
treacherous cover toppled over, and—well, how did it happen? Who ever
knows just how dire accidents happen? Such a second of time in which
they do it all! What Nellie and the rest of the startled spectators
knew was that the family heirloom lay in a dozen pieces on the yellow
kitchen floor!
CHAPTER XXIV.
STORM.
FOR the space of about one minute there was silence in the kitchen;
then Mrs. Morgan, senior, advanced with swift steps and stern face,
and caught the trembling Nellie by the arm and whirled her into the
little bedroom near at hand, and closed the door with an ominous bang.
Then, presently, there followed those sounds so absolutely unendurable
to refined and sensitive nerves—rapid blows, mingled with pitiful
pleadings for mercy.
I have often wondered whether, if those given to the administration of
that sort of punishment could be lookers-on or listeners while another
dealt the blows, it would not materially change their views of the
entire question. Is it possible under those circumstances to avoid
feeling a loss of respect for the administrator?—to escape from the
notion that he or she is submitting to a self-degradation?
The two sisters looked at each other in dire dismay.
"Poor little Nellie!" gasped Dorothy at length. "She hadn't the least
idea that she was doing anything wrong. How can mother punish her?"
Louise made no answer, because there seemed to her nothing that it was
safe to say.
"Oh, mamma, don't, please don't!" wailed Nellie. "I didn't mean to do
anything wrong."
Then did Dorothy's courage rise to the point of action.
She went swiftly over to that closed door, pushed it open, and spoke
with eager, tremulous voice:—
"Oh, mother, don't whip Nellie; I know she didn't mean to do anything
wrong."
"Dorothy Morgan!" said the firm, stern voice of her mother, never
colder or firmer than at that moment, "Leave this room, and close the
door immediately."
And Dorothy immediately obeyed. She always obeyed her mother; but is it
probable that just at that moment she respected her?
Louise leaned her head against the rain-bespattered window-pane, and
looked out into the dreariness, and waited; and Dorothy got back on
her perch and leaned her head against the cupboard door, and wiped a
distressed tear from her face with the back of her hand, and waited. It
was not that either of those misery-stricken waiters feared injury to
Nellie, at least not to the physical part of her. Mrs. Morgan was not
in that sense cruel. They were well aware that the punishment would not
be unduly severe; but, nevertheless, there was that miserable sense of
degradation. Was it possible to avoid the conclusion that the mother
was angry, and was venting the pent-up irritations of the day on her
defenceless child? Each wail of Nellie's sank the mother lower in the
estimation of daughter and daughter-in-law: the latter, realizing
and struggling with the feeling, trying to reason herself into the
belief that Mrs. Morgan must know what was best for her child, and
with strange inconsistency trying to determine whether she could ever
respect her again; Dorothy, not conscious of the name of the miserable
feelings that held her in possession, but knowing that life seemed
very horrid just then. All these phases of misery occupied little room
in time—one's heart works rapidly. Quiet came to the little bedroom,
broken only by an occasional sob, and presently the administrator of
punishment came out, closing the door after her.
"Pick up those pieces and throw them away," was her first command to
Dorothy. "One would have supposed you could have done that without
waiting to be told. And don't climb up there again; I will finish the
work myself. If I had done it in the first place, instead of setting
you at it, I would have saved myself a great deal of trouble."
"Can't they be mended?" Dorothy asked, aghast at the idea of throwing
away the bits of treasured blue china.
"No, they can't. I don't want my mother's china patched up—a continual
eyesore; I would rather put it out of sight."
"Poor Nellie!" said Dorothy, stooping to gather the fragments, and
astonished at her own courage; "she was so eager to help."
"It was not for trying to help that she was punished," explained the
mother coldly—the very tones of her voice betraying the fact that she
felt the need of self-justification. "She knows very well that she has
been forbidden to touch any dishes without special permission; and the
fact that she forgot it only proves that she pays very little attention
to commands. And you, Dorothy, are trying to help her pay less
attention. I was astonished at your interference! Don't let me ever see
anything of that kind again."
And then Dorothy hated the blue china pieces, and would rather throw
them away than not. Still Louise lingered in the kitchen, not because
the atmosphere was pleasant, but because she pitied Dorothy, who was
evidently much tried still; she could not go away and leave her,
perhaps to be vanquished by the tempter.
It presently transpired that Dorothy had a new and fruitful source
of anxiety. The early autumn night was closing in; the rain was
increasing, so were the wind and the dampness. In the kitchen, Mother
Morgan herself poked the fire and added another stick, and the glow
and warmth that followed were agreeable; but the bedroom door was
closed, and Dorothy was almost sure that the bedroom window was open,
and occasionally there came a dry little cough from the little girl
shut in there, that deepened the look of anxiety on the sister's face.
Her mother grew more gloomy looking as the moments passed, but Dorothy
ventured yet again.
"Mother, shall I shut the bedroom window?"
"No; let the bedroom window alone."
Presently the mother descended to the cellar, and Dorothy seized the
opportunity to express her anxieties.
"Nellie will catch her death in there; she must be real chilly. It is
growing damper every minute, and she has a cold now. What can mother be
thinking of?"
Then Louise began to give attention to the dry little cough, and to
grow anxious also. Debating the question for a while as to whether she
would help or hinder by speaking, she finally determined to try; so she
said, in as indifferent a tone as she could assume,—
"Shall I open the bedroom door, mother? Nellie seems to be coughing."
The mother faced round on her from the cupboard, where she was still
working, and these were the words she said,—
"Mrs. Lewis Morgan, can I be allowed to manage my own family, or must I
give it up to you?"
Then Louise went upstairs, and shut her door and locked it, and sat
down in the little rocker so lately vacated by Nellie, and gave herself
up to the luxury of tears. It was not merely this event, it was a good
many little events that had been piling up during many trying days; and
the night was chill, and the world outside was in gloom, and Lewis was
away, to be gone all night, and for two nights to come, and it seemed
to the young wife as though two nights represented years, and it seemed
a long time since she had seen her mother, and she was sorry for poor,
little, banished Nellie—and so she cried. She had some vindictive
thoughts also; she told herself that this struggle to belong to the
family, and be one of them, was perfect nonsense; and she had borne
it quite as long as any human being could be expected to; Lewis would
insist on a separate home whenever she gave the hint; what was the use
in trying to endure this sort of thing longer? Mrs. Morgan had insulted
her; why should she bear it? She would not go down to supper; she would
not go down again to-night; she would send word that, at least so
long as her husband was absent, she would remain in her room, and not
irritate the mistress of the house by her presence. She would write to
her mother, and tell her just what a hateful world this was, and how
disagreeable a person named "mother" could be. She would go home, would
start to-morrow morning, and telegraph Lewis to take the westward train
instead of the eastern, and meet her there; and they would stay until
Father Morgan was willing to give them, what was her husband's right,
a spot for himself. To be sure, she meant to do none of these dire
things; but it was a sort of luxury to go over them in her heart, and
imagine what she could do, the sensation that she could create, if she
chose.
This is one of the miserable snares with which Satan trips the feet
of unwary saints, leading them to feel that to luxuriate in bitter
thoughts, which they really do not intend to carry out, is no harm;
letting them forget that by just so much is their spirituality
weakened, and their communion with Christ cut off. It was in this case
but a partial victory, for Louise, presently feeling the gloom of heart
too much for her to struggle under, looked about for relief, and being
used to seeking it but in one place, dropped on her knees and carried
the whole dreary scene to Him who bears our sorrows and carries our
griefs; and when, almost an hour afterward, she answered Dorothy's
summons to tea, her face was serene and her heart at rest.
Nellie was at the table, a trifle more quiet than usual—albeit she was
always a meek and quiet little mouse—her face a shade paler than usual,
and her eyes disposed to seek Louise's with a questioning gaze, as if
she would determine whether she had been considered naughty; but when
Louise answered the question by a tender, reassuring smile, the little
face became radiant.
I want you to do Mother Morgan justice. She was by no means cruel
intentionally; she would not have kept Nellie in the cold five minutes
had her nature realized the situation. Her own blood was fairly boiling
in her veins; she could not have conceived of the possibility of
anybody being chilled that day. She honestly believed Dorothy to be a
simpleton, and Louise to be trying to interfere with her duties as the
mistress of the family. Therefore she had no self-accusing spirit with
which to meet her family at the tea-table; so she was self-poised and
dignified. But Louise, in her half-hour of communion in the chamber of
peace, had found strength enough to bear any amount of dignity, and
carried herself sweetly and helpfully through the hour.
Into the gloom of that rainy night came a guest that dispelled all
the dignity, and made each member of the unfortunately constructed
household feel of kin. Louise was the first to hear it, even before
Dorothy, that strange, hoarse cough, which has fallen in so many a
household almost like the sound of earth-clods on a coffin, and which
too often has been but the forerunner of that very sound. Louise had
heard it from the little sister at home often enough, and understood
the signal so well that it brought her to her feet with a bound; so
that when Dorothy, a few moments later, knocked hesitatingly at her
door, she answered with a quick "Yes, dear," and threw it wide-open,
herself nearly dressed.
"O Louise! Do you hear Nellie? Isn't she very sick?"
"She has the croup, Dorrie. I am going right down."
And Louise searched rapidly, yet with the air of one who knew what she
wanted and where it was, in her trunk for a package.
Dorothy shivered.
"O Louise! What if mother doesn't think there is much the matter with
her, and will not do things?"
"I wouldn't borrow trouble, dear. Your poor mother is more likely to be
overwhelmed with anxiety. Come down; we can find something to do." And
she sped swiftly downstairs.
Whereupon Dorothy's courage returned. She followed suit, and
immediately attacked the stove, and arranged kindlings with skilled
fingers, and applied her match, and lifted on the large kettle, and
filled it with water; while Louise pushed boldly into the bedroom, none
too soon, for the white-faced mother sorely needed help.
It was a rapid and very severe form of that terrible disease, and there
were no young men to hasten for a doctor, though anxiety lent haste to
the old father's fingers, and he was even then saddling a horse with
what speed he could.
"Have you tried hot water?" was Louise's first question, as she
hastened to raise the head of the struggling, suffering child.
"No," said Mrs. Morgan, her voice expressing an anxiety that she could
not conceal. "There is no hot water; and there isn't anything; and the
doctor will never get here. There is no fire."
"Yes, there is," said Louise, who already caught its brisk snapping.
"Dorrie is there; we will have hot water in five minutes," and she
hurried to the kitchen.
"That's right, Dorrie; just a little water, so we can have it at once;
then set the other kettle on, and fill it half full, and as soon as it
heats fill up. And, Dorrie, get a tub; run for blankets. But, first,
where's a spoon?"
"Have you the medicine that you use?" This to the mother, for she was
back again beside her.
"No," said Mrs. Morgan again in that same distressed tone; "I haven't
anything."
Then Louise produced her package, and untied it with rapid fingers.
"This is what my mother uses for my little sister."
Mrs. Morgan, senior, seized the bottle, gave one glance at the label,
and returned it with a brief, decisive sentence, "Give her some."
And the already secured spoon was promptly produced and the medicine
dropped, none too soon, for it was growing momently harder for Nellie
to swallow anything.
Don't you know just how they worked, those three women, for the next
hour, over that child? If I write for those who have had no experience
in such suffering, where there is such dire need of haste, and where
all remedies at times are utter failures, blessed are they, although
Louise blessed the past hours of experience that had given her
knowledge and skill for this night. Both were needed, for Mrs. Morgan's
usually cold nerves were trembling, and a terrible fear of what might
be coming blanched her face, and made her limbs tremble beneath her.
She gave herself unresistingly to the lead of Louise and Dorothy; for
Dorothy, the moment she found something to do, sprung into action and
energy, and the hot water bath was ready almost before it had seemed
possible.
Nellie, in the midst of her sufferings, had strength to greet Louise's
coming with a smile; and, although it was hard work to speak at all,
murmured, as the face of her sister recalled the earlier events of the
afternoon, "He took me."
"What does she say?" asked the mother, her voice sharpened with pain.
Louise hesitated a moment; then, struggling to keep back the tears,
answered steadily, smiling on Nellie,—
"She is referring to a little conversation which she and I had this
afternoon. She gave herself away to Jesus, and she is telling me that
he took her.—Yes, darling; I know he did."
A sharp cry, almost as from a wounded animal, escaped the drawn lips of
the mother; then she gave herself with renewed energy to the work of
fighting disease.
And the clock was watched eagerly, and the drops administered at just
such moments; and the bath was replenished, and the rubbing of feet and
hands went on, and the compresses were changed constantly; and, just as
Dorothy, with a little gasp of relief, said, "There's the doctor!" as
the sound of voices was heard in the hall, Louise and her mother-in-law
said, in the same breath, "She breathes easier!"
"Well," said the doctor, after the patient had been examined, and the
drops from Louise's bottle looked into, and the questions had been
answered, "you have really done all there was to be done, and the
little woman is past the crisis for to-night; but it was a tough case,
I guess. That medicine works like a charm sometimes, and sometimes it
doesn't. It helps, though, where there is hot water, and speed and good
judgment to supplement it."
The Morgan family were not likely to forget the experiences of that
night. To each member of it they had been peculiar. No one knows, or
at least can describe, the emotions which tugged at the heart of the
father, as he galloped through the gloom of that night, not knowing
but that the death angel, who evidently hovered near, would have gone
away with his youngest born before he could get back to her. No one,
perhaps, but the Searcher of hearts will ever know what the mother felt
as she strained every nerve to hold back the destroyer, and yet thought
she saw his grim steps approaching. Through all the swift working and
swift thinking, the strongest feeling of Louise's heart had been pity
for that mother. All the events of the dreary afternoon photographed
themselves before her with startling distinctness. What must they be to
the mother? Swiftly as she worked, and entirely as she seemed to give
her mind to the needs of the hour, with every motion there went up a
prayer that the Great Physician would, for the mother's sake, speak the
word of healing; and presently there went up the prayer of grateful
acknowledgment. Fair little Nellie, as she lay back at last, white
and exhausted with her hard hours of suffering, seemed possessed with
something like the same feeling of pity for the mother, but she gave it
expression in a way that almost broke that mother's heart. Putting up
her weak little hand as the mother bent over her, she patted tenderly
the white, wrinkled cheek, and said, in the most loving and penitent of
tones,—
"Dear mamma, I didn't mean to be naughty."
Then, indeed, the strain that had been upon the mother's heart, not
only for that afternoon, but for days and weeks, gave way suddenly, and
with the bitter cry, "O Nellie, don't!" she burst into a passion of
tears.
CHAPTER XXV.
UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER.
A SECOND time in her life did Mrs. Morgan, senior, seek her
daughter-in-law's room. Not unsolicited, however. Louise, all
unknowingly, planned the way for an easier approach.
"Mother," she said, toward the evening of the day that followed that
night of watching, "won't you just slip up to my room and lie down for
an hour or two? You look so tired, and you know you had no rest at all
last night. Dorrie and I will take the best possible care of Nellie;
and, indeed, she looks so bright as to hardly need care."
This invitation had been repeated at intervals during the day; but Mrs.
Morgan, though not repellent in her manner, had steadily resisted every
suggestion, and yet had seemed not ungrateful for the thoughtfulness.
"Perhaps I will by-and-by," she had said to Louise's last suggestion;
but it was an hour afterward, when Louise had despaired of her success
and had sought her room, that Mrs. Morgan tapped at her door.
"That is good," the daughter said briskly. "Let me bring a cover and
arrange the pillows comfortably, and you will get a nice rest before
Nellie misses you."
"Wait," said Mrs. Morgan, arresting Louise's quick steps; "don't fix
the bed. I have not come to lie down; I don't feel like resting; I want
to talk with you. Sit down here by the fire. I suppose I need your
help. I need something—I don't really know what. I have been having a
very hard time."
"I know it," said Louise, quick sympathy in her voice. "Last night was
a heavy strain. But you can safely rest now, she is so much better. I
never saw any one rally so rapidly."
"I don't mean that. My hard time did not begin last night. I don't
feel sure that I can tell you when it began; away back. I have made
some of my hard times, I can see that. I have been disappointed in my
children. John disappointed me, long ago; I had ambitions for him, I
had plans, and everything happened to thwart them. I felt hard at Lewis
sometimes because he seemed to come in the way; and I felt hard—well,
at everything. I have thought that his father did not treat him just as
I would have done if I had been a father. So I have just gone through
life, being out of sorts at everything."
"For a while after you came here I had hopes that John would take to
you, and that he would come out all right; and when I saw how much
stress you laid on prayer, I began to feel glad that you were praying
for John, and to sort of expect that good would come out of it. Then
you know how awfully I was disappointed, and how things went from bad
to worse. Then after he went away it seemed to me as though my heart
turned to stone. I didn't feel as though I cared much for the other
children, and I didn't want to. Dorothy provoked me, and Lewis provoked
me, and you provoked me worst of all. I have grown harder and bitterer
every day; I was rebellious at God; I thought he had treated me badly.
I got down on my knees once and prayed for John; and I said to myself
that He ought to have heard me, and he didn't, and I couldn't forgive
him."
"Then came last night. I was hard on my poor little girl. I didn't
punish her hard, I don't mean that. I just gave her three or four
slaps, which, if they had been given in sport, she wouldn't have
minded. It was her heart that I hurt, and I knew it. I knew at the
time that I was punishing her unjustly. The child didn't mean to
be disobedient—didn't know that she was; but I had been having a
dreadful day, and it seemed an actual relief to have some escape for
my bitterness. So I whipped her. But I have been punished for it. Last
night was an awful night! If she had died I believe I should have lost
my reason. And I thought she would die; I believed that God had sent
for her in retribution. Yet I cried to him. I told him I had been
bitter and severe and rebellious, and was yet; but that if he would
spare my baby I would try to serve him—I would do anything that he told
me. Now he has taken me at my word when I didn't expect it, and I am a
woman who has always been noted for keeping a promise. I mean to keep
this one, but I don't know how. I don't even know what he wants of me.
It seemed to me that you ought to know, and to be able to tell me, so I
have come to you for help."
Throughout the telling of this story Louise had not interrupted by word
or movement; but long before it was concluded the sympathetic tears
were dropping on her mother's hand. Directly the steady, unnaturally
quiet voice ceased, this servant of Christ was ready with his message.
"O mother, what he wants of you is to lean your head upon his bosom,
and tell him all your fears and cares and disappointments, and let him
whisper to you, 'Daughter, be of good courage.' He loves you, mother,
and he loves John, and Nellie, and all your flock. He wants to save you
all in his everlasting arms, and bring you, an unbroken family, to his
Father's house. I believe he will do it. And in return he asks your
love; and you know, mother, when we stop to think of it, it would be
simply impossible to help loving one who waits to do all this for us
and ours."
Mrs. Morgan looked at her daughter with grave, earnest eyes, and slowly
shook her head.
"It may not be possible for you to help loving him, but I don't feel a
bit of love in my heart. It feels as hard as flint. I believe that he
is willing to do a great deal for me, and yet I don't seem to care."
"Mother, tell him so." Louise's voice trembled with the earnestness of
her desire. "He is unlike any other friend. To a human friend we could
not go, saying simply: 'I know I ought to love you, but I don't. Show
me how.' But to the tender Saviour we can come with even this story.
Mother, do not wait to feel as you think you ought. You have promised
to serve him. You say you mean to keep the promise; then just give
yourself to him. Be sure he will accept the gift, and fill your heart
with joy in return."
"But, Louise, that would be simply mockery. He asks for love, and I
cannot love him. I feel as though I had no love for anybody."
Louise shook her head. "No, if you are sincere you cannot mock him.
He made the heart. You cannot make your heart love him, but you can
resolve to give yourself to him, to obey his directions, to follow his
voice, and I do assure you he will see to all the rest. Will you keep
your promise?"
Then there was silence. Mrs. Morgan was evidently puzzled, as well as
painfully embarrassed. The way was darker to her than it had been to
Nellie. She had not the faith of a little child to rest upon.
"How much does the promise mean?" she asked at last "What would I have
to do?"
"It means everything," said Louise solemnly; "you would have to do just
exactly as God directs. He has promised to guide you, and you are to
promise to be guided every step of the way; to have no will of your
own, to lose your will in his. Will you do it?"
"But if he directs what I cannot do?"
"There is no possibility of such an 'if,' mother; he will be sure to
give the power to do, with the command. Unless you mean 'will not' by
'cannot,' there is nothing in the way. The world is full of people who
say, 'I can't,' when in their hearts they know they mean 'I won't.'
But you are an honest woman; you will not say I cannot to God, knowing
that you could, if you would. Mother, will you redeem your promise?
See here; your little Nellie sat in that chair where you are only
yesterday, and she knelt beside me and prayed this prayer,—"
"'Here, Lord, I give myself away;
'Tis all that I can do.'"
"When she arose from her knees she said, 'He took me.' Will you use
Nellie's prayer, mother? If you will, I am sure you will receive her
answer. Will you kneel down with me, now and here?"
I cannot assure you that the daughter's faith was strong; she was
startled at her heart's own beating, and a great deal of the emotion
was the result of anxiety. It was evidently the turning-point in Mrs.
Morgan's life, but how would she decide it? Would she kneel down and
deliberately give herself away to Christ, even in this darkness,
declaring that she had no love in her heart for him? Louise was afraid;
and the silence lasted. She did not know what else to say; she was
afraid to speak again, so she kept silent. But, oh, how her heart sped
to the throne with its errand. How she blessed the King that at this
crisis hour she had not to wait to petition for an audience, and then
await his leisure. Instead, without introduction or explanation, she
pressed her petition: "O Jesus, save her now." Again and again, and
yet again, were these desires presented; and thinking of it afterward,
it seemed to her that almost she felt the presence of the Angel of
the covenant, and whispered yet again in his waiting ear, "I will not
let thee go." And so strong grew the feeling, that when suddenly, in
the quiet and the darkness, the little rocker was pushed back with a
resolute hand, and her mother-in-law went down on her knees before it,
Louise, not surprised now, slipped down beside her, and immediately
changing the tone of her prayer, said aloud,—
"Dear Jesus, here is this soul come to redeem her promise; she is
going to give herself to thee now, to be thine for ever; she is going
to follow wherever thy hand points the way. Now, Jesus, accept the
covenant, and write her thine, even as thou hast promised."
And then again from that room, only a trifle over twenty-four hours
away from its yesterday's baptism, went up the solemn words, Nellie's
little prayer,—
"'Here, Lord, I give myself away;
'Tis all that I can do.'"
The tones were firm, broken by no emotion; strong—they might almost be
said to be stern. In truth, it was an iron will that was bending now;
but there was fixed purpose in the act. If the will was hard to bend,
it never seemed to bend when there was no reality. When a strong oak
bows low before unseen power, it is evident that there is power. Only
those words were spoken, then silence. Louise waited, praying softly.
Then again she broke the silence, sealing the offering with a solemn,
tender prayer of petition that the Lord might now reveal his smiling
face to the waiting soul. Then, almost alarmed at the stillness, lest
the tide of feeling might be too much for the wearied body of this
iron-willed woman, she arose. Mrs. Morgan quietly followed her example,
and sat down again in the little chair. To Louise's heart it seemed
unwise to speak more words. Presently she said,—
"Mother, you will rest here now a while, won't you? I will go down to
Nellie, and when she awakens and wants you we will call immediately. I
have made the bed comfortable, and perhaps you will have a chance to
get a nice rest. Will you have a light? No?" as Mrs. Morgan shook her
head. "You like the fire-light best; then I will make it just a little
brighter."
And she stirred the embers and added another stick; and then with soft
step she went back to the little chair and touched her lips for just
one second to the mother's cheek, then slipped out and left her.
Only a few moments Mrs. Morgan sat, as if spell-bound, gazing into the
glow that sprang up on the hearth. Then she roused suddenly, and went
over to the door and turned the key in the lock; but instead of going
toward the bed, she went back to the little chair and bowed before it
on her knees.
Already had this woman, with her first words of actual self-surrender,
felt a touch of the mighty Hand that leaves its impress on the heart.
She could not say now, what she had fifteen minutes before, "I cannot
love him; I feel as though I had no love for anybody." She did not
understand what to name the strange new feelings that were surging
through her heart. Thus much she could say, what she never in her life
had been able to say before, "I want to pray." And so she dropped on
her knees, and the old, and ever new, and continually repeated miracle
of transformation went on. "If any man will do his will, he shall
know of the doctrine, whether it be of God." Why do not the honest
unbelievers apply the test of the Lord's own promising?
"What is the matter?" Dorothy asked, in tones half-startled and wholly
wondering, as Louise came once more to the little bedroom.
"Nothing. Why?" Louise asked, smiling as she took her station beside
the pale little face on the pillow.
"I don't know; you look—I hardly know how—a little as though you had
seen an angel."
"Perhaps I have." This with a glad light in her eyes and a bright,
reassuring smile.
Then came the father to look in on his sleeping baby, and to ask of
Dorothy in a half whisper,—
"Where is your mother?"
"I don't know," said Dorothy, turning inquiring eyes on Louise, who
answered,—
"She is up in my room, father, resting."
"Resting!" Father Morgan repeated the word, wonder and almost terror in
his voice. Rest was something that Mother Morgan never took. The word
seemed foreign to her nature. Even when she slept you hardly thought of
her as actually resting. "She must be sick!"
"Oh no, she isn't; I think she feels better than usual. She will have a
nice rest, and be down presently."
And then the farmer turned and looked wonderingly at his
daughter-in-law. He detected the minor tone of music in her voice, and
he noticed the brightness in her face. It was always a bright face,
but here was positive joy. What was there to be joyful about? Father
Morgan did not define this questioning feeling, neither did he think
of angels. He had not been reading about the shining of Moses' face
after his communion with God, as Dorothy had; but he told himself, for
perhaps the thousandth time, that "Lewis had an unusual kind of a wife,
somehow."
It was verging toward midnight, and Farmer Morgan was asleep on the old
settee in the parlour, when Mrs. Morgan opened the door quietly and
came in.
"Did you get any rest, mother?"
It was Dorothy who questioned, while Louise looked up quickly.
Her voice was in its usual calm, but was it imagination that made it
seem to Louise as though the peculiar, hard ring had gone out of it?
"Yes," she said, "a good rest; better than any that I ever had in my
life. You girls may both go to bed now. I would just as soon sit up all
night as not." And then she looked at Louise and smiled.
"What were those words Nellie said to you last night?"
This to Louise a little later, as Dorothy moved about doing last things
for her mother's comfort.
"She told me that 'He took her.'"
"It is a strange thing, but I believe he has taken her mother too.
Good-night, and God bless you."
And then Mother Morgan deliberately folded her arms about Louise and
deliberately kissed her twice before the astonished eyes of Dorothy.
She had just come in from the kitchen to petition,—
"Mother, couldn't you lie down beside Nellie and sleep, and let me stay
awake to watch her?"
"No, Dorothy, I don't need it; I am rested. I have found such rest as I
knew nothing about. Louise will tell you."
It is very strange that between a mother and a daughter kisses
should have been so rare a thing that for Dorothy to feel one on her
cheek made the rich blood roll into it in waves, and she was utterly
bewildered still, until she heard Louise repeating, "'Come unto me, all
ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.' Mother
has just been to him with his promise, and received its fulfilment,
Dorrie," she said. And as they went up the stairs together, she added,
"Dorrie dear, I believe you and I could sing the long-metre doxology
with good effect to-night. Meantime, dear, don't let us for one moment
let go of John."
Ah! But stronger arms than theirs had hold of John.
CHAPTER XXVI.
DORRIE'S AMBITION.
You think that the progress in the Morgan family has been unusual;
that the fruit has been more than the earnest Christian has a right to
expect? Have you ever tried it—ever given one year of patient endeavour
and constant prayer to the work which lay all around you? If not, how
can you possibly know what the results of such a year might be?
I do not say that Louise Morgan had faith equal even to a grain of
mustard seed; if she had, she would have seen greater mountains
than these removed. I have told you frequently of her discouraged
questioning, "Why?" but such faith as she had the Lord honoured, and as
much real prayer as she was able to send up into the golden vials he
kept before him.
I desire you to distinctly understand that from the hour when Mrs.
Morgan kneeled before the little rocker in Louise's room and gave
herself unconditionally to God she was a different woman. I am not
in sympathy with those who say that conversion makes no radical
change in character; that a person who is selfish or passionate or
penurious before conversion is selfish or passionate or penurious after
conversion in the same degree. Conversion is change of heart; and a
heart given up to the reign of Christ, the supreme desire being to
please him, will, at the outset, be a very different heart from one
that was given up to the reign of self.
Mrs. Morgan's changed heart showed in her life; showed promptly and
decisively. On that very next evening, after tea, with Nellie among
the pillows in the rocking-chair that had been brought from Louise's
room for her use, the mother said: "Now, Lewis, I have made up my mind
that I want family prayers in this house after this, and on Nellie's
account we will have them right after tea, if it is just as well for
you.—Dorothy, get mother's Bible. Sing a hymn, if you like, before
reading. I like singing, if I can't help; and your father used to be
a good singer when he was young." Farmer Morgan made no remark upon
this change in the family arrangements. If he was surprised, he gave no
sign. It is probable that she had been talking with him about it—his
wife was a straightforward woman—but Lewis's voice was very unsteady as
he commenced the solemn hymn:—
"Now I resolve with all my heart,
With all my powers, to serve the Lord."
It seemed to him almost too wonderful and blessed a thing to be true,
that those words should actually embody the resolve of his mother's
heart! Besides, he had another reason for unsteadiness of voice: in his
heart was an absorbing desire to have his father understand and adopt
that language. I have not had a chance to say much about Lewis Morgan
during these latter days; but I can give you the history of his life in
brief. He had reached that point where the history of each day was in
the morning, "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?" and in the evening a
note of triumph,—
"How sweet the work has been!
'Tis joy, not duty,
To speak this beauty:
My soul mounts on the wing!"
And then the consecration,—
"Lord, if I may,
I'll serve another day."
And when a Christian reaches such a plane as that, it is what a blessed
saint of God describes as "the graded road."
How I would like to linger over those autumn days, to tell how rich
they were; what a spirit pervaded the home that had never been there
before; how mother and daughters drew together; how they established
one afternoon a little female prayer-meeting, where mother, and Louise,
and Dorothy, and little Nellie prayed in turn for John, such prayer
as reached after him and drew him steadily though he knew it not; how
in that meeting they prayed constantly, persistently, with a measure
of faith, for the head of the household, and watched eagerly for sign
of life in his still soul, but as yet saw none; how they enjoyed the
rides to church, and to prayer-meeting on Wednesday evening; how Mother
Morgan, who had never been used to going anywhere of an evening,
astonished them all by making ready as a matter of course, answering
Dorothy's wondering look by the sentence: "Of course I am going,
child; I need all the help I can get." All these, and so many more
experiences, I would like to give you in detail; but time will not wait
for me—the days fly past.
They bring us to a certain evening, cold without, but very pleasant
upstairs in Louise's room, whore Dorothy was lingering with her brother
and sister, having a confidential chat, as she was now so fond of
doing. They had grown to be wonderfully in sympathy, these three.
"Dorrie," Lewis said, "what do you think about a district
prayer-meeting this winter? Don't you believe we could sustain one?"
Dorrie flashed a pair of glad eyes on her brother.
"Of course we could; there are enough in our family to sustain it, with
Carey Martyn's help. Isn't Carey splendid, Lewis?" Dorothy sometimes
said this, or something equivalent, several times in a day. "Where
could we have one? At the school-house? How could we warm it? Could we
furnish wood, do you think? Of course we could, if father would think
so, and I guess he would."
Lewis laughed. "You take my breath away," he said pleasantly, and then
the three laughed into eager talk about the district prayer-meeting.
From that they went on to individual effort and individual cases.
"What about the Graham girls?" Lewis asked.
"Well, the Graham girls are progressing steadily. I'm wonderfully
interested in Delia.—Have you talked with Delia, Louise? Don't you
think she is an unusual girl?"
Then Lewis laughed again.
"You think each one of those girls is unusual, don't you, Dorrie? I
think I have heard you make a similar remark of half-a-dozen of them."
"Well, they are remarkable, every one of them, to me. I didn't know
they were such girls. They are getting on nicely with their grammar,
those Graham girls are, and are so interested in it. Mr. Butler thinks
they would have been fair scholars if they had had a chance."
"You would make a good teacher, Dorrie," Lewis said, his mind evidently
more on Dorrie than on the girls of whom she was talking.
Cheeks as well as eyes glowed now.
"Do you think so, Lewis—do you honestly think so? I would like it so
much. Since I commenced studying this last time I have thought about
it a good deal. At first I thought I could not prepare myself without
going away from home, but that was before I knew what a wonderful
teacher I had at home." This last sentence with a loving glance toward
Louise, and a caressing movement of her hand over the fair hair. At
that moment the clang of the old-fashioned knocker sounded through the
house. Dorrie arose promptly.
"I suppose that is Mr. Butler," she said, stopping a moment before
the glass to arrange her hair. "He was to come in this evening to
see about the German class. Shall I speak to him about the district
prayer-meeting? or you will come down presently, will you not?"
To this they assented, looking after her as she went from the room with
quick, eager tread.
"Speaking of changes," Lewis said, "how wonderfully that girl has
changed! I don't think I ever saw anything like it before. Don't you
think she develops very rapidly?"
"It is steady growth," Louise said. "But I am not sure that there is so
much actual change in her as there is development. She evidently had
plenty of energy always, but it was slumbering; she did not know what
to do with it. I think she was in the apathy of disappointment when we
first came home."
"She is certainly a remarkable girl," Lewis said, "and I never knew
it. I believed her to be more than ordinarily commonplace. Now it
seems to me that the influence she has gained over the young people
in a short time is really wonderful. I'm glad she has an ambition to
become a teacher. I believe she will be a good one. Louise, don't you
think Mr. Butler will be helpful to her in the matter of perfecting her
education?"
"I think he has been helpful in many ways, and will be," Louise said,
with smiling eyes.
Downstairs in the kitchen Mrs. Morgan sat before the table, certain
unused implements before her—namely, pen and ink and paper. She had
resolved to spend this evening in writing to John; not that she knew
where John was, only that she imagined that the great city, such a
little distance away, probably held him. She knew no address; she had
simply decided to send the message out, addressed to John Morgan, in
the forlorn hope that the chances of life might put it in his way.
True, it was extremely doubtful, but then what if it should happen! And
the mother's heart within her thrilled at the thought, and she bent
over the paper and carefully commenced her letter; she had wonderful
things to tell John!
Farmer Morgan dozed in his chair behind the stove. He opened his eyes
when the knocker clanged, and kept awake long enough to discover that
Dorothy appeared to answer it, then dozed off again.
"It is Mr. Butler," Dorothy said, appearing again to exchange the
candle for the lamp, which now belonged to the front room. "Louise and
Lewis will be down pretty soon. Will you come in, mother?"
"Not to-night; I am very busy."
Then the writing and the sleeping went on, Dorothy returning to the
brightness of the front room. Writing was slow and laborious work
to Mrs. Morgan; besides, this was an unusual letter, upon a subject
entirely new to her; she wanted to choose her words with special care.
Farmer Morgan, enjoying his many naps in the cozy corner, was unmindful
of the flight of time. Lewis and Louise in their room, enjoying the
delights of a quiet hour together, roused presently to the fact that
they were expected downstairs.
"That couldn't have been Mr. Butler," Lewis said, glancing up at the
clock. "Dorrie would have been after us before this time if it had."
"Perhaps they are busy over their German," Louise made answer. "But we
ought to go down, Lewis; father must be tired of waiting. Mr. Butler is
probably gone before this; I did not know it was so late."
But in the kitchen the writing and the dozing were still going on.
Mother Morgan, flushed with her unusual exercise, looked up as the
husband and wife entered.
"Where is Dorrie?" Lewis asked, speaking low, so as not to disturb his
father.
"She is in the front room with Mr. Butler," the mother said. "Mr.
Butler came in a few minutes ago; Dorothy said you were coming down to
see him."
"A few minutes ago!"
Lewis and Louise exchanged glances of puzzled surprise. It was an hour
and a half by the clock since they had been expected in the parlour,
and it was an hour past the usual bed-time. But the slow-moving pen
moved on, and so Lewis turned the knob of the parlour door. The two
occupants of the room were standing near the large, old-fashioned
fireplace, engaged in earnest conversation, the glow of lights and
shadows in the room revealing, on Dorothy's part, a flushed face and
shining eyes, and on the minister's an attitude that arrested Lewis's
steps, and caused an exclamation to escape his lips even before he was
aware; for he held in his two hands Dorothy's own, and the light in his
eyes and the flush on Dorothy's cheeks were not caused by the play of
the fire-light.
"Come in," he said, turning suddenly at the sound of the opening door,
but in no other way altering his position: "Dorothy and I were just
speaking of you, wishing for you; we want to ask your advice. I want
Mr. and Mrs. Morgan to give me a present. I incline to the opinion that
I had better ask for it to-night, but Dorothy counsels waiting until
to-morrow; what say you?"
"Dorothy!" said her brother, and he could not himself tell whether his
tone meant surprise, or doubt, or what. "I don't understand!"
And the red glow that instantly overspread Dorothy's face told that her
old feelings of embarrassment were taking rapid possession of her; she
could not explain.
"It is a simple matter." The minister's voice was unembarrassed and
dignified. "I have asked Dorothy to be my wife, and she has said 'Yes.'
There remains now the asking for her of the father and mother. I had
hoped that you would not be displeased at the news."
Then did Lewis Morgan recover the use of his wits. Amazed he was,
but plain English, as briefly and plainly put as that, was not to be
misunderstood. He waited to close the door after Louise, then went
forward in hearty fashion holding out a hand to each.
"I was very much astonished," he said; "I am sure I may be excused for
that. Who had imagined such a thing! But to say that it is not a glad
astonishment would not be true."
As for Louise—women, at least some women, know what to do even when
they are very much astonished, and Louise was not that—she went forward
and put both arms around Dorrie, and gave her tender, sisterly kisses,
on the flushed cheeks and glowing lips.
"I thought," said Lewis suddenly, a few minutes thereafter, the first
feelings of bewilderment having subsided, "I thought, Dorrie, that you
had an ambition to be a teacher."
"She has," said Mr. Butler, answering for her promptly and laughingly.
"I have engaged her; but the school is a private one, number of pupils
limited to one."
CHAPTER XXVII.
HEART-THROBS AND COMMONPLACES.
IT is not my purpose to detail to you what was said in the Morgan
family when the astounding revelations connected with that evening
in the parlour were made known to them. That the revelations were
astounding you can hardly doubt,—at least to certain members of the
family. The father and mother would hardly have been more amazed had
an angel from heaven descended and claimed their daughter Dorothy for
a friend. Not that they regarded the young minister in an angelic
light; but they had, although they did not admit it even to themselves,
much stanch loyalty of heart to the profession. A minister was a
person to respect, not so much on account of himself as because of
his profession. Farmer Morgan felt this. Sneer as he might, in a sort
of good-natured, tolerant way, at the inconsistencies of Christians,
ministers included, he never went beyond certain general phrases, and
he disliked to hear others go even so far as that. Besides, Mr. Butler
had grown into the genuine affections of this family. They did not know
it. Farmer Morgan would have been amazed had anybody told him that he
liked Mr. Butler very much; he would have been likely to think the
person mistaken; yet it was true.
As for the mother, along with her respect for the minister, and a
certain sense of satisfied pride in the fact that he had actually
sought her daughter for a wife, came a feeling of utter astonishment
that anybody wanted Dorothy. Why, Dorothy was nothing but a child. The
idea of her being married! She looked at her in a kind of maze; for
several days she studied over it and tried to understand it. It had
never seemed to occur to her to look upon this daughter as one growing
into a woman. She had seemed to stay somewhere in the region of twelve,
or at best fourteen; a girl to be directed and managed; to be told
peremptorily what to wear, and where to go, and where not to go; in
short, a child, to obey unquestioningly—an older child than Nellie, of
course, but after all a child.
Now, in the space of one night—so it seemed to the mother—she had
sprung into young ladyhood, nay, sprung over it entirely, and stood
on the very verge of womanhood! Engaged to be married! What an
unaccountable state of things! Dorothy actually planning to go away
from home—to be gone over night, many nights, every night Dorothy to
have a home of her own, to be a housekeeper, a planner, a manager! To
be a minister's wife! The story grew in strangeness. The mother turned
on her pillow, overwhelmed with it. She arose in the morning with a
strange sense of bewilderment: she looked doubtfully at Dorothy in her
brown calico, the same brown calico that she had worn every morning
that week, looking much the same in every respect, and yet by a certain
light in her eye, and a certain spring in her step, and a certain
throbbing of her mother's heart, known to be not the same for ever.
Look at the matter from whatever standpoint you may—let the
circumstances be as favourable as they will, let the congratulations
be as sincere and as hearty as possible—there is always a sad side to
this story of life. It speaks of great and ever-increasing change; it
always has its heavy corner in the mother's heart. Still, the new order
of things worked well for Dorothy. If the mother was sad, she was also
glad. As I said, there was a sense of satisfied pride about it; also,
there was that feeling of added dignity in being the mother of Dorothy,
albeit at first the sense of respect for her that came with it was
nearly overpowering. Almost it seemed to her that it was hardly the
thing to send the prospective wife of her minister down to the cellar
after the bread and the butter, and to skim the cream! Gradually this
absurd part of the feeling wore away; but the fact that Dorothy was a
young woman, and not a child, was to be consulted and conferred with,
and in a measure deferred to, remained, and was helpful not only to
Dorothy but to the mother. The year that followed would be one that
mother and daughter would like in future years to look back upon and
remember.
Lewis was unaffectedly glad and thankful. Mr. Butler had grown rapidly
in his regard—all the more rapidly since he had awakened to the fact
that he was not merely a critic, but a fellow-worker, bound by solemn
vows to work with and sustain his pastor. That his sister Dorothy
should be the chosen one filled him with astonishment, but since she
was chosen he was glad; and every day he grew more fully of the opinion
that Mr. Butler was a sensible man, and had made a wise choice. He had
underrated his sister nearly all her life; he was almost in danger of
overrating her now; but that is such a pleasant and easily forgiven
failing, and withal such a rare one between brothers and sisters, that
I find myself liking Lewis the better for possessing it.
As for Louise, she was a woman, a young one, with wide-open eyes and
sympathetic heart: she was not surprised at all. Matters had progressed
more rapidly than she had expected. She was even a trifle sorry that
Dorothy had not gotten just a little further on with her German before
her teacher turned into her lover, because she much feared that there
would be little German taught or studied now; but then she reflected
that possibly the lessons he had to teach were more important than
German. At least the matter was in no sense of her planning, and the
studies in which she was teacher, and in which Dorothy had made such
rapid progress during the year, should still continue; and so, all
things considered, Louise was glad.
I find myself lingering longer over this explanation than is needed.
I designed to tell you of something else—of a winter evening near to
Christmas time when, the farm work for the day being all done, the
early evening had closed in upon the Morgan family, and found them in
the bright, clean kitchen, at their substantial supper-table—a cheery
group. Somehow this family was learning to have social suppers and
cheery times together. The account Lewis was giving of a matter of
interest that had occurred in the village was interrupted by a decisive
rap at the outside door.
"Another tramp?" said Lewis inquiringly, as Nellie slipped from her
corner and went to answer the knock. "This is the third one to-day,
isn't it? Those fellows are growing more plentiful."
"Strange that they straggle away out here," the mother said. "I should
think they would stay in large towns."
And then Nellie gave a startled little exclamation, possibly of
terror, or perhaps only of surprise, but it caused each member of the
household to turn suddenly in the direction of the door; and then they
exclaimed—not in terror, certainly, for there was nothing in the young
man to awaken terror, but they were too much excited to analyze the
tone of the exclamations. The mother was on her feet and at the door,
and while the others stared and waited, and knew not what they said nor
how they felt, the mother had both arms around the intruder, and her
lips for the first time for years and years to his cheek, and her heart
cried out,—
"Oh, my boy! My boy!"
Now, I am sure you do not expect me to tell you what the Morgan family
said to each other and to John for the next ten minutes. They do not
know themselves; they could not recall afterward how they acted, nor
what were the first words spoken, nor who, after the mother, spoke
first. And if I should tell the tale, the probabilities are that it
would sound strange and unnatural, the words, trivial in the extreme,
unsuited to the occasion. It is even a chance if the speakers thereof
would not declare, "I don't believe I said any such thing; it doesn't
sound like me." Such scenes are better left untold. The heart-throbs,
and the quivers of lip and chin, and the glances exchanged from wet
eyes, cannot be described, and have much more to do with the matter
than mere words.
Thus much Dorothy remembered; that after the first surprise was
subsiding, before even it had time to subside, she made haste to the
pantry, and coming thence with knife and plate, motioned Louise, who
had taken the hint, further to the left, and arranged for John his old
seat near his father, and set his chair and said, "Come, John;" and
then all settled into their places again. And Farmer Morgan remembers
it now with a curious, half-ashamed smile how he filled John's plate
full to overflowing with the cold beans that he remembered he used to
like, and then, unmindful of what he did, reached forward and added
another spoonful after the plate had been passed. Well, what mattered
it, whether expressed in beans or some other way, so that the heart
made known the fact that it wanted to give even to overflowing to the
son who was lost and is alive again. The familiar sentence hovered
through Louise's mind, "Was he alive?" She looked at him stealthily,
tremblingly, while Lewis talked. His face looked older, much older;
worn and grave, not hard; the eyes were clear and steady, and his dress
was that of a cleanly, respectable working-man. But how much hope was
there that he would bring gladness with him to the old home—a gladness
that would stay?
"Well," John said, pushing his chair forward so that his face was
more in shadow, and the tone of the simple little word sent that
thrill of expectancy through the family group which comes in unison
with a feeling that something important is coming. This was after the
tea-things had been cleared away and the room had assumed order and
quiet. Not that there had been much bustle about the work that evening.
Mrs. Morgan had done what was for her a surprising thing: she pushed
her chair back from the table and sat still during all the moving to
and fro from pantry to cellar, unmindful, for the first time in her
life, as to whether the milk went down in the right pitcher or the
bread went down at all. Louise and Dorothy had moved softly, had set
back chairs noiselessly, and dried cups and plates without a sound, so
as to lose no syllable of the conversation. But it was not until they
were seated that John spoke that little preparatory word.
"I have a long story to tell—a very long one. I don't know where to
begin or how to begin; only this, I have made up my mind to strike into
the middle of it first, and to say to you, father, and to you, mother,
that I want you to forgive me for everything that is past in my life
that has hurt you; and I know that is a great deal. I want to tell you
that I have begun life again—begun at the beginning. In short, I feel
that I can honestly say, 'This your son was dead, and is alive again;
was lost, and is found.'" And he turned to his mother with a smile that
evidently she understood.
"Did you really get my letter?" she asked him, her voice so full of
eagerness and so unlike herself that Louise could not avoid a wondering
look.
"Yes," John said, "I did;" and he launched at once into the details of
the series of apparent accidents which had brought him his mother's
letter. "I was signing an acknowledgment of a package received for Mr.
Stuart, and I had to sign my own name, so that in case of loss, you
know, it could be traced to me. As I wrote my name, the carrier, who
stood by, said, 'There has been a letter lying in the office up here
at Station D for a person of that name. I remember it because it has
neither street nor number—just the name and the city. We thought it was
intended for John Y. Morgan, the mason, but he brought it back to the
station; said it was none of his; said it commenced, "My dear son," and
the two people who used to commence letters that way for him had been
in heaven for a dozen years.'"
"I don't know what made me go after that letter," said John, after a
moment's silence, his voice broken with feeling. "I am sure I had no
reason and no right to expect that it was for me; but it seemed to
me that I must have it, and I went for it. And, mother, that letter
brought me home. There were certain things that I meant to wait to do
before I came—money that I meant to earn. I had an idea of waiting
until I could feel that my coming would not disgrace you. But after I
read that letter I knew I ought to come right away, and after I had so
decided, I could hardly wait for morning. Now, mother, father, will you
take me back? Will you let me try to be to you the son I ought to have
been, and never was? I don't know that I should dare to say that to
you, only that I have been to my heavenly Father and found out how he
can forgive, and I have found that he says, 'Like as a father pitieth
his children,' and 'As one whom his mother comforteth.' And that has
given me a notion of what father and mother love are. And then, mother,
that letter of yours—I went down on my knees before God with it and
blessed him for it."
They were crying now, every one of them save Farmer Morgan, and what
he felt no one knew. He drew out his red silk handkerchief and blew
his nose twice, then he leaned forward and snuffed the candle. When he
presently found voice it was a husky one; but all he said was,—
"We won't talk about them days that are gone; I guess the most of us
are willing to bid good-bye to them and begin again. There's a chance
for improvement in us all; like as not we better try for it."
The Morgan family actually sat up that night until nearly eleven
o'clock. It was an unprecedented thing for them to do. I cannot tell
you what they said; I even doubt much whether I would if I could. Do
not you hate to see some things attempted on paper? A little of the
commonplace mixed in with it? In fact, I doubt whether there could be a
true home scene without touches of what we call commonplace coming in
between. For instance, in the course of the evening Louise bethought
herself of the little dismantled hall chamber, and slipped away and
brought comforts, and quilts, and cover, and pure linen, and towels,
and wrought with rapid hand until the room took on a sense of home and
occupancy again. She even went for the tidies and the vases to make it
all seem as he had left it. Then she climbed to the upper shelf and
got down that Bible, and I am unable to tell you what a rush of glad
emotions swelled in her heart as she thought of the tender way in which
John had quoted those two Bible verses, and remembered that that Bible
would be to him now something besides a cumberer.
Down in the kitchen the mother, her heart filled with the most precious
thoughts that ever throbbed in a mother's heart, remembered suddenly
that John had been very fond of a certain kind of cake, and while he
and Lewis talked, and the father, with his elbows leaning on the arms
of his chair and head bent forward, listened as though ten o'clock had
not been two hours after his bed-time for more than half a century, the
mother gave undertone directions to Dorothy to sift flour, and "bring a
yeast-cake, and a little warm water, and the big yellow bowl, and the
batter-spoon, and a little salt," and with skilful fingers, and such a
light in her eyes as the yellow bowl had never seen before, prepared
to make the breakfast table abound with good cheer. These commonplace
reachings-out after to-morrows that make good cheer for the home are
certainly productive of results that dignify them.
I find myself liking to linger over that evening in the Morgan
household. It was such a wonderful hour to them—something which settled
down into their lives as a history—a time from which they dated. Years
afterward they said, "The moonlight to-night reminds me of that evening
when John came home, you know," and then silence—such sentences never
used save to that innermost circle and those who in after years grew
into the circle and had a right to the family histories. Yet there is
little to tell about it. How very often that is the case where there is
much, so very much, to feel. One train of thought, intimately connected
with it, ought to be told.
There was that in the evening's history which silenced Mr. Morgan—which
bewildered him. Hitherto he had professed to be, and, in fact, I
think believed himself to be, a sceptic as regarded the fact of a
supernatural change in human hearts. Conversion, he believed, meant
simply firm resolves, decision of character, will-power. Louise was,
by natural temperament and by education, different from most others;
so, in his way, was Lewis. Thus Mr. Morgan had reasoned. Dorothy needed
waking up, and Louise and Lewis and Mr. Butler between them had waked
her up. The change, sudden and great in his own wife, had bewildered
him not a little. She certainly had always possessed will enough. But
he told himself, "After all, what had she done but determine to be
interested in the Bible and in the church and all that? All it needed
was determination." Now, here came his strong-willed son—so strong,
indeed, that his will had been his one great source of trouble even
from babyhood. As a wee boy he had hated to give up one inch. He had
been unable to say, "I am sorry," or, "I won't do so again," or,
"Forgive me," or any of the penitent phrases which fall so readily from
baby lips. A scowl and dogged perseverance in his own way had been
characteristics of John's babyhood. Now, what power had brought him
home to say not only, "I was wrong," but "Forgive me; I want to begin
again"? John saying, "Father, mother, forgive me"—saying it without
being ordered or compelled by the force of circumstances! His father
was staggered. Here at last was something—some strange change that
could not be explained by any force of will whatever, save by admitting
that something—somebody—had changed the current of the will-power.
"I believe," said Father Morgan to himself, as late that night he sat
down on the edge of his bed and slowly and thoughtfully removed his
boots, while Mother Morgan went to see if John did not need another
coverlet,—"I believe in my soul that somehow—I don't know how, but
somehow—God has got hold of John."
CHAPTER XXVIII.
"I DON'T KNOW."
JUNE brought the roses and Estelle—herself the fairest rose among them
all. There had been much planning in the Morgan household preparatory
to her coming. Many things had changed in the farmhouse since Louise
first came home to it—subtle changes many of them were, too slowly
brought about to be recognized as changes; new ways, slipped into
gradually, insensibly; little refinements, touches here and there;
trifles every one of them, and perhaps the only method of proving to
the family what a difference they made in the home would have been
to have dropped suddenly back into the old ways for a week. That
experiment no one seemed inclined to try. Louise took great pleasure in
making the large old-fashioned room, with its quaint furniture, into a
very bower of beauty for the sweet rose that was to bloom there, and
smiled joyfully when she thought of what blissful surprises the wealth
of June flowers and the smell of June clover would be to the city
maiden. Many a plan she had for Estelle, many a hope having to do with
this two months' sojourn in the farmhouse—hopes, however, that were not
indulged without anxious little sighs being woven in among them.
She had hoped so long and waited so eagerly and in vain. She told John
about it one evening, as they sat in the vine-covered porch together,
waiting for Lewis and Dorothy to have done with the problem in algebra
that was vexing the latter.
"John, I have such a strong hope that you will be able to help Estelle
this summer; it has a great deal to do with my joy in her coming."
John bestowed anxious eyes on her for a moment, and was silent.
Presently he said,—
"Once I should have thought that you were saying that for effect, but
I have learned to know that you never say things simply for effect.
Having said it, you must mean it; so it makes me anxious. I cannot see
how it would be possible for me to influence your sister in any way, to
say nothing of the folly of hoping to help her; I don't understand what
you can mean."
"She isn't a Christian, you know, John."
"I know, and I understand that it is about such help that you speak.
But what puzzles me is, how you could possibly expect that anything
which I might do or say could influence her when she has had you all
her life."
"That is easily explained," Louise said, smiling. "In the first place,
you are in the mood just now to overrate my influence over people. I
have some with Estelle, but that it is not great is plainly shown in
the fact that, in this most important of all matters, she has chosen
her way and I have chosen mine, and we have walked separately for a
good many years. Don't you know, John, that sometimes the people whom
we meet but once, with whom we really have very little to do, are given
a word to say or an act to perform that shall influence all our future
lives?"
"Yes," John said, with sudden energy and emphasis; he certainly knew
that as well as any person could. And his thoughts went immediately
back to the fair young girl who had held out her hand, and whose
winning voice had said, "Won't you have a card?"
"Well," Louise said, "I cannot help hoping that the Holy Spirit will
give you a word or look that will influence Estelle. It doesn't seem to
me that I can have her wait any longer."
There were tears in her eyes. Then John felt savage toward Estelle; he
said to himself that he didn't believe he should be able to endure her;
she must be a little simpleton. To have grown-up under the influence
of such a sister, and yet to have deliberately chosen a course that
would grieve her, argued ill for her heart or her sense or something.
Altogether, though he desired to help, Louise was not awakening very
hopeful sentiments toward helpfulness. There was a good understanding
established between this brother and sister. For that matter, the
reconstructed household understood each other well during these
days—had begun to realize something of what the family relation meant.
John was certainly "a new creature in Christ Jesus." It is not always
that the new life has so plain a chance of showing itself as his
former life had given. No Christian doubted the presence of the unseen
Guest who had come to abide with him. As for the father, while keeping
absolute silence in regard to the matter, he kept also keen eyes, and
told himself, a dozen times a day, that "whatever had come over John,
he was another person." By slow degrees the Morgan family had settled
into definite plans for the future—plans that were not matured without
some soreness of heart, and even, on Louise's part, a touch of tears.
The giving up of future prospects of usefulness in the church had been
a trial to Lewis, and the giving up had been done by inches. At last,
however, it had been made plain that, if he would keep what health and
strength he had, he must be content with an active outdoor life. This
settled beyond probability of a change, the father was found entirely
willing to loose his hold on John, and give him, what had been the
desire of his heart, a medical education. At least, he said that for
this reason he was willing. Those of the family who watched him closely
strongly suspected that there was very little that the father would not
have been willing to give John during these days.
The father, in himself, was somewhat changed. There were other things
that he was willing to do. For instance, he invited Lewis, one bright
winter day when they happened to come home together, to take Louise out
and pick out the spot where he would like to build a house, and they
would see what kind of a one could be built one of these days. Now,
strange to say, the desire to have a home of their own was less intense
than it had been. They talked it up; they said it would be "nice," in
fact, delightful; and then, in the same breath, Lewis wondered what
mother would do when Dorothy went away; and Louise wondered whether
Dorothy wouldn't need her help right there at home for the next year
or two; and finally, though they made no objection to picking out the
site, and even planned the house—built it, indeed, on paper a good many
times—still they unanimously agreed that nothing definite could be
done about it until spring. The truth was, the necessity for a home by
themselves was not so apparent to this young couple as it had been. Now
that spring, yes, even summer, was fairly upon them, the question of
house came up again, brought forward by Farmer Morgan himself.
"Not that I am in a hurry," he said, with a little embarrassed laugh;
"in fact, I hope it will be about five years in getting built, and you
five more or so getting moved. I've no notion of what this house would
be without you; but what I'm after is, I've made up my mind it is your
right to have your own house, and I mean you shall have it."
So the house was a settled fact; and Lewis and his wife were undeniably
pleased, yet nobody hurried. The necessity for haste in the matter was
past.
So, as I say, they had journeyed into June, when Estelle was to make
her first visit at the farmhouse. She was to have come the summer
before, but home matters had detained her; and Louise, as she arranged
roses in the white vases of her room, rejoiced that it had been so,
and smiled over the different dress the home and family wore from that
which they would have worn to Estelle only a year before. These were
the closing touches to the adornments; for Lewis had already gone
to the train to meet his sister, accompanied by Dorothy and little
Nellie. Louise, under plea of escaping from the afternoon sun, declined
the ride; in reality, feeling not sure of herself, lest when she got
that bright young sister in her arms again she might not disgrace the
welcome by crying outright. Who would have supposed that the months of
separation would have stretched themselves out so! Louise was to have
gone home certainly in a year from the date of her departure, and yet
she didn't. It often happens in this world that, with all our planning,
our lives move in exactly different lines from what we have prepared.
So Louise had really never looked upon the face of her beautiful young
sister since that morning when she became a bride. It is surely not
much wonder that her heart beat hard at the sound of carriage-wheels,
and it seemed to her, for a moment, that she could not get down the
stairs.
It was not until just as daylight was fading that John came to be
introduced to the new-comer. He had planned differently; but unexpected
business had detained him at the village until a late hour, then he had
taken his supper alone, and came to the piazza to meet Estelle, just as
they were about adjourning to the house.
"Come," Louise said; "these insects must be shut out and you must be
shut in. Oh, here comes John."
At that moment Dorothy brought the large lamp, and the glow of it fell
full on Estelle's face. John had decidedly dreaded this ordeal. His
life had been spent so much in shadow that there were certain creations
before whom he was unreasonably timid—among these were young ladies;
and to meet one, too, whom he was expected to help was formidable.
Still, John's strong point was decision of character. What had to
be done was to be done promptly, and with as little appearance of
shrinking as possible. So he advanced boldly and raised his eyes to
Estelle's fair, bright face. But instead of the greeting, in every
way cordial, which he had planned, he gave Estelle the benefit of
a prolonged astonished stare; and at last the words, uttered in an
explosive tone, as by one from whom they were forced by astonishment,
were,—
"You are the very one!"
"Of course," said Estelle, mischief shining in every line of her
beautiful face; and, nothing daunted by this strange greeting, she held
out her hand cordially, while Louise looked on amazed. "Did you think I
was somebody else? Shake hands, won't you?"
"Is it possible that you remember me?" John said at last slowly, as one
awakening from a dream, and then looking from her to Louise, then back
again to her, studying the two faces like one who had been puzzled, but
who had just found the answer to his riddle.
"Not in the least," Estelle said promptly. "I don't think I ever saw
you before in my life; but since you seem to be acquainted with me, I
thought I would be friendly."
"You have seen me before," John said, recovering his natural manner,
and giving the small white hand a cordial grasp; "and it is your
resemblance to Louise which gave me such a vivid impression of your
face and so strange a feeling of having seen you before somewhere."
Then Estelle laughed. "What an idea!" she said gaily. "I don't look
the least in the world like Louise, and never did; and, what is more
trying, I am not in the least like her, as you will find to your
sorrow. Where did you see the being whom you think I am? I'd like to
have a glimpse of her."
Nothing but bright, thoughtless mischief in voice or manner; but John
was still earnest and eager.
"Louise," he said, turning to her for sympathy, "isn't it strange that
it should happen so? She is the very young lady who gave me that card
on that miserable and memorable night, and invited me to the meeting."
A vivid blush overspread Estelle's face. She had given some curious
thoughts to the forlorn specimen of humanity whom she had invited to
the meeting; it was the only attempt she had ever made at evangelistic
effort, and it stood out in her memory. She had commented upon his
appearance to her mother; she had given a laughing description of him
to her young friends. Now it seemed a most improbable thing that this
well-dressed, nice looking young man and her forlorn tramp were one and
the same!
"Are you an adept at masquerades?" she asked at last. "You certainly
played the character of a woe-begone street wanderer to perfection; or
else you are doing the well-dressed young man very well. Which is the
assumed character?"
Viewing it from John's standpoint, there was no comical side to this
episode in his life. He answered her with intense gravity,—
"The street wanderer was a real, and certainly a sufficiently dreary,
wanderer; he thought himself a hopeless case; but he will never cease
to thank God for sending you to put out a rescuing hand that night."
The flush that had been fading from Estelle's face became vivid again;
how was she going to jest with one who took matters so solemnly? She
did not know what to say to him, and turned away embarrassed. Now
indeed was John roused. Intensity was a part of his nature; what he did
at all, he did with all his might. Louise, looking on, anxious as to
what this revelation would effect, was presently satisfied that it had
roused his interest in her as nothing else could have done. The fact
that the one who had been the direct means of bringing him into the
light of Christ was herself walking in darkness filled him with pain.
From that hour he fixed upon her as the subject for his constant
prayer; he brought her before his Master only as one can who has
learned the sweetness of being a servant of Christ, and who longs to
call in others. Now and then a word with her, as opportunity offered,
but the most of his strength spent on his knees.
It chanced that on the way to the district prayer-meeting, which, by
the way, had been started, and which had flourished. John was Estelle's
companion. It was really the first time he had seen her alone. He had
not to waste time in trying to make up his mind to speak to her on the
subject; he was eager to speak.
"I was so surprised," he said. "I had been so accustomed to pray for
the one who gave me that card as one would for a saint almost. I had
not thought of the possibility of your not being a Christian."
"And now all those prayers have been lost—so much wasted strength!
What a pity!" Estelle did not really mean to be wicked, although her
tone was mischief itself. She had accustomed herself to parrying
personalities on this subject in some such jesting way; the usual
effect was to shock into silence the person addressing her, and so give
her freedom for the time being. She did not even mean irreverence; she
meant simply fun, and to be let alone. John, however, was not used to
sparkling nonsense in conversation. Since he began to converse at all,
he had talked nearly always with earnest people, and been tremendously
in earnest himself. So he answered her as if the remark had been made
in all gravity.
"No, I don't think that; for of course God know just where you were,
and he accepted the spirit of the prayer. But isn't it strange that
with Louise for a sister you have lived so many years without Christ?"
Louise was a person about whom Estelle did not jest; she could be
flippant to her, but not about her, so to this sentence she had no
answer at first but silence; then she rallied.
"Come now, isn't it strange that with Lewis for a brother, and Mrs.
Morgan for a mother, you lived so many years without paying any
attention to these things? Didn't you ever hear that people who live in
glass houses shouldn't throw stones?"
"Ah, but," said John eagerly, "I didn't believe in it; I didn't think
there was any such thing as conversion, nor any reality in religion.
I was a fool, to be sure, but I was an honest one; I really didn't
believe in these things. But you had a different bringing up. My mother
is a young Christian, you know. You had no such doubts to trammel you,
had you?"
"No," said Estelle slowly, reluctantly obliged to be truthful before
this truthful young man; thinking of her mother, of her father, of her
sister Louise, she must say, "No."
"Then why haven't you been a Christian these many years?"
"I don't know."
"Then why don't you be one now?"
"I don't know."
John was betrayed into an exclamation not unlike the half sneer with
which he used to express his entire disapproval of an act, and his
tones were very significant as he said, "Seems to me if I were you I'd
find out."
Estelle was silent; this to her was an entirely new way of approaching
the subject. This grave young man gave her some thinking to do. She had
had her bit of scepticism to struggle with, albeit she did not know
it by that name. In her heart she had believed that some persons were
by nature religious in their youth; mamma was, and Louise was like
her. Mamma said that Louise, when just a baby, would lie quiet by the
hour to be read to from the Bible; while she, Estelle, never lay quiet
at any time for anything but sleep. She was not by nature religious,
she argued; some time, when she was old and gray-haired, it would
become natural to her to think about these things. Some people were
called in their youth, and some in later life; it must be that she was
designed for a middle-aged Christian. Into the face of this theory came
John—young, keen, intense, fierce by nature, as irreligious by nature
as a man could be, as far-away from even outward respect for the cause
as a scoffer could be. Louise, whose intuition had shown her somewhat
of this reasoning, had taken pains to explain in detail John's past
life and John's intense nature. Here was a problem that Estelle must
work out for herself; that she had begun to work at it was evidenced by
her grave, sincere answer, "I don't know."
CHAPTER XXIX.
THE OLD AND THE NEW.
IT is not because there is not much concerning the Morgan family which
would be pleasant to me to tell that I pass in silence a stretch of
years. It is simply that the lengthening chapters remind me it is high
time to have done with them; and yet there are certain things that
I must tell. Therefore it is that I drop you into the midst of June
roses again, after a lapse of five busy, earnest years. Back at the old
farmhouse, which really was not the old farmhouse at all; and yet it
was—that is, it was in a new dress. A corner had been put on here, a
bay-window there, a piazza at the south side, and a wide old-fashioned
porch at the east, until really the house would not have recognized
itself. Within, not a single room, from the yellow painted kitchen
onward, remained the same. Was this the new house, planned years
before? Well, not exactly. The new house was built, and built with the
bricks and mortar, just as it had been planned on paper, and a gem of a
house it proved to be; but its location was next to the church, in the
village, and Dorothy and the minister were the occupants.
"It isn't exactly a parsonage," Father Morgan said, "and yet it is; at
least the minister lives in it, and is welcome to, of course, for it
belongs to his wife; but if another minister should come in his place,
why then I suppose it couldn't be called a parsonage."
At present there is no prospect that another minister will come in
Mr. Butler's place. The people like both him and his wife. That is
a strange statement, I am aware—almost an unnatural story; and yet
every one knows that there are a few parishes left in which the people
continue to stand by a faithful pastor even after a lapse of years.
Dorothy had certain advantages. To be sure, Mr. Butler had done what
is supposed to be an unwise thing—married the daughter of one of his
parishioners; but it will be remembered that in her early girlhood she
had almost no acquaintances with the people of the village. She had not
mingled with them in any capacity. They knew no more of her character,
and almost as little of her life, as they would have done had she lived
a thousand miles away; and, somehow, the one whom they used, on rare
occasions, to speak of as "that Morgan girl," seemed to the people an
entirely different person from their minister's wife, as in truth she
was. So, as if to verify the promise about "all things working together
for good," the very obscurity in which Dorothy had spent her girlhood
worked well for her in her present sphere. So Dorothy reigned in the
new house, and ruled it well, and her mother had grown used to looking
upon her as a married woman and a housekeeper, ay, and a mother.
Lewis Morgan had not a little to do with the successful ministrations
of his brother-in-law. When he, after his period of mental depression
and discouragement, rallied at the time of Dorothy's conversion, and
tasted anew the joy of working for Christ, he took what perhaps I may
reverently term a new lease of spiritual life, and gave himself up
to joyful service, since which time he had been eagerly busy for the
Master, the refrain of his song still being, "How sweet the work has
been!" Imagine what such a wide-awake, prudent, faithful Christian
could be to a pastor. Imagine the alert eyes he could have to the
needs, and the wishes, and the whims of the people. Imagine the kind
suggestions he could offer to a pastor younger than himself, who not
only thoroughly respected, but loved him as a brother. Certainly Lewis
Morgan, heavy though the cross had been to give up what is called
active work for Christ, was yet as active in his way, and perhaps fully
as successful, as though he were from the pulpit preaching the gospel.
I make that distinction because Lewis Morgan, in his class, in the
prayer-meeting, in his daily life, was assuredly preaching the gospel.
The renovated farmhouse was still large enough for the two families.
Yet the new house—the other new house—was in process of building.
Louise's plan again. One of the prettiest of houses; but that too was
in the village, and it was planned with special reference to the needs
of Dr. John Morgan. Yes, he was going to settle down in the little
village. No, I forget; the word "little" really does not apply to it
very well. It had, during these years in which I remember I have said
almost nothing about it, sprung into life and growth, aided by the
junction of another railroad, and a large machine-shop; and Dr. John
had accepted a partnership with the gray-haired physician who had held
the practice in village and on hillside for miles around during the
space of forty years. Just as soon as the new house was finished and
furnished (and it was nearly done), he was going to begin housekeeping.
Every cheery, sweet-smelling room in the Morgan farmhouse had a sort
of gala look on this afternoon of which I write. They were such pretty
rooms! I wish I could describe them to you—simple, quiet-toned, in
keeping with the wide-stretching green fields and the glowing flowers,
and so pretty! Bright, clear carpets, in tasteful hues and graceful
patterns; muslin curtains, looped with ribbons to match the carpets;
easy-chairs, nearly every one of them of a pattern peculiar to itself;
wide, low couches, with luxurious pillows, inviting you to lounge
among them; books and papers and pictures in profusion; Louise's piano
and Louise's guitar in convenient positions, and Louise's tasteful
finger-touches everywhere. Who can describe a simple, pretty room?
It is easy to tell the colour of the carpet, and the position of the
furniture; but where is the language in which to describe that nameless
grace, speaking of comfort and ease and home, that hovers over some
rooms, and is utterly lacking in others?
Upstairs, in the room that was once Louise's, and which she had
vacated now for the more sunny side of the house, special care had
been exercised. It was a fair pink and white abode; the carpet was a
sprinkling of pink moss-rose buds on a mossy ground; the white curtains
were looped with pink ribbons; the cool, gray furniture, of that
peculiar tint of gray that suggests white, was adorned with delicate
touches of Louise's skill, in the shape of moss-rose buds that matched
the carpet; the toilet-stand was a mass of delicate white drapery,
through whose thinness a suspicion of pink glowed; and the very china
had been deftly painted in the same pattern; easy-chairs and large
old-fashioned rockers occupied cosy nooks, and Louise, her face aglow
with merry satisfaction, had adorned them with the veritable tidies
which she had brought from home as a bride, or with others made after
a like pattern, to look like the identical ones. She was arranging
real roses with unsparing hand in the mantel vases, on the little
toilet-table, wherever she could find a spot for a vase to stand. Then
came Nellie and stood in the door—herself a vision of beauty—in flowing
curls, and spotless white garments, made after the latest and most
approved fashion for young misses of thirteen, and with a flutter of
blue ribbons about her, from the knot fastened in some deft way among
the curls to the dainty bows perched on her slippers. She made a little
exclamation, indicative of her happy satisfaction in the appearance of
all about her, and Louise turned.
"Will this do for a bride?" she asked, her smiling eyes taking in
Nellie as a very satisfactory part of the picture.
"It is too lovely for anything," Nellie said in genuine girl parlance;
"and it looks just exactly like Estelle."
Louise laughed; she had been thinking something very like that herself.
Don't imagine that I think I have startled you now with a bit of news;
I have given you credit for penetration enough to have surmised, long
ago, that the gala day was in honour of a coming bride, and the bride
none other than Estelle herself. I did not propose to say much about
that; such things are so constantly occurring in all well-regulated
families that you would have been stupid, indeed, not to have foreseen
it.
Louise did not, however; she had been as blind as a bat about it,
though the old story was lived right before her very eyes. Glad eyes
they were, however, when they took in the facts. Louise loved her
brother John. Was he not the one whom God used at last to bring her
darling Estelle to a knowledge of his love?
"Louise," said Nellie, coming back to commonplaces as soon as the eyes
had taken in all the beauty, "mother wants you. She wants you to see if
you think the table looks overloaded, and whether you think the turkey
platters haven't too much dark meat on them, and half-a-dozen other
things that I have forgotten; won't you come right away?"
"In three minutes," said Louise; but she had hardly time to attend
in person to all these important matters when Nellie's voice shouted
through the house,—
"There they come! There's the carriage; it has just driven through the
archway. Oh, I wonder what John thought of the archway!"
When I tell that it was decorated with evergreen, on which there
glowed, in roses arranged by Nellie's own fair hands, the words,
"Welcome Home!" you will be sure that John liked it. Then the family
gathered on that south piazza to greet the bride and groom. The
aroma of coffee was stealing through the house, and the spacious
dining-table, spread its entire length in the large dining-room, did
almost look burdened with its weight of dishes for the wedding-feast.
Mother Morgan tarried to cover a cake-basket before she hurried to the
piazza. Give one moment's time to her. Her face had grown younger; it
was smooth and fair, and set in calmness. Her dress was a holiday one
of soft, neutral-tinted silk, and her white lace cap, which Louise's
fingers had fashioned, was wonderfully becoming to her pleasant face.
Dorothy had seated herself, matronly fashion, in one of the large
easy-chairs with which the piazza abounded, for the fair bundle of
muslin and lace bobbing around in her lap was too restless to admit of
a standing position, although admonished thus: "Do, little Miss Louise,
sit still, and receive your new auntie with becoming dignity."
Little Miss Louise's papa had just dropped her ladyship out of his
arms, and gone forward to open the gate for the family carriage,
which, with Lewis for driver, was just emerging from the shade of the
evergreens. At this moment came Father Morgan from the small room at
the right of the piazza, with a pompous specimen of three-year-old
boyhood perched serenely on his shoulder. He was John Morgan, junior,
and liked no place so well as his grandfather's shoulder. The carriage
wound around the lawn, and drew up before the piazza door, and they
all—father, mother, sisters, and baby—went down to meet it. And as
Estelle's bright and beautiful face, a little matured since we first
knew her, but rarely beautiful still, appeared in view, and her eager
arms were thrown around Mother Morgan's neck, that lady, as she
heartily gave back loving kisses, said, in a voice which I am not sure
you would recognize, so little have you known of her in these latter
days,—
"Welcome home, my daughter!"
I wonder if I have told you that the carriage contained others beside
the bride and groom? Louise had not forgotten it, for her own father
and mother were actually come to pay the long-promised visit. It had
been arranged that they should meet the young couple returning from
their wedding trip and travel with them homeward. Louise had been home
several times in the last five years, but father and mother were just
fulfilling a long-made promise to visit her; and here at last were they
all gathered under the Morgan roof, the two families unbroken.
They went to the spacious dining-room, and sat them down to the
bountiful wedding-feast; and among them all only two had vivid
recollections just then of the contrast between that home-coming and
the greeting that was given Louise and Lewis on that winter night. Mrs.
Dorothy Butler remembered it, it is true; but such important matters
had filled Mrs. Dorothy's mind in the intervening years, and everything
was so utterly changed to her, that she much doubted sometimes whether
she really had not dreamed all those strange earlier experiences, and
only lived through these later years. To Estelle the house was new, of
course, and really handsome, and everything was delightfully improved.
But Estelle did not know that hearts and faces had greatly improved.
She could not imagine Mother Morgan in her straight calico without a
collar; she could not see John in his shirt-sleeves, his pants tucked
within his boots, as Louise saw him in imagination at that moment.
Ah! There were sweeter contrasts than those. When the bright evening
drew to its close, Nellie wheeled the little centre-table close to
her father's chair, and set the student lamp on it. And Farmer Morgan
opened the large old Bible which always had its place of honour on that
centre-table, and read: "Bless the Lord, O my soul; and all that is
within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget
not all his benefits: who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth
all thy diseases; who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth
thee with loving kindness and tender mercies." And then Farmer Morgan
said, with reverent voice, "Let us pray," and the two families, brought
together by ties that reach into eternity, bowed together, and Father
Morgan commended them all to the care of the God whom at last he and
his house served.
They talked about old times just a little, the next morning, both
upstairs and down. Louise, lingering in Estelle's room, listening well
pleased to her lavish praise of all its adorning, said suddenly,—
"Do you remember this, Estelle?"
"Yes; indeed I do. The very tidy that Fannie Brooks made for your
wedding present; and there is that white one I made. O Louise, isn't it
funny? Do you remember my asking you what you were going to do with all
those tidies?"
"Yes, dear. I told you I would find use for them, and you see I have.
Do you remember, also, that you assured me that morning how impossible
it would be for you ever to leave papa and mamma and go away with a
stranger as I was doing?"
"Well," said Estelle, with an amused, half-ashamed little laugh, "I
didn't go away with a stranger; I came with John. You see I didn't know
him then."
And again Louise wondered what she would have said of him if she had.
Downstairs, an hour or so afterward, she lingered in the sitting-room
to say a few loving words to her own dear mother, and while there
Mother Morgan passed the piazza windows, young John by the hand, he
loudly discoursing to her as to the beauties of a certain insect which
she was being dragged by his eager hand to see.
"Mother spoils him," Louise said, with a complacent laugh, as the
boy's shrill voice floated back to them. "She will go anywhere and do
anything that he coaxes her to."
"The idea of mother SPOILING anybody!" said Dr. John, with incredulous
voice and laughing eyes.
"Well, she certainly does. I suppose all grandmothers do."
Then she went about the pretty task of straightening the books and
papers, and restoring the sitting-room to its yesterday's freshness.
"I am glad mothers don't spoil their children," her mother said,
satisfaction in her voice, as she watched Louise moving among the
disordered elements, bringing order out of confusion.
"I didn't spoil her, did I, Lewis? What a lovely home you have had
here all these years! I am glad you have demonstrated the folly
of the saying that no house is large enough for two families. How
could anything be better than the arrangement which you have here?
Mrs. Morgan was telling me this morning that when you talked for
a time of going to housekeeping it almost made her sick. I'm very
glad you didn't. Little John gives Louise care enough without the
responsibilities of housekeeping; though your mother says, Lewis, that
she takes a great deal of care from her. I think she has rather an
exaggerated opinion of you, Louise; perhaps she is trying to spoil you."
"She is a remarkable little woman, you will have to admit," Lewis said,
in a half-laughing tone, but regarding his wife with eyes in which
she saw earnestness and tender feeling. "I am glad you brought her up
so well, mother; there are not many who would have succeeded with the
problem of two families in one house as she has done."
"Yes," said the mother emphatically; "and then there is another
thing to be taken into consideration. She had unusual surroundings.
Anybody can see that your mother is an unusual woman. Probably
Louise's experience has been exceptional. I really believe at heart
that there are not many houses large enough for two families. I
trembled for Louise. I used to watch every letter critically for
signs of failure. You see I did not know your father and mother. I
did not feel so anxious about the father; they always get along well
with daughters-in-law if the mothers do. But I worried a good deal,
unnecessarily I can see now. Still it is, after all, an exceptional
case. Don't you think so?"
Lewis turned slowly round from the mantel against which he had been
leaning and regarded his wife with a curious look—eyes that were
brimming with a mischievous light, and yet had behind the light a
suggestion even of tears. His voice, when he spoke, had also that
curious hint of pent-up feeling.
"Yes, it is an exceptional case. Very few daughters-in-law have such
experiences. I do consider my mother an unusual woman, and my wife an
unusual wife. And I tell you in all honesty, mother, that we of the
Morgan family thank God every day of our lives for the vine from your
branch that was grafted into ours."
THE END.
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