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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/18057-8.txt b/18057-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6093ec6 --- /dev/null +++ b/18057-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10089 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Flower of the Dusk, by Myrtle Reed, +Illustrated by Clinton Balmer + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Flower of the Dusk + + +Author: Myrtle Reed + + + +Release Date: March 27, 2006 [eBook #18057] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FLOWER OF THE DUSK*** + + +E-text prepared by Suzanne Lybarger, Brian Janes, Emmy, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustration. + See 18057-h.htm or 18057-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/0/5/18057/18057-h/18057-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/0/5/18057/18057-h.zip) + + + + + +FLOWER OF THE DUSK + +by + +MYRTLE REED + + + + + + + +G. P. Putnam's Sons +New York and London +The Knickerbocker Press +1908 +Copyright, 1908 +by +Myrtle Reed McCullough +The Knickerbocker Press, New York + + + + +By MYRTLE REED. + + FLOWER OF THE DUSK. + LOVE AFFAIRS OF LITERARY MEN. + A SPINNER IN THE SUN. + LOVE LETTERS OF A MUSICIAN. + LATER LOVE LETTERS OF A MUSICIAN. + THE SPINSTER BOOK. + LAVENDER AND OLD LACE. + THE MASTER'S VIOLIN. + AT THE SIGN OF THE JACK-O'-LANTERN. + THE SHADOW OF VICTORY. + THE BOOK OF CLEVER BEASTS. + PICKABACK SONGS. + + + + +Contents + + +CHAPTER PAGE + + I--A MAKER OF SONGS 1 + + II--MISS MATTIE 15 + + III--THE TOWER OF COLOGNE 28 + + IV--THE SEVENTH OF JUNE 42 + + V--ELOISE 55 + + VI--A LETTER 68 + + VII--AN AFTERNOON CALL 83 + + VIII--A FAIRY GODMOTHER 98 + + IX--TAKING THE CHANCE 111 + + X--IN THE GARDEN 126 + + XI--BARBARA'S "TO-MORROW" 142 + + XII--MIRIAM 155 + + XIII--"WOMAN SUFFRAGE" 169 + + XIV--BARBARA'S BIRTHDAY 181 + + XV--THE SONG OF THE PINES 194 + + XVI--BETRAYAL 209 + + XVII--"NEVER AGAIN" 225 + +XVIII--THE PASSING OF FIDO 238 + + XIX--THE DREAMS COME TRUE 253 + + XX--PARDON 273 + + XXI--THE PERILS OF THE CITY 286 + + XXII--AUTUMN LEAVES 299 + +XXIII--LETTERS TO CONSTANCE 313 + + XXIV--THE BELLS IN THE TOWER 327 + + + + +Flower of the Dusk + + + [Illustration: "Secretly, too, both were ashamed, having come unawares + upon knowledge that was not meant for them."--_Page 82._ + _From a painting by Clinton Balmer_] + + + + +I + +A Maker of Songs + + +[Sidenote: Sunset] + +The pines, darkly purple, towered against the sunset. Behind the hills, +the splendid tapestry glowed and flamed, sending far messages of light +to the grey East, where lay the sea, crooning itself to sleep. Bare +boughs dripped rain upon the sodden earth, where the dead leaves had so +long been hidden by the snow. The thousand sounds and scents of Spring +at last had waked the world. + +The man who stood near the edge of the cliff, quite alone, and carefully +feeling the ground before him with his cane, had chosen to face the +valley and dream of the glory that, perchance, trailed down in living +light from some vast loom of God's. His massive head was thrown back, as +though he listened, with a secret sense, for music denied to those who +see. + +[Sidenote: Joyful Memories] + +He took off his hat and stray gleams came through the deepening shadows +to rest, like an aureole, upon his silvered hair. Remembered sunsets, +from beyond the darkness of more than twenty years, came back to him +with divine beauty and diviner joy. Mnemosyne, that guardian angel of +the soul, brought from her treasure-house gifts of laughter and tears; +the laughter sweet with singing, and the bitterness of the tears +eternally lost in the Water of Forgetfulness. + +Slowly, the light died. Dusk came upon the valley and crept softly to +the hills. Mist drifted in from the sleeping sea, and the hush of night +brooded over the river as it murmured through the plain. A single star +uplifted its exquisite lamp against the afterglow, near the veiled ivory +of the crescent moon. + +Sighing, the man turned away. "Perhaps," he thought, whimsically, as he +went cautiously down the path, searching out every step of the way, +"there was no sunset at all." + +The road was clear until he came to a fallen tree, over which he stepped +easily. The new softness of the soil had, for him, its own deep meaning +of resurrection. He felt it in the swelling buds of the branches that +sometimes swayed before him, and found it in the scent of the cedar as +he crushed a bit of it in his hand. + +Easily, yet carefully, he went around the base of the hill to the +street, where his house was the first upon the right-hand side. The gate +creaked on its hinges and he went quickly up the walk, passing the grey +tangle of last Summer's garden, where the marigolds had died and the +larkspur fallen asleep. + +Within the house, two women awaited him, one with anxious eagerness, the +other with tenderly watchful love. The older one, who had long been +listening, opened the door before he knocked, but it was Barbara who +spoke to him first. + +"You're late, Father, dear." + +"Am I, Barbara? Tell me, was there a sunset to-night?" + +"Yes, a glorious one." + +[Sidenote: Seeing with the Soul] + +"I thought so, and that accounts for my being late. I saw a beautiful +sunset--I saw it with my soul." + +"Give me your coat, Ambrose." The older woman stood at his side, longing +to do him some small service. + +"Thank you, Miriam; you are always kind." + +The tiny living-room was filled with relics of past luxury. Fine +pictures, in tarnished frames, hung on the dingy walls, and worn rugs +covered the floor. The furniture was old mahogany, beautifully cared +for, but decrepit, nevertheless, and the ancient square piano, +outwardly, at least, showed every year of its age. + +Still, the room had "atmosphere," of the indefinable quality that some +people impart to a dwelling-place. Entering, one felt refinement, +daintiness, and the ability to live above mere externals. Barbara had, +very strongly, the house-love which belongs to some rare women. And who +shall say that inanimate things do not answer to our love of them, and +diffuse, between our four walls, a certain gracious spirit of kindliness +and welcome? + +In the dining-room, where the table was set for supper, there were +marked contrasts. A coarse cloth covered the table, but at the head of +it was overlaid a remnant of heavy table-damask, the worn places +carefully hidden. The china at this place was thin and fine, the silver +was solid, and the cup from which Ambrose North drank was Satsuma. + +On the coarse cloth were the heavy, cheap dishes and the discouraging +knives and forks which were the portion of the others. The five damask +napkins remaining from the original stock of linen were used only by the +blind man. + +[Sidenote: A Comforting Deceit] + +For years the two women had carried on this comforting deceit, and the +daily lie they lived, so lovingly, had become a sort of second nature. +They had learned to speak, casually, of the difficulty in procuring +servants, and to say how much easier it was to do their own small tasks +than to watch continually over fine linen and rare china intrusted to +incompetent hands. They talked of tapestries, laces, and jewels which +had long ago been sold, and Barbara frequently wore a string of beads +which, with a lump in her throat, she called "Mother's pearls." + +Discovering that the sound of her crutches on the floor distressed him +greatly, Barbara had padded the sharp ends with flannel and was careful +to move about as little as possible when he was in the house. She had +gone, mouse-like, to her own particular chair while Miriam was hanging +up his coat and hat and placing his easy chair near the open fire. He +sat down and held his slender hands close to the grateful warmth. + +"It isn't cold," he said, "and yet I am glad of the fire. To-day is the +first day of Spring." + +"By the almanac?" laughed Barbara. + +"No, according to the almanac, I believe, it has been Spring for ten +days. Nature does not move according to man's laws, but she forces him +to observe hers--except in almanacs." + +[Sidenote: Kindly Shadows] + +The firelight made kindly shadows in the room, softening the +unloveliness and lending such beauty as it might. It gave to Ambrose +North's fine, strong face the delicacy and dignity of an old miniature. +It transfigured Barbara's yellow hair into a crown of gold, and put a +new gentleness into Miriam's lined face as she sat in the half-light, +one of them in blood, yet singularly alien and apart. + +"What are you doing, Barbara?" The sensitive hands strayed to her lap +and lifted the sheer bit of linen upon which she was working. + +"Making lingerie by hand." + +"You have a great deal of it, haven't you?" + +"Not as much as you think, perhaps. It takes a long time to do it well." + +"It seems to me you are always sewing." + +"Girls are very vain these days, Father. We need a great many pretty +things." + +"Your dear mother used to sew a great deal. She--" His voice broke, for +even after many years his grief was keenly alive. + +"Is supper ready, Aunt Miriam?" asked Barbara, quickly. + +"Yes." + +"Then come, let's go in." + +Ambrose North took his place at the head of the table, which, purposely, +was nearest the door. Barbara and Miriam sat together, at the other end. + +"Where were you to-day, Father?" + +[Sidenote: At the top of the World] + +"On the summit of the highest hill, almost at the top of the world. +I think I heard a robin, but I am not sure. I smelled Spring in the +maple branches and the cedar, and felt it in the salt mist that blew +up from the sea. The Winter has been so long!" + +"Did you make a song?" + +[Sidenote: Always Make a Song] + +"Yes--two. I'll tell you about them afterward. Always make a song, +Barbara, no matter what comes." + +So the two talked, while the other woman watched them furtively. Her +face was that of one who has lived much in a short space of time and her +dark, burning eyes betrayed tragic depths of feeling. Her black hair, +slightly tinged with grey, was brushed straight back from her wrinkled +forehead. Her shoulders were stooped and her hands rough from hard work. + +She was the older sister of Ambrose North's dead wife--the woman he had +so devotedly loved. Ever since her sister's death, she had lived with +them, taking care of little lame Barbara, now grown into beautiful +womanhood, except for the crutches. After his blindness, Ambrose North +had lost his wife, and then, by slow degrees, his fortune. Mercifully, a +long illness had made him forget a great deal. + +"Never mind, Barbara," said Miriam, in a low tone, as they rose from the +table. "It will make your hands too rough for the sewing." + +"Shan't I wipe the dishes for you, Aunty? I'd just as soon." + +"No--go with him." + +The fire had gone down, but the room was warm, so Barbara turned up the +light and began again on her endless stitching. Her father's hands +sought hers. + +"More sewing?" His voice was tender and appealing. + +"Just a little bit, Father, please. I'm so anxious to get this done." + +"But why, dear?" + +"Because girls are so vain," she answered, with a laugh. + +"Is my little girl vain?" + +"Awfully. Hasn't she the dearest father in the world and the +prettiest"--she swallowed hard here--"the prettiest house and the +loveliest clothes? Who wouldn't be vain!" + +"I am so glad," said the old man, contentedly, "that I have been able to +give you the things you want. I could not bear it if we were poor." + +"You told me you had made two songs to-day, Father." + +[Sidenote: Song of the River] + +He drew closer to her and laid one hand upon the arm of her chair. +Quietly, she moved her crutches beyond his reach. "One is about the +river," he began. + +"In Winter, a cruel fairy put it to sleep in an enchanted tower, far up +in the mountains, and walled up the door with crystal. All the while the +river was asleep, it was dreaming of the green fields and the soft, +fragrant winds. + +"It tossed and murmured in its sleep, and at last it woke, too soon, for +the cruel fairy's spell could not have lasted much longer. When it found +the door barred, it was very sad. Then it grew rebellious and hurled +itself against the door, trying to escape, but the barrier only seemed +more unyielding. So, making the best of things, the river began to sing +about the dream. + +"From its prison-house, it sang of the green fields and fragrant winds, +the blue violets that starred the meadow, the strange, singing harps of +the marsh grasses, and the wonder of the sea. A good fairy happened to +be passing, and she stopped to hear the song. She became so interested +that she wanted to see the singer, so she opened the door. The river +laughed and ran out, still singing, and carrying the door along. It +never stopped until it had taken every bit of the broken crystal far out +to sea." + +"I made one, too, Father." + +"What is it?" + +[Sidenote: Song of the Flax] + +"Mine is about the linen. Once there was a little seed put away into the +darkness and covered deep with earth. But there was a soul in the seed, +and after the darkness grew warm it began to climb up and up, until one +day it reached the sunshine. After that, it was so glad that it tossed +out tiny, green branches and finally its soul blossomed into a blue +flower. Then a princess passed, and her hair was flaxen and her eyes +were the colour of the flower. + +"The flower said, 'Oh, pretty Princess, I want to go with you.' + +"The princess answered, 'You would die, little Flower, if you were +picked,' and she went on. + +"But one day the Reaper passed and the little blue flower and all its +fellows were gathered. After a terrible time of darkness and pain, the +flower found itself in a web of sheerest linen. There was much cutting +and more pain, and thousands of pricking stitches, then a beautiful gown +was made, all embroidered with the flax in palest blue and green. And it +was the wedding gown of the pretty princess, because her hair was flaxen +and her eyes the colour of the flower." + +[Sidenote: Barbara] + +"What colour is your hair, Barbara?" He had asked the question many +times. + +"The colour of ripe corn, Daddy. Don't you remember my telling you?" + +He leaned forward to stroke the shining braids. "And your eyes?" + +"Like the larkspur that grows in the garden." + +"I know--your dear mother's eyes." He touched her face gently as he +spoke. "Your skin is so smooth--is it fair?" + +"Yes, Daddy." + +"I think you must be beautiful; I have asked Miriam so often, but she +will not tell me. She only says you look well enough and something like +your mother. Are you beautiful?" + +"Oh, Daddy! Daddy!" laughed Barbara, in confusion. "You mustn't ask such +questions! Didn't you say you had made two songs? What is the other +one?" + +Miriam sat in the dining-room, out of sight but within hearing. Having +observed that in her presence they laughed less, she spent her evenings +alone unless they urged her to join them. She had a newspaper more than +a week old, but, as yet, she had not read it. She sat staring into the +shadows, with the light of her one candle flickering upon her face, +nervously moving her work-worn hands. + +"The other song," reminded Barbara, gently. + +[Sidenote: Song of the Sunset] + +"This one was about a sunset," he sighed. "It was such a sunset as was +never on sea or land, because two who loved each other saw it together. +God and all His angels had hung a marvellous tapestry from the high +walls of Heaven, and it reached almost to the mountain-tops, where some +of the little clouds sleep. + +"The man said, 'Shall we always look for the sunsets together?' + +"The woman smiled and answered, 'Yes, always.' + +"'And,' the man continued, 'when one of us goes on the last long +journey?' + +"'Then,' answered the woman, 'the other will not be watching alone. For, +I think, there in the West is the Golden City with the jasper walls and +the jewelled foundations, where the twelve gates are twelve pearls.'" + +There was a long silence. "And so--" said Barbara, softly. + +Ambrose North lifted his grey head from his hands and rose to his feet +unsteadily. "And so," he said, with difficulty, "she leans from the +sunset toward him, but he can never see her, because he is blind. Oh, +Barbara," he cried, passionately, "last night I dreamed that you could +walk and I could see!" + +"So we can, Daddy," said Barbara, very gently. "Our souls are neither +blind nor lame. Here, I am eyes for you and you are feet for me, so we +belong together. And--past the sunset----" + +"Past the sunset," repeated the old man, dreamily, "soul and body shall +be as one. We must wait--for life is made up of waiting--and make what +songs we can." + +"I think, Father, that a song should be in poetry, shouldn't it?" + +[Sidenote: The Real Song] + +"Some of them are, but more are not. Some are music and some are words, +and some, like prayers, are feeling. The real song is in the thrush's +heart, not in the silvery rain of sound that comes from the green boughs +in Spring. When you open the door of your heart and let all the joy rush +out, laughing--then you are making a song." + +"But--is there always joy?" + +"Yes, though sometimes it is sadly covered up with other things. We must +find it and divide it, for only in that way it grows. Good-night, my +dear." + +He bent to kiss her, while Miriam, with her heart full of nameless +yearning, watched them from the far shadows. The sound of his footsteps +died away and a distant door closed. Soon afterward Miriam took her +candle and went noiselessly upstairs, but she did not say good-night to +Barbara. + +[Sidenote: Midnight] + +Until midnight, the girl sat at her sewing, taking the finest of +stitches in tuck and hem. The lamp burning low made her needle fly +swiftly. In her own room was an old chest nearly full of dainty garments +which she was never to wear. She had wrought miracles of embroidery upon +some of them, and others were unadorned save by tucks and lace. + +When the work was finished, she folded it and laid it aside, then put +away her thimble and thread. "When the guests come to the hotel," she +thought--"ah, when they come, and buy all the things I've made the past +year, and the preserves and the candied orange peel, the rag rugs and +the quilts, then----" + +[Sidenote: Dying Embers] + +So Barbara fell a-dreaming, and the light of the dying embers lay +lovingly upon her face, already transfigured by tenderness into beauty +beyond words. The lamp went out and little by little the room faded into +twilight, then into night. It was quite dark when she leaned over and +picked up her crutches. + +"Dear, dear father," she breathed. "He must never know!" + + + + +II + +Miss Mattie + + +Miss Mattie was getting supper, sustained by the comforting thought that +her task was utterly beneath her and had been forced upon her by the +mysterious workings of an untoward Fate. She was not really "Miss," +since she had been married and widowed, and a grown son was waiting +impatiently in the sitting-room for his evening meal, but her +neighbours, nearly all of whom had known her before her marriage, still +called her "Miss Mattie." + +[Sidenote: "Old Maids"] + +The arbitrary social distinctions, made regardless of personality, are +often cruelly ironical. Many a man, incapable by nature of life-long +devotion to one woman, becomes a husband in half an hour, duly +sanctioned by Church and State. A woman who remains unmarried, because, +with fine courage, she will have her true mate or none, is called "an +old maid." She may have the heart of a wife and the soul of a mother, +but she cannot escape her sinister label. The real "old maids" are of +both sexes, and many are married, but alas! seldom to each other. + +[Sidenote: A Grievance] + +In his introspective moments, Roger Austin sometimes wondered why +marriage, maternity, and bereavement should have left no trace upon his +mother. The uttermost depths of life had been hers for the sounding, but +Miss Mattie had refused to drop her plummet overboard and had spent the +years in prolonged study of her own particular boat. + +She came in, with the irritating air of a martyr, and clucked sharply +with her false teeth when she saw that her son was reading. + +"I don't know what I've done," she remarked, "that I should have to live +all the time with people who keep their noses in books. Your pa was +forever readin' and you're marked with it. I could set here and set here +and set here, and he took no more notice of me than if I was a piece of +furniture. When he died, the brethren and sistern used to come to +condole with me and say how I must miss him. There wasn't nothin' to +miss, 'cause the books and his chair was left. I've a good mind to burn +'em all up." + +"I won't read if you don't want me to, Mother," answered Roger, laying +his book aside regretfully. + +"I dunno but what I'd rather you would than to want to and not," she +retorted, somewhat obscurely. "What I'm a-sayin' is that it's in the +blood and you can't help it. If I'd known it was your pa's intention to +give himself up so exclusive to readin', I'd never have married him, +that's all I've got to say. There's no sense in it. Lemme see what +you're at now." + +She took the open book, that lay face downward upon the table, and read +aloud, awkwardly: + +"Leave to the diamond its ages to grow, nor expect to accelerate the +births of the eternal. Friendship demands a religious treatment. We talk +of choosing our friends, but friends are self-elected." + +[Sidenote: Peculiar Way of Putting Things] + +"Now," she demanded, in a shrill voice, "what does that mean?" + +"I don't think I could explain it to you, Mother." + +"That's just the point. Your pa couldn't never explain nothin', neither. +You're readin' and readin' and readin' and you never know what you're +readin' about. Diamonds growin' and births bein' hurried up, and friends +bein' religious and voted for at township elections. Who's runnin' for +friend this year on the Republican ticket?" she inquired, caustically. + +Roger managed to force a laugh. "You have your own peculiar way of +putting things, Mother. Is supper ready? I'm as hungry as a bear." + +"I suppose you are. When it ain't readin', it's eatin'. Work all day to +get a meal that don't last more'n fifteen minutes, and then see readin' +goin' on till long past bedtime, and oil goin' up every six months. +Which'll you have--fresh apple sauce, or canned raspberries?" + +"It doesn't matter." + +"Then I'll get the apple sauce, because the canned raspberries can lay +over as long as they're kept cool." + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's Personal Appearance] + +Miss Mattie shuffled back into the kitchen. During the Winter she wore +black knitted slippers attached to woollen inner soles which had no +heels. She was well past the half-century mark, but her face had few +lines in it and her grey eyes were sharp and penetrating. Her smooth, +pale brown hair, which did not show the grey in it, was parted precisely +in the middle. Every morning she brushed it violently with a stiff brush +dipped into cold water, and twisted the ends into a tight knot at the +back of her head. In militant moments, this knot seemed to rise and the +protruding ends of the wire hairpins to bristle into formidable weapons +of offence. + +She habitually wore her steel-bowed spectacles half-way down her nose. +They might have fallen off had not a kindly Providence placed a large +wart where it would do the most good. On Sundays, when she put on shoes, +corsets, her best black silk, and her gold-bowed spectacles, she took +great pains to wear them properly. When she reached home, however, she +always took off her fine raiment and laid her spectacles aside with a +great sigh of relief. Miss Mattie's disposition improved rapidly as soon +as the old steel-bowed pair were in their rightful place, resting safely +upon the wart. + +[Sidenote: Second-hand Things] + +When they sat down to supper, she reverted to the original topic. "As +I was sayin'," she began, "there ain't no sense in the books you and +your pa has always set such store by. Where he ever got 'em, I dunno, +but they was always a comin'. Lots of 'em was well-nigh wore out when +he got 'em, and he wouldn't let me buy nothin' that had been used before, +even if I knew the folks. + +"I got a silver coffin plate once at an auction over to the Ridge for +almost nothin' and your pa was as mad as a wet hen. There was a name on +it, but it could have been scraped off, and the rest of it was perfectly +good. When you need a coffin plate you need it awful bad. While your pa +was rampin' around, he said he wouldn't have been surprised to see me +comin' home with a second-hand coffin in the back of the buggy. Who ever +heard of a second-hand coffin? I've always thought his mind was +unsettled by so much readin'. + +"I ain't a-sayin' but what some readin' is all right. Some folks has +just moved over to the Ridge and the postmaster's wife was a-showin' me +some papers they get, every week. One is _The Metropolitan Weekly_, and +the other _The Housewife's Companion_. I must say, the stories in those +papers is certainly beautiful. + +"Once, when they come after their mail, they was as mad as anything +because the papers hadn't come, but the postmaster's wife was readin' +one of the stories and settin' up nights to do it, so she wa'n't to +blame for not lettin' 'em go until she got through with 'em. They slip +out of the covers just as easy, and nobody ever knows the difference. + +[Sidenote: The Doctor's Darling] + +"She was tellin' me about one of the stories. It's named _Lovely Lulu, +or the Doctor's Darling_. Lovely Lulu is a little orphant who has to do +most of the housework for a family of eight, and the way they abuse that +child is something awful. The young ladies are forever puttin' ruffled +white skirts into her wash, and makin' her darn the lace on their blue +silk mornin' dresses. + +"There's a rich doctor that they're all after and one day little Lulu +happens to open the front-door for him, and he gets a good look at her +for the first time. As she goes upstairs, Arthur Montmorency--that's his +name--holds both hands to his heart and says, 'She and she only shall be +my bride.' The conclusion of this highly fascinatin' and absorbin' +romance will be found in the next number of _The Housewife's +Companion_." + +"Mother," suggested Roger, "why don't you subscribe for the papers +yourself?" + +Miss Mattie dropped her knife and fork and gazed at him in open-mouthed +astonishment. "Roger," she said, kindly, "I declare if sometimes you +don't remind me of my people more'n your pa's. I never thought of that +myself and I dunno how you come to. I'll do it the very first time I go +down to the store. The postmaster's wife can get the addresses without +tearin' off the covers, and after I get 'em read she can borrow mine, +and not be always makin' the people at the Ridge so mad that she's +runnin' the risk of losin' her job. If you ain't the beatenest!" + +Basking in the unaccustomed warmth of his mother's approval, Roger +finished his supper in peace. Afterward, while she was clearing up, he +even dared to take up the much-criticised book and lose himself once +more in his father's beloved Emerson. + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: Childish Memories] + +All his childish memories of his father had been blurred into one by the +mists of the intervening years. As though it were yesterday, he could +see the library upstairs, which was still the same, and the grave, +silent, kindly man who sat dreaming over his books. When the child +entered, half afraid because the room was so quiet, the man had risen +and caught him in his arms with such hungry passion that he had almost +cried out. + +"Oh, my son," came in the deep, rich voice, vibrant with tenderness; "my +dear little son!" + +[Sidenote: The Priceless Legacy] + +That was all, save a few old photographs and the priceless legacy of the +books. The library was not a large one, but it had been chosen by a man +of discriminating, yet catholic, taste. The books had been used and were +not, as so often happens, merely ornaments. Page after page had been +interlined and there was scarcely a volume which was not rich in +marginal notes, sometimes questioning in character, but indicating +always understanding and appreciation. + +As soon as he learned to read, Roger began to spend his leisure hours in +this library. When he could not understand a book, he put it aside and +took up another. Always there were pictures and sometimes many of them, +for in his later years Laurence Austin had contracted the baneful habit +of extra-illustration. Never maternal, save in the limited physical +sense, Miss Mattie had been glad to have the child out of her way. + +Day by day, the young mind grew and expanded in its own way. Year by +year, Roger came to an affectionate knowledge of his father, through +the medium of the marginal notes. He wondered, sometimes, that a pencil +mark should so long outlive the fine, strong body of the man who made +it. It seemed pitiful, in a way, and yet he knew that books and letters +are the things that endure, in a world of transition and decay. + +The underlined passages and the marginal comments gave evidence of an +extraordinary love of beauty, in whatever shape or form. And yet--the +parlour, which was opened only on Sunday--was hideous with a gaudy +carpet, stuffed chairs, family portraits done in crayon and inflicted +upon the house by itinerant vendors of tea and coffee, and there was a +basket of wax flowers, protected by glass, on the marble-topped +"centre-table." + +The pride of Miss Mattie's heart was a chair, which, with incredible +industry, she had made from an empty flour barrel. She had spoiled a +good barrel to make a bad chair, but her thrifty soul rejoiced in her +achievement. Roger never went near it, so Miss Mattie herself sat in it +on Sunday afternoons, nodding, and crooning hymns to herself. + +[Sidenote: An Awful Chasm] + +"How did father stand it?" thought Roger, intending no disrespect. He +loved his mother and appreciated her good qualities, but he saw the +awful chasm between those two souls, which no ceremony of marriage could +ever span. + +[Sidenote: Roger Austin] + +In appearance, Roger was like his father. He had the same clear, dark +skin, with regular features and kind, dark eyes, the same abundant, wavy +hair, strong, square chin, and incongruous, beauty-loving mouth. He had, +too, the lovable boyishness, which never quite leaves some fortunate +men. He was studying law in the judge's office, and hoped by another +year to be ready to take his examinations. After working hard all day, +he found refreshment for mind and body in an hour or so at night spent +with the treasures of his father's library. + +"Let us buy our entrance to this guild with a long probation," read +Roger. "Why should we desecrate noble and beautiful souls by intruding +upon them? Why insist upon rash personal relations with your friend? Why +go to his house, and know his mother and brother and sisters? Why be +visited by him at your own? Are these things material to our covenant? +Leave this touching and clawing. Let him be to me----" + +"I've spoke twice," complained Miss Mattie, "and you don't hear me no +more'n your pa did." + +"I beg your pardon, Mother. I did not hear you come in. What is it?" + +"I was just a-sayin' that maybe those papers would be too expensive. +Maybe I ought not to have 'em." + +"I'm sure they're not, Mother. Anyhow, you get them, and we'll make it +up in some other way if we have to." Dimly, in the future, Roger saw +long, quiet evenings in which his disturbing influence should be +rendered null and void by the charms of _Lovely Lulu, or the Doctor's +Darling_. + +[Sidenote: A Morning Call] + +"Barbara North sent her pa over here this morning to ask for some book. +I disremember now what it was, but it was after you was gone." + +Roger's expressive face changed instantly. "Why didn't you tell me +sooner, Mother?" He spoke with evident effort. "It's too late now for me +to go over there." + +"There's no call for you to go over. They can send again. Miss Miriam +can come after it any time. They ain't got no business to let a blind +old man like Ambrose North run around by himself the way they do." + +"He takes very good care of himself. He knew this place before he was +blind, and I don't think there is any danger." + +"Just the same, he ought not to go around alone, and that's what I told +him this morning. 'A blind old man like you,' says I, 'ain't got no +business chasin' around alone. First thing you know, you'll fall down +and break a leg or arm or something.'" + +Roger shrank as if from a physical hurt. "Mother!" he cried. "How can +you say such things!" + +"Why not?" she queried, imperturbably. "He knows he's blind, I guess, +and he certainly can't think he's young, so what harm does it do to +speak of it? Anyway," she added, piously, "I always say just what I +think." + +Roger got up, put his hands in his pockets, and paced back and forth +restlessly. "People who always say what they think, Mother," he +answered, not unkindly, "assume that their opinions are of great +importance to people who probably do not care for them at all. Unless +directly asked, it is better to say only the kind things and keep the +rest to ourselves." + +"I was kind," objected Miss Mattie. "I was tellin' him he ought not to +take the risk of hurtin' himself by runnin' around alone. I don't know +what ails you, Roger. Every day you get more and more like your pa." + +[Sidenote: Dangerous Rocks] + +"How long had you and father known each other before you were married?" +asked Roger, steering quickly away from the dangerous rocks that will +loom up in the best-regulated of conversations. + +"'Bout three months. Why?" + +"Oh, I just wanted to know." + +"I used to be a pretty girl, Roger, though you mightn't think it now." +Her voice was softened, and, taking off her spectacles, she gazed far +into space; seemingly to that distant girlhood when radiant youth lent +to the grey old world some of its own immortal joy. + +"I don't doubt it," said Roger, politely. + +"Your pa and me used to go to church together. He sang in the choir and +I had a white dress and a bonnet trimmed with lutestring ribbon. I can +smell the clover now and hear the bees hummin' when the windows was open +in Summer. A bee come in once while the minister was prayin' and lighted +on Deacon Emory's bald head. Seems a'most as if 't was yesterday. + +[Sidenote: Great Notions] + +"Your pa had great notions," she went on, after a pause. "Just before we +was married, he said he was goin' to educate me, but he never did." + + + + +III + +The Tower of Cologne + + +Roger sat in Ambrose North's easy chair, watching Barbara while she +sewed. "I am sorry," he said, "that I wasn't at home when your father +came over after the book. Mother was unable to find it. I'm afraid I'm +not very orderly." + +"It doesn't matter," returned Barbara, threading her needle again. "I +steal too much time from my work as it is." + +Roger sighed and turned restlessly in his chair. "I wish I could come +over every day and read to you, but you know how it is. Days, I'm in the +office with the musty old law books, and in the evenings, your father +wants you and my mother wants me." + +"I know, but father usually goes to bed by nine, and I'm sure your +mother doesn't sit up much later, for I usually see her light by that +time. I always work until eleven or half past, so why shouldn't you come +over then?" + +[Sidenote: A Happy Thought] + +"Happy thought!" exclaimed Roger. "Still, you might not always want me. +How shall I know?" + +"I'll put a candle in the front window," suggested Barbara, "and if you +can come, all right. If not, I'll understand." + +Both laughed delightedly at the idea, for they were young enough to find +a certain pleasure in clandestine ways and means. Miss Mattie had so far +determinedly set her face against her son's association with the young +of the other sex, and even Barbara, who had been born lame and had never +walked farther than her own garden, came under the ban. + +Ambrose North, with the keen and unconscious selfishness of age, +begrudged others even an hour of Barbara's society. He felt a third +person always as an intruder, though he tried his best to appear +hospitable when anyone came. Miriam might sometimes have read to +Barbara, while he was out upon his long, lonely walks, but it had never +occurred to either of them. + +[Sidenote: World-wide Fellowship] + +Through Laurence Austin's library, as transported back and forth by +Roger, one volume at a time, Barbara had come into the world-wide +fellowship of those who love books. She was closely housed and +constantly at work, but her mind soared free. When the poverty and +ugliness of her surroundings oppressed her beauty-loving soul; when her +fingers ached and the stitches blurred into mist before her eyes, some +little brown book, much worn, had often given her the key to the House +of Content. + +"Shall you always have to sew?" asked Roger. "Is there no way out?" + +[Sidenote: Glad of Work] + +"Not unless some fairy prince comes prancing up on a white charger," +laughed Barbara, "and takes us all away with him to his palace. Don't +pity me," she went on, her lips quivering a little, "for every day I'm +glad I can do it and keep father from knowing we are poor. + +"Besides, I'm of use in the world, and I wouldn't want to live if I +couldn't work. Aunt Miriam works, too. She does all the housework, takes +care of me when I can't help myself, does the mending, many things for +father, and makes the quilts, preserves, candied orange peel, and the +other little things we sell. People are so kind to us. Last Summer the +women at the hotel bought everything we had and left orders enough to +keep me busy until long after Christmas." + +"Don't call people kind because they buy what they want." + +"Don't be so cynical. You wouldn't have them buy things they didn't +want, would you?" + +"Sometimes they do." + +"Where?" + +"Well, at church fairs, for instance. They spend more than they can +afford for things they do not want, in order to please people whom they +do not like and help heathen who are much happier than they are." + +"I'm glad I'm not running a church fair," laughed Barbara. "And who told +you that heathen are happier than we are? Are you a heathen?" + +"I don't know. Most of us are, I suppose, in one way or another. But how +nice it would be if we could paint ourselves instead of wearing clothes, +and go under a tree when it rained, and pick cocoanuts or bananas when +we were hungry. It would save so much trouble and expense." + +"Paint is sticky," observed Barbara, "and the rain would come around the +tree when the wind was blowing from all ways at once, as it does +sometimes, and I do not like either cocoanuts or bananas. I'd rather +sew. What went wrong to-day?" she asked, with a whimsical smile. +"Everything?" + +"Almost," admitted Roger. "How did you know?" + +[Sidenote: Unfailing Barometer] + +"Because you want to be a heathen instead of the foremost lawyer of your +time. Your ambition is an unfailing barometer." + +He laughed lightly. This sort of banter was very pleasing to him after a +day with the law books and an hour or more with his mother. He had known +Barbara since they were children and their comradeship dated back to +the mud-pie days. + +"I don't know but what you're right," he said. "Whether I go to Congress +or the Fiji Islands may depend, eventually, upon Judge Bascom's liver." + +"Don't let it depend upon him," cautioned Barbara. "Make your own +destiny. It was Napoleon, wasn't it, who prided himself upon making his +own circumstances? What would you do--or be--if you could have your +choice?" + +[Sidenote: Aspirations] + +"The best lawyer in the State," he answered, promptly. "I'd never oppose +the innocent nor defend the guilty. And I'd have money enough to be +comfortable and to make those I love comfortable." + +"Would you marry?" she asked, thoughtfully. + +"Why--I suppose so. It would seem queer, though." + +"Roger," she said, abruptly, "you were born a year and more before I +was, and yet you're fully ten or fifteen years younger." + +"Don't take me back too far, Barbara, for I hate milk. Please don't +deprive me of my solid food. What would you do, if you could choose?" + +"I'd write a book." + +"What kind? Dictionary?" + +"No, just a little book. The sort that people who love each other would +choose for a gift. Something that would be given to one who was going +on a long or difficult journey. The one book a woman would take with her +when she was tired and went away to rest. A book with laughter and tears +in it and so much fine courage that it would be given to those who are +in deep trouble. I'd soften the hard hearts, rest the weary ones, and +give the despairing ones new strength to go on. Just a little book, but +so brave and true and sweet and tender that it would bring the sun to +every shady place." + +"Would you marry?" + +[Sidenote: The Right Man] + +"Of course, if the right man came. Otherwise not." + +"I wonder," mused Roger, "how a person could know the right one?" + +"Foolish child," she answered, "that's it--the knowing. When you don't +know, it isn't it." + +"My dear Miss North," remarked Roger, "the heads of your argument are +somewhat involved, but I think I grasp your meaning. When you know it +is, then it is, but when you don't know that it is, then it isn't. Is +that right?" + +"Exactly. Wonderfully intelligent for one so young." + +Barbara's blue eyes danced merrily and her red lips parted in a mocking +smile. A long heavy braid of hair, "the colour of ripe corn," hung over +either shoulder and into her lap. She was almost twenty-two, but she +still clung to the childish fashion of dressing her hair, because the +heavy braids and the hairpins made her head ache. All her gowns were +white, either of wool or cotton, and were made to be washed. On Sundays, +she sometimes wore blue ribbons on her braids. + +[Sidenote: Simply Barbara] + +To Roger, she was very fair. He never thought of her crutches because +she had always been lame. She was simply Barbara, and Barbara needed +crutches. It had never occurred to him that she might in any way be +different, for he was not one of those restless souls who are forever +making people over to fit their own patterns. + +"Why doesn't your father like to have me come here?" asked Roger, +irrelevantly. + +"Why doesn't your mother like to have you come?" queried Barbara, +quickly on the defensive. + +"No, but tell me. Please!" + +"Father always goes to bed early." + +"But not at eight o'clock. It was a quarter of eight when I came, and by +eight he was gone." + +"It isn't you, Roger," she said, unwillingly; "it's anyone. I'm all he +has, and if I talk much to other people he feels as if I were being +taken away from him--that's all. It's natural, I suppose. You mustn't +mind him." + +"But I wouldn't hurt him," returned Roger, softly; "you know that." + +"I know." + +"I wish you could make him understand that I come to see every one of +you." + +[Sidenote: Hard Work] + +"It's the hardest work in the world," sighed Barbara, "to make people +understand things." + +"Somebody said once that all the wars had been caused by one set of +people trying to force their opinions upon another set, who did not +desire to have their minds changed." + +"Very true. I wonder, sometimes, if we have done right with father." + +"I'm sure you have," said Roger, gently. "You couldn't do anything wrong +if you tried." + +"We haven't meant to," she answered, her sweet face growing grave. "Of +course it was all begun long before I was old enough to understand. He +thinks the city house, which we lost so long ago that I cannot even +remember our having it, was sold for so high a price that it would have +been foolish not to sell it, and that we live here because we prefer the +country. Just think, Roger, before I was born, this was father's and +mother's Summer home, and now it's all we have." + +"It's a roof and four walls--that's all any house is, without the spirit +that makes it home." + +"He thinks it's beautifully furnished. Of course we have the old +mahogany and some of the pictures, but we've had to sell nearly +everything. I've used some of mother's real laces in the sewing and sold +practically all the rest. Whatever anyone would buy has been disposed +of. Even the broken furniture in the attic has gone to people who had a +fancy for 'antiques.'" + +"You have made him very happy, Barbara." + +"I know, but is it right?" + +"I'm not orthodox, my dear girl, but, speaking as a lawyer, if it harms +no one and makes a blind old man happy, it can't be wrong." + +"I hope you're right, but sometimes my conscience bothers me." + +[Sidenote: A Saint's Conscience] + +"Imagine a saint's conscience being troublesome." + +"Don't laugh at me--you know I'm not a saint." + +"How should I know?" + +"Ask Aunt Miriam. She has no illusions about me." + +"Thanks, but I don't know her well enough. We haven't been on good terms +since she drove me out of the melon patch--do you remember?" + +"Yes, I remember. We wanted the blossoms, didn't we, to make golden +bells in the Tower of Cologne?" + +"I believe so. We never got the Tower finished, did we?" + +"No. I wasn't allowed to play with you for a long time, because you were +such a bad boy." + +"Next Summer, I think we should rebuild it. Let's renew our youth +sometime by making the Tower of Cologne in your back yard." + +"There are no golden bells." + +"I'll get some from somewhere. We owe it to ourselves to do it." + +Barbara's blue eyes were sparkling now, and her sweet lips smiled. "When +it's done?" she asked. + +[Sidenote: Like Fairy Tales] + +"We'll move into it and be happy ever afterward, like the people in the +fairy tales." + +"I said a little while ago that you were fifteen years younger than I am, +but, upon my word, I believe it's nearer twenty." + +"That makes me an enticing infant of three or four, flourishing like the +green bay tree on a diet of bread and milk with an occasional +soft-boiled egg. I should have been in bed by six o'clock, and now +it's--gracious, Barbara, it's after eleven. What do you mean by keeping +the young up so late?" + +As he spoke, he hurriedly found his hat, and, reaching into the pocket +of his overcoat, drew out a book. "That's the one you wanted, isn't it?" + +"Yes, thank you." + +"I didn't give it to you before because I wanted to talk, but we'll +read, sometimes, when we can. Don't forget to put the light in the +window when it's all right for me to come. If I don't, you'll +understand. And please don't work so hard." + +Barbara smiled. "I have to earn a living for three healthy people," she +said, "and everybody is trying, by moral suasion, to prevent me from +doing it. Do you want us all piled up in the front yard in a nice little +heap of bones before the Tower of Cologne is rebuilt?" + +Roger took both her hands and attempted to speak, but his face suddenly +crimsoned, and he floundered out into the darkness like an awkward +school-boy instead of a self-possessed young man of almost twenty-four. +It had occurred to him that it might be very nice to kiss Barbara. + +[Sidenote: Back to Childhood] + +But Barbara, magically taken back to childhood, did not notice his +confusion. The Tower of Cologne had been a fancy of hers ever since she +could remember, though it had been temporarily eclipsed by the hard work +which circumstances had thrust upon her. As she grew from childhood to +womanhood, it had changed very little--the dream, always, was +practically the same. + +[Sidenote: A Day Dream] + +The Tower itself was made of cologne bottles neatly piled together, and +the brightly-tinted labels gave it a bizarre but beautiful effect. It +was square in shape and very high, with a splendid cupola of clear +glass arches--the labels probably would not show, up so high. It stood +in an enchanted land with the sea behind it--nobody had ever thought of +taking Barbara down to the sea, though it was so near. The sea was +always blue, of course, like the sky, or the larkspur--she was never +quite sure of the colour. + +The air all around the Tower smelled sweet, just like cologne. There was +a flight of steps, also made of cologne bottles, but they did not break +when you walked on them, and the door was always ajar. Inside was a +great, winding staircase which led to the cupola. You could climb and +climb and climb, and when you were tired, you could stop to rest in any +of the rooms that were on the different floors. + +Strangely enough, in the Tower of Cologne, Barbara was never lame. She +always left her crutches leaning up against the steps outside. She could +walk and run like anyone else and never even think of crutches. There +were many charming people in the Tower and none of them ever said, +pityingly, "It's too bad you're lame." + +All the dear people of the books lived in the Tower of Cologne, besides +many more, whom Barbara did not know. Maggie Tulliver, Little Nell, +Dora, Agnes, Mr. Pickwick, King Arthur, the Lady of Shalott, and +unnumbered others dwelt happily there. They all knew Barbara and were +always glad to see her. + +Wonderful tapestries were hung along the stairs, there were beautiful +pictures in every room, and whatever you wanted to eat was instantly +placed before you. Each room smelled of a different kind of cologne and +no two rooms were furnished alike. Her friends in the Tower were of all +ages and of many different stations in life, but there was one whose +face she had never seen. He was always just as old as Barbara, and was +closer to her than the rest. + +[Sidenote: The Boy] + +When she lost herself in the queer winding passages, the Boy, whose face +she was unable to picture, was always at her side to show her the way +out. They both wanted to get up into the cupola and ring all the golden +bells at once, but there seemed to be some law against it, for when they +were almost there, something always happened. Either the Tower itself +vanished beyond recall, or Aunt Miriam called her, or an imperative +voice summoned the Boy downstairs--and Barbara would not think of going +to the cupola without him. + +When she and Roger had begun to make mud pies together, she had told him +about the Tower and got him interested in it, too--all but the Boy whose +face she was unable to see and whose name she did not know. In the +Tower, she addressed him simply as "Boy." Barbara kept him to herself +for some occult reason. Roger liked the Tower very much, but thought the +construction might possibly be improved. Barbara never allowed him to +make any changes. He could build another Tower for himself, if he chose, +and have it just as he wanted it, but this was her very own. + +It all seemed as if it were yesterday. "And," mused Barbara, "it was +almost sixteen years ago, when I was six and Roger 'seven-going-on-eight,' +as he always said." The dear Tower still stoodin her memory, but far off +and veiled, like a mirage seen in the clouds. The Boy who helped her over +the difficult places was a grown man now, tall and straight and strong, +but she could not see his face. + +"It's queer," thought Barbara, as she put out the light. "I wonder if +I ever shall." + +[Sidenote: An Enchanted Land] + +That night she dreamed of the Tower of Cologne, in the old, enchanted +land, where a blue sky bent down to meet a bluer sea. She and the Boy +were in the cupola, making music with the golden bells. Their laughter +chimed in with the sweet sound of the ringing, but still, she could not +see his face. + + + + +IV + +The Seventh of June + + +Barbara sat by the old chest which held her completed work, frowning +prettily over a note-book in her lap. She was very methodical, and, in +some inscrutable way, things had become mixed. She kept track of every +yard of lace and linen and every spool of thread, for, it was evident, +she must know the exact cost of the material and the amount of time +spent on a garment before it could be accurately priced. + +[Sidenote: Finishing Touches] + +Aunt Miriam had carefully pressed the lingerie after it was made and +laid it away in the chest with lavender to keep it from turning yellow. +There remained only the last finishing touches. Aunt Miriam could have +put in the ribbons as well as she could, but Barbara chose to do it +herself. + +[Sidenote: Ways and Means] + +Three prices were put on each tag in Barbara's private cipher, +understood only by Aunt Miriam. The highest was the one hoped for, the +next the probable one, and the lowest one was to be taken only at the +end of the season. + +Already four or five early arrivals were reported at the hotel. By the +end of next week, it would be proper for Aunt Miriam to go down with a +few of the garments packed in a box with tissue paper, and see what she +could do. Barbara had used nearly all of her material and had sent for +more, but, in the meantime, she was using the scraps for handkerchiefs, +pin-cushion covers, and heart-shaped corsage pads, delicately scented +and trimmed with lace and ribbon. + +Once, Aunt Miriam had gone to the city for material and patterns, and +had priced hand-made lingerie in the shops. When she came back with an +itemised report, Barbara had clapped her hands in glee, for she saw the +wealth of Croesus looming up ahead. She had soon learned, however, +that she must keep far below the city prices if she would tempt the +horde of Summer visitors who came, yearly, to the hotel. At times, she +thought that Aunt Miriam must have been dreadfully mistaken. + +Barbara put down the highest price of every separate article in the +small, neat hand that Aunt Miriam had taught her to write--for she had +never been to school. If she should sell everything, why, there would be +more than a year of comfort for them all, and new clothes for father, +who was beginning to look shabby. + +"But they won't," Barbara said to herself, sadly. "I can't expect them +to buy it all when I'm asking so much." + +Down in the living-room, Ambrose North was inquiring restlessly for +Barbara. "Yes," he said, somewhat impatiently, "I know she's upstairs, +for you've told me so twice. What I want to know is, why doesn't she +come down?" + +"She's busy at something, probably," returned Miriam, with forced +carelessness, "but I think she'll soon be through." + +"Barbara is always busy," he answered, with a sigh. "I can't understand +it. Anyone might think she had to work for a living. By the way, Miriam, +do you need more money?" + +"We still have some," she replied, in a low voice. + +"How much?" he demanded. + +"Less than a hundred dollars." She did not dare to say how much less. + +"That is not enough. If you will get my check-book, I will write another +check." + +[Sidenote: The Old Check-Book] + +Miriam's face was grimly set and her eyes burned strangely beneath her +dark brows. She went to the mahogany desk and took an old check-book out +of the drawer. + +"Now," he said, as she gave him the pen and ink, "please show me the +line. 'Pay to the order of'----" + +She guided his hand with her own, trying to keep her cold fingers from +trembling. "Miriam Leonard," he spelled out, in uneven characters, +"Five--hundred--dollars. Signed--Ambrose--North. There. When you have no +money, I wish you would speak of it. I am fully able to provide for my +family, and I want to do it." + +"Thank you." Miriam's voice was almost inaudible as she took the check. + +"The date," he said; "I forgot to date it. What day of the month is it?" + +She moistened her parched lips, but did not speak. This was what she had +been dreading. + +"The date, Miriam," he called. "Will you please tell me what day of the +month it is?" + +"The seventh," she answered, with difficulty. + +"The seventh? The seventh of June?" + +"Yes." + +There was a long pause. "Twenty-one years," he said, in a shrill +whisper. "Twenty-one years ago to-day." + +[Sidenote: A Dreadful Anniversary] + +Miriam sat down quietly on the other side of the room. Her eyes were +glittering and she was moving her hands nervously. This dreadful +anniversary had, for her, its own particular significance. Upstairs, +Barbara, light-hearted and hopeful, was singing to herself while she +pinned on the last of the price tags and built her air-castle. The song +came down lightly, yet discordantly. It was as though a waltz should be +played at an open grave. + +"Miriam," cried Ambrose North, passionately, "why did she kill herself? +In God's name, tell me why!" + +"I do not know," murmured Miriam. He had asked her more than fifty +times, and she always gave the same answer. + +"But you must know--someone must know! A woman does not die by her own +hand without having a reason! She was well and strong, loved, taken care +of and petted, she had all that the world could give her, and hosts of +friends. I was blind and Barbara was lame, but she loved us none the +less. If I only knew why!" he cried, miserably; "Oh, if I only knew +why!" + +Miriam, unable to bear more, went out of the room. She pressed her cold +hands to her throbbing temples. "I shall go mad," she muttered. "How +long, O Lord, how long!" + +[Sidenote: Constance North] + +Twenty-one years ago to-day, Constance North had, intentionally, taken +an overdose of laudanum. She had left a note to her husband begging him +to forgive her, and thanking him for all his kindness to her during the +three years they had lived together. She had also written a note to +Miriam, asking her to look after the blind man and to be a mother to +Barbara. Enclosed were two other letters, sealed with wax. One was +addressed "To My Daughter, Barbara. To be opened on her twenty-second +birthday." Miriam had both the letters safely put away. It was not time +for Barbara to have hers and she had never delivered the other to the +person to whom it was addressed--so often does the arrogant power of the +living deny the holiest wishes of the dead. + +The whole scene came vividly back to Miriam--the late afternoon sun +streaming in glory from the far hills into Constance North's dainty +sitting-room, upstairs; the golden-haired woman, in the full splendour +of her youth and beauty, lying upon the couch asleep, with a smile of +heavenly peace upon her lips; the blind man's hands straying over her as +she lay there, with his tears falling upon her face, and blue-eyed +Barbara, cooing and laughing in her own little bed in the next room. + +[Sidenote: Years of Torture] + +Miriam had found the notes on the dressing-table, and had lied. She had +said there were but two when, in reality, there were four. Two had been +read and destroyed; the other two, with unbroken seals, were waiting to +be read. She was keeping the one for Barbara; the other had tortured her +through all of the twenty years. + +The time had passed when she could have delivered it, for the man to +whom it was addressed was dead. But he had survived Constance by nearly +five years, and, at any time during those five years, Miriam might have +given it to him, unseen and safely. She justified herself by dwelling +upon her care of Barbara and the blind man, and the fact that she would +give Barbara her letter upon the appointed day. Sternly she said to +herself: "I will fulfil one trust. I will keep faith with Constance in +this one way, bitterly though she has wronged me." + +[Sidenote: Haunting Dreams] + +Yet the fulfilment of one trust seemed not to be enough, for her sleep +was haunted by the pleading eyes of Constance, asking mutely for some +boon. Until the man died, Constance had come often, with her hands +outstretched, craving that which was so little and yet so much. After +his death, Constance still continued to come, but less often and +reproachfully; she seemed to ask for nothing now. + +Miriam had grown old, but Constance, though sad, was always young. One +of Death's surpassing gifts is eternal youth to those whom he claims too +soon. In her old husband's grieving heart, Constance had assumed +immortal beauty as well as immortal youth. She was now no older than +Barbara, who still sang heedlessly upstairs. + +Every night of the twenty-one years, Miriam had closed her eyes in +dread. When she dreamed it was always of Constance--Constance laughing +or singing, Constance bringing "the light that never was on sea or land" +to the fine, grave face of Ambrose North; Constance hugging little lame +Barbara to her breast with passionate, infinitely pitying love. And, +above all, Constance in her grave-clothes, dumb, reproachful, her sad +eyes fixed on Miriam in pleading that was almost prayer. + +"Miriam! Oh, Miriam!" The blind man in the next room was calling her. +Fearfully, she went back. + +"Sit down," said Ambrose North. "Sit down near me, where I can touch +your hand. How cold your fingers are! I want to thank you for all you +have done for us--for my little girl and for me. You have been so +faithful, so watchful, so obedient to her every wish." + +Miriam shrank from him, for the kindly words stung like a lash on flesh +already quivering. + +[Sidenote: Miriam and Ambrose] + +"We have always been such good friends," he said, reminiscently. "Do you +remember how much we were together all that year, until Constance came +home from school?" + +"I have not forgotten," said Miriam, in a choking whisper. A surge of +passionate hate swept over her even now, against the dead woman whose +pretty face had swerved Ambrose North from his old allegiance. + +"And I shall not forget," he answered, kindly. "I am on the westward +slope, Miriam, and have been, for a long time. But a few more years--or +months--or days--as God wills, and I shall join her again, past the +sunset, where she waits for me. + +"I have made things right for you and Barbara. Roger Austin has my +will, dividing everything I have between you. I should like your share +to go to Barbara, eventually, if you can see your way clear to do it." + +"Don't!" cried Miriam, sharply. The strain was insupportable. + +"I do not wish to pain you, Sister," answered the old man, with gentle +dignity, "but sometimes it is necessary that these things be said. I +shall not speak of it again. Will you give me back the check, please, +and show me where to date it? I shall date it to-morrow--I cannot bear +to write down this day." + + * * * * * + +When Barbara came down, her father was sitting at the old square piano, +quite alone, improvising music that was both beautiful and sad. He +seldom touched the instrument, but, when he did, wayfarers in the street +paused to listen. + +"Are you making a song, Father?" she asked, softly, when the last deep +chord died away. + +[Sidenote: Too Sad for Songs] + +"No," he sighed; "I cannot make songs to-day." + +"There is always a song, Daddy," she reminded him. "You told me so +yourself." + +"Yes, I know, but not to-day. Do you know what to-day is, my dear?" + +"The seventh--the seventh of June." + +"Twenty-one years ago to-day," he said, with an effort, "your dear +mother took her own life." The last words were almost inaudible. + +Barbara went to him and put her soft arms around his neck. "Daddy!" she +whispered, with infinite sympathy, "Daddy!" + +He patted her arm gently, unable to speak. She said no more, but the +voice and the touch brought healing to his pain. Bone of her bone and +flesh of her flesh, the daughter of the dead Constance was thrilled +unspeakably with a tenderness that the other had never given him. + +"Sit down, my dear," said Ambrose North, slowly releasing her. "I want +to talk to you--of her. Did I hear Aunt Miriam go out?" + +"Yes, just a few minutes ago." + +"You are almost twenty-two, are you not, Barbara?" + +"Yes, Daddy." + +"Then you are a woman grown. Your dear mother was twenty-two, when--" He +choked on the words. + +"When she died," whispered Barbara, her eyes luminous with tears. + +[Sidenote: A Torturing Doubt] + +[Sidenote: A Change] + +"Yes, when she--died. I have never known why, Barbara, unless it was +because I was blind and you were lame. But all these years there has +been a torturing doubt in my heart. Before you were born, and after my +blindness, I fancied that a change came over her. She was still tender +and loving, but it was not quite in the same way. Sometimes I felt that +she had ceased to love me. Do you think my blindness could--?" + +"Never, Father, never." Barbara's voice rang out strong and clear. "That +would only have made her love you more." + +"Thank you, my dear. Someway it comforts me to have you say it. But, +after you came, I felt the change even more keenly. You have read in the +books, doubtless, many times, that a child unites those who bring it +into the world, but I have seen, quite as often, that it divides them by +a gulf that is never bridged again." + +"Daddy!" cried Barbara, in pain. "Didn't you want me?" + +"Want you?" he repeated, in a tone that made the words a caress. "I +wanted you always, and every day I want you more. I am only trying to +say that her love seemed to lessen, instead of growing, as time went on. +If I could know that she died loving me, I would not ask why. If I could +know that she died loving me--if I were sure she loved me still--" + +"She did, Daddy--I know she did." + +"If I might only be so sure! But the ways of the Everlasting are not our +ways, and life is made up of waiting." + +Insensibly relieved by speech, his pain gradually merged into quiet +acceptance, if not resignation. "Shall you marry some day, Barbara?" he +asked, at last. + +"If the right man comes--otherwise not." + +"Much is written of it in the books, and I know you read a great deal, +but some things in the books are not true, and many things that are true +are not written. They say that a man of fifty should not marry a girl of +twenty and expect to be happy. Miriam was fifteen years older than +Constance and at first I thought of her, but when your mother came from +school, with her blue eyes and golden hair and her pretty, laughing +ways, there was but one face in all the world for me. + +"We were so happy, Barbara! The first year seemed less than a month, it +passed so quickly. The books will tell you that the first joy dies. +Perhaps it does, but I do not know, because our marriage lasted only +three years. It may be that, after many years, the heart does not beat +faster at the sound of the beloved's step; that the touch of the loving +hand brings no answering clasp. + +[Sidenote: Gift of Marriage] + +"But the divinest gift of marriage is this--the daily, unconscious +growing of two souls into one. Aspirations and ambitions merge, each +with the other, and love grows fast to love. Unselfishness answers to +unselfishness, tenderness responds to tenderness, and the highest joy of +each is the well-being of the other. The words of Church and State are +only the seal of a predestined compact. Day by day and year by year the +bond becomes closer and dearer, until at last the two are one, and even +death is no division. + +[Sidenote: If----] + +"A grave has lain between us for more than twenty years, but I am still +her husband--there has been no change. And, if she died loving me, she +is still mine. If she died loving me--if--she--died--loving me----" + +His voice broke at the end, and he went out, murmuring the words to +himself. Barbara watched him from the window as he opened the gate. Her +face was wet with tears. + +Flaming banners of sunset streamed from the hills beyond him, but his +soul could see no Golden City to-night. He went up the road that led to +another hillside, where, in the long, dreamy shadows, the dwellers in +God's acre lay at peace. Barbara guessed where he was going and her +heart ached for him--kneeling in prayer and vigil beside a sunken grave, +to ask of earth a question to which the answer was lost, in heaven--or +in hell. + + + + +V + +Eloise + + +[Sidenote: A Summer Hotel] + +The hotel was a long, low, rambling structure, with creaky floors and +old-fashioned furniture. But the wide verandas commanded a glorious view +of the sea, no canned vegetables were served at the table, and there was +no orchestra. Naturally, it was crowded from June to October with people +who earnestly desired quiet and were willing to go far to get it. + +The inevitable row of rocking-chairs swayed back and forth on the +seaward side. Most of them were empty, save, perhaps, for the ghosts of +long-dead gossips who had sat and rocked and talked and rocked from one +meal to the next. The paint on the veranda was worn in a long series of +parallel lines, slightly curved, but nobody cared. + +No phonograph broke upon the evening stillness with an ear-splitting +din, no unholy piccolo sounded above the other tortured instruments, no +violin wailed pitifully at its inhuman treatment, and the piano was +locked. + +At seasonable hours the key might be had at the office by those who +could prove themselves worthy of the trust, but otherwise quiet reigned. + +[Sidenote: Eloise Wynne] + +Miss Eloise Wynne came downstairs, with a book under her arm. She was +fresh as the morning itself and as full of exuberant vitality. She was +tall and straight and strong; her copper-coloured hair shone as though +it had been burnished, and her tanned cheeks had a tint of rose. When +she entered the dining-room, with a cheery "good-morning" that included +everybody, she produced precisely the effect of a cool breeze from the +sea. + +She was thirty, and cheerfully admitted it on occasion. "If I don't look +it," she said, smiling, "people will be surprised, and if I do, there +would be no use in denying it. Anyhow, I'm old enough to go about +alone." It was her wont to settle herself for Summer or Winter in any +place she chose, with no chaperon in sight. + +For a week she had been at Riverdale-by-the-Sea, and liked it on account +of the lack of entertainment. People who lived there called it simply +"Riverdale," but the manager of the hotel, perhaps to atone for the +missing orchestra and canned vegetables, added "by-the-Sea" to the name +in his modest advertisements. + +Miss Wynne, fortunately, had enough money to enable her to live the +much-talked-of "simple life," which is wildly impossible to the poor. +As it was not necessary for her to concern herself with the sordid and +material, she could occupy herself with the finer things of the soul. +Just now, however, she was deeply interested in the material foundation +of the finest thing in the world--a home. + +[Sidenote: A Passion for Lists] + +She had taken the bizarre paper slip which protected the even more +striking cover of a recent popular novel, and adjusted it to a bulky +volume of very different character. In her chatelaine bag she had a +pencil and a note-book, for Miss Eloise was sorely afflicted with the +note-book habit, and had a passion for reducing everything to lists. She +had lists of things she wanted and lists of things she didn't want, +which circumstances or well-meaning Santa Clauses had forced upon her; +little books of addresses and telephone numbers, jewels and other +personal belongings, and, finally, a catalogue of her library +alphabetically arranged by author and title. + +Immediately after breakfast, she went off with a long, swinging stride +which filled her small audience with envy and admiration. Disjointed +remarks, such as "skirt a little too short, but good tailor," and +"terrible amount of energy," and "wonder where she's going," followed +her. These comments were audible, had she been listening, but she had +the gift of keeping solitude in a crowd. + +Far along the beach she went, hatless, her blood singing with the joy of +life. A June morning, the sea, youth, and the consciousness of being +loved--for what more could one ask? The diamond on the third finger of +her left hand sparkled wonderfully in the sunlight. It was the only ring +she wore. + +[Sidenote: The Cook Book] + +Presently, she found a warm, soft place behind a sand dune. She reared +upon the dune a dark green parasol with a white border, and patted sand +around the curved handle until it was, as she thought, firmly placed. +Then she settled her skirts comfortably and opened her book, for the +first time. + +"It looks bad," she mused. "Wonder what a carbohydrate is. And +proteids--where do you buy 'em? Albuminoids--I've been from Maine to +Florida and have never seen any. They must be germs. + +"However," she continued, to herself, "I have a trained mind, and +'keeping everlastingly at it brings success.' It would be strange if +three hours of hard study every day, on the book the man in the store +said was the best ever, didn't produce some sort of definite result. +But, oh, how Allan would laugh at me!" + +The book fell on the sand, unheeded. The brown eyes looked out past the +blue surges to some far Castle in Spain. Her thoughts refused to phrase +themselves in words, but her pulses leaped with the old, immortal joy. +The sun had risen high in the shining East before she returned to her +book. + +"This isn't work," she sighed to herself; "away with the dreams." + +Before long, she got out her note-book. "A fresh fish," she wrote, "does +not smell fishy and its eyes are bright and its gills red. A tender +chicken or turkey has a springy breast bone. If you push it down with +your finger, it springs back. A leg of lamb has to have the tough, outer +parchment-like skin taken off with a sharp knife. Some of the oil of the +wool is in it and makes it taste muttony and bad. A lobster should +always be bought when he is alive and green and boiled at home. Then you +know he is fresh. Save everything for soup." + +[Sidenote: The Air of Knowing] + +"I will go out into the kitchen," mused Eloise, "and I will have the air +of knowing all about everything. I will say: 'Mary Ann, I have ordered a +lobster for you to boil. We will have a salad for lunch. And I trust you +have saved everything that was left last night for to-night's soup.' +Mary Ann will be afraid of me, and Allan will be _so_ proud." + +"'I thought I told you,' continued Eloise, to herself, 'to save all the +crumbs. Doctor Conrad does not like to have everything salt and he +prefers to make the salad dressing himself. Do not cook any cereal the +mornings we have oranges or grape-fruit--the starch and acid are likely +to make a disturbance inside. Four people are coming to dinner this +evening. I have ordered some pink roses and we will use the pink +candle-shades. Or, wait--I had forgotten that my hair is red. Use the +green candle-shades and I will change the roses to white.'" + +[Sidenote: A Frolicsome Wind] + +A frolicsome little wind, which had long been ruffling the waves of +Eloise's copper-coloured hair, took the note-book out of her lap and +laid it open on the sand some little distance away. Then, after making +merry with the green parasol, it lifted it bodily by its roots out of +the sand dune and went gaily down the beach with it. + +Eloise started in pursuit, but the wind and the parasol out-distanced +her easily. Rounding the corner of another dune, she saw the parasol, +with all sails set, jauntily embarked toward Europe. Turning away, +disconsolate, she collided with a big blonde giant who took her into his +arms, saying, "Never mind--I'll get you another." + +When the first raptures had somewhat subsided, Eloise led him back to +the place where the parasol had started from. "When and where from and +how did you come?" she asked, hurriedly picking up her books. + +"This morning, from yonder palatial hotel, on foot," he answered. "I +thought you'd be out here somewhere. I didn't ask for you--I wanted to +hunt you up myself." + +"But I might have been upstairs," she said, reproachfully. + +"On a morning like this? Not unless you've changed in the last ten days, +and you haven't, except to grow lovelier." + +"But why did you come?" she asked. "Nobody told you that you could." + +"Sweet," said Allan, softly, possessing himself of her hand, "did you +think I could stay away from you two whole weeks? Ten days is the +limit--a badly strained limit at that." + +The colour surged into her face. She was radiant, as though with some +inner light. The atmosphere around her was fairly electric with life and +youth and joy. + +[Sidenote: Dr. Conrad] + +Doctor Allan Conrad was very good to look at. He had tawny hair and kind +brown eyes, a straight nose, and a good firm chin. He wore eye-glasses, +and his face might have seemed severe had it not been discredited by his +mouth. He was smooth-shaven, and knew enough to wear brown clothes +instead of grey. + +Eloise looked at him approvingly. Every detail of his attire satisfied +her fastidious sense. If he had worn a diamond ring or a conspicuous +tie, he might not have occupied his present proud position. His +unfailing good taste was a great comfort to her. + +"How long can you stay?" she inquired. + +"Nice question," he laughed, "to ask an eager lover who has just come. +Sounds a good deal like 'Here's-your-hat-what's-your-hurry?' Before I +knew you, I used to go to see a girl sometimes who always said, at ten +o'clock: 'I'm so glad you came. When can you come again?' The first time +she did it I told her I couldn't come again until I had gone away this +time." + +"And afterward?" + +[Sidenote: Forgetting the Clock] + +"I kept going away earlier and earlier, and finally it was so much +earlier that I went before I had come. If I can't make a girl forget the +clock, I have no call to waste my valuable time on her, have I?" + +Assuming a frown with difficulty, Miss Wynne consulted her watch. "Why, +it's only half-past eleven," she exclaimed; "I thought it was much +later." + +"You darling," said the man, irrelevantly. "What are you reading?" +Before she could stop him, he had picked up the book and nearly choked +in a burst of unseemly merriment. + +"Upon my word," he said, when he could speak. "A cook book! A classmate +of mine used to indulge himself in floral catalogues when he wanted to +rest his mind with light literature, but I never heard of a cook book as +among the 'books for Summer reading' that the booksellers advertise." + +"Why not?" retorted Eloise, quickly. + +"No real reason. Lots of worse things are printed and sold by thousands, +but, someway, I can't seem to reconcile you--and your glorious +voice--with a cook-book." + +"Allan Conrad," said Miss Wynne, with affected sternness, "if you hadn't +studied medicine, would you be practising it now?" + +"No," admitted Allan; "not with the laws as they are in this State." + +"If I had no voice and had never studied music, would I be singing at +concerts?" + +"Not twice." + +"If a girl had never seen a typewriter and didn't know the first thing +about shorthand, would she apply for a position as a stenographer?" + +"They do," said Allan, gloomily. + +[Sidenote: Preparation] + +"Don't dissemble, please. My point is simply this: If every other +occupation in the world demands some previous preparation, why shouldn't +a girl know something about housekeeping and homemaking before she +undertakes it?" + +"But, my dear, you're not going to cook." + +"I am if I want to," announced Eloise, with authority. "And, anyhow, I'm +going to know. Do you think I'm going to let some peripatetic, untrained +immigrant manage my house for me? I guess not." + +"But cooking isn't theory," he ventured, picking up the note-book; "it's +practice. What good is all this going to do you when you have no +stove?" + +"Don't you remember the famous painter who told inquiring visitors that +he mixed his paints with brains? I am now cooking with my mind. After my +mind learns to cook, my hands will find it simple enough. And some time, +when you come in at midnight and have had no dinner, and the immigrant +has long since gone to sleep, you may be glad to be presented with +panned oysters, piping hot, instead of a can of salmon and a +can-opener." + +"Bless your heart," answered Allan, fondly. "It's dear of you, and I hope +it'll work. I'm starving this minute--kiss me." + +"'Longing is divine compared with satiety,'" she reminded him, as she +yielded. "How could you get away? Was nobody ill?" + +"Nobody would have the heart to be ill on a Saturday in June, when a +doctor's best girl was only fifty miles away. Monday, I'll go back and +put some cholera or typhoid germs in the water supply, and get nice and +busy. Who's up yonder?" indicating the hotel. + +"Nobody we know, but very few of the guests have come, so far." + +[Sidenote: "Guests"] + +"In all our varied speech," commented Allan, "I know of nothing so +exquisitely ironical as alluding to the people who stop at a hotel as +'guests.' In Mexico, they call them 'passengers,' which is more in +keeping with the facts. Fancy the feelings of a real guest upon +receiving a bill of the usual proportions. I should consider it a +violation of hospitality if a man at my house had to pay three prices +for his dinner and a tip besides." + +"You always had queer notions," remarked Eloise, with a sidelong glance +which set his heart to pounding. "We'll call them inmates if you like it +better. As yet, there are only eight inmates besides ourselves, though +more are coming next week. Two old couples, one widow, one _divorcée_, +and two spinsters with life-works." + +"No galloping cherubs?" + +"School isn't out yet." + +[Sidenote: Life-Works] + +"I see. It wouldn't be the real thing unless there were little ones to +gallop through the corridors at six in the morning and weep at the +dinner table. What are the life-works?" + +"One is writing a book, I understand, on _The Equality of the Sexes_. +The other--oh, Allan, it's too funny." + +"Spring it," he demanded. + +"She's trying to have cornet-playing introduced into the public schools. +She says that tuberculosis and pneumonia are caused by insufficient lung +development, and that cornet-playing will develop the lungs of the +rising generation. Fancy going by a school during the cornet hour." + +"I don't know why they shouldn't put cornet-playing into the schools," +he observed, after a moment of profound thought. "Everything else is +there now. Why shouldn't they teach crime, and even make a fine art of +it?" + +"If you let her know you're a doctor," cautioned Eloise, "she'll corner +you, and I shall never see you again. She says that she 'hopes, +incidentally, to enlist the sympathies of the medical profession.'" + +"She's beginning at the wrong end. Cornet manufacturers and the people +who keep sanitariums and private asylums are the co-workers she wants. +I couldn't live through the coming Winter were it not for pneumonia. It +means coal, and repairs for the automobile, and furs for my wife--when +I get one." + +"Come," said Eloise, springing to her feet; "let's go up and get ready +for luncheon." + +"Have you told me all?" asked Allan, "or is there some gay young +troubadour who serenades you in the evening and whose existence you +conceal from me for reasons of your own?" + +[Sidenote: A Pathetic Little Woman] + +"Nary a troubadour," she replied. "I haven't seen another soul except a +pathetic little woman who came up to the hotel yesterday afternoon to +sell the most exquisite things you ever saw. Think of offering hand-made +lingerie, of sheer, embroidered lawn and batiste and linen, to _that_ +crowd! The old ladies weren't interested, the spinsters sniffed, the +widow wept, and only the _divorcée_ took any notice of it. The prices +were so ridiculous that I wouldn't let her unpack the box. I'd be +ashamed to pay her the price she asked. It's made by a little lame girl +up the main road. I'm to go up there sometime next week." + +"Fairy godmother?" asked Allan, good-naturedly. He had known Eloise for +many years. + +"Perhaps," she answered, somewhat shamefaced. "What's the use of having +money if you don't spend it?" + +[Sidenote: A Human Interest] + +They went into the hotel together, utterly oblivious of the eight pairs +of curious eyes that were fastened upon them in a frank, open stare. The +rocking-chairs scraped on the veranda as they instinctively drew closer +together. A strong human interest, imperatively demanding immediate +discussion, had come to Riverdale-by-the-Sea. + + + + +VI + +A Letter + + +[Sidenote: Discouraging Prospects] + +Miriam had come home disappointed and secretly afraid to hope for any +tangible results from Miss Wynne's promised visit. Nevertheless, she +told Barbara. + +"Wouldn't any of them even look at it, Aunty?" + +"One of them would have looked at it and rumpled it so that I'd have had +to iron it again, but she wouldn't have bought anything. This young lady +said she was busy just then, and she wanted to come up and look over all +the things at her leisure. She won't pay much, though, even if she buys +anything. She said the price was 'ridiculous.'" + +"Perhaps she meant it was too low," suggested Barbara. + +"Possibly," answered Miriam. Her tone indicated that it was equally +possible for canary birds to play the piano, or for ducks to sing. + +"How does she look?" queried Barbara. + +"Well enough." Enthusiasm was not one of Miriam's attractions. + +"What did she have on?" + +"White. Linen, I think." + +"Then she knows good material. Was her gown tailor-made?" + +"Might have been. Why?" + +"Because if her white linen gowns are tailored she has money and is used +to spending it for clothes. I'm sure she meant the price was too low. +Did she say when she was coming?" + +"Next week. She didn't say what day." + +[Sidenote: Waiting] + +"Then," sighed Barbara, "all we can do is to wait." + +"We'll wait until she comes, or has had time to. In the meantime, I'm +going to show my quilts to those old ladies and take down a jar or two +of preserves. I wish you'd write to the people who left orders last +year, and ask if they want preserves or jam or jelly, or pickles, or +quilts, or anything. It would be nice to get some orders in before we +buy the fruit." + +Barbara put down her book, asked for the pen and ink, and went +cheerfully to work, with the aid of Aunt Miriam's small memorandum book +which contained a list of addresses. + +"What colour is her hair, Aunty?" she asked, as she blotted and turned +her first neat page. + +"A good deal the colour of that old copper tea-kettle that a woman paid +six dollars for once, do you remember? I've always thought she was +crazy, for she wouldn't even let me clean it." + +"And her eyes?" + +"Brown and big, with long lashes. She looks well enough, and her voice +is pleasant, and I must say she has nice ways. She didn't make me feel +like a peddler, as so many of them do. P'raps she'll come," admitted +Miriam, grudgingly. + +"Oh, I hope so. I'd love to see her and her pretty clothes, even if she +didn't buy anything." Barbara threw back a golden braid impatiently, +wishing it were copper-coloured and had smooth, shiny waves in it, +instead of fluffing out like an undeserved halo. + +While Barbara was writing, her father came in and sat down near her. +"More sewing, dear?" he asked, wistfully. + +[Sidenote: Writing Letters] + +"No, Daddy, not this time. I'm just writing letters." + +"I didn't know you ever got any letters--do you?" + +"Oh, yes--sometimes. The people at the hotel come up to call once in a +while, you know, and after they go away, Aunt Miriam and I occasionally +exchange letters with them. It's nice to get letters." + +The old man's face changed. "Are you lonely, dear?" + +"Lonely?" repeated Barbara, laughing; "why I don't even know what the +word means. I have you and my books and my sewing and these letters to +write, and I can sit in the window and nod to people who go by--how +could I be lonely, Daddy?" + +"I want you to be happy, dear." + +"So I am," returned the girl, trying hard to make her voice even. "With +you, and everything a girl could want, why shouldn't I be happy?" + +Miriam went out, closing the door quietly, and the blind man drew his +chair very near to Barbara. + +[Sidenote: Dreaming] + +"I dream," he said, "and I keep on dreaming that you can walk and I can +see. What do you suppose it means? I never dreamed it before." + +"We all have dreams, Daddy. I've had the same one very often ever since +I was a little child. It's about a tower made of cologne bottles, with a +cupola of lovely glass arches, built on the white sand by the blue sea. +Inside is a winding stairway hung with tapestries, leading to the cupola +where the golden bells are. There are lovely rooms on every floor, and +you can stop wherever you please." + +"It sounds like a song," he mused. + +"Perhaps it is. Can't you make one of it?" + +"No--we each have to make our own. I made one this morning." + +"Tell me, please." + +[Sidenote: Love Never Lost] + +"It is about love. When God made the world, He put love in, and none of +it has ever been lost. It is simply transferred from one person to +another. Sometimes it takes a different form, and becomes a deed, which, +at first, may not look as if it were made of love, but, in reality, is. + +"Love blossoms in flowers, sings in moving waters, fills the forest with +birds, and makes all the wonderful music of Spring. It puts the colour +upon the robin's breast, scents the orchard with far-reaching drifts of +bloom, and scatters the pink and white petals over the grass beneath. +Through love the flower changes to fruit, and the birds sing lullabies +at twilight instead of mating songs. + +"It is at the root of everything good in all the world, and where things +are wrong, it is only because sometime, somewhere, there has not been +enough love. The balance has been uneven and some have had too much +while others were starving for it. As the lack of food stunts the body, +so the denial of love warps the soul. + +"But God has made it so that love given must unfailingly come back an +hundred-fold; the more we give, the richer we are. And Heaven is only a +place where the things that have gone wrong here will at last come +right. Is it not so, Barbara?" + +"Surely, Daddy." + +"Then," he continued, anxiously, "all my loving must come back to me +sometime, somewhere. I think it will be right, for God Himself is Love." + +The blind man's sensitive fingers lovingly sought Barbara's face. His +touch was a caress. "I am sure you are like your dear mother," he said, +softly. "If I could know that she died loving me, and if I could see her +face again, just for an instant, why, all the years of loving, with no +answer, would be fully repaid." + +"She loved you, Daddy--I know she did." + +[Sidenote: The Old Doubt] + +"I know, too, but not always. Sometimes the old, tormenting doubt comes +back to me." + +"It shouldn't--mother would never have meant you to doubt her." + +"Barbara," cried the old man, with sudden passion, "if you ever love a +man, never let him doubt you--always let him be sure. There is so much +in a man's world that a woman knows nothing of. When he comes home at +night, tired beyond words, and sick to death of the world and its ways, +make him sure. When he thinks himself defeated, make him sure. When you +see him tempted to swerve even the least from the straight path, make +him sure. When the last parting comes, if he is leaving you, give him +the certainty to take with him into his narrow house, and make his last +sleep sweet. And if you are the one to go first, and leave him, old and +desolate and stricken, oh, Barbara, make him sure then--make him very +sure." + +[Sidenote: A String of Pearls] + +The girl's hand closed tightly upon his. He leaned over to pat her cheek +and stroke the heavy braids of silken hair. Then he felt the strand of +beads around her neck. + +"You have on your mother's pearls," he said. His fine old face illumined +as he touched the tawdry trinket. + +Barbara swallowed the hard lump in her throat. "Yes, Daddy." They had +lived for years upon that single strand of large, perfectly matched +pearls which Ambrose North had clasped around his young wife's neck upon +their wedding day. + +"Would you like more pearls, dear? A bracelet, or a ring?" + +"No--these are all I want." + +"I want to give you a diamond ring some day, Barbara. Your mother's was +buried with her. It was her engagement ring." + +"Perhaps somebody will give me an engagement ring," she suggested. + +"I shouldn't wonder. I don't want to be selfish, dear. You are all I have, +but, if you loved a man, I wouldn't try to keep you away from him." + +"Prince Charming hasn't come yet, Daddy, so cheer up. I'll tell you when +he does." + +Thus she turned the talk into a happier vein. They were laughing +together like two children when Miriam came in to say that supper was +ready. + +[Sidenote: Alone] + +Afterward, he sat at the piano, improvising low, sweet chords that +echoed back plaintively from the dingy walls. The music was full of +questioning, of pleading, of longing so deep that it was almost prayer. +Barbara finished her letters by the light of the lamp, while Miriam sat +in the dining-room alone, asking herself the old, torturing questions, +facing her temptation, and bearing the old, terrible hunger of the heart +that hurt her like physical pain. + +A little before nine o'clock, the blind man came to kiss Barbara +good-night. Then he went upstairs. Miriam came in and talked a few +minutes of quilts, pickles, and lingerie, then she, too, went up to +begin her usual restless night. + +Left alone, Barbara discovered that she did not care to read. It was too +late to begin work upon the new stock of linen, lawn, and batiste which +had come the day before, and she lacked the impulse, in the face of such +discouraging prospects as Aunt Miriam had encountered at the hotel. +Barbara steadily refused to admit, even to herself, that she was +discouraged, but she found no pleasure in the thought of her work. + +[Sidenote: A Light in the Window] + +She unfastened the front door, lighted a candle, and set it upon the +sill of the front window. Within twenty minutes Roger had come, entering +the house so quietly that Barbara did not hear his step and was +frightened when she saw him. + +"Don't scream," he said, as he closed the door leading into the hall. +"I'm not a burglar--only a struggling young law student with no +prospects and even less hope." + +"I infer," said Barbara, "that the Bascom liver is out of repair." + +"Correct. It seems absurd, doesn't it, to be affected by another man's +liver while you are supremely unconscious of your own?" + +"There are more things in other people's digestions than our philosophy +can account for," she replied, with a wicked perversion of classic +phrase. "What was the primary cause of the explosion?" + +"It was all his own fault," explained Roger. "I like dogs almost as well +as I do people, but it doesn't follow that dogs should mix so constantly +with people as they usually are allowed to. I was never in favour of +Judge Bascom's bull pup keeping regular office hours with us, but he +has, ever since the day he waddled in behind the Judge with a small +chain as the connecting link. I got so accustomed to his howling in the +corner of the office where he was chained up that I couldn't do my work +properly when he was asleep. So all went well until the Judge decided to +remove the chain and give the pup more room to develop himself in. + +[Sidenote: "Pethood"] + +"I tried to dissuade him, but it was no use. I told him he would run +away, and he said, with great dignity, that he did not desire for a pet +anything which had to be tied up in order to be retained. He observed +that the restraining influence worked against the pethood so strongly as +practically to obscure it." + +"New word?" laughed Barbara. + +"I don't know why it isn't a good word," returned Roger, in defence. "If +'manhood' and 'womanhood' and 'brotherhood' and all the other 'hoods' +are good English, I see no reason why 'pethood' shouldn't be used in the +same sense. The English language needs a lot of words added to it before +it can be called complete." + +"One wouldn't think so, judging by the size of the dictionary. However, +we'll let it pass. Go on with the story." + +"Things have been lively for a week or more. The pup has romped around a +good deal and has playfully bitten a client or two, but the Judge has +been highly edified until to-day. Fido got an important legal document +which the Judge had just drafted, and literally chewed it to pulp. Then +he swallowed it, apparently with great relish. I was told to make +another, and my not knowing about it, and taking the liberty of asking a +few necessary questions, produced the fireworks. It wasn't Fido's fault, +but mine." + +"How is Fido?" queried Barbara, with affected anxiety. + +"He was well at last accounts, but the document was long enough and +complicated enough to make him very ill. I hope he'll die of it +to-morrow." + +"Perhaps he's going to study law, too," remarked Barbara, "and believes, +with Macaulay, that 'a page digested is better than a book hurriedly +read.'" + +"I think that will do, Miss North. I'll read to you now, if you don't +mind. I would fain improve myself instead of listening to such childish +chatter." + +"Perhaps, if you read to me enough, I'll improve so that even you will +enjoy talking to me," she returned, with a mischievous smile. "What did +you bring over?" + +[Sidenote: A New Book] + +"A new book--that is, one that we've never seen before. There is a large +box of father's books behind some trunks in the attic, and I never found +them until Sunday, when I was rummaging around up there. I haven't read +them--I thought I'd make a list of them first, and you can choose those +you'd like to have me read to you. I brought this little one because +I was sure you'd like it, after reading _Endymion_ and _The Eve of St. +Agnes_." + +"What is it?" + +"Keats's letters to Fanny Brawne." + +The little brown book was old and its corners were dog-eared, but the +yellowed pages, with their record of a deathless passion, were still +warmly human and alive. Roger had a deep, pleasant voice, and he read +well. Quite apart from the beauty of the letters, it gave Barbara +pleasure to sit in the firelight and watch his face. + +[Sidenote: A Folded Paper] + +He read steadily, pausing now and then for comment, until he was +half-way through the volume; then, as he turned a page, a folded paper +fell out. He picked it up curiously. + +"Why, Barbara," he said, in astonishment. "It's my father's writing." + +"What is it--notes?" + +"No, he seems to have been trying to write a letter like those in the +book. It is all in pencil, with changes and erasures here and there. +Listen: + +[Sidenote: The Letter] + + "'You are right, as you always are, and we must + never see each other again. We must live near each + other for the rest of our lives, with that + consciousness between us. We must pass each other + on the street and not speak unless others are with + us; then we must bow, pleasantly, for the sake of + appearances. + + "'I hope you do not blame me because I went mad. + I ask your pardon, and yet I cannot say I am sorry. + That one hour of confession is worth a lifetime of + waiting--it is worth all the husks that we are to + have henceforward while we starve for more. + + "'Through all the years to come, we shall be + separated by less than a mile, yet the world lies + between us and divides us as by a glittering + sword. You will not be unfaithful to your pledge, + nor I to mine. Nothing is changed there. It is + only that two people chose to live in the + starlight and bound themselves to it eternally, + then had one blinding glimpse of God's great sun. + + "'But, Constance, the stars are the same as + always, and we must try to forget that we have + seen the sun. The little lights of the temple must + be the more faithfully tended if the Great Light + goes out. When the white splendour fades, we must + be content with the misty gold of night, and not + mind the shadows nor the great desolate spaces + where not even starlight comes. Your star and mine + met for an instant, then were sundered as widely + as the poles, but the light of each must be kept + steadfast and clear, because of the other. + + "'I do not know that I shall have the courage to + send this letter. Everything was said when I told + you that I love you, for that one word holds it + all and there is nothing more. As you can take + your heart in the hollow of your hand and hold it, + it is so small a thing; so the one word 'love' + holds everything that can be said, or given, or + hungered for, or prayed for and denied. + + "'And if, sometimes, in the starlight, we dream of + the sun, we must remember that both sun and stars + are God's. Past the unutterable leagues that + divide us now, one day we shall meet again, + purged, mayhap, of earthly longing for earthly + love. + + "'But Heaven, for me, would be the hour I held you + close again. I should ask nothing more than to + tell you once more, face to face and heart to + heart, the words I write now: I love you--I love + you--I love you.'" + +[Sidenote: A Discovery] + +Roger put down the book and stared fixedly at the fire. Barbara's face +was very pale and the light had gone from her eyes. + +"Roger," she said, in a strange tone, "Constance was my mother's name. +Do you think----" + +He was startled, for his thought had not gone so far as her intuition. +"I--do--not--know," he said. + +"They knew each other," Barbara went on, swiftly, "for the two families +have always lived here, in these same two houses where you and I were +born. It was only a step across the road, and they----" + +[Sidenote: A Barrier] + +She choked back a sob. Something new and terrible seemed to have sprung +up suddenly between her and Roger. + +The blood beat hard in his ears and his own words sounded dull and far +away. "It is dated June third," he said. + +"My mother died on the seventh," said Barbara, slowly, +"by--her--own--hand." + +They sat in silence for a long time. Then, speaking of indifferent +things, they tried to get back upon the old friendly footing again, but +failed miserably. There was a consciousness as of guilt, on either side. + +Roger tried not to think of it. Later, when he was alone, he would go +over it all and try to reason it out--try to discover if it were true. +Barbara did not need to do this, for, with a woman's quick insight, she +knew. + +Secretly, too, both were ashamed, having come unawares upon knowledge +that was not meant for them. Presently, Roger went home, and was glad to +be alone in the free outer air; but, long after he was gone, Barbara sat +in the dark, her heart aching with the burden of her father's doubt and +her dead mother's secret. + + + + +VII + +An Afternoon Call + + +The rap at the Norths' front door was of the sort which would impel the +dead to rise and answer it. Before the echo of the imperative summons +had died away, Miriam had opened it and admitted Miss Mattie. + +[Sidenote: Bein' Neighbourly] + +"I was sewin' over to my house," announced the visitor, settling herself +comfortably, "and I surmised as how you might be sewin' over here, so +I thought we might as well set together for a spell. I believe in bein' +neighbourly." + +Barbara smiled a welcome and Miriam brought in a quilt which she was +binding by hand. As she worked, she studied Miss Mattie furtively, and +with an air of detachment. + +"I come over on the trail Roger has wore in the grass," continued Miss +Mattie, biting off her thread with a snap. "He's organised himself into +sort of a travellin' library, I take it, what with transportin' books at +all hours back and forth. After I go to bed, Roger lets himself out and +sneaks over here, carryin' readin' matter both ways. But land's sake," +she chuckled, "I ain't carin' what he does after I get sleepy. I was +never one to stay up after nine o'clock for the sake of entertainment. +If there's sickness, or anythin' like that, of course it's a different +matter. + +"Roger's pa was always a great one for readin', and we've both inherited +it from him. Roger sits with his books and I sit with my paper, and we +both read, never sayin' a word to each other, till almost nine o'clock. +We're what you might call a literary family. + +[Sidenote: "Jewel of a Girl"] + +"I'm just readin' a perfectly beautiful story called _Margaret Merriman, +or the Maiden's Mad Marriage_. Margaret must have been worth lookin' at, +for she had golden hair and eyes like sapphires and ruby lips and pearly +teeth. I was readin' the description of her to Roger, and he said she +seemed to be what some people would call 'a jewel of a girl.' + +"Margaret Merriman's mother died when she was an infant in arms, just +like your ma, Barbara, and left her to her pa. Her pa didn't marry +again, though several was settin' their caps for him on account of him +bein' young and handsome and havin' a lot of money. I suppose bein' a +widower had somethin' to do with it, too. It does beat all how women +will run after a widower. I suppose they want a man who's already been +trained, but, speakin' for myself, I've always felt as if I'd rather +have somethin' fresh and do my own trainin'--women's notions differ so +about husbands. + +[Sidenote: Training Husbands] + +"Just think what it would be to marry a man, thinkin' he was all +trained, and to find out that it had been done wrong. You'd have to +begin all over again, and it'd be harder than startin' in with absolute +ignorance. The man would get restless, too. When he thought he was +graduated and was about ready to begin on a post-graduate course, he'd +find himself in the kindergarten, studyin' with beads and singin' about +little raindrops. + +"Gettin' an idea into a man's head is like furnishin' a room. If you can +once get a piece of furniture where you want it, it can stay there until +it's worn out or busted, except for occasional dustin' and repairin'. +You can add from time to time as you have to, but if you attempt to +refurnish a room that's all furnished, and do it all at once, you're +bound to make more disturbance than housecleanin'. + +"It has to be done slow and careful, unless you have a likin' for rows, +and if you're one of those kind of women that's forever changin' their +minds about furniture and their husband's ideas, you're bound to have a +terrible restless marriage. + +"Roger's pa was fresh when I took him, but, unbeknownst to me, he'd done +his own furnishin', and the pieces was dreadful set and hard to move. +Some of 'em I slid out gently and others took some manouverin', but +steady work tells on anythin'. He was thinkin' as I wanted him to about +most things, though, when he died, and that's sayin' a good deal, for he +didn't die until after we'd been married seven years and three months +and eighteen days. If he wasn't really thinkin' right, he was pretendin' +to, and that's enough to satisfy any reasonable woman. + +[Sidenote: The Will] + +"Margaret Merriman's pa died when she was at the tender age of ten, and +he left all his money to a distant relation in trust for Margaret, the +relative bein' supposed to spend the income on her. If Margaret died +before she was of age, the relative was to keep it, and if she should +marry before she was of age, the relative was to keep it, too. But, +livin' to eighteen' and marryin' afterwards, it was all to be +Margaret's, and the relative wasn't to have as much as a two-cent stamp +with the mucilage licked off. + +"This relative was a sweet-faced lady with a large mole on her right +cheek. Margaret used to call her 'Moley,' when she was mad at her, which +was right frequent. Her name was Magdalene Mather and she'd been married +three times. She was dreadful careless with her husbands and had mislaid +'em all. Not bein' able to find 'em again, she just reckoned on their +bein' dead and was thinkin' of marryin' some more. + +[Sidenote: Keeping Margaret Young] + +"Seems to me it's a mistake for anybody to marry more'n once. In one of +Roger's books it says somethin' about a second marriage bein' the +triumph of hope over experience. Magdalene Mather was dreadful hopeful +and kept thinkin' that maybe she could get somebody who would stay with +her without bein' chained up. Meanwhile it was to her interest to keep +little Margaret as young as possible. + +"Margaret thought she was ten when she went to live with Magdalene, but +she soon learned that it was a mistake and she got to be only seven in +less'n half an hour. Magdalene put shorter dresses on her and kept her +in white and gave her shoes without any heels, and these little short +socks that show a foot or so of bare leg and which is indecent, if +fashionable. + +"Margaret's birthdays kept gettin' farther and farther apart, and as +soon as the neighbours begun to notice that Margaret wasn't agin' like +everybody else, why, Magdalene would just pack up and go to a new place. + +"She didn't go to school, but had private teachers, because it was in +the will that she was to be educated like a real lady. Any teacher who +thought Margaret was too far advanced for her age got fired the minute +it was spoke of, and pretty soon Margaret got onto it herself. She used +to tell teachers she liked to say that she was very backward in her +studies, and tell those she didn't like that Aunty Magdalene would be +dreadful pleased to hear that she was improvin' in her readin' and +'rithmetic and grammar. + +"Meanwhile Nature was workin' in Margaret's interest and she was growin' +taller and taller every day. The short socks had to be took off because +people laughed so, and Magdalene had to let her braid her hair instead +of havin' it cut Dutch and tied with a ribbon. When she was eighteen, +she thought she was thirteen, and she was wearin' dresses that come to +her shoe tops, and her hair in one braid down her back, and dreadful +young hats and no jewels, though her pa had left her a small trunk full +of rubies and diamonds and pearls. Magdalene was wearin' the jewels +herself. They were movin' around pretty rapid about this time, and goin' +from city to city in order to find better teachers for 'the dear child' +as Magdalene used to call her. + +[Sidenote: The Conductor] + +"One day, soon after they'd gone to a new city, Margaret was goin' down +town to take her music lesson. She went alone because Magdalene was laid +up with a headache and wanted the house quiet. When the conductor come +along for the fare, Margaret was lookin' out of the window, and, +absent-minded like, she give him a penny instead of a nickel. + +"The conductor give it back to her, and asked her if she was so young +she could go for half fare, and Margaret says, right sharp, when she +give him the nickel, 'It's not so long since I was travellin' on +half-fare.' + +"The conductor says: 'I'd hate to have been hangin' up by the thumbs +since you was,' says he. Of course this made Margaret good and mad, and +she says to the conductor, 'How old do you think I am?' + +"The conductor says: 'I ain't paid to think durin' union hours, but +I imagine that you ain't old enough to lie about your age.' + +[Sidenote: Ronald Macdonald] + +"Just then an old woman with a green parrot in a big cage fell off the +car while she was gettin' off backwards as usual, and Margaret didn't +have no more chance to fight with the conductor. She saw, however, that +he was terrible good lookin'--like the dummy in the tailor's window. It +says in the story that 'Ronald Macdonald'--that was his name--was as +handsome as a young Greek god and, though lowly in station, he would +have adorned a title had it been his.' + +"Margaret got to doin' some thinkin' about herself, and wonderin' why it +was she didn't seem to age none. And whenever she happened to get onto +Ronald Macdonald's car, she noticed that he was awful polite and +chivalrous to women. He waited patiently when any two of 'em was +decidin' who was to pay the fare and findin' their purses, and sayin', +'You must let me pay next time,' and he would tickle a cryin' baby +under the chin and make it bill and coo like a bird. + +"Did you ever see a baby bill? I never did neither, but that's what it +said in the paper. I suppose it has some reference to the expense of +their comin' and their keep through the whoopin' cough stage and the +measles, and so on. There don't neither of you know nothin' about it +'cause you ain't married, but when Roger come, his pa was obliged to +mortgage the house, and the mortgage didn't get took off until Roger was +out of dresses and goin' to school and beginnin' to write with ink. + +[Sidenote: Fine Manners] + +"Let me see--what was I talkin' about? Oh, yes--Ronald Macdonald's fine +manners. When a woman give him five pennies instead of a nickel, he was +always just as polite to her as he was to anybody, and would help her +off the car and carry her bundles to the corner for her, and everything +like that. Of course Margaret couldn't help noticin' this and likin' him +for it though she was still mad at him for what he said about her age. + +"One morning Margaret give him a quarter so's he'd have to make change, +and while he was doin' it, she says to him, 'How nice it must be to ride +all day without payin' for it.' + +"'I'm under age,' says Ronald Macdonald, with a smile that showed all +his beautiful teeth and his ruby lips under his black waxed mustache. + +"'Get out,' says Margaret, surprised. + +"'I am, though,' says Ronald, confidentially. 'I'm just nineteen. How +old are you?' + +"'Thirteen,' says Margaret, softly. + +"'Don't renig,' says Ronald. 'I think we're pretty near of an age.' + +"When Margaret got home, she looked up 'renig' in the dictionary, but it +wasn't there. She was too smart to ask Magdalene, but she kept on +thinkin'. + +[Sidenote: Chance Acquaintances] + +"One day, while she was goin' down in the car, two men came in and sat +by her. They was chance acquaintances, it seemed, havin' just met at the +hotel. 'Your face is terrible familiar to me,' one of the men said. +'I've seen you before, or your picture, or something, somewhere. Upon my +soul, I believe your picture is hung up in my last wife's boudoir.' + +"'Good God,' says the other man, turnin' as pale as death, 'did you +marry Magdalene Mather, too?' + +"'I did,' says the first man. + +"'Then, brother,' says the second man, 'let us get off at the next +corner and go and drown our mutual sorrow in drink.' + +"After they got off, Margaret went out to Ronald, and she says to him: +'There goes two of my aunt's husbands. She's had three, and there's two +of 'em, right there.' + +"'Well,' says Ronald, 'if Aunty ain't got a death certificate and two or +three divorces put away somewhere, she stands right in line to get +canned for a few years for bigamy. You don't look like you had an aunt +that was a trigamist,' says he. + +"Margaret didn't understand much of this, but she still kept thinkin'. +One day while Magdalene was at an afternoon reception, wearin' all of +Margaret's jewels, Margaret looked all through her private belongings to +see if she could find any divorces, and she come on a family Bible with +the date of her birth in it, and her father's will. + +[Sidenote: Facts of the Case] + +"Soon, she understands the whole game, and by doin' a small sum in +subtraction, she sees that she is goin' on nineteen now. She's afraid to +leave the proofs in the house over night, so she wraps 'em up in a +newspaper, and flies with 'em to her only friend Ronald Macdonald, and +asks him to keep 'em for her until she comes after 'em. He says he will +guard them with his life. + +"When Margaret goes back after them, havin' decided to face her aunt and +demand her inheritance, Ronald has already read 'em, but of course he +don't let on that he has. He convinces her that she ought to get married +before she faces her aunt, so that a husband's strong arm will be at +hand to defend her through the terrible ordeal. + +"Margaret thinks she sees a way out, for she has been studyin' up on law +in the meantime, and she remembers how Ronald has told her he is under +age, and she knows the marriage won't be legal, but will serve to +deceive her aunt. + +[Sidenote: The Climax] + +"So she flies with him and they are married, and then when they confront +Magdalene with the will, and the family Bible and their marriage +certificate, and tell her she is a trigamist, and they will make trouble +for her if she don't do right by 'em, Magdalene sobs out, 'Oh, Heaven, I +am lost!' and falls in a dead faint from which she don't come out for +six weeks. + +"In the meantime, Margaret has thanked Ronald Macdonald for his great +kindness, and says he can go now, as the marriage ain't legal, he bein' +under age and not havin' his parents' consent. Ronald gives a long, loud +laugh and then he digs up his family Bible and shows Margaret how he is +almost twenty-five and old enough to be married, and that women have no +patent on lyin' about their ages, and that he is not going away. + +"Margaret swoons, and when she comes to, she finds that Ronald has +resigned his job as a street-car conductor, and has bought some fine +clothes on her credit, and is prepared to live happy ever afterward. He +bids eternal farewell to work in a long and impassioned speech that's so +full of fine language that it would do credit to a minister, and there +Margaret is, in a trap of her own makin', with a husband to take care +of her money instead of an aunt. Next week, I'll know more about how it +turns out, but that's as far as I've got now. Ain't it a perfectly +beautiful story?" + +Miriam muttered some sort of answer, but Barbara smiled. "It is very +interesting," she said, kindly. "I've never read anything like it." + +[Sidenote: Going the Rounds] + +"It's a lot better'n the books you and Roger waste your time over," +returned the guest, much gratified; "but I can't lend you the papers, +cause there's five waitin' after the postmaster's wife, and goodness +knows how many of them has promised others. I don't mind runnin' over +once in a while, though, and tellin' you about 'em while I sew. + +"It keeps 'em fresh in my memory," she added, happily, "and Roger is so +busy with his law books he don't have time to listen to 'em except at +supper. He reads law every evening now, and he didn't used to. Guess he +ain't wasting so much time as he was. Been down to the hotel yet?" she +asked, inclining her head toward Miriam. + +"Once," answered Miriam, reluctantly. + +[Sidenote: Gossip] + +"There ain't many come yet," the postmaster's wife tells me. "There's a +young lady at the hotel named Miss Eloise Wynne, and every day but +Saturday she gets a letter from the city, addressed in a man's writin'. +And every afternoon, when the boy brings the hotel mail down to go out +on the night train, there's a big white square envelope in a woman's +writin' addressed to Doctor Allan Conrad, some place in the city. The +envelope smells sweet, but the writin' is dreadful big and +sploshy-lookin'. Know anything about her?" Miss Mattie gazed sharply at +Miriam over her spectacles. + +"No," returned Miriam, decisively. + +"Thought maybe you would. Anyhow, you don't need to be so sharp about +it, cause there's no harm in askin' a civil question. My mother always +taught me that a civil question called for a civil answer. I should +think, from the letters and all, that he was her steady company, +shouldn't you?" + +"It's possible," assented Barbara, seeing that Miriam did not intend to +reply. + +"There's some talk at the sewin' circle of gettin' you one of them hand +sewin' machines," continued Miss Mattie, "so's you could sew more and +better." + +Barbara flushed painfully. "Thank you," she answered, "but I couldn't +use it. I much prefer to do all my work by hand." + +"All right," assented Miss Mattie, good-humouredly. "It ain't our idea +to force a sewin' machine onto anybody that don't want it. We can use +some of the money in gettin' a door-mat for the front door of the +church. And, if I was you, I wouldn't let my pa run around so much by +himself. If he wants to borrow a dog to go with him, Roger would be +willin' to lend him Judge Bascom's Fido. If the Judge wasn't willin', +Roger would try to persuade him. Lendin' Fido would make law easier for +Roger and be a great help to your pa. + +"I must go, now, and get supper. Good-bye. I've enjoyed my visit ever so +much. Come over sometime, Miriam--you ain't very sociable. Good-bye." + +The two women watched Miss Mattie scudding blithely over the trail +which, as she said, Roger had worn in the grass. Miriam looked after her +gloomily, but Barbara was laughing. + +"Don't look so cross, Aunty," chided Barbara. "No one ever came here who +was so easy to entertain." + +"Humph," grunted Miriam, and went out. + +[Sidenote: Relief] + +But even Barbara sighed in relief when she was left alone. She +understood some of Roger's difficulties of which he never spoke, and +realised that the much-maligned "Bascom liver" could not be held +responsible for all his discontent. + +She wondered what Roger's father had been like, and did not wonder that +he was unhappy, if his nature was in any way akin to his son's. But her +mother? How could she have failed to appreciate the beautiful old father +whom Barbara loved with all the passion and strength of her young +heart! + +[Sidenote: The Secret] + +"He mustn't know," said Barbara to herself, for the hundredth time. +"Father must never know." + + + + +VIII + +A Fairy Godmother + + +[Sidenote: The Postponed Visit] + +As cool and fresh as the June morning of which she seemed a veritable +part, Miss Eloise Wynne, immaculately clad in white linen, opened the +little grey gate. It was a week later than she had promised to come, but +she had not been idle, and considered herself justified for the delay. + +Miriam opened the door for her and introduced Barbara. Eloise smiled +radiantly as she offered a smooth, well-kept hand. "I know I'm late," +she said, "but I think you'll forgive me for it a little later on. +I want to see all the lingerie--every piece you have to sell." + +"Would you mind coming upstairs?" asked Barbara. + +"No, indeed." + +The two went up, Barbara slowly leading the way. Miriam remained +downstairs to make sure that the blind man did not come in unexpectedly +and overhear things which he would be much happier not to know. + +"What a lot of it," Eloise was saying. "And what a wonderful old chest." + +[Sidenote: Dainty Wares] + +Trembling with excitement, Barbara spread forth her dainty wares. Eloise +was watching her narrowly, and, with womanly intuition, saw the dire +need and the courageous spirit struggling against it. + +"Just a minute, please," said Barbara; "I'd better tell you now. My +father is blind and he does not know we are poor, nor that I make these +things to sell. He thinks that they are for myself and that I am very +vain. So, if he should come home while you are here, please do not spoil +our little deceit." + +Barbara lifted her luminous blue eyes to Eloise and smiled. It was a +brave little smile without a hint of self-pity, and it went straight to +the older woman's heart. + +"I'll be careful," said Eloise. "I think it's dear of you." + +"Now," said Barbara, stooping to peer into the corners of the deep +chest, "I think that's all." She began, hurriedly, to price everything +as she passed it to Eloise, giving the highest price each time. When she +had finished, she was amazed at Miss Wynne's face--it was so full of +resentment. + +"Do you mean to tell me," asked Eloise, in a queer voice, "that you are +asking _that_ for _these_?" + +The blue eyes threatened to overflow, but Barbara straightened herself +proudly. "It is all hand work," she said, with quiet dignity, "and the +material is the very best. I could not possibly afford to sell it for +less." + +"You goose," laughed Eloise, "you have misunderstood me. There is not a +thing here that is not worth at least a third more than you are asking +for it. Give me a pencil and paper and some pins." + +[Sidenote: Higher Prices] + +Barbara obeyed, wondering what this beautiful visitor would do next. +Eloise took up every garment and examined it critically. Then she made a +new price tag and pinned it over the old one. She advanced even the +plainest garments at least a third, the more elaborate ones were +doubled, and some of the embroidered things were even tripled in price. +When she came to the shirtwaist patterns, exquisitely embroidered upon +sheerest handkerchief linen, she shamelessly multiplied the price by +four and pinned the new tag on. + +"Oh," gasped Barbara; "nobody will ever pay that much for things to +wear." + +"Somebody is going to right now," announced Eloise, with decision. "I'll +take this, and this, and this," she went on, rapidly choosing, "and +these, and these, and this. I'll take those four for a friend of mine +who is going to be married next week--this solves the eternal problem of +wedding-presents--and all of these for next Santa Claus time. + +"I can use all the handkerchiefs, and every pin-cushion cover and +corsage-pad you've made. Please don't sell anything else until I've +heard from some more of my friends to whom I have already written. And +you're not to offer one of these exquisite things to those +unappreciative people at the hotel, for I have a letter from a friend +who is on the Board of Directors of the Woman's Exchange, and got a +chance for you to sell there. How long have you been doing this?" + +[Sidenote: In a Whirl of Confusion] + +"Seven or eight years," murmured Barbara. Her senses were so confused +that the room seemed to be whirling and her face was almost as white as +the lingerie. + +"And those women at the hotel would really buy these things at such +ridiculous prices?" + +"Not often," answered Barbara, trying to smile. "They would not pay so +much. Sometimes we had to sell for very little more than the cost of the +material. One woman said we ought not to expect so much for things that +were not made with a sewing-machine, but of course, Aunt Miriam had been +to the city and she knew that hand work was worth more." + +"I wish I'd been there," remarked Eloise. There was a look around her +mouth which would have boded no good to anybody if she had. "When I see +what brutes women can be, sometimes I am ashamed because I am a woman." + +"And," returned Barbara, softly, "when I see what good angels women can +be, it makes me proud to be a woman." + +"Where do you get your material?" asked Eloise, quickly. + +Barbara named the large department store where Aunt Miriam bought linen, +lawn, batiste, lace, patterns, and incidentally managed to absorb ideas. + +"I see I'm needed in Riverdale-by-the-Sea," observed Miss Wynne. "I can +arrange for you to buy all you want at the lowest wholesale price." + +"Would it save anything?" asked Barbara, doubtfully. + +[Sidenote: Practical Help] + +"Would it?" repeated Eloise, smiling. "Just wait and see. After I've +written about that and had some samples sent to you, we'll talk over +half a dozen or more complete sets of lingerie for me, and some more +shirtwaists. Is there a pen downstairs? I want to write a check for +you." + +When they went into the living-room, Barbara's cheeks were burning with +excitement and her eyes shone like stars. When she took the check, which +Eloise wrote with an accustomed air, she could scarcely speak, but +managed to stammer out, "Thank you." + +"You needn't," said Eloise, coolly, "for I'm only buying what I want at +a price I consider very reasonable and fair. If you'll get some samples +of your work ready, I'll send up for them, and hurry them on to my +friend who is to put them into the Woman's Exchange. And please don't +sell anything more just now. I've just thought of a friend whose +daughter is going to be married soon, and she may want me to select some +things for her." + +"You're a fairy godmother," said Barbara. "This morning we were poor and +discouraged. You came in and waved your wand, and now we are rich. I have +heart for anything now." + +[Sidenote: Always Rich] + +"You are always rich while you have courage, and without it Croesus +himself would be poor. It's not the circumstance, remember--it's the way +you meet it." + +"I know," said Barbara, but her eyes filled with tears of gratitude, +nevertheless. + +Ambrose North came in from the street, and immediately felt the presence +of a stranger in the room. "Who is here?" he asked. + +"This is Miss Wynne, Father. She is stopping at the hotel and came up to +call." + +The old man bowed in courtly fashion over the young woman's hand. "We +are glad to see you," he said, gently. "I am blind, but I can see with +my soul." + +"That is the true sight," returned Eloise. Her big brown eyes were soft +with pity. + +"Have many of the guests come?" he inquired. + +"I have a friend," laughed Eloise, "who says it is wrong to call people +'guests' when they are stopping at a hotel. He insists that 'inmates' is +a much better word." + +"He is not far from right," said the old man, smiling. "Is he there +now?" + +"No, he comes down Saturday mornings and stays until Monday morning. +That is all the vacation he allows himself. You are fortunate to live +here," she added, kindly. "I do not know of a more beautiful place." + +[Sidenote: Invited to Luncheon] + +"Nor I. To us--to me, especially--it is hallowed by memories. We--you +will stay to luncheon, will you not, Miss Wynne?" + +Eloise glanced quickly at Barbara. "If you only would," she said. + +"If you really want me," said Eloise, "I'd love to." She took off her +hat--a white one trimmed with lilacs--and smoothed the waves in her +copper-coloured hair. Barbara took her crutches and went out, very +quietly, to help Aunt Miriam prepare for the guest. + +When the kitchen door was safely closed, Barbara's joy bubbled into +speech. "Oh, Aunt Miriam," she cried; "she's bought nearly every thing +I had and paid almost double price for it. She's already arranged for +me to sell at the Woman's Exchange in the city, and she is going to +write to some of her friends about the things I have left. She's going +to arrange for me to get all my material at the lowest wholesale price, +and she's ordered six complete sets of lingerie for herself. She wants +some more shirtwaists, too. Oh, Aunt Miriam, do you think the world is +coming to an end?" + +"Has she paid you?" queried Miriam, gravely. + +"Indeed she has." + +"Then it probably is." + +Miriam was not a woman easily to be affected by joy, but the hard lines +of her face softened perceptibly. "Show her the quilts," she suggested. + +"Oh, Aunt Miriam, I'd be ashamed to, to-day, when she's bought so much. +She'll be coming up again before long--she said so. And father's asked +her to luncheon." + +"Just like him," commented Miriam, with a sigh. "He always suffered from +hospitality. I'll have to go to the store." + +[Sidenote: The Best We Have] + +"No, you won't, Aunty--she's not that sort. We'll give her the best we +have, with a welcome thrown in." + +If Eloise thought it strange for one end of the table to be set with +solid silver, heavy damask, and fine china, while the other end, where +she and the two women of the house sat, was painfully different, she +gave no sign of it in look or speech. The humble fare might have been +the finest banquet so far as she was concerned. She fitted herself to +their ways without apparent effort; there was no awkwardness nor feeling +of strangeness. She might have been a life-long friend of the family, +instead of a passing acquaintance who had come to buy lingerie. + +[Sidenote: Friendly Conversation] + +As she ate, she talked. It was not aimless chatter, but the rare gift of +conversation. She drew them all out and made them talk, too. Even Miriam +relaxed and said something more than "yes" and "no." + +"What delicious preserves," said Eloise. "May I have some more, please? +Where do you get them?" + +"I make them," answered Miriam, the dull red rising in her cheeks. She +had not been entirely disinterested when she climbed up on a chair and +took down some of her choicest fruit from the highest shelf of the +store-room. + +"Do you--" A look from Barbara stopped the unlucky speech. "Do you find +it difficult?" asked Eloise, instantly mistress of the situation. "I +should so love to make some for myself." + +"Miriam will be glad to teach you," put in Ambrose North. "She likes to +do it because she can do it so well." + +The red grew deeper in Miriam's lined face, for every word of praise +from him was food to her hungry soul. She would gladly have laid down +her life for him, even though she hated herself for feeling as she did. + +[Sidenote: An Hour of Song] + +Afterward, while Miriam was clearing off the table, Eloise went to the +piano without being asked, and sang to them for more than an hour. She +chose folk-songs and tender melodies--little songs made of tears and +laughter, and the simple ballads that never grow old. She had a deep, +vibrant contralto voice of splendid range and volume; she sang with rare +sympathy, and every word could be clearly understood. + +"Don't stop," pleaded Barbara, when she paused and ran her fingers +lightly over the keys. + +"I don't want to impose upon your good-nature," she returned, "but I love +to sing." + +"And we love to have you," said North. "I think, Barbara, we must get a +new piano." + +"I wouldn't," answered Eloise, before Barbara could speak. "The years +improve wine and violins and friendship, so why not a piano?" Without +waiting for his reply, she began to sing, with exquisite tenderness: + + "Sometimes between long shadows on the grass + The little truant waves of sunlight pass; + Mine eyes grow dim with tenderness the while, + Thinking I see thee, thinking I see thee smile. + + "And sometimes in the twilight gloom apart + The tall trees whisper, whisper heart to heart; + From my fond lips the eager answers fall, + Thinking I hear thee, thinking I hear thee call." + +"Yes," said Ambrose North, unsteadily, as the last chord died away, "I +know. You can call and call, but nothing ever comes back to you." The +tears streamed over his blind face as he rose and went out of the room. + +"What have I done?" asked Eloise. "Oh, what have I done?" + +"Nothing," sighed Barbara. "My mother has been dead for twenty-one +years, but my father never forgets. She was only a girl when she +died--like me." + +"I'm so sorry. Why didn't you tell me before, so I could have chosen +jolly, happy things?" + +"That wouldn't keep him from grieving--nothing can, so don't be troubled +about it." + +Eloise turned back to the piano and sang two or three rollicking, +laughing melodies that set Barbara's one foot to tapping on the floor, +but the old man did not come back. + +"I never meant to stay so long," said Eloise, rising and putting on her +hat. + +"It isn't long," returned Barbara, with evident sincerity. "I wish you +wouldn't go." + +"But I must, my dear. If I don't go, I can never come again. I have lots +of letters to write, and mail will be waiting for me, and I have some +studying to do, so I must go." + +[Sidenote: Adieus] + +Barbara went to the door with her. "Good-bye, Fairy Godmother," she +said, wistfully. + +"Good-bye, Fairy Godchild," answered Eloise, carelessly. Then something +in the girl's face impelled her to put a strong arm around Barbara, and +kiss her, very tenderly. The blue eyes filled with tears. + +"Thank you for that," breathed Barbara, "more than for anything else." + + * * * * * + +Eloise went away humming to herself, but she stopped as soon as she was +out of sight of the house. "The little thing," she thought; "the dear, +brave little thing! A face like an angel, and that cross old woman, and +that beautiful old man who sees with his soul. And all that exquisite +work and the prices those brutal women paid her for it. Blind and lame, +and nothing to be done." + +Then another thought made her brown eyes very bright. "But I'm not so +sure of that--we'll see." + +[Sidenote: A Request] + +She wrote many letters that afternoon, and all were for Barbara. The +last and longest was to Doctor Conrad, begging him to come at the first +possible moment and go with her to see a poor broken child who might be +made well and strong and beautiful. + +"And," the letter went on, "perhaps you could give her father back his +eyesight. She calls me her Fairy Godmother, and I rely upon you to keep +my proud position for me. Any way, Allan, dear, please come, won't you?" + +[Sidenote: Awaiting Results] + +She closed it with a few words which would have made him start for the +Klondike that night, had there been a train, and she asked it of him; +posted it, and hopefully awaited results. + + + + +IX + +Taking the Chance + + +[Sidenote: Dr. Conrad Comes] + +"Well, I'm here," remarked Doctor Conrad, as he sat on the beach with +Eloise. "I have left all my patients in the care of an inferior, though +reputable physician, who has such winning ways that he may have annexed +my entire practice by the time I get back. + +"If you'll tell me just where these protégées of yours are, I'll go up +there right away. I'll ring the bell, and when they open the door I'll +say: 'I've come from Miss Wynne, and I'm to amputate this morning and +remove a couple of cataracts this afternoon. Kindly have the patients +get ready at once.'" + +"Don't joke, Allan," pleaded Eloise. Her brown eyes were misty and her +mood of exalted tenderness made her in love with all the world. "If you +could see that brave little thing, with her beautiful face and her +divine unselfishness, hobbling around on crutches and sewing for a +living, meanwhile keeping her blind old father from knowing they are +poor, you'd feel just as I do." + +[Sidenote: Discussing the Case] + +"It is very improbable," returned Allan, seriously, "that anything can +be done. If they were well-to-do, they undoubtedly made every effort and +saw everybody worth seeing." + +"But in twenty years," suggested Eloise, hopefully. "Think of all the +progress that has been made in twenty years." + +"I know," said Allan, doubtfully. "All we can do is to see. And if +anything can be done for them, why, of course we'll do it." + +"Then we'll go for a little drive," she said, "and on our way back, we +can stop there and get the things I bought the other day. They have no +one to send with them, and it's too much for one person to carry, +anyway." + +"I suppose she has sold everything she had," mused Allan impersonally. + +"Not quite," answered Eloise, flushing. "I left her some samples for the +Woman's Exchange." + +"Very kind," he observed, with the same air of detachment. "I can see my +finish. My wife will have so much charity work for me to do that there +will be no time for anything else, and, in a little while, she will have +given away all the money we both have. Then when we're sitting together +in the sun on the front steps of the poorhouse, we can fittingly lament +the end of our usefulness." + +[Sidenote: Policy of Segregation] + +"They won't let us sit together," she retorted. "Don't you know that +even in the old people's homes they keep the men and women +apart--husbands and wives included?" + +"For the love of Mike, what for?" he asked, in surprise. + +"Because it makes the place too gay and frivolous. Old ladies of eighty +were courted by awkward swains of ninety and more, and there was so much +checker-playing in the evening and so many lights burning, and so many +requests for new clothes, that the management couldn't stand it. There +were heart-burnings and jealousies, too, so they had to adopt a policy +of segregation." + +"'Hope springs eternal in the human breast,'" quoted Allan. + +"And love," she said. "I've thought sometimes I'd like to play fairy +godmother to some of those poor, desolate old people who love each +other, and give them a pretty wedding. Wouldn't it be dear to see two +old people married and settled in a little home of their own?" + +"Or, more likely, with us," he returned. "I've been thinking about a +nice little house with a guest room or two, but I've changed my mind. My +vote is for a very small apartment. You're not the sort to be trusted +with a guest room." + +[Sidenote: Starting Off] + +Eloise laughed and sprang to her feet. "On to the errand of mercy," she +said. "We're wasting valuable time. Get a horse and buggy and I'll see +if I can borrow an extra suit-case or two for my purchases." + +When she came down, Allan was waiting for her in the buggy. A bell-boy, +in her wake, brought three suit-cases and piled them under the seat. +Half a dozen rocking-chairs, on the veranda, held highly interested +observers. The paraphernalia suggested an elopement. + +"Tell those women on the veranda," said Eloise, to the boy, "that I'm +not taking any trunks and will soon be back." + +"What for?" queried Allan, as they drove away. + +"Reasons of my own," she answered, crisply. "Men are as blind as bats." + +"I'm wearing glasses," he returned, with due humility. "If you think I'm +fit to hear why you left that cryptic message, I'd be pleased to." + +"You're far from fit. Here, turn into this road." + +Spread like a tawny ribbon upon the green of the hills, the road wound +lazily through open sunny spaces and shaded aisles sweet with that cool +fragrance found only in the woods. The horse did not hurry, but wandered +comfortably from side to side of the road, browsing where he chose. He +seemed to know that lovers were driving him. + +[Sidenote: Horses versus Autos] + +"He's a one-armed horse, isn't he?" laughed Eloise. "I like him lots +better than an automobile, don't you?" + +"Out here, I do. But an automobile has certain advantages." + +"What are they?" she demanded. "I'd rather feed a horse than to buy a +tire, any day." + +"So would I--unless he tired of his feed. But if you want to get +anywhere very quickly and the thing happens not to break, the machine is +better." + +"But it never happens. I believe the average automobile is possessed of +an intuition little short of devilish. A horse seems more friendly. If +you were thinking of getting me a little electric runabout for my +birthday, please change it to a horse." + +"All right," returned Allan, serenely. "We can keep him in the +living-room of our six-room apartment and have his dinner sent in from +the nearest _table d'oat_. For breakfast, he can come out into the +_salle à manger_ and eat cereals with us." + +"You're absolutely incorrigible," she sighed. "This is the river road. +Follow it until I tell you where to turn." + +Within half an hour, the horse came to a full stop of his own accord in +front of the grey, weather-worn house where Barbara lived. He was +cropping at a particularly enticing clump of grass when Eloise +alighted. + +"Going to push?" queried Allan, lazily. + +"No, this is the place. Come on. You bring two of the suit-cases and +I'll take the other." + +[Sidenote: Observations] + +The blind man was not there at the moment, but came in while Miriam was +upstairs packing Miss Wynne's recent additions to her wardrobe. Doctor +Conrad had been observing Barbara keenly as they talked of indifferent +things. Outwardly, he was calm and professional, but within, a warmly +human impulse answered her evident need. + +He was young and had not yet been at his work long enough to determine +his ultimate nature. Later on, his profession would do to him one of two +things. It would transform him into a mere machine, brutalised and +calloused, with only one or two emotions aside from selfishness left to +thrive in his dwarfed soul, or it would humanise him to godlike +unselfishness, attune him to a divine sympathy, and mellow his heart in +tenderness beyond words. In one instance he would be feared; in the +other, only loved, by those who came to him. + +As Barbara went across the room to another chair, his eyes followed her +with intense interest. Eloise shrank from him a little--she had never +seen him like this before. Yet she knew, from the expression of his +face, that he had found hope, and was glad. + +"Barbara?" It was Miriam, calling from upstairs. + +"In just a minute, Aunty. Excuse me, please--I'll come right back." + +She was scarcely out of the room before Eloise leaned over to Allan, her +face alight with eager questioning. "You think--?" + +[Sidenote: Willing to Try] + +"I don't know," he returned, in a low tone. "It depends on the hardness +of the muscles and several other local conditions. Of course it's +impossible to tell definitely without a thorough examination, but I've +done it successfully in two adult cases, and have seen it done more than +a dozen times. I'd be very willing to try." + +"Oh, Allan," whispered Eloise. "I'm so glad." + +Barbara's padded crutches sounded softly on the stairs as she came down. +Eloise went to the window and studied the horse attentively, though he +was not of the restless sort that needs to be tied. + +While she was watching, Ambrose North came around the base of the hill, +crossed the road, and opened the gate. He had been to his old solitude +at the top of the hill, where, as nowhere else, he found peace. While he +was talking with the visitors, Miriam went out, taking the neatly-packed +suit-cases, one at a time, and put them into the buggy. + +"Mr. North," said Doctor Conrad, "while these girls are chattering, +will you go for a little drive with me?" + +The blind man's fine old face illumined with pleasure. "I should like it +very much," he said. "It is a long time since I had have a drive." + +"It's more like a walk," laughed Allan, as they went out, "with this +horse." + +"We sold our horses many years ago," the old man explained, as he +climbed in. "Miriam is afraid of horses and Barbara said she did not +care to go. I thought the open air and the slight exercise would be good +for her, but she insisted upon my selling them." + +[Sidenote: About Barbara] + +"It is about Barbara that I wished to speak," said Allan. "With your +consent, I should like to make a thorough examination and see whether an +operation would not do away with her crutches entirely." + +"It is no use," sighed North, wearily. "We went everywhere and did +everything, long ago. There is nothing that can be done." + +"But there may be," insisted Allan. "We have learned much, in my +profession, in the last twenty years. May I try?" + +"You're asking me if you can hurt my baby?" + +"Not to hurt her more than is necessary to heal. Understand me, I do not +know but what you are right, but I hope, and believe, that there may be +a chance." + +"I have dreamed sometimes," said the old man, very slowly, "that my baby +could walk and I could see." + +[Sidenote: If Possible] + +"The dream shall come true, if it is possible. Let me see your eyes." He +stopped the horse on the brow of the hill, where the sun shone clear and +strong, stood up, and turned the blind face to the light. Then, sitting +down once more, he asked innumerable questions. When he finally was +silent, Ambrose North turned to him, indifferently. + +"Well?" The tone was simply polite inquiry. The matter seemed to be one +which concerned nobody. + +"Again I do not know," returned Allan. "This is altogether out of my +line, but, if you'll go to the city with me, I'll take you to a friend +of mine who is a great specialist. If anything can be done, he is the +man who can do it. Will you come?" + +There was a long pause. "If Barbara is willing," he answered simply. +"Ask her." + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: The Plunge] + +Meanwhile, Eloise was talking to Barbara. First, she told her of the +letters she had written in her behalf and to which the answers might +come any day now. Then she asked if she might order preserves from Aunt +Miriam, and discussed patterns and material for the lingerie she had +previously spoken of. Finding, at length, that the best way to approach +a difficult subject was the straightest one, she took the plunge. + +"Have you always been lame?" she asked. She did not look at Barbara, but +tried to speak carelessly, as she gazed out of the window. + +"Yes," came the answer, so low that she could scarcely hear it. + +"Wouldn't you like to walk like the rest of us?" continued Eloise. + +Barbara writhed under the torturing question. "My mind can walk," she +said, with difficulty; "my soul isn't lame." + +The tone made Eloise turn quickly--and hate herself bitterly for her +awkwardness. She saw that an apology would only make a bad matter worse, +so she went straight on. + +"Doctor Conrad is very skilful," she continued. "In the city, he is one +of the few really great surgeons. He told me that he would like to make +an examination and see if an operation would not do away with the +crutches. He thinks there may be a good chance. If there is, will you +take it?" + +"Thank you," said Barbara, almost inaudibly. Her voice had sunk to a +whisper and she was very pale. "I do not mean to seem ungrateful, but it +is impossible." + +"Impossible!" repeated Eloise. "Why?" + +"Because of father," explained Barbara. Her colour was coming back +slowly now. "I am all he has, my work supplies his needs, and I dare +not take the risk." + +"Is that the only reason?" + +Barbara nodded. + +"You're not afraid?" + +Barbara's blue eyes opened wide with astonishment. "Why should I be +afraid?" she asked. "Do you take me for a coward?" + +Eloise knelt beside Barbara's low chair and put her strong arms around +the slender, white-clad figure. "Listen, dear," she said. Her face was +shining as though with some great inner light. + +"My own dear father died when I was a child. My mother died when I was +born. I have never had anything but money. I have never had anyone to +take care of, no one to make sacrifices for, no one to make me strong +because I was needed. If the worst should happen, would you trust your +father to me? Could you trust me?" + +"Yes," said Barbara slowly; "I could." + +[Sidenote: A Compact] + +"Then I promise you solemnly that your father shall never want for +anything while he lives. And now, if there is a chance, will you take +it--for me?" + +Barbara looked long into the sweet face, glorified by the inner light. +Then she leaned forward and put her soft arms around the older woman, +hiding her face in the masses of copper-coloured hair. + +"For you? A thousand times, yes," she sobbed. "Oh, anything for you!" + + * * * * * + +Late in the afternoon, when Ambrose North and Barbara were alone again, +he came over to her chair and stroked her shining hair with a loving +hand. + +"Did they tell you, dear?" he asked. + +"Yes," whispered Barbara. + +"I have dreamed so often that my baby could walk and I could see. He +said that the dream should come true if he could make it so." + +"Did he say anything about your eyes?" asked Barbara, in astonishment. + +[Sidenote: Hopeful] + +"Yes. He thinks there may be a chance there, too. If you are willing, +I am to go to the city with him sometime and see a friend of his who is +a great specialist." + +"Oh, Daddy," cried Barbara. "I'm afraid--for you." + +He drew a chair up near hers and sat down. The old hand, in which the +pulses moved so slowly, clasped the younger one, warm with life. + +"Barbara," he said; "I have never seen my baby." + +"I know, Daddy." + +"I want to see you, dear." + +"And I want you to." + +"Then, will you let me go?" + +"Perhaps, but it must be--afterward, you know." + +"Why?" + +"Because, when you see me, I want to be strong and well. I want to be +able to walk. You mustn't see the crutches, Daddy--they are ugly +things." + +"Nothing could be ugly that belongs to you. I made a little song this +afternoon, while you and Miriam were talking and I was out alone." + +"Tell me." + +[Sidenote: In a Beautiful Garden] + +"Once there was a man who had a garden. When he was a child he had +played in it, in his youth and early manhood he had worked in it and +found pleasure in seeing things grow, but he did not really know what a +beautiful garden it was until another walked in it with him and found it +fair. + +"Together they watched it from Springtime to harvest, finding new beauty +in it every day. One night at twilight she whispered to him that some +day a perfect flower of their very own was to bloom in the garden. They +watched and waited and prayed for it together, but, before it blossomed, +the man went blind. + +"In the darkness, he could not see the garden, but she was still there, +bringing divine consolation with her touch, and whispering to him always +of the perfect flower so soon to be their own. + +"When it blossomed, the man could not see it, but the one who walked +beside him told him that it was as pure and fair as they had prayed it +might be. They enjoyed it together for a year, and he saw it through her +eyes. + +"Then she went to God's Garden, and he was left desolate and alone. He +cared for nothing and for a time even forgot the flower that she had +left. Weeds grew among the flowers, nettles and thistles took possession +of the walks, and strange vines choked with their tendrils everything +that dared to bloom. + +[Sidenote: A Perfect Flower] + +"One day, he went out into the intolerable loneliness and desolation, +and, groping blindly, he found among the nettles and thistles and weeds +the one perfect white blossom. It was cool and soft to his hot hand, it +was exquisitely fragrant, and, more than all, it was part of her. +Gradually, it eased his pain. He took out the weeds and thistles as best +he could, but there was little he could do, for he had left it too long. + +"The years went by, but the flower did not fade. Seeking, he always +found it; weary, it always refreshed him; starving, it fed his soul. +Blind, it gave him sight; weak, it gave him courage; hurt, it brought +him balm. At last he lived only because of it, for, in some mysterious +way, it seemed to need him, too, and sometimes it even seemed divinely +to restore the lost. + +"Flower of the Dusk," he said, leaning to Barbara; "what should I have +been without you? How could I have borne it all?" + +[Sidenote: Strength for the Burden] + +"God suits the burden to the bearer, I think," she answered, softly. "If +you have much to bear, it is because you are strong enough to do it +nobly and well. Only the weak are allowed to shirk, and shift their load +to the shoulders of the strong." + +"I know, but, Barbara--suppose----" + +"There is nothing to suppose, Daddy. Whatever happened would be the best +that could happen. I'm not afraid." + +Her voice rang clear and strong. Insensibly, he caught some of her own +fine courage and his soul rallied greatly to meet hers. From her height +she had summoned him as with a bugle-call, and he had answered. + +"The ways of the Everlasting are not our ways," he said, "but I will not +be afraid. No, I will not let myself be afraid." + + + + +X + +In the Garden + + +[Sidenote: A Summer Evening] + +The subtle, far-reaching fragrance of a Summer night came through the +open window. A cool wind from the hills had set the maple branches to +murmuring and hushed the incoming tide as it swept up to the waiting +shore. Out in the illimitable darkness of the East, grey surges throbbed +like the beating of a troubled heart, but the shore knew only the drowsy +croon of a sea that has gone to sleep. + +Golden lilies swung their censers softly, and the exquisite incense +perfumed the dusk. Fairy lamp-bearers starred the night with glimmering +radiance, faintly seen afar. A cricket chirped just outside the window +and a ghostly white moth circled around the evening lamp. + +Roger sat by the table, with Keats's letters to his beloved Fanny open +before him. The letter to Constance, so strangely brought back after all +the intervening years, lay beside the book. The ink was faded and the +paper was yellow, but his father's love, for a woman not his mother, +stared the son full in the face and was not to be denied. + +Was this all, or--? His thought refused to go further. Constance North +had died, by her own hand, four days after the letter was written. What +might not have happened in four days? In one day, Columbus found a +world. In another, electricity was discovered. In one day, one hour, +even, some immeasurable force moving according to unseen law might sway +the sun and set all the stars to reeling madly through the unutterable +midnights of the universe. And in four days? Ah, what had happened in +those four days? + +[Sidenote: A Recurring Question] + +The question had haunted him since the night he read the letter, when he +was reading to Barbara and had unwittingly come upon it. Constance was +dead and Laurence Austin was dead, but their love lived on. The grave +was closed against it, and in neither heaven nor hell could it find an +abiding-place. Ghostly and forbidding, it had sent Constance to haunt +Miriam's troubled sleep, it had filled Ambrose North's soul with cruel +doubt and foreboding, and had now come back to Roger and Barbara, to ask +eternal questions of the one, and stir the heart of the other to new +depths of pain. + +He had not seen Barbara since that night and she had sent no message. No +beacon light in the window across the way said "come." The sword that +had lain, keen-edged and cruel, between Constance and her lover, had, by +a single swift stroke, changed everything between her daughter and his +son. + +Not that Barbara herself was less beautiful or less dear. Roger had +missed her more than he realised. When her lovely, changing face had +come between his eyes and the musty pages of his law books, while the +disturbing Bascom pup cavorted merrily around the office, unheard and +unheeded, Roger had ascribed it to the letter that had forced them +apart. + + * * * * * + +The woollen slippers muffled Miss Mattie's step so that Roger did not +hear her enter the room. Preoccupied and absorbed, he was staring +vacantly out of the window, when a strong, capable hand swooped down +beside him, gathering up the book and the letter. + +[Sidenote: Tremendous Power] + +"I don't know what it is about your readin', Roger," complained his +mother, "that makes you blind and deaf and dumb and practically +paralysed. Your pa was the same way. Reckon I'll read a piece myself and +see what it is that's so affectin'. It ain't a very big book, but it +seems to have tremendous power." + +She sat down and began to read aloud, in a curiously unsympathetic voice +which grated abominably upon her unwilling listener: + +"'Ask yourself, my Love, whether you are not very cruel to have so +entrammelled me, so destroyed my freedom. Will you confess this in the +letter you must write immediately and do all you can to console me in +it--make it rich as a draught of poppies to intoxicate me--write the +softest words and kiss them, that I may at least touch my lips where +yours have been. For myself, I know not how to express my devotion to so +fair a form; I want a brighter word than bright, a fairer word than +fair. I almost wish we were butterflies and lived but three summer +days--three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty +common years could ever contain.' + +"Ain't that wonderful, Roger? Wants to get drunk on poppies and kiss the +writin' and thinks after that he'll be made into a butterfly. Your pa +couldn't have been far from bein' a butterfly when he bought this book. +There ain't no sense in it. And this--why, it's your pa's writin', +Roger! I ain't seen it for years." + +Miss Mattie leaned forward in her chair and brought the letter to +Constance close to the light. She read it through, calmly, without haste +or excitement. Roger's hands gripped the arms of his chair and his face +turned ashen. His whole body was tense. + +[Sidenote: A Moment's Pain] + +Then, as swiftly as it had come, the moment passed. Miss Mattie took off +her spectacles and leaned back in her chair with great weariness +evident in every line of her figure. + +[Sidenote: Crazy as a Loon] + +"Roger," she said, sadly, "there's no use in tryin' to conceal it from +you any longer. Your pa was crazy--as crazy as a loon. What with buyin' +books so steady and readin' of 'em so continual, his mind got unhinged. +I've always suspected it, and now I know. + +"Your pa gets this book, and reads all this stuff that's been written +about 'Fanny,' and he don't see no reason why he shouldn't duplicate it +and maybe get it printed. I knew he set great store by books, but it +comes to me as a shock that he was allowin' to write 'em. Some of the +time he sees he's crazy himself. Didn't you see, there where he says, 'I +hope you do not blame me because I went mad'? 'Mad' is the refined word +for crazy. + +"Then he goes on about eatin' husks and bein' starved. That's what I +told him when he insisted on havin' oatmeal cooked for his breakfast +every mornin'. I told him humans couldn't expect to live on horse-feed, +but, la sakes! He never paid no attention to me. I could set and talk by +the hour just as I'm talkin' to you and he wasn't listenin' any more'n +you be." + +"I am listening, Mother," he assured her, in a forced voice. He could +not say with what joyful relief. + +"Maybe," she went on, "I'd 'a' been more gentle with your pa if I'd +realised just what condition his mind was in. There's a book in the +attic full of just such writin' as this. I found it once when I was +cleaning, but I never paid no more attention to it. I surmised it was +somethin' he was copyin' out of another book that he'd borrowed from the +minister, but I see now. The Lord tempers the wind to the shorn lamb. If +I'd 'a' knowed what it was then, maybe I couldn't have bore it as I can +now." + +Seizing his opportunity, Roger put the book and the letter aside. Miss +Mattie slipped out of its wrapper the paper which Roger had brought to +her from the post-office that same night, and began to read. Roger sat +back in his chair with his eyes closed, meditating upon the theory of +Chance, and wondering if, after all, there was a single controlling +purpose behind the extraordinary things that happened. + +[Sidenote: Inner Turmoil] + +Miss Mattie wiped her spectacles twice and changed her position three +times. Then she got another chair and moved the lamp closer. At last she +clucked sharply with her false teeth--always the outward evidence of +inner turmoil or displeasure. + +"What's the matter, Mother?" + +"I can't see with these glasses," she said, fretfully. "I can see a lot +better without 'em than I can with 'em." + +"Have you wiped them?" + +"Yes, I've wiped 'em till it's a wonder the polish ain't all wore off +the glass." + +"Put them up close to your eyes instead of wearing them so far down on +your nose." + +"I've tried that, but the closer they get to my eyes, the more I can't +see. The further away they are, the better 't is. When I have 'em off, +I can see pretty good." + +"Then why don't you take them off?" + +"That sounds just like your pa. Do you suppose, after payin' seven +dollars and ninety cents for these glasses, and more'n twice as much for +my gold-bowed ones, that I ain't goin' to use 'em and get the benefit of +'em? Your pa never had no notion of economy. They're just as good as +they ever was, and I reckon I'll wear 'em out, if I live." + +"But, Mother, your eyes may have changed. They probably have." + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's Eyes] + +Miss Mattie went to the kitchen and brought back a small, cracked +mirror. She studied the offending orbs by the light, very carefully, +both with and without her spectacles. + +"No, they ain't," she announced, finally. "They're the same size and +shape and colour that they've always been, and the specs are the same. +Your pa bought 'em for me soon after you commenced readin' out of a +reader, and they're just as good as they ever was. It must be the oil. +I've noticed that it gets poorer every time the price goes up." She +pushed the paper aside with a sigh. "I was readin' such a nice story, +too." + +"Shan't I read it to you, Mother?" + +"Why, I don't know. Do you want to?" + +"Surely, if you want me to." + +"Then you'd better begin a new story, because I'm more'n half-way +through this one." + +"I'll begin right where you left off, Mother. It doesn't make a particle +of difference to me." + +"But you won't get the sense of it. I'd like for you to enjoy it while +you're readin'." + +"Don't worry about my enjoying it--you know I've always been fond of +books. If there's anything I don't understand, I can ask you." + +"All right. Begin right here in _True Gold, or Pretty Crystal's Love_. +This is the place: 'With a terrible scream, Crystal sprang toward the +fire escape, carrying her mother and her little sister in her arms.'" + +[Sidenote: Two Sighs] + +For nearly two hours, Roger read, in a deep, mellow voice, of the +adventures of poor, persecuted Crystal, who was only sixteen, and +engaged to a floor-walker in 'one of the great city's finest emporiums +of trade.' He and his mother both sighed when he came to the end of the +installment, but for vastly different reasons. + +"Ain't it lovely, Roger?" + +"It's what you might call 'different,'" he temporised, with a smile. + +"Just think of that poor little thing havin' her house set afire by a +rival suitor just after she had paid off the mortgage by savin' out of +her week's wages! Do you suppose he will ever win her?" + +"I shouldn't think it likely." + +"No, you wouldn't, but the endin' of those stories is always what you +wouldn't expect. It's what makes 'em so interestin' and, as you say, +'different.'" + +Roger did not answer. He merely yawned and tapped impatiently on the +table with his fingers. + +[Sidenote: Nine o'Clock] + +"What time is it?" she asked, adjusting her spectacles carefully upon +the ever-useful and unfailing wart. + +"A little after nine." + +"Sakes alive! It's time I was abed. I've got to get up early in the +mornin' and set my bread. Good-night." + +"Good-night, Mother." + +"Don't set up long. Oil is terrible high." + +"All right, Mother." + +Miss Mattie went upstairs and closed her door with a resounding bang. +Roger heard her strike a match on a bit of sandpaper tacked on the wall +near the match-safe, and close the green blinds that served the purpose +of the more modern window-shades. Soon, a deep, regular sound suggestive +of comfortable slumber echoed and re-echoed overhead. Then, and then +only, he dared to go out. + +[Sidenote: A Light in the Window] + +He sat on the narrow front porch for a few minutes, deeply breathing the +cool air and enjoying the beauty of the night. Across the way, the +little grey house seemed lonely and forlorn. The upper windows were +dark, but downstairs Barbara's lamp still shone. + +"Sewing, probably," mused Roger. "Poor little thing." + +As he watched, the lamp was put out. Then a white shadow moved painfully +toward the window, bent, and struck a match. Star-like, Barbara's +signal-light flamed out into the gloom, with its eager message. + +"She wants me," he said to himself. The joy was inextricably mingled +with pain. "She wants me," he thought, "and I must not go." + +"Why?" asked his heart, and his conscience replied, miserably, +"Because." + +For ten or fifteen minutes he argued with himself, vainly. Every +objection that came forward was reasoned down by a trained mind, versed +in the intricacies of the law. The deprivations of the fathers need not +always descend unto the children. At last he went over, wondering +whether his father had not more than once, and at the same hour, taken +the same path. + +[Sidenote: Two Hours of Life] + +Barbara was out in the garden, dreaming. For the first time in years, +when she had work to do, she had laid it aside before eleven o'clock. +But, in two hours, she could have made little progress with her +embroidery, and she chose to take for herself two hours of life, out of +what might prove to be the last night she had to live. + +When Roger opened the gate, Barbara took her crutches and rose out of +her low chair. + +"Don't," he said. "I'm coming to you." + +She had brought out another chair, with great difficulty, in +anticipation of his coming. Her own was near the moonflower that climbed +over the tiny veranda and was now in full bloom. The white, half-open +trumpets, delicately fragrant, had more than once reminded him of +Barbara herself. + +"What a brute I'd be," thought Roger, with a pang, "if I had +disappointed her." + +"I'm so glad," said Barbara, giving him a cool, soft little hand. "I +began to be afraid you couldn't come." + +"I couldn't, just at first, but afterward it was all right. How are +you?" + +"I'm well, thank you, but I'm going to be made better to-morrow. That's +why I wanted to see you to-night--it may be for the last time." + +Her words struck him with chill foreboding. "What do you mean?" + +"To-morrow, some doctors are coming down from the city, with two nurses +and a few other things. They're going to see if I can't do without +these." She indicated the crutches with an inclination of her golden +head. + +"Barbara," he gasped. "You mustn't. It's impossible." + +"Nothing is impossible any more," she returned, serenely. + +"That isn't what I meant. You mustn't be hurt." + +[Sidenote: A Wonderful World] + +"I'm not going to be hurt--much. It's all to be done while I'm asleep. +Miss Wynne, a lady from the hotel, brought Doctor Conrad to see me. +Afterward, he came again by himself, and he says he is very sure that it +will come out all right. And when I'm straight and strong and can walk, +he's going to try to have father made to see. A fairy godmother came in +and waved her wand," went on Barbara, lightly, "and the poor became rich +at once. Now the lame are to walk and the blind to see. Is it not a +wonderful world?" + +"Barbara!" cried Roger; "I can't bear it. I don't want you changed--I +want you just as you are." + +"Such impediments as are placed in the path of progress!" she returned. +Her eyes were laughing, but her voice had in it a little note of +tenderness. "Will you do something for me?" + +"Anything--everything." + +"It's only this," said Barbara, gently. "If it should turn out the +other way, will you keep father from being lonely? Miss Wynne has +promised that he shall never want for anything, and, at the most, it +couldn't be long until he was with me again, but, in the meantime, would +you, Roger? Would you try to take my place?" + +"Nobody in the world could ever take your place, but I'd try--God knows +I'd try. Barbara, I couldn't bear it, if----" + +"Hush. There isn't any 'if.' It's all coming right to-morrow." + +[Sidenote: Beauty of a Saint] + +The full moon had swung slowly up out of the sea, and the misty, silvery +light touched Barbara lovingly. Her slender hands, crossed in her lap, +seemed like those of a little child. Her deep blue eyes were lovelier +than ever in the enchanted light--they had the calmness of deep waters +at dawn, untroubled by wind or tide. Around her face her golden hair +shimmered and shone like a halo. She had the unearthly beauty of a +saint. + +"Afterward?" he asked, with a little choke in his voice. + +"I'll be in plaster for a long time, and, after that, I'll have to learn +to walk." + +"And then?" + +"Work," she said, joyously. "Think of having all the rest of your life +to work in, with no crutches! And if Daddy can see me--" she stopped, +but he caught the wistfulness in her tone. "The first thing," she +continued, "I'm going down to the sea. I have a fancy to go alone." + +"Have you never been?" + +"I've never been outside this house and garden but once or twice. Have +you forgotten?" + +All the things he might have done came to Roger, remorsefully, and too +late. He might have taken Barbara out for a drive almost any time during +the last eight years. She could have been lifted into a low carriage +easily enough and she had never even been to the sea. A swift, pitying +tenderness made his heart ache. + +"Nobody ever thought of it," said Barbara, soothingly, as though she had +read his thought, "and, besides, I've been too busy, except Sundays. But +sometimes, when I've heard the shore singing as the tide came in, and +seen the gulls fly past my window, and smelled the salt mist--oh, I've +wanted it so." + +"I'd have taken you, if I hadn't been such a brute as to forget." + +[Sidenote: More than the Sea] + +"You've brought me more than the sea, Roger. Think of all the books +you've carried back and forth so patiently all these years. You've done +more for me than anybody in the world, in some ways. You've given me the +magic carpet of the _Arabian Nights_, only it was a book, instead of a +rug. Through your kindness, I've travelled over most of the world, I've +met many of the really great people face to face, I've lived in all ages +and all countries, and I've learned to know the world as it is now. What +more could one person do for another than you have done for me?" + +"Barbara?" It was Miriam's voice, calling softly from an upper window. +"You mustn't stay up late. Remember to-morrow." + +"All right, Aunty." Her answer carried with it no hint of impatience. "I +forgot that we weren't in the house," she added, to Roger, in a low +tone. + +"Must I go?" To-night, for some reason, he could not bear even the +thought of leaving her. + +"Not just yet. I've been thinking," she continued, in a swift whisper, +"about my mother and--your father. Of course we can't understand--we +only know that they cared. And, in a way, it makes you and me something +like brother and sister, doesn't it?" + +"Perhaps it does. I hadn't thought of that." + +[Sidenote: The Barrier Broken] + +All at once, the barrier that seemed to have been between them crashed +down and was forgotten. Mysteriously, Roger was very sure that those +four days had held no wrong--no betrayal of another's trust. His father +would not have done anything which was not absolutely right. The thought +made him straighten himself proudly. And the mother of the girl who +leaned toward him, with her beautiful soul shining in her deep eyes, +could have been nothing less than an angel. + +"To-morrow"--began Roger. + +[Sidenote: "To-morrow is Mine"] + +"To-morrow was made for me. God is giving me a day to be made straight +in. To-morrow is mine, but--will you come and stay with father? Keep him +away from the house and with you, until--afterward?" + +"I will, gladly." + +Barbara rose and Roger picked up her crutches. "You'll never have to do +that for me again," she said, as she took them, "but there'll be lots of +other things. Will you take in the chairs, please?" + +A lump was in his throat and he could not speak. When he came out, after +having made a brief but valiant effort to recover his self-control, +Barbara was standing at the foot of the steps, leaning on her crutches, +with the moon shining full upon her face. + +Roger went to her. "Barbara," he said, huskily, "my father loved your +mother. For the sake of that, and for to-morrow, will you kiss me +to-night?" + +Smiling, Barbara lifted her face and gave him her lips as simply and +sweetly as a child. "Good-night," she said, softly, but he could not +answer, for, at the touch, the white fire burned in his blood and the +white magic of life's Maytime went, singing, through his soul. + + + + +XI + +Barbara's "To-morrow" + + +The shimmering white silence of noon lay upon the land. Bees hummed in +the clover, gorgeous butterflies floated drowsily over the meadows, and +far in the blue distance a meadow-lark scattered his golden notes like +rain upon the fields. + +[Sidenote: A Cold Shadow] + +The world teemed with life, and yet a cold shadow, as of approaching +death, darkened the souls of two who walked together in the dusty road +that led from the hills to the sea. The old man leaned heavily upon the +arm of the younger, and his footsteps faltered. The young man's face was +white and he saw dimly, as through a mist, but he tried to keep his +voice even. + +From the open windows of the little grey house came the deadly sweet +smell of anæsthetics, heavy with prescience and pain. It dominated, +instantly, all the blended Summer fragrances and brought terror to them +both. + +"I cannot bear it," said Ambrose North, miserably. "I cannot bear to +have my baby hurt." + +"She isn't being hurt now," answered Roger, with dry lips. "She's +asleep." + +"It may be the sleep that knows no waking. If you loved Barbara, you +would understand." + +The boy's senses, exquisitely alive and quivering, merged suddenly into +one unspeakable hurt. If he loved Barbara! Ah, did he not love her? What +of last night, when he walked up and down in that selfsame road until +dawn, alone with the wonder and fear and joy of it, and unutterably +dreading the to-morrow that had so swiftly become to-day. + +"I was a fool," muttered Ambrose North. "I was a fool to give my +consent." + +"It was her choice," the boy reminded him, "and when she walks----" + +"When she walks, it may be in the City Not Made With Hands. If I had +said 'no,' we should not be out here now, while she--" The tears +streamed over his wrinkled cheeks and his bowed shoulders shook. + +[Sidenote: All for the Best] + +"Don't," pleaded Roger. "It's all for the best--it must be all for the +best." + +Neither of them saw Eloise approaching as she came up the road from the +hotel. She was in white, as usual, bareheaded, and she carried a white +linen parasol. She went to them, calling out brightly, "Good morning!" + +"Who is it?" asked the old man. + +"It must be Miss Wynne, I think." + +"What is it?" inquired Eloise, when she joined them. "What is the +matter?" + +The blind man could not speak, but he pointed toward the house with a +shaking hand. + +"It's Barbara, you know," said Roger. "They're in there--cutting her." +The last words were almost a whisper. + +[Sidenote: Allan is There] + +"But you mustn't worry," cried Eloise. "Nothing can go wrong. Why, Allan +is there." + +Insensibly her confidence in Allan and the clear ring of her voice +relieved the unbearable tension. Surely, Barbara could not die if Allan +were there. + +"It's hard, I know," Eloise went on, in her cool, even tones, "but there +is no doubt about the ending. Allan is one of the few really great +surgeons--he has done wonderful things. He has done things that everyone +else said were impossible. Barbara will walk and be as straight and +strong as any of us. Think what it will mean to her after twenty years +of helplessness. How fine it will be to see her without the crutches." + +"I have never minded the crutches," said Roger. "I do not want her +changed." + +"I cannot see her," sighed Ambrose North. "I have never seen my baby." + +"But you're going to," Eloise assured him, "for Allan says so, and +whatever Allan says is true." + +At length, she managed to lead them farther away, though not out of +sight of the house, and they all sat down on the grass. She talked +continually and cheerfully, but the atmosphere was tense with waiting. +Ambrose North bowed his grey head in his hands, and Roger, still pale, +did not once take his eyes from the door of the little grey house. + +After what seemed an eternity, someone came out. It was one of Allan's +assistants. A nurse followed, and put a black bag into the buggy which +was waiting outside. Roger was on his feet instantly, watching. + +"Sit down," commanded Eloise, coolly. "Allan can see us from here, and +he will come and tell us." + +Ambrose North lifted his grey head. "Have they--finished--with her?" + +"I don't know," returned Eloise. "Be patient just a little longer, +please do." + +[Sidenote: All Right] + +Outwardly she was calm, but, none the less, a great sob of relief almost +choked her when Doctor Conrad came across the road to them, swinging his +black bag, and called out, in a voice high with hope, "All right!" + + * * * * * + +The sky was a wonderful blue, but the colour of the sea was deeper +still. The vast reaches of sand were as white as the blown snow, and +the Tower of Cologne had never been so fair as it was to-day. The sun +shone brightly on the clear glass arches that made the cupola, and the +golden bells swayed back and forth silently. + +[Sidenote: The Changed Tower] + +Barbara was trying to climb up to the cupola, but her feet were weary +and she paused often to rest. The rooms that opened off from the various +landings of the winding stairway were lovelier than ever. The +furnishings had been changed since she was last there, and each room was +made to represent a different flower. + +There was a rose room, all in pink and green, a pond-lily room in green +and white, a violet room in green and lavender, and a gorgeous suite of +rooms which someway seemed like a great bouquet of nasturtiums. But, +strangely, there was no fragrance of cologne in the Tower. The bottles +were all on the mantels, as usual, but Barbara could not open any of +them. Instead, there was a heavy, sweet, sickening smell from which she +could not escape, though she went continually from room to room. It +followed her like some evil thing that threatened to overpower her. + +The Boy who had always been beside her, and whose face she could not +see, was still in the Tower, but he was far away, with his back toward +her. He seemed to be suffering and Barbara tried to get to him to +comfort him, but some unforeseen obstacle inevitably loomed up in her +path. + +[Sidenote: People in the Tower] + +There were many people in the Tower, and most of them were old friends, +but there were some new faces. Her father was there, of course, and all +the brave knights and lovely ladies of whom she had read in her books. +Miss Wynne was there and she had never been in the Tower before, but +Barbara smiled at her and was glad, though she wished they might have +had cologne instead of the sickening smell which grew more deadly every +minute. + +A grave, silent young man whose demeanour was oddly at variance with his +red hair was there also. He had just come and it seemed that he was a +doctor. Barbara had heard his name but could not remember it. There were +also two young women in blue and white striped uniforms which were very +neat and becoming. They wore white caps and smiled at Barbara. She had +heard their names, too, but she had forgotten. + +None of them seemed to mind the heavy odour which oppressed her so. She +opened the windows in the Tower and the cool air came in from the blue +sea, but it changed nothing. + +"Come, Boy," she called across the intervening mist. "Let's go up to the +cupola and ring all the golden bells." + +He did not seem to hear, so she called again, and again, but there was +no response. It was the first time he had failed to answer her, and it +made her angry. + +"Then," cried Barbara, shrilly, "if you don't want to come, you needn't, +so there. But I'm going. Do you hear? I'm going. I'm going up to ring +those bells if I have to go alone." + +Still, the Boy did not answer, and Barbara, her heart warm with +resentment, began to climb the winding stairs. She did not hurry, for +pictures of castles, towers, and beautiful ladies were woven in the +tapestry that lined the walls. + +She came, at last, to the highest landing. There was only one short flight +between her and the cupola. The clear glass arches were dazzling in the sun +and the golden bells swayed temptingly. But a blinding, overwhelming fog +drifted in from the sea, and she was afraid to move by so much as a step. +She turned to go back, and fell, down--down--down--into what seemed +eternity. + +[Sidenote: The Clouds Lift] + +Before long, the cloud began to lift. She could see a vague suggestion +of blue and white through it now. The man with the red hair was talking, +loudly and unconcernedly, to a tall man beside him whose face was +obscured by the mist. The voices beat upon Barbara's ears with physical +pain. She tried to speak, to ask them to stop, but the words would not +come. Then she raised her hand, weakly, and silence came upon the room. + +Out of the fog rose Doctor Allan Conrad. He was tired and there was a +strained look about his eyes, but he smiled encouragingly. He leaned +over her and she smiled, very faintly, back at him. + +"Brave little girl," he said. "It's all right now. All we ever hoped for +is coming very soon." Then he went out, and she closed her eyes. When +she was again conscious of her surroundings, it was the next day, but +she thought she had been asleep only a few minutes. + +At first there was numbness of mind and body. Then, with every +heart-beat and throb by throb, came unbearable agony. A trembling old +hand strayed across her face and her father's voice, deep with love and +longing, whispered: "Barbara, my darling! Does it hurt you now?" + +"Just a little, Daddy, but it won't last long. I'll be better very +soon." + +One of the blue and white nurses came to her and said, gently, "Is it +very bad, Miss North?" + +[Sidenote: Intense Pain] + +"Pretty bad," she gasped. Then she tried to smile, but her white lips +quivered piteously. The woman with the kind, calm face came back with a +shining bit of silver in her hand. There was a sharp stab in Barbara's +arm, and then, with incredible quickness, peace. + +"What was it?" she asked, wondering. + +"Poppies," answered the nurse. "They bring forgetfulness." + +"Barbara," said the old man, sadly, "I wish I could help you bear +it----" + +"So you can, Daddy." + +"But how?" + +"Don't be afraid for me--it's coming out all right. And make me a little +song." + +"I couldn't--to-day." + +"There is always a song," she reminded him. "Think how many times you +have said to me, 'Always make a song, Barbara, no matter what comes.'" + +The old man stirred uneasily in his chair. "What about, dear?" + +"About the sea." + +[Sidenote: Song of the Sea] + +"The sea is so vast that it reaches around the world," he began, +hesitatingly. "It sings upon the shore of every land, from the regions +of perpetual ice and snow to the far tropic islands, where the sun +forever shines. As it lies under the palms, all blue and silver, +crooning so softly that you can scarcely hear it, you would not think it +was the same sea that yesterday was raging upon an ice-bound shore. + +"If you listen to its ever-changing music you can hear almost anything +you please, for the sea goes everywhere. Ask, and the sea shall sing to +you of the frozen north where half the year is darkness and the +impassable waste of waters sweeps across the pole. Ask, and you shall +hear of the distant islands, where there has never been snow, and the +tide may even bring to you a bough of olive or a leaf of palm. + +[Sidenote: Song of the Sea] + +"Ask, and the sea will give you red and white coral, queer shells, +mystically filled with its own weird music, and treasures of fairy-like +lace-work and bloom. It will sing to you of cool, green caves where the +waves creep sleepily up to the rocks and drift out drowsily with the ebb +of the tide. + +"It will sing of grey waves changing to foam in the path of the wind, +and bring you the cry of the white gulls that speed ahead of the storm. +It will sing to you of mermen and mermaids, chanting their own melodies +to the accompaniment of harps with golden strings. Listen, and you shall +hear the songs of many lands, merged into one by the sea that unites +them all. + +"It bears upon its breast the great white ships that carry messages from +one land to another. Silks and spices and pearls are taken from place to +place along the vast highways of the sea. And if, sometimes, in a +blinding tumult of terror and despair, the men and ships go down, the +sea, remorsefully, brings back the broken spars, and, at last, gives up +the dead. + +[Sidenote: The Dominant Chord] + +"Yet it is always beautiful, whether you see it grey or blue; whether it +is mad with rage or moaning with pain, or only crooning a lullaby as +the world goes to sleep. And in all the wonderful music there is one +dominant chord, for the song of the sea, as of the world, is Love. + +"Long ago, Barbara--so long ago that it is written in only the very +oldest books, Love was born in the foam of the sea and came to dwell +upon the shore. And so the sea, singing forever of Love, creeps around +the world upon an unending quest. When the tide sweeps in with the cold +grey waves, foam-crested, or in shining sapphire surges that break into +pearls, it is only the sea searching eagerly for the lost. So the +loneliness and the beauty, the longing and the pain, belong to Love as +to the sea." + +"Oh, Daddy," breathed Barbara, "I want it so." + +"What, dear? The sea?" + +"Yes. The music and the colour and the vastness of it. I can hardly wait +until I can go." + +There was a long silence. "Why didn't you tell me?" asked the old man. +"There would have been some way, if I had only known." + +"I don't know, Daddy. I think I've been waiting for this way, for it's +the best way, after all. When I can walk and you can see, we'll go down +together, shall we?" + +"Yes, dear, surely." + +"You must help me be patient, Daddy. It will be so hard for me to lie +here, doing nothing." + +"I wish I could read to you." + +"You can talk to me, and that's better. Roger will come over some day +and read to me, when he has time." + +"He was with me yesterday, while----" + +"I know," she answered, softly. "I asked him. I thought it would make it +easier for you." + +[Sidenote: Father and Daughter] + +"My baby! You thought of your old father even then?" + +"I'm always thinking of you, Daddy, because you and I are all each other +has got. That sounds queer, but you know what I mean." + +The calm, strong young woman in blue and white came back into the room. +"She mustn't talk," she said, to the blind man. "To-morrow, perhaps. +Come away now." + +"Don't take him away from me," pleaded Barbara. "We'll be very good and +not say a single word, won't we?" + +"Not a word," he answered, "if it isn't best." + +[Sidenote: Peaceful Sleep] + +The afternoon wore away to sunset, the shadows grew long, and Barbara +lay quietly, with her little hand in his. Long lines of light came over +the hills and brought into the room some subtle suggestion of colour. +Gradually, the pain came back, so keenly that it was not to be borne, +and the kind woman with the bit of silver in her hand leaned over the +bed once more. Quickly, the poppies brought their divine gift of peace +again. And so, Barbara slept. + +Then Ambrose North gently loosened the still fingers that were +interlaced with his, bent over, and, so gently as not to waken her, took +her boy-lover's kiss from her lips. + + + + +XII + +Miriam + + +Miriam moved about the house, silently, as always. She had assumed the +extra burden of Barbara's helplessness as she assumed everything--without +comment, and with outward calm. + +[Sidenote: Joy and Duty] + +Only her dark eyes, that burned and glittered so strangely, gave hint of +the restlessness within. She served Ambrose North with steadfast and +unfailing devotion; she waited upon Barbara mechanically, but readily. +An observer could not have detected any real difference in her bearing +toward the two, yet the service of one was a joy, the other a duty. + +After the first week the nurse who had remained with Barbara had gone +back to the city. In this short time, Miriam had learned much from her. +She knew how to change a sheet without disturbing the patient very much; +she could give Barbara both food and drink as she lay flat upon her +back, and ease her aching body a little in spite of the plaster cast. + +Ambrose North restlessly haunted the house and refused to leave +Barbara's bedside unless she was asleep. Often she feigned slumber to +give him opportunity to go outdoors for the exercise he was accustomed +to taking. And so the life of the household moved along in its usual +channels. + +[Sidenote: A Living Image] + +As she lay helpless, with her pretty colour gone and the great braids of +golden hair hanging down on either side, Barbara looked more like her +dead mother than ever. Suffering had brought maturity to her face and +sometimes even Miriam was startled by the resemblance. One day Barbara +had asked, thoughtfully, "Aunty, do I look like my mother?" And Miriam +had answered, harshly, "You're the living image of her, if you want to +know." + +Miriam repeatedly told herself that Constance had wronged her--that +Ambrose North had belonged to her until the younger girl came from +school with her pretty, laughing ways. He had never had eyes for Miriam +after he had once seen Constance, and, in an incredibly short time, they +had been married. + +Miriam had been forced to stand by and see it; she had made dainty +garments for Constance's trousseau, and had even been obliged to serve +as maid of honour at the wedding. She had seen, day by day, the man's +love increase and the girl's fancy wane, and, after his blindness came +upon him, Constance would often have been cruelly thoughtless had not +Miriam sternly held her to her own ideal of wifely duty. + +Now, when she had taken a mother's place to Barbara, and worked for the +blind man as his wife would never have dreamed of doing, she saw the +faithless one worshipped almost as a household god. The power to +disillusionise North lay in her hands--of that she was very sure. What +if she should come to him some day with the letter Constance had left +for another man and which she had never delivered? What if she should +open it, at his bidding, and read him the burning sentences Constance +had written to another during her last hour on earth? Knowing, beyond +doubt, that Constance was faithless, would he at last turn to the woman +he had deserted for the sake of a pretty face? The question racked +Miriam by night and by day. + +[Sidenote: Miriam's Jealousy] + +And, as always, the dead Constance, mute, accusing, bitterly +reproachful, haunted her dreams. Her fear of it became an obsession. As +Barbara grew daily more to resemble her mother, Miriam's position became +increasingly difficult and complex. + +Sometimes she waited outside the door until she could summon courage to +go in to Barbara, who lay, helpless, in the very room where her mother +had died. Miriam never entered without seeing upon the dressing table +those two envelopes, one addressed to Ambrose North and one to herself. +Her own envelope was bulky, since it contained two letters beside the +short note which might have been read to anybody. These two, with seals +unbroken, were safely put away in Miriam's room. + +One was addressed to Laurence Austin. Miriam continually told herself +that it was impossible for her to deliver it--that the person to whom it +was addressed was dead. She tried persistently to forget the five years +that had intervened between Constance's death and his. For five years, +he had lived almost directly across the street and Miriam saw him daily. +Yet she had not given him the letter, though the vision of Constance, +dumbly pleading for some boon, had distressed her almost every night +until Laurence Austin died. + +After that, there had been peace--but only for a little while. Constance +still came, though intermittently, and reproached Miriam for betraying +her trust. + +[Sidenote: The One Betrayal] + +As Barbara's twenty-second birthday approached, Miriam sometimes +wondered whether Constance would not cease to haunt her after the other +letter was delivered. She had been faithful in all things but +one--surely she might be forgiven the one betrayal. The envelope was +addressed, in a clear, unfaltering hand: "To My Daughter Barbara. To be +opened upon her twenty-second birthday." In her brief note to Miriam, +Constance had asked her to destroy it unopened if Barbara should not +live until the appointed day. + +She had said nothing, however, about the other letter--had not even +alluded to its existence. Yet there it was, apparently written upon a +single sheet of paper and enclosed in an envelope firmly sealed with +wax. The monogram, made of the interlaced initials "C.N.," still +lingered upon the seal. For twenty years and more the letter had waited, +unread, and the hands that once would eagerly have torn it open were +long since made one with the all-hiding, all-absolving dust. + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: At Supper] + +At supper, Ambrose North still had his fine linen and his Satsuma cup. +Miriam sat at the other end, where the coarse cloth and the heavy dishes +were. She used the fine china for Barbara, also, washing it carefully +six times every day. + +The blind man ate little, for he was lonely without the consciousness +that Barbara sat, smiling, across the table from him. + +"Is she asleep?" he asked, of Miriam. + +"Yes." + +"She hasn't had her supper yet, has she?" + +"No." + +"When she wakes, will you let me take it up to her?" + +"Yes, if you want to." + +"Miriam, tell me--does Barbara look like her mother?" His voice was full +of love and longing. + +"There may be a slight resemblance," Miriam admitted. + +"But how much?" + +[Sidenote: The Same Old Question] + +A curious, tigerish impulse possessed Miriam. He had asked her this same +question many times and she had always eluded him with a vague +generalisation. + +"How much does she resemble her mother?" he insisted. "You told me once +that they were 'something alike.'" + +"That was a long time ago," answered Miriam. She was breathing hard and +her eyes glittered. "Barbara has changed lately." + +"Don't hide the truth for fear of hurting me," he pleaded. "Once for all +I ask you--does Barbara resemble her mother?" + +For a moment Miriam paused, then all her hatred of the dead woman rose +up within her. "No," she said, coldly. "Their hair and eyes are nearly +the same colour, but they are not in the least alike. Why? What +difference does it make?" + +"None," sighed the blind man. "But I am glad to have the truth at last, +and I thank you. Sometimes I have fancied, when Barbara spoke, that it +was Constance talking to me. It would have been a great satisfaction to +me to have had my baby the living image of her mother, since I am to see +again, but it is all right as it is." + +Since he was to see! Miriam had not counted upon that possibility, and +she clenched her hands in swift remorse. If he should discover that she +had lied to him, he would never forgive her, and she would lose what +little regard he had for her. He had a Puritan insistence upon the +literal truth. + +"How beautiful Constance was," he sighed. An inarticulate murmur escaped +from Miriam, which he took for full assent. + +"Did you ever see anyone half so beautiful, Miriam?" + +Her throat was parched, but Miriam forced herself to whisper, "No." This +much was truth. + +[Sidenote: A Beautiful Bride] + +"How sweet she was and what pretty ways she had," he went on. "Do you +remember how lovely she was in her wedding gown?" + +Again Miriam forced herself to answer, "Yes." + +"Do you remember how people said we were mismated--that a man of fifty +could never hope to keep the love of a girl of twenty, who knew nothing +of the world?" + +"I remember," muttered Miriam. + +"And it was false, wasn't it?" he asked, hungering for assurance. +"Constance loved me--do you remember how dearly she loved me?" + +[Sidenote: Beloved Constance] + +A thousand words struggled for utterance, but Miriam could not speak +just then. She longed, as never before, to tear open the envelope +addressed to Laurence Austin and read to North the words his beloved +Constance had written to another man before she took her own life. She +longed to tell him how, for months previous, she had followed Constance +when she left the house, and discovered that she had a trysting-place +down on the shore. He wanted the truth, did he? Very well, he should +have it--the truth without mercy. + +"Constance," she began, huskily, "Constance loved----" + +"I know," interrupted Ambrose North. "I know how dearly she loved me up +to the very last. Even Barbara, baby that she was, felt it. She +remembers it still." + +Barbara's bell tinkled upstairs while he said the last words. "She wants +us," he said, his face illumined with love. "If you will prepare her +supper, Miriam, I will take it up." + +The room swayed before Miriam's eyes and her senses were confused. She +had drawn her dagger to strike and it had been forced back into its +sheath by some unseen hand. "But I will," she repeated to herself again +and again as her trembling hands prepared Barbara's tray. "He shall +know the truth--and from me." + + * * * * * + +"Barbara," said the old man, as he entered the room, "your Daddy has +brought up your supper." + +"I'm glad," she responded, brightly. "I'm very hungry." + +"We have been talking downstairs of your mother," he went on, as he set +down the tray. "Miriam has been telling me how beautiful she was, what +winning ways she had, and how dearly she loved us. She says you do not +look at all like her, Barbara, and we both have been thinking that you +did." + +[Sidenote: Disappointed] + +Barbara was startled. Only a few days ago, Aunt Miriam had assured her +that she was the living image of her mother. She was perplexed and +disappointed. Then she reflected that when she had asked the question +she had been very ill and Aunt Miriam was trying to answer in a way that +pleased her. She generously forgave the deceit for the sake of the +kindly motive behind it. + +"Dear Aunt Miriam," said Barbara, softly. "How good she has been to us, +Daddy." + +"Yes," he replied; "I do not know what we should have done without her. +I want to do something for her, dear. Shall we buy her a diamond ring, +or some pearls?" + +"We'll see, Daddy. When I can walk, and you can see, we shall do many +things together that we cannot do now." + +The old man bent down very near her. "Flower of the Dusk," he whispered, +"when may I go?" + +"Go where, Daddy?" + +"To the city, you know, with Doctor Conrad. I want to begin to see." + +Barbara patted his hand. "When I am strong enough to spare you," she +said, "I will let you go. When you see me, I want to be well and able to +go to meet you without crutches. Will you wait until then?" + +"I want to see my baby. I do not care about the crutches, now that you +are to get well. I want to see you, dear, so very, very much." + +"Some day, Daddy," she promised him. "Wait until I'm almost well, won't +you?" + +"Just as you say, dear, but it seems so long." + +"I couldn't spare you now, Daddy. I want you with me every day." + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: Miriam's Prayer] + +Though long unused to prayer, Miriam prayed that night, very earnestly, +that Ambrose North might not recover his sight; that he might never see +the daughter who lived and spoke in the likeness of her dead mother. It +was long past midnight when she fell asleep. The house had been quiet +for several hours. + +As she slept, she dreamed. The door opened quietly, yet with a certain +authority, and Constance, in her grave-clothes, came into her room. The +white gown trailed behind her as she walked, and the two golden braids, +so like Barbara's, hung down over either shoulder and far below her +waist. + +She fixed her deep, sad eyes upon Miriam, reproachfully, as always, but +her red lips were curled in a mocking smile. "Do your worst," she seemed +to say. "You cannot harm me now." + +[Sidenote: The Vision] + +The vision sat down in a low chair and rocked back and forth, slowly, as +though meditating. Occasionally, she looked at Miriam doubtfully, but +the mocking smile was still there. At last Constance rose, having come, +apparently, to some definite plan. She went to the dresser, opened the +lower drawer, and reached under the pile of neatly-folded clothing. + +Cold as ice, Miriam sprang to her feet. She was wide awake now, but the +room was empty. The door was open, half-way, and she could not remember +whether she had left it so when she went to bed. She had always kept her +bedroom door closed and locked, but since Barbara's illness had left it +at least ajar, that she might be able to hear a call in the night. + +Shaken like an aspen in a storm, Miriam lighted her candle and stared +into the shadows. Nothing was there. The clock ticked steadily--almost +maddeningly. It was just four o'clock. + +She, too, opened the lower drawer of the dresser and thrust her hand +under the clothing. The letters were still there. She drew them out, her +hands trembling, and read the superscriptions with difficulty, for the +words danced, and made themselves almost illegible. + +Constance was coming back for the letters, then? That was out of +Miriam's power to prevent, but she would keep the knowledge of their +contents--at least of one. She thrust aside contemptuously the letter to +Barbara--she cared nothing for that. + +[Sidenote: The Seal Broken] + +Taking the one addressed to "Mr. Laurence Austin; Kindness of Miss +Leonard," she went back to bed, taking her candle to the small table +that stood at the head of the bed. With forced calmness, she broke the +seal which the dead fingers had made so long ago, opened it shamelessly, +and read it. + + "You who have loved me since the beginning of + time," the letter began, "will understand and + forgive me for what I do to-day. I do it because + I am not strong enough to go on and do my duty by + those who need me. + + "If there should be meeting past the grave, some + day you and I shall come together again with no + barrier between us. I take with me the knowledge + of your love, which has sheltered and strengthened + and sustained me since the day we first met, and + which must make even a grave warm and sweet. + + "And, remember this--dead though I am, I love you + still; you and my little lame baby who needs me so + and whom I must leave because I am not strong + enough to stay. + + "Through life and in death and eternally, + + "Yours, + + "CONSTANCE." + +In the letter was enclosed a long, silken tress of golden hair. It +curled around Miriam's fingers as though it were alive, and she thrust +it from her. It was cold and smooth and sinuous, like a snake. She +folded up the letter, put it back in the envelope with the lock of hair, +then returned it to its old hiding-place, with Barbara's. + +"So, Constance," she said to herself, "you came for the letters? Come +and take them when you like--I do not fear you now." + +[Sidenote: The Evidence] + +All of her suspicions were crystallised into certainty by this one page +of proof. Constance might not have violated the letter of her marriage +vow--very probably had not even dreamed of it--but in spirit, she had +been false. + +"Come, Constance," said Miriam, aloud; "come and take your letters. +When the hour comes, I shall tell him, and you cannot keep me from it." + +[Sidenote: Triumph] + +She was curiously at peace, now, and no longer afraid. Her dark eyes +blazed with triumph as she lay there in the candle light. The tension +within her had snapped when suspicion gave way to absolute knowledge. +Thwarted and denied and pushed aside all her life by Constance and her +memory, at last she had come to her own. + + + + +XIII + +"Woman Suffrage" + + +There was a shuffling step on the stairway, accompanied by spasmodic +shrieks and an occasional "ouch." Roger looked up from his book in +surprise as Miss Mattie made her painful way into the room. + +"Why, Mother. What's the matter?" + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's Back] + +Miss Mattie sat down in the chair she had made out of a flour barrel and +screamed as she did so. "What is it?" he demanded. "Are you ill?" + +"Roger," she replied, "my back is either busted, or the hinge in it is +rusty from overwork. I stooped over to open the lower drawer in my +bureau, and when I come to rise up, I couldn't. I've been over half an +hour comin' downstairs. I called you twice, but you didn't hear me, and +I knowed you was readin', so I thought I might better save my voice to +yell with." + +"I'm sorry," he said. "What can I do for you?" + +"About the first thing to do, I take it, is to put down that book. Now, +if you'll put on your hat, you can go and get that new-fangled doctor +from the city. The postmaster's wife told me yesterday that he'd sent +Barbara one of them souverine postal cards and said on it he'd be down +last night. As you go, you might stop and tell the Norths that he's +comin', for they don't go after their mail much and most likely it's +still there in the box. Tell Barbara that the card has a picture of a +terrible high buildin' on it and the street is full of carriages, both +horsed and unhorsed. If he can make the lame walk and the blind see, +I reckon he can fix my back. I'll set here." + +"Shan't I get someone to stay with you while I'm gone, Mother? I don't +like to leave you here alone. Miss Miriam would----" + +"Miss Miriam," interrupted his mother, "ain't fit company for a horse or +cow, let alone a sufferin' woman. She just sets and stares and never +says nothin'. I have to do all the talkin' and I'm in no condition to +talk. You run along and let me set here in peace. It don't hurt so much +when I set still." + +[Sidenote: Roger's Errand] + +Roger obediently started on his errand, but met Doctor Conrad half-way. +The two had never been formally introduced, but Roger knew him, and the +Doctor remembered Roger as "the nice boy" who was with Ambrose North +and Eloise when he went over to tell them that Barbara was all right. + +"Why, yes," said Allan. "If it's an emergency case, I'll come there +first. After I see what's the matter, I'll go over to North's and then +come back. I seem to be getting quite a practice in Riverdale." + +When they went in, Roger introduced Doctor Conrad to the patient. +"You'll excuse my not gettin' up," said Miss Mattie, "for it's about the +gettin' up that I wanted to see you. Roger, you run away. It ain't +proper for boys to be standin' around listenin' when woman suffrage is +bein' discussed by the only people havin' any right to talk of it--women +and doctors." + +Roger coloured to his temples as he took his hat and hurried out. With +an effort Doctor Conrad kept his face straight, but his eyes were +laughing. + +[Sidenote: What's Wrong?] + +"Now, what's wrong?" asked Allan, briefly, as Roger closed the door. + +"It's my back," explained the patient. "It's busted. It busted all of a +sudden." + +"Was it when you were stooping over, perhaps to pick up something?" + +Miss Mattie stared at him in astonishment. "Are you a mind-reader, or +did Roger tell you?" + +"Neither," smiled Allan. "Did a sharp pain come in the lumbar region +when you attempted to straighten up?" + +"'Twan't the lumber room. I ain't been in the attic for weeks, though I +expect it needs straightenin'. It was in my bedroom. I was stoopin' over +to open a bureau drawer, and when I riz up, I found my back was busted." + +[Sidenote: The Prescription] + +"I see," said Allan. He was already writing a prescription. "If your son +will go down and get this filled, you will have no more trouble. Take +two every four hours." + +Miss Mattie took the bit of paper anxiously. "No surgical operation?" +she asked. + +"No," laughed Allan. + +"No mortar piled up on me and left to set? No striped nurses?" + +"No plaster cast," Allan assured her, "and no striped nurses." + +"I reckon it ain't none of my business," remarked Miss Mattie, "but why +didn't you do somethin' like this for Barbara instead of cuttin' her up? +I'm worse off than she ever was, because she could walk right spry with +crutches, and crutches wouldn't have helped me none when I was risin' up +from the bureau drawer." + +"Barbara's case is different. She had a congenital dislocation of the +femur." + +Miss Mattie's jaw dropped, but she quickly recovered herself. "And what +have I got?" + +"Lumbago." + +"My disease is shorter," she commented, after a moment of reflection, +"but I'll bet it feels worse." + +"I'll ask your son to come in if I see him," said Doctor Conrad, +reaching for his hat, "and if you don't get well immediately, let me +know. Good-bye." + +Roger was nowhere in sight, but he was watching the two houses, and as +soon as he saw Doctor Conrad go into North's, he went back to his +mother. + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's "Disease"] + +"Barbara's disease has three words in it, Roger," she explained, "and +mine has only one, but it's more painful. You're to go immediately with +this piece of paper and get it full of the medicine he's written on it. +I've been lookin' at it, but I don't get no sense out of it. He said to +take two every four hours--two what?" + +"Pills, probably, or capsules." + +"Pills? Now, Roger, you know that no pill small enough to swallow could +cure a big pain like this in my back. The postmaster's wife had the +rheumatiz last Winter, and she took over five quarts of Old Doctor +Jameson's Pain Killer, and it never did her a mite of good. What do you +think a paper that size, full of pills, can do for a person that ain't +able to stand up without screechin'?" + +"Well, we'll try it anyway, Mother. Just sit still until I come back +with the medicine." + +He went out and returned, presently, with a red box containing forty or +fifty capsules. Miss Mattie took it from him and studied it carefully. +"This box ain't more'n a tenth as big as the pain," she observed +critically. + +Roger brought a glass of water and took out two of the capsules. "Take +these," he said, "and at half past two, take two more. Let's give Doctor +Conrad a fair trial. It's probably a more powerful medicine than it +seems to be." + +[Sidenote: A Difficulty] + +Miss Mattie had some difficulty at first, as she insisted on taking both +capsules at once, but when she was persuaded to swallow one after the +other, all went well. "I suppose," she remarked, "that these long narrow +pills have to be took endways. If a person went to swallow 'em +crossways, they'd choke to death. I was careful how I took 'em, but +other people might not be, and I think, myself, that round pills are +safer." + +"I went to the office," said Roger, "and told the Judge I wouldn't be +down to-day. I have some work I can do at home, and I'd rather not leave +you." + +"It's just come to my mind now," mused Miss Mattie, ignoring his +thoughtfulness, "about the minister's sermon Sunday. He said that +everything that came to us might teach us something if we only looked +for it. I've been thinkin' as I set here, what a heap I've learned about +my back this mornin'. I never sensed, until now, that it was used in +walkin'. I reckoned that my back was just kind of a finish to me and +was to keep the dust out of my vital organs more'n anything else. This +mornin' I see that the back is entirely used in walkin'. What gets me is +that Barbara North had to have crutches when her back was all right. +Nothin' was out of kilter but her legs, and only one of 'em at that." + +"Here's your paper, Mother." Roger pulled _The Metropolitan Weekly_ out +of his pocket. + +"Lay it down on the table, please. It oughtn't to have come until +to-morrow. I ain't got time for it now." + +"Why, Mother? Don't you want to read?" + +[Sidenote: Proper Care] + +The knot of hair on the back of Miss Mattie's head seemed to rise, and +her protruding wire hairpins bristled. "I should think you'd know," she +said, indignantly, "when you've been takin' time from the law to read +your pa's books to Barbara North, that no sick person has got the +strength to read. Even if my disease is only in one word when hers is in +three, I reckon I'm goin' to take proper care of myself." + +"But you're sitting up and she can't," explained Roger, kindly. + +"Sittin' up or not sittin' up ain't got nothin' to do with it. If my +back was set in mortar as it ought to have been, I wouldn't be settin' +up either. I can't get up without screamin', and as long as I've knowed +Barbara she's never been that bad. That new-fangled doctor hasn't come +out of North's yet, either. How much do you reckon he charges for a +visit?" + +"Two or three dollars, I suppose." + +Miss Mattie clucked sharply with her false teeth. "'Cordin' to that," +she calculated, "he was here about twenty cents' worth. But I'm willin' +to give him a quarter--that's a nickel extra for the time he was writin' +out the recipe for them long narrow pills that would choke anybody but a +horse if they happened to go down crossways. There he comes, now. If he +don't come here of his own accord, you go out and get him, Roger. I want +he should finish his visit." + +[Sidenote: The Doctor's Visit] + +But it was not necessary for Roger to go. "Of his own accord," Doctor +Conrad came across the street and opened the creaky white gate. When he +came in, he brought with him the atmosphere of vitality and good cheer. +He had, too, that gentle sympathy which is the inestimable gift of the +physician, and which requires no words to make itself felt. + +His quick eye noted the box of capsules upon the table, as he sat down +and took Miss Mattie's rough, work-worn hand in his. "How is it?" he +asked. "Better?" + +"Mebbe," she answered, grudgingly. "No more'n a mite, though." + +"That's all we can expect so soon. By to-morrow morning, though, you +should be all right." His manner unconsciously indicated that it would +be the one joy of a hitherto desolate existence if Miss Mattie should be +perfectly well again in the morning. + +"How's my fellow sufferer?" she inquired, somewhat mollified. + +"Barbara? She's doing very well. She's a brave little thing." + +"Which is the sickest--her or me?" + +"As regards actual pain," replied Doctor Conrad, tactfully, "you are +probably suffering more than she is at the present moment." + +"I knowed it," cried Miss Mattie triumphantly. "Do you hear that, +Roger?" + +But Roger had slipped out, remembering that "woman suffrage" was not a +proper subject for discussion in his hearing. + +[Sidenote: Wanderin' Fits] + +"I reckon he's gone over to North's," grumbled Miss Mattie. "When my eye +ain't on him, he scoots off. His pa was the same way. He was forever +chasin' over there and Roger's inherited it from him. Whenever I've +wanted either of 'em, they've always been took with wanderin' fits." + +"You sent him out before," Allan reminded her. + +"So I did, but I ain't sent him out now and he's gone just the same. +That's the trouble. After you once get an idea into a man's head, it +stays put. You can't never get it out again. And ideas that other +people puts in is just the same." + +"Women change their minds more easily, don't they?" asked Allan. He was +enjoying himself very much. + +"Of course. There's nothin' set about a woman unless she's got a busted +back. She ain't carin' to move around much then. The postmaster's wife +was tellin' me about one of the women at the hotel--the one that's +writin' the book. Do you know her?" + +"I've probably seen her." + +[Sidenote: All a Mistake] + +"The postmaster's wife's bunion was a hurtin' her awful one day when +this woman come in after stamps, and she told her to go and help herself +and put the money in the drawer. So she did, and while she was doin' it +she told the postmaster's wife that she didn't have no bunion and no +pain--that it was all a mistake." + +"'You wouldn't think so,' says the postmaster's wife, 'if it was your +foot that had the mistake on it.' She was awful mad at first, but, after +she got calmed down, the book-woman told her what she meant." + +"'There ain't no pain nor disease in the world,' she says. 'It's all +imagination.' + +"'Well,' says the postmaster's wife, 'when the swellin' is so bad, how'm +I to undeceive myself?' + +"The book-woman says: 'Just deny it, and affirm the existence of good. +You just set down and say to yourself: "I can't have no bunion cause +there ain't no such thing, and it can't hurt me because there is no such +thing as pain. My foot is perfectly well and strong. I will get right up +and walk."' + +"As soon as the woman was gone out with her stamps, the postmaster's +wife tried it and like to have fainted dead away. She said she might +have been able to convince her mind that there wasn't no bunion on her +foot, but she couldn't convince her foot. She said there wasn't no such +thing as pain, and the bunion made it its first business to do a little +denyin' on its own account. You have to be awful careful not to offend a +bunion. + +[Sidenote: A Test] + +"This mornin', while Roger was gone after them long, narrow pills that +has to be swallowed endways unless you want to choke to death, I +reckoned I'd try it on my back. So I says, right out loud: 'My back +don't hurt me. It is all imagination. I can't have no pain because there +ain't no such thing.' Then I stood up right quick, and--Lord!" + +Miss Mattie shook her head sadly at the recollection. "Do you know," she +went on, thoughtfully, "I wish that woman at the hotel had lumbago?" + +Doctor Conrad's nice brown eyes twinkled, and his mouth twitched, ever +so slightly. "I'm afraid I do, too," he said. + +"If she did, and wanted some of them long narrow pills, would you give +'em to her?" + +"Probably, but I'd be strongly tempted not to." + +[Sidenote: Surprise] + +When he took his leave, Miss Mattie, from force of habit, rose from her +chair. "Ouch!" she said, as she slowly straightened up. "Why, I do +believe it's better. It don't hurt nothin' like so much as it did." + +"Your surprise isn't very flattering, Mrs. Austin, but I'll forgive you. +The next time I come up, I'll take another look at you. Good-bye." + +Miss Mattie made her way slowly over to the table where the box of +capsules lay, and returned, with some effort, to her chair. She studied +both the box and its contents faithfully, once with her spectacles, and +once without. "You'd never think," she mused, "that a pill of that size +and shape could have any effect on a big pain that's nowheres near your +stomach. He must be a dreadful clever young man, for it sure is a +searchin' medicine." + + + + +XIV + +Barbara's Birthday + + +"Fairy Godmother," said Barbara, "I should like a drink." + +[Sidenote: Fairy Godchild] + +"Fairy Godchild," answered Eloise, "you shall have one. What do you +want--rose-dew, lilac-honey, or a golden lily full of clear, cool +water?" + +"I'll take the water, please," laughed Barbara, "but I want more than a +lily full." + +Eloise brought a glass of water and managed to give it to Barbara +without spilling more than a third of it upon her. "What a pretty neck +and what glorious shoulders you have," she commented, as she wiped up +the water with her handkerchief. "How lovely you'd look in an evening +gown." + +"Don't try to divert me," said Barbara, with affected sternness. "I'm +wet, and I'm likely to take cold and die." + +"I'm not afraid of your dying after you've lived through what you have. +Allan says you're the bravest little thing he has ever seen." + +The deep colour dyed Barbara's pale face. "I'm not brave," she +whispered; "I was horribly afraid, but I thought that, even if I were, +I could keep people from knowing it." + +"If that isn't real courage," Eloise assured her, "it's so good an +imitation that it would take an expert to tell the difference." + +"I'm afraid now," continued Barbara. Her colour was almost gone and she +did not look at Eloise. "I'm afraid that, after all, I can never walk." +She indicated the crutches at the foot of her bed by a barely +perceptible nod. "I have Aunt Miriam keep them there so that I won't +forget." + +"Nonsense," cried Eloise. "Allan says that you have every possible +chance, so don't be foolish. You're going to walk--you must walk. Why, +you mustn't even think of anything else." + +"It would seem strange," sighed Barbara, "after almost twenty-two years, +why--what day of the month is to-day?" + +"The sixteenth." + +[Sidenote: Twenty-two] + +"Then it is twenty-two. This is my birthday--I'm twenty-two years old +to-day." + +"Fairy Godchild, why didn't you tell me?" + +"Because I'd forgotten it myself." + +"You're too young to begin to forget your birthdays. I'm past thirty, +but I still 'keep tab' on mine." + +"If you're thirty, I must be at least forty, for I'm really much older +than you are. And Roger is an infant in arms compared with me." + +"Wise lady, how did you grow so old in so short a time?" + +"By working and reading, and thinking--and suffering, I suppose." + +"When you're well, dear, I'm going to try to give you some of the +girlhood you've never had. You're entitled to pretty gowns and parties +and beaux, and all the other things that belong to the teens and +twenties. You're coming to town with me, I hope--that's why I'm +staying." + +Barbara's blue eyes filled and threatened to overflow. "Oh, Fairy +Godmother, how lovely it would be. But I can't go. I must stay here and +sew and try to make up for lost time. Besides, father would miss me so." + +[Sidenote: Wait and See] + +Eloise only smiled, for she had plans of her own for father. "We won't +argue," she said, lightly, "we'll wait and see. It's a great mistake to +try to live to-morrow, or even yesterday, to-day." + +When Eloise went back to the hotel, her generous heart full of plans for +her protégé, Miriam did not hear her go out, and so it happened that +Barbara was alone for some time. Ambrose North had gone for one of his +long walks over the hills and along the shore, expecting to return +before Eloise left Barbara. For some vague reason which he himself could +not have put into words, he did not like to leave her alone with +Miriam. + +When Miriam came upstairs, she paused at the door to listen. Hearing no +voices, she peeped within. Barbara lay quietly, looking out of the +window, and dreaming of the day when she could walk freely and joyously, +as did the people who passed and repassed. + +Miriam went stealthily to her own room, and took out the letter to +Barbara. She had no curiosity as to its contents. If she had, it would +be an easy matter to open it, and put it into another envelope, without +the address, and explain that it had been merely enclosed with +instructions as to its delivery. + +[Sidenote: Miriam Delivers the Letter] + +Taking it, she went into the room where Barbara lay--the same room where +the dead Constance had lain so long before. + +"Barbara," she said, without emotion, "when your mother died she left +this letter for you, in my care." She put it into the girl's eager, +outstretched hand and left the room, closing the door after her. + +With trembling fingers, Barbara broke the seal, and took out the closely +written sheet. All four pages were covered. The ink had faded and the +paper was yellow, but the words were still warm with love and life. + +[Sidenote: The Letter] + + "Barbara, my darling, my little lame baby," the + letter began. "If you live to receive this + letter, your mother will have been dead for many + years and, perhaps, forgotten. I have chosen your + twenty-second birthday for this because I am + twenty-two now, and, when you are the same age, + you will, perhaps, be better fitted to understand + than at any other time. + + "I trust you have not married, because, if you + have, my warning may come too late. Never marry a + man whom you do not know, absolutely, that you + love, and when this knowledge comes to you, if + there are no barriers in the way, do not let + anything on God's earth keep you apart. + + "I have made the mistake which many girls make. + I came from school, young, inexperienced, unbalanced, + and eager for admiration. Your father, a brilliant man + of more than twice my age, easily appealed to my fancy. + He was handsome, courteous, distinguished, wealthy, of + fine character and unassailable position. I did not + know, then, that a woman could love love, rather than + the man who gave it to her. + + "There is not a word to be said of him that is not + wholly good. He has failed at no point, nor in the + smallest degree. On the contrary, it is I who have + disappointed him, even though I love him dearly + and always have. I have never loved him more than + to-day, when I leave you both forever. + + "My feeling for him is unchanged. It is only that + at last I have come face to face with the one man + of all the world--the one God made for me, back in + the beginning. I have known it for a long, long + time, but I did not know that he also loved me + until a few days ago. + + "Since then, my world has been chaos, illumined by + this unutterable light. I have been a true wife, + and when I can be true no longer, it is time to + take the one way out. I cannot live here and run + the risk of seeing him constantly, yet trust + myself not to speak; I cannot bear to know that + the little space lying between us is, in reality, + the whole world. + + "He is bound, too. He has a wife and a son only a + little older than you are. If I stay, I shall be + false to your father, to you, to him, and even to + myself, because, in my relation to each of you, + I shall be living a lie. + + [Sidenote: The Message] + + "Tell your dear father, if he still lives, that he + has been very good to me, that I appreciate all + his kindness, gentleness, patience, and the + beautiful love he has given me. Tell him I am + sorry I have failed him, that I have not been a + better wife, but God knows I have done the best I + could. Tell him I have loved him, that I love him + still, and have never loved him more than I do + to-day. But oh, my baby, do not tell him that the + full-orbed sun has risen before one who knew only + twilight before. + + "And, if you can, love your mother a little, as + she lies asleep in her far-away grave. Your + father, if he has not forgotten me, will have + dealt gently with my memory--of that I am sure. + But I do not quite trust Miriam, and I do not know + what she may have said. She loved your father and + I took him away from her. She has never forgiven + me for that and she never will. + + [Sidenote: A Burden] + + "If I have done wrong, it has been in thought only + and not in deed. I do not believe we can control + thought or feeling, though action and speech can + be kept within bounds. Forgive me, Barbara, + darling, and love me if you can. + + "Your + + "MOTHER." + +The last words danced through the blurring mist and Barbara sobbed aloud +as she put the letter down. Blind though he was, her father had felt the +lack--the change. The pity of it all overwhelmed her. + +Her thought flew swiftly to Roger, but--no, he must not know. This +letter was written to the living and not to the dead. Aunt Miriam would +ask no questions--she was sure of that--but the message to her father +lay heavily upon her soul. How could she make him believe in the love he +so hungered for even now? + +As the hours passed, Barbara became calm. When Miriam came in to see if +she wanted anything, she asked for pencil and paper, and for a book to +be propped up on a pillow in front of her, so that she might write. + +Miriam obeyed silently, taking an occasional swift, keen look at +Barbara, but the calm, impassive face and the deep eyes were +inscrutable. + +[Sidenote: The Meaning Changed] + +As soon as she was alone again, she began to write, with difficulty, +from her mother's letter, altering it as little as possible, and yet +changing the meaning of it all. She could trust herself to read from her +own sheet, but not from the other. It took a long time, but at last she +was satisfied. + +It was almost dusk when Ambrose North returned, and Barbara asked for a +candle to be placed on the small table at the head of her bed. She also +sent away the book and pencil and the paper she had not used. Miriam's +curiosity was faintly aroused, but, as she told herself, she could wait. +She had already waited long. + +"Daddy," said, Barbara, softly, when they were alone, "do you know what +day it is?" + +"No," he answered; "why?" + +"It's my birthday--I'm twenty-two to-day." + +"Are you? Your dear mother was twenty-two when she--I wish you were like +your mother, Barbara." + +"Mother left a letter with Aunt Miriam," said Barbara, gently. "She +gave it to me to-day." + +The old man sprang to his feet. "A letter!" he cried, reaching out a +trembling hand. "For me?" + +[Sidenote: Barbara Reads to her Father] + +Barbara laughed--a little sadly. "No, Daddy--for me. But there is +something for you in it. Sit down, and I'll read it to you." + +"Read it all," he cried. "Read every word." + +"Barbara, my darling, my little lame baby," read the girl, her voice +shaking, "if you live to read this letter, your mother will have been +dead for many years, and possibly forgotten." + +"No," breathed Ambrose North--"never forgotten." + +"I have chosen your twenty-second birthday for this, because I am +twenty-two now, and when you are the same age, it will be as if we were +sisters, rather than mother and daughter." + +"Dear Constance," whispered the old man. + +"When I came from school, I met your father. He was a brilliant man, +handsome, courteous, distinguished, of fine character and unassailable +position." + +Barbara glanced up quickly. The dull red had crept into his wrinkled +cheeks, but his lips were parted in a smile. + +"There is not a word to be said of him that is not wholly good. He has +failed at no point, nor in the smallest degree. I have disappointed +him, I fear, even though I love him dearly and always have. I have never +loved him more than I do to-day, when I leave you both forever. + +"Tell your dear father, if he still lives, that he has been very good to +me, that I appreciate all his kindness, gentleness, patience, and the +beautiful love he has given me. Tell him I am sorry I have failed +him----" + +"Oh, dear God!" he cried. "_She_ fail?" + +"That I have not been a better wife," Barbara went on, brokenly. "Tell +him I have loved him, that I love him still, and have never loved him +more than I do to-day. + +"Forgive me, both of you, and love me if you can. Your Mother." + +In the tense silence, Barbara folded up both sheets and put them back +into the envelope. Still, she did not dare to look at her father. When, +at last, she turned to him, sorely perplexed and afraid, he was still +sitting at her bedside. He had not moved a muscle, but he had changed. +If molten light had suddenly been poured over him from above, while the +rest of the room lay in shadow, he could not have changed more. + +[Sidenote: As by Magic] + +The sorrowful years had slipped from him, and, as though by magic, Youth +had come back. His shoulders were still stooped, his face and hands +wrinkled, and his hair was still as white as the blown snow, but his +soul was young, as never before. + +"Barbara," he breathed, in ecstasy. "She died loving me." + +The slender white hand stole out to his, half fearfully. "Yes, Daddy, +I've always told you so, don't you know?" Her senses whirled, but she +kept her voice even. + +"She died loving me," he whispered. + +The clock ticked steadily, a door closed below, and a little bird +outside chirped softly. There was no other sound save the wild beating +of Barbara's heart, which she alone heard. Still transfigured, he sat +beside the bed, holding her hand in his. + +[Sidenote: Far-Away Voices] + +Far-away voices sounded faintly in his ears, for, like a garment, the +years had fallen from him and taken with them the questioning and the +fear. Into his doubting heart Constance had come once more, radiant with +new beauty, thrilling his soul to new worship and new belief. + +"She died loving me," he said, as though he could scarcely believe his +own words. "Barbara, I know it is much to ask, for it must be very +precious to you, but--would you let me hold the letter? Would you let me +feel the words I cannot see?" + +Choking back a sob, Barbara took both sheets out of the envelope and +gave them to him. "Show me," he whispered, "show me the line where she +wrote, 'Tell him I love him still, and have never loved him more than +I do to-day.'" + +When Barbara put his finger upon the words, he bent and kissed them. +"What does it say here?" + +He pointed to the paragraph beginning, "I have made the mistake which +many girls make." + +"It says," answered Barbara, "'There is not a word to be said of him +that is not wholly good.'" He bent and kissed that, too. "And here?" His +finger pointed to the line, "I did not know that a woman could love +love, rather than the man who gave it to her." + +"That is where it says again, 'Tell him I have loved him, that I love +him still, and have never loved him more than I do to-day.'" + +"Dear, blessed Constance," he said, crushing the lie to his lips. "Dear +wife, true wife; truest of all the world." + +Barbara could bear no more. "Let me have the letter again, Daddy." + +[Sidenote: After Years of Waiting] + +"No, dear, no. After all these years of waiting, let me keep it for a +little while. Just for a little while, Barbara. Please." His voice broke +at the end. + +"For a little while, then, Daddy," she said, slowly; "only a little +while." + +[Sidenote: His Illumined Face] + +He went out, with the precious letter in his hand. Miriam was in the +hall, but he was unconscious of the fact. She shrank back against the +wall as he passed her, with his fine old face illumined as from some +light within. + +In his own room, he sat down, after closing the door, and spread the two +sheets on the table before him. He moved his hands caressingly over the +lines Constance had written in ink and Barbara in pencil. + +"She died loving me," he said to himself, "and I was wrong. She did not +change when I was blind and Barbara was lame. All these years I have +been doubting her while her own assurance was in the house. + +"She thought she failed me--the dear saint thought she failed. It must +take me all eternity to atone to her for that. But she died loving me." +His thought lingered fondly upon the words, then the tears streamed +suddenly over his blind face. + +"Oh, Constance, Constance," he cried aloud, forgetting that the dead +cannot hear. "You never failed me! Forgive me if you can." + + + + +XV + +The Song of the Pines + + +Upon the couch in the sitting-room, though it was not yet noon, Miss +Mattie slept peacefully. She had the repose, not merely of one dead, but +of one who had been dead long and was very weary at the time of dying. + +As Doctor Conrad had expected, her back was entirely well the morning +following his visit, and when she awoke, free from pain, she had dinned +his praises into Roger's ears until that long-suffering young man was +well-nigh fatigued. The subject was not exhausted, however, even though +Roger was. + +[Sidenote: A Wonder-Worker] + +"I'll tell you what it is, Roger," Miss Mattie had said, drawing a long +breath, and taking a fresh start; "a young man that can cure a pain like +mine, with pills that size, has got a great future ahead of him as well +as a brilliant past behind. He's a wonder-worker, that's what he is, not +to mention bein' a mind-reader as well." + +She had taken but a half dozen of the capsules the first day, having +fallen asleep after taking the third dose. When Roger went to the +office, very weary of Doctor Conrad's amazing skill, Miss Mattie had +resumed her capsules and, shortly thereafter, fallen asleep. + +She had slept for the better part of three days, caring little for food +and not in the least for domestic tasks. At the fourth day, Roger became +alarmed, but Doctor Conrad had gone back to the city, and there was no +one within his reach in whom he had confidence. + +[Sidenote: The Sleeping Woman] + +At last it seemed that it was time for him to act, and he shook the +sleeping woman vigorously. "What's the matter, Roger?" she asked, +drowsily; "is it time for my medicine?" + +"No, it isn't time for medicine, but it's time to get up. Your back +doesn't hurt you, does it?" + +"No," murmured Miss Mattie, "my back is as good as it ever was. What +time is it?" + +"Almost four o'clock and you've been asleep ever since ten this morning. +Wake up." + +"Eight--ten--twelve--two--four," breathed Miss Mattie, counting on her +fingers. Then, to his astonishment, she sat up straight and rubbed her +eyes. "If it's four, it's time for my medicine." She went over to the +cupboard in which the precious box of capsules was kept, took two more, +and returned to the couch. She still had the box in her hand. + +"Mother," gasped Roger, horrified. "What are you taking that medicine +for?" + +"For my back," she responded, sleepily. + +"I thought your back was well." + +"So 'tis." + +"Then what in thunder do you keep on taking dope for?" + +Miss Mattie sat up. She was very weary and greatly desired her sleep, +but it was evident that Roger must be soothed first. + +[Sidenote: Getting her Money's Worth] + +"You don't seem to understand me," she sighed, with a yawn. "After +payin' a dollar and twenty cents for that medicine, do you reckon I'm +goin' to let it go to waste? I'm goin' to keep right on takin' it, every +four hours, as he said, until it's used up." + +"Mother!" + +"Don't you worry none, Roger," said Miss Mattie, kindly, with a drowsy +smile. "Your mother is bein' took care of by a wonderful doctor. He +makes the lame walk and the blind see and cures large pains with small +pills. I am goin' to stick to my medicine. He didn't say to stop takin' +it." + +"But, Mother, you mustn't take it when there is no need for it. He never +meant for you to take it after you were cured. Besides, you might have +the same trouble again when we couldn't get hold of him." + +"How'm I to have it again?" demanded Miss Mattie, pricking up her ears, +"when I'm cured? If I take all the medicine, I'll stay cured, won't I? +You ain't got no logic, Roger, no more'n your pa had." + +"I wish you wouldn't, Mother," pleaded the boy, genuinely distressed. +"It's the medicine that makes you sleep so." + +"I reckon," responded Miss Mattie, settling herself comfortably back +among the pillows, "that he wanted me to have some sleep. In all my life +I ain't never had such sleep as I'm havin' now. You go away, Roger, and +study law. You ain't cut out for medicine." + +The last words died away in an incoherent whisper. Miss Mattie slept +again, with the box tightly clutched in her hand. As her fingers +gradually loosened their hold, Roger managed to gain possession of it +without waking her. He did not dare dispose of it, for he well knew that +the maternal resentment would make the remainder of his life a burden. +Besides, she might have another attack, when the ministering mind-reader +was not accessible. If it were possible to give her some harmless +substitute, and at the same time keep the "searching medicine" for a +time of need. + +[Sidenote: A Bright Idea] + +A bright idea came to Roger, which he hastened to put into execution. He +went to the druggist and secured a number of empty capsules of the same +size. At home, he laboriously filled them with flour and replaced those +in the box with an equal number of them. He put the "searching +medicine" safely away in his desk at the office, and went to work, his +heart warmed by the pleasant consciousness that he had done a good deed. + +When he went home at night, Miss Mattie was partially awake and inclined +to be fretful. "The strength is gone out of my medicine," she grumbled, +"and it ain't time to take more. I've got to set here and be deprived of +my sleep until eight o'clock." + +Roger prepared his own supper and induced his mother to eat a little. +When the clock began to strike eight, she took two of the flour-filled +capsules, confidently climbed upstairs, and--such is the power of +suggestion--was shortly asleep. + +[Sidenote: Favourable Opportunity] + +Having an unusually favourable opportunity, Roger went over to see +Barbara. He had not seen her since the night before the operation, but +Doctor Conrad had told him that in a few days he might be allowed to +talk to her or read to her for a little while at a time. + +Miriam opened the door for him, and, he thought, looked at him with +unusual sharpness. "I guess you can see her," she said, shortly. "I'll +ask her." + +In the pathetically dingy room, out of which Barbara had tried so hard +to make a home, he waited until Miriam returned. "They said to come up," +she said, and disappeared. + +Roger climbed the creaking stairs and made his way through the dark, +narrow hall to the open door from whence a faint light came. "Come in," +called Barbara, as he paused. + +Ambrose North sat by her bedside holding her hand, but she laughingly +offered the other to Roger. "Bad boy," she said; "why haven't you come +before? I've lain here in the window and watched you go back and forth +for days." + +"I didn't dare," returned Roger. "I was afraid I might do you harm by +coming and so I stayed away." + +"Everybody has been so kind," Barbara went on. "People I never saw nor +heard of have come to inquire and to give me things. You're absolutely +the last one to come." + +[Sidenote: Last but Not Least] + +"Last--and least?" + +"Not quite," she said, with a smile. "But I haven't been lonely. Father +has been right beside me all the time except when I've been asleep, +haven't you, Daddy?" + +"I've wanted to be," smiled the old man, "but sometimes they made me go +away." + +"Tell me about the Judge's liver," suggested Barbara, "and Fido. I've +been thinking a good deal about Fido. Did his legal document hurt him?" + +[Sidenote: Fido] + +"Not in the least. On the contrary, he thrived on it. He liked it so +well that he's eaten others as opportunity offered. The Judge is used to +it now, and doesn't mind. I've been thinking that it might save time and +trouble if, when I copied papers, I took an extra carbon copy for Fido. +That pup literally eats everything. He's cut some of his teeth on a pair +of rubbers that a client left in the office, and this noon he ate nearly +half a box of matches." + +"I suppose," remarked Barbara, "that he was hungry and wanted a light +lunch." + +"That'll be about all from you just now," laughed Roger. "You're going +to get well all right--I can see that." + +"Of course I'm going to get well. Who dared to say I wasn't?" + +"Nobody that I know of. Do you want me to bring Fido to see you?" + +"Some day," said Barbara, thoughtfully, "I would like to have you lead +Fido up and down in front of the house, but I do not believe I would +care to have him come inside." + +So they talked for half an hour or more. The blind man sat silently, +holding Barbara's hand, too happy to feel neglected or in any way +slighted. From time to time her fingers tightened upon his in a +reassuring clasp that took the place of words. + +Acutely self-conscious, Roger's memory harked back continually to the +last evening he and Barbara had spent together. In a way, he was +grateful for North's presence. It measurably lessened his constraint, +and the subtle antagonism that he had hitherto felt in the house seemed +wholly to have vanished. + +At last the blind man rose, still holding Barbara's hand. "It is late +for old folks to be sitting up," he said. + +"Don't go, Daddy. Make a song first, won't you? A little song for Roger +and me?" + +He sat down again, smiling. "What about?" he asked. + +"About the pines," suggested Barbara--"the tallest pines on the hills." + +There was a long pause, then, clearing his throat, the old man began. + +[Sidenote: Small Beginnings] + +"Even the tall and stately pines," he said, "were once the tiniest of +seeds like everything else, for everything in the world, either good or +evil, has a very small beginning. + +"They grow slowly, and in Summer, when you look at the dark, bending +boughs, you can see the year's growth in paler green at the tips. No one +pays much attention to them, for they are very dark and quiet compared +with the other trees. But the air is balmy around them, they scatter a +thick, fragrant carpet underneath, and there is no music in the world, +I think, like a sea-wind blowing through the pines. + +"When the brown cones fall, the seeds drop out from between the smooth, +satin-like scales, and so, in the years to come, a dreaming mother pine +broods over a whole forest of smaller trees. A pine is lonely and +desolate, if there are no smaller trees around it. A single one, +towering against the sky, always means loneliness, but where you see a +little clump of evergreens huddled together, braving the sleet and snow, +it warms your heart. + +"In Summer they give fragrant shade, and in Winter a shelter from the +coldest blast. The birds sleep among the thick branches, finding seeds +for food in the cones, and, on some trees, blue, waxen berries. + +[Sidenote: A Love Story] + +"Before the darkness came to me, I saw a love story in a forest of +pines. One tree was very straight and tall, and close beside it was +another, not quite so high. The taller tree leaned protectingly over the +other, as if listening to the music the wind made on its way from the +hills to the sea. As time went on, their branches became so thickly +interlaced that you could scarcely tell one from the other. + +"Around them sprang up half a dozen or more smaller trees, sheltered, +brooded over, and faithfully watched by these two with the interlaced +branches. The young trees grew straight and tall, but when they were not +quite half grown, a man came and cut them all down for Christmas trees. + +"When he took them away, the forest was strangely desolate to these two, +who now stood alone. When the Daughters of Dawn opened wide the gates of +darkness, and the Lord of Light fared forth upon the sea, they saw it +not. When it was high noon, and there were no shadows, even upon the +hill, it seemed that they might lift up their heads, but they only +twined their branches more closely together. When all the flaming +tapestry of heaven was spread in the West, they leaned nearer to each +other, and sighed. + +[Sidenote: Bereft] + +"When the night wind stirred their boughs to faint music, it was like +the moan of a heart that refuses to be comforted. When Spring danced +through the forest, leaving flowers upon her way, while all the silences +were filled with life and joy, these two knew it not, for they were +bereft. + +"Mating calls echoed through the woods, and silver sounds dripped like +rain from the maples, but there was no love-song in the boughs of the +pines. The birds went by, on hushed wings, and built their nests far +away. + +"When the maples put on the splendid robes of Autumn, the pines, more +gaunt and desolate than ever, covered the ground with a dense fabric of +needles, lacking in fragrance. When the winds grew cool, and the Little +People of the Forest pattered swiftly through the dead and scurrying +leaves, there was no sound from the pines. They only waited for the end. + +"When storm swept through the forest and the other trees bowed their +heads in fear, these two straightened themselves to meet it, for they +were not afraid. Frightened birds took refuge there, and the Little +People, with wild-beating hearts, crept under the spreading boughs to be +sheltered. + +"Vast, reverberating thunders sounded from hill to hill, and the sea +answered with crashing surges that leaped high upon the shore. Suddenly, +from the utter darkness, a javelin of lightning flashed through the +pines, but they only trembled and leaned closer still. + +"One by one, with the softness of falling snow, the leaves dropped upon +the brown carpet beneath, but there was no more fragrance, since the sap +had ceased to move through the secret channels and breathe balm into the +forest. Snow lay heavily upon the lower boughs and they broke, instead +of bending. When Spring danced through the world again, piping her +plaintive music upon the farthest hills, the pines were almost bare. + +[Sidenote: As One] + +"All through the sweet Summer the needles kept dropping. Every +frolicsome breeze of June carried some of them a little farther down the +road; every full moon shone more clearly through the barrier of the +pines. And at last, when the chill winds of Autumn chanted a requiem +through the forest, it was seen that the pines had long been dead, but +they so leaned together and their branches were so interlaced, that, +even in death, they stood as one. + +"They had passed their lives together, they had borne the same burdens, +faced the same storms, and rejoiced in the same warmth of Summer sun. +One was not left, stricken, long after the other was dead; their last +grief was borne together and was lessened because it was shared. I stand +there sometimes now, where the two dead trees are leaning close +together, and as the wind sighs through the bare boughs, it chants no +dirge to me, but only a hymn of farewell. + +[Sidenote: Together with Love] + +"There is nothing in all the world, Barbara, that means so much as that +one word, 'together,' and when you add 'love' to it, you have heaven, +for God himself can give no more joy than to bring together two who +love, never to part again." + +"Thank you," said Barbara, gently, after a pause. + +"I thank you too," said Roger. + +Ambrose North rose and offered his hand to Roger. "Good-night," he said. +"I am glad you came. Your father was my friend." Then he bent to kiss +Barbara. "Good-night, my dear." + +"Friend," repeated Roger to himself, as the old man went out. "Yes, +friend who never betrayed you or yours." The boy thrilled with +passionate pride at the thought. Before the memory of his father his +young soul stood at salute. + +Barbara's eyes followed her father fondly as he went out and down the +hall to his own room. When his door closed, Roger came to the other +chair, sat down, and took her hand. + +"It's not really necessary," explained Barbara, with a faint pink upon +her cheeks. "I shall probably recover, even if my hand isn't held all +the time." + +"But I want to," returned Roger, and she did not take her hand away. Her +cheeks took on a deeper colour and she smiled, but there was something +in her deep eyes that Roger had never seen there before. + +"I've missed you so," he went on. + +"And I have missed you." She did not dare to say how much. + +"How long must you lie here?" + +"Not much longer, I hope. Somebody is coming down next week to take off +the plaster; then, after I've stayed in bed a little longer, they'll see +whether I can walk or not." + +[Sidenote: The Crutches] + +She sighed wistfully and a strange expression settled on her face as she +looked at the crutches which still leaned against the foot of her bed. + +"Why do you have those there?" asked Roger, quickly. + +"To remind me always that I mustn't hope too much. It's just a chance, +you know." + +"If you don't need them again, may I have them?" + +"Why?" she asked, startled. + +"Because they are yours--they've seemed a part of you ever since I've +known you. I couldn't bear to have thrown away anything that was part of +you, even if you've outgrown it." + +"Certainly," answered Barbara, in a high, uncertain voice. "You're very +welcome and I hope you can have them." + +"Barbara!" Roger knelt beside the bed, still keeping her hand in his. +"What did I say that was wrong?" + +"Nothing," she answered, with difficulty. "But, after bearing all this, +it seems hard to think that you don't want me to be--to be separated +from my crutches. Because they have belonged to me always--you think +they always must." + +"Barbara! When you've always understood me, must I begin explaining to +you now? I've never had anything that belonged to you, and I thought you +wouldn't mind, if it was something you didn't need any more--I wouldn't +care what it was--if----" + +"I see," she interrupted. A blinding flash of insight had, indeed, made +many things wonderfully clear. "Here--wouldn't you rather have this?" + +[Sidenote: A Knot of Blue Ribbon] + +She slipped a knot of pale blue ribbon from the end of one of her long, +golden braids, and gave it to him. + +"Yes," he said. Then he added, anxiously, "are you sure you don't need +it? If you do----" + +"If I do," she answered, smiling, "I'll either get another, or tie my +braid with a string." + +Outwardly, they were back upon the old terms again, but, for the first +time since the mud-pie days, Barbara was self-conscious. Her heart beat +strangely, heavy with the prescience of new knowledge. When Roger rose +from his chair with a bit of blue ribbon protruding from his coat +pocket, she laughed hysterically. + +But Roger did not laugh. He bent over her, with all his boyish soul in +his eyes. She crimsoned as she turned away from him. + +[Sidenote: Please?] + +"Please?" he asked, very tenderly. "You did once." + +"No," she cried, shrilly. + +Roger straightened himself instantly. "Then I won't," he said, softly. +"I won't do anything you don't want me to--ever." + + + + +XVI + +Betrayal + + +The long weeks dragged by and, at last, the end of Barbara's +imprisonment drew near. The red-haired young man who had previously +assisted Doctor Conrad came down with one of the nurses and removed the +heavy plaster cast. The nurse taught Miriam how to massage Barbara with +oils and exercise the muscles that had never been used. + +"Doctor Conrad told me," said the red-haired young man, "to take your +father back with me to-morrow, if you were ready to have him go. The +sooner the better, he thought." + +[Sidenote: Love and Terror] + +Barbara turned away, with love and terror clutching coldly at her heart. +"Perhaps," she said, finally. "I'll talk with father to-night." + +Her own forgotten agony surged back into her remembrance, magnified an +hundred fold. Fear she had never had for herself strongly asserted +itself now, for him. "If it should come out wrong," she thought, "I +could never forgive myself--never in the wide world." + +When the doctor and nurse had gone to the hotel and Miriam was busy +getting supper, Ambrose North came quietly into Barbara's room. + +"How are you, dear?" he asked, anxiously. + +"I'm all right, Daddy, except that I feel very queer. It's all +different, some way. Like the old woman in _Mother Goose_, I wonder if +this can be I." + +There was a long pause. "Are they going back to-morrow," he asked, "the +doctor and nurse who came down to-day?" + +"Yes," answered Barbara, in a voice that was little more than a whisper. + +The old man took her hand in his and leaned over her. "Dear," he +pleaded, "may I go, too?" + +Barbara was startled. "Have they said anything to you?" + +[Sidenote: Long Waiting] + +"No, I was just thinking that I could go with them as well as with +Doctor Conrad. It is so long to wait," he sighed. + +"I cannot bear to have you hurt," answered Barbara, with a choking sob. + +"I know," he said, "but I bore it for you. Have you forgotten?" + +There was no response in words, but she breathed hard, every shrill +respiration fraught with dread. + +"Flower of the Dusk," he pleaded, "may I go?" + +"Yes," she sobbed. "I have no right to say no." + +"Dear, don't cry." The old man's voice was as tender as though she had +been the merest child. "The dream is coming true at last--that you can +walk and I can see. Think what it will mean to us both. And oh, Barbara, +think what it will be to me to see the words your dear mother wrote to +you--to know, from her own hand, that she died loving me." + +[Sidenote: Systematic Lying] + +Barbara suddenly turned cold. The hand that seemingly had clutched her +heart was tearing unmercifully at the tender fibre now. He would read +her mother's letter and know that his beloved Constance was in love with +another; that she took her own life because she could bear it no more. +He would know that they were poor, that the house was shabby, that the +pearls and laces and tapestries had all been sold. He would know, +inevitably, that Barbara's needle had earned their living for many +years; he would see, in the dining-room, the pitiful subterfuge of the +bit of damask, one knife and fork of solid silver, one fine plate and +cup. Above all, he would know that Barbara herself had systematically +lied to him ever since she could talk at all. And he had a horror of a +lie. + +"Don't," she cried, weakly. "Don't go." + +"You promised Barbara," he said, gently. Then he added, proudly: "The +Norths never go back on their spoken or written word. It is in the blood +to be true and you have promised. I shall go to-morrow." + +Barbara cringed and shrank from him. "Don't, dear," he said. "Your hands +are cold. Let me warm them in mine. I fear that to-day has been too much +for you." + +"I think it has," she answered. The words were almost a whisper. + +[Sidenote: If the Dream Comes True] + +"Then, don't try to talk, Barbara. I will talk to you. I know how you +feel about my going, but it is not necessary, for I do not fear in the +least for myself. I am sure that the dream is coming true, but, if it +should not--why, we can bear it together, dear, as we have borne +everything. The ways of the Everlasting are not our ways, but my faith +is very strong. + +[Sidenote: If the Dream Comes True] + +"If the dream comes true, as I hope and believe it will, you and I will +go away, dear, and see the world. We shall go to Europe and Egypt and +Japan and India, and to the Southern islands, to Greece and +Constantinople--I have planned it all. Aunt Miriam can stay here, or we +will take her with us, just as you choose. When you can walk, Barbara, +and I can see, I shall draw a large check, and we will start at the +first possible moment. The greatest blessing of money, I think, is the +opportunity it gives for travel. I have been glad, too, so many times, +that we are able to afford all these doctors and nurses. Think of the +poor people who must suffer always because they cannot command services +which are necessarily high-priced." + +Barbara's senses reeled and the cold, steel fingers clutched more +closely at the aching fibre of her heart. Until this moment, she had not +thought of the financial aspects of her situation--it had not occurred +to her that Doctor Conrad and the blue and white nurses and even the +red-haired young man would expect to be paid. And when her father went +to the hospital--"I shall have to sew night and day all the rest of my +life," she thought, "and, even then, die in debt." + +[Sidenote: The Lie] + +But over and above and beyond it all stood the Lie, that had lived in +her house for twenty years and more and was now to be cast out, +if--Barbara's heart stood still in horror because, for the merest +fraction of an instant, she had dared to hope that her father might +never see again. + +"I could not have gone alone," the old man was saying, "and even if +I could, I should never have left you, but now, I think, the time is +coming. I have dreamed all my life of the strange countries beyond the +sea, and longed to go. Your dear mother and I were going, in a little +while, but--" His lips quivered and he stopped abruptly. + +[Sidenote: Three Things] + +"What would you see, Daddy, if you had your choice? Tell me the three +things in the world that you most want to see." With supreme effort, +Barbara put self aside and endeavoured to lead him back to happier +things. + +"Three things?" he repeated. "Let me think. If God should give me back +my sight for the space of half an hour before I died, I should choose to +see, first, your dear mother's letter in which she says that she died +loving me; next, your mother herself as she was just before she died, +and then, dear, my Flower of the Dusk--my baby whom I never have seen. +Perhaps," he added, thoughtfully, "perhaps I should rather see you than +Constance, for, in a very little while, I should meet her past the +sunset, where she has waited so long for me. But the letter would come +first, Barbara--can you understand?" + +"Yes," she breathed, "I understand." + +The hope in her heart died. She could not ask for the letter. He took it +from his pocket as though it were a jewel of great price. "Put my finger +on the words that say, 'I love him still.'" + +Blinded with tears and choked by sobs, Barbara pointed out the line. +That, at least, was true. The old man raised it to his lips as a monk +might raise his crucifix when kneeling in penitential prayer. + +"I keep it always near me," he said, softly. "I shall keep it until +I can see." + + * * * * * + +Long after he had gone to bed, Barbara lay trembling. The problem that +had risen up before her without warning seemed to have no possible +solution. If he recovered his sight, she could not keep him from knowing +their poverty. One swift glance would show him all--and destroy his +faith in her. That was unavoidable. But--need he know that the dead had +deceived him too? + +The innate sex-loyalty, which is strong in all women who are really +fine, asserted itself in full power now. It was not only the desire to +save her father pain that made Barbara resolve, at any cost, to keep the +betraying letter from him. It was also the secret loyalty, not of a +child to an unknown mother, but of woman to woman--of sex to sex. + +[Sidenote: To-Day and To-Morrow] + +The house was very still. Outside, a belated cricket kept up his cheery +fiddling as he fared to his hidden home. Sometimes a leaf fell and +rustled down the road ahead of a vagrant wind. The clock ticked +monotonously. Second by second and minute by minute, To-Morrow advanced +upon Barbara; that To-Morrow which must be made surely right by the +deeds of To-Day. + +"If I could go," murmured Barbara. She was free of the plaster and she +could move about in bed easily. Ironically enough, her crutches leaned +against the farther wall, in sight but as completely out of reach as +though they were in the next room. + +Barbara sat up in bed and, cautiously, placed her two tiny bare feet on +the floor. With great effort, she stood up, sustained by a boundless +hope. She discovered that she could stand, even though she ached +miserably, but when she attempted to move, she fell back upon the bed. +She could not walk a step. + +[Sidenote: Vanishing Hopes] + +Faint with fear and pain, she got back into bed. She knew, now, all that +the red-haired young man had refused to tell her. He was too kind to say +that she was not to walk, after all. He was leaving it for Doctor +Conrad--or Eloise. + +Objects in the room danced before her mockingly. Her crutches were +veiled by a mist--those friendly crutches which had served her so well +and were now out of her reach. But Barbara had no time for self-pity. +The dominant need of the hour was pressing heavily upon her. + +With icy, shaking fingers, Barbara rang her bell. Presently Miriam came +in, attired in a flannel dressing-gown which was hopelessly unbecoming. +Barbara was moved to hysterical laughter, but she bit her lips. + +"Aunt Miriam," she said, trying to keep her voice even, "father has a +letter of mine in his coat pocket which I should like to read again +to-night. Will you bring me his coat, please?" + +Miriam turned away without a word. Her face was inscrutable. + +"Don't wake him," called Barbara, in a shrill whisper. "If he is not +asleep, wait until he is. I would not have him wakened, but I must have +the coat to-night." + +From his closed door came the sound of deep, regular breathing. Miriam +turned the knob noiselessly, opened the door, and slipped in. When her +eyes became accustomed to the darkness, she found the coat easily. It +had not taken long. Even Barbara might well be surprised at her +quickness. + +Perhaps the letter was not in his coat--it might be somewhere else. At +any rate, it would do no harm to make sure before going in to Barbara. +Miriam went into her own room and calmly lighted a candle. + +[Sidenote: The Letter Recovered] + +Yes, the letter was there--two sheets: one in ink, in Constance's hand, +the other, in pencil, written by Barbara. Why should Barbara write to +one who was blind? + +With her curiosity now thoroughly aroused, Miriam hastily read both +letters, then put them back. Her lips were curled in a sneer when she +took the coat into Barbara's room and gave it to her without speaking. + +The girl thrust an eager hand into the inner pocket and, with almost a +sob of relief, took out her mother's letter and her own version of it. + +"Thank you, Aunty," breathed Barbara. "I am sorry--to--to--disturb you, +but there was no--other way." + +[Sidenote: The Letter Destroyed] + +Miriam went out, as quietly as she had come, carrying the coat and +leaving Barbara's door ajar. When she was certain that she was alone, +Barbara tore the letter into shreds. So much, at least, was sure. Her +father should never see them, whatever he might think of her. + +Miriam was standing outside the blind man's door. She fancied she heard +him stir. It did not matter--there was plenty of time before morning to +return the coat. She took it back into her own room and sat down to +think. + +Her mirror reflected her face and the unbecoming dressing-gown. The +candlelight, however, was kind. It touched gently upon the grey in her +hair, hid the dark hollows under her eyes, and softened the lines in her +face. It lent a touch of grace to her work-worn hands, moving nervously +in her lap. + +After twenty-one years, this was what Constance had to say to +Barbara--that she loved another man, that Ambrose North was not to know +it, and that she did not quite trust Miriam. Also that Miriam had loved +Ambrose North and had never quite forgiven Constance for taking him +away from her. + +Out of the shadow of the grave, Miriam's secret stared her in the face. +She had not dreamed, until she read the letter, that Constance knew. +Barbara knew now, too. Miriam was glad that Barbara had the letter, for +she knew that, in all probability, she would destroy it. + +[Sidenote: A Crumbling Structure] + +The elaborate structure of deceit which they had so carefully reared +around the blind man was crumbling, even now. If he recovered his sight, +it must inevitably fall. He would know, in an instant of revelation, +that Miriam was old and ugly and not beautiful, as she had foolishly led +him to believe, years ago, when he asked how much time had changed her. +She looked pitifully at her hands, rough and knotted and red through +untiring slavery for him and his. + +She and Barbara would be sacrificed--no, for he would forgive Barbara +anything. She was the only one who would lose through his restored +vision, unless Constance might, in some way, be revealed to him as she +was. + +_"I do not quite trust Miriam. She loved your father and I took him away +from her."_ The cruel sentences moved crazily before her as in letters +of fire. + +The letter was gone. Ambrose North would never see the evidence of +Constance's distrust of her, nor come, without warning, upon Miriam's +pitiful secret which, with a woman's pride, she would hide from him at +all costs. None the less, Constance had stabbed her again. A ghostly +hand clutching a dagger had suddenly come up from the grave, and the +thrust of the cold, keen steel had been very sure. + +[Sidenote: Scheming Miriam] + +For twenty years and more, she had been tempted to read to the blind man +the letter Constance had written to Laurence Austin just before she +died. For that length of time, her desire to blacken Constance, in the +hope that the grief-stricken heart might once more turn to her, had +warred with her love and her woman's fear of hurting the one she loved. +To-night, even in the face of the letter to Barbara, she knew that she +should never have courage to read it to him, nor even to give it to him +with her own hands. + +In case he recovered his sight, she might leave it where he would find +it. She was glad, now, that the envelope was torn, for he would not be +apt to open a letter addressed to another, even though Constance had +penned the superscription and the man to whom it was addressed was dead. +His fine sense of honour would, undoubtedly, lead him to burn it. But, +if the letter were in a plain envelope, sealed, and she should leave it +on his dresser, he would be very sure to open it, if he saw it lying +there, and then---- + +Miriam smiled. Constance would be paid at last for her theft of another +woman's suitor, for her faithlessness and her cowardly desertion. There +was a heavy score against Constance, who had so belied the meaning of +her name, and the twenty years had added compound interest. North might +not--probably would not--turn again to Miriam after all these years; she +saw that plainly to-night for the first time, but he would, at any rate, +see that he had given up the gold for the dross. + +Miriam got her work-box and began to mend the coat lining. She had not +known that it was torn. She wondered how he would feel when he +discovered that the precious letter was lost. Would he blame Barbara--or +her? + +It would be too bad to have him lose the comfort those two sheets of +paper had given him. Miriam had seen him as he sat alone for hours in +his own room, with the door ajar, caressing the written pages as though +they were alive and answered him with love for love. She knew it was +Constance's letter to Barbara, but she had lacked curiosity as to its +contents until to-night. + +[Sidenote: The Plot] + +The letter to Laurence Austin was written on paper of the same size. +There was still some of it, in Constance's desk, in the living-room +downstairs. Suppose she should replace one letter with the other, and, +if he ever read it, let him have it all out with Barbara, who was +trying to save him from knowledge that he should have had long ago. + +The coat slipped to the floor as Miriam considered the plan. Perhaps one +of them would ask her what it was. In that case she would say, +carelessly: "Oh, a letter Constance left for Laurence Austin. I did not +think it best to deliver it, as it could do no good and might do a great +deal of harm." She would have the courage for that, surely, but, if she +failed at the critical moment, she could say, simply: "I do not know." + +She crept downstairs and returned with a sheet of Constance's +note-paper. Neither she nor Barbara had ever been obliged to use it, and +it was far back in a corner of a deep drawer, together with North's +check-book, which had been useless for so many years. + +As she had expected, it exactly matched the other sheet. She folded the +two together, with the letter to Laurence Austin inside. North would not +be disappointed, now, when he reached into his pocket and found no fond +letter from his dead but still beloved Constance. Barbara could not +change this, by rewriting into anything save a cry of passionate love. + +[Sidenote: Subtle Revenge] + +Miriam's whole being glowed with satisfaction. She thrilled with the +pleasure of this subtle revenge upon Constance, who was fully repaid, +now, for writing as she had. + +_"I do not quite trust Miriam. She loved your father and I took him away +from her."_ + +She repeated the words in a whisper, and smiled to think of the deeply +loving, passionate page to another man that had filled the place. Let +the Fates do their worst now, for when he should read it---- + +[Sidenote: The Irony of Fate] + +Some way, Miriam was very sure that his sight was to be restored to him. +She perceived, now, the irony of his caressing the letter Constance had +written to Barbara. How much more ironical it would be to see him, with +that unearthly light upon his face, moving his hand across the page +Constance had written to Laurence Austin just before she died. Miriam +well knew that the other letters had come first and that Constance's +last word had been to the man she loved. + +The hours passed on, slowly. The mist that hung over the sea was faintly +touched with dawn before Miriam arose, and, taking the coat, went back +to Ambrose North's room. She paused outside the door, but all was still. + +She entered, quietly, and laid the coat on a chair. She started back to +the door, but, before she touched the knob, the blind man stirred in his +sleep. + +"Constance," he said, drowsily, "is that you? Have you come back, +Beloved? It has seemed so long." + +[Sidenote: Surging Hatred] + +Miriam set her lips grimly against the surging hatred for the dead that +welled up within her. She went out hastily, and noiselessly closed the +door. + + + + +XVII + +"Never Again" + + +Barbara did not mind lying in bed, now that the heavy plaster cast was +gone and she could move about with comparative freedom. Every day, Aunt +Miriam massaged her with fragrant oils, and she faithfully took the +slight exercises she was bidden to take, even though she knew it was of +no use. She was glad, now, that she had kept the crutches in sight, for +they had steadily reminded her not to hope too much. + +[Sidenote: Bitterly Disappointed] + +Still, she was bitterly disappointed, though she thought she had not +allowed herself to hope--that she had done it only because Eloise wanted +her to. Perhaps the red-haired young man knew, and perhaps not--she was +not so sure, now, that he had refrained from telling her through motives +of kindness. But Doctor Conrad would know, instantly, and he and Eloise +would be very sorry. Barbara wiped away her tears and compressed her +lips tightly together. "I won't cry," she said to herself. "I won't, +I won't, I won't." + +Her father had gone to the city with the red-haired young man and the +nurse. He had been gone more than a week, and Barbara had received no +news of him save a brief note from Doctor Conrad. He said that her +father had been to a specialist of whom he had spoken to her, and that +an operation had been decided upon. He would tell her all about it, he +added, when he saw her. + +Day by day, Barbara lived over the last evening she and her father had +spent together--all the fear and foreboding. She did not for a moment +regret that she had taken his precious letter from him and destroyed it. +She would face whatever she must, and as bravely as she might, but he +should not be hurt in that manner--she had taken the one sure way to +spare him that. + +[Sidenote: A Long Farewell] + +When he came back, and realised to the full how steadily she had +deceived him, he could love her no more. When he said good-bye to her +the morning he went away, it had been good-bye in more ways than one. It +was a long farewell to the love and confidence that had bound him to +her; an eternal separation, in spirit, from the child he had loved. + +The tears came when she remembered how he had said good-bye to her. Aunt +Miriam and the red-haired young man and the nurse had left them alone +together for what might be the last time on earth, and was most surely +the last time as regarded the old, sweet relation so soon to be +severed--unless he came back blind, as he had gone. + +The old man had leaned over her and kissed her twice. "Flower of the +Dusk," he had said, with surpassing tenderness, "when I come back, the +dusk will change to dawn. If the darkness lifts I shall see you first, +and so, for a little while, good-bye." + +He had gone downstairs quickly and lightly, as one who is glad to go. +When she last saw him, he was walking ahead of the young doctor and the +nurse, straight and eager and almost young again, sustained by the same +boundless hope that had given Barbara strength for her ordeal. + +[Sidenote: Dr. Conrad Comes Again] + +It was almost two weeks before Doctor Conrad came down. He had been +obliged, lately, to miss several Sundays with Eloise. When Aunt Miriam +came and told Barbara that he was downstairs, she felt a sudden, sharp +pang of disappointment, not for herself, but for him. He had tried so +hard and done so much, and to know that he had failed-- Even in the face +of her own bitter outlook, she could be sorry for him. + +But, when he came in, he did not seem to need anyone's sympathy. He was +so magnificently young and strong, so full of splendid vitality. +Barbara's failing courage rose in answer to him and she smiled as she +offered a frail little hand. + +"Well, little girl," said Doctor Allan, sitting down on the bed beside +her, "how goes it?" + +"Tell me about father," begged Barbara, ignoring the question. + +[Sidenote: The Main Trouble] + +"Father is doing very well," Allan assured her. "He has recovered nicely +from the operation and we have strong hope for the sight of one eye if +not for both. I can almost promise you partial restoration, but, of +course, it is impossible to tell definitely until later. His heart is +very weak--that seems to be the main trouble now." + +Barbara lay very still, with her eyes closed. + +"Aren't you glad?" asked Doctor Allan, in surprise. + +"Yes," answered Barbara, with difficulty. "Indeed, yes. I was just +thinking." + +"A penny for your thoughts," he smiled. + +"Are they going to take off the bandages there at the hospital?" + +"Why, yes--of course." + +"They mustn't!" cried Barbara, sitting up in bed. "Or, if they have to, +I must go there. Doctor Conrad, I must see my father before he regains +his sight." + +"Why?" asked Allan. "Don't cry, little girl--tell me." + +His voice was very soothing, and, as he spoke, he took hold of her +fluttering hands. The strong clasp was friendly and reassuring. + +"Because I've lied to him," sobbed Barbara. + +"I've made him think we were rich instead of poor. He doesn't know that +I've earned our living all these years by sewing, and that we've had to +sell everything that anybody would buy--the pearls and laces and +everything. He hates a lie and he'll despise me. It will break his +heart. I'd rather tell him myself than to have him find it out." + +"Little girl," said Allan, in his deep, tender voice; "dear little girl. +Nobody on earth could blame you for doing that, least of all your +father. If he's half the man I think he is, he'll only love you the more +for doing it." + +Barbara looked up at him, her deep blue eyes brimming with tears. "Do +you think," she asked, chokingly, "that he ever can forgive me?" + +[Sidenote: A Promise] + +Allan laughed. "In a minute," he assured her. "Of course he'll forgive +you. But I'll promise you that you shall see him first. As far as that +is concerned, I can take the bandages off myself, after he comes home." + +"Can you really? And will you?" + +"Surely. Now don't fret about it any more. Let's see how you're getting +on." + +In an instant the man was pushed into the background and the great +surgeon took his place. He went at his work with the precision and power +of a perfect machine, guided by that unspoken sympathy which was his +inestimable gift. He tested muscles and bones and turned the joint in +its socket. Barbara watched his face anxiously. His forehead was set in +a frown and his eyes were keen, but the rest of his face was impassive. + +"Sit up," he said. "Now, turn this way. That's right--now stand up." + +Barbara obeyed him, trembling. In a minute more he would know. + +"Stand on this side only. Now, can you walk?" + +"No," answered Barbara, in a sad little whisper, "I can't." She reached +for her faithful crutches, which leaned against the foot of the bed, but +Doctor Allan snatched them away from her. + +"No," he said, with his face illumined. "Never again." + +[Sidenote: New Hopes] + +Barbara gasped. "What do you mean?" she asked, terror and joy strangely +mingling in her voice. + +"Never again," Doctor Allan repeated. "You're never to have your +crutches again." + +Barbara gazed at him in astonishment. She stood there in her little +white night-gown, which was not long enough to cover her bare pink feet, +with a great golden braid hanging over either shoulder and far below her +waist. Her blue eyes were very wide and dark. + +"Am I going to walk?" she asked, in a queer little whisper. + +"Certainly, except when you're riding, or sitting down, or asleep." + +"I can't believe it," she answered, with quivering lips. Then she threw +her arms around Doctor Allan's neck and kissed him with the sweet +impulsiveness of a child. + +"Thank you," he said, softly. "Now we'll walk." + +[Sidenote: Walking Again] + +He put his arm around her and Barbara took a few stumbling steps. Aunt +Miriam opened the door and came in. + +"Look," cried Barbara. "I'm walking." + +"So I see," replied Miriam. "I heard the noise and came up to see what +was the matter. I thought perhaps you wanted something." She retreated +as swiftly as she had come. Allan stared after her and seemed to be on +the verge of saying something very much to the point, but fortunately +held his peace. + +"You'll have to learn," he said, to Barbara, with a new gentleness in +his tone. "Your balance is entirely different and these muscles and +joints will have to learn to work. Keep up the exercise and the massage. +You can have a cane, if you like, but no crutches. Is there someone who +would help you for an hour or so every day?" + +"Roger would," she said, "or Aunt Miriam." + +"Better get Roger--he'll be stronger. And also more willing," he +thought, but he did not say so. "Don't tire yourself, but walk a little +every day, as you feel like it." + +When he went, he took the crutches with him. "You might be tempted," he +explained, "if they were here, and your father's cane is all you really +need. Be a good girl and I'll come up again soon." + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: A Great Success] + +Eloise was watching from the piazza of the hotel, and, when he came in +sight, she went up the road to meet him. + +"Oh, Allan," she cried, breathlessly, as she saw the crutches. "Is +she----?" + +"She's all right. It's one of the most successful operations ever done +in that line, even if I do say it as shouldn't." + +"Of course," smiled Eloise, looking up at him fondly. "I know _that_." + +They walked together down to the shore, followed by the deep and open +interest of the rocking-chair brigade, marshalled twenty strong, on the +hotel veranda. It was October and the children had all been taken back +to school. The exquisite peace of the place was a thing to dream about +and be spoken of only in reverent whispers. + +The tide was going out. Allan hurled one of the crutches far out to sea. +"They've worked faithfully and long," he said, "and they deserve a +little jaunt to Europe. Here goes." + +He was about to throw the other, but Eloise took it from him. "Let me," +she suggested. "I'd love to throw a crutch over to Europe." + +She tried it, with the customary feminine awkwardness. It did not go +beyond the shallow water, and speared itself, sharp end downward, in the +soft sand. + +Allan laughed uproariously and Eloise coloured with shame. "Never mind," +she said, with affected carelessness, "you couldn't have made it stick +up in the sand like that, and I think it'll get to Europe just as soon +as yours does, so there." + +They sat down on the beach, sheltered from prying eyes by a sand dune, +and directly opposite the crutch, which wobbled with every wave that +struck it. "Think what it means," said Eloise, "and think what it might +mean. It might be part of a shipwreck, or someone who needed it very +much might have dropped it accidentally out of a boat, or the one who +had it might have died, after long suffering." + +"Or," continued Allan, "someone might have outgrown the need of it and +thrown it away, as the tiny dwellers in the sea cast off their shells." + +[Sidenote: Thanks] + +Eloise turned to him, with her deep eyes soft with luminous mist. "I +haven't thanked you," she said, "for all you have done for my little +girl." She lifted her sweet face to his. + +"If you're going to thank me like that," said Allan, huskily, "I'll cut +up the whole township and not even bother to save the pieces." + +"You needn't," laughed Eloise, "but it was dear of you. You've never +done anything half so lovely in all your life." + +"It was you who did it, dear. I was but the humble instrument in your +hands." + +"Was Barbara glad?" + +"I think so. She kissed me, too, but not like that." + +"Did she, really? The sweet, shy little thing. Bless her heart." + +"I infer, Miss Wynne," remarked Allan, in a judicial tone, "that you're +not jealous." + +"Jealous? I should say not. Anybody who can get you away from me," she +added, as an afterthought, "can have you with my blessing and a few +hints as to your management." + +[Sidenote: Really Glad] + +"Safe offer," he commented. "Are you really glad I've done what I have +for Barbara?" + +"Oh, my dear! So glad!" + +"Then," suggested Allan, hopefully, "don't you think I should be thanked +again?" + + * * * * * + +"I forgot to ask you about that dear old man," said Eloise, after a +little. "Is he going to be all right, too?" + +"Pretty much so, I think. We're very sure that he can see a little--he +will not be totally blind. He will probably need glasses, but there +will be plenty of time for that. His heart is the main trouble now. Any +sudden excitement or shock might easily prove fatal." + +"Of course he won't have that." + +[Sidenote: Will It Last?] + +"We'll hope not, but life itself is more or less exciting and you can +never tell what's going to break loose next. I have long since ceased to +be surprised at anything, except the fact that you love me. I can't get +used to that." + +"You will, though," said Eloise, a little sadly. "You'll get so used to +it that you won't even look up when I come into the room--you'll keep +right on reading your paper." + +"Impossible." + +"That's what they all say, but it's so." + +"Have all your previous husbands changed so quickly that you're afraid +to try me?" + +"I've seen it so much," sighed Eloise. + +A great light broke in upon Allan. "Is that why?" he demanded, putting +his arm around her. "No, you needn't try to get away, for you can't. Is +that why I'm sentenced to all this infernal waiting?" + +Eloise bit her lips and did not answer. + +"Is it?" he asked, authoritatively. + +"A little," she whispered. "This is so sweet, and sometimes I'm +afraid----" + +"Darling! Darling!" he said, drawing her closer. "You make me ashamed of +my fellowmen when you say that. But do you want the year to stand still +always at June?" + +"No," she answered. "I'm willing to grow with Love, from all the promise +of Spring into the harvest and even into Winter, as long as the +sweetness is there. Don't you understand, Allan? Who would wish for June +when Indian Summer fills all the silences with shimmering amethystine +haze? And who would give up a keen, crisp Winter day, when the air sets +the blood to tingling, for apple blossoms or even roses? It's not +that--I only want the sweetness to stay." + +"Please God, it shall," returned Allan, solemnly. He was profoundly +moved. + +[Sidenote: Bank of Life] + +"It shouldn't be so hard to keep it," went on Eloise, thoughtfully. +"I've been thinking about it a good deal, lately. Life will give us back +whatever we put into it. In a way, it's just like a bank. Put joy into +the world and it will come back to you with compound interest, but you +can't check out either money or happiness when you have made no +deposits." + +"Very true," he responded. "I never thought of it in just that way +before." + +"If you put joy in, and love, unselfishness, and a little laughter, and +perfect faith--I think they'll all come back, some day." + +A scarlet leaf from a maple danced along the beach, blown from some +distant bough where the frost had set a flaming signal in the still +September night. A yellow leaf from an elm swiftly caught it, and +together they floated out to sea. + +[Sidenote: When?] + +"Sweetheart," said Allan, "do you see? The leaves are beginning to fall +and in a little while the trees will be bare. How long are you going to +keep me waiting for wife and home?" + +"I--don't--know." + +"Dear, can't you trust me?" + +"Yes, always," she answered, quickly. "You know that." + +"Then when?" + +"When all the colour is gone," she said, after a pause. "When the forest +is desolate and the wind sighs through bare branches--when Winter chills +our hearts--then I will come to you, and for a little while bring back +the Spring." + +"Truly, Sweetheart?" + +"Truly." + +"You'll never be sorry, dear." He took her into his arms and sealed her +promise upon her lips. + + + + +XVIII + +The Passing of Fido + + +[Sidenote: Alone in the Office] + +Fido had been in the office alone for almost three hours. The old man, +who he knew was his master, and the young man, who was inclined to be +impatient with him when he felt playful, had both gone out. The door was +locked and there was nobody on the other side of it to answer a vigorous +scratch or even a pleading whine. When people knocked, they went away +again, almost immediately. + +The window-sills were too high for a little dog to reach, and there was +no chair near. He walked restlessly around the office, stopping at +intervals to sit down and thoughtfully contemplate his feet, which were +much too large for the rest of him. He chased a fly that tickled his +ear, but it eluded him, and now buzzed temptingly on a window-pane, out +of his reach. + +It seemed that something serious must have happened, for Fido had never +been left alone so long before. If he had known that the old man was +conversing pleasantly with some fellow-citizens at the grocery store, +and that the young one had his arm around a laughing girl in white, +trying to teach her to walk, he would have been very indignant indeed. + +Several times, lately, Fido had noticed, the young man had gone out +shortly after the old one went to the post-office. It would be, usually, +half a day later when his master returned with a letter or two, or often +with none. The young man took pains to get back before the old one did, +which was well, for there should always be someone in a lawyer's office +to receive clients and keep dogs from being lonely. + +[Sidenote: Pangs of Hunger] + +The pangs of a devastating hunger assailed Fido, which was not strange, +for it was long past the hour when the old man usually took a bulky +parcel out of his desk, spread a newspaper upon the floor, and bade Fido +eat of cold potatoes, meat, and bread. There was, nearly always, a nice, +juicy bone to beguile the tedium of the afternoon. Fido and the old man +seldom went home to supper before half past five, and Fido would have +been famished were it not for the comfort of the bone. + +He sniffed around the larger of the two desks. A tempting odour came +from a drawer far above. He stood on his hind legs and reached up as far +as he could, but the drawer was closed. So was every other drawer in the +office, except one, and that was in the young man's desk. Probably +there was nothing in it for a hungry dog--there never had been. + +[Sidenote: The Little Red Box] + +Still, it might be well to investigate. Fido laboriously climbed up on +the chair and put his paws upon the edge of the open drawer. There was +nothing in it but papers and a small, square, red box with a rubber band +around it. + +Fido took the box in his mouth and jumped down. He pushed it with paws +and nose over to his own particular corner, sniffing appreciatively +meanwhile. It took much vigorous chewing to get the rubber band off and +to make a hole in one corner of the box, out of which rolled a great +number of small, cylindrical objects. They were not like anything Fido +had ever eaten before, but hungry little dogs must take what they can +find. So he gulped them all down but one. This one refused to be +swallowed and Fido quickly repented of his rashness, for it was +distinctly not good. He ate the rubber band and all but a little piece +of the red box before the taste was quite gone out of his mouth. Even +then, a drink of fresh, cool water would have been very acceptable, but +there was nobody to care whether a little dog died of thirst or not. + +The bluebottle fly buzzed loudly upon the window-pane, but Fido no +longer aspired to him. A vast weariness took the place of his former +restlessness. He sat and blinked at his ill-assorted feet for some +time, then dragged himself lazily toward his cushion in the corner. +Before he reached it, he was so very sleepy that he lay down upon the +floor. In less than five minutes, he was off to the canine dreamland, +one paw still caressingly laid over the fragments of the little red box. + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: The Judge Returns] + +When the Judge came in, an hour later, he was much surprised to find the +office locked and the cards of three valued clients on the floor under +the door. There had been four, but Fido had eaten the first one. Two of +them were marked with the hour of the call. It indicated, plainly, to a +logical mind, that Roger had left the office soon after he did, and had +not returned. It was very strange. + +Fido slumbered on, though hitherto the sound of his master's step would +awaken him to noisy and affectionate demonstrations. The Judge turned +Fido over with a friendly foot, but there was no answer save a wide +yawn. He brought the parcel of bread and meat and opened it, leaving it +on the floor close by. Then he took a chicken bone and held it to the +sleeper's nose, but Fido turned away as though from an annoying fly. + +As the dog had never before failed to take immediate interest in a +chicken bone, the Judge was alarmed. He picked up the fragments of the +little red box and wondered if anyone could have poisoned his pet. He +brought fresh water, but Fido, hitherto possessed of an unquenchable +thirst, failed to respond. + +When Roger came in, belated and breathless, he found his explanations +coldly received. Whether or not Barbara North ever walked was evidently +a matter of no particular concern to the Judge. It was also of no +immediate importance that clients had come and found the office empty, +even though one of them, presumably, had intended to settle an account +of long standing. The vital question was simply this: what was the +matter with Fido? + +Roger did not know. Though Fido's disdain of food and drink might be +abnormal, his position on the floor and his deep breathing were quite +natural. + +[Sidenote: An Inquiry] + +Then the fragments of the little red box were presented to Roger, and +inquiry made as to the contents. Also, had Roger tried to poison the +Judge's pet? + +Roger had not. The box had contained a prescription for lumbago which +Doctor Conrad had given his mother. It was in the drawer in his desk. He +might possibly have left the drawer open--probably had, as the box was +gone. + +The Judge was deeply desirous of knowing why Mrs. Austin's lumbago cure +should be kept in the office, within reach of unwary pets. After +considerable hesitation, Roger explained. + +The owner of Fido was highly incensed. First, he condemned the entire +procedure as "criminal carelessness," setting forth his argument in +unparliamentary language. Then, remembering that Roger had not really +loved Fido, he brought forth an unworthy motive, and accused the hapless +young man of murderous intent. + +[Sidenote: The Judge Commands] + +Roger would kindly borrow the miniature express waggon which was the +prized possession of the postmaster's small son, place the cushion in +it, with its precious burden, and convey Fido, with all possible +tenderness, to his other and larger cushion in the Judge's own bedroom. +He would take the cold chicken, too, please, for if Fido ever wanted +anything again in this world, it would probably be chicken. + +The Judge would follow as soon as he had written to his clients and +expressed his regret that his clerk's numerous social duties did not +permit of his giving much time to his business. And, the Judge added, as +an afterthought, if Fido should die, it would not be necessary for Roger +to return to the office. He wanted someone who could be trusted not to +poison his dog while he was out. + +Roger was too much disturbed to be conscious of the ludicrous aspect he +presented to the public eye as he went down the main thoroughfare of +Riverdale, dragging the small cart which contained the slumbering Fido +and his cushion. He did not even hear the pointed comments made by the +young of both sexes whom he encountered on his interminable walk, and +forgot to thank the postmaster for the loan of the cart when he returned +it, empty save for a fragment of cold chicken and a faint, doggy smell. + +[Sidenote: On the Beach] + +For obvious reasons, he could not go to the office and he did not like +to take his disturbing mood to Barbara. Besides, his mother, who now had +long wakeful periods in the daytime, might see him and ask unpleasant +questions. He went down to the beach, yearning for solitude, and settled +himself in the shelter of a sand dune to meditate upon the unhappy +events of the day. + +He did not realise that the sand dune belonged to Eloise, and that she +was wont to sit there with Doctor Conrad, out of the wind, and safely +screened from the argus-eyed rocking-chairs on the veranda. He was so +preoccupied that he did not even hear the sound of their voices as they +approached. Turning the corner quickly, they almost stumbled over him. + +"Upon my word," cried Eloise. "Sir Knight of the Dolorous Countenance, +what has gone wrong?" + +"Nothing," answered Roger, miserably. + +"Anybody dead?" queried Allan, lazily stretching himself upon the sand. + +"Not yet, but somebody is dying." + +"Who?" demanded Eloise. "Barbara, or your mother? Who is it?" + +"Fido," said Roger hopelessly, staring out to sea. + +Allan laughed, but Eloise returned, kindly: "I didn't know you had a +dog. I'm sorry." + +"He isn't mine," explained Roger; "I only wish he were. If he had been," +he added, viciously, "he'd have died a violent death long ago." + +[Sidenote: Miss Wynne's Plans] + +Little by little, the whole story came out. Allan kept his face straight +with difficulty, but Eloise was genuinely distressed. "Don't worry," she +said, sympathetically. "If Fido dies and the Judge won't take you back, +I can probably find an opening for you in town. Your office work will +pay your expenses, so you can go to law school in the evenings and be +ready for your examinations in the Spring." + +"Oh, Miss Wynne," cried Roger. "How good you are! I don't wonder Barbara +calls you her Fairy Godmother." + +"Barbara is coming to town to spend the Winter with me," Eloise went on, +happily. "She's never had a good time and I'm going to give her one. As +soon as she's strong enough, and can walk well, I'm going to take her, +bag and baggage. It's all I'm waiting here for." + +In a twinkling, Roger's despair was changed to something entirely +different. "Oh," he cried, "I do hope Fido will die. Do you think there +is any chance?" he asked, eagerly, of Allan. + +"I should think, from what you tell me," remarked Allan, judicially, +"that Fido was nearly through with his earthly troubles. A dose of that +size might easily keep any of us from worrying any longer about the +price of meat and next month's rent." + +"Mother won't like it," said Roger, soberly. "She may not be willing for +me to go." + +"She should be," returned Allan, "as you've saved her life at the +expense of Fido's. When I go up to see Barbara this afternoon, I'll stop +in and tell her." + +[Sidenote: Unexpected Call] + +Miss Mattie was awake, but yawning, when he knocked at her door. "There +wasn't no call for you to come," she said, inhospitably; "the medicine +ain't used up yet." + +"Let me see the box, please." + +She shuffled off to the kitchen cupboard and brought it to him. There +were half a dozen flour-filled capsules in it. Allan observed that the +druggist, in writing the directions on the cover, had failed to add the +last two words. + +"Idiot," he said, under his breath. "I wrote, 'Take two every four hours +until relieved.'" + +"I was relieved," explained Miss Mattie, "and I've had fine sleep ever +since. It's wore off considerable in the last three days, though." + +Allan then told her, in vivid and powerful language, how the druggist's +error might have had very serious results, had it not been for Roger's +presence of mind in substituting the flour-filled capsules for the +"searching medicine." He was surprised to find that Miss Mattie was +ungrateful, and that she violently resented the imposition. + +[Sidenote: Notion of Economy] + +"Roger's just like his pa," she said, with the dull red rising in her +cheeks. "He never had no notion of economy. When I'm takin' a dollar and +twenty cents' worth of medicine, to keep it from bein' wasted, Roger +goes and puts flour into the covers of it, and feeds the expensive +medicine to Judge Bascom's Fido. He thinks more of that dog than he does +of his sick mother." + +"My dear Mrs. Austin," said Allan, solemnly, "have you not heard the +news?" + +"What news?" she demanded, bristling. + +"Little Fido is dying. He took all the medicine and has been asleep ever +since. By morning, he will be dead." + +Miss Mattie's jaw dropped. "Would you mind tellin' me," she asked, +suspiciously, "why you took it on yourself to give me medicine that +would pizen a dog? I might have took it all at once, to save it. Once +I was minded to." + +"Roger saved your life," said Allan, endeavouring to make his tone +serious. "And because of it, he is about to lose his position. The Judge +is so disturbed over Fido's approaching dissolution that he has told +Roger never to come back any more. Unless we can find him a place in +town, he has sacrificed his whole future to save his mother's life." + +"Where is Roger?" + +"I left him down on the beach, with Miss Wynne. I suppose he is still +there." + +"When you see him," commanded Miss Mattie, with some asperity, "will you +kindly send him home? It's no time for him to be gallivantin' around +with girls, when his mother's been so near death." + +"I will," Allan assured her, reaching for his hat. "I hope you +appreciate what he has done for you." + +[Sidenote: The Doctor Laughs] + +When he went down the road, his shoulders were shaking suspiciously. +Miss Mattie was watching him through the lace curtains that glorified +the parlour windows. "Seems as if he had St. Vitus's dance," she mused. +"Wonder why he doesn't mix up some dog-pizen, and cure himself?" + +When he was sure that he was out of sight, Allan sat down on a +convenient boulder at the side of the road, and gave himself up to +unrestrained mirth. The medicine which was about to prove fatal to Fido +would have caused only prolonged sleep if taken in small doses, at +proper intervals, by an adult. "It's a wonder she didn't take 'em all at +once," he thought. "And if she had--" He speculated, idly, upon the +probable effect. + +His conscience pricked him slightly on account of the exaggeration in +which he had mischievously indulged, but he told himself that Roger +would be far better off in the city and his mother's consent would make +his going much less difficult. He also realised that if Roger were there +to amuse Barbara, Eloise might have more spare time than she would +otherwise. + +He stopped long enough to give the druggist a bad quarter of an hour, +and then went back to the beach. Eloise and Roger were where he had left +them, and the boy's gloom was entirely gone. + +"Your mother wants you," he said, as he sat down on the other side of +Eloise. + +"All right--I'll go right up. How did she take it?" + +"Very well. Just remember that you've saved her life, and you'll have no +trouble." + +[Sidenote: Light-Hearted] + +When Roger went up the street, he was whistling, from sheer +light-heartedness. Eloise had made so many plans for his future that he +saw fame and fortune already within his reach. + +When he knocked, never having been allowed the freedom of a latch key, +he noted that all the blinds in the house were closed and wondered +whether his mother had gone to sleep again. After a suitable interval, +she opened the door, clad in her best black silk, and portentously +solemn. + +"Why, Mother, what's the matter?" + +"Come in," she whispered. "Doctor Conrad has just been tellin' me how +near I come to death. Oh, my son," she cried, throwing her arms around +his neck, "you have saved my life." + +[Sidenote: Two Greetings] + +It seemed to Roger like a paragraph torn from _The Metropolitan Weekly_, +but he patted her back soothingly as she clung to him. Maternal +outbursts of this sort were extremely rare. He remembered only one other +greeting like this--the day he had been swimming in the river with three +other small boys and had been brought home in a blanket, half drowned. + +"I suppose I shouldn't regret takin' dog-pizen, if it cured my back and +give me the sleep I needed, but it was a dreadful narrow escape. And +your takin' the medicine away from me and feedin' it to Fido was +certainly clever, Roger. Every day you remind me more and more of your +pa." + +"Thank you," answered Roger. He was struggling with various emotions and +found speech almost impossible. + +"It's no more'n right," she resumed, "that, after having pizened Fido +and lost you your place, that Doctor Conrad should stir himself around +and get you a better place in the city, but I do hate to have you go, +Roger. It'll be dreadful lonesome for me." + +"Cheer up, Mother; I haven't gone yet. The dog may get well." + +Miss Mattie shook her head sadly. "No, he won't," she sighed. "I took +enough of that medicine to know how powerful it is, and Fido ain't got +no chance. To-morrow I'll look over your things." + +An atmosphere of solemnity pervaded the house, and the evening was spent +very quietly. Miss Mattie read her Bible, as on Sunday evenings when she +did not go to church, and sternly refused to open _The Housewife's +Companion_, which lay temptingly near her. + +[Sidenote: Nightmare] + +She went to bed early, and Roger soon followed her, having strangely +lost his desire to read, and not daring to go to see Barbara more than +once a day. His night was made hideous by visions of himself drawing the +cart containing the slumbering Fido into the church where Eloise and +Doctor Conrad were being married, while Judge Bascom at the house, was +conducting Miss Mattie's funeral. + +In the morning, after breakfast, Roger seriously debated whether or not +he should go down to the office. At last he tossed up a coin and +muttered a faint imprecation as he picked it up. + +With his hat firmly on and his hands in his pockets, Roger fared forth, +whistling determinedly. He did not want to go to the office, and he +dreaded, exceedingly, his next meeting with the irascible Judge. + +As it happened, it was not necessary for him to go, for, at the corner +of the street which led to the Judge's house, he met the postmaster's +small son, laboriously dragging the fateful cart of yesterday. In it +were all of Roger's books and other belongings, including an umbrella +which he had loaned to the Judge on a rainy night and expected never to +see again. + +[Sidenote: A Brief Message] + +The message was brief and very much to the point. Fido had died +painlessly at four o'clock that morning. + + + + +XIX + +The Dreams Come True + + +[Sidenote: Gaining Strength] + +The hours Roger had taken from his work in the office had brought +nothing but good to Barbara. She gained strength rapidly after she began +to walk, and was soon able to dispense with the cane, though she could +not walk easily, nor far. She tired quickly and was forced to rest +often, but she went about the house slowly and even up and down the +stairs. + +Aunt Miriam made no comment of any sort. She did not say she was glad +Barbara was well after twenty-two years of helplessness, even though she +had taken entire care of her, and must have felt greatly relieved when +the burden was lifted. She went about her work as quietly as ever, and +fulfilled all her household duties with mechanical precision. + +Spicy odours were wafted through the rooms, for Eloise had ordered +enough jelly, sweet pickles, and preserves to supply a large family for +two or three years. She had also bought quilts and rag rugs for all of +her old-lady friends and taken the entire stock of candied orange peel +for the afternoon teas which she expected to give during the Winter. + +Barbara was hard at work upon the dainty lingerie Eloise had planned, +and found, by a curious anomaly, that when she did not work so hard, she +was able to accomplish more. The needle flew more swiftly when her +fingers did not ache and the stitches blur indistinguishably with the +fibre of the fabric. When Roger was not there to help her, she divided +her day, by the clock, into hours of work and quarter-hours of exercise +and rest. + +She had been out of the gate twice, with Roger, and had walked up and +down the road in front of the house, but, as yet, she had not gone +beyond the little garden alone. + +[Sidenote: One Dark Cloud] + +Upon the fair horizon of the future was one dark cloud of dread which +even Doctor Conrad's positive assurance had mitigated only for a little +time. Barbara knew her father and his stern, uncompromising +righteousness. When the bandages were taken off and he saw the faded +walls and dingy furniture, the worn rugs, and the pitiful remnant of +damask at his place at the table; when he realised that his daughter had +deceived him ever since she could talk at all, he must inevitably +despise her, even though he tried to hide it. + +Dimly, Barbara began to perceive the intangible price that is attached +to the things of the spirit as well as to the material necessities of +daily life. She was forced to surrender his love for her as the +compensation for his sight, yet she was firmly resolved to keep, for +him, the love that refused to reckon with the barrier of a grave, but +triumphantly went past it to clasp the dead Beloved closer still. + +[Sidenote: A Vague Dream] + +Of late, she had been thinking much of her mother. Until Roger had found +his father's letter, and she had received her own, upon her +twenty-second birthday, she had felt no sense of loss. Constance had +been a vague dream to her and little more, in spite of her father's +grieving and her instinctive sympathy. + +With the letters, however, had come a change. Barbara felt a certain +shadowy relationship and an indefinite bereavement. She wondered how her +mother had looked, what she had worn, and even how she had dressed her +hair. Since her father had gone to the hospital, she had wondered more +than ever, but got no satisfaction when she had once asked Aunt Miriam. + +She finished the garment upon which she was working, threaded the narrow +white ribbon into it, folded it in tissue paper and put it into the +chest. It was the last of the second set and Eloise had ordered six. +"Four more to do," thought Barbara. "I wonder whether she wants them all +alike." + +The afternoon shadows had begun to lengthen, and it was Saturday. It was +hardly worth while to begin a new piece of work before Monday morning, +especially since she wanted to ask Eloise about a new pattern. Doctor +Conrad was coming down for the weekend, and probably both of them would +be there late in the afternoon, or on Sunday. + +"How glad he'll be," said Barbara, to herself. "He'll be surprised when +he sees how well I can walk. And father--oh, if father could only come +too." She was eager, in spite of her dread. + +[Sidenote: In the Attic] + +Simply for the sake of exercise, Barbara climbed the attic stairs and +came down again. After she had rested, she tried it once more, but was +so faint when she reached the top that she went into the attic and sat +down in an old broken rocker. It was the only place in the house where +she had not been since she could walk, and she rather enjoyed the +novelty of it. + +A decrepit sofa, with the springs hanging from under it, was against the +wall at one side, far back under the eaves. It was of solid mahogany and +had not been bought by the searchers for antiques because its +rehabilitation would be so expensive. That and the rocker in which +Barbara sat were the only pieces of furniture remaining. + +There were several trunks, old-fashioned but little worn. One was Aunt +Miriam's, one was her father's, and the others must have belonged to her +dead mother. For the first time in her life, Barbara was curious about +the trunks. + +[Sidenote: The Old Trunk] + +When she was quite rested, she went over to a small one which stood near +the window, and opened it. A faint, musty odour greeted her, but there +was no disconcerting flight of moths. Every woollen garment in the house +had long ago been used by Aunt Miriam for rugs and braided mats. She had +taken Constance's underwear for her own use when misfortune overtook +them, and there was little else left. + +Barbara lifted from the trunk a gown of heavy white brocade, figured +with violets in lavender and palest green. It was yellow and faded and +the silver thread that ran through the pattern was tarnished so that it +was almost black. The skirt had a long train and around the low-cut +bodice was a deep fall of heavy Duchess lace, yellowed to the exquisite +tint of old ivory. The short sleeves were trimmed with lace of the same +pattern, but only half as wide. + +"Oh," said Barbara, aloud, "how lovely!" + +There was a petticoat of rustling silk, and a pair of dainty white +slippers, yellowed, too, by the slow passage of the years. Their silver +buckles were tarnished, but their high heels were as coquettish as +ever. + +"What a little foot," thought Barbara. "I believe it was smaller than +mine." + +She took off her low shoe, and, like Cinderella, tried on the slipper. +She was much surprised to find that it fitted, though the high heels +felt queer. Her own shoe was more comfortable, and so she changed again, +though she had quite made up her mind to wear the slippers sometime. + +[Sidenote: Treasured Finery] + +In the trunk, too, she found a white bonnet that she tried on, but +without satisfaction, as there was no mirror in the attic. This one +trunk evidently contained the finery for which Miriam had not been able +to find use. + +One by one, Barbara took out the garments, which were all of silk or +linen--there was nothing there for the moths. The long bridal veil of +rose point, that Barbara had sternly refused to sell, was yellow, too, +but none the less lovely. There was a gold scent-bottle set with +discoloured pearls, an amethyst brooch which no one would buy because it +had three small gold tassels hanging from it, and a lace fan with +tortoise-shell sticks, inlaid with mother-of-pearl. A thrifty woman at +the hotel had once offered two dollars for the fan, but Barbara had kept +it, as she was sure it was worth more. + +Down in the bottom of the trunk was an inlaid box that she did not +remember having seen before. She slid back the cover and found a lace +handkerchief, a broken cuff-button, a gold locket enamelled with black, +a long fan-chain of gold, set with amethysts, a small gold-framed mirror +evidently meant to be carried in a purse or hand-bag, a high shell comb +inlaid with gold and set with amethysts, and ten of the dozen large, +heavy gold hairpins which Ambrose North, in an extravagant mood, had +ordered made for the shining golden braids of his girl-wife. + +[Sidenote: A Photograph] + +On the bottom of the box, face down, was a photograph. Barbara took it +out, wonderingly, and started in amazement as her own face looked back +at her. On the back was written, in the same clear hand as the letter: +"For my son, or daughter. Constance North." Below was the date--just a +month before Barbara was born. + +The heavy hair, in the picture, was braided and wound around the shapely +head. The high comb, the same that Barbara had just taken out of the +box, added a finishing touch. Around the slender neck and fair, smooth +shoulders fell the Duchess lace that trimmed the brocade gown. The +amethyst brooch, with two of the three tassels plainly showing, was +pinned into the lace on the left side, half-way to the shoulder. + +But it was the face that interested Barbara most, as it was the +counterpart of her own. There was the same broad, low forehead, the +large, deep eyes with long lashes, the straight little nose, and the +tender, girlish mouth with its short upper lip, and the same firm, +round, dimpled chin. Even the expression was almost the same, but in +Constance's deep eyes was a certain wistfulness that the faint smile of +her mouth could not wholly deny. + +The woman who looked back at her daughter seemed strangely youthful. +Barbara felt, in a way, as though she were the mother and Constance the +child, for she was older, now, than her mother had been when she died. +The years of helplessness and struggle had aged Barbara, too. + +[Sidenote: A Sweet Face] + +The slanting sunbeams of late afternoon came into the attic, but Barbara +still studied the sweet face of the picture. Constance was made for +love, and love had come when it was too late. What tenderness she was +capable of; what toilsome journeys she would undertake without fear, if +her heart bade her go! And what courage must have nerved her dimpled +hands when she opened the grey, mysterious door of the Unknown! There +was no hint of weakness in the face, but Constance had died rather than +to take the chance of betraying the man who held her pledge. Barbara's +young soul answered in passionate loyalty to the wistfulness, the +hunger, and the unspoken appeal. + +"He shall never know, Mother, dear," she said aloud. "I promise you +that he shall never know." + +[Sidenote: Like her Mother] + +The shadows grew longer, and, at length, Barbara put the picture down. +If she had on the gown, and twisted her braids around her head, she +would look like her mother even more than now. She had a fancy to try +it--to go downstairs and see what Aunt Miriam would say when she came +in. Her eyes sparkled with delight when she drew on the long white +stockings of finest silk and put on the white slippers with the +tarnished silver buckles. + +The gown was too long and a little too loose, but Barbara rejoiced in +the faded brocade and in the rustle of the silk petticoat that cracked +in several places when she put it on, the fabric was so frail. The +ivory-tinted lace set off her shoulders beautifully, but she could only +guess at the effect from the brief glimpses the tiny mirror gave her. +She put on the amethyst brooch, hung the fan upon its chain and put it +around her neck. Then she wound her braids around her head and fastened +them securely with the gold hairpins. With the aid of the small-gold +mirror, she put the comb in place, and loosened the soft hair on either +side, so that it covered the tops of her ears. + +She walked back and forth a few times, the full length of the attic, +looking back to admire the sweep of her train. Then she sat down upon +the decrepit sofa, trying to fancy herself a stately lady of long ago. +The room was very still, and, without knowing it, Barbara had wearied +herself with her unaccustomed exertion. Her white woollen gown and soft +low shoes lay in a little heap on the floor near the window. She must +not forget to take them when she went down to look in the mirror. + +Presently, she stretched herself out upon the sofa, wondering, drowsily, +whether her mother would have lain down to rest in that splendid +brocade. She did not intend to sleep, but only to rest a little before +going downstairs to surprise Aunt Miriam. Nevertheless, in a few minutes +she was fast asleep and dreaming. + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: The Home-Coming] + +Eloise went down to the three o'clock train to meet Allan, and was much +surprised when Ambrose North came, too. His eyes were bandaged, but +otherwise he seemed as well as ever. They offered to go home with him, +but he refused, saying that he could go alone as well as he ever had. + +They strolled after him, however, keeping at a respectful distance, +until they saw him enter the grey, weather-worn gate; then they turned +back. + +"Is he all right, Allan?" asked Eloise, anxiously. + +"I hope so--indeed, I'm very sure he is. The operation turned out to be +an extremely simple one, though it wasn't even dreamed of twenty years +ago. Barbara's case was simple too,--it's all in the knowing how. She +has made one of the quickest recoveries on record, owing to the fact +that her body is almost that of a child. When you come down to the root +of the matter, surgery is merely the job of a skilled mechanic." + +"But you'd be angry if anyone else said that." + +"Of course." + +"When do the bandages come off?" + +[Sidenote: A Case of Conscience] + +"I'm going up to-morrow. They'd have been off over a week ago, but +Barbara insisted that she must see him first and ask him to forgive her +for deceiving him. She thinks she's a criminal." + +"Dear little saint," said Eloise, softly. "I wish none of us ever did +anything more wicked than that." + +"So do I, but there is an active remnant of a New-England conscience +somewhere in Barbara. I'm not sure that the old man hasn't it, too." + +"Do you suppose, for a moment, that he won't forgive her?" + +"If he doesn't," returned Allan, concisely, "I'll break his ungrateful +old neck. I hope she won't stir him up very much, though--he's got a bad +heart." + +[Sidenote: Miriam's Welcome] + +Still, the old man showed no sign of weakness as he went briskly up the +walk and knocked at his own door. When Miriam opened it, astonishment +made her welcome almost inarticulate, for she had not expected him home +so soon. He gave her the small black satchel that he carried, his coat +and hat. + +"How is Barbara?" he asked, eagerly. "How is my little girl?" + +"Well enough," answered Miriam. + +"Is she asleep?" + +Miriam went to the stairs and called out: "Barbara! Oh, Barbara!" There +was no answer. + +She started upstairs, but he called her back. "Don't wake her," he said. +"Perhaps I can take her supper up to her." + +"Suit yourself," responded Miriam, shortly. + +She did not see fit to tell him that Barbara was up and could walk. +Doctor Conrad could have told him, if he had wanted to--at any rate, it +was not Miriam's affair. She bitterly resented the fact that he had not +even shaken hands with her when he came home, after his long absence. +She hung up his coat and hat, lighted the fire, as the room was cool, +went out into the kitchen, and closed the door. + +The familiar atmosphere and the comfortable chair in which he sat +brought him that peculiar peace of home which is one of the greatest +gifts travel can bestow. Even the ticking of the clock came to his +senses gratefully. Home at last, after all the pain, the dreary nights +and days of acute loneliness, and only one more day to wait--perhaps. + +"To see again," he thought. "I am glad I came home first. To-morrow, if +God is good to me, I shall see my baby--and the letter. I have dreamed +so often that she could walk and I could see!" + +He took the two sheets of paper from his pocket and spread them out upon +his knee. He moved his hands lovingly across the pages--the one written +upon, the other blank. "She died loving me," he said to himself. +"To-morrow I shall see it, in her own hand." + +[Sidenote: Why Not To-Day] + +Sunset flamed behind the hills and brought into the little room faint +threads of gold and amethyst that wove a luminous tapestry with the +dusk. The clock ticked steadily, and with every cheery tick brought +nearer that dear To-Morrow of which he had dreamed so long. He +speculated upon the difference made by the slow passage of a few hours. +To-morrow, at this time, his bandages would be off--then why not to-day? + +The letter fell to the floor and he picked it up, one sheet at a time, +fretfully. The bandage around his temples and the gauze and cotton held +firmly against his eyes all at once grew intolerable. It was the last +few miles to the weary traveller, the last hour that lay between the +lover and his beloved, the darkness before the dawn. He had been very +patient, but at last had come to the end. + +[Sidenote: He Opens his Eyes] + +If only the bandages were off! "If they were," he thought, "I need not +open my eyes--I could keep them closed until to-morrow." He raised his +hands and worked carefully at the surgical knots until the outer strip +was loosened. He wound it slowly off, then cautiously removed the layers +of cotton and gauze. + +He breathed a sigh of relief as he leaned back in his chair, with his +eyes closed, determined to keep faith with the physicians, and, above +all, with Doctor Conrad, who had been so very kind. There was no pain at +all--only weakness. If the room were absolutely dark, perhaps he might +open his eyes for a moment or two. Why should to-morrow be so different +from to-day? + +The letter was in his hands--that dear letter which said, "I have loved +him, I love him still, and have never loved him more than I do to-day." +The temptation worked subtly in his mind as strong wine might in his +blood. Perhaps, after all, he could not see--the doctors had not given +him a positive promise. + +The fear made him faint, then surging hope and infinite longing merged +into perfect belief--and trust. Unable to endure the strain of waiting +longer, he opened his eyes, and as swiftly closed them again. + +"I can see," he whispered, shrilly. "Oh, I can see!" + +The blood beat hard in his pulses. He waited, wisely, until he was calm, +then opened his eyes once more. The room was not dark, but was filled +with the soft, golden glow of sunset--a light that illumined and, +strangely, brought no pain. Objects long unfamiliar save by touch loomed +large and dark before him. Remembered colours came back, mellowed by the +half-light. Distances readjusted themselves and perspectives appeared in +the transparent mist that seemed to veil everything. He closed his eyes, +and said, aloud: "I can see! Oh, I can see!" + +[Sidenote: Reading the Letter] + +Little by little the mist disappeared and objects became clear. The +velvety softness of the last light lay kindly upon the dingy room. When +he tried to read the letter the words danced on the page. Trembling, he +rose and took it over to the window, where the light was stronger. As he +stood there, with his back to the door, Miriam, unheard, came into the +room. + +The bandages on the floor, the eagerness in every line of his body as he +stood at the window, and the letter in his hand, gave her, in a single +instant, all the information she needed. Her heart beat high with wild +hope--the hour of her vengeance had come at last. + +She feared he would not be able to read it. Then she remembered the +yellowed page on which the writing stood out as clearly as though it had +been large print. If he could see at all, he could see that. + +Little by little, sustained and supported by his immeasurable longing, +the man at the window spelled out the words, in an eager whisper: + +"You who have loved me since the beginning of time--will understand and +forgive me--for what I do to-day. I do it because I am not strong +enough--to go on--and do my duty--by those who need me." + +Miriam nodded with satisfaction. At last he knew why Constance had taken +her own life. + +"If there should be--meeting--past the grave--some day you and I--shall +come together again--with no barrier between us." He put his hand to his +forehead as though he did not quite understand, but hurried on to the +next sentence, for his eyes were failing under the strain. + +"I take with me--the knowledge of your love--which has strengthened--and +sustained me--since the day--we first met--and must make--even a +grave--warm and sweet." + +[Sidenote: Radiance of Soul] + +The light in the room seemed to Miriam to be not wholly of the golden +sunset. Some radiance of soul must have made that clear soft light which +veiled but did not hide. It was sunset, and yet the light was that of a +Summer afternoon. + +"And remember this--dead though I am--I love you still--you--and my +little lame baby--who needs me so--and whom--I must leave--because I am +not strong--enough to stay. Through life--and in death--and eternally +yours--Constance." + +There was a tense, unbearable silence. Miriam moistened her parched lips +and chafed her cold hands. "At last," she thought. "At last." + +[Sidenote: The Assurance] + +"She died loving me," said Ambrose North, in a shrill whisper. His eyes +were closed again, for the strain had hurt--terribly. Dimly, he +remembered the other letter. This was not the same, but the other had +been to Barbara, and not to him. He did not stop to wonder how it came +to be in his pocket. It sufficed that some Angel of God, working through +devious ways and long years, had given him at last, face to face, the +assurance he had hungered for since the day Constance died. + +In a blinding instant, Miriam remembered that no names had been +mentioned in the letter. He had made a mistake--but she could set him +right. Constance should not triumph again, even in an hour like this. + +Ambrose North turned back into the shadow, fearing to face the window. +The woman cowering in the corner advanced steadily to meet him. He saw +her, vaguely, when his eyes became accustomed to the change of lights. + +"Miriam!" he cried, transfigured by joy. "She died loving me! I have it +here. It was only because she was not strong--she was ill, and she never +let us know." He held forth the letter with a shaking hand. + +"She--" began Miriam. + +"She died loving me!" he cried. "Oh, Miriam, can you not see? I have it +here." His voice rang through the house like some far silver bugle +chanting triumph over a field of the slain. "She died loving me!" + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: Triumphant Cry] + +Barbara had already wakened and she sat up, rubbing her eyes. The attic +was almost dark. She went downstairs hurriedly, forgetting her borrowed +finery until her long train caught on a projecting splinter and had to +be loosened. When she reached her own door she started toward her +mirror, anxious to see how she looked, but that triumphant cry from the +room below made her heart stand still. + +White as death and strangely fearful, she went down and into the +living-room, where the last light deepened the shadows and lay lovingly +upon her father's illumined face. + +Barbara smiled and went toward him, with her hands outstretched in +welcome. Miriam shrank back into the farthest shadows, shaking as +though she had seen a ghost. + +There was an instant's tense silence. All the forces of life and love +seemed suddenly to have concentrated into the space of a single +heart-beat. Then the old man spoke. + +"Constance," he said, unsteadily, "have you come back, Beloved? It has +been so long!" + +Radiant with beauty no woman had ever worn before, Barbara went to him, +still smiling, and the old man's arms closed hungrily about her. "I +dreamed you were dead," he sobbed, "but I knew you died loving me. Where +is our baby, Constance? Where is my Flower of the Dusk?" + +[Sidenote: Burden of Joy] + +Even as he spoke, the overburdened heart failed beneath its burden of +joy. He staggered and would have fallen, had not Miriam caught him in +her strong arms. Together, they helped him to the couch, where he lay +down, breathing with great difficulty. + +"Constance, darling," he gasped, feebly, "where is our baby? I want +Barbara." + +For the sake of the dead and the living, Barbara supremely put self +aside. "I do not know," she whispered, "just where Barbara is. Am I not +enough?" + +"Enough for earth," he breathed in answer, "and--for--heaven--too. Kiss +me--Constance--just once--dear--before----" + +[Sidenote: The Passing] + +Barbara bent down. He lifted his shaking hands caressingly to the +splendid crown of golden hair, the smooth, fair cheeks, the perfect neck +and shoulders, and died, enraptured, with her kiss upon his lips. + + + + +XX + +Pardon + + +[Sidenote: The Burial Service] + +Crushed and almost broken-hearted, Barbara sat in the dining-room. The +air was heavy with the overpowering scent of tuberoses. From the room +beyond came the solemn words of the burial service: "I am the +resurrection and the life. He that believeth on me, though he were dead, +yet shall he live." + +The words beat unbearably upon her ears. The walls of the room moved as +though they were of fabric, stirred by winds of hell. The floor +undulated beneath her feet and black mists blinded her. Her hands were +so cold that she scarcely felt the friendly, human touch on either side +of her chair. + +Roger held one of her cold little hands in both his own, yearning to +share her grief, to divide it in some way; even to bear it for her. On +the other side was Doctor Conrad, profoundly moved. His science had not +yet obliterated his human instincts and he was neither ashamed of the +mist in his eyes nor of the painful throbbing of his heart. His fingers +were upon Barbara's pulse, where the lifetide moved so slowly that he +could barely feel it. + +On the other side of the room, alien and apart, as always, sat Miriam. +She wore her best black gown, but her face was inscrutable. Perhaps the +lines were more sharply cut, perhaps the rough, red hands moved more +nervously than usual, and perhaps the deep-set black eyes burned more +fiercely, but no one noticed--or cared. + +[Sidenote: The Minister] + +The deep voice in the room beyond was vibrant with tenderness. The man +who stood near Ambrose North as he lay in his last sleep had been +summoned from town by Eloise. He did not make the occasion an excuse for +presenting his own particular doctrine, bolstered up by argument, nor +did he bid his hearers rejoice and be glad. He admitted, at the +beginning, that sorrow lay heavily upon the hearts of those who loved +Ambrose North and did not say that God was chastening them for their own +good. + +He spoke of Life as the rainbow that brilliantly spans two mysterious +silences, one of which is dawn and the other sunset. This flaming arc +must end, as it begins, in pain, but, past the silence, and, perhaps, in +even greater mystery, the circle must somewhere become complete and +round back to a new birth. + +Could not the God who ordained the beginning be safely trusted with the +end? Forgetting the grey mists of dawn in which the rainbow began, +should we deny the inevitable night when the arc bends down at the other +end of the world? Having seen so much of the perfect curve, could we not +believe in the circle? And should we not remember that the rainbow +itself was a signal and a promise that there should be no more sea? Even +so, was not this mortal life of ours, tempered as it is by sorrow and +tears, a further promise that, when the circle was completed, there +should be no more death? + +[Sidenote: God's Love] + +The deep voice went on, even more tenderly, to speak of God; not of His +power, but of His purpose, not of His justice, but His forgiveness, not +of His vengeance, but of His love. A love so vast and far-reaching that +there is no place where it is not; it enfolds not only our little world, +poised in infinite space like a mote in a sunbeam, but all the shining, +rolling worlds beyond. Every star that rises within our sight and all +the million stars beyond, in misty distances so great as to be +incomprehensible, are guided and surrounded by this same love. It is +impossible to conceive of a place where it is not--even in the midst of +pain, poverty, suffering, and death, God's love is there also. The +minister pleaded with those who listened to him to lean wholly upon this +all-sustaining, all-forgiving love; to believe that it sheltered both +the living and the dead, and to trust, simply, as a little child. + +[Sidenote: At the Close of the Service] + +In the stillness that followed, Eloise went to the piano. The worn +strings answered softly as her fingers touched the keys. In her full, +low contralto she sang, to an exquisite melody: + + "When I am dead, my dearest, + Sing no sad songs for me; + Plant thou no roses at my head, + Nor shady cypress tree; + Be the green grass above me + With showers and dewdrops wet; + And if thou wilt, remember, + And if thou wilt, forget. + + "I shall not see the shadows, + I shall not feel the rain; + I shall not hear the nightingale + Sing on, as if in pain: + And dreaming through the twilight + That doth not rise nor set, + Haply I may remember, + And haply may forget." + +The deep, manly voice followed with a benediction, then the little group +of neighbours and friends went out with hushed and reverent step, into +the golden Autumn afternoon. Miriam came in, to all outward appearance +wholly unmoved. She stood by him for a moment, then turned away. + +Eloise closed the door and Roger and Allan brought Barbara in. She bent +down to her father, who lay so quietly, with a smile of heavenly peace +upon his lips, and her tears rained upon his face. "Good-bye, dear +Daddy," she sobbed. "It is Barbara who kisses you now." + + * * * * * + +When Ambrose North went out of his door for the last time, on his way to +rest beside his beloved Constance until God should summon them both, +Roger stayed behind, with Barbara. Doctor Conrad had said, positively, +that she must not go, and, as always, she obeyed. + +The boy's heart was too full for words. He still kept her cold little +hand in his. "There isn't anything I can say or do, is there, Barbara, +dear?" + +[Sidenote: The Pity of It] + +"No," she sobbed. "That is the pity of it. There is never anything to be +said or done." + +"I wish I could take it from you and bear it for you," he said, simply. +"Some way, we seem to belong together, you and I." + +They sat in silence until the others came back. Eloise came straight to +Barbara and put her strong young arms around the frail, bent little +figure. + +"Will you come with me, dear?" she asked. "We can get a carriage easily +and I'd love to have you with me. Will you come?" + +For a moment, Barbara hesitated. "No," she said, "I must stay here. I've +got to live right on here, and I might as well begin to-night." + +Allan took from his pocket several small, round white tablets, and gave +them to Barbara. "Two just before going to bed," he said. "And if you're +the same brave girl that you've been ever since I've known you, you'll +have your bearings again in a short time." + +[Sidenote: By the Open Fire] + +Roger stayed to supper, but none of them made more than a pretence of +eating. The odour of tuberoses still pervaded the house and brought, +inevitably, the thought of death. Afterward, Barbara sat by the open +fire with one hand lying listlessly in Roger's warm, understanding +clasp. In the kitchen, Miriam vigorously washed the few dishes. She had +put away the fine china, the solid silver knife and fork, the remnant of +table damask, and the Satsuma cup. + +"Shall I read to you, Barbara?" asked Roger. + +"No," she answered, wearily. "I couldn't listen to-night." + +The hours dragged on. Miriam sat in the dining-room alone, by the light +of one candle, remorsefully, after many years, face to face with +herself. + +She wondered what Constance would do to her now, when she went to bed +and fearfully closed her eyes. She determined to cheat Constance by +sitting up all night, and then realised that by doing so she would only +postpone the inevitable reckoning. + +Miriam felt that a reckoning was due somewhere, on earth, or in heaven, +or in hell. Mysterious balances must be made before things were right, +and her endeavours to get what she had conceived to be her own just due +had all failed. + +She wondered why. Constance had wronged her and she was entitled to pay +Constance back in her own coin. But the opportunity had been taken out +of her hands, every time. Even at the last, her subtle revenge had been +transmuted into further glory for Constance. Why? + +The answer flashed upon her like words of fire--"_Vengeance is mine; +I will repay._" + +Then, suddenly, from some unknown source, the need of confession came +pitilessly upon her soul. Her lined face blanched in the candle-light +and her worn, nervous hands clutched fearfully at the arm of her chair. + +[Sidenote: The Still Small Voice] + +"Confess," she repeated to herself scornfully as though in answer to +some imperative summons. "To whom?" + +There was no answer, but, in her heart, Miriam knew. Only one of the +blood was left and to that one, if possible, payment must be made. And +if anything was due her, either from the dead or the living, it must +come to her through Barbara. + +Miriam laughed shrilly and then bit her lips, thinking the others might +hear. Roger heard--and wondered--but said nothing. + +After he went home, Barbara still sat by the fire, in that surcease +which comes when one is unable to sustain grief longer and it steps +aside, to wait a little, before taking a fresh hold. She could wonder +now about the letter, in her mother's writing, that she had picked up +from the floor, and which her father had found, and very possibly read. +She hesitated to ask Miriam anything concerning either her father or her +mother. + +[Sidenote: Miriam's Confession] + +But, while she sat there, Miriam came into the room, urged by goading +impulses without number and one insupportable need. She stood near +Barbara for several minutes without speaking; then she began, huskily, +"Barbara----" + +The girl turned, wearily. "Yes?" + +"I've got something to say and I don't know but what to-night is as good +a time as any. Neither of us are likely to sleep much." + +Barbara did not answer. + +"I hated your mother," said Miriam, passionately. "I always hated her." + +"I guessed that," answered Barbara, with a sigh. + +"Your father was in love with me when she came from school, with her +doll-face and pretty ways. She took him away from me. He never looked at +me after he saw her. I had to stand by and see it, help her with her +pretty clothes, and even be maid of honour at the wedding. It was hard, +but I did it. + +"She loved him, in a way, but it wasn't much of a way. She liked the +fine clothes and the trinkets he gave her, but, after he went blind, she +could hardly tolerate him. Lots of times, she would have been downright +cruel to him if I hadn't made her do differently. + +"The first time they came here for the Summer, she met Laurence Austin, +Roger's father, and it was love at first sight on both sides. They used +to see each other every day either here or out somewhere. After you were +born, the first place she went was down to the shore to meet him. I know, +for I followed. + +"When your father asked where she was, I lied to him, not only then, but +many times. I wasn't screening her--I was shielding him. It went on for +over a year, then she took the laudanum. She left four notes--one to me, +one to your father, one to you, and one to Laurence Austin. I never +delivered that, even though she haunted me almost every night for five +years. After he died, she still haunted me, but it was less often, and +different. + +"When you sent me into your father's room after that letter he had in +his pocket, I took time to read it. She said, there, that she didn't +trust me, and that I had always loved your father. It was true enough, +but I didn't know she knew it. + +"After you took the letter out, I put in the one to Laurence Austin. I'd +opened it and read it some little time back. I thought it was time he +knew her as she was, and I never thought about no name being mentioned +in it. + +"When he tore off the bandages, he read that letter, and never knew that +it wasn't meant for him. Then, when you came in in that old dress of +your mother's, he thought it was her come back to him, and never knew +any different." + +There was a long pause. "Well?" said Barbara, wearily. It did not seem +as if anything mattered. + +"I just want you to know that I've hated your mother all my life, ever +since she came home from school. I've hated you because you look like +her. I've hated your father because he talked so of her all the time, +and hated myself for loving him. I've hated everybody, but I've done my +duty, as far as I know. I've scrubbed and slaved and taken care of you +and your father, and done the best I could. + +"When I put that letter into his pocket, I intended for him to know that +Constance was in love with another man. I'd have read it to him long ago +if I'd had any idea he'd believe me. When he thought it was for him, +I was just on the verge of telling him different when you came in and +stopped me. You looked so much like your mother I thought Constance had +taken to walking down here daytimes instead of back and forth in my room +at night. + +"I suppose," Miriam went on, in a strange tone, "that I've killed +him--that there's murder on my hands as well as hate in my heart. +I suppose you'll want to make some different arrangements now--you +won't want to go on living with me after I've killed your father." + +[Sidenote: A Wonderful Joy] + +"Aunt Miriam," said Barbara, calmly, "I've known for a long time almost +everything you've told me, but I didn't know how father got the letter. +I thought he must have found it somewhere in the desk or in his own +room, or even in the attic. You didn't kill him any more than I did, by +coming into the room in mother's gown. What he really died of was a +great, wonderful joy that suddenly broke a heart too weak to hold it. +And, even though I've wanted my father to see me, all my life long, I'd +rather have had it as it was, and he would, too. I'm sure of that. + +"He told me once the three things he most wanted to see in the world +were mother's letter, saying that she loved him, then mother herself, +and, last of all, me. And for a long time his dearest dream has been +that I could walk and he could see. So when, in the space of five or +ten minutes, all the dreams came true, his heart failed." + +"But," Miriam persisted, "I meant to do him harm." Her burning eyes were +keenly fixed upon Barbara's face. + +"Sometimes," answered the girl, gently, "I think that right must come +from trying to do wrong, to make up for the countless times wrong comes +from trying to do right. Father could not have had greater joy, even in +heaven, than you and I gave him at the last, neither of us meaning to do +it." + +[Sidenote: Human Sympathy and Love] + +The stern barrier that had reared itself between Miriam and her kind +suddenly crumbled and fell. Warm tides of human sympathy and love came +into her numb heart and ice-bound soul. The lines in her face relaxed, +her hands ceased to tremble, and her burning eyes softened with the mist +of tears. Her mouth quivered as she said words she had not even dreamed +of saying for more than a quarter of a century: + +"Will you--can you--forgive me?" + +All that she needed from the dead and all they could have given her came +generously from Barbara. She sprang to her feet and threw her arms +around Miriam's neck. "Oh, Aunty! Aunty!" she cried, "indeed I do, not +only for myself, but for father and mother, too. We don't forgive +enough, we don't love enough, we're not kind enough, and that's all +that's wrong with the world. There isn't time enough for bitterness--the +end comes too soon." + +[Sidenote: At Peace] + +Miriam went upstairs, strangely uplifted, strangely at peace. She was no +longer alien and apart, but one with the world. She had a sense of +universal kinship--almost of brotherhood. That night she slept, for the +first time in more than twenty years, without the fear of Constance. + +And Constance, who was more sinned against than sinning, and whose +faithful old husband had that day lain down, in joy and triumph, to rest +beside her in the churchyard, came no more. + + + + +XXI + +The Perils of the City + + +"Roger," remarked Miss Mattie, laying aside her paper, "I don't know as +I'm in favour of havin' you go to the city. Can't you get the Judge +another dog?" + +"Why not, Mother?" asked Roger, ignoring her question. + +"Because it seems to me, from all I've been readin' and hearin' lately, +that the city ain't a proper place for a young person. Take that +minister, now, that those folks brought down for Ambrose North's +funeral. I never heard anything like it in all my life. You was there +and you heard what he said, so there ain't no need of dwellin' on it, +but it wasn't what I'm accustomed to in the way of funerals." Miss +Mattie's militant hairpins bristled as she spoke. + +"I thought it was all right, Mother. What was wrong with it?" + +[Sidenote: Everything Wrong] + +"Wrong!" repeated Miss Mattie, in astonishment. "Everything was wrong +with it! Ambrose North wasn't a church-member and he never went more'n +once or twice that I know of, even after the Lord chastened him with +blindness for not goin'. There was no power to the sermon and no cryin' +except Barbara and that Miss Wynne that sang that outlandish piece +instead of a hymn. + +"Why, Roger, I was to a funeral once over to the Ridge where the corpse +was an unbaptized infant, and you ought to have heard that preacher +describin' the abode of the lost! The child's mother fainted dead away +and had to be carried out of the church, it was that powerful and +movin'. That was somethin' like!" + +It was in Roger's mind to say he was glad that the minister had not made +Barbara faint, but he wisely kept silent. + +[Sidenote: Life in the City] + +"That's only one thing," Miss Mattie went on. "What with religion bein' +in that condition in the city, and the life folks live there, I don't +think it's any fit place for a person that ain't strong in the faith, +and you know you ain't, Roger. You take after your pa. + +"I was readin' in _The Metropolitan Weekly_ only last week a story about +a lovely young orphan that was caught one night by a rejected suitor and +tied to the railroad track. Just as the train was goin' to run over her, +the man she wanted to marry come along on the dead run with a knife and +cut her bonds. She got off the track just as the night express come +around the curve, goin' ninety-five miles an hour. + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's Fears] + +"This man says to her, 'Genevieve, will you come to me now, and let me +put you out of this dread villain's power forever?' Then he opened his +arms and the beautiful Genevieve fled to them as to some ark of safety +and laid her pale and weary face upon his lovin' and forgivin' heart. +That's the exact endin' of it, and I must say it's written beautiful, +but when I wake up in the night and think about it, I get scared to have +you go. + +"You ain't so bad lookin', Roger, and you're gettin' to the age where +you might be expected to take notice, and what if some designing female +should tie you to the railroad track? I declare, it makes me nervous to +think of it." + +Roger did not like to shake his mother's faith in _The Metropolitan +Weekly_, but he longed to set her fears at rest. "Those things aren't +true, Mother," he said, kindly. "They not only haven't happened, but +they couldn't happen--it's impossible." + +"Roger, what do you mean by sayin' such things. Of course it's true, or +it wouldn't be in the paper. Ain't it right there in print, as plain as +the nose on your face? You can see for yourself. I hope studyin' law +ain't goin' to make an infidel of you." + +"I don't think it will," temporised Roger. "I'll keep a close watch for +designing females, and will avoid railroad tracks at night." + +Miss Mattie shook her head doubtfully. "That ain't a goin' to do no +good, Roger, if they once get set after you. I've noticed that the +villain always triumphs." + +"But only for a little while, Mother. Surely you must have seen that?" + +[Sidenote: The Villain Foiled] + +She settled her steel-bowed spectacles firmly on the wart and gazed at +him. "I believe you're right," she said, after a few moments of +reflection. "I can't recall no story now where the villain was not +foiled at last. Let me see--there was _Lovely Lulu, or the Doctor's +Darling_, and _Margaret Merriman, or the Maiden's Mad Marriage_, and +_True Gold, or Pretty Crystal's Love_, and _The American Countess, or +Hearts Aflame_, and this one I was just speakin' of, _Genevieve +Carleton, or the Brakeman's Bride_. In every one of 'em, the villain got +his just deserts, though sometimes they was disjointed owin' to the +story bein' broke off at the most interestin' point and continued the +followin' week." + +"Well, if the villain is always foiled, you're surely not afraid, are +you?" + +"I don't know's I'm afraid in the long run, but I don't like to have you +go through such things and be exposed to the temptations of a great +city." + +"Why don't you come with me, Mother, and keep house for me? We can find +a little flat somewhere, and----" + +"What on earth is that?" + +[Sidenote: Apartments and Flats] + +"I've never been in one myself, but Miss Wynne said that, if you wanted +to come, she would find us a flat, or an apartment." + +"What's the difference between a flat and an apartment?" + +"That's what I asked her. She said it was just the rent. You pay more +for an apartment than you do for a flat." + +"I wouldn't want anything I had to pay more for," observed Miss Mattie, +stroking her chin thoughtfully. "You ain't told me what a flat is." + +"A few rooms all on one floor, like a cottage. It's like several +cottages, all under one roof." + +"What do they want to cover the cottages with a roof for? Don't they +want light and air?" + +"You don't understand, Mother. Suppose that our house here was an +apartment house. The stairs would be shut off from these rooms and the +hall would be accessible from the street. Instead of having three rooms +upstairs, there might be six--one of them a kitchen and the others +living-rooms and bedrooms. Don't you see?" + +"You mean a kitchen on the same floor with the bedrooms?" + +"Yes, all the rooms on one floor." + +"Just as if an earthquake was to jolt off the top of the house and shake +all the bedrooms down here?" + +"Something like that." + +"Well, then," said Miss Mattie, firmly, "all I've got to say is that it +ain't decent. Think of people sleepin' just off kitchens and washin' +their faces and hands in the sink." + +"I think some of them must be very nice, Mother. Miss Wynne expects to +live in an apartment after she is married and she has a little one of +her own now. If you'll come with me we'll find some place that you'll +like. I don't want to leave you alone here." + +[Sidenote: Under One Roof] + +"No," she answered, after due deliberation, "I reckon I'll stay here. +You can't transplant an old tree and you can't take a woman who has +lived all her life in a house and put her in a place where there are +several cottages all under one roof with bedrooms off of kitchens and +folks washin' in the sinks. Miss Wynne can do it if she likes, but I was +brought up different." + +"I'm afraid you'll be lonesome." + +"I don't know why I should be any more lonesome than I always have been. +All I see of you is at meals and while you're readin' nights. You're +just like your pa. If I propped up a book by the lamp, it would be just +as sociable as it is to have you settin' here. Readin' is a good thing +in its place and I enjoy it myself, but sometimes it's pleasant to hear +the human voice sayin' somethin' besides 'What?' and 'Yes' and 'All +right' and 'Is supper ready?' + +[Sidenote: The Blue Hair Ribbon] + +"I've been lookin' over your things to-day and gettin' 'em ready. The +moths has ate your Winter flannels and you'll have to get more. I've +mended your coat linin's and sewed on buttons, and darned and patched, +and I've took Barbara North's blue hair ribbon back to her--the one you +found some place and had in your pocket. You mustn't be careless about +those things, Roger--she might think you meant to steal it." + +"What did Barbara say?" he stammered. The high colour had mounted to his +temples. + +"She didn't know what to say at first, but she recognised it as her hair +ribbon. I told her you hadn't meant to steal it--that you'd just found +it somewheres and had forgot to give it to her, and it was all right. +She laughed some, but it was a funny laugh. You must be careful, +Roger--you won't always have your mother to get you out of scrapes." + +Roger wondered if the knot of blue ribbon that had so strangely gone +back to Barbara had, by any chance, carried to her its intangible +freight of dreams and kisses, with a boyish tear or two, of which he had +the grace not to be ashamed. + +"Your pa was in the habit of annexin' female belongin's, though the Lord +knows where he ever got 'em. I suppose he picked 'em up on the +street--he was so dreadful absent-minded. He was systematic about 'em in +a way, though. After he died, I found 'em all put away most careful in a +box--a handkerchief and one kid glove, and a piece of ribbon about like +the one I took back to Barbara. He was flighty sometimes: constant +devotion to readin' had unsettled his mind. + +"That brings me to what I wanted to say when I first started out. +I don't want you should load up your trunk with your pa's books to +the exclusion of your clothes, and I don't want you to spend your +evenin's readin'." + +"I'm not apt to read very much, Mother, if I work in an office in the +daytime and go to law school at night." + +[Sidenote: Ten Books Only] + +"That's so, too, but there's Sundays. You can take any ten of your pa's +books that you like, but no more. I'll keep the rest here against the +time the train is blocked and the mails don't come through. I may get a +taste for your pa's books myself." + +Roger did not think it likely, but he was too wise to say so. + +"And I didn't tell you this before, but I've made it my business to go +and see the Judge and tell him how you saved my life at the expense of +Fido's. I don't know when I've seen a man so mad. I was goin' to suggest +that we get him another dog from some place, and land sakes! he clean +drove it out of my mind. + +"I don't know how you've stood it, bein' there in the office with him, +and I told him so. He's got a red-headed boy from the Ridge in there +now, and I think maybe the Judge will get what's comin' to him before he +gets through. I've learned not to trifle with anybody what has red hair, +but seemin'ly the Judge ain't. It takes some folks a long time to learn. + +"Barbara's goin' to the city, too, to spend the Winter with that Miss +Wynne in the cottage that's under the same roof with other cottages and +the bedrooms off the kitchen. I don't know how Barbara'll take to +washin' in the sink, when she's always had that rose-sprigged bowl and +pitcher of her ma's, but it's her business, not mine, and if she wants +to go, she can. + +[Sidenote: "Me and Miriam"] + +"Me and Miriam'll set together evenings and keep each other from bein' +lonesome. She ain't much more company than a cow, as far as talkin' +goes, but there's a feelin,' some way, about another person bein' in the +house, when the wind gets to howlin' down the chimney. We may arrange to +have supper together, once in a while, and in case of severe weather, +put the two fires goin' in one house, which ever's the warmest. + +"I don't know what we shall do, for we ain't talked it over much yet, +but with church twice on Sunday and prayer-meetin' Wednesday evenings, +and the sewin' circle on Friday, and two New York papers every week, and +Miriam, and all your pa's books to prop up against the lamp, I don't +reckon I'll get so dreadful lonesome. I've thought some of gettin' +myself a cat. There's somethin' mighty comfortable and heartenin' about +a cup of hot tea and the sound of purrin' close by. And on the Spring +excursion to the city, I reckon I'll come up and see you, if I don't +have no more pain in my back." + +[Sidenote: Dr. Conrad's Automobile] + +"I'd love to have you come, Mother, and I'd do all I could to give you a +good time. I know the others would, too. Doctor Conrad has an automobile +and----" + +Miss Mattie became deeply concerned. "Is he treatin' himself for it?" +she demanded. + +"I don't think so," answered Roger, choking back a laugh. + +"It beats all," mused Miss Mattie. "They say the shoemaker's children +never have shoes, and it seems that doctors have diseases just like +other folks. I disremember of havin' heard of this, but I know from my +own experience that a disease with only one word to it can be dreadful +painful. Is it catchin'?" + +"Not with full speed on," replied Roger. "An automobile is very hard to +catch." + +"Well, see that you don't take it," cautioned Miss Mattie. The first +part of his answer was obscure, but she was not one to pause over an +uninteresting detail. + +"You've warned me about almost everything now, Mother," he said, +smiling. "Is there anything else?" + +"Nothing but matrimony, and that's included under the head of designing +females. I shouldn't want you to get married." + +"Why not?" + +[Sidenote: Welded Souls] + +"I don't know as I could tell you just why, only it seems to me that a +person is just as well off without it. I've been thinking of it a good +deal since I've had these New York papers and read so much about two +souls bein' welded into one. My soul wasn't never welded with your pa's, +nor his with mine, as I know of. + +"Marriage wasn't so dreadful different from livin' at home. It reminded +me of the Summer ma took a boarder, your pa required so much waitin' on. +And when you came, I had a baby to take care of besides. If I was welded +I never noticed it--I was too busy." + +Roger's heart softened into unspeakable pity. In missing the "welding," +Miss Mattie had missed the best that life has to give. Somewhere, +doubtless, the man existed who could have stirred the woman's soul +beneath the surface shallows and set the sordid tasks of daily living in +tune with the music that sways the world. + +[Sidenote: "Un-marriage"] + +"There's a good deal in the papers about un-marriage, too," resumed Miss +Mattie, "and I can't understand it. When you've stood before the altar +and said 'till death do us part,' I don't see how another man, who ain't +even a minister, can undo it and let you have another chance at it. +Maybe you do, bein' as you're up in law, but I don't. + +"It looks to me as if the laws were wrong or else the marriage ceremony +ought to be written different. If a man said, 'I take thee to be my +wedded wife, to love and to cherish until I see somebody else I like +better,' I could understand the un-marriage, but I can't now. When you +get to be a power in the law, Roger, I think you should try to get that +fixed. I never was welded, but after I'd given my word, I stuck to it, +even though your pa was dreadful aggravatin' sometimes. He didn't mean +to be, but he was. I guess it's the nature of men folks." + +Deeply moved, Roger went over and kissed her smooth cheek. "Have I been +aggravating, Mother?" + +Miss Mattie's eyes grew misty. She took off her spectacles and wiped +them briskly on one corner of the table-cover. "No more'n was natural, +I guess," she answered. "You've been a good boy, Roger, and I want you +should be a good man. When you get away from home, where your mother +can't look after you, just remember that she expects you to be good, +like your pa. He might have been aggravatin', but he wasn't wicked." + +[Sidenote: Remember] + +All the best part of the boy's nature rose in answer, and the mist came +into his eyes, too. "I'll remember, Mother, and you shall never be +disappointed in me--I promise you that." + + + + +XXII + +Autumn Leaves + + +[Sidenote: Autumn Glory] + +Summer had gone long ago, but the sweetness of her passing yet lay upon +the land and sea. The hills were glorious with a pageantry of scarlet +and gold where, in the midnight silences, the soul of the woods had +flamed in answer to the far, mysterious bugles of the frost. Bloom was +on the grapes in the vineyard, and fairy lace, of cobweb fineness, had +been hung by the secret spinners from stem to stem of the purple +clusters and across bits of stubble in the field. + +From the blue sea, now and then, came the breath of Winter, though +Autumn lingered on the shore. Many of the people at the hotel had gone +back to town, feeling the imperious call of the city with the first keen +wind. Eloise, with a few others, waited. She expected to stay until +Barbara was strong enough to go with her. + +But Barbara's strength was coming very slowly now. She grieved for her +father, and the grieving kept her back. Allan came down once a +fortnight to spend Sunday with Eloise and to look after Barbara, though +he realised that Barbara was, in a way, beyond his reach. + +[Sidenote: What We Need] + +"She doesn't need medicine," he said, to Eloise. "She is perfectly well, +physically, though of course her strength is limited and will be for +some time to come. What she needs is happiness." + +"That is what we all need," answered Eloise. + +Allan flashed a quick glance at her. "Even I," he said, in a different +tone, "but I must wait for mine." + +"We all wait for things," she laughed, but the lovely colour had mounted +to the roots of her hair that waved so softly back from her low +forehead. + +"When, dear?" insisted Allan, possessing himself of her hand. + +"I promised once," she answered. "When the colour is all gone from the +hills and the last leaves have fallen, then I'll come." + +"You're not counting the oaks?" he asked, half fearfully. "Sometimes the +oak leaves stay on all Winter, you know. And evergreens are ruled out, +aren't they?" + +"Certainly. We won't count the oaks or the Christmas trees. Long before +Santa Claus comes, I'll be a sedate matron instead of a flyaway, +frivolous spinster." + +"For the first time since I grew up," remarked Allan, with evident +sincerity, "I wish Christmas came earlier. Upon what day, fair lady, do +you think the leaves will be gone?" + +"In November, I suppose," she answered, with an affected indifference +that did not deceive him. "The day after Thanksgiving, perhaps." + +"That's Friday, and I positively refuse to be married on a Friday." + +[Sidenote: The Best Day of All] + +"Then the day before--that's Wednesday. You know the old rhyme says: +'Wednesday the best day of all.'" + +So it was settled. Allan laughingly put down in his little red leather +pocket diary, under the date of Wednesday, November twenty-fifth, "Miss +Wynne's wedding." "Where is it to be?" he asked. "I wouldn't miss it for +worlds." + +"I've been thinking about that," said Eloise, slowly, after a pause. "I +suppose we'll have to be conventional." + +"Why?" + +"Because everybody is." + +"The very reason why we shouldn't be. This is our wedding, and we'll +have it to please ourselves. It's probably our last." + +"In spite of the advanced civilisation in which we live," she returned, +"I hope and believe that it is the one and only wedding in which either +of us will ever take a leading part." + +"Haven't you ever had day-dreams, dear, about your wedding?" + +"Many a time," she laughed. "I'd be the rankest kind of polygamist if +I had all the kinds I've planned for." + +"But the best kind?" he persisted. "Which is in the ascendant now?" + +[Sidenote: An Ideal Wedding] + +"If I could choose," she replied, thoughtfully, "I'd have it in some +quiet little country church, on a brilliant, sunshiny day--the kind that +makes your blood tingle and fills you with the joy of living. I'd like +it to be Indian Summer, with gold and crimson leaves falling all through +the woods. I'd like to have little brown birds chirping, and squirrels +and chipmunks pattering through the leaves. I'd like to have the church +almost in the heart of the woods, and have the sun stream into every +nook and corner of it while we were being married. I'd like two taper +lights at the altar, and the Episcopal service, but no music." + +"Any crowd?" + +Her sweet face grew very tender. "No," she said. "Nobody but our two +selves." + +"We'll have to have a minister," he reminded her, practically, "and two +witnesses. Otherwise it isn't legal. Whom would you choose for +witnesses?" + +"I think I'd like to have Barbara and Roger. I don't know why, for I have +so many other friends who mean more to me. Yet it seems, some way, as if +they two belonged in the picture." + +[Sidenote: Right Now] + +A bright idea came to Allan. "Dearest," he said, "you couldn't have the +falling leaves and the squirrels if we waited until Thanksgiving time, +but it's all here, right now. Don't you remember that little church in +the woods that we passed the other day--the little white church with +maples all around it and the Autumn leaves dropping silently through the +still, warm air? Why not here--and now?" + +"Oh, I couldn't," cried Eloise. + +"Why not?" + +"Oh, you're so stupid! Clothes and things! I've got a million things to +do before I can be married decently." + +He laughed at her woman's reason as he put his arms around her. "I want +a wife, and not a Parisian wardrobe. You're lovelier to me right now in +your white linen gown than you've ever been before. Don't wear yourself +out with dressmakers and shopping. You'll have all the rest of your life +for that." + +"Won't I have all the rest of my life to get married in?" she queried, +demurely. + +"You have if you insist upon taking it, darling, but I feel very +strongly to get married to-day." + +"Not to-day," she demurred. + +"Why not? It's only half past one and the ceremony doesn't last over +twenty minutes. I suppose it can be cut down to fifteen or eighteen if +you insist upon having it condensed. You don't even need to wash your +face. Get your hat and come on." + +His tone was tender, even pleading, but some far survival of Primitive +Woman, whose marriage was by capture, stirred faintly in Eloise. "Our +friends won't like it," she said, as a last excuse. + +[Sidenote: The Two Concerned] + +He noted, with joy, that she said "won't," instead of "wouldn't," but +she did not realise that she had betrayed herself. "We don't care, do +we?" he asked. "It's our wedding and nobody's else. When we can't please +everybody, we might as well please ourselves. Matrimony is the one thing +in the world that concerns nobody but the two who enter into it--and +it's the thing that everybody has the most to say about. While you're +putting on your hat, I'll get the license and see about a carriage." + +"I thought I'd wait until Barbara could go to town with me," she said. + +"There's nothing to hinder your coming back for her, if you want to and +she isn't willing to come with Roger. I insist upon having my honeymoon +alone." + +"All alone? If I were very good, wouldn't you let me come along?" + +Allan coloured. "You know what I mean," he said, softly. "I've waited so +long, darling, and I think I've been patient. Isn't it time I was +rewarded?" + +They were on the beach, behind the friendly sand-dune that had been +their trysting place all Summer. Thoroughly humble in her surrender, yet +wholly womanly, Eloise put her soft arms around his neck. "I will," she +said. "Kiss me for the last time before----" + +"Before what?" demanded Allan, as, laughing, she extricated herself from +his close embrace. + +"Before you exchange your sweetheart for a wife." + +[Sidenote: More Secure] + +"I'm not making any exchange. I'm only making my possession more secure. +Look, dear." + +He took from his pocket a shining golden circlet which exactly fitted +the third finger of her left hand. Their initials were engraved inside. +Only the date was lacking. + +"I've had it for a long, long time," he said, in reply to her surprised +question. "I hoped that some day I might find you in a yielding mood." + +When she went up to her room, her heart was beating wildly. This sudden +plunge into the unknown was blinding, even though she longed to make it. +Having come to the edge of the precipice she feared the leap, in spite +of the conviction that life-long happiness lay beyond. + +In the fond sight of her lover, Eloise was very lovely when she went +down in her white gown and hat, her eyes shining with the world-old joy +that makes the old world new for those to whom it comes, be it soon or +late. + +[Sidenote: Beautifully Unconventional] + +"It's beautifully unconventional," she said, as he assisted her into the +surrey. "No bridesmaids, no wedding presents, and no dreary round of +entertainments. I believe I like it." + +"I know I do," he responded, fervently. "You're the loveliest thing I've +ever seen, sweetheart. Is that a new gown?" + +"I've worn it all Summer," she laughed "and it's been washed over a +dozen times. You have lots to learn about gowns." + +"I'm a willing pupil," he announced. "Shouldn't you have a veil? I +believe the bride's veil is usually 'of tulle, caught with a diamond +star, the gift of the groom.'" + +"You've been reading the society column. Give me the star, and I'll get +the veil." + +"You shall have it the first minute we get to town. I'd rob the Milky +Way for you, if I could. I'd give you a handful of stars to play with +and let you roll the sun and moon over the golf links." + +"I may take the moon," she replied. "I've always liked the looks of it, +but I'm afraid the sun would burn my fingers. Somebody once got into +trouble, I believe, for trying to drive the chariot of the sun for a +day. Give me the moon and just one star." + +"Which star do you want?" + +[Sidenote: The Love-star] + +"The love-star," she answered, very softly. "Will you keep it shining +for me, in spite of clouds and darkness?" + +"Indeed I will." + +The horses stopped at Barbara's door. Allan went across the street to +call for Roger and Eloise went in to invite Barbara to go for a drive. + +"How lovely you look," cried Barbara, in admiration. "You look like a +bride." + +"Make yourself look bridal also," suggested Eloise, flushing, "by +putting on your best white gown. Roger is coming, too." + +Barbara missed the point entirely. It did not take her long to get +ready, and she sang happily to herself while she was dressing. She put a +white lace scarf of her mother's over her golden hair, which was now +piled high on her shapely head, and started out, for the first time in +all her twenty-two years, for a journey beyond the limits of her own +domain. + +Allan and Roger helped her in. She was very awkward about it, and was +sufficiently impressed with her awkwardness to offer a laughing apology. +"I've never been in a carriage before," she said, "nor seen a train, nor +even a church. All I've had is pictures and books--and Roger," she +added, as an afterthought, when he took his place beside her on the back +seat. + +"You're going to see lots of things to-day that you never saw before," +observed Allan, starting the horses toward the hill road. "We'll begin +by showing you a church, and then a wedding." + +"A wedding!" cried Barbara. "Who is going to be married?" + +"We," he replied, concisely. "Don't you think it's time?" + +"Isn't it sudden?" asked Roger. "I thought you weren't going to be +married until almost Christmas." + +"I've been serving time now for two years," explained Allan, "and she's +given me two months off for good behaviour. Just remember, young man, +when your turn comes, that nothing is sudden when you've been waiting +for it all your life." + +[Sidenote: The Little White Church] + +The door of the little white church was open and the sun that streamed +through the door and the stained glass windows carried the glory and the +radiance of Autumn into every nook and corner of it. At the altar burned +two tall taper lights, and the young minister, in white vestments, was +waiting. + +The joking mood was still upon Allan and Eloise, but she requested in +all seriousness that the word "obey" be omitted from the ceremony. + +"Why?" asked the minister, gravely. + +"Because I don't want to promise anything I don't intend to do." + +"Put it in for me," suggested Allan, cheerfully. "I might as well +promise, for I'll have to do it anyway." + +Gradually, the hush and solemnity of the church banished the light mood. +A new joy, deeper, and more lasting, took the place of laughter as they +sat in the front pew, reading over the service. Barbara and Roger sat +together, half way down to the door. Neither had spoken since they +entered the church. + +A shaft of golden light lay full upon Eloise's face. In that moment, +before they went to the altar, Allan was afraid of her, she seemed so +angelic, so unreal. But the minister was waiting, with his open book. +"Come," said Allan, in a whisper, and she rose, smiling, to follow him, +not only then, but always. + +[Sidenote: The Ceremony] + +"Dearly Beloved," began the minister, "we are gathered here together in +the sight of God and in the face of this company, to join together this +man and this woman in holy matrimony." He went on through the beautiful +service, while the light streamed in, bearing its fairy freight of +colour and gold, and the swift patter of the Little People of the Forest +rustled through the drifting leaves. + +It was all as Eloise had chosen, even to the two who sat far back, with +their hands clasped, as wide-eyed as children before this sacred merging +of two souls into one. + +A little brown bird perched on the threshold, chirped a few questioning +notes, then flew away to his own nest. Acorns fell from the oaks across +the road, and the musical hum and whir of Autumn came faintly from the +fields. The taper lights burned in the sunshine like yellow stars. + +"That ye may so live together in this life," the minister was saying, +"that in the world to come ye may have life everlasting. Amen." + +[Sidenote: After the Ordeal] + +It was over in an incredibly brief space of time. When they came down +the aisle, Allan had the satisfied air of a man who has just emerged, +triumphantly, through his own skill, from a very difficult and dangerous +ordeal. Eloise was radiant, for her heart was singing within her a +splendid strophe of joy. + +When Barbara and Roger went to meet them, the strange, new shyness that +had settled down upon them both effectually hindered conversation. Roger +began an awkward little speech of congratulation, which immediately +became inarticulate and ended in silent embarrassment. + +But Allan wrung Roger's hand in a mighty grip that made him wince, and +Eloise smiled, for she saw more than either of them had yet guessed. +"You're kids," she said, fondly; "just dear, foolish kids." Impulsively, +she kissed them both, then they all went out into the sunshine again. + +The minister's eyes followed them with a certain wistfulness, for he was +young, and, as yet, the great miracle had not come to him. He sighed +when he put out the tapers and closed the door that divided him from the +music of Autumn and one great, overwhelming joy. + +[Sidenote: On the Way Home] + +On the way home, neither Barbara nor Roger spoke. They had nothing to +say and the others were silent because they had so much. They left the +two at Barbara's gate, then Allan turned the horses back to the hill +road. They were to have two glorious, golden hours alone before taking +the afternoon train. + +Barbara and Roger watched them as they went slowly up the tawny road +that trailed like a ribbon over the pageantry of the hill. When they +came to the crossroads, where one road led to the church and the other +into the boundless world beyond, Eloise leaned far out to wave a +fluttering bit of white in farewell. + + "And on her lover's arm she leant, + And round her waist she felt it fold, + And far across the hills they went + In that new world which is the old," + +quoted Barbara, softly. + +[Sidenote: O'er the Hills] + + "And o'er the hills, and far away, + Beyond their utmost purple rim, + Beyond the night, across the day, + Through all the world she followed him," + +added Roger. + +The carriage was now only a black speck on the brow of the hill. +Presently it descended into the Autumn sunset and vanished altogether. + +"I'm glad they asked us," said Roger. + +"Wasn't it dear of them!" cried Barbara, with her face aglow. "Oh, +Roger, if I ever have a wedding, I want it to be just like that!" + + + + +XXIII + +Letters to Constance + + +[Sidenote: Faith in Results] + +Roger was in the library, trying to choose, from an embarrassment of +riches, the ten of his father's books which he was to be permitted to +take to the city with him. With characteristic thoughtfulness, Eloise +had busied herself in his behalf immediately upon her return to town. +She had found a good opportunity for him, and the letter appointing the +time for a personal interview was even then in his pocket. + +Neither he nor his mother had the slightest doubt as to the result. Miss +Mattie was certain that any lawyer with sense enough to practise law +would be only too glad to have Roger in his office. She scornfully +dismissed the grieving owner of Fido from her consideration, for it was +obvious that anyone with even passable mental equipment would not have +been disturbed by the accidental and painless removal of a bull pup. + +Roger's ambition and eagerness made him very sure of the outcome of his +forthcoming venture. All he asked for was the chance to work, and Eloise +was giving him that. How good she had been and how much she had done for +Barbara! Roger's heart fairly overflowed with gratitude and he +registered a boyish vow not to disappoint those who believed in him. + +It seemed strange to think of Eloise as "Mrs. Conrad." She had signed +her brief note to Roger, "Very cordially, Eloise Wynne Conrad." Down in +the corner she had written "Mrs. Allan Conrad." Roger smiled as he noted +the space between the "Wynne" and the "Conrad" in her signature--the +surest betrayal of a bride. + +"If I should marry," Roger thought, "my wife's name would be 'Mrs. Roger +Austin.'" He wrote it out on a scrap of paper to see how it would look. +It was certainly very attractive. "And if it were Barbara, for instance, +she would sign her letters 'Barbara North Austin.'" He wrote that out, +too, and, in the lamplight, appreciatively studied the effect from many +different angles. It was really a very beautiful name. + +[Sidenote: Lost in Reverie] + +He lost himself in reverie, and it was nearly an hour afterward when he +returned to the difficult task of choosing his ten books. Shakespeare, +of course--fortunately there was a one-volume edition that came within +the letter of the law if not the spirit of it. To this he added +Browning. As it happened, there was a complete one-volume edition of +this, too. Emerson came next--the Essays in two volumes. That made four. +He added _Vanity Fair_, _David Copperfield_, a translation of the +_Æneid_, and his beloved Keats. He hesitated a long time over the last +two, but finally took down Boswell's _Life of Johnson_ and the _Essays +of Elia_, neither of which he had read. + +[Sidenote: A Little Old Book] + +Behind these two books, which had stood side by side, there was a small, +thin book that had either fallen down or been hidden there. Roger took +it out and carefully wiped off the dust. It was a blank book in which +his father had written on all but the last few pages. He took it over to +the table, drew the lamp closer, and sat down. + +The gay cover had softened with the years, the pages were yellow, and +some of them were blurred by blistering spots. The ink had faded, but +the writing was still legible. At the top of the first page was the +date, "_Evening, June the seventh_." + +"I have lived long," was written on the next line below, "but a thousand +years of living have been centred remorselessly into to-day. I cannot go +over, though in this house and in the one across the road it will seem +very strange. I knew the clouds of darkness must eternally hide us each +from the other, that we must see each other no more save at a great +distance, but the thunder and the riving lightning have put heaven +between us as well as earth. + +"I cannot eat, for food is dust and ashes in my mouth. I cannot drink +enough water to moisten my dry, parched throat. I cannot answer when +anyone speaks to me, for I do not hear what is said. It does not seem +that I shall ever sleep again. Yet God, pitiless and unforgiving, lets +me live on." + +The remainder of the page was blank. The next entry was dated: "_June +tenth. Night._" + +[Sidenote: No Other Way] + +"I had to go. There was no other way. I had to sit and listen. I saw the +blind man in the room beyond, sitting beside the dark woman with the +hard face. She had the little lame baby in her arms--the baby who is a +year or so younger than my own son. I smelled the tuberoses and the +great clusters of white lilacs. And I saw her, dead, with her golden +braids on either side of her, smiling, in her white casket. When no one +was looking, I touched her hand. I called softly, 'Constance.' She did +not answer, so I knew she was dead. + +"I had to go to the churchyard, with the others. I was compelled to look +at the grave and to see the white casket lowered in. I heard that awful +fall of earth upon her and a voice saying those terrible words, 'Dust to +dust, earth to earth, ashes to ashes.' The blind man sobbed aloud when +the earth fell. The dark woman with the hard face did not seem to care. +I could have strangled her, but I had to keep my hands still. + +"They said that she had not been sleeping and that she took too much +laudanum by mistake. It was not a mistake, for she was not of that sort. +She did it purposely. She did it because of that one mad hour of full +confession. I have killed her. After three years of self-control, it +failed me, and I went mad. It was my fault, for if I had not failed, she +would not have gone mad, too. I have killed her." + + +"_June fifteenth. Midnight._ + +"I am calmer now. I can think more clearly. I have been alone in the +woods all day and every day since--. I have been thinking, thinking, +thinking, and going over everything. She left no word for me; she was so +sure I would understand. I do not understand yet, but I shall. + +[Sidenote: Estranged] + +"There was no wrong between us, there never would have been. We were +divided by the whole earth, denied by all the leagues of sundering sea. +Now we are estranged by all the angels of heaven and all the hosts of +hell. + +"My arms ache for her--my lips hunger for hers. In that mysterious +darkness, does she want me, too? Did her heart cry out for me as mine +for her, until the blood of the poppies mingled with hers and brought +the white sleep? + +"It would have been something to know that we breathed the same air, +trod the same highways, listened together to the thrush and robin, and +all the winged wayfarers of forest and field. It would have been comfort +to know the same sun shone on us both, that the same moon lighted the +midnight silences with misty silver, that the same stars burned +taper-lights in the vaulted darkness for her and for me. + +[Sidenote: One Hour] + +"But I have not even that. I have nothing, though I have done no wrong +beyond holding her in my arms for one little hour. Out of all the time +that was before our beginning, out of all the time that shall be after +our ending, and in all the unpitying years of our mortal life, we have +had one hour." + + +"_June nineteenth._ + +"I have been to her grave. I have tried to realise that the little mound +of earth upon the distant hill, over which the sun and stars sweep +endlessly, still shelters her; that, in some way, she is there. But +I cannot. + +"The mystery agonises me, for I have never had the belief that comforts +so many. Why is one belief any better than another when we come face to +face with the grey, impenetrable veil that never parts save for a +passage? Freed from the bonds of earth, does she still live, somewhere, +in perfect peace with no thought of me? Sentient, but invisible, is she +here beside me now? Or is she asleep, dreamlessly, abiding in the earth +until some archangel shall sound the trumpet bidding all the myriad dead +arise? Oh, God, God! Only tell me where she is, that I may go, too!" + + +"_June twenty-first._ + +[Sidenote: The Hand Stayed] + +"It is true that the path she took is open to me also. I have thought of +it many times. I am not afraid to follow where she has led, even into +the depths of hell. I have had for several days a vial of the crushed +poppies, and the bitter odour, even now, fills my room. Only one thought +stays my hand--my little son. + +"Should I follow, he must inevitably come to believe that his father was +a coward--that he was afraid of life, which is the most craven fear of +all. He will see that I have given to him something that I could not +bear myself, and will despise me, as people despise a man who shirks his +burden and shifts it to the shoulders of one weaker than he. + +"When temptation assails him, he will remember that his father yielded. +When life looms dark before him and among the fearful shadows there is +no hint of light, he will recall that his father was too much of a +coward to go into those same shadows, carrying his own light. + +"And if his heart is ever filled with an awful agony that requires all +his strength to meet it, he will remember that his father failed. I +could not rest in my grave if my son, living, should despise me, even +though my narrow house was in the same darkness that hides Her." + + +"_July tenth. Dawn._ + +[Sidenote: Punishment] + +"This, then, is my punishment. Because for one hour my self-control +deserted me, when my man's blood had been crying out for three years for +the touch of her--because for one little hour my hungry arms held her +close to my aching heart, there is no peace. Nowhere in earth nor in +heaven nor in hell is there one moment's forgetfulness. Nowhere in all +God's illimitable universe is there pardon and surcease of pain. + +"The blind man comes to me and talks of her. He asks me piteously, +'Why?' He calls me his friend. He says that she often spoke of me; that +they were glad to have me in their house. He asks me if she ever said +one word that would give a reason. Was she unhappy? Was it because he +was blind and the little yellow-haired baby with her mother's blue eyes +was born lame? I can only say 'No,' and beg him not to talk of it--not +even to think of it." + + +"_July twentieth. Night._ + +"The beauty of the world at midsummer only makes my loneliness more +keen. The butterflies flit through the meadows like wandering souls of +last year's flowers that died and were buried by the snow. The harvest +moon, red-gold and wonderful, will rise slowly up out of the sea. The +path of light will lie on the still waters and widen into a vast arc at +the line of the shore. Cobwebs will come among the stubble when the +harvest is gathered in and on them will lie dewdrops that the moon will +make into pearls. + +[Sidenote: Cycle of the Seasons] + +"The gorgeous colouring of Autumn will transfigure the hills with glory, +and fill the far silences with misty amethyst and gold. The year-long +sleep will come with the first snow, and the stars burn blue and cold in +the frosty night. April bugles will wake the violets and anemones, the +dead leaves of Autumn will be starred with springtime bloom, May will +dance through the world with lilacs and apple blossoms, and I shall be +alone. + +"I can go to her grave again and see the violets all around it, their +exquisite odour made of her dust. I can carry to her the first roses of +June, as I used to do, but she cannot take them in her still hands. +I can only lay them on that impassable mound, and let the warm rains, +as soft as woman's tears, drip down and down and down until the fragrance +and my love come to her in the mist. + +"But will she care? Is that last sleep so deep that the quiet heart is +never stirred by love? When my whole soul goes out to her in an agony +of love and pain, is it possible that there is no answer? If there is a +God in heaven, it cannot be!" + + +"_October fifth. Night._ + +"It is said that Time heals everything. I have been waiting to see if it +were so. Day by day my loss is greater; day by day my grief becomes more +difficult to bear. I read all the time, or pretend to. I sit for hours +with the open book before me and never see a line that is printed there. +Oh, Love, if I could dream to-night, in the earth with you!" + + +"_October seventh._ + +"Just four months ago to-day! I was numb, then, with the shock and +horror. I could not feel as I do now. When the tide of my heart came in, +with agony in every pulse-beat, it rose steadily to the full, without +pause, without rest. I think it has reached its flood now, for I cannot +endure more. Will there ever be recession?" + + +"_November tenth._ + +[Sidenote: Death of Passion] + +"I am coming, gradually, to have some sort of faith. I do not know why, +for I have never had it before. I can see that all things made of earth +must perish as the leaves. Passion dies because it is of the earth, but +does not love live? + +[Sidenote: A Gift] + +"If only the finer things of the spirit could be bequeathed, like +material possessions! All I have to leave my son is a very small income +and a few books. I cannot give him endurance, self-control, or the power +to withstand temptation. I cannot give him joy. If I could, I should +leave him one priceless gift--my love for Constance, to which, for one +hour, hers answered fully--I should give him that love with no barrier +to divide it from its desire. + +"I wonder if Constance would have left hers to her little yellow-haired +girl? I wonder if sometimes the joys of the fathers are not visited upon +their children as well as their sins?" + + +"_November nineteenth. Night._ + +"I have come to believe that love never dies for God is love, and He is +immortal. My love for Constance has not died and cannot. Why should hers +have died? It does not seem that it has, since to-day, for the first +time, I have found surcease. + +"Constance is dead, but she has left her love to sustain and strengthen +me. It streams out from the quiet hillside to-night as never before, and +gives me the peace of a benediction. I understand, now, the blinding +pain of the last five months. The immortal spirit of love, which can +neither die nor grow old, was extricating itself from the earth that +clung to it. + + +"_December third._ + +"At last I have come to perfect peace. I no longer hunger so terribly +for the touch of her, for my aching arms to clasp her close, for her +lips to quiver beneath mine. The tide has ebbed--there is no more pain. + +"I have come, strangely, into kinship with the universe. I have a +feeling to-night of brotherhood. I can see that death is no division +when a heart is deep enough to hold a grave. The Grey Angel cannot +separate her from me, though she took the white poppies from his hands, +and gave none to me. + + +"_December eighteenth._ + +[Sidenote: Day by Day] + +"Constance, Beloved, I feel you near to-night. The wild snows of Winter +have blown across your grave, but your love is warm and sweet around my +heart. The sorrow is all gone and in its place has come a peace as deep +and calm as the sea. I can wait, day by day, until the Grey Angel +summons me to join you; until the poppies that stilled your heartbeats, +shall, in another way, quiet mine, too. + +"I can have faith. I can believe that somewhere beyond the star-filled +spaces, when this arc of mortal life merges into the perfect circle of +eternity, there will be no barrier between you and me, because, if God +is love, love must be God, and He has no limitations. + +"I can take up my burden and go on until the road divides, and the Grey +Angel leads me down your path. I can be kind. I can try, each day, to +put joy into the world that so sorely needs it, and to take nothing away +from whatever it holds of happiness now. I can be strong because I have +known you, I can have courage because you were brave, I can be true +because you were true, I can be tender because I love you. + +"At last I understand. It is passion that cries out for continual +assurance, for fresh sacrifices, for new proof. Love needs nothing but +itself; it asks for nothing but to give itself; it denies nothing, +neither barriers nor the grave. Love can wait until life comes to its +end, and trust to eternity, because it is of God." + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: A Man's Heart] + +Roger put the little book down and wiped his eyes. He had come upon a +man's heart laid bare and was thrilled to the depths by the revelation. +He was as one who stands in a holy place, with uncovered head, in the +hush that follows prayer. + +In the midst of his tenderness for his dead father welled up a +passionate loyalty toward the woman who slept in the room adjoining the +library, whose soul had "never been welded." She had known life no more +than a prattling brook in a meadow may know the sea. Bound in shallows, +she knew nothing of the unutterable vastness in which deep answered unto +deep; tide and tempest and blue surges were fraught with no meaning for +her. + +The clock struck twelve and Roger still sat there, with his head resting +upon his hand. He read once more his father's wish to bequeath to him +his love, "with no barrier to divide it from its desire." + +Hedged in by earth and hopelessly put asunder, could it at last come to +fulfilment through daughter and son? At the thought his heart swelled +with a pure passion all its own--the eager pulse-beats owed nothing to +the dead. + +[Sidenote: Out into the Night] + +He found a sheet of paper and reverently wrapped up the little brown +book. An hour later, he slipped under the string a letter of his own, +sealed and addressed, and quietly, though afraid that the beating of his +heart sounded in the stillness, went out into the night. + + + + +XXIV + +The Bells in the Tower + + +The sea was very blue behind the Tower of Cologne, though it was not yet +dawn. The velvet darkness, in that enchanted land, seemed to have a +magical quality--it veiled but did not hide. Barbara went up the glass +steps, made of cologne bottles, and opened the door. + +[Sidenote: The Tower Unchanged] + +She had not been there for a long time, but nothing was changed. The +winding stairway hung with tapestries and the round windows at the +landings, through which one looked to the sea, were all the same. + +King Arthur, Sir Lancelot and Guinevere were all in the Tower, as usual. +The Lady of Shalott was there, with Mr. Pickwick, Dora, and Little Nell. +All the dear people of the books moved through the lovely rooms, +sniffing at cologne, or talking and laughing with each other, just as +they pleased. + +The red-haired young man and the two blue and white nurses were still +there, but they seemed to be on the point of going out. Doctor Conrad +and Eloise were in every room she went into. Eloise was all in white, +like a bride, and the Doctor was very, very happy. + +Ambrose North was there, no longer blind or dead, but well and strong +and able to see. He took Barbara in his arms when she went in, kissed +her, and called her "Constance." + +A sharp pang went through her heart because he did not know her. "I'm +Barbara, Daddy," she cried out; "don't you know me?" But he only +murmured, "Constance, my Beloved," and kissed her again--not with a +father's kiss, but with a yearning tenderness that seemed very strange. +She finally gave up trying to make him understand that her name was +Barbara--that she was not Constance at all. At last she said, "It +doesn't matter by what name you call me, as long as you love me," and +went on upstairs. + +[Sidenote: An Unfinished Tapestry] + +One of the tapestries that hung on the wall along the winding stairway +was new--at least she did not remember having seen it before. It was in +the soft rose and gold and brown and blue of the other tapestries, and +appeared old, as though it had been hanging there for some time. She +fingered it curiously. It felt and looked like the others, but it must +be new, for it was not quite finished. + +In the picture, a man in white vestments stood at an altar with his +hands outstretched in blessing. Before him knelt a girl and a man. The +girl was in white and the taper-lights at the altar shone on her two +long yellow braids that hung down over her white gown, so that they +looked like burnished gold. The face was turned away so that she could +not see who it was, but the man who knelt beside her was looking +straight at her, or would have been, if the tapestry-maker had not put +down her needle at a critical point. The man's face had not been +touched, though everything else was done. Barbara sighed. She hoped that +the next time she came to the Tower the tapestry would be finished. + +[Sidenote: In the Violet Room] + +She went into the violet room, for a little while, and sat down on a +green chair with a purple cushion in it. She took a great bunch of +violets out of a bowl and buried her face in the sweetness. Then she +went to the mantel, where the bottles were, and drenched her +handkerchief with violet water. She had tried all the different kinds of +cologne that were in the Tower, but she liked the violet water best, and +nearly always went into the violet room for a little while on her way +upstairs. + +As she turned to go out, the Boy joined her. He was a young man now, +taller than Barbara, but his face, as always, was hidden from her as by +a mist. His voice was very kind and tender as he took both her hands in +his. + +"How do you do, Barbara, dear?" he asked. + +"You have not been in the Tower for a long time." + +"I have been ill," she answered. "See?" She tried to show him her +crutches, but they were not there. "I used to have crutches," she +explained. + +"Did you?" he asked, in surprise. "You never had them in the Tower." + +"That's so," she answered. "I had forgotten." She remembered now that +when she went into the Tower she had always left her crutches leaning up +against the glass steps. + +"Let's go upstairs," suggested the Boy, "and ring the golden bells in +the cupola." + +Barbara wanted to go very much, but was afraid to try it, because she +had never been able to reach the cupola. + +"If you get tired," the Boy went on, as though he had read her thought, +"I'll put my arm around you and help you walk. Come, let's go." + +[Sidenote: Up the Winding Stairs] + +They went out of the violet room and up the winding stairway. Barbara +was not tired at all, but she let him put his arm around her, and leaned +her cheek against his shoulder as they climbed. Some way, she felt that +this time they were really going to reach the cupola. + +It was very sweet to be taken care of in this way and to hear the Boy's +deep, tender voice telling her about the Lady of Shalott and all the +other dear people who lived in the Tower. Sometimes he would make her +sit down on the stairs to rest. He sat beside her so that he might keep +his arm around her, and Barbara wished, as never before, that she might +see his face. + +[Sidenote: The Angel with the Flaming Sword] + +Finally, they came to the last landing. They had been up as high as this +once before, but it was long ago. The cupola was hidden in a cloud as +before, but it seemed to be the cloud of a Summer day, and not a dark +mist. They went into the cloud, and an Angel with a Flaming Sword +appeared before them and stopped them. The Angel was all in white and +very tall and stately, with a divinely tender face--Barbara's own face, +exalted and transfigured into beauty beyond all words. + +"Please," said Barbara, softly, though she was not at all afraid, "may +we go up into the cupola and ring the golden bells? We have tried so +many times." + +There was no answer, but Barbara saw the Angel looking at her with +infinite longing and love. All at once, she knew that the Angel was her +mother. + +"Please, Mother dear," said Barbara, "let us go in and ring the bells." + +The Angel smiled and stepped aside, pointing to the right with the +Flaming Sword that made a rainbow in the cloud. In the light of it, +they went through the mist, that seemed to be lifting now. + +"We're really in the cupola," cried the Boy, in delight. "See, here are +the bells." He took the two heavy golden chains in his hands and gave +one to Barbara. + +"Ring!" she cried out. "Oh, ring all the bells at once! Now!" + +[Sidenote: Ringing the Bells] + +They pulled the two chains with all their strength, and from far above +them rang out the most wonderful golden chimes that anyone had ever +dreamed of--strong and sweet and thrilling, yet curiously soft and low. + +With the first sound, the mist lifted and the Angel with the Flaming +Sword came into the cupola and stood near them, smiling. Far out was the +blue sky that bent down to meet a bluer sea, the sand on the shore was +as white as the blown snow, and the sea-birds that circled around the +cupola in the crystalline, fragrant air were singing. The melody blended +strangely with the sound of the surf on the shining shore below. + +The Angel with the Flaming Sword touched Barbara gently on the arm, and +smiled. Barbara looked up, first at the Angel, and then at the Boy who +stood beside her. The mist that had always been around him had lifted, +too, and she saw that it was Roger, whom she had known all her life. + +Barbara woke with a start. The sound of the golden bells was still +chiming in her ears. "Roger," she said, dreamily, "we rang them all +together, didn't we?" But Roger did not answer, for she was in her own +little room, now, and not in the Tower of Cologne. + +She slipped out of bed and her little bare, pink feet pattered over to +the window. She pushed the curtains back and looked out. It was a keen, +cool, Autumn morning, and still dark, but in the east was the deep, +wonderful purple that presages daybreak. + +Oh, to see the sun rise over the sea! Barbara's heart ached with +longing. She had wanted to go for so many years and nobody had ever +thought of taking her. Now, though Roger had suggested it more than +once, she had said, each time, that when she went she wanted to go +alone. + +[Sidenote: "I'll Try It"] + +"I'll try it," she thought. "If I get tired, I can sit down and rest, +and if I think it is going to be too much for me, I can come back. It +can't be very far--just down this road." + +She dressed hurriedly, putting on her warm, white wool gown and her +little low soft shoes. She did not stop to brush out her hair and braid +it again, for it was very early and no one would see. She put over her +head the white lace scarf she had worn to the wedding, took her white +knitted shawl, and went downstairs so quietly that Aunt Miriam did not +hear her. + +She unbolted the door noiselessly and went out, closing it carefully +after her. On the top step was a very small package, tied with string, +and a letter addressed, simply, "To Barbara." She recognised it as a +book and a note from Roger--he had done such things before. She did not +want to go back, so she tucked it under her arm and went on. + +It seemed so strange to be going out of her gate alone and in the dark! +Barbara was thrilled with a sense of adventure and romance which was +quite new to her. This journeying into unknown lands in pursuit of +unknown waters had all the fascination of discovery. + +[Sidenote: An Autumn Dawn] + +She went down the road faster than she had ever walked before. She was +not at all tired and was eager for the sea. The Autumn dawn with its +keen, cool air stirred her senses to new and abounding life. She went on +and on and on, pausing now and then to lean against somebody's fence, or +to rest on a friendly boulder when it appeared along the way. + +Faint suggestions of colour appeared in the illimitable distances +beyond. Barbara saw only a vast, grey expanse, but the surf murmured +softly on the shadowy shore. Crossing the sand, and stumbling as she +went, she stooped and dipped her hand into it, then put her rosy +forefinger into her mouth to see if it were really salt, as everyone +said. She sat down in the soft, cool sand, drew her white knitted shawl +and lace scarf more closely about her, and settled herself to wait. + +[Sidenote: Sunrise on the Sea] + +The deep purple softened with rose. Tints of gold came far down on the +horizon line. Barbara drew a long breath of wonder and joy. Out in the +vastness dark surges sang and crooned, breaking slowly into white foam +as they approached the shore. Rose and purple melted into amethyst and +azure, and, out beyond the breakers, the grey sea changed to opal and +pearl. + +Mist rose from the far waters and the long shafts of leaping light +divided it by rainbows as it lifted. Prismatic fires burned on the +boundless curve where the sky met the sea. Wet-winged gulls, crying +hoarsely, came from the night that still lay upon the islands near +shore, and circled out across the breakers to meet the dawn. + +Spires of splendid colour flamed to the zenith, the whole east burned +with crimson and glowed with gold, and from that far, mystical arc of +heaven and earth, a javelin of molten light leaped to the farthest hill. +The pearl and opal changed to softest green, mellowed by turquoise and +gold, the slow blue surges chimed softly on the singing shore, and +Barbara's heart beat high with rapture, for it was daybreak in earth and +heaven and morning in her soul. + +She sat there for over an hour, asking for nothing but the sky and sea, +and the warm, sweet sun that made the air as clear as crystal and +touched the Autumn hills with living flame. She drew long breaths of the +wind that swept, like shafts of sunrise, half-way across the world. + +[Sidenote: The Boy in the Tower] + +At last she turned to the package that lay beside her, and untied the +string, idly wondering what book Roger had sent. How strange that the +Boy in the Tower should be Roger, and yet, was it so strange, after all, +when she had known him all her life? + +Before looking at the book, she tore open the letter and read it--with +wide, wondering eyes and wild-beating heart. + +[Sidenote: Roger's Letter] + + "Barbara, my darling," it began. "I found this + book to-night and so I send it to you, for it is + yours as much as mine. + + "I think my father's wish has been granted and his + love has been bequeathed to me. I have known for a + long time how much I care for you, and I have + often tried to tell you, but fear has kept me + silent. + + "It has been so sweet to live near you, to read to + you when you were sewing or while you were ill, + and sweeter than all else besides to help you + walk, and to feel that you leaned on me, depending + on me for strength and guidance. + + "Sometimes I have thought you cared, too, and + then I was not sure, so I have kept the words + back, fearing to lose what I have. But to-night, + after having read his letters, I feel that I must + throw the dice for eternal winning or eternal + loss. You can never know, if I should spend the + rest of my life in telling you, just how much you + have meant to me in a thousand different ways. + + "Looking back, I see that you have given me my + ideals, since the time we made mud pies together + and built the Tower of Cologne, for which, alas, + we never got the golden bells. I have loved you + always and it has not changed since the beginning, + save to grow deeper and sweeter with every day + that passed. + + "As much as I have of courage, or tenderness, or + truth, or honour, I owe to you, who set my + standard high for me at the beginning, and oh, my + dearest, my love has kept me clean. If I have + nothing else to give you, I can offer you a clean + heart and clean hands, for there is nothing in my + life that can make me ashamed to look straight + into the eyes of the woman I love. + + "Ever since we went to that wedding the other day, + I have been wishing it were our own--that you and + I might stand together before God's high altar in + that little church with the sun streaming in, and + be joined, each to the other, until death do us + part. + + "Sweetheart, can you trust me? Can you believe + that it is for always and not just for a little + while? Has your mother left her love to you as my + father left me his? + + "Let me have the sweetness of your leaning on me + always, let me take care of you, comfort you when + you are tired, laugh with you when you are glad, + and love you until death and even after, as he + loved her. + + "Tell me you care, Barbara, even if it is only a + little. Tell me you care, and I can wait, a long, + long time. + + "ROGER." + +Barbara's heart sang with the joy of the morning. She opened the little +worn book, with its yellow, tear-stained pages, and read it all, up to +the very last line. + +"Oh!" she cried aloud, in pity. "Oh! oh!" + +Fully understanding, she put it aside, closing the faded cover +reverently on its love and pain. Then she turned to Roger's letter, and +read it again. + +[Sidenote: First Flush of Rapture] + +Dreaming over it, in the first flush of that mystical rapture which +makes the world new for those to whom it comes, as light is recreated +with every dawn, she took no heed of the passing hours. She did not know +that it was very late, nor that Aunt Miriam, much worried, had asked +Roger to go in search of her. She knew only that love and morning and +the sea were all hers. + +The tide was coming in. Each wave broke a little higher upon the +thirsting shore. Far out on the water was a tiny dark object that moved +slowly shoreward on the crests of the waves. Barbara stood up, shading +her eyes with her hand, and waited, counting the rhythmic pulse-beats +that brought it nearer. + +She could not make out what it was, for it advanced and then receded, or +paused in a circling eddy made by two retreating waves. At last a high +wave brought it in and left it, stranded, at her feet. + +[Sidenote: A Fragment] + +Barbara laughed aloud, for, broken by the wind and wave and worn by +tide, a fragment of one of her crutches had come back to her. The bit of +flannel with which she had padded the sharp end, so that the sound would +not distress her father, still clung to it. She wondered how it came +there, never guessing that it was but the natural result of Eloise's +attempt to throw it as far as Allan had thrown the other, the day he +took them away from her. + +A great sob of thankfulness almost choked her. Here she stood firmly on +her own two feet, after twenty-two years of helplessness, reminded of it +only by a fragment of a crutch that the sea had given back as it gives +up its dead. She had outgrown her need of crutches as the tiny +creatures of the sea outgrow their shells. + + "Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul, + As the swift seasons roll! + Leave thy low-vaulted past! + Let each new temple, nobler than the last, + Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, + Till thou at length art free, + Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea!" + +The beautiful words chanted themselves over and over in her +consciousness. The past, with all its pain and grieving, fell from her +like a garment. She was one with the sun and the morning; uplifted by +all the world's joy. + +[Sidenote: The True Lover] + +Her blood sang within her and it seemed that her heart had wings. All of +life lay before her--that life which is made sweet by love. She felt +again the ecstasy that claimed her in the Tower of Cologne, when she and +the Boy, after a lifetime of waiting, had rung all the golden bells at +once. + +And the Boy was Roger--always had been Roger--only she did not know. +Into Barbara's heart came something new and sweet that she had never +known before--the deep sense of conviction and the everlasting peace +which the True Lover, and he alone, has power to bestow. + +It was part of the wonder of the morning that when she turned, startled +a little by a muffled footstep, she should see Roger with his hands +outstretched in pleading and all his soul in his eyes. + +Barbara's face took on the unearthly beauty of dawn. Her blue eyes +deepened to violet, her sweet lips smiled. She was radiant, from her +feet to the heavy braids that hung over her shoulders and the shimmering +halo of soft hair, that blew, like golden mist, about her face. + +Roger caught her mood unerringly--it was like him always to understand. +He was no longer afraid, and the trembling of his boyish mouth was lost +in a smile. She was more beautiful than the morning of which she seemed +a veritable part--and she was his. + +[Sidenote: Flower of the Dawn] + +"Flower of the Dawn," he cried, his voice ringing with love and triumph, +"do you care? Are you mine?" + +She went to him, smiling, with the colour of the fiery dawning on her +cheeks and lips. "Yes," she whispered. "Didn't you know?" + +Then the sun and the morning and the world itself vanished all at once +beyond his ken, for Barbara had put her soft little hand upon his +shoulder, and lifted her love-lit face to his. + + +THE END. + + + + * * * * * + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + Obvious punctuation errors repaired. + + Page 4, "instrusted" changed to "intrusted" (china intrusted) + + Page 272, "checks" changed to "cheeks" (fair cheeks) + + Page 275, "venegeance" changed to "vengeance" (not of His vengeance) + + Page 321, "anenomes" changed to "anemones" (and anemones) + + Page 326, "assunder" changed to "asunder" (hopelessly put asunder) + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FLOWER OF THE DUSK*** + + +******* This file should be named 18057-8.txt or 18057-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/0/5/18057 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre> +<p>Title: Flower of the Dusk</p> +<p>Author: Myrtle Reed</p> +<p>Release Date: March 27, 2006 [eBook #18057]</p> +<p>Language: English</p> +<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p> +<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FLOWER OF THE DUSK***</p> +<p> </p> +<h3>E-text prepared by Suzanne Lybarger, Brian Janes, Emmy,<br /> + and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> + (http://www.pgdp.net/)</h3> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p> </p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i">[i]</a></span></p> + + + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 248px;"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="248" height="396" alt="Cover" title="Cover" /> +</div> + +<div class='bbox'> +<h1>FLOWER OF THE<br />DUSK</h1> + +<h3><span class="smcap">By</span> MYRTLE REED</h3></div> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 150px;"> +<img src="images/emblem.png" width="150" height="124" alt="Emblem" title="Emblem" /> +</div> +<p> </p> + + +<div class='bbox'> +<div class="center">G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS<br /> +New York and London<br /> +The Knickerbocker Press<br /> +1908</div> +</div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[ii]</a></span></p> +<div class="center"><span class="smcap">Copyright</span>, 1908<br /> +BY<br /> +MYRTLE REED McCULLOUGH<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +<br /> +The Knickerbocker Press, New York<br /> +</div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[iii]</a></span></p> + + +<div class='bbox2'> +<h3>By MYRTLE REED.</h3> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="Myrtle Reed Books"> +<tr><td align='left'>FLOWER OF THE DUSK.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>LOVE AFFAIRS OF LITERARY MEN.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>A SPINNER IN THE SUN.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>LOVE LETTERS OF A MUSICIAN.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>LATER LOVE LETTERS OF A MUSICIAN.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>THE SPINSTER BOOK.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>LAVENDER AND OLD LACE.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>THE MASTER'S VIOLIN.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>AT THE SIGN OF THE JACK-O'-LANTERN.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>THE SHADOW OF VICTORY.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>THE BOOK OF CLEVER BEASTS.</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>PICKABACK SONGS.</td></tr> +</table></div> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>Contents</h2> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="Contents"> +<tr><td align='right'><span class="smcap">chapter</span></td><td align='left'></td><td align='right'><span class="smcap">page</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>I—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Maker of Songs</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_1'>1</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>II—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Miss Mattie</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_15'>15</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>III—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Tower of Cologne</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_28'>28</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>IV—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Seventh of June</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_42'>42</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>V—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Eloise</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_55'>55</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>VI—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Letter</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_68'>68</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>VII—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">An Afternoon Call</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_83'>83</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>VIII—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">A Fairy Godmother</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_98'>98</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>IX—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Taking the Chance</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_111'>111</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>X—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">In the Garden</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_126'>126</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XI—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Barbara's "To-morrow"</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_142'>142</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XII—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Miriam</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_155'>155</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XIII—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">"Woman Suffrage"</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_169'>169</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XIV—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Barbara's Birthday</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_181'>181</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XV—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Song of the Pines</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_194'>194</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XVI—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Betrayal</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_209'>209</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XVII—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">"Never Again"</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_225'>225</a><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[iv]</a></span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XVIII—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Passing of Fido</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_238'>238</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XIX—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Dreams Come True</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_253'>253</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XX—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Pardon</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_273'>273</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XXI—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Perils of the City</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_286'>286</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XXII—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Autumn Leaves</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_299'>299</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XXIII—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">Letters to Constance</span></td><td align='right'><a href='#Page_313'>313</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='right'>XXIV—</td><td align='left'><span class="smcap">The Bells in the Tower</span></td><td align='right'> <a href='#Page_327'>327</a></td></tr> +</table></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[v]</a></span></p> +<h2>Flower of the Dusk</h2> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 283px;"> +<img src="images/frontis.jpg" width="283" height="400" alt=""Secretly, too, both were ashamed, having come unawares upon knowledge that was not meant for them."" title=""Secretly, too, both were ashamed, having come unawares upon knowledge that was not meant for them."" /> +<span class="caption">"Secretly, too, both were ashamed, having come unawares upon knowledge that was not meant for them."</span> +—<a href='#Page_82'>Page 82</a></div> + +<div class='center'><i>From a painting by Clinton Balmer</i></div> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>I</h2> + +<h3>A Maker of Songs</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">Sunset</div> + +<p>The pines, darkly purple, towered against the sunset. Behind the hills, +the splendid tapestry glowed and flamed, sending far messages of light +to the grey East, where lay the sea, crooning itself to sleep. Bare +boughs dripped rain upon the sodden earth, where the dead leaves had so +long been hidden by the snow. The thousand sounds and scents of Spring +at last had waked the world.</p> + +<p>The man who stood near the edge of the cliff, quite alone, and carefully +feeling the ground before him with his cane, had chosen to face the +valley and dream of the glory that, perchance, trailed down in living +light from some vast loom of God's. His massive head was thrown back, as +though he listened, with a secret sense, for music denied to those who +see.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Joyful Memories</div> + +<p>He took off his hat and stray gleams came through the deepening shadows +to rest, like an aureole, upon his silvered hair. Remembered sunsets, +from beyond the darkness of more than twenty years, came back to him +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span>with divine beauty and diviner joy. Mnemosyne, that guardian angel of +the soul, brought from her treasure-house gifts of laughter and tears; +the laughter sweet with singing, and the bitterness of the tears +eternally lost in the Water of Forgetfulness.</p> + +<p>Slowly, the light died. Dusk came upon the valley and crept softly to +the hills. Mist drifted in from the sleeping sea, and the hush of night +brooded over the river as it murmured through the plain. A single star +uplifted its exquisite lamp against the afterglow, near the veiled ivory +of the crescent moon.</p> + +<p>Sighing, the man turned away. "Perhaps," he thought, whimsically, as he +went cautiously down the path, searching out every step of the way, +"there was no sunset at all."</p> + +<p>The road was clear until he came to a fallen tree, over which he stepped +easily. The new softness of the soil had, for him, its own deep meaning +of resurrection. He felt it in the swelling buds of the branches that +sometimes swayed before him, and found it in the scent of the cedar as +he crushed a bit of it in his hand.</p> + +<p>Easily, yet carefully, he went around the base of the hill to the +street, where his house was the first upon the right-hand side. The gate +creaked on its hinges and he went quickly up the walk, passing the grey +tangle of last<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span> Summer's garden, where the marigolds had died and the +larkspur fallen asleep.</p> + +<p>Within the house, two women awaited him, one with anxious eagerness, the +other with tenderly watchful love. The older one, who had long been +listening, opened the door before he knocked, but it was Barbara who +spoke to him first.</p> + +<p>"You're late, Father, dear."</p> + +<p>"Am I, Barbara? Tell me, was there a sunset to-night?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, a glorious one."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Seeing with the Soul</div> + +<p>"I thought so, and that accounts for my being late. I saw a beautiful +sunset—I saw it with my soul."</p> + +<p>"Give me your coat, Ambrose." The older woman stood at his side, longing +to do him some small service.</p> + +<p>"Thank you, Miriam; you are always kind."</p> + +<p>The tiny living-room was filled with relics of past luxury. Fine +pictures, in tarnished frames, hung on the dingy walls, and worn rugs +covered the floor. The furniture was old mahogany, beautifully cared +for, but decrepit, nevertheless, and the ancient square piano, +outwardly, at least, showed every year of its age.</p> + +<p>Still, the room had "atmosphere," of the indefinable quality that some +people impart to a dwelling-place. Entering, one felt refinement, +daintiness, and the ability to live above mere <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>externals. Barbara had, +very strongly, the house-love which belongs to some rare women. And who +shall say that inanimate things do not answer to our love of them, and +diffuse, between our four walls, a certain gracious spirit of kindliness +and welcome?</p> + +<p>In the dining-room, where the table was set for supper, there were +marked contrasts. A coarse cloth covered the table, but at the head of +it was overlaid a remnant of heavy table-damask, the worn places +carefully hidden. The china at this place was thin and fine, the silver +was solid, and the cup from which Ambrose North drank was Satsuma.</p> + +<p>On the coarse cloth were the heavy, cheap dishes and the discouraging +knives and forks which were the portion of the others. The five damask +napkins remaining from the original stock of linen were used only by the +blind man.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Comforting Deceit</div> + +<p>For years the two women had carried on this comforting deceit, and the +daily lie they lived, so lovingly, had become a sort of second nature. +They had learned to speak, casually, of the difficulty in procuring +servants, and to say how much easier it was to do their own small tasks +than to watch continually over fine linen and rare china <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'instrusted'">intrusted</ins> to +incompetent hands. They talked of tapestries, laces, and jewels which +had long ago been sold, and Barbara frequently wore a string of beads +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>which, with a lump in her throat, she called "Mother's pearls."</p> + +<p>Discovering that the sound of her crutches on the floor distressed him +greatly, Barbara had padded the sharp ends with flannel and was careful +to move about as little as possible when he was in the house. She had +gone, mouse-like, to her own particular chair while Miriam was hanging +up his coat and hat and placing his easy chair near the open fire. He +sat down and held his slender hands close to the grateful warmth.</p> + +<p>"It isn't cold," he said, "and yet I am glad of the fire. To-day is the +first day of Spring."</p> + +<p>"By the almanac?" laughed Barbara.</p> + +<p>"No, according to the almanac, I believe, it has been Spring for ten +days. Nature does not move according to man's laws, but she forces him +to observe hers—except in almanacs."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Kindly Shadows</div> + +<p>The firelight made kindly shadows in the room, softening the +unloveliness and lending such beauty as it might. It gave to Ambrose +North's fine, strong face the delicacy and dignity of an old miniature. +It transfigured Barbara's yellow hair into a crown of gold, and put a +new gentleness into Miriam's lined face as she sat in the half-light, +one of them in blood, yet singularly alien and apart.</p> + +<p>"What are you doing, Barbara?" The <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>sensitive hands strayed to her lap +and lifted the sheer bit of linen upon which she was working.</p> + +<p>"Making lingerie by hand."</p> + +<p>"You have a great deal of it, haven't you?"</p> + +<p>"Not as much as you think, perhaps. It takes a long time to do it well."</p> + +<p>"It seems to me you are always sewing."</p> + +<p>"Girls are very vain these days, Father. We need a great many pretty +things."</p> + +<p>"Your dear mother used to sew a great deal. She—" His voice broke, for +even after many years his grief was keenly alive.</p> + +<p>"Is supper ready, Aunt Miriam?" asked Barbara, quickly.</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Then come, let's go in."</p> + +<p>Ambrose North took his place at the head of the table, which, purposely, +was nearest the door. Barbara and Miriam sat together, at the other end.</p> + +<p>"Where were you to-day, Father?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">At the top of the World</div> + +<p>"On the summit of the highest hill, almost at the top of the world. I +think I heard a robin, but I am not sure. I smelled Spring in the maple +branches and the cedar, and felt it in the salt mist that blew up from +the sea. The Winter has been so long!"</p> + +<p>"Did you make a song?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Always Make a Song</div> + +<p>"Yes—two. I'll tell you about them after<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span>ward. Always make a song, +Barbara, no matter what comes."</p> + +<p>So the two talked, while the other woman watched them furtively. Her +face was that of one who has lived much in a short space of time and her +dark, burning eyes betrayed tragic depths of feeling. Her black hair, +slightly tinged with grey, was brushed straight back from her wrinkled +forehead. Her shoulders were stooped and her hands rough from hard work.</p> + +<p>She was the older sister of Ambrose North's dead wife—the woman he had +so devotedly loved. Ever since her sister's death, she had lived with +them, taking care of little lame Barbara, now grown into beautiful +womanhood, except for the crutches. After his blindness, Ambrose North +had lost his wife, and then, by slow degrees, his fortune. Mercifully, a +long illness had made him forget a great deal.</p> + +<p>"Never mind, Barbara," said Miriam, in a low tone, as they rose from the +table. "It will make your hands too rough for the sewing."</p> + +<p>"Shan't I wipe the dishes for you, Aunty? I'd just as soon."</p> + +<p>"No—go with him."</p> + +<p>The fire had gone down, but the room was warm, so Barbara turned up the +light and began again on her endless stitching. Her father's hands +sought hers.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span></p> + +<p>"More sewing?" His voice was tender and appealing.</p> + +<p>"Just a little bit, Father, please. I'm so anxious to get this done."</p> + +<p>"But why, dear?"</p> + +<p>"Because girls are so vain," she answered, with a laugh.</p> + +<p>"Is my little girl vain?"</p> + +<p>"Awfully. Hasn't she the dearest father in the world and the +prettiest"—she swallowed hard here—"the prettiest house and the +loveliest clothes? Who wouldn't be vain!"</p> + +<p>"I am so glad," said the old man, contentedly, "that I have been able to +give you the things you want. I could not bear it if we were poor."</p> + +<p>"You told me you had made two songs to-day, Father."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Song of the River</div> + +<p>He drew closer to her and laid one hand upon the arm of her chair. +Quietly, she moved her crutches beyond his reach. "One is about the +river," he began.</p> + +<p>"In Winter, a cruel fairy put it to sleep in an enchanted tower, far up +in the mountains, and walled up the door with crystal. All the while the +river was asleep, it was dreaming of the green fields and the soft, +fragrant winds.</p> + +<p>"It tossed and murmured in its sleep, and at last it woke, too soon, for +the cruel fairy's spell could not have lasted much longer. When it found +the door barred, it was very <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>sad. Then it grew rebellious and hurled +itself against the door, trying to escape, but the barrier only seemed +more unyielding. So, making the best of things, the river began to sing +about the dream.</p> + +<p>"From its prison-house, it sang of the green fields and fragrant winds, +the blue violets that starred the meadow, the strange, singing harps of +the marsh grasses, and the wonder of the sea. A good fairy happened to +be passing, and she stopped to hear the song. She became so interested +that she wanted to see the singer, so she opened the door. The river +laughed and ran out, still singing, and carrying the door along. It +never stopped until it had taken every bit of the broken crystal far out +to sea."</p> + +<p>"I made one, too, Father."</p> + +<p>"What is it?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Song of the Flax</div> + +<p>"Mine is about the linen. Once there was a little seed put away into the +darkness and covered deep with earth. But there was a soul in the seed, +and after the darkness grew warm it began to climb up and up, until one +day it reached the sunshine. After that, it was so glad that it tossed +out tiny, green branches and finally its soul blossomed into a blue +flower. Then a princess passed, and her hair was flaxen and her eyes +were the colour of the flower.</p> + +<p>"The flower said, 'Oh, pretty Princess, I want to go with you.'</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The princess answered, 'You would die, little Flower, if you were +picked,' and she went on.</p> + +<p>"But one day the Reaper passed and the little blue flower and all its +fellows were gathered. After a terrible time of darkness and pain, the +flower found itself in a web of sheerest linen. There was much cutting +and more pain, and thousands of pricking stitches, then a beautiful gown +was made, all embroidered with the flax in palest blue and green. And it +was the wedding gown of the pretty princess, because her hair was flaxen +and her eyes the colour of the flower."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Barbara</div> + +<p>"What colour is your hair, Barbara?" He had asked the question many +times.</p> + +<p>"The colour of ripe corn, Daddy. Don't you remember my telling you?"</p> + +<p>He leaned forward to stroke the shining braids. "And your eyes?"</p> + +<p>"Like the larkspur that grows in the garden."</p> + +<p>"I know—your dear mother's eyes." He touched her face gently as he +spoke. "Your skin is so smooth—is it fair?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, Daddy."</p> + +<p>"I think you must be beautiful; I have asked Miriam so often, but she +will not tell me. She only says you look well enough and something like +your mother. Are you beautiful?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Oh, Daddy! Daddy!" laughed Barbara, in confusion. "You mustn't ask such +questions! Didn't you say you had made two songs? What is the other +one?"</p> + +<p>Miriam sat in the dining-room, out of sight but within hearing. Having +observed that in her presence they laughed less, she spent her evenings +alone unless they urged her to join them. She had a newspaper more than +a week old, but, as yet, she had not read it. She sat staring into the +shadows, with the light of her one candle flickering upon her face, +nervously moving her work-worn hands.</p> + +<p>"The other song," reminded Barbara, gently.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Song of the Sunset</div> + +<p>"This one was about a sunset," he sighed. "It was such a sunset as was +never on sea or land, because two who loved each other saw it together. +God and all His angels had hung a marvellous tapestry from the high +walls of Heaven, and it reached almost to the mountain-tops, where some +of the little clouds sleep.</p> + +<p>"The man said, 'Shall we always look for the sunsets together?'</p> + +<p>"The woman smiled and answered, 'Yes, always.'</p> + +<p>"'And,' the man continued, 'when one of us goes on the last long +journey?'</p> + +<p>"'Then,' answered the woman, 'the other will not be watching alone. For, +I think, there in the West is the Golden City with the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>jasper walls and +the jewelled foundations, where the twelve gates are twelve pearls.'"</p> + +<p>There was a long silence. "And so—" said Barbara, softly.</p> + +<p>Ambrose North lifted his grey head from his hands and rose to his feet +unsteadily. "And so," he said, with difficulty, "she leans from the +sunset toward him, but he can never see her, because he is blind. Oh, +Barbara," he cried, passionately, "last night I dreamed that you could +walk and I could see!"</p> + +<p>"So we can, Daddy," said Barbara, very gently. "Our souls are neither +blind nor lame. Here, I am eyes for you and you are feet for me, so we +belong together. And—past the sunset——"</p> + +<p>"Past the sunset," repeated the old man, dreamily, "soul and body shall +be as one. We must wait—for life is made up of waiting—and make what +songs we can."</p> + +<p>"I think, Father, that a song should be in poetry, shouldn't it?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Real Song</div> + +<p>"Some of them are, but more are not. Some are music and some are words, +and some, like prayers, are feeling. The real song is in the thrush's +heart, not in the silvery rain of sound that comes from the green boughs +in Spring. When you open the door of your heart and let all the joy rush +out, laughing—then you are making a song."</p> + +<p>"But—is there always joy?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Yes, though sometimes it is sadly covered up with other things. We must +find it and divide it, for only in that way it grows. Good-night, my +dear."</p> + +<p>He bent to kiss her, while Miriam, with her heart full of nameless +yearning, watched them from the far shadows. The sound of his footsteps +died away and a distant door closed. Soon afterward Miriam took her +candle and went noiselessly upstairs, but she did not say good-night to +Barbara.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Midnight</div> + +<p>Until midnight, the girl sat at her sewing, taking the finest of +stitches in tuck and hem. The lamp burning low made her needle fly +swiftly. In her own room was an old chest nearly full of dainty garments +which she was never to wear. She had wrought miracles of embroidery upon +some of them, and others were unadorned save by tucks and lace.</p> + +<p>When the work was finished, she folded it and laid it aside, then put +away her thimble and thread. "When the guests come to the hotel," she +thought—"ah, when they come, and buy all the things I've made the past +year, and the preserves and the candied orange peel, the rag rugs and +the quilts, then——"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Dying Embers</div> + +<p>So Barbara fell a-dreaming, and the light of the dying embers lay +lovingly upon her face, already transfigured by tenderness into beauty +beyond words. The lamp went out and little by little the room faded into +twilight, then <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>into night. It was quite dark when she leaned over and +picked up her crutches.</p> + +<p>"Dear, dear father," she breathed. "He must never know!"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>II</h2> + +<h3>Miss Mattie</h3> + + +<p>Miss Mattie was getting supper, sustained by the comforting thought that +her task was utterly beneath her and had been forced upon her by the +mysterious workings of an untoward Fate. She was not really "Miss," +since she had been married and widowed, and a grown son was waiting +impatiently in the sitting-room for his evening meal, but her +neighbours, nearly all of whom had known her before her marriage, still +called her "Miss Mattie."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">"Old Maids"</div> + +<p>The arbitrary social distinctions, made regardless of personality, are +often cruelly ironical. Many a man, incapable by nature of life-long +devotion to one woman, becomes a husband in half an hour, duly +sanctioned by Church and State. A woman who remains unmarried, because, +with fine courage, she will have her true mate or none, is called "an +old maid." She may have the heart of a wife and the soul of a mother, +but she cannot escape her sinister label. The real "old maids" are of +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>both sexes, and many are married, but alas! seldom to each other.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Grievance</div> + +<p>In his introspective moments, Roger Austin sometimes wondered why +marriage, maternity, and bereavement should have left no trace upon his +mother. The uttermost depths of life had been hers for the sounding, but +Miss Mattie had refused to drop her plummet overboard and had spent the +years in prolonged study of her own particular boat.</p> + +<p>She came in, with the irritating air of a martyr, and clucked sharply +with her false teeth when she saw that her son was reading.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what I've done," she remarked, "that I should have to live +all the time with people who keep their noses in books. Your pa was +forever readin' and you're marked with it. I could set here and set here +and set here, and he took no more notice of me than if I was a piece of +furniture. When he died, the brethren and sistern used to come to +condole with me and say how I must miss him. There wasn't nothin' to +miss, 'cause the books and his chair was left. I've a good mind to burn +'em all up."</p> + +<p>"I won't read if you don't want me to, Mother," answered Roger, laying +his book aside regretfully.</p> + +<p>"I dunno but what I'd rather you would than to want to and not," she +retorted, somewhat obscurely. "What I'm a-sayin' is that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>it's in the +blood and you can't help it. If I'd known it was your pa's intention to +give himself up so exclusive to readin', I'd never have married him, +that's all I've got to say. There's no sense in it. Lemme see what +you're at now."</p> + +<p>She took the open book, that lay face downward upon the table, and read +aloud, awkwardly:</p> + +<p>"Leave to the diamond its ages to grow, nor expect to accelerate the +births of the eternal. Friendship demands a religious treatment. We talk +of choosing our friends, but friends are self-elected."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Peculiar Way of Putting Things</div> + +<p>"Now," she demanded, in a shrill voice, "what does that mean?"</p> + +<p>"I don't think I could explain it to you, Mother."</p> + +<p>"That's just the point. Your pa couldn't never explain nothin', neither. +You're readin' and readin' and readin' and you never know what you're +readin' about. Diamonds growin' and births bein' hurried up, and friends +bein' religious and voted for at township elections. Who's runnin' for +friend this year on the Republican ticket?" she inquired, caustically.</p> + +<p>Roger managed to force a laugh. "You have your own peculiar way of +putting things, Mother. Is supper ready? I'm as hungry as a bear."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I suppose you are. When it ain't readin', it's eatin'. Work all day to +get a meal that don't last more'n fifteen minutes, and then see readin' +goin' on till long past bedtime, and oil goin' up every six months. +Which'll you have—fresh apple sauce, or canned raspberries?"</p> + +<p>"It doesn't matter."</p> + +<p>"Then I'll get the apple sauce, because the canned raspberries can lay +over as long as they're kept cool."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miss Mattie's Personal Appearance</div> + +<p>Miss Mattie shuffled back into the kitchen. During the Winter she wore +black knitted slippers attached to woollen inner soles which had no +heels. She was well past the half-century mark, but her face had few +lines in it and her grey eyes were sharp and penetrating. Her smooth, +pale brown hair, which did not show the grey in it, was parted precisely +in the middle. Every morning she brushed it violently with a stiff brush +dipped into cold water, and twisted the ends into a tight knot at the +back of her head. In militant moments, this knot seemed to rise and the +protruding ends of the wire hairpins to bristle into formidable weapons +of offence.</p> + +<p>She habitually wore her steel-bowed spectacles half-way down her nose. +They might have fallen off had not a kindly Providence placed a large +wart where it would do the most good. On Sundays, when she put on shoes, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>corsets, her best black silk, and her gold-bowed spectacles, she took +great pains to wear them properly. When she reached home, however, she +always took off her fine raiment and laid her spectacles aside with a +great sigh of relief. Miss Mattie's disposition improved rapidly as soon +as the old steel-bowed pair were in their rightful place, resting safely +upon the wart.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Second-hand Things</div> + +<p>When they sat down to supper, she reverted to the original topic. "As I +was sayin'," she began, "there ain't no sense in the books you and your +pa has always set such store by. Where he ever got 'em, I dunno, but +they was always a comin'. Lots of 'em was well-nigh wore out when he got +'em, and he wouldn't let me buy nothin' that had been used before, even +if I knew the folks.</p> + +<p>"I got a silver coffin plate once at an auction over to the Ridge for +almost nothin' and your pa was as mad as a wet hen. There was a name on +it, but it could have been scraped off, and the rest of it was perfectly +good. When you need a coffin plate you need it awful bad. While your pa +was rampin' around, he said he wouldn't have been surprised to see me +comin' home with a second-hand coffin in the back of the buggy. Who ever +heard of a second-hand coffin? I've always thought his mind was +unsettled by so much readin'.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I ain't a-sayin' but what some readin' is all right. Some folks has +just moved over to the Ridge and the postmaster's wife was a-showin' me +some papers they get, every week. One is <i>The Metropolitan Weekly</i>, and +the other <i>The Housewife's Companion</i>. I must say, the stories in those +papers is certainly beautiful.</p> + +<p>"Once, when they come after their mail, they was as mad as anything +because the papers hadn't come, but the postmaster's wife was readin' +one of the stories and settin' up nights to do it, so she wa'n't to +blame for not lettin' 'em go until she got through with 'em. They slip +out of the covers just as easy, and nobody ever knows the difference.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Doctor's Darling</div> + +<p>"She was tellin' me about one of the stories. It's named <i>Lovely Lulu, +or the Doctor's Darling</i>. Lovely Lulu is a little orphant who has to do +most of the housework for a family of eight, and the way they abuse that +child is something awful. The young ladies are forever puttin' ruffled +white skirts into her wash, and makin' her darn the lace on their blue +silk mornin' dresses.</p> + +<p>"There's a rich doctor that they're all after and one day little Lulu +happens to open the front-door for him, and he gets a good look at her +for the first time. As she goes upstairs, Arthur Montmorency—that's his +name—holds both hands to his heart and says, 'She and she only shall be +my bride.' The conclusion of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>this highly fascinatin' and absorbin' +romance will be found in the next number of <i>The Housewife's +Companion</i>."</p> + +<p>"Mother," suggested Roger, "why don't you subscribe for the papers +yourself?"</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie dropped her knife and fork and gazed at him in open-mouthed +astonishment. "Roger," she said, kindly, "I declare if sometimes you +don't remind me of my people more'n your pa's. I never thought of that +myself and I dunno how you come to. I'll do it the very first time I go +down to the store. The postmaster's wife can get the addresses without +tearin' off the covers, and after I get 'em read she can borrow mine, +and not be always makin' the people at the Ridge so mad that she's +runnin' the risk of losin' her job. If you ain't the beatenest!"</p> + +<p>Basking in the unaccustomed warmth of his mother's approval, Roger +finished his supper in peace. Afterward, while she was clearing up, he +even dared to take up the much-criticised book and lose himself once +more in his father's beloved Emerson.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="sidenote">Childish Memories</div> + +<p>All his childish memories of his father had been blurred into one by the +mists of the intervening years. As though it were yesterday, he could +see the library upstairs, which was still the same, and the grave, +silent, kindly man who sat dreaming over his books. When <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>the child +entered, half afraid because the room was so quiet, the man had risen +and caught him in his arms with such hungry passion that he had almost +cried out.</p> + +<p>"Oh, my son," came in the deep, rich voice, vibrant with tenderness; "my +dear little son!"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Priceless Legacy</div> + +<p>That was all, save a few old photographs and the priceless legacy of the +books. The library was not a large one, but it had been chosen by a man +of discriminating, yet catholic, taste. The books had been used and were +not, as so often happens, merely ornaments. Page after page had been +interlined and there was scarcely a volume which was not rich in +marginal notes, sometimes questioning in character, but indicating +always understanding and appreciation.</p> + +<p>As soon as he learned to read, Roger began to spend his leisure hours in +this library. When he could not understand a book, he put it aside and +took up another. Always there were pictures and sometimes many of them, +for in his later years Laurence Austin had contracted the baneful habit +of extra-illustration. Never maternal, save in the limited physical +sense, Miss Mattie had been glad to have the child out of her way.</p> + +<p>Day by day, the young mind grew and expanded in its own way. Year by +year, Roger came to an affectionate knowledge of his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>father, through +the medium of the marginal notes. He wondered, sometimes, that a pencil +mark should so long outlive the fine, strong body of the man who made +it. It seemed pitiful, in a way, and yet he knew that books and letters +are the things that endure, in a world of transition and decay.</p> + +<p>The underlined passages and the marginal comments gave evidence of an +extraordinary love of beauty, in whatever shape or form. And yet—the +parlour, which was opened only on Sunday—was hideous with a gaudy +carpet, stuffed chairs, family portraits done in crayon and inflicted +upon the house by itinerant vendors of tea and coffee, and there was a +basket of wax flowers, protected by glass, on the marble-topped +"centre-table."</p> + +<p>The pride of Miss Mattie's heart was a chair, which, with incredible +industry, she had made from an empty flour barrel. She had spoiled a +good barrel to make a bad chair, but her thrifty soul rejoiced in her +achievement. Roger never went near it, so Miss Mattie herself sat in it +on Sunday afternoons, nodding, and crooning hymns to herself.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">An Awful Chasm</div> + +<p>"How did father stand it?" thought Roger, intending no disrespect. He +loved his mother and appreciated her good qualities, but he saw the +awful chasm between those two souls, which no ceremony of marriage could +ever span.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Roger Austin</div> + +<p>In appearance, Roger was like his father.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span> He had the same clear, dark +skin, with regular features and kind, dark eyes, the same abundant, wavy +hair, strong, square chin, and incongruous, beauty-loving mouth. He had, +too, the lovable boyishness, which never quite leaves some fortunate +men. He was studying law in the judge's office, and hoped by another +year to be ready to take his examinations. After working hard all day, +he found refreshment for mind and body in an hour or so at night spent +with the treasures of his father's library.</p> + +<p>"Let us buy our entrance to this guild with a long probation," read +Roger. "Why should we desecrate noble and beautiful souls by intruding +upon them? Why insist upon rash personal relations with your friend? Why +go to his house, and know his mother and brother and sisters? Why be +visited by him at your own? Are these things material to our covenant? +Leave this touching and clawing. Let him be to me——"</p> + +<p>"I've spoke twice," complained Miss Mattie, "and you don't hear me no +more'n your pa did."</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon, Mother. I did not hear you come in. What is it?"</p> + +<p>"I was just a-sayin' that maybe those papers would be too expensive. +Maybe I ought not to have 'em."</p> + +<p>"I'm sure they're not, Mother. Anyhow, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>you get them, and we'll make it +up in some other way if we have to." Dimly, in the future, Roger saw +long, quiet evenings in which his disturbing influence should be +rendered null and void by the charms of <i>Lovely Lulu, or the Doctor's +Darling</i>.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Morning Call</div> + +<p>"Barbara North sent her pa over here this morning to ask for some book. +I disremember now what it was, but it was after you was gone."</p> + +<p>Roger's expressive face changed instantly. "Why didn't you tell me +sooner, Mother?" He spoke with evident effort. "It's too late now for me +to go over there."</p> + +<p>"There's no call for you to go over. They can send again. Miss Miriam +can come after it any time. They ain't got no business to let a blind +old man like Ambrose North run around by himself the way they do."</p> + +<p>"He takes very good care of himself. He knew this place before he was +blind, and I don't think there is any danger."</p> + +<p>"Just the same, he ought not to go around alone, and that's what I told +him this morning. 'A blind old man like you,' says I, 'ain't got no +business chasin' around alone. First thing you know, you'll fall down +and break a leg or arm or something.'"</p> + +<p>Roger shrank as if from a physical hurt. "Mother!" he cried. "How can +you say such things!"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Why not?" she queried, imperturbably. "He knows he's blind, I guess, +and he certainly can't think he's young, so what harm does it do to +speak of it? Anyway," she added, piously, "I always say just what I +think."</p> + +<p>Roger got up, put his hands in his pockets, and paced back and forth +restlessly. "People who always say what they think, Mother," he +answered, not unkindly, "assume that their opinions are of great +importance to people who probably do not care for them at all. Unless +directly asked, it is better to say only the kind things and keep the +rest to ourselves."</p> + +<p>"I was kind," objected Miss Mattie. "I was tellin' him he ought not to +take the risk of hurtin' himself by runnin' around alone. I don't know +what ails you, Roger. Every day you get more and more like your pa."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Dangerous Rocks</div> + +<p>"How long had you and father known each other before you were married?" +asked Roger, steering quickly away from the dangerous rocks that will +loom up in the best-regulated of conversations.</p> + +<p>"'Bout three months. Why?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I just wanted to know."</p> + +<p>"I used to be a pretty girl, Roger, though you mightn't think it now." +Her voice was softened, and, taking off her spectacles, she gazed far +into space; seemingly to that distant girlhood when radiant youth lent +to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>the grey old world some of its own immortal joy.</p> + +<p>"I don't doubt it," said Roger, politely.</p> + +<p>"Your pa and me used to go to church together. He sang in the choir and +I had a white dress and a bonnet trimmed with lutestring ribbon. I can +smell the clover now and hear the bees hummin' when the windows was open +in Summer. A bee come in once while the minister was prayin' and lighted +on Deacon Emory's bald head. Seems a'most as if 't was yesterday.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Great Notions</div> + +<p>"Your pa had great notions," she went on, after a pause. "Just before we +was married, he said he was goin' to educate me, but he never did."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>III</h2> + +<h3>The Tower of Cologne</h3> + + +<p>Roger sat in Ambrose North's easy chair, watching Barbara while she +sewed. "I am sorry," he said, "that I wasn't at home when your father +came over after the book. Mother was unable to find it. I'm afraid I'm +not very orderly."</p> + +<p>"It doesn't matter," returned Barbara, threading her needle again. "I +steal too much time from my work as it is."</p> + +<p>Roger sighed and turned restlessly in his chair. "I wish I could come +over every day and read to you, but you know how it is. Days, I'm in the +office with the musty old law books, and in the evenings, your father +wants you and my mother wants me."</p> + +<p>"I know, but father usually goes to bed by nine, and I'm sure your +mother doesn't sit up much later, for I usually see her light by that +time. I always work until eleven or half past, so why shouldn't you come +over then?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Happy Thought</div> + +<p>"Happy thought!" exclaimed Roger. "Still, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>you might not always want me. +How shall I know?"</p> + +<p>"I'll put a candle in the front window," suggested Barbara, "and if you +can come, all right. If not, I'll understand."</p> + +<p>Both laughed delightedly at the idea, for they were young enough to find +a certain pleasure in clandestine ways and means. Miss Mattie had so far +determinedly set her face against her son's association with the young +of the other sex, and even Barbara, who had been born lame and had never +walked farther than her own garden, came under the ban.</p> + +<p>Ambrose North, with the keen and unconscious selfishness of age, +begrudged others even an hour of Barbara's society. He felt a third +person always as an intruder, though he tried his best to appear +hospitable when anyone came. Miriam might sometimes have read to +Barbara, while he was out upon his long, lonely walks, but it had never +occurred to either of them.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">World-wide Fellowship</div> + +<p>Through Laurence Austin's library, as transported back and forth by +Roger, one volume at a time, Barbara had come into the world-wide +fellowship of those who love books. She was closely housed and +constantly at work, but her mind soared free. When the poverty and +ugliness of her surroundings oppressed her beauty-loving soul; when her +fingers ached <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>and the stitches blurred into mist before her eyes, some +little brown book, much worn, had often given her the key to the House +of Content.</p> + +<p>"Shall you always have to sew?" asked Roger. "Is there no way out?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Glad of Work</div> + +<p>"Not unless some fairy prince comes prancing up on a white charger," +laughed Barbara, "and takes us all away with him to his palace. Don't +pity me," she went on, her lips quivering a little, "for every day I'm +glad I can do it and keep father from knowing we are poor.</p> + +<p>"Besides, I'm of use in the world, and I wouldn't want to live if I +couldn't work. Aunt Miriam works, too. She does all the housework, takes +care of me when I can't help myself, does the mending, many things for +father, and makes the quilts, preserves, candied orange peel, and the +other little things we sell. People are so kind to us. Last Summer the +women at the hotel bought everything we had and left orders enough to +keep me busy until long after Christmas."</p> + +<p>"Don't call people kind because they buy what they want."</p> + +<p>"Don't be so cynical. You wouldn't have them buy things they didn't +want, would you?"</p> + +<p>"Sometimes they do."</p> + +<p>"Where?"</p> + +<p>"Well, at church fairs, for instance. They <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>spend more than they can +afford for things they do not want, in order to please people whom they +do not like and help heathen who are much happier than they are."</p> + +<p>"I'm glad I'm not running a church fair," laughed Barbara. "And who told +you that heathen are happier than we are? Are you a heathen?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Most of us are, I suppose, in one way or another. But how +nice it would be if we could paint ourselves instead of wearing clothes, +and go under a tree when it rained, and pick cocoanuts or bananas when +we were hungry. It would save so much trouble and expense."</p> + +<p>"Paint is sticky," observed Barbara, "and the rain would come around the +tree when the wind was blowing from all ways at once, as it does +sometimes, and I do not like either cocoanuts or bananas. I'd rather +sew. What went wrong to-day?" she asked, with a whimsical smile. +"Everything?"</p> + +<p>"Almost," admitted Roger. "How did you know?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Unfailing Barometer</div> + +<p>"Because you want to be a heathen instead of the foremost lawyer of your +time. Your ambition is an unfailing barometer."</p> + +<p>He laughed lightly. This sort of banter was very pleasing to him after a +day with the law books and an hour or more with his mother. He had known +Barbara since they were <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>children and their comradeship dated back to +the mud-pie days.</p> + +<p>"I don't know but what you're right," he said. "Whether I go to Congress +or the Fiji Islands may depend, eventually, upon Judge Bascom's liver."</p> + +<p>"Don't let it depend upon him," cautioned Barbara. "Make your own +destiny. It was Napoleon, wasn't it, who prided himself upon making his +own circumstances? What would you do—or be—if you could have your +choice?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Aspirations</div> + +<p>"The best lawyer in the State," he answered, promptly. "I'd never oppose +the innocent nor defend the guilty. And I'd have money enough to be +comfortable and to make those I love comfortable."</p> + +<p>"Would you marry?" she asked, thoughtfully.</p> + +<p>"Why—I suppose so. It would seem queer, though."</p> + +<p>"Roger," she said, abruptly, "you were born a year and more before I +was, and yet you're fully ten or fifteen years younger."</p> + +<p>"Don't take me back too far, Barbara, for I hate milk. Please don't +deprive me of my solid food. What would you do, if you could choose?"</p> + +<p>"I'd write a book."</p> + +<p>"What kind? Dictionary?"</p> + +<p>"No, just a little book. The sort that people who love each other would +choose for <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>a gift. Something that would be given to one who was going +on a long or difficult journey. The one book a woman would take with her +when she was tired and went away to rest. A book with laughter and tears +in it and so much fine courage that it would be given to those who are +in deep trouble. I'd soften the hard hearts, rest the weary ones, and +give the despairing ones new strength to go on. Just a little book, but +so brave and true and sweet and tender that it would bring the sun to +every shady place."</p> + +<p>"Would you marry?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Right Man</div> + +<p>"Of course, if the right man came. Otherwise not."</p> + +<p>"I wonder," mused Roger, "how a person could know the right one?"</p> + +<p>"Foolish child," she answered, "that's it—the knowing. When you don't +know, it isn't it."</p> + +<p>"My dear Miss North," remarked Roger, "the heads of your argument are +somewhat involved, but I think I grasp your meaning. When you know it +is, then it is, but when you don't know that it is, then it isn't. Is +that right?"</p> + +<p>"Exactly. Wonderfully intelligent for one so young."</p> + +<p>Barbara's blue eyes danced merrily and her red lips parted in a mocking +smile. A long heavy braid of hair, "the colour of ripe corn,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span> hung over +either shoulder and into her lap. She was almost twenty-two, but she +still clung to the childish fashion of dressing her hair, because the +heavy braids and the hairpins made her head ache. All her gowns were +white, either of wool or cotton, and were made to be washed. On Sundays, +she sometimes wore blue ribbons on her braids.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Simply Barbara</div> + +<p>To Roger, she was very fair. He never thought of her crutches because +she had always been lame. She was simply Barbara, and Barbara needed +crutches. It had never occurred to him that she might in any way be +different, for he was not one of those restless souls who are forever +making people over to fit their own patterns.</p> + +<p>"Why doesn't your father like to have me come here?" asked Roger, +irrelevantly.</p> + +<p>"Why doesn't your mother like to have you come?" queried Barbara, +quickly on the defensive.</p> + +<p>"No, but tell me. Please!"</p> + +<p>"Father always goes to bed early."</p> + +<p>"But not at eight o'clock. It was a quarter of eight when I came, and by +eight he was gone."</p> + +<p>"It isn't you, Roger," she said, unwillingly; "it's anyone. I'm all he +has, and if I talk much to other people he feels as if I were being +taken away from him—that's all. It's natural, I suppose. You mustn't +mind him."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span></p> + +<p>"But I wouldn't hurt him," returned Roger, softly; "you know that."</p> + +<p>"I know."</p> + +<p>"I wish you could make him understand that I come to see every one of +you."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Hard Work</div> + +<p>"It's the hardest work in the world," sighed Barbara, "to make people +understand things."</p> + +<p>"Somebody said once that all the wars had been caused by one set of +people trying to force their opinions upon another set, who did not +desire to have their minds changed."</p> + +<p>"Very true. I wonder, sometimes, if we have done right with father."</p> + +<p>"I'm sure you have," said Roger, gently. "You couldn't do anything wrong +if you tried."</p> + +<p>"We haven't meant to," she answered, her sweet face growing grave. "Of +course it was all begun long before I was old enough to understand. He +thinks the city house, which we lost so long ago that I cannot even +remember our having it, was sold for so high a price that it would have +been foolish not to sell it, and that we live here because we prefer the +country. Just think, Roger, before I was born, this was father's and +mother's Summer home, and now it's all we have."</p> + +<p>"It's a roof and four walls—that's all any house is, without the spirit +that makes it home."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span></p> + +<p>"He thinks it's beautifully furnished. Of course we have the old +mahogany and some of the pictures, but we've had to sell nearly +everything. I've used some of mother's real laces in the sewing and sold +practically all the rest. Whatever anyone would buy has been disposed +of. Even the broken furniture in the attic has gone to people who had a +fancy for 'antiques.'"</p> + +<p>"You have made him very happy, Barbara."</p> + +<p>"I know, but is it right?"</p> + +<p>"I'm not orthodox, my dear girl, but, speaking as a lawyer, if it harms +no one and makes a blind old man happy, it can't be wrong."</p> + +<p>"I hope you're right, but sometimes my conscience bothers me."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Saint's Conscience</div> + +<p>"Imagine a saint's conscience being troublesome."</p> + +<p>"Don't laugh at me—you know I'm not a saint."</p> + +<p>"How should I know?"</p> + +<p>"Ask Aunt Miriam. She has no illusions about me."</p> + +<p>"Thanks, but I don't know her well enough. We haven't been on good terms +since she drove me out of the melon patch—do you remember?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I remember. We wanted the blossoms, didn't we, to make golden +bells in the Tower of Cologne?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I believe so. We never got the Tower finished, did we?"</p> + +<p>"No. I wasn't allowed to play with you for a long time, because you were +such a bad boy."</p> + +<p>"Next Summer, I think we should rebuild it. Let's renew our youth +sometime by making the Tower of Cologne in your back yard."</p> + +<p>"There are no golden bells."</p> + +<p>"I'll get some from somewhere. We owe it to ourselves to do it."</p> + +<p>Barbara's blue eyes were sparkling now, and her sweet lips smiled. "When +it's done?" she asked.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Like Fairy Tales</div> + +<p>"We'll move into it and be happy ever afterward, like the people in the +fairy tales."</p> + +<p>"I said a little while ago that you were fifteen years younger than I +am, but, upon my word, I believe it's nearer twenty."</p> + +<p>"That makes me an enticing infant of three or four, flourishing like the +green bay tree on a diet of bread and milk with an occasional +soft-boiled egg. I should have been in bed by six o'clock, and now +it's—gracious, Barbara, it's after eleven. What do you mean by keeping +the young up so late?"</p> + +<p>As he spoke, he hurriedly found his hat, and, reaching into the pocket +of his overcoat, drew out a book. "That's the one you wanted, isn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, thank you."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I didn't give it to you before because I wanted to talk, but we'll +read, sometimes, when we can. Don't forget to put the light in the +window when it's all right for me to come. If I don't, you'll +understand. And please don't work so hard."</p> + +<p>Barbara smiled. "I have to earn a living for three healthy people," she +said, "and everybody is trying, by moral suasion, to prevent me from +doing it. Do you want us all piled up in the front yard in a nice little +heap of bones before the Tower of Cologne is rebuilt?"</p> + +<p>Roger took both her hands and attempted to speak, but his face suddenly +crimsoned, and he floundered out into the darkness like an awkward +school-boy instead of a self-possessed young man of almost twenty-four. +It had occurred to him that it might be very nice to kiss Barbara.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Back to Childhood</div> + +<p>But Barbara, magically taken back to childhood, did not notice his +confusion. The Tower of Cologne had been a fancy of hers ever since she +could remember, though it had been temporarily eclipsed by the hard work +which circumstances had thrust upon her. As she grew from childhood to +womanhood, it had changed very little—the dream, always, was +practically the same.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Day Dream</div> + +<p>The Tower itself was made of cologne bottles neatly piled together, and +the brightly-tinted labels gave it a bizarre but beautiful effect. It +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>was square in shape and very high, with a splendid cupola of clear +glass arches—the labels probably would not show, up so high. It stood +in an enchanted land with the sea behind it—nobody had ever thought of +taking Barbara down to the sea, though it was so near. The sea was +always blue, of course, like the sky, or the larkspur—she was never +quite sure of the colour.</p> + +<p>The air all around the Tower smelled sweet, just like cologne. There was +a flight of steps, also made of cologne bottles, but they did not break +when you walked on them, and the door was always ajar. Inside was a +great, winding staircase which led to the cupola. You could climb and +climb and climb, and when you were tired, you could stop to rest in any +of the rooms that were on the different floors.</p> + +<p>Strangely enough, in the Tower of Cologne, Barbara was never lame. She +always left her crutches leaning up against the steps outside. She could +walk and run like anyone else and never even think of crutches. There +were many charming people in the Tower and none of them ever said, +pityingly, "It's too bad you're lame."</p> + +<p>All the dear people of the books lived in the Tower of Cologne, besides +many more, whom Barbara did not know. Maggie Tulliver, Little Nell, +Dora, Agnes, Mr. Pickwick, King Arthur, the Lady of Shalott, and +un<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>numbered others dwelt happily there. They all knew Barbara and were +always glad to see her.</p> + +<p>Wonderful tapestries were hung along the stairs, there were beautiful +pictures in every room, and whatever you wanted to eat was instantly +placed before you. Each room smelled of a different kind of cologne and +no two rooms were furnished alike. Her friends in the Tower were of all +ages and of many different stations in life, but there was one whose +face she had never seen. He was always just as old as Barbara, and was +closer to her than the rest.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Boy</div> + +<p>When she lost herself in the queer winding passages, the Boy, whose face +she was unable to picture, was always at her side to show her the way +out. They both wanted to get up into the cupola and ring all the golden +bells at once, but there seemed to be some law against it, for when they +were almost there, something always happened. Either the Tower itself +vanished beyond recall, or Aunt Miriam called her, or an imperative +voice summoned the Boy downstairs—and Barbara would not think of going +to the cupola without him.</p> + +<p>When she and Roger had begun to make mud pies together, she had told him +about the Tower and got him interested in it, too—all but the Boy whose +face she was unable to see and whose name she did not know. In <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>the +Tower, she addressed him simply as "Boy." Barbara kept him to herself +for some occult reason. Roger liked the Tower very much, but thought the +construction might possibly be improved. Barbara never allowed him to +make any changes. He could build another Tower for himself, if he chose, +and have it just as he wanted it, but this was her very own.</p> + +<p>It all seemed as if it were yesterday. "And," mused Barbara, "it was +almost sixteen years ago, when I was six and Roger +'seven-going-on-eight,' as he always said." The dear Tower still stood +in her memory, but far off and veiled, like a mirage seen in the clouds. +The Boy who helped her over the difficult places was a grown man now, +tall and straight and strong, but she could not see his face.</p> + +<p>"It's queer," thought Barbara, as she put out the light. "I wonder if I +ever shall."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">An Enchanted Land</div> + +<p>That night she dreamed of the Tower of Cologne, in the old, enchanted +land, where a blue sky bent down to meet a bluer sea. She and the Boy +were in the cupola, making music with the golden bells. Their laughter +chimed in with the sweet sound of the ringing, but still, she could not +see his face.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>IV</h2> + +<h3>The Seventh of June</h3> + + +<p>Barbara sat by the old chest which held her completed work, frowning +prettily over a note-book in her lap. She was very methodical, and, in +some inscrutable way, things had become mixed. She kept track of every +yard of lace and linen and every spool of thread, for, it was evident, +she must know the exact cost of the material and the amount of time +spent on a garment before it could be accurately priced.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Finishing Touches</div> + +<p>Aunt Miriam had carefully pressed the lingerie after it was made and +laid it away in the chest with lavender to keep it from turning yellow. +There remained only the last finishing touches. Aunt Miriam could have +put in the ribbons as well as she could, but Barbara chose to do it +herself.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Ways and Means</div> + +<p>Three prices were put on each tag in Barbara's private cipher, +understood only by Aunt Miriam. The highest was the one hoped for, the +next the probable one, and the lowest <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>one was to be taken only at the +end of the season.</p> + +<p>Already four or five early arrivals were reported at the hotel. By the +end of next week, it would be proper for Aunt Miriam to go down with a +few of the garments packed in a box with tissue paper, and see what she +could do. Barbara had used nearly all of her material and had sent for +more, but, in the meantime, she was using the scraps for handkerchiefs, +pin-cushion covers, and heart-shaped corsage pads, delicately scented +and trimmed with lace and ribbon.</p> + +<p>Once, Aunt Miriam had gone to the city for material and patterns, and +had priced hand-made lingerie in the shops. When she came back with an +itemised report, Barbara had clapped her hands in glee, for she saw the +wealth of Crœsus looming up ahead. She had soon learned, however, +that she must keep far below the city prices if she would tempt the +horde of Summer visitors who came, yearly, to the hotel. At times, she +thought that Aunt Miriam must have been dreadfully mistaken.</p> + +<p>Barbara put down the highest price of every separate article in the +small, neat hand that Aunt Miriam had taught her to write—for she had +never been to school. If she should sell everything, why, there would be +more than a year of comfort for them all, and new clothes for father, +who was beginning to look shabby.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span></p> + +<p>"But they won't," Barbara said to herself, sadly. "I can't expect them +to buy it all when I'm asking so much."</p> + +<p>Down in the living-room, Ambrose North was inquiring restlessly for +Barbara. "Yes," he said, somewhat impatiently, "I know she's upstairs, +for you've told me so twice. What I want to know is, why doesn't she +come down?"</p> + +<p>"She's busy at something, probably," returned Miriam, with forced +carelessness, "but I think she'll soon be through."</p> + +<p>"Barbara is always busy," he answered, with a sigh. "I can't understand +it. Anyone might think she had to work for a living. By the way, Miriam, +do you need more money?"</p> + +<p>"We still have some," she replied, in a low voice.</p> + +<p>"How much?" he demanded.</p> + +<p>"Less than a hundred dollars." She did not dare to say how much less.</p> + +<p>"That is not enough. If you will get my check-book, I will write another +check."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Old Check-Book</div> + +<p>Miriam's face was grimly set and her eyes burned strangely beneath her +dark brows. She went to the mahogany desk and took an old check-book out +of the drawer.</p> + +<p>"Now," he said, as she gave him the pen and ink, "please show me the +line. 'Pay to the order of'——"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span></p> + +<p>She guided his hand with her own, trying to keep her cold fingers from +trembling. "Miriam Leonard," he spelled out, in uneven characters, +"Five—hundred—dollars. Signed—Ambrose—North. There. When you have no +money, I wish you would speak of it. I am fully able to provide for my +family, and I want to do it."</p> + +<p>"Thank you." Miriam's voice was almost inaudible as she took the check.</p> + +<p>"The date," he said; "I forgot to date it. What day of the month is it?"</p> + +<p>She moistened her parched lips, but did not speak. This was what she had +been dreading.</p> + +<p>"The date, Miriam," he called. "Will you please tell me what day of the +month it is?"</p> + +<p>"The seventh," she answered, with difficulty.</p> + +<p>"The seventh? The seventh of June?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>There was a long pause. "Twenty-one years," he said, in a shrill +whisper. "Twenty-one years ago to-day."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Dreadful Anniversary</div> + +<p>Miriam sat down quietly on the other side of the room. Her eyes were +glittering and she was moving her hands nervously. This dreadful +anniversary had, for her, its own particular significance. Upstairs, +Barbara, light-hearted and hopeful, was singing to herself while she +pinned on the last of the price tags and built her air-castle. The song +came down lightly, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>yet discordantly. It was as though a waltz should be +played at an open grave.</p> + +<p>"Miriam," cried Ambrose North, passionately, "why did she kill herself? +In God's name, tell me why!"</p> + +<p>"I do not know," murmured Miriam. He had asked her more than fifty +times, and she always gave the same answer.</p> + +<p>"But you must know—someone must know! A woman does not die by her own +hand without having a reason! She was well and strong, loved, taken care +of and petted, she had all that the world could give her, and hosts of +friends. I was blind and Barbara was lame, but she loved us none the +less. If I only knew why!" he cried, miserably; "Oh, if I only knew +why!"</p> + +<p>Miriam, unable to bear more, went out of the room. She pressed her cold +hands to her throbbing temples. "I shall go mad," she muttered. "How +long, O Lord, how long!"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Constance North</div> + +<p>Twenty-one years ago to-day, Constance North had, intentionally, taken +an overdose of laudanum. She had left a note to her husband begging him +to forgive her, and thanking him for all his kindness to her during the +three years they had lived together. She had also written a note to +Miriam, asking her to look after the blind man and to be a mother to +Barbara. Enclosed were two other letters, sealed with wax. One was +addressed "To My Daughter, Barbara. To be opened on her <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>twenty-second +birthday." Miriam had both the letters safely put away. It was not time +for Barbara to have hers and she had never delivered the other to the +person to whom it was addressed—so often does the arrogant power of the +living deny the holiest wishes of the dead.</p> + +<p>The whole scene came vividly back to Miriam—the late afternoon sun +streaming in glory from the far hills into Constance North's dainty +sitting-room, upstairs; the golden-haired woman, in the full splendour +of her youth and beauty, lying upon the couch asleep, with a smile of +heavenly peace upon her lips; the blind man's hands straying over her as +she lay there, with his tears falling upon her face, and blue-eyed +Barbara, cooing and laughing in her own little bed in the next room.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Years of Torture</div> + +<p>Miriam had found the notes on the dressing-table, and had lied. She had +said there were but two when, in reality, there were four. Two had been +read and destroyed; the other two, with unbroken seals, were waiting to +be read. She was keeping the one for Barbara; the other had tortured her +through all of the twenty years.</p> + +<p>The time had passed when she could have delivered it, for the man to +whom it was addressed was dead. But he had survived Constance by nearly +five years, and, at any time during those five years, Miriam might have +given it to him, unseen and safely. She <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>justified herself by dwelling +upon her care of Barbara and the blind man, and the fact that she would +give Barbara her letter upon the appointed day. Sternly she said to +herself: "I will fulfil one trust. I will keep faith with Constance in +this one way, bitterly though she has wronged me."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Haunting Dreams</div> + +<p>Yet the fulfilment of one trust seemed not to be enough, for her sleep +was haunted by the pleading eyes of Constance, asking mutely for some +boon. Until the man died, Constance had come often, with her hands +outstretched, craving that which was so little and yet so much. After +his death, Constance still continued to come, but less often and +reproachfully; she seemed to ask for nothing now.</p> + +<p>Miriam had grown old, but Constance, though sad, was always young. One +of Death's surpassing gifts is eternal youth to those whom he claims too +soon. In her old husband's grieving heart, Constance had assumed +immortal beauty as well as immortal youth. She was now no older than +Barbara, who still sang heedlessly upstairs.</p> + +<p>Every night of the twenty-one years, Miriam had closed her eyes in +dread. When she dreamed it was always of Constance—Constance laughing +or singing, Constance bringing "the light that never was on sea or land" +to the fine, grave face of Ambrose North; Constance hugging little lame +Barbara to her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span> breast with passionate, infinitely pitying love. And, +above all, Constance in her grave-clothes, dumb, reproachful, her sad +eyes fixed on Miriam in pleading that was almost prayer.</p> + +<p>"Miriam! Oh, Miriam!" The blind man in the next room was calling her. +Fearfully, she went back.</p> + +<p>"Sit down," said Ambrose North. "Sit down near me, where I can touch +your hand. How cold your fingers are! I want to thank you for all you +have done for us—for my little girl and for me. You have been so +faithful, so watchful, so obedient to her every wish."</p> + +<p>Miriam shrank from him, for the kindly words stung like a lash on flesh +already quivering.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miriam and Ambrose</div> + +<p>"We have always been such good friends," he said, reminiscently. "Do you +remember how much we were together all that year, until Constance came +home from school?"</p> + +<p>"I have not forgotten," said Miriam, in a choking whisper. A surge of +passionate hate swept over her even now, against the dead woman whose +pretty face had swerved Ambrose North from his old allegiance.</p> + +<p>"And I shall not forget," he answered, kindly. "I am on the westward +slope, Miriam, and have been, for a long time. But a few more years—or +months—or days—as God wills, and I shall join her again, past the +sunset, where she waits for me.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>"I have made things right for you and Barbara. Roger Austin has my +will, dividing everything I have between you. I should like your share +to go to Barbara, eventually, if you can see your way clear to do it."</p> + +<p>"Don't!" cried Miriam, sharply. The strain was insupportable.</p> + +<p>"I do not wish to pain you, Sister," answered the old man, with gentle +dignity, "but sometimes it is necessary that these things be said. I +shall not speak of it again. Will you give me back the check, please, +and show me where to date it? I shall date it to-morrow—I cannot bear +to write down this day."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>When Barbara came down, her father was sitting at the old square piano, +quite alone, improvising music that was both beautiful and sad. He +seldom touched the instrument, but, when he did, wayfarers in the street +paused to listen.</p> + +<p>"Are you making a song, Father?" she asked, softly, when the last deep +chord died away.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Too Sad for Songs</div> + +<p>"No," he sighed; "I cannot make songs to-day."</p> + +<p>"There is always a song, Daddy," she reminded him. "You told me so +yourself."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know, but not to-day. Do you know what to-day is, my dear?"</p> + +<p>"The seventh—the seventh of June."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Twenty-one years ago to-day," he said, with an effort, "your dear +mother took her own life." The last words were almost inaudible.</p> + +<p>Barbara went to him and put her soft arms around his neck. "Daddy!" she +whispered, with infinite sympathy, "Daddy!"</p> + +<p>He patted her arm gently, unable to speak. She said no more, but the +voice and the touch brought healing to his pain. Bone of her bone and +flesh of her flesh, the daughter of the dead Constance was thrilled +unspeakably with a tenderness that the other had never given him.</p> + +<p>"Sit down, my dear," said Ambrose North, slowly releasing her. "I want +to talk to you—of her. Did I hear Aunt Miriam go out?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, just a few minutes ago."</p> + +<p>"You are almost twenty-two, are you not, Barbara?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, Daddy."</p> + +<p>"Then you are a woman grown. Your dear mother was twenty-two, when—" He +choked on the words.</p> + +<p>"When she died," whispered Barbara, her eyes luminous with tears.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Torturing Doubt</div> + +<div class="sidenote">A Change</div> + +<p>"Yes, when she—died. I have never known why, Barbara, unless it was +because I was blind and you were lame. But all these years there has +been a torturing doubt in my heart. Before you were born, and after my +blindness,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span> I fancied that a change came over her. She was still tender +and loving, but it was not quite in the same way. Sometimes I felt that +she had ceased to love me. Do you think my blindness could—?"</p> + +<p>"Never, Father, never." Barbara's voice rang out strong and clear. "That +would only have made her love you more."</p> + +<p>"Thank you, my dear. Someway it comforts me to have you say it. But, +after you came, I felt the change even more keenly. You have read in the +books, doubtless, many times, that a child unites those who bring it +into the world, but I have seen, quite as often, that it divides them by +a gulf that is never bridged again."</p> + +<p>"Daddy!" cried Barbara, in pain. "Didn't you want me?"</p> + +<p>"Want you?" he repeated, in a tone that made the words a caress. "I +wanted you always, and every day I want you more. I am only trying to +say that her love seemed to lessen, instead of growing, as time went on. +If I could know that she died loving me, I would not ask why. If I could +know that she died loving me—if I were sure she loved me still—"</p> + +<p>"She did, Daddy—I know she did."</p> + +<p>"If I might only be so sure! But the ways of the Everlasting are not our +ways, and life is made up of waiting."</p> + +<p>Insensibly relieved by speech, his pain <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>gradually merged into quiet +acceptance, if not resignation. "Shall you marry some day, Barbara?" he +asked, at last.</p> + +<p>"If the right man comes—otherwise not."</p> + +<p>"Much is written of it in the books, and I know you read a great deal, +but some things in the books are not true, and many things that are true +are not written. They say that a man of fifty should not marry a girl of +twenty and expect to be happy. Miriam was fifteen years older than +Constance and at first I thought of her, but when your mother came from +school, with her blue eyes and golden hair and her pretty, laughing +ways, there was but one face in all the world for me.</p> + +<p>"We were so happy, Barbara! The first year seemed less than a month, it +passed so quickly. The books will tell you that the first joy dies. +Perhaps it does, but I do not know, because our marriage lasted only +three years. It may be that, after many years, the heart does not beat +faster at the sound of the beloved's step; that the touch of the loving +hand brings no answering clasp.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Gift of Marriage</div> + +<p>"But the divinest gift of marriage is this—the daily, unconscious +growing of two souls into one. Aspirations and ambitions merge, each +with the other, and love grows fast to love. Unselfishness answers to +unselfishness, tenderness responds to tenderness, and the highest joy of +each is the well-being of the other. The <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>words of Church and State are +only the seal of a predestined compact. Day by day and year by year the +bond becomes closer and dearer, until at last the two are one, and even +death is no division.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">If——</div> + +<p>"A grave has lain between us for more than twenty years, but I am still +her husband—there has been no change. And, if she died loving me, she +is still mine. If she died loving me—if—she—died—loving me——"</p> + +<p>His voice broke at the end, and he went out, murmuring the words to +himself. Barbara watched him from the window as he opened the gate. Her +face was wet with tears.</p> + +<p>Flaming banners of sunset streamed from the hills beyond him, but his +soul could see no Golden City to-night. He went up the road that led to +another hillside, where, in the long, dreamy shadows, the dwellers in +God's acre lay at peace. Barbara guessed where he was going and her +heart ached for him—kneeling in prayer and vigil beside a sunken grave, +to ask of earth a question to which the answer was lost, in heaven—or +in hell.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>V</h2> + +<h3>Eloise</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">A Summer Hotel</div> + +<p>The hotel was a long, low, rambling structure, with creaky floors and +old-fashioned furniture. But the wide verandas commanded a glorious view +of the sea, no canned vegetables were served at the table, and there was +no orchestra. Naturally, it was crowded from June to October with people +who earnestly desired quiet and were willing to go far to get it.</p> + +<p>The inevitable row of rocking-chairs swayed back and forth on the +seaward side. Most of them were empty, save, perhaps, for the ghosts of +long-dead gossips who had sat and rocked and talked and rocked from one +meal to the next. The paint on the veranda was worn in a long series of +parallel lines, slightly curved, but nobody cared.</p> + +<p>No phonograph broke upon the evening stillness with an ear-splitting +din, no unholy piccolo sounded above the other tortured instruments, no +violin wailed pitifully at its inhuman treatment, and the piano was +locked.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span></p> + +<p>At seasonable hours the key might be had at the office by those who +could prove themselves worthy of the trust, but otherwise quiet reigned.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Eloise Wynne</div> + +<p>Miss Eloise Wynne came downstairs, with a book under her arm. She was +fresh as the morning itself and as full of exuberant vitality. She was +tall and straight and strong; her copper-coloured hair shone as though +it had been burnished, and her tanned cheeks had a tint of rose. When +she entered the dining-room, with a cheery "good-morning" that included +everybody, she produced precisely the effect of a cool breeze from the +sea.</p> + +<p>She was thirty, and cheerfully admitted it on occasion. "If I don't look +it," she said, smiling, "people will be surprised, and if I do, there +would be no use in denying it. Anyhow, I'm old enough to go about +alone." It was her wont to settle herself for Summer or Winter in any +place she chose, with no chaperon in sight.</p> + +<p>For a week she had been at Riverdale-by-the-Sea, and liked it on account +of the lack of entertainment. People who lived there called it simply +"Riverdale," but the manager of the hotel, perhaps to atone for the +missing orchestra and canned vegetables, added "by-the-Sea" to the name +in his modest advertisements.</p> + +<p>Miss Wynne, fortunately, had enough money to enable her to live the +much-talked-of "sim<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>ple life," which is wildly impossible to the poor. +As it was not necessary for her to concern herself with the sordid and +material, she could occupy herself with the finer things of the soul. +Just now, however, she was deeply interested in the material foundation +of the finest thing in the world—a home.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Passion for Lists</div> + +<p>She had taken the bizarre paper slip which protected the even more +striking cover of a recent popular novel, and adjusted it to a bulky +volume of very different character. In her chatelaine bag she had a +pencil and a note-book, for Miss Eloise was sorely afflicted with the +note-book habit, and had a passion for reducing everything to lists. She +had lists of things she wanted and lists of things she didn't want, +which circumstances or well-meaning Santa Clauses had forced upon her; +little books of addresses and telephone numbers, jewels and other +personal belongings, and, finally, a catalogue of her library +alphabetically arranged by author and title.</p> + +<p>Immediately after breakfast, she went off with a long, swinging stride +which filled her small audience with envy and admiration. Disjointed +remarks, such as "skirt a little too short, but good tailor," and +"terrible amount of energy," and "wonder where she's going," followed +her. These comments were audible, had she been listening, but she had +the gift of keeping solitude in a crowd.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span></p> + +<p>Far along the beach she went, hatless, her blood singing with the joy of +life. A June morning, the sea, youth, and the consciousness of being +loved—for what more could one ask? The diamond on the third finger of +her left hand sparkled wonderfully in the sunlight. It was the only ring +she wore.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Cook Book</div> + +<p>Presently, she found a warm, soft place behind a sand dune. She reared +upon the dune a dark green parasol with a white border, and patted sand +around the curved handle until it was, as she thought, firmly placed. +Then she settled her skirts comfortably and opened her book, for the +first time.</p> + +<p>"It looks bad," she mused. "Wonder what a carbohydrate is. And +proteids—where do you buy 'em? Albuminoids—I've been from Maine to +Florida and have never seen any. They must be germs.</p> + +<p>"However," she continued, to herself, "I have a trained mind, and +'keeping everlastingly at it brings success.' It would be strange if +three hours of hard study every day, on the book the man in the store +said was the best ever, didn't produce some sort of definite result. +But, oh, how Allan would laugh at me!"</p> + +<p>The book fell on the sand, unheeded. The brown eyes looked out past the +blue surges to some far Castle in Spain. Her thoughts refused to phrase +themselves in words, but her <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>pulses leaped with the old, immortal joy. +The sun had risen high in the shining East before she returned to her +book.</p> + +<p>"This isn't work," she sighed to herself; "away with the dreams."</p> + +<p>Before long, she got out her note-book. "A fresh fish," she wrote, "does +not smell fishy and its eyes are bright and its gills red. A tender +chicken or turkey has a springy breast bone. If you push it down with +your finger, it springs back. A leg of lamb has to have the tough, outer +parchment-like skin taken off with a sharp knife. Some of the oil of the +wool is in it and makes it taste muttony and bad. A lobster should +always be bought when he is alive and green and boiled at home. Then you +know he is fresh. Save everything for soup."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Air of Knowing</div> + +<p>"I will go out into the kitchen," mused Eloise, "and I will have the air +of knowing all about everything. I will say: 'Mary Ann, I have ordered a +lobster for you to boil. We will have a salad for lunch. And I trust you +have saved everything that was left last night for to-night's soup.' +Mary Ann will be afraid of me, and Allan will be <i>so</i> proud."</p> + +<p>"'I thought I told you,' continued Eloise, to herself, 'to save all the +crumbs. Doctor Conrad does not like to have everything salt and he +prefers to make the salad dressing himself. Do not cook any cereal the +mornings <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>we have oranges or grape-fruit—the starch and acid are likely +to make a disturbance inside. Four people are coming to dinner this +evening. I have ordered some pink roses and we will use the pink +candle-shades. Or, wait—I had forgotten that my hair is red. Use the +green candle-shades and I will change the roses to white.'"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Frolicsome Wind</div> + +<p>A frolicsome little wind, which had long been ruffling the waves of +Eloise's copper-coloured hair, took the note-book out of her lap and +laid it open on the sand some little distance away. Then, after making +merry with the green parasol, it lifted it bodily by its roots out of +the sand dune and went gaily down the beach with it.</p> + +<p>Eloise started in pursuit, but the wind and the parasol out-distanced +her easily. Rounding the corner of another dune, she saw the parasol, +with all sails set, jauntily embarked toward Europe. Turning away, +disconsolate, she collided with a big blonde giant who took her into his +arms, saying, "Never mind—I'll get you another."</p> + +<p>When the first raptures had somewhat subsided, Eloise led him back to +the place where the parasol had started from. "When and where from and +how did you come?" she asked, hurriedly picking up her books.</p> + +<p>"This morning, from yonder palatial hotel, on foot," he answered. "I +thought you'd <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>be out here somewhere. I didn't ask for you—I wanted to +hunt you up myself."</p> + +<p>"But I might have been upstairs," she said, reproachfully.</p> + +<p>"On a morning like this? Not unless you've changed in the last ten days, +and you haven't, except to grow lovelier."</p> + +<p>"But why did you come?" she asked. "Nobody told you that you could."</p> + +<p>"Sweet," said Allan, softly, possessing himself of her hand, "did you +think I could stay away from you two whole weeks? Ten days is the +limit—a badly strained limit at that."</p> + +<p>The colour surged into her face. She was radiant, as though with some +inner light. The atmosphere around her was fairly electric with life and +youth and joy.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Dr. Conrad</div> + +<p>Doctor Allan Conrad was very good to look at. He had tawny hair and kind +brown eyes, a straight nose, and a good firm chin. He wore eye-glasses, +and his face might have seemed severe had it not been discredited by his +mouth. He was smooth-shaven, and knew enough to wear brown clothes +instead of grey.</p> + +<p>Eloise looked at him approvingly. Every detail of his attire satisfied +her fastidious sense. If he had worn a diamond ring or a conspicuous +tie, he might not have occupied his present proud position. His +unfailing good taste was a great comfort to her.</p> + +<p>"How long can you stay?" she inquired.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Nice question," he laughed, "to ask an eager lover who has just come. +Sounds a good deal like 'Here's-your-hat-what's-your-hurry?' Before I +knew you, I used to go to see a girl sometimes who always said, at ten +o'clock: 'I'm so glad you came. When can you come again?' The first time +she did it I told her I couldn't come again until I had gone away this +time."</p> + +<p>"And afterward?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Forgetting the Clock</div> + +<p>"I kept going away earlier and earlier, and finally it was so much +earlier that I went before I had come. If I can't make a girl forget the +clock, I have no call to waste my valuable time on her, have I?"</p> + +<p>Assuming a frown with difficulty, Miss Wynne consulted her watch. "Why, +it's only half-past eleven," she exclaimed; "I thought it was much +later."</p> + +<p>"You darling," said the man, irrelevantly. "What are you reading?" +Before she could stop him, he had picked up the book and nearly choked +in a burst of unseemly merriment.</p> + +<p>"Upon my word," he said, when he could speak. "A cook book! A classmate +of mine used to indulge himself in floral catalogues when he wanted to +rest his mind with light literature, but I never heard of a cook book as +among the 'books for Summer reading' that the booksellers advertise."</p> + +<p>"Why not?" retorted Eloise, quickly.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span></p> + +<p>"No real reason. Lots of worse things are printed and sold by thousands, +but, someway, I can't seem to reconcile you—and your glorious +voice—with a cook-book."</p> + +<p>"Allan Conrad," said Miss Wynne, with affected sternness, "if you hadn't +studied medicine, would you be practising it now?"</p> + +<p>"No," admitted Allan; "not with the laws as they are in this State."</p> + +<p>"If I had no voice and had never studied music, would I be singing at +concerts?"</p> + +<p>"Not twice."</p> + +<p>"If a girl had never seen a typewriter and didn't know the first thing +about shorthand, would she apply for a position as a stenographer?"</p> + +<p>"They do," said Allan, gloomily.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Preparation</div> + +<p>"Don't dissemble, please. My point is simply this: If every other +occupation in the world demands some previous preparation, why shouldn't +a girl know something about housekeeping and homemaking before she +undertakes it?"</p> + +<p>"But, my dear, you're not going to cook."</p> + +<p>"I am if I want to," announced Eloise, with authority. "And, anyhow, I'm +going to know. Do you think I'm going to let some peripatetic, untrained +immigrant manage my house for me? I guess not."</p> + +<p>"But cooking isn't theory," he ventured, picking up the note-book; "it's +practice.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span> What good is all this going to do you when you have no +stove?"</p> + +<p>"Don't you remember the famous painter who told inquiring visitors that +he mixed his paints with brains? I am now cooking with my mind. After my +mind learns to cook, my hands will find it simple enough. And some time, +when you come in at midnight and have had no dinner, and the immigrant +has long since gone to sleep, you may be glad to be presented with +panned oysters, piping hot, instead of a can of salmon and a +can-opener."</p> + +<p>"Bless your heart," answered Allan, fondly. "It's dear of you, and I +hope it'll work. I'm starving this minute—kiss me."</p> + +<p>"'Longing is divine compared with satiety,'" she reminded him, as she +yielded. "How could you get away? Was nobody ill?"</p> + +<p>"Nobody would have the heart to be ill on a Saturday in June, when a +doctor's best girl was only fifty miles away. Monday, I'll go back and +put some cholera or typhoid germs in the water supply, and get nice and +busy. Who's up yonder?" indicating the hotel.</p> + +<p>"Nobody we know, but very few of the guests have come, so far."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">"Guests"</div> + +<p>"In all our varied speech," commented Allan, "I know of nothing so +exquisitely ironical as alluding to the people who stop at a hotel as +'guests.' In Mexico, they call them 'passengers,' which is more in +keeping with the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>facts. Fancy the feelings of a real guest upon +receiving a bill of the usual proportions. I should consider it a +violation of hospitality if a man at my house had to pay three prices +for his dinner and a tip besides."</p> + +<p>"You always had queer notions," remarked Eloise, with a sidelong glance +which set his heart to pounding. "We'll call them inmates if you like it +better. As yet, there are only eight inmates besides ourselves, though +more are coming next week. Two old couples, one widow, one <i>divorcée</i>, +and two spinsters with life-works."</p> + +<p>"No galloping cherubs?"</p> + +<p>"School isn't out yet."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Life-Works</div> + +<p>"I see. It wouldn't be the real thing unless there were little ones to +gallop through the corridors at six in the morning and weep at the +dinner table. What are the life-works?"</p> + +<p>"One is writing a book, I understand, on <i>The Equality of the Sexes</i>. +The other—oh, Allan, it's too funny."</p> + +<p>"Spring it," he demanded.</p> + +<p>"She's trying to have cornet-playing introduced into the public schools. +She says that tuberculosis and pneumonia are caused by insufficient lung +development, and that cornet-playing will develop the lungs of the +rising generation. Fancy going by a school during the cornet hour."</p> + +<p>"I don't know why they shouldn't put <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span>cornet-playing into the schools," +he observed, after a moment of profound thought. "Everything else is +there now. Why shouldn't they teach crime, and even make a fine art of +it?"</p> + +<p>"If you let her know you're a doctor," cautioned Eloise, "she'll corner +you, and I shall never see you again. She says that she 'hopes, +incidentally, to enlist the sympathies of the medical profession.'"</p> + +<p>"She's beginning at the wrong end. Cornet manufacturers and the people +who keep sanitariums and private asylums are the co-workers she wants. I +couldn't live through the coming Winter were it not for pneumonia. It +means coal, and repairs for the automobile, and furs for my wife—when I +get one."</p> + +<p>"Come," said Eloise, springing to her feet; "let's go up and get ready +for luncheon."</p> + +<p>"Have you told me all?" asked Allan, "or is there some gay young +troubadour who serenades you in the evening and whose existence you +conceal from me for reasons of your own?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Pathetic Little Woman</div> + +<p>"Nary a troubadour," she replied. "I haven't seen another soul except a +pathetic little woman who came up to the hotel yesterday afternoon to +sell the most exquisite things you ever saw. Think of offering hand-made +lingerie, of sheer, embroidered lawn and batiste and linen, to <i>that</i> +crowd! The old ladies weren't interested, the spinsters sniffed, the +widow wept, and only the <i>divorcée</i> took any <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>notice of it. The prices +were so ridiculous that I wouldn't let her unpack the box. I'd be +ashamed to pay her the price she asked. It's made by a little lame girl +up the main road. I'm to go up there sometime next week."</p> + +<p>"Fairy godmother?" asked Allan, good-naturedly. He had known Eloise for +many years.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps," she answered, somewhat shamefaced. "What's the use of having +money if you don't spend it?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Human Interest</div> + +<p>They went into the hotel together, utterly oblivious of the eight pairs +of curious eyes that were fastened upon them in a frank, open stare. The +rocking-chairs scraped on the veranda as they instinctively drew closer +together. A strong human interest, imperatively demanding immediate +discussion, had come to Riverdale-by-the-Sea.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>VI</h2> + +<h3>A Letter</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">Discouraging Prospects</div> + +<p>Miriam had come home disappointed and secretly afraid to hope for any +tangible results from Miss Wynne's promised visit. Nevertheless, she +told Barbara.</p> + +<p>"Wouldn't any of them even look at it, Aunty?"</p> + +<p>"One of them would have looked at it and rumpled it so that I'd have had +to iron it again, but she wouldn't have bought anything. This young lady +said she was busy just then, and she wanted to come up and look over all +the things at her leisure. She won't pay much, though, even if she buys +anything. She said the price was 'ridiculous.'"</p> + +<p>"Perhaps she meant it was too low," suggested Barbara.</p> + +<p>"Possibly," answered Miriam. Her tone indicated that it was equally +possible for canary birds to play the piano, or for ducks to sing.</p> + +<p>"How does she look?" queried Barbara.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Well enough." Enthusiasm was not one of Miriam's attractions.</p> + +<p>"What did she have on?"</p> + +<p>"White. Linen, I think."</p> + +<p>"Then she knows good material. Was her gown tailor-made?"</p> + +<p>"Might have been. Why?"</p> + +<p>"Because if her white linen gowns are tailored she has money and is used +to spending it for clothes. I'm sure she meant the price was too low. +Did she say when she was coming?"</p> + +<p>"Next week. She didn't say what day."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Waiting</div> + +<p>"Then," sighed Barbara, "all we can do is to wait."</p> + +<p>"We'll wait until she comes, or has had time to. In the meantime, I'm +going to show my quilts to those old ladies and take down a jar or two +of preserves. I wish you'd write to the people who left orders last +year, and ask if they want preserves or jam or jelly, or pickles, or +quilts, or anything. It would be nice to get some orders in before we +buy the fruit."</p> + +<p>Barbara put down her book, asked for the pen and ink, and went +cheerfully to work, with the aid of Aunt Miriam's small memorandum book +which contained a list of addresses.</p> + +<p>"What colour is her hair, Aunty?" she asked, as she blotted and turned +her first neat page.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span></p> + +<p>"A good deal the colour of that old copper tea-kettle that a woman paid +six dollars for once, do you remember? I've always thought she was +crazy, for she wouldn't even let me clean it."</p> + +<p>"And her eyes?"</p> + +<p>"Brown and big, with long lashes. She looks well enough, and her voice +is pleasant, and I must say she has nice ways. She didn't make me feel +like a peddler, as so many of them do. P'raps she'll come," admitted +Miriam, grudgingly.</p> + +<p>"Oh, I hope so. I'd love to see her and her pretty clothes, even if she +didn't buy anything." Barbara threw back a golden braid impatiently, +wishing it were copper-coloured and had smooth, shiny waves in it, +instead of fluffing out like an undeserved halo.</p> + +<p>While Barbara was writing, her father came in and sat down near her. +"More sewing, dear?" he asked, wistfully.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Writing Letters</div> + +<p>"No, Daddy, not this time. I'm just writing letters."</p> + +<p>"I didn't know you ever got any letters—do you?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes—sometimes. The people at the hotel come up to call once in a +while, you know, and after they go away, Aunt Miriam and I occasionally +exchange letters with them. It's nice to get letters."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span></p> + +<p>The old man's face changed. "Are you lonely, dear?"</p> + +<p>"Lonely?" repeated Barbara, laughing; "why I don't even know what the +word means. I have you and my books and my sewing and these letters to +write, and I can sit in the window and nod to people who go by—how +could I be lonely, Daddy?"</p> + +<p>"I want you to be happy, dear."</p> + +<p>"So I am," returned the girl, trying hard to make her voice even. "With +you, and everything a girl could want, why shouldn't I be happy?"</p> + +<p>Miriam went out, closing the door quietly, and the blind man drew his +chair very near to Barbara.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Dreaming</div> + +<p>"I dream," he said, "and I keep on dreaming that you can walk and I can +see. What do you suppose it means? I never dreamed it before."</p> + +<p>"We all have dreams, Daddy. I've had the same one very often ever since +I was a little child. It's about a tower made of cologne bottles, with a +cupola of lovely glass arches, built on the white sand by the blue sea. +Inside is a winding stairway hung with tapestries, leading to the cupola +where the golden bells are. There are lovely rooms on every floor, and +you can stop wherever you please."</p> + +<p>"It sounds like a song," he mused.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps it is. Can't you make one of it?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span></p> + +<p>"No—we each have to make our own. I made one this morning."</p> + +<p>"Tell me, please."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Love Never Lost</div> + +<p>"It is about love. When God made the world, He put love in, and none of +it has ever been lost. It is simply transferred from one person to +another. Sometimes it takes a different form, and becomes a deed, which, +at first, may not look as if it were made of love, but, in reality, is.</p> + +<p>"Love blossoms in flowers, sings in moving waters, fills the forest with +birds, and makes all the wonderful music of Spring. It puts the colour +upon the robin's breast, scents the orchard with far-reaching drifts of +bloom, and scatters the pink and white petals over the grass beneath. +Through love the flower changes to fruit, and the birds sing lullabies +at twilight instead of mating songs.</p> + +<p>"It is at the root of everything good in all the world, and where things +are wrong, it is only because sometime, somewhere, there has not been +enough love. The balance has been uneven and some have had too much +while others were starving for it. As the lack of food stunts the body, +so the denial of love warps the soul.</p> + +<p>"But God has made it so that love given must unfailingly come back an +hundred-fold; the more we give, the richer we are. And Heaven is only a +place where the things that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>have gone wrong here will at last come +right. Is it not so, Barbara?"</p> + +<p>"Surely, Daddy."</p> + +<p>"Then," he continued, anxiously, "all my loving must come back to me +sometime, somewhere. I think it will be right, for God Himself is Love."</p> + +<p>The blind man's sensitive fingers lovingly sought Barbara's face. His +touch was a caress. "I am sure you are like your dear mother," he said, +softly. "If I could know that she died loving me, and if I could see her +face again, just for an instant, why, all the years of loving, with no +answer, would be fully repaid."</p> + +<p>"She loved you, Daddy—I know she did."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Old Doubt</div> + +<p>"I know, too, but not always. Sometimes the old, tormenting doubt comes +back to me."</p> + +<p>"It shouldn't—mother would never have meant you to doubt her."</p> + +<p>"Barbara," cried the old man, with sudden passion, "if you ever love a +man, never let him doubt you—always let him be sure. There is so much +in a man's world that a woman knows nothing of. When he comes home at +night, tired beyond words, and sick to death of the world and its ways, +make him sure. When he thinks himself defeated, make him sure. When you +see him tempted to swerve even the least from the straight path, make +him sure. When the last parting comes, if he is leaving <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>you, give him +the certainty to take with him into his narrow house, and make his last +sleep sweet. And if you are the one to go first, and leave him, old and +desolate and stricken, oh, Barbara, make him sure then—make him very +sure."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A String of Pearls</div> + +<p>The girl's hand closed tightly upon his. He leaned over to pat her cheek +and stroke the heavy braids of silken hair. Then he felt the strand of +beads around her neck.</p> + +<p>"You have on your mother's pearls," he said. His fine old face illumined +as he touched the tawdry trinket.</p> + +<p>Barbara swallowed the hard lump in her throat. "Yes, Daddy." They had +lived for years upon that single strand of large, perfectly matched +pearls which Ambrose North had clasped around his young wife's neck upon +their wedding day.</p> + +<p>"Would you like more pearls, dear? A bracelet, or a ring?"</p> + +<p>"No—these are all I want."</p> + +<p>"I want to give you a diamond ring some day, Barbara. Your mother's was +buried with her. It was her engagement ring."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps somebody will give me an engagement ring," she suggested.</p> + +<p>"I shouldn't wonder. I don't want to be selfish, dear. You are all I +have, but, if you loved a man, I wouldn't try to keep you away from +him."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Prince Charming hasn't come yet, Daddy, so cheer up. I'll tell you when +he does."</p> + +<p>Thus she turned the talk into a happier vein. They were laughing +together like two children when Miriam came in to say that supper was +ready.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Alone</div> + +<p>Afterward, he sat at the piano, improvising low, sweet chords that +echoed back plaintively from the dingy walls. The music was full of +questioning, of pleading, of longing so deep that it was almost prayer. +Barbara finished her letters by the light of the lamp, while Miriam sat +in the dining-room alone, asking herself the old, torturing questions, +facing her temptation, and bearing the old, terrible hunger of the heart +that hurt her like physical pain.</p> + +<p>A little before nine o'clock, the blind man came to kiss Barbara +good-night. Then he went upstairs. Miriam came in and talked a few +minutes of quilts, pickles, and lingerie, then she, too, went up to +begin her usual restless night.</p> + +<p>Left alone, Barbara discovered that she did not care to read. It was too +late to begin work upon the new stock of linen, lawn, and batiste which +had come the day before, and she lacked the impulse, in the face of such +discouraging prospects as Aunt Miriam had encountered at the hotel. +Barbara steadily refused to admit, even to herself, that she was +discouraged, but <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>she found no pleasure in the thought of her work.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Light in the Window</div> + +<p>She unfastened the front door, lighted a candle, and set it upon the +sill of the front window. Within twenty minutes Roger had come, entering +the house so quietly that Barbara did not hear his step and was +frightened when she saw him.</p> + +<p>"Don't scream," he said, as he closed the door leading into the hall. +"I'm not a burglar—only a struggling young law student with no +prospects and even less hope."</p> + +<p>"I infer," said Barbara, "that the Bascom liver is out of repair."</p> + +<p>"Correct. It seems absurd, doesn't it, to be affected by another man's +liver while you are supremely unconscious of your own?"</p> + +<p>"There are more things in other people's digestions than our philosophy +can account for," she replied, with a wicked perversion of classic +phrase. "What was the primary cause of the explosion?"</p> + +<p>"It was all his own fault," explained Roger. "I like dogs almost as well +as I do people, but it doesn't follow that dogs should mix so constantly +with people as they usually are allowed to. I was never in favour of +Judge Bascom's bull pup keeping regular office hours with us, but he +has, ever since the day he waddled in behind the Judge with a small +chain as the connecting link. I got so accustomed to his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>howling in the +corner of the office where he was chained up that I couldn't do my work +properly when he was asleep. So all went well until the Judge decided to +remove the chain and give the pup more room to develop himself in.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">"Pethood"</div> + +<p>"I tried to dissuade him, but it was no use. I told him he would run +away, and he said, with great dignity, that he did not desire for a pet +anything which had to be tied up in order to be retained. He observed +that the restraining influence worked against the pethood so strongly as +practically to obscure it."</p> + +<p>"New word?" laughed Barbara.</p> + +<p>"I don't know why it isn't a good word," returned Roger, in defence. "If +'manhood' and 'womanhood' and 'brotherhood' and all the other 'hoods' +are good English, I see no reason why 'pethood' shouldn't be used in the +same sense. The English language needs a lot of words added to it before +it can be called complete."</p> + +<p>"One wouldn't think so, judging by the size of the dictionary. However, +we'll let it pass. Go on with the story."</p> + +<p>"Things have been lively for a week or more. The pup has romped around a +good deal and has playfully bitten a client or two, but the Judge has +been highly edified until to-day. Fido got an important legal document +which the Judge had just drafted, and literally chewed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>it to pulp. Then +he swallowed it, apparently with great relish. I was told to make +another, and my not knowing about it, and taking the liberty of asking a +few necessary questions, produced the fireworks. It wasn't Fido's fault, +but mine."</p> + +<p>"How is Fido?" queried Barbara, with affected anxiety.</p> + +<p>"He was well at last accounts, but the document was long enough and +complicated enough to make him very ill. I hope he'll die of it +to-morrow."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps he's going to study law, too," remarked Barbara, "and believes, +with Macaulay, that 'a page digested is better than a book hurriedly +read.'"</p> + +<p>"I think that will do, Miss North. I'll read to you now, if you don't +mind. I would fain improve myself instead of listening to such childish +chatter."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps, if you read to me enough, I'll improve so that even you will +enjoy talking to me," she returned, with a mischievous smile. "What did +you bring over?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A New Book</div> + +<p>"A new book—that is, one that we've never seen before. There is a large +box of father's books behind some trunks in the attic, and I never found +them until Sunday, when I was rummaging around up there. I haven't read +them—I thought I'd make a list of them first, and you can choose those +you'd like to have <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>me read to you. I brought this little one because I +was sure you'd like it, after reading <i>Endymion</i> and <i>The Eve of St. +Agnes</i>."</p> + +<p>"What is it?"</p> + +<p>"Keats's letters to Fanny Brawne."</p> + +<p>The little brown book was old and its corners were dog-eared, but the +yellowed pages, with their record of a deathless passion, were still +warmly human and alive. Roger had a deep, pleasant voice, and he read +well. Quite apart from the beauty of the letters, it gave Barbara +pleasure to sit in the firelight and watch his face.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Folded Paper</div> + +<p>He read steadily, pausing now and then for comment, until he was +half-way through the volume; then, as he turned a page, a folded paper +fell out. He picked it up curiously.</p> + +<p>"Why, Barbara," he said, in astonishment. "It's my father's writing."</p> + +<p>"What is it—notes?"</p> + +<p>"No, he seems to have been trying to write a letter like those in the +book. It is all in pencil, with changes and erasures here and there. +Listen:</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Letter</div> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"'You are right, as you always are, and we must +never see each other again. We must live near each +other for the rest of our lives, with that +consciousness between us. We must pass each other +on the street and not speak unless others are with +us; then we must bow, pleasantly, for the sake of +appearances.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span></p> + +<p>"'I hope you do not blame me because I went mad. I +ask your pardon, and yet I cannot say I am sorry. +That one hour of confession is worth a lifetime of +waiting—it is worth all the husks that we are to +have henceforward while we starve for more.</p> + +<p>"'Through all the years to come, we shall be +separated by less than a mile, yet the world lies +between us and divides us as by a glittering +sword. You will not be unfaithful to your pledge, +nor I to mine. Nothing is changed there. It is +only that two people chose to live in the +starlight and bound themselves to it eternally, +then had one blinding glimpse of God's great sun.</p> + +<p>"'But, Constance, the stars are the same as +always, and we must try to forget that we have +seen the sun. The little lights of the temple must +be the more faithfully tended if the Great Light +goes out. When the white splendour fades, we must +be content with the misty gold of night, and not +mind the shadows nor the great desolate spaces +where not even starlight comes. Your star and mine +met for an instant, then were sundered as widely +as the poles, but the light of each must be kept +steadfast and clear, because of the other.</p> + +<p>"'I do not know that I shall have the courage to +send this letter. Everything was said when I told +you that I love you, for that one word holds it +all and there is nothing more.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span> As you can take +your heart in the hollow of your hand and hold it, +it is so small a thing; so the one word 'love' +holds everything that can be said, or given, or +hungered for, or prayed for and denied.</p> + +<p>"'And if, sometimes, in the starlight, we dream of +the sun, we must remember that both sun and stars +are God's. Past the unutterable leagues that +divide us now, one day we shall meet again, +purged, mayhap, of earthly longing for earthly +love.</p> + +<p>"'But Heaven, for me, would be the hour I held you +close again. I should ask nothing more than to +tell you once more, face to face and heart to +heart, the words I write now: I love you—I love +you—I love you.'" </p></div> + +<div class="sidenote">A Discovery</div> + +<p>Roger put down the book and stared fixedly at the fire. Barbara's face +was very pale and the light had gone from her eyes.</p> + +<p>"Roger," she said, in a strange tone, "Constance was my mother's name. +Do you think——"</p> + +<p>He was startled, for his thought had not gone so far as her intuition. +"I—do—not—know," he said.</p> + +<p>"They knew each other," Barbara went on, swiftly, "for the two families +have always lived here, in these same two houses where you and I were +born. It was only a step across the road, and they——"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span></p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Barrier</div> + +<p>She choked back a sob. Something new and terrible seemed to have sprung +up suddenly between her and Roger.</p> + +<p>The blood beat hard in his ears and his own words sounded dull and far +away. "It is dated June third," he said.</p> + +<p>"My mother died on the seventh," said Barbara, slowly, +"by—her—own—hand."</p> + +<p>They sat in silence for a long time. Then, speaking of indifferent +things, they tried to get back upon the old friendly footing again, but +failed miserably. There was a consciousness as of guilt, on either side.</p> + +<p>Roger tried not to think of it. Later, when he was alone, he would go +over it all and try to reason it out—try to discover if it were true. +Barbara did not need to do this, for, with a woman's quick insight, she +knew.</p> + +<p>Secretly, too, both were ashamed, having come unawares upon knowledge +that was not meant for them. Presently, Roger went home, and was glad to +be alone in the free outer air; but, long after he was gone, Barbara sat +in the dark, her heart aching with the burden of her father's doubt and +her dead mother's secret.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>VII</h2> + +<h3>An Afternoon Call</h3> + + +<p>The rap at the Norths' front door was of the sort which would impel the +dead to rise and answer it. Before the echo of the imperative summons +had died away, Miriam had opened it and admitted Miss Mattie.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Bein' Neighbourly</div> + +<p>"I was sewin' over to my house," announced the visitor, settling herself +comfortably, "and I surmised as how you might be sewin' over here, so I +thought we might as well set together for a spell. I believe in bein' +neighbourly."</p> + +<p>Barbara smiled a welcome and Miriam brought in a quilt which she was +binding by hand. As she worked, she studied Miss Mattie furtively, and +with an air of detachment.</p> + +<p>"I come over on the trail Roger has wore in the grass," continued Miss +Mattie, biting off her thread with a snap. "He's organised himself into +sort of a travellin' library, I take it, what with transportin' books at +all hours back and forth. After I go to bed, Roger lets himself out and +sneaks over here, carryin' readin' matter both ways. But land's sake," +she <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>chuckled, "I ain't carin' what he does after I get sleepy. I was +never one to stay up after nine o'clock for the sake of entertainment. +If there's sickness, or anythin' like that, of course it's a different +matter.</p> + +<p>"Roger's pa was always a great one for readin', and we've both inherited +it from him. Roger sits with his books and I sit with my paper, and we +both read, never sayin' a word to each other, till almost nine o'clock. +We're what you might call a literary family.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">"Jewel of a Girl"</div> + +<p>"I'm just readin' a perfectly beautiful story called <i>Margaret Merriman, +or the Maiden's Mad Marriage</i>. Margaret must have been worth lookin' at, +for she had golden hair and eyes like sapphires and ruby lips and pearly +teeth. I was readin' the description of her to Roger, and he said she +seemed to be what some people would call 'a jewel of a girl.'</p> + +<p>"Margaret Merriman's mother died when she was an infant in arms, just +like your ma, Barbara, and left her to her pa. Her pa didn't marry +again, though several was settin' their caps for him on account of him +bein' young and handsome and havin' a lot of money. I suppose bein' a +widower had somethin' to do with it, too. It does beat all how women +will run after a widower. I suppose they want a man who's already been +trained, but, speakin' for myself, I've always felt as if I'd rather +have somethin' fresh and do my <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>own trainin'—women's notions differ so +about husbands.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Training Husbands</div> + +<p>"Just think what it would be to marry a man, thinkin' he was all +trained, and to find out that it had been done wrong. You'd have to +begin all over again, and it'd be harder than startin' in with absolute +ignorance. The man would get restless, too. When he thought he was +graduated and was about ready to begin on a post-graduate course, he'd +find himself in the kindergarten, studyin' with beads and singin' about +little raindrops.</p> + +<p>"Gettin' an idea into a man's head is like furnishin' a room. If you can +once get a piece of furniture where you want it, it can stay there until +it's worn out or busted, except for occasional dustin' and repairin'. +You can add from time to time as you have to, but if you attempt to +refurnish a room that's all furnished, and do it all at once, you're +bound to make more disturbance than housecleanin'.</p> + +<p>"It has to be done slow and careful, unless you have a likin' for rows, +and if you're one of those kind of women that's forever changin' their +minds about furniture and their husband's ideas, you're bound to have a +terrible restless marriage.</p> + +<p>"Roger's pa was fresh when I took him, but, unbeknownst to me, he'd done +his own furnishin', and the pieces was dreadful set and hard to move. +Some of 'em I slid out gently <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>and others took some manouverin', but +steady work tells on anythin'. He was thinkin' as I wanted him to about +most things, though, when he died, and that's sayin' a good deal, for he +didn't die until after we'd been married seven years and three months +and eighteen days. If he wasn't really thinkin' right, he was pretendin' +to, and that's enough to satisfy any reasonable woman.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Will</div> + +<p>"Margaret Merriman's pa died when she was at the tender age of ten, and +he left all his money to a distant relation in trust for Margaret, the +relative bein' supposed to spend the income on her. If Margaret died +before she was of age, the relative was to keep it, and if she should +marry before she was of age, the relative was to keep it, too. But, +livin' to eighteen' and marryin' afterwards, it was all to be +Margaret's, and the relative wasn't to have as much as a two-cent stamp +with the mucilage licked off.</p> + +<p>"This relative was a sweet-faced lady with a large mole on her right +cheek. Margaret used to call her 'Moley,' when she was mad at her, which +was right frequent. Her name was Magdalene Mather and she'd been married +three times. She was dreadful careless with her husbands and had mislaid +'em all. Not bein' able to find 'em again, she just reckoned on their +bein' dead and was thinkin' of marryin' some more.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span></p> + +<div class="sidenote">Keeping Margaret Young</div> + +<p>"Seems to me it's a mistake for anybody to marry more'n once. In one of +Roger's books it says somethin' about a second marriage bein' the +triumph of hope over experience. Magdalene Mather was dreadful hopeful +and kept thinkin' that maybe she could get somebody who would stay with +her without bein' chained up. Meanwhile it was to her interest to keep +little Margaret as young as possible.</p> + +<p>"Margaret thought she was ten when she went to live with Magdalene, but +she soon learned that it was a mistake and she got to be only seven in +less'n half an hour. Magdalene put shorter dresses on her and kept her +in white and gave her shoes without any heels, and these little short +socks that show a foot or so of bare leg and which is indecent, if +fashionable.</p> + +<p>"Margaret's birthdays kept gettin' farther and farther apart, and as +soon as the neighbours begun to notice that Margaret wasn't agin' like +everybody else, why, Magdalene would just pack up and go to a new place.</p> + +<p>"She didn't go to school, but had private teachers, because it was in +the will that she was to be educated like a real lady. Any teacher who +thought Margaret was too far advanced for her age got fired the minute +it was spoke of, and pretty soon Margaret got onto it herself. She used +to tell teachers she liked to say that she was very backward in her +studies, and tell <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span>those she didn't like that Aunty Magdalene would be +dreadful pleased to hear that she was improvin' in her readin' and +'rithmetic and grammar.</p> + +<p>"Meanwhile Nature was workin' in Margaret's interest and she was growin' +taller and taller every day. The short socks had to be took off because +people laughed so, and Magdalene had to let her braid her hair instead +of havin' it cut Dutch and tied with a ribbon. When she was eighteen, +she thought she was thirteen, and she was wearin' dresses that come to +her shoe tops, and her hair in one braid down her back, and dreadful +young hats and no jewels, though her pa had left her a small trunk full +of rubies and diamonds and pearls. Magdalene was wearin' the jewels +herself. They were movin' around pretty rapid about this time, and goin' +from city to city in order to find better teachers for 'the dear child' +as Magdalene used to call her.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Conductor</div> + +<p>"One day, soon after they'd gone to a new city, Margaret was goin' down +town to take her music lesson. She went alone because Magdalene was laid +up with a headache and wanted the house quiet. When the conductor come +along for the fare, Margaret was lookin' out of the window, and, +absent-minded like, she give him a penny instead of a nickel.</p> + +<p>"The conductor give it back to her, and asked her if she was so young +she could go for <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>half fare, and Margaret says, right sharp, when she +give him the nickel, 'It's not so long since I was travellin' on +half-fare.'</p> + +<p>"The conductor says: 'I'd hate to have been hangin' up by the thumbs +since you was,' says he. Of course this made Margaret good and mad, and +she says to the conductor, 'How old do you think I am?'</p> + +<p>"The conductor says: 'I ain't paid to think durin' union hours, but I +imagine that you ain't old enough to lie about your age.'</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Ronald Macdonald</div> + +<p>"Just then an old woman with a green parrot in a big cage fell off the +car while she was gettin' off backwards as usual, and Margaret didn't +have no more chance to fight with the conductor. She saw, however, that +he was terrible good lookin'—like the dummy in the tailor's window. It +says in the story that 'Ronald Macdonald'—that was his name—was as +handsome as a young Greek god and, though lowly in station, he would +have adorned a title had it been his.'</p> + +<p>"Margaret got to doin' some thinkin' about herself, and wonderin' why it +was she didn't seem to age none. And whenever she happened to get onto +Ronald Macdonald's car, she noticed that he was awful polite and +chivalrous to women. He waited patiently when any two of 'em was +decidin' who was to pay the fare and findin' their purses, and sayin', +'You must let me pay next time,' and he would <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>tickle a cryin' baby +under the chin and make it bill and coo like a bird.</p> + +<p>"Did you ever see a baby bill? I never did neither, but that's what it +said in the paper. I suppose it has some reference to the expense of +their comin' and their keep through the whoopin' cough stage and the +measles, and so on. There don't neither of you know nothin' about it +'cause you ain't married, but when Roger come, his pa was obliged to +mortgage the house, and the mortgage didn't get took off until Roger was +out of dresses and goin' to school and beginnin' to write with ink.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Fine Manners</div> + +<p>"Let me see—what was I talkin' about? Oh, yes—Ronald Macdonald's fine +manners. When a woman give him five pennies instead of a nickel, he was +always just as polite to her as he was to anybody, and would help her +off the car and carry her bundles to the corner for her, and everything +like that. Of course Margaret couldn't help noticin' this and likin' him +for it though she was still mad at him for what he said about her age.</p> + +<p>"One morning Margaret give him a quarter so's he'd have to make change, +and while he was doin' it, she says to him, 'How nice it must be to ride +all day without payin' for it.'</p> + +<p>"'I'm under age,' says Ronald Macdonald, with a smile that showed all +his beautiful teeth and his ruby lips under his black waxed mustache.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span></p> + +<p>"'Get out,' says Margaret, surprised.</p> + +<p>"'I am, though,' says Ronald, confidentially. 'I'm just nineteen. How +old are you?'</p> + +<p>"'Thirteen,' says Margaret, softly.</p> + +<p>"'Don't renig,' says Ronald. 'I think we're pretty near of an age.'</p> + +<p>"When Margaret got home, she looked up 'renig' in the dictionary, but it +wasn't there. She was too smart to ask Magdalene, but she kept on +thinkin'.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Chance Acquaintances</div> + +<p>"One day, while she was goin' down in the car, two men came in and sat +by her. They was chance acquaintances, it seemed, havin' just met at the +hotel. 'Your face is terrible familiar to me,' one of the men said. +'I've seen you before, or your picture, or something, somewhere. Upon my +soul, I believe your picture is hung up in my last wife's boudoir.'</p> + +<p>"'Good God,' says the other man, turnin' as pale as death, 'did you +marry Magdalene Mather, too?'</p> + +<p>"'I did,' says the first man.</p> + +<p>"'Then, brother,' says the second man, 'let us get off at the next +corner and go and drown our mutual sorrow in drink.'</p> + +<p>"After they got off, Margaret went out to Ronald, and she says to him: +'There goes two of my aunt's husbands. She's had three, and there's two +of 'em, right there.'</p> + +<p>"'Well,' says Ronald, 'if Aunty ain't got a death certificate and two or +three divorces <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>put away somewhere, she stands right in line to get +canned for a few years for bigamy. You don't look like you had an aunt +that was a trigamist,' says he.</p> + +<p>"Margaret didn't understand much of this, but she still kept thinkin'. +One day while Magdalene was at an afternoon reception, wearin' all of +Margaret's jewels, Margaret looked all through her private belongings to +see if she could find any divorces, and she come on a family Bible with +the date of her birth in it, and her father's will.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Facts of the Case</div> + +<p>"Soon, she understands the whole game, and by doin' a small sum in +subtraction, she sees that she is goin' on nineteen now. She's afraid to +leave the proofs in the house over night, so she wraps 'em up in a +newspaper, and flies with 'em to her only friend Ronald Macdonald, and +asks him to keep 'em for her until she comes after 'em. He says he will +guard them with his life.</p> + +<p>"When Margaret goes back after them, havin' decided to face her aunt and +demand her inheritance, Ronald has already read 'em, but of course he +don't let on that he has. He convinces her that she ought to get married +before she faces her aunt, so that a husband's strong arm will be at +hand to defend her through the terrible ordeal.</p> + +<p>"Margaret thinks she sees a way out, for she has been studyin' up on law +in the mean<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>time, and she remembers how Ronald has told her he is under +age, and she knows the marriage won't be legal, but will serve to +deceive her aunt.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Climax</div> + +<p>"So she flies with him and they are married, and then when they confront +Magdalene with the will, and the family Bible and their marriage +certificate, and tell her she is a trigamist, and they will make trouble +for her if she don't do right by 'em, Magdalene sobs out, 'Oh, Heaven, I +am lost!' and falls in a dead faint from which she don't come out for +six weeks.</p> + +<p>"In the meantime, Margaret has thanked Ronald Macdonald for his great +kindness, and says he can go now, as the marriage ain't legal, he bein' +under age and not havin' his parents' consent. Ronald gives a long, loud +laugh and then he digs up his family Bible and shows Margaret how he is +almost twenty-five and old enough to be married, and that women have no +patent on lyin' about their ages, and that he is not going away.</p> + +<p>"Margaret swoons, and when she comes to, she finds that Ronald has +resigned his job as a street-car conductor, and has bought some fine +clothes on her credit, and is prepared to live happy ever afterward. He +bids eternal farewell to work in a long and impassioned speech that's so +full of fine language that it would do credit to a minister, and there +Mar<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>garet is, in a trap of her own makin', with a husband to take care +of her money instead of an aunt. Next week, I'll know more about how it +turns out, but that's as far as I've got now. Ain't it a perfectly +beautiful story?"</p> + +<p>Miriam muttered some sort of answer, but Barbara smiled. "It is very +interesting," she said, kindly. "I've never read anything like it."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Going the Rounds</div> + +<p>"It's a lot better'n the books you and Roger waste your time over," +returned the guest, much gratified; "but I can't lend you the papers, +cause there's five waitin' after the postmaster's wife, and goodness +knows how many of them has promised others. I don't mind runnin' over +once in a while, though, and tellin' you about 'em while I sew.</p> + +<p>"It keeps 'em fresh in my memory," she added, happily, "and Roger is so +busy with his law books he don't have time to listen to 'em except at +supper. He reads law every evening now, and he didn't used to. Guess he +ain't wasting so much time as he was. Been down to the hotel yet?" she +asked, inclining her head toward Miriam.</p> + +<p>"Once," answered Miriam, reluctantly.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Gossip</div> + +<p>"There ain't many come yet," the postmaster's wife tells me. "There's a +young lady at the hotel named Miss Eloise Wynne, and every day but +Saturday she gets a letter from the city, addressed in a man's writin'.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span> +And every afternoon, when the boy brings the hotel mail down to go out +on the night train, there's a big white square envelope in a woman's +writin' addressed to Doctor Allan Conrad, some place in the city. The +envelope smells sweet, but the writin' is dreadful big and +sploshy-lookin'. Know anything about her?" Miss Mattie gazed sharply at +Miriam over her spectacles.</p> + +<p>"No," returned Miriam, decisively.</p> + +<p>"Thought maybe you would. Anyhow, you don't need to be so sharp about +it, cause there's no harm in askin' a civil question. My mother always +taught me that a civil question called for a civil answer. I should +think, from the letters and all, that he was her steady company, +shouldn't you?"</p> + +<p>"It's possible," assented Barbara, seeing that Miriam did not intend to +reply.</p> + +<p>"There's some talk at the sewin' circle of gettin' you one of them hand +sewin' machines," continued Miss Mattie, "so's you could sew more and +better."</p> + +<p>Barbara flushed painfully. "Thank you," she answered, "but I couldn't +use it. I much prefer to do all my work by hand."</p> + +<p>"All right," assented Miss Mattie, good-humouredly. "It ain't our idea +to force a sewin' machine onto anybody that don't want it. We can use +some of the money in gettin' a door-mat for the front door of the +church.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span> And, if I was you, I wouldn't let my pa run around so much by +himself. If he wants to borrow a dog to go with him, Roger would be +willin' to lend him Judge Bascom's Fido. If the Judge wasn't willin', +Roger would try to persuade him. Lendin' Fido would make law easier for +Roger and be a great help to your pa.</p> + +<p>"I must go, now, and get supper. Good-bye. I've enjoyed my visit ever so +much. Come over sometime, Miriam—you ain't very sociable. Good-bye."</p> + +<p>The two women watched Miss Mattie scudding blithely over the trail +which, as she said, Roger had worn in the grass. Miriam looked after her +gloomily, but Barbara was laughing.</p> + +<p>"Don't look so cross, Aunty," chided Barbara. "No one ever came here who +was so easy to entertain."</p> + +<p>"Humph," grunted Miriam, and went out.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Relief</div> + +<p>But even Barbara sighed in relief when she was left alone. She +understood some of Roger's difficulties of which he never spoke, and +realised that the much-maligned "Bascom liver" could not be held +responsible for all his discontent.</p> + +<p>She wondered what Roger's father had been like, and did not wonder that +he was unhappy, if his nature was in any way akin to his son's. But her +mother? How could she have failed to appreciate the beautiful old father +whom<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span> Barbara loved with all the passion and strength of her young +heart!</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Secret</div> + +<p>"He mustn't know," said Barbara to herself, for the hundredth time. +"Father must never know."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>VIII</h2> + +<h3>A Fairy Godmother</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">The Postponed Visit</div> + +<p>As cool and fresh as the June morning of which she seemed a veritable +part, Miss Eloise Wynne, immaculately clad in white linen, opened the +little grey gate. It was a week later than she had promised to come, but +she had not been idle, and considered herself justified for the delay.</p> + +<p>Miriam opened the door for her and introduced Barbara. Eloise smiled +radiantly as she offered a smooth, well-kept hand. "I know I'm late," +she said, "but I think you'll forgive me for it a little later on. I +want to see all the lingerie—every piece you have to sell."</p> + +<p>"Would you mind coming upstairs?" asked Barbara.</p> + +<p>"No, indeed."</p> + +<p>The two went up, Barbara slowly leading the way. Miriam remained +downstairs to make sure that the blind man did not come in unexpectedly +and overhear things which he would be much happier not to know.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span></p> + +<p>"What a lot of it," Eloise was saying. "And what a wonderful old chest."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Dainty Wares</div> + +<p>Trembling with excitement, Barbara spread forth her dainty wares. Eloise +was watching her narrowly, and, with womanly intuition, saw the dire +need and the courageous spirit struggling against it.</p> + +<p>"Just a minute, please," said Barbara; "I'd better tell you now. My +father is blind and he does not know we are poor, nor that I make these +things to sell. He thinks that they are for myself and that I am very +vain. So, if he should come home while you are here, please do not spoil +our little deceit."</p> + +<p>Barbara lifted her luminous blue eyes to Eloise and smiled. It was a +brave little smile without a hint of self-pity, and it went straight to +the older woman's heart.</p> + +<p>"I'll be careful," said Eloise. "I think it's dear of you."</p> + +<p>"Now," said Barbara, stooping to peer into the corners of the deep +chest, "I think that's all." She began, hurriedly, to price everything +as she passed it to Eloise, giving the highest price each time. When she +had finished, she was amazed at Miss Wynne's face—it was so full of +resentment.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to tell me," asked Eloise, in a queer voice, "that you are +asking <i>that</i> for <i>these?</i>"</p> + +<p>The blue eyes threatened to overflow, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span> Barbara straightened herself +proudly. "It is all hand work," she said, with quiet dignity, "and the +material is the very best. I could not possibly afford to sell it for +less."</p> + +<p>"You goose," laughed Eloise, "you have misunderstood me. There is not a +thing here that is not worth at least a third more than you are asking +for it. Give me a pencil and paper and some pins."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Higher Prices</div> + +<p>Barbara obeyed, wondering what this beautiful visitor would do next. +Eloise took up every garment and examined it critically. Then she made a +new price tag and pinned it over the old one. She advanced even the +plainest garments at least a third, the more elaborate ones were +doubled, and some of the embroidered things were even tripled in price. +When she came to the shirtwaist patterns, exquisitely embroidered upon +sheerest handkerchief linen, she shamelessly multiplied the price by +four and pinned the new tag on.</p> + +<p>"Oh," gasped Barbara; "nobody will ever pay that much for things to +wear."</p> + +<p>"Somebody is going to right now," announced Eloise, with decision. "I'll +take this, and this, and this," she went on, rapidly choosing, "and +these, and these, and this. I'll take those four for a friend of mine +who is going to be married next week—this solves the eternal problem of +wedding-presents—and all of these for next Santa Claus time.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I can use all the handkerchiefs, and every pin-cushion cover and +corsage-pad you've made. Please don't sell anything else until I've +heard from some more of my friends to whom I have already written. And +you're not to offer one of these exquisite things to those +unappreciative people at the hotel, for I have a letter from a friend +who is on the Board of Directors of the Woman's Exchange, and got a +chance for you to sell there. How long have you been doing this?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">In a Whirl of Confusion</div> + +<p>"Seven or eight years," murmured Barbara. Her senses were so confused +that the room seemed to be whirling and her face was almost as white as +the lingerie.</p> + +<p>"And those women at the hotel would really buy these things at such +ridiculous prices?"</p> + +<p>"Not often," answered Barbara, trying to smile. "They would not pay so +much. Sometimes we had to sell for very little more than the cost of the +material. One woman said we ought not to expect so much for things that +were not made with a sewing-machine, but of course, Aunt Miriam had been +to the city and she knew that hand work was worth more."</p> + +<p>"I wish I'd been there," remarked Eloise. There was a look around her +mouth which would have boded no good to anybody if she had. "When I see +what brutes women can be, sometimes I am ashamed because I am a woman."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span></p> + +<p>"And," returned Barbara, softly, "when I see what good angels women can +be, it makes me proud to be a woman."</p> + +<p>"Where do you get your material?" asked Eloise, quickly.</p> + +<p>Barbara named the large department store where Aunt Miriam bought linen, +lawn, batiste, lace, patterns, and incidentally managed to absorb ideas.</p> + +<p>"I see I'm needed in Riverdale-by-the-Sea," observed Miss Wynne. "I can +arrange for you to buy all you want at the lowest wholesale price."</p> + +<p>"Would it save anything?" asked Barbara, doubtfully.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Practical Help</div> + +<p>"Would it?" repeated Eloise, smiling. "Just wait and see. After I've +written about that and had some samples sent to you, we'll talk over +half a dozen or more complete sets of lingerie for me, and some more +shirtwaists. Is there a pen downstairs? I want to write a check for +you."</p> + +<p>When they went into the living-room, Barbara's cheeks were burning with +excitement and her eyes shone like stars. When she took the check, which +Eloise wrote with an accustomed air, she could scarcely speak, but +managed to stammer out, "Thank you."</p> + +<p>"You needn't," said Eloise, coolly, "for I'm only buying what I want at +a price I consider very reasonable and fair. If you'll get <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>some samples +of your work ready, I'll send up for them, and hurry them on to my +friend who is to put them into the Woman's Exchange. And please don't +sell anything more just now. I've just thought of a friend whose +daughter is going to be married soon, and she may want me to select some +things for her."</p> + +<p>"You're a fairy godmother," said Barbara. "This morning we were poor and +discouraged. You came in and waved your wand, and now we are rich. I +have heart for anything now."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Always Rich</div> + +<p>"You are always rich while you have courage, and without it Crœsus +himself would be poor. It's not the circumstance, remember—it's the way +you meet it."</p> + +<p>"I know," said Barbara, but her eyes filled with tears of gratitude, +nevertheless.</p> + +<p>Ambrose North came in from the street, and immediately felt the presence +of a stranger in the room. "Who is here?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"This is Miss Wynne, Father. She is stopping at the hotel and came up to +call."</p> + +<p>The old man bowed in courtly fashion over the young woman's hand. "We +are glad to see you," he said, gently. "I am blind, but I can see with +my soul."</p> + +<p>"That is the true sight," returned Eloise. Her big brown eyes were soft +with pity.</p> + +<p>"Have many of the guests come?" he inquired.</p> + +<p>"I have a friend," laughed Eloise, "who <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>says it is wrong to call people +'guests' when they are stopping at a hotel. He insists that 'inmates' is +a much better word."</p> + +<p>"He is not far from right," said the old man, smiling. "Is he there +now?"</p> + +<p>"No, he comes down Saturday mornings and stays until Monday morning. +That is all the vacation he allows himself. You are fortunate to live +here," she added, kindly. "I do not know of a more beautiful place."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Invited to Luncheon</div> + +<p>"Nor I. To us—to me, especially—it is hallowed by memories. We—you +will stay to luncheon, will you not, Miss Wynne?"</p> + +<p>Eloise glanced quickly at Barbara. "If you only would," she said.</p> + +<p>"If you really want me," said Eloise, "I'd love to." She took off her +hat—a white one trimmed with lilacs—and smoothed the waves in her +copper-coloured hair. Barbara took her crutches and went out, very +quietly, to help Aunt Miriam prepare for the guest.</p> + +<p>When the kitchen door was safely closed, Barbara's joy bubbled into +speech. "Oh, Aunt Miriam," she cried; "she's bought nearly every thing I +had and paid almost double price for it. She's already arranged for me +to sell at the Woman's Exchange in the city, and she is going to write +to some of her friends about the things I have left. She's going to +arrange for me to get all my material at the lowest wholesale price, and +she's ordered six complete <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>sets of lingerie for herself. She wants some +more shirtwaists, too. Oh, Aunt Miriam, do you think the world is coming +to an end?"</p> + +<p>"Has she paid you?" queried Miriam, gravely.</p> + +<p>"Indeed she has."</p> + +<p>"Then it probably is."</p> + +<p>Miriam was not a woman easily to be affected by joy, but the hard lines +of her face softened perceptibly. "Show her the quilts," she suggested.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Aunt Miriam, I'd be ashamed to, to-day, when she's bought so much. +She'll be coming up again before long—she said so. And father's asked +her to luncheon."</p> + +<p>"Just like him," commented Miriam, with a sigh. "He always suffered from +hospitality. I'll have to go to the store."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Best We Have</div> + +<p>"No, you won't, Aunty—she's not that sort. We'll give her the best we +have, with a welcome thrown in."</p> + +<p>If Eloise thought it strange for one end of the table to be set with +solid silver, heavy damask, and fine china, while the other end, where +she and the two women of the house sat, was painfully different, she +gave no sign of it in look or speech. The humble fare might have been +the finest banquet so far as she was concerned. She fitted herself to +their ways without apparent effort; there was no awkwardness nor feeling +of strangeness. She might have been <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>a life-long friend of the family, +instead of a passing acquaintance who had come to buy lingerie.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Friendly Conversation</div> + +<p>As she ate, she talked. It was not aimless chatter, but the rare gift of +conversation. She drew them all out and made them talk, too. Even Miriam +relaxed and said something more than "yes" and "no."</p> + +<p>"What delicious preserves," said Eloise. "May I have some more, please? +Where do you get them?"</p> + +<p>"I make them," answered Miriam, the dull red rising in her cheeks. She +had not been entirely disinterested when she climbed up on a chair and +took down some of her choicest fruit from the highest shelf of the +store-room.</p> + +<p>"Do you—" A look from Barbara stopped the unlucky speech. "Do you find +it difficult?" asked Eloise, instantly mistress of the situation. "I +should so love to make some for myself."</p> + +<p>"Miriam will be glad to teach you," put in Ambrose North. "She likes to +do it because she can do it so well."</p> + +<p>The red grew deeper in Miriam's lined face, for every word of praise +from him was food to her hungry soul. She would gladly have laid down +her life for him, even though she hated herself for feeling as she did.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">An Hour of Song</div> + +<p>Afterward, while Miriam was clearing off the table, Eloise went to the +piano without <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>being asked, and sang to them for more than an hour. She +chose folk-songs and tender melodies—little songs made of tears and +laughter, and the simple ballads that never grow old. She had a deep, +vibrant contralto voice of splendid range and volume; she sang with rare +sympathy, and every word could be clearly understood.</p> + +<p>"Don't stop," pleaded Barbara, when she paused and ran her fingers +lightly over the keys.</p> + +<p>"I don't want to impose upon your good-nature," she returned, "but I +love to sing."</p> + +<p>"And we love to have you," said North. "I think, Barbara, we must get a +new piano."</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't," answered Eloise, before Barbara could speak. "The years +improve wine and violins and friendship, so why not a piano?" Without +waiting for his reply, she began to sing, with exquisite tenderness:</p> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="Sometimes between long shadows"> +<tr><td align='left'>"Sometimes between long shadows on the grass</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">The little truant waves of sunlight pass;</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Mine eyes grow dim with tenderness the while,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Thinking I see thee, thinking I see thee smile.</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><br />"And sometimes in the twilight gloom apart</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">The tall trees whisper, whisper heart to heart;</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">From my fond lips the eager answers fall,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Thinking I hear thee, thinking I hear thee call."</span></td></tr> +</table></div> + +<p>"Yes," said Ambrose North, unsteadily, as the last chord died away, "I +know. You can <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>call and call, but nothing ever comes back to you." The +tears streamed over his blind face as he rose and went out of the room.</p> + +<p>"What have I done?" asked Eloise. "Oh, what have I done?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing," sighed Barbara. "My mother has been dead for twenty-one +years, but my father never forgets. She was only a girl when she +died—like me."</p> + +<p>"I'm so sorry. Why didn't you tell me before, so I could have chosen +jolly, happy things?"</p> + +<p>"That wouldn't keep him from grieving—nothing can, so don't be troubled +about it."</p> + +<p>Eloise turned back to the piano and sang two or three rollicking, +laughing melodies that set Barbara's one foot to tapping on the floor, +but the old man did not come back.</p> + +<p>"I never meant to stay so long," said Eloise, rising and putting on her +hat.</p> + +<p>"It isn't long," returned Barbara, with evident sincerity. "I wish you +wouldn't go."</p> + +<p>"But I must, my dear. If I don't go, I can never come again. I have lots +of letters to write, and mail will be waiting for me, and I have some +studying to do, so I must go."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Adieus</div> + +<p>Barbara went to the door with her. "Good-bye, Fairy Godmother," she +said, wistfully.</p> + +<p>"Good-bye, Fairy Godchild," answered Eloise, carelessly. Then something +in the girl's face impelled her to put a strong arm <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>around Barbara, and +kiss her, very tenderly. The blue eyes filled with tears.</p> + +<p>"Thank you for that," breathed Barbara, "more than for anything else."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Eloise went away humming to herself, but she stopped as soon as she was +out of sight of the house. "The little thing," she thought; "the dear, +brave little thing! A face like an angel, and that cross old woman, and +that beautiful old man who sees with his soul. And all that exquisite +work and the prices those brutal women paid her for it. Blind and lame, +and nothing to be done."</p> + +<p>Then another thought made her brown eyes very bright. "But I'm not so +sure of that—we'll see."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Request</div> + +<p>She wrote many letters that afternoon, and all were for Barbara. The +last and longest was to Doctor Conrad, begging him to come at the first +possible moment and go with her to see a poor broken child who might be +made well and strong and beautiful.</p> + +<p>"And," the letter went on, "perhaps you could give her father back his +eyesight. She calls me her Fairy Godmother, and I rely upon you to keep +my proud position for me. Any way, Allan, dear, please come, won't you?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Awaiting Results</div> + +<p>She closed it with a few words which would <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>have made him start for the +Klondike that night, had there been a train, and she asked it of him; +posted it, and hopefully awaited results.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>IX</h2> + +<h3>Taking the Chance</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">Dr. Conrad Comes</div> + +<p>"Well, I'm here," remarked Doctor Conrad, as he sat on the beach with +Eloise. "I have left all my patients in the care of an inferior, though +reputable physician, who has such winning ways that he may have annexed +my entire practice by the time I get back.</p> + +<p>"If you'll tell me just where these protégées of yours are, I'll go up +there right away. I'll ring the bell, and when they open the door I'll +say: 'I've come from Miss Wynne, and I'm to amputate this morning and +remove a couple of cataracts this afternoon. Kindly have the patients +get ready at once.'"</p> + +<p>"Don't joke, Allan," pleaded Eloise. Her brown eyes were misty and her +mood of exalted tenderness made her in love with all the world. "If you +could see that brave little thing, with her beautiful face and her +divine unselfishness, hobbling around on crutches and sewing for a +living, meanwhile keeping her blind old <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>father from knowing they are +poor, you'd feel just as I do."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Discussing the Case</div> + +<p>"It is very improbable," returned Allan, seriously, "that anything can +be done. If they were well-to-do, they undoubtedly made every effort and +saw everybody worth seeing."</p> + +<p>"But in twenty years," suggested Eloise, hopefully. "Think of all the +progress that has been made in twenty years."</p> + +<p>"I know," said Allan, doubtfully. "All we can do is to see. And if +anything can be done for them, why, of course we'll do it."</p> + +<p>"Then we'll go for a little drive," she said, "and on our way back, we +can stop there and get the things I bought the other day. They have no +one to send with them, and it's too much for one person to carry, +anyway."</p> + +<p>"I suppose she has sold everything she had," mused Allan impersonally.</p> + +<p>"Not quite," answered Eloise, flushing. "I left her some samples for the +Woman's Exchange."</p> + +<p>"Very kind," he observed, with the same air of detachment. "I can see my +finish. My wife will have so much charity work for me to do that there +will be no time for anything else, and, in a little while, she will have +given away all the money we both have. Then when we're sitting together +in the sun on the front steps of the poorhouse, we can fittingly lament +the end of our usefulness."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span></p> + +<div class="sidenote">Policy of Segregation</div> + +<p>"They won't let us sit together," she retorted. "Don't you know that +even in the old people's homes they keep the men and women +apart—husbands and wives included?"</p> + +<p>"For the love of Mike, what for?" he asked, in surprise.</p> + +<p>"Because it makes the place too gay and frivolous. Old ladies of eighty +were courted by awkward swains of ninety and more, and there was so much +checker-playing in the evening and so many lights burning, and so many +requests for new clothes, that the management couldn't stand it. There +were heart-burnings and jealousies, too, so they had to adopt a policy +of segregation."</p> + +<p>"'Hope springs eternal in the human breast,'" quoted Allan.</p> + +<p>"And love," she said. "I've thought sometimes I'd like to play fairy +godmother to some of those poor, desolate old people who love each +other, and give them a pretty wedding. Wouldn't it be dear to see two +old people married and settled in a little home of their own?"</p> + +<p>"Or, more likely, with us," he returned. "I've been thinking about a +nice little house with a guest room or two, but I've changed my mind. My +vote is for a very small apartment. You're not the sort to be trusted +with a guest room."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Starting Off</div> + +<p>Eloise laughed and sprang to her feet. "On <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>to the errand of mercy," she +said. "We're wasting valuable time. Get a horse and buggy and I'll see +if I can borrow an extra suit-case or two for my purchases."</p> + +<p>When she came down, Allan was waiting for her in the buggy. A bell-boy, +in her wake, brought three suit-cases and piled them under the seat. +Half a dozen rocking-chairs, on the veranda, held highly interested +observers. The paraphernalia suggested an elopement.</p> + +<p>"Tell those women on the veranda," said Eloise, to the boy, "that I'm +not taking any trunks and will soon be back."</p> + +<p>"What for?" queried Allan, as they drove away.</p> + +<p>"Reasons of my own," she answered, crisply. "Men are as blind as bats."</p> + +<p>"I'm wearing glasses," he returned, with due humility. "If you think I'm +fit to hear why you left that cryptic message, I'd be pleased to."</p> + +<p>"You're far from fit. Here, turn into this road."</p> + +<p>Spread like a tawny ribbon upon the green of the hills, the road wound +lazily through open sunny spaces and shaded aisles sweet with that cool +fragrance found only in the woods. The horse did not hurry, but wandered +comfortably from side to side of the road, browsing where he chose. He +seemed to know that lovers were driving him.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span></p> + +<div class="sidenote">Horses versus Autos</div> + +<p>"He's a one-armed horse, isn't he?" laughed Eloise. "I like him lots +better than an automobile, don't you?"</p> + +<p>"Out here, I do. But an automobile has certain advantages."</p> + +<p>"What are they?" she demanded. "I'd rather feed a horse than to buy a +tire, any day."</p> + +<p>"So would I—unless he tired of his feed. But if you want to get +anywhere very quickly and the thing happens not to break, the machine is +better."</p> + +<p>"But it never happens. I believe the average automobile is possessed of +an intuition little short of devilish. A horse seems more friendly. If +you were thinking of getting me a little electric runabout for my +birthday, please change it to a horse."</p> + +<p>"All right," returned Allan, serenely. "We can keep him in the +living-room of our six-room apartment and have his dinner sent in from +the nearest <i>table d'oat</i>. For breakfast, he can come out into the +<i>salle à manger</i> and eat cereals with us."</p> + +<p>"You're absolutely incorrigible," she sighed. "This is the river road. +Follow it until I tell you where to turn."</p> + +<p>Within half an hour, the horse came to a full stop of his own accord in +front of the grey, weather-worn house where Barbara lived. He was +cropping at a particularly enticing clump of grass when Eloise +alighted.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Going to push?" queried Allan, lazily.</p> + +<p>"No, this is the place. Come on. You bring two of the suit-cases and +I'll take the other."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Observations</div> + +<p>The blind man was not there at the moment, but came in while Miriam was +upstairs packing Miss Wynne's recent additions to her wardrobe. Doctor +Conrad had been observing Barbara keenly as they talked of indifferent +things. Outwardly, he was calm and professional, but within, a warmly +human impulse answered her evident need.</p> + +<p>He was young and had not yet been at his work long enough to determine +his ultimate nature. Later on, his profession would do to him one of two +things. It would transform him into a mere machine, brutalised and +calloused, with only one or two emotions aside from selfishness left to +thrive in his dwarfed soul, or it would humanise him to godlike +unselfishness, attune him to a divine sympathy, and mellow his heart in +tenderness beyond words. In one instance he would be feared; in the +other, only loved, by those who came to him.</p> + +<p>As Barbara went across the room to another chair, his eyes followed her +with intense interest. Eloise shrank from him a little—she had never +seen him like this before. Yet she knew, from the expression of his +face, that he had found hope, and was glad.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Barbara?" It was Miriam, calling from upstairs.</p> + +<p>"In just a minute, Aunty. Excuse me, please—I'll come right back."</p> + +<p>She was scarcely out of the room before Eloise leaned over to Allan, her +face alight with eager questioning. "You think—?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Willing to Try</div> + +<p>"I don't know," he returned, in a low tone. "It depends on the hardness +of the muscles and several other local conditions. Of course it's +impossible to tell definitely without a thorough examination, but I've +done it successfully in two adult cases, and have seen it done more than +a dozen times. I'd be very willing to try."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Allan," whispered Eloise. "I'm so glad."</p> + +<p>Barbara's padded crutches sounded softly on the stairs as she came down. +Eloise went to the window and studied the horse attentively, though he +was not of the restless sort that needs to be tied.</p> + +<p>While she was watching, Ambrose North came around the base of the hill, +crossed the road, and opened the gate. He had been to his old solitude +at the top of the hill, where, as nowhere else, he found peace. While he +was talking with the visitors, Miriam went out, taking the neatly-packed +suit-cases, one at a time, and put them into the buggy.</p> + +<p>"Mr. North," said Doctor Conrad, "while <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>these girls are chattering, +will you go for a little drive with me?"</p> + +<p>The blind man's fine old face illumined with pleasure. "I should like it +very much," he said. "It is a long time since I had have a drive."</p> + +<p>"It's more like a walk," laughed Allan, as they went out, "with this +horse."</p> + +<p>"We sold our horses many years ago," the old man explained, as he +climbed in. "Miriam is afraid of horses and Barbara said she did not +care to go. I thought the open air and the slight exercise would be good +for her, but she insisted upon my selling them."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">About Barbara</div> + +<p>"It is about Barbara that I wished to speak," said Allan. "With your +consent, I should like to make a thorough examination and see whether an +operation would not do away with her crutches entirely."</p> + +<p>"It is no use," sighed North, wearily. "We went everywhere and did +everything, long ago. There is nothing that can be done."</p> + +<p>"But there may be," insisted Allan. "We have learned much, in my +profession, in the last twenty years. May I try?"</p> + +<p>"You're asking me if you can hurt my baby?"</p> + +<p>"Not to hurt her more than is necessary to heal. Understand me, I do not +know but what you are right, but I hope, and believe, that there may be +a chance."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I have dreamed sometimes," said the old man, very slowly, "that my baby +could walk and I could see."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">If Possible</div> + +<p>"The dream shall come true, if it is possible. Let me see your eyes." He +stopped the horse on the brow of the hill, where the sun shone clear and +strong, stood up, and turned the blind face to the light. Then, sitting +down once more, he asked innumerable questions. When he finally was +silent, Ambrose North turned to him, indifferently.</p> + +<p>"Well?" The tone was simply polite inquiry. The matter seemed to be one +which concerned nobody.</p> + +<p>"Again I do not know," returned Allan. "This is altogether out of my +line, but, if you'll go to the city with me, I'll take you to a friend +of mine who is a great specialist. If anything can be done, he is the +man who can do it. Will you come?"</p> + +<p>There was a long pause. "If Barbara is willing," he answered simply. +"Ask her."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="sidenote">The Plunge</div> + +<p>Meanwhile, Eloise was talking to Barbara. First, she told her of the +letters she had written in her behalf and to which the answers might +come any day now. Then she asked if she might order preserves from Aunt +Miriam, and discussed patterns and material for the lingerie she had +previously spoken of. Finding, at length, that the best way to approach +a diffi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span>cult subject was the straightest one, she took the plunge.</p> + +<p>"Have you always been lame?" she asked. She did not look at Barbara, but +tried to speak carelessly, as she gazed out of the window.</p> + +<p>"Yes," came the answer, so low that she could scarcely hear it.</p> + +<p>"Wouldn't you like to walk like the rest of us?" continued Eloise.</p> + +<p>Barbara writhed under the torturing question. "My mind can walk," she +said, with difficulty; "my soul isn't lame."</p> + +<p>The tone made Eloise turn quickly—and hate herself bitterly for her +awkwardness. She saw that an apology would only make a bad matter worse, +so she went straight on.</p> + +<p>"Doctor Conrad is very skilful," she continued. "In the city, he is one +of the few really great surgeons. He told me that he would like to make +an examination and see if an operation would not do away with the +crutches. He thinks there may be a good chance. If there is, will you +take it?"</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said Barbara, almost inaudibly. Her voice had sunk to a +whisper and she was very pale. "I do not mean to seem ungrateful, but it +is impossible."</p> + +<p>"Impossible!" repeated Eloise. "Why?"</p> + +<p>"Because of father," explained Barbara. Her colour was coming back +slowly now. "I <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>am all he has, my work supplies his needs, and I dare +not take the risk."</p> + +<p>"Is that the only reason?"</p> + +<p>Barbara nodded.</p> + +<p>"You're not afraid?"</p> + +<p>Barbara's blue eyes opened wide with astonishment. "Why should I be +afraid?" she asked. "Do you take me for a coward?"</p> + +<p>Eloise knelt beside Barbara's low chair and put her strong arms around +the slender, white-clad figure. "Listen, dear," she said. Her face was +shining as though with some great inner light.</p> + +<p>"My own dear father died when I was a child. My mother died when I was +born. I have never had anything but money. I have never had anyone to +take care of, no one to make sacrifices for, no one to make me strong +because I was needed. If the worst should happen, would you trust your +father to me? Could you trust me?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Barbara slowly; "I could."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Compact</div> + +<p>"Then I promise you solemnly that your father shall never want for +anything while he lives. And now, if there is a chance, will you take +it—for me?"</p> + +<p>Barbara looked long into the sweet face, glorified by the inner light. +Then she leaned forward and put her soft arms around the older woman, +hiding her face in the masses of copper-coloured hair.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span></p> + +<p>"For you? A thousand times, yes," she sobbed. "Oh, anything for you!"</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Late in the afternoon, when Ambrose North and Barbara were alone again, +he came over to her chair and stroked her shining hair with a loving +hand.</p> + +<p>"Did they tell you, dear?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"Yes," whispered Barbara.</p> + +<p>"I have dreamed so often that my baby could walk and I could see. He +said that the dream should come true if he could make it so."</p> + +<p>"Did he say anything about your eyes?" asked Barbara, in astonishment.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Hopeful</div> + +<p>"Yes. He thinks there may be a chance there, too. If you are willing, I +am to go to the city with him sometime and see a friend of his who is a +great specialist."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Daddy," cried Barbara. "I'm afraid—for you."</p> + +<p>He drew a chair up near hers and sat down. The old hand, in which the +pulses moved so slowly, clasped the younger one, warm with life.</p> + +<p>"Barbara," he said; "I have never seen my baby."</p> + +<p>"I know, Daddy."</p> + +<p>"I want to see you, dear."</p> + +<p>"And I want you to."</p> + +<p>"Then, will you let me go?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Perhaps, but it must be—afterward, you know."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"Because, when you see me, I want to be strong and well. I want to be +able to walk. You mustn't see the crutches, Daddy—they are ugly +things."</p> + +<p>"Nothing could be ugly that belongs to you. I made a little song this +afternoon, while you and Miriam were talking and I was out alone."</p> + +<p>"Tell me."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">In a Beautiful Garden</div> + +<p>"Once there was a man who had a garden. When he was a child he had +played in it, in his youth and early manhood he had worked in it and +found pleasure in seeing things grow, but he did not really know what a +beautiful garden it was until another walked in it with him and found it +fair.</p> + +<p>"Together they watched it from Springtime to harvest, finding new beauty +in it every day. One night at twilight she whispered to him that some +day a perfect flower of their very own was to bloom in the garden. They +watched and waited and prayed for it together, but, before it blossomed, +the man went blind.</p> + +<p>"In the darkness, he could not see the garden, but she was still there, +bringing divine consolation with her touch, and whispering to him always +of the perfect flower so soon to be their own.</p> + +<p>"When it blossomed, the man could not see <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>it, but the one who walked +beside him told him that it was as pure and fair as they had prayed it +might be. They enjoyed it together for a year, and he saw it through her +eyes.</p> + +<p>"Then she went to God's Garden, and he was left desolate and alone. He +cared for nothing and for a time even forgot the flower that she had +left. Weeds grew among the flowers, nettles and thistles took possession +of the walks, and strange vines choked with their tendrils everything +that dared to bloom.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Perfect Flower</div> + +<p>"One day, he went out into the intolerable loneliness and desolation, +and, groping blindly, he found among the nettles and thistles and weeds +the one perfect white blossom. It was cool and soft to his hot hand, it +was exquisitely fragrant, and, more than all, it was part of her. +Gradually, it eased his pain. He took out the weeds and thistles as best +he could, but there was little he could do, for he had left it too long.</p> + +<p>"The years went by, but the flower did not fade. Seeking, he always +found it; weary, it always refreshed him; starving, it fed his soul. +Blind, it gave him sight; weak, it gave him courage; hurt, it brought +him balm. At last he lived only because of it, for, in some mysterious +way, it seemed to need him, too, and sometimes it even seemed divinely +to restore the lost.</p> + +<p>"Flower of the Dusk," he said, leaning to Barbara; "what should I have +been without you? How could I have borne it all?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span></p> + +<div class="sidenote">Strength for the Burden</div> + +<p>"God suits the burden to the bearer, I think," she answered, softly. "If +you have much to bear, it is because you are strong enough to do it +nobly and well. Only the weak are allowed to shirk, and shift their load +to the shoulders of the strong."</p> + +<p>"I know, but, Barbara—suppose——"</p> + +<p>"There is nothing to suppose, Daddy. Whatever happened would be the best +that could happen. I'm not afraid."</p> + +<p>Her voice rang clear and strong. Insensibly, he caught some of her own +fine courage and his soul rallied greatly to meet hers. From her height +she had summoned him as with a bugle-call, and he had answered.</p> + +<p>"The ways of the Everlasting are not our ways," he said, "but I will not +be afraid. No, I will not let myself be afraid."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>X</h2> + +<h3>In the Garden</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">A Summer Evening</div> + +<p>The subtle, far-reaching fragrance of a Summer night came through the +open window. A cool wind from the hills had set the maple branches to +murmuring and hushed the incoming tide as it swept up to the waiting +shore. Out in the illimitable darkness of the East, grey surges throbbed +like the beating of a troubled heart, but the shore knew only the drowsy +croon of a sea that has gone to sleep.</p> + +<p>Golden lilies swung their censers softly, and the exquisite incense +perfumed the dusk. Fairy lamp-bearers starred the night with glimmering +radiance, faintly seen afar. A cricket chirped just outside the window +and a ghostly white moth circled around the evening lamp.</p> + +<p>Roger sat by the table, with Keats's letters to his beloved Fanny open +before him. The letter to Constance, so strangely brought back after all +the intervening years, lay beside the book. The ink was faded and the +paper <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span>was yellow, but his father's love, for a woman not his mother, +stared the son full in the face and was not to be denied.</p> + +<p>Was this all, or—? His thought refused to go further. Constance North +had died, by her own hand, four days after the letter was written. What +might not have happened in four days? In one day, Columbus found a +world. In another, electricity was discovered. In one day, one hour, +even, some immeasurable force moving according to unseen law might sway +the sun and set all the stars to reeling madly through the unutterable +midnights of the universe. And in four days? Ah, what had happened in +those four days?</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Recurring Question</div> + +<p>The question had haunted him since the night he read the letter, when he +was reading to Barbara and had unwittingly come upon it. Constance was +dead and Laurence Austin was dead, but their love lived on. The grave +was closed against it, and in neither heaven nor hell could it find an +abiding-place. Ghostly and forbidding, it had sent Constance to haunt +Miriam's troubled sleep, it had filled Ambrose North's soul with cruel +doubt and foreboding, and had now come back to Roger and Barbara, to ask +eternal questions of the one, and stir the heart of the other to new +depths of pain.</p> + +<p>He had not seen Barbara since that night and she had sent no message. No +beacon <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>light in the window across the way said "come." The sword that +had lain, keen-edged and cruel, between Constance and her lover, had, by +a single swift stroke, changed everything between her daughter and his +son.</p> + +<p>Not that Barbara herself was less beautiful or less dear. Roger had +missed her more than he realised. When her lovely, changing face had +come between his eyes and the musty pages of his law books, while the +disturbing Bascom pup cavorted merrily around the office, unheard and +unheeded, Roger had ascribed it to the letter that had forced them +apart.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The woollen slippers muffled Miss Mattie's step so that Roger did not +hear her enter the room. Preoccupied and absorbed, he was staring +vacantly out of the window, when a strong, capable hand swooped down +beside him, gathering up the book and the letter.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Tremendous Power</div> + +<p>"I don't know what it is about your readin', Roger," complained his +mother, "that makes you blind and deaf and dumb and practically +paralysed. Your pa was the same way. Reckon I'll read a piece myself and +see what it is that's so affectin'. It ain't a very big book, but it +seems to have tremendous power."</p> + +<p>She sat down and began to read aloud, in a curiously unsympathetic voice +which grated abominably upon her unwilling listener:</p> + +<p>"'Ask yourself, my Love, whether you are <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>not very cruel to have so +entrammelled me, so destroyed my freedom. Will you confess this in the +letter you must write immediately and do all you can to console me in +it—make it rich as a draught of poppies to intoxicate me—write the +softest words and kiss them, that I may at least touch my lips where +yours have been. For myself, I know not how to express my devotion to so +fair a form; I want a brighter word than bright, a fairer word than +fair. I almost wish we were butterflies and lived but three summer +days—three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty +common years could ever contain.'</p> + +<p>"Ain't that wonderful, Roger? Wants to get drunk on poppies and kiss the +writin' and thinks after that he'll be made into a butterfly. Your pa +couldn't have been far from bein' a butterfly when he bought this book. +There ain't no sense in it. And this—why, it's your pa's writin', +Roger! I ain't seen it for years."</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie leaned forward in her chair and brought the letter to +Constance close to the light. She read it through, calmly, without haste +or excitement. Roger's hands gripped the arms of his chair and his face +turned ashen. His whole body was tense.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Moment's Pain</div> + +<p>Then, as swiftly as it had come, the moment passed. Miss Mattie took off +her spectacles and leaned back in her chair <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>with great weariness +evident in every line of her figure.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Crazy as a Loon</div> + +<p>"Roger," she said, sadly, "there's no use in tryin' to conceal it from +you any longer. Your pa was crazy—as crazy as a loon. What with buyin' +books so steady and readin' of 'em so continual, his mind got unhinged. +I've always suspected it, and now I know.</p> + +<p>"Your pa gets this book, and reads all this stuff that's been written +about 'Fanny,' and he don't see no reason why he shouldn't duplicate it +and maybe get it printed. I knew he set great store by books, but it +comes to me as a shock that he was allowin' to write 'em. Some of the +time he sees he's crazy himself. Didn't you see, there where he says, 'I +hope you do not blame me because I went mad'? 'Mad' is the refined word +for crazy.</p> + +<p>"Then he goes on about eatin' husks and bein' starved. That's what I +told him when he insisted on havin' oatmeal cooked for his breakfast +every mornin'. I told him humans couldn't expect to live on horse-feed, +but, la sakes! He never paid no attention to me. I could set and talk by +the hour just as I'm talkin' to you and he wasn't listenin' any more'n +you be."</p> + +<p>"I am listening, Mother," he assured her, in a forced voice. He could +not say with what joyful relief.</p> + +<p>"Maybe," she went on, "I'd 'a' been more <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>gentle with your pa if I'd +realised just what condition his mind was in. There's a book in the +attic full of just such writin' as this. I found it once when I was +cleaning, but I never paid no more attention to it. I surmised it was +somethin' he was copyin' out of another book that he'd borrowed from the +minister, but I see now. The Lord tempers the wind to the shorn lamb. If +I'd 'a' knowed what it was then, maybe I couldn't have bore it as I can +now."</p> + +<p>Seizing his opportunity, Roger put the book and the letter aside. Miss +Mattie slipped out of its wrapper the paper which Roger had brought to +her from the post-office that same night, and began to read. Roger sat +back in his chair with his eyes closed, meditating upon the theory of +Chance, and wondering if, after all, there was a single controlling +purpose behind the extraordinary things that happened.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Inner Turmoil</div> + +<p>Miss Mattie wiped her spectacles twice and changed her position three +times. Then she got another chair and moved the lamp closer. At last she +clucked sharply with her false teeth—always the outward evidence of +inner turmoil or displeasure.</p> + +<p>"What's the matter, Mother?"</p> + +<p>"I can't see with these glasses," she said, fretfully. "I can see a lot +better without 'em than I can with 'em."</p> + +<p>"Have you wiped them?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Yes, I've wiped 'em till it's a wonder the polish ain't all wore off +the glass."</p> + +<p>"Put them up close to your eyes instead of wearing them so far down on +your nose."</p> + +<p>"I've tried that, but the closer they get to my eyes, the more I can't +see. The further away they are, the better 't is. When I have 'em off, I +can see pretty good."</p> + +<p>"Then why don't you take them off?"</p> + +<p>"That sounds just like your pa. Do you suppose, after payin' seven +dollars and ninety cents for these glasses, and more'n twice as much for +my gold-bowed ones, that I ain't goin' to use 'em and get the benefit of +'em? Your pa never had no notion of economy. They're just as good as +they ever was, and I reckon I'll wear 'em out, if I live."</p> + +<p>"But, Mother, your eyes may have changed. They probably have."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miss Mattie's Eyes</div> + +<p>Miss Mattie went to the kitchen and brought back a small, cracked +mirror. She studied the offending orbs by the light, very carefully, +both with and without her spectacles.</p> + +<p>"No, they ain't," she announced, finally. "They're the same size and +shape and colour that they've always been, and the specs are the same. +Your pa bought 'em for me soon after you commenced readin' out of a +reader, and they're just as good as they ever was. It must be the oil. +I've noticed that it gets poorer every time the price goes up." She +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>pushed the paper aside with a sigh. "I was readin' such a nice story, +too."</p> + +<p>"Shan't I read it to you, Mother?"</p> + +<p>"Why, I don't know. Do you want to?"</p> + +<p>"Surely, if you want me to."</p> + +<p>"Then you'd better begin a new story, because I'm more'n half-way +through this one."</p> + +<p>"I'll begin right where you left off, Mother. It doesn't make a particle +of difference to me."</p> + +<p>"But you won't get the sense of it. I'd like for you to enjoy it while +you're readin'."</p> + +<p>"Don't worry about my enjoying it—you know I've always been fond of +books. If there's anything I don't understand, I can ask you."</p> + +<p>"All right. Begin right here in <i>True Gold, or Pretty Crystal's Love</i>. +This is the place: 'With a terrible scream, Crystal sprang toward the +fire escape, carrying her mother and her little sister in her arms.'"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Two Sighs</div> + +<p>For nearly two hours, Roger read, in a deep, mellow voice, of the +adventures of poor, persecuted Crystal, who was only sixteen, and +engaged to a floor-walker in 'one of the great city's finest emporiums +of trade.' He and his mother both sighed when he came to the end of the +installment, but for vastly different reasons.</p> + +<p>"Ain't it lovely, Roger?"</p> + +<p>"It's what you might call 'different,'" he temporised, with a smile.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Just think of that poor little thing havin' her house set afire by a +rival suitor just after she had paid off the mortgage by savin' out of +her week's wages! Do you suppose he will ever win her?"</p> + +<p>"I shouldn't think it likely."</p> + +<p>"No, you wouldn't, but the endin' of those stories is always what you +wouldn't expect. It's what makes 'em so interestin' and, as you say, +'different.'"</p> + +<p>Roger did not answer. He merely yawned and tapped impatiently on the +table with his fingers.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Nine o'Clock</div> + +<p>"What time is it?" she asked, adjusting her spectacles carefully upon +the ever-useful and unfailing wart.</p> + +<p>"A little after nine."</p> + +<p>"Sakes alive! It's time I was abed. I've got to get up early in the +mornin' and set my bread. Good-night."</p> + +<p>"Good-night, Mother."</p> + +<p>"Don't set up long. Oil is terrible high."</p> + +<p>"All right, Mother."</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie went upstairs and closed her door with a resounding bang. +Roger heard her strike a match on a bit of sandpaper tacked on the wall +near the match-safe, and close the green blinds that served the purpose +of the more modern window-shades. Soon, a deep, regular sound suggestive +of comfortable slumber echoed and re-echoed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>overhead. Then, and then +only, he dared to go out.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Light in the Window</div> + +<p>He sat on the narrow front porch for a few minutes, deeply breathing the +cool air and enjoying the beauty of the night. Across the way, the +little grey house seemed lonely and forlorn. The upper windows were +dark, but downstairs Barbara's lamp still shone.</p> + +<p>"Sewing, probably," mused Roger. "Poor little thing."</p> + +<p>As he watched, the lamp was put out. Then a white shadow moved painfully +toward the window, bent, and struck a match. Star-like, Barbara's +signal-light flamed out into the gloom, with its eager message.</p> + +<p>"She wants me," he said to himself. The joy was inextricably mingled +with pain. "She wants me," he thought, "and I must not go."</p> + +<p>"Why?" asked his heart, and his conscience replied, miserably, +"Because."</p> + +<p>For ten or fifteen minutes he argued with himself, vainly. Every +objection that came forward was reasoned down by a trained mind, versed +in the intricacies of the law. The deprivations of the fathers need not +always descend unto the children. At last he went over, wondering +whether his father had not more than once, and at the same hour, taken +the same path.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Two Hours of Life</div> + +<p>Barbara was out in the garden, dreaming. For the first time in years, +when she had work <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>to do, she had laid it aside before eleven o'clock. +But, in two hours, she could have made little progress with her +embroidery, and she chose to take for herself two hours of life, out of +what might prove to be the last night she had to live.</p> + +<p>When Roger opened the gate, Barbara took her crutches and rose out of +her low chair.</p> + +<p>"Don't," he said. "I'm coming to you."</p> + +<p>She had brought out another chair, with great difficulty, in +anticipation of his coming. Her own was near the moonflower that climbed +over the tiny veranda and was now in full bloom. The white, half-open +trumpets, delicately fragrant, had more than once reminded him of +Barbara herself.</p> + +<p>"What a brute I'd be," thought Roger, with a pang, "if I had +disappointed her."</p> + +<p>"I'm so glad," said Barbara, giving him a cool, soft little hand. "I +began to be afraid you couldn't come."</p> + +<p>"I couldn't, just at first, but afterward it was all right. How are +you?"</p> + +<p>"I'm well, thank you, but I'm going to be made better to-morrow. That's +why I wanted to see you to-night—it may be for the last time."</p> + +<p>Her words struck him with chill foreboding. "What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"To-morrow, some doctors are coming down from the city, with two nurses +and a few other <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>things. They're going to see if I can't do without +these." She indicated the crutches with an inclination of her golden +head.</p> + +<p>"Barbara," he gasped. "You mustn't. It's impossible."</p> + +<p>"Nothing is impossible any more," she returned, serenely.</p> + +<p>"That isn't what I meant. You mustn't be hurt."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Wonderful World</div> + +<p>"I'm not going to be hurt—much. It's all to be done while I'm asleep. +Miss Wynne, a lady from the hotel, brought Doctor Conrad to see me. +Afterward, he came again by himself, and he says he is very sure that it +will come out all right. And when I'm straight and strong and can walk, +he's going to try to have father made to see. A fairy godmother came in +and waved her wand," went on Barbara, lightly, "and the poor became rich +at once. Now the lame are to walk and the blind to see. Is it not a +wonderful world?"</p> + +<p>"Barbara!" cried Roger; "I can't bear it. I don't want you changed—I +want you just as you are."</p> + +<p>"Such impediments as are placed in the path of progress!" she returned. +Her eyes were laughing, but her voice had in it a little note of +tenderness. "Will you do something for me?"</p> + +<p>"Anything—everything."</p> + +<p>"It's only this," said Barbara, gently. "If <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>it should turn out the +other way, will you keep father from being lonely? Miss Wynne has +promised that he shall never want for anything, and, at the most, it +couldn't be long until he was with me again, but, in the meantime, would +you, Roger? Would you try to take my place?"</p> + +<p>"Nobody in the world could ever take your place, but I'd try—God knows +I'd try. Barbara, I couldn't bear it, if——"</p> + +<p>"Hush. There isn't any 'if.' It's all coming right to-morrow."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Beauty of a Saint</div> + +<p>The full moon had swung slowly up out of the sea, and the misty, silvery +light touched Barbara lovingly. Her slender hands, crossed in her lap, +seemed like those of a little child. Her deep blue eyes were lovelier +than ever in the enchanted light—they had the calmness of deep waters +at dawn, untroubled by wind or tide. Around her face her golden hair +shimmered and shone like a halo. She had the unearthly beauty of a +saint.</p> + +<p>"Afterward?" he asked, with a little choke in his voice.</p> + +<p>"I'll be in plaster for a long time, and, after that, I'll have to learn +to walk."</p> + +<p>"And then?"</p> + +<p>"Work," she said, joyously. "Think of having all the rest of your life +to work in, with no crutches! And if Daddy can see me—" she stopped, +but he caught the wistfulness in <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span>her tone. "The first thing," she +continued, "I'm going down to the sea. I have a fancy to go alone."</p> + +<p>"Have you never been?"</p> + +<p>"I've never been outside this house and garden but once or twice. Have +you forgotten?"</p> + +<p>All the things he might have done came to Roger, remorsefully, and too +late. He might have taken Barbara out for a drive almost any time during +the last eight years. She could have been lifted into a low carriage +easily enough and she had never even been to the sea. A swift, pitying +tenderness made his heart ache.</p> + +<p>"Nobody ever thought of it," said Barbara, soothingly, as though she had +read his thought, "and, besides, I've been too busy, except Sundays. But +sometimes, when I've heard the shore singing as the tide came in, and +seen the gulls fly past my window, and smelled the salt mist—oh, I've +wanted it so."</p> + +<p>"I'd have taken you, if I hadn't been such a brute as to forget."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">More than the Sea</div> + +<p>"You've brought me more than the sea, Roger. Think of all the books +you've carried back and forth so patiently all these years. You've done +more for me than anybody in the world, in some ways. You've given me the +magic carpet of the <i>Arabian Nights</i>, only it was a book, instead of a +rug. Through your <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>kindness, I've travelled over most of the world, I've +met many of the really great people face to face, I've lived in all ages +and all countries, and I've learned to know the world as it is now. What +more could one person do for another than you have done for me?"</p> + +<p>"Barbara?" It was Miriam's voice, calling softly from an upper window. +"You mustn't stay up late. Remember to-morrow."</p> + +<p>"All right, Aunty." Her answer carried with it no hint of impatience. "I +forgot that we weren't in the house," she added, to Roger, in a low +tone.</p> + +<p>"Must I go?" To-night, for some reason, he could not bear even the +thought of leaving her.</p> + +<p>"Not just yet. I've been thinking," she continued, in a swift whisper, +"about my mother and—your father. Of course we can't understand—we +only know that they cared. And, in a way, it makes you and me something +like brother and sister, doesn't it?"</p> + +<p>"Perhaps it does. I hadn't thought of that."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Barrier Broken</div> + +<p>All at once, the barrier that seemed to have been between them crashed +down and was forgotten. Mysteriously, Roger was very sure that those +four days had held no wrong—no betrayal of another's trust. His father +would not have done anything which was not absolutely right. The thought +made him straighten himself proudly. And the mother of the girl <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>who +leaned toward him, with her beautiful soul shining in her deep eyes, +could have been nothing less than an angel.</p> + +<p>"To-morrow"—began Roger.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">"To-morrow is Mine"</div> + +<p>"To-morrow was made for me. God is giving me a day to be made straight +in. To-morrow is mine, but—will you come and stay with father? Keep him +away from the house and with you, until—afterward?"</p> + +<p>"I will, gladly."</p> + +<p>Barbara rose and Roger picked up her crutches. "You'll never have to do +that for me again," she said, as she took them, "but there'll be lots of +other things. Will you take in the chairs, please?"</p> + +<p>A lump was in his throat and he could not speak. When he came out, after +having made a brief but valiant effort to recover his self-control, +Barbara was standing at the foot of the steps, leaning on her crutches, +with the moon shining full upon her face.</p> + +<p>Roger went to her. "Barbara," he said, huskily, "my father loved your +mother. For the sake of that, and for to-morrow, will you kiss me +to-night?"</p> + +<p>Smiling, Barbara lifted her face and gave him her lips as simply and +sweetly as a child. "Good-night," she said, softly, but he could not +answer, for, at the touch, the white fire burned in his blood and the +white magic of life's Maytime went, singing, through his soul.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XI</h2> + +<h3>Barbara's "To-morrow"</h3> + + +<p>The shimmering white silence of noon lay upon the land. Bees hummed in +the clover, gorgeous butterflies floated drowsily over the meadows, and +far in the blue distance a meadow-lark scattered his golden notes like +rain upon the fields.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Cold Shadow</div> + +<p>The world teemed with life, and yet a cold shadow, as of approaching +death, darkened the souls of two who walked together in the dusty road +that led from the hills to the sea. The old man leaned heavily upon the +arm of the younger, and his footsteps faltered. The young man's face was +white and he saw dimly, as through a mist, but he tried to keep his +voice even.</p> + +<p>From the open windows of the little grey house came the deadly sweet +smell of anæsthetics, heavy with prescience and pain. It dominated, +instantly, all the blended Summer fragrances and brought terror to them +both.</p> + +<p>"I cannot bear it," said Ambrose North, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>miserably. "I cannot bear to +have my baby hurt."</p> + +<p>"She isn't being hurt now," answered Roger, with dry lips. "She's +asleep."</p> + +<p>"It may be the sleep that knows no waking. If you loved Barbara, you +would understand."</p> + +<p>The boy's senses, exquisitely alive and quivering, merged suddenly into +one unspeakable hurt. If he loved Barbara! Ah, did he not love her? What +of last night, when he walked up and down in that selfsame road until +dawn, alone with the wonder and fear and joy of it, and unutterably +dreading the to-morrow that had so swiftly become to-day.</p> + +<p>"I was a fool," muttered Ambrose North. "I was a fool to give my +consent."</p> + +<p>"It was her choice," the boy reminded him, "and when she walks——"</p> + +<p>"When she walks, it may be in the City Not Made With Hands. If I had +said 'no,' we should not be out here now, while she—" The tears +streamed over his wrinkled cheeks and his bowed shoulders shook.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">All for the Best</div> + +<p>"Don't," pleaded Roger. "It's all for the best—it must be all for the +best."</p> + +<p>Neither of them saw Eloise approaching as she came up the road from the +hotel. She was in white, as usual, bareheaded, and she carried a white +linen parasol. She went to them, calling out brightly, "Good morning!"</p> + +<p>"Who is it?" asked the old man.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It must be Miss Wynne, I think."</p> + +<p>"What is it?" inquired Eloise, when she joined them. "What is the +matter?"</p> + +<p>The blind man could not speak, but he pointed toward the house with a +shaking hand.</p> + +<p>"It's Barbara, you know," said Roger. "They're in there—cutting her." +The last words were almost a whisper.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Allan is There</div> + +<p>"But you mustn't worry," cried Eloise. "Nothing can go wrong. Why, Allan +is there."</p> + +<p>Insensibly her confidence in Allan and the clear ring of her voice +relieved the unbearable tension. Surely, Barbara could not die if Allan +were there.</p> + +<p>"It's hard, I know," Eloise went on, in her cool, even tones, "but there +is no doubt about the ending. Allan is one of the few really great +surgeons—he has done wonderful things. He has done things that everyone +else said were impossible. Barbara will walk and be as straight and +strong as any of us. Think what it will mean to her after twenty years +of helplessness. How fine it will be to see her without the crutches."</p> + +<p>"I have never minded the crutches," said Roger. "I do not want her +changed."</p> + +<p>"I cannot see her," sighed Ambrose North. "I have never seen my baby."</p> + +<p>"But you're going to," Eloise assured him,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span> "for Allan says so, and +whatever Allan says is true."</p> + +<p>At length, she managed to lead them farther away, though not out of +sight of the house, and they all sat down on the grass. She talked +continually and cheerfully, but the atmosphere was tense with waiting. +Ambrose North bowed his grey head in his hands, and Roger, still pale, +did not once take his eyes from the door of the little grey house.</p> + +<p>After what seemed an eternity, someone came out. It was one of Allan's +assistants. A nurse followed, and put a black bag into the buggy which +was waiting outside. Roger was on his feet instantly, watching.</p> + +<p>"Sit down," commanded Eloise, coolly. "Allan can see us from here, and +he will come and tell us."</p> + +<p>Ambrose North lifted his grey head. "Have they—finished—with her?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know," returned Eloise. "Be patient just a little longer, +please do."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">All Right</div> + +<p>Outwardly she was calm, but, none the less, a great sob of relief almost +choked her when Doctor Conrad came across the road to them, swinging his +black bag, and called out, in a voice high with hope, "All right!"</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The sky was a wonderful blue, but the colour of the sea was deeper +still. The vast reaches <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span>of sand were as white as the blown snow, and +the Tower of Cologne had never been so fair as it was to-day. The sun +shone brightly on the clear glass arches that made the cupola, and the +golden bells swayed back and forth silently.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Changed Tower</div> + +<p>Barbara was trying to climb up to the cupola, but her feet were weary +and she paused often to rest. The rooms that opened off from the various +landings of the winding stairway were lovelier than ever. The +furnishings had been changed since she was last there, and each room was +made to represent a different flower.</p> + +<p>There was a rose room, all in pink and green, a pond-lily room in green +and white, a violet room in green and lavender, and a gorgeous suite of +rooms which someway seemed like a great bouquet of nasturtiums. But, +strangely, there was no fragrance of cologne in the Tower. The bottles +were all on the mantels, as usual, but Barbara could not open any of +them. Instead, there was a heavy, sweet, sickening smell from which she +could not escape, though she went continually from room to room. It +followed her like some evil thing that threatened to overpower her.</p> + +<p>The Boy who had always been beside her, and whose face she could not +see, was still in the Tower, but he was far away, with his back toward +her. He seemed to be suffering and Barbara tried to get to him to +comfort <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>him, but some unforeseen obstacle inevitably loomed up in her +path.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">People in the Tower</div> + +<p>There were many people in the Tower, and most of them were old friends, +but there were some new faces. Her father was there, of course, and all +the brave knights and lovely ladies of whom she had read in her books. +Miss Wynne was there and she had never been in the Tower before, but +Barbara smiled at her and was glad, though she wished they might have +had cologne instead of the sickening smell which grew more deadly every +minute.</p> + +<p>A grave, silent young man whose demeanour was oddly at variance with his +red hair was there also. He had just come and it seemed that he was a +doctor. Barbara had heard his name but could not remember it. There were +also two young women in blue and white striped uniforms which were very +neat and becoming. They wore white caps and smiled at Barbara. She had +heard their names, too, but she had forgotten.</p> + +<p>None of them seemed to mind the heavy odour which oppressed her so. She +opened the windows in the Tower and the cool air came in from the blue +sea, but it changed nothing.</p> + +<p>"Come, Boy," she called across the intervening mist. "Let's go up to the +cupola and ring all the golden bells."</p> + +<p>He did not seem to hear, so she called again, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>and again, but there was +no response. It was the first time he had failed to answer her, and it +made her angry.</p> + +<p>"Then," cried Barbara, shrilly, "if you don't want to come, you needn't, +so there. But I'm going. Do you hear? I'm going. I'm going up to ring +those bells if I have to go alone."</p> + +<p>Still, the Boy did not answer, and Barbara, her heart warm with +resentment, began to climb the winding stairs. She did not hurry, for +pictures of castles, towers, and beautiful ladies were woven in the +tapestry that lined the walls.</p> + +<p>She came, at last, to the highest landing. There was only one short +flight between her and the cupola. The clear glass arches were dazzling +in the sun and the golden bells swayed temptingly. But a blinding, +overwhelming fog drifted in from the sea, and she was afraid to move by +so much as a step. She turned to go back, and fell, +down—down—down—into what seemed eternity.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Clouds Lift</div> + +<p>Before long, the cloud began to lift. She could see a vague suggestion +of blue and white through it now. The man with the red hair was talking, +loudly and unconcernedly, to a tall man beside him whose face was +obscured by the mist. The voices beat upon Barbara's ears with physical +pain. She tried to speak, to ask them to stop, but the words would not +come. Then she raised her hand, weakly, and silence came upon the room.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span></p> + +<p>Out of the fog rose Doctor Allan Conrad. He was tired and there was a +strained look about his eyes, but he smiled encouragingly. He leaned +over her and she smiled, very faintly, back at him.</p> + +<p>"Brave little girl," he said. "It's all right now. All we ever hoped for +is coming very soon." Then he went out, and she closed her eyes. When +she was again conscious of her surroundings, it was the next day, but +she thought she had been asleep only a few minutes.</p> + +<p>At first there was numbness of mind and body. Then, with every +heart-beat and throb by throb, came unbearable agony. A trembling old +hand strayed across her face and her father's voice, deep with love and +longing, whispered: "Barbara, my darling! Does it hurt you now?"</p> + +<p>"Just a little, Daddy, but it won't last long. I'll be better very +soon."</p> + +<p>One of the blue and white nurses came to her and said, gently, "Is it +very bad, Miss North?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Intense Pain</div> + +<p>"Pretty bad," she gasped. Then she tried to smile, but her white lips +quivered piteously. The woman with the kind, calm face came back with a +shining bit of silver in her hand. There was a sharp stab in Barbara's +arm, and then, with incredible quickness, peace.</p> + +<p>"What was it?" she asked, wondering.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Poppies," answered the nurse. "They bring forgetfulness."</p> + +<p>"Barbara," said the old man, sadly, "I wish I could help you bear +it——"</p> + +<p>"So you can, Daddy."</p> + +<p>"But how?"</p> + +<p>"Don't be afraid for me—it's coming out all right. And make me a little +song."</p> + +<p>"I couldn't—to-day."</p> + +<p>"There is always a song," she reminded him. "Think how many times you +have said to me, 'Always make a song, Barbara, no matter what comes.'"</p> + +<p>The old man stirred uneasily in his chair. "What about, dear?"</p> + +<p>"About the sea."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Song of the Sea</div> + +<p>"The sea is so vast that it reaches around the world," he began, +hesitatingly. "It sings upon the shore of every land, from the regions +of perpetual ice and snow to the far tropic islands, where the sun +forever shines. As it lies under the palms, all blue and silver, +crooning so softly that you can scarcely hear it, you would not think it +was the same sea that yesterday was raging upon an ice-bound shore.</p> + +<p>"If you listen to its ever-changing music you can hear almost anything +you please, for the sea goes everywhere. Ask, and the sea shall sing to +you of the frozen north where half the year is darkness and the +impassable waste of waters sweeps across the pole. Ask, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>you shall +hear of the distant islands, where there has never been snow, and the +tide may even bring to you a bough of olive or a leaf of palm.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Song of the Sea</div> + +<p>"Ask, and the sea will give you red and white coral, queer shells, +mystically filled with its own weird music, and treasures of fairy-like +lace-work and bloom. It will sing to you of cool, green caves where the +waves creep sleepily up to the rocks and drift out drowsily with the ebb +of the tide.</p> + +<p>"It will sing of grey waves changing to foam in the path of the wind, +and bring you the cry of the white gulls that speed ahead of the storm. +It will sing to you of mermen and mermaids, chanting their own melodies +to the accompaniment of harps with golden strings. Listen, and you shall +hear the songs of many lands, merged into one by the sea that unites +them all.</p> + +<p>"It bears upon its breast the great white ships that carry messages from +one land to another. Silks and spices and pearls are taken from place to +place along the vast highways of the sea. And if, sometimes, in a +blinding tumult of terror and despair, the men and ships go down, the +sea, remorsefully, brings back the broken spars, and, at last, gives up +the dead.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Dominant Chord</div> + +<p>"Yet it is always beautiful, whether you see it grey or blue; whether it +is mad with rage or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span> moaning with pain, or only crooning a lullaby as +the world goes to sleep. And in all the wonderful music there is one +dominant chord, for the song of the sea, as of the world, is Love.</p> + +<p>"Long ago, Barbara—so long ago that it is written in only the very +oldest books, Love was born in the foam of the sea and came to dwell +upon the shore. And so the sea, singing forever of Love, creeps around +the world upon an unending quest. When the tide sweeps in with the cold +grey waves, foam-crested, or in shining sapphire surges that break into +pearls, it is only the sea searching eagerly for the lost. So the +loneliness and the beauty, the longing and the pain, belong to Love as +to the sea."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Daddy," breathed Barbara, "I want it so."</p> + +<p>"What, dear? The sea?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. The music and the colour and the vastness of it. I can hardly wait +until I can go."</p> + +<p>There was a long silence. "Why didn't you tell me?" asked the old man. +"There would have been some way, if I had only known."</p> + +<p>"I don't know, Daddy. I think I've been waiting for this way, for it's +the best way, after all. When I can walk and you can see, we'll go down +together, shall we?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, dear, surely."</p> + +<p>"You must help me be patient, Daddy.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span> It will be so hard for me to lie +here, doing nothing."</p> + +<p>"I wish I could read to you."</p> + +<p>"You can talk to me, and that's better. Roger will come over some day +and read to me, when he has time."</p> + +<p>"He was with me yesterday, while——"</p> + +<p>"I know," she answered, softly. "I asked him. I thought it would make it +easier for you."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Father and Daughter</div> + +<p>"My baby! You thought of your old father even then?"</p> + +<p>"I'm always thinking of you, Daddy, because you and I are all each other +has got. That sounds queer, but you know what I mean."</p> + +<p>The calm, strong young woman in blue and white came back into the room. +"She mustn't talk," she said, to the blind man. "To-morrow, perhaps. +Come away now."</p> + +<p>"Don't take him away from me," pleaded Barbara. "We'll be very good and +not say a single word, won't we?"</p> + +<p>"Not a word," he answered, "if it isn't best."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Peaceful Sleep</div> + +<p>The afternoon wore away to sunset, the shadows grew long, and Barbara +lay quietly, with her little hand in his. Long lines of light came over +the hills and brought into the room some subtle suggestion of colour. +Gradually, the pain came back, so keenly that it was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>not to be borne, +and the kind woman with the bit of silver in her hand leaned over the +bed once more. Quickly, the poppies brought their divine gift of peace +again. And so, Barbara slept.</p> + +<p>Then Ambrose North gently loosened the still fingers that were +interlaced with his, bent over, and, so gently as not to waken her, took +her boy-lover's kiss from her lips.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XII</h2> + +<h3>Miriam</h3> + + +<p>Miriam moved about the house, silently, as always. She had assumed the +extra burden of Barbara's helplessness as she assumed +everything—without comment, and with outward calm.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Joy and Duty</div> + +<p>Only her dark eyes, that burned and glittered so strangely, gave hint of +the restlessness within. She served Ambrose North with steadfast and +unfailing devotion; she waited upon Barbara mechanically, but readily. +An observer could not have detected any real difference in her bearing +toward the two, yet the service of one was a joy, the other a duty.</p> + +<p>After the first week the nurse who had remained with Barbara had gone +back to the city. In this short time, Miriam had learned much from her. +She knew how to change a sheet without disturbing the patient very much; +she could give Barbara both food and drink as she lay flat upon her +back, and ease <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span>her aching body a little in spite of the plaster cast.</p> + +<p>Ambrose North restlessly haunted the house and refused to leave +Barbara's bedside unless she was asleep. Often she feigned slumber to +give him opportunity to go outdoors for the exercise he was accustomed +to taking. And so the life of the household moved along in its usual +channels.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Living Image</div> + +<p>As she lay helpless, with her pretty colour gone and the great braids of +golden hair hanging down on either side, Barbara looked more like her +dead mother than ever. Suffering had brought maturity to her face and +sometimes even Miriam was startled by the resemblance. One day Barbara +had asked, thoughtfully, "Aunty, do I look like my mother?" And Miriam +had answered, harshly, "You're the living image of her, if you want to +know."</p> + +<p>Miriam repeatedly told herself that Constance had wronged her—that +Ambrose North had belonged to her until the younger girl came from +school with her pretty, laughing ways. He had never had eyes for Miriam +after he had once seen Constance, and, in an incredibly short time, they +had been married.</p> + +<p>Miriam had been forced to stand by and see it; she had made dainty +garments for Constance's trousseau, and had even been obliged to serve +as maid of honour at the wedding. She had seen, day by day, the man's +love <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>increase and the girl's fancy wane, and, after his blindness came +upon him, Constance would often have been cruelly thoughtless had not +Miriam sternly held her to her own ideal of wifely duty.</p> + +<p>Now, when she had taken a mother's place to Barbara, and worked for the +blind man as his wife would never have dreamed of doing, she saw the +faithless one worshipped almost as a household god. The power to +disillusionise North lay in her hands—of that she was very sure. What +if she should come to him some day with the letter Constance had left +for another man and which she had never delivered? What if she should +open it, at his bidding, and read him the burning sentences Constance +had written to another during her last hour on earth? Knowing, beyond +doubt, that Constance was faithless, would he at last turn to the woman +he had deserted for the sake of a pretty face? The question racked +Miriam by night and by day.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miriam's Jealousy</div> + +<p>And, as always, the dead Constance, mute, accusing, bitterly +reproachful, haunted her dreams. Her fear of it became an obsession. As +Barbara grew daily more to resemble her mother, Miriam's position became +increasingly difficult and complex.</p> + +<p>Sometimes she waited outside the door until she could summon courage to +go in to Barbara, who lay, helpless, in the very room where her <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>mother +had died. Miriam never entered without seeing upon the dressing table +those two envelopes, one addressed to Ambrose North and one to herself. +Her own envelope was bulky, since it contained two letters beside the +short note which might have been read to anybody. These two, with seals +unbroken, were safely put away in Miriam's room.</p> + +<p>One was addressed to Laurence Austin. Miriam continually told herself +that it was impossible for her to deliver it—that the person to whom it +was addressed was dead. She tried persistently to forget the five years +that had intervened between Constance's death and his. For five years, +he had lived almost directly across the street and Miriam saw him daily. +Yet she had not given him the letter, though the vision of Constance, +dumbly pleading for some boon, had distressed her almost every night +until Laurence Austin died.</p> + +<p>After that, there had been peace—but only for a little while. Constance +still came, though intermittently, and reproached Miriam for betraying +her trust.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The One Betrayal</div> + +<p>As Barbara's twenty-second birthday approached, Miriam sometimes +wondered whether Constance would not cease to haunt her after the other +letter was delivered. She had been faithful in all things but +one—surely she might be forgiven the one betrayal. The envelope was +addressed, in a clear, unfaltering hand:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span> "To My Daughter Barbara. To be +opened upon her twenty-second birthday." In her brief note to Miriam, +Constance had asked her to destroy it unopened if Barbara should not +live until the appointed day.</p> + +<p>She had said nothing, however, about the other letter—had not even +alluded to its existence. Yet there it was, apparently written upon a +single sheet of paper and enclosed in an envelope firmly sealed with +wax. The monogram, made of the interlaced initials "C.N.," still +lingered upon the seal. For twenty years and more the letter had waited, +unread, and the hands that once would eagerly have torn it open were +long since made one with the all-hiding, all-absolving dust.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="sidenote">At Supper</div> + +<p>At supper, Ambrose North still had his fine linen and his Satsuma cup. +Miriam sat at the other end, where the coarse cloth and the heavy dishes +were. She used the fine china for Barbara, also, washing it carefully +six times every day.</p> + +<p>The blind man ate little, for he was lonely without the consciousness +that Barbara sat, smiling, across the table from him.</p> + +<p>"Is she asleep?" he asked, of Miriam.</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"She hasn't had her supper yet, has she?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span></p> + +<p>"When she wakes, will you let me take it up to her?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, if you want to."</p> + +<p>"Miriam, tell me—does Barbara look like her mother?" His voice was full +of love and longing.</p> + +<p>"There may be a slight resemblance," Miriam admitted.</p> + +<p>"But how much?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Same Old Question</div> + +<p>A curious, tigerish impulse possessed Miriam. He had asked her this same +question many times and she had always eluded him with a vague +generalisation.</p> + +<p>"How much does she resemble her mother?" he insisted. "You told me once +that they were 'something alike.'"</p> + +<p>"That was a long time ago," answered Miriam. She was breathing hard and +her eyes glittered. "Barbara has changed lately."</p> + +<p>"Don't hide the truth for fear of hurting me," he pleaded. "Once for all +I ask you—does Barbara resemble her mother?"</p> + +<p>For a moment Miriam paused, then all her hatred of the dead woman rose +up within her. "No," she said, coldly. "Their hair and eyes are nearly +the same colour, but they are not in the least alike. Why? What +difference does it make?"</p> + +<p>"None," sighed the blind man. "But I am glad to have the truth at last, +and I thank you. Sometimes I have fancied, when Barbara spoke, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>that it +was Constance talking to me. It would have been a great satisfaction to +me to have had my baby the living image of her mother, since I am to see +again, but it is all right as it is."</p> + +<p>Since he was to see! Miriam had not counted upon that possibility, and +she clenched her hands in swift remorse. If he should discover that she +had lied to him, he would never forgive her, and she would lose what +little regard he had for her. He had a Puritan insistence upon the +literal truth.</p> + +<p>"How beautiful Constance was," he sighed. An inarticulate murmur escaped +from Miriam, which he took for full assent.</p> + +<p>"Did you ever see anyone half so beautiful, Miriam?"</p> + +<p>Her throat was parched, but Miriam forced herself to whisper, "No." This +much was truth.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Beautiful Bride</div> + +<p>"How sweet she was and what pretty ways she had," he went on. "Do you +remember how lovely she was in her wedding gown?"</p> + +<p>Again Miriam forced herself to answer, "Yes."</p> + +<p>"Do you remember how people said we were mismated—that a man of fifty +could never hope to keep the love of a girl of twenty, who knew nothing +of the world?"</p> + +<p>"I remember," muttered Miriam.</p> + +<p>"And it was false, wasn't it?" he asked, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>hungering for assurance. +"Constance loved me—do you remember how dearly she loved me?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Beloved Constance</div> + +<p>A thousand words struggled for utterance, but Miriam could not speak +just then. She longed, as never before, to tear open the envelope +addressed to Laurence Austin and read to North the words his beloved +Constance had written to another man before she took her own life. She +longed to tell him how, for months previous, she had followed Constance +when she left the house, and discovered that she had a trysting-place +down on the shore. He wanted the truth, did he? Very well, he should +have it—the truth without mercy.</p> + +<p>"Constance," she began, huskily, "Constance loved——"</p> + +<p>"I know," interrupted Ambrose North. "I know how dearly she loved me up +to the very last. Even Barbara, baby that she was, felt it. She +remembers it still."</p> + +<p>Barbara's bell tinkled upstairs while he said the last words. "She wants +us," he said, his face illumined with love. "If you will prepare her +supper, Miriam, I will take it up."</p> + +<p>The room swayed before Miriam's eyes and her senses were confused. She +had drawn her dagger to strike and it had been forced back into its +sheath by some unseen hand. "But I will," she repeated to herself again +and again as her trembling hands prepared Barbara's <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span>tray. "He shall +know the truth—and from me."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>"Barbara," said the old man, as he entered the room, "your Daddy has +brought up your supper."</p> + +<p>"I'm glad," she responded, brightly. "I'm very hungry."</p> + +<p>"We have been talking downstairs of your mother," he went on, as he set +down the tray. "Miriam has been telling me how beautiful she was, what +winning ways she had, and how dearly she loved us. She says you do not +look at all like her, Barbara, and we both have been thinking that you +did."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Disappointed</div> + +<p>Barbara was startled. Only a few days ago, Aunt Miriam had assured her +that she was the living image of her mother. She was perplexed and +disappointed. Then she reflected that when she had asked the question +she had been very ill and Aunt Miriam was trying to answer in a way that +pleased her. She generously forgave the deceit for the sake of the +kindly motive behind it.</p> + +<p>"Dear Aunt Miriam," said Barbara, softly. "How good she has been to us, +Daddy."</p> + +<p>"Yes," he replied; "I do not know what we should have done without her. +I want to do something for her, dear. Shall we buy her a diamond ring, +or some pearls?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span></p> + +<p>"We'll see, Daddy. When I can walk, and you can see, we shall do many +things together that we cannot do now."</p> + +<p>The old man bent down very near her. "Flower of the Dusk," he whispered, +"when may I go?"</p> + +<p>"Go where, Daddy?"</p> + +<p>"To the city, you know, with Doctor Conrad. I want to begin to see."</p> + +<p>Barbara patted his hand. "When I am strong enough to spare you," she +said, "I will let you go. When you see me, I want to be well and able to +go to meet you without crutches. Will you wait until then?"</p> + +<p>"I want to see my baby. I do not care about the crutches, now that you +are to get well. I want to see you, dear, so very, very much."</p> + +<p>"Some day, Daddy," she promised him. "Wait until I'm almost well, won't +you?"</p> + +<p>"Just as you say, dear, but it seems so long."</p> + +<p>"I couldn't spare you now, Daddy. I want you with me every day."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="sidenote">Miriam's Prayer</div> + +<p>Though long unused to prayer, Miriam prayed that night, very earnestly, +that Ambrose North might not recover his sight; that he might never see +the daughter who lived and spoke in the likeness of her dead mother. It +was long past <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span>midnight when she fell asleep. The house had been quiet +for several hours.</p> + +<p>As she slept, she dreamed. The door opened quietly, yet with a certain +authority, and Constance, in her grave-clothes, came into her room. The +white gown trailed behind her as she walked, and the two golden braids, +so like Barbara's, hung down over either shoulder and far below her +waist.</p> + +<p>She fixed her deep, sad eyes upon Miriam, reproachfully, as always, but +her red lips were curled in a mocking smile. "Do your worst," she seemed +to say. "You cannot harm me now."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Vision</div> + +<p>The vision sat down in a low chair and rocked back and forth, slowly, as +though meditating. Occasionally, she looked at Miriam doubtfully, but +the mocking smile was still there. At last Constance rose, having come, +apparently, to some definite plan. She went to the dresser, opened the +lower drawer, and reached under the pile of neatly-folded clothing.</p> + +<p>Cold as ice, Miriam sprang to her feet. She was wide awake now, but the +room was empty. The door was open, half-way, and she could not remember +whether she had left it so when she went to bed. She had always kept her +bedroom door closed and locked, but since Barbara's illness had left it +at least ajar, that she might be able to hear a call in the night.</p> + +<p>Shaken like an aspen in a storm, Miriam <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>lighted her candle and stared +into the shadows. Nothing was there. The clock ticked steadily—almost +maddeningly. It was just four o'clock.</p> + +<p>She, too, opened the lower drawer of the dresser and thrust her hand +under the clothing. The letters were still there. She drew them out, her +hands trembling, and read the superscriptions with difficulty, for the +words danced, and made themselves almost illegible.</p> + +<p>Constance was coming back for the letters, then? That was out of +Miriam's power to prevent, but she would keep the knowledge of their +contents—at least of one. She thrust aside contemptuously the letter to +Barbara—she cared nothing for that.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Seal Broken</div> + +<p>Taking the one addressed to "Mr. Laurence Austin; Kindness of Miss +Leonard," she went back to bed, taking her candle to the small table +that stood at the head of the bed. With forced calmness, she broke the +seal which the dead fingers had made so long ago, opened it shamelessly, +and read it.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"You who have loved me since the beginning of +time," the letter began, "will understand and +forgive me for what I do to-day. I do it because I +am not strong enough to go on and do my duty by +those who need me.</p> + +<p>"If there should be meeting past the grave, some +day you and I shall come together again <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>with no +barrier between us. I take with me the knowledge +of your love, which has sheltered and strengthened +and sustained me since the day we first met, and +which must make even a grave warm and sweet.</p> + +<p>"And, remember this—dead though I am, I love you +still; you and my little lame baby who needs me so +and whom I must leave because I am not strong +enough to stay. </p> + +<div class='right'> +<span style="margin-right: 7em;">"Through life and in death and eternally,</span><br /><br /> +<span style="margin-right: 5em;">"Yours,</span><br /><br /> +"<span class="smcap">Constance</span>."<br /> +</div></div> + +<p>In the letter was enclosed a long, silken tress of golden hair. It +curled around Miriam's fingers as though it were alive, and she thrust +it from her. It was cold and smooth and sinuous, like a snake. She +folded up the letter, put it back in the envelope with the lock of hair, +then returned it to its old hiding-place, with Barbara's.</p> + +<p>"So, Constance," she said to herself, "you came for the letters? Come +and take them when you like—I do not fear you now."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Evidence</div> + +<p>All of her suspicions were crystallised into certainty by this one page +of proof. Constance might not have violated the letter of her marriage +vow—very probably had not even dreamed of it—but in spirit, she had +been false.</p> + +<p>"Come, Constance," said Miriam, aloud;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span> "come and take your letters. +When the hour comes, I shall tell him, and you cannot keep me from it."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Triumph</div> + +<p>She was curiously at peace, now, and no longer afraid. Her dark eyes +blazed with triumph as she lay there in the candle light. The tension +within her had snapped when suspicion gave way to absolute knowledge. +Thwarted and denied and pushed aside all her life by Constance and her +memory, at last she had come to her own.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XIII</h2> + +<h3>"Woman Suffrage"</h3> + + +<p>There was a shuffling step on the stairway, accompanied by spasmodic +shrieks and an occasional "ouch." Roger looked up from his book in +surprise as Miss Mattie made her painful way into the room.</p> + +<p>"Why, Mother. What's the matter?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miss Mattie's Back</div> + +<p>Miss Mattie sat down in the chair she had made out of a flour barrel and +screamed as she did so. "What is it?" he demanded. "Are you ill?"</p> + +<p>"Roger," she replied, "my back is either busted, or the hinge in it is +rusty from overwork. I stooped over to open the lower drawer in my +bureau, and when I come to rise up, I couldn't. I've been over half an +hour comin' downstairs. I called you twice, but you didn't hear me, and +I knowed you was readin', so I thought I might better save my voice to +yell with."</p> + +<p>"I'm sorry," he said. "What can I do for you?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span></p> + +<p>"About the first thing to do, I take it, is to put down that book. Now, +if you'll put on your hat, you can go and get that new-fangled doctor +from the city. The postmaster's wife told me yesterday that he'd sent +Barbara one of them souverine postal cards and said on it he'd be down +last night. As you go, you might stop and tell the Norths that he's +comin', for they don't go after their mail much and most likely it's +still there in the box. Tell Barbara that the card has a picture of a +terrible high buildin' on it and the street is full of carriages, both +horsed and unhorsed. If he can make the lame walk and the blind see, I +reckon he can fix my back. I'll set here."</p> + +<p>"Shan't I get someone to stay with you while I'm gone, Mother? I don't +like to leave you here alone. Miss Miriam would——"</p> + +<p>"Miss Miriam," interrupted his mother, "ain't fit company for a horse or +cow, let alone a sufferin' woman. She just sets and stares and never +says nothin'. I have to do all the talkin' and I'm in no condition to +talk. You run along and let me set here in peace. It don't hurt so much +when I set still."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Roger's Errand</div> + +<p>Roger obediently started on his errand, but met Doctor Conrad half-way. +The two had never been formally introduced, but Roger knew him, and the +Doctor remembered Roger as "the nice boy" who was with Ambrose<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span> North +and Eloise when he went over to tell them that Barbara was all right.</p> + +<p>"Why, yes," said Allan. "If it's an emergency case, I'll come there +first. After I see what's the matter, I'll go over to North's and then +come back. I seem to be getting quite a practice in Riverdale."</p> + +<p>When they went in, Roger introduced Doctor Conrad to the patient. +"You'll excuse my not gettin' up," said Miss Mattie, "for it's about the +gettin' up that I wanted to see you. Roger, you run away. It ain't +proper for boys to be standin' around listenin' when woman suffrage is +bein' discussed by the only people havin' any right to talk of it—women +and doctors."</p> + +<p>Roger coloured to his temples as he took his hat and hurried out. With +an effort Doctor Conrad kept his face straight, but his eyes were +laughing.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">What's Wrong?</div> + +<p>"Now, what's wrong?" asked Allan, briefly, as Roger closed the door.</p> + +<p>"It's my back," explained the patient. "It's busted. It busted all of a +sudden."</p> + +<p>"Was it when you were stooping over, perhaps to pick up something?"</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie stared at him in astonishment. "Are you a mind-reader, or +did Roger tell you?"</p> + +<p>"Neither," smiled Allan. "Did a sharp pain come in the lumbar region +when you attempted to straighten up?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span></p> + +<p>"'Twan't the lumber room. I ain't been in the attic for weeks, though I +expect it needs straightenin'. It was in my bedroom. I was stoopin' over +to open a bureau drawer, and when I riz up, I found my back was busted."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Prescription</div> + +<p>"I see," said Allan. He was already writing a prescription. "If your son +will go down and get this filled, you will have no more trouble. Take +two every four hours."</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie took the bit of paper anxiously. "No surgical operation?" +she asked.</p> + +<p>"No," laughed Allan.</p> + +<p>"No mortar piled up on me and left to set? No striped nurses?"</p> + +<p>"No plaster cast," Allan assured her, "and no striped nurses."</p> + +<p>"I reckon it ain't none of my business," remarked Miss Mattie, "but why +didn't you do somethin' like this for Barbara instead of cuttin' her up? +I'm worse off than she ever was, because she could walk right spry with +crutches, and crutches wouldn't have helped me none when I was risin' up +from the bureau drawer."</p> + +<p>"Barbara's case is different. She had a congenital dislocation of the +femur."</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie's jaw dropped, but she quickly recovered herself. "And what +have I got?"</p> + +<p>"Lumbago."</p> + +<p>"My disease is shorter," she commented, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span>after a moment of reflection, +"but I'll bet it feels worse."</p> + +<p>"I'll ask your son to come in if I see him," said Doctor Conrad, +reaching for his hat, "and if you don't get well immediately, let me +know. Good-bye."</p> + +<p>Roger was nowhere in sight, but he was watching the two houses, and as +soon as he saw Doctor Conrad go into North's, he went back to his +mother.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miss Mattie's "Disease"</div> + +<p>"Barbara's disease has three words in it, Roger," she explained, "and +mine has only one, but it's more painful. You're to go immediately with +this piece of paper and get it full of the medicine he's written on it. +I've been lookin' at it, but I don't get no sense out of it. He said to +take two every four hours—two what?"</p> + +<p>"Pills, probably, or capsules."</p> + +<p>"Pills? Now, Roger, you know that no pill small enough to swallow could +cure a big pain like this in my back. The postmaster's wife had the +rheumatiz last Winter, and she took over five quarts of Old Doctor +Jameson's Pain Killer, and it never did her a mite of good. What do you +think a paper that size, full of pills, can do for a person that ain't +able to stand up without screechin'?"</p> + +<p>"Well, we'll try it anyway, Mother. Just sit still until I come back +with the medicine."</p> + +<p>He went out and returned, presently, with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>a red box containing forty or +fifty capsules. Miss Mattie took it from him and studied it carefully. +"This box ain't more'n a tenth as big as the pain," she observed +critically.</p> + +<p>Roger brought a glass of water and took out two of the capsules. "Take +these," he said, "and at half past two, take two more. Let's give Doctor +Conrad a fair trial. It's probably a more powerful medicine than it +seems to be."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Difficulty</div> + +<p>Miss Mattie had some difficulty at first, as she insisted on taking both +capsules at once, but when she was persuaded to swallow one after the +other, all went well. "I suppose," she remarked, "that these long narrow +pills have to be took endways. If a person went to swallow 'em +crossways, they'd choke to death. I was careful how I took 'em, but +other people might not be, and I think, myself, that round pills are +safer."</p> + +<p>"I went to the office," said Roger, "and told the Judge I wouldn't be +down to-day. I have some work I can do at home, and I'd rather not leave +you."</p> + +<p>"It's just come to my mind now," mused Miss Mattie, ignoring his +thoughtfulness, "about the minister's sermon Sunday. He said that +everything that came to us might teach us something if we only looked +for it. I've been thinkin' as I set here, what a heap I've learned about +my back this mornin'. I never sensed, until now, that it was used in +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span>walkin'. I reckoned that my back was just kind of a finish to me and +was to keep the dust out of my vital organs more'n anything else. This +mornin' I see that the back is entirely used in walkin'. What gets me is +that Barbara North had to have crutches when her back was all right. +Nothin' was out of kilter but her legs, and only one of 'em at that."</p> + +<p>"Here's your paper, Mother." Roger pulled <i>The Metropolitan Weekly</i> out +of his pocket.</p> + +<p>"Lay it down on the table, please. It oughtn't to have come until +to-morrow. I ain't got time for it now."</p> + +<p>"Why, Mother? Don't you want to read?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Proper Care</div> + +<p>The knot of hair on the back of Miss Mattie's head seemed to rise, and +her protruding wire hairpins bristled. "I should think you'd know," she +said, indignantly, "when you've been takin' time from the law to read +your pa's books to Barbara North, that no sick person has got the +strength to read. Even if my disease is only in one word when hers is in +three, I reckon I'm goin' to take proper care of myself."</p> + +<p>"But you're sitting up and she can't," explained Roger, kindly.</p> + +<p>"Sittin' up or not sittin' up ain't got nothin' to do with it. If my +back was set in mortar as it ought to have been, I wouldn't be settin' +up either. I can't get up without screamin', and as long as I've knowed +Barbara she's <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span>never been that bad. That new-fangled doctor hasn't come +out of North's yet, either. How much do you reckon he charges for a +visit?"</p> + +<p>"Two or three dollars, I suppose."</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie clucked sharply with her false teeth. "'Cordin' to that," +she calculated, "he was here about twenty cents' worth. But I'm willin' +to give him a quarter—that's a nickel extra for the time he was writin' +out the recipe for them long narrow pills that would choke anybody but a +horse if they happened to go down crossways. There he comes, now. If he +don't come here of his own accord, you go out and get him, Roger. I want +he should finish his visit."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Doctor's Visit</div> + +<p>But it was not necessary for Roger to go. "Of his own accord," Doctor +Conrad came across the street and opened the creaky white gate. When he +came in, he brought with him the atmosphere of vitality and good cheer. +He had, too, that gentle sympathy which is the inestimable gift of the +physician, and which requires no words to make itself felt.</p> + +<p>His quick eye noted the box of capsules upon the table, as he sat down +and took Miss Mattie's rough, work-worn hand in his. "How is it?" he +asked. "Better?"</p> + +<p>"Mebbe," she answered, grudgingly. "No more'n a mite, though."</p> + +<p>"That's all we can expect so soon. By <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>to-morrow morning, though, you +should be all right." His manner unconsciously indicated that it would +be the one joy of a hitherto desolate existence if Miss Mattie should be +perfectly well again in the morning.</p> + +<p>"How's my fellow sufferer?" she inquired, somewhat mollified.</p> + +<p>"Barbara? She's doing very well. She's a brave little thing."</p> + +<p>"Which is the sickest—her or me?"</p> + +<p>"As regards actual pain," replied Doctor Conrad, tactfully, "you are +probably suffering more than she is at the present moment."</p> + +<p>"I knowed it," cried Miss Mattie triumphantly. "Do you hear that, +Roger?"</p> + +<p>But Roger had slipped out, remembering that "woman suffrage" was not a +proper subject for discussion in his hearing.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Wanderin' Fits</div> + +<p>"I reckon he's gone over to North's," grumbled Miss Mattie. "When my eye +ain't on him, he scoots off. His pa was the same way. He was forever +chasin' over there and Roger's inherited it from him. Whenever I've +wanted either of 'em, they've always been took with wanderin' fits."</p> + +<p>"You sent him out before," Allan reminded her.</p> + +<p>"So I did, but I ain't sent him out now and he's gone just the same. +That's the trouble. After you once get an idea into a man's head, it +stays put. You can't never get it out again.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span> And ideas that other +people puts in is just the same."</p> + +<p>"Women change their minds more easily, don't they?" asked Allan. He was +enjoying himself very much.</p> + +<p>"Of course. There's nothin' set about a woman unless she's got a busted +back. She ain't carin' to move around much then. The postmaster's wife +was tellin' me about one of the women at the hotel—the one that's +writin' the book. Do you know her?"</p> + +<p>"I've probably seen her."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">All a Mistake</div> + +<p>"The postmaster's wife's bunion was a hurtin' her awful one day when +this woman come in after stamps, and she told her to go and help herself +and put the money in the drawer. So she did, and while she was doin' it +she told the postmaster's wife that she didn't have no bunion and no +pain—that it was all a mistake."</p> + +<p>"'You wouldn't think so,' says the postmaster's wife, 'if it was your +foot that had the mistake on it.' She was awful mad at first, but, after +she got calmed down, the book-woman told her what she meant."</p> + +<p>"'There ain't no pain nor disease in the world,' she says. 'It's all +imagination.'</p> + +<p>"'Well,' says the postmaster's wife, 'when the swellin' is so bad, how'm +I to undeceive myself?'</p> + +<p>"The book-woman says: 'Just deny it, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span>affirm the existence of good. +You just set down and say to yourself: "I can't have no bunion cause +there ain't no such thing, and it can't hurt me because there is no such +thing as pain. My foot is perfectly well and strong. I will get right up +and walk."'</p> + +<p>"As soon as the woman was gone out with her stamps, the postmaster's +wife tried it and like to have fainted dead away. She said she might +have been able to convince her mind that there wasn't no bunion on her +foot, but she couldn't convince her foot. She said there wasn't no such +thing as pain, and the bunion made it its first business to do a little +denyin' on its own account. You have to be awful careful not to offend a +bunion.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Test</div> + +<p>"This mornin', while Roger was gone after them long, narrow pills that +has to be swallowed endways unless you want to choke to death, I +reckoned I'd try it on my back. So I says, right out loud: 'My back +don't hurt me. It is all imagination. I can't have no pain because there +ain't no such thing.' Then I stood up right quick, and—Lord!"</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie shook her head sadly at the recollection. "Do you know," she +went on, thoughtfully, "I wish that woman at the hotel had lumbago?"</p> + +<p>Doctor Conrad's nice brown eyes twinkled, and his mouth twitched, ever +so slightly. "I'm afraid I do, too," he said.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span></p> + +<p>"If she did, and wanted some of them long narrow pills, would you give +'em to her?"</p> + +<p>"Probably, but I'd be strongly tempted not to."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Surprise</div> + +<p>When he took his leave, Miss Mattie, from force of habit, rose from her +chair. "Ouch!" she said, as she slowly straightened up. "Why, I do +believe it's better. It don't hurt nothin' like so much as it did."</p> + +<p>"Your surprise isn't very flattering, Mrs. Austin, but I'll forgive you. +The next time I come up, I'll take another look at you. Good-bye."</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie made her way slowly over to the table where the box of +capsules lay, and returned, with some effort, to her chair. She studied +both the box and its contents faithfully, once with her spectacles, and +once without. "You'd never think," she mused, "that a pill of that size +and shape could have any effect on a big pain that's nowheres near your +stomach. He must be a dreadful clever young man, for it sure is a +searchin' medicine."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XIV</h2> + +<h3>Barbara's Birthday</h3> + + +<p>"Fairy Godmother," said Barbara, "I should like a drink."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Fairy Godchild</div> + +<p>"Fairy Godchild," answered Eloise, "you shall have one. What do you +want—rose-dew, lilac-honey, or a golden lily full of clear, cool +water?"</p> + +<p>"I'll take the water, please," laughed Barbara, "but I want more than a +lily full."</p> + +<p>Eloise brought a glass of water and managed to give it to Barbara +without spilling more than a third of it upon her. "What a pretty neck +and what glorious shoulders you have," she commented, as she wiped up +the water with her handkerchief. "How lovely you'd look in an evening +gown."</p> + +<p>"Don't try to divert me," said Barbara, with affected sternness. "I'm +wet, and I'm likely to take cold and die."</p> + +<p>"I'm not afraid of your dying after you've lived through what you have. +Allan says you're the bravest little thing he has ever seen."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span></p> + +<p>The deep colour dyed Barbara's pale face. "I'm not brave," she +whispered; "I was horribly afraid, but I thought that, even if I were, I +could keep people from knowing it."</p> + +<p>"If that isn't real courage," Eloise assured her, "it's so good an +imitation that it would take an expert to tell the difference."</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid now," continued Barbara. Her colour was almost gone and she +did not look at Eloise. "I'm afraid that, after all, I can never walk." +She indicated the crutches at the foot of her bed by a barely +perceptible nod. "I have Aunt Miriam keep them there so that I won't +forget."</p> + +<p>"Nonsense," cried Eloise. "Allan says that you have every possible +chance, so don't be foolish. You're going to walk—you must walk. Why, +you mustn't even think of anything else."</p> + +<p>"It would seem strange," sighed Barbara, "after almost twenty-two years, +why—what day of the month is to-day?"</p> + +<p>"The sixteenth."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Twenty-two</div> + +<p>"Then it is twenty-two. This is my birthday—I'm twenty-two years old +to-day."</p> + +<p>"Fairy Godchild, why didn't you tell me?"</p> + +<p>"Because I'd forgotten it myself."</p> + +<p>"You're too young to begin to forget your birthdays. I'm past thirty, +but I still 'keep tab' on mine."</p> + +<p>"If you're thirty, I must be at least forty, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>for I'm really much older +than you are. And Roger is an infant in arms compared with me."</p> + +<p>"Wise lady, how did you grow so old in so short a time?"</p> + +<p>"By working and reading, and thinking—and suffering, I suppose."</p> + +<p>"When you're well, dear, I'm going to try to give you some of the +girlhood you've never had. You're entitled to pretty gowns and parties +and beaux, and all the other things that belong to the teens and +twenties. You're coming to town with me, I hope—that's why I'm +staying."</p> + +<p>Barbara's blue eyes filled and threatened to overflow. "Oh, Fairy +Godmother, how lovely it would be. But I can't go. I must stay here and +sew and try to make up for lost time. Besides, father would miss me so."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Wait and See</div> + +<p>Eloise only smiled, for she had plans of her own for father. "We won't +argue," she said, lightly, "we'll wait and see. It's a great mistake to +try to live to-morrow, or even yesterday, to-day."</p> + +<p>When Eloise went back to the hotel, her generous heart full of plans for +her protégé, Miriam did not hear her go out, and so it happened that +Barbara was alone for some time. Ambrose North had gone for one of his +long walks over the hills and along the shore, expecting to return +before Eloise left Barbara. For some vague reason which he himself could +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span>not have put into words, he did not like to leave her alone with +Miriam.</p> + +<p>When Miriam came upstairs, she paused at the door to listen. Hearing no +voices, she peeped within. Barbara lay quietly, looking out of the +window, and dreaming of the day when she could walk freely and joyously, +as did the people who passed and repassed.</p> + +<p>Miriam went stealthily to her own room, and took out the letter to +Barbara. She had no curiosity as to its contents. If she had, it would +be an easy matter to open it, and put it into another envelope, without +the address, and explain that it had been merely enclosed with +instructions as to its delivery.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miriam Delivers the Letter</div> + +<p>Taking it, she went into the room where Barbara lay—the same room where +the dead Constance had lain so long before.</p> + +<p>"Barbara," she said, without emotion, "when your mother died she left +this letter for you, in my care." She put it into the girl's eager, +outstretched hand and left the room, closing the door after her.</p> + +<p>With trembling fingers, Barbara broke the seal, and took out the closely +written sheet. All four pages were covered. The ink had faded and the +paper was yellow, but the words were still warm with love and life.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Letter</div> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Barbara, my darling, my little lame baby," the +letter began. "If you live to receive this +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span>letter, your mother will have been dead for many +years and, perhaps, forgotten. I have chosen your +twenty-second birthday for this because I am +twenty-two now, and, when you are the same age, +you will, perhaps, be better fitted to understand +than at any other time.</p> + +<p>"I trust you have not married, because, if you +have, my warning may come too late. Never marry a +man whom you do not know, absolutely, that you +love, and when this knowledge comes to you, if +there are no barriers in the way, do not let +anything on God's earth keep you apart.</p> + +<p>"I have made the mistake which many girls make. I +came from school, young, inexperienced, +unbalanced, and eager for admiration. Your father, +a brilliant man of more than twice my age, easily +appealed to my fancy. He was handsome, courteous, +distinguished, wealthy, of fine character and +unassailable position. I did not know, then, that +a woman could love love, rather than the man who +gave it to her.</p> + +<p>"There is not a word to be said of him that is not +wholly good. He has failed at no point, nor in the +smallest degree. On the contrary, it is I who have +disappointed him, even though I love him dearly +and always have. I have never loved him more than +to-day, when I leave you both forever.</p> + +<p>"My feeling for him is unchanged. It is only <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>that +at last I have come face to face with the one man +of all the world—the one God made for me, back in +the beginning. I have known it for a long, long +time, but I did not know that he also loved me +until a few days ago.</p> + +<p>"Since then, my world has been chaos, illumined by +this unutterable light. I have been a true wife, +and when I can be true no longer, it is time to +take the one way out. I cannot live here and run +the risk of seeing him constantly, yet trust +myself not to speak; I cannot bear to know that +the little space lying between us is, in reality, +the whole world.</p> + +<p>"He is bound, too. He has a wife and a son only a +little older than you are. If I stay, I shall be +false to your father, to you, to him, and even to +myself, because, in my relation to each of you, I +shall be living a lie.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Message</div> + +<p>"Tell your dear father, if he still lives, that he +has been very good to me, that I appreciate all +his kindness, gentleness, patience, and the +beautiful love he has given me. Tell him I am +sorry I have failed him, that I have not been a +better wife, but God knows I have done the best I +could. Tell him I have loved him, that I love him +still, and have never loved him more than I do +to-day. But oh, my baby, do not tell him that the +full-orbed sun has risen before one who knew only +twilight before.</p> + +<p>"And, if you can, love your mother a little, as +she lies asleep in her far-away grave. Your +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>father, if he has not forgotten me, will have +dealt gently with my memory—of that I am sure. +But I do not quite trust Miriam, and I do not know +what she may have said. She loved your father and +I took him away from her. She has never forgiven +me for that and she never will.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Burden</div> + +<p>"If I have done wrong, it has been in thought only +and not in deed. I do not believe we can control +thought or feeling, though action and speech can +be kept within bounds. Forgive me, Barbara, +darling, and love me if you can. </p> + +<div class='right'> +<span style="margin-right: 5em;">"Your</span><br /><br /> +<span class="smcap">"Mother</span>."<br /> +</div></div> + +<p>The last words danced through the blurring mist and Barbara sobbed aloud +as she put the letter down. Blind though he was, her father had felt the +lack—the change. The pity of it all overwhelmed her.</p> + +<p>Her thought flew swiftly to Roger, but—no, he must not know. This +letter was written to the living and not to the dead. Aunt Miriam would +ask no questions—she was sure of that—but the message to her father +lay heavily upon her soul. How could she make him believe in the love he +so hungered for even now?</p> + +<p>As the hours passed, Barbara became calm. When Miriam came in to see if +she wanted <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span>anything, she asked for pencil and paper, and for a book to +be propped up on a pillow in front of her, so that she might write.</p> + +<p>Miriam obeyed silently, taking an occasional swift, keen look at +Barbara, but the calm, impassive face and the deep eyes were +inscrutable.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Meaning Changed</div> + +<p>As soon as she was alone again, she began to write, with difficulty, +from her mother's letter, altering it as little as possible, and yet +changing the meaning of it all. She could trust herself to read from her +own sheet, but not from the other. It took a long time, but at last she +was satisfied.</p> + +<p>It was almost dusk when Ambrose North returned, and Barbara asked for a +candle to be placed on the small table at the head of her bed. She also +sent away the book and pencil and the paper she had not used. Miriam's +curiosity was faintly aroused, but, as she told herself, she could wait. +She had already waited long.</p> + +<p>"Daddy," said, Barbara, softly, when they were alone, "do you know what +day it is?"</p> + +<p>"No," he answered; "why?"</p> + +<p>"It's my birthday—I'm twenty-two to-day."</p> + +<p>"Are you? Your dear mother was twenty-two when she—I wish you were like +your mother, Barbara."</p> + +<p>"Mother left a letter with Aunt Miriam,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span> said Barbara, gently. "She +gave it to me to-day."</p> + +<p>The old man sprang to his feet. "A letter!" he cried, reaching out a +trembling hand. "For me?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Barbara Reads to her Father</div> + +<p>Barbara laughed—a little sadly. "No, Daddy—for me. But there is +something for you in it. Sit down, and I'll read it to you."</p> + +<p>"Read it all," he cried. "Read every word."</p> + +<p>"Barbara, my darling, my little lame baby," read the girl, her voice +shaking, "if you live to read this letter, your mother will have been +dead for many years, and possibly forgotten."</p> + +<p>"No," breathed Ambrose North—"never forgotten."</p> + +<p>"I have chosen your twenty-second birthday for this, because I am +twenty-two now, and when you are the same age, it will be as if we were +sisters, rather than mother and daughter."</p> + +<p>"Dear Constance," whispered the old man.</p> + +<p>"When I came from school, I met your father. He was a brilliant man, +handsome, courteous, distinguished, of fine character and unassailable +position."</p> + +<p>Barbara glanced up quickly. The dull red had crept into his wrinkled +cheeks, but his lips were parted in a smile.</p> + +<p>"There is not a word to be said of him that is not wholly good. He has +failed at no point, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span>nor in the smallest degree. I have disappointed +him, I fear, even though I love him dearly and always have. I have never +loved him more than I do to-day, when I leave you both forever.</p> + +<p>"Tell your dear father, if he still lives, that he has been very good to +me, that I appreciate all his kindness, gentleness, patience, and the +beautiful love he has given me. Tell him I am sorry I have failed +him——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, dear God!" he cried. "<i>She</i> fail?"</p> + +<p>"That I have not been a better wife," Barbara went on, brokenly. "Tell +him I have loved him, that I love him still, and have never loved him +more than I do to-day.</p> + +<p>"Forgive me, both of you, and love me if you can. Your Mother."</p> + +<p>In the tense silence, Barbara folded up both sheets and put them back +into the envelope. Still, she did not dare to look at her father. When, +at last, she turned to him, sorely perplexed and afraid, he was still +sitting at her bedside. He had not moved a muscle, but he had changed. +If molten light had suddenly been poured over him from above, while the +rest of the room lay in shadow, he could not have changed more.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">As by Magic</div> + +<p>The sorrowful years had slipped from him, and, as though by magic, Youth +had come back. His shoulders were still stooped, his face and hands +wrinkled, and his hair was still as white <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span>as the blown snow, but his +soul was young, as never before.</p> + +<p>"Barbara," he breathed, in ecstasy. "She died loving me."</p> + +<p>The slender white hand stole out to his, half fearfully. "Yes, Daddy, +I've always told you so, don't you know?" Her senses whirled, but she +kept her voice even.</p> + +<p>"She died loving me," he whispered.</p> + +<p>The clock ticked steadily, a door closed below, and a little bird +outside chirped softly. There was no other sound save the wild beating +of Barbara's heart, which she alone heard. Still transfigured, he sat +beside the bed, holding her hand in his.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Far-Away Voices</div> + +<p>Far-away voices sounded faintly in his ears, for, like a garment, the +years had fallen from him and taken with them the questioning and the +fear. Into his doubting heart Constance had come once more, radiant with +new beauty, thrilling his soul to new worship and new belief.</p> + +<p>"She died loving me," he said, as though he could scarcely believe his +own words. "Barbara, I know it is much to ask, for it must be very +precious to you, but—would you let me hold the letter? Would you let me +feel the words I cannot see?"</p> + +<p>Choking back a sob, Barbara took both sheets out of the envelope and +gave them to him. "Show me," he whispered, "show me <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span>the line where she +wrote, 'Tell him I love him still, and have never loved him more than I +do to-day.'"</p> + +<p>When Barbara put his finger upon the words, he bent and kissed them. +"What does it say here?"</p> + +<p>He pointed to the paragraph beginning, "I have made the mistake which +many girls make."</p> + +<p>"It says," answered Barbara, "'There is not a word to be said of him +that is not wholly good.'" He bent and kissed that, too. "And here?" His +finger pointed to the line, "I did not know that a woman could love +love, rather than the man who gave it to her."</p> + +<p>"That is where it says again, 'Tell him I have loved him, that I love +him still, and have never loved him more than I do to-day.'"</p> + +<p>"Dear, blessed Constance," he said, crushing the lie to his lips. "Dear +wife, true wife; truest of all the world."</p> + +<p>Barbara could bear no more. "Let me have the letter again, Daddy."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">After Years of Waiting</div> + +<p>"No, dear, no. After all these years of waiting, let me keep it for a +little while. Just for a little while, Barbara. Please." His voice broke +at the end.</p> + +<p>"For a little while, then, Daddy," she said, slowly; "only a little +while."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">His Illumined Face</div> + +<p>He went out, with the precious letter in his hand. Miriam was in the +hall, but he was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span> unconscious of the fact. She shrank back against the +wall as he passed her, with his fine old face illumined as from some +light within.</p> + +<p>In his own room, he sat down, after closing the door, and spread the two +sheets on the table before him. He moved his hands caressingly over the +lines Constance had written in ink and Barbara in pencil.</p> + +<p>"She died loving me," he said to himself, "and I was wrong. She did not +change when I was blind and Barbara was lame. All these years I have +been doubting her while her own assurance was in the house.</p> + +<p>"She thought she failed me—the dear saint thought she failed. It must +take me all eternity to atone to her for that. But she died loving me." +His thought lingered fondly upon the words, then the tears streamed +suddenly over his blind face.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Constance, Constance," he cried aloud, forgetting that the dead +cannot hear. "You never failed me! Forgive me if you can."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XV</h2> + +<h3>The Song of the Pines</h3> + + +<p>Upon the couch in the sitting-room, though it was not yet noon, Miss +Mattie slept peacefully. She had the repose, not merely of one dead, but +of one who had been dead long and was very weary at the time of dying.</p> + +<p>As Doctor Conrad had expected, her back was entirely well the morning +following his visit, and when she awoke, free from pain, she had dinned +his praises into Roger's ears until that long-suffering young man was +well-nigh fatigued. The subject was not exhausted, however, even though +Roger was.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Wonder-Worker</div> + +<p>"I'll tell you what it is, Roger," Miss Mattie had said, drawing a long +breath, and taking a fresh start; "a young man that can cure a pain like +mine, with pills that size, has got a great future ahead of him as well +as a brilliant past behind. He's a wonder-worker, that's what he is, not +to mention bein' a mind-reader as well."</p> + +<p>She had taken but a half dozen of the capsules <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span>the first day, having +fallen asleep after taking the third dose. When Roger went to the +office, very weary of Doctor Conrad's amazing skill, Miss Mattie had +resumed her capsules and, shortly thereafter, fallen asleep.</p> + +<p>She had slept for the better part of three days, caring little for food +and not in the least for domestic tasks. At the fourth day, Roger became +alarmed, but Doctor Conrad had gone back to the city, and there was no +one within his reach in whom he had confidence.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Sleeping Woman</div> + +<p>At last it seemed that it was time for him to act, and he shook the +sleeping woman vigorously. "What's the matter, Roger?" she asked, +drowsily; "is it time for my medicine?"</p> + +<p>"No, it isn't time for medicine, but it's time to get up. Your back +doesn't hurt you, does it?"</p> + +<p>"No," murmured Miss Mattie, "my back is as good as it ever was. What +time is it?"</p> + +<p>"Almost four o'clock and you've been asleep ever since ten this morning. +Wake up."</p> + +<p>"Eight—ten—twelve—two—four," breathed Miss Mattie, counting on her +fingers. Then, to his astonishment, she sat up straight and rubbed her +eyes. "If it's four, it's time for my medicine." She went over to the +cupboard in which the precious box of capsules was kept, took two more, +and returned to the couch. She still had the box in her hand.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Mother," gasped Roger, horrified. "What are you taking that medicine +for?"</p> + +<p>"For my back," she responded, sleepily.</p> + +<p>"I thought your back was well."</p> + +<p>"So 'tis."</p> + +<p>"Then what in thunder do you keep on taking dope for?"</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie sat up. She was very weary and greatly desired her sleep, +but it was evident that Roger must be soothed first.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Getting her Money's Worth</div> + +<p>"You don't seem to understand me," she sighed, with a yawn. "After +payin' a dollar and twenty cents for that medicine, do you reckon I'm +goin' to let it go to waste? I'm goin' to keep right on takin' it, every +four hours, as he said, until it's used up."</p> + +<p>"Mother!"</p> + +<p>"Don't you worry none, Roger," said Miss Mattie, kindly, with a drowsy +smile. "Your mother is bein' took care of by a wonderful doctor. He +makes the lame walk and the blind see and cures large pains with small +pills. I am goin' to stick to my medicine. He didn't say to stop takin' +it."</p> + +<p>"But, Mother, you mustn't take it when there is no need for it. He never +meant for you to take it after you were cured. Besides, you might have +the same trouble again when we couldn't get hold of him."</p> + +<p>"How'm I to have it again?" demanded Miss Mattie, pricking up her ears, +"when I'm <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span>cured? If I take all the medicine, I'll stay cured, won't I? +You ain't got no logic, Roger, no more'n your pa had."</p> + +<p>"I wish you wouldn't, Mother," pleaded the boy, genuinely distressed. +"It's the medicine that makes you sleep so."</p> + +<p>"I reckon," responded Miss Mattie, settling herself comfortably back +among the pillows, "that he wanted me to have some sleep. In all my life +I ain't never had such sleep as I'm havin' now. You go away, Roger, and +study law. You ain't cut out for medicine."</p> + +<p>The last words died away in an incoherent whisper. Miss Mattie slept +again, with the box tightly clutched in her hand. As her fingers +gradually loosened their hold, Roger managed to gain possession of it +without waking her. He did not dare dispose of it, for he well knew that +the maternal resentment would make the remainder of his life a burden. +Besides, she might have another attack, when the ministering mind-reader +was not accessible. If it were possible to give her some harmless +substitute, and at the same time keep the "searching medicine" for a +time of need.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Bright Idea</div> + +<p>A bright idea came to Roger, which he hastened to put into execution. He +went to the druggist and secured a number of empty capsules of the same +size. At home, he laboriously filled them with flour and replaced those +in the box with an equal number of them. He put <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>the "searching +medicine" safely away in his desk at the office, and went to work, his +heart warmed by the pleasant consciousness that he had done a good deed.</p> + +<p>When he went home at night, Miss Mattie was partially awake and inclined +to be fretful. "The strength is gone out of my medicine," she grumbled, +"and it ain't time to take more. I've got to set here and be deprived of +my sleep until eight o'clock."</p> + +<p>Roger prepared his own supper and induced his mother to eat a little. +When the clock began to strike eight, she took two of the flour-filled +capsules, confidently climbed upstairs, and—such is the power of +suggestion—was shortly asleep.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Favourable Opportunity</div> + +<p>Having an unusually favourable opportunity, Roger went over to see +Barbara. He had not seen her since the night before the operation, but +Doctor Conrad had told him that in a few days he might be allowed to +talk to her or read to her for a little while at a time.</p> + +<p>Miriam opened the door for him, and, he thought, looked at him with +unusual sharpness. "I guess you can see her," she said, shortly. "I'll +ask her."</p> + +<p>In the pathetically dingy room, out of which Barbara had tried so hard +to make a home, he waited until Miriam returned. "They said to come up," +she said, and disappeared.</p> + +<p>Roger climbed the creaking stairs and made <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>his way through the dark, +narrow hall to the open door from whence a faint light came. "Come in," +called Barbara, as he paused.</p> + +<p>Ambrose North sat by her bedside holding her hand, but she laughingly +offered the other to Roger. "Bad boy," she said; "why haven't you come +before? I've lain here in the window and watched you go back and forth +for days."</p> + +<p>"I didn't dare," returned Roger. "I was afraid I might do you harm by +coming and so I stayed away."</p> + +<p>"Everybody has been so kind," Barbara went on. "People I never saw nor +heard of have come to inquire and to give me things. You're absolutely +the last one to come."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Last but Not Least</div> + +<p>"Last—and least?"</p> + +<p>"Not quite," she said, with a smile. "But I haven't been lonely. Father +has been right beside me all the time except when I've been asleep, +haven't you, Daddy?"</p> + +<p>"I've wanted to be," smiled the old man, "but sometimes they made me go +away."</p> + +<p>"Tell me about the Judge's liver," suggested Barbara, "and Fido. I've +been thinking a good deal about Fido. Did his legal document hurt him?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Fido</div> + +<p>"Not in the least. On the contrary, he thrived on it. He liked it so +well that he's eaten others as opportunity offered. The Judge is used to +it now, and doesn't mind. I've been thinking that it might save time and +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>trouble if, when I copied papers, I took an extra carbon copy for Fido. +That pup literally eats everything. He's cut some of his teeth on a pair +of rubbers that a client left in the office, and this noon he ate nearly +half a box of matches."</p> + +<p>"I suppose," remarked Barbara, "that he was hungry and wanted a light +lunch."</p> + +<p>"That'll be about all from you just now," laughed Roger. "You're going +to get well all right—I can see that."</p> + +<p>"Of course I'm going to get well. Who dared to say I wasn't?"</p> + +<p>"Nobody that I know of. Do you want me to bring Fido to see you?"</p> + +<p>"Some day," said Barbara, thoughtfully, "I would like to have you lead +Fido up and down in front of the house, but I do not believe I would +care to have him come inside."</p> + +<p>So they talked for half an hour or more. The blind man sat silently, +holding Barbara's hand, too happy to feel neglected or in any way +slighted. From time to time her fingers tightened upon his in a +reassuring clasp that took the place of words.</p> + +<p>Acutely self-conscious, Roger's memory harked back continually to the +last evening he and Barbara had spent together. In a way, he was +grateful for North's presence. It measurably lessened his constraint, +and the subtle antagonism that he had hitherto felt <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span>in the house seemed +wholly to have vanished.</p> + +<p>At last the blind man rose, still holding Barbara's hand. "It is late +for old folks to be sitting up," he said.</p> + +<p>"Don't go, Daddy. Make a song first, won't you? A little song for Roger +and me?"</p> + +<p>He sat down again, smiling. "What about?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"About the pines," suggested Barbara—"the tallest pines on the hills."</p> + +<p>There was a long pause, then, clearing his throat, the old man began.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Small Beginnings</div> + +<p>"Even the tall and stately pines," he said, "were once the tiniest of +seeds like everything else, for everything in the world, either good or +evil, has a very small beginning.</p> + +<p>"They grow slowly, and in Summer, when you look at the dark, bending +boughs, you can see the year's growth in paler green at the tips. No one +pays much attention to them, for they are very dark and quiet compared +with the other trees. But the air is balmy around them, they scatter a +thick, fragrant carpet underneath, and there is no music in the world, I +think, like a sea-wind blowing through the pines.</p> + +<p>"When the brown cones fall, the seeds drop out from between the smooth, +satin-like scales, and so, in the years to come, a dreaming mother pine +broods over a whole forest of smaller trees. A pine is lonely and +desolate, if <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span>there are no smaller trees around it. A single one, +towering against the sky, always means loneliness, but where you see a +little clump of evergreens huddled together, braving the sleet and snow, +it warms your heart.</p> + +<p>"In Summer they give fragrant shade, and in Winter a shelter from the +coldest blast. The birds sleep among the thick branches, finding seeds +for food in the cones, and, on some trees, blue, waxen berries.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Love Story</div> + +<p>"Before the darkness came to me, I saw a love story in a forest of +pines. One tree was very straight and tall, and close beside it was +another, not quite so high. The taller tree leaned protectingly over the +other, as if listening to the music the wind made on its way from the +hills to the sea. As time went on, their branches became so thickly +interlaced that you could scarcely tell one from the other.</p> + +<p>"Around them sprang up half a dozen or more smaller trees, sheltered, +brooded over, and faithfully watched by these two with the interlaced +branches. The young trees grew straight and tall, but when they were not +quite half grown, a man came and cut them all down for Christmas trees.</p> + +<p>"When he took them away, the forest was strangely desolate to these two, +who now stood alone. When the Daughters of Dawn opened wide the gates of +darkness, and the Lord of Light fared forth upon the sea, they saw it +not.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span> When it was high noon, and there were no shadows, even upon the +hill, it seemed that they might lift up their heads, but they only +twined their branches more closely together. When all the flaming +tapestry of heaven was spread in the West, they leaned nearer to each +other, and sighed.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Bereft</div> + +<p>"When the night wind stirred their boughs to faint music, it was like +the moan of a heart that refuses to be comforted. When Spring danced +through the forest, leaving flowers upon her way, while all the silences +were filled with life and joy, these two knew it not, for they were +bereft.</p> + +<p>"Mating calls echoed through the woods, and silver sounds dripped like +rain from the maples, but there was no love-song in the boughs of the +pines. The birds went by, on hushed wings, and built their nests far +away.</p> + +<p>"When the maples put on the splendid robes of Autumn, the pines, more +gaunt and desolate than ever, covered the ground with a dense fabric of +needles, lacking in fragrance. When the winds grew cool, and the Little +People of the Forest pattered swiftly through the dead and scurrying +leaves, there was no sound from the pines. They only waited for the end.</p> + +<p>"When storm swept through the forest and the other trees bowed their +heads in fear, these two straightened themselves to meet it, for <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>they +were not afraid. Frightened birds took refuge there, and the Little +People, with wild-beating hearts, crept under the spreading boughs to be +sheltered.</p> + +<p>"Vast, reverberating thunders sounded from hill to hill, and the sea +answered with crashing surges that leaped high upon the shore. Suddenly, +from the utter darkness, a javelin of lightning flashed through the +pines, but they only trembled and leaned closer still.</p> + +<p>"One by one, with the softness of falling snow, the leaves dropped upon +the brown carpet beneath, but there was no more fragrance, since the sap +had ceased to move through the secret channels and breathe balm into the +forest. Snow lay heavily upon the lower boughs and they broke, instead +of bending. When Spring danced through the world again, piping her +plaintive music upon the farthest hills, the pines were almost bare.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">As One</div> + +<p>"All through the sweet Summer the needles kept dropping. Every +frolicsome breeze of June carried some of them a little farther down the +road; every full moon shone more clearly through the barrier of the +pines. And at last, when the chill winds of Autumn chanted a requiem +through the forest, it was seen that the pines had long been dead, but +they so leaned together and their branches were so interlaced, that, +even in death, they stood as one.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span></p> + +<p>"They had passed their lives together, they had borne the same burdens, +faced the same storms, and rejoiced in the same warmth of Summer sun. +One was not left, stricken, long after the other was dead; their last +grief was borne together and was lessened because it was shared. I stand +there sometimes now, where the two dead trees are leaning close +together, and as the wind sighs through the bare boughs, it chants no +dirge to me, but only a hymn of farewell.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Together with Love</div> + +<p>"There is nothing in all the world, Barbara, that means so much as that +one word, 'together,' and when you add 'love' to it, you have heaven, +for God himself can give no more joy than to bring together two who +love, never to part again."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," said Barbara, gently, after a pause.</p> + +<p>"I thank you too," said Roger.</p> + +<p>Ambrose North rose and offered his hand to Roger. "Good-night," he said. +"I am glad you came. Your father was my friend." Then he bent to kiss +Barbara. "Good-night, my dear."</p> + +<p>"Friend," repeated Roger to himself, as the old man went out. "Yes, +friend who never betrayed you or yours." The boy thrilled with +passionate pride at the thought. Before the memory of his father his +young soul stood at salute.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span></p> + +<p>Barbara's eyes followed her father fondly as he went out and down the +hall to his own room. When his door closed, Roger came to the other +chair, sat down, and took her hand.</p> + +<p>"It's not really necessary," explained Barbara, with a faint pink upon +her cheeks. "I shall probably recover, even if my hand isn't held all +the time."</p> + +<p>"But I want to," returned Roger, and she did not take her hand away. Her +cheeks took on a deeper colour and she smiled, but there was something +in her deep eyes that Roger had never seen there before.</p> + +<p>"I've missed you so," he went on.</p> + +<p>"And I have missed you." She did not dare to say how much.</p> + +<p>"How long must you lie here?"</p> + +<p>"Not much longer, I hope. Somebody is coming down next week to take off +the plaster; then, after I've stayed in bed a little longer, they'll see +whether I can walk or not."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Crutches</div> + +<p>She sighed wistfully and a strange expression settled on her face as she +looked at the crutches which still leaned against the foot of her bed.</p> + +<p>"Why do you have those there?" asked Roger, quickly.</p> + +<p>"To remind me always that I mustn't hope too much. It's just a chance, +you know."</p> + +<p>"If you don't need them again, may I have them?"</p> + +<p>"Why?" she asked, startled.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Because they are yours—they've seemed a part of you ever since I've +known you. I couldn't bear to have thrown away anything that was part of +you, even if you've outgrown it."</p> + +<p>"Certainly," answered Barbara, in a high, uncertain voice. "You're very +welcome and I hope you can have them."</p> + +<p>"Barbara!" Roger knelt beside the bed, still keeping her hand in his. +"What did I say that was wrong?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing," she answered, with difficulty. "But, after bearing all this, +it seems hard to think that you don't want me to be—to be separated +from my crutches. Because they have belonged to me always—you think +they always must."</p> + +<p>"Barbara! When you've always understood me, must I begin explaining to +you now? I've never had anything that belonged to you, and I thought you +wouldn't mind, if it was something you didn't need any more—I wouldn't +care what it was—if——"</p> + +<p>"I see," she interrupted. A blinding flash of insight had, indeed, made +many things wonderfully clear. "Here—wouldn't you rather have this?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Knot of Blue Ribbon</div> + +<p>She slipped a knot of pale blue ribbon from the end of one of her long, +golden braids, and gave it to him.</p> + +<p>"Yes," he said. Then he added, anxiously,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span> "are you sure you don't need +it? If you do——"</p> + +<p>"If I do," she answered, smiling, "I'll either get another, or tie my +braid with a string."</p> + +<p>Outwardly, they were back upon the old terms again, but, for the first +time since the mud-pie days, Barbara was self-conscious. Her heart beat +strangely, heavy with the prescience of new knowledge. When Roger rose +from his chair with a bit of blue ribbon protruding from his coat +pocket, she laughed hysterically.</p> + +<p>But Roger did not laugh. He bent over her, with all his boyish soul in +his eyes. She crimsoned as she turned away from him.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Please?</div> + +<p>"Please?" he asked, very tenderly. "You did once."</p> + +<p>"No," she cried, shrilly.</p> + +<p>Roger straightened himself instantly. "Then I won't," he said, softly. +"I won't do anything you don't want me to—ever."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XVI</h2> + +<h3>Betrayal</h3> + + +<p>The long weeks dragged by and, at last, the end of Barbara's +imprisonment drew near. The red-haired young man who had previously +assisted Doctor Conrad came down with one of the nurses and removed the +heavy plaster cast. The nurse taught Miriam how to massage Barbara with +oils and exercise the muscles that had never been used.</p> + +<p>"Doctor Conrad told me," said the red-haired young man, "to take your +father back with me to-morrow, if you were ready to have him go. The +sooner the better, he thought."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Love and Terror</div> + +<p>Barbara turned away, with love and terror clutching coldly at her heart. +"Perhaps," she said, finally. "I'll talk with father to-night."</p> + +<p>Her own forgotten agony surged back into her remembrance, magnified an +hundred fold. Fear she had never had for herself strongly asserted +itself now, for him. "If it should come out wrong," she thought, "I +could <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span>never forgive myself—never in the wide world."</p> + +<p>When the doctor and nurse had gone to the hotel and Miriam was busy +getting supper, Ambrose North came quietly into Barbara's room.</p> + +<p>"How are you, dear?" he asked, anxiously.</p> + +<p>"I'm all right, Daddy, except that I feel very queer. It's all +different, some way. Like the old woman in <i>Mother Goose</i>, I wonder if +this can be I."</p> + +<p>There was a long pause. "Are they going back to-morrow," he asked, "the +doctor and nurse who came down to-day?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," answered Barbara, in a voice that was little more than a whisper.</p> + +<p>The old man took her hand in his and leaned over her. "Dear," he +pleaded, "may I go, too?"</p> + +<p>Barbara was startled. "Have they said anything to you?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Long Waiting</div> + +<p>"No, I was just thinking that I could go with them as well as with +Doctor Conrad. It is so long to wait," he sighed.</p> + +<p>"I cannot bear to have you hurt," answered Barbara, with a choking sob.</p> + +<p>"I know," he said, "but I bore it for you. Have you forgotten?"</p> + +<p>There was no response in words, but she breathed hard, every shrill +respiration fraught with dread.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Flower of the Dusk," he pleaded, "may I go?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," she sobbed. "I have no right to say no."</p> + +<p>"Dear, don't cry." The old man's voice was as tender as though she had +been the merest child. "The dream is coming true at last—that you can +walk and I can see. Think what it will mean to us both. And oh, Barbara, +think what it will be to me to see the words your dear mother wrote to +you—to know, from her own hand, that she died loving me."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Systematic Lying</div> + +<p>Barbara suddenly turned cold. The hand that seemingly had clutched her +heart was tearing unmercifully at the tender fibre now. He would read +her mother's letter and know that his beloved Constance was in love with +another; that she took her own life because she could bear it no more. +He would know that they were poor, that the house was shabby, that the +pearls and laces and tapestries had all been sold. He would know, +inevitably, that Barbara's needle had earned their living for many +years; he would see, in the dining-room, the pitiful subterfuge of the +bit of damask, one knife and fork of solid silver, one fine plate and +cup. Above all, he would know that Barbara herself had systematically +lied to him ever since she could talk at all. And he had a horror of a +lie.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Don't," she cried, weakly. "Don't go."</p> + +<p>"You promised Barbara," he said, gently. Then he added, proudly: "The +Norths never go back on their spoken or written word. It is in the blood +to be true and you have promised. I shall go to-morrow."</p> + +<p>Barbara cringed and shrank from him. "Don't, dear," he said. "Your hands +are cold. Let me warm them in mine. I fear that to-day has been too much +for you."</p> + +<p>"I think it has," she answered. The words were almost a whisper.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">If the Dream Comes True</div> + +<p>"Then, don't try to talk, Barbara. I will talk to you. I know how you +feel about my going, but it is not necessary, for I do not fear in the +least for myself. I am sure that the dream is coming true, but, if it +should not—why, we can bear it together, dear, as we have borne +everything. The ways of the Everlasting are not our ways, but my faith +is very strong.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">If the Dream Comes True</div> + +<p>"If the dream comes true, as I hope and believe it will, you and I will +go away, dear, and see the world. We shall go to Europe and Egypt and +Japan and India, and to the Southern islands, to Greece and +Constantinople—I have planned it all. Aunt Miriam can stay here, or we +will take her with us, just as you choose. When you can walk, Barbara, +and I can see, I shall draw a large check, and we will start at the +first possible moment.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span> The greatest blessing of money, I think, is the +opportunity it gives for travel. I have been glad, too, so many times, +that we are able to afford all these doctors and nurses. Think of the +poor people who must suffer always because they cannot command services +which are necessarily high-priced."</p> + +<p>Barbara's senses reeled and the cold, steel fingers clutched more +closely at the aching fibre of her heart. Until this moment, she had not +thought of the financial aspects of her situation—it had not occurred +to her that Doctor Conrad and the blue and white nurses and even the +red-haired young man would expect to be paid. And when her father went +to the hospital—"I shall have to sew night and day all the rest of my +life," she thought, "and, even then, die in debt."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Lie</div> + +<p>But over and above and beyond it all stood the Lie, that had lived in +her house for twenty years and more and was now to be cast out, +if—Barbara's heart stood still in horror because, for the merest +fraction of an instant, she had dared to hope that her father might +never see again.</p> + +<p>"I could not have gone alone," the old man was saying, "and even if I +could, I should never have left you, but now, I think, the time is +coming. I have dreamed all my life of the strange countries beyond the +sea, and longed to go. Your dear mother and I were going, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span>in a little +while, but—" His lips quivered and he stopped abruptly.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Three Things</div> + +<p>"What would you see, Daddy, if you had your choice? Tell me the three +things in the world that you most want to see." With supreme effort, +Barbara put self aside and endeavoured to lead him back to happier +things.</p> + +<p>"Three things?" he repeated. "Let me think. If God should give me back +my sight for the space of half an hour before I died, I should choose to +see, first, your dear mother's letter in which she says that she died +loving me; next, your mother herself as she was just before she died, +and then, dear, my Flower of the Dusk—my baby whom I never have seen. +Perhaps," he added, thoughtfully, "perhaps I should rather see you than +Constance, for, in a very little while, I should meet her past the +sunset, where she has waited so long for me. But the letter would come +first, Barbara—can you understand?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," she breathed, "I understand."</p> + +<p>The hope in her heart died. She could not ask for the letter. He took it +from his pocket as though it were a jewel of great price. "Put my finger +on the words that say, 'I love him still.'"</p> + +<p>Blinded with tears and choked by sobs, Barbara pointed out the line. +That, at least, was true. The old man raised it to his lips <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>as a monk +might raise his crucifix when kneeling in penitential prayer.</p> + +<p>"I keep it always near me," he said, softly. "I shall keep it until I +can see."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Long after he had gone to bed, Barbara lay trembling. The problem that +had risen up before her without warning seemed to have no possible +solution. If he recovered his sight, she could not keep him from knowing +their poverty. One swift glance would show him all—and destroy his +faith in her. That was unavoidable. But—need he know that the dead had +deceived him too?</p> + +<p>The innate sex-loyalty, which is strong in all women who are really +fine, asserted itself in full power now. It was not only the desire to +save her father pain that made Barbara resolve, at any cost, to keep the +betraying letter from him. It was also the secret loyalty, not of a +child to an unknown mother, but of woman to woman—of sex to sex.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">To-Day and To-Morrow</div> + +<p>The house was very still. Outside, a belated cricket kept up his cheery +fiddling as he fared to his hidden home. Sometimes a leaf fell and +rustled down the road ahead of a vagrant wind. The clock ticked +monotonously. Second by second and minute by minute, To-Morrow advanced +upon Barbara; that To-Morrow which must be made surely right by the +deeds of To-Day.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span></p> + +<p>"If I could go," murmured Barbara. She was free of the plaster and she +could move about in bed easily. Ironically enough, her crutches leaned +against the farther wall, in sight but as completely out of reach as +though they were in the next room.</p> + +<p>Barbara sat up in bed and, cautiously, placed her two tiny bare feet on +the floor. With great effort, she stood up, sustained by a boundless +hope. She discovered that she could stand, even though she ached +miserably, but when she attempted to move, she fell back upon the bed. +She could not walk a step.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Vanishing Hopes</div> + +<p>Faint with fear and pain, she got back into bed. She knew, now, all that +the red-haired young man had refused to tell her. He was too kind to say +that she was not to walk, after all. He was leaving it for Doctor +Conrad—or Eloise.</p> + +<p>Objects in the room danced before her mockingly. Her crutches were +veiled by a mist—those friendly crutches which had served her so well +and were now out of her reach. But Barbara had no time for self-pity. +The dominant need of the hour was pressing heavily upon her.</p> + +<p>With icy, shaking fingers, Barbara rang her bell. Presently Miriam came +in, attired in a flannel dressing-gown which was hopelessly unbecoming. +Barbara was moved to hysterical laughter, but she bit her lips.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Aunt Miriam," she said, trying to keep her voice even, "father has a +letter of mine in his coat pocket which I should like to read again +to-night. Will you bring me his coat, please?"</p> + +<p>Miriam turned away without a word. Her face was inscrutable.</p> + +<p>"Don't wake him," called Barbara, in a shrill whisper. "If he is not +asleep, wait until he is. I would not have him wakened, but I must have +the coat to-night."</p> + +<p>From his closed door came the sound of deep, regular breathing. Miriam +turned the knob noiselessly, opened the door, and slipped in. When her +eyes became accustomed to the darkness, she found the coat easily. It +had not taken long. Even Barbara might well be surprised at her +quickness.</p> + +<p>Perhaps the letter was not in his coat—it might be somewhere else. At +any rate, it would do no harm to make sure before going in to Barbara. +Miriam went into her own room and calmly lighted a candle.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Letter Recovered</div> + +<p>Yes, the letter was there—two sheets: one in ink, in Constance's hand, +the other, in pencil, written by Barbara. Why should Barbara write to +one who was blind?</p> + +<p>With her curiosity now thoroughly aroused, Miriam hastily read both +letters, then put them back. Her lips were curled in a sneer when she +took the coat into Barbara's room and gave it to her without speaking.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span></p> + +<p>The girl thrust an eager hand into the inner pocket and, with almost a +sob of relief, took out her mother's letter and her own version of it.</p> + +<p>"Thank you, Aunty," breathed Barbara. "I am sorry—to—to—disturb you, +but there was no—other way."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Letter Destroyed</div> + +<p>Miriam went out, as quietly as she had come, carrying the coat and +leaving Barbara's door ajar. When she was certain that she was alone, +Barbara tore the letter into shreds. So much, at least, was sure. Her +father should never see them, whatever he might think of her.</p> + +<p>Miriam was standing outside the blind man's door. She fancied she heard +him stir. It did not matter—there was plenty of time before morning to +return the coat. She took it back into her own room and sat down to +think.</p> + +<p>Her mirror reflected her face and the unbecoming dressing-gown. The +candlelight, however, was kind. It touched gently upon the grey in her +hair, hid the dark hollows under her eyes, and softened the lines in her +face. It lent a touch of grace to her work-worn hands, moving nervously +in her lap.</p> + +<p>After twenty-one years, this was what Constance had to say to +Barbara—that she loved another man, that Ambrose North was not to know +it, and that she did not quite trust Miriam. Also that Miriam had loved +Ambrose<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span> North and had never quite forgiven Constance for taking him +away from her.</p> + +<p>Out of the shadow of the grave, Miriam's secret stared her in the face. +She had not dreamed, until she read the letter, that Constance knew. +Barbara knew now, too. Miriam was glad that Barbara had the letter, for +she knew that, in all probability, she would destroy it.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Crumbling Structure</div> + +<p>The elaborate structure of deceit which they had so carefully reared +around the blind man was crumbling, even now. If he recovered his sight, +it must inevitably fall. He would know, in an instant of revelation, +that Miriam was old and ugly and not beautiful, as she had foolishly led +him to believe, years ago, when he asked how much time had changed her. +She looked pitifully at her hands, rough and knotted and red through +untiring slavery for him and his.</p> + +<p>She and Barbara would be sacrificed—no, for he would forgive Barbara +anything. She was the only one who would lose through his restored +vision, unless Constance might, in some way, be revealed to him as she +was.</p> + +<p><i>"I do not quite trust Miriam. She loved your father and I took him away +from her."</i> The cruel sentences moved crazily before her as in letters +of fire.</p> + +<p>The letter was gone. Ambrose North would never see the evidence of +Constance's distrust <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span>of her, nor come, without warning, upon Miriam's +pitiful secret which, with a woman's pride, she would hide from him at +all costs. None the less, Constance had stabbed her again. A ghostly +hand clutching a dagger had suddenly come up from the grave, and the +thrust of the cold, keen steel had been very sure.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Scheming Miriam</div> + +<p>For twenty years and more, she had been tempted to read to the blind man +the letter Constance had written to Laurence Austin just before she +died. For that length of time, her desire to blacken Constance, in the +hope that the grief-stricken heart might once more turn to her, had +warred with her love and her woman's fear of hurting the one she loved. +To-night, even in the face of the letter to Barbara, she knew that she +should never have courage to read it to him, nor even to give it to him +with her own hands.</p> + +<p>In case he recovered his sight, she might leave it where he would find +it. She was glad, now, that the envelope was torn, for he would not be +apt to open a letter addressed to another, even though Constance had +penned the superscription and the man to whom it was addressed was dead. +His fine sense of honour would, undoubtedly, lead him to burn it. But, +if the letter were in a plain envelope, sealed, and she should leave it +on his dresser, he would be very sure to open it, if he saw it lying +there, and then——</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span></p> + +<p>Miriam smiled. Constance would be paid at last for her theft of another +woman's suitor, for her faithlessness and her cowardly desertion. There +was a heavy score against Constance, who had so belied the meaning of +her name, and the twenty years had added compound interest. North might +not—probably would not—turn again to Miriam after all these years; she +saw that plainly to-night for the first time, but he would, at any rate, +see that he had given up the gold for the dross.</p> + +<p>Miriam got her work-box and began to mend the coat lining. She had not +known that it was torn. She wondered how he would feel when he +discovered that the precious letter was lost. Would he blame Barbara—or +her?</p> + +<p>It would be too bad to have him lose the comfort those two sheets of +paper had given him. Miriam had seen him as he sat alone for hours in +his own room, with the door ajar, caressing the written pages as though +they were alive and answered him with love for love. She knew it was +Constance's letter to Barbara, but she had lacked curiosity as to its +contents until to-night.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Plot</div> + +<p>The letter to Laurence Austin was written on paper of the same size. +There was still some of it, in Constance's desk, in the living-room +downstairs. Suppose she should replace one letter with the other, and, +if he ever read it, let him have it all out with Barbara, who was +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span>trying to save him from knowledge that he should have had long ago.</p> + +<p>The coat slipped to the floor as Miriam considered the plan. Perhaps one +of them would ask her what it was. In that case she would say, +carelessly: "Oh, a letter Constance left for Laurence Austin. I did not +think it best to deliver it, as it could do no good and might do a great +deal of harm." She would have the courage for that, surely, but, if she +failed at the critical moment, she could say, simply: "I do not know."</p> + +<p>She crept downstairs and returned with a sheet of Constance's +note-paper. Neither she nor Barbara had ever been obliged to use it, and +it was far back in a corner of a deep drawer, together with North's +check-book, which had been useless for so many years.</p> + +<p>As she had expected, it exactly matched the other sheet. She folded the +two together, with the letter to Laurence Austin inside. North would not +be disappointed, now, when he reached into his pocket and found no fond +letter from his dead but still beloved Constance. Barbara could not +change this, by rewriting into anything save a cry of passionate love.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Subtle Revenge</div> + +<p>Miriam's whole being glowed with satisfaction. She thrilled with the +pleasure of this subtle revenge upon Constance, who was fully repaid, +now, for writing as she had.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span></p> + +<p><i>"I do not quite trust Miriam. She loved your father and I took him away +from her."</i></p> + +<p>She repeated the words in a whisper, and smiled to think of the deeply +loving, passionate page to another man that had filled the place. Let +the Fates do their worst now, for when he should read it——</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Irony of Fate</div> + +<p>Some way, Miriam was very sure that his sight was to be restored to him. +She perceived, now, the irony of his caressing the letter Constance had +written to Barbara. How much more ironical it would be to see him, with +that unearthly light upon his face, moving his hand across the page +Constance had written to Laurence Austin just before she died. Miriam +well knew that the other letters had come first and that Constance's +last word had been to the man she loved.</p> + +<p>The hours passed on, slowly. The mist that hung over the sea was faintly +touched with dawn before Miriam arose, and, taking the coat, went back +to Ambrose North's room. She paused outside the door, but all was still.</p> + +<p>She entered, quietly, and laid the coat on a chair. She started back to +the door, but, before she touched the knob, the blind man stirred in his +sleep.</p> + +<p>"Constance," he said, drowsily, "is that you? Have you come back, +Beloved? It has seemed so long."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span></p> + +<div class="sidenote">Surging Hatred</div> + +<p>Miriam set her lips grimly against the surging hatred for the dead that +welled up within her. She went out hastily, and noiselessly closed the +door.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XVII</h2> + +<h3>"Never Again"</h3> + + +<p>Barbara did not mind lying in bed, now that the heavy plaster cast was +gone and she could move about with comparative freedom. Every day, Aunt +Miriam massaged her with fragrant oils, and she faithfully took the +slight exercises she was bidden to take, even though she knew it was of +no use. She was glad, now, that she had kept the crutches in sight, for +they had steadily reminded her not to hope too much.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Bitterly Disappointed</div> + +<p>Still, she was bitterly disappointed, though she thought she had not +allowed herself to hope—that she had done it only because Eloise wanted +her to. Perhaps the red-haired young man knew, and perhaps not—she was +not so sure, now, that he had refrained from telling her through motives +of kindness. But Doctor Conrad would know, instantly, and he and Eloise +would be very sorry. Barbara wiped away her tears and compressed her +lips tightly together. "I won't cry," she said to herself. "I won't, I +won't, I won't."</p> + +<p>Her father had gone to the city with the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span>red-haired young man and the +nurse. He had been gone more than a week, and Barbara had received no +news of him save a brief note from Doctor Conrad. He said that her +father had been to a specialist of whom he had spoken to her, and that +an operation had been decided upon. He would tell her all about it, he +added, when he saw her.</p> + +<p>Day by day, Barbara lived over the last evening she and her father had +spent together—all the fear and foreboding. She did not for a moment +regret that she had taken his precious letter from him and destroyed it. +She would face whatever she must, and as bravely as she might, but he +should not be hurt in that manner—she had taken the one sure way to +spare him that.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Long Farewell</div> + +<p>When he came back, and realised to the full how steadily she had +deceived him, he could love her no more. When he said good-bye to her +the morning he went away, it had been good-bye in more ways than one. It +was a long farewell to the love and confidence that had bound him to +her; an eternal separation, in spirit, from the child he had loved.</p> + +<p>The tears came when she remembered how he had said good-bye to her. Aunt +Miriam and the red-haired young man and the nurse had left them alone +together for what might be the last time on earth, and was most surely +the last time as regarded the old, sweet relation <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span>so soon to be +severed—unless he came back blind, as he had gone.</p> + +<p>The old man had leaned over her and kissed her twice. "Flower of the +Dusk," he had said, with surpassing tenderness, "when I come back, the +dusk will change to dawn. If the darkness lifts I shall see you first, +and so, for a little while, good-bye."</p> + +<p>He had gone downstairs quickly and lightly, as one who is glad to go. +When she last saw him, he was walking ahead of the young doctor and the +nurse, straight and eager and almost young again, sustained by the same +boundless hope that had given Barbara strength for her ordeal.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Dr. Conrad Comes Again</div> + +<p>It was almost two weeks before Doctor Conrad came down. He had been +obliged, lately, to miss several Sundays with Eloise. When Aunt Miriam +came and told Barbara that he was downstairs, she felt a sudden, sharp +pang of disappointment, not for herself, but for him. He had tried so +hard and done so much, and to know that he had failed— Even in the face +of her own bitter outlook, she could be sorry for him.</p> + +<p>But, when he came in, he did not seem to need anyone's sympathy. He was +so magnificently young and strong, so full of splendid vitality. +Barbara's failing courage rose in answer to him and she smiled as she +offered a frail little hand.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Well, little girl," said Doctor Allan, sitting down on the bed beside +her, "how goes it?"</p> + +<p>"Tell me about father," begged Barbara, ignoring the question.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Main Trouble</div> + +<p>"Father is doing very well," Allan assured her. "He has recovered nicely +from the operation and we have strong hope for the sight of one eye if +not for both. I can almost promise you partial restoration, but, of +course, it is impossible to tell definitely until later. His heart is +very weak—that seems to be the main trouble now."</p> + +<p>Barbara lay very still, with her eyes closed.</p> + +<p>"Aren't you glad?" asked Doctor Allan, in surprise.</p> + +<p>"Yes," answered Barbara, with difficulty. "Indeed, yes. I was just +thinking."</p> + +<p>"A penny for your thoughts," he smiled.</p> + +<p>"Are they going to take off the bandages there at the hospital?"</p> + +<p>"Why, yes—of course."</p> + +<p>"They mustn't!" cried Barbara, sitting up in bed. "Or, if they have to, +I must go there. Doctor Conrad, I must see my father before he regains +his sight."</p> + +<p>"Why?" asked Allan. "Don't cry, little girl—tell me."</p> + +<p>His voice was very soothing, and, as he spoke, he took hold of her +fluttering hands. The strong clasp was friendly and reassuring.</p> + +<p>"Because I've lied to him," sobbed Barbara.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I've made him think we were rich instead of poor. He doesn't know that +I've earned our living all these years by sewing, and that we've had to +sell everything that anybody would buy—the pearls and laces and +everything. He hates a lie and he'll despise me. It will break his +heart. I'd rather tell him myself than to have him find it out."</p> + +<p>"Little girl," said Allan, in his deep, tender voice; "dear little girl. +Nobody on earth could blame you for doing that, least of all your +father. If he's half the man I think he is, he'll only love you the more +for doing it."</p> + +<p>Barbara looked up at him, her deep blue eyes brimming with tears. "Do +you think," she asked, chokingly, "that he ever can forgive me?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Promise</div> + +<p>Allan laughed. "In a minute," he assured her. "Of course he'll forgive +you. But I'll promise you that you shall see him first. As far as that +is concerned, I can take the bandages off myself, after he comes home."</p> + +<p>"Can you really? And will you?"</p> + +<p>"Surely. Now don't fret about it any more. Let's see how you're getting +on."</p> + +<p>In an instant the man was pushed into the background and the great +surgeon took his place. He went at his work with the precision and power +of a perfect machine, guided by that unspoken sympathy which was his +inestimable gift. He tested muscles and bones and turned <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span>the joint in +its socket. Barbara watched his face anxiously. His forehead was set in +a frown and his eyes were keen, but the rest of his face was impassive.</p> + +<p>"Sit up," he said. "Now, turn this way. That's right—now stand up."</p> + +<p>Barbara obeyed him, trembling. In a minute more he would know.</p> + +<p>"Stand on this side only. Now, can you walk?"</p> + +<p>"No," answered Barbara, in a sad little whisper, "I can't." She reached +for her faithful crutches, which leaned against the foot of the bed, but +Doctor Allan snatched them away from her.</p> + +<p>"No," he said, with his face illumined. "Never again."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">New Hopes</div> + +<p>Barbara gasped. "What do you mean?" she asked, terror and joy strangely +mingling in her voice.</p> + +<p>"Never again," Doctor Allan repeated. "You're never to have your +crutches again."</p> + +<p>Barbara gazed at him in astonishment. She stood there in her little +white night-gown, which was not long enough to cover her bare pink feet, +with a great golden braid hanging over either shoulder and far below her +waist. Her blue eyes were very wide and dark.</p> + +<p>"Am I going to walk?" she asked, in a queer little whisper.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Certainly, except when you're riding, or sitting down, or asleep."</p> + +<p>"I can't believe it," she answered, with quivering lips. Then she threw +her arms around Doctor Allan's neck and kissed him with the sweet +impulsiveness of a child.</p> + +<p>"Thank you," he said, softly. "Now we'll walk."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Walking Again</div> + +<p>He put his arm around her and Barbara took a few stumbling steps. Aunt +Miriam opened the door and came in.</p> + +<p>"Look," cried Barbara. "I'm walking."</p> + +<p>"So I see," replied Miriam. "I heard the noise and came up to see what +was the matter. I thought perhaps you wanted something." She retreated +as swiftly as she had come. Allan stared after her and seemed to be on +the verge of saying something very much to the point, but fortunately +held his peace.</p> + +<p>"You'll have to learn," he said, to Barbara, with a new gentleness in +his tone. "Your balance is entirely different and these muscles and +joints will have to learn to work. Keep up the exercise and the massage. +You can have a cane, if you like, but no crutches. Is there someone who +would help you for an hour or so every day?"</p> + +<p>"Roger would," she said, "or Aunt Miriam."</p> + +<p>"Better get Roger—he'll be stronger. And also more willing," he +thought, but he did not <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span>say so. "Don't tire yourself, but walk a little +every day, as you feel like it."</p> + +<p>When he went, he took the crutches with him. "You might be tempted," he +explained, "if they were here, and your father's cane is all you really +need. Be a good girl and I'll come up again soon."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="sidenote">A Great Success</div> + +<p>Eloise was watching from the piazza of the hotel, and, when he came in +sight, she went up the road to meet him.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Allan," she cried, breathlessly, as she saw the crutches. "Is +she——?"</p> + +<p>"She's all right. It's one of the most successful operations ever done +in that line, even if I do say it as shouldn't."</p> + +<p>"Of course," smiled Eloise, looking up at him fondly. "I know <i>that</i>."</p> + +<p>They walked together down to the shore, followed by the deep and open +interest of the rocking-chair brigade, marshalled twenty strong, on the +hotel veranda. It was October and the children had all been taken back +to school. The exquisite peace of the place was a thing to dream about +and be spoken of only in reverent whispers.</p> + +<p>The tide was going out. Allan hurled one of the crutches far out to sea. +"They've worked faithfully and long," he said, "and they deserve a +little jaunt to Europe. Here goes."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span></p> + +<p>He was about to throw the other, but Eloise took it from him. "Let me," +she suggested. "I'd love to throw a crutch over to Europe."</p> + +<p>She tried it, with the customary feminine awkwardness. It did not go +beyond the shallow water, and speared itself, sharp end downward, in the +soft sand.</p> + +<p>Allan laughed uproariously and Eloise coloured with shame. "Never mind," +she said, with affected carelessness, "you couldn't have made it stick +up in the sand like that, and I think it'll get to Europe just as soon +as yours does, so there."</p> + +<p>They sat down on the beach, sheltered from prying eyes by a sand dune, +and directly opposite the crutch, which wobbled with every wave that +struck it. "Think what it means," said Eloise, "and think what it might +mean. It might be part of a shipwreck, or someone who needed it very +much might have dropped it accidentally out of a boat, or the one who +had it might have died, after long suffering."</p> + +<p>"Or," continued Allan, "someone might have outgrown the need of it and +thrown it away, as the tiny dwellers in the sea cast off their shells."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Thanks</div> + +<p>Eloise turned to him, with her deep eyes soft with luminous mist. "I +haven't thanked you," she said, "for all you have done for my little +girl." She lifted her sweet face to his.</p> + +<p>"If you're going to thank me like that,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span> said Allan, huskily, "I'll cut +up the whole township and not even bother to save the pieces."</p> + +<p>"You needn't," laughed Eloise, "but it was dear of you. You've never +done anything half so lovely in all your life."</p> + +<p>"It was you who did it, dear. I was but the humble instrument in your +hands."</p> + +<p>"Was Barbara glad?"</p> + +<p>"I think so. She kissed me, too, but not like that."</p> + +<p>"Did she, really? The sweet, shy little thing. Bless her heart."</p> + +<p>"I infer, Miss Wynne," remarked Allan, in a judicial tone, "that you're +not jealous."</p> + +<p>"Jealous? I should say not. Anybody who can get you away from me," she +added, as an afterthought, "can have you with my blessing and a few +hints as to your management."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Really Glad</div> + +<p>"Safe offer," he commented. "Are you really glad I've done what I have +for Barbara?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, my dear! So glad!"</p> + +<p>"Then," suggested Allan, hopefully, "don't you think I should be thanked +again?"</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>"I forgot to ask you about that dear old man," said Eloise, after a +little. "Is he going to be all right, too?"</p> + +<p>"Pretty much so, I think. We're very sure that he can see a little—he +will not be totally blind. He will probably need glasses, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span>but there +will be plenty of time for that. His heart is the main trouble now. Any +sudden excitement or shock might easily prove fatal."</p> + +<p>"Of course he won't have that."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Will It Last?</div> + +<p>"We'll hope not, but life itself is more or less exciting and you can +never tell what's going to break loose next. I have long since ceased to +be surprised at anything, except the fact that you love me. I can't get +used to that."</p> + +<p>"You will, though," said Eloise, a little sadly. "You'll get so used to +it that you won't even look up when I come into the room—you'll keep +right on reading your paper."</p> + +<p>"Impossible."</p> + +<p>"That's what they all say, but it's so."</p> + +<p>"Have all your previous husbands changed so quickly that you're afraid +to try me?"</p> + +<p>"I've seen it so much," sighed Eloise.</p> + +<p>A great light broke in upon Allan. "Is that why?" he demanded, putting +his arm around her. "No, you needn't try to get away, for you can't. Is +that why I'm sentenced to all this infernal waiting?"</p> + +<p>Eloise bit her lips and did not answer.</p> + +<p>"Is it?" he asked, authoritatively.</p> + +<p>"A little," she whispered. "This is so sweet, and sometimes I'm +afraid——"</p> + +<p>"Darling! Darling!" he said, drawing her closer. "You make me ashamed of +my fellow<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span>men when you say that. But do you want the year to stand still +always at June?"</p> + +<p>"No," she answered. "I'm willing to grow with Love, from all the promise +of Spring into the harvest and even into Winter, as long as the +sweetness is there. Don't you understand, Allan? Who would wish for June +when Indian Summer fills all the silences with shimmering amethystine +haze? And who would give up a keen, crisp Winter day, when the air sets +the blood to tingling, for apple blossoms or even roses? It's not +that—I only want the sweetness to stay."</p> + +<p>"Please God, it shall," returned Allan, solemnly. He was profoundly +moved.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Bank of Life</div> + +<p>"It shouldn't be so hard to keep it," went on Eloise, thoughtfully. +"I've been thinking about it a good deal, lately. Life will give us back +whatever we put into it. In a way, it's just like a bank. Put joy into +the world and it will come back to you with compound interest, but you +can't check out either money or happiness when you have made no +deposits."</p> + +<p>"Very true," he responded. "I never thought of it in just that way +before."</p> + +<p>"If you put joy in, and love, unselfishness, and a little laughter, and +perfect faith—I think they'll all come back, some day."</p> + +<p>A scarlet leaf from a maple danced along the beach, blown from some +distant bough <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span>where the frost had set a flaming signal in the still +September night. A yellow leaf from an elm swiftly caught it, and +together they floated out to sea.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">When?</div> + +<p>"Sweetheart," said Allan, "do you see? The leaves are beginning to fall +and in a little while the trees will be bare. How long are you going to +keep me waiting for wife and home?"</p> + +<p>"I—don't—know."</p> + +<p>"Dear, can't you trust me?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, always," she answered, quickly. "You know that."</p> + +<p>"Then when?"</p> + +<p>"When all the colour is gone," she said, after a pause. "When the forest +is desolate and the wind sighs through bare branches—when Winter chills +our hearts—then I will come to you, and for a little while bring back +the Spring."</p> + +<p>"Truly, Sweetheart?"</p> + +<p>"Truly."</p> + +<p>"You'll never be sorry, dear." He took her into his arms and sealed her +promise upon her lips.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XVIII</h2> + +<h3>The Passing of Fido</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">Alone in the Office</div> + +<p>Fido had been in the office alone for almost three hours. The old man, +who he knew was his master, and the young man, who was inclined to be +impatient with him when he felt playful, had both gone out. The door was +locked and there was nobody on the other side of it to answer a vigorous +scratch or even a pleading whine. When people knocked, they went away +again, almost immediately.</p> + +<p>The window-sills were too high for a little dog to reach, and there was +no chair near. He walked restlessly around the office, stopping at +intervals to sit down and thoughtfully contemplate his feet, which were +much too large for the rest of him. He chased a fly that tickled his +ear, but it eluded him, and now buzzed temptingly on a window-pane, out +of his reach.</p> + +<p>It seemed that something serious must have happened, for Fido had never +been left alone so long before. If he had known that the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span>old man was +conversing pleasantly with some fellow-citizens at the grocery store, +and that the young one had his arm around a laughing girl in white, +trying to teach her to walk, he would have been very indignant indeed.</p> + +<p>Several times, lately, Fido had noticed, the young man had gone out +shortly after the old one went to the post-office. It would be, usually, +half a day later when his master returned with a letter or two, or often +with none. The young man took pains to get back before the old one did, +which was well, for there should always be someone in a lawyer's office +to receive clients and keep dogs from being lonely.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Pangs of Hunger</div> + +<p>The pangs of a devastating hunger assailed Fido, which was not strange, +for it was long past the hour when the old man usually took a bulky +parcel out of his desk, spread a newspaper upon the floor, and bade Fido +eat of cold potatoes, meat, and bread. There was, nearly always, a nice, +juicy bone to beguile the tedium of the afternoon. Fido and the old man +seldom went home to supper before half past five, and Fido would have +been famished were it not for the comfort of the bone.</p> + +<p>He sniffed around the larger of the two desks. A tempting odour came +from a drawer far above. He stood on his hind legs and reached up as far +as he could, but the drawer was closed. So was every other drawer in the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span>office, except one, and that was in the young man's desk. Probably +there was nothing in it for a hungry dog—there never had been.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Little Red Box</div> + +<p>Still, it might be well to investigate. Fido laboriously climbed up on +the chair and put his paws upon the edge of the open drawer. There was +nothing in it but papers and a small, square, red box with a rubber band +around it.</p> + +<p>Fido took the box in his mouth and jumped down. He pushed it with paws +and nose over to his own particular corner, sniffing appreciatively +meanwhile. It took much vigorous chewing to get the rubber band off and +to make a hole in one corner of the box, out of which rolled a great +number of small, cylindrical objects. They were not like anything Fido +had ever eaten before, but hungry little dogs must take what they can +find. So he gulped them all down but one. This one refused to be +swallowed and Fido quickly repented of his rashness, for it was +distinctly not good. He ate the rubber band and all but a little piece +of the red box before the taste was quite gone out of his mouth. Even +then, a drink of fresh, cool water would have been very acceptable, but +there was nobody to care whether a little dog died of thirst or not.</p> + +<p>The bluebottle fly buzzed loudly upon the window-pane, but Fido no +longer aspired to him. A vast weariness took the place of his former +restlessness. He sat and blinked at <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span>his ill-assorted feet for some +time, then dragged himself lazily toward his cushion in the corner. +Before he reached it, he was so very sleepy that he lay down upon the +floor. In less than five minutes, he was off to the canine dreamland, +one paw still caressingly laid over the fragments of the little red box.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="sidenote">The Judge Returns</div> + +<p>When the Judge came in, an hour later, he was much surprised to find the +office locked and the cards of three valued clients on the floor under +the door. There had been four, but Fido had eaten the first one. Two of +them were marked with the hour of the call. It indicated, plainly, to a +logical mind, that Roger had left the office soon after he did, and had +not returned. It was very strange.</p> + +<p>Fido slumbered on, though hitherto the sound of his master's step would +awaken him to noisy and affectionate demonstrations. The Judge turned +Fido over with a friendly foot, but there was no answer save a wide +yawn. He brought the parcel of bread and meat and opened it, leaving it +on the floor close by. Then he took a chicken bone and held it to the +sleeper's nose, but Fido turned away as though from an annoying fly.</p> + +<p>As the dog had never before failed to take immediate interest in a +chicken bone, the Judge was alarmed. He picked up the fragments of the +little red box and wondered if <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span>anyone could have poisoned his pet. He +brought fresh water, but Fido, hitherto possessed of an unquenchable +thirst, failed to respond.</p> + +<p>When Roger came in, belated and breathless, he found his explanations +coldly received. Whether or not Barbara North ever walked was evidently +a matter of no particular concern to the Judge. It was also of no +immediate importance that clients had come and found the office empty, +even though one of them, presumably, had intended to settle an account +of long standing. The vital question was simply this: what was the +matter with Fido?</p> + +<p>Roger did not know. Though Fido's disdain of food and drink might be +abnormal, his position on the floor and his deep breathing were quite +natural.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">An Inquiry</div> + +<p>Then the fragments of the little red box were presented to Roger, and +inquiry made as to the contents. Also, had Roger tried to poison the +Judge's pet?</p> + +<p>Roger had not. The box had contained a prescription for lumbago which +Doctor Conrad had given his mother. It was in the drawer in his desk. He +might possibly have left the drawer open—probably had, as the box was +gone.</p> + +<p>The Judge was deeply desirous of knowing why Mrs. Austin's lumbago cure +should be kept in the office, within reach of unwary pets.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span> After +considerable hesitation, Roger explained.</p> + +<p>The owner of Fido was highly incensed. First, he condemned the entire +procedure as "criminal carelessness," setting forth his argument in +unparliamentary language. Then, remembering that Roger had not really +loved Fido, he brought forth an unworthy motive, and accused the hapless +young man of murderous intent.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Judge Commands</div> + +<p>Roger would kindly borrow the miniature express waggon which was the +prized possession of the postmaster's small son, place the cushion in +it, with its precious burden, and convey Fido, with all possible +tenderness, to his other and larger cushion in the Judge's own bedroom. +He would take the cold chicken, too, please, for if Fido ever wanted +anything again in this world, it would probably be chicken.</p> + +<p>The Judge would follow as soon as he had written to his clients and +expressed his regret that his clerk's numerous social duties did not +permit of his giving much time to his business. And, the Judge added, as +an afterthought, if Fido should die, it would not be necessary for Roger +to return to the office. He wanted someone who could be trusted not to +poison his dog while he was out.</p> + +<p>Roger was too much disturbed to be conscious of the ludicrous aspect he +presented to the public eye as he went down the main thoroughfare of +Riverdale, dragging the small <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span>cart which contained the slumbering Fido +and his cushion. He did not even hear the pointed comments made by the +young of both sexes whom he encountered on his interminable walk, and +forgot to thank the postmaster for the loan of the cart when he returned +it, empty save for a fragment of cold chicken and a faint, doggy smell.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">On the Beach</div> + +<p>For obvious reasons, he could not go to the office and he did not like +to take his disturbing mood to Barbara. Besides, his mother, who now had +long wakeful periods in the daytime, might see him and ask unpleasant +questions. He went down to the beach, yearning for solitude, and settled +himself in the shelter of a sand dune to meditate upon the unhappy +events of the day.</p> + +<p>He did not realise that the sand dune belonged to Eloise, and that she +was wont to sit there with Doctor Conrad, out of the wind, and safely +screened from the argus-eyed rocking-chairs on the veranda. He was so +preoccupied that he did not even hear the sound of their voices as they +approached. Turning the corner quickly, they almost stumbled over him.</p> + +<p>"Upon my word," cried Eloise. "Sir Knight of the Dolorous Countenance, +what has gone wrong?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing," answered Roger, miserably.</p> + +<p>"Anybody dead?" queried Allan, lazily stretching himself upon the sand.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Not yet, but somebody is dying."</p> + +<p>"Who?" demanded Eloise. "Barbara, or your mother? Who is it?"</p> + +<p>"Fido," said Roger hopelessly, staring out to sea.</p> + +<p>Allan laughed, but Eloise returned, kindly: "I didn't know you had a +dog. I'm sorry."</p> + +<p>"He isn't mine," explained Roger; "I only wish he were. If he had been," +he added, viciously, "he'd have died a violent death long ago."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miss Wynne's Plans</div> + +<p>Little by little, the whole story came out. Allan kept his face straight +with difficulty, but Eloise was genuinely distressed. "Don't worry," she +said, sympathetically. "If Fido dies and the Judge won't take you back, +I can probably find an opening for you in town. Your office work will +pay your expenses, so you can go to law school in the evenings and be +ready for your examinations in the Spring."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Miss Wynne," cried Roger. "How good you are! I don't wonder Barbara +calls you her Fairy Godmother."</p> + +<p>"Barbara is coming to town to spend the Winter with me," Eloise went on, +happily. "She's never had a good time and I'm going to give her one. As +soon as she's strong enough, and can walk well, I'm going to take her, +bag and baggage. It's all I'm waiting here for."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span></p> + +<p>In a twinkling, Roger's despair was changed to something entirely +different. "Oh," he cried, "I do hope Fido will die. Do you think there +is any chance?" he asked, eagerly, of Allan.</p> + +<p>"I should think, from what you tell me," remarked Allan, judicially, +"that Fido was nearly through with his earthly troubles. A dose of that +size might easily keep any of us from worrying any longer about the +price of meat and next month's rent."</p> + +<p>"Mother won't like it," said Roger, soberly. "She may not be willing for +me to go."</p> + +<p>"She should be," returned Allan, "as you've saved her life at the +expense of Fido's. When I go up to see Barbara this afternoon, I'll stop +in and tell her."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Unexpected Call</div> + +<p>Miss Mattie was awake, but yawning, when he knocked at her door. "There +wasn't no call for you to come," she said, inhospitably; "the medicine +ain't used up yet."</p> + +<p>"Let me see the box, please."</p> + +<p>She shuffled off to the kitchen cupboard and brought it to him. There +were half a dozen flour-filled capsules in it. Allan observed that the +druggist, in writing the directions on the cover, had failed to add the +last two words.</p> + +<p>"Idiot," he said, under his breath. "I wrote, 'Take two every four hours +until relieved.'"</p> + +<p>"I was relieved," explained Miss Mattie,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span> "and I've had fine sleep ever +since. It's wore off considerable in the last three days, though."</p> + +<p>Allan then told her, in vivid and powerful language, how the druggist's +error might have had very serious results, had it not been for Roger's +presence of mind in substituting the flour-filled capsules for the +"searching medicine." He was surprised to find that Miss Mattie was +ungrateful, and that she violently resented the imposition.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Notion of Economy</div> + +<p>"Roger's just like his pa," she said, with the dull red rising in her +cheeks. "He never had no notion of economy. When I'm takin' a dollar and +twenty cents' worth of medicine, to keep it from bein' wasted, Roger +goes and puts flour into the covers of it, and feeds the expensive +medicine to Judge Bascom's Fido. He thinks more of that dog than he does +of his sick mother."</p> + +<p>"My dear Mrs. Austin," said Allan, solemnly, "have you not heard the +news?"</p> + +<p>"What news?" she demanded, bristling.</p> + +<p>"Little Fido is dying. He took all the medicine and has been asleep ever +since. By morning, he will be dead."</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie's jaw dropped. "Would you mind tellin' me," she asked, +suspiciously, "why you took it on yourself to give me medicine that +would pizen a dog? I might have took it all at once, to save it. Once I +was minded to."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Roger saved your life," said Allan, endeavouring to make his tone +serious. "And because of it, he is about to lose his position. The Judge +is so disturbed over Fido's approaching dissolution that he has told +Roger never to come back any more. Unless we can find him a place in +town, he has sacrificed his whole future to save his mother's life."</p> + +<p>"Where is Roger?"</p> + +<p>"I left him down on the beach, with Miss Wynne. I suppose he is still +there."</p> + +<p>"When you see him," commanded Miss Mattie, with some asperity, "will you +kindly send him home? It's no time for him to be gallivantin' around +with girls, when his mother's been so near death."</p> + +<p>"I will," Allan assured her, reaching for his hat. "I hope you +appreciate what he has done for you."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Doctor Laughs</div> + +<p>When he went down the road, his shoulders were shaking suspiciously. +Miss Mattie was watching him through the lace curtains that glorified +the parlour windows. "Seems as if he had St. Vitus's dance," she mused. +"Wonder why he doesn't mix up some dog-pizen, and cure himself?"</p> + +<p>When he was sure that he was out of sight, Allan sat down on a +convenient boulder at the side of the road, and gave himself up to +unrestrained mirth. The medicine which was about to prove fatal to Fido +would have <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span>caused only prolonged sleep if taken in small doses, at +proper intervals, by an adult. "It's a wonder she didn't take 'em all at +once," he thought. "And if she had—" He speculated, idly, upon the +probable effect.</p> + +<p>His conscience pricked him slightly on account of the exaggeration in +which he had mischievously indulged, but he told himself that Roger +would be far better off in the city and his mother's consent would make +his going much less difficult. He also realised that if Roger were there +to amuse Barbara, Eloise might have more spare time than she would +otherwise.</p> + +<p>He stopped long enough to give the druggist a bad quarter of an hour, +and then went back to the beach. Eloise and Roger were where he had left +them, and the boy's gloom was entirely gone.</p> + +<p>"Your mother wants you," he said, as he sat down on the other side of +Eloise.</p> + +<p>"All right—I'll go right up. How did she take it?"</p> + +<p>"Very well. Just remember that you've saved her life, and you'll have no +trouble."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Light-Hearted</div> + +<p>When Roger went up the street, he was whistling, from sheer +light-heartedness. Eloise had made so many plans for his future that he +saw fame and fortune already within his reach.</p> + +<p>When he knocked, never having been <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span>allowed the freedom of a latch key, +he noted that all the blinds in the house were closed and wondered +whether his mother had gone to sleep again. After a suitable interval, +she opened the door, clad in her best black silk, and portentously +solemn.</p> + +<p>"Why, Mother, what's the matter?"</p> + +<p>"Come in," she whispered. "Doctor Conrad has just been tellin' me how +near I come to death. Oh, my son," she cried, throwing her arms around +his neck, "you have saved my life."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Two Greetings</div> + +<p>It seemed to Roger like a paragraph torn from <i>The Metropolitan Weekly</i>, +but he patted her back soothingly as she clung to him. Maternal +outbursts of this sort were extremely rare. He remembered only one other +greeting like this—the day he had been swimming in the river with three +other small boys and had been brought home in a blanket, half drowned.</p> + +<p>"I suppose I shouldn't regret takin' dog-pizen, if it cured my back and +give me the sleep I needed, but it was a dreadful narrow escape. And +your takin' the medicine away from me and feedin' it to Fido was +certainly clever, Roger. Every day you remind me more and more of your +pa."</p> + +<p>"Thank you," answered Roger. He was struggling with various emotions and +found speech almost impossible.</p> + +<p>"It's no more'n right," she resumed, "that, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span>after having pizened Fido +and lost you your place, that Doctor Conrad should stir himself around +and get you a better place in the city, but I do hate to have you go, +Roger. It'll be dreadful lonesome for me."</p> + +<p>"Cheer up, Mother; I haven't gone yet. The dog may get well."</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie shook her head sadly. "No, he won't," she sighed. "I took +enough of that medicine to know how powerful it is, and Fido ain't got +no chance. To-morrow I'll look over your things."</p> + +<p>An atmosphere of solemnity pervaded the house, and the evening was spent +very quietly. Miss Mattie read her Bible, as on Sunday evenings when she +did not go to church, and sternly refused to open <i>The Housewife's +Companion</i>, which lay temptingly near her.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Nightmare</div> + +<p>She went to bed early, and Roger soon followed her, having strangely +lost his desire to read, and not daring to go to see Barbara more than +once a day. His night was made hideous by visions of himself drawing the +cart containing the slumbering Fido into the church where Eloise and +Doctor Conrad were being married, while Judge Bascom at the house, was +conducting Miss Mattie's funeral.</p> + +<p>In the morning, after breakfast, Roger seriously debated whether or not +he should go down to the office. At last he tossed up a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>coin and +muttered a faint imprecation as he picked it up.</p> + +<p>With his hat firmly on and his hands in his pockets, Roger fared forth, +whistling determinedly. He did not want to go to the office, and he +dreaded, exceedingly, his next meeting with the irascible Judge.</p> + +<p>As it happened, it was not necessary for him to go, for, at the corner +of the street which led to the Judge's house, he met the postmaster's +small son, laboriously dragging the fateful cart of yesterday. In it +were all of Roger's books and other belongings, including an umbrella +which he had loaned to the Judge on a rainy night and expected never to +see again.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Brief Message</div> + +<p>The message was brief and very much to the point. Fido had died +painlessly at four o'clock that morning.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XIX</h2> + +<h3>The Dreams Come True</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">Gaining Strength</div> + +<p>The hours Roger had taken from his work in the office had brought +nothing but good to Barbara. She gained strength rapidly after she began +to walk, and was soon able to dispense with the cane, though she could +not walk easily, nor far. She tired quickly and was forced to rest +often, but she went about the house slowly and even up and down the +stairs.</p> + +<p>Aunt Miriam made no comment of any sort. She did not say she was glad +Barbara was well after twenty-two years of helplessness, even though she +had taken entire care of her, and must have felt greatly relieved when +the burden was lifted. She went about her work as quietly as ever, and +fulfilled all her household duties with mechanical precision.</p> + +<p>Spicy odours were wafted through the rooms, for Eloise had ordered +enough jelly, sweet pickles, and preserves to supply a large family for +two or three years. She had also bought <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span>quilts and rag rugs for all of +her old-lady friends and taken the entire stock of candied orange peel +for the afternoon teas which she expected to give during the Winter.</p> + +<p>Barbara was hard at work upon the dainty lingerie Eloise had planned, +and found, by a curious anomaly, that when she did not work so hard, she +was able to accomplish more. The needle flew more swiftly when her +fingers did not ache and the stitches blur indistinguishably with the +fibre of the fabric. When Roger was not there to help her, she divided +her day, by the clock, into hours of work and quarter-hours of exercise +and rest.</p> + +<p>She had been out of the gate twice, with Roger, and had walked up and +down the road in front of the house, but, as yet, she had not gone +beyond the little garden alone.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">One Dark Cloud</div> + +<p>Upon the fair horizon of the future was one dark cloud of dread which +even Doctor Conrad's positive assurance had mitigated only for a little +time. Barbara knew her father and his stern, uncompromising +righteousness. When the bandages were taken off and he saw the faded +walls and dingy furniture, the worn rugs, and the pitiful remnant of +damask at his place at the table; when he realised that his daughter had +deceived him ever since she could talk at all, he must inevitably +despise her, even though he tried to hide it.</p> + +<p>Dimly, Barbara began to perceive the in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span>tangible price that is attached +to the things of the spirit as well as to the material necessities of +daily life. She was forced to surrender his love for her as the +compensation for his sight, yet she was firmly resolved to keep, for +him, the love that refused to reckon with the barrier of a grave, but +triumphantly went past it to clasp the dead Beloved closer still.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Vague Dream</div> + +<p>Of late, she had been thinking much of her mother. Until Roger had found +his father's letter, and she had received her own, upon her +twenty-second birthday, she had felt no sense of loss. Constance had +been a vague dream to her and little more, in spite of her father's +grieving and her instinctive sympathy.</p> + +<p>With the letters, however, had come a change. Barbara felt a certain +shadowy relationship and an indefinite bereavement. She wondered how her +mother had looked, what she had worn, and even how she had dressed her +hair. Since her father had gone to the hospital, she had wondered more +than ever, but got no satisfaction when she had once asked Aunt Miriam.</p> + +<p>She finished the garment upon which she was working, threaded the narrow +white ribbon into it, folded it in tissue paper and put it into the +chest. It was the last of the second set and Eloise had ordered six. +"Four more to do," thought Barbara. "I wonder whether she wants them all +alike."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span></p> + +<p>The afternoon shadows had begun to lengthen, and it was Saturday. It was +hardly worth while to begin a new piece of work before Monday morning, +especially since she wanted to ask Eloise about a new pattern. Doctor +Conrad was coming down for the weekend, and probably both of them would +be there late in the afternoon, or on Sunday.</p> + +<p>"How glad he'll be," said Barbara, to herself. "He'll be surprised when +he sees how well I can walk. And father—oh, if father could only come +too." She was eager, in spite of her dread.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">In the Attic</div> + +<p>Simply for the sake of exercise, Barbara climbed the attic stairs and +came down again. After she had rested, she tried it once more, but was +so faint when she reached the top that she went into the attic and sat +down in an old broken rocker. It was the only place in the house where +she had not been since she could walk, and she rather enjoyed the +novelty of it.</p> + +<p>A decrepit sofa, with the springs hanging from under it, was against the +wall at one side, far back under the eaves. It was of solid mahogany and +had not been bought by the searchers for antiques because its +rehabilitation would be so expensive. That and the rocker in which +Barbara sat were the only pieces of furniture remaining.</p> + +<p>There were several trunks, old-fashioned <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span>but little worn. One was Aunt +Miriam's, one was her father's, and the others must have belonged to her +dead mother. For the first time in her life, Barbara was curious about +the trunks.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Old Trunk</div> + +<p>When she was quite rested, she went over to a small one which stood near +the window, and opened it. A faint, musty odour greeted her, but there +was no disconcerting flight of moths. Every woollen garment in the house +had long ago been used by Aunt Miriam for rugs and braided mats. She had +taken Constance's underwear for her own use when misfortune overtook +them, and there was little else left.</p> + +<p>Barbara lifted from the trunk a gown of heavy white brocade, figured +with violets in lavender and palest green. It was yellow and faded and +the silver thread that ran through the pattern was tarnished so that it +was almost black. The skirt had a long train and around the low-cut +bodice was a deep fall of heavy Duchess lace, yellowed to the exquisite +tint of old ivory. The short sleeves were trimmed with lace of the same +pattern, but only half as wide.</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Barbara, aloud, "how lovely!"</p> + +<p>There was a petticoat of rustling silk, and a pair of dainty white +slippers, yellowed, too, by the slow passage of the years. Their silver +buckles were tarnished, but their high heels were as coquettish as +ever.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span></p> + +<p>"What a little foot," thought Barbara. "I believe it was smaller than +mine."</p> + +<p>She took off her low shoe, and, like Cinderella, tried on the slipper. +She was much surprised to find that it fitted, though the high heels +felt queer. Her own shoe was more comfortable, and so she changed again, +though she had quite made up her mind to wear the slippers sometime.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Treasured Finery</div> + +<p>In the trunk, too, she found a white bonnet that she tried on, but +without satisfaction, as there was no mirror in the attic. This one +trunk evidently contained the finery for which Miriam had not been able +to find use.</p> + +<p>One by one, Barbara took out the garments, which were all of silk or +linen—there was nothing there for the moths. The long bridal veil of +rose point, that Barbara had sternly refused to sell, was yellow, too, +but none the less lovely. There was a gold scent-bottle set with +discoloured pearls, an amethyst brooch which no one would buy because it +had three small gold tassels hanging from it, and a lace fan with +tortoise-shell sticks, inlaid with mother-of-pearl. A thrifty woman at +the hotel had once offered two dollars for the fan, but Barbara had kept +it, as she was sure it was worth more.</p> + +<p>Down in the bottom of the trunk was an inlaid box that she did not +remember having seen before. She slid back the cover and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span>found a lace +handkerchief, a broken cuff-button, a gold locket enamelled with black, +a long fan-chain of gold, set with amethysts, a small gold-framed mirror +evidently meant to be carried in a purse or hand-bag, a high shell comb +inlaid with gold and set with amethysts, and ten of the dozen large, +heavy gold hairpins which Ambrose North, in an extravagant mood, had +ordered made for the shining golden braids of his girl-wife.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Photograph</div> + +<p>On the bottom of the box, face down, was a photograph. Barbara took it +out, wonderingly, and started in amazement as her own face looked back +at her. On the back was written, in the same clear hand as the letter: +"For my son, or daughter. Constance North." Below was the date—just a +month before Barbara was born.</p> + +<p>The heavy hair, in the picture, was braided and wound around the shapely +head. The high comb, the same that Barbara had just taken out of the +box, added a finishing touch. Around the slender neck and fair, smooth +shoulders fell the Duchess lace that trimmed the brocade gown. The +amethyst brooch, with two of the three tassels plainly showing, was +pinned into the lace on the left side, half-way to the shoulder.</p> + +<p>But it was the face that interested Barbara most, as it was the +counterpart of her own. There was the same broad, low forehead, the +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span>large, deep eyes with long lashes, the straight little nose, and the +tender, girlish mouth with its short upper lip, and the same firm, +round, dimpled chin. Even the expression was almost the same, but in +Constance's deep eyes was a certain wistfulness that the faint smile of +her mouth could not wholly deny.</p> + +<p>The woman who looked back at her daughter seemed strangely youthful. +Barbara felt, in a way, as though she were the mother and Constance the +child, for she was older, now, than her mother had been when she died. +The years of helplessness and struggle had aged Barbara, too.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Sweet Face</div> + +<p>The slanting sunbeams of late afternoon came into the attic, but Barbara +still studied the sweet face of the picture. Constance was made for +love, and love had come when it was too late. What tenderness she was +capable of; what toilsome journeys she would undertake without fear, if +her heart bade her go! And what courage must have nerved her dimpled +hands when she opened the grey, mysterious door of the Unknown! There +was no hint of weakness in the face, but Constance had died rather than +to take the chance of betraying the man who held her pledge. Barbara's +young soul answered in passionate loyalty to the wistfulness, the +hunger, and the unspoken appeal.</p> + +<p>"He shall never know, Mother, dear," she <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span>said aloud. "I promise you +that he shall never know."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Like her Mother</div> + +<p>The shadows grew longer, and, at length, Barbara put the picture down. +If she had on the gown, and twisted her braids around her head, she +would look like her mother even more than now. She had a fancy to try +it—to go downstairs and see what Aunt Miriam would say when she came +in. Her eyes sparkled with delight when she drew on the long white +stockings of finest silk and put on the white slippers with the +tarnished silver buckles.</p> + +<p>The gown was too long and a little too loose, but Barbara rejoiced in +the faded brocade and in the rustle of the silk petticoat that cracked +in several places when she put it on, the fabric was so frail. The +ivory-tinted lace set off her shoulders beautifully, but she could only +guess at the effect from the brief glimpses the tiny mirror gave her. +She put on the amethyst brooch, hung the fan upon its chain and put it +around her neck. Then she wound her braids around her head and fastened +them securely with the gold hairpins. With the aid of the small-gold +mirror, she put the comb in place, and loosened the soft hair on either +side, so that it covered the tops of her ears.</p> + +<p>She walked back and forth a few times, the full length of the attic, +looking back to admire the sweep of her train. Then she sat down <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span>upon +the decrepit sofa, trying to fancy herself a stately lady of long ago. +The room was very still, and, without knowing it, Barbara had wearied +herself with her unaccustomed exertion. Her white woollen gown and soft +low shoes lay in a little heap on the floor near the window. She must +not forget to take them when she went down to look in the mirror.</p> + +<p>Presently, she stretched herself out upon the sofa, wondering, drowsily, +whether her mother would have lain down to rest in that splendid +brocade. She did not intend to sleep, but only to rest a little before +going downstairs to surprise Aunt Miriam. Nevertheless, in a few minutes +she was fast asleep and dreaming.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="sidenote">The Home-Coming</div> + +<p>Eloise went down to the three o'clock train to meet Allan, and was much +surprised when Ambrose North came, too. His eyes were bandaged, but +otherwise he seemed as well as ever. They offered to go home with him, +but he refused, saying that he could go alone as well as he ever had.</p> + +<p>They strolled after him, however, keeping at a respectful distance, +until they saw him enter the grey, weather-worn gate; then they turned +back.</p> + +<p>"Is he all right, Allan?" asked Eloise, anxiously.</p> + +<p>"I hope so—indeed, I'm very sure he is.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span> The operation turned out to be +an extremely simple one, though it wasn't even dreamed of twenty years +ago. Barbara's case was simple too,—it's all in the knowing how. She +has made one of the quickest recoveries on record, owing to the fact +that her body is almost that of a child. When you come down to the root +of the matter, surgery is merely the job of a skilled mechanic."</p> + +<p>"But you'd be angry if anyone else said that."</p> + +<p>"Of course."</p> + +<p>"When do the bandages come off?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Case of Conscience</div> + +<p>"I'm going up to-morrow. They'd have been off over a week ago, but +Barbara insisted that she must see him first and ask him to forgive her +for deceiving him. She thinks she's a criminal."</p> + +<p>"Dear little saint," said Eloise, softly. "I wish none of us ever did +anything more wicked than that."</p> + +<p>"So do I, but there is an active remnant of a New-England conscience +somewhere in Barbara. I'm not sure that the old man hasn't it, too."</p> + +<p>"Do you suppose, for a moment, that he won't forgive her?"</p> + +<p>"If he doesn't," returned Allan, concisely, "I'll break his ungrateful +old neck. I hope she won't stir him up very much, though—he's got a bad +heart."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span></p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miriam's Welcome</div> + +<p>Still, the old man showed no sign of weakness as he went briskly up the +walk and knocked at his own door. When Miriam opened it, astonishment +made her welcome almost inarticulate, for she had not expected him home +so soon. He gave her the small black satchel that he carried, his coat +and hat.</p> + +<p>"How is Barbara?" he asked, eagerly. "How is my little girl?"</p> + +<p>"Well enough," answered Miriam.</p> + +<p>"Is she asleep?"</p> + +<p>Miriam went to the stairs and called out: "Barbara! Oh, Barbara!" There +was no answer.</p> + +<p>She started upstairs, but he called her back. "Don't wake her," he said. +"Perhaps I can take her supper up to her."</p> + +<p>"Suit yourself," responded Miriam, shortly.</p> + +<p>She did not see fit to tell him that Barbara was up and could walk. +Doctor Conrad could have told him, if he had wanted to—at any rate, it +was not Miriam's affair. She bitterly resented the fact that he had not +even shaken hands with her when he came home, after his long absence. +She hung up his coat and hat, lighted the fire, as the room was cool, +went out into the kitchen, and closed the door.</p> + +<p>The familiar atmosphere and the comfortable chair in which he sat +brought him that peculiar peace of home which is one of the greatest +gifts travel can bestow. Even the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span>ticking of the clock came to his +senses gratefully. Home at last, after all the pain, the dreary nights +and days of acute loneliness, and only one more day to wait—perhaps.</p> + +<p>"To see again," he thought. "I am glad I came home first. To-morrow, if +God is good to me, I shall see my baby—and the letter. I have dreamed +so often that she could walk and I could see!"</p> + +<p>He took the two sheets of paper from his pocket and spread them out upon +his knee. He moved his hands lovingly across the pages—the one written +upon, the other blank. "She died loving me," he said to himself. +"To-morrow I shall see it, in her own hand."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Why Not To-Day</div> + +<p>Sunset flamed behind the hills and brought into the little room faint +threads of gold and amethyst that wove a luminous tapestry with the +dusk. The clock ticked steadily, and with every cheery tick brought +nearer that dear To-Morrow of which he had dreamed so long. He +speculated upon the difference made by the slow passage of a few hours. +To-morrow, at this time, his bandages would be off—then why not to-day?</p> + +<p>The letter fell to the floor and he picked it up, one sheet at a time, +fretfully. The bandage around his temples and the gauze and cotton held +firmly against his eyes all at once grew intolerable. It was the last +few miles to the weary traveller, the last hour that lay between <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span>the +lover and his beloved, the darkness before the dawn. He had been very +patient, but at last had come to the end.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">He Opens his Eyes</div> + +<p>If only the bandages were off! "If they were," he thought, "I need not +open my eyes—I could keep them closed until to-morrow." He raised his +hands and worked carefully at the surgical knots until the outer strip +was loosened. He wound it slowly off, then cautiously removed the layers +of cotton and gauze.</p> + +<p>He breathed a sigh of relief as he leaned back in his chair, with his +eyes closed, determined to keep faith with the physicians, and, above +all, with Doctor Conrad, who had been so very kind. There was no pain at +all—only weakness. If the room were absolutely dark, perhaps he might +open his eyes for a moment or two. Why should to-morrow be so different +from to-day?</p> + +<p>The letter was in his hands—that dear letter which said, "I have loved +him, I love him still, and have never loved him more than I do to-day." +The temptation worked subtly in his mind as strong wine might in his +blood. Perhaps, after all, he could not see—the doctors had not given +him a positive promise.</p> + +<p>The fear made him faint, then surging hope and infinite longing merged +into perfect belief—and trust. Unable to endure the strain of waiting +longer, he opened his eyes, and as swiftly closed them again.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I can see," he whispered, shrilly. "Oh, I can see!"</p> + +<p>The blood beat hard in his pulses. He waited, wisely, until he was calm, +then opened his eyes once more. The room was not dark, but was filled +with the soft, golden glow of sunset—a light that illumined and, +strangely, brought no pain. Objects long unfamiliar save by touch loomed +large and dark before him. Remembered colours came back, mellowed by the +half-light. Distances readjusted themselves and perspectives appeared in +the transparent mist that seemed to veil everything. He closed his eyes, +and said, aloud: "I can see! Oh, I can see!"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Reading the Letter</div> + +<p>Little by little the mist disappeared and objects became clear. The +velvety softness of the last light lay kindly upon the dingy room. When +he tried to read the letter the words danced on the page. Trembling, he +rose and took it over to the window, where the light was stronger. As he +stood there, with his back to the door, Miriam, unheard, came into the +room.</p> + +<p>The bandages on the floor, the eagerness in every line of his body as he +stood at the window, and the letter in his hand, gave her, in a single +instant, all the information she needed. Her heart beat high with wild +hope—the hour of her vengeance had come at last.</p> + +<p>She feared he would not be able to read it.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span> Then she remembered the +yellowed page on which the writing stood out as clearly as though it had +been large print. If he could see at all, he could see that.</p> + +<p>Little by little, sustained and supported by his immeasurable longing, +the man at the window spelled out the words, in an eager whisper:</p> + +<p>"You who have loved me since the beginning of time—will understand and +forgive me—for what I do to-day. I do it because I am not strong +enough—to go on—and do my duty—by those who need me."</p> + +<p>Miriam nodded with satisfaction. At last he knew why Constance had taken +her own life.</p> + +<p>"If there should be—meeting—past the grave—some day you and I—shall +come together again—with no barrier between us." He put his hand to his +forehead as though he did not quite understand, but hurried on to the +next sentence, for his eyes were failing under the strain.</p> + +<p>"I take with me—the knowledge of your love—which has strengthened—and +sustained me—since the day—we first met—and must make—even a +grave—warm and sweet."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Radiance of Soul</div> + +<p>The light in the room seemed to Miriam to be not wholly of the golden +sunset. Some radiance of soul must have made that clear soft light which +veiled but did not hide. It <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span>was sunset, and yet the light was that of a +Summer afternoon.</p> + +<p>"And remember this—dead though I am—I love you still—you—and my +little lame baby—who needs me so—and whom—I must leave—because I am +not strong—enough to stay. Through life—and in death—and eternally +yours—Constance."</p> + +<p>There was a tense, unbearable silence. Miriam moistened her parched lips +and chafed her cold hands. "At last," she thought. "At last."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Assurance</div> + +<p>"She died loving me," said Ambrose North, in a shrill whisper. His eyes +were closed again, for the strain had hurt—terribly. Dimly, he +remembered the other letter. This was not the same, but the other had +been to Barbara, and not to him. He did not stop to wonder how it came +to be in his pocket. It sufficed that some Angel of God, working through +devious ways and long years, had given him at last, face to face, the +assurance he had hungered for since the day Constance died.</p> + +<p>In a blinding instant, Miriam remembered that no names had been +mentioned in the letter. He had made a mistake—but she could set him +right. Constance should not triumph again, even in an hour like this.</p> + +<p>Ambrose North turned back into the shadow, fearing to face the window. +The woman cowering in the corner advanced steadily to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span>meet him. He saw +her, vaguely, when his eyes became accustomed to the change of lights.</p> + +<p>"Miriam!" he cried, transfigured by joy. "She died loving me! I have it +here. It was only because she was not strong—she was ill, and she never +let us know." He held forth the letter with a shaking hand.</p> + +<p>"She—" began Miriam.</p> + +<p>"She died loving me!" he cried. "Oh, Miriam, can you not see? I have it +here." His voice rang through the house like some far silver bugle +chanting triumph over a field of the slain. "She died loving me!"</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="sidenote">Triumphant Cry</div> + +<p>Barbara had already wakened and she sat up, rubbing her eyes. The attic +was almost dark. She went downstairs hurriedly, forgetting her borrowed +finery until her long train caught on a projecting splinter and had to +be loosened. When she reached her own door she started toward her +mirror, anxious to see how she looked, but that triumphant cry from the +room below made her heart stand still.</p> + +<p>White as death and strangely fearful, she went down and into the +living-room, where the last light deepened the shadows and lay lovingly +upon her father's illumined face.</p> + +<p>Barbara smiled and went toward him, with her hands outstretched in +welcome. Miriam <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span>shrank back into the farthest shadows, shaking as +though she had seen a ghost.</p> + +<p>There was an instant's tense silence. All the forces of life and love +seemed suddenly to have concentrated into the space of a single +heart-beat. Then the old man spoke.</p> + +<p>"Constance," he said, unsteadily, "have you come back, Beloved? It has +been so long!"</p> + +<p>Radiant with beauty no woman had ever worn before, Barbara went to him, +still smiling, and the old man's arms closed hungrily about her. "I +dreamed you were dead," he sobbed, "but I knew you died loving me. Where +is our baby, Constance? Where is my Flower of the Dusk?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Burden of Joy</div> + +<p>Even as he spoke, the overburdened heart failed beneath its burden of +joy. He staggered and would have fallen, had not Miriam caught him in +her strong arms. Together, they helped him to the couch, where he lay +down, breathing with great difficulty.</p> + +<p>"Constance, darling," he gasped, feebly, "where is our baby? I want +Barbara."</p> + +<p>For the sake of the dead and the living, Barbara supremely put self +aside. "I do not know," she whispered, "just where Barbara is. Am I not +enough?"</p> + +<p>"Enough for earth," he breathed in answer, "and—for—heaven—too. Kiss +me—Constance—just once—dear—before——"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Passing</div> + +<p>Barbara bent down. He lifted his shaking <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span>hands caressingly to the +splendid crown of golden hair, the smooth, fair <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'checks'">cheeks</ins>, the perfect neck +and shoulders, and died, enraptured, with her kiss upon his lips.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XX</h2> + +<h3>Pardon</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">The Burial Service</div> + +<p>Crushed and almost broken-hearted, Barbara sat in the dining-room. The +air was heavy with the overpowering scent of tuberoses. From the room +beyond came the solemn words of the burial service: "I am the +resurrection and the life. He that believeth on me, though he were dead, +yet shall he live."</p> + +<p>The words beat unbearably upon her ears. The walls of the room moved as +though they were of fabric, stirred by winds of hell. The floor +undulated beneath her feet and black mists blinded her. Her hands were +so cold that she scarcely felt the friendly, human touch on either side +of her chair.</p> + +<p>Roger held one of her cold little hands in both his own, yearning to +share her grief, to divide it in some way; even to bear it for her. On +the other side was Doctor Conrad, profoundly moved. His science had not +yet obliterated his human instincts and he was neither ashamed of the +mist in his eyes nor of the painful throbbing of his heart. His <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span>fingers +were upon Barbara's pulse, where the lifetide moved so slowly that he +could barely feel it.</p> + +<p>On the other side of the room, alien and apart, as always, sat Miriam. +She wore her best black gown, but her face was inscrutable. Perhaps the +lines were more sharply cut, perhaps the rough, red hands moved more +nervously than usual, and perhaps the deep-set black eyes burned more +fiercely, but no one noticed—or cared.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Minister</div> + +<p>The deep voice in the room beyond was vibrant with tenderness. The man +who stood near Ambrose North as he lay in his last sleep had been +summoned from town by Eloise. He did not make the occasion an excuse for +presenting his own particular doctrine, bolstered up by argument, nor +did he bid his hearers rejoice and be glad. He admitted, at the +beginning, that sorrow lay heavily upon the hearts of those who loved +Ambrose North and did not say that God was chastening them for their own +good.</p> + +<p>He spoke of Life as the rainbow that brilliantly spans two mysterious +silences, one of which is dawn and the other sunset. This flaming arc +must end, as it begins, in pain, but, past the silence, and, perhaps, in +even greater mystery, the circle must somewhere become complete and +round back to a new birth.</p> + +<p>Could not the God who ordained the begin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span>ning be safely trusted with the +end? Forgetting the grey mists of dawn in which the rainbow began, +should we deny the inevitable night when the arc bends down at the other +end of the world? Having seen so much of the perfect curve, could we not +believe in the circle? And should we not remember that the rainbow +itself was a signal and a promise that there should be no more sea? Even +so, was not this mortal life of ours, tempered as it is by sorrow and +tears, a further promise that, when the circle was completed, there +should be no more death?</p> + +<div class="sidenote">God's Love</div> + +<p>The deep voice went on, even more tenderly, to speak of God; not of His +power, but of His purpose, not of His justice, but His forgiveness, not +of His <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'venegeance'">vengeance</ins>, but of His love. A love so vast and far-reaching that +there is no place where it is not; it enfolds not only our little world, +poised in infinite space like a mote in a sunbeam, but all the shining, +rolling worlds beyond. Every star that rises within our sight and all +the million stars beyond, in misty distances so great as to be +incomprehensible, are guided and surrounded by this same love. It is +impossible to conceive of a place where it is not—even in the midst of +pain, poverty, suffering, and death, God's love is there also. The +minister pleaded with those who listened to him to lean wholly upon this +all-sustaining, all-forgiving love; to believe that it sheltered <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span>both +the living and the dead, and to trust, simply, as a little child.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">At the Close of the Service</div> + +<p>In the stillness that followed, Eloise went to the piano. The worn +strings answered softly as her fingers touched the keys. In her full, +low contralto she sang, to an exquisite melody:</p> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="When I am dead, my dearest"> +<tr><td align='left'>"When I am dead, my dearest,</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">Sing no sad songs for me;</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Plant thou no roses at my head,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">Nor shady cypress tree;</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Be the green grass above me</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">With showers and dewdrops wet;</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">And if thou wilt, remember,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">And if thou wilt, forget.</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><br />"I shall not see the shadows,</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">I shall not feel the rain;</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">I shall not hear the nightingale</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">Sing on, as if in pain:</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">And dreaming through the twilight</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">That doth not rise nor set,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Haply I may remember,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">And haply may forget."</span></td></tr> +</table></div> + +<p>The deep, manly voice followed with a benediction, then the little group +of neighbours and friends went out with hushed and reverent step, into +the golden Autumn afternoon. Miriam came in, to all outward appearance +wholly unmoved. She stood by him for a moment, then turned away.</p> + +<p>Eloise closed the door and Roger and Allan brought Barbara in. She bent +down to her <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span>father, who lay so quietly, with a smile of heavenly peace +upon his lips, and her tears rained upon his face. "Good-bye, dear +Daddy," she sobbed. "It is Barbara who kisses you now."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>When Ambrose North went out of his door for the last time, on his way to +rest beside his beloved Constance until God should summon them both, +Roger stayed behind, with Barbara. Doctor Conrad had said, positively, +that she must not go, and, as always, she obeyed.</p> + +<p>The boy's heart was too full for words. He still kept her cold little +hand in his. "There isn't anything I can say or do, is there, Barbara, +dear?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Pity of It</div> + +<p>"No," she sobbed. "That is the pity of it. There is never anything to be +said or done."</p> + +<p>"I wish I could take it from you and bear it for you," he said, simply. +"Some way, we seem to belong together, you and I."</p> + +<p>They sat in silence until the others came back. Eloise came straight to +Barbara and put her strong young arms around the frail, bent little +figure.</p> + +<p>"Will you come with me, dear?" she asked. "We can get a carriage easily +and I'd love to have you with me. Will you come?"</p> + +<p>For a moment, Barbara hesitated. "No," she said, "I must stay here. I've +got to live <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span>right on here, and I might as well begin to-night."</p> + +<p>Allan took from his pocket several small, round white tablets, and gave +them to Barbara. "Two just before going to bed," he said. "And if you're +the same brave girl that you've been ever since I've known you, you'll +have your bearings again in a short time."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">By the Open Fire</div> + +<p>Roger stayed to supper, but none of them made more than a pretence of +eating. The odour of tuberoses still pervaded the house and brought, +inevitably, the thought of death. Afterward, Barbara sat by the open +fire with one hand lying listlessly in Roger's warm, understanding +clasp. In the kitchen, Miriam vigorously washed the few dishes. She had +put away the fine china, the solid silver knife and fork, the remnant of +table damask, and the Satsuma cup.</p> + +<p>"Shall I read to you, Barbara?" asked Roger.</p> + +<p>"No," she answered, wearily. "I couldn't listen to-night."</p> + +<p>The hours dragged on. Miriam sat in the dining-room alone, by the light +of one candle, remorsefully, after many years, face to face with +herself.</p> + +<p>She wondered what Constance would do to her now, when she went to bed +and fearfully closed her eyes. She determined to cheat Constance by +sitting up all night, and then <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span>realised that by doing so she would only +postpone the inevitable reckoning.</p> + +<p>Miriam felt that a reckoning was due somewhere, on earth, or in heaven, +or in hell. Mysterious balances must be made before things were right, +and her endeavours to get what she had conceived to be her own just due +had all failed.</p> + +<p>She wondered why. Constance had wronged her and she was entitled to pay +Constance back in her own coin. But the opportunity had been taken out +of her hands, every time. Even at the last, her subtle revenge had been +transmuted into further glory for Constance. Why?</p> + +<p>The answer flashed upon her like words of fire—"<i>Vengeance is mine; I +will repay.</i>"</p> + +<p>Then, suddenly, from some unknown source, the need of confession came +pitilessly upon her soul. Her lined face blanched in the candle-light +and her worn, nervous hands clutched fearfully at the arm of her chair.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Still Small Voice</div> + +<p>"Confess," she repeated to herself scornfully as though in answer to +some imperative summons. "To whom?"</p> + +<p>There was no answer, but, in her heart, Miriam knew. Only one of the +blood was left and to that one, if possible, payment must be made. And +if anything was due her, either from the dead or the living, it must +come to her through Barbara.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span></p> + +<p>Miriam laughed shrilly and then bit her lips, thinking the others might +hear. Roger heard—and wondered—but said nothing.</p> + +<p>After he went home, Barbara still sat by the fire, in that surcease +which comes when one is unable to sustain grief longer and it steps +aside, to wait a little, before taking a fresh hold. She could wonder +now about the letter, in her mother's writing, that she had picked up +from the floor, and which her father had found, and very possibly read. +She hesitated to ask Miriam anything concerning either her father or her +mother.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miriam's Confession</div> + +<p>But, while she sat there, Miriam came into the room, urged by goading +impulses without number and one insupportable need. She stood near +Barbara for several minutes without speaking; then she began, huskily, +"Barbara——"</p> + +<p>The girl turned, wearily. "Yes?"</p> + +<p>"I've got something to say and I don't know but what to-night is as good +a time as any. Neither of us are likely to sleep much."</p> + +<p>Barbara did not answer.</p> + +<p>"I hated your mother," said Miriam, passionately. "I always hated her."</p> + +<p>"I guessed that," answered Barbara, with a sigh.</p> + +<p>"Your father was in love with me when she came from school, with her +doll-face and pretty ways. She took him away from me. He never looked at +me after he saw her. I <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span>had to stand by and see it, help her with her +pretty clothes, and even be maid of honour at the wedding. It was hard, +but I did it.</p> + +<p>"She loved him, in a way, but it wasn't much of a way. She liked the +fine clothes and the trinkets he gave her, but, after he went blind, she +could hardly tolerate him. Lots of times, she would have been downright +cruel to him if I hadn't made her do differently.</p> + +<p>"The first time they came here for the Summer, she met Laurence Austin, +Roger's father, and it was love at first sight on both sides. They used +to see each other every day either here or out somewhere. After you were +born, the first place she went was down to the shore to meet him. I +know, for I followed.</p> + +<p>"When your father asked where she was, I lied to him, not only then, but +many times. I wasn't screening her—I was shielding him. It went on for +over a year, then she took the laudanum. She left four notes—one to me, +one to your father, one to you, and one to Laurence Austin. I never +delivered that, even though she haunted me almost every night for five +years. After he died, she still haunted me, but it was less often, and +different.</p> + +<p>"When you sent me into your father's room after that letter he had in +his pocket, I took time to read it. She said, there, that she didn't +trust me, and that I had always loved <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span>your father. It was true enough, +but I didn't know she knew it.</p> + +<p>"After you took the letter out, I put in the one to Laurence Austin. I'd +opened it and read it some little time back. I thought it was time he +knew her as she was, and I never thought about no name being mentioned +in it.</p> + +<p>"When he tore off the bandages, he read that letter, and never knew that +it wasn't meant for him. Then, when you came in in that old dress of +your mother's, he thought it was her come back to him, and never knew +any different."</p> + +<p>There was a long pause. "Well?" said Barbara, wearily. It did not seem +as if anything mattered.</p> + +<p>"I just want you to know that I've hated your mother all my life, ever +since she came home from school. I've hated you because you look like +her. I've hated your father because he talked so of her all the time, +and hated myself for loving him. I've hated everybody, but I've done my +duty, as far as I know. I've scrubbed and slaved and taken care of you +and your father, and done the best I could.</p> + +<p>"When I put that letter into his pocket, I intended for him to know that +Constance was in love with another man. I'd have read it to him long ago +if I'd had any idea he'd believe me. When he thought it was for him, I +was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span>just on the verge of telling him different when you came in and +stopped me. You looked so much like your mother I thought Constance had +taken to walking down here daytimes instead of back and forth in my room +at night.</p> + +<p>"I suppose," Miriam went on, in a strange tone, "that I've killed +him—that there's murder on my hands as well as hate in my heart. I +suppose you'll want to make some different arrangements now—you won't +want to go on living with me after I've killed your father."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Wonderful Joy</div> + +<p>"Aunt Miriam," said Barbara, calmly, "I've known for a long time almost +everything you've told me, but I didn't know how father got the letter. +I thought he must have found it somewhere in the desk or in his own +room, or even in the attic. You didn't kill him any more than I did, by +coming into the room in mother's gown. What he really died of was a +great, wonderful joy that suddenly broke a heart too weak to hold it. +And, even though I've wanted my father to see me, all my life long, I'd +rather have had it as it was, and he would, too. I'm sure of that.</p> + +<p>"He told me once the three things he most wanted to see in the world +were mother's letter, saying that she loved him, then mother herself, +and, last of all, me. And for a long time his dearest dream has been +that I could walk and he could see. So when, in the space <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span>of five or +ten minutes, all the dreams came true, his heart failed."</p> + +<p>"But," Miriam persisted, "I meant to do him harm." Her burning eyes were +keenly fixed upon Barbara's face.</p> + +<p>"Sometimes," answered the girl, gently, "I think that right must come +from trying to do wrong, to make up for the countless times wrong comes +from trying to do right. Father could not have had greater joy, even in +heaven, than you and I gave him at the last, neither of us meaning to do +it."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Human Sympathy and Love</div> + +<p>The stern barrier that had reared itself between Miriam and her kind +suddenly crumbled and fell. Warm tides of human sympathy and love came +into her numb heart and ice-bound soul. The lines in her face relaxed, +her hands ceased to tremble, and her burning eyes softened with the mist +of tears. Her mouth quivered as she said words she had not even dreamed +of saying for more than a quarter of a century:</p> + +<p>"Will you—can you—forgive me?"</p> + +<p>All that she needed from the dead and all they could have given her came +generously from Barbara. She sprang to her feet and threw her arms +around Miriam's neck. "Oh, Aunty! Aunty!" she cried, "indeed I do, not +only for myself, but for father and mother, too. We don't forgive +enough, we don't love enough, we're not kind enough, and that's <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span>all +that's wrong with the world. There isn't time enough for bitterness—the +end comes too soon."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">At Peace</div> + +<p>Miriam went upstairs, strangely uplifted, strangely at peace. She was no +longer alien and apart, but one with the world. She had a sense of +universal kinship—almost of brotherhood. That night she slept, for the +first time in more than twenty years, without the fear of Constance.</p> + +<p>And Constance, who was more sinned against than sinning, and whose +faithful old husband had that day lain down, in joy and triumph, to rest +beside her in the churchyard, came no more.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XXI</h2> + +<h3>The Perils of the City</h3> + + +<p>"Roger," remarked Miss Mattie, laying aside her paper, "I don't know as +I'm in favour of havin' you go to the city. Can't you get the Judge +another dog?"</p> + +<p>"Why not, Mother?" asked Roger, ignoring her question.</p> + +<p>"Because it seems to me, from all I've been readin' and hearin' lately, +that the city ain't a proper place for a young person. Take that +minister, now, that those folks brought down for Ambrose North's +funeral. I never heard anything like it in all my life. You was there +and you heard what he said, so there ain't no need of dwellin' on it, +but it wasn't what I'm accustomed to in the way of funerals." Miss +Mattie's militant hairpins bristled as she spoke.</p> + +<p>"I thought it was all right, Mother. What was wrong with it?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Everything Wrong</div> + +<p>"Wrong!" repeated Miss Mattie, in astonishment. "Everything was wrong +with it! Am<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span>brose North wasn't a church-member and he never went more'n +once or twice that I know of, even after the Lord chastened him with +blindness for not goin'. There was no power to the sermon and no cryin' +except Barbara and that Miss Wynne that sang that outlandish piece +instead of a hymn.</p> + +<p>"Why, Roger, I was to a funeral once over to the Ridge where the corpse +was an unbaptized infant, and you ought to have heard that preacher +describin' the abode of the lost! The child's mother fainted dead away +and had to be carried out of the church, it was that powerful and +movin'. That was somethin' like!"</p> + +<p>It was in Roger's mind to say he was glad that the minister had not made +Barbara faint, but he wisely kept silent.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Life in the City</div> + +<p>"That's only one thing," Miss Mattie went on. "What with religion bein' +in that condition in the city, and the life folks live there, I don't +think it's any fit place for a person that ain't strong in the faith, +and you know you ain't, Roger. You take after your pa.</p> + +<p>"I was readin' in <i>The Metropolitan Weekly</i> only last week a story about +a lovely young orphan that was caught one night by a rejected suitor and +tied to the railroad track. Just as the train was goin' to run over her, +the man she wanted to marry come along on the dead run with a knife and +cut her bonds. She <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[288]</a></span>got off the track just as the night express come +around the curve, goin' ninety-five miles an hour.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Miss Mattie's Fears</div> + +<p>"This man says to her, 'Genevieve, will you come to me now, and let me +put you out of this dread villain's power forever?' Then he opened his +arms and the beautiful Genevieve fled to them as to some ark of safety +and laid her pale and weary face upon his lovin' and forgivin' heart. +That's the exact endin' of it, and I must say it's written beautiful, +but when I wake up in the night and think about it, I get scared to have +you go.</p> + +<p>"You ain't so bad lookin', Roger, and you're gettin' to the age where +you might be expected to take notice, and what if some designing female +should tie you to the railroad track? I declare, it makes me nervous to +think of it."</p> + +<p>Roger did not like to shake his mother's faith in <i>The Metropolitan +Weekly</i>, but he longed to set her fears at rest. "Those things aren't +true, Mother," he said, kindly. "They not only haven't happened, but +they couldn't happen—it's impossible."</p> + +<p>"Roger, what do you mean by sayin' such things. Of course it's true, or +it wouldn't be in the paper. Ain't it right there in print, as plain as +the nose on your face? You can see for yourself. I hope studyin' law +ain't goin' to make an infidel of you."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[289]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I don't think it will," temporised Roger. "I'll keep a close watch for +designing females, and will avoid railroad tracks at night."</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie shook her head doubtfully. "That ain't a goin' to do no +good, Roger, if they once get set after you. I've noticed that the +villain always triumphs."</p> + +<p>"But only for a little while, Mother. Surely you must have seen that?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Villain Foiled</div> + +<p>She settled her steel-bowed spectacles firmly on the wart and gazed at +him. "I believe you're right," she said, after a few moments of +reflection. "I can't recall no story now where the villain was not +foiled at last. Let me see—there was <i>Lovely Lulu, or the Doctor's +Darling</i>, and <i>Margaret Merriman, or the Maiden's Mad Marriage</i>, and +<i>True Gold, or Pretty Crystal's Love</i>, and <i>The American Countess, or +Hearts Aflame</i>, and this one I was just speakin' of, <i>Genevieve +Carleton, or the Brakeman's Bride</i>. In every one of 'em, the villain got +his just deserts, though sometimes they was disjointed owin' to the +story bein' broke off at the most interestin' point and continued the +followin' week."</p> + +<p>"Well, if the villain is always foiled, you're surely not afraid, are +you?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know's I'm afraid in the long run, but I don't like to have you +go through such things and be exposed to the temptations of a great +city."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[290]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Why don't you come with me, Mother, and keep house for me? We can find +a little flat somewhere, and——"</p> + +<p>"What on earth is that?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Apartments and Flats</div> + +<p>"I've never been in one myself, but Miss Wynne said that, if you wanted +to come, she would find us a flat, or an apartment."</p> + +<p>"What's the difference between a flat and an apartment?"</p> + +<p>"That's what I asked her. She said it was just the rent. You pay more +for an apartment than you do for a flat."</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't want anything I had to pay more for," observed Miss Mattie, +stroking her chin thoughtfully. "You ain't told me what a flat is."</p> + +<p>"A few rooms all on one floor, like a cottage. It's like several +cottages, all under one roof."</p> + +<p>"What do they want to cover the cottages with a roof for? Don't they +want light and air?"</p> + +<p>"You don't understand, Mother. Suppose that our house here was an +apartment house. The stairs would be shut off from these rooms and the +hall would be accessible from the street. Instead of having three rooms +upstairs, there might be six—one of them a kitchen and the others +living-rooms and bedrooms. Don't you see?"</p> + +<p>"You mean a kitchen on the same floor with the bedrooms?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[291]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Yes, all the rooms on one floor."</p> + +<p>"Just as if an earthquake was to jolt off the top of the house and shake +all the bedrooms down here?"</p> + +<p>"Something like that."</p> + +<p>"Well, then," said Miss Mattie, firmly, "all I've got to say is that it +ain't decent. Think of people sleepin' just off kitchens and washin' +their faces and hands in the sink."</p> + +<p>"I think some of them must be very nice, Mother. Miss Wynne expects to +live in an apartment after she is married and she has a little one of +her own now. If you'll come with me we'll find some place that you'll +like. I don't want to leave you alone here."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Under One Roof</div> + +<p>"No," she answered, after due deliberation, "I reckon I'll stay here. +You can't transplant an old tree and you can't take a woman who has +lived all her life in a house and put her in a place where there are +several cottages all under one roof with bedrooms off of kitchens and +folks washin' in the sinks. Miss Wynne can do it if she likes, but I was +brought up different."</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid you'll be lonesome."</p> + +<p>"I don't know why I should be any more lonesome than I always have been. +All I see of you is at meals and while you're readin' nights. You're +just like your pa. If I propped up a book by the lamp, it would be just +as sociable as it is to have you settin'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[292]</a></span> here. Readin' is a good thing +in its place and I enjoy it myself, but sometimes it's pleasant to hear +the human voice sayin' somethin' besides 'What?' and 'Yes' and 'All +right' and 'Is supper ready?'</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Blue Hair Ribbon</div> + +<p>"I've been lookin' over your things to-day and gettin' 'em ready. The +moths has ate your Winter flannels and you'll have to get more. I've +mended your coat linin's and sewed on buttons, and darned and patched, +and I've took Barbara North's blue hair ribbon back to her—the one you +found some place and had in your pocket. You mustn't be careless about +those things, Roger—she might think you meant to steal it."</p> + +<p>"What did Barbara say?" he stammered. The high colour had mounted to his +temples.</p> + +<p>"She didn't know what to say at first, but she recognised it as her hair +ribbon. I told her you hadn't meant to steal it—that you'd just found +it somewheres and had forgot to give it to her, and it was all right. +She laughed some, but it was a funny laugh. You must be careful, +Roger—you won't always have your mother to get you out of scrapes."</p> + +<p>Roger wondered if the knot of blue ribbon that had so strangely gone +back to Barbara had, by any chance, carried to her its intangible +freight of dreams and kisses, with a boyish tear or two, of which he had +the grace not to be ashamed.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[293]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Your pa was in the habit of annexin' female belongin's, though the Lord +knows where he ever got 'em. I suppose he picked 'em up on the +street—he was so dreadful absent-minded. He was systematic about 'em in +a way, though. After he died, I found 'em all put away most careful in a +box—a handkerchief and one kid glove, and a piece of ribbon about like +the one I took back to Barbara. He was flighty sometimes: constant +devotion to readin' had unsettled his mind.</p> + +<p>"That brings me to what I wanted to say when I first started out. I +don't want you should load up your trunk with your pa's books to the +exclusion of your clothes, and I don't want you to spend your evenin's +readin'."</p> + +<p>"I'm not apt to read very much, Mother, if I work in an office in the +daytime and go to law school at night."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Ten Books Only</div> + +<p>"That's so, too, but there's Sundays. You can take any ten of your pa's +books that you like, but no more. I'll keep the rest here against the +time the train is blocked and the mails don't come through. I may get a +taste for your pa's books myself."</p> + +<p>Roger did not think it likely, but he was too wise to say so.</p> + +<p>"And I didn't tell you this before, but I've made it my business to go +and see the Judge and tell him how you saved my life at <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[294]</a></span>the expense of +Fido's. I don't know when I've seen a man so mad. I was goin' to suggest +that we get him another dog from some place, and land sakes! he clean +drove it out of my mind.</p> + +<p>"I don't know how you've stood it, bein' there in the office with him, +and I told him so. He's got a red-headed boy from the Ridge in there +now, and I think maybe the Judge will get what's comin' to him before he +gets through. I've learned not to trifle with anybody what has red hair, +but seemin'ly the Judge ain't. It takes some folks a long time to learn.</p> + +<p>"Barbara's goin' to the city, too, to spend the Winter with that Miss +Wynne in the cottage that's under the same roof with other cottages and +the bedrooms off the kitchen. I don't know how Barbara'll take to +washin' in the sink, when she's always had that rose-sprigged bowl and +pitcher of her ma's, but it's her business, not mine, and if she wants +to go, she can.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">"Me and Miriam"</div> + +<p>"Me and Miriam'll set together evenings and keep each other from bein' +lonesome. She ain't much more company than a cow, as far as talkin' +goes, but there's a feelin,' some way, about another person bein' in the +house, when the wind gets to howlin' down the chimney. We may arrange to +have supper together, once in a while, and in case of severe <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span>weather, +put the two fires goin' in one house, which ever's the warmest.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what we shall do, for we ain't talked it over much yet, +but with church twice on Sunday and prayer-meetin' Wednesday evenings, +and the sewin' circle on Friday, and two New York papers every week, and +Miriam, and all your pa's books to prop up against the lamp, I don't +reckon I'll get so dreadful lonesome. I've thought some of gettin' +myself a cat. There's somethin' mighty comfortable and heartenin' about +a cup of hot tea and the sound of purrin' close by. And on the Spring +excursion to the city, I reckon I'll come up and see you, if I don't +have no more pain in my back."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Dr. Conrad's Automobile</div> + +<p>"I'd love to have you come, Mother, and I'd do all I could to give you a +good time. I know the others would, too. Doctor Conrad has an automobile +and——"</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie became deeply concerned. "Is he treatin' himself for it?" +she demanded.</p> + +<p>"I don't think so," answered Roger, choking back a laugh.</p> + +<p>"It beats all," mused Miss Mattie. "They say the shoemaker's children +never have shoes, and it seems that doctors have diseases just like +other folks. I disremember of havin' heard of this, but I know from my +own experience that a disease with only one word to it can be dreadful +painful. Is it catchin'?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[296]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Not with full speed on," replied Roger. "An automobile is very hard to +catch."</p> + +<p>"Well, see that you don't take it," cautioned Miss Mattie. The first +part of his answer was obscure, but she was not one to pause over an +uninteresting detail.</p> + +<p>"You've warned me about almost everything now, Mother," he said, +smiling. "Is there anything else?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing but matrimony, and that's included under the head of designing +females. I shouldn't want you to get married."</p> + +<p>"Why not?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Welded Souls</div> + +<p>"I don't know as I could tell you just why, only it seems to me that a +person is just as well off without it. I've been thinking of it a good +deal since I've had these New York papers and read so much about two +souls bein' welded into one. My soul wasn't never welded with your pa's, +nor his with mine, as I know of.</p> + +<p>"Marriage wasn't so dreadful different from livin' at home. It reminded +me of the Summer ma took a boarder, your pa required so much waitin' on. +And when you came, I had a baby to take care of besides. If I was welded +I never noticed it—I was too busy."</p> + +<p>Roger's heart softened into unspeakable pity. In missing the "welding," +Miss Mattie had missed the best that life has to give. Somewhere, +doubtless, the man existed who <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span>could have stirred the woman's soul +beneath the surface shallows and set the sordid tasks of daily living in +tune with the music that sways the world.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">"Un-marriage"</div> + +<p>"There's a good deal in the papers about un-marriage, too," resumed Miss +Mattie, "and I can't understand it. When you've stood before the altar +and said 'till death do us part,' I don't see how another man, who ain't +even a minister, can undo it and let you have another chance at it. +Maybe you do, bein' as you're up in law, but I don't.</p> + +<p>"It looks to me as if the laws were wrong or else the marriage ceremony +ought to be written different. If a man said, 'I take thee to be my +wedded wife, to love and to cherish until I see somebody else I like +better,' I could understand the un-marriage, but I can't now. When you +get to be a power in the law, Roger, I think you should try to get that +fixed. I never was welded, but after I'd given my word, I stuck to it, +even though your pa was dreadful aggravatin' sometimes. He didn't mean +to be, but he was. I guess it's the nature of men folks."</p> + +<p>Deeply moved, Roger went over and kissed her smooth cheek. "Have I been +aggravating, Mother?"</p> + +<p>Miss Mattie's eyes grew misty. She took off her spectacles and wiped +them briskly on one corner of the table-cover. "No more'n <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[298]</a></span>was natural, +I guess," she answered. "You've been a good boy, Roger, and I want you +should be a good man. When you get away from home, where your mother +can't look after you, just remember that she expects you to be good, +like your pa. He might have been aggravatin', but he wasn't wicked."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Remember</div> + +<p>All the best part of the boy's nature rose in answer, and the mist came +into his eyes, too. "I'll remember, Mother, and you shall never be +disappointed in me—I promise you that."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[299]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XXII</h2> + +<h3>Autumn Leaves</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">Autumn Glory</div> + +<p>Summer had gone long ago, but the sweetness of her passing yet lay upon +the land and sea. The hills were glorious with a pageantry of scarlet +and gold where, in the midnight silences, the soul of the woods had +flamed in answer to the far, mysterious bugles of the frost. Bloom was +on the grapes in the vineyard, and fairy lace, of cobweb fineness, had +been hung by the secret spinners from stem to stem of the purple +clusters and across bits of stubble in the field.</p> + +<p>From the blue sea, now and then, came the breath of Winter, though +Autumn lingered on the shore. Many of the people at the hotel had gone +back to town, feeling the imperious call of the city with the first keen +wind. Eloise, with a few others, waited. She expected to stay until +Barbara was strong enough to go with her.</p> + +<p>But Barbara's strength was coming very slowly now. She grieved for her +father, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[300]</a></span>the grieving kept her back. Allan came down once a +fortnight to spend Sunday with Eloise and to look after Barbara, though +he realised that Barbara was, in a way, beyond his reach.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">What We Need</div> + +<p>"She doesn't need medicine," he said, to Eloise. "She is perfectly well, +physically, though of course her strength is limited and will be for +some time to come. What she needs is happiness."</p> + +<p>"That is what we all need," answered Eloise.</p> + +<p>Allan flashed a quick glance at her. "Even I," he said, in a different +tone, "but I must wait for mine."</p> + +<p>"We all wait for things," she laughed, but the lovely colour had mounted +to the roots of her hair that waved so softly back from her low +forehead.</p> + +<p>"When, dear?" insisted Allan, possessing himself of her hand.</p> + +<p>"I promised once," she answered. "When the colour is all gone from the +hills and the last leaves have fallen, then I'll come."</p> + +<p>"You're not counting the oaks?" he asked, half fearfully. "Sometimes the +oak leaves stay on all Winter, you know. And evergreens are ruled out, +aren't they?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly. We won't count the oaks or the Christmas trees. Long before +Santa Claus comes, I'll be a sedate matron instead of a flyaway, +frivolous spinster."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span></p> + +<p>"For the first time since I grew up," remarked Allan, with evident +sincerity, "I wish Christmas came earlier. Upon what day, fair lady, do +you think the leaves will be gone?"</p> + +<p>"In November, I suppose," she answered, with an affected indifference +that did not deceive him. "The day after Thanksgiving, perhaps."</p> + +<p>"That's Friday, and I positively refuse to be married on a Friday."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Best Day of All</div> + +<p>"Then the day before—that's Wednesday. You know the old rhyme says: +'Wednesday the best day of all.'"</p> + +<p>So it was settled. Allan laughingly put down in his little red leather +pocket diary, under the date of Wednesday, November twenty-fifth, "Miss +Wynne's wedding." "Where is it to be?" he asked. "I wouldn't miss it for +worlds."</p> + +<p>"I've been thinking about that," said Eloise, slowly, after a pause. "I +suppose we'll have to be conventional."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"Because everybody is."</p> + +<p>"The very reason why we shouldn't be. This is our wedding, and we'll +have it to please ourselves. It's probably our last."</p> + +<p>"In spite of the advanced civilisation in which we live," she returned, +"I hope and believe that it is the one and only wedding <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[302]</a></span>in which either +of us will ever take a leading part."</p> + +<p>"Haven't you ever had day-dreams, dear, about your wedding?"</p> + +<p>"Many a time," she laughed. "I'd be the rankest kind of polygamist if I +had all the kinds I've planned for."</p> + +<p>"But the best kind?" he persisted. "Which is in the ascendant now?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">An Ideal Wedding</div> + +<p>"If I could choose," she replied, thoughtfully, "I'd have it in some +quiet little country church, on a brilliant, sunshiny day—the kind that +makes your blood tingle and fills you with the joy of living. I'd like +it to be Indian Summer, with gold and crimson leaves falling all through +the woods. I'd like to have little brown birds chirping, and squirrels +and chipmunks pattering through the leaves. I'd like to have the church +almost in the heart of the woods, and have the sun stream into every +nook and corner of it while we were being married. I'd like two taper +lights at the altar, and the Episcopal service, but no music."</p> + +<p>"Any crowd?"</p> + +<p>Her sweet face grew very tender. "No," she said. "Nobody but our two +selves."</p> + +<p>"We'll have to have a minister," he reminded her, practically, "and two +witnesses. Otherwise it isn't legal. Whom would you choose for +witnesses?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[303]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I think I'd like to have Barbara and Roger. I don't know why, for I +have so many other friends who mean more to me. Yet it seems, some way, +as if they two belonged in the picture."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Right Now</div> + +<p>A bright idea came to Allan. "Dearest," he said, "you couldn't have the +falling leaves and the squirrels if we waited until Thanksgiving time, +but it's all here, right now. Don't you remember that little church in +the woods that we passed the other day—the little white church with +maples all around it and the Autumn leaves dropping silently through the +still, warm air? Why not here—and now?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I couldn't," cried Eloise.</p> + +<p>"Why not?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, you're so stupid! Clothes and things! I've got a million things to +do before I can be married decently."</p> + +<p>He laughed at her woman's reason as he put his arms around her. "I want +a wife, and not a Parisian wardrobe. You're lovelier to me right now in +your white linen gown than you've ever been before. Don't wear yourself +out with dressmakers and shopping. You'll have all the rest of your life +for that."</p> + +<p>"Won't I have all the rest of my life to get married in?" she queried, +demurely.</p> + +<p>"You have if you insist upon taking it, darling, but I feel very +strongly to get married to-day."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[304]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Not to-day," she demurred.</p> + +<p>"Why not? It's only half past one and the ceremony doesn't last over +twenty minutes. I suppose it can be cut down to fifteen or eighteen if +you insist upon having it condensed. You don't even need to wash your +face. Get your hat and come on."</p> + +<p>His tone was tender, even pleading, but some far survival of Primitive +Woman, whose marriage was by capture, stirred faintly in Eloise. "Our +friends won't like it," she said, as a last excuse.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Two Concerned</div> + +<p>He noted, with joy, that she said "won't," instead of "wouldn't," but +she did not realise that she had betrayed herself. "We don't care, do +we?" he asked. "It's our wedding and nobody's else. When we can't please +everybody, we might as well please ourselves. Matrimony is the one thing +in the world that concerns nobody but the two who enter into it—and +it's the thing that everybody has the most to say about. While you're +putting on your hat, I'll get the license and see about a carriage."</p> + +<p>"I thought I'd wait until Barbara could go to town with me," she said.</p> + +<p>"There's nothing to hinder your coming back for her, if you want to and +she isn't willing to come with Roger. I insist upon having my honeymoon +alone."</p> + +<p>"All alone? If I were very good, wouldn't you let me come along?"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[305]</a></span></p> + +<p>Allan coloured. "You know what I mean," he said, softly. "I've waited so +long, darling, and I think I've been patient. Isn't it time I was +rewarded?"</p> + +<p>They were on the beach, behind the friendly sand-dune that had been +their trysting place all Summer. Thoroughly humble in her surrender, yet +wholly womanly, Eloise put her soft arms around his neck. "I will," she +said. "Kiss me for the last time before——"</p> + +<p>"Before what?" demanded Allan, as, laughing, she extricated herself from +his close embrace.</p> + +<p>"Before you exchange your sweetheart for a wife."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">More Secure</div> + +<p>"I'm not making any exchange. I'm only making my possession more secure. +Look, dear."</p> + +<p>He took from his pocket a shining golden circlet which exactly fitted +the third finger of her left hand. Their initials were engraved inside. +Only the date was lacking.</p> + +<p>"I've had it for a long, long time," he said, in reply to her surprised +question. "I hoped that some day I might find you in a yielding mood."</p> + +<p>When she went up to her room, her heart was beating wildly. This sudden +plunge into the unknown was blinding, even though she longed to make it. +Having come to the edge of the precipice she feared the leap, in spite +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[306]</a></span>of the conviction that life-long happiness lay beyond.</p> + +<p>In the fond sight of her lover, Eloise was very lovely when she went +down in her white gown and hat, her eyes shining with the world-old joy +that makes the old world new for those to whom it comes, be it soon or +late.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Beautifully Unconventional</div> + +<p>"It's beautifully unconventional," she said, as he assisted her into the +surrey. "No bridesmaids, no wedding presents, and no dreary round of +entertainments. I believe I like it."</p> + +<p>"I know I do," he responded, fervently. "You're the loveliest thing I've +ever seen, sweetheart. Is that a new gown?"</p> + +<p>"I've worn it all Summer," she laughed "and it's been washed over a +dozen times. You have lots to learn about gowns."</p> + +<p>"I'm a willing pupil," he announced. "Shouldn't you have a veil? I +believe the bride's veil is usually 'of tulle, caught with a diamond +star, the gift of the groom.'"</p> + +<p>"You've been reading the society column. Give me the star, and I'll get +the veil."</p> + +<p>"You shall have it the first minute we get to town. I'd rob the Milky +Way for you, if I could. I'd give you a handful of stars to play with +and let you roll the sun and moon over the golf links."</p> + +<p>"I may take the moon," she replied. "I've always liked the looks of it, +but I'm afraid the sun would burn my fingers. Some<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[307]</a></span>body once got into +trouble, I believe, for trying to drive the chariot of the sun for a +day. Give me the moon and just one star."</p> + +<p>"Which star do you want?"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Love-star</div> + +<p>"The love-star," she answered, very softly. "Will you keep it shining +for me, in spite of clouds and darkness?"</p> + +<p>"Indeed I will."</p> + +<p>The horses stopped at Barbara's door. Allan went across the street to +call for Roger and Eloise went in to invite Barbara to go for a drive.</p> + +<p>"How lovely you look," cried Barbara, in admiration. "You look like a +bride."</p> + +<p>"Make yourself look bridal also," suggested Eloise, flushing, "by +putting on your best white gown. Roger is coming, too."</p> + +<p>Barbara missed the point entirely. It did not take her long to get +ready, and she sang happily to herself while she was dressing. She put a +white lace scarf of her mother's over her golden hair, which was now +piled high on her shapely head, and started out, for the first time in +all her twenty-two years, for a journey beyond the limits of her own +domain.</p> + +<p>Allan and Roger helped her in. She was very awkward about it, and was +sufficiently impressed with her awkwardness to offer a laughing apology. +"I've never been in a carriage before," she said, "nor seen a train, nor +even a church. All I've had is pictures <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[308]</a></span>and books—and Roger," she +added, as an afterthought, when he took his place beside her on the back +seat.</p> + +<p>"You're going to see lots of things to-day that you never saw before," +observed Allan, starting the horses toward the hill road. "We'll begin +by showing you a church, and then a wedding."</p> + +<p>"A wedding!" cried Barbara. "Who is going to be married?"</p> + +<p>"We," he replied, concisely. "Don't you think it's time?"</p> + +<p>"Isn't it sudden?" asked Roger. "I thought you weren't going to be +married until almost Christmas."</p> + +<p>"I've been serving time now for two years," explained Allan, "and she's +given me two months off for good behaviour. Just remember, young man, +when your turn comes, that nothing is sudden when you've been waiting +for it all your life."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Little White Church</div> + +<p>The door of the little white church was open and the sun that streamed +through the door and the stained glass windows carried the glory and the +radiance of Autumn into every nook and corner of it. At the altar burned +two tall taper lights, and the young minister, in white vestments, was +waiting.</p> + +<p>The joking mood was still upon Allan and Eloise, but she requested in +all seriousness <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[309]</a></span>that the word "obey" be omitted from the ceremony.</p> + +<p>"Why?" asked the minister, gravely.</p> + +<p>"Because I don't want to promise anything I don't intend to do."</p> + +<p>"Put it in for me," suggested Allan, cheerfully. "I might as well +promise, for I'll have to do it anyway."</p> + +<p>Gradually, the hush and solemnity of the church banished the light mood. +A new joy, deeper, and more lasting, took the place of laughter as they +sat in the front pew, reading over the service. Barbara and Roger sat +together, half way down to the door. Neither had spoken since they +entered the church.</p> + +<p>A shaft of golden light lay full upon Eloise's face. In that moment, +before they went to the altar, Allan was afraid of her, she seemed so +angelic, so unreal. But the minister was waiting, with his open book. +"Come," said Allan, in a whisper, and she rose, smiling, to follow him, +not only then, but always.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Ceremony</div> + +<p>"Dearly Beloved," began the minister, "we are gathered here together in +the sight of God and in the face of this company, to join together this +man and this woman in holy matrimony." He went on through the beautiful +service, while the light streamed in, bearing its fairy freight of +colour and gold, and the swift patter of the Little People of the Forest +rustled through the drifting leaves.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[310]</a></span></p> + +<p>It was all as Eloise had chosen, even to the two who sat far back, with +their hands clasped, as wide-eyed as children before this sacred merging +of two souls into one.</p> + +<p>A little brown bird perched on the threshold, chirped a few questioning +notes, then flew away to his own nest. Acorns fell from the oaks across +the road, and the musical hum and whir of Autumn came faintly from the +fields. The taper lights burned in the sunshine like yellow stars.</p> + +<p>"That ye may so live together in this life," the minister was saying, +"that in the world to come ye may have life everlasting. Amen."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">After the Ordeal</div> + +<p>It was over in an incredibly brief space of time. When they came down +the aisle, Allan had the satisfied air of a man who has just emerged, +triumphantly, through his own skill, from a very difficult and dangerous +ordeal. Eloise was radiant, for her heart was singing within her a +splendid strophe of joy.</p> + +<p>When Barbara and Roger went to meet them, the strange, new shyness that +had settled down upon them both effectually hindered conversation. Roger +began an awkward little speech of congratulation, which immediately +became inarticulate and ended in silent embarrassment.</p> + +<p>But Allan wrung Roger's hand in a mighty grip that made him wince, and +Eloise smiled, for she saw more than either of them had yet <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[311]</a></span>guessed. +"You're kids," she said, fondly; "just dear, foolish kids." Impulsively, +she kissed them both, then they all went out into the sunshine again.</p> + +<p>The minister's eyes followed them with a certain wistfulness, for he was +young, and, as yet, the great miracle had not come to him. He sighed +when he put out the tapers and closed the door that divided him from the +music of Autumn and one great, overwhelming joy.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">On the Way Home</div> + +<p>On the way home, neither Barbara nor Roger spoke. They had nothing to +say and the others were silent because they had so much. They left the +two at Barbara's gate, then Allan turned the horses back to the hill +road. They were to have two glorious, golden hours alone before taking +the afternoon train.</p> + +<p>Barbara and Roger watched them as they went slowly up the tawny road +that trailed like a ribbon over the pageantry of the hill. When they +came to the crossroads, where one road led to the church and the other +into the boundless world beyond, Eloise leaned far out to wave a +fluttering bit of white in farewell.</p> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="And on her lover's arm"> +<tr><td align='left'>"And on her lover's arm she leant,</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">And round her waist she felt it fold,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">And far across the hills they went</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">In that new world which is the old,"</span></td></tr> +</table></div> + +<div>quoted Barbara, softly.<br /></div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[312]</a></span></p> + +<div class="sidenote">O'er the Hills</div> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="And o'er the hills"> +<tr><td align='left'>"And o'er the hills, and far away,</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">Beyond their utmost purple rim,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Beyond the night, across the day,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 1.5em;">Through all the world she followed him,"</span></td></tr> +</table></div> + +<div>added Roger.<br /></div> + +<p>The carriage was now only a black speck on the brow of the hill. +Presently it descended into the Autumn sunset and vanished altogether.</p> + +<p>"I'm glad they asked us," said Roger.</p> + +<p>"Wasn't it dear of them!" cried Barbara, with her face aglow. "Oh, +Roger, if I ever have a wedding, I want it to be just like that!"</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[313]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XXIII</h2> + +<h3>Letters to Constance</h3> + + +<div class="sidenote">Faith in Results</div> + +<p>Roger was in the library, trying to choose, from an embarrassment of +riches, the ten of his father's books which he was to be permitted to +take to the city with him. With characteristic thoughtfulness, Eloise +had busied herself in his behalf immediately upon her return to town. +She had found a good opportunity for him, and the letter appointing the +time for a personal interview was even then in his pocket.</p> + +<p>Neither he nor his mother had the slightest doubt as to the result. Miss +Mattie was certain that any lawyer with sense enough to practise law +would be only too glad to have Roger in his office. She scornfully +dismissed the grieving owner of Fido from her consideration, for it was +obvious that anyone with even passable mental equipment would not have +been disturbed by the accidental and painless removal of a bull pup.</p> + +<p>Roger's ambition and eagerness made him <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[314]</a></span>very sure of the outcome of his +forthcoming venture. All he asked for was the chance to work, and Eloise +was giving him that. How good she had been and how much she had done for +Barbara! Roger's heart fairly overflowed with gratitude and he +registered a boyish vow not to disappoint those who believed in him.</p> + +<p>It seemed strange to think of Eloise as "Mrs. Conrad." She had signed +her brief note to Roger, "Very cordially, Eloise Wynne Conrad." Down in +the corner she had written "Mrs. Allan Conrad." Roger smiled as he noted +the space between the "Wynne" and the "Conrad" in her signature—the +surest betrayal of a bride.</p> + +<p>"If I should marry," Roger thought, "my wife's name would be 'Mrs. Roger +Austin.'" He wrote it out on a scrap of paper to see how it would look. +It was certainly very attractive. "And if it were Barbara, for instance, +she would sign her letters 'Barbara North Austin.'" He wrote that out, +too, and, in the lamplight, appreciatively studied the effect from many +different angles. It was really a very beautiful name.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Lost in Reverie</div> + +<p>He lost himself in reverie, and it was nearly an hour afterward when he +returned to the difficult task of choosing his ten books. Shakespeare, +of course—fortunately there was a one-volume edition that came within +the letter of the law if not the spirit of it. To this he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[315]</a></span>added +Browning. As it happened, there was a complete one-volume edition of +this, too. Emerson came next—the Essays in two volumes. That made four. +He added <i>Vanity Fair</i>, <i>David Copperfield</i>, a translation of the +<i>Æneid</i>, and his beloved Keats. He hesitated a long time over the last +two, but finally took down Boswell's <i>Life of Johnson</i> and the <i>Essays +of Elia</i>, neither of which he had read.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Little Old Book</div> + +<p>Behind these two books, which had stood side by side, there was a small, +thin book that had either fallen down or been hidden there. Roger took +it out and carefully wiped off the dust. It was a blank book in which +his father had written on all but the last few pages. He took it over to +the table, drew the lamp closer, and sat down.</p> + +<p>The gay cover had softened with the years, the pages were yellow, and +some of them were blurred by blistering spots. The ink had faded, but +the writing was still legible. At the top of the first page was the +date, "<i>Evening, June the seventh</i>."</p> + +<p>"I have lived long," was written on the next line below, "but a thousand +years of living have been centred remorselessly into to-day. I cannot go +over, though in this house and in the one across the road it will seem +very strange. I knew the clouds of darkness must eternally hide us each +from the other, that we <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[316]</a></span>must see each other no more save at a great +distance, but the thunder and the riving lightning have put heaven +between us as well as earth.</p> + +<p>"I cannot eat, for food is dust and ashes in my mouth. I cannot drink +enough water to moisten my dry, parched throat. I cannot answer when +anyone speaks to me, for I do not hear what is said. It does not seem +that I shall ever sleep again. Yet God, pitiless and unforgiving, lets +me live on."</p> + +<p>The remainder of the page was blank. The next entry was dated: "<i>June +tenth. Night.</i>"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">No Other Way</div> + +<p>"I had to go. There was no other way. I had to sit and listen. I saw the +blind man in the room beyond, sitting beside the dark woman with the +hard face. She had the little lame baby in her arms—the baby who is a +year or so younger than my own son. I smelled the tuberoses and the +great clusters of white lilacs. And I saw her, dead, with her golden +braids on either side of her, smiling, in her white casket. When no one +was looking, I touched her hand. I called softly, 'Constance.' She did +not answer, so I knew she was dead.</p> + +<p>"I had to go to the churchyard, with the others. I was compelled to look +at the grave and to see the white casket lowered in. I heard that awful +fall of earth upon her and a voice saying those terrible words, 'Dust to +dust, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[317]</a></span>earth to earth, ashes to ashes.' The blind man sobbed aloud when +the earth fell. The dark woman with the hard face did not seem to care. +I could have strangled her, but I had to keep my hands still.</p> + +<p>"They said that she had not been sleeping and that she took too much +laudanum by mistake. It was not a mistake, for she was not of that sort. +She did it purposely. She did it because of that one mad hour of full +confession. I have killed her. After three years of self-control, it +failed me, and I went mad. It was my fault, for if I had not failed, she +would not have gone mad, too. I have killed her."<br /><br /></p> + + +<p>"<i>June fifteenth. Midnight.</i></p> + +<p>"I am calmer now. I can think more clearly. I have been alone in the +woods all day and every day since—. I have been thinking, thinking, +thinking, and going over everything. She left no word for me; she was so +sure I would understand. I do not understand yet, but I shall.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Estranged</div> + +<p>"There was no wrong between us, there never would have been. We were +divided by the whole earth, denied by all the leagues of sundering sea. +Now we are estranged by all the angels of heaven and all the hosts of +hell.</p> + +<p>"My arms ache for her—my lips hunger for hers. In that mysterious +darkness, does she want me, too? Did her heart cry out for me <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[318]</a></span>as mine +for her, until the blood of the poppies mingled with hers and brought +the white sleep?</p> + +<p>"It would have been something to know that we breathed the same air, +trod the same highways, listened together to the thrush and robin, and +all the winged wayfarers of forest and field. It would have been comfort +to know the same sun shone on us both, that the same moon lighted the +midnight silences with misty silver, that the same stars burned +taper-lights in the vaulted darkness for her and for me.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">One Hour</div> + +<p>"But I have not even that. I have nothing, though I have done no wrong +beyond holding her in my arms for one little hour. Out of all the time +that was before our beginning, out of all the time that shall be after +our ending, and in all the unpitying years of our mortal life, we have +had one hour."<br /><br /></p> + + +<p>"<i>June nineteenth.</i></p> + +<p>"I have been to her grave. I have tried to realise that the little mound +of earth upon the distant hill, over which the sun and stars sweep +endlessly, still shelters her; that, in some way, she is there. But I +cannot.</p> + +<p>"The mystery agonises me, for I have never had the belief that comforts +so many. Why is one belief any better than another when we come face to +face with the grey, impenetrable veil that never parts save for a +passage? Freed from the bonds of earth, does she still live, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[319]</a></span>somewhere, +in perfect peace with no thought of me? Sentient, but invisible, is she +here beside me now? Or is she asleep, dreamlessly, abiding in the earth +until some archangel shall sound the trumpet bidding all the myriad dead +arise? Oh, God, God! Only tell me where she is, that I may go, too!"<br /><br /></p> + + +<p>"<i>June twenty-first.</i></p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Hand Stayed</div> + +<p>"It is true that the path she took is open to me also. I have thought of +it many times. I am not afraid to follow where she has led, even into +the depths of hell. I have had for several days a vial of the crushed +poppies, and the bitter odour, even now, fills my room. Only one thought +stays my hand—my little son.</p> + +<p>"Should I follow, he must inevitably come to believe that his father was +a coward—that he was afraid of life, which is the most craven fear of +all. He will see that I have given to him something that I could not +bear myself, and will despise me, as people despise a man who shirks his +burden and shifts it to the shoulders of one weaker than he.</p> + +<p>"When temptation assails him, he will remember that his father yielded. +When life looms dark before him and among the fearful shadows there is +no hint of light, he will recall that his father was too much of a +coward to go into those same shadows, carrying his own light.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[320]</a></span></p> + +<p>"And if his heart is ever filled with an awful agony that requires all +his strength to meet it, he will remember that his father failed. I +could not rest in my grave if my son, living, should despise me, even +though my narrow house was in the same darkness that hides Her."<br /><br /></p> + + +<p>"<i>July tenth. Dawn.</i></p> + +<div class="sidenote">Punishment</div> + +<p>"This, then, is my punishment. Because for one hour my self-control +deserted me, when my man's blood had been crying out for three years for +the touch of her—because for one little hour my hungry arms held her +close to my aching heart, there is no peace. Nowhere in earth nor in +heaven nor in hell is there one moment's forgetfulness. Nowhere in all +God's illimitable universe is there pardon and surcease of pain.</p> + +<p>"The blind man comes to me and talks of her. He asks me piteously, +'Why?' He calls me his friend. He says that she often spoke of me; that +they were glad to have me in their house. He asks me if she ever said +one word that would give a reason. Was she unhappy? Was it because he +was blind and the little yellow-haired baby with her mother's blue eyes +was born lame? I can only say 'No,' and beg him not to talk of it—not +even to think of it."<br /><br /></p> + + +<p>"<i>July twentieth. Night.</i></p> + +<p>"The beauty of the world at midsummer only makes my loneliness more +keen. The butter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[321]</a></span>flies flit through the meadows like wandering souls of +last year's flowers that died and were buried by the snow. The harvest +moon, red-gold and wonderful, will rise slowly up out of the sea. The +path of light will lie on the still waters and widen into a vast arc at +the line of the shore. Cobwebs will come among the stubble when the +harvest is gathered in and on them will lie dewdrops that the moon will +make into pearls.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Cycle of the Seasons</div> + +<p>"The gorgeous colouring of Autumn will transfigure the hills with glory, +and fill the far silences with misty amethyst and gold. The year-long +sleep will come with the first snow, and the stars burn blue and cold in +the frosty night. April bugles will wake the violets and <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'anenomes'">anemones</ins>, the +dead leaves of Autumn will be starred with springtime bloom, May will +dance through the world with lilacs and apple blossoms, and I shall be +alone.</p> + +<p>"I can go to her grave again and see the violets all around it, their +exquisite odour made of her dust. I can carry to her the first roses of +June, as I used to do, but she cannot take them in her still hands. I +can only lay them on that impassable mound, and let the warm rains, as +soft as woman's tears, drip down and down and down until the fragrance +and my love come to her in the mist.</p> + +<p>"But will she care? Is that last sleep so deep that the quiet heart is +never stirred by <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[322]</a></span>love? When my whole soul goes out to her in an agony +of love and pain, is it possible that there is no answer? If there is a +God in heaven, it cannot be!"<br /><br /></p> + + +<p>"<i>October fifth. Night.</i></p> + +<p>"It is said that Time heals everything. I have been waiting to see if it +were so. Day by day my loss is greater; day by day my grief becomes more +difficult to bear. I read all the time, or pretend to. I sit for hours +with the open book before me and never see a line that is printed there. +Oh, Love, if I could dream to-night, in the earth with you!"<br /><br /></p> + + +<p>"<i>October seventh.</i></p> + +<p>"Just four months ago to-day! I was numb, then, with the shock and +horror. I could not feel as I do now. When the tide of my heart came in, +with agony in every pulse-beat, it rose steadily to the full, without +pause, without rest. I think it has reached its flood now, for I cannot +endure more. Will there ever be recession?"<br /><br /></p> + + +<p>"<i>November tenth.</i></p> + +<div class="sidenote">Death of Passion</div> + +<p>"I am coming, gradually, to have some sort of faith. I do not know why, +for I have never had it before. I can see that all things made of earth +must perish as the leaves. Passion dies because it is of the earth, but +does not love live?</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Gift</div> + +<p>"If only the finer things of the spirit could be bequeathed, like +material possessions! All<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[323]</a></span> I have to leave my son is a very small income +and a few books. I cannot give him endurance, self-control, or the power +to withstand temptation. I cannot give him joy. If I could, I should +leave him one priceless gift—my love for Constance, to which, for one +hour, hers answered fully—I should give him that love with no barrier +to divide it from its desire.</p> + +<p>"I wonder if Constance would have left hers to her little yellow-haired +girl? I wonder if sometimes the joys of the fathers are not visited upon +their children as well as their sins?"<br /><br /></p> + +<p>"<i>November nineteenth. Night.</i></p> + +<p>"I have come to believe that love never dies for God is love, and He is +immortal. My love for Constance has not died and cannot. Why should hers +have died? It does not seem that it has, since to-day, for the first +time, I have found surcease.</p> + +<p>"Constance is dead, but she has left her love to sustain and strengthen +me. It streams out from the quiet hillside to-night as never before, and +gives me the peace of a benediction. I understand, now, the blinding +pain of the last five months. The immortal spirit of love, which can +neither die nor grow old, was extricating itself from the earth that +clung to it.<br /><br /></p> + +<p>"<i>December third.</i></p> + +<p>"At last I have come to perfect peace. I <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[324]</a></span>no longer hunger so terribly +for the touch of her, for my aching arms to clasp her close, for her +lips to quiver beneath mine. The tide has ebbed—there is no more pain.</p> + +<p>"I have come, strangely, into kinship with the universe. I have a +feeling to-night of brotherhood. I can see that death is no division +when a heart is deep enough to hold a grave. The Grey Angel cannot +separate her from me, though she took the white poppies from his hands, +and gave none to me.<br /><br /></p> + + +<p>"<i>December eighteenth.</i></p> + +<div class="sidenote">Day by Day</div> + +<p>"Constance, Beloved, I feel you near to-night. The wild snows of Winter +have blown across your grave, but your love is warm and sweet around my +heart. The sorrow is all gone and in its place has come a peace as deep +and calm as the sea. I can wait, day by day, until the Grey Angel +summons me to join you; until the poppies that stilled your heartbeats, +shall, in another way, quiet mine, too.</p> + +<p>"I can have faith. I can believe that somewhere beyond the star-filled +spaces, when this arc of mortal life merges into the perfect circle of +eternity, there will be no barrier between you and me, because, if God +is love, love must be God, and He has no limitations.</p> + +<p>"I can take up my burden and go on until the road divides, and the Grey +Angel leads me down your path. I can be kind. I can try, each day, to +put joy into the world that so <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[325]</a></span>sorely needs it, and to take nothing +away from whatever it holds of happiness now. I can be strong because I +have known you, I can have courage because you were brave, I can be true +because you were true, I can be tender because I love you.</p> + +<p>"At last I understand. It is passion that cries out for continual +assurance, for fresh sacrifices, for new proof. Love needs nothing but +itself; it asks for nothing but to give itself; it denies nothing, +neither barriers nor the grave. Love can wait until life comes to its +end, and trust to eternity, because it is of God."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="sidenote">A Man's Heart</div> + +<p>Roger put the little book down and wiped his eyes. He had come upon a +man's heart laid bare and was thrilled to the depths by the revelation. +He was as one who stands in a holy place, with uncovered head, in the +hush that follows prayer.</p> + +<p>In the midst of his tenderness for his dead father welled up a +passionate loyalty toward the woman who slept in the room adjoining the +library, whose soul had "never been welded." She had known life no more +than a prattling brook in a meadow may know the sea. Bound in shallows, +she knew nothing of the unutterable vastness in which deep answered unto +deep; tide and tempest and blue surges were fraught with no meaning for +her.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[326]</a></span></p> + +<p>The clock struck twelve and Roger still sat there, with his head resting +upon his hand. He read once more his father's wish to bequeath to him +his love, "with no barrier to divide it from its desire."</p> + +<p>Hedged in by earth and hopelessly put <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'assunder'">asunder</ins>, could it at last come to +fulfilment through daughter and son? At the thought his heart swelled +with a pure passion all its own—the eager pulse-beats owed nothing to +the dead.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Out into the Night</div> + +<p>He found a sheet of paper and reverently wrapped up the little brown +book. An hour later, he slipped under the string a letter of his own, +sealed and addressed, and quietly, though afraid that the beating of his +heart sounded in the stillness, went out into the night.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[327]</a></span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>XXIV</h2> + +<h3>The Bells in the Tower</h3> + + +<p>The sea was very blue behind the Tower of Cologne, though it was not yet +dawn. The velvet darkness, in that enchanted land, seemed to have a +magical quality—it veiled but did not hide. Barbara went up the glass +steps, made of cologne bottles, and opened the door.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Tower Unchanged</div> + +<p>She had not been there for a long time, but nothing was changed. The +winding stairway hung with tapestries and the round windows at the +landings, through which one looked to the sea, were all the same.</p> + +<p>King Arthur, Sir Lancelot and Guinevere were all in the Tower, as usual. +The Lady of Shalott was there, with Mr. Pickwick, Dora, and Little Nell. +All the dear people of the books moved through the lovely rooms, +sniffing at cologne, or talking and laughing with each other, just as +they pleased.</p> + +<p>The red-haired young man and the two blue and white nurses were still +there, but they <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[328]</a></span>seemed to be on the point of going out. Doctor Conrad +and Eloise were in every room she went into. Eloise was all in white, +like a bride, and the Doctor was very, very happy.</p> + +<p>Ambrose North was there, no longer blind or dead, but well and strong +and able to see. He took Barbara in his arms when she went in, kissed +her, and called her "Constance."</p> + +<p>A sharp pang went through her heart because he did not know her. "I'm +Barbara, Daddy," she cried out; "don't you know me?" But he only +murmured, "Constance, my Beloved," and kissed her again—not with a +father's kiss, but with a yearning tenderness that seemed very strange. +She finally gave up trying to make him understand that her name was +Barbara—that she was not Constance at all. At last she said, "It +doesn't matter by what name you call me, as long as you love me," and +went on upstairs.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">An Unfinished Tapestry</div> + +<p>One of the tapestries that hung on the wall along the winding stairway +was new—at least she did not remember having seen it before. It was in +the soft rose and gold and brown and blue of the other tapestries, and +appeared old, as though it had been hanging there for some time. She +fingered it curiously. It felt and looked like the others, but it must +be new, for it was not quite finished.</p> + +<p>In the picture, a man in white vestments stood at an altar with his +hands outstretched <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[329]</a></span>in blessing. Before him knelt a girl and a man. The +girl was in white and the taper-lights at the altar shone on her two +long yellow braids that hung down over her white gown, so that they +looked like burnished gold. The face was turned away so that she could +not see who it was, but the man who knelt beside her was looking +straight at her, or would have been, if the tapestry-maker had not put +down her needle at a critical point. The man's face had not been +touched, though everything else was done. Barbara sighed. She hoped that +the next time she came to the Tower the tapestry would be finished.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">In the Violet Room</div> + +<p>She went into the violet room, for a little while, and sat down on a +green chair with a purple cushion in it. She took a great bunch of +violets out of a bowl and buried her face in the sweetness. Then she +went to the mantel, where the bottles were, and drenched her +handkerchief with violet water. She had tried all the different kinds of +cologne that were in the Tower, but she liked the violet water best, and +nearly always went into the violet room for a little while on her way +upstairs.</p> + +<p>As she turned to go out, the Boy joined her. He was a young man now, +taller than Barbara, but his face, as always, was hidden from her as by +a mist. His voice was very kind and tender as he took both her hands in +his.</p> + +<p>"How do you do, Barbara, dear?" he asked.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[330]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You have not been in the Tower for a long time."</p> + +<p>"I have been ill," she answered. "See?" She tried to show him her +crutches, but they were not there. "I used to have crutches," she +explained.</p> + +<p>"Did you?" he asked, in surprise. "You never had them in the Tower."</p> + +<p>"That's so," she answered. "I had forgotten." She remembered now that +when she went into the Tower she had always left her crutches leaning up +against the glass steps.</p> + +<p>"Let's go upstairs," suggested the Boy, "and ring the golden bells in +the cupola."</p> + +<p>Barbara wanted to go very much, but was afraid to try it, because she +had never been able to reach the cupola.</p> + +<p>"If you get tired," the Boy went on, as though he had read her thought, +"I'll put my arm around you and help you walk. Come, let's go."</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Up the Winding Stairs</div> + +<p>They went out of the violet room and up the winding stairway. Barbara +was not tired at all, but she let him put his arm around her, and leaned +her cheek against his shoulder as they climbed. Some way, she felt that +this time they were really going to reach the cupola.</p> + +<p>It was very sweet to be taken care of in this way and to hear the Boy's +deep, tender voice telling her about the Lady of Shalott and all <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[331]</a></span>the +other dear people who lived in the Tower. Sometimes he would make her +sit down on the stairs to rest. He sat beside her so that he might keep +his arm around her, and Barbara wished, as never before, that she might +see his face.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Angel with the Flaming Sword</div> + +<p>Finally, they came to the last landing. They had been up as high as this +once before, but it was long ago. The cupola was hidden in a cloud as +before, but it seemed to be the cloud of a Summer day, and not a dark +mist. They went into the cloud, and an Angel with a Flaming Sword +appeared before them and stopped them. The Angel was all in white and +very tall and stately, with a divinely tender face—Barbara's own face, +exalted and transfigured into beauty beyond all words.</p> + +<p>"Please," said Barbara, softly, though she was not at all afraid, "may +we go up into the cupola and ring the golden bells? We have tried so +many times."</p> + +<p>There was no answer, but Barbara saw the Angel looking at her with +infinite longing and love. All at once, she knew that the Angel was her +mother.</p> + +<p>"Please, Mother dear," said Barbara, "let us go in and ring the bells."</p> + +<p>The Angel smiled and stepped aside, pointing to the right with the +Flaming Sword that made a rainbow in the cloud. In the light of it, +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[332]</a></span>they went through the mist, that seemed to be lifting now.</p> + +<p>"We're really in the cupola," cried the Boy, in delight. "See, here are +the bells." He took the two heavy golden chains in his hands and gave +one to Barbara.</p> + +<p>"Ring!" she cried out. "Oh, ring all the bells at once! Now!"</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Ringing the Bells</div> + +<p>They pulled the two chains with all their strength, and from far above +them rang out the most wonderful golden chimes that anyone had ever +dreamed of—strong and sweet and thrilling, yet curiously soft and low.</p> + +<p>With the first sound, the mist lifted and the Angel with the Flaming +Sword came into the cupola and stood near them, smiling. Far out was the +blue sky that bent down to meet a bluer sea, the sand on the shore was +as white as the blown snow, and the sea-birds that circled around the +cupola in the crystalline, fragrant air were singing. The melody blended +strangely with the sound of the surf on the shining shore below.</p> + +<p>The Angel with the Flaming Sword touched Barbara gently on the arm, and +smiled. Barbara looked up, first at the Angel, and then at the Boy who +stood beside her. The mist that had always been around him had lifted, +too, and she saw that it was Roger, whom she had known all her life.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[333]</a></span></p> + +<p>Barbara woke with a start. The sound of the golden bells was still +chiming in her ears. "Roger," she said, dreamily, "we rang them all +together, didn't we?" But Roger did not answer, for she was in her own +little room, now, and not in the Tower of Cologne.</p> + +<p>She slipped out of bed and her little bare, pink feet pattered over to +the window. She pushed the curtains back and looked out. It was a keen, +cool, Autumn morning, and still dark, but in the east was the deep, +wonderful purple that presages daybreak.</p> + +<p>Oh, to see the sun rise over the sea! Barbara's heart ached with +longing. She had wanted to go for so many years and nobody had ever +thought of taking her. Now, though Roger had suggested it more than +once, she had said, each time, that when she went she wanted to go +alone.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">"I'll Try It"</div> + +<p>"I'll try it," she thought. "If I get tired, I can sit down and rest, +and if I think it is going to be too much for me, I can come back. It +can't be very far—just down this road."</p> + +<p>She dressed hurriedly, putting on her warm, white wool gown and her +little low soft shoes. She did not stop to brush out her hair and braid +it again, for it was very early and no one would see. She put over her +head the white lace scarf she had worn to the wedding, took her white +knitted shawl, and went downstairs so quietly that Aunt Miriam did not +hear her.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[334]</a></span></p> + +<p>She unbolted the door noiselessly and went out, closing it carefully +after her. On the top step was a very small package, tied with string, +and a letter addressed, simply, "To Barbara." She recognised it as a +book and a note from Roger—he had done such things before. She did not +want to go back, so she tucked it under her arm and went on.</p> + +<p>It seemed so strange to be going out of her gate alone and in the dark! +Barbara was thrilled with a sense of adventure and romance which was +quite new to her. This journeying into unknown lands in pursuit of +unknown waters had all the fascination of discovery.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">An Autumn Dawn</div> + +<p>She went down the road faster than she had ever walked before. She was +not at all tired and was eager for the sea. The Autumn dawn with its +keen, cool air stirred her senses to new and abounding life. She went on +and on and on, pausing now and then to lean against somebody's fence, or +to rest on a friendly boulder when it appeared along the way.</p> + +<p>Faint suggestions of colour appeared in the illimitable distances +beyond. Barbara saw only a vast, grey expanse, but the surf murmured +softly on the shadowy shore. Crossing the sand, and stumbling as she +went, she stooped and dipped her hand into it, then put her rosy +forefinger into her mouth to see if it were really salt, as everyone +said. She sat down in the soft, cool sand, drew her white <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[335]</a></span>knitted shawl +and lace scarf more closely about her, and settled herself to wait.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Sunrise on the Sea</div> + +<p>The deep purple softened with rose. Tints of gold came far down on the +horizon line. Barbara drew a long breath of wonder and joy. Out in the +vastness dark surges sang and crooned, breaking slowly into white foam +as they approached the shore. Rose and purple melted into amethyst and +azure, and, out beyond the breakers, the grey sea changed to opal and +pearl.</p> + +<p>Mist rose from the far waters and the long shafts of leaping light +divided it by rainbows as it lifted. Prismatic fires burned on the +boundless curve where the sky met the sea. Wet-winged gulls, crying +hoarsely, came from the night that still lay upon the islands near +shore, and circled out across the breakers to meet the dawn.</p> + +<p>Spires of splendid colour flamed to the zenith, the whole east burned +with crimson and glowed with gold, and from that far, mystical arc of +heaven and earth, a javelin of molten light leaped to the farthest hill. +The pearl and opal changed to softest green, mellowed by turquoise and +gold, the slow blue surges chimed softly on the singing shore, and +Barbara's heart beat high with rapture, for it was daybreak in earth and +heaven and morning in her soul.</p> + +<p>She sat there for over an hour, asking for <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[336]</a></span>nothing but the sky and sea, +and the warm, sweet sun that made the air as clear as crystal and +touched the Autumn hills with living flame. She drew long breaths of the +wind that swept, like shafts of sunrise, half-way across the world.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The Boy in the Tower</div> + +<p>At last she turned to the package that lay beside her, and untied the +string, idly wondering what book Roger had sent. How strange that the +Boy in the Tower should be Roger, and yet, was it so strange, after all, +when she had known him all her life?</p> + +<p>Before looking at the book, she tore open the letter and read it—with +wide, wondering eyes and wild-beating heart.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Roger's Letter</div> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Barbara, my darling," it began. "I found this +book to-night and so I send it to you, for it is +yours as much as mine.</p> + +<p>"I think my father's wish has been granted and his +love has been bequeathed to me. I have known for a +long time how much I care for you, and I have +often tried to tell you, but fear has kept me +silent.</p> + +<p>"It has been so sweet to live near you, to read to +you when you were sewing or while you were ill, +and sweeter than all else besides to help you +walk, and to feel that you leaned on me, depending +on me for strength and guidance.</p> + +<p>"Sometimes I have thought you cared, too, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[337]</a></span>and +then I was not sure, so I have kept the words +back, fearing to lose what I have. But to-night, +after having read his letters, I feel that I must +throw the dice for eternal winning or eternal +loss. You can never know, if I should spend the +rest of my life in telling you, just how much you +have meant to me in a thousand different ways.</p> + +<p>"Looking back, I see that you have given me my +ideals, since the time we made mud pies together +and built the Tower of Cologne, for which, alas, +we never got the golden bells. I have loved you +always and it has not changed since the beginning, +save to grow deeper and sweeter with every day +that passed.</p> + +<p>"As much as I have of courage, or tenderness, or +truth, or honour, I owe to you, who set my +standard high for me at the beginning, and oh, my +dearest, my love has kept me clean. If I have +nothing else to give you, I can offer you a clean +heart and clean hands, for there is nothing in my +life that can make me ashamed to look straight +into the eyes of the woman I love.</p> + +<p>"Ever since we went to that wedding the other day, +I have been wishing it were our own—that you and +I might stand together before God's high altar in +that little church with the sun streaming in, and +be joined, each to the other, until death do us +part.</p> + +<p>"Sweetheart, can you trust me? Can you <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[338]</a></span>believe +that it is for always and not just for a little +while? Has your mother left her love to you as my +father left me his?</p> + +<p>"Let me have the sweetness of your leaning on me +always, let me take care of you, comfort you when +you are tired, laugh with you when you are glad, +and love you until death and even after, as he +loved her.</p> + +<p>"Tell me you care, Barbara, even if it is only a +little. Tell me you care, and I can wait, a long, +long time. </p> + +<div class='right'> +<span class='smcap'>Roger.</span> +</div></div> + +<p>Barbara's heart sang with the joy of the morning. She opened the little +worn book, with its yellow, tear-stained pages, and read it all, up to +the very last line.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" she cried aloud, in pity. "Oh! oh!"</p> + +<p>Fully understanding, she put it aside, closing the faded cover +reverently on its love and pain. Then she turned to Roger's letter, and +read it again.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">First Flush of Rapture</div> + +<p>Dreaming over it, in the first flush of that mystical rapture which +makes the world new for those to whom it comes, as light is recreated +with every dawn, she took no heed of the passing hours. She did not know +that it was very late, nor that Aunt Miriam, much worried, had asked +Roger to go in search of her. She knew only that love and morning and +the sea were all hers.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[339]</a></span></p> + +<p>The tide was coming in. Each wave broke a little higher upon the +thirsting shore. Far out on the water was a tiny dark object that moved +slowly shoreward on the crests of the waves. Barbara stood up, shading +her eyes with her hand, and waited, counting the rhythmic pulse-beats +that brought it nearer.</p> + +<p>She could not make out what it was, for it advanced and then receded, or +paused in a circling eddy made by two retreating waves. At last a high +wave brought it in and left it, stranded, at her feet.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">A Fragment</div> + +<p>Barbara laughed aloud, for, broken by the wind and wave and worn by +tide, a fragment of one of her crutches had come back to her. The bit of +flannel with which she had padded the sharp end, so that the sound would +not distress her father, still clung to it. She wondered how it came +there, never guessing that it was but the natural result of Eloise's +attempt to throw it as far as Allan had thrown the other, the day he +took them away from her.</p> + +<p>A great sob of thankfulness almost choked her. Here she stood firmly on +her own two feet, after twenty-two years of helplessness, reminded of it +only by a fragment of a crutch that the sea had given back as it gives +up its dead. She had outgrown her need of crutches <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[340]</a></span>as the tiny +creatures of the sea outgrow their shells.</p> + + + +<div class='center'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" summary="Build thee more stately mansions"> +<tr><td align='left'>"Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul,</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">As the swift seasons roll!</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Leave thy low-vaulted past!</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Let each new temple, nobler than the last,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Till thou at length art free,</span></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'><span style="margin-left: 0.5em;">Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea!"</span></td></tr> +</table></div> + +<p>The beautiful words chanted themselves over and over in her +consciousness. The past, with all its pain and grieving, fell from her +like a garment. She was one with the sun and the morning; uplifted by +all the world's joy.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">The True Lover</div> + +<p>Her blood sang within her and it seemed that her heart had wings. All of +life lay before her—that life which is made sweet by love. She felt +again the ecstasy that claimed her in the Tower of Cologne, when she and +the Boy, after a lifetime of waiting, had rung all the golden bells at +once.</p> + +<p>And the Boy was Roger—always had been Roger—only she did not know. +Into Barbara's heart came something new and sweet that she had never +known before—the deep sense of conviction and the everlasting peace +which the True Lover, and he alone, has power to bestow.</p> + +<p>It was part of the wonder of the morning that when she turned, startled +a little by a muffled footstep, she should see Roger with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[341]</a></span>his hands +outstretched in pleading and all his soul in his eyes.</p> + +<p>Barbara's face took on the unearthly beauty of dawn. Her blue eyes +deepened to violet, her sweet lips smiled. She was radiant, from her +feet to the heavy braids that hung over her shoulders and the shimmering +halo of soft hair, that blew, like golden mist, about her face.</p> + +<p>Roger caught her mood unerringly—it was like him always to understand. +He was no longer afraid, and the trembling of his boyish mouth was lost +in a smile. She was more beautiful than the morning of which she seemed +a veritable part—and she was his.</p> + +<div class="sidenote">Flower of the Dawn</div> + +<p>"Flower of the Dawn," he cried, his voice ringing with love and triumph, +"do you care? Are you mine?"</p> + +<p>She went to him, smiling, with the colour of the fiery dawning on her +cheeks and lips. "Yes," she whispered. "Didn't you know?"</p> + +<p>Then the sun and the morning and the world itself vanished all at once +beyond his ken, for Barbara had put her soft little hand upon his +shoulder, and lifted her love-lit face to his.</p> + + +<h2>THE END.</h2> + +<hr style='width: 65%;' /> +<p> </p> + +<div class='tnote'><h3>Transcriber's Notes:</h3> + +<p>Obvious punctuation errors repaired.</p> + +<p>The remaining corrections made are indicated by dotted lines under the corrections. +Scroll the mouse over the word and the original text will <ins title="Transcriber's Note: original reads 'apprear'">appear</ins>.</p> +</div> + +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<hr class="full" /> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FLOWER OF THE DUSK***</p> +<p>******* This file should be named 18057-h.txt or 18057-h.zip *******</p> +<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> +<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/0/5/18057">http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/0/5/18057</a></p> +<p>Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed.</p> + +<p>Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Flower of the Dusk + + +Author: Myrtle Reed + + + +Release Date: March 27, 2006 [eBook #18057] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FLOWER OF THE DUSK*** + + +E-text prepared by Suzanne Lybarger, Brian Janes, Emmy, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustration. + See 18057-h.htm or 18057-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/0/5/18057/18057-h/18057-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/0/5/18057/18057-h.zip) + + + + + +FLOWER OF THE DUSK + +by + +MYRTLE REED + + + + + + + +G. P. Putnam's Sons +New York and London +The Knickerbocker Press +1908 +Copyright, 1908 +by +Myrtle Reed McCullough +The Knickerbocker Press, New York + + + + +By MYRTLE REED. + + FLOWER OF THE DUSK. + LOVE AFFAIRS OF LITERARY MEN. + A SPINNER IN THE SUN. + LOVE LETTERS OF A MUSICIAN. + LATER LOVE LETTERS OF A MUSICIAN. + THE SPINSTER BOOK. + LAVENDER AND OLD LACE. + THE MASTER'S VIOLIN. + AT THE SIGN OF THE JACK-O'-LANTERN. + THE SHADOW OF VICTORY. + THE BOOK OF CLEVER BEASTS. + PICKABACK SONGS. + + + + +Contents + + +CHAPTER PAGE + + I--A MAKER OF SONGS 1 + + II--MISS MATTIE 15 + + III--THE TOWER OF COLOGNE 28 + + IV--THE SEVENTH OF JUNE 42 + + V--ELOISE 55 + + VI--A LETTER 68 + + VII--AN AFTERNOON CALL 83 + + VIII--A FAIRY GODMOTHER 98 + + IX--TAKING THE CHANCE 111 + + X--IN THE GARDEN 126 + + XI--BARBARA'S "TO-MORROW" 142 + + XII--MIRIAM 155 + + XIII--"WOMAN SUFFRAGE" 169 + + XIV--BARBARA'S BIRTHDAY 181 + + XV--THE SONG OF THE PINES 194 + + XVI--BETRAYAL 209 + + XVII--"NEVER AGAIN" 225 + +XVIII--THE PASSING OF FIDO 238 + + XIX--THE DREAMS COME TRUE 253 + + XX--PARDON 273 + + XXI--THE PERILS OF THE CITY 286 + + XXII--AUTUMN LEAVES 299 + +XXIII--LETTERS TO CONSTANCE 313 + + XXIV--THE BELLS IN THE TOWER 327 + + + + +Flower of the Dusk + + + [Illustration: "Secretly, too, both were ashamed, having come unawares + upon knowledge that was not meant for them."--_Page 82._ + _From a painting by Clinton Balmer_] + + + + +I + +A Maker of Songs + + +[Sidenote: Sunset] + +The pines, darkly purple, towered against the sunset. Behind the hills, +the splendid tapestry glowed and flamed, sending far messages of light +to the grey East, where lay the sea, crooning itself to sleep. Bare +boughs dripped rain upon the sodden earth, where the dead leaves had so +long been hidden by the snow. The thousand sounds and scents of Spring +at last had waked the world. + +The man who stood near the edge of the cliff, quite alone, and carefully +feeling the ground before him with his cane, had chosen to face the +valley and dream of the glory that, perchance, trailed down in living +light from some vast loom of God's. His massive head was thrown back, as +though he listened, with a secret sense, for music denied to those who +see. + +[Sidenote: Joyful Memories] + +He took off his hat and stray gleams came through the deepening shadows +to rest, like an aureole, upon his silvered hair. Remembered sunsets, +from beyond the darkness of more than twenty years, came back to him +with divine beauty and diviner joy. Mnemosyne, that guardian angel of +the soul, brought from her treasure-house gifts of laughter and tears; +the laughter sweet with singing, and the bitterness of the tears +eternally lost in the Water of Forgetfulness. + +Slowly, the light died. Dusk came upon the valley and crept softly to +the hills. Mist drifted in from the sleeping sea, and the hush of night +brooded over the river as it murmured through the plain. A single star +uplifted its exquisite lamp against the afterglow, near the veiled ivory +of the crescent moon. + +Sighing, the man turned away. "Perhaps," he thought, whimsically, as he +went cautiously down the path, searching out every step of the way, +"there was no sunset at all." + +The road was clear until he came to a fallen tree, over which he stepped +easily. The new softness of the soil had, for him, its own deep meaning +of resurrection. He felt it in the swelling buds of the branches that +sometimes swayed before him, and found it in the scent of the cedar as +he crushed a bit of it in his hand. + +Easily, yet carefully, he went around the base of the hill to the +street, where his house was the first upon the right-hand side. The gate +creaked on its hinges and he went quickly up the walk, passing the grey +tangle of last Summer's garden, where the marigolds had died and the +larkspur fallen asleep. + +Within the house, two women awaited him, one with anxious eagerness, the +other with tenderly watchful love. The older one, who had long been +listening, opened the door before he knocked, but it was Barbara who +spoke to him first. + +"You're late, Father, dear." + +"Am I, Barbara? Tell me, was there a sunset to-night?" + +"Yes, a glorious one." + +[Sidenote: Seeing with the Soul] + +"I thought so, and that accounts for my being late. I saw a beautiful +sunset--I saw it with my soul." + +"Give me your coat, Ambrose." The older woman stood at his side, longing +to do him some small service. + +"Thank you, Miriam; you are always kind." + +The tiny living-room was filled with relics of past luxury. Fine +pictures, in tarnished frames, hung on the dingy walls, and worn rugs +covered the floor. The furniture was old mahogany, beautifully cared +for, but decrepit, nevertheless, and the ancient square piano, +outwardly, at least, showed every year of its age. + +Still, the room had "atmosphere," of the indefinable quality that some +people impart to a dwelling-place. Entering, one felt refinement, +daintiness, and the ability to live above mere externals. Barbara had, +very strongly, the house-love which belongs to some rare women. And who +shall say that inanimate things do not answer to our love of them, and +diffuse, between our four walls, a certain gracious spirit of kindliness +and welcome? + +In the dining-room, where the table was set for supper, there were +marked contrasts. A coarse cloth covered the table, but at the head of +it was overlaid a remnant of heavy table-damask, the worn places +carefully hidden. The china at this place was thin and fine, the silver +was solid, and the cup from which Ambrose North drank was Satsuma. + +On the coarse cloth were the heavy, cheap dishes and the discouraging +knives and forks which were the portion of the others. The five damask +napkins remaining from the original stock of linen were used only by the +blind man. + +[Sidenote: A Comforting Deceit] + +For years the two women had carried on this comforting deceit, and the +daily lie they lived, so lovingly, had become a sort of second nature. +They had learned to speak, casually, of the difficulty in procuring +servants, and to say how much easier it was to do their own small tasks +than to watch continually over fine linen and rare china intrusted to +incompetent hands. They talked of tapestries, laces, and jewels which +had long ago been sold, and Barbara frequently wore a string of beads +which, with a lump in her throat, she called "Mother's pearls." + +Discovering that the sound of her crutches on the floor distressed him +greatly, Barbara had padded the sharp ends with flannel and was careful +to move about as little as possible when he was in the house. She had +gone, mouse-like, to her own particular chair while Miriam was hanging +up his coat and hat and placing his easy chair near the open fire. He +sat down and held his slender hands close to the grateful warmth. + +"It isn't cold," he said, "and yet I am glad of the fire. To-day is the +first day of Spring." + +"By the almanac?" laughed Barbara. + +"No, according to the almanac, I believe, it has been Spring for ten +days. Nature does not move according to man's laws, but she forces him +to observe hers--except in almanacs." + +[Sidenote: Kindly Shadows] + +The firelight made kindly shadows in the room, softening the +unloveliness and lending such beauty as it might. It gave to Ambrose +North's fine, strong face the delicacy and dignity of an old miniature. +It transfigured Barbara's yellow hair into a crown of gold, and put a +new gentleness into Miriam's lined face as she sat in the half-light, +one of them in blood, yet singularly alien and apart. + +"What are you doing, Barbara?" The sensitive hands strayed to her lap +and lifted the sheer bit of linen upon which she was working. + +"Making lingerie by hand." + +"You have a great deal of it, haven't you?" + +"Not as much as you think, perhaps. It takes a long time to do it well." + +"It seems to me you are always sewing." + +"Girls are very vain these days, Father. We need a great many pretty +things." + +"Your dear mother used to sew a great deal. She--" His voice broke, for +even after many years his grief was keenly alive. + +"Is supper ready, Aunt Miriam?" asked Barbara, quickly. + +"Yes." + +"Then come, let's go in." + +Ambrose North took his place at the head of the table, which, purposely, +was nearest the door. Barbara and Miriam sat together, at the other end. + +"Where were you to-day, Father?" + +[Sidenote: At the top of the World] + +"On the summit of the highest hill, almost at the top of the world. +I think I heard a robin, but I am not sure. I smelled Spring in the +maple branches and the cedar, and felt it in the salt mist that blew +up from the sea. The Winter has been so long!" + +"Did you make a song?" + +[Sidenote: Always Make a Song] + +"Yes--two. I'll tell you about them afterward. Always make a song, +Barbara, no matter what comes." + +So the two talked, while the other woman watched them furtively. Her +face was that of one who has lived much in a short space of time and her +dark, burning eyes betrayed tragic depths of feeling. Her black hair, +slightly tinged with grey, was brushed straight back from her wrinkled +forehead. Her shoulders were stooped and her hands rough from hard work. + +She was the older sister of Ambrose North's dead wife--the woman he had +so devotedly loved. Ever since her sister's death, she had lived with +them, taking care of little lame Barbara, now grown into beautiful +womanhood, except for the crutches. After his blindness, Ambrose North +had lost his wife, and then, by slow degrees, his fortune. Mercifully, a +long illness had made him forget a great deal. + +"Never mind, Barbara," said Miriam, in a low tone, as they rose from the +table. "It will make your hands too rough for the sewing." + +"Shan't I wipe the dishes for you, Aunty? I'd just as soon." + +"No--go with him." + +The fire had gone down, but the room was warm, so Barbara turned up the +light and began again on her endless stitching. Her father's hands +sought hers. + +"More sewing?" His voice was tender and appealing. + +"Just a little bit, Father, please. I'm so anxious to get this done." + +"But why, dear?" + +"Because girls are so vain," she answered, with a laugh. + +"Is my little girl vain?" + +"Awfully. Hasn't she the dearest father in the world and the +prettiest"--she swallowed hard here--"the prettiest house and the +loveliest clothes? Who wouldn't be vain!" + +"I am so glad," said the old man, contentedly, "that I have been able to +give you the things you want. I could not bear it if we were poor." + +"You told me you had made two songs to-day, Father." + +[Sidenote: Song of the River] + +He drew closer to her and laid one hand upon the arm of her chair. +Quietly, she moved her crutches beyond his reach. "One is about the +river," he began. + +"In Winter, a cruel fairy put it to sleep in an enchanted tower, far up +in the mountains, and walled up the door with crystal. All the while the +river was asleep, it was dreaming of the green fields and the soft, +fragrant winds. + +"It tossed and murmured in its sleep, and at last it woke, too soon, for +the cruel fairy's spell could not have lasted much longer. When it found +the door barred, it was very sad. Then it grew rebellious and hurled +itself against the door, trying to escape, but the barrier only seemed +more unyielding. So, making the best of things, the river began to sing +about the dream. + +"From its prison-house, it sang of the green fields and fragrant winds, +the blue violets that starred the meadow, the strange, singing harps of +the marsh grasses, and the wonder of the sea. A good fairy happened to +be passing, and she stopped to hear the song. She became so interested +that she wanted to see the singer, so she opened the door. The river +laughed and ran out, still singing, and carrying the door along. It +never stopped until it had taken every bit of the broken crystal far out +to sea." + +"I made one, too, Father." + +"What is it?" + +[Sidenote: Song of the Flax] + +"Mine is about the linen. Once there was a little seed put away into the +darkness and covered deep with earth. But there was a soul in the seed, +and after the darkness grew warm it began to climb up and up, until one +day it reached the sunshine. After that, it was so glad that it tossed +out tiny, green branches and finally its soul blossomed into a blue +flower. Then a princess passed, and her hair was flaxen and her eyes +were the colour of the flower. + +"The flower said, 'Oh, pretty Princess, I want to go with you.' + +"The princess answered, 'You would die, little Flower, if you were +picked,' and she went on. + +"But one day the Reaper passed and the little blue flower and all its +fellows were gathered. After a terrible time of darkness and pain, the +flower found itself in a web of sheerest linen. There was much cutting +and more pain, and thousands of pricking stitches, then a beautiful gown +was made, all embroidered with the flax in palest blue and green. And it +was the wedding gown of the pretty princess, because her hair was flaxen +and her eyes the colour of the flower." + +[Sidenote: Barbara] + +"What colour is your hair, Barbara?" He had asked the question many +times. + +"The colour of ripe corn, Daddy. Don't you remember my telling you?" + +He leaned forward to stroke the shining braids. "And your eyes?" + +"Like the larkspur that grows in the garden." + +"I know--your dear mother's eyes." He touched her face gently as he +spoke. "Your skin is so smooth--is it fair?" + +"Yes, Daddy." + +"I think you must be beautiful; I have asked Miriam so often, but she +will not tell me. She only says you look well enough and something like +your mother. Are you beautiful?" + +"Oh, Daddy! Daddy!" laughed Barbara, in confusion. "You mustn't ask such +questions! Didn't you say you had made two songs? What is the other +one?" + +Miriam sat in the dining-room, out of sight but within hearing. Having +observed that in her presence they laughed less, she spent her evenings +alone unless they urged her to join them. She had a newspaper more than +a week old, but, as yet, she had not read it. She sat staring into the +shadows, with the light of her one candle flickering upon her face, +nervously moving her work-worn hands. + +"The other song," reminded Barbara, gently. + +[Sidenote: Song of the Sunset] + +"This one was about a sunset," he sighed. "It was such a sunset as was +never on sea or land, because two who loved each other saw it together. +God and all His angels had hung a marvellous tapestry from the high +walls of Heaven, and it reached almost to the mountain-tops, where some +of the little clouds sleep. + +"The man said, 'Shall we always look for the sunsets together?' + +"The woman smiled and answered, 'Yes, always.' + +"'And,' the man continued, 'when one of us goes on the last long +journey?' + +"'Then,' answered the woman, 'the other will not be watching alone. For, +I think, there in the West is the Golden City with the jasper walls and +the jewelled foundations, where the twelve gates are twelve pearls.'" + +There was a long silence. "And so--" said Barbara, softly. + +Ambrose North lifted his grey head from his hands and rose to his feet +unsteadily. "And so," he said, with difficulty, "she leans from the +sunset toward him, but he can never see her, because he is blind. Oh, +Barbara," he cried, passionately, "last night I dreamed that you could +walk and I could see!" + +"So we can, Daddy," said Barbara, very gently. "Our souls are neither +blind nor lame. Here, I am eyes for you and you are feet for me, so we +belong together. And--past the sunset----" + +"Past the sunset," repeated the old man, dreamily, "soul and body shall +be as one. We must wait--for life is made up of waiting--and make what +songs we can." + +"I think, Father, that a song should be in poetry, shouldn't it?" + +[Sidenote: The Real Song] + +"Some of them are, but more are not. Some are music and some are words, +and some, like prayers, are feeling. The real song is in the thrush's +heart, not in the silvery rain of sound that comes from the green boughs +in Spring. When you open the door of your heart and let all the joy rush +out, laughing--then you are making a song." + +"But--is there always joy?" + +"Yes, though sometimes it is sadly covered up with other things. We must +find it and divide it, for only in that way it grows. Good-night, my +dear." + +He bent to kiss her, while Miriam, with her heart full of nameless +yearning, watched them from the far shadows. The sound of his footsteps +died away and a distant door closed. Soon afterward Miriam took her +candle and went noiselessly upstairs, but she did not say good-night to +Barbara. + +[Sidenote: Midnight] + +Until midnight, the girl sat at her sewing, taking the finest of +stitches in tuck and hem. The lamp burning low made her needle fly +swiftly. In her own room was an old chest nearly full of dainty garments +which she was never to wear. She had wrought miracles of embroidery upon +some of them, and others were unadorned save by tucks and lace. + +When the work was finished, she folded it and laid it aside, then put +away her thimble and thread. "When the guests come to the hotel," she +thought--"ah, when they come, and buy all the things I've made the past +year, and the preserves and the candied orange peel, the rag rugs and +the quilts, then----" + +[Sidenote: Dying Embers] + +So Barbara fell a-dreaming, and the light of the dying embers lay +lovingly upon her face, already transfigured by tenderness into beauty +beyond words. The lamp went out and little by little the room faded into +twilight, then into night. It was quite dark when she leaned over and +picked up her crutches. + +"Dear, dear father," she breathed. "He must never know!" + + + + +II + +Miss Mattie + + +Miss Mattie was getting supper, sustained by the comforting thought that +her task was utterly beneath her and had been forced upon her by the +mysterious workings of an untoward Fate. She was not really "Miss," +since she had been married and widowed, and a grown son was waiting +impatiently in the sitting-room for his evening meal, but her +neighbours, nearly all of whom had known her before her marriage, still +called her "Miss Mattie." + +[Sidenote: "Old Maids"] + +The arbitrary social distinctions, made regardless of personality, are +often cruelly ironical. Many a man, incapable by nature of life-long +devotion to one woman, becomes a husband in half an hour, duly +sanctioned by Church and State. A woman who remains unmarried, because, +with fine courage, she will have her true mate or none, is called "an +old maid." She may have the heart of a wife and the soul of a mother, +but she cannot escape her sinister label. The real "old maids" are of +both sexes, and many are married, but alas! seldom to each other. + +[Sidenote: A Grievance] + +In his introspective moments, Roger Austin sometimes wondered why +marriage, maternity, and bereavement should have left no trace upon his +mother. The uttermost depths of life had been hers for the sounding, but +Miss Mattie had refused to drop her plummet overboard and had spent the +years in prolonged study of her own particular boat. + +She came in, with the irritating air of a martyr, and clucked sharply +with her false teeth when she saw that her son was reading. + +"I don't know what I've done," she remarked, "that I should have to live +all the time with people who keep their noses in books. Your pa was +forever readin' and you're marked with it. I could set here and set here +and set here, and he took no more notice of me than if I was a piece of +furniture. When he died, the brethren and sistern used to come to +condole with me and say how I must miss him. There wasn't nothin' to +miss, 'cause the books and his chair was left. I've a good mind to burn +'em all up." + +"I won't read if you don't want me to, Mother," answered Roger, laying +his book aside regretfully. + +"I dunno but what I'd rather you would than to want to and not," she +retorted, somewhat obscurely. "What I'm a-sayin' is that it's in the +blood and you can't help it. If I'd known it was your pa's intention to +give himself up so exclusive to readin', I'd never have married him, +that's all I've got to say. There's no sense in it. Lemme see what +you're at now." + +She took the open book, that lay face downward upon the table, and read +aloud, awkwardly: + +"Leave to the diamond its ages to grow, nor expect to accelerate the +births of the eternal. Friendship demands a religious treatment. We talk +of choosing our friends, but friends are self-elected." + +[Sidenote: Peculiar Way of Putting Things] + +"Now," she demanded, in a shrill voice, "what does that mean?" + +"I don't think I could explain it to you, Mother." + +"That's just the point. Your pa couldn't never explain nothin', neither. +You're readin' and readin' and readin' and you never know what you're +readin' about. Diamonds growin' and births bein' hurried up, and friends +bein' religious and voted for at township elections. Who's runnin' for +friend this year on the Republican ticket?" she inquired, caustically. + +Roger managed to force a laugh. "You have your own peculiar way of +putting things, Mother. Is supper ready? I'm as hungry as a bear." + +"I suppose you are. When it ain't readin', it's eatin'. Work all day to +get a meal that don't last more'n fifteen minutes, and then see readin' +goin' on till long past bedtime, and oil goin' up every six months. +Which'll you have--fresh apple sauce, or canned raspberries?" + +"It doesn't matter." + +"Then I'll get the apple sauce, because the canned raspberries can lay +over as long as they're kept cool." + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's Personal Appearance] + +Miss Mattie shuffled back into the kitchen. During the Winter she wore +black knitted slippers attached to woollen inner soles which had no +heels. She was well past the half-century mark, but her face had few +lines in it and her grey eyes were sharp and penetrating. Her smooth, +pale brown hair, which did not show the grey in it, was parted precisely +in the middle. Every morning she brushed it violently with a stiff brush +dipped into cold water, and twisted the ends into a tight knot at the +back of her head. In militant moments, this knot seemed to rise and the +protruding ends of the wire hairpins to bristle into formidable weapons +of offence. + +She habitually wore her steel-bowed spectacles half-way down her nose. +They might have fallen off had not a kindly Providence placed a large +wart where it would do the most good. On Sundays, when she put on shoes, +corsets, her best black silk, and her gold-bowed spectacles, she took +great pains to wear them properly. When she reached home, however, she +always took off her fine raiment and laid her spectacles aside with a +great sigh of relief. Miss Mattie's disposition improved rapidly as soon +as the old steel-bowed pair were in their rightful place, resting safely +upon the wart. + +[Sidenote: Second-hand Things] + +When they sat down to supper, she reverted to the original topic. "As +I was sayin'," she began, "there ain't no sense in the books you and +your pa has always set such store by. Where he ever got 'em, I dunno, +but they was always a comin'. Lots of 'em was well-nigh wore out when +he got 'em, and he wouldn't let me buy nothin' that had been used before, +even if I knew the folks. + +"I got a silver coffin plate once at an auction over to the Ridge for +almost nothin' and your pa was as mad as a wet hen. There was a name on +it, but it could have been scraped off, and the rest of it was perfectly +good. When you need a coffin plate you need it awful bad. While your pa +was rampin' around, he said he wouldn't have been surprised to see me +comin' home with a second-hand coffin in the back of the buggy. Who ever +heard of a second-hand coffin? I've always thought his mind was +unsettled by so much readin'. + +"I ain't a-sayin' but what some readin' is all right. Some folks has +just moved over to the Ridge and the postmaster's wife was a-showin' me +some papers they get, every week. One is _The Metropolitan Weekly_, and +the other _The Housewife's Companion_. I must say, the stories in those +papers is certainly beautiful. + +"Once, when they come after their mail, they was as mad as anything +because the papers hadn't come, but the postmaster's wife was readin' +one of the stories and settin' up nights to do it, so she wa'n't to +blame for not lettin' 'em go until she got through with 'em. They slip +out of the covers just as easy, and nobody ever knows the difference. + +[Sidenote: The Doctor's Darling] + +"She was tellin' me about one of the stories. It's named _Lovely Lulu, +or the Doctor's Darling_. Lovely Lulu is a little orphant who has to do +most of the housework for a family of eight, and the way they abuse that +child is something awful. The young ladies are forever puttin' ruffled +white skirts into her wash, and makin' her darn the lace on their blue +silk mornin' dresses. + +"There's a rich doctor that they're all after and one day little Lulu +happens to open the front-door for him, and he gets a good look at her +for the first time. As she goes upstairs, Arthur Montmorency--that's his +name--holds both hands to his heart and says, 'She and she only shall be +my bride.' The conclusion of this highly fascinatin' and absorbin' +romance will be found in the next number of _The Housewife's +Companion_." + +"Mother," suggested Roger, "why don't you subscribe for the papers +yourself?" + +Miss Mattie dropped her knife and fork and gazed at him in open-mouthed +astonishment. "Roger," she said, kindly, "I declare if sometimes you +don't remind me of my people more'n your pa's. I never thought of that +myself and I dunno how you come to. I'll do it the very first time I go +down to the store. The postmaster's wife can get the addresses without +tearin' off the covers, and after I get 'em read she can borrow mine, +and not be always makin' the people at the Ridge so mad that she's +runnin' the risk of losin' her job. If you ain't the beatenest!" + +Basking in the unaccustomed warmth of his mother's approval, Roger +finished his supper in peace. Afterward, while she was clearing up, he +even dared to take up the much-criticised book and lose himself once +more in his father's beloved Emerson. + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: Childish Memories] + +All his childish memories of his father had been blurred into one by the +mists of the intervening years. As though it were yesterday, he could +see the library upstairs, which was still the same, and the grave, +silent, kindly man who sat dreaming over his books. When the child +entered, half afraid because the room was so quiet, the man had risen +and caught him in his arms with such hungry passion that he had almost +cried out. + +"Oh, my son," came in the deep, rich voice, vibrant with tenderness; "my +dear little son!" + +[Sidenote: The Priceless Legacy] + +That was all, save a few old photographs and the priceless legacy of the +books. The library was not a large one, but it had been chosen by a man +of discriminating, yet catholic, taste. The books had been used and were +not, as so often happens, merely ornaments. Page after page had been +interlined and there was scarcely a volume which was not rich in +marginal notes, sometimes questioning in character, but indicating +always understanding and appreciation. + +As soon as he learned to read, Roger began to spend his leisure hours in +this library. When he could not understand a book, he put it aside and +took up another. Always there were pictures and sometimes many of them, +for in his later years Laurence Austin had contracted the baneful habit +of extra-illustration. Never maternal, save in the limited physical +sense, Miss Mattie had been glad to have the child out of her way. + +Day by day, the young mind grew and expanded in its own way. Year by +year, Roger came to an affectionate knowledge of his father, through +the medium of the marginal notes. He wondered, sometimes, that a pencil +mark should so long outlive the fine, strong body of the man who made +it. It seemed pitiful, in a way, and yet he knew that books and letters +are the things that endure, in a world of transition and decay. + +The underlined passages and the marginal comments gave evidence of an +extraordinary love of beauty, in whatever shape or form. And yet--the +parlour, which was opened only on Sunday--was hideous with a gaudy +carpet, stuffed chairs, family portraits done in crayon and inflicted +upon the house by itinerant vendors of tea and coffee, and there was a +basket of wax flowers, protected by glass, on the marble-topped +"centre-table." + +The pride of Miss Mattie's heart was a chair, which, with incredible +industry, she had made from an empty flour barrel. She had spoiled a +good barrel to make a bad chair, but her thrifty soul rejoiced in her +achievement. Roger never went near it, so Miss Mattie herself sat in it +on Sunday afternoons, nodding, and crooning hymns to herself. + +[Sidenote: An Awful Chasm] + +"How did father stand it?" thought Roger, intending no disrespect. He +loved his mother and appreciated her good qualities, but he saw the +awful chasm between those two souls, which no ceremony of marriage could +ever span. + +[Sidenote: Roger Austin] + +In appearance, Roger was like his father. He had the same clear, dark +skin, with regular features and kind, dark eyes, the same abundant, wavy +hair, strong, square chin, and incongruous, beauty-loving mouth. He had, +too, the lovable boyishness, which never quite leaves some fortunate +men. He was studying law in the judge's office, and hoped by another +year to be ready to take his examinations. After working hard all day, +he found refreshment for mind and body in an hour or so at night spent +with the treasures of his father's library. + +"Let us buy our entrance to this guild with a long probation," read +Roger. "Why should we desecrate noble and beautiful souls by intruding +upon them? Why insist upon rash personal relations with your friend? Why +go to his house, and know his mother and brother and sisters? Why be +visited by him at your own? Are these things material to our covenant? +Leave this touching and clawing. Let him be to me----" + +"I've spoke twice," complained Miss Mattie, "and you don't hear me no +more'n your pa did." + +"I beg your pardon, Mother. I did not hear you come in. What is it?" + +"I was just a-sayin' that maybe those papers would be too expensive. +Maybe I ought not to have 'em." + +"I'm sure they're not, Mother. Anyhow, you get them, and we'll make it +up in some other way if we have to." Dimly, in the future, Roger saw +long, quiet evenings in which his disturbing influence should be +rendered null and void by the charms of _Lovely Lulu, or the Doctor's +Darling_. + +[Sidenote: A Morning Call] + +"Barbara North sent her pa over here this morning to ask for some book. +I disremember now what it was, but it was after you was gone." + +Roger's expressive face changed instantly. "Why didn't you tell me +sooner, Mother?" He spoke with evident effort. "It's too late now for me +to go over there." + +"There's no call for you to go over. They can send again. Miss Miriam +can come after it any time. They ain't got no business to let a blind +old man like Ambrose North run around by himself the way they do." + +"He takes very good care of himself. He knew this place before he was +blind, and I don't think there is any danger." + +"Just the same, he ought not to go around alone, and that's what I told +him this morning. 'A blind old man like you,' says I, 'ain't got no +business chasin' around alone. First thing you know, you'll fall down +and break a leg or arm or something.'" + +Roger shrank as if from a physical hurt. "Mother!" he cried. "How can +you say such things!" + +"Why not?" she queried, imperturbably. "He knows he's blind, I guess, +and he certainly can't think he's young, so what harm does it do to +speak of it? Anyway," she added, piously, "I always say just what I +think." + +Roger got up, put his hands in his pockets, and paced back and forth +restlessly. "People who always say what they think, Mother," he +answered, not unkindly, "assume that their opinions are of great +importance to people who probably do not care for them at all. Unless +directly asked, it is better to say only the kind things and keep the +rest to ourselves." + +"I was kind," objected Miss Mattie. "I was tellin' him he ought not to +take the risk of hurtin' himself by runnin' around alone. I don't know +what ails you, Roger. Every day you get more and more like your pa." + +[Sidenote: Dangerous Rocks] + +"How long had you and father known each other before you were married?" +asked Roger, steering quickly away from the dangerous rocks that will +loom up in the best-regulated of conversations. + +"'Bout three months. Why?" + +"Oh, I just wanted to know." + +"I used to be a pretty girl, Roger, though you mightn't think it now." +Her voice was softened, and, taking off her spectacles, she gazed far +into space; seemingly to that distant girlhood when radiant youth lent +to the grey old world some of its own immortal joy. + +"I don't doubt it," said Roger, politely. + +"Your pa and me used to go to church together. He sang in the choir and +I had a white dress and a bonnet trimmed with lutestring ribbon. I can +smell the clover now and hear the bees hummin' when the windows was open +in Summer. A bee come in once while the minister was prayin' and lighted +on Deacon Emory's bald head. Seems a'most as if 't was yesterday. + +[Sidenote: Great Notions] + +"Your pa had great notions," she went on, after a pause. "Just before we +was married, he said he was goin' to educate me, but he never did." + + + + +III + +The Tower of Cologne + + +Roger sat in Ambrose North's easy chair, watching Barbara while she +sewed. "I am sorry," he said, "that I wasn't at home when your father +came over after the book. Mother was unable to find it. I'm afraid I'm +not very orderly." + +"It doesn't matter," returned Barbara, threading her needle again. "I +steal too much time from my work as it is." + +Roger sighed and turned restlessly in his chair. "I wish I could come +over every day and read to you, but you know how it is. Days, I'm in the +office with the musty old law books, and in the evenings, your father +wants you and my mother wants me." + +"I know, but father usually goes to bed by nine, and I'm sure your +mother doesn't sit up much later, for I usually see her light by that +time. I always work until eleven or half past, so why shouldn't you come +over then?" + +[Sidenote: A Happy Thought] + +"Happy thought!" exclaimed Roger. "Still, you might not always want me. +How shall I know?" + +"I'll put a candle in the front window," suggested Barbara, "and if you +can come, all right. If not, I'll understand." + +Both laughed delightedly at the idea, for they were young enough to find +a certain pleasure in clandestine ways and means. Miss Mattie had so far +determinedly set her face against her son's association with the young +of the other sex, and even Barbara, who had been born lame and had never +walked farther than her own garden, came under the ban. + +Ambrose North, with the keen and unconscious selfishness of age, +begrudged others even an hour of Barbara's society. He felt a third +person always as an intruder, though he tried his best to appear +hospitable when anyone came. Miriam might sometimes have read to +Barbara, while he was out upon his long, lonely walks, but it had never +occurred to either of them. + +[Sidenote: World-wide Fellowship] + +Through Laurence Austin's library, as transported back and forth by +Roger, one volume at a time, Barbara had come into the world-wide +fellowship of those who love books. She was closely housed and +constantly at work, but her mind soared free. When the poverty and +ugliness of her surroundings oppressed her beauty-loving soul; when her +fingers ached and the stitches blurred into mist before her eyes, some +little brown book, much worn, had often given her the key to the House +of Content. + +"Shall you always have to sew?" asked Roger. "Is there no way out?" + +[Sidenote: Glad of Work] + +"Not unless some fairy prince comes prancing up on a white charger," +laughed Barbara, "and takes us all away with him to his palace. Don't +pity me," she went on, her lips quivering a little, "for every day I'm +glad I can do it and keep father from knowing we are poor. + +"Besides, I'm of use in the world, and I wouldn't want to live if I +couldn't work. Aunt Miriam works, too. She does all the housework, takes +care of me when I can't help myself, does the mending, many things for +father, and makes the quilts, preserves, candied orange peel, and the +other little things we sell. People are so kind to us. Last Summer the +women at the hotel bought everything we had and left orders enough to +keep me busy until long after Christmas." + +"Don't call people kind because they buy what they want." + +"Don't be so cynical. You wouldn't have them buy things they didn't +want, would you?" + +"Sometimes they do." + +"Where?" + +"Well, at church fairs, for instance. They spend more than they can +afford for things they do not want, in order to please people whom they +do not like and help heathen who are much happier than they are." + +"I'm glad I'm not running a church fair," laughed Barbara. "And who told +you that heathen are happier than we are? Are you a heathen?" + +"I don't know. Most of us are, I suppose, in one way or another. But how +nice it would be if we could paint ourselves instead of wearing clothes, +and go under a tree when it rained, and pick cocoanuts or bananas when +we were hungry. It would save so much trouble and expense." + +"Paint is sticky," observed Barbara, "and the rain would come around the +tree when the wind was blowing from all ways at once, as it does +sometimes, and I do not like either cocoanuts or bananas. I'd rather +sew. What went wrong to-day?" she asked, with a whimsical smile. +"Everything?" + +"Almost," admitted Roger. "How did you know?" + +[Sidenote: Unfailing Barometer] + +"Because you want to be a heathen instead of the foremost lawyer of your +time. Your ambition is an unfailing barometer." + +He laughed lightly. This sort of banter was very pleasing to him after a +day with the law books and an hour or more with his mother. He had known +Barbara since they were children and their comradeship dated back to +the mud-pie days. + +"I don't know but what you're right," he said. "Whether I go to Congress +or the Fiji Islands may depend, eventually, upon Judge Bascom's liver." + +"Don't let it depend upon him," cautioned Barbara. "Make your own +destiny. It was Napoleon, wasn't it, who prided himself upon making his +own circumstances? What would you do--or be--if you could have your +choice?" + +[Sidenote: Aspirations] + +"The best lawyer in the State," he answered, promptly. "I'd never oppose +the innocent nor defend the guilty. And I'd have money enough to be +comfortable and to make those I love comfortable." + +"Would you marry?" she asked, thoughtfully. + +"Why--I suppose so. It would seem queer, though." + +"Roger," she said, abruptly, "you were born a year and more before I +was, and yet you're fully ten or fifteen years younger." + +"Don't take me back too far, Barbara, for I hate milk. Please don't +deprive me of my solid food. What would you do, if you could choose?" + +"I'd write a book." + +"What kind? Dictionary?" + +"No, just a little book. The sort that people who love each other would +choose for a gift. Something that would be given to one who was going +on a long or difficult journey. The one book a woman would take with her +when she was tired and went away to rest. A book with laughter and tears +in it and so much fine courage that it would be given to those who are +in deep trouble. I'd soften the hard hearts, rest the weary ones, and +give the despairing ones new strength to go on. Just a little book, but +so brave and true and sweet and tender that it would bring the sun to +every shady place." + +"Would you marry?" + +[Sidenote: The Right Man] + +"Of course, if the right man came. Otherwise not." + +"I wonder," mused Roger, "how a person could know the right one?" + +"Foolish child," she answered, "that's it--the knowing. When you don't +know, it isn't it." + +"My dear Miss North," remarked Roger, "the heads of your argument are +somewhat involved, but I think I grasp your meaning. When you know it +is, then it is, but when you don't know that it is, then it isn't. Is +that right?" + +"Exactly. Wonderfully intelligent for one so young." + +Barbara's blue eyes danced merrily and her red lips parted in a mocking +smile. A long heavy braid of hair, "the colour of ripe corn," hung over +either shoulder and into her lap. She was almost twenty-two, but she +still clung to the childish fashion of dressing her hair, because the +heavy braids and the hairpins made her head ache. All her gowns were +white, either of wool or cotton, and were made to be washed. On Sundays, +she sometimes wore blue ribbons on her braids. + +[Sidenote: Simply Barbara] + +To Roger, she was very fair. He never thought of her crutches because +she had always been lame. She was simply Barbara, and Barbara needed +crutches. It had never occurred to him that she might in any way be +different, for he was not one of those restless souls who are forever +making people over to fit their own patterns. + +"Why doesn't your father like to have me come here?" asked Roger, +irrelevantly. + +"Why doesn't your mother like to have you come?" queried Barbara, +quickly on the defensive. + +"No, but tell me. Please!" + +"Father always goes to bed early." + +"But not at eight o'clock. It was a quarter of eight when I came, and by +eight he was gone." + +"It isn't you, Roger," she said, unwillingly; "it's anyone. I'm all he +has, and if I talk much to other people he feels as if I were being +taken away from him--that's all. It's natural, I suppose. You mustn't +mind him." + +"But I wouldn't hurt him," returned Roger, softly; "you know that." + +"I know." + +"I wish you could make him understand that I come to see every one of +you." + +[Sidenote: Hard Work] + +"It's the hardest work in the world," sighed Barbara, "to make people +understand things." + +"Somebody said once that all the wars had been caused by one set of +people trying to force their opinions upon another set, who did not +desire to have their minds changed." + +"Very true. I wonder, sometimes, if we have done right with father." + +"I'm sure you have," said Roger, gently. "You couldn't do anything wrong +if you tried." + +"We haven't meant to," she answered, her sweet face growing grave. "Of +course it was all begun long before I was old enough to understand. He +thinks the city house, which we lost so long ago that I cannot even +remember our having it, was sold for so high a price that it would have +been foolish not to sell it, and that we live here because we prefer the +country. Just think, Roger, before I was born, this was father's and +mother's Summer home, and now it's all we have." + +"It's a roof and four walls--that's all any house is, without the spirit +that makes it home." + +"He thinks it's beautifully furnished. Of course we have the old +mahogany and some of the pictures, but we've had to sell nearly +everything. I've used some of mother's real laces in the sewing and sold +practically all the rest. Whatever anyone would buy has been disposed +of. Even the broken furniture in the attic has gone to people who had a +fancy for 'antiques.'" + +"You have made him very happy, Barbara." + +"I know, but is it right?" + +"I'm not orthodox, my dear girl, but, speaking as a lawyer, if it harms +no one and makes a blind old man happy, it can't be wrong." + +"I hope you're right, but sometimes my conscience bothers me." + +[Sidenote: A Saint's Conscience] + +"Imagine a saint's conscience being troublesome." + +"Don't laugh at me--you know I'm not a saint." + +"How should I know?" + +"Ask Aunt Miriam. She has no illusions about me." + +"Thanks, but I don't know her well enough. We haven't been on good terms +since she drove me out of the melon patch--do you remember?" + +"Yes, I remember. We wanted the blossoms, didn't we, to make golden +bells in the Tower of Cologne?" + +"I believe so. We never got the Tower finished, did we?" + +"No. I wasn't allowed to play with you for a long time, because you were +such a bad boy." + +"Next Summer, I think we should rebuild it. Let's renew our youth +sometime by making the Tower of Cologne in your back yard." + +"There are no golden bells." + +"I'll get some from somewhere. We owe it to ourselves to do it." + +Barbara's blue eyes were sparkling now, and her sweet lips smiled. "When +it's done?" she asked. + +[Sidenote: Like Fairy Tales] + +"We'll move into it and be happy ever afterward, like the people in the +fairy tales." + +"I said a little while ago that you were fifteen years younger than I am, +but, upon my word, I believe it's nearer twenty." + +"That makes me an enticing infant of three or four, flourishing like the +green bay tree on a diet of bread and milk with an occasional +soft-boiled egg. I should have been in bed by six o'clock, and now +it's--gracious, Barbara, it's after eleven. What do you mean by keeping +the young up so late?" + +As he spoke, he hurriedly found his hat, and, reaching into the pocket +of his overcoat, drew out a book. "That's the one you wanted, isn't it?" + +"Yes, thank you." + +"I didn't give it to you before because I wanted to talk, but we'll +read, sometimes, when we can. Don't forget to put the light in the +window when it's all right for me to come. If I don't, you'll +understand. And please don't work so hard." + +Barbara smiled. "I have to earn a living for three healthy people," she +said, "and everybody is trying, by moral suasion, to prevent me from +doing it. Do you want us all piled up in the front yard in a nice little +heap of bones before the Tower of Cologne is rebuilt?" + +Roger took both her hands and attempted to speak, but his face suddenly +crimsoned, and he floundered out into the darkness like an awkward +school-boy instead of a self-possessed young man of almost twenty-four. +It had occurred to him that it might be very nice to kiss Barbara. + +[Sidenote: Back to Childhood] + +But Barbara, magically taken back to childhood, did not notice his +confusion. The Tower of Cologne had been a fancy of hers ever since she +could remember, though it had been temporarily eclipsed by the hard work +which circumstances had thrust upon her. As she grew from childhood to +womanhood, it had changed very little--the dream, always, was +practically the same. + +[Sidenote: A Day Dream] + +The Tower itself was made of cologne bottles neatly piled together, and +the brightly-tinted labels gave it a bizarre but beautiful effect. It +was square in shape and very high, with a splendid cupola of clear +glass arches--the labels probably would not show, up so high. It stood +in an enchanted land with the sea behind it--nobody had ever thought of +taking Barbara down to the sea, though it was so near. The sea was +always blue, of course, like the sky, or the larkspur--she was never +quite sure of the colour. + +The air all around the Tower smelled sweet, just like cologne. There was +a flight of steps, also made of cologne bottles, but they did not break +when you walked on them, and the door was always ajar. Inside was a +great, winding staircase which led to the cupola. You could climb and +climb and climb, and when you were tired, you could stop to rest in any +of the rooms that were on the different floors. + +Strangely enough, in the Tower of Cologne, Barbara was never lame. She +always left her crutches leaning up against the steps outside. She could +walk and run like anyone else and never even think of crutches. There +were many charming people in the Tower and none of them ever said, +pityingly, "It's too bad you're lame." + +All the dear people of the books lived in the Tower of Cologne, besides +many more, whom Barbara did not know. Maggie Tulliver, Little Nell, +Dora, Agnes, Mr. Pickwick, King Arthur, the Lady of Shalott, and +unnumbered others dwelt happily there. They all knew Barbara and were +always glad to see her. + +Wonderful tapestries were hung along the stairs, there were beautiful +pictures in every room, and whatever you wanted to eat was instantly +placed before you. Each room smelled of a different kind of cologne and +no two rooms were furnished alike. Her friends in the Tower were of all +ages and of many different stations in life, but there was one whose +face she had never seen. He was always just as old as Barbara, and was +closer to her than the rest. + +[Sidenote: The Boy] + +When she lost herself in the queer winding passages, the Boy, whose face +she was unable to picture, was always at her side to show her the way +out. They both wanted to get up into the cupola and ring all the golden +bells at once, but there seemed to be some law against it, for when they +were almost there, something always happened. Either the Tower itself +vanished beyond recall, or Aunt Miriam called her, or an imperative +voice summoned the Boy downstairs--and Barbara would not think of going +to the cupola without him. + +When she and Roger had begun to make mud pies together, she had told him +about the Tower and got him interested in it, too--all but the Boy whose +face she was unable to see and whose name she did not know. In the +Tower, she addressed him simply as "Boy." Barbara kept him to herself +for some occult reason. Roger liked the Tower very much, but thought the +construction might possibly be improved. Barbara never allowed him to +make any changes. He could build another Tower for himself, if he chose, +and have it just as he wanted it, but this was her very own. + +It all seemed as if it were yesterday. "And," mused Barbara, "it was +almost sixteen years ago, when I was six and Roger 'seven-going-on-eight,' +as he always said." The dear Tower still stoodin her memory, but far off +and veiled, like a mirage seen in the clouds. The Boy who helped her over +the difficult places was a grown man now, tall and straight and strong, +but she could not see his face. + +"It's queer," thought Barbara, as she put out the light. "I wonder if +I ever shall." + +[Sidenote: An Enchanted Land] + +That night she dreamed of the Tower of Cologne, in the old, enchanted +land, where a blue sky bent down to meet a bluer sea. She and the Boy +were in the cupola, making music with the golden bells. Their laughter +chimed in with the sweet sound of the ringing, but still, she could not +see his face. + + + + +IV + +The Seventh of June + + +Barbara sat by the old chest which held her completed work, frowning +prettily over a note-book in her lap. She was very methodical, and, in +some inscrutable way, things had become mixed. She kept track of every +yard of lace and linen and every spool of thread, for, it was evident, +she must know the exact cost of the material and the amount of time +spent on a garment before it could be accurately priced. + +[Sidenote: Finishing Touches] + +Aunt Miriam had carefully pressed the lingerie after it was made and +laid it away in the chest with lavender to keep it from turning yellow. +There remained only the last finishing touches. Aunt Miriam could have +put in the ribbons as well as she could, but Barbara chose to do it +herself. + +[Sidenote: Ways and Means] + +Three prices were put on each tag in Barbara's private cipher, +understood only by Aunt Miriam. The highest was the one hoped for, the +next the probable one, and the lowest one was to be taken only at the +end of the season. + +Already four or five early arrivals were reported at the hotel. By the +end of next week, it would be proper for Aunt Miriam to go down with a +few of the garments packed in a box with tissue paper, and see what she +could do. Barbara had used nearly all of her material and had sent for +more, but, in the meantime, she was using the scraps for handkerchiefs, +pin-cushion covers, and heart-shaped corsage pads, delicately scented +and trimmed with lace and ribbon. + +Once, Aunt Miriam had gone to the city for material and patterns, and +had priced hand-made lingerie in the shops. When she came back with an +itemised report, Barbara had clapped her hands in glee, for she saw the +wealth of Croesus looming up ahead. She had soon learned, however, +that she must keep far below the city prices if she would tempt the +horde of Summer visitors who came, yearly, to the hotel. At times, she +thought that Aunt Miriam must have been dreadfully mistaken. + +Barbara put down the highest price of every separate article in the +small, neat hand that Aunt Miriam had taught her to write--for she had +never been to school. If she should sell everything, why, there would be +more than a year of comfort for them all, and new clothes for father, +who was beginning to look shabby. + +"But they won't," Barbara said to herself, sadly. "I can't expect them +to buy it all when I'm asking so much." + +Down in the living-room, Ambrose North was inquiring restlessly for +Barbara. "Yes," he said, somewhat impatiently, "I know she's upstairs, +for you've told me so twice. What I want to know is, why doesn't she +come down?" + +"She's busy at something, probably," returned Miriam, with forced +carelessness, "but I think she'll soon be through." + +"Barbara is always busy," he answered, with a sigh. "I can't understand +it. Anyone might think she had to work for a living. By the way, Miriam, +do you need more money?" + +"We still have some," she replied, in a low voice. + +"How much?" he demanded. + +"Less than a hundred dollars." She did not dare to say how much less. + +"That is not enough. If you will get my check-book, I will write another +check." + +[Sidenote: The Old Check-Book] + +Miriam's face was grimly set and her eyes burned strangely beneath her +dark brows. She went to the mahogany desk and took an old check-book out +of the drawer. + +"Now," he said, as she gave him the pen and ink, "please show me the +line. 'Pay to the order of'----" + +She guided his hand with her own, trying to keep her cold fingers from +trembling. "Miriam Leonard," he spelled out, in uneven characters, +"Five--hundred--dollars. Signed--Ambrose--North. There. When you have no +money, I wish you would speak of it. I am fully able to provide for my +family, and I want to do it." + +"Thank you." Miriam's voice was almost inaudible as she took the check. + +"The date," he said; "I forgot to date it. What day of the month is it?" + +She moistened her parched lips, but did not speak. This was what she had +been dreading. + +"The date, Miriam," he called. "Will you please tell me what day of the +month it is?" + +"The seventh," she answered, with difficulty. + +"The seventh? The seventh of June?" + +"Yes." + +There was a long pause. "Twenty-one years," he said, in a shrill +whisper. "Twenty-one years ago to-day." + +[Sidenote: A Dreadful Anniversary] + +Miriam sat down quietly on the other side of the room. Her eyes were +glittering and she was moving her hands nervously. This dreadful +anniversary had, for her, its own particular significance. Upstairs, +Barbara, light-hearted and hopeful, was singing to herself while she +pinned on the last of the price tags and built her air-castle. The song +came down lightly, yet discordantly. It was as though a waltz should be +played at an open grave. + +"Miriam," cried Ambrose North, passionately, "why did she kill herself? +In God's name, tell me why!" + +"I do not know," murmured Miriam. He had asked her more than fifty +times, and she always gave the same answer. + +"But you must know--someone must know! A woman does not die by her own +hand without having a reason! She was well and strong, loved, taken care +of and petted, she had all that the world could give her, and hosts of +friends. I was blind and Barbara was lame, but she loved us none the +less. If I only knew why!" he cried, miserably; "Oh, if I only knew +why!" + +Miriam, unable to bear more, went out of the room. She pressed her cold +hands to her throbbing temples. "I shall go mad," she muttered. "How +long, O Lord, how long!" + +[Sidenote: Constance North] + +Twenty-one years ago to-day, Constance North had, intentionally, taken +an overdose of laudanum. She had left a note to her husband begging him +to forgive her, and thanking him for all his kindness to her during the +three years they had lived together. She had also written a note to +Miriam, asking her to look after the blind man and to be a mother to +Barbara. Enclosed were two other letters, sealed with wax. One was +addressed "To My Daughter, Barbara. To be opened on her twenty-second +birthday." Miriam had both the letters safely put away. It was not time +for Barbara to have hers and she had never delivered the other to the +person to whom it was addressed--so often does the arrogant power of the +living deny the holiest wishes of the dead. + +The whole scene came vividly back to Miriam--the late afternoon sun +streaming in glory from the far hills into Constance North's dainty +sitting-room, upstairs; the golden-haired woman, in the full splendour +of her youth and beauty, lying upon the couch asleep, with a smile of +heavenly peace upon her lips; the blind man's hands straying over her as +she lay there, with his tears falling upon her face, and blue-eyed +Barbara, cooing and laughing in her own little bed in the next room. + +[Sidenote: Years of Torture] + +Miriam had found the notes on the dressing-table, and had lied. She had +said there were but two when, in reality, there were four. Two had been +read and destroyed; the other two, with unbroken seals, were waiting to +be read. She was keeping the one for Barbara; the other had tortured her +through all of the twenty years. + +The time had passed when she could have delivered it, for the man to +whom it was addressed was dead. But he had survived Constance by nearly +five years, and, at any time during those five years, Miriam might have +given it to him, unseen and safely. She justified herself by dwelling +upon her care of Barbara and the blind man, and the fact that she would +give Barbara her letter upon the appointed day. Sternly she said to +herself: "I will fulfil one trust. I will keep faith with Constance in +this one way, bitterly though she has wronged me." + +[Sidenote: Haunting Dreams] + +Yet the fulfilment of one trust seemed not to be enough, for her sleep +was haunted by the pleading eyes of Constance, asking mutely for some +boon. Until the man died, Constance had come often, with her hands +outstretched, craving that which was so little and yet so much. After +his death, Constance still continued to come, but less often and +reproachfully; she seemed to ask for nothing now. + +Miriam had grown old, but Constance, though sad, was always young. One +of Death's surpassing gifts is eternal youth to those whom he claims too +soon. In her old husband's grieving heart, Constance had assumed +immortal beauty as well as immortal youth. She was now no older than +Barbara, who still sang heedlessly upstairs. + +Every night of the twenty-one years, Miriam had closed her eyes in +dread. When she dreamed it was always of Constance--Constance laughing +or singing, Constance bringing "the light that never was on sea or land" +to the fine, grave face of Ambrose North; Constance hugging little lame +Barbara to her breast with passionate, infinitely pitying love. And, +above all, Constance in her grave-clothes, dumb, reproachful, her sad +eyes fixed on Miriam in pleading that was almost prayer. + +"Miriam! Oh, Miriam!" The blind man in the next room was calling her. +Fearfully, she went back. + +"Sit down," said Ambrose North. "Sit down near me, where I can touch +your hand. How cold your fingers are! I want to thank you for all you +have done for us--for my little girl and for me. You have been so +faithful, so watchful, so obedient to her every wish." + +Miriam shrank from him, for the kindly words stung like a lash on flesh +already quivering. + +[Sidenote: Miriam and Ambrose] + +"We have always been such good friends," he said, reminiscently. "Do you +remember how much we were together all that year, until Constance came +home from school?" + +"I have not forgotten," said Miriam, in a choking whisper. A surge of +passionate hate swept over her even now, against the dead woman whose +pretty face had swerved Ambrose North from his old allegiance. + +"And I shall not forget," he answered, kindly. "I am on the westward +slope, Miriam, and have been, for a long time. But a few more years--or +months--or days--as God wills, and I shall join her again, past the +sunset, where she waits for me. + +"I have made things right for you and Barbara. Roger Austin has my +will, dividing everything I have between you. I should like your share +to go to Barbara, eventually, if you can see your way clear to do it." + +"Don't!" cried Miriam, sharply. The strain was insupportable. + +"I do not wish to pain you, Sister," answered the old man, with gentle +dignity, "but sometimes it is necessary that these things be said. I +shall not speak of it again. Will you give me back the check, please, +and show me where to date it? I shall date it to-morrow--I cannot bear +to write down this day." + + * * * * * + +When Barbara came down, her father was sitting at the old square piano, +quite alone, improvising music that was both beautiful and sad. He +seldom touched the instrument, but, when he did, wayfarers in the street +paused to listen. + +"Are you making a song, Father?" she asked, softly, when the last deep +chord died away. + +[Sidenote: Too Sad for Songs] + +"No," he sighed; "I cannot make songs to-day." + +"There is always a song, Daddy," she reminded him. "You told me so +yourself." + +"Yes, I know, but not to-day. Do you know what to-day is, my dear?" + +"The seventh--the seventh of June." + +"Twenty-one years ago to-day," he said, with an effort, "your dear +mother took her own life." The last words were almost inaudible. + +Barbara went to him and put her soft arms around his neck. "Daddy!" she +whispered, with infinite sympathy, "Daddy!" + +He patted her arm gently, unable to speak. She said no more, but the +voice and the touch brought healing to his pain. Bone of her bone and +flesh of her flesh, the daughter of the dead Constance was thrilled +unspeakably with a tenderness that the other had never given him. + +"Sit down, my dear," said Ambrose North, slowly releasing her. "I want +to talk to you--of her. Did I hear Aunt Miriam go out?" + +"Yes, just a few minutes ago." + +"You are almost twenty-two, are you not, Barbara?" + +"Yes, Daddy." + +"Then you are a woman grown. Your dear mother was twenty-two, when--" He +choked on the words. + +"When she died," whispered Barbara, her eyes luminous with tears. + +[Sidenote: A Torturing Doubt] + +[Sidenote: A Change] + +"Yes, when she--died. I have never known why, Barbara, unless it was +because I was blind and you were lame. But all these years there has +been a torturing doubt in my heart. Before you were born, and after my +blindness, I fancied that a change came over her. She was still tender +and loving, but it was not quite in the same way. Sometimes I felt that +she had ceased to love me. Do you think my blindness could--?" + +"Never, Father, never." Barbara's voice rang out strong and clear. "That +would only have made her love you more." + +"Thank you, my dear. Someway it comforts me to have you say it. But, +after you came, I felt the change even more keenly. You have read in the +books, doubtless, many times, that a child unites those who bring it +into the world, but I have seen, quite as often, that it divides them by +a gulf that is never bridged again." + +"Daddy!" cried Barbara, in pain. "Didn't you want me?" + +"Want you?" he repeated, in a tone that made the words a caress. "I +wanted you always, and every day I want you more. I am only trying to +say that her love seemed to lessen, instead of growing, as time went on. +If I could know that she died loving me, I would not ask why. If I could +know that she died loving me--if I were sure she loved me still--" + +"She did, Daddy--I know she did." + +"If I might only be so sure! But the ways of the Everlasting are not our +ways, and life is made up of waiting." + +Insensibly relieved by speech, his pain gradually merged into quiet +acceptance, if not resignation. "Shall you marry some day, Barbara?" he +asked, at last. + +"If the right man comes--otherwise not." + +"Much is written of it in the books, and I know you read a great deal, +but some things in the books are not true, and many things that are true +are not written. They say that a man of fifty should not marry a girl of +twenty and expect to be happy. Miriam was fifteen years older than +Constance and at first I thought of her, but when your mother came from +school, with her blue eyes and golden hair and her pretty, laughing +ways, there was but one face in all the world for me. + +"We were so happy, Barbara! The first year seemed less than a month, it +passed so quickly. The books will tell you that the first joy dies. +Perhaps it does, but I do not know, because our marriage lasted only +three years. It may be that, after many years, the heart does not beat +faster at the sound of the beloved's step; that the touch of the loving +hand brings no answering clasp. + +[Sidenote: Gift of Marriage] + +"But the divinest gift of marriage is this--the daily, unconscious +growing of two souls into one. Aspirations and ambitions merge, each +with the other, and love grows fast to love. Unselfishness answers to +unselfishness, tenderness responds to tenderness, and the highest joy of +each is the well-being of the other. The words of Church and State are +only the seal of a predestined compact. Day by day and year by year the +bond becomes closer and dearer, until at last the two are one, and even +death is no division. + +[Sidenote: If----] + +"A grave has lain between us for more than twenty years, but I am still +her husband--there has been no change. And, if she died loving me, she +is still mine. If she died loving me--if--she--died--loving me----" + +His voice broke at the end, and he went out, murmuring the words to +himself. Barbara watched him from the window as he opened the gate. Her +face was wet with tears. + +Flaming banners of sunset streamed from the hills beyond him, but his +soul could see no Golden City to-night. He went up the road that led to +another hillside, where, in the long, dreamy shadows, the dwellers in +God's acre lay at peace. Barbara guessed where he was going and her +heart ached for him--kneeling in prayer and vigil beside a sunken grave, +to ask of earth a question to which the answer was lost, in heaven--or +in hell. + + + + +V + +Eloise + + +[Sidenote: A Summer Hotel] + +The hotel was a long, low, rambling structure, with creaky floors and +old-fashioned furniture. But the wide verandas commanded a glorious view +of the sea, no canned vegetables were served at the table, and there was +no orchestra. Naturally, it was crowded from June to October with people +who earnestly desired quiet and were willing to go far to get it. + +The inevitable row of rocking-chairs swayed back and forth on the +seaward side. Most of them were empty, save, perhaps, for the ghosts of +long-dead gossips who had sat and rocked and talked and rocked from one +meal to the next. The paint on the veranda was worn in a long series of +parallel lines, slightly curved, but nobody cared. + +No phonograph broke upon the evening stillness with an ear-splitting +din, no unholy piccolo sounded above the other tortured instruments, no +violin wailed pitifully at its inhuman treatment, and the piano was +locked. + +At seasonable hours the key might be had at the office by those who +could prove themselves worthy of the trust, but otherwise quiet reigned. + +[Sidenote: Eloise Wynne] + +Miss Eloise Wynne came downstairs, with a book under her arm. She was +fresh as the morning itself and as full of exuberant vitality. She was +tall and straight and strong; her copper-coloured hair shone as though +it had been burnished, and her tanned cheeks had a tint of rose. When +she entered the dining-room, with a cheery "good-morning" that included +everybody, she produced precisely the effect of a cool breeze from the +sea. + +She was thirty, and cheerfully admitted it on occasion. "If I don't look +it," she said, smiling, "people will be surprised, and if I do, there +would be no use in denying it. Anyhow, I'm old enough to go about +alone." It was her wont to settle herself for Summer or Winter in any +place she chose, with no chaperon in sight. + +For a week she had been at Riverdale-by-the-Sea, and liked it on account +of the lack of entertainment. People who lived there called it simply +"Riverdale," but the manager of the hotel, perhaps to atone for the +missing orchestra and canned vegetables, added "by-the-Sea" to the name +in his modest advertisements. + +Miss Wynne, fortunately, had enough money to enable her to live the +much-talked-of "simple life," which is wildly impossible to the poor. +As it was not necessary for her to concern herself with the sordid and +material, she could occupy herself with the finer things of the soul. +Just now, however, she was deeply interested in the material foundation +of the finest thing in the world--a home. + +[Sidenote: A Passion for Lists] + +She had taken the bizarre paper slip which protected the even more +striking cover of a recent popular novel, and adjusted it to a bulky +volume of very different character. In her chatelaine bag she had a +pencil and a note-book, for Miss Eloise was sorely afflicted with the +note-book habit, and had a passion for reducing everything to lists. She +had lists of things she wanted and lists of things she didn't want, +which circumstances or well-meaning Santa Clauses had forced upon her; +little books of addresses and telephone numbers, jewels and other +personal belongings, and, finally, a catalogue of her library +alphabetically arranged by author and title. + +Immediately after breakfast, she went off with a long, swinging stride +which filled her small audience with envy and admiration. Disjointed +remarks, such as "skirt a little too short, but good tailor," and +"terrible amount of energy," and "wonder where she's going," followed +her. These comments were audible, had she been listening, but she had +the gift of keeping solitude in a crowd. + +Far along the beach she went, hatless, her blood singing with the joy of +life. A June morning, the sea, youth, and the consciousness of being +loved--for what more could one ask? The diamond on the third finger of +her left hand sparkled wonderfully in the sunlight. It was the only ring +she wore. + +[Sidenote: The Cook Book] + +Presently, she found a warm, soft place behind a sand dune. She reared +upon the dune a dark green parasol with a white border, and patted sand +around the curved handle until it was, as she thought, firmly placed. +Then she settled her skirts comfortably and opened her book, for the +first time. + +"It looks bad," she mused. "Wonder what a carbohydrate is. And +proteids--where do you buy 'em? Albuminoids--I've been from Maine to +Florida and have never seen any. They must be germs. + +"However," she continued, to herself, "I have a trained mind, and +'keeping everlastingly at it brings success.' It would be strange if +three hours of hard study every day, on the book the man in the store +said was the best ever, didn't produce some sort of definite result. +But, oh, how Allan would laugh at me!" + +The book fell on the sand, unheeded. The brown eyes looked out past the +blue surges to some far Castle in Spain. Her thoughts refused to phrase +themselves in words, but her pulses leaped with the old, immortal joy. +The sun had risen high in the shining East before she returned to her +book. + +"This isn't work," she sighed to herself; "away with the dreams." + +Before long, she got out her note-book. "A fresh fish," she wrote, "does +not smell fishy and its eyes are bright and its gills red. A tender +chicken or turkey has a springy breast bone. If you push it down with +your finger, it springs back. A leg of lamb has to have the tough, outer +parchment-like skin taken off with a sharp knife. Some of the oil of the +wool is in it and makes it taste muttony and bad. A lobster should +always be bought when he is alive and green and boiled at home. Then you +know he is fresh. Save everything for soup." + +[Sidenote: The Air of Knowing] + +"I will go out into the kitchen," mused Eloise, "and I will have the air +of knowing all about everything. I will say: 'Mary Ann, I have ordered a +lobster for you to boil. We will have a salad for lunch. And I trust you +have saved everything that was left last night for to-night's soup.' +Mary Ann will be afraid of me, and Allan will be _so_ proud." + +"'I thought I told you,' continued Eloise, to herself, 'to save all the +crumbs. Doctor Conrad does not like to have everything salt and he +prefers to make the salad dressing himself. Do not cook any cereal the +mornings we have oranges or grape-fruit--the starch and acid are likely +to make a disturbance inside. Four people are coming to dinner this +evening. I have ordered some pink roses and we will use the pink +candle-shades. Or, wait--I had forgotten that my hair is red. Use the +green candle-shades and I will change the roses to white.'" + +[Sidenote: A Frolicsome Wind] + +A frolicsome little wind, which had long been ruffling the waves of +Eloise's copper-coloured hair, took the note-book out of her lap and +laid it open on the sand some little distance away. Then, after making +merry with the green parasol, it lifted it bodily by its roots out of +the sand dune and went gaily down the beach with it. + +Eloise started in pursuit, but the wind and the parasol out-distanced +her easily. Rounding the corner of another dune, she saw the parasol, +with all sails set, jauntily embarked toward Europe. Turning away, +disconsolate, she collided with a big blonde giant who took her into his +arms, saying, "Never mind--I'll get you another." + +When the first raptures had somewhat subsided, Eloise led him back to +the place where the parasol had started from. "When and where from and +how did you come?" she asked, hurriedly picking up her books. + +"This morning, from yonder palatial hotel, on foot," he answered. "I +thought you'd be out here somewhere. I didn't ask for you--I wanted to +hunt you up myself." + +"But I might have been upstairs," she said, reproachfully. + +"On a morning like this? Not unless you've changed in the last ten days, +and you haven't, except to grow lovelier." + +"But why did you come?" she asked. "Nobody told you that you could." + +"Sweet," said Allan, softly, possessing himself of her hand, "did you +think I could stay away from you two whole weeks? Ten days is the +limit--a badly strained limit at that." + +The colour surged into her face. She was radiant, as though with some +inner light. The atmosphere around her was fairly electric with life and +youth and joy. + +[Sidenote: Dr. Conrad] + +Doctor Allan Conrad was very good to look at. He had tawny hair and kind +brown eyes, a straight nose, and a good firm chin. He wore eye-glasses, +and his face might have seemed severe had it not been discredited by his +mouth. He was smooth-shaven, and knew enough to wear brown clothes +instead of grey. + +Eloise looked at him approvingly. Every detail of his attire satisfied +her fastidious sense. If he had worn a diamond ring or a conspicuous +tie, he might not have occupied his present proud position. His +unfailing good taste was a great comfort to her. + +"How long can you stay?" she inquired. + +"Nice question," he laughed, "to ask an eager lover who has just come. +Sounds a good deal like 'Here's-your-hat-what's-your-hurry?' Before I +knew you, I used to go to see a girl sometimes who always said, at ten +o'clock: 'I'm so glad you came. When can you come again?' The first time +she did it I told her I couldn't come again until I had gone away this +time." + +"And afterward?" + +[Sidenote: Forgetting the Clock] + +"I kept going away earlier and earlier, and finally it was so much +earlier that I went before I had come. If I can't make a girl forget the +clock, I have no call to waste my valuable time on her, have I?" + +Assuming a frown with difficulty, Miss Wynne consulted her watch. "Why, +it's only half-past eleven," she exclaimed; "I thought it was much +later." + +"You darling," said the man, irrelevantly. "What are you reading?" +Before she could stop him, he had picked up the book and nearly choked +in a burst of unseemly merriment. + +"Upon my word," he said, when he could speak. "A cook book! A classmate +of mine used to indulge himself in floral catalogues when he wanted to +rest his mind with light literature, but I never heard of a cook book as +among the 'books for Summer reading' that the booksellers advertise." + +"Why not?" retorted Eloise, quickly. + +"No real reason. Lots of worse things are printed and sold by thousands, +but, someway, I can't seem to reconcile you--and your glorious +voice--with a cook-book." + +"Allan Conrad," said Miss Wynne, with affected sternness, "if you hadn't +studied medicine, would you be practising it now?" + +"No," admitted Allan; "not with the laws as they are in this State." + +"If I had no voice and had never studied music, would I be singing at +concerts?" + +"Not twice." + +"If a girl had never seen a typewriter and didn't know the first thing +about shorthand, would she apply for a position as a stenographer?" + +"They do," said Allan, gloomily. + +[Sidenote: Preparation] + +"Don't dissemble, please. My point is simply this: If every other +occupation in the world demands some previous preparation, why shouldn't +a girl know something about housekeeping and homemaking before she +undertakes it?" + +"But, my dear, you're not going to cook." + +"I am if I want to," announced Eloise, with authority. "And, anyhow, I'm +going to know. Do you think I'm going to let some peripatetic, untrained +immigrant manage my house for me? I guess not." + +"But cooking isn't theory," he ventured, picking up the note-book; "it's +practice. What good is all this going to do you when you have no +stove?" + +"Don't you remember the famous painter who told inquiring visitors that +he mixed his paints with brains? I am now cooking with my mind. After my +mind learns to cook, my hands will find it simple enough. And some time, +when you come in at midnight and have had no dinner, and the immigrant +has long since gone to sleep, you may be glad to be presented with +panned oysters, piping hot, instead of a can of salmon and a +can-opener." + +"Bless your heart," answered Allan, fondly. "It's dear of you, and I hope +it'll work. I'm starving this minute--kiss me." + +"'Longing is divine compared with satiety,'" she reminded him, as she +yielded. "How could you get away? Was nobody ill?" + +"Nobody would have the heart to be ill on a Saturday in June, when a +doctor's best girl was only fifty miles away. Monday, I'll go back and +put some cholera or typhoid germs in the water supply, and get nice and +busy. Who's up yonder?" indicating the hotel. + +"Nobody we know, but very few of the guests have come, so far." + +[Sidenote: "Guests"] + +"In all our varied speech," commented Allan, "I know of nothing so +exquisitely ironical as alluding to the people who stop at a hotel as +'guests.' In Mexico, they call them 'passengers,' which is more in +keeping with the facts. Fancy the feelings of a real guest upon +receiving a bill of the usual proportions. I should consider it a +violation of hospitality if a man at my house had to pay three prices +for his dinner and a tip besides." + +"You always had queer notions," remarked Eloise, with a sidelong glance +which set his heart to pounding. "We'll call them inmates if you like it +better. As yet, there are only eight inmates besides ourselves, though +more are coming next week. Two old couples, one widow, one _divorcee_, +and two spinsters with life-works." + +"No galloping cherubs?" + +"School isn't out yet." + +[Sidenote: Life-Works] + +"I see. It wouldn't be the real thing unless there were little ones to +gallop through the corridors at six in the morning and weep at the +dinner table. What are the life-works?" + +"One is writing a book, I understand, on _The Equality of the Sexes_. +The other--oh, Allan, it's too funny." + +"Spring it," he demanded. + +"She's trying to have cornet-playing introduced into the public schools. +She says that tuberculosis and pneumonia are caused by insufficient lung +development, and that cornet-playing will develop the lungs of the +rising generation. Fancy going by a school during the cornet hour." + +"I don't know why they shouldn't put cornet-playing into the schools," +he observed, after a moment of profound thought. "Everything else is +there now. Why shouldn't they teach crime, and even make a fine art of +it?" + +"If you let her know you're a doctor," cautioned Eloise, "she'll corner +you, and I shall never see you again. She says that she 'hopes, +incidentally, to enlist the sympathies of the medical profession.'" + +"She's beginning at the wrong end. Cornet manufacturers and the people +who keep sanitariums and private asylums are the co-workers she wants. +I couldn't live through the coming Winter were it not for pneumonia. It +means coal, and repairs for the automobile, and furs for my wife--when +I get one." + +"Come," said Eloise, springing to her feet; "let's go up and get ready +for luncheon." + +"Have you told me all?" asked Allan, "or is there some gay young +troubadour who serenades you in the evening and whose existence you +conceal from me for reasons of your own?" + +[Sidenote: A Pathetic Little Woman] + +"Nary a troubadour," she replied. "I haven't seen another soul except a +pathetic little woman who came up to the hotel yesterday afternoon to +sell the most exquisite things you ever saw. Think of offering hand-made +lingerie, of sheer, embroidered lawn and batiste and linen, to _that_ +crowd! The old ladies weren't interested, the spinsters sniffed, the +widow wept, and only the _divorcee_ took any notice of it. The prices +were so ridiculous that I wouldn't let her unpack the box. I'd be +ashamed to pay her the price she asked. It's made by a little lame girl +up the main road. I'm to go up there sometime next week." + +"Fairy godmother?" asked Allan, good-naturedly. He had known Eloise for +many years. + +"Perhaps," she answered, somewhat shamefaced. "What's the use of having +money if you don't spend it?" + +[Sidenote: A Human Interest] + +They went into the hotel together, utterly oblivious of the eight pairs +of curious eyes that were fastened upon them in a frank, open stare. The +rocking-chairs scraped on the veranda as they instinctively drew closer +together. A strong human interest, imperatively demanding immediate +discussion, had come to Riverdale-by-the-Sea. + + + + +VI + +A Letter + + +[Sidenote: Discouraging Prospects] + +Miriam had come home disappointed and secretly afraid to hope for any +tangible results from Miss Wynne's promised visit. Nevertheless, she +told Barbara. + +"Wouldn't any of them even look at it, Aunty?" + +"One of them would have looked at it and rumpled it so that I'd have had +to iron it again, but she wouldn't have bought anything. This young lady +said she was busy just then, and she wanted to come up and look over all +the things at her leisure. She won't pay much, though, even if she buys +anything. She said the price was 'ridiculous.'" + +"Perhaps she meant it was too low," suggested Barbara. + +"Possibly," answered Miriam. Her tone indicated that it was equally +possible for canary birds to play the piano, or for ducks to sing. + +"How does she look?" queried Barbara. + +"Well enough." Enthusiasm was not one of Miriam's attractions. + +"What did she have on?" + +"White. Linen, I think." + +"Then she knows good material. Was her gown tailor-made?" + +"Might have been. Why?" + +"Because if her white linen gowns are tailored she has money and is used +to spending it for clothes. I'm sure she meant the price was too low. +Did she say when she was coming?" + +"Next week. She didn't say what day." + +[Sidenote: Waiting] + +"Then," sighed Barbara, "all we can do is to wait." + +"We'll wait until she comes, or has had time to. In the meantime, I'm +going to show my quilts to those old ladies and take down a jar or two +of preserves. I wish you'd write to the people who left orders last +year, and ask if they want preserves or jam or jelly, or pickles, or +quilts, or anything. It would be nice to get some orders in before we +buy the fruit." + +Barbara put down her book, asked for the pen and ink, and went +cheerfully to work, with the aid of Aunt Miriam's small memorandum book +which contained a list of addresses. + +"What colour is her hair, Aunty?" she asked, as she blotted and turned +her first neat page. + +"A good deal the colour of that old copper tea-kettle that a woman paid +six dollars for once, do you remember? I've always thought she was +crazy, for she wouldn't even let me clean it." + +"And her eyes?" + +"Brown and big, with long lashes. She looks well enough, and her voice +is pleasant, and I must say she has nice ways. She didn't make me feel +like a peddler, as so many of them do. P'raps she'll come," admitted +Miriam, grudgingly. + +"Oh, I hope so. I'd love to see her and her pretty clothes, even if she +didn't buy anything." Barbara threw back a golden braid impatiently, +wishing it were copper-coloured and had smooth, shiny waves in it, +instead of fluffing out like an undeserved halo. + +While Barbara was writing, her father came in and sat down near her. +"More sewing, dear?" he asked, wistfully. + +[Sidenote: Writing Letters] + +"No, Daddy, not this time. I'm just writing letters." + +"I didn't know you ever got any letters--do you?" + +"Oh, yes--sometimes. The people at the hotel come up to call once in a +while, you know, and after they go away, Aunt Miriam and I occasionally +exchange letters with them. It's nice to get letters." + +The old man's face changed. "Are you lonely, dear?" + +"Lonely?" repeated Barbara, laughing; "why I don't even know what the +word means. I have you and my books and my sewing and these letters to +write, and I can sit in the window and nod to people who go by--how +could I be lonely, Daddy?" + +"I want you to be happy, dear." + +"So I am," returned the girl, trying hard to make her voice even. "With +you, and everything a girl could want, why shouldn't I be happy?" + +Miriam went out, closing the door quietly, and the blind man drew his +chair very near to Barbara. + +[Sidenote: Dreaming] + +"I dream," he said, "and I keep on dreaming that you can walk and I can +see. What do you suppose it means? I never dreamed it before." + +"We all have dreams, Daddy. I've had the same one very often ever since +I was a little child. It's about a tower made of cologne bottles, with a +cupola of lovely glass arches, built on the white sand by the blue sea. +Inside is a winding stairway hung with tapestries, leading to the cupola +where the golden bells are. There are lovely rooms on every floor, and +you can stop wherever you please." + +"It sounds like a song," he mused. + +"Perhaps it is. Can't you make one of it?" + +"No--we each have to make our own. I made one this morning." + +"Tell me, please." + +[Sidenote: Love Never Lost] + +"It is about love. When God made the world, He put love in, and none of +it has ever been lost. It is simply transferred from one person to +another. Sometimes it takes a different form, and becomes a deed, which, +at first, may not look as if it were made of love, but, in reality, is. + +"Love blossoms in flowers, sings in moving waters, fills the forest with +birds, and makes all the wonderful music of Spring. It puts the colour +upon the robin's breast, scents the orchard with far-reaching drifts of +bloom, and scatters the pink and white petals over the grass beneath. +Through love the flower changes to fruit, and the birds sing lullabies +at twilight instead of mating songs. + +"It is at the root of everything good in all the world, and where things +are wrong, it is only because sometime, somewhere, there has not been +enough love. The balance has been uneven and some have had too much +while others were starving for it. As the lack of food stunts the body, +so the denial of love warps the soul. + +"But God has made it so that love given must unfailingly come back an +hundred-fold; the more we give, the richer we are. And Heaven is only a +place where the things that have gone wrong here will at last come +right. Is it not so, Barbara?" + +"Surely, Daddy." + +"Then," he continued, anxiously, "all my loving must come back to me +sometime, somewhere. I think it will be right, for God Himself is Love." + +The blind man's sensitive fingers lovingly sought Barbara's face. His +touch was a caress. "I am sure you are like your dear mother," he said, +softly. "If I could know that she died loving me, and if I could see her +face again, just for an instant, why, all the years of loving, with no +answer, would be fully repaid." + +"She loved you, Daddy--I know she did." + +[Sidenote: The Old Doubt] + +"I know, too, but not always. Sometimes the old, tormenting doubt comes +back to me." + +"It shouldn't--mother would never have meant you to doubt her." + +"Barbara," cried the old man, with sudden passion, "if you ever love a +man, never let him doubt you--always let him be sure. There is so much +in a man's world that a woman knows nothing of. When he comes home at +night, tired beyond words, and sick to death of the world and its ways, +make him sure. When he thinks himself defeated, make him sure. When you +see him tempted to swerve even the least from the straight path, make +him sure. When the last parting comes, if he is leaving you, give him +the certainty to take with him into his narrow house, and make his last +sleep sweet. And if you are the one to go first, and leave him, old and +desolate and stricken, oh, Barbara, make him sure then--make him very +sure." + +[Sidenote: A String of Pearls] + +The girl's hand closed tightly upon his. He leaned over to pat her cheek +and stroke the heavy braids of silken hair. Then he felt the strand of +beads around her neck. + +"You have on your mother's pearls," he said. His fine old face illumined +as he touched the tawdry trinket. + +Barbara swallowed the hard lump in her throat. "Yes, Daddy." They had +lived for years upon that single strand of large, perfectly matched +pearls which Ambrose North had clasped around his young wife's neck upon +their wedding day. + +"Would you like more pearls, dear? A bracelet, or a ring?" + +"No--these are all I want." + +"I want to give you a diamond ring some day, Barbara. Your mother's was +buried with her. It was her engagement ring." + +"Perhaps somebody will give me an engagement ring," she suggested. + +"I shouldn't wonder. I don't want to be selfish, dear. You are all I have, +but, if you loved a man, I wouldn't try to keep you away from him." + +"Prince Charming hasn't come yet, Daddy, so cheer up. I'll tell you when +he does." + +Thus she turned the talk into a happier vein. They were laughing +together like two children when Miriam came in to say that supper was +ready. + +[Sidenote: Alone] + +Afterward, he sat at the piano, improvising low, sweet chords that +echoed back plaintively from the dingy walls. The music was full of +questioning, of pleading, of longing so deep that it was almost prayer. +Barbara finished her letters by the light of the lamp, while Miriam sat +in the dining-room alone, asking herself the old, torturing questions, +facing her temptation, and bearing the old, terrible hunger of the heart +that hurt her like physical pain. + +A little before nine o'clock, the blind man came to kiss Barbara +good-night. Then he went upstairs. Miriam came in and talked a few +minutes of quilts, pickles, and lingerie, then she, too, went up to +begin her usual restless night. + +Left alone, Barbara discovered that she did not care to read. It was too +late to begin work upon the new stock of linen, lawn, and batiste which +had come the day before, and she lacked the impulse, in the face of such +discouraging prospects as Aunt Miriam had encountered at the hotel. +Barbara steadily refused to admit, even to herself, that she was +discouraged, but she found no pleasure in the thought of her work. + +[Sidenote: A Light in the Window] + +She unfastened the front door, lighted a candle, and set it upon the +sill of the front window. Within twenty minutes Roger had come, entering +the house so quietly that Barbara did not hear his step and was +frightened when she saw him. + +"Don't scream," he said, as he closed the door leading into the hall. +"I'm not a burglar--only a struggling young law student with no +prospects and even less hope." + +"I infer," said Barbara, "that the Bascom liver is out of repair." + +"Correct. It seems absurd, doesn't it, to be affected by another man's +liver while you are supremely unconscious of your own?" + +"There are more things in other people's digestions than our philosophy +can account for," she replied, with a wicked perversion of classic +phrase. "What was the primary cause of the explosion?" + +"It was all his own fault," explained Roger. "I like dogs almost as well +as I do people, but it doesn't follow that dogs should mix so constantly +with people as they usually are allowed to. I was never in favour of +Judge Bascom's bull pup keeping regular office hours with us, but he +has, ever since the day he waddled in behind the Judge with a small +chain as the connecting link. I got so accustomed to his howling in the +corner of the office where he was chained up that I couldn't do my work +properly when he was asleep. So all went well until the Judge decided to +remove the chain and give the pup more room to develop himself in. + +[Sidenote: "Pethood"] + +"I tried to dissuade him, but it was no use. I told him he would run +away, and he said, with great dignity, that he did not desire for a pet +anything which had to be tied up in order to be retained. He observed +that the restraining influence worked against the pethood so strongly as +practically to obscure it." + +"New word?" laughed Barbara. + +"I don't know why it isn't a good word," returned Roger, in defence. "If +'manhood' and 'womanhood' and 'brotherhood' and all the other 'hoods' +are good English, I see no reason why 'pethood' shouldn't be used in the +same sense. The English language needs a lot of words added to it before +it can be called complete." + +"One wouldn't think so, judging by the size of the dictionary. However, +we'll let it pass. Go on with the story." + +"Things have been lively for a week or more. The pup has romped around a +good deal and has playfully bitten a client or two, but the Judge has +been highly edified until to-day. Fido got an important legal document +which the Judge had just drafted, and literally chewed it to pulp. Then +he swallowed it, apparently with great relish. I was told to make +another, and my not knowing about it, and taking the liberty of asking a +few necessary questions, produced the fireworks. It wasn't Fido's fault, +but mine." + +"How is Fido?" queried Barbara, with affected anxiety. + +"He was well at last accounts, but the document was long enough and +complicated enough to make him very ill. I hope he'll die of it +to-morrow." + +"Perhaps he's going to study law, too," remarked Barbara, "and believes, +with Macaulay, that 'a page digested is better than a book hurriedly +read.'" + +"I think that will do, Miss North. I'll read to you now, if you don't +mind. I would fain improve myself instead of listening to such childish +chatter." + +"Perhaps, if you read to me enough, I'll improve so that even you will +enjoy talking to me," she returned, with a mischievous smile. "What did +you bring over?" + +[Sidenote: A New Book] + +"A new book--that is, one that we've never seen before. There is a large +box of father's books behind some trunks in the attic, and I never found +them until Sunday, when I was rummaging around up there. I haven't read +them--I thought I'd make a list of them first, and you can choose those +you'd like to have me read to you. I brought this little one because +I was sure you'd like it, after reading _Endymion_ and _The Eve of St. +Agnes_." + +"What is it?" + +"Keats's letters to Fanny Brawne." + +The little brown book was old and its corners were dog-eared, but the +yellowed pages, with their record of a deathless passion, were still +warmly human and alive. Roger had a deep, pleasant voice, and he read +well. Quite apart from the beauty of the letters, it gave Barbara +pleasure to sit in the firelight and watch his face. + +[Sidenote: A Folded Paper] + +He read steadily, pausing now and then for comment, until he was +half-way through the volume; then, as he turned a page, a folded paper +fell out. He picked it up curiously. + +"Why, Barbara," he said, in astonishment. "It's my father's writing." + +"What is it--notes?" + +"No, he seems to have been trying to write a letter like those in the +book. It is all in pencil, with changes and erasures here and there. +Listen: + +[Sidenote: The Letter] + + "'You are right, as you always are, and we must + never see each other again. We must live near each + other for the rest of our lives, with that + consciousness between us. We must pass each other + on the street and not speak unless others are with + us; then we must bow, pleasantly, for the sake of + appearances. + + "'I hope you do not blame me because I went mad. + I ask your pardon, and yet I cannot say I am sorry. + That one hour of confession is worth a lifetime of + waiting--it is worth all the husks that we are to + have henceforward while we starve for more. + + "'Through all the years to come, we shall be + separated by less than a mile, yet the world lies + between us and divides us as by a glittering + sword. You will not be unfaithful to your pledge, + nor I to mine. Nothing is changed there. It is + only that two people chose to live in the + starlight and bound themselves to it eternally, + then had one blinding glimpse of God's great sun. + + "'But, Constance, the stars are the same as + always, and we must try to forget that we have + seen the sun. The little lights of the temple must + be the more faithfully tended if the Great Light + goes out. When the white splendour fades, we must + be content with the misty gold of night, and not + mind the shadows nor the great desolate spaces + where not even starlight comes. Your star and mine + met for an instant, then were sundered as widely + as the poles, but the light of each must be kept + steadfast and clear, because of the other. + + "'I do not know that I shall have the courage to + send this letter. Everything was said when I told + you that I love you, for that one word holds it + all and there is nothing more. As you can take + your heart in the hollow of your hand and hold it, + it is so small a thing; so the one word 'love' + holds everything that can be said, or given, or + hungered for, or prayed for and denied. + + "'And if, sometimes, in the starlight, we dream of + the sun, we must remember that both sun and stars + are God's. Past the unutterable leagues that + divide us now, one day we shall meet again, + purged, mayhap, of earthly longing for earthly + love. + + "'But Heaven, for me, would be the hour I held you + close again. I should ask nothing more than to + tell you once more, face to face and heart to + heart, the words I write now: I love you--I love + you--I love you.'" + +[Sidenote: A Discovery] + +Roger put down the book and stared fixedly at the fire. Barbara's face +was very pale and the light had gone from her eyes. + +"Roger," she said, in a strange tone, "Constance was my mother's name. +Do you think----" + +He was startled, for his thought had not gone so far as her intuition. +"I--do--not--know," he said. + +"They knew each other," Barbara went on, swiftly, "for the two families +have always lived here, in these same two houses where you and I were +born. It was only a step across the road, and they----" + +[Sidenote: A Barrier] + +She choked back a sob. Something new and terrible seemed to have sprung +up suddenly between her and Roger. + +The blood beat hard in his ears and his own words sounded dull and far +away. "It is dated June third," he said. + +"My mother died on the seventh," said Barbara, slowly, +"by--her--own--hand." + +They sat in silence for a long time. Then, speaking of indifferent +things, they tried to get back upon the old friendly footing again, but +failed miserably. There was a consciousness as of guilt, on either side. + +Roger tried not to think of it. Later, when he was alone, he would go +over it all and try to reason it out--try to discover if it were true. +Barbara did not need to do this, for, with a woman's quick insight, she +knew. + +Secretly, too, both were ashamed, having come unawares upon knowledge +that was not meant for them. Presently, Roger went home, and was glad to +be alone in the free outer air; but, long after he was gone, Barbara sat +in the dark, her heart aching with the burden of her father's doubt and +her dead mother's secret. + + + + +VII + +An Afternoon Call + + +The rap at the Norths' front door was of the sort which would impel the +dead to rise and answer it. Before the echo of the imperative summons +had died away, Miriam had opened it and admitted Miss Mattie. + +[Sidenote: Bein' Neighbourly] + +"I was sewin' over to my house," announced the visitor, settling herself +comfortably, "and I surmised as how you might be sewin' over here, so +I thought we might as well set together for a spell. I believe in bein' +neighbourly." + +Barbara smiled a welcome and Miriam brought in a quilt which she was +binding by hand. As she worked, she studied Miss Mattie furtively, and +with an air of detachment. + +"I come over on the trail Roger has wore in the grass," continued Miss +Mattie, biting off her thread with a snap. "He's organised himself into +sort of a travellin' library, I take it, what with transportin' books at +all hours back and forth. After I go to bed, Roger lets himself out and +sneaks over here, carryin' readin' matter both ways. But land's sake," +she chuckled, "I ain't carin' what he does after I get sleepy. I was +never one to stay up after nine o'clock for the sake of entertainment. +If there's sickness, or anythin' like that, of course it's a different +matter. + +"Roger's pa was always a great one for readin', and we've both inherited +it from him. Roger sits with his books and I sit with my paper, and we +both read, never sayin' a word to each other, till almost nine o'clock. +We're what you might call a literary family. + +[Sidenote: "Jewel of a Girl"] + +"I'm just readin' a perfectly beautiful story called _Margaret Merriman, +or the Maiden's Mad Marriage_. Margaret must have been worth lookin' at, +for she had golden hair and eyes like sapphires and ruby lips and pearly +teeth. I was readin' the description of her to Roger, and he said she +seemed to be what some people would call 'a jewel of a girl.' + +"Margaret Merriman's mother died when she was an infant in arms, just +like your ma, Barbara, and left her to her pa. Her pa didn't marry +again, though several was settin' their caps for him on account of him +bein' young and handsome and havin' a lot of money. I suppose bein' a +widower had somethin' to do with it, too. It does beat all how women +will run after a widower. I suppose they want a man who's already been +trained, but, speakin' for myself, I've always felt as if I'd rather +have somethin' fresh and do my own trainin'--women's notions differ so +about husbands. + +[Sidenote: Training Husbands] + +"Just think what it would be to marry a man, thinkin' he was all +trained, and to find out that it had been done wrong. You'd have to +begin all over again, and it'd be harder than startin' in with absolute +ignorance. The man would get restless, too. When he thought he was +graduated and was about ready to begin on a post-graduate course, he'd +find himself in the kindergarten, studyin' with beads and singin' about +little raindrops. + +"Gettin' an idea into a man's head is like furnishin' a room. If you can +once get a piece of furniture where you want it, it can stay there until +it's worn out or busted, except for occasional dustin' and repairin'. +You can add from time to time as you have to, but if you attempt to +refurnish a room that's all furnished, and do it all at once, you're +bound to make more disturbance than housecleanin'. + +"It has to be done slow and careful, unless you have a likin' for rows, +and if you're one of those kind of women that's forever changin' their +minds about furniture and their husband's ideas, you're bound to have a +terrible restless marriage. + +"Roger's pa was fresh when I took him, but, unbeknownst to me, he'd done +his own furnishin', and the pieces was dreadful set and hard to move. +Some of 'em I slid out gently and others took some manouverin', but +steady work tells on anythin'. He was thinkin' as I wanted him to about +most things, though, when he died, and that's sayin' a good deal, for he +didn't die until after we'd been married seven years and three months +and eighteen days. If he wasn't really thinkin' right, he was pretendin' +to, and that's enough to satisfy any reasonable woman. + +[Sidenote: The Will] + +"Margaret Merriman's pa died when she was at the tender age of ten, and +he left all his money to a distant relation in trust for Margaret, the +relative bein' supposed to spend the income on her. If Margaret died +before she was of age, the relative was to keep it, and if she should +marry before she was of age, the relative was to keep it, too. But, +livin' to eighteen' and marryin' afterwards, it was all to be +Margaret's, and the relative wasn't to have as much as a two-cent stamp +with the mucilage licked off. + +"This relative was a sweet-faced lady with a large mole on her right +cheek. Margaret used to call her 'Moley,' when she was mad at her, which +was right frequent. Her name was Magdalene Mather and she'd been married +three times. She was dreadful careless with her husbands and had mislaid +'em all. Not bein' able to find 'em again, she just reckoned on their +bein' dead and was thinkin' of marryin' some more. + +[Sidenote: Keeping Margaret Young] + +"Seems to me it's a mistake for anybody to marry more'n once. In one of +Roger's books it says somethin' about a second marriage bein' the +triumph of hope over experience. Magdalene Mather was dreadful hopeful +and kept thinkin' that maybe she could get somebody who would stay with +her without bein' chained up. Meanwhile it was to her interest to keep +little Margaret as young as possible. + +"Margaret thought she was ten when she went to live with Magdalene, but +she soon learned that it was a mistake and she got to be only seven in +less'n half an hour. Magdalene put shorter dresses on her and kept her +in white and gave her shoes without any heels, and these little short +socks that show a foot or so of bare leg and which is indecent, if +fashionable. + +"Margaret's birthdays kept gettin' farther and farther apart, and as +soon as the neighbours begun to notice that Margaret wasn't agin' like +everybody else, why, Magdalene would just pack up and go to a new place. + +"She didn't go to school, but had private teachers, because it was in +the will that she was to be educated like a real lady. Any teacher who +thought Margaret was too far advanced for her age got fired the minute +it was spoke of, and pretty soon Margaret got onto it herself. She used +to tell teachers she liked to say that she was very backward in her +studies, and tell those she didn't like that Aunty Magdalene would be +dreadful pleased to hear that she was improvin' in her readin' and +'rithmetic and grammar. + +"Meanwhile Nature was workin' in Margaret's interest and she was growin' +taller and taller every day. The short socks had to be took off because +people laughed so, and Magdalene had to let her braid her hair instead +of havin' it cut Dutch and tied with a ribbon. When she was eighteen, +she thought she was thirteen, and she was wearin' dresses that come to +her shoe tops, and her hair in one braid down her back, and dreadful +young hats and no jewels, though her pa had left her a small trunk full +of rubies and diamonds and pearls. Magdalene was wearin' the jewels +herself. They were movin' around pretty rapid about this time, and goin' +from city to city in order to find better teachers for 'the dear child' +as Magdalene used to call her. + +[Sidenote: The Conductor] + +"One day, soon after they'd gone to a new city, Margaret was goin' down +town to take her music lesson. She went alone because Magdalene was laid +up with a headache and wanted the house quiet. When the conductor come +along for the fare, Margaret was lookin' out of the window, and, +absent-minded like, she give him a penny instead of a nickel. + +"The conductor give it back to her, and asked her if she was so young +she could go for half fare, and Margaret says, right sharp, when she +give him the nickel, 'It's not so long since I was travellin' on +half-fare.' + +"The conductor says: 'I'd hate to have been hangin' up by the thumbs +since you was,' says he. Of course this made Margaret good and mad, and +she says to the conductor, 'How old do you think I am?' + +"The conductor says: 'I ain't paid to think durin' union hours, but +I imagine that you ain't old enough to lie about your age.' + +[Sidenote: Ronald Macdonald] + +"Just then an old woman with a green parrot in a big cage fell off the +car while she was gettin' off backwards as usual, and Margaret didn't +have no more chance to fight with the conductor. She saw, however, that +he was terrible good lookin'--like the dummy in the tailor's window. It +says in the story that 'Ronald Macdonald'--that was his name--was as +handsome as a young Greek god and, though lowly in station, he would +have adorned a title had it been his.' + +"Margaret got to doin' some thinkin' about herself, and wonderin' why it +was she didn't seem to age none. And whenever she happened to get onto +Ronald Macdonald's car, she noticed that he was awful polite and +chivalrous to women. He waited patiently when any two of 'em was +decidin' who was to pay the fare and findin' their purses, and sayin', +'You must let me pay next time,' and he would tickle a cryin' baby +under the chin and make it bill and coo like a bird. + +"Did you ever see a baby bill? I never did neither, but that's what it +said in the paper. I suppose it has some reference to the expense of +their comin' and their keep through the whoopin' cough stage and the +measles, and so on. There don't neither of you know nothin' about it +'cause you ain't married, but when Roger come, his pa was obliged to +mortgage the house, and the mortgage didn't get took off until Roger was +out of dresses and goin' to school and beginnin' to write with ink. + +[Sidenote: Fine Manners] + +"Let me see--what was I talkin' about? Oh, yes--Ronald Macdonald's fine +manners. When a woman give him five pennies instead of a nickel, he was +always just as polite to her as he was to anybody, and would help her +off the car and carry her bundles to the corner for her, and everything +like that. Of course Margaret couldn't help noticin' this and likin' him +for it though she was still mad at him for what he said about her age. + +"One morning Margaret give him a quarter so's he'd have to make change, +and while he was doin' it, she says to him, 'How nice it must be to ride +all day without payin' for it.' + +"'I'm under age,' says Ronald Macdonald, with a smile that showed all +his beautiful teeth and his ruby lips under his black waxed mustache. + +"'Get out,' says Margaret, surprised. + +"'I am, though,' says Ronald, confidentially. 'I'm just nineteen. How +old are you?' + +"'Thirteen,' says Margaret, softly. + +"'Don't renig,' says Ronald. 'I think we're pretty near of an age.' + +"When Margaret got home, she looked up 'renig' in the dictionary, but it +wasn't there. She was too smart to ask Magdalene, but she kept on +thinkin'. + +[Sidenote: Chance Acquaintances] + +"One day, while she was goin' down in the car, two men came in and sat +by her. They was chance acquaintances, it seemed, havin' just met at the +hotel. 'Your face is terrible familiar to me,' one of the men said. +'I've seen you before, or your picture, or something, somewhere. Upon my +soul, I believe your picture is hung up in my last wife's boudoir.' + +"'Good God,' says the other man, turnin' as pale as death, 'did you +marry Magdalene Mather, too?' + +"'I did,' says the first man. + +"'Then, brother,' says the second man, 'let us get off at the next +corner and go and drown our mutual sorrow in drink.' + +"After they got off, Margaret went out to Ronald, and she says to him: +'There goes two of my aunt's husbands. She's had three, and there's two +of 'em, right there.' + +"'Well,' says Ronald, 'if Aunty ain't got a death certificate and two or +three divorces put away somewhere, she stands right in line to get +canned for a few years for bigamy. You don't look like you had an aunt +that was a trigamist,' says he. + +"Margaret didn't understand much of this, but she still kept thinkin'. +One day while Magdalene was at an afternoon reception, wearin' all of +Margaret's jewels, Margaret looked all through her private belongings to +see if she could find any divorces, and she come on a family Bible with +the date of her birth in it, and her father's will. + +[Sidenote: Facts of the Case] + +"Soon, she understands the whole game, and by doin' a small sum in +subtraction, she sees that she is goin' on nineteen now. She's afraid to +leave the proofs in the house over night, so she wraps 'em up in a +newspaper, and flies with 'em to her only friend Ronald Macdonald, and +asks him to keep 'em for her until she comes after 'em. He says he will +guard them with his life. + +"When Margaret goes back after them, havin' decided to face her aunt and +demand her inheritance, Ronald has already read 'em, but of course he +don't let on that he has. He convinces her that she ought to get married +before she faces her aunt, so that a husband's strong arm will be at +hand to defend her through the terrible ordeal. + +"Margaret thinks she sees a way out, for she has been studyin' up on law +in the meantime, and she remembers how Ronald has told her he is under +age, and she knows the marriage won't be legal, but will serve to +deceive her aunt. + +[Sidenote: The Climax] + +"So she flies with him and they are married, and then when they confront +Magdalene with the will, and the family Bible and their marriage +certificate, and tell her she is a trigamist, and they will make trouble +for her if she don't do right by 'em, Magdalene sobs out, 'Oh, Heaven, I +am lost!' and falls in a dead faint from which she don't come out for +six weeks. + +"In the meantime, Margaret has thanked Ronald Macdonald for his great +kindness, and says he can go now, as the marriage ain't legal, he bein' +under age and not havin' his parents' consent. Ronald gives a long, loud +laugh and then he digs up his family Bible and shows Margaret how he is +almost twenty-five and old enough to be married, and that women have no +patent on lyin' about their ages, and that he is not going away. + +"Margaret swoons, and when she comes to, she finds that Ronald has +resigned his job as a street-car conductor, and has bought some fine +clothes on her credit, and is prepared to live happy ever afterward. He +bids eternal farewell to work in a long and impassioned speech that's so +full of fine language that it would do credit to a minister, and there +Margaret is, in a trap of her own makin', with a husband to take care +of her money instead of an aunt. Next week, I'll know more about how it +turns out, but that's as far as I've got now. Ain't it a perfectly +beautiful story?" + +Miriam muttered some sort of answer, but Barbara smiled. "It is very +interesting," she said, kindly. "I've never read anything like it." + +[Sidenote: Going the Rounds] + +"It's a lot better'n the books you and Roger waste your time over," +returned the guest, much gratified; "but I can't lend you the papers, +cause there's five waitin' after the postmaster's wife, and goodness +knows how many of them has promised others. I don't mind runnin' over +once in a while, though, and tellin' you about 'em while I sew. + +"It keeps 'em fresh in my memory," she added, happily, "and Roger is so +busy with his law books he don't have time to listen to 'em except at +supper. He reads law every evening now, and he didn't used to. Guess he +ain't wasting so much time as he was. Been down to the hotel yet?" she +asked, inclining her head toward Miriam. + +"Once," answered Miriam, reluctantly. + +[Sidenote: Gossip] + +"There ain't many come yet," the postmaster's wife tells me. "There's a +young lady at the hotel named Miss Eloise Wynne, and every day but +Saturday she gets a letter from the city, addressed in a man's writin'. +And every afternoon, when the boy brings the hotel mail down to go out +on the night train, there's a big white square envelope in a woman's +writin' addressed to Doctor Allan Conrad, some place in the city. The +envelope smells sweet, but the writin' is dreadful big and +sploshy-lookin'. Know anything about her?" Miss Mattie gazed sharply at +Miriam over her spectacles. + +"No," returned Miriam, decisively. + +"Thought maybe you would. Anyhow, you don't need to be so sharp about +it, cause there's no harm in askin' a civil question. My mother always +taught me that a civil question called for a civil answer. I should +think, from the letters and all, that he was her steady company, +shouldn't you?" + +"It's possible," assented Barbara, seeing that Miriam did not intend to +reply. + +"There's some talk at the sewin' circle of gettin' you one of them hand +sewin' machines," continued Miss Mattie, "so's you could sew more and +better." + +Barbara flushed painfully. "Thank you," she answered, "but I couldn't +use it. I much prefer to do all my work by hand." + +"All right," assented Miss Mattie, good-humouredly. "It ain't our idea +to force a sewin' machine onto anybody that don't want it. We can use +some of the money in gettin' a door-mat for the front door of the +church. And, if I was you, I wouldn't let my pa run around so much by +himself. If he wants to borrow a dog to go with him, Roger would be +willin' to lend him Judge Bascom's Fido. If the Judge wasn't willin', +Roger would try to persuade him. Lendin' Fido would make law easier for +Roger and be a great help to your pa. + +"I must go, now, and get supper. Good-bye. I've enjoyed my visit ever so +much. Come over sometime, Miriam--you ain't very sociable. Good-bye." + +The two women watched Miss Mattie scudding blithely over the trail +which, as she said, Roger had worn in the grass. Miriam looked after her +gloomily, but Barbara was laughing. + +"Don't look so cross, Aunty," chided Barbara. "No one ever came here who +was so easy to entertain." + +"Humph," grunted Miriam, and went out. + +[Sidenote: Relief] + +But even Barbara sighed in relief when she was left alone. She +understood some of Roger's difficulties of which he never spoke, and +realised that the much-maligned "Bascom liver" could not be held +responsible for all his discontent. + +She wondered what Roger's father had been like, and did not wonder that +he was unhappy, if his nature was in any way akin to his son's. But her +mother? How could she have failed to appreciate the beautiful old father +whom Barbara loved with all the passion and strength of her young +heart! + +[Sidenote: The Secret] + +"He mustn't know," said Barbara to herself, for the hundredth time. +"Father must never know." + + + + +VIII + +A Fairy Godmother + + +[Sidenote: The Postponed Visit] + +As cool and fresh as the June morning of which she seemed a veritable +part, Miss Eloise Wynne, immaculately clad in white linen, opened the +little grey gate. It was a week later than she had promised to come, but +she had not been idle, and considered herself justified for the delay. + +Miriam opened the door for her and introduced Barbara. Eloise smiled +radiantly as she offered a smooth, well-kept hand. "I know I'm late," +she said, "but I think you'll forgive me for it a little later on. +I want to see all the lingerie--every piece you have to sell." + +"Would you mind coming upstairs?" asked Barbara. + +"No, indeed." + +The two went up, Barbara slowly leading the way. Miriam remained +downstairs to make sure that the blind man did not come in unexpectedly +and overhear things which he would be much happier not to know. + +"What a lot of it," Eloise was saying. "And what a wonderful old chest." + +[Sidenote: Dainty Wares] + +Trembling with excitement, Barbara spread forth her dainty wares. Eloise +was watching her narrowly, and, with womanly intuition, saw the dire +need and the courageous spirit struggling against it. + +"Just a minute, please," said Barbara; "I'd better tell you now. My +father is blind and he does not know we are poor, nor that I make these +things to sell. He thinks that they are for myself and that I am very +vain. So, if he should come home while you are here, please do not spoil +our little deceit." + +Barbara lifted her luminous blue eyes to Eloise and smiled. It was a +brave little smile without a hint of self-pity, and it went straight to +the older woman's heart. + +"I'll be careful," said Eloise. "I think it's dear of you." + +"Now," said Barbara, stooping to peer into the corners of the deep +chest, "I think that's all." She began, hurriedly, to price everything +as she passed it to Eloise, giving the highest price each time. When she +had finished, she was amazed at Miss Wynne's face--it was so full of +resentment. + +"Do you mean to tell me," asked Eloise, in a queer voice, "that you are +asking _that_ for _these_?" + +The blue eyes threatened to overflow, but Barbara straightened herself +proudly. "It is all hand work," she said, with quiet dignity, "and the +material is the very best. I could not possibly afford to sell it for +less." + +"You goose," laughed Eloise, "you have misunderstood me. There is not a +thing here that is not worth at least a third more than you are asking +for it. Give me a pencil and paper and some pins." + +[Sidenote: Higher Prices] + +Barbara obeyed, wondering what this beautiful visitor would do next. +Eloise took up every garment and examined it critically. Then she made a +new price tag and pinned it over the old one. She advanced even the +plainest garments at least a third, the more elaborate ones were +doubled, and some of the embroidered things were even tripled in price. +When she came to the shirtwaist patterns, exquisitely embroidered upon +sheerest handkerchief linen, she shamelessly multiplied the price by +four and pinned the new tag on. + +"Oh," gasped Barbara; "nobody will ever pay that much for things to +wear." + +"Somebody is going to right now," announced Eloise, with decision. "I'll +take this, and this, and this," she went on, rapidly choosing, "and +these, and these, and this. I'll take those four for a friend of mine +who is going to be married next week--this solves the eternal problem of +wedding-presents--and all of these for next Santa Claus time. + +"I can use all the handkerchiefs, and every pin-cushion cover and +corsage-pad you've made. Please don't sell anything else until I've +heard from some more of my friends to whom I have already written. And +you're not to offer one of these exquisite things to those +unappreciative people at the hotel, for I have a letter from a friend +who is on the Board of Directors of the Woman's Exchange, and got a +chance for you to sell there. How long have you been doing this?" + +[Sidenote: In a Whirl of Confusion] + +"Seven or eight years," murmured Barbara. Her senses were so confused +that the room seemed to be whirling and her face was almost as white as +the lingerie. + +"And those women at the hotel would really buy these things at such +ridiculous prices?" + +"Not often," answered Barbara, trying to smile. "They would not pay so +much. Sometimes we had to sell for very little more than the cost of the +material. One woman said we ought not to expect so much for things that +were not made with a sewing-machine, but of course, Aunt Miriam had been +to the city and she knew that hand work was worth more." + +"I wish I'd been there," remarked Eloise. There was a look around her +mouth which would have boded no good to anybody if she had. "When I see +what brutes women can be, sometimes I am ashamed because I am a woman." + +"And," returned Barbara, softly, "when I see what good angels women can +be, it makes me proud to be a woman." + +"Where do you get your material?" asked Eloise, quickly. + +Barbara named the large department store where Aunt Miriam bought linen, +lawn, batiste, lace, patterns, and incidentally managed to absorb ideas. + +"I see I'm needed in Riverdale-by-the-Sea," observed Miss Wynne. "I can +arrange for you to buy all you want at the lowest wholesale price." + +"Would it save anything?" asked Barbara, doubtfully. + +[Sidenote: Practical Help] + +"Would it?" repeated Eloise, smiling. "Just wait and see. After I've +written about that and had some samples sent to you, we'll talk over +half a dozen or more complete sets of lingerie for me, and some more +shirtwaists. Is there a pen downstairs? I want to write a check for +you." + +When they went into the living-room, Barbara's cheeks were burning with +excitement and her eyes shone like stars. When she took the check, which +Eloise wrote with an accustomed air, she could scarcely speak, but +managed to stammer out, "Thank you." + +"You needn't," said Eloise, coolly, "for I'm only buying what I want at +a price I consider very reasonable and fair. If you'll get some samples +of your work ready, I'll send up for them, and hurry them on to my +friend who is to put them into the Woman's Exchange. And please don't +sell anything more just now. I've just thought of a friend whose +daughter is going to be married soon, and she may want me to select some +things for her." + +"You're a fairy godmother," said Barbara. "This morning we were poor and +discouraged. You came in and waved your wand, and now we are rich. I have +heart for anything now." + +[Sidenote: Always Rich] + +"You are always rich while you have courage, and without it Croesus +himself would be poor. It's not the circumstance, remember--it's the way +you meet it." + +"I know," said Barbara, but her eyes filled with tears of gratitude, +nevertheless. + +Ambrose North came in from the street, and immediately felt the presence +of a stranger in the room. "Who is here?" he asked. + +"This is Miss Wynne, Father. She is stopping at the hotel and came up to +call." + +The old man bowed in courtly fashion over the young woman's hand. "We +are glad to see you," he said, gently. "I am blind, but I can see with +my soul." + +"That is the true sight," returned Eloise. Her big brown eyes were soft +with pity. + +"Have many of the guests come?" he inquired. + +"I have a friend," laughed Eloise, "who says it is wrong to call people +'guests' when they are stopping at a hotel. He insists that 'inmates' is +a much better word." + +"He is not far from right," said the old man, smiling. "Is he there +now?" + +"No, he comes down Saturday mornings and stays until Monday morning. +That is all the vacation he allows himself. You are fortunate to live +here," she added, kindly. "I do not know of a more beautiful place." + +[Sidenote: Invited to Luncheon] + +"Nor I. To us--to me, especially--it is hallowed by memories. We--you +will stay to luncheon, will you not, Miss Wynne?" + +Eloise glanced quickly at Barbara. "If you only would," she said. + +"If you really want me," said Eloise, "I'd love to." She took off her +hat--a white one trimmed with lilacs--and smoothed the waves in her +copper-coloured hair. Barbara took her crutches and went out, very +quietly, to help Aunt Miriam prepare for the guest. + +When the kitchen door was safely closed, Barbara's joy bubbled into +speech. "Oh, Aunt Miriam," she cried; "she's bought nearly every thing +I had and paid almost double price for it. She's already arranged for +me to sell at the Woman's Exchange in the city, and she is going to +write to some of her friends about the things I have left. She's going +to arrange for me to get all my material at the lowest wholesale price, +and she's ordered six complete sets of lingerie for herself. She wants +some more shirtwaists, too. Oh, Aunt Miriam, do you think the world is +coming to an end?" + +"Has she paid you?" queried Miriam, gravely. + +"Indeed she has." + +"Then it probably is." + +Miriam was not a woman easily to be affected by joy, but the hard lines +of her face softened perceptibly. "Show her the quilts," she suggested. + +"Oh, Aunt Miriam, I'd be ashamed to, to-day, when she's bought so much. +She'll be coming up again before long--she said so. And father's asked +her to luncheon." + +"Just like him," commented Miriam, with a sigh. "He always suffered from +hospitality. I'll have to go to the store." + +[Sidenote: The Best We Have] + +"No, you won't, Aunty--she's not that sort. We'll give her the best we +have, with a welcome thrown in." + +If Eloise thought it strange for one end of the table to be set with +solid silver, heavy damask, and fine china, while the other end, where +she and the two women of the house sat, was painfully different, she +gave no sign of it in look or speech. The humble fare might have been +the finest banquet so far as she was concerned. She fitted herself to +their ways without apparent effort; there was no awkwardness nor feeling +of strangeness. She might have been a life-long friend of the family, +instead of a passing acquaintance who had come to buy lingerie. + +[Sidenote: Friendly Conversation] + +As she ate, she talked. It was not aimless chatter, but the rare gift of +conversation. She drew them all out and made them talk, too. Even Miriam +relaxed and said something more than "yes" and "no." + +"What delicious preserves," said Eloise. "May I have some more, please? +Where do you get them?" + +"I make them," answered Miriam, the dull red rising in her cheeks. She +had not been entirely disinterested when she climbed up on a chair and +took down some of her choicest fruit from the highest shelf of the +store-room. + +"Do you--" A look from Barbara stopped the unlucky speech. "Do you find +it difficult?" asked Eloise, instantly mistress of the situation. "I +should so love to make some for myself." + +"Miriam will be glad to teach you," put in Ambrose North. "She likes to +do it because she can do it so well." + +The red grew deeper in Miriam's lined face, for every word of praise +from him was food to her hungry soul. She would gladly have laid down +her life for him, even though she hated herself for feeling as she did. + +[Sidenote: An Hour of Song] + +Afterward, while Miriam was clearing off the table, Eloise went to the +piano without being asked, and sang to them for more than an hour. She +chose folk-songs and tender melodies--little songs made of tears and +laughter, and the simple ballads that never grow old. She had a deep, +vibrant contralto voice of splendid range and volume; she sang with rare +sympathy, and every word could be clearly understood. + +"Don't stop," pleaded Barbara, when she paused and ran her fingers +lightly over the keys. + +"I don't want to impose upon your good-nature," she returned, "but I love +to sing." + +"And we love to have you," said North. "I think, Barbara, we must get a +new piano." + +"I wouldn't," answered Eloise, before Barbara could speak. "The years +improve wine and violins and friendship, so why not a piano?" Without +waiting for his reply, she began to sing, with exquisite tenderness: + + "Sometimes between long shadows on the grass + The little truant waves of sunlight pass; + Mine eyes grow dim with tenderness the while, + Thinking I see thee, thinking I see thee smile. + + "And sometimes in the twilight gloom apart + The tall trees whisper, whisper heart to heart; + From my fond lips the eager answers fall, + Thinking I hear thee, thinking I hear thee call." + +"Yes," said Ambrose North, unsteadily, as the last chord died away, "I +know. You can call and call, but nothing ever comes back to you." The +tears streamed over his blind face as he rose and went out of the room. + +"What have I done?" asked Eloise. "Oh, what have I done?" + +"Nothing," sighed Barbara. "My mother has been dead for twenty-one +years, but my father never forgets. She was only a girl when she +died--like me." + +"I'm so sorry. Why didn't you tell me before, so I could have chosen +jolly, happy things?" + +"That wouldn't keep him from grieving--nothing can, so don't be troubled +about it." + +Eloise turned back to the piano and sang two or three rollicking, +laughing melodies that set Barbara's one foot to tapping on the floor, +but the old man did not come back. + +"I never meant to stay so long," said Eloise, rising and putting on her +hat. + +"It isn't long," returned Barbara, with evident sincerity. "I wish you +wouldn't go." + +"But I must, my dear. If I don't go, I can never come again. I have lots +of letters to write, and mail will be waiting for me, and I have some +studying to do, so I must go." + +[Sidenote: Adieus] + +Barbara went to the door with her. "Good-bye, Fairy Godmother," she +said, wistfully. + +"Good-bye, Fairy Godchild," answered Eloise, carelessly. Then something +in the girl's face impelled her to put a strong arm around Barbara, and +kiss her, very tenderly. The blue eyes filled with tears. + +"Thank you for that," breathed Barbara, "more than for anything else." + + * * * * * + +Eloise went away humming to herself, but she stopped as soon as she was +out of sight of the house. "The little thing," she thought; "the dear, +brave little thing! A face like an angel, and that cross old woman, and +that beautiful old man who sees with his soul. And all that exquisite +work and the prices those brutal women paid her for it. Blind and lame, +and nothing to be done." + +Then another thought made her brown eyes very bright. "But I'm not so +sure of that--we'll see." + +[Sidenote: A Request] + +She wrote many letters that afternoon, and all were for Barbara. The +last and longest was to Doctor Conrad, begging him to come at the first +possible moment and go with her to see a poor broken child who might be +made well and strong and beautiful. + +"And," the letter went on, "perhaps you could give her father back his +eyesight. She calls me her Fairy Godmother, and I rely upon you to keep +my proud position for me. Any way, Allan, dear, please come, won't you?" + +[Sidenote: Awaiting Results] + +She closed it with a few words which would have made him start for the +Klondike that night, had there been a train, and she asked it of him; +posted it, and hopefully awaited results. + + + + +IX + +Taking the Chance + + +[Sidenote: Dr. Conrad Comes] + +"Well, I'm here," remarked Doctor Conrad, as he sat on the beach with +Eloise. "I have left all my patients in the care of an inferior, though +reputable physician, who has such winning ways that he may have annexed +my entire practice by the time I get back. + +"If you'll tell me just where these protegees of yours are, I'll go up +there right away. I'll ring the bell, and when they open the door I'll +say: 'I've come from Miss Wynne, and I'm to amputate this morning and +remove a couple of cataracts this afternoon. Kindly have the patients +get ready at once.'" + +"Don't joke, Allan," pleaded Eloise. Her brown eyes were misty and her +mood of exalted tenderness made her in love with all the world. "If you +could see that brave little thing, with her beautiful face and her +divine unselfishness, hobbling around on crutches and sewing for a +living, meanwhile keeping her blind old father from knowing they are +poor, you'd feel just as I do." + +[Sidenote: Discussing the Case] + +"It is very improbable," returned Allan, seriously, "that anything can +be done. If they were well-to-do, they undoubtedly made every effort and +saw everybody worth seeing." + +"But in twenty years," suggested Eloise, hopefully. "Think of all the +progress that has been made in twenty years." + +"I know," said Allan, doubtfully. "All we can do is to see. And if +anything can be done for them, why, of course we'll do it." + +"Then we'll go for a little drive," she said, "and on our way back, we +can stop there and get the things I bought the other day. They have no +one to send with them, and it's too much for one person to carry, +anyway." + +"I suppose she has sold everything she had," mused Allan impersonally. + +"Not quite," answered Eloise, flushing. "I left her some samples for the +Woman's Exchange." + +"Very kind," he observed, with the same air of detachment. "I can see my +finish. My wife will have so much charity work for me to do that there +will be no time for anything else, and, in a little while, she will have +given away all the money we both have. Then when we're sitting together +in the sun on the front steps of the poorhouse, we can fittingly lament +the end of our usefulness." + +[Sidenote: Policy of Segregation] + +"They won't let us sit together," she retorted. "Don't you know that +even in the old people's homes they keep the men and women +apart--husbands and wives included?" + +"For the love of Mike, what for?" he asked, in surprise. + +"Because it makes the place too gay and frivolous. Old ladies of eighty +were courted by awkward swains of ninety and more, and there was so much +checker-playing in the evening and so many lights burning, and so many +requests for new clothes, that the management couldn't stand it. There +were heart-burnings and jealousies, too, so they had to adopt a policy +of segregation." + +"'Hope springs eternal in the human breast,'" quoted Allan. + +"And love," she said. "I've thought sometimes I'd like to play fairy +godmother to some of those poor, desolate old people who love each +other, and give them a pretty wedding. Wouldn't it be dear to see two +old people married and settled in a little home of their own?" + +"Or, more likely, with us," he returned. "I've been thinking about a +nice little house with a guest room or two, but I've changed my mind. My +vote is for a very small apartment. You're not the sort to be trusted +with a guest room." + +[Sidenote: Starting Off] + +Eloise laughed and sprang to her feet. "On to the errand of mercy," she +said. "We're wasting valuable time. Get a horse and buggy and I'll see +if I can borrow an extra suit-case or two for my purchases." + +When she came down, Allan was waiting for her in the buggy. A bell-boy, +in her wake, brought three suit-cases and piled them under the seat. +Half a dozen rocking-chairs, on the veranda, held highly interested +observers. The paraphernalia suggested an elopement. + +"Tell those women on the veranda," said Eloise, to the boy, "that I'm +not taking any trunks and will soon be back." + +"What for?" queried Allan, as they drove away. + +"Reasons of my own," she answered, crisply. "Men are as blind as bats." + +"I'm wearing glasses," he returned, with due humility. "If you think I'm +fit to hear why you left that cryptic message, I'd be pleased to." + +"You're far from fit. Here, turn into this road." + +Spread like a tawny ribbon upon the green of the hills, the road wound +lazily through open sunny spaces and shaded aisles sweet with that cool +fragrance found only in the woods. The horse did not hurry, but wandered +comfortably from side to side of the road, browsing where he chose. He +seemed to know that lovers were driving him. + +[Sidenote: Horses versus Autos] + +"He's a one-armed horse, isn't he?" laughed Eloise. "I like him lots +better than an automobile, don't you?" + +"Out here, I do. But an automobile has certain advantages." + +"What are they?" she demanded. "I'd rather feed a horse than to buy a +tire, any day." + +"So would I--unless he tired of his feed. But if you want to get +anywhere very quickly and the thing happens not to break, the machine is +better." + +"But it never happens. I believe the average automobile is possessed of +an intuition little short of devilish. A horse seems more friendly. If +you were thinking of getting me a little electric runabout for my +birthday, please change it to a horse." + +"All right," returned Allan, serenely. "We can keep him in the +living-room of our six-room apartment and have his dinner sent in from +the nearest _table d'oat_. For breakfast, he can come out into the +_salle a manger_ and eat cereals with us." + +"You're absolutely incorrigible," she sighed. "This is the river road. +Follow it until I tell you where to turn." + +Within half an hour, the horse came to a full stop of his own accord in +front of the grey, weather-worn house where Barbara lived. He was +cropping at a particularly enticing clump of grass when Eloise +alighted. + +"Going to push?" queried Allan, lazily. + +"No, this is the place. Come on. You bring two of the suit-cases and +I'll take the other." + +[Sidenote: Observations] + +The blind man was not there at the moment, but came in while Miriam was +upstairs packing Miss Wynne's recent additions to her wardrobe. Doctor +Conrad had been observing Barbara keenly as they talked of indifferent +things. Outwardly, he was calm and professional, but within, a warmly +human impulse answered her evident need. + +He was young and had not yet been at his work long enough to determine +his ultimate nature. Later on, his profession would do to him one of two +things. It would transform him into a mere machine, brutalised and +calloused, with only one or two emotions aside from selfishness left to +thrive in his dwarfed soul, or it would humanise him to godlike +unselfishness, attune him to a divine sympathy, and mellow his heart in +tenderness beyond words. In one instance he would be feared; in the +other, only loved, by those who came to him. + +As Barbara went across the room to another chair, his eyes followed her +with intense interest. Eloise shrank from him a little--she had never +seen him like this before. Yet she knew, from the expression of his +face, that he had found hope, and was glad. + +"Barbara?" It was Miriam, calling from upstairs. + +"In just a minute, Aunty. Excuse me, please--I'll come right back." + +She was scarcely out of the room before Eloise leaned over to Allan, her +face alight with eager questioning. "You think--?" + +[Sidenote: Willing to Try] + +"I don't know," he returned, in a low tone. "It depends on the hardness +of the muscles and several other local conditions. Of course it's +impossible to tell definitely without a thorough examination, but I've +done it successfully in two adult cases, and have seen it done more than +a dozen times. I'd be very willing to try." + +"Oh, Allan," whispered Eloise. "I'm so glad." + +Barbara's padded crutches sounded softly on the stairs as she came down. +Eloise went to the window and studied the horse attentively, though he +was not of the restless sort that needs to be tied. + +While she was watching, Ambrose North came around the base of the hill, +crossed the road, and opened the gate. He had been to his old solitude +at the top of the hill, where, as nowhere else, he found peace. While he +was talking with the visitors, Miriam went out, taking the neatly-packed +suit-cases, one at a time, and put them into the buggy. + +"Mr. North," said Doctor Conrad, "while these girls are chattering, +will you go for a little drive with me?" + +The blind man's fine old face illumined with pleasure. "I should like it +very much," he said. "It is a long time since I had have a drive." + +"It's more like a walk," laughed Allan, as they went out, "with this +horse." + +"We sold our horses many years ago," the old man explained, as he +climbed in. "Miriam is afraid of horses and Barbara said she did not +care to go. I thought the open air and the slight exercise would be good +for her, but she insisted upon my selling them." + +[Sidenote: About Barbara] + +"It is about Barbara that I wished to speak," said Allan. "With your +consent, I should like to make a thorough examination and see whether an +operation would not do away with her crutches entirely." + +"It is no use," sighed North, wearily. "We went everywhere and did +everything, long ago. There is nothing that can be done." + +"But there may be," insisted Allan. "We have learned much, in my +profession, in the last twenty years. May I try?" + +"You're asking me if you can hurt my baby?" + +"Not to hurt her more than is necessary to heal. Understand me, I do not +know but what you are right, but I hope, and believe, that there may be +a chance." + +"I have dreamed sometimes," said the old man, very slowly, "that my baby +could walk and I could see." + +[Sidenote: If Possible] + +"The dream shall come true, if it is possible. Let me see your eyes." He +stopped the horse on the brow of the hill, where the sun shone clear and +strong, stood up, and turned the blind face to the light. Then, sitting +down once more, he asked innumerable questions. When he finally was +silent, Ambrose North turned to him, indifferently. + +"Well?" The tone was simply polite inquiry. The matter seemed to be one +which concerned nobody. + +"Again I do not know," returned Allan. "This is altogether out of my +line, but, if you'll go to the city with me, I'll take you to a friend +of mine who is a great specialist. If anything can be done, he is the +man who can do it. Will you come?" + +There was a long pause. "If Barbara is willing," he answered simply. +"Ask her." + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: The Plunge] + +Meanwhile, Eloise was talking to Barbara. First, she told her of the +letters she had written in her behalf and to which the answers might +come any day now. Then she asked if she might order preserves from Aunt +Miriam, and discussed patterns and material for the lingerie she had +previously spoken of. Finding, at length, that the best way to approach +a difficult subject was the straightest one, she took the plunge. + +"Have you always been lame?" she asked. She did not look at Barbara, but +tried to speak carelessly, as she gazed out of the window. + +"Yes," came the answer, so low that she could scarcely hear it. + +"Wouldn't you like to walk like the rest of us?" continued Eloise. + +Barbara writhed under the torturing question. "My mind can walk," she +said, with difficulty; "my soul isn't lame." + +The tone made Eloise turn quickly--and hate herself bitterly for her +awkwardness. She saw that an apology would only make a bad matter worse, +so she went straight on. + +"Doctor Conrad is very skilful," she continued. "In the city, he is one +of the few really great surgeons. He told me that he would like to make +an examination and see if an operation would not do away with the +crutches. He thinks there may be a good chance. If there is, will you +take it?" + +"Thank you," said Barbara, almost inaudibly. Her voice had sunk to a +whisper and she was very pale. "I do not mean to seem ungrateful, but it +is impossible." + +"Impossible!" repeated Eloise. "Why?" + +"Because of father," explained Barbara. Her colour was coming back +slowly now. "I am all he has, my work supplies his needs, and I dare +not take the risk." + +"Is that the only reason?" + +Barbara nodded. + +"You're not afraid?" + +Barbara's blue eyes opened wide with astonishment. "Why should I be +afraid?" she asked. "Do you take me for a coward?" + +Eloise knelt beside Barbara's low chair and put her strong arms around +the slender, white-clad figure. "Listen, dear," she said. Her face was +shining as though with some great inner light. + +"My own dear father died when I was a child. My mother died when I was +born. I have never had anything but money. I have never had anyone to +take care of, no one to make sacrifices for, no one to make me strong +because I was needed. If the worst should happen, would you trust your +father to me? Could you trust me?" + +"Yes," said Barbara slowly; "I could." + +[Sidenote: A Compact] + +"Then I promise you solemnly that your father shall never want for +anything while he lives. And now, if there is a chance, will you take +it--for me?" + +Barbara looked long into the sweet face, glorified by the inner light. +Then she leaned forward and put her soft arms around the older woman, +hiding her face in the masses of copper-coloured hair. + +"For you? A thousand times, yes," she sobbed. "Oh, anything for you!" + + * * * * * + +Late in the afternoon, when Ambrose North and Barbara were alone again, +he came over to her chair and stroked her shining hair with a loving +hand. + +"Did they tell you, dear?" he asked. + +"Yes," whispered Barbara. + +"I have dreamed so often that my baby could walk and I could see. He +said that the dream should come true if he could make it so." + +"Did he say anything about your eyes?" asked Barbara, in astonishment. + +[Sidenote: Hopeful] + +"Yes. He thinks there may be a chance there, too. If you are willing, +I am to go to the city with him sometime and see a friend of his who is +a great specialist." + +"Oh, Daddy," cried Barbara. "I'm afraid--for you." + +He drew a chair up near hers and sat down. The old hand, in which the +pulses moved so slowly, clasped the younger one, warm with life. + +"Barbara," he said; "I have never seen my baby." + +"I know, Daddy." + +"I want to see you, dear." + +"And I want you to." + +"Then, will you let me go?" + +"Perhaps, but it must be--afterward, you know." + +"Why?" + +"Because, when you see me, I want to be strong and well. I want to be +able to walk. You mustn't see the crutches, Daddy--they are ugly +things." + +"Nothing could be ugly that belongs to you. I made a little song this +afternoon, while you and Miriam were talking and I was out alone." + +"Tell me." + +[Sidenote: In a Beautiful Garden] + +"Once there was a man who had a garden. When he was a child he had +played in it, in his youth and early manhood he had worked in it and +found pleasure in seeing things grow, but he did not really know what a +beautiful garden it was until another walked in it with him and found it +fair. + +"Together they watched it from Springtime to harvest, finding new beauty +in it every day. One night at twilight she whispered to him that some +day a perfect flower of their very own was to bloom in the garden. They +watched and waited and prayed for it together, but, before it blossomed, +the man went blind. + +"In the darkness, he could not see the garden, but she was still there, +bringing divine consolation with her touch, and whispering to him always +of the perfect flower so soon to be their own. + +"When it blossomed, the man could not see it, but the one who walked +beside him told him that it was as pure and fair as they had prayed it +might be. They enjoyed it together for a year, and he saw it through her +eyes. + +"Then she went to God's Garden, and he was left desolate and alone. He +cared for nothing and for a time even forgot the flower that she had +left. Weeds grew among the flowers, nettles and thistles took possession +of the walks, and strange vines choked with their tendrils everything +that dared to bloom. + +[Sidenote: A Perfect Flower] + +"One day, he went out into the intolerable loneliness and desolation, +and, groping blindly, he found among the nettles and thistles and weeds +the one perfect white blossom. It was cool and soft to his hot hand, it +was exquisitely fragrant, and, more than all, it was part of her. +Gradually, it eased his pain. He took out the weeds and thistles as best +he could, but there was little he could do, for he had left it too long. + +"The years went by, but the flower did not fade. Seeking, he always +found it; weary, it always refreshed him; starving, it fed his soul. +Blind, it gave him sight; weak, it gave him courage; hurt, it brought +him balm. At last he lived only because of it, for, in some mysterious +way, it seemed to need him, too, and sometimes it even seemed divinely +to restore the lost. + +"Flower of the Dusk," he said, leaning to Barbara; "what should I have +been without you? How could I have borne it all?" + +[Sidenote: Strength for the Burden] + +"God suits the burden to the bearer, I think," she answered, softly. "If +you have much to bear, it is because you are strong enough to do it +nobly and well. Only the weak are allowed to shirk, and shift their load +to the shoulders of the strong." + +"I know, but, Barbara--suppose----" + +"There is nothing to suppose, Daddy. Whatever happened would be the best +that could happen. I'm not afraid." + +Her voice rang clear and strong. Insensibly, he caught some of her own +fine courage and his soul rallied greatly to meet hers. From her height +she had summoned him as with a bugle-call, and he had answered. + +"The ways of the Everlasting are not our ways," he said, "but I will not +be afraid. No, I will not let myself be afraid." + + + + +X + +In the Garden + + +[Sidenote: A Summer Evening] + +The subtle, far-reaching fragrance of a Summer night came through the +open window. A cool wind from the hills had set the maple branches to +murmuring and hushed the incoming tide as it swept up to the waiting +shore. Out in the illimitable darkness of the East, grey surges throbbed +like the beating of a troubled heart, but the shore knew only the drowsy +croon of a sea that has gone to sleep. + +Golden lilies swung their censers softly, and the exquisite incense +perfumed the dusk. Fairy lamp-bearers starred the night with glimmering +radiance, faintly seen afar. A cricket chirped just outside the window +and a ghostly white moth circled around the evening lamp. + +Roger sat by the table, with Keats's letters to his beloved Fanny open +before him. The letter to Constance, so strangely brought back after all +the intervening years, lay beside the book. The ink was faded and the +paper was yellow, but his father's love, for a woman not his mother, +stared the son full in the face and was not to be denied. + +Was this all, or--? His thought refused to go further. Constance North +had died, by her own hand, four days after the letter was written. What +might not have happened in four days? In one day, Columbus found a +world. In another, electricity was discovered. In one day, one hour, +even, some immeasurable force moving according to unseen law might sway +the sun and set all the stars to reeling madly through the unutterable +midnights of the universe. And in four days? Ah, what had happened in +those four days? + +[Sidenote: A Recurring Question] + +The question had haunted him since the night he read the letter, when he +was reading to Barbara and had unwittingly come upon it. Constance was +dead and Laurence Austin was dead, but their love lived on. The grave +was closed against it, and in neither heaven nor hell could it find an +abiding-place. Ghostly and forbidding, it had sent Constance to haunt +Miriam's troubled sleep, it had filled Ambrose North's soul with cruel +doubt and foreboding, and had now come back to Roger and Barbara, to ask +eternal questions of the one, and stir the heart of the other to new +depths of pain. + +He had not seen Barbara since that night and she had sent no message. No +beacon light in the window across the way said "come." The sword that +had lain, keen-edged and cruel, between Constance and her lover, had, by +a single swift stroke, changed everything between her daughter and his +son. + +Not that Barbara herself was less beautiful or less dear. Roger had +missed her more than he realised. When her lovely, changing face had +come between his eyes and the musty pages of his law books, while the +disturbing Bascom pup cavorted merrily around the office, unheard and +unheeded, Roger had ascribed it to the letter that had forced them +apart. + + * * * * * + +The woollen slippers muffled Miss Mattie's step so that Roger did not +hear her enter the room. Preoccupied and absorbed, he was staring +vacantly out of the window, when a strong, capable hand swooped down +beside him, gathering up the book and the letter. + +[Sidenote: Tremendous Power] + +"I don't know what it is about your readin', Roger," complained his +mother, "that makes you blind and deaf and dumb and practically +paralysed. Your pa was the same way. Reckon I'll read a piece myself and +see what it is that's so affectin'. It ain't a very big book, but it +seems to have tremendous power." + +She sat down and began to read aloud, in a curiously unsympathetic voice +which grated abominably upon her unwilling listener: + +"'Ask yourself, my Love, whether you are not very cruel to have so +entrammelled me, so destroyed my freedom. Will you confess this in the +letter you must write immediately and do all you can to console me in +it--make it rich as a draught of poppies to intoxicate me--write the +softest words and kiss them, that I may at least touch my lips where +yours have been. For myself, I know not how to express my devotion to so +fair a form; I want a brighter word than bright, a fairer word than +fair. I almost wish we were butterflies and lived but three summer +days--three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty +common years could ever contain.' + +"Ain't that wonderful, Roger? Wants to get drunk on poppies and kiss the +writin' and thinks after that he'll be made into a butterfly. Your pa +couldn't have been far from bein' a butterfly when he bought this book. +There ain't no sense in it. And this--why, it's your pa's writin', +Roger! I ain't seen it for years." + +Miss Mattie leaned forward in her chair and brought the letter to +Constance close to the light. She read it through, calmly, without haste +or excitement. Roger's hands gripped the arms of his chair and his face +turned ashen. His whole body was tense. + +[Sidenote: A Moment's Pain] + +Then, as swiftly as it had come, the moment passed. Miss Mattie took off +her spectacles and leaned back in her chair with great weariness +evident in every line of her figure. + +[Sidenote: Crazy as a Loon] + +"Roger," she said, sadly, "there's no use in tryin' to conceal it from +you any longer. Your pa was crazy--as crazy as a loon. What with buyin' +books so steady and readin' of 'em so continual, his mind got unhinged. +I've always suspected it, and now I know. + +"Your pa gets this book, and reads all this stuff that's been written +about 'Fanny,' and he don't see no reason why he shouldn't duplicate it +and maybe get it printed. I knew he set great store by books, but it +comes to me as a shock that he was allowin' to write 'em. Some of the +time he sees he's crazy himself. Didn't you see, there where he says, 'I +hope you do not blame me because I went mad'? 'Mad' is the refined word +for crazy. + +"Then he goes on about eatin' husks and bein' starved. That's what I +told him when he insisted on havin' oatmeal cooked for his breakfast +every mornin'. I told him humans couldn't expect to live on horse-feed, +but, la sakes! He never paid no attention to me. I could set and talk by +the hour just as I'm talkin' to you and he wasn't listenin' any more'n +you be." + +"I am listening, Mother," he assured her, in a forced voice. He could +not say with what joyful relief. + +"Maybe," she went on, "I'd 'a' been more gentle with your pa if I'd +realised just what condition his mind was in. There's a book in the +attic full of just such writin' as this. I found it once when I was +cleaning, but I never paid no more attention to it. I surmised it was +somethin' he was copyin' out of another book that he'd borrowed from the +minister, but I see now. The Lord tempers the wind to the shorn lamb. If +I'd 'a' knowed what it was then, maybe I couldn't have bore it as I can +now." + +Seizing his opportunity, Roger put the book and the letter aside. Miss +Mattie slipped out of its wrapper the paper which Roger had brought to +her from the post-office that same night, and began to read. Roger sat +back in his chair with his eyes closed, meditating upon the theory of +Chance, and wondering if, after all, there was a single controlling +purpose behind the extraordinary things that happened. + +[Sidenote: Inner Turmoil] + +Miss Mattie wiped her spectacles twice and changed her position three +times. Then she got another chair and moved the lamp closer. At last she +clucked sharply with her false teeth--always the outward evidence of +inner turmoil or displeasure. + +"What's the matter, Mother?" + +"I can't see with these glasses," she said, fretfully. "I can see a lot +better without 'em than I can with 'em." + +"Have you wiped them?" + +"Yes, I've wiped 'em till it's a wonder the polish ain't all wore off +the glass." + +"Put them up close to your eyes instead of wearing them so far down on +your nose." + +"I've tried that, but the closer they get to my eyes, the more I can't +see. The further away they are, the better 't is. When I have 'em off, +I can see pretty good." + +"Then why don't you take them off?" + +"That sounds just like your pa. Do you suppose, after payin' seven +dollars and ninety cents for these glasses, and more'n twice as much for +my gold-bowed ones, that I ain't goin' to use 'em and get the benefit of +'em? Your pa never had no notion of economy. They're just as good as +they ever was, and I reckon I'll wear 'em out, if I live." + +"But, Mother, your eyes may have changed. They probably have." + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's Eyes] + +Miss Mattie went to the kitchen and brought back a small, cracked +mirror. She studied the offending orbs by the light, very carefully, +both with and without her spectacles. + +"No, they ain't," she announced, finally. "They're the same size and +shape and colour that they've always been, and the specs are the same. +Your pa bought 'em for me soon after you commenced readin' out of a +reader, and they're just as good as they ever was. It must be the oil. +I've noticed that it gets poorer every time the price goes up." She +pushed the paper aside with a sigh. "I was readin' such a nice story, +too." + +"Shan't I read it to you, Mother?" + +"Why, I don't know. Do you want to?" + +"Surely, if you want me to." + +"Then you'd better begin a new story, because I'm more'n half-way +through this one." + +"I'll begin right where you left off, Mother. It doesn't make a particle +of difference to me." + +"But you won't get the sense of it. I'd like for you to enjoy it while +you're readin'." + +"Don't worry about my enjoying it--you know I've always been fond of +books. If there's anything I don't understand, I can ask you." + +"All right. Begin right here in _True Gold, or Pretty Crystal's Love_. +This is the place: 'With a terrible scream, Crystal sprang toward the +fire escape, carrying her mother and her little sister in her arms.'" + +[Sidenote: Two Sighs] + +For nearly two hours, Roger read, in a deep, mellow voice, of the +adventures of poor, persecuted Crystal, who was only sixteen, and +engaged to a floor-walker in 'one of the great city's finest emporiums +of trade.' He and his mother both sighed when he came to the end of the +installment, but for vastly different reasons. + +"Ain't it lovely, Roger?" + +"It's what you might call 'different,'" he temporised, with a smile. + +"Just think of that poor little thing havin' her house set afire by a +rival suitor just after she had paid off the mortgage by savin' out of +her week's wages! Do you suppose he will ever win her?" + +"I shouldn't think it likely." + +"No, you wouldn't, but the endin' of those stories is always what you +wouldn't expect. It's what makes 'em so interestin' and, as you say, +'different.'" + +Roger did not answer. He merely yawned and tapped impatiently on the +table with his fingers. + +[Sidenote: Nine o'Clock] + +"What time is it?" she asked, adjusting her spectacles carefully upon +the ever-useful and unfailing wart. + +"A little after nine." + +"Sakes alive! It's time I was abed. I've got to get up early in the +mornin' and set my bread. Good-night." + +"Good-night, Mother." + +"Don't set up long. Oil is terrible high." + +"All right, Mother." + +Miss Mattie went upstairs and closed her door with a resounding bang. +Roger heard her strike a match on a bit of sandpaper tacked on the wall +near the match-safe, and close the green blinds that served the purpose +of the more modern window-shades. Soon, a deep, regular sound suggestive +of comfortable slumber echoed and re-echoed overhead. Then, and then +only, he dared to go out. + +[Sidenote: A Light in the Window] + +He sat on the narrow front porch for a few minutes, deeply breathing the +cool air and enjoying the beauty of the night. Across the way, the +little grey house seemed lonely and forlorn. The upper windows were +dark, but downstairs Barbara's lamp still shone. + +"Sewing, probably," mused Roger. "Poor little thing." + +As he watched, the lamp was put out. Then a white shadow moved painfully +toward the window, bent, and struck a match. Star-like, Barbara's +signal-light flamed out into the gloom, with its eager message. + +"She wants me," he said to himself. The joy was inextricably mingled +with pain. "She wants me," he thought, "and I must not go." + +"Why?" asked his heart, and his conscience replied, miserably, +"Because." + +For ten or fifteen minutes he argued with himself, vainly. Every +objection that came forward was reasoned down by a trained mind, versed +in the intricacies of the law. The deprivations of the fathers need not +always descend unto the children. At last he went over, wondering +whether his father had not more than once, and at the same hour, taken +the same path. + +[Sidenote: Two Hours of Life] + +Barbara was out in the garden, dreaming. For the first time in years, +when she had work to do, she had laid it aside before eleven o'clock. +But, in two hours, she could have made little progress with her +embroidery, and she chose to take for herself two hours of life, out of +what might prove to be the last night she had to live. + +When Roger opened the gate, Barbara took her crutches and rose out of +her low chair. + +"Don't," he said. "I'm coming to you." + +She had brought out another chair, with great difficulty, in +anticipation of his coming. Her own was near the moonflower that climbed +over the tiny veranda and was now in full bloom. The white, half-open +trumpets, delicately fragrant, had more than once reminded him of +Barbara herself. + +"What a brute I'd be," thought Roger, with a pang, "if I had +disappointed her." + +"I'm so glad," said Barbara, giving him a cool, soft little hand. "I +began to be afraid you couldn't come." + +"I couldn't, just at first, but afterward it was all right. How are +you?" + +"I'm well, thank you, but I'm going to be made better to-morrow. That's +why I wanted to see you to-night--it may be for the last time." + +Her words struck him with chill foreboding. "What do you mean?" + +"To-morrow, some doctors are coming down from the city, with two nurses +and a few other things. They're going to see if I can't do without +these." She indicated the crutches with an inclination of her golden +head. + +"Barbara," he gasped. "You mustn't. It's impossible." + +"Nothing is impossible any more," she returned, serenely. + +"That isn't what I meant. You mustn't be hurt." + +[Sidenote: A Wonderful World] + +"I'm not going to be hurt--much. It's all to be done while I'm asleep. +Miss Wynne, a lady from the hotel, brought Doctor Conrad to see me. +Afterward, he came again by himself, and he says he is very sure that it +will come out all right. And when I'm straight and strong and can walk, +he's going to try to have father made to see. A fairy godmother came in +and waved her wand," went on Barbara, lightly, "and the poor became rich +at once. Now the lame are to walk and the blind to see. Is it not a +wonderful world?" + +"Barbara!" cried Roger; "I can't bear it. I don't want you changed--I +want you just as you are." + +"Such impediments as are placed in the path of progress!" she returned. +Her eyes were laughing, but her voice had in it a little note of +tenderness. "Will you do something for me?" + +"Anything--everything." + +"It's only this," said Barbara, gently. "If it should turn out the +other way, will you keep father from being lonely? Miss Wynne has +promised that he shall never want for anything, and, at the most, it +couldn't be long until he was with me again, but, in the meantime, would +you, Roger? Would you try to take my place?" + +"Nobody in the world could ever take your place, but I'd try--God knows +I'd try. Barbara, I couldn't bear it, if----" + +"Hush. There isn't any 'if.' It's all coming right to-morrow." + +[Sidenote: Beauty of a Saint] + +The full moon had swung slowly up out of the sea, and the misty, silvery +light touched Barbara lovingly. Her slender hands, crossed in her lap, +seemed like those of a little child. Her deep blue eyes were lovelier +than ever in the enchanted light--they had the calmness of deep waters +at dawn, untroubled by wind or tide. Around her face her golden hair +shimmered and shone like a halo. She had the unearthly beauty of a +saint. + +"Afterward?" he asked, with a little choke in his voice. + +"I'll be in plaster for a long time, and, after that, I'll have to learn +to walk." + +"And then?" + +"Work," she said, joyously. "Think of having all the rest of your life +to work in, with no crutches! And if Daddy can see me--" she stopped, +but he caught the wistfulness in her tone. "The first thing," she +continued, "I'm going down to the sea. I have a fancy to go alone." + +"Have you never been?" + +"I've never been outside this house and garden but once or twice. Have +you forgotten?" + +All the things he might have done came to Roger, remorsefully, and too +late. He might have taken Barbara out for a drive almost any time during +the last eight years. She could have been lifted into a low carriage +easily enough and she had never even been to the sea. A swift, pitying +tenderness made his heart ache. + +"Nobody ever thought of it," said Barbara, soothingly, as though she had +read his thought, "and, besides, I've been too busy, except Sundays. But +sometimes, when I've heard the shore singing as the tide came in, and +seen the gulls fly past my window, and smelled the salt mist--oh, I've +wanted it so." + +"I'd have taken you, if I hadn't been such a brute as to forget." + +[Sidenote: More than the Sea] + +"You've brought me more than the sea, Roger. Think of all the books +you've carried back and forth so patiently all these years. You've done +more for me than anybody in the world, in some ways. You've given me the +magic carpet of the _Arabian Nights_, only it was a book, instead of a +rug. Through your kindness, I've travelled over most of the world, I've +met many of the really great people face to face, I've lived in all ages +and all countries, and I've learned to know the world as it is now. What +more could one person do for another than you have done for me?" + +"Barbara?" It was Miriam's voice, calling softly from an upper window. +"You mustn't stay up late. Remember to-morrow." + +"All right, Aunty." Her answer carried with it no hint of impatience. "I +forgot that we weren't in the house," she added, to Roger, in a low +tone. + +"Must I go?" To-night, for some reason, he could not bear even the +thought of leaving her. + +"Not just yet. I've been thinking," she continued, in a swift whisper, +"about my mother and--your father. Of course we can't understand--we +only know that they cared. And, in a way, it makes you and me something +like brother and sister, doesn't it?" + +"Perhaps it does. I hadn't thought of that." + +[Sidenote: The Barrier Broken] + +All at once, the barrier that seemed to have been between them crashed +down and was forgotten. Mysteriously, Roger was very sure that those +four days had held no wrong--no betrayal of another's trust. His father +would not have done anything which was not absolutely right. The thought +made him straighten himself proudly. And the mother of the girl who +leaned toward him, with her beautiful soul shining in her deep eyes, +could have been nothing less than an angel. + +"To-morrow"--began Roger. + +[Sidenote: "To-morrow is Mine"] + +"To-morrow was made for me. God is giving me a day to be made straight +in. To-morrow is mine, but--will you come and stay with father? Keep him +away from the house and with you, until--afterward?" + +"I will, gladly." + +Barbara rose and Roger picked up her crutches. "You'll never have to do +that for me again," she said, as she took them, "but there'll be lots of +other things. Will you take in the chairs, please?" + +A lump was in his throat and he could not speak. When he came out, after +having made a brief but valiant effort to recover his self-control, +Barbara was standing at the foot of the steps, leaning on her crutches, +with the moon shining full upon her face. + +Roger went to her. "Barbara," he said, huskily, "my father loved your +mother. For the sake of that, and for to-morrow, will you kiss me +to-night?" + +Smiling, Barbara lifted her face and gave him her lips as simply and +sweetly as a child. "Good-night," she said, softly, but he could not +answer, for, at the touch, the white fire burned in his blood and the +white magic of life's Maytime went, singing, through his soul. + + + + +XI + +Barbara's "To-morrow" + + +The shimmering white silence of noon lay upon the land. Bees hummed in +the clover, gorgeous butterflies floated drowsily over the meadows, and +far in the blue distance a meadow-lark scattered his golden notes like +rain upon the fields. + +[Sidenote: A Cold Shadow] + +The world teemed with life, and yet a cold shadow, as of approaching +death, darkened the souls of two who walked together in the dusty road +that led from the hills to the sea. The old man leaned heavily upon the +arm of the younger, and his footsteps faltered. The young man's face was +white and he saw dimly, as through a mist, but he tried to keep his +voice even. + +From the open windows of the little grey house came the deadly sweet +smell of anaesthetics, heavy with prescience and pain. It dominated, +instantly, all the blended Summer fragrances and brought terror to them +both. + +"I cannot bear it," said Ambrose North, miserably. "I cannot bear to +have my baby hurt." + +"She isn't being hurt now," answered Roger, with dry lips. "She's +asleep." + +"It may be the sleep that knows no waking. If you loved Barbara, you +would understand." + +The boy's senses, exquisitely alive and quivering, merged suddenly into +one unspeakable hurt. If he loved Barbara! Ah, did he not love her? What +of last night, when he walked up and down in that selfsame road until +dawn, alone with the wonder and fear and joy of it, and unutterably +dreading the to-morrow that had so swiftly become to-day. + +"I was a fool," muttered Ambrose North. "I was a fool to give my +consent." + +"It was her choice," the boy reminded him, "and when she walks----" + +"When she walks, it may be in the City Not Made With Hands. If I had +said 'no,' we should not be out here now, while she--" The tears +streamed over his wrinkled cheeks and his bowed shoulders shook. + +[Sidenote: All for the Best] + +"Don't," pleaded Roger. "It's all for the best--it must be all for the +best." + +Neither of them saw Eloise approaching as she came up the road from the +hotel. She was in white, as usual, bareheaded, and she carried a white +linen parasol. She went to them, calling out brightly, "Good morning!" + +"Who is it?" asked the old man. + +"It must be Miss Wynne, I think." + +"What is it?" inquired Eloise, when she joined them. "What is the +matter?" + +The blind man could not speak, but he pointed toward the house with a +shaking hand. + +"It's Barbara, you know," said Roger. "They're in there--cutting her." +The last words were almost a whisper. + +[Sidenote: Allan is There] + +"But you mustn't worry," cried Eloise. "Nothing can go wrong. Why, Allan +is there." + +Insensibly her confidence in Allan and the clear ring of her voice +relieved the unbearable tension. Surely, Barbara could not die if Allan +were there. + +"It's hard, I know," Eloise went on, in her cool, even tones, "but there +is no doubt about the ending. Allan is one of the few really great +surgeons--he has done wonderful things. He has done things that everyone +else said were impossible. Barbara will walk and be as straight and +strong as any of us. Think what it will mean to her after twenty years +of helplessness. How fine it will be to see her without the crutches." + +"I have never minded the crutches," said Roger. "I do not want her +changed." + +"I cannot see her," sighed Ambrose North. "I have never seen my baby." + +"But you're going to," Eloise assured him, "for Allan says so, and +whatever Allan says is true." + +At length, she managed to lead them farther away, though not out of +sight of the house, and they all sat down on the grass. She talked +continually and cheerfully, but the atmosphere was tense with waiting. +Ambrose North bowed his grey head in his hands, and Roger, still pale, +did not once take his eyes from the door of the little grey house. + +After what seemed an eternity, someone came out. It was one of Allan's +assistants. A nurse followed, and put a black bag into the buggy which +was waiting outside. Roger was on his feet instantly, watching. + +"Sit down," commanded Eloise, coolly. "Allan can see us from here, and +he will come and tell us." + +Ambrose North lifted his grey head. "Have they--finished--with her?" + +"I don't know," returned Eloise. "Be patient just a little longer, +please do." + +[Sidenote: All Right] + +Outwardly she was calm, but, none the less, a great sob of relief almost +choked her when Doctor Conrad came across the road to them, swinging his +black bag, and called out, in a voice high with hope, "All right!" + + * * * * * + +The sky was a wonderful blue, but the colour of the sea was deeper +still. The vast reaches of sand were as white as the blown snow, and +the Tower of Cologne had never been so fair as it was to-day. The sun +shone brightly on the clear glass arches that made the cupola, and the +golden bells swayed back and forth silently. + +[Sidenote: The Changed Tower] + +Barbara was trying to climb up to the cupola, but her feet were weary +and she paused often to rest. The rooms that opened off from the various +landings of the winding stairway were lovelier than ever. The +furnishings had been changed since she was last there, and each room was +made to represent a different flower. + +There was a rose room, all in pink and green, a pond-lily room in green +and white, a violet room in green and lavender, and a gorgeous suite of +rooms which someway seemed like a great bouquet of nasturtiums. But, +strangely, there was no fragrance of cologne in the Tower. The bottles +were all on the mantels, as usual, but Barbara could not open any of +them. Instead, there was a heavy, sweet, sickening smell from which she +could not escape, though she went continually from room to room. It +followed her like some evil thing that threatened to overpower her. + +The Boy who had always been beside her, and whose face she could not +see, was still in the Tower, but he was far away, with his back toward +her. He seemed to be suffering and Barbara tried to get to him to +comfort him, but some unforeseen obstacle inevitably loomed up in her +path. + +[Sidenote: People in the Tower] + +There were many people in the Tower, and most of them were old friends, +but there were some new faces. Her father was there, of course, and all +the brave knights and lovely ladies of whom she had read in her books. +Miss Wynne was there and she had never been in the Tower before, but +Barbara smiled at her and was glad, though she wished they might have +had cologne instead of the sickening smell which grew more deadly every +minute. + +A grave, silent young man whose demeanour was oddly at variance with his +red hair was there also. He had just come and it seemed that he was a +doctor. Barbara had heard his name but could not remember it. There were +also two young women in blue and white striped uniforms which were very +neat and becoming. They wore white caps and smiled at Barbara. She had +heard their names, too, but she had forgotten. + +None of them seemed to mind the heavy odour which oppressed her so. She +opened the windows in the Tower and the cool air came in from the blue +sea, but it changed nothing. + +"Come, Boy," she called across the intervening mist. "Let's go up to the +cupola and ring all the golden bells." + +He did not seem to hear, so she called again, and again, but there was +no response. It was the first time he had failed to answer her, and it +made her angry. + +"Then," cried Barbara, shrilly, "if you don't want to come, you needn't, +so there. But I'm going. Do you hear? I'm going. I'm going up to ring +those bells if I have to go alone." + +Still, the Boy did not answer, and Barbara, her heart warm with +resentment, began to climb the winding stairs. She did not hurry, for +pictures of castles, towers, and beautiful ladies were woven in the +tapestry that lined the walls. + +She came, at last, to the highest landing. There was only one short flight +between her and the cupola. The clear glass arches were dazzling in the sun +and the golden bells swayed temptingly. But a blinding, overwhelming fog +drifted in from the sea, and she was afraid to move by so much as a step. +She turned to go back, and fell, down--down--down--into what seemed +eternity. + +[Sidenote: The Clouds Lift] + +Before long, the cloud began to lift. She could see a vague suggestion +of blue and white through it now. The man with the red hair was talking, +loudly and unconcernedly, to a tall man beside him whose face was +obscured by the mist. The voices beat upon Barbara's ears with physical +pain. She tried to speak, to ask them to stop, but the words would not +come. Then she raised her hand, weakly, and silence came upon the room. + +Out of the fog rose Doctor Allan Conrad. He was tired and there was a +strained look about his eyes, but he smiled encouragingly. He leaned +over her and she smiled, very faintly, back at him. + +"Brave little girl," he said. "It's all right now. All we ever hoped for +is coming very soon." Then he went out, and she closed her eyes. When +she was again conscious of her surroundings, it was the next day, but +she thought she had been asleep only a few minutes. + +At first there was numbness of mind and body. Then, with every +heart-beat and throb by throb, came unbearable agony. A trembling old +hand strayed across her face and her father's voice, deep with love and +longing, whispered: "Barbara, my darling! Does it hurt you now?" + +"Just a little, Daddy, but it won't last long. I'll be better very +soon." + +One of the blue and white nurses came to her and said, gently, "Is it +very bad, Miss North?" + +[Sidenote: Intense Pain] + +"Pretty bad," she gasped. Then she tried to smile, but her white lips +quivered piteously. The woman with the kind, calm face came back with a +shining bit of silver in her hand. There was a sharp stab in Barbara's +arm, and then, with incredible quickness, peace. + +"What was it?" she asked, wondering. + +"Poppies," answered the nurse. "They bring forgetfulness." + +"Barbara," said the old man, sadly, "I wish I could help you bear +it----" + +"So you can, Daddy." + +"But how?" + +"Don't be afraid for me--it's coming out all right. And make me a little +song." + +"I couldn't--to-day." + +"There is always a song," she reminded him. "Think how many times you +have said to me, 'Always make a song, Barbara, no matter what comes.'" + +The old man stirred uneasily in his chair. "What about, dear?" + +"About the sea." + +[Sidenote: Song of the Sea] + +"The sea is so vast that it reaches around the world," he began, +hesitatingly. "It sings upon the shore of every land, from the regions +of perpetual ice and snow to the far tropic islands, where the sun +forever shines. As it lies under the palms, all blue and silver, +crooning so softly that you can scarcely hear it, you would not think it +was the same sea that yesterday was raging upon an ice-bound shore. + +"If you listen to its ever-changing music you can hear almost anything +you please, for the sea goes everywhere. Ask, and the sea shall sing to +you of the frozen north where half the year is darkness and the +impassable waste of waters sweeps across the pole. Ask, and you shall +hear of the distant islands, where there has never been snow, and the +tide may even bring to you a bough of olive or a leaf of palm. + +[Sidenote: Song of the Sea] + +"Ask, and the sea will give you red and white coral, queer shells, +mystically filled with its own weird music, and treasures of fairy-like +lace-work and bloom. It will sing to you of cool, green caves where the +waves creep sleepily up to the rocks and drift out drowsily with the ebb +of the tide. + +"It will sing of grey waves changing to foam in the path of the wind, +and bring you the cry of the white gulls that speed ahead of the storm. +It will sing to you of mermen and mermaids, chanting their own melodies +to the accompaniment of harps with golden strings. Listen, and you shall +hear the songs of many lands, merged into one by the sea that unites +them all. + +"It bears upon its breast the great white ships that carry messages from +one land to another. Silks and spices and pearls are taken from place to +place along the vast highways of the sea. And if, sometimes, in a +blinding tumult of terror and despair, the men and ships go down, the +sea, remorsefully, brings back the broken spars, and, at last, gives up +the dead. + +[Sidenote: The Dominant Chord] + +"Yet it is always beautiful, whether you see it grey or blue; whether it +is mad with rage or moaning with pain, or only crooning a lullaby as +the world goes to sleep. And in all the wonderful music there is one +dominant chord, for the song of the sea, as of the world, is Love. + +"Long ago, Barbara--so long ago that it is written in only the very +oldest books, Love was born in the foam of the sea and came to dwell +upon the shore. And so the sea, singing forever of Love, creeps around +the world upon an unending quest. When the tide sweeps in with the cold +grey waves, foam-crested, or in shining sapphire surges that break into +pearls, it is only the sea searching eagerly for the lost. So the +loneliness and the beauty, the longing and the pain, belong to Love as +to the sea." + +"Oh, Daddy," breathed Barbara, "I want it so." + +"What, dear? The sea?" + +"Yes. The music and the colour and the vastness of it. I can hardly wait +until I can go." + +There was a long silence. "Why didn't you tell me?" asked the old man. +"There would have been some way, if I had only known." + +"I don't know, Daddy. I think I've been waiting for this way, for it's +the best way, after all. When I can walk and you can see, we'll go down +together, shall we?" + +"Yes, dear, surely." + +"You must help me be patient, Daddy. It will be so hard for me to lie +here, doing nothing." + +"I wish I could read to you." + +"You can talk to me, and that's better. Roger will come over some day +and read to me, when he has time." + +"He was with me yesterday, while----" + +"I know," she answered, softly. "I asked him. I thought it would make it +easier for you." + +[Sidenote: Father and Daughter] + +"My baby! You thought of your old father even then?" + +"I'm always thinking of you, Daddy, because you and I are all each other +has got. That sounds queer, but you know what I mean." + +The calm, strong young woman in blue and white came back into the room. +"She mustn't talk," she said, to the blind man. "To-morrow, perhaps. +Come away now." + +"Don't take him away from me," pleaded Barbara. "We'll be very good and +not say a single word, won't we?" + +"Not a word," he answered, "if it isn't best." + +[Sidenote: Peaceful Sleep] + +The afternoon wore away to sunset, the shadows grew long, and Barbara +lay quietly, with her little hand in his. Long lines of light came over +the hills and brought into the room some subtle suggestion of colour. +Gradually, the pain came back, so keenly that it was not to be borne, +and the kind woman with the bit of silver in her hand leaned over the +bed once more. Quickly, the poppies brought their divine gift of peace +again. And so, Barbara slept. + +Then Ambrose North gently loosened the still fingers that were +interlaced with his, bent over, and, so gently as not to waken her, took +her boy-lover's kiss from her lips. + + + + +XII + +Miriam + + +Miriam moved about the house, silently, as always. She had assumed the +extra burden of Barbara's helplessness as she assumed everything--without +comment, and with outward calm. + +[Sidenote: Joy and Duty] + +Only her dark eyes, that burned and glittered so strangely, gave hint of +the restlessness within. She served Ambrose North with steadfast and +unfailing devotion; she waited upon Barbara mechanically, but readily. +An observer could not have detected any real difference in her bearing +toward the two, yet the service of one was a joy, the other a duty. + +After the first week the nurse who had remained with Barbara had gone +back to the city. In this short time, Miriam had learned much from her. +She knew how to change a sheet without disturbing the patient very much; +she could give Barbara both food and drink as she lay flat upon her +back, and ease her aching body a little in spite of the plaster cast. + +Ambrose North restlessly haunted the house and refused to leave +Barbara's bedside unless she was asleep. Often she feigned slumber to +give him opportunity to go outdoors for the exercise he was accustomed +to taking. And so the life of the household moved along in its usual +channels. + +[Sidenote: A Living Image] + +As she lay helpless, with her pretty colour gone and the great braids of +golden hair hanging down on either side, Barbara looked more like her +dead mother than ever. Suffering had brought maturity to her face and +sometimes even Miriam was startled by the resemblance. One day Barbara +had asked, thoughtfully, "Aunty, do I look like my mother?" And Miriam +had answered, harshly, "You're the living image of her, if you want to +know." + +Miriam repeatedly told herself that Constance had wronged her--that +Ambrose North had belonged to her until the younger girl came from +school with her pretty, laughing ways. He had never had eyes for Miriam +after he had once seen Constance, and, in an incredibly short time, they +had been married. + +Miriam had been forced to stand by and see it; she had made dainty +garments for Constance's trousseau, and had even been obliged to serve +as maid of honour at the wedding. She had seen, day by day, the man's +love increase and the girl's fancy wane, and, after his blindness came +upon him, Constance would often have been cruelly thoughtless had not +Miriam sternly held her to her own ideal of wifely duty. + +Now, when she had taken a mother's place to Barbara, and worked for the +blind man as his wife would never have dreamed of doing, she saw the +faithless one worshipped almost as a household god. The power to +disillusionise North lay in her hands--of that she was very sure. What +if she should come to him some day with the letter Constance had left +for another man and which she had never delivered? What if she should +open it, at his bidding, and read him the burning sentences Constance +had written to another during her last hour on earth? Knowing, beyond +doubt, that Constance was faithless, would he at last turn to the woman +he had deserted for the sake of a pretty face? The question racked +Miriam by night and by day. + +[Sidenote: Miriam's Jealousy] + +And, as always, the dead Constance, mute, accusing, bitterly +reproachful, haunted her dreams. Her fear of it became an obsession. As +Barbara grew daily more to resemble her mother, Miriam's position became +increasingly difficult and complex. + +Sometimes she waited outside the door until she could summon courage to +go in to Barbara, who lay, helpless, in the very room where her mother +had died. Miriam never entered without seeing upon the dressing table +those two envelopes, one addressed to Ambrose North and one to herself. +Her own envelope was bulky, since it contained two letters beside the +short note which might have been read to anybody. These two, with seals +unbroken, were safely put away in Miriam's room. + +One was addressed to Laurence Austin. Miriam continually told herself +that it was impossible for her to deliver it--that the person to whom it +was addressed was dead. She tried persistently to forget the five years +that had intervened between Constance's death and his. For five years, +he had lived almost directly across the street and Miriam saw him daily. +Yet she had not given him the letter, though the vision of Constance, +dumbly pleading for some boon, had distressed her almost every night +until Laurence Austin died. + +After that, there had been peace--but only for a little while. Constance +still came, though intermittently, and reproached Miriam for betraying +her trust. + +[Sidenote: The One Betrayal] + +As Barbara's twenty-second birthday approached, Miriam sometimes +wondered whether Constance would not cease to haunt her after the other +letter was delivered. She had been faithful in all things but +one--surely she might be forgiven the one betrayal. The envelope was +addressed, in a clear, unfaltering hand: "To My Daughter Barbara. To be +opened upon her twenty-second birthday." In her brief note to Miriam, +Constance had asked her to destroy it unopened if Barbara should not +live until the appointed day. + +She had said nothing, however, about the other letter--had not even +alluded to its existence. Yet there it was, apparently written upon a +single sheet of paper and enclosed in an envelope firmly sealed with +wax. The monogram, made of the interlaced initials "C.N.," still +lingered upon the seal. For twenty years and more the letter had waited, +unread, and the hands that once would eagerly have torn it open were +long since made one with the all-hiding, all-absolving dust. + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: At Supper] + +At supper, Ambrose North still had his fine linen and his Satsuma cup. +Miriam sat at the other end, where the coarse cloth and the heavy dishes +were. She used the fine china for Barbara, also, washing it carefully +six times every day. + +The blind man ate little, for he was lonely without the consciousness +that Barbara sat, smiling, across the table from him. + +"Is she asleep?" he asked, of Miriam. + +"Yes." + +"She hasn't had her supper yet, has she?" + +"No." + +"When she wakes, will you let me take it up to her?" + +"Yes, if you want to." + +"Miriam, tell me--does Barbara look like her mother?" His voice was full +of love and longing. + +"There may be a slight resemblance," Miriam admitted. + +"But how much?" + +[Sidenote: The Same Old Question] + +A curious, tigerish impulse possessed Miriam. He had asked her this same +question many times and she had always eluded him with a vague +generalisation. + +"How much does she resemble her mother?" he insisted. "You told me once +that they were 'something alike.'" + +"That was a long time ago," answered Miriam. She was breathing hard and +her eyes glittered. "Barbara has changed lately." + +"Don't hide the truth for fear of hurting me," he pleaded. "Once for all +I ask you--does Barbara resemble her mother?" + +For a moment Miriam paused, then all her hatred of the dead woman rose +up within her. "No," she said, coldly. "Their hair and eyes are nearly +the same colour, but they are not in the least alike. Why? What +difference does it make?" + +"None," sighed the blind man. "But I am glad to have the truth at last, +and I thank you. Sometimes I have fancied, when Barbara spoke, that it +was Constance talking to me. It would have been a great satisfaction to +me to have had my baby the living image of her mother, since I am to see +again, but it is all right as it is." + +Since he was to see! Miriam had not counted upon that possibility, and +she clenched her hands in swift remorse. If he should discover that she +had lied to him, he would never forgive her, and she would lose what +little regard he had for her. He had a Puritan insistence upon the +literal truth. + +"How beautiful Constance was," he sighed. An inarticulate murmur escaped +from Miriam, which he took for full assent. + +"Did you ever see anyone half so beautiful, Miriam?" + +Her throat was parched, but Miriam forced herself to whisper, "No." This +much was truth. + +[Sidenote: A Beautiful Bride] + +"How sweet she was and what pretty ways she had," he went on. "Do you +remember how lovely she was in her wedding gown?" + +Again Miriam forced herself to answer, "Yes." + +"Do you remember how people said we were mismated--that a man of fifty +could never hope to keep the love of a girl of twenty, who knew nothing +of the world?" + +"I remember," muttered Miriam. + +"And it was false, wasn't it?" he asked, hungering for assurance. +"Constance loved me--do you remember how dearly she loved me?" + +[Sidenote: Beloved Constance] + +A thousand words struggled for utterance, but Miriam could not speak +just then. She longed, as never before, to tear open the envelope +addressed to Laurence Austin and read to North the words his beloved +Constance had written to another man before she took her own life. She +longed to tell him how, for months previous, she had followed Constance +when she left the house, and discovered that she had a trysting-place +down on the shore. He wanted the truth, did he? Very well, he should +have it--the truth without mercy. + +"Constance," she began, huskily, "Constance loved----" + +"I know," interrupted Ambrose North. "I know how dearly she loved me up +to the very last. Even Barbara, baby that she was, felt it. She +remembers it still." + +Barbara's bell tinkled upstairs while he said the last words. "She wants +us," he said, his face illumined with love. "If you will prepare her +supper, Miriam, I will take it up." + +The room swayed before Miriam's eyes and her senses were confused. She +had drawn her dagger to strike and it had been forced back into its +sheath by some unseen hand. "But I will," she repeated to herself again +and again as her trembling hands prepared Barbara's tray. "He shall +know the truth--and from me." + + * * * * * + +"Barbara," said the old man, as he entered the room, "your Daddy has +brought up your supper." + +"I'm glad," she responded, brightly. "I'm very hungry." + +"We have been talking downstairs of your mother," he went on, as he set +down the tray. "Miriam has been telling me how beautiful she was, what +winning ways she had, and how dearly she loved us. She says you do not +look at all like her, Barbara, and we both have been thinking that you +did." + +[Sidenote: Disappointed] + +Barbara was startled. Only a few days ago, Aunt Miriam had assured her +that she was the living image of her mother. She was perplexed and +disappointed. Then she reflected that when she had asked the question +she had been very ill and Aunt Miriam was trying to answer in a way that +pleased her. She generously forgave the deceit for the sake of the +kindly motive behind it. + +"Dear Aunt Miriam," said Barbara, softly. "How good she has been to us, +Daddy." + +"Yes," he replied; "I do not know what we should have done without her. +I want to do something for her, dear. Shall we buy her a diamond ring, +or some pearls?" + +"We'll see, Daddy. When I can walk, and you can see, we shall do many +things together that we cannot do now." + +The old man bent down very near her. "Flower of the Dusk," he whispered, +"when may I go?" + +"Go where, Daddy?" + +"To the city, you know, with Doctor Conrad. I want to begin to see." + +Barbara patted his hand. "When I am strong enough to spare you," she +said, "I will let you go. When you see me, I want to be well and able to +go to meet you without crutches. Will you wait until then?" + +"I want to see my baby. I do not care about the crutches, now that you +are to get well. I want to see you, dear, so very, very much." + +"Some day, Daddy," she promised him. "Wait until I'm almost well, won't +you?" + +"Just as you say, dear, but it seems so long." + +"I couldn't spare you now, Daddy. I want you with me every day." + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: Miriam's Prayer] + +Though long unused to prayer, Miriam prayed that night, very earnestly, +that Ambrose North might not recover his sight; that he might never see +the daughter who lived and spoke in the likeness of her dead mother. It +was long past midnight when she fell asleep. The house had been quiet +for several hours. + +As she slept, she dreamed. The door opened quietly, yet with a certain +authority, and Constance, in her grave-clothes, came into her room. The +white gown trailed behind her as she walked, and the two golden braids, +so like Barbara's, hung down over either shoulder and far below her +waist. + +She fixed her deep, sad eyes upon Miriam, reproachfully, as always, but +her red lips were curled in a mocking smile. "Do your worst," she seemed +to say. "You cannot harm me now." + +[Sidenote: The Vision] + +The vision sat down in a low chair and rocked back and forth, slowly, as +though meditating. Occasionally, she looked at Miriam doubtfully, but +the mocking smile was still there. At last Constance rose, having come, +apparently, to some definite plan. She went to the dresser, opened the +lower drawer, and reached under the pile of neatly-folded clothing. + +Cold as ice, Miriam sprang to her feet. She was wide awake now, but the +room was empty. The door was open, half-way, and she could not remember +whether she had left it so when she went to bed. She had always kept her +bedroom door closed and locked, but since Barbara's illness had left it +at least ajar, that she might be able to hear a call in the night. + +Shaken like an aspen in a storm, Miriam lighted her candle and stared +into the shadows. Nothing was there. The clock ticked steadily--almost +maddeningly. It was just four o'clock. + +She, too, opened the lower drawer of the dresser and thrust her hand +under the clothing. The letters were still there. She drew them out, her +hands trembling, and read the superscriptions with difficulty, for the +words danced, and made themselves almost illegible. + +Constance was coming back for the letters, then? That was out of +Miriam's power to prevent, but she would keep the knowledge of their +contents--at least of one. She thrust aside contemptuously the letter to +Barbara--she cared nothing for that. + +[Sidenote: The Seal Broken] + +Taking the one addressed to "Mr. Laurence Austin; Kindness of Miss +Leonard," she went back to bed, taking her candle to the small table +that stood at the head of the bed. With forced calmness, she broke the +seal which the dead fingers had made so long ago, opened it shamelessly, +and read it. + + "You who have loved me since the beginning of + time," the letter began, "will understand and + forgive me for what I do to-day. I do it because + I am not strong enough to go on and do my duty by + those who need me. + + "If there should be meeting past the grave, some + day you and I shall come together again with no + barrier between us. I take with me the knowledge + of your love, which has sheltered and strengthened + and sustained me since the day we first met, and + which must make even a grave warm and sweet. + + "And, remember this--dead though I am, I love you + still; you and my little lame baby who needs me so + and whom I must leave because I am not strong + enough to stay. + + "Through life and in death and eternally, + + "Yours, + + "CONSTANCE." + +In the letter was enclosed a long, silken tress of golden hair. It +curled around Miriam's fingers as though it were alive, and she thrust +it from her. It was cold and smooth and sinuous, like a snake. She +folded up the letter, put it back in the envelope with the lock of hair, +then returned it to its old hiding-place, with Barbara's. + +"So, Constance," she said to herself, "you came for the letters? Come +and take them when you like--I do not fear you now." + +[Sidenote: The Evidence] + +All of her suspicions were crystallised into certainty by this one page +of proof. Constance might not have violated the letter of her marriage +vow--very probably had not even dreamed of it--but in spirit, she had +been false. + +"Come, Constance," said Miriam, aloud; "come and take your letters. +When the hour comes, I shall tell him, and you cannot keep me from it." + +[Sidenote: Triumph] + +She was curiously at peace, now, and no longer afraid. Her dark eyes +blazed with triumph as she lay there in the candle light. The tension +within her had snapped when suspicion gave way to absolute knowledge. +Thwarted and denied and pushed aside all her life by Constance and her +memory, at last she had come to her own. + + + + +XIII + +"Woman Suffrage" + + +There was a shuffling step on the stairway, accompanied by spasmodic +shrieks and an occasional "ouch." Roger looked up from his book in +surprise as Miss Mattie made her painful way into the room. + +"Why, Mother. What's the matter?" + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's Back] + +Miss Mattie sat down in the chair she had made out of a flour barrel and +screamed as she did so. "What is it?" he demanded. "Are you ill?" + +"Roger," she replied, "my back is either busted, or the hinge in it is +rusty from overwork. I stooped over to open the lower drawer in my +bureau, and when I come to rise up, I couldn't. I've been over half an +hour comin' downstairs. I called you twice, but you didn't hear me, and +I knowed you was readin', so I thought I might better save my voice to +yell with." + +"I'm sorry," he said. "What can I do for you?" + +"About the first thing to do, I take it, is to put down that book. Now, +if you'll put on your hat, you can go and get that new-fangled doctor +from the city. The postmaster's wife told me yesterday that he'd sent +Barbara one of them souverine postal cards and said on it he'd be down +last night. As you go, you might stop and tell the Norths that he's +comin', for they don't go after their mail much and most likely it's +still there in the box. Tell Barbara that the card has a picture of a +terrible high buildin' on it and the street is full of carriages, both +horsed and unhorsed. If he can make the lame walk and the blind see, +I reckon he can fix my back. I'll set here." + +"Shan't I get someone to stay with you while I'm gone, Mother? I don't +like to leave you here alone. Miss Miriam would----" + +"Miss Miriam," interrupted his mother, "ain't fit company for a horse or +cow, let alone a sufferin' woman. She just sets and stares and never +says nothin'. I have to do all the talkin' and I'm in no condition to +talk. You run along and let me set here in peace. It don't hurt so much +when I set still." + +[Sidenote: Roger's Errand] + +Roger obediently started on his errand, but met Doctor Conrad half-way. +The two had never been formally introduced, but Roger knew him, and the +Doctor remembered Roger as "the nice boy" who was with Ambrose North +and Eloise when he went over to tell them that Barbara was all right. + +"Why, yes," said Allan. "If it's an emergency case, I'll come there +first. After I see what's the matter, I'll go over to North's and then +come back. I seem to be getting quite a practice in Riverdale." + +When they went in, Roger introduced Doctor Conrad to the patient. +"You'll excuse my not gettin' up," said Miss Mattie, "for it's about the +gettin' up that I wanted to see you. Roger, you run away. It ain't +proper for boys to be standin' around listenin' when woman suffrage is +bein' discussed by the only people havin' any right to talk of it--women +and doctors." + +Roger coloured to his temples as he took his hat and hurried out. With +an effort Doctor Conrad kept his face straight, but his eyes were +laughing. + +[Sidenote: What's Wrong?] + +"Now, what's wrong?" asked Allan, briefly, as Roger closed the door. + +"It's my back," explained the patient. "It's busted. It busted all of a +sudden." + +"Was it when you were stooping over, perhaps to pick up something?" + +Miss Mattie stared at him in astonishment. "Are you a mind-reader, or +did Roger tell you?" + +"Neither," smiled Allan. "Did a sharp pain come in the lumbar region +when you attempted to straighten up?" + +"'Twan't the lumber room. I ain't been in the attic for weeks, though I +expect it needs straightenin'. It was in my bedroom. I was stoopin' over +to open a bureau drawer, and when I riz up, I found my back was busted." + +[Sidenote: The Prescription] + +"I see," said Allan. He was already writing a prescription. "If your son +will go down and get this filled, you will have no more trouble. Take +two every four hours." + +Miss Mattie took the bit of paper anxiously. "No surgical operation?" +she asked. + +"No," laughed Allan. + +"No mortar piled up on me and left to set? No striped nurses?" + +"No plaster cast," Allan assured her, "and no striped nurses." + +"I reckon it ain't none of my business," remarked Miss Mattie, "but why +didn't you do somethin' like this for Barbara instead of cuttin' her up? +I'm worse off than she ever was, because she could walk right spry with +crutches, and crutches wouldn't have helped me none when I was risin' up +from the bureau drawer." + +"Barbara's case is different. She had a congenital dislocation of the +femur." + +Miss Mattie's jaw dropped, but she quickly recovered herself. "And what +have I got?" + +"Lumbago." + +"My disease is shorter," she commented, after a moment of reflection, +"but I'll bet it feels worse." + +"I'll ask your son to come in if I see him," said Doctor Conrad, +reaching for his hat, "and if you don't get well immediately, let me +know. Good-bye." + +Roger was nowhere in sight, but he was watching the two houses, and as +soon as he saw Doctor Conrad go into North's, he went back to his +mother. + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's "Disease"] + +"Barbara's disease has three words in it, Roger," she explained, "and +mine has only one, but it's more painful. You're to go immediately with +this piece of paper and get it full of the medicine he's written on it. +I've been lookin' at it, but I don't get no sense out of it. He said to +take two every four hours--two what?" + +"Pills, probably, or capsules." + +"Pills? Now, Roger, you know that no pill small enough to swallow could +cure a big pain like this in my back. The postmaster's wife had the +rheumatiz last Winter, and she took over five quarts of Old Doctor +Jameson's Pain Killer, and it never did her a mite of good. What do you +think a paper that size, full of pills, can do for a person that ain't +able to stand up without screechin'?" + +"Well, we'll try it anyway, Mother. Just sit still until I come back +with the medicine." + +He went out and returned, presently, with a red box containing forty or +fifty capsules. Miss Mattie took it from him and studied it carefully. +"This box ain't more'n a tenth as big as the pain," she observed +critically. + +Roger brought a glass of water and took out two of the capsules. "Take +these," he said, "and at half past two, take two more. Let's give Doctor +Conrad a fair trial. It's probably a more powerful medicine than it +seems to be." + +[Sidenote: A Difficulty] + +Miss Mattie had some difficulty at first, as she insisted on taking both +capsules at once, but when she was persuaded to swallow one after the +other, all went well. "I suppose," she remarked, "that these long narrow +pills have to be took endways. If a person went to swallow 'em +crossways, they'd choke to death. I was careful how I took 'em, but +other people might not be, and I think, myself, that round pills are +safer." + +"I went to the office," said Roger, "and told the Judge I wouldn't be +down to-day. I have some work I can do at home, and I'd rather not leave +you." + +"It's just come to my mind now," mused Miss Mattie, ignoring his +thoughtfulness, "about the minister's sermon Sunday. He said that +everything that came to us might teach us something if we only looked +for it. I've been thinkin' as I set here, what a heap I've learned about +my back this mornin'. I never sensed, until now, that it was used in +walkin'. I reckoned that my back was just kind of a finish to me and +was to keep the dust out of my vital organs more'n anything else. This +mornin' I see that the back is entirely used in walkin'. What gets me is +that Barbara North had to have crutches when her back was all right. +Nothin' was out of kilter but her legs, and only one of 'em at that." + +"Here's your paper, Mother." Roger pulled _The Metropolitan Weekly_ out +of his pocket. + +"Lay it down on the table, please. It oughtn't to have come until +to-morrow. I ain't got time for it now." + +"Why, Mother? Don't you want to read?" + +[Sidenote: Proper Care] + +The knot of hair on the back of Miss Mattie's head seemed to rise, and +her protruding wire hairpins bristled. "I should think you'd know," she +said, indignantly, "when you've been takin' time from the law to read +your pa's books to Barbara North, that no sick person has got the +strength to read. Even if my disease is only in one word when hers is in +three, I reckon I'm goin' to take proper care of myself." + +"But you're sitting up and she can't," explained Roger, kindly. + +"Sittin' up or not sittin' up ain't got nothin' to do with it. If my +back was set in mortar as it ought to have been, I wouldn't be settin' +up either. I can't get up without screamin', and as long as I've knowed +Barbara she's never been that bad. That new-fangled doctor hasn't come +out of North's yet, either. How much do you reckon he charges for a +visit?" + +"Two or three dollars, I suppose." + +Miss Mattie clucked sharply with her false teeth. "'Cordin' to that," +she calculated, "he was here about twenty cents' worth. But I'm willin' +to give him a quarter--that's a nickel extra for the time he was writin' +out the recipe for them long narrow pills that would choke anybody but a +horse if they happened to go down crossways. There he comes, now. If he +don't come here of his own accord, you go out and get him, Roger. I want +he should finish his visit." + +[Sidenote: The Doctor's Visit] + +But it was not necessary for Roger to go. "Of his own accord," Doctor +Conrad came across the street and opened the creaky white gate. When he +came in, he brought with him the atmosphere of vitality and good cheer. +He had, too, that gentle sympathy which is the inestimable gift of the +physician, and which requires no words to make itself felt. + +His quick eye noted the box of capsules upon the table, as he sat down +and took Miss Mattie's rough, work-worn hand in his. "How is it?" he +asked. "Better?" + +"Mebbe," she answered, grudgingly. "No more'n a mite, though." + +"That's all we can expect so soon. By to-morrow morning, though, you +should be all right." His manner unconsciously indicated that it would +be the one joy of a hitherto desolate existence if Miss Mattie should be +perfectly well again in the morning. + +"How's my fellow sufferer?" she inquired, somewhat mollified. + +"Barbara? She's doing very well. She's a brave little thing." + +"Which is the sickest--her or me?" + +"As regards actual pain," replied Doctor Conrad, tactfully, "you are +probably suffering more than she is at the present moment." + +"I knowed it," cried Miss Mattie triumphantly. "Do you hear that, +Roger?" + +But Roger had slipped out, remembering that "woman suffrage" was not a +proper subject for discussion in his hearing. + +[Sidenote: Wanderin' Fits] + +"I reckon he's gone over to North's," grumbled Miss Mattie. "When my eye +ain't on him, he scoots off. His pa was the same way. He was forever +chasin' over there and Roger's inherited it from him. Whenever I've +wanted either of 'em, they've always been took with wanderin' fits." + +"You sent him out before," Allan reminded her. + +"So I did, but I ain't sent him out now and he's gone just the same. +That's the trouble. After you once get an idea into a man's head, it +stays put. You can't never get it out again. And ideas that other +people puts in is just the same." + +"Women change their minds more easily, don't they?" asked Allan. He was +enjoying himself very much. + +"Of course. There's nothin' set about a woman unless she's got a busted +back. She ain't carin' to move around much then. The postmaster's wife +was tellin' me about one of the women at the hotel--the one that's +writin' the book. Do you know her?" + +"I've probably seen her." + +[Sidenote: All a Mistake] + +"The postmaster's wife's bunion was a hurtin' her awful one day when +this woman come in after stamps, and she told her to go and help herself +and put the money in the drawer. So she did, and while she was doin' it +she told the postmaster's wife that she didn't have no bunion and no +pain--that it was all a mistake." + +"'You wouldn't think so,' says the postmaster's wife, 'if it was your +foot that had the mistake on it.' She was awful mad at first, but, after +she got calmed down, the book-woman told her what she meant." + +"'There ain't no pain nor disease in the world,' she says. 'It's all +imagination.' + +"'Well,' says the postmaster's wife, 'when the swellin' is so bad, how'm +I to undeceive myself?' + +"The book-woman says: 'Just deny it, and affirm the existence of good. +You just set down and say to yourself: "I can't have no bunion cause +there ain't no such thing, and it can't hurt me because there is no such +thing as pain. My foot is perfectly well and strong. I will get right up +and walk."' + +"As soon as the woman was gone out with her stamps, the postmaster's +wife tried it and like to have fainted dead away. She said she might +have been able to convince her mind that there wasn't no bunion on her +foot, but she couldn't convince her foot. She said there wasn't no such +thing as pain, and the bunion made it its first business to do a little +denyin' on its own account. You have to be awful careful not to offend a +bunion. + +[Sidenote: A Test] + +"This mornin', while Roger was gone after them long, narrow pills that +has to be swallowed endways unless you want to choke to death, I +reckoned I'd try it on my back. So I says, right out loud: 'My back +don't hurt me. It is all imagination. I can't have no pain because there +ain't no such thing.' Then I stood up right quick, and--Lord!" + +Miss Mattie shook her head sadly at the recollection. "Do you know," she +went on, thoughtfully, "I wish that woman at the hotel had lumbago?" + +Doctor Conrad's nice brown eyes twinkled, and his mouth twitched, ever +so slightly. "I'm afraid I do, too," he said. + +"If she did, and wanted some of them long narrow pills, would you give +'em to her?" + +"Probably, but I'd be strongly tempted not to." + +[Sidenote: Surprise] + +When he took his leave, Miss Mattie, from force of habit, rose from her +chair. "Ouch!" she said, as she slowly straightened up. "Why, I do +believe it's better. It don't hurt nothin' like so much as it did." + +"Your surprise isn't very flattering, Mrs. Austin, but I'll forgive you. +The next time I come up, I'll take another look at you. Good-bye." + +Miss Mattie made her way slowly over to the table where the box of +capsules lay, and returned, with some effort, to her chair. She studied +both the box and its contents faithfully, once with her spectacles, and +once without. "You'd never think," she mused, "that a pill of that size +and shape could have any effect on a big pain that's nowheres near your +stomach. He must be a dreadful clever young man, for it sure is a +searchin' medicine." + + + + +XIV + +Barbara's Birthday + + +"Fairy Godmother," said Barbara, "I should like a drink." + +[Sidenote: Fairy Godchild] + +"Fairy Godchild," answered Eloise, "you shall have one. What do you +want--rose-dew, lilac-honey, or a golden lily full of clear, cool +water?" + +"I'll take the water, please," laughed Barbara, "but I want more than a +lily full." + +Eloise brought a glass of water and managed to give it to Barbara +without spilling more than a third of it upon her. "What a pretty neck +and what glorious shoulders you have," she commented, as she wiped up +the water with her handkerchief. "How lovely you'd look in an evening +gown." + +"Don't try to divert me," said Barbara, with affected sternness. "I'm +wet, and I'm likely to take cold and die." + +"I'm not afraid of your dying after you've lived through what you have. +Allan says you're the bravest little thing he has ever seen." + +The deep colour dyed Barbara's pale face. "I'm not brave," she +whispered; "I was horribly afraid, but I thought that, even if I were, +I could keep people from knowing it." + +"If that isn't real courage," Eloise assured her, "it's so good an +imitation that it would take an expert to tell the difference." + +"I'm afraid now," continued Barbara. Her colour was almost gone and she +did not look at Eloise. "I'm afraid that, after all, I can never walk." +She indicated the crutches at the foot of her bed by a barely +perceptible nod. "I have Aunt Miriam keep them there so that I won't +forget." + +"Nonsense," cried Eloise. "Allan says that you have every possible +chance, so don't be foolish. You're going to walk--you must walk. Why, +you mustn't even think of anything else." + +"It would seem strange," sighed Barbara, "after almost twenty-two years, +why--what day of the month is to-day?" + +"The sixteenth." + +[Sidenote: Twenty-two] + +"Then it is twenty-two. This is my birthday--I'm twenty-two years old +to-day." + +"Fairy Godchild, why didn't you tell me?" + +"Because I'd forgotten it myself." + +"You're too young to begin to forget your birthdays. I'm past thirty, +but I still 'keep tab' on mine." + +"If you're thirty, I must be at least forty, for I'm really much older +than you are. And Roger is an infant in arms compared with me." + +"Wise lady, how did you grow so old in so short a time?" + +"By working and reading, and thinking--and suffering, I suppose." + +"When you're well, dear, I'm going to try to give you some of the +girlhood you've never had. You're entitled to pretty gowns and parties +and beaux, and all the other things that belong to the teens and +twenties. You're coming to town with me, I hope--that's why I'm +staying." + +Barbara's blue eyes filled and threatened to overflow. "Oh, Fairy +Godmother, how lovely it would be. But I can't go. I must stay here and +sew and try to make up for lost time. Besides, father would miss me so." + +[Sidenote: Wait and See] + +Eloise only smiled, for she had plans of her own for father. "We won't +argue," she said, lightly, "we'll wait and see. It's a great mistake to +try to live to-morrow, or even yesterday, to-day." + +When Eloise went back to the hotel, her generous heart full of plans for +her protege, Miriam did not hear her go out, and so it happened that +Barbara was alone for some time. Ambrose North had gone for one of his +long walks over the hills and along the shore, expecting to return +before Eloise left Barbara. For some vague reason which he himself could +not have put into words, he did not like to leave her alone with +Miriam. + +When Miriam came upstairs, she paused at the door to listen. Hearing no +voices, she peeped within. Barbara lay quietly, looking out of the +window, and dreaming of the day when she could walk freely and joyously, +as did the people who passed and repassed. + +Miriam went stealthily to her own room, and took out the letter to +Barbara. She had no curiosity as to its contents. If she had, it would +be an easy matter to open it, and put it into another envelope, without +the address, and explain that it had been merely enclosed with +instructions as to its delivery. + +[Sidenote: Miriam Delivers the Letter] + +Taking it, she went into the room where Barbara lay--the same room where +the dead Constance had lain so long before. + +"Barbara," she said, without emotion, "when your mother died she left +this letter for you, in my care." She put it into the girl's eager, +outstretched hand and left the room, closing the door after her. + +With trembling fingers, Barbara broke the seal, and took out the closely +written sheet. All four pages were covered. The ink had faded and the +paper was yellow, but the words were still warm with love and life. + +[Sidenote: The Letter] + + "Barbara, my darling, my little lame baby," the + letter began. "If you live to receive this + letter, your mother will have been dead for many + years and, perhaps, forgotten. I have chosen your + twenty-second birthday for this because I am + twenty-two now, and, when you are the same age, + you will, perhaps, be better fitted to understand + than at any other time. + + "I trust you have not married, because, if you + have, my warning may come too late. Never marry a + man whom you do not know, absolutely, that you + love, and when this knowledge comes to you, if + there are no barriers in the way, do not let + anything on God's earth keep you apart. + + "I have made the mistake which many girls make. + I came from school, young, inexperienced, unbalanced, + and eager for admiration. Your father, a brilliant man + of more than twice my age, easily appealed to my fancy. + He was handsome, courteous, distinguished, wealthy, of + fine character and unassailable position. I did not + know, then, that a woman could love love, rather than + the man who gave it to her. + + "There is not a word to be said of him that is not + wholly good. He has failed at no point, nor in the + smallest degree. On the contrary, it is I who have + disappointed him, even though I love him dearly + and always have. I have never loved him more than + to-day, when I leave you both forever. + + "My feeling for him is unchanged. It is only that + at last I have come face to face with the one man + of all the world--the one God made for me, back in + the beginning. I have known it for a long, long + time, but I did not know that he also loved me + until a few days ago. + + "Since then, my world has been chaos, illumined by + this unutterable light. I have been a true wife, + and when I can be true no longer, it is time to + take the one way out. I cannot live here and run + the risk of seeing him constantly, yet trust + myself not to speak; I cannot bear to know that + the little space lying between us is, in reality, + the whole world. + + "He is bound, too. He has a wife and a son only a + little older than you are. If I stay, I shall be + false to your father, to you, to him, and even to + myself, because, in my relation to each of you, + I shall be living a lie. + + [Sidenote: The Message] + + "Tell your dear father, if he still lives, that he + has been very good to me, that I appreciate all + his kindness, gentleness, patience, and the + beautiful love he has given me. Tell him I am + sorry I have failed him, that I have not been a + better wife, but God knows I have done the best I + could. Tell him I have loved him, that I love him + still, and have never loved him more than I do + to-day. But oh, my baby, do not tell him that the + full-orbed sun has risen before one who knew only + twilight before. + + "And, if you can, love your mother a little, as + she lies asleep in her far-away grave. Your + father, if he has not forgotten me, will have + dealt gently with my memory--of that I am sure. + But I do not quite trust Miriam, and I do not know + what she may have said. She loved your father and + I took him away from her. She has never forgiven + me for that and she never will. + + [Sidenote: A Burden] + + "If I have done wrong, it has been in thought only + and not in deed. I do not believe we can control + thought or feeling, though action and speech can + be kept within bounds. Forgive me, Barbara, + darling, and love me if you can. + + "Your + + "MOTHER." + +The last words danced through the blurring mist and Barbara sobbed aloud +as she put the letter down. Blind though he was, her father had felt the +lack--the change. The pity of it all overwhelmed her. + +Her thought flew swiftly to Roger, but--no, he must not know. This +letter was written to the living and not to the dead. Aunt Miriam would +ask no questions--she was sure of that--but the message to her father +lay heavily upon her soul. How could she make him believe in the love he +so hungered for even now? + +As the hours passed, Barbara became calm. When Miriam came in to see if +she wanted anything, she asked for pencil and paper, and for a book to +be propped up on a pillow in front of her, so that she might write. + +Miriam obeyed silently, taking an occasional swift, keen look at +Barbara, but the calm, impassive face and the deep eyes were +inscrutable. + +[Sidenote: The Meaning Changed] + +As soon as she was alone again, she began to write, with difficulty, +from her mother's letter, altering it as little as possible, and yet +changing the meaning of it all. She could trust herself to read from her +own sheet, but not from the other. It took a long time, but at last she +was satisfied. + +It was almost dusk when Ambrose North returned, and Barbara asked for a +candle to be placed on the small table at the head of her bed. She also +sent away the book and pencil and the paper she had not used. Miriam's +curiosity was faintly aroused, but, as she told herself, she could wait. +She had already waited long. + +"Daddy," said, Barbara, softly, when they were alone, "do you know what +day it is?" + +"No," he answered; "why?" + +"It's my birthday--I'm twenty-two to-day." + +"Are you? Your dear mother was twenty-two when she--I wish you were like +your mother, Barbara." + +"Mother left a letter with Aunt Miriam," said Barbara, gently. "She +gave it to me to-day." + +The old man sprang to his feet. "A letter!" he cried, reaching out a +trembling hand. "For me?" + +[Sidenote: Barbara Reads to her Father] + +Barbara laughed--a little sadly. "No, Daddy--for me. But there is +something for you in it. Sit down, and I'll read it to you." + +"Read it all," he cried. "Read every word." + +"Barbara, my darling, my little lame baby," read the girl, her voice +shaking, "if you live to read this letter, your mother will have been +dead for many years, and possibly forgotten." + +"No," breathed Ambrose North--"never forgotten." + +"I have chosen your twenty-second birthday for this, because I am +twenty-two now, and when you are the same age, it will be as if we were +sisters, rather than mother and daughter." + +"Dear Constance," whispered the old man. + +"When I came from school, I met your father. He was a brilliant man, +handsome, courteous, distinguished, of fine character and unassailable +position." + +Barbara glanced up quickly. The dull red had crept into his wrinkled +cheeks, but his lips were parted in a smile. + +"There is not a word to be said of him that is not wholly good. He has +failed at no point, nor in the smallest degree. I have disappointed +him, I fear, even though I love him dearly and always have. I have never +loved him more than I do to-day, when I leave you both forever. + +"Tell your dear father, if he still lives, that he has been very good to +me, that I appreciate all his kindness, gentleness, patience, and the +beautiful love he has given me. Tell him I am sorry I have failed +him----" + +"Oh, dear God!" he cried. "_She_ fail?" + +"That I have not been a better wife," Barbara went on, brokenly. "Tell +him I have loved him, that I love him still, and have never loved him +more than I do to-day. + +"Forgive me, both of you, and love me if you can. Your Mother." + +In the tense silence, Barbara folded up both sheets and put them back +into the envelope. Still, she did not dare to look at her father. When, +at last, she turned to him, sorely perplexed and afraid, he was still +sitting at her bedside. He had not moved a muscle, but he had changed. +If molten light had suddenly been poured over him from above, while the +rest of the room lay in shadow, he could not have changed more. + +[Sidenote: As by Magic] + +The sorrowful years had slipped from him, and, as though by magic, Youth +had come back. His shoulders were still stooped, his face and hands +wrinkled, and his hair was still as white as the blown snow, but his +soul was young, as never before. + +"Barbara," he breathed, in ecstasy. "She died loving me." + +The slender white hand stole out to his, half fearfully. "Yes, Daddy, +I've always told you so, don't you know?" Her senses whirled, but she +kept her voice even. + +"She died loving me," he whispered. + +The clock ticked steadily, a door closed below, and a little bird +outside chirped softly. There was no other sound save the wild beating +of Barbara's heart, which she alone heard. Still transfigured, he sat +beside the bed, holding her hand in his. + +[Sidenote: Far-Away Voices] + +Far-away voices sounded faintly in his ears, for, like a garment, the +years had fallen from him and taken with them the questioning and the +fear. Into his doubting heart Constance had come once more, radiant with +new beauty, thrilling his soul to new worship and new belief. + +"She died loving me," he said, as though he could scarcely believe his +own words. "Barbara, I know it is much to ask, for it must be very +precious to you, but--would you let me hold the letter? Would you let me +feel the words I cannot see?" + +Choking back a sob, Barbara took both sheets out of the envelope and +gave them to him. "Show me," he whispered, "show me the line where she +wrote, 'Tell him I love him still, and have never loved him more than +I do to-day.'" + +When Barbara put his finger upon the words, he bent and kissed them. +"What does it say here?" + +He pointed to the paragraph beginning, "I have made the mistake which +many girls make." + +"It says," answered Barbara, "'There is not a word to be said of him +that is not wholly good.'" He bent and kissed that, too. "And here?" His +finger pointed to the line, "I did not know that a woman could love +love, rather than the man who gave it to her." + +"That is where it says again, 'Tell him I have loved him, that I love +him still, and have never loved him more than I do to-day.'" + +"Dear, blessed Constance," he said, crushing the lie to his lips. "Dear +wife, true wife; truest of all the world." + +Barbara could bear no more. "Let me have the letter again, Daddy." + +[Sidenote: After Years of Waiting] + +"No, dear, no. After all these years of waiting, let me keep it for a +little while. Just for a little while, Barbara. Please." His voice broke +at the end. + +"For a little while, then, Daddy," she said, slowly; "only a little +while." + +[Sidenote: His Illumined Face] + +He went out, with the precious letter in his hand. Miriam was in the +hall, but he was unconscious of the fact. She shrank back against the +wall as he passed her, with his fine old face illumined as from some +light within. + +In his own room, he sat down, after closing the door, and spread the two +sheets on the table before him. He moved his hands caressingly over the +lines Constance had written in ink and Barbara in pencil. + +"She died loving me," he said to himself, "and I was wrong. She did not +change when I was blind and Barbara was lame. All these years I have +been doubting her while her own assurance was in the house. + +"She thought she failed me--the dear saint thought she failed. It must +take me all eternity to atone to her for that. But she died loving me." +His thought lingered fondly upon the words, then the tears streamed +suddenly over his blind face. + +"Oh, Constance, Constance," he cried aloud, forgetting that the dead +cannot hear. "You never failed me! Forgive me if you can." + + + + +XV + +The Song of the Pines + + +Upon the couch in the sitting-room, though it was not yet noon, Miss +Mattie slept peacefully. She had the repose, not merely of one dead, but +of one who had been dead long and was very weary at the time of dying. + +As Doctor Conrad had expected, her back was entirely well the morning +following his visit, and when she awoke, free from pain, she had dinned +his praises into Roger's ears until that long-suffering young man was +well-nigh fatigued. The subject was not exhausted, however, even though +Roger was. + +[Sidenote: A Wonder-Worker] + +"I'll tell you what it is, Roger," Miss Mattie had said, drawing a long +breath, and taking a fresh start; "a young man that can cure a pain like +mine, with pills that size, has got a great future ahead of him as well +as a brilliant past behind. He's a wonder-worker, that's what he is, not +to mention bein' a mind-reader as well." + +She had taken but a half dozen of the capsules the first day, having +fallen asleep after taking the third dose. When Roger went to the +office, very weary of Doctor Conrad's amazing skill, Miss Mattie had +resumed her capsules and, shortly thereafter, fallen asleep. + +She had slept for the better part of three days, caring little for food +and not in the least for domestic tasks. At the fourth day, Roger became +alarmed, but Doctor Conrad had gone back to the city, and there was no +one within his reach in whom he had confidence. + +[Sidenote: The Sleeping Woman] + +At last it seemed that it was time for him to act, and he shook the +sleeping woman vigorously. "What's the matter, Roger?" she asked, +drowsily; "is it time for my medicine?" + +"No, it isn't time for medicine, but it's time to get up. Your back +doesn't hurt you, does it?" + +"No," murmured Miss Mattie, "my back is as good as it ever was. What +time is it?" + +"Almost four o'clock and you've been asleep ever since ten this morning. +Wake up." + +"Eight--ten--twelve--two--four," breathed Miss Mattie, counting on her +fingers. Then, to his astonishment, she sat up straight and rubbed her +eyes. "If it's four, it's time for my medicine." She went over to the +cupboard in which the precious box of capsules was kept, took two more, +and returned to the couch. She still had the box in her hand. + +"Mother," gasped Roger, horrified. "What are you taking that medicine +for?" + +"For my back," she responded, sleepily. + +"I thought your back was well." + +"So 'tis." + +"Then what in thunder do you keep on taking dope for?" + +Miss Mattie sat up. She was very weary and greatly desired her sleep, +but it was evident that Roger must be soothed first. + +[Sidenote: Getting her Money's Worth] + +"You don't seem to understand me," she sighed, with a yawn. "After +payin' a dollar and twenty cents for that medicine, do you reckon I'm +goin' to let it go to waste? I'm goin' to keep right on takin' it, every +four hours, as he said, until it's used up." + +"Mother!" + +"Don't you worry none, Roger," said Miss Mattie, kindly, with a drowsy +smile. "Your mother is bein' took care of by a wonderful doctor. He +makes the lame walk and the blind see and cures large pains with small +pills. I am goin' to stick to my medicine. He didn't say to stop takin' +it." + +"But, Mother, you mustn't take it when there is no need for it. He never +meant for you to take it after you were cured. Besides, you might have +the same trouble again when we couldn't get hold of him." + +"How'm I to have it again?" demanded Miss Mattie, pricking up her ears, +"when I'm cured? If I take all the medicine, I'll stay cured, won't I? +You ain't got no logic, Roger, no more'n your pa had." + +"I wish you wouldn't, Mother," pleaded the boy, genuinely distressed. +"It's the medicine that makes you sleep so." + +"I reckon," responded Miss Mattie, settling herself comfortably back +among the pillows, "that he wanted me to have some sleep. In all my life +I ain't never had such sleep as I'm havin' now. You go away, Roger, and +study law. You ain't cut out for medicine." + +The last words died away in an incoherent whisper. Miss Mattie slept +again, with the box tightly clutched in her hand. As her fingers +gradually loosened their hold, Roger managed to gain possession of it +without waking her. He did not dare dispose of it, for he well knew that +the maternal resentment would make the remainder of his life a burden. +Besides, she might have another attack, when the ministering mind-reader +was not accessible. If it were possible to give her some harmless +substitute, and at the same time keep the "searching medicine" for a +time of need. + +[Sidenote: A Bright Idea] + +A bright idea came to Roger, which he hastened to put into execution. He +went to the druggist and secured a number of empty capsules of the same +size. At home, he laboriously filled them with flour and replaced those +in the box with an equal number of them. He put the "searching +medicine" safely away in his desk at the office, and went to work, his +heart warmed by the pleasant consciousness that he had done a good deed. + +When he went home at night, Miss Mattie was partially awake and inclined +to be fretful. "The strength is gone out of my medicine," she grumbled, +"and it ain't time to take more. I've got to set here and be deprived of +my sleep until eight o'clock." + +Roger prepared his own supper and induced his mother to eat a little. +When the clock began to strike eight, she took two of the flour-filled +capsules, confidently climbed upstairs, and--such is the power of +suggestion--was shortly asleep. + +[Sidenote: Favourable Opportunity] + +Having an unusually favourable opportunity, Roger went over to see +Barbara. He had not seen her since the night before the operation, but +Doctor Conrad had told him that in a few days he might be allowed to +talk to her or read to her for a little while at a time. + +Miriam opened the door for him, and, he thought, looked at him with +unusual sharpness. "I guess you can see her," she said, shortly. "I'll +ask her." + +In the pathetically dingy room, out of which Barbara had tried so hard +to make a home, he waited until Miriam returned. "They said to come up," +she said, and disappeared. + +Roger climbed the creaking stairs and made his way through the dark, +narrow hall to the open door from whence a faint light came. "Come in," +called Barbara, as he paused. + +Ambrose North sat by her bedside holding her hand, but she laughingly +offered the other to Roger. "Bad boy," she said; "why haven't you come +before? I've lain here in the window and watched you go back and forth +for days." + +"I didn't dare," returned Roger. "I was afraid I might do you harm by +coming and so I stayed away." + +"Everybody has been so kind," Barbara went on. "People I never saw nor +heard of have come to inquire and to give me things. You're absolutely +the last one to come." + +[Sidenote: Last but Not Least] + +"Last--and least?" + +"Not quite," she said, with a smile. "But I haven't been lonely. Father +has been right beside me all the time except when I've been asleep, +haven't you, Daddy?" + +"I've wanted to be," smiled the old man, "but sometimes they made me go +away." + +"Tell me about the Judge's liver," suggested Barbara, "and Fido. I've +been thinking a good deal about Fido. Did his legal document hurt him?" + +[Sidenote: Fido] + +"Not in the least. On the contrary, he thrived on it. He liked it so +well that he's eaten others as opportunity offered. The Judge is used to +it now, and doesn't mind. I've been thinking that it might save time and +trouble if, when I copied papers, I took an extra carbon copy for Fido. +That pup literally eats everything. He's cut some of his teeth on a pair +of rubbers that a client left in the office, and this noon he ate nearly +half a box of matches." + +"I suppose," remarked Barbara, "that he was hungry and wanted a light +lunch." + +"That'll be about all from you just now," laughed Roger. "You're going +to get well all right--I can see that." + +"Of course I'm going to get well. Who dared to say I wasn't?" + +"Nobody that I know of. Do you want me to bring Fido to see you?" + +"Some day," said Barbara, thoughtfully, "I would like to have you lead +Fido up and down in front of the house, but I do not believe I would +care to have him come inside." + +So they talked for half an hour or more. The blind man sat silently, +holding Barbara's hand, too happy to feel neglected or in any way +slighted. From time to time her fingers tightened upon his in a +reassuring clasp that took the place of words. + +Acutely self-conscious, Roger's memory harked back continually to the +last evening he and Barbara had spent together. In a way, he was +grateful for North's presence. It measurably lessened his constraint, +and the subtle antagonism that he had hitherto felt in the house seemed +wholly to have vanished. + +At last the blind man rose, still holding Barbara's hand. "It is late +for old folks to be sitting up," he said. + +"Don't go, Daddy. Make a song first, won't you? A little song for Roger +and me?" + +He sat down again, smiling. "What about?" he asked. + +"About the pines," suggested Barbara--"the tallest pines on the hills." + +There was a long pause, then, clearing his throat, the old man began. + +[Sidenote: Small Beginnings] + +"Even the tall and stately pines," he said, "were once the tiniest of +seeds like everything else, for everything in the world, either good or +evil, has a very small beginning. + +"They grow slowly, and in Summer, when you look at the dark, bending +boughs, you can see the year's growth in paler green at the tips. No one +pays much attention to them, for they are very dark and quiet compared +with the other trees. But the air is balmy around them, they scatter a +thick, fragrant carpet underneath, and there is no music in the world, +I think, like a sea-wind blowing through the pines. + +"When the brown cones fall, the seeds drop out from between the smooth, +satin-like scales, and so, in the years to come, a dreaming mother pine +broods over a whole forest of smaller trees. A pine is lonely and +desolate, if there are no smaller trees around it. A single one, +towering against the sky, always means loneliness, but where you see a +little clump of evergreens huddled together, braving the sleet and snow, +it warms your heart. + +"In Summer they give fragrant shade, and in Winter a shelter from the +coldest blast. The birds sleep among the thick branches, finding seeds +for food in the cones, and, on some trees, blue, waxen berries. + +[Sidenote: A Love Story] + +"Before the darkness came to me, I saw a love story in a forest of +pines. One tree was very straight and tall, and close beside it was +another, not quite so high. The taller tree leaned protectingly over the +other, as if listening to the music the wind made on its way from the +hills to the sea. As time went on, their branches became so thickly +interlaced that you could scarcely tell one from the other. + +"Around them sprang up half a dozen or more smaller trees, sheltered, +brooded over, and faithfully watched by these two with the interlaced +branches. The young trees grew straight and tall, but when they were not +quite half grown, a man came and cut them all down for Christmas trees. + +"When he took them away, the forest was strangely desolate to these two, +who now stood alone. When the Daughters of Dawn opened wide the gates of +darkness, and the Lord of Light fared forth upon the sea, they saw it +not. When it was high noon, and there were no shadows, even upon the +hill, it seemed that they might lift up their heads, but they only +twined their branches more closely together. When all the flaming +tapestry of heaven was spread in the West, they leaned nearer to each +other, and sighed. + +[Sidenote: Bereft] + +"When the night wind stirred their boughs to faint music, it was like +the moan of a heart that refuses to be comforted. When Spring danced +through the forest, leaving flowers upon her way, while all the silences +were filled with life and joy, these two knew it not, for they were +bereft. + +"Mating calls echoed through the woods, and silver sounds dripped like +rain from the maples, but there was no love-song in the boughs of the +pines. The birds went by, on hushed wings, and built their nests far +away. + +"When the maples put on the splendid robes of Autumn, the pines, more +gaunt and desolate than ever, covered the ground with a dense fabric of +needles, lacking in fragrance. When the winds grew cool, and the Little +People of the Forest pattered swiftly through the dead and scurrying +leaves, there was no sound from the pines. They only waited for the end. + +"When storm swept through the forest and the other trees bowed their +heads in fear, these two straightened themselves to meet it, for they +were not afraid. Frightened birds took refuge there, and the Little +People, with wild-beating hearts, crept under the spreading boughs to be +sheltered. + +"Vast, reverberating thunders sounded from hill to hill, and the sea +answered with crashing surges that leaped high upon the shore. Suddenly, +from the utter darkness, a javelin of lightning flashed through the +pines, but they only trembled and leaned closer still. + +"One by one, with the softness of falling snow, the leaves dropped upon +the brown carpet beneath, but there was no more fragrance, since the sap +had ceased to move through the secret channels and breathe balm into the +forest. Snow lay heavily upon the lower boughs and they broke, instead +of bending. When Spring danced through the world again, piping her +plaintive music upon the farthest hills, the pines were almost bare. + +[Sidenote: As One] + +"All through the sweet Summer the needles kept dropping. Every +frolicsome breeze of June carried some of them a little farther down the +road; every full moon shone more clearly through the barrier of the +pines. And at last, when the chill winds of Autumn chanted a requiem +through the forest, it was seen that the pines had long been dead, but +they so leaned together and their branches were so interlaced, that, +even in death, they stood as one. + +"They had passed their lives together, they had borne the same burdens, +faced the same storms, and rejoiced in the same warmth of Summer sun. +One was not left, stricken, long after the other was dead; their last +grief was borne together and was lessened because it was shared. I stand +there sometimes now, where the two dead trees are leaning close +together, and as the wind sighs through the bare boughs, it chants no +dirge to me, but only a hymn of farewell. + +[Sidenote: Together with Love] + +"There is nothing in all the world, Barbara, that means so much as that +one word, 'together,' and when you add 'love' to it, you have heaven, +for God himself can give no more joy than to bring together two who +love, never to part again." + +"Thank you," said Barbara, gently, after a pause. + +"I thank you too," said Roger. + +Ambrose North rose and offered his hand to Roger. "Good-night," he said. +"I am glad you came. Your father was my friend." Then he bent to kiss +Barbara. "Good-night, my dear." + +"Friend," repeated Roger to himself, as the old man went out. "Yes, +friend who never betrayed you or yours." The boy thrilled with +passionate pride at the thought. Before the memory of his father his +young soul stood at salute. + +Barbara's eyes followed her father fondly as he went out and down the +hall to his own room. When his door closed, Roger came to the other +chair, sat down, and took her hand. + +"It's not really necessary," explained Barbara, with a faint pink upon +her cheeks. "I shall probably recover, even if my hand isn't held all +the time." + +"But I want to," returned Roger, and she did not take her hand away. Her +cheeks took on a deeper colour and she smiled, but there was something +in her deep eyes that Roger had never seen there before. + +"I've missed you so," he went on. + +"And I have missed you." She did not dare to say how much. + +"How long must you lie here?" + +"Not much longer, I hope. Somebody is coming down next week to take off +the plaster; then, after I've stayed in bed a little longer, they'll see +whether I can walk or not." + +[Sidenote: The Crutches] + +She sighed wistfully and a strange expression settled on her face as she +looked at the crutches which still leaned against the foot of her bed. + +"Why do you have those there?" asked Roger, quickly. + +"To remind me always that I mustn't hope too much. It's just a chance, +you know." + +"If you don't need them again, may I have them?" + +"Why?" she asked, startled. + +"Because they are yours--they've seemed a part of you ever since I've +known you. I couldn't bear to have thrown away anything that was part of +you, even if you've outgrown it." + +"Certainly," answered Barbara, in a high, uncertain voice. "You're very +welcome and I hope you can have them." + +"Barbara!" Roger knelt beside the bed, still keeping her hand in his. +"What did I say that was wrong?" + +"Nothing," she answered, with difficulty. "But, after bearing all this, +it seems hard to think that you don't want me to be--to be separated +from my crutches. Because they have belonged to me always--you think +they always must." + +"Barbara! When you've always understood me, must I begin explaining to +you now? I've never had anything that belonged to you, and I thought you +wouldn't mind, if it was something you didn't need any more--I wouldn't +care what it was--if----" + +"I see," she interrupted. A blinding flash of insight had, indeed, made +many things wonderfully clear. "Here--wouldn't you rather have this?" + +[Sidenote: A Knot of Blue Ribbon] + +She slipped a knot of pale blue ribbon from the end of one of her long, +golden braids, and gave it to him. + +"Yes," he said. Then he added, anxiously, "are you sure you don't need +it? If you do----" + +"If I do," she answered, smiling, "I'll either get another, or tie my +braid with a string." + +Outwardly, they were back upon the old terms again, but, for the first +time since the mud-pie days, Barbara was self-conscious. Her heart beat +strangely, heavy with the prescience of new knowledge. When Roger rose +from his chair with a bit of blue ribbon protruding from his coat +pocket, she laughed hysterically. + +But Roger did not laugh. He bent over her, with all his boyish soul in +his eyes. She crimsoned as she turned away from him. + +[Sidenote: Please?] + +"Please?" he asked, very tenderly. "You did once." + +"No," she cried, shrilly. + +Roger straightened himself instantly. "Then I won't," he said, softly. +"I won't do anything you don't want me to--ever." + + + + +XVI + +Betrayal + + +The long weeks dragged by and, at last, the end of Barbara's +imprisonment drew near. The red-haired young man who had previously +assisted Doctor Conrad came down with one of the nurses and removed the +heavy plaster cast. The nurse taught Miriam how to massage Barbara with +oils and exercise the muscles that had never been used. + +"Doctor Conrad told me," said the red-haired young man, "to take your +father back with me to-morrow, if you were ready to have him go. The +sooner the better, he thought." + +[Sidenote: Love and Terror] + +Barbara turned away, with love and terror clutching coldly at her heart. +"Perhaps," she said, finally. "I'll talk with father to-night." + +Her own forgotten agony surged back into her remembrance, magnified an +hundred fold. Fear she had never had for herself strongly asserted +itself now, for him. "If it should come out wrong," she thought, "I +could never forgive myself--never in the wide world." + +When the doctor and nurse had gone to the hotel and Miriam was busy +getting supper, Ambrose North came quietly into Barbara's room. + +"How are you, dear?" he asked, anxiously. + +"I'm all right, Daddy, except that I feel very queer. It's all +different, some way. Like the old woman in _Mother Goose_, I wonder if +this can be I." + +There was a long pause. "Are they going back to-morrow," he asked, "the +doctor and nurse who came down to-day?" + +"Yes," answered Barbara, in a voice that was little more than a whisper. + +The old man took her hand in his and leaned over her. "Dear," he +pleaded, "may I go, too?" + +Barbara was startled. "Have they said anything to you?" + +[Sidenote: Long Waiting] + +"No, I was just thinking that I could go with them as well as with +Doctor Conrad. It is so long to wait," he sighed. + +"I cannot bear to have you hurt," answered Barbara, with a choking sob. + +"I know," he said, "but I bore it for you. Have you forgotten?" + +There was no response in words, but she breathed hard, every shrill +respiration fraught with dread. + +"Flower of the Dusk," he pleaded, "may I go?" + +"Yes," she sobbed. "I have no right to say no." + +"Dear, don't cry." The old man's voice was as tender as though she had +been the merest child. "The dream is coming true at last--that you can +walk and I can see. Think what it will mean to us both. And oh, Barbara, +think what it will be to me to see the words your dear mother wrote to +you--to know, from her own hand, that she died loving me." + +[Sidenote: Systematic Lying] + +Barbara suddenly turned cold. The hand that seemingly had clutched her +heart was tearing unmercifully at the tender fibre now. He would read +her mother's letter and know that his beloved Constance was in love with +another; that she took her own life because she could bear it no more. +He would know that they were poor, that the house was shabby, that the +pearls and laces and tapestries had all been sold. He would know, +inevitably, that Barbara's needle had earned their living for many +years; he would see, in the dining-room, the pitiful subterfuge of the +bit of damask, one knife and fork of solid silver, one fine plate and +cup. Above all, he would know that Barbara herself had systematically +lied to him ever since she could talk at all. And he had a horror of a +lie. + +"Don't," she cried, weakly. "Don't go." + +"You promised Barbara," he said, gently. Then he added, proudly: "The +Norths never go back on their spoken or written word. It is in the blood +to be true and you have promised. I shall go to-morrow." + +Barbara cringed and shrank from him. "Don't, dear," he said. "Your hands +are cold. Let me warm them in mine. I fear that to-day has been too much +for you." + +"I think it has," she answered. The words were almost a whisper. + +[Sidenote: If the Dream Comes True] + +"Then, don't try to talk, Barbara. I will talk to you. I know how you +feel about my going, but it is not necessary, for I do not fear in the +least for myself. I am sure that the dream is coming true, but, if it +should not--why, we can bear it together, dear, as we have borne +everything. The ways of the Everlasting are not our ways, but my faith +is very strong. + +[Sidenote: If the Dream Comes True] + +"If the dream comes true, as I hope and believe it will, you and I will +go away, dear, and see the world. We shall go to Europe and Egypt and +Japan and India, and to the Southern islands, to Greece and +Constantinople--I have planned it all. Aunt Miriam can stay here, or we +will take her with us, just as you choose. When you can walk, Barbara, +and I can see, I shall draw a large check, and we will start at the +first possible moment. The greatest blessing of money, I think, is the +opportunity it gives for travel. I have been glad, too, so many times, +that we are able to afford all these doctors and nurses. Think of the +poor people who must suffer always because they cannot command services +which are necessarily high-priced." + +Barbara's senses reeled and the cold, steel fingers clutched more +closely at the aching fibre of her heart. Until this moment, she had not +thought of the financial aspects of her situation--it had not occurred +to her that Doctor Conrad and the blue and white nurses and even the +red-haired young man would expect to be paid. And when her father went +to the hospital--"I shall have to sew night and day all the rest of my +life," she thought, "and, even then, die in debt." + +[Sidenote: The Lie] + +But over and above and beyond it all stood the Lie, that had lived in +her house for twenty years and more and was now to be cast out, +if--Barbara's heart stood still in horror because, for the merest +fraction of an instant, she had dared to hope that her father might +never see again. + +"I could not have gone alone," the old man was saying, "and even if +I could, I should never have left you, but now, I think, the time is +coming. I have dreamed all my life of the strange countries beyond the +sea, and longed to go. Your dear mother and I were going, in a little +while, but--" His lips quivered and he stopped abruptly. + +[Sidenote: Three Things] + +"What would you see, Daddy, if you had your choice? Tell me the three +things in the world that you most want to see." With supreme effort, +Barbara put self aside and endeavoured to lead him back to happier +things. + +"Three things?" he repeated. "Let me think. If God should give me back +my sight for the space of half an hour before I died, I should choose to +see, first, your dear mother's letter in which she says that she died +loving me; next, your mother herself as she was just before she died, +and then, dear, my Flower of the Dusk--my baby whom I never have seen. +Perhaps," he added, thoughtfully, "perhaps I should rather see you than +Constance, for, in a very little while, I should meet her past the +sunset, where she has waited so long for me. But the letter would come +first, Barbara--can you understand?" + +"Yes," she breathed, "I understand." + +The hope in her heart died. She could not ask for the letter. He took it +from his pocket as though it were a jewel of great price. "Put my finger +on the words that say, 'I love him still.'" + +Blinded with tears and choked by sobs, Barbara pointed out the line. +That, at least, was true. The old man raised it to his lips as a monk +might raise his crucifix when kneeling in penitential prayer. + +"I keep it always near me," he said, softly. "I shall keep it until +I can see." + + * * * * * + +Long after he had gone to bed, Barbara lay trembling. The problem that +had risen up before her without warning seemed to have no possible +solution. If he recovered his sight, she could not keep him from knowing +their poverty. One swift glance would show him all--and destroy his +faith in her. That was unavoidable. But--need he know that the dead had +deceived him too? + +The innate sex-loyalty, which is strong in all women who are really +fine, asserted itself in full power now. It was not only the desire to +save her father pain that made Barbara resolve, at any cost, to keep the +betraying letter from him. It was also the secret loyalty, not of a +child to an unknown mother, but of woman to woman--of sex to sex. + +[Sidenote: To-Day and To-Morrow] + +The house was very still. Outside, a belated cricket kept up his cheery +fiddling as he fared to his hidden home. Sometimes a leaf fell and +rustled down the road ahead of a vagrant wind. The clock ticked +monotonously. Second by second and minute by minute, To-Morrow advanced +upon Barbara; that To-Morrow which must be made surely right by the +deeds of To-Day. + +"If I could go," murmured Barbara. She was free of the plaster and she +could move about in bed easily. Ironically enough, her crutches leaned +against the farther wall, in sight but as completely out of reach as +though they were in the next room. + +Barbara sat up in bed and, cautiously, placed her two tiny bare feet on +the floor. With great effort, she stood up, sustained by a boundless +hope. She discovered that she could stand, even though she ached +miserably, but when she attempted to move, she fell back upon the bed. +She could not walk a step. + +[Sidenote: Vanishing Hopes] + +Faint with fear and pain, she got back into bed. She knew, now, all that +the red-haired young man had refused to tell her. He was too kind to say +that she was not to walk, after all. He was leaving it for Doctor +Conrad--or Eloise. + +Objects in the room danced before her mockingly. Her crutches were +veiled by a mist--those friendly crutches which had served her so well +and were now out of her reach. But Barbara had no time for self-pity. +The dominant need of the hour was pressing heavily upon her. + +With icy, shaking fingers, Barbara rang her bell. Presently Miriam came +in, attired in a flannel dressing-gown which was hopelessly unbecoming. +Barbara was moved to hysterical laughter, but she bit her lips. + +"Aunt Miriam," she said, trying to keep her voice even, "father has a +letter of mine in his coat pocket which I should like to read again +to-night. Will you bring me his coat, please?" + +Miriam turned away without a word. Her face was inscrutable. + +"Don't wake him," called Barbara, in a shrill whisper. "If he is not +asleep, wait until he is. I would not have him wakened, but I must have +the coat to-night." + +From his closed door came the sound of deep, regular breathing. Miriam +turned the knob noiselessly, opened the door, and slipped in. When her +eyes became accustomed to the darkness, she found the coat easily. It +had not taken long. Even Barbara might well be surprised at her +quickness. + +Perhaps the letter was not in his coat--it might be somewhere else. At +any rate, it would do no harm to make sure before going in to Barbara. +Miriam went into her own room and calmly lighted a candle. + +[Sidenote: The Letter Recovered] + +Yes, the letter was there--two sheets: one in ink, in Constance's hand, +the other, in pencil, written by Barbara. Why should Barbara write to +one who was blind? + +With her curiosity now thoroughly aroused, Miriam hastily read both +letters, then put them back. Her lips were curled in a sneer when she +took the coat into Barbara's room and gave it to her without speaking. + +The girl thrust an eager hand into the inner pocket and, with almost a +sob of relief, took out her mother's letter and her own version of it. + +"Thank you, Aunty," breathed Barbara. "I am sorry--to--to--disturb you, +but there was no--other way." + +[Sidenote: The Letter Destroyed] + +Miriam went out, as quietly as she had come, carrying the coat and +leaving Barbara's door ajar. When she was certain that she was alone, +Barbara tore the letter into shreds. So much, at least, was sure. Her +father should never see them, whatever he might think of her. + +Miriam was standing outside the blind man's door. She fancied she heard +him stir. It did not matter--there was plenty of time before morning to +return the coat. She took it back into her own room and sat down to +think. + +Her mirror reflected her face and the unbecoming dressing-gown. The +candlelight, however, was kind. It touched gently upon the grey in her +hair, hid the dark hollows under her eyes, and softened the lines in her +face. It lent a touch of grace to her work-worn hands, moving nervously +in her lap. + +After twenty-one years, this was what Constance had to say to +Barbara--that she loved another man, that Ambrose North was not to know +it, and that she did not quite trust Miriam. Also that Miriam had loved +Ambrose North and had never quite forgiven Constance for taking him +away from her. + +Out of the shadow of the grave, Miriam's secret stared her in the face. +She had not dreamed, until she read the letter, that Constance knew. +Barbara knew now, too. Miriam was glad that Barbara had the letter, for +she knew that, in all probability, she would destroy it. + +[Sidenote: A Crumbling Structure] + +The elaborate structure of deceit which they had so carefully reared +around the blind man was crumbling, even now. If he recovered his sight, +it must inevitably fall. He would know, in an instant of revelation, +that Miriam was old and ugly and not beautiful, as she had foolishly led +him to believe, years ago, when he asked how much time had changed her. +She looked pitifully at her hands, rough and knotted and red through +untiring slavery for him and his. + +She and Barbara would be sacrificed--no, for he would forgive Barbara +anything. She was the only one who would lose through his restored +vision, unless Constance might, in some way, be revealed to him as she +was. + +_"I do not quite trust Miriam. She loved your father and I took him away +from her."_ The cruel sentences moved crazily before her as in letters +of fire. + +The letter was gone. Ambrose North would never see the evidence of +Constance's distrust of her, nor come, without warning, upon Miriam's +pitiful secret which, with a woman's pride, she would hide from him at +all costs. None the less, Constance had stabbed her again. A ghostly +hand clutching a dagger had suddenly come up from the grave, and the +thrust of the cold, keen steel had been very sure. + +[Sidenote: Scheming Miriam] + +For twenty years and more, she had been tempted to read to the blind man +the letter Constance had written to Laurence Austin just before she +died. For that length of time, her desire to blacken Constance, in the +hope that the grief-stricken heart might once more turn to her, had +warred with her love and her woman's fear of hurting the one she loved. +To-night, even in the face of the letter to Barbara, she knew that she +should never have courage to read it to him, nor even to give it to him +with her own hands. + +In case he recovered his sight, she might leave it where he would find +it. She was glad, now, that the envelope was torn, for he would not be +apt to open a letter addressed to another, even though Constance had +penned the superscription and the man to whom it was addressed was dead. +His fine sense of honour would, undoubtedly, lead him to burn it. But, +if the letter were in a plain envelope, sealed, and she should leave it +on his dresser, he would be very sure to open it, if he saw it lying +there, and then---- + +Miriam smiled. Constance would be paid at last for her theft of another +woman's suitor, for her faithlessness and her cowardly desertion. There +was a heavy score against Constance, who had so belied the meaning of +her name, and the twenty years had added compound interest. North might +not--probably would not--turn again to Miriam after all these years; she +saw that plainly to-night for the first time, but he would, at any rate, +see that he had given up the gold for the dross. + +Miriam got her work-box and began to mend the coat lining. She had not +known that it was torn. She wondered how he would feel when he +discovered that the precious letter was lost. Would he blame Barbara--or +her? + +It would be too bad to have him lose the comfort those two sheets of +paper had given him. Miriam had seen him as he sat alone for hours in +his own room, with the door ajar, caressing the written pages as though +they were alive and answered him with love for love. She knew it was +Constance's letter to Barbara, but she had lacked curiosity as to its +contents until to-night. + +[Sidenote: The Plot] + +The letter to Laurence Austin was written on paper of the same size. +There was still some of it, in Constance's desk, in the living-room +downstairs. Suppose she should replace one letter with the other, and, +if he ever read it, let him have it all out with Barbara, who was +trying to save him from knowledge that he should have had long ago. + +The coat slipped to the floor as Miriam considered the plan. Perhaps one +of them would ask her what it was. In that case she would say, +carelessly: "Oh, a letter Constance left for Laurence Austin. I did not +think it best to deliver it, as it could do no good and might do a great +deal of harm." She would have the courage for that, surely, but, if she +failed at the critical moment, she could say, simply: "I do not know." + +She crept downstairs and returned with a sheet of Constance's +note-paper. Neither she nor Barbara had ever been obliged to use it, and +it was far back in a corner of a deep drawer, together with North's +check-book, which had been useless for so many years. + +As she had expected, it exactly matched the other sheet. She folded the +two together, with the letter to Laurence Austin inside. North would not +be disappointed, now, when he reached into his pocket and found no fond +letter from his dead but still beloved Constance. Barbara could not +change this, by rewriting into anything save a cry of passionate love. + +[Sidenote: Subtle Revenge] + +Miriam's whole being glowed with satisfaction. She thrilled with the +pleasure of this subtle revenge upon Constance, who was fully repaid, +now, for writing as she had. + +_"I do not quite trust Miriam. She loved your father and I took him away +from her."_ + +She repeated the words in a whisper, and smiled to think of the deeply +loving, passionate page to another man that had filled the place. Let +the Fates do their worst now, for when he should read it---- + +[Sidenote: The Irony of Fate] + +Some way, Miriam was very sure that his sight was to be restored to him. +She perceived, now, the irony of his caressing the letter Constance had +written to Barbara. How much more ironical it would be to see him, with +that unearthly light upon his face, moving his hand across the page +Constance had written to Laurence Austin just before she died. Miriam +well knew that the other letters had come first and that Constance's +last word had been to the man she loved. + +The hours passed on, slowly. The mist that hung over the sea was faintly +touched with dawn before Miriam arose, and, taking the coat, went back +to Ambrose North's room. She paused outside the door, but all was still. + +She entered, quietly, and laid the coat on a chair. She started back to +the door, but, before she touched the knob, the blind man stirred in his +sleep. + +"Constance," he said, drowsily, "is that you? Have you come back, +Beloved? It has seemed so long." + +[Sidenote: Surging Hatred] + +Miriam set her lips grimly against the surging hatred for the dead that +welled up within her. She went out hastily, and noiselessly closed the +door. + + + + +XVII + +"Never Again" + + +Barbara did not mind lying in bed, now that the heavy plaster cast was +gone and she could move about with comparative freedom. Every day, Aunt +Miriam massaged her with fragrant oils, and she faithfully took the +slight exercises she was bidden to take, even though she knew it was of +no use. She was glad, now, that she had kept the crutches in sight, for +they had steadily reminded her not to hope too much. + +[Sidenote: Bitterly Disappointed] + +Still, she was bitterly disappointed, though she thought she had not +allowed herself to hope--that she had done it only because Eloise wanted +her to. Perhaps the red-haired young man knew, and perhaps not--she was +not so sure, now, that he had refrained from telling her through motives +of kindness. But Doctor Conrad would know, instantly, and he and Eloise +would be very sorry. Barbara wiped away her tears and compressed her +lips tightly together. "I won't cry," she said to herself. "I won't, +I won't, I won't." + +Her father had gone to the city with the red-haired young man and the +nurse. He had been gone more than a week, and Barbara had received no +news of him save a brief note from Doctor Conrad. He said that her +father had been to a specialist of whom he had spoken to her, and that +an operation had been decided upon. He would tell her all about it, he +added, when he saw her. + +Day by day, Barbara lived over the last evening she and her father had +spent together--all the fear and foreboding. She did not for a moment +regret that she had taken his precious letter from him and destroyed it. +She would face whatever she must, and as bravely as she might, but he +should not be hurt in that manner--she had taken the one sure way to +spare him that. + +[Sidenote: A Long Farewell] + +When he came back, and realised to the full how steadily she had +deceived him, he could love her no more. When he said good-bye to her +the morning he went away, it had been good-bye in more ways than one. It +was a long farewell to the love and confidence that had bound him to +her; an eternal separation, in spirit, from the child he had loved. + +The tears came when she remembered how he had said good-bye to her. Aunt +Miriam and the red-haired young man and the nurse had left them alone +together for what might be the last time on earth, and was most surely +the last time as regarded the old, sweet relation so soon to be +severed--unless he came back blind, as he had gone. + +The old man had leaned over her and kissed her twice. "Flower of the +Dusk," he had said, with surpassing tenderness, "when I come back, the +dusk will change to dawn. If the darkness lifts I shall see you first, +and so, for a little while, good-bye." + +He had gone downstairs quickly and lightly, as one who is glad to go. +When she last saw him, he was walking ahead of the young doctor and the +nurse, straight and eager and almost young again, sustained by the same +boundless hope that had given Barbara strength for her ordeal. + +[Sidenote: Dr. Conrad Comes Again] + +It was almost two weeks before Doctor Conrad came down. He had been +obliged, lately, to miss several Sundays with Eloise. When Aunt Miriam +came and told Barbara that he was downstairs, she felt a sudden, sharp +pang of disappointment, not for herself, but for him. He had tried so +hard and done so much, and to know that he had failed-- Even in the face +of her own bitter outlook, she could be sorry for him. + +But, when he came in, he did not seem to need anyone's sympathy. He was +so magnificently young and strong, so full of splendid vitality. +Barbara's failing courage rose in answer to him and she smiled as she +offered a frail little hand. + +"Well, little girl," said Doctor Allan, sitting down on the bed beside +her, "how goes it?" + +"Tell me about father," begged Barbara, ignoring the question. + +[Sidenote: The Main Trouble] + +"Father is doing very well," Allan assured her. "He has recovered nicely +from the operation and we have strong hope for the sight of one eye if +not for both. I can almost promise you partial restoration, but, of +course, it is impossible to tell definitely until later. His heart is +very weak--that seems to be the main trouble now." + +Barbara lay very still, with her eyes closed. + +"Aren't you glad?" asked Doctor Allan, in surprise. + +"Yes," answered Barbara, with difficulty. "Indeed, yes. I was just +thinking." + +"A penny for your thoughts," he smiled. + +"Are they going to take off the bandages there at the hospital?" + +"Why, yes--of course." + +"They mustn't!" cried Barbara, sitting up in bed. "Or, if they have to, +I must go there. Doctor Conrad, I must see my father before he regains +his sight." + +"Why?" asked Allan. "Don't cry, little girl--tell me." + +His voice was very soothing, and, as he spoke, he took hold of her +fluttering hands. The strong clasp was friendly and reassuring. + +"Because I've lied to him," sobbed Barbara. + +"I've made him think we were rich instead of poor. He doesn't know that +I've earned our living all these years by sewing, and that we've had to +sell everything that anybody would buy--the pearls and laces and +everything. He hates a lie and he'll despise me. It will break his +heart. I'd rather tell him myself than to have him find it out." + +"Little girl," said Allan, in his deep, tender voice; "dear little girl. +Nobody on earth could blame you for doing that, least of all your +father. If he's half the man I think he is, he'll only love you the more +for doing it." + +Barbara looked up at him, her deep blue eyes brimming with tears. "Do +you think," she asked, chokingly, "that he ever can forgive me?" + +[Sidenote: A Promise] + +Allan laughed. "In a minute," he assured her. "Of course he'll forgive +you. But I'll promise you that you shall see him first. As far as that +is concerned, I can take the bandages off myself, after he comes home." + +"Can you really? And will you?" + +"Surely. Now don't fret about it any more. Let's see how you're getting +on." + +In an instant the man was pushed into the background and the great +surgeon took his place. He went at his work with the precision and power +of a perfect machine, guided by that unspoken sympathy which was his +inestimable gift. He tested muscles and bones and turned the joint in +its socket. Barbara watched his face anxiously. His forehead was set in +a frown and his eyes were keen, but the rest of his face was impassive. + +"Sit up," he said. "Now, turn this way. That's right--now stand up." + +Barbara obeyed him, trembling. In a minute more he would know. + +"Stand on this side only. Now, can you walk?" + +"No," answered Barbara, in a sad little whisper, "I can't." She reached +for her faithful crutches, which leaned against the foot of the bed, but +Doctor Allan snatched them away from her. + +"No," he said, with his face illumined. "Never again." + +[Sidenote: New Hopes] + +Barbara gasped. "What do you mean?" she asked, terror and joy strangely +mingling in her voice. + +"Never again," Doctor Allan repeated. "You're never to have your +crutches again." + +Barbara gazed at him in astonishment. She stood there in her little +white night-gown, which was not long enough to cover her bare pink feet, +with a great golden braid hanging over either shoulder and far below her +waist. Her blue eyes were very wide and dark. + +"Am I going to walk?" she asked, in a queer little whisper. + +"Certainly, except when you're riding, or sitting down, or asleep." + +"I can't believe it," she answered, with quivering lips. Then she threw +her arms around Doctor Allan's neck and kissed him with the sweet +impulsiveness of a child. + +"Thank you," he said, softly. "Now we'll walk." + +[Sidenote: Walking Again] + +He put his arm around her and Barbara took a few stumbling steps. Aunt +Miriam opened the door and came in. + +"Look," cried Barbara. "I'm walking." + +"So I see," replied Miriam. "I heard the noise and came up to see what +was the matter. I thought perhaps you wanted something." She retreated +as swiftly as she had come. Allan stared after her and seemed to be on +the verge of saying something very much to the point, but fortunately +held his peace. + +"You'll have to learn," he said, to Barbara, with a new gentleness in +his tone. "Your balance is entirely different and these muscles and +joints will have to learn to work. Keep up the exercise and the massage. +You can have a cane, if you like, but no crutches. Is there someone who +would help you for an hour or so every day?" + +"Roger would," she said, "or Aunt Miriam." + +"Better get Roger--he'll be stronger. And also more willing," he +thought, but he did not say so. "Don't tire yourself, but walk a little +every day, as you feel like it." + +When he went, he took the crutches with him. "You might be tempted," he +explained, "if they were here, and your father's cane is all you really +need. Be a good girl and I'll come up again soon." + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: A Great Success] + +Eloise was watching from the piazza of the hotel, and, when he came in +sight, she went up the road to meet him. + +"Oh, Allan," she cried, breathlessly, as she saw the crutches. "Is +she----?" + +"She's all right. It's one of the most successful operations ever done +in that line, even if I do say it as shouldn't." + +"Of course," smiled Eloise, looking up at him fondly. "I know _that_." + +They walked together down to the shore, followed by the deep and open +interest of the rocking-chair brigade, marshalled twenty strong, on the +hotel veranda. It was October and the children had all been taken back +to school. The exquisite peace of the place was a thing to dream about +and be spoken of only in reverent whispers. + +The tide was going out. Allan hurled one of the crutches far out to sea. +"They've worked faithfully and long," he said, "and they deserve a +little jaunt to Europe. Here goes." + +He was about to throw the other, but Eloise took it from him. "Let me," +she suggested. "I'd love to throw a crutch over to Europe." + +She tried it, with the customary feminine awkwardness. It did not go +beyond the shallow water, and speared itself, sharp end downward, in the +soft sand. + +Allan laughed uproariously and Eloise coloured with shame. "Never mind," +she said, with affected carelessness, "you couldn't have made it stick +up in the sand like that, and I think it'll get to Europe just as soon +as yours does, so there." + +They sat down on the beach, sheltered from prying eyes by a sand dune, +and directly opposite the crutch, which wobbled with every wave that +struck it. "Think what it means," said Eloise, "and think what it might +mean. It might be part of a shipwreck, or someone who needed it very +much might have dropped it accidentally out of a boat, or the one who +had it might have died, after long suffering." + +"Or," continued Allan, "someone might have outgrown the need of it and +thrown it away, as the tiny dwellers in the sea cast off their shells." + +[Sidenote: Thanks] + +Eloise turned to him, with her deep eyes soft with luminous mist. "I +haven't thanked you," she said, "for all you have done for my little +girl." She lifted her sweet face to his. + +"If you're going to thank me like that," said Allan, huskily, "I'll cut +up the whole township and not even bother to save the pieces." + +"You needn't," laughed Eloise, "but it was dear of you. You've never +done anything half so lovely in all your life." + +"It was you who did it, dear. I was but the humble instrument in your +hands." + +"Was Barbara glad?" + +"I think so. She kissed me, too, but not like that." + +"Did she, really? The sweet, shy little thing. Bless her heart." + +"I infer, Miss Wynne," remarked Allan, in a judicial tone, "that you're +not jealous." + +"Jealous? I should say not. Anybody who can get you away from me," she +added, as an afterthought, "can have you with my blessing and a few +hints as to your management." + +[Sidenote: Really Glad] + +"Safe offer," he commented. "Are you really glad I've done what I have +for Barbara?" + +"Oh, my dear! So glad!" + +"Then," suggested Allan, hopefully, "don't you think I should be thanked +again?" + + * * * * * + +"I forgot to ask you about that dear old man," said Eloise, after a +little. "Is he going to be all right, too?" + +"Pretty much so, I think. We're very sure that he can see a little--he +will not be totally blind. He will probably need glasses, but there +will be plenty of time for that. His heart is the main trouble now. Any +sudden excitement or shock might easily prove fatal." + +"Of course he won't have that." + +[Sidenote: Will It Last?] + +"We'll hope not, but life itself is more or less exciting and you can +never tell what's going to break loose next. I have long since ceased to +be surprised at anything, except the fact that you love me. I can't get +used to that." + +"You will, though," said Eloise, a little sadly. "You'll get so used to +it that you won't even look up when I come into the room--you'll keep +right on reading your paper." + +"Impossible." + +"That's what they all say, but it's so." + +"Have all your previous husbands changed so quickly that you're afraid +to try me?" + +"I've seen it so much," sighed Eloise. + +A great light broke in upon Allan. "Is that why?" he demanded, putting +his arm around her. "No, you needn't try to get away, for you can't. Is +that why I'm sentenced to all this infernal waiting?" + +Eloise bit her lips and did not answer. + +"Is it?" he asked, authoritatively. + +"A little," she whispered. "This is so sweet, and sometimes I'm +afraid----" + +"Darling! Darling!" he said, drawing her closer. "You make me ashamed of +my fellowmen when you say that. But do you want the year to stand still +always at June?" + +"No," she answered. "I'm willing to grow with Love, from all the promise +of Spring into the harvest and even into Winter, as long as the +sweetness is there. Don't you understand, Allan? Who would wish for June +when Indian Summer fills all the silences with shimmering amethystine +haze? And who would give up a keen, crisp Winter day, when the air sets +the blood to tingling, for apple blossoms or even roses? It's not +that--I only want the sweetness to stay." + +"Please God, it shall," returned Allan, solemnly. He was profoundly +moved. + +[Sidenote: Bank of Life] + +"It shouldn't be so hard to keep it," went on Eloise, thoughtfully. +"I've been thinking about it a good deal, lately. Life will give us back +whatever we put into it. In a way, it's just like a bank. Put joy into +the world and it will come back to you with compound interest, but you +can't check out either money or happiness when you have made no +deposits." + +"Very true," he responded. "I never thought of it in just that way +before." + +"If you put joy in, and love, unselfishness, and a little laughter, and +perfect faith--I think they'll all come back, some day." + +A scarlet leaf from a maple danced along the beach, blown from some +distant bough where the frost had set a flaming signal in the still +September night. A yellow leaf from an elm swiftly caught it, and +together they floated out to sea. + +[Sidenote: When?] + +"Sweetheart," said Allan, "do you see? The leaves are beginning to fall +and in a little while the trees will be bare. How long are you going to +keep me waiting for wife and home?" + +"I--don't--know." + +"Dear, can't you trust me?" + +"Yes, always," she answered, quickly. "You know that." + +"Then when?" + +"When all the colour is gone," she said, after a pause. "When the forest +is desolate and the wind sighs through bare branches--when Winter chills +our hearts--then I will come to you, and for a little while bring back +the Spring." + +"Truly, Sweetheart?" + +"Truly." + +"You'll never be sorry, dear." He took her into his arms and sealed her +promise upon her lips. + + + + +XVIII + +The Passing of Fido + + +[Sidenote: Alone in the Office] + +Fido had been in the office alone for almost three hours. The old man, +who he knew was his master, and the young man, who was inclined to be +impatient with him when he felt playful, had both gone out. The door was +locked and there was nobody on the other side of it to answer a vigorous +scratch or even a pleading whine. When people knocked, they went away +again, almost immediately. + +The window-sills were too high for a little dog to reach, and there was +no chair near. He walked restlessly around the office, stopping at +intervals to sit down and thoughtfully contemplate his feet, which were +much too large for the rest of him. He chased a fly that tickled his +ear, but it eluded him, and now buzzed temptingly on a window-pane, out +of his reach. + +It seemed that something serious must have happened, for Fido had never +been left alone so long before. If he had known that the old man was +conversing pleasantly with some fellow-citizens at the grocery store, +and that the young one had his arm around a laughing girl in white, +trying to teach her to walk, he would have been very indignant indeed. + +Several times, lately, Fido had noticed, the young man had gone out +shortly after the old one went to the post-office. It would be, usually, +half a day later when his master returned with a letter or two, or often +with none. The young man took pains to get back before the old one did, +which was well, for there should always be someone in a lawyer's office +to receive clients and keep dogs from being lonely. + +[Sidenote: Pangs of Hunger] + +The pangs of a devastating hunger assailed Fido, which was not strange, +for it was long past the hour when the old man usually took a bulky +parcel out of his desk, spread a newspaper upon the floor, and bade Fido +eat of cold potatoes, meat, and bread. There was, nearly always, a nice, +juicy bone to beguile the tedium of the afternoon. Fido and the old man +seldom went home to supper before half past five, and Fido would have +been famished were it not for the comfort of the bone. + +He sniffed around the larger of the two desks. A tempting odour came +from a drawer far above. He stood on his hind legs and reached up as far +as he could, but the drawer was closed. So was every other drawer in the +office, except one, and that was in the young man's desk. Probably +there was nothing in it for a hungry dog--there never had been. + +[Sidenote: The Little Red Box] + +Still, it might be well to investigate. Fido laboriously climbed up on +the chair and put his paws upon the edge of the open drawer. There was +nothing in it but papers and a small, square, red box with a rubber band +around it. + +Fido took the box in his mouth and jumped down. He pushed it with paws +and nose over to his own particular corner, sniffing appreciatively +meanwhile. It took much vigorous chewing to get the rubber band off and +to make a hole in one corner of the box, out of which rolled a great +number of small, cylindrical objects. They were not like anything Fido +had ever eaten before, but hungry little dogs must take what they can +find. So he gulped them all down but one. This one refused to be +swallowed and Fido quickly repented of his rashness, for it was +distinctly not good. He ate the rubber band and all but a little piece +of the red box before the taste was quite gone out of his mouth. Even +then, a drink of fresh, cool water would have been very acceptable, but +there was nobody to care whether a little dog died of thirst or not. + +The bluebottle fly buzzed loudly upon the window-pane, but Fido no +longer aspired to him. A vast weariness took the place of his former +restlessness. He sat and blinked at his ill-assorted feet for some +time, then dragged himself lazily toward his cushion in the corner. +Before he reached it, he was so very sleepy that he lay down upon the +floor. In less than five minutes, he was off to the canine dreamland, +one paw still caressingly laid over the fragments of the little red box. + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: The Judge Returns] + +When the Judge came in, an hour later, he was much surprised to find the +office locked and the cards of three valued clients on the floor under +the door. There had been four, but Fido had eaten the first one. Two of +them were marked with the hour of the call. It indicated, plainly, to a +logical mind, that Roger had left the office soon after he did, and had +not returned. It was very strange. + +Fido slumbered on, though hitherto the sound of his master's step would +awaken him to noisy and affectionate demonstrations. The Judge turned +Fido over with a friendly foot, but there was no answer save a wide +yawn. He brought the parcel of bread and meat and opened it, leaving it +on the floor close by. Then he took a chicken bone and held it to the +sleeper's nose, but Fido turned away as though from an annoying fly. + +As the dog had never before failed to take immediate interest in a +chicken bone, the Judge was alarmed. He picked up the fragments of the +little red box and wondered if anyone could have poisoned his pet. He +brought fresh water, but Fido, hitherto possessed of an unquenchable +thirst, failed to respond. + +When Roger came in, belated and breathless, he found his explanations +coldly received. Whether or not Barbara North ever walked was evidently +a matter of no particular concern to the Judge. It was also of no +immediate importance that clients had come and found the office empty, +even though one of them, presumably, had intended to settle an account +of long standing. The vital question was simply this: what was the +matter with Fido? + +Roger did not know. Though Fido's disdain of food and drink might be +abnormal, his position on the floor and his deep breathing were quite +natural. + +[Sidenote: An Inquiry] + +Then the fragments of the little red box were presented to Roger, and +inquiry made as to the contents. Also, had Roger tried to poison the +Judge's pet? + +Roger had not. The box had contained a prescription for lumbago which +Doctor Conrad had given his mother. It was in the drawer in his desk. He +might possibly have left the drawer open--probably had, as the box was +gone. + +The Judge was deeply desirous of knowing why Mrs. Austin's lumbago cure +should be kept in the office, within reach of unwary pets. After +considerable hesitation, Roger explained. + +The owner of Fido was highly incensed. First, he condemned the entire +procedure as "criminal carelessness," setting forth his argument in +unparliamentary language. Then, remembering that Roger had not really +loved Fido, he brought forth an unworthy motive, and accused the hapless +young man of murderous intent. + +[Sidenote: The Judge Commands] + +Roger would kindly borrow the miniature express waggon which was the +prized possession of the postmaster's small son, place the cushion in +it, with its precious burden, and convey Fido, with all possible +tenderness, to his other and larger cushion in the Judge's own bedroom. +He would take the cold chicken, too, please, for if Fido ever wanted +anything again in this world, it would probably be chicken. + +The Judge would follow as soon as he had written to his clients and +expressed his regret that his clerk's numerous social duties did not +permit of his giving much time to his business. And, the Judge added, as +an afterthought, if Fido should die, it would not be necessary for Roger +to return to the office. He wanted someone who could be trusted not to +poison his dog while he was out. + +Roger was too much disturbed to be conscious of the ludicrous aspect he +presented to the public eye as he went down the main thoroughfare of +Riverdale, dragging the small cart which contained the slumbering Fido +and his cushion. He did not even hear the pointed comments made by the +young of both sexes whom he encountered on his interminable walk, and +forgot to thank the postmaster for the loan of the cart when he returned +it, empty save for a fragment of cold chicken and a faint, doggy smell. + +[Sidenote: On the Beach] + +For obvious reasons, he could not go to the office and he did not like +to take his disturbing mood to Barbara. Besides, his mother, who now had +long wakeful periods in the daytime, might see him and ask unpleasant +questions. He went down to the beach, yearning for solitude, and settled +himself in the shelter of a sand dune to meditate upon the unhappy +events of the day. + +He did not realise that the sand dune belonged to Eloise, and that she +was wont to sit there with Doctor Conrad, out of the wind, and safely +screened from the argus-eyed rocking-chairs on the veranda. He was so +preoccupied that he did not even hear the sound of their voices as they +approached. Turning the corner quickly, they almost stumbled over him. + +"Upon my word," cried Eloise. "Sir Knight of the Dolorous Countenance, +what has gone wrong?" + +"Nothing," answered Roger, miserably. + +"Anybody dead?" queried Allan, lazily stretching himself upon the sand. + +"Not yet, but somebody is dying." + +"Who?" demanded Eloise. "Barbara, or your mother? Who is it?" + +"Fido," said Roger hopelessly, staring out to sea. + +Allan laughed, but Eloise returned, kindly: "I didn't know you had a +dog. I'm sorry." + +"He isn't mine," explained Roger; "I only wish he were. If he had been," +he added, viciously, "he'd have died a violent death long ago." + +[Sidenote: Miss Wynne's Plans] + +Little by little, the whole story came out. Allan kept his face straight +with difficulty, but Eloise was genuinely distressed. "Don't worry," she +said, sympathetically. "If Fido dies and the Judge won't take you back, +I can probably find an opening for you in town. Your office work will +pay your expenses, so you can go to law school in the evenings and be +ready for your examinations in the Spring." + +"Oh, Miss Wynne," cried Roger. "How good you are! I don't wonder Barbara +calls you her Fairy Godmother." + +"Barbara is coming to town to spend the Winter with me," Eloise went on, +happily. "She's never had a good time and I'm going to give her one. As +soon as she's strong enough, and can walk well, I'm going to take her, +bag and baggage. It's all I'm waiting here for." + +In a twinkling, Roger's despair was changed to something entirely +different. "Oh," he cried, "I do hope Fido will die. Do you think there +is any chance?" he asked, eagerly, of Allan. + +"I should think, from what you tell me," remarked Allan, judicially, +"that Fido was nearly through with his earthly troubles. A dose of that +size might easily keep any of us from worrying any longer about the +price of meat and next month's rent." + +"Mother won't like it," said Roger, soberly. "She may not be willing for +me to go." + +"She should be," returned Allan, "as you've saved her life at the +expense of Fido's. When I go up to see Barbara this afternoon, I'll stop +in and tell her." + +[Sidenote: Unexpected Call] + +Miss Mattie was awake, but yawning, when he knocked at her door. "There +wasn't no call for you to come," she said, inhospitably; "the medicine +ain't used up yet." + +"Let me see the box, please." + +She shuffled off to the kitchen cupboard and brought it to him. There +were half a dozen flour-filled capsules in it. Allan observed that the +druggist, in writing the directions on the cover, had failed to add the +last two words. + +"Idiot," he said, under his breath. "I wrote, 'Take two every four hours +until relieved.'" + +"I was relieved," explained Miss Mattie, "and I've had fine sleep ever +since. It's wore off considerable in the last three days, though." + +Allan then told her, in vivid and powerful language, how the druggist's +error might have had very serious results, had it not been for Roger's +presence of mind in substituting the flour-filled capsules for the +"searching medicine." He was surprised to find that Miss Mattie was +ungrateful, and that she violently resented the imposition. + +[Sidenote: Notion of Economy] + +"Roger's just like his pa," she said, with the dull red rising in her +cheeks. "He never had no notion of economy. When I'm takin' a dollar and +twenty cents' worth of medicine, to keep it from bein' wasted, Roger +goes and puts flour into the covers of it, and feeds the expensive +medicine to Judge Bascom's Fido. He thinks more of that dog than he does +of his sick mother." + +"My dear Mrs. Austin," said Allan, solemnly, "have you not heard the +news?" + +"What news?" she demanded, bristling. + +"Little Fido is dying. He took all the medicine and has been asleep ever +since. By morning, he will be dead." + +Miss Mattie's jaw dropped. "Would you mind tellin' me," she asked, +suspiciously, "why you took it on yourself to give me medicine that +would pizen a dog? I might have took it all at once, to save it. Once +I was minded to." + +"Roger saved your life," said Allan, endeavouring to make his tone +serious. "And because of it, he is about to lose his position. The Judge +is so disturbed over Fido's approaching dissolution that he has told +Roger never to come back any more. Unless we can find him a place in +town, he has sacrificed his whole future to save his mother's life." + +"Where is Roger?" + +"I left him down on the beach, with Miss Wynne. I suppose he is still +there." + +"When you see him," commanded Miss Mattie, with some asperity, "will you +kindly send him home? It's no time for him to be gallivantin' around +with girls, when his mother's been so near death." + +"I will," Allan assured her, reaching for his hat. "I hope you +appreciate what he has done for you." + +[Sidenote: The Doctor Laughs] + +When he went down the road, his shoulders were shaking suspiciously. +Miss Mattie was watching him through the lace curtains that glorified +the parlour windows. "Seems as if he had St. Vitus's dance," she mused. +"Wonder why he doesn't mix up some dog-pizen, and cure himself?" + +When he was sure that he was out of sight, Allan sat down on a +convenient boulder at the side of the road, and gave himself up to +unrestrained mirth. The medicine which was about to prove fatal to Fido +would have caused only prolonged sleep if taken in small doses, at +proper intervals, by an adult. "It's a wonder she didn't take 'em all at +once," he thought. "And if she had--" He speculated, idly, upon the +probable effect. + +His conscience pricked him slightly on account of the exaggeration in +which he had mischievously indulged, but he told himself that Roger +would be far better off in the city and his mother's consent would make +his going much less difficult. He also realised that if Roger were there +to amuse Barbara, Eloise might have more spare time than she would +otherwise. + +He stopped long enough to give the druggist a bad quarter of an hour, +and then went back to the beach. Eloise and Roger were where he had left +them, and the boy's gloom was entirely gone. + +"Your mother wants you," he said, as he sat down on the other side of +Eloise. + +"All right--I'll go right up. How did she take it?" + +"Very well. Just remember that you've saved her life, and you'll have no +trouble." + +[Sidenote: Light-Hearted] + +When Roger went up the street, he was whistling, from sheer +light-heartedness. Eloise had made so many plans for his future that he +saw fame and fortune already within his reach. + +When he knocked, never having been allowed the freedom of a latch key, +he noted that all the blinds in the house were closed and wondered +whether his mother had gone to sleep again. After a suitable interval, +she opened the door, clad in her best black silk, and portentously +solemn. + +"Why, Mother, what's the matter?" + +"Come in," she whispered. "Doctor Conrad has just been tellin' me how +near I come to death. Oh, my son," she cried, throwing her arms around +his neck, "you have saved my life." + +[Sidenote: Two Greetings] + +It seemed to Roger like a paragraph torn from _The Metropolitan Weekly_, +but he patted her back soothingly as she clung to him. Maternal +outbursts of this sort were extremely rare. He remembered only one other +greeting like this--the day he had been swimming in the river with three +other small boys and had been brought home in a blanket, half drowned. + +"I suppose I shouldn't regret takin' dog-pizen, if it cured my back and +give me the sleep I needed, but it was a dreadful narrow escape. And +your takin' the medicine away from me and feedin' it to Fido was +certainly clever, Roger. Every day you remind me more and more of your +pa." + +"Thank you," answered Roger. He was struggling with various emotions and +found speech almost impossible. + +"It's no more'n right," she resumed, "that, after having pizened Fido +and lost you your place, that Doctor Conrad should stir himself around +and get you a better place in the city, but I do hate to have you go, +Roger. It'll be dreadful lonesome for me." + +"Cheer up, Mother; I haven't gone yet. The dog may get well." + +Miss Mattie shook her head sadly. "No, he won't," she sighed. "I took +enough of that medicine to know how powerful it is, and Fido ain't got +no chance. To-morrow I'll look over your things." + +An atmosphere of solemnity pervaded the house, and the evening was spent +very quietly. Miss Mattie read her Bible, as on Sunday evenings when she +did not go to church, and sternly refused to open _The Housewife's +Companion_, which lay temptingly near her. + +[Sidenote: Nightmare] + +She went to bed early, and Roger soon followed her, having strangely +lost his desire to read, and not daring to go to see Barbara more than +once a day. His night was made hideous by visions of himself drawing the +cart containing the slumbering Fido into the church where Eloise and +Doctor Conrad were being married, while Judge Bascom at the house, was +conducting Miss Mattie's funeral. + +In the morning, after breakfast, Roger seriously debated whether or not +he should go down to the office. At last he tossed up a coin and +muttered a faint imprecation as he picked it up. + +With his hat firmly on and his hands in his pockets, Roger fared forth, +whistling determinedly. He did not want to go to the office, and he +dreaded, exceedingly, his next meeting with the irascible Judge. + +As it happened, it was not necessary for him to go, for, at the corner +of the street which led to the Judge's house, he met the postmaster's +small son, laboriously dragging the fateful cart of yesterday. In it +were all of Roger's books and other belongings, including an umbrella +which he had loaned to the Judge on a rainy night and expected never to +see again. + +[Sidenote: A Brief Message] + +The message was brief and very much to the point. Fido had died +painlessly at four o'clock that morning. + + + + +XIX + +The Dreams Come True + + +[Sidenote: Gaining Strength] + +The hours Roger had taken from his work in the office had brought +nothing but good to Barbara. She gained strength rapidly after she began +to walk, and was soon able to dispense with the cane, though she could +not walk easily, nor far. She tired quickly and was forced to rest +often, but she went about the house slowly and even up and down the +stairs. + +Aunt Miriam made no comment of any sort. She did not say she was glad +Barbara was well after twenty-two years of helplessness, even though she +had taken entire care of her, and must have felt greatly relieved when +the burden was lifted. She went about her work as quietly as ever, and +fulfilled all her household duties with mechanical precision. + +Spicy odours were wafted through the rooms, for Eloise had ordered +enough jelly, sweet pickles, and preserves to supply a large family for +two or three years. She had also bought quilts and rag rugs for all of +her old-lady friends and taken the entire stock of candied orange peel +for the afternoon teas which she expected to give during the Winter. + +Barbara was hard at work upon the dainty lingerie Eloise had planned, +and found, by a curious anomaly, that when she did not work so hard, she +was able to accomplish more. The needle flew more swiftly when her +fingers did not ache and the stitches blur indistinguishably with the +fibre of the fabric. When Roger was not there to help her, she divided +her day, by the clock, into hours of work and quarter-hours of exercise +and rest. + +She had been out of the gate twice, with Roger, and had walked up and +down the road in front of the house, but, as yet, she had not gone +beyond the little garden alone. + +[Sidenote: One Dark Cloud] + +Upon the fair horizon of the future was one dark cloud of dread which +even Doctor Conrad's positive assurance had mitigated only for a little +time. Barbara knew her father and his stern, uncompromising +righteousness. When the bandages were taken off and he saw the faded +walls and dingy furniture, the worn rugs, and the pitiful remnant of +damask at his place at the table; when he realised that his daughter had +deceived him ever since she could talk at all, he must inevitably +despise her, even though he tried to hide it. + +Dimly, Barbara began to perceive the intangible price that is attached +to the things of the spirit as well as to the material necessities of +daily life. She was forced to surrender his love for her as the +compensation for his sight, yet she was firmly resolved to keep, for +him, the love that refused to reckon with the barrier of a grave, but +triumphantly went past it to clasp the dead Beloved closer still. + +[Sidenote: A Vague Dream] + +Of late, she had been thinking much of her mother. Until Roger had found +his father's letter, and she had received her own, upon her +twenty-second birthday, she had felt no sense of loss. Constance had +been a vague dream to her and little more, in spite of her father's +grieving and her instinctive sympathy. + +With the letters, however, had come a change. Barbara felt a certain +shadowy relationship and an indefinite bereavement. She wondered how her +mother had looked, what she had worn, and even how she had dressed her +hair. Since her father had gone to the hospital, she had wondered more +than ever, but got no satisfaction when she had once asked Aunt Miriam. + +She finished the garment upon which she was working, threaded the narrow +white ribbon into it, folded it in tissue paper and put it into the +chest. It was the last of the second set and Eloise had ordered six. +"Four more to do," thought Barbara. "I wonder whether she wants them all +alike." + +The afternoon shadows had begun to lengthen, and it was Saturday. It was +hardly worth while to begin a new piece of work before Monday morning, +especially since she wanted to ask Eloise about a new pattern. Doctor +Conrad was coming down for the weekend, and probably both of them would +be there late in the afternoon, or on Sunday. + +"How glad he'll be," said Barbara, to herself. "He'll be surprised when +he sees how well I can walk. And father--oh, if father could only come +too." She was eager, in spite of her dread. + +[Sidenote: In the Attic] + +Simply for the sake of exercise, Barbara climbed the attic stairs and +came down again. After she had rested, she tried it once more, but was +so faint when she reached the top that she went into the attic and sat +down in an old broken rocker. It was the only place in the house where +she had not been since she could walk, and she rather enjoyed the +novelty of it. + +A decrepit sofa, with the springs hanging from under it, was against the +wall at one side, far back under the eaves. It was of solid mahogany and +had not been bought by the searchers for antiques because its +rehabilitation would be so expensive. That and the rocker in which +Barbara sat were the only pieces of furniture remaining. + +There were several trunks, old-fashioned but little worn. One was Aunt +Miriam's, one was her father's, and the others must have belonged to her +dead mother. For the first time in her life, Barbara was curious about +the trunks. + +[Sidenote: The Old Trunk] + +When she was quite rested, she went over to a small one which stood near +the window, and opened it. A faint, musty odour greeted her, but there +was no disconcerting flight of moths. Every woollen garment in the house +had long ago been used by Aunt Miriam for rugs and braided mats. She had +taken Constance's underwear for her own use when misfortune overtook +them, and there was little else left. + +Barbara lifted from the trunk a gown of heavy white brocade, figured +with violets in lavender and palest green. It was yellow and faded and +the silver thread that ran through the pattern was tarnished so that it +was almost black. The skirt had a long train and around the low-cut +bodice was a deep fall of heavy Duchess lace, yellowed to the exquisite +tint of old ivory. The short sleeves were trimmed with lace of the same +pattern, but only half as wide. + +"Oh," said Barbara, aloud, "how lovely!" + +There was a petticoat of rustling silk, and a pair of dainty white +slippers, yellowed, too, by the slow passage of the years. Their silver +buckles were tarnished, but their high heels were as coquettish as +ever. + +"What a little foot," thought Barbara. "I believe it was smaller than +mine." + +She took off her low shoe, and, like Cinderella, tried on the slipper. +She was much surprised to find that it fitted, though the high heels +felt queer. Her own shoe was more comfortable, and so she changed again, +though she had quite made up her mind to wear the slippers sometime. + +[Sidenote: Treasured Finery] + +In the trunk, too, she found a white bonnet that she tried on, but +without satisfaction, as there was no mirror in the attic. This one +trunk evidently contained the finery for which Miriam had not been able +to find use. + +One by one, Barbara took out the garments, which were all of silk or +linen--there was nothing there for the moths. The long bridal veil of +rose point, that Barbara had sternly refused to sell, was yellow, too, +but none the less lovely. There was a gold scent-bottle set with +discoloured pearls, an amethyst brooch which no one would buy because it +had three small gold tassels hanging from it, and a lace fan with +tortoise-shell sticks, inlaid with mother-of-pearl. A thrifty woman at +the hotel had once offered two dollars for the fan, but Barbara had kept +it, as she was sure it was worth more. + +Down in the bottom of the trunk was an inlaid box that she did not +remember having seen before. She slid back the cover and found a lace +handkerchief, a broken cuff-button, a gold locket enamelled with black, +a long fan-chain of gold, set with amethysts, a small gold-framed mirror +evidently meant to be carried in a purse or hand-bag, a high shell comb +inlaid with gold and set with amethysts, and ten of the dozen large, +heavy gold hairpins which Ambrose North, in an extravagant mood, had +ordered made for the shining golden braids of his girl-wife. + +[Sidenote: A Photograph] + +On the bottom of the box, face down, was a photograph. Barbara took it +out, wonderingly, and started in amazement as her own face looked back +at her. On the back was written, in the same clear hand as the letter: +"For my son, or daughter. Constance North." Below was the date--just a +month before Barbara was born. + +The heavy hair, in the picture, was braided and wound around the shapely +head. The high comb, the same that Barbara had just taken out of the +box, added a finishing touch. Around the slender neck and fair, smooth +shoulders fell the Duchess lace that trimmed the brocade gown. The +amethyst brooch, with two of the three tassels plainly showing, was +pinned into the lace on the left side, half-way to the shoulder. + +But it was the face that interested Barbara most, as it was the +counterpart of her own. There was the same broad, low forehead, the +large, deep eyes with long lashes, the straight little nose, and the +tender, girlish mouth with its short upper lip, and the same firm, +round, dimpled chin. Even the expression was almost the same, but in +Constance's deep eyes was a certain wistfulness that the faint smile of +her mouth could not wholly deny. + +The woman who looked back at her daughter seemed strangely youthful. +Barbara felt, in a way, as though she were the mother and Constance the +child, for she was older, now, than her mother had been when she died. +The years of helplessness and struggle had aged Barbara, too. + +[Sidenote: A Sweet Face] + +The slanting sunbeams of late afternoon came into the attic, but Barbara +still studied the sweet face of the picture. Constance was made for +love, and love had come when it was too late. What tenderness she was +capable of; what toilsome journeys she would undertake without fear, if +her heart bade her go! And what courage must have nerved her dimpled +hands when she opened the grey, mysterious door of the Unknown! There +was no hint of weakness in the face, but Constance had died rather than +to take the chance of betraying the man who held her pledge. Barbara's +young soul answered in passionate loyalty to the wistfulness, the +hunger, and the unspoken appeal. + +"He shall never know, Mother, dear," she said aloud. "I promise you +that he shall never know." + +[Sidenote: Like her Mother] + +The shadows grew longer, and, at length, Barbara put the picture down. +If she had on the gown, and twisted her braids around her head, she +would look like her mother even more than now. She had a fancy to try +it--to go downstairs and see what Aunt Miriam would say when she came +in. Her eyes sparkled with delight when she drew on the long white +stockings of finest silk and put on the white slippers with the +tarnished silver buckles. + +The gown was too long and a little too loose, but Barbara rejoiced in +the faded brocade and in the rustle of the silk petticoat that cracked +in several places when she put it on, the fabric was so frail. The +ivory-tinted lace set off her shoulders beautifully, but she could only +guess at the effect from the brief glimpses the tiny mirror gave her. +She put on the amethyst brooch, hung the fan upon its chain and put it +around her neck. Then she wound her braids around her head and fastened +them securely with the gold hairpins. With the aid of the small-gold +mirror, she put the comb in place, and loosened the soft hair on either +side, so that it covered the tops of her ears. + +She walked back and forth a few times, the full length of the attic, +looking back to admire the sweep of her train. Then she sat down upon +the decrepit sofa, trying to fancy herself a stately lady of long ago. +The room was very still, and, without knowing it, Barbara had wearied +herself with her unaccustomed exertion. Her white woollen gown and soft +low shoes lay in a little heap on the floor near the window. She must +not forget to take them when she went down to look in the mirror. + +Presently, she stretched herself out upon the sofa, wondering, drowsily, +whether her mother would have lain down to rest in that splendid +brocade. She did not intend to sleep, but only to rest a little before +going downstairs to surprise Aunt Miriam. Nevertheless, in a few minutes +she was fast asleep and dreaming. + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: The Home-Coming] + +Eloise went down to the three o'clock train to meet Allan, and was much +surprised when Ambrose North came, too. His eyes were bandaged, but +otherwise he seemed as well as ever. They offered to go home with him, +but he refused, saying that he could go alone as well as he ever had. + +They strolled after him, however, keeping at a respectful distance, +until they saw him enter the grey, weather-worn gate; then they turned +back. + +"Is he all right, Allan?" asked Eloise, anxiously. + +"I hope so--indeed, I'm very sure he is. The operation turned out to be +an extremely simple one, though it wasn't even dreamed of twenty years +ago. Barbara's case was simple too,--it's all in the knowing how. She +has made one of the quickest recoveries on record, owing to the fact +that her body is almost that of a child. When you come down to the root +of the matter, surgery is merely the job of a skilled mechanic." + +"But you'd be angry if anyone else said that." + +"Of course." + +"When do the bandages come off?" + +[Sidenote: A Case of Conscience] + +"I'm going up to-morrow. They'd have been off over a week ago, but +Barbara insisted that she must see him first and ask him to forgive her +for deceiving him. She thinks she's a criminal." + +"Dear little saint," said Eloise, softly. "I wish none of us ever did +anything more wicked than that." + +"So do I, but there is an active remnant of a New-England conscience +somewhere in Barbara. I'm not sure that the old man hasn't it, too." + +"Do you suppose, for a moment, that he won't forgive her?" + +"If he doesn't," returned Allan, concisely, "I'll break his ungrateful +old neck. I hope she won't stir him up very much, though--he's got a bad +heart." + +[Sidenote: Miriam's Welcome] + +Still, the old man showed no sign of weakness as he went briskly up the +walk and knocked at his own door. When Miriam opened it, astonishment +made her welcome almost inarticulate, for she had not expected him home +so soon. He gave her the small black satchel that he carried, his coat +and hat. + +"How is Barbara?" he asked, eagerly. "How is my little girl?" + +"Well enough," answered Miriam. + +"Is she asleep?" + +Miriam went to the stairs and called out: "Barbara! Oh, Barbara!" There +was no answer. + +She started upstairs, but he called her back. "Don't wake her," he said. +"Perhaps I can take her supper up to her." + +"Suit yourself," responded Miriam, shortly. + +She did not see fit to tell him that Barbara was up and could walk. +Doctor Conrad could have told him, if he had wanted to--at any rate, it +was not Miriam's affair. She bitterly resented the fact that he had not +even shaken hands with her when he came home, after his long absence. +She hung up his coat and hat, lighted the fire, as the room was cool, +went out into the kitchen, and closed the door. + +The familiar atmosphere and the comfortable chair in which he sat +brought him that peculiar peace of home which is one of the greatest +gifts travel can bestow. Even the ticking of the clock came to his +senses gratefully. Home at last, after all the pain, the dreary nights +and days of acute loneliness, and only one more day to wait--perhaps. + +"To see again," he thought. "I am glad I came home first. To-morrow, if +God is good to me, I shall see my baby--and the letter. I have dreamed +so often that she could walk and I could see!" + +He took the two sheets of paper from his pocket and spread them out upon +his knee. He moved his hands lovingly across the pages--the one written +upon, the other blank. "She died loving me," he said to himself. +"To-morrow I shall see it, in her own hand." + +[Sidenote: Why Not To-Day] + +Sunset flamed behind the hills and brought into the little room faint +threads of gold and amethyst that wove a luminous tapestry with the +dusk. The clock ticked steadily, and with every cheery tick brought +nearer that dear To-Morrow of which he had dreamed so long. He +speculated upon the difference made by the slow passage of a few hours. +To-morrow, at this time, his bandages would be off--then why not to-day? + +The letter fell to the floor and he picked it up, one sheet at a time, +fretfully. The bandage around his temples and the gauze and cotton held +firmly against his eyes all at once grew intolerable. It was the last +few miles to the weary traveller, the last hour that lay between the +lover and his beloved, the darkness before the dawn. He had been very +patient, but at last had come to the end. + +[Sidenote: He Opens his Eyes] + +If only the bandages were off! "If they were," he thought, "I need not +open my eyes--I could keep them closed until to-morrow." He raised his +hands and worked carefully at the surgical knots until the outer strip +was loosened. He wound it slowly off, then cautiously removed the layers +of cotton and gauze. + +He breathed a sigh of relief as he leaned back in his chair, with his +eyes closed, determined to keep faith with the physicians, and, above +all, with Doctor Conrad, who had been so very kind. There was no pain at +all--only weakness. If the room were absolutely dark, perhaps he might +open his eyes for a moment or two. Why should to-morrow be so different +from to-day? + +The letter was in his hands--that dear letter which said, "I have loved +him, I love him still, and have never loved him more than I do to-day." +The temptation worked subtly in his mind as strong wine might in his +blood. Perhaps, after all, he could not see--the doctors had not given +him a positive promise. + +The fear made him faint, then surging hope and infinite longing merged +into perfect belief--and trust. Unable to endure the strain of waiting +longer, he opened his eyes, and as swiftly closed them again. + +"I can see," he whispered, shrilly. "Oh, I can see!" + +The blood beat hard in his pulses. He waited, wisely, until he was calm, +then opened his eyes once more. The room was not dark, but was filled +with the soft, golden glow of sunset--a light that illumined and, +strangely, brought no pain. Objects long unfamiliar save by touch loomed +large and dark before him. Remembered colours came back, mellowed by the +half-light. Distances readjusted themselves and perspectives appeared in +the transparent mist that seemed to veil everything. He closed his eyes, +and said, aloud: "I can see! Oh, I can see!" + +[Sidenote: Reading the Letter] + +Little by little the mist disappeared and objects became clear. The +velvety softness of the last light lay kindly upon the dingy room. When +he tried to read the letter the words danced on the page. Trembling, he +rose and took it over to the window, where the light was stronger. As he +stood there, with his back to the door, Miriam, unheard, came into the +room. + +The bandages on the floor, the eagerness in every line of his body as he +stood at the window, and the letter in his hand, gave her, in a single +instant, all the information she needed. Her heart beat high with wild +hope--the hour of her vengeance had come at last. + +She feared he would not be able to read it. Then she remembered the +yellowed page on which the writing stood out as clearly as though it had +been large print. If he could see at all, he could see that. + +Little by little, sustained and supported by his immeasurable longing, +the man at the window spelled out the words, in an eager whisper: + +"You who have loved me since the beginning of time--will understand and +forgive me--for what I do to-day. I do it because I am not strong +enough--to go on--and do my duty--by those who need me." + +Miriam nodded with satisfaction. At last he knew why Constance had taken +her own life. + +"If there should be--meeting--past the grave--some day you and I--shall +come together again--with no barrier between us." He put his hand to his +forehead as though he did not quite understand, but hurried on to the +next sentence, for his eyes were failing under the strain. + +"I take with me--the knowledge of your love--which has strengthened--and +sustained me--since the day--we first met--and must make--even a +grave--warm and sweet." + +[Sidenote: Radiance of Soul] + +The light in the room seemed to Miriam to be not wholly of the golden +sunset. Some radiance of soul must have made that clear soft light which +veiled but did not hide. It was sunset, and yet the light was that of a +Summer afternoon. + +"And remember this--dead though I am--I love you still--you--and my +little lame baby--who needs me so--and whom--I must leave--because I am +not strong--enough to stay. Through life--and in death--and eternally +yours--Constance." + +There was a tense, unbearable silence. Miriam moistened her parched lips +and chafed her cold hands. "At last," she thought. "At last." + +[Sidenote: The Assurance] + +"She died loving me," said Ambrose North, in a shrill whisper. His eyes +were closed again, for the strain had hurt--terribly. Dimly, he +remembered the other letter. This was not the same, but the other had +been to Barbara, and not to him. He did not stop to wonder how it came +to be in his pocket. It sufficed that some Angel of God, working through +devious ways and long years, had given him at last, face to face, the +assurance he had hungered for since the day Constance died. + +In a blinding instant, Miriam remembered that no names had been +mentioned in the letter. He had made a mistake--but she could set him +right. Constance should not triumph again, even in an hour like this. + +Ambrose North turned back into the shadow, fearing to face the window. +The woman cowering in the corner advanced steadily to meet him. He saw +her, vaguely, when his eyes became accustomed to the change of lights. + +"Miriam!" he cried, transfigured by joy. "She died loving me! I have it +here. It was only because she was not strong--she was ill, and she never +let us know." He held forth the letter with a shaking hand. + +"She--" began Miriam. + +"She died loving me!" he cried. "Oh, Miriam, can you not see? I have it +here." His voice rang through the house like some far silver bugle +chanting triumph over a field of the slain. "She died loving me!" + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: Triumphant Cry] + +Barbara had already wakened and she sat up, rubbing her eyes. The attic +was almost dark. She went downstairs hurriedly, forgetting her borrowed +finery until her long train caught on a projecting splinter and had to +be loosened. When she reached her own door she started toward her +mirror, anxious to see how she looked, but that triumphant cry from the +room below made her heart stand still. + +White as death and strangely fearful, she went down and into the +living-room, where the last light deepened the shadows and lay lovingly +upon her father's illumined face. + +Barbara smiled and went toward him, with her hands outstretched in +welcome. Miriam shrank back into the farthest shadows, shaking as +though she had seen a ghost. + +There was an instant's tense silence. All the forces of life and love +seemed suddenly to have concentrated into the space of a single +heart-beat. Then the old man spoke. + +"Constance," he said, unsteadily, "have you come back, Beloved? It has +been so long!" + +Radiant with beauty no woman had ever worn before, Barbara went to him, +still smiling, and the old man's arms closed hungrily about her. "I +dreamed you were dead," he sobbed, "but I knew you died loving me. Where +is our baby, Constance? Where is my Flower of the Dusk?" + +[Sidenote: Burden of Joy] + +Even as he spoke, the overburdened heart failed beneath its burden of +joy. He staggered and would have fallen, had not Miriam caught him in +her strong arms. Together, they helped him to the couch, where he lay +down, breathing with great difficulty. + +"Constance, darling," he gasped, feebly, "where is our baby? I want +Barbara." + +For the sake of the dead and the living, Barbara supremely put self +aside. "I do not know," she whispered, "just where Barbara is. Am I not +enough?" + +"Enough for earth," he breathed in answer, "and--for--heaven--too. Kiss +me--Constance--just once--dear--before----" + +[Sidenote: The Passing] + +Barbara bent down. He lifted his shaking hands caressingly to the +splendid crown of golden hair, the smooth, fair cheeks, the perfect neck +and shoulders, and died, enraptured, with her kiss upon his lips. + + + + +XX + +Pardon + + +[Sidenote: The Burial Service] + +Crushed and almost broken-hearted, Barbara sat in the dining-room. The +air was heavy with the overpowering scent of tuberoses. From the room +beyond came the solemn words of the burial service: "I am the +resurrection and the life. He that believeth on me, though he were dead, +yet shall he live." + +The words beat unbearably upon her ears. The walls of the room moved as +though they were of fabric, stirred by winds of hell. The floor +undulated beneath her feet and black mists blinded her. Her hands were +so cold that she scarcely felt the friendly, human touch on either side +of her chair. + +Roger held one of her cold little hands in both his own, yearning to +share her grief, to divide it in some way; even to bear it for her. On +the other side was Doctor Conrad, profoundly moved. His science had not +yet obliterated his human instincts and he was neither ashamed of the +mist in his eyes nor of the painful throbbing of his heart. His fingers +were upon Barbara's pulse, where the lifetide moved so slowly that he +could barely feel it. + +On the other side of the room, alien and apart, as always, sat Miriam. +She wore her best black gown, but her face was inscrutable. Perhaps the +lines were more sharply cut, perhaps the rough, red hands moved more +nervously than usual, and perhaps the deep-set black eyes burned more +fiercely, but no one noticed--or cared. + +[Sidenote: The Minister] + +The deep voice in the room beyond was vibrant with tenderness. The man +who stood near Ambrose North as he lay in his last sleep had been +summoned from town by Eloise. He did not make the occasion an excuse for +presenting his own particular doctrine, bolstered up by argument, nor +did he bid his hearers rejoice and be glad. He admitted, at the +beginning, that sorrow lay heavily upon the hearts of those who loved +Ambrose North and did not say that God was chastening them for their own +good. + +He spoke of Life as the rainbow that brilliantly spans two mysterious +silences, one of which is dawn and the other sunset. This flaming arc +must end, as it begins, in pain, but, past the silence, and, perhaps, in +even greater mystery, the circle must somewhere become complete and +round back to a new birth. + +Could not the God who ordained the beginning be safely trusted with the +end? Forgetting the grey mists of dawn in which the rainbow began, +should we deny the inevitable night when the arc bends down at the other +end of the world? Having seen so much of the perfect curve, could we not +believe in the circle? And should we not remember that the rainbow +itself was a signal and a promise that there should be no more sea? Even +so, was not this mortal life of ours, tempered as it is by sorrow and +tears, a further promise that, when the circle was completed, there +should be no more death? + +[Sidenote: God's Love] + +The deep voice went on, even more tenderly, to speak of God; not of His +power, but of His purpose, not of His justice, but His forgiveness, not +of His vengeance, but of His love. A love so vast and far-reaching that +there is no place where it is not; it enfolds not only our little world, +poised in infinite space like a mote in a sunbeam, but all the shining, +rolling worlds beyond. Every star that rises within our sight and all +the million stars beyond, in misty distances so great as to be +incomprehensible, are guided and surrounded by this same love. It is +impossible to conceive of a place where it is not--even in the midst of +pain, poverty, suffering, and death, God's love is there also. The +minister pleaded with those who listened to him to lean wholly upon this +all-sustaining, all-forgiving love; to believe that it sheltered both +the living and the dead, and to trust, simply, as a little child. + +[Sidenote: At the Close of the Service] + +In the stillness that followed, Eloise went to the piano. The worn +strings answered softly as her fingers touched the keys. In her full, +low contralto she sang, to an exquisite melody: + + "When I am dead, my dearest, + Sing no sad songs for me; + Plant thou no roses at my head, + Nor shady cypress tree; + Be the green grass above me + With showers and dewdrops wet; + And if thou wilt, remember, + And if thou wilt, forget. + + "I shall not see the shadows, + I shall not feel the rain; + I shall not hear the nightingale + Sing on, as if in pain: + And dreaming through the twilight + That doth not rise nor set, + Haply I may remember, + And haply may forget." + +The deep, manly voice followed with a benediction, then the little group +of neighbours and friends went out with hushed and reverent step, into +the golden Autumn afternoon. Miriam came in, to all outward appearance +wholly unmoved. She stood by him for a moment, then turned away. + +Eloise closed the door and Roger and Allan brought Barbara in. She bent +down to her father, who lay so quietly, with a smile of heavenly peace +upon his lips, and her tears rained upon his face. "Good-bye, dear +Daddy," she sobbed. "It is Barbara who kisses you now." + + * * * * * + +When Ambrose North went out of his door for the last time, on his way to +rest beside his beloved Constance until God should summon them both, +Roger stayed behind, with Barbara. Doctor Conrad had said, positively, +that she must not go, and, as always, she obeyed. + +The boy's heart was too full for words. He still kept her cold little +hand in his. "There isn't anything I can say or do, is there, Barbara, +dear?" + +[Sidenote: The Pity of It] + +"No," she sobbed. "That is the pity of it. There is never anything to be +said or done." + +"I wish I could take it from you and bear it for you," he said, simply. +"Some way, we seem to belong together, you and I." + +They sat in silence until the others came back. Eloise came straight to +Barbara and put her strong young arms around the frail, bent little +figure. + +"Will you come with me, dear?" she asked. "We can get a carriage easily +and I'd love to have you with me. Will you come?" + +For a moment, Barbara hesitated. "No," she said, "I must stay here. I've +got to live right on here, and I might as well begin to-night." + +Allan took from his pocket several small, round white tablets, and gave +them to Barbara. "Two just before going to bed," he said. "And if you're +the same brave girl that you've been ever since I've known you, you'll +have your bearings again in a short time." + +[Sidenote: By the Open Fire] + +Roger stayed to supper, but none of them made more than a pretence of +eating. The odour of tuberoses still pervaded the house and brought, +inevitably, the thought of death. Afterward, Barbara sat by the open +fire with one hand lying listlessly in Roger's warm, understanding +clasp. In the kitchen, Miriam vigorously washed the few dishes. She had +put away the fine china, the solid silver knife and fork, the remnant of +table damask, and the Satsuma cup. + +"Shall I read to you, Barbara?" asked Roger. + +"No," she answered, wearily. "I couldn't listen to-night." + +The hours dragged on. Miriam sat in the dining-room alone, by the light +of one candle, remorsefully, after many years, face to face with +herself. + +She wondered what Constance would do to her now, when she went to bed +and fearfully closed her eyes. She determined to cheat Constance by +sitting up all night, and then realised that by doing so she would only +postpone the inevitable reckoning. + +Miriam felt that a reckoning was due somewhere, on earth, or in heaven, +or in hell. Mysterious balances must be made before things were right, +and her endeavours to get what she had conceived to be her own just due +had all failed. + +She wondered why. Constance had wronged her and she was entitled to pay +Constance back in her own coin. But the opportunity had been taken out +of her hands, every time. Even at the last, her subtle revenge had been +transmuted into further glory for Constance. Why? + +The answer flashed upon her like words of fire--"_Vengeance is mine; +I will repay._" + +Then, suddenly, from some unknown source, the need of confession came +pitilessly upon her soul. Her lined face blanched in the candle-light +and her worn, nervous hands clutched fearfully at the arm of her chair. + +[Sidenote: The Still Small Voice] + +"Confess," she repeated to herself scornfully as though in answer to +some imperative summons. "To whom?" + +There was no answer, but, in her heart, Miriam knew. Only one of the +blood was left and to that one, if possible, payment must be made. And +if anything was due her, either from the dead or the living, it must +come to her through Barbara. + +Miriam laughed shrilly and then bit her lips, thinking the others might +hear. Roger heard--and wondered--but said nothing. + +After he went home, Barbara still sat by the fire, in that surcease +which comes when one is unable to sustain grief longer and it steps +aside, to wait a little, before taking a fresh hold. She could wonder +now about the letter, in her mother's writing, that she had picked up +from the floor, and which her father had found, and very possibly read. +She hesitated to ask Miriam anything concerning either her father or her +mother. + +[Sidenote: Miriam's Confession] + +But, while she sat there, Miriam came into the room, urged by goading +impulses without number and one insupportable need. She stood near +Barbara for several minutes without speaking; then she began, huskily, +"Barbara----" + +The girl turned, wearily. "Yes?" + +"I've got something to say and I don't know but what to-night is as good +a time as any. Neither of us are likely to sleep much." + +Barbara did not answer. + +"I hated your mother," said Miriam, passionately. "I always hated her." + +"I guessed that," answered Barbara, with a sigh. + +"Your father was in love with me when she came from school, with her +doll-face and pretty ways. She took him away from me. He never looked at +me after he saw her. I had to stand by and see it, help her with her +pretty clothes, and even be maid of honour at the wedding. It was hard, +but I did it. + +"She loved him, in a way, but it wasn't much of a way. She liked the +fine clothes and the trinkets he gave her, but, after he went blind, she +could hardly tolerate him. Lots of times, she would have been downright +cruel to him if I hadn't made her do differently. + +"The first time they came here for the Summer, she met Laurence Austin, +Roger's father, and it was love at first sight on both sides. They used +to see each other every day either here or out somewhere. After you were +born, the first place she went was down to the shore to meet him. I know, +for I followed. + +"When your father asked where she was, I lied to him, not only then, but +many times. I wasn't screening her--I was shielding him. It went on for +over a year, then she took the laudanum. She left four notes--one to me, +one to your father, one to you, and one to Laurence Austin. I never +delivered that, even though she haunted me almost every night for five +years. After he died, she still haunted me, but it was less often, and +different. + +"When you sent me into your father's room after that letter he had in +his pocket, I took time to read it. She said, there, that she didn't +trust me, and that I had always loved your father. It was true enough, +but I didn't know she knew it. + +"After you took the letter out, I put in the one to Laurence Austin. I'd +opened it and read it some little time back. I thought it was time he +knew her as she was, and I never thought about no name being mentioned +in it. + +"When he tore off the bandages, he read that letter, and never knew that +it wasn't meant for him. Then, when you came in in that old dress of +your mother's, he thought it was her come back to him, and never knew +any different." + +There was a long pause. "Well?" said Barbara, wearily. It did not seem +as if anything mattered. + +"I just want you to know that I've hated your mother all my life, ever +since she came home from school. I've hated you because you look like +her. I've hated your father because he talked so of her all the time, +and hated myself for loving him. I've hated everybody, but I've done my +duty, as far as I know. I've scrubbed and slaved and taken care of you +and your father, and done the best I could. + +"When I put that letter into his pocket, I intended for him to know that +Constance was in love with another man. I'd have read it to him long ago +if I'd had any idea he'd believe me. When he thought it was for him, +I was just on the verge of telling him different when you came in and +stopped me. You looked so much like your mother I thought Constance had +taken to walking down here daytimes instead of back and forth in my room +at night. + +"I suppose," Miriam went on, in a strange tone, "that I've killed +him--that there's murder on my hands as well as hate in my heart. +I suppose you'll want to make some different arrangements now--you +won't want to go on living with me after I've killed your father." + +[Sidenote: A Wonderful Joy] + +"Aunt Miriam," said Barbara, calmly, "I've known for a long time almost +everything you've told me, but I didn't know how father got the letter. +I thought he must have found it somewhere in the desk or in his own +room, or even in the attic. You didn't kill him any more than I did, by +coming into the room in mother's gown. What he really died of was a +great, wonderful joy that suddenly broke a heart too weak to hold it. +And, even though I've wanted my father to see me, all my life long, I'd +rather have had it as it was, and he would, too. I'm sure of that. + +"He told me once the three things he most wanted to see in the world +were mother's letter, saying that she loved him, then mother herself, +and, last of all, me. And for a long time his dearest dream has been +that I could walk and he could see. So when, in the space of five or +ten minutes, all the dreams came true, his heart failed." + +"But," Miriam persisted, "I meant to do him harm." Her burning eyes were +keenly fixed upon Barbara's face. + +"Sometimes," answered the girl, gently, "I think that right must come +from trying to do wrong, to make up for the countless times wrong comes +from trying to do right. Father could not have had greater joy, even in +heaven, than you and I gave him at the last, neither of us meaning to do +it." + +[Sidenote: Human Sympathy and Love] + +The stern barrier that had reared itself between Miriam and her kind +suddenly crumbled and fell. Warm tides of human sympathy and love came +into her numb heart and ice-bound soul. The lines in her face relaxed, +her hands ceased to tremble, and her burning eyes softened with the mist +of tears. Her mouth quivered as she said words she had not even dreamed +of saying for more than a quarter of a century: + +"Will you--can you--forgive me?" + +All that she needed from the dead and all they could have given her came +generously from Barbara. She sprang to her feet and threw her arms +around Miriam's neck. "Oh, Aunty! Aunty!" she cried, "indeed I do, not +only for myself, but for father and mother, too. We don't forgive +enough, we don't love enough, we're not kind enough, and that's all +that's wrong with the world. There isn't time enough for bitterness--the +end comes too soon." + +[Sidenote: At Peace] + +Miriam went upstairs, strangely uplifted, strangely at peace. She was no +longer alien and apart, but one with the world. She had a sense of +universal kinship--almost of brotherhood. That night she slept, for the +first time in more than twenty years, without the fear of Constance. + +And Constance, who was more sinned against than sinning, and whose +faithful old husband had that day lain down, in joy and triumph, to rest +beside her in the churchyard, came no more. + + + + +XXI + +The Perils of the City + + +"Roger," remarked Miss Mattie, laying aside her paper, "I don't know as +I'm in favour of havin' you go to the city. Can't you get the Judge +another dog?" + +"Why not, Mother?" asked Roger, ignoring her question. + +"Because it seems to me, from all I've been readin' and hearin' lately, +that the city ain't a proper place for a young person. Take that +minister, now, that those folks brought down for Ambrose North's +funeral. I never heard anything like it in all my life. You was there +and you heard what he said, so there ain't no need of dwellin' on it, +but it wasn't what I'm accustomed to in the way of funerals." Miss +Mattie's militant hairpins bristled as she spoke. + +"I thought it was all right, Mother. What was wrong with it?" + +[Sidenote: Everything Wrong] + +"Wrong!" repeated Miss Mattie, in astonishment. "Everything was wrong +with it! Ambrose North wasn't a church-member and he never went more'n +once or twice that I know of, even after the Lord chastened him with +blindness for not goin'. There was no power to the sermon and no cryin' +except Barbara and that Miss Wynne that sang that outlandish piece +instead of a hymn. + +"Why, Roger, I was to a funeral once over to the Ridge where the corpse +was an unbaptized infant, and you ought to have heard that preacher +describin' the abode of the lost! The child's mother fainted dead away +and had to be carried out of the church, it was that powerful and +movin'. That was somethin' like!" + +It was in Roger's mind to say he was glad that the minister had not made +Barbara faint, but he wisely kept silent. + +[Sidenote: Life in the City] + +"That's only one thing," Miss Mattie went on. "What with religion bein' +in that condition in the city, and the life folks live there, I don't +think it's any fit place for a person that ain't strong in the faith, +and you know you ain't, Roger. You take after your pa. + +"I was readin' in _The Metropolitan Weekly_ only last week a story about +a lovely young orphan that was caught one night by a rejected suitor and +tied to the railroad track. Just as the train was goin' to run over her, +the man she wanted to marry come along on the dead run with a knife and +cut her bonds. She got off the track just as the night express come +around the curve, goin' ninety-five miles an hour. + +[Sidenote: Miss Mattie's Fears] + +"This man says to her, 'Genevieve, will you come to me now, and let me +put you out of this dread villain's power forever?' Then he opened his +arms and the beautiful Genevieve fled to them as to some ark of safety +and laid her pale and weary face upon his lovin' and forgivin' heart. +That's the exact endin' of it, and I must say it's written beautiful, +but when I wake up in the night and think about it, I get scared to have +you go. + +"You ain't so bad lookin', Roger, and you're gettin' to the age where +you might be expected to take notice, and what if some designing female +should tie you to the railroad track? I declare, it makes me nervous to +think of it." + +Roger did not like to shake his mother's faith in _The Metropolitan +Weekly_, but he longed to set her fears at rest. "Those things aren't +true, Mother," he said, kindly. "They not only haven't happened, but +they couldn't happen--it's impossible." + +"Roger, what do you mean by sayin' such things. Of course it's true, or +it wouldn't be in the paper. Ain't it right there in print, as plain as +the nose on your face? You can see for yourself. I hope studyin' law +ain't goin' to make an infidel of you." + +"I don't think it will," temporised Roger. "I'll keep a close watch for +designing females, and will avoid railroad tracks at night." + +Miss Mattie shook her head doubtfully. "That ain't a goin' to do no +good, Roger, if they once get set after you. I've noticed that the +villain always triumphs." + +"But only for a little while, Mother. Surely you must have seen that?" + +[Sidenote: The Villain Foiled] + +She settled her steel-bowed spectacles firmly on the wart and gazed at +him. "I believe you're right," she said, after a few moments of +reflection. "I can't recall no story now where the villain was not +foiled at last. Let me see--there was _Lovely Lulu, or the Doctor's +Darling_, and _Margaret Merriman, or the Maiden's Mad Marriage_, and +_True Gold, or Pretty Crystal's Love_, and _The American Countess, or +Hearts Aflame_, and this one I was just speakin' of, _Genevieve +Carleton, or the Brakeman's Bride_. In every one of 'em, the villain got +his just deserts, though sometimes they was disjointed owin' to the +story bein' broke off at the most interestin' point and continued the +followin' week." + +"Well, if the villain is always foiled, you're surely not afraid, are +you?" + +"I don't know's I'm afraid in the long run, but I don't like to have you +go through such things and be exposed to the temptations of a great +city." + +"Why don't you come with me, Mother, and keep house for me? We can find +a little flat somewhere, and----" + +"What on earth is that?" + +[Sidenote: Apartments and Flats] + +"I've never been in one myself, but Miss Wynne said that, if you wanted +to come, she would find us a flat, or an apartment." + +"What's the difference between a flat and an apartment?" + +"That's what I asked her. She said it was just the rent. You pay more +for an apartment than you do for a flat." + +"I wouldn't want anything I had to pay more for," observed Miss Mattie, +stroking her chin thoughtfully. "You ain't told me what a flat is." + +"A few rooms all on one floor, like a cottage. It's like several +cottages, all under one roof." + +"What do they want to cover the cottages with a roof for? Don't they +want light and air?" + +"You don't understand, Mother. Suppose that our house here was an +apartment house. The stairs would be shut off from these rooms and the +hall would be accessible from the street. Instead of having three rooms +upstairs, there might be six--one of them a kitchen and the others +living-rooms and bedrooms. Don't you see?" + +"You mean a kitchen on the same floor with the bedrooms?" + +"Yes, all the rooms on one floor." + +"Just as if an earthquake was to jolt off the top of the house and shake +all the bedrooms down here?" + +"Something like that." + +"Well, then," said Miss Mattie, firmly, "all I've got to say is that it +ain't decent. Think of people sleepin' just off kitchens and washin' +their faces and hands in the sink." + +"I think some of them must be very nice, Mother. Miss Wynne expects to +live in an apartment after she is married and she has a little one of +her own now. If you'll come with me we'll find some place that you'll +like. I don't want to leave you alone here." + +[Sidenote: Under One Roof] + +"No," she answered, after due deliberation, "I reckon I'll stay here. +You can't transplant an old tree and you can't take a woman who has +lived all her life in a house and put her in a place where there are +several cottages all under one roof with bedrooms off of kitchens and +folks washin' in the sinks. Miss Wynne can do it if she likes, but I was +brought up different." + +"I'm afraid you'll be lonesome." + +"I don't know why I should be any more lonesome than I always have been. +All I see of you is at meals and while you're readin' nights. You're +just like your pa. If I propped up a book by the lamp, it would be just +as sociable as it is to have you settin' here. Readin' is a good thing +in its place and I enjoy it myself, but sometimes it's pleasant to hear +the human voice sayin' somethin' besides 'What?' and 'Yes' and 'All +right' and 'Is supper ready?' + +[Sidenote: The Blue Hair Ribbon] + +"I've been lookin' over your things to-day and gettin' 'em ready. The +moths has ate your Winter flannels and you'll have to get more. I've +mended your coat linin's and sewed on buttons, and darned and patched, +and I've took Barbara North's blue hair ribbon back to her--the one you +found some place and had in your pocket. You mustn't be careless about +those things, Roger--she might think you meant to steal it." + +"What did Barbara say?" he stammered. The high colour had mounted to his +temples. + +"She didn't know what to say at first, but she recognised it as her hair +ribbon. I told her you hadn't meant to steal it--that you'd just found +it somewheres and had forgot to give it to her, and it was all right. +She laughed some, but it was a funny laugh. You must be careful, +Roger--you won't always have your mother to get you out of scrapes." + +Roger wondered if the knot of blue ribbon that had so strangely gone +back to Barbara had, by any chance, carried to her its intangible +freight of dreams and kisses, with a boyish tear or two, of which he had +the grace not to be ashamed. + +"Your pa was in the habit of annexin' female belongin's, though the Lord +knows where he ever got 'em. I suppose he picked 'em up on the +street--he was so dreadful absent-minded. He was systematic about 'em in +a way, though. After he died, I found 'em all put away most careful in a +box--a handkerchief and one kid glove, and a piece of ribbon about like +the one I took back to Barbara. He was flighty sometimes: constant +devotion to readin' had unsettled his mind. + +"That brings me to what I wanted to say when I first started out. +I don't want you should load up your trunk with your pa's books to +the exclusion of your clothes, and I don't want you to spend your +evenin's readin'." + +"I'm not apt to read very much, Mother, if I work in an office in the +daytime and go to law school at night." + +[Sidenote: Ten Books Only] + +"That's so, too, but there's Sundays. You can take any ten of your pa's +books that you like, but no more. I'll keep the rest here against the +time the train is blocked and the mails don't come through. I may get a +taste for your pa's books myself." + +Roger did not think it likely, but he was too wise to say so. + +"And I didn't tell you this before, but I've made it my business to go +and see the Judge and tell him how you saved my life at the expense of +Fido's. I don't know when I've seen a man so mad. I was goin' to suggest +that we get him another dog from some place, and land sakes! he clean +drove it out of my mind. + +"I don't know how you've stood it, bein' there in the office with him, +and I told him so. He's got a red-headed boy from the Ridge in there +now, and I think maybe the Judge will get what's comin' to him before he +gets through. I've learned not to trifle with anybody what has red hair, +but seemin'ly the Judge ain't. It takes some folks a long time to learn. + +"Barbara's goin' to the city, too, to spend the Winter with that Miss +Wynne in the cottage that's under the same roof with other cottages and +the bedrooms off the kitchen. I don't know how Barbara'll take to +washin' in the sink, when she's always had that rose-sprigged bowl and +pitcher of her ma's, but it's her business, not mine, and if she wants +to go, she can. + +[Sidenote: "Me and Miriam"] + +"Me and Miriam'll set together evenings and keep each other from bein' +lonesome. She ain't much more company than a cow, as far as talkin' +goes, but there's a feelin,' some way, about another person bein' in the +house, when the wind gets to howlin' down the chimney. We may arrange to +have supper together, once in a while, and in case of severe weather, +put the two fires goin' in one house, which ever's the warmest. + +"I don't know what we shall do, for we ain't talked it over much yet, +but with church twice on Sunday and prayer-meetin' Wednesday evenings, +and the sewin' circle on Friday, and two New York papers every week, and +Miriam, and all your pa's books to prop up against the lamp, I don't +reckon I'll get so dreadful lonesome. I've thought some of gettin' +myself a cat. There's somethin' mighty comfortable and heartenin' about +a cup of hot tea and the sound of purrin' close by. And on the Spring +excursion to the city, I reckon I'll come up and see you, if I don't +have no more pain in my back." + +[Sidenote: Dr. Conrad's Automobile] + +"I'd love to have you come, Mother, and I'd do all I could to give you a +good time. I know the others would, too. Doctor Conrad has an automobile +and----" + +Miss Mattie became deeply concerned. "Is he treatin' himself for it?" +she demanded. + +"I don't think so," answered Roger, choking back a laugh. + +"It beats all," mused Miss Mattie. "They say the shoemaker's children +never have shoes, and it seems that doctors have diseases just like +other folks. I disremember of havin' heard of this, but I know from my +own experience that a disease with only one word to it can be dreadful +painful. Is it catchin'?" + +"Not with full speed on," replied Roger. "An automobile is very hard to +catch." + +"Well, see that you don't take it," cautioned Miss Mattie. The first +part of his answer was obscure, but she was not one to pause over an +uninteresting detail. + +"You've warned me about almost everything now, Mother," he said, +smiling. "Is there anything else?" + +"Nothing but matrimony, and that's included under the head of designing +females. I shouldn't want you to get married." + +"Why not?" + +[Sidenote: Welded Souls] + +"I don't know as I could tell you just why, only it seems to me that a +person is just as well off without it. I've been thinking of it a good +deal since I've had these New York papers and read so much about two +souls bein' welded into one. My soul wasn't never welded with your pa's, +nor his with mine, as I know of. + +"Marriage wasn't so dreadful different from livin' at home. It reminded +me of the Summer ma took a boarder, your pa required so much waitin' on. +And when you came, I had a baby to take care of besides. If I was welded +I never noticed it--I was too busy." + +Roger's heart softened into unspeakable pity. In missing the "welding," +Miss Mattie had missed the best that life has to give. Somewhere, +doubtless, the man existed who could have stirred the woman's soul +beneath the surface shallows and set the sordid tasks of daily living in +tune with the music that sways the world. + +[Sidenote: "Un-marriage"] + +"There's a good deal in the papers about un-marriage, too," resumed Miss +Mattie, "and I can't understand it. When you've stood before the altar +and said 'till death do us part,' I don't see how another man, who ain't +even a minister, can undo it and let you have another chance at it. +Maybe you do, bein' as you're up in law, but I don't. + +"It looks to me as if the laws were wrong or else the marriage ceremony +ought to be written different. If a man said, 'I take thee to be my +wedded wife, to love and to cherish until I see somebody else I like +better,' I could understand the un-marriage, but I can't now. When you +get to be a power in the law, Roger, I think you should try to get that +fixed. I never was welded, but after I'd given my word, I stuck to it, +even though your pa was dreadful aggravatin' sometimes. He didn't mean +to be, but he was. I guess it's the nature of men folks." + +Deeply moved, Roger went over and kissed her smooth cheek. "Have I been +aggravating, Mother?" + +Miss Mattie's eyes grew misty. She took off her spectacles and wiped +them briskly on one corner of the table-cover. "No more'n was natural, +I guess," she answered. "You've been a good boy, Roger, and I want you +should be a good man. When you get away from home, where your mother +can't look after you, just remember that she expects you to be good, +like your pa. He might have been aggravatin', but he wasn't wicked." + +[Sidenote: Remember] + +All the best part of the boy's nature rose in answer, and the mist came +into his eyes, too. "I'll remember, Mother, and you shall never be +disappointed in me--I promise you that." + + + + +XXII + +Autumn Leaves + + +[Sidenote: Autumn Glory] + +Summer had gone long ago, but the sweetness of her passing yet lay upon +the land and sea. The hills were glorious with a pageantry of scarlet +and gold where, in the midnight silences, the soul of the woods had +flamed in answer to the far, mysterious bugles of the frost. Bloom was +on the grapes in the vineyard, and fairy lace, of cobweb fineness, had +been hung by the secret spinners from stem to stem of the purple +clusters and across bits of stubble in the field. + +From the blue sea, now and then, came the breath of Winter, though +Autumn lingered on the shore. Many of the people at the hotel had gone +back to town, feeling the imperious call of the city with the first keen +wind. Eloise, with a few others, waited. She expected to stay until +Barbara was strong enough to go with her. + +But Barbara's strength was coming very slowly now. She grieved for her +father, and the grieving kept her back. Allan came down once a +fortnight to spend Sunday with Eloise and to look after Barbara, though +he realised that Barbara was, in a way, beyond his reach. + +[Sidenote: What We Need] + +"She doesn't need medicine," he said, to Eloise. "She is perfectly well, +physically, though of course her strength is limited and will be for +some time to come. What she needs is happiness." + +"That is what we all need," answered Eloise. + +Allan flashed a quick glance at her. "Even I," he said, in a different +tone, "but I must wait for mine." + +"We all wait for things," she laughed, but the lovely colour had mounted +to the roots of her hair that waved so softly back from her low +forehead. + +"When, dear?" insisted Allan, possessing himself of her hand. + +"I promised once," she answered. "When the colour is all gone from the +hills and the last leaves have fallen, then I'll come." + +"You're not counting the oaks?" he asked, half fearfully. "Sometimes the +oak leaves stay on all Winter, you know. And evergreens are ruled out, +aren't they?" + +"Certainly. We won't count the oaks or the Christmas trees. Long before +Santa Claus comes, I'll be a sedate matron instead of a flyaway, +frivolous spinster." + +"For the first time since I grew up," remarked Allan, with evident +sincerity, "I wish Christmas came earlier. Upon what day, fair lady, do +you think the leaves will be gone?" + +"In November, I suppose," she answered, with an affected indifference +that did not deceive him. "The day after Thanksgiving, perhaps." + +"That's Friday, and I positively refuse to be married on a Friday." + +[Sidenote: The Best Day of All] + +"Then the day before--that's Wednesday. You know the old rhyme says: +'Wednesday the best day of all.'" + +So it was settled. Allan laughingly put down in his little red leather +pocket diary, under the date of Wednesday, November twenty-fifth, "Miss +Wynne's wedding." "Where is it to be?" he asked. "I wouldn't miss it for +worlds." + +"I've been thinking about that," said Eloise, slowly, after a pause. "I +suppose we'll have to be conventional." + +"Why?" + +"Because everybody is." + +"The very reason why we shouldn't be. This is our wedding, and we'll +have it to please ourselves. It's probably our last." + +"In spite of the advanced civilisation in which we live," she returned, +"I hope and believe that it is the one and only wedding in which either +of us will ever take a leading part." + +"Haven't you ever had day-dreams, dear, about your wedding?" + +"Many a time," she laughed. "I'd be the rankest kind of polygamist if +I had all the kinds I've planned for." + +"But the best kind?" he persisted. "Which is in the ascendant now?" + +[Sidenote: An Ideal Wedding] + +"If I could choose," she replied, thoughtfully, "I'd have it in some +quiet little country church, on a brilliant, sunshiny day--the kind that +makes your blood tingle and fills you with the joy of living. I'd like +it to be Indian Summer, with gold and crimson leaves falling all through +the woods. I'd like to have little brown birds chirping, and squirrels +and chipmunks pattering through the leaves. I'd like to have the church +almost in the heart of the woods, and have the sun stream into every +nook and corner of it while we were being married. I'd like two taper +lights at the altar, and the Episcopal service, but no music." + +"Any crowd?" + +Her sweet face grew very tender. "No," she said. "Nobody but our two +selves." + +"We'll have to have a minister," he reminded her, practically, "and two +witnesses. Otherwise it isn't legal. Whom would you choose for +witnesses?" + +"I think I'd like to have Barbara and Roger. I don't know why, for I have +so many other friends who mean more to me. Yet it seems, some way, as if +they two belonged in the picture." + +[Sidenote: Right Now] + +A bright idea came to Allan. "Dearest," he said, "you couldn't have the +falling leaves and the squirrels if we waited until Thanksgiving time, +but it's all here, right now. Don't you remember that little church in +the woods that we passed the other day--the little white church with +maples all around it and the Autumn leaves dropping silently through the +still, warm air? Why not here--and now?" + +"Oh, I couldn't," cried Eloise. + +"Why not?" + +"Oh, you're so stupid! Clothes and things! I've got a million things to +do before I can be married decently." + +He laughed at her woman's reason as he put his arms around her. "I want +a wife, and not a Parisian wardrobe. You're lovelier to me right now in +your white linen gown than you've ever been before. Don't wear yourself +out with dressmakers and shopping. You'll have all the rest of your life +for that." + +"Won't I have all the rest of my life to get married in?" she queried, +demurely. + +"You have if you insist upon taking it, darling, but I feel very +strongly to get married to-day." + +"Not to-day," she demurred. + +"Why not? It's only half past one and the ceremony doesn't last over +twenty minutes. I suppose it can be cut down to fifteen or eighteen if +you insist upon having it condensed. You don't even need to wash your +face. Get your hat and come on." + +His tone was tender, even pleading, but some far survival of Primitive +Woman, whose marriage was by capture, stirred faintly in Eloise. "Our +friends won't like it," she said, as a last excuse. + +[Sidenote: The Two Concerned] + +He noted, with joy, that she said "won't," instead of "wouldn't," but +she did not realise that she had betrayed herself. "We don't care, do +we?" he asked. "It's our wedding and nobody's else. When we can't please +everybody, we might as well please ourselves. Matrimony is the one thing +in the world that concerns nobody but the two who enter into it--and +it's the thing that everybody has the most to say about. While you're +putting on your hat, I'll get the license and see about a carriage." + +"I thought I'd wait until Barbara could go to town with me," she said. + +"There's nothing to hinder your coming back for her, if you want to and +she isn't willing to come with Roger. I insist upon having my honeymoon +alone." + +"All alone? If I were very good, wouldn't you let me come along?" + +Allan coloured. "You know what I mean," he said, softly. "I've waited so +long, darling, and I think I've been patient. Isn't it time I was +rewarded?" + +They were on the beach, behind the friendly sand-dune that had been +their trysting place all Summer. Thoroughly humble in her surrender, yet +wholly womanly, Eloise put her soft arms around his neck. "I will," she +said. "Kiss me for the last time before----" + +"Before what?" demanded Allan, as, laughing, she extricated herself from +his close embrace. + +"Before you exchange your sweetheart for a wife." + +[Sidenote: More Secure] + +"I'm not making any exchange. I'm only making my possession more secure. +Look, dear." + +He took from his pocket a shining golden circlet which exactly fitted +the third finger of her left hand. Their initials were engraved inside. +Only the date was lacking. + +"I've had it for a long, long time," he said, in reply to her surprised +question. "I hoped that some day I might find you in a yielding mood." + +When she went up to her room, her heart was beating wildly. This sudden +plunge into the unknown was blinding, even though she longed to make it. +Having come to the edge of the precipice she feared the leap, in spite +of the conviction that life-long happiness lay beyond. + +In the fond sight of her lover, Eloise was very lovely when she went +down in her white gown and hat, her eyes shining with the world-old joy +that makes the old world new for those to whom it comes, be it soon or +late. + +[Sidenote: Beautifully Unconventional] + +"It's beautifully unconventional," she said, as he assisted her into the +surrey. "No bridesmaids, no wedding presents, and no dreary round of +entertainments. I believe I like it." + +"I know I do," he responded, fervently. "You're the loveliest thing I've +ever seen, sweetheart. Is that a new gown?" + +"I've worn it all Summer," she laughed "and it's been washed over a +dozen times. You have lots to learn about gowns." + +"I'm a willing pupil," he announced. "Shouldn't you have a veil? I +believe the bride's veil is usually 'of tulle, caught with a diamond +star, the gift of the groom.'" + +"You've been reading the society column. Give me the star, and I'll get +the veil." + +"You shall have it the first minute we get to town. I'd rob the Milky +Way for you, if I could. I'd give you a handful of stars to play with +and let you roll the sun and moon over the golf links." + +"I may take the moon," she replied. "I've always liked the looks of it, +but I'm afraid the sun would burn my fingers. Somebody once got into +trouble, I believe, for trying to drive the chariot of the sun for a +day. Give me the moon and just one star." + +"Which star do you want?" + +[Sidenote: The Love-star] + +"The love-star," she answered, very softly. "Will you keep it shining +for me, in spite of clouds and darkness?" + +"Indeed I will." + +The horses stopped at Barbara's door. Allan went across the street to +call for Roger and Eloise went in to invite Barbara to go for a drive. + +"How lovely you look," cried Barbara, in admiration. "You look like a +bride." + +"Make yourself look bridal also," suggested Eloise, flushing, "by +putting on your best white gown. Roger is coming, too." + +Barbara missed the point entirely. It did not take her long to get +ready, and she sang happily to herself while she was dressing. She put a +white lace scarf of her mother's over her golden hair, which was now +piled high on her shapely head, and started out, for the first time in +all her twenty-two years, for a journey beyond the limits of her own +domain. + +Allan and Roger helped her in. She was very awkward about it, and was +sufficiently impressed with her awkwardness to offer a laughing apology. +"I've never been in a carriage before," she said, "nor seen a train, nor +even a church. All I've had is pictures and books--and Roger," she +added, as an afterthought, when he took his place beside her on the back +seat. + +"You're going to see lots of things to-day that you never saw before," +observed Allan, starting the horses toward the hill road. "We'll begin +by showing you a church, and then a wedding." + +"A wedding!" cried Barbara. "Who is going to be married?" + +"We," he replied, concisely. "Don't you think it's time?" + +"Isn't it sudden?" asked Roger. "I thought you weren't going to be +married until almost Christmas." + +"I've been serving time now for two years," explained Allan, "and she's +given me two months off for good behaviour. Just remember, young man, +when your turn comes, that nothing is sudden when you've been waiting +for it all your life." + +[Sidenote: The Little White Church] + +The door of the little white church was open and the sun that streamed +through the door and the stained glass windows carried the glory and the +radiance of Autumn into every nook and corner of it. At the altar burned +two tall taper lights, and the young minister, in white vestments, was +waiting. + +The joking mood was still upon Allan and Eloise, but she requested in +all seriousness that the word "obey" be omitted from the ceremony. + +"Why?" asked the minister, gravely. + +"Because I don't want to promise anything I don't intend to do." + +"Put it in for me," suggested Allan, cheerfully. "I might as well +promise, for I'll have to do it anyway." + +Gradually, the hush and solemnity of the church banished the light mood. +A new joy, deeper, and more lasting, took the place of laughter as they +sat in the front pew, reading over the service. Barbara and Roger sat +together, half way down to the door. Neither had spoken since they +entered the church. + +A shaft of golden light lay full upon Eloise's face. In that moment, +before they went to the altar, Allan was afraid of her, she seemed so +angelic, so unreal. But the minister was waiting, with his open book. +"Come," said Allan, in a whisper, and she rose, smiling, to follow him, +not only then, but always. + +[Sidenote: The Ceremony] + +"Dearly Beloved," began the minister, "we are gathered here together in +the sight of God and in the face of this company, to join together this +man and this woman in holy matrimony." He went on through the beautiful +service, while the light streamed in, bearing its fairy freight of +colour and gold, and the swift patter of the Little People of the Forest +rustled through the drifting leaves. + +It was all as Eloise had chosen, even to the two who sat far back, with +their hands clasped, as wide-eyed as children before this sacred merging +of two souls into one. + +A little brown bird perched on the threshold, chirped a few questioning +notes, then flew away to his own nest. Acorns fell from the oaks across +the road, and the musical hum and whir of Autumn came faintly from the +fields. The taper lights burned in the sunshine like yellow stars. + +"That ye may so live together in this life," the minister was saying, +"that in the world to come ye may have life everlasting. Amen." + +[Sidenote: After the Ordeal] + +It was over in an incredibly brief space of time. When they came down +the aisle, Allan had the satisfied air of a man who has just emerged, +triumphantly, through his own skill, from a very difficult and dangerous +ordeal. Eloise was radiant, for her heart was singing within her a +splendid strophe of joy. + +When Barbara and Roger went to meet them, the strange, new shyness that +had settled down upon them both effectually hindered conversation. Roger +began an awkward little speech of congratulation, which immediately +became inarticulate and ended in silent embarrassment. + +But Allan wrung Roger's hand in a mighty grip that made him wince, and +Eloise smiled, for she saw more than either of them had yet guessed. +"You're kids," she said, fondly; "just dear, foolish kids." Impulsively, +she kissed them both, then they all went out into the sunshine again. + +The minister's eyes followed them with a certain wistfulness, for he was +young, and, as yet, the great miracle had not come to him. He sighed +when he put out the tapers and closed the door that divided him from the +music of Autumn and one great, overwhelming joy. + +[Sidenote: On the Way Home] + +On the way home, neither Barbara nor Roger spoke. They had nothing to +say and the others were silent because they had so much. They left the +two at Barbara's gate, then Allan turned the horses back to the hill +road. They were to have two glorious, golden hours alone before taking +the afternoon train. + +Barbara and Roger watched them as they went slowly up the tawny road +that trailed like a ribbon over the pageantry of the hill. When they +came to the crossroads, where one road led to the church and the other +into the boundless world beyond, Eloise leaned far out to wave a +fluttering bit of white in farewell. + + "And on her lover's arm she leant, + And round her waist she felt it fold, + And far across the hills they went + In that new world which is the old," + +quoted Barbara, softly. + +[Sidenote: O'er the Hills] + + "And o'er the hills, and far away, + Beyond their utmost purple rim, + Beyond the night, across the day, + Through all the world she followed him," + +added Roger. + +The carriage was now only a black speck on the brow of the hill. +Presently it descended into the Autumn sunset and vanished altogether. + +"I'm glad they asked us," said Roger. + +"Wasn't it dear of them!" cried Barbara, with her face aglow. "Oh, +Roger, if I ever have a wedding, I want it to be just like that!" + + + + +XXIII + +Letters to Constance + + +[Sidenote: Faith in Results] + +Roger was in the library, trying to choose, from an embarrassment of +riches, the ten of his father's books which he was to be permitted to +take to the city with him. With characteristic thoughtfulness, Eloise +had busied herself in his behalf immediately upon her return to town. +She had found a good opportunity for him, and the letter appointing the +time for a personal interview was even then in his pocket. + +Neither he nor his mother had the slightest doubt as to the result. Miss +Mattie was certain that any lawyer with sense enough to practise law +would be only too glad to have Roger in his office. She scornfully +dismissed the grieving owner of Fido from her consideration, for it was +obvious that anyone with even passable mental equipment would not have +been disturbed by the accidental and painless removal of a bull pup. + +Roger's ambition and eagerness made him very sure of the outcome of his +forthcoming venture. All he asked for was the chance to work, and Eloise +was giving him that. How good she had been and how much she had done for +Barbara! Roger's heart fairly overflowed with gratitude and he +registered a boyish vow not to disappoint those who believed in him. + +It seemed strange to think of Eloise as "Mrs. Conrad." She had signed +her brief note to Roger, "Very cordially, Eloise Wynne Conrad." Down in +the corner she had written "Mrs. Allan Conrad." Roger smiled as he noted +the space between the "Wynne" and the "Conrad" in her signature--the +surest betrayal of a bride. + +"If I should marry," Roger thought, "my wife's name would be 'Mrs. Roger +Austin.'" He wrote it out on a scrap of paper to see how it would look. +It was certainly very attractive. "And if it were Barbara, for instance, +she would sign her letters 'Barbara North Austin.'" He wrote that out, +too, and, in the lamplight, appreciatively studied the effect from many +different angles. It was really a very beautiful name. + +[Sidenote: Lost in Reverie] + +He lost himself in reverie, and it was nearly an hour afterward when he +returned to the difficult task of choosing his ten books. Shakespeare, +of course--fortunately there was a one-volume edition that came within +the letter of the law if not the spirit of it. To this he added +Browning. As it happened, there was a complete one-volume edition of +this, too. Emerson came next--the Essays in two volumes. That made four. +He added _Vanity Fair_, _David Copperfield_, a translation of the +_AEneid_, and his beloved Keats. He hesitated a long time over the last +two, but finally took down Boswell's _Life of Johnson_ and the _Essays +of Elia_, neither of which he had read. + +[Sidenote: A Little Old Book] + +Behind these two books, which had stood side by side, there was a small, +thin book that had either fallen down or been hidden there. Roger took +it out and carefully wiped off the dust. It was a blank book in which +his father had written on all but the last few pages. He took it over to +the table, drew the lamp closer, and sat down. + +The gay cover had softened with the years, the pages were yellow, and +some of them were blurred by blistering spots. The ink had faded, but +the writing was still legible. At the top of the first page was the +date, "_Evening, June the seventh_." + +"I have lived long," was written on the next line below, "but a thousand +years of living have been centred remorselessly into to-day. I cannot go +over, though in this house and in the one across the road it will seem +very strange. I knew the clouds of darkness must eternally hide us each +from the other, that we must see each other no more save at a great +distance, but the thunder and the riving lightning have put heaven +between us as well as earth. + +"I cannot eat, for food is dust and ashes in my mouth. I cannot drink +enough water to moisten my dry, parched throat. I cannot answer when +anyone speaks to me, for I do not hear what is said. It does not seem +that I shall ever sleep again. Yet God, pitiless and unforgiving, lets +me live on." + +The remainder of the page was blank. The next entry was dated: "_June +tenth. Night._" + +[Sidenote: No Other Way] + +"I had to go. There was no other way. I had to sit and listen. I saw the +blind man in the room beyond, sitting beside the dark woman with the +hard face. She had the little lame baby in her arms--the baby who is a +year or so younger than my own son. I smelled the tuberoses and the +great clusters of white lilacs. And I saw her, dead, with her golden +braids on either side of her, smiling, in her white casket. When no one +was looking, I touched her hand. I called softly, 'Constance.' She did +not answer, so I knew she was dead. + +"I had to go to the churchyard, with the others. I was compelled to look +at the grave and to see the white casket lowered in. I heard that awful +fall of earth upon her and a voice saying those terrible words, 'Dust to +dust, earth to earth, ashes to ashes.' The blind man sobbed aloud when +the earth fell. The dark woman with the hard face did not seem to care. +I could have strangled her, but I had to keep my hands still. + +"They said that she had not been sleeping and that she took too much +laudanum by mistake. It was not a mistake, for she was not of that sort. +She did it purposely. She did it because of that one mad hour of full +confession. I have killed her. After three years of self-control, it +failed me, and I went mad. It was my fault, for if I had not failed, she +would not have gone mad, too. I have killed her." + + +"_June fifteenth. Midnight._ + +"I am calmer now. I can think more clearly. I have been alone in the +woods all day and every day since--. I have been thinking, thinking, +thinking, and going over everything. She left no word for me; she was so +sure I would understand. I do not understand yet, but I shall. + +[Sidenote: Estranged] + +"There was no wrong between us, there never would have been. We were +divided by the whole earth, denied by all the leagues of sundering sea. +Now we are estranged by all the angels of heaven and all the hosts of +hell. + +"My arms ache for her--my lips hunger for hers. In that mysterious +darkness, does she want me, too? Did her heart cry out for me as mine +for her, until the blood of the poppies mingled with hers and brought +the white sleep? + +"It would have been something to know that we breathed the same air, +trod the same highways, listened together to the thrush and robin, and +all the winged wayfarers of forest and field. It would have been comfort +to know the same sun shone on us both, that the same moon lighted the +midnight silences with misty silver, that the same stars burned +taper-lights in the vaulted darkness for her and for me. + +[Sidenote: One Hour] + +"But I have not even that. I have nothing, though I have done no wrong +beyond holding her in my arms for one little hour. Out of all the time +that was before our beginning, out of all the time that shall be after +our ending, and in all the unpitying years of our mortal life, we have +had one hour." + + +"_June nineteenth._ + +"I have been to her grave. I have tried to realise that the little mound +of earth upon the distant hill, over which the sun and stars sweep +endlessly, still shelters her; that, in some way, she is there. But +I cannot. + +"The mystery agonises me, for I have never had the belief that comforts +so many. Why is one belief any better than another when we come face to +face with the grey, impenetrable veil that never parts save for a +passage? Freed from the bonds of earth, does she still live, somewhere, +in perfect peace with no thought of me? Sentient, but invisible, is she +here beside me now? Or is she asleep, dreamlessly, abiding in the earth +until some archangel shall sound the trumpet bidding all the myriad dead +arise? Oh, God, God! Only tell me where she is, that I may go, too!" + + +"_June twenty-first._ + +[Sidenote: The Hand Stayed] + +"It is true that the path she took is open to me also. I have thought of +it many times. I am not afraid to follow where she has led, even into +the depths of hell. I have had for several days a vial of the crushed +poppies, and the bitter odour, even now, fills my room. Only one thought +stays my hand--my little son. + +"Should I follow, he must inevitably come to believe that his father was +a coward--that he was afraid of life, which is the most craven fear of +all. He will see that I have given to him something that I could not +bear myself, and will despise me, as people despise a man who shirks his +burden and shifts it to the shoulders of one weaker than he. + +"When temptation assails him, he will remember that his father yielded. +When life looms dark before him and among the fearful shadows there is +no hint of light, he will recall that his father was too much of a +coward to go into those same shadows, carrying his own light. + +"And if his heart is ever filled with an awful agony that requires all +his strength to meet it, he will remember that his father failed. I +could not rest in my grave if my son, living, should despise me, even +though my narrow house was in the same darkness that hides Her." + + +"_July tenth. Dawn._ + +[Sidenote: Punishment] + +"This, then, is my punishment. Because for one hour my self-control +deserted me, when my man's blood had been crying out for three years for +the touch of her--because for one little hour my hungry arms held her +close to my aching heart, there is no peace. Nowhere in earth nor in +heaven nor in hell is there one moment's forgetfulness. Nowhere in all +God's illimitable universe is there pardon and surcease of pain. + +"The blind man comes to me and talks of her. He asks me piteously, +'Why?' He calls me his friend. He says that she often spoke of me; that +they were glad to have me in their house. He asks me if she ever said +one word that would give a reason. Was she unhappy? Was it because he +was blind and the little yellow-haired baby with her mother's blue eyes +was born lame? I can only say 'No,' and beg him not to talk of it--not +even to think of it." + + +"_July twentieth. Night._ + +"The beauty of the world at midsummer only makes my loneliness more +keen. The butterflies flit through the meadows like wandering souls of +last year's flowers that died and were buried by the snow. The harvest +moon, red-gold and wonderful, will rise slowly up out of the sea. The +path of light will lie on the still waters and widen into a vast arc at +the line of the shore. Cobwebs will come among the stubble when the +harvest is gathered in and on them will lie dewdrops that the moon will +make into pearls. + +[Sidenote: Cycle of the Seasons] + +"The gorgeous colouring of Autumn will transfigure the hills with glory, +and fill the far silences with misty amethyst and gold. The year-long +sleep will come with the first snow, and the stars burn blue and cold in +the frosty night. April bugles will wake the violets and anemones, the +dead leaves of Autumn will be starred with springtime bloom, May will +dance through the world with lilacs and apple blossoms, and I shall be +alone. + +"I can go to her grave again and see the violets all around it, their +exquisite odour made of her dust. I can carry to her the first roses of +June, as I used to do, but she cannot take them in her still hands. +I can only lay them on that impassable mound, and let the warm rains, +as soft as woman's tears, drip down and down and down until the fragrance +and my love come to her in the mist. + +"But will she care? Is that last sleep so deep that the quiet heart is +never stirred by love? When my whole soul goes out to her in an agony +of love and pain, is it possible that there is no answer? If there is a +God in heaven, it cannot be!" + + +"_October fifth. Night._ + +"It is said that Time heals everything. I have been waiting to see if it +were so. Day by day my loss is greater; day by day my grief becomes more +difficult to bear. I read all the time, or pretend to. I sit for hours +with the open book before me and never see a line that is printed there. +Oh, Love, if I could dream to-night, in the earth with you!" + + +"_October seventh._ + +"Just four months ago to-day! I was numb, then, with the shock and +horror. I could not feel as I do now. When the tide of my heart came in, +with agony in every pulse-beat, it rose steadily to the full, without +pause, without rest. I think it has reached its flood now, for I cannot +endure more. Will there ever be recession?" + + +"_November tenth._ + +[Sidenote: Death of Passion] + +"I am coming, gradually, to have some sort of faith. I do not know why, +for I have never had it before. I can see that all things made of earth +must perish as the leaves. Passion dies because it is of the earth, but +does not love live? + +[Sidenote: A Gift] + +"If only the finer things of the spirit could be bequeathed, like +material possessions! All I have to leave my son is a very small income +and a few books. I cannot give him endurance, self-control, or the power +to withstand temptation. I cannot give him joy. If I could, I should +leave him one priceless gift--my love for Constance, to which, for one +hour, hers answered fully--I should give him that love with no barrier +to divide it from its desire. + +"I wonder if Constance would have left hers to her little yellow-haired +girl? I wonder if sometimes the joys of the fathers are not visited upon +their children as well as their sins?" + + +"_November nineteenth. Night._ + +"I have come to believe that love never dies for God is love, and He is +immortal. My love for Constance has not died and cannot. Why should hers +have died? It does not seem that it has, since to-day, for the first +time, I have found surcease. + +"Constance is dead, but she has left her love to sustain and strengthen +me. It streams out from the quiet hillside to-night as never before, and +gives me the peace of a benediction. I understand, now, the blinding +pain of the last five months. The immortal spirit of love, which can +neither die nor grow old, was extricating itself from the earth that +clung to it. + + +"_December third._ + +"At last I have come to perfect peace. I no longer hunger so terribly +for the touch of her, for my aching arms to clasp her close, for her +lips to quiver beneath mine. The tide has ebbed--there is no more pain. + +"I have come, strangely, into kinship with the universe. I have a +feeling to-night of brotherhood. I can see that death is no division +when a heart is deep enough to hold a grave. The Grey Angel cannot +separate her from me, though she took the white poppies from his hands, +and gave none to me. + + +"_December eighteenth._ + +[Sidenote: Day by Day] + +"Constance, Beloved, I feel you near to-night. The wild snows of Winter +have blown across your grave, but your love is warm and sweet around my +heart. The sorrow is all gone and in its place has come a peace as deep +and calm as the sea. I can wait, day by day, until the Grey Angel +summons me to join you; until the poppies that stilled your heartbeats, +shall, in another way, quiet mine, too. + +"I can have faith. I can believe that somewhere beyond the star-filled +spaces, when this arc of mortal life merges into the perfect circle of +eternity, there will be no barrier between you and me, because, if God +is love, love must be God, and He has no limitations. + +"I can take up my burden and go on until the road divides, and the Grey +Angel leads me down your path. I can be kind. I can try, each day, to +put joy into the world that so sorely needs it, and to take nothing away +from whatever it holds of happiness now. I can be strong because I have +known you, I can have courage because you were brave, I can be true +because you were true, I can be tender because I love you. + +"At last I understand. It is passion that cries out for continual +assurance, for fresh sacrifices, for new proof. Love needs nothing but +itself; it asks for nothing but to give itself; it denies nothing, +neither barriers nor the grave. Love can wait until life comes to its +end, and trust to eternity, because it is of God." + + * * * * * + +[Sidenote: A Man's Heart] + +Roger put the little book down and wiped his eyes. He had come upon a +man's heart laid bare and was thrilled to the depths by the revelation. +He was as one who stands in a holy place, with uncovered head, in the +hush that follows prayer. + +In the midst of his tenderness for his dead father welled up a +passionate loyalty toward the woman who slept in the room adjoining the +library, whose soul had "never been welded." She had known life no more +than a prattling brook in a meadow may know the sea. Bound in shallows, +she knew nothing of the unutterable vastness in which deep answered unto +deep; tide and tempest and blue surges were fraught with no meaning for +her. + +The clock struck twelve and Roger still sat there, with his head resting +upon his hand. He read once more his father's wish to bequeath to him +his love, "with no barrier to divide it from its desire." + +Hedged in by earth and hopelessly put asunder, could it at last come to +fulfilment through daughter and son? At the thought his heart swelled +with a pure passion all its own--the eager pulse-beats owed nothing to +the dead. + +[Sidenote: Out into the Night] + +He found a sheet of paper and reverently wrapped up the little brown +book. An hour later, he slipped under the string a letter of his own, +sealed and addressed, and quietly, though afraid that the beating of his +heart sounded in the stillness, went out into the night. + + + + +XXIV + +The Bells in the Tower + + +The sea was very blue behind the Tower of Cologne, though it was not yet +dawn. The velvet darkness, in that enchanted land, seemed to have a +magical quality--it veiled but did not hide. Barbara went up the glass +steps, made of cologne bottles, and opened the door. + +[Sidenote: The Tower Unchanged] + +She had not been there for a long time, but nothing was changed. The +winding stairway hung with tapestries and the round windows at the +landings, through which one looked to the sea, were all the same. + +King Arthur, Sir Lancelot and Guinevere were all in the Tower, as usual. +The Lady of Shalott was there, with Mr. Pickwick, Dora, and Little Nell. +All the dear people of the books moved through the lovely rooms, +sniffing at cologne, or talking and laughing with each other, just as +they pleased. + +The red-haired young man and the two blue and white nurses were still +there, but they seemed to be on the point of going out. Doctor Conrad +and Eloise were in every room she went into. Eloise was all in white, +like a bride, and the Doctor was very, very happy. + +Ambrose North was there, no longer blind or dead, but well and strong +and able to see. He took Barbara in his arms when she went in, kissed +her, and called her "Constance." + +A sharp pang went through her heart because he did not know her. "I'm +Barbara, Daddy," she cried out; "don't you know me?" But he only +murmured, "Constance, my Beloved," and kissed her again--not with a +father's kiss, but with a yearning tenderness that seemed very strange. +She finally gave up trying to make him understand that her name was +Barbara--that she was not Constance at all. At last she said, "It +doesn't matter by what name you call me, as long as you love me," and +went on upstairs. + +[Sidenote: An Unfinished Tapestry] + +One of the tapestries that hung on the wall along the winding stairway +was new--at least she did not remember having seen it before. It was in +the soft rose and gold and brown and blue of the other tapestries, and +appeared old, as though it had been hanging there for some time. She +fingered it curiously. It felt and looked like the others, but it must +be new, for it was not quite finished. + +In the picture, a man in white vestments stood at an altar with his +hands outstretched in blessing. Before him knelt a girl and a man. The +girl was in white and the taper-lights at the altar shone on her two +long yellow braids that hung down over her white gown, so that they +looked like burnished gold. The face was turned away so that she could +not see who it was, but the man who knelt beside her was looking +straight at her, or would have been, if the tapestry-maker had not put +down her needle at a critical point. The man's face had not been +touched, though everything else was done. Barbara sighed. She hoped that +the next time she came to the Tower the tapestry would be finished. + +[Sidenote: In the Violet Room] + +She went into the violet room, for a little while, and sat down on a +green chair with a purple cushion in it. She took a great bunch of +violets out of a bowl and buried her face in the sweetness. Then she +went to the mantel, where the bottles were, and drenched her +handkerchief with violet water. She had tried all the different kinds of +cologne that were in the Tower, but she liked the violet water best, and +nearly always went into the violet room for a little while on her way +upstairs. + +As she turned to go out, the Boy joined her. He was a young man now, +taller than Barbara, but his face, as always, was hidden from her as by +a mist. His voice was very kind and tender as he took both her hands in +his. + +"How do you do, Barbara, dear?" he asked. + +"You have not been in the Tower for a long time." + +"I have been ill," she answered. "See?" She tried to show him her +crutches, but they were not there. "I used to have crutches," she +explained. + +"Did you?" he asked, in surprise. "You never had them in the Tower." + +"That's so," she answered. "I had forgotten." She remembered now that +when she went into the Tower she had always left her crutches leaning up +against the glass steps. + +"Let's go upstairs," suggested the Boy, "and ring the golden bells in +the cupola." + +Barbara wanted to go very much, but was afraid to try it, because she +had never been able to reach the cupola. + +"If you get tired," the Boy went on, as though he had read her thought, +"I'll put my arm around you and help you walk. Come, let's go." + +[Sidenote: Up the Winding Stairs] + +They went out of the violet room and up the winding stairway. Barbara +was not tired at all, but she let him put his arm around her, and leaned +her cheek against his shoulder as they climbed. Some way, she felt that +this time they were really going to reach the cupola. + +It was very sweet to be taken care of in this way and to hear the Boy's +deep, tender voice telling her about the Lady of Shalott and all the +other dear people who lived in the Tower. Sometimes he would make her +sit down on the stairs to rest. He sat beside her so that he might keep +his arm around her, and Barbara wished, as never before, that she might +see his face. + +[Sidenote: The Angel with the Flaming Sword] + +Finally, they came to the last landing. They had been up as high as this +once before, but it was long ago. The cupola was hidden in a cloud as +before, but it seemed to be the cloud of a Summer day, and not a dark +mist. They went into the cloud, and an Angel with a Flaming Sword +appeared before them and stopped them. The Angel was all in white and +very tall and stately, with a divinely tender face--Barbara's own face, +exalted and transfigured into beauty beyond all words. + +"Please," said Barbara, softly, though she was not at all afraid, "may +we go up into the cupola and ring the golden bells? We have tried so +many times." + +There was no answer, but Barbara saw the Angel looking at her with +infinite longing and love. All at once, she knew that the Angel was her +mother. + +"Please, Mother dear," said Barbara, "let us go in and ring the bells." + +The Angel smiled and stepped aside, pointing to the right with the +Flaming Sword that made a rainbow in the cloud. In the light of it, +they went through the mist, that seemed to be lifting now. + +"We're really in the cupola," cried the Boy, in delight. "See, here are +the bells." He took the two heavy golden chains in his hands and gave +one to Barbara. + +"Ring!" she cried out. "Oh, ring all the bells at once! Now!" + +[Sidenote: Ringing the Bells] + +They pulled the two chains with all their strength, and from far above +them rang out the most wonderful golden chimes that anyone had ever +dreamed of--strong and sweet and thrilling, yet curiously soft and low. + +With the first sound, the mist lifted and the Angel with the Flaming +Sword came into the cupola and stood near them, smiling. Far out was the +blue sky that bent down to meet a bluer sea, the sand on the shore was +as white as the blown snow, and the sea-birds that circled around the +cupola in the crystalline, fragrant air were singing. The melody blended +strangely with the sound of the surf on the shining shore below. + +The Angel with the Flaming Sword touched Barbara gently on the arm, and +smiled. Barbara looked up, first at the Angel, and then at the Boy who +stood beside her. The mist that had always been around him had lifted, +too, and she saw that it was Roger, whom she had known all her life. + +Barbara woke with a start. The sound of the golden bells was still +chiming in her ears. "Roger," she said, dreamily, "we rang them all +together, didn't we?" But Roger did not answer, for she was in her own +little room, now, and not in the Tower of Cologne. + +She slipped out of bed and her little bare, pink feet pattered over to +the window. She pushed the curtains back and looked out. It was a keen, +cool, Autumn morning, and still dark, but in the east was the deep, +wonderful purple that presages daybreak. + +Oh, to see the sun rise over the sea! Barbara's heart ached with +longing. She had wanted to go for so many years and nobody had ever +thought of taking her. Now, though Roger had suggested it more than +once, she had said, each time, that when she went she wanted to go +alone. + +[Sidenote: "I'll Try It"] + +"I'll try it," she thought. "If I get tired, I can sit down and rest, +and if I think it is going to be too much for me, I can come back. It +can't be very far--just down this road." + +She dressed hurriedly, putting on her warm, white wool gown and her +little low soft shoes. She did not stop to brush out her hair and braid +it again, for it was very early and no one would see. She put over her +head the white lace scarf she had worn to the wedding, took her white +knitted shawl, and went downstairs so quietly that Aunt Miriam did not +hear her. + +She unbolted the door noiselessly and went out, closing it carefully +after her. On the top step was a very small package, tied with string, +and a letter addressed, simply, "To Barbara." She recognised it as a +book and a note from Roger--he had done such things before. She did not +want to go back, so she tucked it under her arm and went on. + +It seemed so strange to be going out of her gate alone and in the dark! +Barbara was thrilled with a sense of adventure and romance which was +quite new to her. This journeying into unknown lands in pursuit of +unknown waters had all the fascination of discovery. + +[Sidenote: An Autumn Dawn] + +She went down the road faster than she had ever walked before. She was +not at all tired and was eager for the sea. The Autumn dawn with its +keen, cool air stirred her senses to new and abounding life. She went on +and on and on, pausing now and then to lean against somebody's fence, or +to rest on a friendly boulder when it appeared along the way. + +Faint suggestions of colour appeared in the illimitable distances +beyond. Barbara saw only a vast, grey expanse, but the surf murmured +softly on the shadowy shore. Crossing the sand, and stumbling as she +went, she stooped and dipped her hand into it, then put her rosy +forefinger into her mouth to see if it were really salt, as everyone +said. She sat down in the soft, cool sand, drew her white knitted shawl +and lace scarf more closely about her, and settled herself to wait. + +[Sidenote: Sunrise on the Sea] + +The deep purple softened with rose. Tints of gold came far down on the +horizon line. Barbara drew a long breath of wonder and joy. Out in the +vastness dark surges sang and crooned, breaking slowly into white foam +as they approached the shore. Rose and purple melted into amethyst and +azure, and, out beyond the breakers, the grey sea changed to opal and +pearl. + +Mist rose from the far waters and the long shafts of leaping light +divided it by rainbows as it lifted. Prismatic fires burned on the +boundless curve where the sky met the sea. Wet-winged gulls, crying +hoarsely, came from the night that still lay upon the islands near +shore, and circled out across the breakers to meet the dawn. + +Spires of splendid colour flamed to the zenith, the whole east burned +with crimson and glowed with gold, and from that far, mystical arc of +heaven and earth, a javelin of molten light leaped to the farthest hill. +The pearl and opal changed to softest green, mellowed by turquoise and +gold, the slow blue surges chimed softly on the singing shore, and +Barbara's heart beat high with rapture, for it was daybreak in earth and +heaven and morning in her soul. + +She sat there for over an hour, asking for nothing but the sky and sea, +and the warm, sweet sun that made the air as clear as crystal and +touched the Autumn hills with living flame. She drew long breaths of the +wind that swept, like shafts of sunrise, half-way across the world. + +[Sidenote: The Boy in the Tower] + +At last she turned to the package that lay beside her, and untied the +string, idly wondering what book Roger had sent. How strange that the +Boy in the Tower should be Roger, and yet, was it so strange, after all, +when she had known him all her life? + +Before looking at the book, she tore open the letter and read it--with +wide, wondering eyes and wild-beating heart. + +[Sidenote: Roger's Letter] + + "Barbara, my darling," it began. "I found this + book to-night and so I send it to you, for it is + yours as much as mine. + + "I think my father's wish has been granted and his + love has been bequeathed to me. I have known for a + long time how much I care for you, and I have + often tried to tell you, but fear has kept me + silent. + + "It has been so sweet to live near you, to read to + you when you were sewing or while you were ill, + and sweeter than all else besides to help you + walk, and to feel that you leaned on me, depending + on me for strength and guidance. + + "Sometimes I have thought you cared, too, and + then I was not sure, so I have kept the words + back, fearing to lose what I have. But to-night, + after having read his letters, I feel that I must + throw the dice for eternal winning or eternal + loss. You can never know, if I should spend the + rest of my life in telling you, just how much you + have meant to me in a thousand different ways. + + "Looking back, I see that you have given me my + ideals, since the time we made mud pies together + and built the Tower of Cologne, for which, alas, + we never got the golden bells. I have loved you + always and it has not changed since the beginning, + save to grow deeper and sweeter with every day + that passed. + + "As much as I have of courage, or tenderness, or + truth, or honour, I owe to you, who set my + standard high for me at the beginning, and oh, my + dearest, my love has kept me clean. If I have + nothing else to give you, I can offer you a clean + heart and clean hands, for there is nothing in my + life that can make me ashamed to look straight + into the eyes of the woman I love. + + "Ever since we went to that wedding the other day, + I have been wishing it were our own--that you and + I might stand together before God's high altar in + that little church with the sun streaming in, and + be joined, each to the other, until death do us + part. + + "Sweetheart, can you trust me? Can you believe + that it is for always and not just for a little + while? Has your mother left her love to you as my + father left me his? + + "Let me have the sweetness of your leaning on me + always, let me take care of you, comfort you when + you are tired, laugh with you when you are glad, + and love you until death and even after, as he + loved her. + + "Tell me you care, Barbara, even if it is only a + little. Tell me you care, and I can wait, a long, + long time. + + "ROGER." + +Barbara's heart sang with the joy of the morning. She opened the little +worn book, with its yellow, tear-stained pages, and read it all, up to +the very last line. + +"Oh!" she cried aloud, in pity. "Oh! oh!" + +Fully understanding, she put it aside, closing the faded cover +reverently on its love and pain. Then she turned to Roger's letter, and +read it again. + +[Sidenote: First Flush of Rapture] + +Dreaming over it, in the first flush of that mystical rapture which +makes the world new for those to whom it comes, as light is recreated +with every dawn, she took no heed of the passing hours. She did not know +that it was very late, nor that Aunt Miriam, much worried, had asked +Roger to go in search of her. She knew only that love and morning and +the sea were all hers. + +The tide was coming in. Each wave broke a little higher upon the +thirsting shore. Far out on the water was a tiny dark object that moved +slowly shoreward on the crests of the waves. Barbara stood up, shading +her eyes with her hand, and waited, counting the rhythmic pulse-beats +that brought it nearer. + +She could not make out what it was, for it advanced and then receded, or +paused in a circling eddy made by two retreating waves. At last a high +wave brought it in and left it, stranded, at her feet. + +[Sidenote: A Fragment] + +Barbara laughed aloud, for, broken by the wind and wave and worn by +tide, a fragment of one of her crutches had come back to her. The bit of +flannel with which she had padded the sharp end, so that the sound would +not distress her father, still clung to it. She wondered how it came +there, never guessing that it was but the natural result of Eloise's +attempt to throw it as far as Allan had thrown the other, the day he +took them away from her. + +A great sob of thankfulness almost choked her. Here she stood firmly on +her own two feet, after twenty-two years of helplessness, reminded of it +only by a fragment of a crutch that the sea had given back as it gives +up its dead. She had outgrown her need of crutches as the tiny +creatures of the sea outgrow their shells. + + "Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul, + As the swift seasons roll! + Leave thy low-vaulted past! + Let each new temple, nobler than the last, + Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, + Till thou at length art free, + Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea!" + +The beautiful words chanted themselves over and over in her +consciousness. The past, with all its pain and grieving, fell from her +like a garment. She was one with the sun and the morning; uplifted by +all the world's joy. + +[Sidenote: The True Lover] + +Her blood sang within her and it seemed that her heart had wings. All of +life lay before her--that life which is made sweet by love. She felt +again the ecstasy that claimed her in the Tower of Cologne, when she and +the Boy, after a lifetime of waiting, had rung all the golden bells at +once. + +And the Boy was Roger--always had been Roger--only she did not know. +Into Barbara's heart came something new and sweet that she had never +known before--the deep sense of conviction and the everlasting peace +which the True Lover, and he alone, has power to bestow. + +It was part of the wonder of the morning that when she turned, startled +a little by a muffled footstep, she should see Roger with his hands +outstretched in pleading and all his soul in his eyes. + +Barbara's face took on the unearthly beauty of dawn. Her blue eyes +deepened to violet, her sweet lips smiled. She was radiant, from her +feet to the heavy braids that hung over her shoulders and the shimmering +halo of soft hair, that blew, like golden mist, about her face. + +Roger caught her mood unerringly--it was like him always to understand. +He was no longer afraid, and the trembling of his boyish mouth was lost +in a smile. She was more beautiful than the morning of which she seemed +a veritable part--and she was his. + +[Sidenote: Flower of the Dawn] + +"Flower of the Dawn," he cried, his voice ringing with love and triumph, +"do you care? Are you mine?" + +She went to him, smiling, with the colour of the fiery dawning on her +cheeks and lips. "Yes," she whispered. "Didn't you know?" + +Then the sun and the morning and the world itself vanished all at once +beyond his ken, for Barbara had put her soft little hand upon his +shoulder, and lifted her love-lit face to his. + + +THE END. + + + + * * * * * + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + Obvious punctuation errors repaired. + + Page 4, "instrusted" changed to "intrusted" (china intrusted) + + Page 272, "checks" changed to "cheeks" (fair cheeks) + + Page 275, "venegeance" changed to "vengeance" (not of His vengeance) + + Page 321, "anenomes" changed to "anemones" (and anemones) + + Page 326, "assunder" changed to "asunder" (hopelessly put asunder) + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FLOWER OF THE DUSK*** + + +******* This file should be named 18057.txt or 18057.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/8/0/5/18057 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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