Say and Seal, Volume II
by Susan Warner · English · Gutenberg #28545 · 1,108,352 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Say and Seal, Volume II
Author: Susan Warner
Anna Bartlett Warner
Release date: April 8, 2009 [eBook #28545]
Most recently updated: January 4, 2021
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/28545
Credits: Produced by Daniel Fromont
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SAY AND SEAL, VOLUME II ***
Produced by Daniel Fromont
[Transcriber's note: Susan Warner (1819-1885) & Anna Warner
(1824-1915), _Say and seal_ (1860), Tauchnitz edition 1860 volume 2]
COLLECTION
OF
BRITISH AUTHORS
VOL. CCCXCIX.
SAY AND SEAL.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. II.
SAY AND SEAL.
BY
THE AUTHOR OF "WIDE WIDE WORLD,"
AND
THE AUTHOR OF "DOLLARS AND CENTS."
COPYRIGHT EDITION.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. II.
LEIPZIG
BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ
1860.
SAY AND SEAL.
VOL. II.
CHAPTER I.
So came the holiday week, wherein was to be done so much less than
usual--and so much more. Mr. Linden's work, indeed, was like to double
on all hands; for he was threatened with more tea-drinkings, dinners,
suppers, and frolics, than the week would hold. How should he manage to
give everybody a piece of him, and likewise present himself entire to
the assembled boys when ever they chose to assemble?--which promised to
be pretty often. How should he go skating, sliding, and sleigh-riding,
at all hours of the day and night, and yet spend all those hours where
he wanted to spend them? It was a grave question; and not easy, as he
remarked to Faith, to hold so many feelings in his hands and hurt none
of them. So with the question yet undecided, Christmas day came.
It was a brilliant day--all white and blue; the sky like a sapphire,
the earth like a pearl; the sunbeams burnished gold.
"Ha' ye but seen the light fall of the snow,
Before the soil hath smutched it?"--
Such was Pattaquasset, Christmas morning. And the bright lily,
"Before rude hands have touched it,"
that was Faith Derrick when she came down stairs. The dainty little
crimson silk hood which Mrs. Derrick had quilted for her, was in her
hand, brought down for display; but at present the sitting-room was
empty, and Faith passed on to her work-basket, to put the hood in safe
keeping. She found a pre-occupied basket. At some unknown hour of the
night, Santa Claus had come and left upon it his mark in the shape of a
package: a rather large and rather thin package, but done up with that
infallible brown paper and small cord which everybody knows by
instinct. Who ever looked twice at a parcel from _that_ wagon, and
doubted whence it came?
Faith's cheeks took an additional tinge, quite as brilliant as if the
crimson hood had been on. What doubtful fingers lifted the package from
the basket!
The thing--whatever it was--had been done up carefully. Beneath the
brown paper a white one revealed itself, beneath that a red leather
portfolio--made in the pretty old-fashioned style, and securing its
contents by means of its red leather tongue. But when Faith had
withdrawn this, and with the caution always exercised on such occasions
had also drawn out the contents, she found the prettiest continuation
of her Italian journey, in the shape of very fine photographs of all
sorts of Italian places and things, mingled with here and there an
excursion into the Swiss mountains.
A few almost awe-stricken glances Faith gave; then she put the
photographs in the portfolio again, scarcely seen, and looked at the
outside of the red leather; felt of its smooth surface with admiring
fingers that hardly believed what they touched, and a face glowing with
a very deep glow by this time. Faith thought herself rich, beyond the
imagination of a millionaire. But after a little mute amazed
consideration of her happiness, she rushed off to the kitchen to
signalize the Christmas breakfast--and perhaps spend a few of her too
many thoughts--by the preparation and production of one of Madame
Danforth's nice, but in Pattaquasset unheard of, delicacies; and when
all the rest of the breakfast was ready, Faith demurely went in with
her dish.
She had not a word of acknowledgment for Mr. Linden, which was
ungrateful. She gave him her hand, however, with a manner and look
which were graceful enough; being at once open and shy, very bright,
and yet veiled with a shade of reserve. She had been over the fire, so
her face was naturally a little rosy. There was no particular reserve
about him,--his "Merry Christmas" was not only wished but carried out,
so far as breakfast time extended. Faith might be as demure as she
liked, but she had to be merry too; so on the whole the breakfast room
was beaming with more than sunlight. Yes, it was a merry
Christmas!--merry without and merry within,--that sort of merriment
which "doeth good like a medicine." Gay voices and steps and
snowballing on the broad street; gay snowbirds and chickadees in the
branches; in the house glad faces; over and upon all, clear sunshine
and the soft hush of a winter's morning.
"What are you going to do to-day, mother?" said Faith towards the close
of breakfast time.
"I'd rather look at you than anything else, child," said her mother,
"but I've got to go out, you know. What are _you_ going to do Faith?"
"All sorts of things, mother. Mr. Linden?"--
"All sorts of things, Miss Faith--therefore we shall probably meet
quite often in the course of the day," he said smiling. "Will you give
me any commands?"
"Perhaps--if I can. Mother, how are we to get to Mrs. Somers
to-night?--is Crab well?"
"O Crab's gone away for the winter, child, and we've got Mr.
Stoutenburgh's Jerry. To be sure--that's since you went away."
The first thing for Faith was the Christmas dinner, into which she
plunged, heart and hand. The turkey, the apples, and the pies, were all
seen to at last; and about an hour before dinner Faith was ready to
take off her kitchen apron and go into the parlour. She longed for a
further touch and eyesight of that red leather.
She had it, for that hour; as dainty a luxuriating over her treasures
as anybody ever had. Faith pondered and dreamed over the photographs,
one after another; with endless marvel and querying of numberless
questions springing out of them,--general and particular, historical,
natural, social, and artistic or scientific. Questions that sometimes
she knew only enough to form vaguely. What a looking over of prints
that was! such an hour as is known by few, few of those who have seen
engravings all their lives. Nay, further than that;--such as is not
known by many a one that stands on the Bridge of sighs, and crosses the
Mer de glace, and sees the smoke curling up from Vesuvius. For once in
a while there is an imaginary traveller at home to whom is revealed
more of the spirit of beauty residing in these things, than hundreds of
those who visit them do ever see. Who
"Feels the warm Orient in the noontide air,
And from cloud-minarets hears the sunset call to prayer."
Before dinner time was quite on the stroke came home Mr. Linden, who
betaking himself first upstairs and then into the sitting-room, brought
Faith her Christmas breastknot of green and red. Stiff holly leaves,
with their glossy sheen, and bright winterberries--clear and red, set
each other off like jewellers' work; and the soft ribbon that bound
them together was of the darkest possible blue. It was as dainty a bit
of floral handicraft as Faith had often seen.
"Will you wear it, Miss Faith?" Mr. Linden said as he laid it on the
table by her.
Faith had come out of her dream, and gave the holly and winterberries a
downcast look of recognition. It was given in silence, but the pleasure
which had been uppermost for some time presently made her overcome
shyness, and looking up gratefully she exclaimed, "Mr. Linden--what
pleasure you have given me!"--The soft colour which had been in her
cheeks before, mounted instantly to deep crimson, and she added
timidly, "Wasn't it you?"
"What pleasure you give me!"--he said with a smile at her crimson and
all. "Yes, it was I."
"It seems to me I have been at those places to-day," she went on,
looking over at the sofa where her portfolio lay. "I have been fancying
your sister standing here and there and looking at something I saw in
the picture. Now I can understand a little better what she was writing
about."
"I am very glad you like them! Some time you must let me give you any
explanations they may need. What have you found for me to do this
afternoon?"
"Aren't you going to be busy, Mr. Linden?"
"About something--your business shall come first."
"It can wait," said Faith very brightly. "It was just that, Mr.
Linden.--I was going to ask you some time to shew them to me. I have
been looking at some of them by myself, and going into a great many
things over them that I could not understand. But any time will do for
that--as well as to-day."
"And to-day as well as any time"--he said smiling; "but I suppose we
must wait till after dinner."
There was great satisfaction at that dinner, not to say in it--which
indeed the dinner merited. There was the remaining glow of the pleasant
morning, and a little dawning of the afternoon, besides the hour's own
light. Faith indeed was the radiating point of pleasure, which the two
others watched and furnished with new supplies. Then after dinner came
the Italian work, and she had as elaborate and careful answers and
information as she wished for. Mr. Linden could go back and tell her
where each place got its name, and what had been its history, with many
stories of its climate and productions and traditions; and so one by
one Faith went over again her new treasures. One by one,--until the
short afternoon began to fade, and it was time to dress for Mrs.
Somers'; and they had made but little progress into the portfolio,
after all. Yet it was a great "progress" to Faith;--a grand procession
through the years of history and the stages of civilization and the
varying phases of nature and humanity.
Very tenderly the photographs were restored to the portfolio and the
red leather tongue drawn through, with a little breath heavy with
pleasure, and Faith carried off the whole to be put where profane hands
should not get hold of it. Then the comparatively ignoble business of
dressing occupied her. And Mrs. Derrick yet more, who of course was
there to help and look on; while Faith's head was erratically in her
portfolio, or at Rome, or at Florence, or--elsewhere,--as the case
might be. Her dress was this evening the same she had worn to Mrs.
Stoutenburgh's, but the knot of holly and winterberries transformed her
more than the rose and myrtle had done; and she stood an undoubted
guest of Christmas night. Faith herself took somewhat of the effect,
which her thought however concentrated.
"Mother," she said as she looked in the glass,--"I never saw anything
so pretty!"
"Neither did I, child," said Mrs. Derrick smiling.
Faith took still closer note of the beauty of her breastknot; and then
gathering up her crimson hood and cloak, they went down stairs. It was
not quite the hour yet for Mrs. Somers'. Mr. Linden was ready and in
the sitting-room; but Faith did not this time call his attention to her
bouquet. She came in and sat down very quietly in a corner of the sofa.
He paused in his walk up and down the room however, noting her well as
she came in and took her seat; coming presently to take one at her
side; and then catching up a book from the table he proceeded to give
her the ice palace of the little brook, with which he had threatened
her before.--
"Down swept the cold wind from the mountain peak,
From the snow five thousand summers old"--etc.
"O," exclaimed Faith, "I have seen just such a brook! I have played in
it; when mother was afraid I should take cold, and wouldn't let me
stay. But that's as good as the brook," she added timidly.
"Without the danger of taking cold. You are quite sure it has not
chilled you, Miss Faith?--do you feel 'winter-proof'?"
"I think I do, for to-day," said Faith. "If the evening were to be even
very disagreeable, I think I could stand it."
Which remark was perhaps significant.
The tinkle of Jerry's bells now made itself heard at the door, and
Faith was shawled and cloaked and wrapped up by her mother in the house
and by Mr. Linden in the sleigh. He was more skilful about it than
Squire Stoutenburgh; and contrived to enclose Faith in a little wigwam
of buffalo robes, without letting her feel the weight of them. Then
they dashed off--Jerry well disposed for exercise after his five
minutes' stand, and spurning the snow from a light enough pair of
heels. How merrily the bells jingled! how calmly and steadily the stars
shone down! There was no moon now, but the whitened earth caught and
reflected every bit of the starlight, and made it by no means dark; and
the gleams from cottage windows came out and fell on the snow in little
streaks of brightness. Sleighs enough abroad!--from the swift little
cutters and large family sleighs that glided on towards the parsonage,
down to sledding parties of boys, cheered only by a cow-bell and their
own laughter. Tinkle, tinkle--everywhere,--near by and in the distance;
the dark figures just casting a light shadow on the roadside, the merry
voices ignoring anything of the kind.
Mrs. Somers' house was a good long drive from Mrs. Derrick's. The road
was first on the way to Mr. Simlins'; from there it turned off at right
angles and went winding crookedly down a solitary piece of country;
rising and falling over uneven ground, twisting out of the way of a
rock here and there, and for some distance skirting the edge of a
woodland. There was light enough to see by, but it was not just the
piece of road one would choose of a dark night; and Faith felt thankful
Squire Deacon was gone to Egypt.
CHAPTER II.
In the dressing-room Faith was seized upon in the warmest manner by
Mrs. Stoutenburgh, who looked very pretty in her dress of bright
crimson silk.
"I'm so glad you've come back, dear. And how well you're looking!--a
little thin, though. But you'll soon make up for that. You're just as
lovely as you can be, Faith--do you know it?"
"No, ma'am."--Her _flowers_, she knew, were as lovely as they could be.
"Jerry brought us, Mrs. Stoutenburgh, after all, and pretty fast too."
"O he can go fast enough. You needn't look so sober, child--of course
no one thinks so but me, and nobody ever minds what I say. _That's_
pretty, I suppose you'll allow," she said laughing, and bending down
closer to Faith's holly leaves,--"what is it, Faith? basswood?"
"Don't you know holly, Mrs. Stoutenburgh? And the berries are
winterberries."
"Yes my dear--I perceive. You mustn't get angry with me, child--I tell
you nobody does, not even your grave escort. At least not for anything
I do to _him_. Well I'll go down and electrify people with the news
that you're coming." And the crimson dress floated off to the tune of a
light step and a merry voice. And more slowly and more doubtfully the
black dress and winterberries followed her. Perhaps in very truth Faith
would have been willing that Mr. Stoutenburgh should have taken her
under his broad wing for that going down stairs. At least she was as
absolutely grave and quiet as anybody ever saw her, and a little more
inclined to be shrinking. But Mr. Linden was alone in the hall at that
minute, so there was no one else to shrink from; and if Faith wanted to
shrink from him, she hardly could,--there was such an absence of
anything to alarm her, both in his look and manner. Therefore, though
she had to go down stairs upon his arm, and pass sundry people on their
way up, Faith felt that he was a shield between her and the glances and
words which he so little regarded. Eyes and tongues indeed ventured hut
little in his presence; but that protection of course extended only to
the centre of the drawing-room, and the welcome which Faith received
from Mrs. Somers,--then she must shield herself. Then truly, for a
while, she was taken possession of by Squire Stoutenburgh, who walked
with her up and down, and said all manner of kind things.
Faith had no particular skill to shield herself from anything, and
indeed gave herself no thought about it. She took what came, in a
simple and quiet spirit, which was very apt to strike like a bee the
right part of every flower; or that perhaps carried its own honey
along. So she walked up and down with Mr. Stoutenburgh; and so she
afterwards entered into the demands of a posse of her old and young
friends who had not seen her for a good while.
Amidst a little group of these people, collected benignly around Faith,
Dr. Harrison presently intruded himself. Now Dr. Harrison was a lion,
and the smaller animals naturally fell off from him, which was
precisely what he expected them to do. The doctor had the field soon
clear.
"What have you been doing to yourself?" he said to Faith with the
kindly, familiar manner which had grown up between them.
"Taking good care,"--she said, in smiling answer to his question.
"Who took the care? yourself?"
"Yes."
"I thought so."
"Why, Dr. Harrison?"
"Excuse me," said he. "Anybody else would have done it better."
"No," said she shaking her head,--"you are wrong."
"You have been--" said he, looking at her,--"you have been 'doing your
duty' too hard."
"Can one do that, Dr. Harrison?"
"Certainly!"
"I haven't been doing it this time."
"Do you remember," he said sitting down by her and lowering his
voice,--"what you said once about the flowers of the wilderness?"
"Yes."
"Would you like to see some of them?"
"In the wilderness?"
"No," said he smiling. "I can shew you one family of them, by their
portraits, here--to-night."
"I would like to see them in the wilderness or anywhere!" said Faith.
"Then if you'll come with me"--
And the next thing was Dr. Harrison's walking off the black silk and
winterberries before all the eyes of the people and through one room
after another, till a little one-side room was reached which was not a
thoroughfare to anything. In this little room was a table and a lamp
upon it, and also several very large thin books. There was also, which
was singular, a very comfortable easy chair. In this Dr. Harrison
installed his charge close by the table, and drew up one of the volumes.
"I am going to introduce to you," he said, "the whole family of the
Rhododendrons."
"Rhododendron?"--said Faith. "I never saw them."
"It is their loss," said the doctor; "but here they are."
It was as he said;--the whole family of the plant, in the most superb
style of portraiture and presentation. Full size and full colour; one
of the most magnificent of such works. Faith had never seen a
Rhododendron, and even in her dreams had never visited a wilderness
where such flowers grew. Her exquisite delight fully satisfied Dr.
Harrison, and quite kept her attention from herself and the fact of her
being shut off from the rest of the company. Now and then one and
another would drop in and look at what they were about, with curiosity
if not with sympathy; but Rhododendrons were not alluring to most of
the people, nor to say truth was Dr. Harrison. With most urbane
politeness he dispersed any desire to remain and look over his
proceedings which might have been felt by some of the intruders; or
contrived that they should find nothing to detain them.
It was a long business, to turn over all those delicious portraits of
floral life and give anything like a sufficient look at each one. Such
glories of vegetable beauty Faith had never imagined. It was almost a
new revelation. There were deep brilliant crimsons; there was the
loveliest rose-colour, in large heads of the close elegant flowers;
there were, larger still and almost incredible in their magnificence,
enormous clusters of cream-coloured and tinted and even of buff. There
were smaller and humbler members of the family, which would have been
glorious in any other companionship. There were residents of the rich
regions of the tropics; and less superb members of the temperate zones;
there were trees and shrubs; and there were little bushy, hardy
denizens of the highest and barrenest elevations of rocks and snow to
which inflorescence ever climbs. Faith almost caught her breath.
"And these are in the wilderness!" she said.
"Yes. What then?" said the doctor. Faith did not say.
"You are thinking they 'waste their sweetness'?"
"O no, indeed! I don't think that."
"You are thinking something. Please let me be the better for it."
"One ought to be the better for it," said Faith.
"Then I hope you won't refuse it to me," said Dr. Harrison gently
laughing at her.
"I was thinking, Dr Harrison, what the Bible says,--'He hath made
everything beautiful in his time';--and, 'God saw everything that he
had made, and behold it was very good.'"
The doctor turned over the leaf to a new Rhododendron. Faith's thoughts
went to Pequot, and her heart gave a bound of joy at the remembrance of
the sick woman there.
Mrs. Stoutenburgh's crimson dress was so softly worn and managed, that
the wearer thereof was close in Dr. Harrison's neighbourhood for a
minute before he was aware of her presence; which quiet motions, it
should be observed, were habitual to Mrs. Stoutenburgh, and not at all
assumed for the occasion. Therefore it was with no idea of startling
anybody, that she said presently, "My dear Faith, what _are_ you
looking at through those Rhododendrons?" Faith started, and looked up
with a bit of a smile.
"What do you see, Mrs. Stoutenburgh?" said the doctor.
"O several things," said the lady, passing her hand softly over Faith's
brow, and then with one of her sudden impulses putting her lips there.
"Do you like them, Faith?"
"Does not Mrs. Stoutenburgh like them?" said the doctor, as he placed a
chair for her in the best position left for seeing.
"Thank you," said she laughing. "I came here to be seen this evening.
And so ought some other people. How much do you pay for the monopoly,
doctor?"
"I really don't know!" said Dr. Harrison with a very slight rise of his
handsome eyebrows. "I am in Pattaquasset--which is to me a region of
uncertainties. You will know better than I, Mrs. Stoutenburgh."
"Well," said Mrs. Stoutenburgh with a wicked look at the doctor for his
sole benefit,--"speaking of Rhododendrons, which you've seen often
enough before,--don't you admire _this_--which you have _not_ seen
before?" and she touched Faith's holly leaves with the tip of her
little glove. "I should think it must stir what Mr. Linden calls your
'nerves of pleasant sensation'."
"I am honoured by your estimation," said the doctor laughing slightly.
"Miss Derrick's taste is matchless. It is an act of benevolence for her
to wear flowers."
Faith's very brow crimsoned, till she bent it from view as much as she
could. In all her truth she could not rise up there and confess that
her skill was not the skill to be commended. She wanted a shield then.
"Don't flatter yourself that you are an object of charity," said Mrs.
Stoutenburgh turning over another leaf to give Faith employment.
"They're talking of games in the other room, dear," she added in a
gentle voice,--"may I tell Mrs. Somers you will play too?"
"Yes ma'am, certainly!"
"They're not ready yet--sit still and enjoy your prints--I'll see what
they are about." And the lady left the room. Dr. Harrison sought some
particularly fine specimens and engaged Faith in talk about them and
their localities and habits, till her self-possession was restored.
"Have you heard the news about Mr. Linden?" he asked with most
nonchalant carelessness.
"What news?" said Faith, doubtful whether he meant Squire
Stoutenburgh's chapter or some other.
"Then he hasn't told you himself?"
"No," said Faith.
"I thought you ought to be authority," the doctor went on in the same
tone. "It is very good news--for him--I hope it is true. They say--I
have heard,--how beautiful the droop of those petals is!--and the shade
of colour is rare--They say, that he has a very dear friend abroad; I
mean in Europe, somewhere. Do you think it is true?"
"Yes," said Faith. She thought it was not wonderful news.
"I mean a lady friend?" said the doctor.
"Yes," said Faith again. She knew now what the doctor meant, but she
did not feel inclined to enter into the subject or to enlighten him at
all. Then too Mr. Linden might have more friends than _one_ abroad!--It
flashed upon her like a curious illumination.
"Then the story is true?" said the doctor.
"I don't know, sir," said Faith in some distress. "I know nothing about
it."
"But you don't know that it is not true?" said he looking at her.
"No, sir. I don't know."
Dr. Harrison's further questions and remarks were cut short by the
entrance of the very person referred to; who coming up with his usual
light, alert step, held out his hand first of all to the questioner.
"Good evening, doctor!--how do you do again? Miss Faith, may I take you
away from these beauties?" And the released hand was offered to her.
She put hers in it very willingly but very silently; Faith dared not
say a word to him about the Rhododendrons or about anything else.
"Ah, you have two hands again," said Dr. Harrison, "and you turn it
against me!"
"Not that fact--" Mr. Linden said as he went off. And then slackening
his step, he talked or made Faith talk--and laugh--every inch of the
way into the room where all the rest were clustered ready for blind
man's buff. It was a triumph of his skill,--or of his power,--for she
had left the Rhododendrons in a mood most shy and quiet, and disposed
to keep so. Dr. Harrison had not followed them, but soon made his
entrance upon the company by another door.
"What is going on? or off, Mrs. Stoutenburgh?" he whispered to that
lady.
"Why the bandage is going on, and we're going off," said she laughing.
"Will you be blinded first, doctor?"
"Blind man's buff!" said the doctor shrugging his shoulders comically.
"Barbarous! I would rather 'go off' too--but anything to please you,
Mrs. Stoutenburgh. A game to see how much a man without his five senses
can do against other people who have them." But the doctor gallantly
stepped up to Mrs. Somers.
"I represent the forlorn hope for the evening, aunt Ellen. Has anybody
volunteered to be the first victim?"
"You are the last person in the room that ought to volunteer," said
Mrs. Somers,--"however, blindness is proverbial in some cases. Miss
Essie will bandage your eyes, Julius--and use her own for you in the
meanwhile, I dare say. Miss Essie, here is a candidate."
"Not for Miss Essie's good offices!" said the doctor. "I know her. I
shall not trust her. I will put myself in safe hands."
And with an inexpressible air of carelessness and easy pleasure-taking,
Dr. Harrison carried his handsome person across the room to where Faith
yet stood by the side of Mr. Linden; stood looking rather sober. She
had not brought any of the rosy Rhododendron colour away in her face;
or else it had faded. The doctor came up and spoke in an undertone as
wilfully and gracefully independent as his manner.
"If I ask you to do me the honour to put this handkerchief over my
eyes, Miss Derrick, I suppose you will not know what it signifies?"
"No, sir," said Faith, with a very slight smile and extra colour.
"Where I have been," said the doctor,--"where we never play it!--it is
played in this way. My entreating you to blind my eyes, signifies that
without them I shall endeavour to find you."
"Then I wish you'd get somebody else to do it, Dr. Harrison."
"You are not in earnest?" said the doctor.
"Very much in earnest."
"But I should observe," said he smiling, "that even the unkindness of
your refusal would not change my endeavour. I only give you, as in
honour bound, the chance of doing all you can to prevent my succeeding.
Will you do it?"
He tendered the handkerchief. Faith coloured a little more, but to put
a stop to his absurdities, as they seemed to her, and to her consequent
prominence before the eyes of people, she accepted the office. Dr.
Harrison kneeled at her feet, and Faith put the handkerchief round his
eyes and tied it on; endeavouring, to do her justice, to perform the
task thoroughly. She was not quite sure how well it was done, after
all,--for the doctor had interposed a gentle "Softly," as she was
drawing the knot and had at the same time also raised his hand to ease
the bandage. But Faith had to let it go so; and simply resolved to take
care of herself.
Many eyes, meanwhile, surveyed this performance with much edification,
glancing too at the motionless figure who at Faith's side looked down
upon it. But when the smile in those eyes touched the lips as well,
Mrs. Stoutenburgh was roused to a pitch of delight; and running into
the middle of the room to meet the doctor as he came to take his stand,
she clapped her hands exclaiming, "O, doctor! doctor!--how could you
let anybody tie anything over your eyes!"
"Is there treachery, Mrs. Stoutenburgh?" said the doctor with a comic
stop.
"Where?"--said the lady.
"Nay,--I know where," said the doctor. And turning from her he
addressed himself to the game.
But though Dr. Harrison shewed himself a keen player the game came to
no sudden termination. And Faith could not help doubting that her work
had not been too effectual. It was beyond question, even if she had not
been forewarned, that the doctor was endeavouring to find--or
endeavouring to catch her. In vain Mrs. Stoutenburgh's crimson and Miss
Essie's blue floated past him and rustled behind him. In vain Mrs.
Somers' purple stood in his way. The skirt of that one black silk could
go nowhere that some one of the doctor's senses did not inform him of
it. Closely he followed upon her flight, and keen work Faith found it,
play as well as she would. She began to get out of breath, and the
amusement and fun grew uproarious.
It was when her foot was failing that the doctor's gained strength:
between him and the prize there was now no barrier; no leap could avail
Faith in the corner where she was at last hemmed in. Slowly and
securely the doctor advanced, first himself and then his hands, and
caught--Mr Linden! Caught him unmistakeably too,--there was no help for
it; and Dr. Harrison in his astonishment forgot to pronounce him
somebody else!
"Confound you!" said the doctor slowly and comically--"how did you get
here?"
"Are you fatigued?" said Mr. Linden, taking off the bandage. "Miss
Faith, you did _this_ part of your work very ill."
"How did you get here?" repeated the doctor, taking hold of his arm and
shaking it slightly. "I wasn't looking for _you_, man."
"What were you _looking_ for?" said Mr. Linden, with a laughing return
of the doctor's gaze.
"Shall I put that on for you?" said the latter with a sort of
complicate expression, which however never lost its grace and ease. And
then began another chase--but not of Faith this time,--perhaps Mr.
Linden thought she needed rest. And the changes ran round the company,
but never (as it happened) including Faith or Dr. Harrison, until they
reached the finishing round of the game. Then it was Mr. Linden's turn
again to wear the bandage, and then he gave Faith the sort of run he
had given her before at Mrs. Stoutenburgh's--and with the same success.
"Haven't they played blind man's buff long enough?" Faith whispered,
when the bandage was taken off her captor. She was flushed, a little,
and sober more than a little.
"Yes--I will move a change," he answered in the same tone. Which he
did, after a short consultation.
"Dr. Harrison--you have seen the 'Butterfly,' I suppose?"
"_The_ butterfly?" said the doctor. "I have seen many--of all colours;
but the butterfly par excellence, I know not. Unless it is one with
white wings and black body, and spots of most brilliant red on the
breast."
"The one I mean combines more colours," said Mr. Linden. "What were you
doing in France, not to see it?"
"Seeing other things, I suppose. However, now you speak of it, I
believe that butterfly has flown over me--sometime."
"Please to imagine yourself a gay rover for the nonce," said Mr.
Linden, leading the doctor persuasively into the middle of the floor.
"Just suppose you are a Purple Emperor--will you doctor? Miss Essie
wants a story and forfeits,--I shall leave you to gratify her." But he
himself went to give Miss Faith a seat. That was done with a very
different manner from the gay, genial way in which he had addressed the
doctor: it was genial enough, certainly, but grave.
"You do not feel well?" he said, as he wheeled up an easy chair for
her. It was spoken too low for any one else to hear.
"Yes, I do,"--said Faith quickly. But her face flushed deep, and her
eye though it glanced towards him, failed timidly of meeting his; and
her voice had lost all the spring of pleasure.
"Then cannot you keep the promise you made about a disagreeable
evening?" The tone was very low still--(he was arranging her footstool
and chair) a little concerned too, a little--or Faith fancied it--but
indeed she was not quite sure what the third part was; and then the
doctor began his work.
For a minute or two she did not hear him, or heard without heed. She
was thinking over Mr. Linden's question and struggling with it. For its
slight tone, of remonstrance perhaps, only met and stirred into life
the feeling she was trying to keep down. Her lip took one of its
sorrowful curves for an instant; but then Dr. Harrison came towards
them.
"What insect on the face of the earth, Linden, will you be? What does
he resemble most, Miss Derrick?"
"I am not particular about being on the face of the earth," said Mr.
Linden,--"the air will do just as well."
The doctor was waiting for Faith's answer. Under the exigency of the
moment she gave it him, glancing up first at the figure beside her,
perhaps to refresh her memory--or imagination--and smiling a little as
she spoke.
"I don't think of any he is like, Dr. Harrison."
"Do you think I am like a purple butterfly?" said the doctor.
"Yes, a little,"--said Faith. But it was with a face of such childlike
soberness that the doctor looked hard at her.
"What do you think you are like yourself?" said he; not lightly.
"I think I am a little like an ant," said Faith.
The doctor turned half round on his heel.
"'Angels and ministers of grace'!" was his exclamation. "Most winged,
gentle, and etherial of all the dwellers in, or on, anthills,--know
that thy similitude is nothing meaner than a flower. You must take the
name of one, Miss Faith--all the ladies do--what will you be?"
"What will you be?" Mr. Linden repeated,--"Mignonette?--that is even
below the level of some of your anthills."
"If you please,"--she said.
"Or one of your Rhododendrons?" said the doctor--"that is better; for
you have the art--or the nature, indeed,--of representing all the tints
of the family by turns--except the unlovely ones. Be a Rhodora!"
"No"--said Faith--"I am not like that--nor like the other, but I will
be the other."
"Mignonette"--said the doctor. "Well, what shall we call him? what is
_he_ like?"
"I think," said Faith, looking down very gravely, not with the flashing
eye with which she would have said it another time,--"he is most like a
midge."
The little laugh which answered her, the way in which Mr. Linden bent
down and said, "How do you know, Miss Faith?" were slightly mystifying
to Dr. Harrison.
"I don't know,"--she said smiling; and the doctor with one or two looks
of very ungratified curiosity left them and returned to his post.
"What are they going to play, Mr. Linden?" said Faith. The doctor's
explanation, given to the rest generally, she had not heard.
"Do you know what a family connexion you have given me, Miss
Faith?--The proverb declares that 'the mother of mischief is no bigger
than a midge's wing.'"
An involuntary little caught breath attested perhaps Faith's
acquiescence in the truth of the proverb; but the doctor's words
prevented the necessity of her speaking.
"Miss Essie--Ladies and gentlemen! Please answer to your names, and
thereby proclaim your characters. Mrs. Stoutenburgh, what are you?"
"A poppy, I think," said Mrs. Stoutenburgh laughing. "I like to be
beforehand with the public."
"Will you please to name your lord and master? He is incapable of
naming himself."
"I think you've named him!" said Mrs. Stoutenburgh with a gay toss of
her pretty head. "I'm not learned in insects, doctor,--call him
anything that eats up butter-flies."
"Mr. Stoutenburgh will--you be a grub?" said the doctor. "Or a beetle?
I don't know anything else that I--as a butterfly--dislike more."
"No, I'll be a cricket--I'm so spry," said the Squire,--"and I'll be
down upon _you_ in some other form, doctor."
"You'll have to fly higher first," said the doctor. "Miss Essie
declares herself to be a purple Althaea. Miss Davids--an evening
primrose. Miss Deacon--a cluster rose. Miss Fax--a sweet pink. Miss
Chester--a daisy. Miss Bezac--what shall I put you down?" The butterfly
was making a list of his flowers and insects, and cards had been
furnished to the different members of the party, and pencils, to do as
much for themselves.
"I'd as lieve be balm as anything else, if I knew how," said Miss
Bezac; "but I shouldn't call _that_ putting me down."
"That fits, anyhow," said Squire Stoutenburgh.
"'Balm for hurt minds'"--said Dr. Harrison writing. "Miss Julia De
Staff is a white lily. Miss Emmons--a morning glory. Mrs. Churchill a
peony. Miss Derrick is mignonette. Mrs. Somers--?"
"I may as well be lavender," said Mrs. Somers. "You say I am in a good
state of preservation."
"What is Mr. Somers?"
"Mr. Somers--what are you?" said his wife.
"Ha!--I don't know, my dear," said Mr. Somers blandly. "I think I
am--a--out of place."
"Then you're a moth," said the doctor. "That is out of place too, in
most people's opinion. Miss Delaney, I beg your pardon--what are you?"
"Here are the two Miss Churchills, doctor," said Miss Essie--"hyacinth
and laburnum."
"I am sure you have been sponsor, Miss Essie. Well this is my garden of
flowers. Then of fellow insects I have a somewhat confused variety. Mr.
Stoutenburgh sings round his hearth in the shape of a black cricket.
Mr. Linden passes unnoticed in the invisibility of a midge--nothing
more dangerous. Mr. Somers does all the mischief he can in the way of
devouring widows' houses. The two Messrs. De Staff" (two very spruce
and moustachioed young gentlemen) "figure as wasp and snail--one would
hardly think they belonged to the same family--but there is no
accounting for these things. Mr. George Somers professes to have the
taste of a bee--but luckily the garden belongs to the butterfly."
"In other words, some one has put Dr. Harrison in a flutter," said Mrs.
Stoutenburgh.
"I haven't begun yet," said the doctor wheeling round to face her;
"when I do, my first business will be to cut you up, Mrs. Stoutenburgh."
"Miss Faith," said Mr. Linden while the roll went on, "I have not
forgotten your question,--they, and we, are going to play a French game
called 'the Butterfly and the Flowers;' wherein I, a midge, am in
humble attendance oh a sprig of mignonette. Whenever our butterfly
gardener chooses to speak the name of any flower or insect, that Flower
or insect must reply: when he speaks of the gardener, you flowers must
extend one hand in token of welcome, we insects draw back in dismay: if
the gardener brings his watering-pot, or there falls a shower of rain,
you must hold up your head for joy--I must kneel down for fear. If the
sunshine is mentioned, we are free to rejoice together--standing up and
making demonstrations. You may reply, Miss Faith, either in your own
words or quotations, so that you mention some one of your companions;
but if you fail to speak, or break any other rule, you must pay a
forfeit first and redeem it afterwards."
"I may mention either insect or flower?" said Faith.
"Yes, just what you like."
"If everybody is ready," said the doctor, "I will begin by remarking
that I find myself in an 'embarras de richesses'--so many sweets around
me that I--a butterfly--know not which to taste first; and such an
array of enemies, hostile alike to the flowers and me, that I know not
which to demolish first. I hope a demolishing rain will fall some of
these days--ah! that is gratifying! behold my enemies shrinking
already, while the flowers lift up their heads with pleasure and warm
themselves in the rays of the sun. What is mignonette doing?"
There was a general outcry of laughter, for as the gentlemen had
kneeled and bent their heads, and the flowers had risen to greet the
sun,--Faith, in her amusement and preoccupation had sat still. She rose
now, blushing a little at being called upon.
"Mignonette loves the sun without making any show for it. She has no
face to lift up like the white lily."
"The white lily isn't sweet like lavender," said Miss Julia.
"And the lavender has more to do in the linen press than among
butterflies," said Mrs. Somers.
"It is good to know one's place," said the doctor. "But the butterfly,
seeking a safe resting place, flutters with unpoised flight, past the
false poppy which flaunts its gay colours on the sight."
"And fixes its eyes on the distant gardener with his watering-pot,"
said Mrs. Stoutenburgh, stretching forth her hand, sibyl-like, towards
the now prostrate doctor,--"whereat the mignonette rejoices."
"All the flowers rejoice," said the mignonette, "and the cricket jumps
out of the way."
"Into the sunshine"--said Mr. Stoutenburgh, laughing;--"but the moth
feels doubtful."
"The moth"--said Mr. Somers--"he--don't like the sunshine so well as
the rain. He--ha--he wishes he was a midge there, to get under shelter."
"A midge _here_ he can't be," said Mr. Linden, dropping his voice for
Faith's benefit,--"'Two suns hold not their courses in one
sphere!'"--Then aloud--"Invisibility is a great thing--when you can
make up your mind to it, but 'Althaea with the purple eye' looks on
life differently."
"I look on it soberly," said Miss Essie.--
"'Flutter he, flutter he, high as he will,
A butterfly is but a butterfly still.
And 'tis better for us to remain where we are,
In the lowly valley of duty and care,
Than lonely to soar to the heights above,
Where there's nothing to do and nothing to love.'"
"I'll flutter no more! after that"--said the doctor. "I'll creep into
the heart of the white lily and beg it to shelter me."
"It won't hide you from the sun nor from the rain," said the white
lily,--"and I'd as lieve shelter a spider besides."
Faith forgot again that she must welcome the sun; but she was not the
only one who had incurred forfeits. Nor the last one who should. For
while that interesting member of society who called himself spider,
made his reply, Mr. Linden's attention naturally wandered--or came
back; and the lively dialogue which then ensued between Messrs. Snail,
Wasp, Beetle, etc. failed to arouse him to the duties of a midge or the
fear of the gardener: he forgot everything else in the pleasure of
making Mignonette laugh. Standing half before her at last, in some
animated bit of talk, more than one sunbeam and watering-pot had come
and gone, unnoticed by both midge and mignonette,--a fact of which some
other people took note, and smilingly marked down the forfeits.
"Mr. Linden"--said the voice of Miss Essie at his elbow--"do you know
what the doctor is saying?--'The mother of mischief is no bigger than a
midge's wing!' You'd better speak to him."
Mr. Linden turned, with a laughing, recollective glance--
"Who speaks slightingly of the midge?--let him have a dose of syrup of
poppies!"
"I guess you can find balm," said Mrs. Stoutenburgh gaily.
"He shall have it if he wants it," said Miss Bezac--"that is if _I_'ve
got it,--though I rather guess he's got it himself,--I'm sure I don't
know what he hasn't got. And it don't strike me he looks as if he
wanted it, either, if I _had_. But it's funny I should and not the
doctor--though to be sure most things are,--and _he_'s gone to 'the
butterfly's ball and the grasshopper's feast.'"
"The grasshopper's feast being just now announced," said Mrs. Somers
stepping forward, "I shall hope to set the flowers free from their
natural enemies without more delay."
"I shall not confess to that!" said Mr. Linden under-tone. "But will
you come, Miss Faith--the insects are all gone--
'Save the few that linger, even yet,
Round the Alyssum's tuft and the Mignonette.'"
The midge's prompt action had perhaps disappointed several other
people. Dr. Harrison at any rate contrived with Miss Essie to be the
immediately preceding couple in the walk to the supper-room.
"I'm glad of some refreshment!" said the doctor; "butterflies cannot
live on the wing. Linden! have you been singing all the evening, in the
character of a midge?"
"No," said Mr. Linden--"all the singing I have done has been in my own
character."
"I am glad to hear it. By the way," said Dr. Harrison as they reached
the supper-room and paired off from their respective charges,--"I am
sorry to hear that Pattaquasset has no hold on you, Linden."
"Indeed?" said Mr. Linden,--an "indeed" which might refer to the
doctor's sorrow, or the supposed fact.
"Nay I know nothing about it!" said the doctor lightly as he attacked
the supper-table--"but Miss Derrick tells me it is true that your heart
is in another place."
"Dr. Harrison!" Mr. Linden said, with a momentary erectness of
position. But he said no more; turning off then towards Faith with her
oysters. And the gentle respect and quick attention with which she was
served, Faith might feel, and take note of--yet not guess that its
peculiar tone this night was warring, hand to hand, with the injustice
done her name. The doctor had unwittingly betrayed at least one point
of talk held over the Rhododendrons--furnished a clue he dreamed not
of; and stirred a power of displeasure which perhaps he thought Mr.
Linden did not possess.
Faith did not indeed guess anything from the manner of the latter to
her, although she felt it; she felt it as his own, kind and watchful
and even affectionate; but like him, belonging to him, and therefore
not telling upon the question. With a very humbled and self-chiding
spirit, she was endeavouring to keep the face and manner which suited
the place, above a deep sinking of heart which was almost overcoming.
Her success was like the balance of her mind--doubtful. Gentle her face
was as ever; all the crosses of the evening had not brought an angle
there; but it was shadowed beyond the fitness of things; and she was
still and retiring so far as it was possible to be, shrinking into a
very child's lowness of place.
Ladies were in the majority that night and the gentlemen were obliged
to be constantly on the move. In one of the minutes when Faith was
alone, Mrs. Stoutenburgh came up.
"Faith," she whispered, "have you been doing anything to vex my friend?"
Faith started a little, with a sort of shadow of pain crossing her face.
"Who is your friend, Mrs. Stoutenburgh?"
"Hush, child!" she answered--"_your_ friend, if you like it better."
And she added softly but seriously, "Don't vex him,--he doesn't deserve
it."
Faith's lip was that touchingly sorrowful child's lip for an instant.
She was beyond speaking. Then came up help, in the shape of Miss Essie;
with questions about the forfeits and about Mr. Linden. All Mrs.
Stoutenburgh's kindness made itself into a screen for Faith, on the
instant,--neither eyes nor tongues were allowed to come near her.
"Mr. Linden!" said Miss Essie as he just then came up, "will you help
us give out forfeits? Who do you think is best to do it?"
"Mr. Linden," said Mrs. Somers, "we are all very anxious to know
whether all the reports about you are true."
Mr. Linden bowed to the anxiety, but gave it no further heed.
"Are they?" she repeated.
"Do all the reports agree, Mrs. Somers?"
"I must confess they are at swords' points."
"Then they cannot all be true,--let them fight it out."
"But suppose some of the fighting should come upon you?"
"That is a supposition I have just refused to take up," said Mr.
Linden, stepping towards the table and bringing a bunch of grapes to
Faith's plate.
"Yes, but everybody hasn't the patience of Job," said Mrs. Somers.
"Julius, for instance."
"He has at least his own ways of obtaining information," said Mr.
Linden, and Faith felt the slight change of voice. "Miss Essie, what
will you have?"
"Has the doctor any forfeits to pay?" was the somewhat irrelevant
answer. "I should so like to see you two set against each other! Dr.
Harrison!--have you any forfeits?"
"No," said the doctor;--"but as severe service to perform as if I had.
Linden, we shall want your help--it's too much for one man."
Faith edged away behind this growing knot of talkers, and presently was
deeply engaged in conversation with Miss Cecilia Deacon, at a table in
the corner, and alternating her attention between grapes and words.
Then Squire Stoutenburgh walked softly up and stood behind Faith's
chair.
"My dear, will you have anything more?"
"No, sir, thank you."
"Then I am going to carry you off!" said the Squire,--"if I wait a
quarter of a second more I shall lose my chance. Come!"
Faith was very willing to come, indeed; and they went back to the
drawing-room, all the company pouring after them; and Faith feeling as
if she had got under a kind of lee shore, on Mr. Stoutenburgh's arm. It
could not shelter her long, for the forfeits began.
The doctor and Mr. Linden, with Miss Essie and Mrs. Stoutenburgh for
coadjutors, were constituted the awarding committee; and the forfeits
were distributed to them indifferently. There were many to be redeemed;
and at first there was a crowd of inferior interest, Messrs. Spider and
Wasp, Mesdemoiselles White Lily and Cluster rose; who were easily
disposed of and gallantly dismissed. But there were others behind. One
of Faith's forfeits came up; it was held by Dr. Harrison.
"Please to stand forth, Miss Derrick, and hear your sentence," said the
doctor, leading her to a central position in the floor; which Faith
took quietly, but with what inward rebellion one or two people could
somewhat guess.
"Have the goodness to state to the company what you consider to be the
most admirable and praiseworthy of all the characters of flowers within
your knowledge; and to describe the same, that we may judge of the
justness of your opinion."
"Describe the character?" said Faith in a low voice.
"Yes. If you please."
She stood silent a moment, with downcast eyes, and did not raise them
when she spoke. Her colour was hardly heightened, and though her voice
rose little above its former pitch, its sweet accents were perfectly
audible everywhere. The picture would have been enough for her forfeit.
"The prettiest character of a flower that I know, is that of a little
species of Rhododendron. It is one of the least handsome, to look at,
of all its family; its beauty is in its living. It grows on the high
places of high mountains, where frost and barrenness give it no help
nor chance; but there, where no other flower ever blossoms, it opens
its flowers patiently and perseveringly; and its flowers are very
sweet. Nothing checks it nor discourages it. As soon as the great cold
lets it come, it comes; and as long as the least mildness lets it stay,
it stays. Amidst snow and tempest and desolation it opens its blossoms
and spreads its sweetness, with nobody to see it nor to praise it;
where from the nature of the place it lives in, its work is all alone.
For no other flower will bear what it bears.--Will that do?" said
Faith, looking up gravely at her questioner.
Very gently, very reverently even, he took her hand, put it upon his
arm and led her to a seat, speaking as he went low words of gratified
pardon asking. "You must forgive me!" he said. "Forfeits must be
forfeits, you know. I couldn't resist the temptation."
"Now wasn't that pretty?" whispered Miss Essie in the mean time in Mr.
Linden's ear.
He had listened, leaning against the mantelpiece, and with shaded eyes
looking down; and now to Miss Essie's question returned only a grave
bend of the head.
"If you have been looking at the floor all this while, you have lost
something," said the lady. "Do you know your turn comes next? Mr.
Linden--ladies and gentlemen!--is condemned to tell us what he holds
the most precious thing in this world; and to justify himself in his
opinion by an argument, a quotation, and an illustration!"--
"Now will he find means to evade his sentence!" said Mrs. Stoutenburgh
laughing.
"He has confessed himself addicted to witchcraft in my hearing," said
the doctor, who had remained standing by Faith's chair.
"The most precious thing in the world," said Mr. Linden, in a tone as
carelessly graceful as his attitude, "is that which cannot be
bought,--for if money could buy it, then were money equally valuable.
Take for illustration, the perfection of a friend."
"_I_ don't understand,"--said Miss Essie; "but perhaps I shall when I
hear the rest."
He smiled a little and gave the quotation on that point in his own
clear and perfect manner.
"'A sweet, attractive kind of grace;
A full assurance given by looks;
Continual comfort in a face;
The lineaments of gospel books,--
I trow that countenance cannot lye
Whose thoughts are legible in the eye.'"
The quotation was received variously, but in general with vast
admiration. Miss Essie turned to Mrs. Stoutenburgh and remarked, half
loud,
"_That's_ easy to understand. I was dull."
"What do you think of it?" said the doctor softly, stooping towards
Faith. But if she heard she did not answer him. She sat with downcast
eyes that did not move. She had been wondering whether that was a
description of "Pet,"--or of somebody else.
"Faith," whispered Mrs. Stoutenburgh's kind mischievous voice in her
ear,--"in whose face do you suppose he finds 'continual comfort'?" But
she was sorry the next instant, for the pained, startled look which
flashed up at her. Sorry and yet amused--the soft little kiss on
Faith's cheek was smiling although apologetic.
"Mr. Linden," said the doctor, who held the bag of forfeits,--"it is
your duty to punish Miss Essie with some infliction, such as you can
devise."
"Miss Essie," said Mr. Linden, walking gravely up to her, "if there is
any person in this room towards whom you entertain and practise
malicious, mischievous, and underhand designs, you are hereby sentenced
to indicate the person, declare the designs, and to 'shew cause.'"
"Why I never did in my life!" said Miss Essie, with a mixture of
surprise and amusement in her gracious black eyes.
"The court is obliged to refuse an unsupported negative," said Mr.
Linden bowing.
"Well," said Miss Essie, with no diminishing of the lustre of her black
orbs,--"I had a design against you, sir!"
"Of what sort?" said Mr. Linden with intense gravity, while everybody
else laughed in proportion.
"I had a design to enter your mind by private fraud, and steal away its
secrets;--and the reason was, because the door was so terribly strong
and had such an uncommon good lock! and I couldn't get in any other
way."
"I hope that is news to the rest of the company," said Mr. Linden
laughing as he bowed his acknowledgments. "It is none to me! Miss
Essie, may your shadow never be less!"--
"Aint you ashamed!" said Miss Essie reproachfully. "Didn't such a
confession deserve better? Who's next, Mr. Harrison?"
Some unimportant names followed, with commonplace forfeits according;
then Faith's name came to Mr. Linden. Then was there an opening of eyes
and a pricking of ears of all the rest of the company. Only Faith
herself sat as still as a mouse, after one little quick glance over to
where the person stood in whose hands she was. He stood looking at
her,--then walked with great deliberation across the room to her low
seat, and taking both her hands lifted her up.
"You need not be frightened," he said softly, as keeping one hand in
his clasp he led her back to where he had been standing; then placed
her in a great downy easy chair in that corner of the fireplace, and
drew up a footstool for her feet.
"Miss Faith," he said, "you are to sit there in absolute silence for
the next fifteen minutes. If anybody speaks to you, you are not to
answer,--if you are longing to speak yourself you must wait. It is also
required that you look at nobody, and hear as little as possible." With
which fierce sentence, Mr. Linden took his stand by the chair to see it
enforced.
"What a man you are!" said Mrs. Stoutenburgh laughing.
"That's not fair play!" said Mrs. Somers. "She don't want to sit
there--if you think she does, you're mistaken."
"She should have been more careful then," said Mr. Linden. "Dr.
Harrison, you have the floor."
Dr. Harrison did not appear to think that was much of a possession;--to
judge by his face, which cast several very observant glances towards
the chair, and by his manner which for a moment was slightly abstracted
and destitute of the spirit of the game. Miss Essie's eyes took the
same direction, with a steady gaze which the picture justified. Faith
sat where she had been placed, in most absolute obedience to the orders
she had received,--except possibly--not probably--the last one. The
lids drooped over her eyes, which moved rarely from the floor, and
never raised themselves. Her colour had risen indeed to a rich tint,
where it stayed; but Mrs. Somers' declaration nevertheless was hardly
borne out by a certain little bit-in smile which lurked there too,
spite of everything. Otherwise she sat like an impersonation of
silence, happily screened, by not looking at anybody, from any
annoyance of the eyes that were levelled at her and at the figure that
held post by her side.
"Mrs. Stoutenburgh," said the doctor, "you have my aunt Ellen."
Mrs. Stoutenburgh however was lenient in that quarter, and told Mrs.
Somers they would require nothing of her but the three last items of
Pattaquasset news--which she, as pastor's wife, was bound to know. And
Mrs. Somers was not backward in declaring them; the first being the
engagement of two people who hated each other, the second the
separation of two people who loved each other; the third, that Mr.
Linden shot himself--to make a sensation.
"Mr. Linden," said the doctor, "you come next--and you are mine. What
shall I do with you?"
"Why--anything," said Mr. Linden.
"Well--I am greatly at a loss what you are good for," said the doctor
lightly,--"but on the whole I order you to preach a sermon to the
company."
"Have you any choice as to the text?"
"I am not in the way of those things," said the doctor laughingly.
"Give us the lesson you think we want most."
The clear, grave look that met him--Dr. Harrison had seen it before.
The change was like the parting of a little bright vapour, revealing
the steadfast blue beneath.
"Nay doctor, you must bid me do something else! I dare not play at
marbles with precious stones."
There was probably a mixture of things in the doctor's mind;--but the
outward show in answer to this was in the highest degree seemly and
becoming. The expression of Dr. Harrison's face changed; with a look
gentle and kind, even winning, he came up to Mr. Linden's side and took
his hand.
"You are right!" said he, "and I have got my sermon--which I deserve.
But now, Linden, _that_ is not your forfeit;--for that you must tell
me--honestly--what you think of me." There was always a general air of
carelessness about Dr. Harrison, as to what he said himself or what
others said in his presence. Along with this carelessness, which
whether seeming or real was almost invariable, there mingled now a
friend's look and tone and something of a friend's apology making.
"But do you want me to tell everybody else?" said Mr. Linden, smiling
in his old way at the doctor. "Do you like to blush before so many
people?"
"That's your forfeit!" said the doctor resuming also his old-fashioned
light tone. "You're to tell me--and you are _not_ to tell anybody else!"
"Well--if you will have it," said Mr. Linden looking at
him,--"Honestly, I think you are very handsome!--of course that is news
to nobody but yourself."
"Mercy on you, man!" said the doctor; "do you think that is news to
_me?_"
"It is supposed to be--by courtesy," said Mr. Linden laughing.
"Well--give me all the grace courtesy will let you," said the doctor;
whether altogether lightly, or with some feeling, it would have been
hard for a by-stander to tell. "Is Miss Derrick's penance out? She
comes next--and Miss Essie has her."
"No,"--said Mr. Linden consulting his watch. "I am sorry to interfere
with your arrangements, doctor, but justice must have its course."
"Then there is a 'recess'"--said the doctor comically. "Ladies and
gentlemen--please amuse yourselves."--
He had no intention of helping them, it seemed, for he stood fast in
his place and talked to Mr. Linden in a different tone till the minutes
were run out. No thing could be more motionless than the occupant of
the chair.
"Miss Faith," Mr. Linden said then, "it is a little hard to pass from
one inquisitor to another--but I must hand you over to Miss Essie."
Faith's glance at him expressed no gratification. Meanwhile the doctor
had gone for Miss Essie and brought her up to the fireplace.
"Miss Derrick," said the black-eyed lady, "I wish you to tell--as the
penalty of your forfeit--why, when you thought the Rhododendron the
most perfect flower, you did not take it for your name?"
If anybody had known the pain this question gave Faith--the leap of
dismay that her heart made! Nobody knew it; her head drooped, and the
colour rose again to be sure; but one hand sheltered the exposed cheek
and the other was turned to the fire. She could not refuse to answer,
and with the doctor's weapons she would not; but here, as once before,
Faith's straightforwardness saved her.
"Why didn't you call yourself Rhodora?" repeated Miss Essie. And Faith
answered,--
"Because another name was suggested to me."
The question could not decently be pushed any further; and both Miss
Essie and the doctor looked as if they had failed. Faith's own tumult
and sinking of heart prevented her knowing how thoroughly this was true.
"And you two people," said Mr. Linden, "come and ask Miss Derrick why
she chose to appropriate a character that she thought fell short of
perfection!--what is the use of telling anybody anything, after that?"
"I am only one people," said Miss Essie.
"I am another," said the doctor; "and I confess myself curious.
Besides, a single point of imperfection might be supposed, without
injury to mortal and human nature."
"Julius," said Miss Harrison, "will you have the goodness to do so
impolite a thing as to look at your watch? Aunt Ellen will expect us to
set a proper example. Dear Faith, are you bound to sit in that big
chair all night?"
Then there was a general stir and break-up of the party. One bit of
conversation Faith was fated to hear as she slowly made her way out of
the dressing-room door, among comers and goers: the first speaker was a
young De Staff.
"Since that shooting affair there's been nothing but reports about you,
Linden."
"Reports seldom kill," said Mr. Linden.
"Don't trust to that!" said another laughing moustache,--"keep 'em this
side the water. By the way--is there any likeness of that fair
foreigner going? How do you fancy _she_ would like reports?"
"When you find out I wish you would let me know," said Mr. Linden with
a little accent of impatience, as he came forward and took Faith in
charge.
CHAPTER III.
It was pretty late when Jerry and his little sleigh-load got clear of
the gates. The stars were as bright as ever, and now they had the help
of the old moon; which was pouring her clear radiance over the snow and
sending long shadows from trees and fences. The fresh air was pleasant
too. Faith felt it, and wondered that starlight and snow and
sleigh-bells were such a different thing from what they were a few
hours before. She chid herself, she was vexed at herself, and humbled
exceedingly. She endeavoured to get back on the simple abstract ground
she had held in her own thoughts until within a day or two; she was
deeply ashamed that her head should have allowed even a flutter of
imagination from Mr. Stoutenburgh's words, which now it appeared might
bear a quite contrary sense to that which she had given them. What was
_she_, to have anything to do with them? Faith humbly said, nothing.
And yet,--she could not help that either,--the image of the possibility
of what Dr. Harrison had suggested, raised a pain that Faith could not
look at. She sat still and motionless, and heard the sleigh-bells
without knowing to what tune they jingled.
It was a quick tune, at all events,--for the first ten or fifteen
minutes Jerry dashed along to his heart's content, and his driver even
urged him on,--then with other sleighs left far behind and a hill
before him, Jerry brought the tune to a staccato, and Mr. Linden spoke.
But the words were not very relevant to either stars or sleigh-bells.
"Miss Faith, I thought you knew me better."
They startled her, for she was a minute or two without answering; then
came a gentle, and also rather frightened,
"Why?--why do you say that, Mr. Linden?"
"Do you think you know me?" he said, turning towards her with a little
bit of a smile, though the voice was grave. "Do you think you have any
idea how much I care about you?"
"I think you do," she said. "I am sure you do--very much!"
"Do you know how much?"--and the smile was full then, and followed by a
moment's silence. "I shall not try to tell you, Miss Faith; I could not
if I would--but there is something on the other side of the question
which I want you to tell me."
And Jerry walked slowly up the snowy hill, and the slight tinkle of his
bells was as silvery as the starlight of Orion overhead.
Faith looked at her questioner and then off again, while a rich colour
was slowly mantling in her cheeks. But the silence was breathless.
Jerry's bells only announced it. And having by that time reached the
top of the hill he chose--and was permitted--to set off at his former
pace; flinging off the snow right and left, and tossing his mane on the
cool night air. Down that hill, and up the next, and down that--and
along a level bit of road to the foot of another,--then slowly.
"Miss Faith," said Mr. Linden when they were half way up, "do you never
mean to speak to me again?"
A very low-breathed although audible "yes."
"Is that all you mean to say?--I shall take it very comprehensively."
She was willing probably that he should take it any way that he
pleased; but to add was as much beyond Faith's power at the moment as
to subtract from her one word. She did not even look.
"Do you know what this silence is promising?" Mr. Linden said in the
same tone, and bending down by her. "I do--and yet I want to hear you
speak once more. If there is any reason why I should try not to love
you better than all the rest of the world, you must tell me now."
One other quick, inquiring, astonished glance her eyes gave into his
face; and then, as usual, his wish to have her speak made her speak,
through all the intense difficulty. There was a minute's further
hesitation, and then the words, very low, very simple, and trembling,
"Do--if you can."
"Do _try?_" he said in a lower and graver tone.
"Try?"--she said; then with a change of voice and in very much
confusion,--"O no, Mr. Linden!"
"I should not succeed"--was all his answer, nor was there time for much
more; for having now turned into the main street where other
homeward-bound sleighs were flying along, there was nothing to do but
fly along with the rest; and a very few minutes brought them home.
Mr. Skip was probably reposing in parts unknown, for there was no sign
of him at his post; and when Faith had been silently taken out of the
sleigh and into the hall, Mr. Linden went back to Jerry--telling her
she must take good care of herself for five minutes.
Bewilderedly, and trembling yet, Faith turned into the sitting-room. It
was warm and bright, Mrs. Derrick having only lately left it; and
taking off hood and cloak in a sort of mechanical way, with fingers
that did not feel the strings, she sat down in the easy chair and laid
her head on the arm of it; as very a child as she had been on the night
of that terrible walk;--wondering to herself if this were Christmas
day--if she were Faith Derrick--and if anything were anything!--but
with a wonder of such growing happiness as made it more and more
difficult for her to raise her head up. She dreaded--with an odd kind
of dread which contradicted itself--to hear Mr. Linden come in; and in
the abstract, she would have liked very much to jump up and run away;
but that little intimation was quite enough to hold her fast. She sat
still drawing quick little breaths. The loud voice of the clock near
by, striking its twelve strokes, was not half so distinct to her as
that light step in the hall which came so swiftly and quick to her side.
"What is the problem now, pretty child?" Mr. Linden said, laying both
hands upon hers,--"it is too late for study to-night. You must wait
till to-morrow and have my help."
She rose up at that, however gladly she would have hidden the face her
rising revealed; but yet with no awkwardness she stood before him,
rosily grave and shy, and with downcast eyelids that could by no means
lift themselves up to shew what was beneath; a fair combination of the
child's character and the woman's nature in one; both spoken fairly and
fully. Mr. Linden watched her for a minute, softly passing his hand
over that fair brow; then drew her closer.
"I suppose I may claim Mr. Stoutenburgh's privilege now," he said. But
it was more than that he took. And then with one hand still held fast,
Faith was put back in her chair and wheeled up to the fire "to get
warm," and Mr. Linden sat down by her side.
Did he really think she needed it, when she was rosy to her fingers'
ends? But what could she do, but be very still and very happy Even as a
flower whose head is heavy with dew,--never more fragrant than then,
yet with the weight of its sweet burden it bends a little;--like that
was the droop of Faith's head at this minute. Whither had the whirl of
this evening whirled her? Faith did not know. She felt as if, to some
harbour of rest, broad and safe; the very one where from its fitness it
seemed she ought to be. But shyly and confusedly, she felt it much as a
man feels the ground, who is near taken off it by a hurricane. Yet she
felt it, for her head drooped more and more.
"Faith," Mr. Linden said, half smiling, half seriously, "what has made
you so sober all this evening--so much afraid of me?"
The quick answer of the eye stayed not a minute; the blush was more
abiding.
"You don't want me to tell you that!"--she said in soft pleading.
"Do you know now who I think has--
'A sweet attractive kind of grace'?"
"O don't, please, speak so, Mr. Linden!" she said bowing her face in
her hands,--"it don't belong to me."--And pressing her hands closer,
she added, "_You_ have made me all I am--that is anything."
"There is one thing I mean to make you--if I live," he answered
smiling, and taking down her hand. "Faith, what do you mean by talking
to me in that style?--haven't you just given me leave to think what I
like of you? You deserve another half hour's silent penance."
A little bit of smile broke upon her face which for an instant she
tried to hide with her other hand. But she dropped that and turned the
face towards him, rosy, grave, and happy, more than she knew, or she
perhaps would have hidden it again. Her eyes indeed only saw his and
fell instantly; and her words began and stopped.
"There is one comfort--"
"What, dear child?"
"That you know what to think," she said, looking up with a face that
evidently rested in the confidence of that fact.
"About what?" Mr. Linden said with an amused look. "I have known what
to think about _you_ for some time."
"I meant that,"--she said quietly and with very downcast eyes again.
"I am not in a good mood for riddles to-night," said Mr. Linden,--"just
what does this one mean?"
"Nothing, only--" said Faith flushing,--"you said--"
She was near breaking down in sheer confusion, but she rallied and went
on. "You said I had given you leave to think what you liked of me,--and
I say it is a comfort that you know _what_ to think."
Mr. Linden laughed.
"You are a dear little child!" he said. "Being just the most precious
thing in the world to me, you sit there and rejoice that I am in no
danger of overestimating you--which is profoundly true. My comfort in
knowing what to think, runs in a different line."
It is hard to describe Faith's look; it was a mixture of so many
things. It was wondering, and shamefaced; and curious for its blending
of humility and gladness; but gladness moved to such a point as to be
near the edge of sorrowful expression. She would not have permitted it
to choose such expression, and indeed it easily took another line; for
even as she looked, her eye caught the light from Mr. Linden's and the
gravity of her face broke in a sunny and somewhat obstinate smile,
which Faith would have controlled if she could.
"That penance was not so very bad," she said, perhaps by way of
diversion.
"I enjoyed it," said Mr. Linden,--"I am not sure that everybody else
did. Are you longing for another piece of rest?--Look up at me, and let
me see if _I_ ought to keep you here any longer."
She obeyed, though shyly; the smile lingering round her lips yet, and
her whole face, to tell the truth, bearing much more resemblance to the
dawn of a May morning than to the middle of a December night. Mr.
Linden was in some danger of forgetting why he had asked to see it; but
when her eyes fell beneath his, then he remembered.
"I must let you go," he said,--"I suppose the sooner I do that, the
sooner I may hope to see you again. Will you sleep diligently, to that
end?"
"I don't know--" she said softly; rising at the same time to gather up
her wrappers which lay strewed about, around and under her. Her lips
had the first answer to that; only as he let her go Mr. Linden said,
"You must try."
And a little scarce-spoken "yes" promised it.
It was easier than she thought. When Faith had got to her room, when
she had as usual laid down her heart's burden--joyful or careful--in
her prayer, there came soon a great subsiding; and mind and body slept,
as sleep comes to an exhausted child; or as those sleep, at any age,
whose hearts bear no weight which God's hand can bear for them, and who
are contented to leave their dearest things to the same hand. There was
no "ravelled sleeve of care" ever in Faith's mind, for sleep to knit
up; but "tired nature's sweet restorer" she needed like the rest of the
human family; and on this occasion sleep did her work without let or
hindrance from the time ten minutes after Faith's head touched her
pillow till the sun was strong and bright on the morning of the 26th of
December. Yes, and pretty high up too; for the first thing that fell
upon her waking senses was eight clear strokes of the town clock.
Faith got up and dressed herself in a great hurry and in absolute
dismay; blushing to think where was her mother; and breakfast--and
everybody--all this while, and what everybody was thinking of her. From
her room Faith went straight to dairy and kitchen. She wanted her hands
full this morning. But her duties in the kitchen were done; breakfast
was only waiting, and her mother talking to the butcher. Faith stood
till he was dismissed and had turned his back, and then came into Mrs.
Derrick's arms.
"Mother!--why _didn't_ you call me!"
"Pretty child!" was the fond answer, "why should I?--I've been up to
look at you half a dozen times, Faith, to make sure you were not sick;
but Mr. Linden said he was in no hurry for breakfast--and of course I
wasn't. Did you have a good time last night?"
"I should think you _ought_ to be in a hurry for breakfast by this
time." And Faith busied herself in helping Cindy put the breakfast on
the table.
"You run and call Mr. Linden, child," said her mother, "and I'll see to
this. He was here till a minute ago, and then some of the boys wanted
to see him."
Faith turned away, but with no sort of mind to present herself before
the boys, and in tolerable fear of presenting herself before anybody.
The closing hall door informed her that one danger was over; and
forcing herself to brave the other, she passed into the sitting-room
just as Mr. Linden reëntered it from the hall. Very timidly then she
advanced a few steps to meet him and stood still, with cheeks as rosy
as it was possible to be, and eyes that dared not lift themselves up.
The greeting she had did not help either matter very much, but that
could not be helped either.
"What colour are your cheeks under all these roses?" Mr. Linden said
smiling at her. "My dear Faith, were you quite tired out?"
"No--You must think so," she said with stammering lips--"but breakfast
is ready at last. If you'll go in--I'll come, Mr. Linden."
"Do you want me to go in first?"
"Yes. I'll come directly."
He let her go, and went in as she desired; and having persuaded Mrs.
Derrick that as breakfast was on the table it had better have prompt
attention, Mr. Linden engaged her with a lively account of the people,
dresses, and doings, which had graced the Christmas party; keeping her
mind pretty well on that subject both before and after Faith made her
appearance. How little it engrossed him, only one person at the table
could even guess. But she knew, and rested herself happily under the
screen he spread out for her; as quiet and demure as anything that ever
sat at a breakfast table yet. And all the attention she received was as
silent as it was careful; not till breakfast was over did Mr. Linden
give her more than a passing word; but then he inquired how soon she
would be ready for philosophy.
Faith's hesitating answer was "Very soon;"--then as Mr. Linden left the
room she asked, "What are you going to do to-day, mother?"
"O just the old story," said Mrs. Derrick,--"two or three sick people I
must go and see,--and some well people I'd rather see, by half. It's so
good to have you home, dear!" And she kissed Faith and held her off and
looked at her--several feelings at work in her face. "Pretty child,"
she said, "I don't think I ever saw you look so pretty."
Faith returned the kiss, and hid her face in her mother's neck; more
things than one were in her mind to say, but not one of them could get
out. She could only kiss her mother and hold her fast. The words that
at last came, were a very commonplace remark about--"going to see to
the dinner."
"I guess you will!" said Mrs. Derrick--"with Mr. Linden waiting for you
in the other room. I wonder what he'd say to you, or to me either. And
besides--people that want to see about dinner must get up earlier in
the morning."
The words, some of them, were a little moved; but whatever Mrs. Derrick
was thinking of, she did not explain, only bade Faith go off and attend
to her lessons and make up for lost time.
Which after some scouting round kitchen and dairy, Faith did. She
entered the sitting-room with the little green book in her hand, as
near as possible as she would have done three weeks ago. Not quite.
She had a bright smile of welcome, and Mr. Linden placed a chair for
her and placed her in it; and then the lessons went on with all their
old gentle care and guidance. More, they could hardly have--though
Faith sometimes fancied there was more; and if the old sobriety was
hard to keep up, still it was done, for her sake. A little play of the
lips which she could sometimes see, was kept within very quiet bounds;
whatever novelty there might be in look or manner was perhaps
unconscious and unavoidable. She might be watched a little more than
formerly, but her work none the less; and Mr. Linden's explanations and
corrections were given with just their old grave freedom, and no more.
And yet how different a thing the lessons were to him!--
As to Faith, her hand trembled very much at first, and even her voice;
but for all that, the sunshine within was easy to see, and there came a
bright flash of it sometimes. In spite of timidity and shyness, every
now and then something made her forget herself, and then the sunlight
broke out; to be followed perhaps by a double cloud of gravity. But for
the rest, she worked like a docile pupil, as she always had done.
Apparently her teacher's thoughts had not been confined to the work, if
they had to her; for when all was done that could be done before
dinner, he made one of those sudden speeches with which he sometimes
indulged himself.
"Faith--I wish you would ask me to do half a dozen almost impossible
things for you."
What a pretty wondering look she gave him. One of the flashes of the
sunlight came then. But then came an amused expression.
"What would be the good of that, Mr. Linden?"
"I should have the pleasure of doing them."
"I believe you would," said Faith. "I think the only things quite
impossible to you are wrong things."
"The only thing you ever did ask of me was impossible," he said with a
smile, upon which there was a shadow too--as if the recollection pained
him. "Child, how could you?--It half broke my heart to withstand you
so, do you know that? I want the almost impossible things to make me
forget it."
Her lip trembled instantly and her command of herself was nearly gone.
She had risen for something, and as he spoke she came swiftly behind
him, putting herself where he could not see her face, and laid her hand
on his shoulder. It lay there as light as thistle-down; but it was
Faith's mute way of saying a great many things that her voice could not.
Very quick and tenderly Mr. Linden drew her forward again, and tried
the power of his lips to still hers.
"Hush, dear child!" he said--"you must not mind any thing I say,--I am
the last person in the world you ought to be afraid of. And you must
not claim it as your prerogative to get before me in danger and behind
me at all other times--because that is just reversing the proper order
of things. Faith, I am going to ask an almost impossible thing of you."
"What is it?" Faith was secretly glad, for afraid of his _requests_ she
could not be.
"You will try to do it?"
"Yes--certainly!"
"It is only to forget that 'Mr. Linden' is any part of my name," he
said smiling.
She had been rosy enough before, but now the blood reddened her very
brow, till for one instant she put up her hands to hide it.
"What then?"--she said in a breathless sort of way.
"What you like"--he answered brightly. "I have not quite as many names
as a Prince Royal, but still enough to choose from. You may separate,
combine, or invent, at your pleasure."
There came a summons to dinner then; and part of the hours which should
follow thereafter, Mr. Linden was pledged to spend somewhere with
somebody--away from home. But he promised to be back to tea, and before
that, if he could; and so left Faith to the quiet companionship of her
mother and her lessons--if she felt disposed for them. They were both
in the sitting-room together, Mrs. Derrick and the books,--both helping
the sunlight that came in at the windows. But Faith neglected the
books, and came to her mother's side. She sat down and put her arms
round her, and nestled her head on her mother's bosom, as she had done
in the morning. And then was silent. That might have been just what
Mrs. Derrick expected, she was so very ready for it; her work was
dropped so instantly, her head rested so fondly on Faith's. But her
silence was soon broken.
"How long do you think I can wait, pretty child?" she said in the
softest, tenderest tone that even she could use.
"Mother!" said Faith startling. "For what?"
"Suppose you tell me."
"Do you know, mother?" said Faith in a low, changed tone and drawing
closer. But Mrs. Derrick only repeated,
"What, child?"
"What Mr. Linden has said to me,"--she whispered.
"I knew what he would"--but the words broke off there, and Mrs. Derrick
rested her head again in silence as absolute as Faith's.
For awhile; and then Faith lifted up her flushed face and began to kiss
her.
"Mother!--why don't you speak to me?"
It was not very easy to speak--Faith could see that; but Mrs. Derrick
did command her voice enough to give a sort of answer.
"He had my leave, child,--at least he has talked to me about you in a
way that I should have said no to, if I had meant it,--and he knew
that. Do you think I should have let him stay here all this time if I
had _not_ been willing?"
Faith laid her head down again.
"Mother--dear mother!"--she said,--"I want more than that!"--
She had all she wanted then,--Mrs. Derrick spoke clearly and steadily,
though the tears were falling fast.
"I am as glad as you are, darling--or as he is,--I cannot say more than
that. So glad that you should be so happy--so glad to have such hands
in which to leave you." The last words were scarce above a whisper.
Faith was desperate. She did not cry, but she did everything else. With
trembling fingers she stroked her mother's face; with lips that
trembled she kissed her; but Faith's voice was steady, whatever lay
behind it.
"Mother--mother!--why do you do so? why do you speak so? Does this look
like gladness?" And lips and hands kissed away the tears with an
eagerness that was to the last degree tender.
"Why yes, child!" her mother said rousing up, and with a little bit of
a smile that did not belie her words,--"I tell you I'm as glad as I can
be!--Tears don't mean anything, Faith,--I can't help crying sometimes.
But I'm just as glad as he is," she repeated, trying her soothing
powers in turn,--"and if you'd seen his face as I did when he went
away, you'd think that was enough. I don't know whether I _could_ be,"
she added softly, "if I thought he would take you away from me--but I
know he'll never do that, from something he said once. Why pretty
child! any one but a baby could see this long ago,--and as for that,
Faith, I believe I love him almost as well as you do, this minute."
The last few minutes had tried Faith more than she could bear, with the
complete reaction that followed. The tears that very rarely made their
way from her eyes in anybody's sight, came now. But they were not
permitted to be many; her mother hardly knew they were come before they
were gone; and half nestling in her arms, Faith lay with her face hid;
silent and quiet. It seemed to Mrs. Derrick as if she was too far off
still, for she lifted Faith softly up, and took her on her lap after
the old childish fashion, kissing her once and again.
"Now, pretty child," she said, softly stroking the uncovered cheek,
"keep your hands down and tell me all about it. I don't mean every
word," she added smiling, "but all you like to tell."
But Faith could not do that. She made very lame work of it. She managed
only with much difficulty to give her mother a very sketchy and thin
outline of what she wanted to know; which perhaps was as much as Mrs.
Derrick expected; and was given with a simplicity as bare of additions
as her facts were. A very few words told all she had to tell. Yes, her
mother was satisfied,--she loved to hear Faith speak those few words,
and to watch her the while--herself supplying all deficiencies; and
then was content that her child should lie still and go to sleep, if
she chose--it was enough to look at her and think: rejoicing with her
and for her with a very pure joy, if it was sometimes tearful.
Faith presently changed her position, and gave a very particular
attention to the smoothing of the hair over her mother's forehead. Then
pulling her cap straight, and giving her a finishing look and kiss, she
took a low seat close beside her, laid one of her study books on her
mother's lap, resting one arm there fondly, and went hard to work
remarking however that Mrs. Derrick might talk as much as she liked and
she would talk too. But Mrs. Derrick either did not want to talk, or
else she did not want to interrupt; for she watched Faith and smiled
upon her, and stroked her hair, and said very little.
Just at the end of the afternoon, when Faith was finishing her work by
firelight, Mr. Linden came in. She did not see the look that passed
between her mother and him--she only knew that they held each other's
hands for a minute silently,--then one of the hands was laid upon her
forehead.
"Little student--do you want to try the fresh air?"
She said yes; and without raising her eyes, ran off to get ready. In
another minute she was out in the cool freshness of the December
twilight.
CHAPTER IV.
The walk lasted till all the afterglow had faded and all the stars come
out, and till half Pattaquasset had done tea; having its own glow and
starlight, and its flow of conversation to which the table talk was
nothing.
Of course, Faith's first business on reaching home was to see about the
tea. She and Mrs. Derrick were happily engaged together in various
preparations, and Mr. Linden alone in the sitting-room, when the
unwelcome sound of a knock came at the front door; and the next minute
his solitude was broken in upon.
"Good evening!" said the doctor. "Three-quarters of a mile off 'I heard
the clarion of the unseen midge!' so I thought it was best to come to
close quarters with the enemy.--There is nothing so annoying as a
distant humming in your ears. How do you do?" He had come up and laid
his hand on Mr. Linden's shoulder before the latter had time to rise.
"What a perverse taste!" Mr. Linden said, laughing and springing up.
"All the rest of the world think a near-by humming so much worse."
"Can't distinguish at a distance," said the doctor;--"one doesn't know
whether it's a midge or a dragon-fly. How is Mignonette? and
Mignonette's mother?"
"They were both well the last time I saw them. In what sort of a calm
flutter are you, doctor?"
"Do you think that is my character?" said the doctor, taking his
favourite position on the rug.
"You go straight to the fire--like all the rest of the tribe," said Mr.
Linden.
"Is it inconsistent with the character of such an extra ordinary midge,
to go straight to the mark?"
"Nobody ever saw a midge do that yet, I'll venture to say."
"And you are resolved to act in character," said the doctor gravely.
"You have got clean away from the point. I asked you last night to tell
me what you thought of me. We are alone now--do it, Linden!"
"Why do you want to know?"
"I don't know. A man likes to talk of himself--cela s'entend--but I
care enough about you, to care to know how I stand in your thoughts. If
you asked me how I stand in my own, I could not tell you; and I should
like to know how the just balances of your mind--I'm not talking
ironically, Linden,--weigh and poise me;--what sort of alloy your
mental tests make me out. No matter why!--indulge me, and let me have
it. I presume it is nothing better than philosophical curiosity. I
am--every man is to himself--an enigma--a mystery;--and I should like
to have a sudden outside view--from optics that I have some respect
for."
"I gave you the outside view last night," Mr. Linden said. But then he
came and stood near the doctor and answered him simply; speaking with
that grave gentleness of interest which rarely failed to give the
speaker a place in people's hearts, even when his words failed of it.
"I think much of you, in the first place,--and in the second place, I
wish you would let me think more;--you stand in my thoughts as an
object of very warm interest, of very earnest prayer. Measured--not by
my standards, but by those which the word of God sets up, you are like
your own admirably made and adjusted microscope, with all the higher
powers left off. The only enigma, the only mystery is, that you
yourself cannot see this."
Dr. Harrison looked at him with a grave, considerative face, drawing a
little back; perhaps to do it the better.
"Do you mean to say, that _you_ do such a thing as pray for _me?_"
A slight, sweet smile came with the answer--"Can you doubt it?"
"Why I might very reasonably doubt it,--though not your word. Why do
you,--may I ask?"
"What can I do for a man in deadly peril, whom my arm cannot reach?"
The tone was very kindly, very earnest; the eyes with their deep light
looked full into the doctor's.
Dr. Harrison was silent, meeting the look and taking the depth and
meaning of it, so far as fathomable by him. The two faces and figures,
fine as they both were, made a strange contrast. The doctor's face was
in one of its serious and good expressions; but the other had come from
a region of light which this one had never entered. And even in
attitude--the dignified unconsciousness of the one, was very different
from the satisfied carelessness of the other.
"May I further ask," he said in a softened tone,--"why you do this for
me?"
"Because I care about you."
"It's incredible!" said the doctor, his eye wavering, however. "One man
care about another! Why, man, I may be the worst enemy you have in the
world, for aught you know."
"That cannot hinder my being your friend."
"Do you know," said the other looking at him half curiously,--"I am
ready to do such a foolish thing as to believe you? Well--be as much of
a friend to me as you can; and I'll deserve it as well as I can--which
maybe won't be very well. Indeed that is most likely!" He had stretched
out his hand to Mr. Linden however, and clasped his warmly. He quitted
it now to go forward and take that of Faith.
She came in just as usual, and met the doctor with her wonted manner;
only the crimson stain on her cheek telling anything against her. She
did not give him much chance to observe that; for Cindy followed her
with the tea things and Faith busied herself about the table. The
doctor went back to his stand and watched her.
"Mignonette has changed colour," he remarked presently. "How is that,
Miss Derrick?"
"How is what, sir?"
"How come you to change the proper characteristics of mignonette? Don't
you know that never shews high brilliancy?"
"I suppose I am not mignonette to-night," said Faith, returning to the
safer observation of the tea-table.
"Are you my flower, then? the Rhodora?" he said with a lowered tone,
coming near her.
If Faith heard, she did not seem to hear this question. Her attention
was bestowed upon the preparations for tea, till Mrs. Derrick came in
to make it; and then Faith found a great deal to do in the care of the
other duties of the table. It was a mystery, how she managed it; she
who generally had as much leisure at meals as anybody wanted. Dr.
Harrison's attention however was no longer exclusively given to her.
"Do you _always_ have these muffins for tea, Mrs. Derrick?" he remarked
with his second essay.
"Why no!" said Mrs. Derrick,--"we have all sorts of other things. Don't
you like muffins, doctor?"
"Like them!" said the doctor. "I am thinking what a happy man Mr.
Linden must be."
"Marvellously true!" said Mr. Linden. "I hope you'll go home and write
a new 'Search after happiness,' ending it sentimentally in muffins."
"Not so," said the doctor. "I should only begin it in muffins--as I am
doing. But my remark after all had a point;--for I was thinking of the
possibility of detaching anybody from such a periodical attraction.
Mrs. Derrick, I am the bearer of an humble message to you from my
sister and father--who covet the honour and pleasure of your presence
to-morrow evening. Sophy makes me useful, when she can. I hope you will
give me a gracious answer--for yourself and Miss Faith, and so make me
useful again. It is a rare chance! I am not often good for anything."
"I don't know whether I know how to give what you call gracious
answers, doctor," said Mrs. Derrick pleasantly. "I'm very much obliged
to Miss Sophy, but I never go anywhere at night."
With the other two the doctor's mission was more successful; and then
he disclosed the other object of his visit.
"Miss Derrick, do you remember I once threatened to bring the play of
Portia here--and introduce her to you?"
"I remember it," said Faith.
"Would it be pleasant to you that I should fulfil my threat this
evening?"
"I don't know, sir," said Faith smiling,--"till I hear the play."
"Mr. Linden,--what do you think?" said the doctor, also with a smile.
"I am ready for anything--if you will let me be impolite enough to
finish writing a letter while I hear the first part of your reading."
"To change the subject slightly--what do you suppose, Mr. Linden, would
on the whole be the effect, on society, if the hand of Truth were in
every case to be presented without a glove?" The doctor spoke gravely
now.
"The effect would be that society would shake hands more cordially--I
should think," said Mr. Linden; "though it is hard to say how such an
extreme proposition would work."
"Do you know, it strikes me that it would work just the other way, and
that hands would presently clasp nothing but daggers' hilts. But there
is another question.--How will one fair hand of truth live among a
crowd of steel gauntlets?"
"_What?_" Mr. Linden said, with a little bending of his brows upon the
doctor. "I am wearing neither glove nor gauntlet,--what are you talking
about?--And my half-finished letter is a fact and no pretence."
"I sha'n't believe you," said the doctor, "if you give my fingers such
a wring as that. Well, go to your letter, and I'll take Miss Derrick to
Venice--if she will let me."
Venice!--That exquisite photograph of the Bridge of Sighs, and "the
palace and the prison on each hand," about which such a long, long
entrancing account had been given by Mr. Linden to her--the scene and
the talk rose up before Faith's imagination; she was very ready to go
to Venice. Its witching scenery, its strange history, floated up, in a
fascinating, strange cloud-view; she was ready for Shylock and the
Rialto. Nay, for the Rialto, not for Shylock; him, or anything like
him, she had never seen nor imagined. She was only sorry that Mr.
Linden had to go to his letter; but there was a compensative side to
that, for her shyness was somewhat less endangered. With only the
doctor and Shylock to attend to, she could get along very well.
Shyness and fears however, were of very short endurance. To Venice she
went,--Shylock she saw; and then she saw nothing else but Shylock, and
those who were dealing with him; unless an occasional slight glance
towards the distant table where Mr. Linden sat at his writing, might be
held to signify that she _had_ powers of vision for somewhat else. It
did not interrupt the doctor's pleasure, nor her own. Dr. Harrison had
begun with at least a double motive in his mind; but man of the world
as he was, he forgot his unsatisfied curiosity in the singular
gratification of reading such a play to such a listener. It was so
plain that Faith was in Venice! She entered with such simplicity, and
also with such intelligence, into the characters and interests of the
persons in the drama; she relished their words so well; she weighed in
such a nice balance of her own the right and the wrong, the true and
the false, of whatever rested on nature and truth for its proper
judgment;--she was so perfectly and deliciously ignorant of the world
and the ways of it! The fresh view that such pure eyes took of such
actors and scenes, was indescribably interesting; Dr. Harrison found it
the best play he had ever read in his life. He made it convenient
sometimes to pause to indoctrinate Faith in characters or customs of
which she had no adequate knowledge; it did not hurt her pleasure; it
was all part of the play.
In the second scene, the doctor stopped to explain the terms on which
Portia had been left with her suitors.
"What do you think of it?"
"I think it was hard," said Faith smiling.
"What would you have done if you had been left so?"
"I would not have been left so."
"But you might not help yourself. Suppose it had been a father's or a
mother's command? that anybody might come up and have you, for the
finding--if they could pitch upon the right box of jewelry?"
"My father or mother would never have put such a command on me," said
Faith looking amused.
"But you may _suppose_ anything," said the doctor leaning forward and
smiling. "_Suppose_ they had?"
"Then you must suppose me different too," said Faith laughing. "Suppose
me to have been like Portia; and I should have done as she did."
The doctor shook his head and looked gravely at her.
"Are you so impracticable?"
"Was she?" said Faith.
"Then you wouldn't think it right to obey Mrs. Derrick in all
circumstances?"
"Not if she was Portia's mother," said Faith.
"Suppose you had been the Prince of Arragon--which casket would you
have chosen?" said Mr. Linden, as he came from his table, letter in
hand.
"I suppose I should have chosen as he did," said the doctor
carelessly--"I really don't remember how that was. I'll tell you when I
come to him. Have you done letter-writing?"
"I have done writing letters, for to-night. Have I permission to go to
Venice in your train?"
"I am only a locomotive," said the doctor. "But you know, with two a
train goes faster. If you had another copy of the play, now,
Linden--and we should read it as I have read Shakspeare in certain
former times--take different parts--I presume the effect would excel
steam-power, and be electric. Can you?"
This was agreed to, and the "effect" almost equalled the doctor's
prognostications. Even Mrs. Derrick, who had somewhat carelessly held
aloof from his single presentation of the play, was fascinated now, and
drew near and dropped her knitting. It would have been a very rare
entertainment to any that had heard it; but for once an audience of two
was sufficient for the stimulus and reward of the readers. That and the
actual enjoyment of the parts they were playing. Dr. Harrison read
well, with cultivated and critical accuracy. His voice was good and
melodious, his English enunciation excellent; his knowledge of his
author thorough, as far as acquaintanceship went; and his habit of
reading a dramatically practised one. But Faith, amid all her delight,
had felt a want in it, as compared with the reading to which of late
she had been accustomed; it did not give the soul and heart of the
author--though it gave everything else. _That_ is what only soul and
heart can do. Not that Dr. Harrison was entirely wanting in those gifts
either; they lay somewhere, perhaps, in him; but they are not the ones
which in what is called "the world" come most often or readily into
play; and so it falls out that one who lives there long becomes like
the cork oak when it has stood long untouched in _its_ world; the heart
is encrusted with a monstrous thick, almost impenetrable, coating of
bark. When Mr. Linden joined the reading, the pleasure was perfect; the
very contrast between the two characters and the two voices made the
illusion more happy. Then Faith was in a little danger of betraying
herself; for it was difficult to look at both readers with the same
eyes; and if she tried to keep her eyes at home, that was more
difficult still.
In the second act, Portia says to Arragon,
"In terms of choice I am not solely led
By nice direction of a maiden's eyes," etc.
"What do you think of that, Miss Derrick?" said the doctor pausing when
his turn came. "Do you think a lady's choice ought to be so determined?"
Faith raised her eyes, and answered, "No, sir."
"By what then? You don't trust appearances?"
Faith hesitated.
"I should like to hear how Portia managed," she said, with a little
heightened colour. "I never thought much about it."
"What do you think of Portia's gloves, doctor?" said Mr. Linden.
"Hum"--said the doctor. "They are a pattern!--soft as steel, harsh as
kid-leather. They fit too, so exquisitely! But, if I were marrying her,
I think I should request that she would give her gloves into my
keeping."
"Then would your exercise of power be properly thwarted. Every time you
made the demand, Portia would, like a juggler, pull off and surrender a
fresh pair of gloves, leaving ever a pair yet finer-spun upon her
hands."
"I suppose she would," said the doctor comically. "Come! I won't marry
her. And yet, Linden,--one might do worse. Such gloves keep off a
wonderful amount of friction."
"If you happen to have fur which cannot be even _stroked_ the wrong
way!"
The doctor's eye glanced with fun, and Faith laughed The reading went
on. And went on without much pausing, until the lines--
"O ten times faster Venus' pigeons fly
To seal love's bonds new made, than they are wont
To keep obliged faith unforfeited!
----Who riseth from a feast,
With that keen appetite that he sits down?
Where is the horse, that doth untread again
His tedious measures with the unbated fire
That he did pace them first? All things that are,
Are with more spirit chased than enjoyed."
"Do you believe in that doctrine, Miss Faith?" said the doctor, with a
gentle look in her direction.
"I suppose it is true of some things,"--she said after a minute's
consideration.
"What a wicked truth it is, Linden!" said the doctor.
"There is 'an error i' the bill,'" said Mr. Linden.
Faith's eyes looked somewhat eagerly, the doctor's philosophically.
"Declare and shew," said the doctor. "I thought it was a universal,
most deplorable, human fact; and here it is, in Shakspeare, man; which
is another word for saying it is in humanity."
"It is true only of false things. The Magician's coins are next day but
withered leaves--the real gold is at compound interest."
The doctor's smile was doubtful and cynical; Faith's had a touch of
sunlight on it.
"Where is your 'real gold'?" said the doctor.
"Do you expect me to tell you?" said Mr. Linden laughing. "I have found
a good deal in the course of my life, and the interest is regularly
paid in."
"Are you talking seriously?"
"Ay truly. So may you."
"From any other man, I should throw away your words as the veriest
Magician's coin; but if they are true metal--why I'll ask you to take
me to see the Mint some day!"
"Let me remind you," said Mr. Linden, "that there are many things in
Shakspeare. What do you think of this, for a set-off?--
'Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out e'en to the edge of doom.
If this be error, and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.'"
"There's an error proved upon _me_," said the doctor, biting his lips
as he looked at Faith who had listened delightedly. "Come on! I'll stop
no more. The thing is, Linden, that I am less happy than you--I never
found any real gold in my life!"
"Ah you expect gold to come set with diamonds,--and that cannot always
be. I don't doubt you have gold enough to start a large fortune, if you
would only rub it up and make it productive."
The doctor made no answer to that, and the reading went on; Faith
becoming exceedingly engrossed with the progress of the drama. She
listened with an eagerness which both the readers amusedly took heed
of, as the successive princes of Morocco and Arragon made their trial:
the doctor avowing by the way, that he thought he should have "assumed
desert" as the latter prince did, and received the fool's head for his
pains. Then they came to the beautiful "casket scene." The doctor had
somehow from the beginning left Portia in Mr. Linden's hands; and now
gave with great truth and gracefulness the very graceful words of her
successful suitor. He could put truth into these, and did, and
accordingly read beautifully; well heard, for the play of Faith's
varying face shewed she went along thoroughly with all the fine turns
of thought and feeling; here and elsewhere. But how well and how
delicately Mr. Linden gave Portia! That Dr. Harrison could not have
done; the parts had fallen out happily, whether by chance or design.
Her ladylike and coy play with words--her transparent veil of delicate
shifting turns of expression--contriving to say all and yet as if she
would say nothing--were rendered by the reader with a grace of tone
every way fit to them. Faith's eye ceased to look at anybody, and her
colour flitted, as this scene went on; and when Portia's address to her
fortunate wooer was reached--that very noble and dignified declaration
of her woman's mind, when she certainly pulled off her gloves, wherever
else she might wear them;--Faith turned her face quite away from the
readers and with the cheek she could not hide sheltered by her hand--as
well as her hand could--she let nobody but the fire and Mrs. Derrick
see what a flush covered the other. Very incautious in Faith, but it
was the best she could do. And the varied interests that immediately
followed, of Antonio's danger and deliverance, gradually brought her
head round again and accounted sufficiently for the colour with which
her cheeks still burned. The Merchant of Venice was not the only play
enacting that evening; and the temptation to break in upon the one,
made the doctor, as often as he could, break off the other; though the
interest of the plot for a while gave him little chance.
"So shines a good deed in a naughty world."
"Do you suppose, Miss Derrick," said Dr. Harrison with his look of
amused pleasure,--"that is because the world is so dark?--or because
the effects of the good deed reach to such a distance?"
"Both," said Faith immediately.
"You think the world is so bad?"
"I don't know much of the world," said Faith,--"but I suppose the
_shining_ good deeds aren't so very many."
"What makes a good deed _shining?_" said the doctor.
Faith glanced at Mr. Linden. But he did not take it up, and she was
thrown back upon her own resources. She thought a bit.
"I suppose,"--she said,--"its coming from the very spirit of light."
"You must explain," said the doctor good-humouredly but smiling,--"for
that puts me in absolute darkness."
"I don't know very well how to tell what I mean," said Faith colouring
and looking thoughtful;--"I think I know. Things that are done for the
pure love of God and truth, I think, shine; if they are ever so little
things, because really there is a great light in them. I think they
shine more than some of the greater things that people call very
brilliant, but that are done from a lower motive."
"I should like"--said the doctor--"Can you remember an instance or two?
of both kinds?"
Well Faith remembered an instance or two of _one_ kind, which she could
not instance. She sought in her memory.
"When Daniel kneeled upon his knees three times a day to pray, with his
windows open, after the king's law had for bidden any one to do it on
pain of death,--" said Faith.--"I think that was a shining good deed!"
"But that was a very notable instance," said the doctor.
"It was a very little thing he did," said Faith. "Only kneeled down to
pray in his own room. And it has shined all the way down to us."
"And in later times," said Mr. Linden,--"when the exploring shallop of
the Mayflower sought a place of settlement, and after beating about in
winter storms came to anchor Friday night at Plymouth Rock;--all
Saturday was lost in refitting and preparing, and yet on Sunday they
would not land. Those two dozen men, with no human eye to see, with
every possible need for haste!"
"That hasn't shined quite so far," said the doctor, "for it never
reached me. And it don't enlighten me now! I should have landed."
"Do you know nothing of the _spirit_ of Say and Seal, as well as the
province?" said Mr. Linden.
"As how, against landing?"
"They rested that day '_according to the commandment_.' Having promised
to obey God in all things, the seal of their obedience was unbroken."
"Well, Miss Faith," said the doctor--"Now for a counter example."
"I know so little of what has been done," said Faith. "Don't you
remember some such things yourself, Dr. Harrison?--Mr. Linden?"--The
voice changed and fell a little as it passed from one to the other.
"General Putnam went into the wolf's den, and pulled him out"--said the
doctor humorously,--"that's all I can think of just now, and it is not
very much in point. I don't know that there was anything very bright
about it except the wolf's eyes!--But here we are keeping Portia out of
doors, and Miss Derrick waiting! Linden--fall to." And with comical
life and dramatic zeal on the doctor's part, in a few minutes more, the
play was finished.
"Mrs. Derrick," said the doctor gravely as he rose and stood before
her,--"I hope you approve of plays."
Mrs. Derrick expressed her amusement and satisfaction.
"Miss Faith," he said extending his hand,--"I have to thank you for the
most perfect enjoyment I have ever had of Shakspeare. I only wish
to-morrow evening would roll off on such swift wheels--but it would be
too much. Look where this one has rolled to!" And he shewed his watch
and hurried off; that is, if Dr. Harrison could be said to do such a
thing.
The rest of the party also were stirred from their quiet. Mrs Derrick
went out; and Mr. Linden, coming behind Faith as she stood by the fire,
gently raised her face till he could have a full view of it, and asked
her how she liked being in Venice?
"Very much," she said, smiling and blushing at him,--"very much!"
"You are not the magician's coin!" he said, kissing her. "You are not
even a witch. Do you know how I found that out?"
"No"--she said softly, the colour spreading over her face and her eyes
falling, but raised again immediately to ask the question of him.
"A witch's charms are always dispelled whenever she tries to cross
running water!"--
She laughed; an amused, bright, happy little laugh, that it was
pleasant to hear.
"But what did Dr. Harrison mean,--by what he said when he thanked me?
What did he thank me for?"
"He _said_--for a new enjoyment of Shakspeare."
"What did he mean?"
"Do you understand how the sweet fragrance of mignonette can give new
enjoyment to a summer's day?"
She blushed exceedingly. "But, Mr. Linden, please don't talk so! And I
don't want to give Dr. Harrison enjoyment in that way."
"Which part of your sentence shall I handle first?" he said with a
laughing flash of the eyes,--"'Dr. Harrison'--or 'Mr. Linden'?"
"The first," said Faith laying her hand deprecatingly on his arm;--"and
let the other alone!"
"How am I to 'please not to talk'?"
"So--as I don't deserve," she said raising her grave eyes to his face.
"I would rather have you tell me my wrong things."
He looked at her, with one of those rare smiles which belonged to her;
holding her hand with a little soft motion of it to and fro upon his
own.
"I am not sure that I dare promise 'to be good,'" he said,--"I am so
apt to speak of things as I find them. And Mignonette you are to
me--both in French and English. Faith, I know there is no glove upon
your hand,--and I know there is none on mine; but I cannot feel, nor
imagine, any friction,--can you?"
She looked up and smiled. So much friction or promise of it, as there
is about the blue sky's reflection in the clear deep waters of a
mountain lake--so much there was in the soft depth--and reflection--of
Faith's eyes at that moment. So deep,--so unruffled;--and as in the
lake, so in the look that he saw, there was a mingling of earth and
heaven.
CHAPTER V.
Wednesday morning was cold and raw, and the sun presently put on a
thick grey cloak. There were suspicions abroad that it was one made in
the regions of perpetual snow, for whatever effect it might have had
upon the sun, it made the earth very cold. Now and then a little
frozen-up snowflake came silently down, and the wind swept fitfully
round the corners of houses, and wandered up and down the chimneys.
People who were out subsided into a little trot to keep themselves
warm, all except the younger part of creation, who made the trot a run;
and those who could, staid at home.
All of Mrs. Derrick's little family were of this latter class, after
the very early morning; for as some of them were to brave the weather
at night, there seemed no reason why they should also brave it by day.
As speedily as might be, Mr. Linden despatched his various matters of
outdoor business, of which there were always more or less on his hands,
and then came back and went into the sitting-room to look for his
scholar. In two minutes she came in from the other door, with the stir
of business and the cold morning fresh in her cheeks. But no one would
guess--no one could ever guess, from Faith's brown dress and white
rufffles, that she had just been flying about in the kitchen--to use
Cindy's elegant illustration--"like shelled peas"; not quite so
aimlessly, however. And her smiling glance at her teacher spoke of
readiness for all sorts of other business.
The first thing she was set about was her French exercise, during the
first few lines of which Mr. Linden stood by her and looked on. But
then he suddenly turned away and went up stairs--returning however,
presently, to take his usual seat by her side. He watched her progress
silently, except for business words and instructions, till the exercise
was finished and Faith had turned to him for further directions; then
taking her hand he put upon its forefinger one of the prettiest things
she had ever seen. It was an old-fashioned diamond ring; the stones all
of a size, and of great clearness and lustre, set close upon each other
all the way round; with just enough goldsmith's work to bind them
together, and to form a dainty frill of filagree work above and
below--looking almost like a gold line of shadow by that flashing line
of light.
"It was my mother's, Faith," he said, "and she gave it to me in trust
for whatever lady I should love as I love you."
Faith looked down at it with very, very grave eyes. Her head bent
lower, and then suddenly laying her hands together on the table she hid
her face in them; and the diamonds glittered against her temple and in
contrast with the neighbouring soft hair.
One or two mute questions came there, before Mr. Linden said softly,
"Faith!" She looked up with flushed face, and all of tears in her eyes
_but_ the tears; and her lip had its very unbent line. She looked first
at him and then at the ring again. Anything more humble or more grave
than her look cannot be imagined. His face was grave too, with a sort
of moved gravity, that touched both the present and the past, but he
did not mean hers should be.
"Now what will you do, dear child?" he said. "For I must forewarn you
that there is a language of rings which is well established in the
world."
"What--do you mean?" she said, looking alternately at the ring and him.
"You know what plain gold on this finger means?" he said, touching the
one he spoke of. She looked at first doubtfully, then coloured and said
"yes."
"Well diamonds on _this_ finger are understood to be the avant-couriers
of that."
Faith had never seen diamonds; but that was not what she was thinking
of, nor what brought such a deep spot of colour on her cheeks. It was
pretty to see, it was so bright and so different from the flush which
had been there a few minutes before. Her eyes considered the diamonds
attentively.
"What shall I do?" she said after a little.
"I don't know--you must try your powers of contrivance."
"I cannot contrive. I could keep ray glove on to-night; but I could not
every day. Shall I give it back to you to keep for me?"--she said
looking at it lovingly. "Perhaps that will be best!--What would you
like me to do?"
"Anything _but_ that," he said smiling,--"I should say that would be
worst. You may wear a glove, or glove-finger--what you will; but there
it must stay, and keep possession for me, till the other one comes to
bear it company. In fact I suppose I _could_ endure to have it seen!"
Her eyes went down to it again. Clearly the ring had a charm for Faith.
And so it had, something beyond the glitter of brilliants. Of
jewellers' value she knew little; the marketable worth of the thing was
an enigma to her. But as a treasure of another kind it was beyond
price. His mother's ring, on _her_ finger--to Faith's fancy it bound
and pledged her to a round of life as perfect, as bright, and as pure,
as its own circlet of light-giving gems. That she might fill to him--as
far as was possible--all the place that the once owner of the diamonds
would have looked for and desired; and be all that _he_ would look for
in the person to whom the ring, so derived, had come. Faith considered
it lovingly, with intent brow, and at last lifted her eyes to Mr.
Linden by way of answer; without saying anything, yet with half her
thoughts in her face. His face was very grave--Faith could see a little
what the flashing of that ring was to him; but her look was met and
answered with a fulness of warmth and tenderness which said that he had
read her thoughts, and that to his mind they were already accomplished.
Then he took up one of her books and opened it at the place where she
was to read.
The morning, and the afternoon, went off all too fast, and the sun went
down sullenly. As if to be in keeping with the expected change of work
and company, the evening brought worse weather,--a keener
wind--beginning to bestir itself in earnest, a thicker sky; though the
ground was too snow-covered already to allow it to be very dark. With
anybody but Mr. Linden, Mrs. Derrick would hardly have let Faith go
out; and even as it was, she several times hoped the weather would
moderate before they came home. Faith was so well wrapped up however,
both in the house and in the sleigh, that the weather gave her no
discomfort; it was rather exhilarating to be so warm in spite of it;
and they flew along at a good rate, having the road pretty much to
themselves.
"Faith," Mr. Linden said as they approached Judge Harrison's, "I cannot
spend all the evening here with you--that is, I ought not. I had a
message sent me this afternoon--too late to attend to then, which I
cannot leave till morning. But if I see you safe by the fire, I hope
Miss Harrison will take good care of you till I get back."
"Well," said Faith,--"I wouldn't meddle with your 'oughts,'--if I
could. I hope you'll take care of Jerry!"--
"What shall I do with him?"
"Don't you know?" said Faith demurely.
"I suppose I ought to drive him so fast that he'll keep warm," said Mr.
Linden. "What else?"
Faith's little laugh made a contrast with the rough night. "You had
better let me get out to the fire," she said joy fully,--"or _I_
sha'n't keep warm."
"You sha'n't?" he said bending down by her, as they reached the
door,--"your face has no idea of being cold!--I'll take care of Jerry,
child--if I don't forget him in my own pleasant thoughts."
Faith threw off her cloak and furs on the hall table where some others
lay, and pulled off one glove.
"Keep them both on!" Mr. Linden said softly and smiling,--"enact Portia
for once. Then if you are much urged, you can gracefully yield your own
prejudices so far as to take off one."
She looked at him, then amusedly pulled on her glove again; and the
door was opened for them into a region of warmth and brightness; where
there were all sorts of rejoicings over them and against the cold
night. Mr. Linden was by force persuaded to wait till after coffee
before braving it again; and the Judge and his daughter fairly involved
Faith in the meshes of their kindness. A very mouse Faith was to-night,
as ever wore gloves; and with a little of a mouse's watchfulness about
her, fancying cat's ears at every corner. A brown mouse too; she had
worn only her finest and best stuff dress. But upon the breast of that,
a bunch of snowy Laurustinus, nestling among green leaves, put forth a
secret claim in a way that was very beautifying. The Judge and Miss
Sophy put her in a great soft velvet chair and hovered round her, both
of them conscious of her being a little more dainty than usual. Sophy
thought perhaps it was the Laurustinus; her father believed it
intrinsic.
The coffee came, and the doctor.
"I have something better for you than Portia to-night"--he said as he
dealt out sugar,--"though not something better than muffins."
"Faith, my dear child," said Miss Sophy,--"you needn't be so
ceremonious--none of us are wearing gloves."
Faith laughed and blushed and pulled off one glove.
"You are enacting Portia, are you?" said Dr. Harrison. "Even she would
not have handled wigs with them. I see I have done mischief! But the
harm I did you last night I will undo this evening. Ladies and
Gentlemen!--I will give you, presently, the pleasure of hearing some
lines written expressive of my wishes toward the unknown--but
supposed--mistress of my life and affections. Any suggestions toward
the bettering of them--I will hear."
"The bettering of what?" said Mrs. Somers,--"your life and affections?"
"I am aware, my dear aunt Ellen, you think the one impossible--the
other improbable. I speak of bettering the wishes."
"'Unknown but supposed'"--said Mr. Linden. "'Item--She hath many
nameless virtues'."
"That is not my wish," said the doctor gravely looking at him, "I think
nameless virtues--deserve their obscurity!"
"What do you call your ideal?"
"Psyche,--" said the doctor, after a minute's sober consideration
apparently divided between Mr. Linden's face and the subject.
"That is not so uncommon a name as Campaspe," said Mr. Linden, with a
queer little gesture of brow and lips.
"Who is Campaspe?" said the doctor; while Faith looked, and Miss
Essie's black eyes sparkled and danced, and everybody else held his
coffee cup in abeyance.
"Did you never hear of my Campaspe?" said Mr. Linden, glancing up from
under his brows.
"We will exchange civilities," said the doctor. "I should be very happy
to hear of her."
Laughing a little, his own cup sending its persuasive steam unheeded,
his own face on the sparkling order--though the eyes looked demurely
down,--Mr. Linden went on to answer.
"'Cupid and my Campaspe played
At cards for kisses; Cupid payed;
He stakes his quiver, bow and arrows,
His mother's doves, and teame of sparrows;
Loses them too; then down he throws
The coral of his lippe, the rose
Growing on's cheek, (but none knows how)
With these, the crystal of his browe,
And then the dimple of his chinne;
All these did my Campaspe winne.
At last he set her both his eyes,--
She won, and Cupid blind did rise.
O Love! has she done this to thee?
What shall, alas! become of me!'"
There was a general little breeze of laughter and applause. The doctor
had glanced at Faith;--her colour was certainly raised; but then the
old Judge had just bent down to ask her "if she had ever heard of
Campaspe before?" The doctor did not hear but he guessed at the
whisper, and saw Faith's laugh and shake of the head.
"Is that a true bill, Linden?"
"Very true,--" said Mr. Linden, trying his coffee. "But it is not yet
known what will become of me."
"What has become of Campaspe?"
"She is using her eyes."
"Are they _those_ eyes, Mr. Linden?" said Miss Essie coming nearer and
using her own.
"What was the colour of Cupid's?"
"Blue, certainly!"
"Miss Derrick!"--said the doctor,--"let us have your opinion."
Faith gave him at least a frank view of her own, all blushing and
laughing as she was, and answered readily,--"As to the colour of
Cupid's eyes?--I have never seen him, sir."
The doctor was obliged to laugh himself, and the chorus became general,
at something in the combination of Faith and her words. But Faith's
confusion thereupon mastered her so completely, that perhaps to shield
her the doctor requested silence and attention and began to read; of a
lady who, he said he was certain, had borrowed of nobody--not even of
Cupid.--
"'Whoe'er she be,
That not impossible she,
That shall command my heart and me.'"
"I believe she _is_ impossible, to begin with," said Miss Essie. "You
will never let any woman command you, Dr. Harrison."
"You don't know me, Miss Essie," said the doctor, with a curiously
grave face, for him.
"He means--
'Who shall command my heart--_not_ me.'"
said Mr. Linden.
"If she can command my heart--what of me is left to rebel?" said the
doctor.
"Sophy," said Mrs. Somers, "how long has Julius been all heart?"
"Ever since my aunt Ellen has been _all_ eyes and ears. Mr. Somers,
which portion of your mental nature owns the supremacy of your wife?
may I inquire, in the course of this investigation?"
"Ha!" said Mr. Somers blandly, thus called upon--"I own her supremacy,
sir--ha--in all proper things!"
"Ha! Very proper!" said the doctor.
"That is all any good woman wants," said the old Judge benignly. "I
take it, that is all she wants."
"Then you must say which are the proper things, father!" said Miss
Sophy laughing.
"You'll have to ask every man separately, Sophy," said Mrs.
Somers,--"they all have their own ideas about proper things. Mr. Somers
thinks milk porridge is the limit."
"Mr. Stoutenburgh," said the doctor, "haven't you owned yourself
commanded, ever since your heart gave up its lock and key?"
"Yes indeed," said the Squire earnestly,--"I am so bound up in slavery
that I have even forgotten the wish to be free! All my wife's things
are proper!"
"O hush!" his wife said laughing, but with a little quick bright
witness in her eyes, that was pretty to see. Dr. Harrison smiled.
"You see, Miss Derrick!" he said with a little bow to her,--"there is
witness on all sides;--and now I will go on with my _not impossible_
she."--
He got through several verses, not without several interruptions, till
he came to the exquisite words following;--
"'I wish her beauty,
That owes not all his duty
To gaudy tire or glistring shoetye.
'Something more than
Taffeta or tissue can,
Or rampant feather, or rich fan.
'More than the spoil
Of shop, or silk-worm's toil,
Or a bought blush, or a set smile.'"
While Miss Essie exclaimed, Miss Harrison stole a look at Faith; who
was looking up at the doctor, listening, with a very simple face of
amusement. Her thoughts were indeed better ballasted than to sway to
such a breeze if she had felt it. But the real extreme beauty of the
image and of the delineation was what she felt; she made no application
of them. The doctor came to this verse.
"'A well-tamed heart,
For whose more noble smart
Love may be long choosing a dart.'--
What does that mean, Linden?--isn't that an error in the description?"
"Poetical license," said Mr. Linden smiling. "Psyche will give you
trouble enough, wings and all,--there is no fear you will find her
'tamed'."
"How is Campaspe in that respect?"
"She has never given me much trouble yet," said Mr. Linden.
"What I object to is the 'long choosing'," said the doctor. "Miss de
Staff--do you think a good heart should be very hard to win?"
"Certainly!--the harder the better," replied the lady. "That's the only
way to bring down your pride. The harder she is, the more likely you
are to think she's a diamond."
"Mrs. Stoutenburgh!"--
"What has been the texture of yours all these years, doctor?"
"He thinks that when he has dined the rest of the world should follow
suit--like the Khan of Tartary," said Mrs. Somers.
"Miss Derrick!" said the doctor--"I hope for some gentleness from you.
Do you think such a heart as we have been talking of, should be very
difficult to move?"
Faith's blush was exquisite. Real speech was hard to command. She knew
all eyes were waiting upon her; and she could not reason out and
comfort herself with the truth--that to them her blush might mean
several things as well as one. The answer came in that delicate voice
of hers which timidity had shaken.
"I think--it depends on what there is to move it."
"What do you call sufficient force?" said Mrs. Somers.
"I?"--said Faith.--
"Yes, you," replied the parson's wife with a look not unkindly amused.
"What sort and degree of power should move 'such a heart'?--to quote
Julius."
Faith's blush was painful again, and it was only the sheer necessity of
the case that enabled her to rally. But her answer was clear.
"Something better than itself, Mrs. Somers."
"I should like to know what that is!" said Mrs. Somers.
Mr. Linden's involuntary "And so should I"--was in a different tone,
but rather drew eyes upon himself than Faith.
"It's of no consequence to you!" said the doctor, with a funny, mock
serious tone of admonition.
Mr. Linden bowed, acquiescingly.--"Psychology is an interesting
study"--he added, in qualification. "But let me return your warning,
doctor--you have a formidable rival."
"Qui donc?"
"Cupid carried off Psyche some time ago--do you suppose you can get her
back?" And with a laughing sign of adieu, Mr. Linden went away.
Luckily for Faith, she was not acquainted with the heathen mythology;
and was also guiltless of any thought of connexion between herself and
the doctor's ideal. So her very free, unsuspicious face and laughter
quite reassured him.
"Mr. Linden is an odd sort of person," said Miss Essie philosophically.
"I have studied him a good deal, and I can't quite make him out. He's a
very interesting man! But I think he is deeper than he seems."
"He's deeper than the salt mines of Salzburg then!" said the doctor.
"Why?" said Miss Essie curiously.
The doctor answered gravely that "there were beautiful things
there";--and went on with his reading. And Faith listened now with
unwavering attention, till he came to--
"'Sydnean showers
Of soft discourse, whose powers
Can crown old winter's head with flowers.'"
Faith's mind took a leap. And it hardly came back again. The reading
was followed by a very lively round game of talk; but it was not _such_
talk; and Faith's thoughts wandered away and watched round that circlet
of brightness that was covered by her glove; scattered rays from which
led them variously,--home, to her Sunday school, to Pequot,--and to
heaven; coming back again and again to the diamonds and to the image
that was in the centre of them. No wonder her grave sweet face was
remarked as being even graver and sweeter than usual; and the doctor at
last devoted himself to breaking up its quiet. He took her into the
library to finish the Rhododendrons--ostensibly--but in reality to get
rid of the stiff circle in the other room. The circle followed; but no
longer stiff; under the influence of the cold weather and the big fires
and good prompting, their spirits got up at last to the pitch of acting
charades. Miss Harrison brought down her stores of old and new finery;
and with much zeal and success charades and tableaux went on for some
length of time; to the extreme amusement of Faith, who had never seen
any before. They did not divert her from watching for the sound of Mr.
Linden's return; but it came not, and Miss Essie expected and hoped
aloud in vain. The hour did come, and passed, at which such gatherings
in Pattaquasset were wont to break up. That was not very late to be
sure. The Stoutenburghs, and the De Staffs, and finally Mr. and Mrs.
Somers, went off in turn; and Faith was left alone to wait; for she had
refused all offers of being set down by her various friends.
It happened that Mr. Linden had been, by no harmful accident but simply
by the untowardness of things, delayed beyond his time; and then having
a good distance to drive, it was some while after the last visiters had
departed when he once more reined up Jerry at the door. No servant came
to take him, and Mr. Linden applied himself to the bell-handle. But
there seemed a spell upon the house--or else the inmates were
asleep--for ring as he would, no one came.
To fasten Jerry and let himself in were the next steps--neither of
which took long. But in the drawing-room, to which he had been ushered
in the beginning of the evening, there was now no one. The lights and
the fires and the empty chairs were there; that was all. Mr. Linden
knew the house well enough to know where next to look; he crossed the
hall to a room at the other side, which was the one most commonly used
by the family, and from which a passage led to the library. No one was
here, and the room was in a strange state of confusion. Before he had
well time to remark upon it, Faith came in from the passage bearing a
heavy marble bust in her arms. The colour sprang to her cheeks; she set
down Prince Talleyrand quickly and came towards Mr. Linden, saying,
"There's fire in the library."
"My dear child!" he said softly, "what is the matter? What are you
about?"
"Why there is fire in the library--it's all on fire, or soon will be,"
she said hurriedly, "and we are bringing the things out. The fire can't
get in here--its a fireproof building only the inside will all burn up.
The servants are carrying water to the roof of the house, lest that
should catch. I am so glad to see you!"--
And Miss Sophy and the doctor came in, carrying one a picture, the
other an armful of books. Faith ran back through the passage. But
before she could set her foot inside the library, Mr. Linden's hand was
on her shoulder, and he stepped before her and took the survey of the
room in one glance.
Its condition was sufficiently unpromising. The fire had kindled in a
heap of combustible trumpery brought there for the tableaux. It had got
far beyond management before any one discovered it; and now was making
fast work in that corner of the room and creeping with no slow progress
along the cornices of the bookshelves. Short time evidently there was
for the family to remove their treasures from its destructive sweep.
One corner of the room was in a light blaze; one or two lamps mockingly
joined their light to the glare; the smoke was curling in grey wreaths
and clouds over and around almost everything. Here an exquisite bust of
Proserpine looked forlornly through it; and there a noble painting of
Alston's shewed in richer lights than ever before, its harmony of
colouring. The servants were, as Faith had said, engaged in
endeavouring to keep the roof of the house from catching; only one old
black retainer of the family, too infirm for that service, was helping
them in the labour of rescuing books and treasures of art from the
tire, which must take its way within the library. The wall it could not
pass, that being, as Faith had also said, proof against it.
"Stay where you are," Mr. Linden said, "and I will hand things to
you"--adding under his breath, "if you love me, Faith!" And passing
into the room he snatched Proserpine from her smoky berth and gave her
to the old servant, handing Faith a light picture.
"Don't let your sister come in here, Harrison," he said, springing up
the steps to the upper shelves of the bookcase nearest the fire--"and
don't let everybody do everything,--keep half in the passage and half
here."
"Yes, Sophy," said the doctor, "that is much better--don't you come in
here, nor Miss Faith. And don't work too hard," he said gently to the
latter as she came back after bestowing the picture. "I won't ask you
not to work at all, for I know it would be of no use."
"Just work like monkeys," Mr. Linden said from his high post, which was
a rather invisible one. "Reuben!--I am glad of your help."
"Reuben!" exclaimed Faith joyously. "How good that is. Give me those
books, Reuben."--
And after that the work went on steadily, with few words. It was too
smoky an atmosphere to speak much in; and the utmost exertions on the
part of every one of the workers left no strength nor time for it.
"Like monkeys" they worked--the gentlemen handing things out of the
smoke to the willing fingers and light feet that made quick disposition
of them. Quick it had need to be, for the fire was not waiting for
them. And in an incredibly short time--incredible save to those who
have seen the experiment tried,--books and engravings were emptied from
shelf after shelf--compartment after compartment--and lodged within the
house. Not a spare inch of space--not a spare second of time, it
seemed, was gone over; and the treasures of the library were in quick
process of shifting from one place to another. It was rather a weary
part Faith had to play, to stop short at the doorway and see the
struggle with smoke and fire that was going on inside; and an anxious
eye and trembling heart followed the movements of one of the workers
there whenever she returned to her post of waiting. She would rather
have been amid the smoke and the fire too, than to stand off looking
on; but she did what she was desired--and more than she was desired;
for she said not a word, like a wise child. Only did her work with no
delay and came back again. Two excellent workers were the doctor and
Mr. Linden; Reuben was a capital seconder; and no better runners than
the two ladies need have been found; while the old Judge and his old
serving man did what they could. There was every appearance that their
efforts would be successful; the fire was to be sure, greatly increased
and fast spreading, but so also the precious things that it endangered
were already in great measure secured. Probably very little would have
been lost to be regretted, if the workers had not suffered a slight
interruption.
Mr. Linden was in the middle of the room unlocking the drawers of the
library table, which was too large to be removed. Old Nero, the black
man, had taken one of the lamps which yet remained burning, a large
heavy one, to carry away. He was just opposite the table, when a stone
bust of some weight, which had stood above the bookcases, detached by
the failure of its supports, came down along with some spars of the
burning wood and fell against a rich screen just on the other side of
Nero. The screen was thrown over on him; he struggled an instant to
right himself and it, holding his lamp off at an awful angle towards
Mr. Linden; then, nobody could tell how it was, Nero had saved himself
and struggled out from the falling screen and burning wood, and Faith
and the lamp lay under it, just at Mr. Linden's feet. Yet hardly under
it--so instantly was it thrown off. The lamp was not broken, which was
a wonder; but Faith was stunned, and the burning wood had touched her
brow and singed a lock of hair.
In such a time of confusion all sorts of things come and go, unseen but
by the immediate actors. Dr. Harrison and Reuben were intent upon a
heavy picture; the Judge and his daughter were in the other room. And
Faith was lifted up and borne swiftly along to the drawing-room sofa,
and there was cold water already on her brow, before the others reached
her. She was only a little stunned and had opened her eyes when they
came up. They came round her, all the gang of workers, like a swarm of
bees, and with as many questions and inquiries. Faith smiled at them
all, and begged they would go back and finish what they were doing.
"I'll stay here a little while," she said; "my fall didn't hurt me a
bit, to speak of. Do go! don't anybody wait for me."
There seemed nothing else to be done; she would own to wanting nothing;
and her urgency at length prevailed with them, however reluctantly, to
leave her and go back to the library. But Mr. Linden stood still as the
others moved off.
"Where are you hurt?" he said in a low voice.
"I suppose the fall bruised me a little bit. It didn't do me any real
harm. Don't wait here for me."
"Where?" Mr. Linden said.
"Where it bruised me? A little on my head--and elbow--and side;
altogether nothing!"
He sat down by her, passing his hand softly over the scorched hair;
then said, "Let me see your arm."
"Oh no!--that's not necessary. I said I was bruised, but it isn't much."
"Faith, you have not told me the whole."
Her eye shrank from his instantly, and her colour flitted from red to
pale.
"There is nothing more I need tell you. They will all be back here--or
some of them--if you stay. I'll tell you anything you please to
morrow," she added with a smile. But he only repeated, "Tell me now--I
have a right to know."
Her lip took its childish look, but her eye met him now. "Don't look
so!"--she said, "as if there was any reason for it. I think some of the
fluid from that lamp ran down on my arm--and it smarts. Don't stay here
to look grave about me!--it isn't necessary."
He bent his head and gave her one answer to all that--then sprang up
and went for Dr. Harrison. Faith tried to hinder him, in vain.
There was little now to detain anybody in the library, he found, and a
good deal to drive everybody out of it. The fire had seemed to take
advantage of its unwatched opportunity and had put it pretty well out
of any one's power to rescue much more from its rapacity. Reuben and
Dr. Harrison were carrying out the drawers of the table, which Mr.
Linden had been unlocking; and the doctor dropped the one he held the
instant he caught the sense of Mr. Linden's words. He went through the
other way, summoning his sister.
Faith was lying very quietly and smiled at them, but her colour went
and came with odd suddenness. She would not after all let the doctor
touch her; but rising from the sofa said she would go up stairs and let
Sophy see what was wanting. The three went up, and Mr. Linden was left
alone.
He stood still for a moment where they left him, resting his face upon
his hand, but then he went back to the burning room; and stationing
himself at the doorway, bade all the rest keep back, and those that
could to bring him water. Reuben sprang to this work as he had done to
the other; some of the servants had come down by this time; and Mr.
Linden stood there, dashing the water about the doorway and into the
room, upon the floor, the great table, and such of the bookcases as he
could come near. The effect was soon evident. The blazing bits of
carved moulding as they fell to the floor, went out instead of getting
help to burn; and the heavier shelves and wainscot which being of hard
wood burned slowly, began to give out steam as well as smoke. The door
and doorway were now perfectly safe--the fire hardly could spread into
the passage, a danger which had been imminent when Mr. Linden came, but
which the family seemed to have forgotten; secure in their fireproof
walls, they forgot the un-fireproof floor, nor seemed to remember how
far along the passage the cinders might drift. When there was really
nothing more for him to do, and he had given the servants very special
instructions as to the watch they should keep, then and not till then
did Mr. Linden return to the parlour; the glow of his severe exercise
fading away.
He found the Judge there, who engaged him in not too welcome
conversation; but there was no help for it. He must hear and answer the
old gentleman's thanks for his great services that night--praises of
his conduct and of Faith's conduct; speculations and questions
concerning the evening's disaster. After a time that seemed tedious,
though it was not really very long, Miss Harrison came down.
"She'll be better directly," she said. "Do sit down, Mr. Linden!--I
have ordered some refreshments--you must want them, I should think; and
you'll have to wait a little while, for Faith says she will go home
with you; though I am sure she ought not, and Julius says she must not
stir."
Mr. Linden bowed slightly--answering in the most commonplace way that
he was in no hurry and in no need of refreshments; and probably he felt
also in no need of rest--for he remained standing.
"How is she, dear? how is she?" said the Judge. "Is she much hurt?"
"Just _now_," said Miss Harrison, "she is in such pain that she cannot
move--but we have put something on that will take away the pain, Julius
says, in fifteen minutes; and she will be quite well this time
to-morrow, he says."
"But is she much hurt?" Judge Harrison repeated with a very concerned
face.
"She'll be well to-morrow, father; but she was dreadfully burned--her
arm and shoulder--I thought she would have fainted upstairs--but I
don't know whether people _can_ faint when they are in such pain. I
don't see how she can bear her dress to go home, but she says she will;
Mrs. Derrick would be frightened. Mr. Linden, they say every body does
what you tell them--I wish you'd persuade Faith to stay with me
to-night! She won't hear me."
"How soon can I see her?"--The voice made Miss Harrison look--but her
eyes said her ears had made a mistake.
"Why she said she would come down stairs presently--as soon as the pain
went off enough to let her do anything--and she wanted me to tell you
so; but I am sure it's very wrong. Do, Mr. Linden, take
something!"--(the servant had brought in a tray of meats and
wine)--"While you're waiting, you may as well rest yourself. How shall
we ever thank you for what you've done to-night!"
Miss Harrison spoke under some degree of agitation, but both she and
her father failed in no kind or grateful shew of feeling towards their
guest.
"How did it happen, Mr. Linden?" she said when she had done in this
kind all she could.
He said he had not seen the accident--only its results.
"I can't imagine how Faith got there," said Miss Harrison. "She saw the
screen coming over on Nero, I suppose, and thought she could save the
lamp--she made one spring from the doorway, he says, to where he stood.
And in putting up her hand to the lamp, I suppose that horrid fluid ran
down her arm and on her shoulder--when Nero put out the lamp he must
have loosened the fastening; it went all over her shoulder. But she'll
be well to-morrow night, Julius says."
"Who's with her now, my dear?" said the Judge.
"O Julius is with her--he said he'd stay with her till I came back--she
wanted Mr. Linden to know she would go home with him. Now, Mr. Linden,
won't you send her word back that you'll take care of Mrs. Derrick if
she'll stay?"
"I will go up and see her, Miss Harrison."
That was anticipated however, by the entrance of the doctor; who told
his sister Miss Derrick wanted her help, then came gravely to the
table, poured out a glass of wine and drank it. His father asked
questions, which he answered briefly. Miss Derrick felt better--she was
going to get up and come down stairs.
"But ought she to be suffered to go out to-night, Julius?--such a
night?"
"Certainly not!"
The Judge argued the objections to her going. The doctor made no
answer. He walked up and down the room, and Mr. Linden stood still. Ten
or fifteen minutes passed; and then the door opened softly and Faith,
all dressed, cloaked, and furred, came in with her hood, followed by
her friend. Miss Sophy looked very ill satisfied. Faith's face was pale
enough, but as serenely happy as release from pain can leave a face
that has no care behind. A white embodiment of purity and gentleness
she looked. The doctor was at her side instantly, asking questions. Mr.
Linden did not interrupt him,--he had met her almost before the doctor,
and taken her hand with a quietness through which Faith could perceive
the stir of feelings that might have swept those of all the others out
into the snow. But he held her hand silently until other people had
done their questions--then simply asked if she was quite sure she was
fit to ride home? Then, with that passing of the barrier, look and
voice did change a little.
"I mean to go,"--she said without looking at him,--"if you'll please to
take me."
"She ought not,--I am sure she ought not!" exclaimed Miss Harrison in
much vexation. "She is just able to stand."
"You know," Mr. Linden said,--not at all as if he was urging her, but
merely making a statement he thought best to make; "I could even bring
your mother here, in a very short time, if you wished it."
"O I don't wish it. I can go home very well now."
He gave her his arm without more words. Miss Harrison and the Judge
followed regretfully to the door; the doctor to the sleigh.
"Are you well wrapped up?" he asked.
"I have got all my own and all Sophy's furs," said Faith in a glad tone
of voice.
"Take care of yourself," he said;--"and Mr. Linden, you must take care
of her--which is more to the purpose. If I had it to do, this ride
would not be taken. Linden--I'll thank you another time."
They drove off. But as soon as they were a few steps from the house,
Mr. Linden put his arm about Faith and held her so that she could lean
against him and rest; giving her complete support, and muffling up the
furs about her lightly and effectually, till it was hardly possible for
the cold air to win through; and so drove her home. Not with many
words,--with only a whispered question now and then, whether she was
cold, or wanted any change of posture. The wind had lulled, and it was
much milder, and the snow was beginning to fall softly and fast; Faith
could feel the snow crystals on his face whenever it touched hers. Mr.
Linden would have perhaps chosen to drive gently, as being easier for
her, but the thick air made it needful. Once only he asked any other
question.--
"Faith--is my care of you in fault, that it lets you come home?"
"No, I think not," she said;--"you hold me just so nicely as it is
possible to be! and this snow-storm is beautiful." Which answer, though
she might not know it, testified to her need of precisely the care he
was giving her.
"Are you suffering much now, dear child?"
"Not at all. I am only enjoying. I like being out in such a storm as
this.--Only I am afraid mother is troubled."
"No--I sent Reuben down some time ago, to answer her questions if she
was up, and to have a good fire ready for you."
"O that's good!" she said. And then rested, in how luxurious a rest!
after exertion, and after anxiety, and after pain; so cared for and
guarded. She could almost have gone to sleep to the tinkle of Jerry's
bells; only that her spirit was too wide awake for that and the
pleasure of the time too good to be lost. She had not all the pleasure
to herself--Faith could feel that, every time Mr. Linden spoke or
touched her; but what a different atmosphere his mind was in, from her
quiet rest! Pain had quitted her, but not him, though the kinds were
different. Truly he would have borne any amount of physical pain
himself, to cancel that which she had suffered,--there were some
minutes of the ride when he would have borne it, only to lose the
thought of that. But Faith knew nothing of it all, except as she could
feel once or twice a deep breath that was checked and hushed, and
turned into some sweet low-spoken word to her; and her rest was very
deep. So deep, that the stopping of the sleigh at last, was an
interruption.
The moment Jerry's bells rang their little summons at the door, the
door itself opened, and from the glimmering light Reuben ran out to
take the reins.
"Is Mrs. Derrick up?" Mr. Linden asked, when the first inquiry about
Faith had been answered.
"I don't know, sir. I told her you wore afraid Miss Faith would take
cold without a fire in her room--and she let me take up wood and make
it; and then she said she wasn't sleepy, and she'd take care it didn't
go out. I haven't seen her since."
"Thank you, Reuben--now hold Jerry for me,--I shall keep you here
to-night," Mr. Linden said as he stepped out. And laying his hand upon
the furs and wrappers, he said softly,--"Little Esquimaux--do you think
you can walk to the house?"
"O yes!--certainly."
A little bit of a laugh answered her--the first she had heard since
Campaspe; and then she was softly lifted up, and borne into the house
over the new-fallen snow as lightly as if she had been a snowflake
herself. The snow might lay its white feathers upon her hood, but Faith
felt as if she were in a cradle instead of a snow-storm. She was placed
in the easy chair before the sitting-room fire, and her hood and furs
quickly taken off. "How do you feel?" Mr. Linden asked her.
She looked like one of the flakes of snow herself, for simplicity and
colour; but there was a smile in her eyes and lips that had come from a
climate where roses blow.
"I feel nicely.--Only a little bruised and battered feeling, which
isn't unpleasant."
"Will you have anything?--a cup of tea?--that might do you good."
Faith looked dubious at the cup of tea; but then rose up and said it
would disturb her mother, and she would just go and sleep.
"It won't disturb her a bit,"--Mr. Linden said, reseating her,--"sit
still--I'll send Reuben up to see."
He left her there a very few minutes, apparently attending to more than
one thing, for he came back through the eating-room door; bringing word
to Faith that her fire and room were in nice order, and her mother fast
asleep there in the rocking-chair to keep guard; and that she should
have a cup of tea in no time. And with a smile at her, he went back
into the eating-room, and brought thence her cup and plate, and
requested to be told just how the tea should be made to please her, and
whether he might invade the dairy for cream.
"If I could put this cloak over my shoulders, I would get some myself.
Will you put it on for me? please.--Is there fire in the kitchen? I'll
go and make the tea."
"Is there nothing else you would like to do?" he said standing before
her,--"you shall not stir! Do you think I don't know cream when I see
it?"--and he went off again, coming back this time in company with
Reuben and the tea-kettle, but the former did not stay. Then with
appeals to her for directions the tea was made and poured out, and
toast made and laid on her plate; but she was not allowed to raise a
finger, except now to handle her cup.
"It's very good!" said Faith,--"but--don't you remember you once told
me two cups of cocoa were better than one?"
It is to be noted in passing, that all Faith's _nameless_ addresses
were made with a certain gentle, modulated accent, which invariably
implied in its half timid respect the "Mr. Linden" which she rarely
forgot now she was not to say.
"Dear child! I do indeed," he said, as if the remembrance wore a bright
one. "But I remember too that my opinion was negatived. Faith, I used
to wish then that I could wait upon you--but I would rather have you
wait upon me, after all!"
Faith utterly disallowed the tone of these last words, and urged her
request in great earnest. He laughed at her a little--but brought the
cup and drank the tea,--certainly more to please her than himself;
watching her the while, to see if the refreshment were telling upon her
cheeks. She was very little satisfied with his performance.
"Now I'll go and wake up mother," she said at last rising. "Don't think
of this evening again but to be glad of everything that has happened. I
am."
"I fear, I fear," he said looking at her, "that your gladness and my
sorrow meet on common ground. Child, what shall I do with you?"--but
what he did with her then was to put her in that same cradle and carry
her softly upstairs, to the very door of her room.
CHAPTER VI.
The same soft snow-storm was coming down when Faith opened her eyes
next morning; the air looked like a white sheet; but in her room a
bright fire was blazing, reddening the white walls, and by her side sat
Mrs. Derrick watching her. Very gentle and tender were the hands that
helped her dress, and then Mrs. Derrick said she would go down and see
to breakfast for a little while.
"Wasn't it good your room was warm last night?" she said, stroking
Faith's hair.
Faith's eyes acknowledged that.
"And wasn't it good you were asleep!" she said laughing and kissing
Mrs. Derrick. "Mother!--I was so glad!"
"That's the funny part of it," said Mrs. Derrick. "Reuben's just about
as queer in his way as Mr. Linden. The only thing I thought from the
way he gave the message, was that somebody cared a good deal about his
new possession--which I suppose is true," she added smiling; "and so I
just went to sleep."
Mrs. Derrick went down; and Faith knelt on the rug before the fire and
bent her heart and head over her bible. In great happiness;--in great
endeavour that her happiness should stand well based on its true
foundations and not shift from them to any other. In sober endeavour to
lay hold, and feel that she had hold, of the happiness that cannot be
taken away; to make sure that her feet were on a rock, before she
stooped to take the sweetness of the flowers around her. And to judge
by her face, she had felt the rock and the flowers both, before she
left her room.
The moment she opened her door and went out into the hall, Mr. Linden
opened his,--or rather it was already open, and he came out, meeting
her at the head of the stairs. And after his first greeting, he held
her still and looked at her for a moment--a little anxiously and
intently. "My poor, pale little child!" he said--"you are nothing but a
snowdrop this morning!"
"Well that is a very good thing to be," said Faith brightly. But the
_colour_ resemblance he had destroyed.
She was lifted and carried down just as she had been carried up last
night, and into the sitting-room again; for breakfast was prepared
there this morning, and the sofa wheeled round to the side of the fire
all ready for her. How bright the room looked!--its red curtains within
and its white curtains without, and everything so noiseless and sweet
and in order. Even the coffeepot was there by this time, and Mrs.
Derrick arranged the cups and looked at Faith on the sofa, with eyes
that lost no gladness when they went from her to the person who stood
at her side. Faith's eyes fell, and for a moment she was very sober. It
was only for a moment.
"What a beautiful storm!" she said. "I am glad it snows. I am going to
do a great deal of work to-day."
Mr. Linden looked at her. "Wouldn't you just as lieve be talked to
sleep?"
She smiled. "You--couldn't--do that, Mr. Linden."
"Mr. Linden can do more than you think--and will," he said with a
little comic raising of the eyebrows.
For a while after breakfast Faith sat alone, except as her mother came
in and out to see that she wanted nothing,--alone in the soft snowy
stillness, till Mr. Linden came in from the postoffice and sat down by
her, laying against her cheek a soft little bunch of rosebuds and
violets.
"Faith," he said, "you have been looking sober--what is the reason?"
"I haven't been looking _too_ sober, have I? I didn't know I was
looking sober at all."
She was looking quaint, and lovely; in the plain wrapper she had put on
and the soft thoughtful air and mien, in contrast with which the
diamonds jumped and flashed with every motion of her hand. A study book
lay in her lap.
"How did all that happen last night?" said Mr. Linden abruptly.
"Why!"--said Faith colouring and looking down at her ring--"I was
standing in the doorway and Nero was coming out with that great lamp;
and when he got opposite the screen something fell on it, I believe,
from the burning bookcases, and it was thrown over against him--I
thought the lamp and he would all go over together--and I jumped;--and
in putting up my hand to the lamp I suppose, for I don't remember, the
fluid must have run down my arm and on my shoulder--I don't know how it
got on fire, but it must have been from some of the burning wood that
fell. The next I knew, you were carrying me to the drawing-room--I have
a recollection of that."
He listened with very grave eyes.
"Were you trying to take the lamp from Nero?"
"O no. I thought it was going to fall over."
"What harm would it have done the floor?"
The tinge of colour on Faith's cheek deepened considerably, and her
eyes lifted not themselves from the diamonds. She was not ready to
speak.
"I did not think of the floor"--
"Of what then?"
She waited again. "I was afraid some harm would be done,"--
"Did you prevent it?"
"I don't know"--she said rather faintly.
Gently her head was drawn down till it rested on his shoulder.
"Faith," he said in his own low sweet tones, "I stretched a little
silken thread across the doorway to keep you out--did you make of that
a clue to find your way in?"
She did not answer--nor stir.
There were no more questions asked--no more words said; Mr. Linden was
as silent as she and almost as still. Once or twice his lips touched
her forehead, not just as they had ever done it before, Faith thought;
but some little time had passed, when he suddenly took up the book
which lay in her lap and began the lesson at which it lay open; reading
and explaining in a very gentle, steady voice, a little moved from its
usual clearness. Still his arm did not release her. Faith listened,
with a semidivided mind, for some time; there was something in this
state of things that she wished to mend. It came at last, when there
was a pause in the lesson.
"I am glad of all that happened last night," she said, "except the pain
to you and mother. There is nothing to be sorry for. You shouldn't be
sorry."
"Why not, little naughty child?--and why are you glad?"
"Because--it was good for me,"--she said, not very readily nor
explicitly.
"In what way?"
"It was good for me,"--she repeated;--"it put me in mind of some
things."
"Of what, dear child?"
It was a question evidently Faith would rather not have answered. She
spoke with some difficulty.
"That there are such things in the world as pain--and trouble. It is
best not to forget it."
Mr. Linden understood and felt; but he only answered, "It will be the
business of my life to make you forget it. Now don't you think you
ought to put up this book, and rest or sleep?"
"I dare say _you_ ought," said Faith,--"and I wish you would. _I_ want
to work."
He gave her a laugh, by way of reply, and then gave her work as she
desired; watching carefully against her tiring herself in any way, and
making the lessons more of talk on his part and less of study on hers.
They were none the less good for that, nor any the less pleasant. Till
there came a knock at the front door; and then with a little sigh Faith
leaned back against the sofa, as if lessons were done.
"There is Dr. Harrison."
"And I shall have to be on my good behaviour," Mr. Linden said,
quitting the sofa. "But I suppose he will not stay all the rest of the
day." And as Cindy was slow in her movements, he went and opened the
door; Faith the while fitting on a glove finger.
"First in one element, and then in another--" Mr. Linden said, as the
doctor came in from a sort of simoon of snow.
"This one for me!" said Dr. Harrison shaking herself;--"but I should
say you must be out of your element to-day."
"Wherefore, if you please?" said Mr. Linden, as he endeavoured to get
the doctor out of his.
"Unless you live in a variety! I thought you were in your element last
night." And the doctor went forward into the sitting-room. The first
move was to take a seat by Faith and attend to her; and his address and
his inquiries, with the manner of them, were perfect in their kind.
Interested, concerned, tender, grateful, to the utmost limit of what
might have been in the circumstances testified by anybody, with equal
grace and skill they were limited there. Of special individual interest
he allowed no testimony to escape him--none at least that was
unequivocal. And Faith gave him answers to all he said, till he touched
her gloved finger and inquired if the fire had been at work there too.
Faith rather hastily drew it under cover and said no.
"What is the matter with it?"
"There is nothing bad the matter with it," said Faith, very imprudently
letting her cheeks get rosy. The doctor looked at her--told her he
could cure her finger if she would let him; and then rose up and
assumed his position before the fire, looking down at Mr. Linden.
"There isn't much of a midge about you, after all," he said.
"I suppose in the matter of wings we are about on a par. What is the
extent of the damage?"
"It is nothing worth speaking of--I think now," said the doctor. "But
we are under an extent of obligation to you, my dear fellow,--which
sits on me as lightly as obligation so generously imposed should;--and
yet I should be doubly grateful if you could shew me some way in which
I could--for a moment--reverse the terms on which we stand towards each
other."
"I don't think of any generous imposition just now," said Mr. Linden
smiling. "How are your father and sister?--I was afraid they would
suffer from the fright, if nothing else."
"Strong nerves!" said the doctor shrugging his shoulders. "We all eat
our breakfast this morning, and wanted the chops done as much as usual.
Sophy _did_ suffer, though; but it was because Miss Faith would do
nothing but get hurt in the house and wouldn't stay to be made well."
"I am sure I did something more than _that_," said Faith, to whom the
doctor had looked.
"You don't deserve any thanks!" he said sitting down again beside
her;--"but there is somebody else that does, and I wish you would give
me a hint how to pay them. That young fellow who says he is no friend
of yours--he helped us bravely last night. What can I do to please him?"
"Mr. Linden can tell best," said Faith looking to him. The doctor
turned in the same direction.
"Thank you!" Mr. Linden said, and the words were warmly spoken, yet not
immediately followed up. "Thank you very much, doctor!" he repeated
thoughtfully--"I am not sure that Reuben wants anything just now,--next
summer, perhaps, he may want books."
"I see _you_ are his friend?"
"Yes--if you give the word its full length and breadth."
"What is that?" said Dr. Harrison. "Don't go off to 'Nought and All.'"
"I suppose in this case I may say, a mutual bond of trust, affection,
and active good wishes."
"There's something in that fellow, I judge?"
"You judge right."
"A fisherman's son, I think you said. Well--I share the 'active good
wishes,' at least, if I can't assume the 'affection'--so think about my
question, Linden, and I'll promise to back your thoughts. What do you
do with yourself such a day? I was overcome with ennui--till I got out
into the elements."
"Ennui is not one of my friends," said Mr. Linden smiling--"not even an
acquaintance. In fact I never even set a chair for him, as the woman in
Elia set a chair for the poor relation, saying, 'perhaps he will step
in to-day.' I have been busy, doctor--what shall I do to amuse you?
will you have a foreign newspaper?"
The doctor looked dubious; then took the newspaper and turned it over,
but not as if he had got rid of his ennui.
"This smoke in the house will drive us out of Pattaquasset a little
sooner than we expected."
"Not this winter?"
"Yes. _That's_ nothing new--but we shall go a few days earlier than we
meant. I wish you were going too."
"When to return?" said Mr. Linden. "I mean you--not myself."
"I?--I am a wandering comet," said the doctor. "I have astonished
Pattaquasset so long, it is time for me to flare up in some other
place. I don't know, Linden. Somebody must be here occasionally, to
overlook the refitting of the inside of that library--perhaps that
agreeable duty will fall on me. But Linden,"--said the doctor dropping
the newspaper and turning half round on his chair, speaking gracefully
and comically,--"_you_ astonish Pattaquasset as much as I do; and to
tell you the truth you astonish me sometimes a little. This is no place
for you. Wouldn't you prefer a tutorship at Quilipeak, or a professor's
chair in one of the city colleges? You may step into either berth
presently, and at your pleasure,--I know. I do not speak without
knowledge."
There was a stir of feeling in Mr. Linden's face--there was even an
unwonted tinge of colour, but the firm-set lips gave no indication as
to whence it came; and he presently looked up, answering the doctor in
tones as graceful and more simple than his own.
"Thank you, doctor, once more! But I have full employment, and am--or
am not--ambitious,--whichever way you choose to render it. Not to speak
of the pleasure of astonishing Pattaquasset," he added, with a smile
breaking out,--"I could not hope to do that for Quilipeak."
"Please know," said the doctor, both frankly and with much respect in
his manner, "that I have been so presumptuous as to concern my mind
about this for some time--for which you will punish me as you think I
deserve. How to be so much further presumptuous as to speak to you
about it, was my trouble;--and I ventured at last," he said smiling,
"upon my own certain possession of certain points of that 'friend'
character which you were giving just now to Reuben Taylor--or to
yourself, in his regard."
"I am sure you have them!--But about Reuben,--though I know reward is
the last thing he thought of or would wish,--yet I, his friend, choose
to answer for him, that if you choose to give him any of the books that
he will need in college, they will be well bestowed."
"In college!" said the doctor. "Diable! Where is he going?"
"Probably to Quilipeak."
"You said, to college, man. I mean, what is college the road to, in the
youngster's mind?"
"I am not sure that I have a right to tell you," said Mr. Linden,--"it
is in his mind a road to greater usefulness--so much I may say."
"He'll never be more useful than he was last night. However, I'm
willing to help him try.--What is Mignonette going to do with herself
this afternoon?"--said the doctor throwing aside his newspaper and
standing before her.
"I don't know," said Faith. "Sit here and work, I suppose."
"I'll tell you what she ought to do," the doctor went on impressively.
"She ought to do what the flowers do when the sun goes down,--shut up
her sweetness to herself, see and be seen by nobody, and cease to be
conscious of her own existence."
Faith laughed, in a way that gave doubtful promise of following the
directions. The doctor stood looking down at her, took her hand and
gallantly kissed it, and finally took himself off.
"There is a good little trial of my patience!" Mr. Linden said. "I
don't know but it is well he is going away, for I might forget myself
some time, and bid him hands off."
At which Faith looked thoughtful.
"Faith," Mr. Linden said, gently raising her face, "would you like to
live at Quilipeak?"
The answer to that was a great rush of colour, and a casting down of
eyes and face too as soon as it was permitted.
"Well?" he said smiling--though she felt some other thread in the
voice. "What did you think of the words that passed between the doctor
and me? Would you like to have me agree to his proposal?"
"You would do what is best," she said with a good deal of effort. "I
couldn't wish anything else."--
He answered her mutely at first, with a deep mingling of gravity and
affection, as if she were very, very precious.
"My dear little child!" he said, "if anything on earth could make me do
it, it would be you!--and yet I cannot."
She looked up inquiringly; but except by that look, she asked nothing.
"You strengthen my hands more than you weaken them," he said. "I am so
sure that you would feel with me!--I know it so well! I have a long
story to tell you, dear Faith,--some time, not now," he added, with a
sort of shadow coming over his face. "Will you let me choose my own
time? I know it is asking a good deal."
"It would be asking a great deal more of me to choose any other," Faith
said with a sunny smile. "I like that time best."
He passed his hand softly once or twice across her forehead, giving her
a bright, grateful look, though a little bit of a sigh came with it
too,--then drew her arm within his and led her slowly up and down the
room.
But after dinner, and after one or two more lessons--under careful
guardianship, Faith was persuaded to lay herself on the sofa and rest,
and listen,--first to various bits of reading, then to talk about some
of her photographic pictures; the talk diverging right and left, into
all sorts of paths, fictional, historic, sacred and profane. Then the
light faded--the out-of-door light, still amid falling snow; and the
firelight shone brighter and brighter; and Mrs. Derrick stopped
listening, and went to the dining-room sofa for a nap. Then Mr. Linden,
who had been sitting at Faith's side, changed his place so as to face
her.
"How do you feel to-night?" he asked.
"Perfectly well--and as nicely as possible. Just enough remains of last
night to make it pleasant to lie still."
"You are a real little sunbeam! Do you know I want you to go off with
me on a shining expedition?"
"On _what_ sort of expedition?" said Faith laughing.
"A shining one--I want to carry your bright face into all the darkest
places I can find."
There was an alternation of amusement and a grave expression in her
face for a minute, one and the other flitting by turns; but then she
said quietly, "When, Mr. Linden?"
"What shall I do with you?" he said,--"shall I call you Miss Derrick?"
"No indeed!" she said colouring. "I don't often forget myself."
"No, I shall not do that, for it would punish myself too much, but I
shall do something else--which will not punish me at all, and may
perhaps make you remember. What do you suppose it will be?"
"I don't know"--she said flushing all over.
"Nothing worse than this"--he said, bending his face to hers. "Faith! I
did not mean to frighten you so! I'll tell you where I want to take
you.--You know Monday is the first of January, and I want to go with
you to those houses in the neighbourhood where the wheels of the new
year drag a little, and try to give them a pleasant start. Would you
like it?"
"O!"--she said, springing forward with a delighted exclamation.--"Tell
me, just what you mean. To which houses?"
"I mean that if you are well, we will have a long, long sleigh ride,
and leave as many little pieces of comfort and pleasure by the way as
we can. The houses, dear, will be more than you think--I must make out
a list."
Faith clapped her hands.
"O delicious! That is the best thing we could possibly do with Monday!
and there are two days yet this week--I shall have plenty of chance,
mother and I, to make everything. O what sorts of things shall we take?
and what are some of the houses? There is Mrs. Dow, where we went that
night,"--she said, her voice falling,--"and Sally Lowndes--what places
are you thinking off?"
"I think we might give Reuben at least a visit, if nothing else,--and
there are a good many such houses down about those points, and far on
along the shore. I was thinking most of them--though there are some
nearer by. But my Mignonette must not tire herself,--I did not mean to
bring anything but pleasure upon her hands."
"You can't! in this way," said Faith in delighted eagerness. "Who keeps
house in Reuben's home? he has no mother."
"No--I suppose I may say that he keeps house,--for his father is away a
great deal, and Reuben always seems to be doing what there is to do. As
to things--you will want some for well people, and some for sick,--at
some houses the mere necessary bread and meat, and at others any of
those little extras which people who spend all their money for bread
and meat can never get. But little child," Mr. Linden said smiling, "if
I let you prepare, you must let me send home."
"What?" said she. "I thought you said we would both take them together?"
He laughed--taking her hand and holding it in both his.
"And so we will!--I meant, send home here, to prepare."
"Oh!--Well," said Faith, "but we have a great deal now, you know; and I
can send Mr. Skip to get more. But one thing I know--we will take
Reuben a roast turkey!"
I wonder if she could tell, in the firelight, with what eyes he watched
her and listened to her! Probably not, for his back was towards the
fire, and the changing light and shade on his face was a little
concealed. But the light had the mastery.
"Faith," he said, "I shall send you home some sugar-plums--upon express
condition that you are not to eat them up; being quite sweet enough
already."
His face was so hid that probably Faith thought her own was hid too,
and did not know how clearly its moved timid changes were seen. She
leaned forward, and touching one hand lightly to his shoulder, said,
"What do you mean to make me,--Endecott?"
It was a thing to hear, the soft fall and hesitancy of Faith's voice at
the last word. Yet they hardly told of the struggle it had cost. How
the word thrilled him she did not know,--the persons living from whom
he ever had that name were now so few, that there was a strange
mingling with the exquisite pleasure of hearing it from her lips,--a
mingling of past grief and of present healing. He changed his place
instantly; and taking possession of her, gave her the most gentle,
tender, and silent thanks. Perhaps too much touched to speak--perhaps
feeling sure that if he spoke at all it would be in just such words as
she had so gently reproved. The answer at last was only a bright, "I
told you I could not promise--and I will not now!"
She pushed her head round a little so that she could give a quick
glance into his face, in which lay her answer. Her words, when she
spoke, made something of a transition, which however was proved by the
voice to be a transition in words only.
"Wouldn't a bag of potatoes be a good thing for us to take?"
"Certainly!--and we must take some books, and some orders for wood. And
you must have a basket of trifles to delight all the children we meet."
"That's easy! And books, will you take? that's delicious! that's better
than anything, for those who can enjoy them. Do you think any of them
want bibles?"
"We will take some, at a venture--I never like to go anywhere without
that supply. And then we shall both have to use our wits to find out
just what is wanted in a particular place,--the people that tell you
most have often the least to tell. And above all, Faith, we shall want
plenty of sympathy and kind words and patience,--they are more called
for than anything else. Do you think you can conjure up a sufficient
supply?"
"It is something I know so little about!" said Faith. "I have never had
very much chance. When I went to see Mrs. Custers I didn't in the least
know how to speak to her. But these people where we are going all know
_you_, I suppose?"--she said with another and not a little wistful look
up into his face.
"Most of them--more or less. What of it?"
"That makes it easy," she said quietly. "But I suppose it would be just
the same if you didn't know them! About the sick people,--Endecott--if
you can tell us _how_ they are sick, mother and I between us can make
out what things to prepare for them."
"Did you think I was in earnest, dear Faith, when I asked about your
sympathy?" Mr. Linden said, drawing her closer.
"No.--I think I have the sympathy, but I don't so well know how to shew
it. Then loaves of bread, I suppose, wouldn't come amiss?--And above
all, meat. Where else do you think a roast turkey ought to go?"
"To one particular far-off house on the shore that is brim full of
little children--and nothing else!"
"We'll take them a big one," said Faith smiling,--"and I suppose it is
no matter how many cakes! You'll have to make a very particular list,
with some notion of what would be best at each place; because in some
houses they wouldn't bear what in others they would be very glad of.
Wouldn't that be good? So that we might be sure to have the right thing
everywhere--_one_ right thing, at any rate. The other things might take
their chance."
"Yes, I will do that. But you know the first thing is, that you should
get well, and the next that you should _not_ get tired,--and these must
be secured, if nobody ever has anything."
Faith's laugh was joyous.
"To-morrow I mean to make cakes and pies," she said,--"and the next day
I will bake bread and roast turkeys and boil beef! And you have no idea
what a quantity of each will be wanted! I think I never saw anybody so
good at talking people to sleep!--that didn't want to go. Now what is
that?" For the knocker of the front door sounded loudly again.
"It is something to send people away--that don't want to go!" Mr.
Linden said, as he put her back in her old position on the cushions,
and moved his chair to a respectful distance therefrom. But nothing
worse came in this time than a note, well enveloped and sealed, which
was for Mr. Linden. It ran after this fashion.--
"_In the snow--yet and the chair
not only set for Ennui, but
ennui in the chair!_
"_This 28th Dec_. 18
"DEAR LINDEN,
You see my condition. I am desperate for want of something to do--_so_
I send you this. Enclosed you will please find--if you haven't dropped
it on the floor!--$25, for the bibliothecal and collegiate expenses of
'Miss Derrick's friend.' If you should hereafter know him to be in
further want of the same kind of material aid and comfort--please
convey intelligence of the same to myself or father. He---i. e-. said
'friend'--saved to _us_ last night far more than the value of this.
I am sorry I have no more to say! for your image--what else could it
be?--has for the moment frightened Ennui into the shadow--but he will
come back again as soon as I have sealed this. By which you will know
when you read the (then) present condition of
Your friend most truly
JULIUS HARRISON.
In Pattaquasset, is it?"
Mr. Linden read the note by firelight and standing--then came and sat
down by Faith and put it in her hands. By firelight Faith read it
hastily, and looked up with eyes of great delight. "Oh!" she
said,--"isn't that good!" Then she looked down at the note soberly
again.
"Well, little child? what?" he said smiling. "Yes, I am very glad. What
are you doubting about?"
"I am not doubting about anything," she said giving him the
note,--"only thinking of this strange man."
"Is he very strange?" Mr. Linden said. But he did not pursue the
subject, going back instead to the one they had been upon, to give her
the information she had asked for about the sick people they were
likely to meet in their rounds; passing gradually from that to other
matters, thence into silence. And Faith followed him, step by
step,--only when he was quite silent, she was--asleep!
CHAPTER VII.
The next two days were busy ones, all round; for though Faith was
carefully watched, by both her guardians, yet she was really well and
strong enough again to be allowed to do a good deal; especially with
those intervals of rest and study which Mr. Linden managed for her. His
work, between these intervals, took him often out of doors, and various
were the tokens of that work which came home--greatly to Faith's
interest and amusement. They were curiously indicative, too, both of
the varied wants of the poor people in the neighbourhood, and of his
knowledge on the subject. From a little pair of shoes which was to
accompany one roast turkey, to the particular sort of new fishing net
which was to go with the other, it really seemed as if every sort of
thing was wanted somewhere,--simple things, and easy to get, and not
costing much,--but priceless to people who had no money at all. Faith
was appointed receiver general, and her hands were full of amusement as
well as business. And those two things were the most of all that Mr.
Linden suffered to come upon them,--whatever his own means might be, it
was no part of his plan to trench upon Mrs. Derrick's; though she on
her part entered heart and hands into the work, with almost as much
delight as Faith herself, and would have given the two carte-blanche to
take anything she had in the house. Faith didn't ask _him_ what she
should take there, nor let him know much about it till Monday. By this
time, what with direct and indirect modes of getting at the knowledge,
Faith had become tolerably well acquainted with the class or classes of
wants that were to be ministered to. Many were the ovenfuls that were
baked that Friday and Saturday! great service did the great pot that
was used for boiling great joints! nice and comforting were the broths
and more delicate things provided, with infinite care, for some four or
five sick or infirm people. But Faith's delight was the things Mr.
Linden sent home; every fresh arrival of which sent her to the kitchen
with a new accession of zeal, sympathy, and exultation,--sympathy with
him and the poor people; exultation in the work--most of all in him!
Great was the marvelling of Cindy and Mr. Skip at these days'
proceedings.
So passed Friday and Saturday; and Sunday brought a lull. Faith thought
so, and felt so. Her roast turkeys and chickens were reposing in spicy
readiness; her boiled meats and bakeries were all accomplished and in
waiting; and dismissing all but a little joyful background thought of
them, Faith gave her whole heart and mind to the full Sabbath rest, to
the full Sabbath rising; and looked, in her deep happiness, as if she
were--what she was--enjoying the one and striving after the other. But
the ways by which we are to find the good we must seek, are by no means
always those of our own choosing.
It was a clear, cold, still, winter's day. Cold enough by the
thermometer; but so still that the walking to church was pleasant. They
had come home from the afternoon service--Faith had not taken off her
things--when she was called into the kitchen to receive a message. The
next minute she was in the sitting-room and stood by the side of Mr.
Linden's chair.
"Mrs. Custers is dying--and has sent for me."
"For you, dear child?--Well--Are you able to go?"
"Oh yes."
He looked at her in silence, as if he were making up his own mind on
the subject, then rose up and gently seating her on the sofa, told her
to rest there till he was ready; but before he came back again Mrs.
Derrick came to Faith's side with a smoking cup of chicken broth and a
biscuit.
"You've got to eat it, pretty child," she said fondly,--"we're both
agreed upon that point."
Which point mandate Faith did not try to dispute.
The town clock had struck four, all counted, when Jerry dashed off from
the door with the little sleigh behind him. No other sleigh-bells were
abroad, and his rang out noisily and alone over the great waste of
stillness as soon as they were quit of the village. The air happily was
very still and the cold had not increased; but low, low the sun was,
and sent his slant beams coolly over the snow-white fields, glinting
from fences and rocks and bare thickets with a gleam that threatened he
would not look at them long. The hour was one of extreme beauty,--fair
and still, with a steady strength in its stillness that made the beauty
somewhat imposing. There was none of the yielding character of summer
there; but a power that was doing its work and would do it straight
through. "He giveth forth his ice like morsels; who can stand before
his cold?"--thought Faith.
The sleighing was excellent; the roads in perfect condition.
"How long is it since you were here?" Mr. Linden said as the house came
in sight, shewn only by its twinkling panes of glass.
"Not since before I went to Pequot--not since a day or two after that
ride we took with Dr. Harrison, when you rode 'Stranger' the first
time."
"How was she then?"
"Not much different from what she had been before--she didn't say
much--she seemed to like to listen to me, or to see me, or both. That
was all I could be sure of."
"Try not to let her spend her strength in examining the past state of
her mind. Bid her lay hold of the promise now. A present hold will
answer all her questions--and is all the oldest Christian can rest in."
"I wish you could speak to her instead of me," said Faith. "Perhaps she
will let you."
"It is not you nor I, my child.--Fix your heart upon Christ, and let
him speak,--fix your eyes upon him, and let his light shine."
"I know it. O I do!--" she said, looking up at him with an humble,
moved face.
He lifted her out of the sleigh and led her up to the house, where they
were presently admitted; into an outer room first, where Faith could
lay off her furs.
"She's some brighter to-night," the woman in attendance said, in answer
to Mr. Linden's questions. "I guess she'll be real glad to see
you"--this was addressed to Faith.
Faith left Mr. Linden there, and went into the sick chamber alone;
where she was always received as if she had brought an olive branch, or
a palm branch, or both of them, in her hand. The spirit of both, no
doubt, was in her; the gentle face looked the promise of both peace and
victory, as only humility can look it.
Mrs. Custers on her part looked--as the other had said--glad; if so
bright a word could be applied to a face that had lost all its own
light, and where no reflected light as yet shone. Yet she was quieter
than when Faith had first seen her, whether from mental relief or
physical prostration, and was most eager for all Faith's
words,--listening for the most part in silence, but with eyes that
never said "enough." As some poor exhausted traveller takes the water
which he has at last reached in the desert, nor knows yet whether its
bright drops can avail to save his life, but lays him down by the
fountain--there to live or die. And Faith, feeling that her hand was
ministering those drops of life, lost every other thought,--except to
wish for a hand that could do it better. Once she ventured a
proposition.
"I have a friend here, Mrs. Custers, who can tell you about all these
things much better than I can. Will you let him? May I ask him to come
in and see you?"
"Better?" she said slowly--"I don't believe it. Who is he? your
brother?"
"No--I haven't any brother. But that don't matter. He's somebody that
is a great deal better than I am. May I let him come in? He's here,"
said Faith very quietly, along with her flushing cheek.
There was a poor little faint smile for a moment upon the sick woman's
lips while Faith spoke, but it passed and she answered in the same
tone--"I'll see him--to please you--before you go. I just want the
words now--and I like you best."
Faith troubled her no more with unnecessary suggestions, and gave her
"the words." Gave them with the fragrance of her own love about them,
which certainly is the surest human vehicle for the love above human
that is in them. As on that first occasion, Faith placed herself on the
side of the bed; and holding one of Mrs. Custers' hands in her own,
bending her soft quiet face towards the listening eyes and ears, she
gave her one by one, like crumbs of life-giving food, the words of
promise, of encouragement, of invitation, of example. No answer cheered
or helped her; no token of pleasure or even of assent met her; only
those fixed listening eyes bade her go on, and told that whether for
life and refreshment or no, the words were eagerly taken in, each after
the other, as she said them. There was something in the strong sympathy
of the speaker--in her own feeling and joy of the truths she told--that
might give them double power and life to the ears of another. Faith
reported the words of her Master with such triumphant prizing of them
and such leaning on their strength; she gave his invitations in such
tones of affection; she told over the instances of others' prevailing
faith with such an evident, clear, satisfying share in the same;--the
living words this time lost nothing of their power by a dead utterance.
Of her own words Faith ventured few; now and then the simplest addition
to some thing she had repeated, to make it more plain, or to carry it
further home; such words as she could not keep back; such words, very
much, as she would have spoken to Johnny Fax; not very unlike what
Johnny Fax might have spoken to her. But there was not a little
physical exhaustion about all this after a while, and Faith found she
must have some help to her memory. She went into the other room.
"I want a bible," she said looking round for it--"Is there one here?"
Yes there was one, but it was Mr. Linden's. That was quickly given her.
"I forgot it at the moment you went in," he said, "and then I did not
like to disturb you. My dear Faith!--" and he held her hand and looked
at her a little wistfully. She brought her other hand upon his, and
looked down and looked up wistfully too; like one with a heart full.
"Can I help you? can I take your place?"
"She won't let you," said Faith shaking her head. "She says she will
see you by and by--but she must take her own time for it."
And Faith went back to her ministrations. Of all bibles, she would have
had that one in her hand then! And yet its companionship bowed down her
heart with a sense of weakness;--but that was the very position for the
next move; a spring beyond weakness to the only real and sufficient
ground of strength.
The afternoon merged into the evening. A tallow candle had been brought
by the attendant into the room in which Mr. Linden was waiting; and its
dim smoky light would have made a dismal place of it if he had had no
other to go by. He could sometimes hear the low tones of a word or two
in the other room; more often the tones were so low that they failed to
reach him. When this state of things had lasted a long time--as it
seemed--there came an interruption in the form of quick steps on the
snow; then the door was pushed open, and Dr. Harrison appeared.
"You here!" was his astonished salutation. "What upon earth has brought
you?"
"I came to bring some one else."
"_She_ isn't here?" said the doctor. "You don't mean that?"
His emphatic pronouns were a little smile-provoking, in spite of the
grave thoughts upon which they intruded--or rather perhaps because of
them; but if Mr. Linden's face felt that temptation, it was only for a
moment,--he answered quietly,
"If you mean Miss Faith, she has been here a long time."
The doctor knew that! if she came when she was called. _He_ had stopped
to eat his dinner.
"I mean her, of course," he said with his tone a little subdued. "I
shouldn't think her mother would have let her come--such a night!--"
Which meant very plainly that Dr. Harrison would not have let her.--"Is
she in there with the woman now?"
"Yes."
The doctor went with grave aspect to the door of communication between
the two rooms and softly opened it and went in; so softly, that Faith,
engaged in her reading, did not hear anything; the sick woman's eyes
were the first that perceived him. Hers rested on him a moment--then
came back to Faith, and then again met the doctor's; but not just as
they had been wont. And her first words bore out his impression.
"You may come in," she said, slowly and distinctly,--"I'm not afraid of
you to-night."
He came forward, looked at her, touched her hand, kindly; and then
without a word turned to Faith.
Faith did not dare ask a question, but her eyes put it silently.
"She don't want anything," said he meaningly. "Not from me. She may
have anything she fancies to have."
Faith's eyes went back to the other face. That the doctor's words had
been understood there too, was evident from the little flitting colour,
and the sick woman lay still with closed eyes, clasping Faith's hand as
if she were holding herself back from drifting out on "that great and
unknown sea." But she roused herself and spoke hurriedly. "Won't
somebody pray for me?"
Faith bent over until her lips almost touched the sufferer's cheek and
her warm breath floated in the words, "I'll bring somebody--" then
loosing her hold, she sprang from the bed and out into the other room.
But when she had clasped Mr. Linden's hand, Faith bent down her head
upon it, unable to speak. The strength it could, his hand gave her--and
his voice.
"What, my dear child?"
Then Faith looked up. "S
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