In a Mysterious Way
by Anne Warner · English · Gutenberg #37515 · 445,458 chars · public domain (US)
The Project Gutenberg eBook of In a Mysterious Way
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.
Title: In a Mysterious Way
Author: Anne Warner
Illustrator: J. V. McFall
Release date: September 23, 2011 [eBook #37515]
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/37515
Credits: Produced by Suzanne Shell, Matthew Wheaton and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN A MYSTERIOUS WAY ***
Produced by Suzanne Shell, Matthew Wheaton and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
IN A MYSTERIOUS WAY
[Illustration: "THE ONLY REAL HOLE IS WHERE HE SAT DOWN ON AN ENGINE
SPARK AT THE STATION."]
IN A MYSTERIOUS WAY
BY ANNE WARNER
AUTHOR OF "THE REJUVENATION OF AUNT MARY"
"SUSAN CLEGG AND HER FRIEND MRS. LATHROP"
"AN ORIGINAL GENTLEMAN," ETC.
_Illustrated by_ J. V. McFALL
BOSTON
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY
1909
_Copyright, 1909_,
BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY.
_All rights reserved_
Published April, 1909
Electrotyped and Printed at
THE COLONIAL PRESS:
C. H. Simonds & Co., Boston, U.S.A.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. INTRODUCING MRS. RAY
II. THE COMING OF THE LASSIE
III. INTRODUCING LASSIE TO MRS. RAY
IV. THE DIFFERENCE
V. THAT DISPASSIONATE OBSERVER, MRS. RAY
VI. WHEN DIFFERENCES LEAD TO WHAT IS EVER THE SAME
VII. THE LATHBUNS
VIII. MISS LATHBUN'S STORY
IX. PLEASANT CONVERSE
X. THE BROADER MEANING
XI. THE WAR-PATH
XII. ANOTHER PATH
XIII. AND STILL ANOTHER PATH
XIV. DEVOTED TO COATS AND CASE-KNIVES
XV. LEARNING LESSONS
XVI. THE WALK TO THE LOWER FALLS
XVII. RIGHTEOUS JUSTICE
XVIII. IN THE HOUR OF NEED
XIX. DOUBTS
XX. SHIFTING SUNSHINE AND CLOUDS
XXI. THE POST-OFFICE
XXII. AFTERMATH
XXIII. THE DARKNESS BEFORE
XXIV. DAWN
XXV. THE BREAKING OF ANOTHER DAY AND WAY
ILLUSTRATIONS
"THE ONLY REAL HOLE IS WHERE HE SAT DOWN ON AN ENGINE SPARK AT
THE STATION"
"IT'S HER THAT BOUGHT THE OLD WHITTACKER HOUSE"
"SURELY YOU REMEMBER ME"
ALVA
"IF YOU'VE LENT MONEY TO THE LATHBUNS YOU'RE GOING TO LOSE IT"
IN A MYSTERIOUS WAY
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCING MRS. RAY
"'He moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform,'" sang Mrs. Ray,
coming in from the wood-shed and proceeding to fill up the stove, with
the energy which characterized her whole person. A short, well-knit,
active person it was, too,--a figure of health and compact muscular
strength, a well-shaped head with a tight wad of neat hair on top,
bright eyes, and a firm mouth.
Mrs. Wiley, a near neighbor, sat by the table and watched her friend
with the after-nightfall passivity of a woman who has to be very active
during daylight. Mrs. Wiley was not small and well-knit, neither was she
energetic. Life for Mrs. Wiley had gone mainly in a minor key composed
largely of sharps, and as a consequence she sighed frequently and sighed
even now.
Mrs. Ray slammed the stove door and caroled louder than ever, as if to
drown even the echo of a sigh in her kitchen. "'He moves in a mysterious
way His wonders to perform,'" she sang, and then, folding her arms on
top of her bosom in a manner peculiarly her own, she spoke to Mrs.
Wiley in that obtrusively cheerful tone which we use to those who sigh
when feeling no desire to sigh with them: "That's my motto--that
song--yes, indeed. It fits everything and accounts for everything and
comes in handy anywhere any time, even if I never have wondered myself,
but have been dead sure all along. Yes, indeed."
Mrs. Wiley sighed again, and her eyes moved towards a large, awkward
parcel rolled in newspaper, which lay on the end of the table by her.
"I'm so glad you feel able to undertake it, Mrs. Ray. I don't know how I
ever could have managed it, if you'd said no. Mr. Wiley _will_ have a
new pig-pen this year, and the pigs never can pay for it themselves. So
you were my only way to a new winter coat. I'm so glad you didn't say
no. Besides it's father's suit, and I shall love to wear it for that
reason, too."
"I never do say no to any kind of work, do I?" said Mrs. Ray, looking at
the clock, and then all over the room; "this would be a nice time of
life for me to begin to sit around and say no to work. What with Mr.
Ray's second wife's children not all educated yet, and his first wife's
children getting along to where they're beginning to be left widows with
six apiece and no life insurance, I'm likely to want all the work I can
get for some years, as far as I can see. Yes, indeed."
Mrs. Wiley sighed heavily.
"Mr. Wiley thinks we'd ought to insure our lives in favor of Lottie
Ann," she said, feeling for her pocket-handkerchief at the thought;
"she's so dreadful delicate--but I think it's foolish--she's so
_dreadful_ delicate."
"Why don't you insure Lottie Ann, then?" Mrs. Ray glanced at the clock
again, frowned a little and puckered her lips. "If you don't mind taking
that chair the cat's in, Mrs. Wiley, I believe I've got just about time
enough to sprinkle the clothes before the mail comes in; it looks so to
me."
Mrs. Wiley slowly and gravely exchanged seats with the cat. "Do you take
much washing in now? I shouldn't think you had time."
"Time!" Mrs. Ray was dragging a clothes-basket from under the table and
filling a dipper with water. "I never stop to think whether I have time
or not, any more. 'He moves in a mysterious way--' there's where my
motto comes in again. Yes, indeed. I move just the same way myself. I
don't see how I get so much done, but I've no time to stop and study
over it, or I'd be behind just that much. There's more than you wonder
where I get time from, Mrs. Wiley. They asked me if I had time for the
post-office. And I said I had. They asked first if I could read and
write, and I said I could; and then they asked me if I had time, and I
said I had. And that settled it."
"Why, Mrs. Ray," said Mrs. Wiley, watching the clothes-sprinkling, which
was now going forward, attentively, "that's one of the waists from that
girl at Nellie O'Neil's, isn't it?"
"Yes, indeed. She asked Nellie for a French laundress, and Nellie put
her shawl right over her head and run up and asked me if I had time for
that, too. I said I was willing to try, so I'm a French laundress too,
now. 'He moves'--"
"What do you think of those two young people at Nellie's, anyway?" Mrs.
Wiley dropped her voice confidentially. "I was meaning to ask you that,
right at first."
"Well, if you ask _me_," said Mrs. Ray, "I can't make him out, and I
think she's mooney. I'm a great judge of mooney people ever since I
first knew Mr. Ray, and that girl looks very mooney to me. Look at her
coming here and hiking right over and buying the Whittacker house next
day--a house I wouldn't send a rat to buy--not if I had a real liking
for the rat. And now the way she's pulling it to pieces and nailing on
new improvements, with the trees all boxed up, as though trees weren't
free as air--oh, she's mooney, very mooney--yes, indeed."
"Nellie don't think they act loving," said Mrs. Wiley; "and Joey Beall
says they don't act loving even when they're alone together. He's been
building a culvert for Mr. Ledge, and he's seen 'em alone together
twice. Joey knows how people ought to act when they're alone together.
He always knows when folks are in love, before they know themselves. He
tells by seeing them alone together. Why, he knew when you was going to
be married--he saw you and Mr. Ray alone together that day you walked to
the Lower Falls."
"But it wasn't through our acting loving that he knew it," said Mrs.
Ray, energetically ruminative between the dipper of water and the
clothes to be sprinkled; "my, but I was mad that day! It was the first
and last time anybody ever fooled _me_ into walking to the Lower Falls.
Yes, indeed. I like to of died! If Mr. Ray hadn't asked me to marry him,
I'd never have forgiven him getting me to go on that walk. Those flights
of steps! And those paths! All the way down I was wanting to turn round
and go back. I made up my mind never to take Mr. Ray's word for nothing
again. And I never did. He fooled me into that walk, but he never fooled
me again. Yes, indeed. Never!"
"But Joey Beall saw you that day," said Mrs. Wiley, whose mind was of
that strength which is not to be swept beyond its gait by any other
mind's rapidity, "and he said right off that night you'd marry him."
"Maybe he saw Mr. Ray take his first and second wife down to the Lower
Falls, and knew it from his looks with them--Mr. Ray took 'em both down
there, and asked 'em each to marry him coming back. All the way down he
was telling me what they each said to everything they saw. And coming
back he showed me where he asked 'em each. Mr. Ray never made any secret
of his first and second wife to me. I'll say that for him. Yes, indeed.
And like enough Joey was around then. He's always round when people are
alone together."
"But he doesn't think these young people act loving," Mrs. Wiley went
on, recurring to the main issue under discussion. "Joey says they don't
have the right way at all. He says they don't disagree right, either.
They're on opposite sides of the dam, the same as if they were married
folks, but they don't seem to feel interested in their discussing.
Nellie says they're real pleasant, but she can't understand them;
Nellie's very far from making them out."
"Oh, Nellie can't make nothing out. She and Jack is dead easy. Look at
those other boarders they've got. She says she can't make them out,
either. I should think not."
Mrs. Wiley's standpoint refused to stretch to the other boarders. She
sighed again.
"She seems a very nice girl," she said, sadly.
"Oh, yes, nice enough--but mooney," said Mrs. Ray. "I know the kind as
soon as I see 'em. I could almost tell 'em by their legs, when they get
down from the train on the side away from me. She's got ideas about
souls and scenery, that girl has; but that young man's got his living to
earn, and he hasn't no time for any ideas. I like him! We both work for
the United States Government, and that's a great bond. Yes, indeed. That
young man knows if the dam goes through here, he'll be fixed for life
digging it, and the girl's just the kind he wants, for he's practical
and she's mooney--she's so mooney she's bought a house to live in while
he digs the dam, and yet she's solemnly hoping there won't be no dam.
She says so."
"Perhaps she don't mean it," suggested Mrs. Wiley.
"Yes, she does mean it," said Mrs. Ray; "yes, indeed, she means it. I'm
a great judge of character and that girl means what she says."
"About the dam?"
"Yes, about everything. She's very friendly with me. She buys lots of
stamps, and cancels up like a lady. I'm very fond of her."
"What did she say about the dam?"
"Oh, lots of things. She said it was a desecration for one thing, and
then I was singing one day and she said I was very right, for the Lord
did move in a very mysterious way, and He would save the falls."
"Was she as sure as that?" asked Mrs. Wiley, appalled.
"She seemed to be. Oh, but she's very mooney."
"She's expecting a friend on to-night's train," said Mrs. Wiley; "Nellie
says it's a girl younger than she is."
"There'll be trouble then," said Mrs. Ray, with the calmness of all
prophets of evil; "a girl younger than she is is going to make her look
awful old."
"I wonder how long they'll stay!"
"I don't know. You never can tell how long any one will stay here. Some
come and say 'Oh, it's so quiet,' and the next morning the express has
got to be flagged to take 'em right away; and others come and say 'Oh,
it's so quiet,' and send for their trunks and paint-boxes that night.
You never can tell how this place is going to strike any one. Mr. Ray's
first wife cried all the time, till she died of asthma brought on by
hay-fever; and his second wife liked to be where she could go without
her false teeth, and she just loved it here! Yes, indeed."
"It isn't so very long till the train now," said Mrs. Wiley; "I guess
I'll go down to the station. I always like to see the train come in.
It's so sort of amusing to think it's going to Buffalo. Lottie Ann says
it's so funny to think of something being right here with us, and then
going right to Buffalo. I wish Lottie Ann could travel more. Lottie Ann
would be a great traveller if she could travel any."
Mrs. Ray took up the lamp. "Well, if you must go," she said, "I'll put
the light in the post-office and get down cellar, myself. I'm raising
celery odd minutes this year, and getting the beds ready to lay it under
is a lot of work."
Mrs. Wiley rose and moved slowly towards the door. "I wonder how long
those other two will stay at Nellie's," she said.
Mrs. Ray's lips drew tightly together. "I can't say I'm sure," she said;
"I know nothing about them. Folks who never write letters nor get
letters don't cut any figure in my life. Good night, Mrs. Wiley,"--she
opened the door as she spoke--"good-by."
"They've been there--" murmured Mrs. Wiley, but the door closing behind
her ended her speech.
CHAPTER II
THE COMING OF THE LASSIE
On that same evening Alva and Ingram, the main subject of Mrs. Ray's and
Mrs. Wiley's discourse, sat in the dining-room of the O'Neil House,
waiting for train time. They had the dining-room to themselves, except
for occasional vague and interjectional appearances of Mary Cody in the
door, to see "if they wanted anything." Ingram had been eating,--he was
late, always late,--and Alva sat watching him in the absent-minded way
in which she was apt to contemplate the doings of other people, while
she talked to him with the earnest interest which she always gave to
talking,--when she talked at all. The contrast between her dreamy eyes
and the intentness of her tone was as great as the contrast between the
first impression wrought by a glance at her colorless face and simple
dress, and the second, when, with a start, the onlooker realized that
here was some one well worth looking at, well worth studying, and well
worth meditating later. Perhaps she was not beautiful--I am not quite
sure as to that--but she was surely lovely, with the loveliness which a
certain sort of life brings to some faces.
Ingram, on the other side of the table, was just the ordinary
good-looking, professional man of thirty to thirty-five. Tall, straight,
slightly tanned, as would be natural for a civil engineer who had spent
September in the open; especially well-groomed for a man sixty miles
from what he called civilization, fine to see in his knickerbockers and
laced shoes, genial, jolly, and appreciative to the limit, apparently.
The contrast between the two was very great, and was felt by more than
Mrs. Ray, for there had been many who had watched them during the week
of Alva's stay. "He's a awful nice man," Mrs. O'Neil had said to Mrs.
Ray, "but I don't see how she ever came to fancy him. They seem happy
together, but it's such a funny way to be happy together."
This had been the original form of the statement which Mrs. Ray had
later repeated to Mrs. Wiley.
It was true that they seemed very far apart, but were nevertheless
apparently happy together. The week had been a pleasant week to both.
Not, perhaps, as the town supposed, but pleasant anyway.
"I'm selfish enough to wish that it wasn't at an end to-night," Ingram
said, as he took his piece of blackberry pie from Mary Cody; "you're a
godsend in this place, Alva."
"But you'll like Lassie," his companion replied; "she's a charming
little girl,--and I love her so. I always have loved the child, and just
now it seemed to me as if it would do both her and me good to be
together. Life for me is so wonderful--I don't like to be selfish with
these days. My thoughts are too happy to keep to myself. I want some one
to share my joy."
Ingram looked at her quizzically. "And I won't do at all?" he asked.
"You,--oh, you're away all day. And then, besides, you're still so
material, so awfully material. You can't deny it, Ronald, you're
frightfully material--practical--commonplace. Of the world so very
worldly."
He laughed lightly. "Just because I don't agree with you about the dam,"
he said; "there, that's it, you know. Why, my dear girl, suppose all
America had been reserved for its beauty, set aside for the perpetual
preservation of the buffaloes and the scenery,--where would you and I be
now?"
She looked away from him in her curious, contemplative way. "If you
knew," she said, after a minute, "how silly and petty and trivial such
arguments sound to thinking people, you'd positively blush with shame to
use them. It's like arguing with a baby to try to talk Heaven's reason
with the ordinary man; he just sees his own little, narrow, earthly
standpoint. I wonder whether it's worth while to ever try to be serious
with you. You know very well that the most of your brethren would be
willing to wreck the Yellowstone from end to end, if they could make
their own private and personal fortunes building railways through it."
Ingram laughed again. "Where would the country be without railroads?" he
asked.
She withdrew the meaning in her gaze out of the infinite beyond, where
it seemed to float easily, and centred it on him.
"Just to think," she said, with deep meaning, "that ten years ago I
might have married you, and had to face your system of logic for life!"
"Is it as bad as that?"
"It might have been. We might have made it so before we knew better.
That's the rub in marriage. Every one does it before he or she has
settled his or her own views. I wasn't much of an idealist ten years
ago, and you were not much of anything. But if I could have married any
one then, I should have married you."
A shadow fell upon his face. He turned his chair a little from the
table. "If I was not the right one, I wish that you had married some
other man then,--I wish it with all my heart. You would have been so
much happier. You're not happy now--you know that. It would have been so
much better for you if you had married."
She smiled and shook her head. "Oh, no. It is much better as it is.
Infinitely better. It's like coming up against a great granite wall to
try and talk to you, Ronald, because you simply cannot understand what I
mean when I say words, but nevertheless, believe me, I'm on my knees day
and night, figuratively speaking, thanking God that I didn't marry then.
I wasn't meant to marry then. I've been needed single."
He took out his cigarette case. "What were you meant for, then, do you
think?" he queried; "nothing except as a convenience for others?"
"I was meant to learn, and then later, perhaps, to teach."
"To learn?" He looked his question with a quick intensity. "To teach?--"
the question deepened sharply.
She smiled. "Yes. To learn so that I could teach. I feel some days that
I was born to teach, and of course no one may hope to teach until he has
learned first."
He shrugged his shoulders and laughed a little. She smiled again. "You
great, granite wall, you don't understand a bit, do you? Never mind,
light your cigarette, and then tell me what time it is. We must not
forget Lassie, you know."
He looked at his watch. "Ten minutes yet."
"Dear child, how tired she'll be. Never mind, she'll have a good rest
during the next ten days."
"Will she stay ten days? She'll be here as long as you will then, won't
she?"
"Yes; I'm going when she does."
"You think that the house will be done by that time?"
"I know that it will be done. It must be done."
He took his cigarette up in his fingers, turned it about a little, and
then looked suddenly straight at her. "Alva, tell me the mystery, tell
me the story, please. What is the house for?"
She looked at him and was silent.
"Why won't you tell me?"
Still silence. Still she looked at him.
"You'll tell her when she comes. Why not me?"
She spoke then: "She'll be able to understand, perhaps. You couldn't."
Ingram compressed his lips. "And am I so awfully dense?" he asked, half
hurt.
"Not so dense, but, as yet, too ignorant. Or else it is that I am still
too little myself to be able to rise above some human sentiments. And
there is one point where endurance of the world's opinion is such
refinement of torture, that only the very strongest and greatest can go
willingly forward to meet and suffer the inevitable. The inevitable is
close to me these days; it is approaching closer hourly, and there is no
possible way for me to make you or the world understand how I feel in
regard to it all. And I shrink from facing the kind of thing that I
shall soon have to face any sooner than is absolutely necessary. And so
I won't tell you."
She stopped. Although her voice was firm, her eyes had again become far
away in their expression, and she seemed almost to have forgotten him
even while making this explanation for his sake. He was watching her
with deepest interest, and the curiosity in his eyes burned more
brightly than ever.
"But if it is all as terrible as you make out," he said, "how can you
make that young girl understand what you suppose to be so far beyond
me?"
"Because I can teach her."
"How?"
"She'll be with me night and day for ten days. We'll have a good deal of
time together. And then, too, she is a woman. Women learn some lessons
easily. Easier far than men."
"Is it right to teach her such a lesson as this?"
"Why do you ask that, when you do not know what my lesson will be? How
can you dare fancy that it could possibly be wrong?"
Ingram paused for a minute, a little staggered. Then he said, bluntly:
"The world is made up of reasonable men and women, and it seems to me
best that all men and women should be reasonable. What isn't reasonable
is wrong. Forgive me, Alva, but you don't sound reasonable."
"You think that I am not reasonable? Therefore I must be wrong. That's
your logic?"
He hesitated. "Perhaps I think you wrong. I must confess that to me you
often seem so."
She thought a minute, considering his standpoint.
"Ronald," she said then, "'reasonable' is a term that is given its
meaning by those in power, isn't that so? 'Reasonable' is what best
serves the ends of those who generally seek to serve no ends except
their own. It's true that I don't at all care what a few selfish and
near-sighted individuals think of me. I have thrown in my lot with the
unreasonable majority, the poor, the suffering, and those yet to be born
who are being robbed of their birthright. To leave my mystery and go
back to our familiar difference, there's the dam to illustrate my exact
meaning. The 'reasonable' use of the river out there is to build a dam,
and so make a few more millionaires and give employment for a few years
to a few thousands of Italians. The 'unreasonable' use to make of the
river is to preserve it intact for tired, weary souls to flee to through
all the future, so that their bodies may breathe God and life into their
being again, and go forth strong. You know you don't agree with me as to
that view of that case, so how can I expect you to disagree with the
general opinion that the 'reasonable' thing for me to do personally is
to take my life and get all the pleasure that I can from it? The
'unreasonable' view, the one I hold myself, is that I have elected to
take it and give--not get--all the pleasure that I can with it. Of
course you don't understand that unreasonableness, and so you don't
agree with me; but I can tell you one thing, Ronald," she leaned forward
and suddenly threw intense meaning into her words, "and that is this. My
story--my mystery as you call it so often--is at once a very old mystery
and a very new one. I have suffered, and I am to suffer, most terribly.
The happiness to which I am looking forward is going to be an ordeal
for which all that I have undergone until now will be none too much
preparation. But in the hour of my keenest agony I shall be happier and
more hopeful than you will ever be able to realize in your life. Unless
you change completely. Take my word for that."
She rose as she spoke, and he rose, too, looking towards her with eyes
that plainly subscribed to Mrs. Ray's opinion as expressed in the simple
vernacular.
"Oh, no, I can't understand, and I don't believe," he said: "but I am
able to meet trains, anyhow."
A large cape lay on an empty chair near by, and she took it up now.
"But I'm going alone," she said, as she slipped into it.
"What nonsense. Of course I am not going to let you go alone."
She looked at him, buttoning the woolen cross-straps upon the cape as
she did so; then she threw one corner back over her forearm and laid
that hand on his, speaking decidedly.
"I'm going alone to meet her. You know what I asked you to promise when
I came here a week ago, and you know that you gave me your word that
you'd never interfere with me. Lassie is almost a stranger to you, and
after you have learned to know her as a young lady there will come years
for you two to talk together, but for me this meeting is something that
I don't want to share. Don't say any more."
"But what will she think," he queried, "when she and you return
together, and here sits a cavalier who didn't trouble himself to
accompany one lady through the dark night to meet another's train?"
"She will think nothing, because she will not see the cavalier. When we
come in, we shall go straight up-stairs."
Ingram more than smiled now. "Forgive me, Alva, but you and I are such
old, such near, such dear friends, that I can say to you frankly, as I
do say to you frankly over and over again, I don't understand you."
She laughed at that, and turned towards the door.
"I know--I know. I'm very queer, most awfully queer, in the eyes of
every one. But I can tell you, as I tell them, that the worst of it is
only for a little while. Just a few brief weeks and I shall be again, in
most ways, a normal woman. A woman just like all the rest again," her
back was towards him now, "in most thing--in most things."
"Never! You never have been like other women,--you've always been
different from other women; you always will be."
"Have I? Shall I? Well, perhaps it's so. I'm rather glad of it. Most
women are stupid, I think. Poor things!" she sighed.
He followed her as she moved towards the door, half-vexed,
half-laughing:
"And men, Alva, and men. Are they all stupid in your eyes?"
She had her hand on the knob, and her great cape was gathered about her
in heavy folds.
"Oh, Ronald," she said, looking into his look, "if you had any idea how
fearfully stupid they seem to me. Often and often in the last three
years. Even yourself. And ten years ago, when we were eighteen and
twenty-five, I thought you so interesting, too."
He burst out laughing at that,--it wasn't in him to take her seriously
enough to really mind her "ways" long.
"But what are we to do, when we are such mere ordinary creatures? And
you know, my dear, that if the transcendentals like to muse on bridges
by moonlight, some well-educated, commonplace individuals must build
them the bridges first."
"Ah, there you go again. Yes, that's true. One should never forget that,
of course. Particularly when talking with a man who uses a man's logic."
Then she opened the door, passed quickly into the hall, and let it close
after her.
A lantern was resting on the floor outside, as if in waiting, and she
picked it up and went at once into the night--a dark night through which
the station lights and signals, red and yellow, sparkled brightly.
It was a brisk October air that filled that outer world, and the
superabundant vitality of God's country came glinting, storming, down,
up, and across earth, sky, and ether in between.
"This glorious night!" she thought prayerfully. "If one might only
realize just all it means to be existing right now." She held the
lantern behind her, and saw her shadow spread forth into space and fade
away beyond. "The train isn't in the block yet," she thought, glancing
at the signal; "that means minutes long to wait." Quickly she ran down
the cinder-path beside the tracks, and entered the little station where
a crowd of men lounged.
"Is the train on time to-night?" she asked one.
He shook his head. "Half an hour late," he said; "wreck on the road.
Wheel off a car of thrashing-machines at Kent's."
"A whole half hour?"
"Well, I heard Joey Beall say they was making it up," said the man; "the
station agent's gone home to supper, or you could ask him."
"Thank you very much," Alva said, and turned and went out.
The night appeared even fairer than before. Her eyes roamed widely. She
thought for a minute of going back to the hotel and bidding Ingram come
out with her, but then her own mood cried for relief from the labor of
his companionship. We do not give our spirits credit for what they learn
through adapting themselves to uncongenial companionship. Alva felt hers
craved a rest. "I'll go out on the bridge and wait there," she told
herself; "that will be the right thing,--to stand above the gorge and
say my evening prayers."
So, stepping carefully over the switch impedimenta, she walked on,
following the embankment that led out to the Long Bridge.
It is very long--that Long Bridge--and very high as well. I believe that
the first bridge, the wooden one, was close to a world's wonder in its
days. Even now the skilfully combined network of iron, steel, joist and
cable seems a species of marvel, as it springs across the great cleft
that the glacier sawed through several million layers of Devonian
stratum several million years ago. I forget how many tons of metal went
into its structure, but so intricate and delicately poised is the whole,
that while trains roar forth upon its length and find no danger, yet
does it echo quick and responsive to the light step of a lithe treading
woman or even of the littlest child. On this night Alva, wrapped close
in her cape, fared fearlessly out into the black beyond. The high braces
and beams creaked all along its vanishing length, and she smiled at the
sound. "I wonder if sometime, years from now, I shall return and walk
out here again, and find the bridge crying me a welcome!" she thought;
"I wonder!" A narrow, boarded way led to the right of the rails, and she
was soon directly over the gorge. It was far too dark to see the ribbon
of river hundreds and hundreds of feet below, or the steep
picture-crevasse that encased the water's way. Beyond and below, to the
left, she could have seen the windows of Ledgeville, had she turned that
way, but she did not do so. It was the gorge that always claimed her,
whether by day or by night, and now she leaned upon the steel guard and
stared below. "I can see it plainly, even in the dark," she murmured to
herself. "I can see every rock and eddy down there, the great curve of
whirlpool, and the place where the water slides so smoothly off and then
goes mad and foams below. It is all distinct to me. I remember the day
that I first saw it, years ago, when--right here, where I stand
to-night--he came to me for the first time, and we knew one another
directly. And I shall see it just so plainly in the years to come, when
it will never enter into my daily life any more, and yet will be the
background of all my living."
She stood there for a long time, wrapped in the depth of her own
thoughts. The shadows below seemed to shift and drift in their
variations of intensity, and her eyes found rest in their profundity.
"It's like drawing water out of a well when one is very thirsty," she
said, at last, straightening herself and sighing; "it's
unexplainable, but oh, it's so good,--the lesson of darkness and water
and trees and sky. How grateful I am to be able to spell out a little in
that primer!"
Then she clasped her hands and said a prayer, and as she finished the
signal flashed the train's entrance within the block. That meant only
two minutes until its arrival, and so she turned herself back at once.
The crowd at the station had perceptibly increased and began now to
surge forth upon the platform. Mrs. Dunstall was there and Pinkie, and
Joey Beall and Mrs. Wiley, and Clay Wright Benton, and old Sammy Adams,
and Lucia Cosby.
"Been out on the Bridge, I suppose?" Mrs. Dunstall said pleasantly to
Alva.
"Yes; it's lovely to-night," the latter replied.
Every one smiled. They all felt that any one who would go out on the
bridge on a pitch black night must be mildly insane, but they looked
upon Alva as mildly insane anyhow. Mrs. Ray had many beside Ingram to
uphold her opinion.
"It's her that bought the old Whittacker house and is putting a bath-tub
in it," Joey Beall whispered to a man who was waiting to leave by the
last train out.
[Illustration: "IT'S HER THAT BOUGHT THE OLD WHITTACKER HOUSE."]
"I know it," said the man; he was one of those men who never let Joey or
anybody else feel that he had any advantage of him, in even the
slightest way.
Just then the train charged madly in beside them.
Lassie, out on the Pullman's rear platform, preparatory to climbing down
the steep steps the instant that it should be allowable, saw a
well-known figure wrapped in a dark cloak, and gave a little cry of
joy--
"Alva! Here I am--all safe."
Then she was enwrapped in the same dark cloak herself, for the space of
one warm, all-embracing hug, her friend repeating over and over, "I'm so
happy to have you--so happy to have you." And then they moved away
through the little group of bystanders, and started up the cinder-path
towards the hotel.
"I'm so happy to have you!" Alva exclaimed again, when they were alone.
She did not even seem to know that she had said so before.
"It was so good of you to ask me! How did you come to think of it? And
oh, Alva, what are you doing here, in this lonely place?"
"It will take me all your visit to properly answer those questions,
dear; but I'll tell you this much at once. I asked you because I wanted
to have you with me, and because I thought that you and I could help one
another a great deal right now. And I am here, dear, because I am the
happiest woman that the world has ever seen, and because the greatest
happiness that the world has ever known is to be here in a few weeks."
Lassie stopped short, astonished.
Alva went on, laughing gaily: "Yes, it is so! Come on,--or you will
stumble without my lantern to guide you. I'm going to tell you all about
everything when we get alone in our room, but now, little girl, hurry,
hurry. Don't stop behind."
So Lassie swallowed her astonishment for the time being, and followed.
The hotel stood on the crest of the hill above the station and the
railway's path curved by it. They were there in a minute, and in another
minute alone up-stairs in their room--or rather, rooms--for there were
two bedrooms, opening one into the other.
"Why, how pretty you have made them," the young girl cried; "pictures,
and a real live tea-table. And a work-stand! How cosy and dear! It's
just as if you meant to live here always."
Her face glowed, as she absorbed the surprising charm of her new abode.
One does not need to be very old or to have travelled very extensively
to recognize some comforts as pleasingly surprising in the country.
Alva was hanging up her cloak, and now she came and began to undo the
traveller's with a loving touch.
"Why, in one way I do mean to live here always, dear. I never am
anywhere that I do not--in a certain sense--live there ever after.
People and places never fade out of my life. Wherever I have once been
is forever near and dear to me, so dear that I can't bear to remember
anybody or anything there as ugly. The difference between a pretty room
and an ugly one is only a little money and a few minutes, after all, and
I'm beginning to learn to apply the same rule to people. It only takes a
little to find something interesting about each. We'll be so happy here,
Lassie; how we will talk and sew and drink tea in these two tiny rooms!
I've been just feasting on the thought of it every minute since you
wrote that you could come."
Lassie hugged her again. "I can't tell you how overjoyed I was to think
of coming and having a whole fortnight of you to myself. Every one
thought it was droll, my running off like this when I ought to be deep
in preparations for my début, but mamma said that the rest and change
would do me good. And I was so glad!"
Alva had gone to hang up the second cloak and now she turned, smiling
her usual quiet sweet smile as she did so.
"It's a great thing for me to have you, dear; I haven't been lonely, but
my life has been so happy here that I have felt selfish over keeping so
much rare, sweet, unutterable joy all to myself,--I wanted to share it."
She seated herself on the side of the bed, and held out her hand in
invitation, and Lassie accepted the invitation and went and perched
beside her.
"Tell me all about it," she said, nestling childishly close; "how long
have you been here anyway?"
"A week to-day."
"Only a week! Why, you wrote me a week ago."
"No, dear, six days ago."
"But you spoke as if you had been here ever so long then."
"Did I? It seemed to me that I had been here a long time, I suppose.
Time doesn't go with me as regularly as it should, I believe. Some years
are days, and the first day here was a year."
"And why are you here, Alva?"
"Oh, that's a long story."
"But tell it me, can't you?"
"Wait till to-morrow, dearest; wait until to-morrow, until you see my
house."
"Your house!"
"I've bought a house here,--a dear little old Colonial dwelling hidden
behind a high evergreen wall."
"A house here--in Ledge?"
"No, dear, not in Ledge--in Ledgeville. Across the bridge--"
"But when--"
"A week ago--the day I came."
"But why--"
Alva leaned her face down against the bright brown head.
"I wanted a home of my own, Lassie."
"But I thought that you couldn't leave your father and mother?"
"I can't, dear."
"Are they coming here to live?"
"No, dear."
"But I don't understand--"
"But you will to-morrow; I'll tell you everything to-morrow; I'd tell
you to-night, only that I promised myself that we would go to a certain
dear spot, and sit there alone in the woods while I told you."
"Why in the woods?"
"Ah, Lassie, because I love the woods; I've gotten so fond of woods, you
don't know how fond; trees and grass have come to be such friends to me;
I'll tell you about it all later. It's all part of the story."
"But why did you come here, Alva,--here of all places, where you don't
know any one. For you don't know any one here, do you?"
"I know a man named Ronald Ingram here; he is the chief of the
engineering party that is surveying for the dam."
"Is he an old friend?"
"Oh, yes, from my childhood."
Lassie turned quickly, her eyes shining:
"Alva, are you going to marry him?"
Her face was so bright and eager that something veiled the eyes of the
other with tears as she answered:
"No, dear; he's nothing but a friend. I was looking for a house--a house
in the wilderness--and he sent for me to come and see one here. And I
came and saw it and bought it at once; I expect to see it in order in
less than a fortnight."
"Then you're going to spend this winter here?"
Alva nodded. "Part of it at any rate."
"Alone?"
Alva shook her head.
Lassie's big eyes grew yet more big. "Do you mean--you don't mean--oh,
what do you mean?"
She leaned forward, looking eagerly up into the other's face. "Alva,
Alva, it isn't--it can't be--oh, then you are really--"
Two great tears rolled down that other woman's face. She simply bowed
her head and said nothing.
Lassie stared speechless for a minute; then--"I'm so glad--so glad," she
stammered, "so glad. And you'll tell me all about it to-morrow?"
"Yes, dear," Alva whispered, "I'll tell you all to-morrow. I'll be glad
to tell it all to you. The truth is, Lassie, that I thought that I was
strong enough to live these days alone, but I learned that I am weaker
than I thought. You see how weak I am. I am weeping now, but they are
tears of joy, believe me--they are tears of joy; I am the happiest and
most blessed woman in the whole wide world. And yet, it is your coming
that leads me to weep. I had to have some outlet, dear, some one to whom
to speak. And I want to live, Lassie, and be strong, very, very
strong--for God."
Lassie sat staring.
"You don't understand, do you?" Alva said to her, with the same smile
with which she had put the same question to Ingram.
But Lassie did not answer the question as Ingram had answered it.
"You will teach me and I shall learn to understand," she said.
CHAPTER III
INTRODUCING LASSIE TO MRS. RAY
The next morning dawned gorgeous.
When Lassie, in her little gray kimono, stole gently in to wake her
friend, she found Alva already up and dressed, standing at the window,
looking out over the October beauty that spread afar before her. It was
a wonderful sight, all the trees bright and yet brighter in their autumn
gladness, while the grass sparkled green through the dew that had been
frost an hour before. The view showed the radiance fading off into the
distant blue, where bare brown fields told of the harvest garnered and
the ground made ready for another spring.
Lassie pressed Alva's arm as she peeped over her shoulder, and the other
turned in silence and kissed her tenderly.
Side by side they looked forth together for some minutes longer, and
then Lassie whispered:
"I could hardly get to sleep last night--for thinking of it all, you
know. You don't guess how interested I am. I do so want to know
everything."
Alva turned to regard her with her calm smile.
"But when you did get to sleep, you slept well, didn't you?" she asked;
"tell me that, first of all."
"Why, is it late? Did I sleep too awfully long? Why didn't you call
me?"
"Oh, my dear, why? It's barely nine, and that isn't late at all for a
girl who spent all yesterday on the train. I let you sleep on purpose.
What's the use of waking up before the mail comes? And that isn't in
till half-past under the most favorable circumstances; and even then it
never is distributed until quarter to ten. I thought we'd get our
letters after our breakfast, and then carry them across the bridge with
us. Would you like to do that? I have to cross the bridge every
morning."
"Cross the bridge? That means to go to your house?"
"Yes, dear."
"How nice! I'm crazy to see your house. Is it far from here to the
post-office? Will that be on our way?"
"That is the post-office there--by the trees." Alva pointed to a brown,
two-story, cottage-like structure three hundred yards further up the
track.
"The little house with the box nailed to the gate-post?"
"It isn't such a little house, Lassie; it's quite a mansion. The lady
who lives in it rents the upper part for a flat and takes boarders
down-stairs."
"Does she take many?"
Alva laughed. "She told me that she only had a double-bed and a
half-bed, so she was limited to eight."
"Oh!"
"I know, my dear, I thought that very same 'Oh' myself; but that's what
she said. And that really is as naught compared to the rest of her
capabilities."
"What else does she do?"
"I'm afraid I can't remember it all at once, but among other things she
runs a farm, raises chickens, takes in sewing, cuts hair, canes chairs
and is sexton of the church. She's postmistress, too, and does several
little things around town."
Lassie drew back in amazement. "You're joking."
"No, dear, I'm not joking. She's the eighth wonder in the world, in my
opinion."
"She must be quite a character."
"Every one's quite a character in the country. Country life develops
character. I expect to become a character myself, very soon; indeed I'm
not very positive but that I am one already."
"But how does the woman find time to do so much?"
"There is more time in the country than in the city; you'll soon
discover that. One gets up and dresses and breakfasts and goes for the
mail, and reads the letters and answers them, and then its only quarter
past ten,--in the country."
Lassie withdrew from the arm that held her. "It won't be so with me
to-day, at all events," she laughed. "What will they think of me if
every one here is as prompt as that?"
"It doesn't matter to-day; we'll be prompt ourselves to-morrow. But
you'd better run now. I'm in a hurry to get to my house; I'm as silly
over that house as a little child with a new toy,--sillier, in fact, for
my interest is in ratio with my growth, and I've wanted a home for so
long."
"But you've had a home."
"Not of my very ownest own, not such as this will be."
The young girl looked up into her face. "I'm so _very_ curious," she
said, with emphasis; "I want so to know the story."
Alva touched her cheek caressingly, "I'll tell you soon," she promised,
"after you've seen the house."
Lassie went back into her room and proceeded to make her toilet, which
was soon finished.
They went down into the little hotel dining-room then for breakfast, and
found it quite deserted, but neat and sweet, and pleasantly odorous of
bacon.
"Such a dolls' house of a hotel," said Lassie.
"It's a cozy place," Alva answered. "I like this kind of hotel. It's
sweet and informal. If they forget you, you can step to the kitchen and
ask for more coffee. I'm tired of the world and the world's
conventionality. I told Mrs. Lathbun yesterday that Ledge would spoil me
for civilization hereafter. I like to live in out-of-the-way places."
"Mrs. Lathbun is the hostess, I suppose?"
"No, Mrs. O'Neil is the hostess, or rather, she's the host's wife. You
must meet her to-day. Such a pretty, brown-eyed, girlish creature,--the
last woman in the world to bring into a country hotel. She says herself
that when you've been raised with a faucet and a sewer, it's terrible to
get used to a cistern and a steep bank. She was born and brought up in
Buffalo."
By this time Mary Cody had entered, beaming good morning, and placed the
hot bacon and eggs, toast and coffee, before them.
"I'm going for the mail after breakfast, Mary," Alva said; "shall I
bring yours?"
"Can't I bring yours?" said Mary Cody. "I can run up there just as well
as not." Mary Cody was all smiles at the mere idea.
"No, I'll have to go myself to-day, I think. I'm expecting a registered
letter."
"I'll be much obliged then if you will bring mine."
"If there are any for the house, I'll bring them all," Alva said; "will
you tell Mrs. Lathbun that?"
"I'll tell her if I see her, but they're both gone. They went out
early--off chestnutting, I suppose."
"Oh!"
"Who is Mrs. Lathbun?" Lassie asked, when Mary Cody had gone out of the
room.
"I spoke of her before and you asked about her then, didn't you? And I
meant to tell you and forgot. She's another boarder, a lady who is here
with her daughter. Such nice, plain, simple people. You'll like them
both."
"I thought that we were to be here all alone."
"We are, to all intents and purposes. The Lathbuns won't trouble us.
They are not intrusive, only interesting when we meet at table or by
accident."
"Every one interests you, Alva; but I don't like strangers."
Alva sighed and smiled together.
"I learned to fill my life with interest in people long ago," she said
simply; "it's the only way to keep from getting narrow sometimes."
Lassie looked at her earnestly.
"Does every one that you meet interest you really?" she asked.
"I think so; I hope so, anyway."
"Don't you ever find any one dull?"
Alva looked at her with a smile, quickly repressed. "No one is really
dull, dear, or else every one is dull; it's all in the view-point. The
interest is there if we want it there; or it isn't there, if we so
prefer. That's all."
There was a little pause, while the young girl thought this over.
"I suppose that one is happiest in always trying to find the interest,"
she said then slowly; "but do tell me more about the Lathbuns."
"Presupposing them in the dull catalogue?"
Lassie blushed, "Not necessarily," she said, half confusedly.
Alva laughed at her face, "I don't know so very much about them, except
that they interest me. The mother is large and rather common looking,
but a very fine musician, and the daughter is a pale, delicate girl with
a romance."
Lassie's face lit up: "Oh, a romance! Is it a nice romance? Tell me
about it."
"It's rather a wonderful romance in my eyes. I'll tell it all to you
sometime, but that was the train that came in just now, and I want to
get the mail and go on over to the house, so we'll have to put off the
romance for the present, I'm afraid."
"I don't hear the train."
"Maybe not--but it went by."
"Went by! And the mail! How does the mail get off by itself?"
"Oh, my dear, I must leave you to learn about the mail from Mrs. Ray.
She'll explain to you all about what happens to the Ledge mail when the
train rushes by. It's one of her pet subjects."
"Do you know you're really very clever, Alva; you seem to be plotting to
fill me full of curiosity about everything and everybody in this little
out-of-the-way corner in the world? Nobody could ever be dull where you
are."
A sudden shadow fell over the older's face at that; a wistful wonder
crept to her eyes.
"I wish I could believe that," she said.
"But you can, dear. You've always seemed to me to be just like that
French woman who was the only one who could amuse the king, even after
she'd been his wife for forty years. You'd be like that."
Alva rose, laughing a little sadly. "God grant that it may be so," she
said, "there are so many people who need amusing after forty years. But,
dear, you know I told you last night that I sent for you to come and
teach and learn, and you are teaching already."
"What am I teaching?" Lassie's eyes opened widely.
"You are teaching me what I really am, and that's a lesson that I need
very much just now. It would be so very easy to forget what I really am
these days. My head is so often dizzy."
"Why, dear? What makes you dizzy?"
"Oh, because the world seems slipping from me so fast. I could so easily
quit it altogether. And I must not quit it. I have too much to do. And I
am to have a great task left me to perform, perhaps. Oh, Lassie, it's
hopeless to tell you anything until I have begun by telling you
everything. You'll see then why I want to die, and why I can't."
"Alva!"
"Don't be shocked, dear; you don't know what I mean at all now, but
later you will. Come, we must be going. No time to waste to-day."
They went up-stairs for hats and wraps, and then came down ready for the
October sunshine. It was fine to step into the crispness and breathe the
ozone of its glory. On the big stone cistern cover by the door a fat
little girl sat, hugging a cat and swinging her feet so as to kick
caressingly the brown and white hound that lay in front of her.
"A nice, round, rosy picture of content," Alva said, smiling at the tot.
"I love to see babies and animals stretched out in the sun, enjoying
just being alive."
"I enjoy just being alive myself," said Lassie.
They went up the path that ran beside the road and, arriving at the
post-office, turned in at the gate and climbed the three steps. The
post-office door stuck, and Alva jammed it open with her knee. Then she
went in, followed by Lassie.
The post-office was just an extremely small room, two thirds of which
appeared reserved for groceries, ranged upon shelves or piled in three
of its four corners. The fourth corner belonged to the United States
Government, and was screened off by a system of nine times nine
pigeonholes, all empty. Behind the pigeonholes Mrs. Ray was busy
stamping letters for the outgoing mail.
"You never said that she kept a grocery store, too," whispered Lassie.
"No, but I told you that I'd forgotten ever so many things that she
did," whispered Alva in return.
The lady behind the counter calmly continued her stamping, and paid not
the slightest attention to them.
They sat down upon two of the three wooden chairs that were ranged in
front of a pile of sacks of flour and remained there, meekly silent,
until some one with a basket came in and took the remaining wooden
chair. All three united then in adopting and maintaining the reverential
attitude of country folk awaiting the mail's distribution, and Lassie
learned for the first time in her life how strong and binding so
intangible a force as personal influence and atmosphere may become, even
when it be only the personal influence and atmosphere of a country
postmistress. It may be remarked in passing, that not one of the letters
then being post-marked received an imprint anything like as strong as
that frame of mind which the postmistress of Ledge had the power to
impress upon those who came under her sceptre. She never needed to
speak, she never needed to even glance their way, but her spirit reigned
triumphant in her kingdom, and, as she carried her governmental duties
forward with as deep a realization of their importance as the most
zealous political reformer could wish, no onlooker could fail to feel
anything but admiration for her omniscience and omnipotence. Mrs. Ray's
governmental attitude towards life showed itself in an added seriousness
of expression. Her dress was always plain and severe, and in the
post-office she invariably put over her shoulders a little gray shawl
with fringe which she had a way of tucking in under her arms from time
to time as she moved about.
Lassie had ample time to note all this while the stamping went
vigorously forward. Meanwhile the mail-bag which had just arrived lay
lean and lank across the counter, appearing as resigned as the three
human beings ranged on the chairs opposite. Finally, when the last
letter was post-marked, the postmistress turned abruptly, jerked out a
drawer, drew therefrom a key which hung by a stout dog-chain to the
drawer knob and held it carefully as if for the working up of some magic
spell. Lassie, contemplating every move with the closest attention,
could not but think just here that if the postal key of Ledge ever had
decided to lose its senses and rush madly out into the whirlwind of
wickedness which it may have fancied existing beyond, it would assuredly
not have gotten far with that chain holding it back, and Mrs. Ray
holding the chain. It was a fearfully large and imposing chain, and
seemed, in some odd way, to be Mrs. Ray's assistant in maintaining the
dignity necessary to their dual position in the world's eyes.
The lady of the post-office now unlocked the bag and, thrusting her hand
far in, secured two packets containing nine letters in all from the
yawning depths. She carefully examined each letter, and then turned the
bag upside down and gave it one hard, severe, and solemn shake. Nothing
falling out, she placed it on top of a barrel, took up the nine letters,
and went to work upon them next.
When they were all duly stamped, she laid them, address-side up, before
her like a pack of fortune-telling cards, folded her arms tightly across
her bosom, and, standing immovable, directed her gaze straight ahead.
Now seemed to be the favorable instant for consulting the sacred oracle.
Alva and the third lady rose with dignity and approached the layman's
side of the counter; Lassie sat still, thrilled in spite of herself.
Alva, being a mere visitor, drew back a little with becoming modesty and
gave the native a chance to speak first.
"I s'pose there ain't nothing for me," said that other, almost
apologetically, "but if there's anything for Bessie or Edward Griggs or
Ellen Scott I can take it; and John is going down the St. Helena road
this afternoon, so if there's anything for Judy and Samuel--"
"Here's yours as usual," said Mrs. Ray, rising calmly above the other's
speech and handing Alva three letters as she did so; "the regular one,
and the one you get daily, and then here's a registered one. I shall
require a receipt for the registered one, as the United States
Government holds me legally liable otherwise, and after my husband died
I made up my mind I was all done being legally liable for anything
unless I had a receipt. Yes, indeed. I'd been liable sometimes legally
in my married life, but more often just by being let in for it, and I
quit then. Yes, indeed. When they tell me I'm legally liable for
anything now, I never fail to get a receipt, and I read every word of
the President's message over twice every year to be sure I ain't being
given any chance to get liable accidentally when I don't know it--when I
ain't took in what was being enacted, you know. Here,--here's the things
and the ink; you sign 'em all, please."
Alva bent above the counter obediently and proceeded to fill out the
forms as according to law. Mrs. Ray watched her sharply until the one
protecting her own responsibility had been indorsed, and then she turned
to the other inquirer:
"Now, what was you saying, Mrs. Dunstall? Oh, I remember,--no, of course
there ain't anything for you. Nor for any of them except the Peterkins,
and I daren't give you their mail because they writ me last time not to
ever do so again. I told Mrs. Peterkin you meant it kindly, but she
don't like that law as lets you open other people's letters and then
write on 'Opened by accident.' Mrs. Peterkin makes a point of opening
her own letters. She says her husband even don't darst touch 'em. It's
nothing against you, Mrs. Dunstall, for she's just the same when I write
on 'Received in bad order.' She always comes right down and asks me why
I did it. Yes, indeed. I suppose she ain't to blame; some folks is
funny; they never will be pleasant over having their letters opened."
Alva bent closer over her writing; Lassie was coughing in her
handkerchief. Mrs. Dunstall stood before the counter as if nailed there,
and continued to receive the whole charge full in her face.
"But I've got your hat done for you; yes, I have. I dyed the flowers
according to the Easter egg recipe, and it's in the oven drying now. And
I made you that cake, too. And I've got the setting of hens' eggs all
ready. Just as soon as the mail is give out, I'll get 'em all for you.
It's pretty thick in the kitchen, or you could go out there to wait, but
Elmer Haskins run his lawn-mower over his dog's tail yesterday, and the
dog's so lost confidence in Elmer in consequence, that Elmer brought him
up to me to take care of. He's a nice dog, but he won't let no one but
me set foot in the kitchen to-day. I don't blame him, I'm sure. He was
sleepin' by Deacon Delmar's grave in the cemetery and woke suddenly to
find his tail gone. It's a lesson to me never to leave the grave-cutting
to no one else again. I'd feel just as the dog does, if I'd been through
a similar experience. Yes, indeed. I was telling Sammy Adams last night
and he said the same."
"There, Mrs. Ray," said Alva, in a stifled voice, straightening up as
she spoke, "I think that will set you free from all liability; I've
signed them all."
"Let me see,--you mustn't take it odd that I'm so particular, because a
government position is a responsibility as stands no feeling." She
looked at the signatures carefully, one after the other. "Yes, they're
right," she said then; "it wasn't that I doubted you, but honesty's the
best policy, and I ought to know, for it was the only policy my husband
didn't let run out before he died without telling me. He had four when I
married him--just as many as he had children by his first wife--he had
six by his second--and his name and the fact that it was a honest one,
was all he left me to live on and bring up his second wife's children
on. Goodness knows what he done with his money; he certainly didn't lay
it by for the moths and rust, for I'm like the text in the
Bible--wherever are moths and rust there am I, too. Yes, indeed, and
with pepper and sapolio into the bargain; but no, the money wasn't
there, for if it was where it could rust it would be where I could get
it."
Alva smiled sympathetically, and then she and Lassie almost rushed out
into the open air. When they were well out of hearing, they dared to
laugh.
"Oh, my gracious me," Lassie cried; "how can you stand it and stay
sober?"
"I can't, that's the trouble!" Alva gasped. "My dear, she felt strange
before you, and was rather reticent, but wait till she knows you
well--until to-morrow. Oh, Lassie, she's too amusing! Wait till she gets
started about the dam, or about Niagara, or about her views on running a
post-office, or anything--" she was stopped by Lassie's seizing her
arm.
"Look quick, over there,--who is that? He looks so out of place here,
somehow. Don't he? Just like civilization."
Alva looked. "That? Oh, that's Ronald--Ronald Ingram, you know, coming
across lots for his letters. You remember him, surely, when you were a
little girl. He was always at our house then. You'll meet him again
to-night. I'd stop now and introduce you, only I want to hurry."
"I suppose that he knows all about it?"
"All about what?"
"The secret."
"Ronald? Oh, no, dear. No one knows. No one--that is, except--except we
two. You will be the only outsider to share that secret."
"For how long?"
"Until I am married."
"Until you are married! Why, when are you to be married?--Soon?"
"In a fortnight."
"And no one is to know!"
"No one."
"Not his family? Not yours?"
"No one."
"How strange!"
Alva put out her hand and stayed the words upon her friend's lips.
"Look, dear, this is the Long Bridge. You've heard of it all your life;
now we're going to walk across it. Look to the left; all that lovely
scene of hill and valley and the little white town with green blinds is
Ledgeville; and there to the right is the famous gorge, with its banks
of gray and its chain of falls, each lovelier than the last. Stand still
and just look; you'll never see anything better worth looking at if
you travel the wide world over."
They stopped and leaned on the bridge-rail in silence for several
minutes, and then Alva continued softly, almost reverently: "This scene
is my existence's prayer. I can't make you understand all that it means
to me, because you can't think how life comes when one is crossing the
summit--the very highest peak. I've climbed for so long,--I'll be
descending upon the other side for so long,--but the hours upon the
summit are now, and are wonderful! I should like to be so intensely
conscious that not one second of the joy could ever fade out of my
memory again. I feel that I want to grave every rock and ripple and
branch and bit of color into me forever. Oh, what I'd give if I might
only do so. I'd have it all to comfort me afterwards then--afterwards in
the long, lonely years to come."
"Why, Alva," said her friend, turning towards her in astonishment, "you
speak as if you didn't expect to be happy but for a little while."
A sad, faint smile crept around Alva's mouth, and then it altered
instantly into its usual sweet serenity.
"Come, dear," she said; "we'll hurry on to the house, and then after
you've seen it we'll go to my own dear forest-seat, and there I'll tell
you the whole story."
"Oh, let us hurry!" Lassie said, impetuously; "I can't wait much
longer."
So they set quickly forward across the Long Bridge.
CHAPTER IV
THE DIFFERENCE
On the further side of the Long Bridge the railway tracks swept off in a
smooth curve to the right, and, as there was a high embankment to adapt
the grade to the hillside, a long flight of steps ran down beside it
into the glen below.
A pretty glen, dark with shadows, bright with dancing sun-rays. A glen
which bore an odd likeness to some lives that we may meet (if we have
that happiness), lives that lead their ways in peace and beauty, with
the roar and smoke of the world but a stone's throw distant.
Lassie's eyes, looking down, were full of appreciation.
"Is it there that you are going to live?" she asked.
Alva shook her head. "Oh, no, not there; that is Ledge Park, the place
that all the hue and cry is being raised over just now."
"Oh, yes," Lassie turned eagerly; "tell me about that. I read something
in the papers, but I forgot that it was here."
"It is 'here,' as you say. But it concerns all the country about here,
only it's much too big a subject for us to go into now. There are two
sides, and then ever so many sides more. I try to see them all, I try to
see every one's side of everything as far as I can, but there is one
side that overbalances all else in my eyes, and that happens to be the
unpopular one."
"That's too bad."
"Yes, dear," Alva spoke very simply; "but what makes _you_ say so?"
"Why? Why, because then you won't get what you want."
Her friend laughed. "Don't say that in such a pitying tone, Lassie.
Better to be defeated on the right side, than to win the most glorious
of victories for the wrong. Who said that?"
Lassie looked doubtful.
Alva laughed again and touched her cheek with a finger-caress. "I'll
tell you just this much now, dear;--all of both the river banks--above,
below and surrounding the three falls--belong to Mr. Ledge, and he has
always planned to give the whole to the State as a gift, so that there
might be one bit of what this country once was like, preserved. He made
all his arrangements to that end, and gave the first deeds last winter.
What do you think followed? As soon as the State saw herself practically
in possession, it appointed a commission to examine into the
possibilities of the water power!" Alva paused and looked at her friend.
"But--" Lassie was clearly puzzled.
"The engineers are here surveying now. Ronald Ingram is at the head and
the people of all the neighborhood are so excited over the prospect of
selling their farms that no one stops to think what it would really
mean."
"What would it really mean?"
"A manufacturing district with a huge reservoir above it."
"Where?"
"Back there," she turned and pointed; "they say that there was a great
prehistoric lake there once, and they will utilize it again."
"But there's a town down there."
"Yes, my dear, Ledgeville. Ledgeville and six other towns will be
submerged."
Lassie stopped short on the railroad track and stared. She had come to a
calamity which she could realize now.
"Why, what ever will the people do then?"
"Get damages. They're so pleased over being drowned out. You must talk
it over with Mrs. Ray. You must get Mrs. Ray's standpoint, and then get
Ronald's standpoint. Theirs are the sensible, practical views, the
world's views. My views are never practical. I'm not practical. I'm only
heartbroken to think of anything coming in to ruin the valley. Mr. Ledge
and I share the same opinions as to this valley; it seems to us too
great a good to sell for cash."
"You speak bitterly."
"Yes, dear, I'm afraid that I do speak bitterly. On that subject. But we
won't talk of it any more just now. See, here's the wood road that leads
to my kingdom; come, take it with me."
They turned into a soft, pine-carpeted way on the left, and in the
length of a bow-shot seemed buried in the forest.
"Lassie, wait!"
Turning her head, Lassie saw that Alva had stopped behind, and was
standing still beside where a little pine-tree was growing out from
under a big glacial boulder. She went back to her.
"Dear, look at this little tree. Here's my daily text."
"How?"
"Do you see how it has grown out and struggled up from under the rock?"
Lassie nodded.
"You know very little of what makes up life, dear. I've sent for you to
teach you." She lifted her eyes earnestly to the face near hers, and her
own eyes were full of appeal. "Lassie, try to understand all I say to
you these days; try to believe that it's worth learning. See this little
tree--" she touched her fingers caressingly to the pine branches as she
spoke--"it's a very little tree, but it has taught me daily since I
came, and I believe that you can learn of it, too."
Lassie's big eyes were very big indeed. "Learn of a tree!"
Alva lifted one of the little stunted uneven branches tenderly in her
fingers. "This is its lesson," she said; "the pine-cone fell between the
rocks; it didn't choose where it would fall, it just found itself alive
and under the rocks; there wasn't much earth there, but it took root and
grew. There was no room to give out branches, so it forced its way
crookedly upward; crookedly because there was no room to grow straight,
but always upward; there wasn't much sunlight, but it was as bravely
green as any other tree; the big rock made it one-sided, but it put out
thickly on the side where it had space. My life hasn't been altogether
sunlit. I was born between rocks, and I have been forced to grow
one-sided, too. But the tree's sermon came home to me the first day that
I saw it. Courageous little tree, doing your best in the woods, where
no one but God could take note of your efforts,--you'll be straight and
have space and air and sunshine in plenty next time--next time! Oh,
blessed 'next time' that is to surely right the woes of those who keep
up courage and continue fighting. That's the reward of all. That's the
lesson."
Lassie listened wonderingly. "Next time!" she repeated questioningly,
"what next time? Do you believe in a heaven for trees?"
"I am not sure of a heaven for anything," said Alva, "not an orthodox
heaven. But I believe in an endless existence for every atom existing in
the universe, and I believe that each atom determines the successive
steps of its own future, and so a brave little pine-tree fills me with
just as sincere admiration as any other species of bravery. 'Next time'!
It will have a beautiful 'next time' in the heaven which means something
so different from what we are taught, or here again on earth, or
wherever its little growing spirit takes form again. I'm not wise enough
to understand much of that, but I'm wise enough to know that there is a
next time of so much infinitely greater importance than this time, that
this time is really only of any importance at all in comparison just
according to how we use it in preparation. That's part of the lesson
that the tree teaches. But you can't understand me, Lassie, unless you
are able to grasp my belief--my fixed conviction--that this world is
only an instant in eternity. I couldn't live at all unless I had this
belief and hope, and it's the key to everything with me; so
please--please--give me credit for sincerity, at least."
Lassie looked thoroughly awed. "I'll try to see everything just as you
do," she said.
Alva pressed her hand. "Thank you, dear."
Then they went on up the road.
Presently the sound of hammer and saw was heard, and the smell of wet
plaster and burning rubbish came through the trees.
"Is it from your house?" Lassie asked, with her usual visible relief at
the approach of the understandable.
"Yes, from my house," Alva answered. "They are very much occupied with
my house; fancy buying a dear, old, dilapidated dwelling in the
wilderness, and having to make it new and warm and bright and cheerful
in a fortnight! Why, the tale of these two weeks will go down through
all the future history of the country, I know. Such a fairy tale was
never before. I shall become the Legend of Ledge, I feel sure."
The road, turning here, ended sharply in a large, solid, wooden gate,
set deep in a thick hedge of pine trees.
"It is like a fairy tale!" Lassie cried delightedly; "a regular
Tourangean _porte_ with a _guichet_!"
"It is better than any fairy tale," said Alva; "it is Paradise, the
lovely, simple-minded, Bible-story Paradise, descending upon earth for a
little while." She pushed one half of the great gate-door open, and they
went through.
A small, old-fashioned, Colonial dwelling rose up before them in the
midst of dire disorder. Shingling, painting, glass-setting, and the like
were all going forward at once. Workmen were everywhere; wagons loading
and unloading were drawn up at the side; mysterious boxes, bales and
bundles lay about; confusion reigned rampant.
"Not exactly evolution, but rather revolution," laughed Alva, ceasing
transcendentalism with great abruptness, and becoming blithely gay. "And
oh, Lassie, the joy of it, the downright childish fun of it! Don't you
see that I couldn't be alone through these days; they are too grand to
be selfish over. I had to have some one to share my fun. We'll come here
and help every day after this; the pantries will be ready soon, and you
and I will do every bit of the putting them in order. Screw up the
little hooks for the cups, you know, and arrange the shelves, and oh,
won't we have a good time?"
Lassie's eyes danced. "I just love that kind of work," she said, fully
conscious of the pleasant return to earth, "I can fit paper in drawers
beautifully."
"Which proves that after all women stay women in spite of many modern
encouragements to be men," Alva said. "You know really I'm considered to
be most advanced, and people look upon me as quite intellectual; but I'm
fairly wild over thinking how we'll scrub the pantries, and put in the
china--and then there's a fine linen-closet, too. We'll set that in
order afterwards, and put all the little piles straight on the shelves."
By this time they had gone up the plank that bridged over the present
hiatus between ground and porch, and entered the living-room, which was
being papered in red with a green dado and ceiling.
"How pretty and bright!" Lassie exclaimed.
"It's going to be furnished in the same red and green, with little
book-shelves all around and the dining table in the middle," Alva
explained. "Oh, I do love this room. It's my ideal sitting-room. It has
to be the dining-room, too, but I don't mind that."
"Won't the table have to be very small?"
"Just big enough for two."
"But when you have company?"
"We shall never have any company."
"I mean when you have friends with you here."
"I shall never have any friends with me, dear."
"Alva! Why--I can come--can't I?--Sometime?"
Alva shook her head.
"That's part of the story, Lassie, part of the story that I am going to
tell you in a few minutes now. But be a little patient, dear; give me a
few minutes more. Come in here first; see--this was the dining-room, but
it has been changed into--I don't know what. A sort of bedroom, I
suppose one would call it. I've had it done in blue, with little green
vines and birds and bees and butterflies painted around it. Birds and
bees and butterflies are always so lively and bright, so busy and
cheerful. All the pictures here are going to be of animals, either out
in the wild, free forest or else in warm, sunshiny farmyards. I have a
lovely print of Wouverman's 'Im Stall' to hang in the big space. You
know the picture, don't you?--the shadowy barn-room with one whole side
open, and the hay dripping from above, and the horses just ridden in,
and the chickens scratching, and some little children playing in the
corner by the well. It's such a sweet _gemuthliche_ picture--so full of
fresh country air--I felt that it was the picture of all others to hang
in this room. There will be a big sofa-bed at one side, and my piano,
and pots of blooming flowers. And you can't think, little Lassie, of all
that I look forward to accomplishing in this room. I expect to learn to
be a very different woman, every atom and fibre of my being will be
altered here. All of my faults will be atoned for--" she stopped
abruptly, and Lassie turned quickly with an odd impression that her
voice had broken in tears.
"Alva!" she exclaimed.
"It's nothing, dear, only that side of me that keeps forgetting the
lesson of the tree. Don't mind me,--I am so happy that you must not mind
anything nor must I mind anything either; but--when I come into this
room and think--" her tone suddenly turned dark, full of quivering
emotion, and she put her hand to her eyes.
"Alva, tell me what you mean? I feel frightened,--I must know what's
back of it all now. Tell me. Tell me!"
"I'm going to tell you in just a minute, as soon as I've shown you all
over the house." She took her handkerchief, pressed it to her eyes, made
a great, choking effort at self-control, and then managed to go on
speaking. "See," pushing open a door, "this is a nice little
dressing-room, isn't it? And then around and through this narrow back
hall comes the kitchen. There is an up-stairs, but I've done nothing
there except make a room comfortable and pleasant for the Japanese
servant who will do the work, that is, all that I don't do myself."
"Won't you want but one servant?"
"I think so. A man from outside will take the extras, and really it's a
very small house, dear. The laundry will be sent out. Dear me, how I do
enjoy hearing that kind of speech from my own lips. 'The laundry will be
sent out!' That sounds so delightfully commonplace, so sort of everyday
and like other people. I can't express to you what the commonplaces,
the little monotonies of ordinary lives, mean to me here. You'll divine
later, perhaps. But fancy a married life where nothing is too trivial to
be glorified! That is how things will be with us."
"Are you so sure?" Lassie tried to smile and speak archly. Tried very
hard to do both, because an intangible atmosphere of sorrow was
beginning to press heavily on her spirits.
"Very sure,--really, quite confident. You must not think that, because I
sob suddenly as I did just now, I am ever weak or ever doubt myself or
any one else. I never doubt or waver. It is only that no matter how hard
one tries, one can hardly rise completely out of the thrall of one
existence into the freedom of another at only a week's notice."
"Is that what you are trying to do?"
"Dear, I'm not only trying to do it, but the greater part of the time I
do do it. It's only very seldom that my soul faints and the tears come.
I am really happy! You are not going to be able to comprehend how happy
I am. Every one who wants anything in this world always wants it in such
a narrow, finite way,--no one can understand joy too limitless to be
finite. The difficulty is that occasionally I get blind myself, or else
in mercy God sometimes veils the splendor for a few minutes. When I
faint or struggle, it is just that my soul is absent; you must not mind
when you see me suffer, for the suffering has no meaning. It's just a
sort of discipline,--it doesn't count." She smiled with wonderful
brightness into Lassie's troubled face, and then, pushing open the outer
door,--"You don't quite see how it is, but be patient with yourself,
dearie; it will come. All things come to him who waits."
"Oh, but I don't understand, not one bit," Lassie cried, almost
despairingly.
They were in the yard now; Alva looked at her and took her hand within
her own. "Come," she said, "we'll go down through the woods to a certain
lovely, bright spot where the view is big and wide, and there I'll tell
you all about it."
"I so want to know!"
"I know you do, dear, and I want to tell you, too. I'm not purposely
tormenting you, but there is no one else to whom I can speak. And that
human, sobbing part of me needs companionship just as much these days,
as the merry, house-loving spirit, or the beatifically blessed soul.
Can't you see, dear, that with all my affection for you, I dread telling
you my story, and the reason for that is that it will be too much for
you to comprehend at first, and that I know perfectly well that it is
going to shock and pain you." The last words burst forth like a storm
repressed.
"Shock and pain me!" Lassie opened mouth and eyes.
"Yes, dear, of a certainty."
They were in the woods, quite alone.
Involuntarily Lassie drew a little away; a common, cruel suspicion
flashed through her head. "Alva, is it--is it that you do not mean to
marry the man?"
Alva laughed then, not very loudly, but clearly and sweetly. "No,
Lassie, it isn't that. I am going to be married in the regular way and,
besides, I will tell you in confidence that I fully believe that I have
been married to the same man hundreds of times before, and shall be
married to him countless times again. Does that help you?"
"Alva!"
"There! I told you that you wouldn't understand, and you don't."
"No, I certainly don't, when you talk like that."
"It's natural that you shouldn't, dear; but at the end of the week you
will, perhaps. We'll hope so, any way. Oh, Lassie, how much we are both
to live and learn in the next week."
Lassie turned her eyes to the eyes of the other.
"It's queer, Alva; you talk as if you were crazy, but I know you're not
crazy, and yet I'm worried."
"You don't need to be worried,--"
"I'll try not to be." She raised her sweet eyes to her friend's face as
she spoke, and her friend bent and kissed her. "Don't keep me waiting
much longer," she pleaded.
They were passing through the little, tree-grown way which led out on
the brow of the hill. All the wide, radiant wonder of that October
morning unrolled before them there. For an instant Lassie stood
entranced, forgetting all else; and then:
"Tell me now!" she cried.
"Let us sit down here," Alva said, pointing to a rough seat made out of
a plank laid across two stumps. They sat down side by side.
"Alva, it seems as if I cannot wait another minute; I must know it all
now. Tell me who he is, first; is it some one that I know?"
Alva's eyes rested on the wide radiance beyond.
"You know of him, dear," she replied quietly.
"Who is it?"
The woman laid her arm around the girl and drew her close and kissed her
gently. Then she whispered two words in her ear.
With a scream, Lassie started to her feet. "Oh--no!--no!--_no!_"
Alva looked straight up at her where she stood there above her and
smiled, steadily.
"No, no,--it can't be! I didn't hear right."
"Yes, you heard quite right."
The girl's hands shook violently; tears came fast pouring down her face.
"But, Alva, he is--he can't--"
Tears filled the other's eyes, too, at that, and stole thickly out upon
her cheeks. "I know, my dear child, but didn't I tell you how to me--to
us--this life is only a small part of the whole?"
"Oh, but--but--oh, it's too horrible!" She sank down on the seat again
and burst out sobbing.
"No, dear," Alva exclaimed, her voice suddenly firm, "not horrible, just
that highest summit of life of which I spoke before--the point toward
which I've lived, the point from which I shall live ever afterwards,--my
point of infinite joy,--my all. For he is the man I love--have always
loved--shall always love. Only, dear, don't you see?--he isn't a _man_
as you understand the word; the love isn't even _love_ as you understand
love. It's all so different! So different!"
A long, keenly thrilling silence followed, broken only by the sound of
the younger girl's repressed weeping.
It was one of those pauses during which men and women forget that they
are men and women, that the world is the world, or that life is life.
Every human consideration loses weight, and one is stunned into heaven
or oblivion, according to his or her preparation for such an entry to
either state.
The two friends remained seated side by side, facing the wonderful
valley in all its rich beauty of varied colorings; but neither saw
valley or color, neither remembered for a little what she was or where
she was. Alva, with her hands linked around her knees, was out and away
into another existence; Lassie, her eyes deadened and darkened with a
horror too acute for any words to relieve, sat still beside her, and
knew nothing for the time being but a fearful throbbing in her
temples--a black cloud smothering her whole brain--and tears.
It was Lassie who broke the silence at last, trying hard to speak
evenly. "But, Alva, I never knew ... when did you learn to love him ...
why--" her voice died again just there, and she buried her face on the
other's shoulder.
Alva laid her hand upon the little hand that shook under a fresh stress
of emotion, and said gently, her tone one of deepest pity: "Shall I tell
you all about it? Would you like to know the whole story?"
"Oh, yes, yes,--so much."
"You'll try to be patient and give yourself time to really see how
things may be to one who is altogether outside of your way of thinking,
won't you, dear? You won't pass judgment too quickly?"
"I'll try. Indeed, I will, as well as I can--"
Alva pressed the hand. "Dear little girl," she said, very tenderly, "you
see I look at even you with quite different eyes from those with which
the ordinary person sees you. If you could only see things as I do,
you'd see everything so much more clearly. How can I put it all straight
for you? When even my love for you is not at all what any other gives
you."
Lassie lifted up her head. "How do you mean?"
"There are two Lassies to me, dear,--the pretty, sweet-looking girl, and
the Lassie who loves me. Most people confuse the two, and think them one
and the same; I don't. No matter what happened to you, the Lassie whom I
love could never alter--she is unchangeable. She is not subject to
change; she doesn't belong to this world; she cannot die. And just as I
feel about you, I feel about everybody. What I can see and touch in
those I love is what I love least in them."
"Oh, Alva!" it was like a little moan--the girl's voice.
"That is my earnest belief. Bodies and what they suffer don't count.
That has come to me bit by bit under the pressure of these last years.
But it has come in its completest form in the end. I am entirely
satisfied as to the only truth in the universe being the fact that only
Truth is eternal. Please try to remember all this, while you listen to
my story; try not to forget it. You will, won't you?"
"I'll try, but it isn't clear to me."
"No, I don't suppose so--" Alva sighed--"but do your best, my dear;" she
paused a moment, then drew the hand that she held close between her own
two, and went on slowly; "I must tell you first of all that I have never
seen him but three times in my life. Just think--only three times!"
"Only three--" Lassie looked up in surprise.
"Only three times. And hardly any one knows that I saw him even those
times. No one knows to-day that we love one another, or that we are to
be married, except the surgeons and nurses, who had to be told, of
course. It's a very great secret."
"Tell me how it all began, Alva."
"I don't know when I first heard his name. It all began here, dear, five
years ago. When I stopped off for a few days to visit the Falls. I've
always loved this country, and from the time that I was born I've always
been here for a few days now and then. I always had a queer feeling that
something drew me here. I have those queer feelings about things and
places and people, you know, and out there on the bridge has always
seemed to me a sort of pivot in my life. Every time I go there, the
clock seems to strike some hour for me--" she stopped.
Lassie opened and shut her free hand with a sensation of being very
uneasy; the suspicion that Alva was not quite sane just lightly crossed
her mind. It certainly was not sane to talk as she did.
"So I came here again, on my way home from New York, just five years ago
now. And he was here then, staying at Ledge Park, and I saw him for the
first time; we met out there on the bridge;" she stopped for just a
second or so, then went steadily on. "I think I read about him in the
papers. I had learned to admire him intensely--who could help it?--but
of course I'd never for one instant thought of loving him. He was like a
sort of a story-hero to me; he never seemed like a man; I never thought
of any woman's loving him. He just seemed to be himself, all
alone--always alone. He had seemed quite above and apart from all other
men to me. He interested me; I wanted to learn all that I could about
him and his work, and I did learn a great deal, but I'd never dreamed of
meeting him face to face, of really speaking to him, of having his eyes
really looking at me; he seemed altogether beyond and away from my
existence. As if he lived on another world. And then I met him that
evening on the bridge, in just the simplest sort of way. Oh, it was very
wonderful."
"Did you know him right off?"
"Yes, he looked just like his picture; but then I knew him in another
way, too. I can't describe it; it was all very--very strange. It doesn't
seem strange to me now, but it would seem almost too strange to you."
"Won't you try to tell me?"
"I will some day, dear, perhaps. I can't tell you now, I couldn't
explain it all to you; but, anyway, we met and I looked at him and he
looked at me--" she pressed the hand within her own yet closer, adding
simply, "I believe that love--real love--comes like that, first of all
that one look, and then all the past rushes in and makes the bridge to
all the future. Oh, Lassie," her voice sank to a whisper, "when I think
of that meeting and of all that it brought me, I am so happy that I want
to take the whole wide world into my confidence, and beg every one not
to play at love or to take Love's name in vain; but to be patient, and
wait, and starve, or beg, or endure anything, just so as to merit the
joy which may perhaps be going to be. I never had thought of what love
might be; at least I had never been conscious of such thinking. My life
all these years had been bound so straitly and narrowly there at home.
How could I think of anything that would take me from those duties! And
yet I see now that it was all preparation, all the getting ready. If I
had only known it, though,--if I had only known it then! It would all
have been so much easier."
The whisper died away; she sat quite still looking out over the hills.
Lassie's eyes gazed anxiously upon her; nothing in her own spirit tuned
to this key; instead, flashes of recollection kept lighting up the
present with forgotten paragraphs out of the newspaper accounts of the
accident. She shivered suddenly.
Alva did not notice. After a while she went on again.
"Some day you'll learn to love some one, and then you'll know something
of what I feel. I don't want you to suffer enough to know all that I
feel. But, believe me, whatever one suffers, love is worth it. In that
first instant I learned--that first look showed me--that it can mean
all, everything, more even than happiness itself; oh, yes, a great,
great deal more than happiness itself. In one way they're not synonymous
at all, love and happiness. I have been happy without love all my life,
and now I shall love without being what the world calls 'happy'; but I
_shall_ be happy--happy in my own way, just as I am happy now in
something that makes you tremble only to think of."
She paused; her eyelids fell over her eyes and the lashes quivered where
they lay on her cheeks, but her hand continued to hold Lassie's, warm
and close. There was another long pause. And then another sigh.
"So in that first hour--it was only one hour--I learned the beginning of
life's biggest lesson--what life may be, what love may be, and also what
for me could never be. For just as soon as I really saw him, I saw why
he had remained alone. It was perfectly plain to me. It was that he
didn't live for himself; he lived to carry out his purpose. One reads of
such people, but I never had met any one who was unable to see himself
in his own life before. It was a tremendous lesson to me. It was like
opening a door and looking suddenly out upon a new order of universe.
Everything whirled for the first minutes, and then I saw that my own
life had been sufficiently unselfish to have made me capable of
comprehending his. It rose like a flood through my soul, that everything
has a reason, and that my blind, stupid, hopeless years there at home
had all been leading straight up to that minute. It was such a
revelation, and such a new light on all things. I was born anew, myself;
I have never been the same woman since. Never, never!"
Lassie's brows drew together; the revelation did not appeal to her
personal reason as reasonable.
"We talked for quite a while--not about ourselves--we understood each
other too well to need do that. It seems to me now that we were almost
one then, but I didn't know it. All I knew was that I could measure a
little of what he was, and that there was a bond between us of absolute
content in working out God's will rather than our own. I believe now
that that is really the only true love or the only true basis for any
marriage, and that when that mutual bond is once accepted, nothing can
alter, not even an ocean rolling between--not even ten oceans. He spoke
of the Falls, and he spoke of his own work. I listened and thanked God
that I knew what he meant, and comprehended what it meant to me. At the
end of the hour we parted, and I came back to the hotel and started for
home the morning after.... He went away, too, and it was later--when we
began to write letters--that our life together, our beautiful ideal life
together, began. You can't realize its happiness any more than you can
measure all that my words really mean. I can't explain myself any
better, either. After a while it will all come to you, I hope. I went on
with the work at home, and he continued his labors which allowed him
neither home nor family. Nobody knew and nobody would have known, even
if he or she thought that they knew. The very best and loveliest things
lie all around the most of us, and the best and loveliest of all
treasures are within our own hearts--and yet very few of us know
anything about them. Perhaps better that the world in general shouldn't
understand the joy of my kind of love, anyhow; it isn't time for that
yet."
"How, Alva?"
She smiled almost whimsically, "Dearest, as soon as the whole world
understands that sort of life, its own mission will be fulfilled, and
then there will be no more of this particular world. You see!"
"Oh!"
"So then, dear, time went on and on, and I was happy, very happy. And he
was very happy, also. There was something truly childlike in his
happiness; he had never expected love in his life, because he had never
thought of meeting any one who would be able to adapt herself to his
circumstances. We never met, because it didn't seem best or wise. We
just loved, and I don't believe that any two people have ever been
happier together than we were, apart, for these five years--these happy,
happy five years."
Lassie felt a deepening misery; the last horrible part must be going to
come now.
Alva passed her hand over her eyes and drew a long breath.
"It's so difficult to be different from other people, and then to bear
their way of looking at things. It's so hopeless to try to translate
one's feeling into their language all the time. How can I go on, when I
know just how it all looks to you. It's fearfully hard for me."
"I won't say a word,"--the girl's cry was pitiful.
Alva threw both arms quickly about her and held her close. "Bless you,
darling, I know it. But you'll suffer and I know that, too; and I feel
your suffering more than you guess. I know just how it all seems to you.
There is that within me which shudders too, sometimes, and would shrink
and weep only for the strong, divine power that fills me with something
better than I can describe, something big enough and high enough to
fight down the coward. You have that same divinity within you, dear, and
you can't tell when or where it will be called out, but once it is
called out, you never will be weak in the face of this earth's woes."
Lassie was weeping softly again.
"One morning--you know when--I opened the paper to read it to papa after
breakfast, and I saw on the first page, across the top in bright red
letters, that he had been killed."
There was a little sharp cry--"But he wasn't?"--and then a great sob.
"No, dear, but that was the first report."
"And you thought--"
"Yes, of course I believed it. But, Lassie, try to calm
yourself--because it wasn't to me what you think. I was calm; I had
learned so much, he had taught me so much, during the five years, that I
astonished myself with my strength; really, I did. I went about all that
day just as usual, only thinking with a white sort of numbness how long
the rest of life would seem; and then, in the evening, the paper said
that he was still alive. Then I telegraphed and the next day I went to
him. I knew that I must go to him and see him once more, so I arranged
things and went. I was surprised all the journey at my own courage; it
was like a miracle, my power over myself. It was a long journey, but I
knew that I should see him again at the end. I knew that he would not
leave me without saying good-bye, now that he was conscious that he was
going. I was sure of that. So confident can love and strength be in love
and strength.
"I arrived--I went to the hospital--they had the room darkened
because--well, you can guess. I went to where the bed stood and knelt
down beside him, and laid my hand on his bosom. I felt his heart
beating--ever so faintly, but still beating,--and I heard his voice.
Only think, I had not heard his voice for five years! To you or to any
one else it might have all been frightful, because, of course, the
reality was frightful. The man, as you understand men, was mangled and
dying, and could not possibly be with me except for a few brief days.
But, oh, my dearest,--with me it was so different; it was all so
absolutely different. The man that _I_ loved was unhurt, and the evil
chance had only made us nearer and dearer forever. I don't say that I
was not trembling, and that I was not almost unnerved by the shock; but
I can say, too, and say truly, that the Something Divine which had
filled me from the first day, filled and upheld me and made me know that
all was good even then, even in that dark hour and in that dark room,
where he whom I held dearest on earth was chained to pain beneath my
hand. The nurses were very kind. They left me there beside him while he
was conscious and unconscious for some hours. They saw very quickly that
it was different with us from most people; and when I went out two of
the surgeons took me into a room alone and told me the truth.
"I think that then was the greatest moment of my life--when I
comprehended that one who was not killed outright by such a shock might
live even months until--until--Well, if a man so injured has vitality
enough to live at all, he may--live--"
"Don't go on, Alva, please,--I don't want to know how long he may live."
"No, dear, I won't go into that. Only you must think that to me it was
such unexpected heaven. Instead of death, he was alive. Instead of
separation for this life, we were to have some days of absolute
companionship. It was something so much more than I had ever thought of
hoping. A life--even for a day--together! Companionship! Not letters,
but words. I to be his nurse, his solace, to have him for my own. I
stayed awake all night thinking. I knew what being swept suddenly away
meant to him. I knew of his life plans, and what made death hardest to
him. It came to me that I might ease that bitterness. That his need
could go forth through the medium of my love and interest. That his work
would pass on into other hands through mine. That all the golden web of
Fate had been woven directly to this end."
Lassie continued sobbing.
"I saw what we could do. In the morning I went to the surgeons, and they
said that each day added a week of possible life, and that although it
would be many days before anything could be done, after that, he could
be moved and wait for the end--with me. I went to him then, and again I
knelt there by the bed, and this time I told him how I was going to
spend the weeks, and what he must look forward to. He was unable to
talk, but he looked at me and--like the first time--we understood one
another absolutely. He accepted the happiness that was to be as
gratefully as I did myself. As I said before, it was so much more--so
much more--than we had ever expected! He took up his burden of agony as
cheerfully and courageously as he had taken everything in life, and I
came away. There was no use in my remaining there, as he would be either
unconscious or--I could not remain there; the surgeons forbade it.
"Then I had to find a place quickly, a place where no one would come or
would see. A place where he and I could share life and God, who is Life,
without any outsiders breaking in to stare and wonder."
Her voice suddenly became broken and hurried. "Of course I thought of
Ledge, where we had first met, and I wrote to Ronald at once. He found
me that dear little nest back there, and--" she stopped, for Lassie had
suddenly started to her feet. "What is it, dear?"
"Oh, I can't bear it at all. To me it is horrible--horrible! Why, he can
never stand up again--he--Oh, I want to be alone. I must be alone.
I'll--I'll come back--in time--"
She did not wait to finish; she gave one low, bitter cry, and wrung her
hands. Then she ran down the steep, little path that led to Ledgeville,
leaving her friend on the hilltop, with the October sun pouring its
splendor all about her.
CHAPTER V
THAT DISPASSIONATE OBSERVER, MRS. RAY
THERE never was the human tragedy, comedy, or melodrama, yet, which did
not have one or more dispassionate observers. This is strictly true
because, even if a man goes off into the wilderness to fight his fight
out utterly alone, there are moments when one part of his own spirit
will dissever itself from all the rest and, standing forth, tell him of
his progress or retrogression with a pitiless, unbiassed truth. The
wilderness is advisable for that very reason, but no one makes a greater
mistake than when he or she goes to a small far-away village and
pleasantly terms it "the wilderness," supposing soul-solitude an
integral part thereof. It is very right, proper, and conventional to
view life from one's own standpoint, but the real facts of the case are
old and trite enough to warrant me in repeating the statement that all
doings in this world have their dispassionate observer.
Mrs. Ray was the natural observer for the town of Ledge. The town was
not quite aware that added to her keen powers of observation she was
also the Voice of the community. People never expressed themselves
fully, without first knowing what she said. Public opinion simmered all
over the township, so to speak, and then finally boiled over in Mrs.
Ray.
It will be quite impossible to impress upon the ordinary reader the
importance of such Public Opinion, unless a few paragraphs are devoted
to the town of Ledge and its history. If one fails to properly
appreciate the town of Ledge, the tale might just as well have been
located in North Ledge, South Ledge, Ledgeville, Ledge Centre, or any of
the other Ledges.
Therefore on behalf of the lovely little hamlet of Ledge itself, I will
state in as few words as possible that it lies upon a hill overlooking
one of the most beautiful and picturesque scenes in all Northeastern
America; that it took its name and being from a great and noble-hearted
man, who, passing that way by chance, half a century since, paused near
its site to sadly contemplate the denuded banks of the little river
winding its way amidst the débris and desolation left by the lumber
barons of the period. Time was when the same banks had been smiling
terraces covered thick with primeval pines, but "civilization" had
demanded their downfall and they fell. Fell without warning, and also
without discretion. Fell forever, flinging the riches of all the future
aside for the plenty of one man's day. Blackened stumps, great beds of
unsightly chips, waste which would never have been called waste in any
other land, ruthless destruction,--all this disfigured the landscape
that stretched before that visitor of fifty years ago. His heart was
heavy, for he was one who loved everything good, and trees and beauty
are two of man's best gifts from above; but while he gazed over what to
him and many others was almost as much desecration as desolation, he
saw, forever flowing--however choked--the little river below. Like the
thread of idealism which illuminates the most despairing situation, so
flowed the silvery stream down through the scene before him. Its bed was
clogged with drift, its banks covered with rotting rubbish, yet the
promise of its beauty remained; and then and there the traveller
formulated a plan for its redemption to the end that unborn generations
might revel in the realization of that of which he alone seemed then
conscious.
The town of Ledge was a part of what resulted. There had to be a town,
and Ledge came into existence. Where there is work to be done, come the
workers, and with them come towns. Ledge came and grew. To the call of
prosperity many other Ledges gathered a little later; but they never
enjoyed the dignity of the one and original. The first Ledge was
tenacious of its priority. It held to its privileges as rigidly as any
medieval knight held to his. Castled upon the hill above, it simulated
power in more ways than one. For many years all the others had to go to
Ledge for their mail. Ledge also owned the sheriff, the blacksmith, and
the lawyer, and kept a monopoly on the summer excursionist; the express
office was its natural perquisite; a bend of the canal took it in, and
when the canal went the railroad came to console the losers. Mr. Ledge's
plans, which had turned his private estate into a public park for the
gently disposed, also held Ledge in high honor. To visit Ledge Park from
any of the other Ledges was rendered well-nigh impossible. The little
town stood like a sentinel at the end of the Long Bridge, and at the top
of the First Fall. Every picnicker had to go through it, had to check
such articles as could not conveniently be carried all day, in its
hotel; had to get whatever he might feel disposed to drink in the same
place. During the summer, visitors were so plenteous that it became the
fashion in Ledge to despise them, and that right heartily, too. The
people who brought the town most of its means of livelihood received
much that species of sentiment with which an irritating husband and
father is frequently viewed. It was the fashion in Ledge to despise city
people and their ways in all things; even their coming to see the Falls
was referred to as special proof of their singularly feeble minds, while
the way in which the visitors climbed and walked was the favorite topic
of mirthful criticism, all summer long. Criticism is a strange habit. It
is contagious, thrives in any soil or no soil at all, and is far more
destructive to him or her who gives it birth than it can possibly be to
any other person. Not that it really is destructive, but that the weight
of criticism rarely falls where it is supposed to be most needed.
The summer visitors evoked so much comment between May and November that
a great longing to have something to talk about between November and May
followed. It therefore became the fashion in Ledge to talk of everything
and everybody, and as the summer visitors were rated low, the rest of
the world was pretty freely given over to the same cataloguing. It was
usual to rate Ledgeville and all the other Ledges particularly low, and
this opinion held firm, until a biting edge was given it by a second
railroad which came down the valley's bottom to the unspeakable wrath of
the hills on either side and of Ledge in special. It took several years
to assimilate the second railroad, and resume the even tenor of life.
But the adjustment was finally made, and at the date of this story Ledge
was a wee country idyll set like a pearl amidst the beautiful
environment of that fairest of country counties. He who was responsible
for town and environment lived on his own estate near by, and came in
for his share of consideration from the tongues of his namesake. The
great philanthropist was busily engaged in his battle to preserve
intact, for the good of the many to come, that matchless picture with
its open Bible of Nature's Own History. Of the picture and its practical
value, Ledge had its own opinion. It had its own opinion of the dam,
too. It had its own opinion of Alva. And of Lassie. And of Ingram. And
all these opinions flowed freely forth through the medium of Mrs. Ray.
As that lady herself put it: "Whether I'm picking chickens or digging
fence-posts, or carting the United States mail down to the train in the
wheelbarrow that I had to buy and the United States Government won't pay
for,--I never am idle; I'm always taking in something."
And it was quite true. Whatever Mrs. Ray was working at, her brain was
never idle; it was always absorbing something. It was not uncommon to
see a neighbor walking with her while she ploughed, conversation going
briskly on meanwhile. She swept the church with company, and she almost
never sat alone between mail times. It was a full, busy life, and an
interesting one. It was full of importance and responsibility, too. Mrs.
Ray liked to be responsible and was naturally important. Her opinions
were in the main correct, but sometimes she did draw wrong conclusions.
For instance, when she looked down the road the morning after Lassie's
arrival, and saw the two friends departing over the Long Bridge.
"Oh, dear," she said to whoever was near by at the minute, "I smell
trouble for that oldest one if she's planning to keep that pretty girl
here long. That man is going to fall in love with that pretty girl. He
never has cared much for her, anyway. He don't even seem to like to go
over to their house with her; she goes alone mostly. Yes, indeed."
The somebody sitting near by at the minute was Mrs. Dunstall. And
Pinkie, of course. They had dropped in to see if they had any mail, and
had found Mrs. Ray cutting the hair of the three youngest children left
her, first by her predecessor and then by Mr. Ray himself.
"Sit down," she had said cordially; "the second train isn't in yet, and
it's got to come in and go out and let the mail-train come in, even if
the mail ain't late, on account of the wreck."
"Oh, is there a wreck?" Mrs. Dunstall asked anxiously.
"Yes. Forty-four run into a open switch up at Cornell. If the switch is
open, I never see why the train don't just run on out the other end and
keep right along; but all the accidents is as often open switches as
anything, so I guess there's a reason. At any rate, the wrecking-train's
gone up and the second mail's going to be late. Tip your head a little,
Billy. Yes, indeed."
"I wonder if we'd better wait," said Mrs. Dunstall, unwrapping her shawl
somewhat and taking a chair. "What do you say, Pinkie?"
Pinkie was already seated. She weighed two hundred pounds and never
stood up when she could help it. "I say 'Wait,'" said Pinkie.
Mrs. Dunstall thereupon sat down, too, and after ten minutes of a most
solemn silence Mrs. Ray finished her task and dismissed the children.
She faced her callers, then, folding her little gray shoulder-wrap
tightly across her bosom as she did so, and tucking the ends in close
beneath her armpits. The little gray shawl was one of the first signs of
winter in Ledge; Mrs. Ray always donned it at the beginning of October,
and never took it off before the last day of May.
"Well!" she said now; "anything new come up?"
"Millicent come on the same train with that girl," Mrs. Dunstall began
at once. "I wasn't really expecting any mail this morning, but I thought
I might as well come down about now and tell you how Millicent come on
the train with her. You know who I mean, of course?"
"She knows," said Pinkie.
"I s'posed you would. And so Millicent come on the same train with her.
Seems too curious of Millicent coming on the same train with her, when
Millicent hasn't been on a train but twice in her life before, and then
to think that she would come back with that girl. Things do fall out
queer in this world. She sit right in the seat behind her, too. That was
awful curious, I think."
Mrs. Ray gave the ends of her shawl a fresh tuck, and drew in some extra
breath.
"You never can tell," she began; "things do come about mighty strange in
this world. Yes, indeed. It's the unexpected that has happened so much
that it's got to be a proverb in the end. I always feel when a thing has
been coming about till it gets to be proverb, it's no use me disputing
it. Dig around in smoking ashes long enough, and I've never failed to
find some sparks yet. And what you just said is all true as true can
be. It's the unexpected as always happens. Look at me, for instance.
Look at how the post-office fell out of a clear sky on me, and Mr. Ray
much the same, too. I never had any idea of either of 'em beforehand,
and now here I am stamping letters morning and night to keep up the
payments on his tombstone. Things do work in circles so in this world. I
always say if I hadn't been postmistress no one would have expected to
see my husband have a fringed cloth hang on a pillar over his dead body,
and if I hadn't been postmistress I never could have paid for such a
thing. But where there's a will there's a way, which is another proverb
as I've never found go wrong, unless your way is to stay in bed while
you're willing."
"Oh, but you never could have put anything plain on Mr. Ray--not in your
circumstances, and him passing the plate every Sunday and you the sexton
yourself." Mrs. Dunstall looked almost shocked at the mere fancy.
"Couldn't I! Well, I guess I could if I'd had my own way. But I wasn't
allowed my own way. Nobody is. That's what holds us back in this world;
it's the being expected to live up to what we've got; and in this
country, where the garden is open to the public, most of us has to live
up to a good deal more'n we've got. If America ever takes to walls,
it'll show it's going to begin to economize. It'll mean we're giving up
tulips and going in for potatoes. And you'll see, Mrs. Dunstall, that
just as soon as we really have to economize we'll begin to build walls.
There's something about economy as likes walls around the house--high
ones."
"You was raised with walls, wasn't you?" said Mrs. Dunstall.
"I should think I was. I'm English-born--I am."
"How old was you when you come to this country, Mrs. Ray?"
"I've lived here thirty-eight years; that's how old I was."
"You wasn't here before Mr. Ledge?"
"No, I wasn't, nor before the Falls, neither."
"Why, the Falls was here before Mr. Ledge," said Mrs. Dunstall,
enlarging her eyes. "Oh, I see, you're making a joke, Mrs. Ray."
"I do occasionally make a joke," said Mrs. Ray, giving her shawl another
tuck.
"Well, to go back to the girl," said Mrs. Dunstall, "she sit right
behind Millicent too, and what makes it all the stranger, is, she asked
Millicent the name of the next station. Millicent told her it was going
to be Ledge, and asked her if she was for Ledge, because if she was for
East Ledge she ought to stay on one station more. You know, Mrs. Ray,
how folks are always getting off here for East Ledge, and having to stay
all night or hire a buggy to drive over--two shillings either way; and
Millicent asked her, too, if she was for Ledge's Crossing, because if
she was for the Crossing the train don't stop there, and Millicent
always was kind-hearted and wanted her to know it right off. You know
how Millicent is, Pinkie; the last time she rode on a train she threw
the two bags off to the old lady who forgot them, and they weren't the
old lady's bags; they were the conductor's, and he had to run the train
way back for them; he did feel so vexed about them, Millicent said."
"So vexed," said Pinkie.
"And so then Millicent asked her if maybe she was for Ledgeville,
because if she was for Ledgeville she was on the wrong train, and had
ought to have took the Pennsylvania, unless she telegraphed from Ledge
Centre for the omnibus to come up, which nobody ever knows to do; and
then it come into Millicent's head as maybe she was going to visit Mr.
Ledge, in which case goodness knows what she would do, for although he
gets his mail at Ledge, he gets his company at Castile, and here was
that poor child five miles of bridge and walk out of her way, and
Millicent's heart just bleeding for her, she looked so tired. But she
said she was for Ledge."
"Yes, I could have told you she was for Ledge," said Mrs. Ray; "there
was two letters for her here. When I have letters for people without
having the people for the letters, it always means one or two
things,--either the people are coming or the letters are addressed
wrong. I learned that long ago. Yes, indeed."
"Millicent says she liked her looks from the first," pursued Mrs.
Dunstall, "only her hat did amuse her. I must say the hats folks from
town wear is about the most amusing things we ever see here. One year
they pin 'em to their fronts and next year to their backs, and Millicent
says this one was on hindside before with a feather duster upside down
on top. She never saw anything like it; but she said the girl was so
innocent of what a sight she was that she wouldn't have let her see her
laughing behind her back for anything. What do you think of city people
anyhow, Mrs. Ray?"
"City people are always mooney," responded Mrs. Ray; "such mooney ideas
as come into their heads in the country always. Seems like they save
all their mooney ideas for the country. Yes, indeed. They take off their
hats and their shoes and carry stones around in their handkerchiefs; and
when I see 'em slipping and scrambling up and down that steep bank all
the hot summer long, and taking that walk to the Lower Falls that's
enough to kill any Christian with brains, I most humbly thank our
merciful Father in heaven that I've stayed in the country and kept my
good senses. Yes, indeed. And then what they lug back to town with them!
That's what uses me all up! Roots and stones! Why, I saw some one bring
a root from the Lower Falls last year, yes, indeed."
"That walk to the Lower Falls is terrible," said Mrs. Dunstall,
meditatively. "I took it once,--and you, too,--didn't you, Pinkie?"
"Twice," said Pinkie.
"I took it once, too," said Mrs. Ray, who was never loath to discuss
that famous promenade. "Mr. Ray and me took it together. It was when we
first met. He took me, and we walked to the Lower Falls. It was a awful
walk; I never see a worse one, myself. They say it isn't so bad now. Of
course, the time I went with Mr. Ray was while he was still alive. It
was harder then. He asked me to marry him coming back. Oh, I'll never
forget that awful walk!"
"It's bad enough yet," said Mrs. Dunstall. "Mr. Ledge has done all he
could to build things to catch hold of where you'd go head over heels to
heaven if he hadn't, but it's a awful walk still. And then the steps!
Why, Nathan and Lizzie was there last summer, and Lizzie says all the
way down she was thinking how she was ever going to be able to get back,
and all the way back she was thinking just the same thing. Going, you
go down steps till it seems like there never would come the bottom, and
coming back you come up steps till you're ready to move to Ledgeville
and live on the bottoms for life. You know how that is, Pinkie?"
"Yes," said Pinkie.
"It wouldn't do any good to move to Ledgeville to get rid of the Lower
Falls," said Mrs. Ray, "because the dam is going to do away with the
Lower Falls and drown Ledgeville entirely. That's the next little
surprise the city folks will be giving us."
"I shall like to stand on the bridge the day they let the water in over
the dam the first time," said Mrs. Dunstall. "It'll be a great sight to
see the valley turn into a lake, and South Ledge and Ledgeville go
under."
"I wouldn't look forward to it too much if I was you," said Mrs. Ray;
"it's going to take three or four years to dig that dam, they tell me.
You can't lay out a lake and break up three sets of falls in a minute."
"They haven't got to do something to all the Falls," said Mrs. Dunstall.
"Josiah Bates was holding stakes for one of the surveyors yesterday, and
he heard him say as the Lower Falls wouldn't need a thing, for it was a
mill-race already."
"Well, it's a blessing if there's one thing ready to their hands," said
Mrs. Ray, "for I must say the way the State has took hold of us, since
Mr. Ledge set out to give it something for nothing, is a caution. If
he'd offered to sell the Falls at cost price, we'd of had a petition and
our taxes increased and been marked 'keep off the grass,' in all
directions; but just because he offered to give it to 'em all cleared up
and in order, they must tear around and build a dam and drown five
villages and go cutting up monkey-shines generally. Yes, indeed."
"They do say that the dam will keep the Falls, instead of spoiling
them," said Mrs. Dunstall; "they say the Falls is stratifying backward,
and is most through being falls, anyway, and if the dam is built, we'll
all have that to look at always."
"It'll be all one to me," said Mrs. Ray; "I never get time to look at
nothing, anyway, unless it's folks waiting for their mail, and goodness
knows they've long ceased to interest me."
Mrs. Dunstall looked a bit uncertain as to how to receive this outburst
of confidence. "It does you good to take a little rest," she said at
last; "you work too hard for a woman of your time of life, Mrs. Ray."
"Well, I'd like to know how I can help it, with my farm and my chickens
and my grocery business, not to speak of the boarders and the children
and the post-office. When one's a mother and a farmer and a sexton and
an employee under bond to the United States Government one has to keep
on the jump."
Mrs. Dunstall rearranged the set of her lips slightly. "The mail's very
late, ain't it?" she asked.
"Late! I should think it was late. I guess that open switch has settled
Forty-four for to-day. But that train's always late. It isn't in the
block yet, and the mail-train follows it."
"If it don't come soon, I can't wait," said Mrs. Dunstall; "this is one
of my awful days, and speaking of awful days, what do you think of the
doings over at the old Whittaker house, Mrs. Ray?"
"I've heard she's wrecking it completely."
"Josiah Bates' been doing some carting there. He says it's enough to
make old Grandma Whittaker shiver in her grave. He says they've turned
the house just about inside out. That girl must be crazy."
"She is crazy," said Mrs. Ray with decision; "she's in love."
"Oh!" said Mrs. Dunstall, "with him, you mean?"
"Of course. But she's crazy two ways, I think, to go bringing that
pretty girl here, and she so thin and white herself. You can't tell me
that that man doesn't know a pretty girl when he sees her, even if he
ain't seen her yet--which he hasn't, for he didn't see 'em this morning.
I know that, for I was watching."
"That's the train now, isn't it?" said Mrs. Dunstall, listening.
Mrs. Ray pricked up her ears. "Yes, that's the train, rushing along and
sprinkling soot over everything. Picking hops used to be such nice clean
work, but now they're all over soot."
"The canal was better, I think," said Mrs. Dunstall.
Mrs. Ray made no answer; she was absorbed in looking out of the window.
"It was cleaner, anyhow," Mrs. Dunstall continued; "but they do say the
men swore most awful locking boats through in the night. I never lived
on the canal, myself, but you did, Pinkie; did they swear much or not?"
"They swore," said Pinkie.
"Well," said Mrs. Ray, now facing about and making certain active
preparations for the reception of the mail, "it must be nice to spend
your days ways that lets you lay awake nights listening to anything
swear. I've never had time nor money to lay awake nights. I leave that
for those who can, but I can't. Walking to the Lower Falls and laying
awake nights is pleasant, I've no doubt, but I need my days other ways.
Summer folks is always coming in here and saying, 'Oh, have you seen the
gorge this morning, Mrs. Ray,' and me like enough out ploughing in the
opposite direction since sun up. I haven't got any time to lay awake or
to look at views. If the weeds grew up all around my fence-posts while I
was hanging over the bridge looking at the gorge, I guess you'd hear of
it, and since I've taken to raising chickens, there's hen-houses to
spray and me busier than ever. If I was a hen, my day's work would be
over when I'd laid my egg and I could run out with a free mind and look
at the gorge, but as it stands now, I ain't got time to look at
nothing,"--in testimony whereof she disappeared into the kitchen.
"I'll tell you who's got time," said Mrs. Dunstall as soon as she
reappeared; "it's those Lathbuns down at Nellie's. How long are they
going to stay around here, do you suppose?"
"I don't know; I don't know anything about them. They don't get any
mail, so I've no way of knowing a thing. My own opinion is that if I was
Nellie I'd keep a sharp eye on my shawls, for folks who come walking
along without baggage, can go walking off without baggage, too. Those
are her shawls they're wearing, you know; they haven't got so much as a
jacket between them of their own."
"Nellie says they're very nice people," said Mrs. Dunstall; "and the
girl has got a love affair. She don't mind their wearing her shawls."
"Why don't he write her, then," said Mrs. Ray; "that's the time even the
poorest letter-writer writes letters. Mr. Ray wrote me the first
Thursday after he was in love. I've got the letter yet."
"What did he write you for, when you was keeping house for him, anyway?"
asked Mrs. Dunstall.
"He was gone to Ledge Centre for the license."
"I never see why you married him," said Mrs. Dunstall; "he paid you for
keeping house for him before that, didn't he?"
"Yes, but he had his mind set on marrying some one, and I thought I'd
better marry him than any one else. And I was fond of the children, and
I didn't know nothing about the mortgages. I always say we was real
fashionable. I didn't know nothing about the mortgages, and he thought I
had some money in the bank. Well, it was an even thing when it all came
out. I guess marriage generally is. Everything else, too."
"I don't see why the mail don't come, if it's in," said Mrs. Dunstall.
Mrs. Ray went to the window and looked out.
"It'll come soon now," she declared, hopefully.
"But I can't wait any longer," said Mrs. Dunstall, rising, "I wasn't
expecting anything, anyway. Come, Pinkie."
They both rose and started to go out together.
But just at the door they met one of the surveyors.
"Oh, that reminds me why I come," said Mrs. Dunstall, stopping; "young
man, do you know Sallie Busby?"
The young surveyor looked startled.
"Chestnuts in a blue and white sunbonnet, mainly?" said Mrs. Dunstall.
"I don't recollect."
"Well, you might not have noticed, or she might not have had it on, but
either way she's been most amused watching your young men pegging those
little flags all through her meadow, but she says that when you got
through last night you forgot seven, and she saw 'em when she went out
to pick the two trees up the cow-path this morning, and run down and got
'em, and has 'em all laid by for you whenever you want to send for 'em."
The young man stood speechless.
Finally he said: "But they were meant to be left there."
"Were--were they?" said Mrs. Dunstall, in great surprise; "well, you
ought to have told her so then. She saw you pull some up, so she thought
you meant to pull them all up. Too bad! Now you'll have to get your
machine and go peeking all over her land again, won't you?"
"We will if she's pulled up the flags, certainly."
"Well, she's pulled up the flags. If Sallie set out to pull them up,
they'd up, you can count on that! How's the dam coming on, anyway?"
The young man laughed. "Why, there's no question of the dam yet. You all
seem to think that we're here to build it. We have to make a report to
the commission first, and the commission will lay the report before the
legislature. That's how it is."
Mrs. Ray folded her arms and joined in suddenly, "So--that's how it is,
is it? Well, I don't wonder it's difficult to run a post-office, when
anything as plain as a dam has to be fussed over like that. By the way,
you're one of the surveyors and you ought to know,--is it true that if
they do build the dam, it may get a little too full and run over into
our valley or burst altogether and drown Rochester? I'm interested to
know."
"That's what we want to know, too," said Ingram's assistant; "that's
what we're surveying for."
"How long will it take you to tell? I've got a friend--maybe you know
him, Sammy Adams?--and he owns most of the valley back here. He's the
worrying kind, and he's worried. Yes, indeed."
"It wouldn't make so much difference about Rochester," said Mrs.
Dunstall; "it's a deal easier to go for our shopping to Buffalo from
here; but wouldn't it be awful for Sammy Adams! Why, his house is right
in the valley."
"Yes," said Mrs. Ray, "and as a general thing Sammy's right in his
house. It's bad enough now, with the freshets scooping sand all over the
farm every other spring, but if the dam goes and scoops Sammy Adams, the
legislature'll have something else to settle besides the Capitol at
Albany. Sammy Adams looks meek, but he'd never take being drowned
quietly; he's got too much spirit for that. Yes, indeed!"
"We're going to do away with the freshets, Mrs. Ray," the young man
said; "the dam--if it comes--will be the biggest blessing that ever came
this way, let me tell you. In the summer you'll have a beautiful lake to
sail on, and no end of excursions."
"Why, I thought they were going to store up the water in spring, and
draw it off in the summer," said Mrs. Dunstall. "A man told my husband
that that was what they wanted the dam for,--to save the high water in
the spring so as to use it in the summer. Wasn't that what Ebenezer
said, Pinkie?"
"Yes, it was," said Pinkie.
"How do you explain that?" asked Mrs. Ray, turning an inquisitorial eye
sternly on the surveyor. "Where's your beautiful lake going to be by
July? Marsh and mosquitoes, that's what we'll have left. Don't tell me;
I've seen too many kind thoughts about making folks happy end that way,
and I've seen one or two reservoirs, too. The dam'll drown Sammy Adams,
that's what it'll do, and Ledge'll be left high and dry with a lot of
dead fish lying all over the fields. I know!"
"Well, we'll see!" said the young man, laughing.
"But I thought you was all for the dam, Mrs. Ray," said Mrs. Dunstall, a
little surprised. "Whatever has changed you so?"
Mrs. Ray shut her mouth tightly and then opened it with a snap. "I've
been thinking," she said abruptly; "and I don't mind changing my opinion
when I must. Any one who wants to hold a position under the United
States Government has got to have brains and use 'em freely in changing
their opinion."
"But you said--" began Mrs. Dunstall.
"What if I did? Like enough I'll say it again. I will, if I feel like
it. Yes, indeed. 'He moves in a mysterious way,' you know, and I'm one
of His ways, and I've got a right to keep my own counsel about my own
work. But--speaking of work--the mail-train was in before you come up. I
wonder what's become of the bag!" She went to the window and looked down
towards the station. "I do have such trouble to get hold of that bag.
That's one of the hardest things about keeping a post-office, is the
getting hold of the bag. They don't have any sort of understanding of
what a United States Government position means, down at our station;
they kick the mail-bag around like it was a crate of hens. Once they
asked me if they couldn't have the key at the station, and open the mail
because there's always more inhabitants in the station than in the
post-office. They seemed to think that was a glory to the station, and a
reflection on me. But I don't want to have men sitting around here. I
won't have it. The only man who has any legal right to sit around me is
in heaven, and just because I'm the postmistress is no reason why I
should take chances. If you don't want men sitting around, you can
easily keep 'em from doing it by having no chairs for them to sit on. I
never have."
"Don't you want me to go down and get the mail?" suggested the young
surveyor, somewhat uneasily.
Mrs. Ray turned a severe eye his way. "Have you go down and get the
mail! Well, young man, I guess you don't know that it's a penitentiary
offence to lay hands on a mail-sack, unauthorized by the United States
Government! Yes, indeed. It is, though, and I've had such hard work
getting it into people's heads that it is, that I wouldn't authorize no
one. _No one!_ Why, when we first was a post-office, I had the most
awful time. Everybody coming this way brought the bag with 'em. It's a
penitentiary offence to touch the bag, and here Sammy Adams forgot he
had it in his buggy one night, and drove home with it. It was when Mrs.
Allen's cousin Eliza was dying, and she was so anxious, and no mail-bag
at all that night. I tell you I took a firm stand after that; I made the
rule and made it for keeps, that no matter if there wasn't but one
postal, and all the men in the station had felt the bag to see that
there wasn't, the bag must come up to me just the same. You'll find,
young man, that if you hold a United States Government position, you'll
be expected to uphold the United States Government, and if you're
building the dam and employ the men around here, you'll find that to
impress them you must keep a bold front. That's why I have my arms
folded most of the time."
The young surveyor listened with reverent attention.
"Whose business is it to bring the bag, anyway?" asked Mrs. Dunstall. "I
can't wait much longer."
"It isn't anybody's business,--that's what's the trouble. The United
States Government don't provide nothing but penalties for touching the
mail-bag. That's another hard thing about holding a government position
when your hands are as full as mine. At first I couldn't get the
mail-bag respected, in fact they used it to keep the door to the station
open windy days; and then, when I got it respected by explaining what we
was liable to if we didn't respect it, I couldn't get no one to touch it
any more. I had to wheel it up and down in the baby-carriage for a
while, and then I looked up the law and found I could delegate my
authority; so since then Mr. Hopkins has delegated for me except when he
goes to Ledge Lake, and when he does that I take it in a wheelbarrow. I
give the baby-carriage to Lucy. She had that baby, you know. Well, of
course a baby needs a carriage, so I give her ours."
"A baby's lots of trouble," said Mrs. Dunstall, thoughtfully.
"Yes, but we're here for trouble," said Mrs. Ray, cheerfully. "I've got
the post-office, Lucy's got the baby, and poor Clay Wright Benton's got
his mother and the parrot. Everybody's got something!"
"Well, I can't wait any longer," said Mrs. Dunstall; "good-bye. Come,
Pinkie."
They went out.
"Who is Pinkie?" the young man asked, when he was alone with Mrs. Ray.
"I d'n know," said Mrs. Ray, "she don't, either. They adopted her when
she weighed six pounds and named her Pinkie, and that's what come of
it."
"I see." Just then the mail-bag was brought in.
CHAPTER VI
WHEN DIFFERENCES LEAD TO WHAT IS EVER THE SAME
Lassie fled down the path. Not even that primeval river which once
rushed wildly across the old Devonian rocks just here was more
thoughtless as to whither it was going. All that she was conscious of in
that instant was irresistible revolt against the horror of what she had
just heard, and which bred in her a sudden and utter rebellion. A vivid
imagination will have already pictured the possible effect of Alva's
story upon her friend, and that vast majority whose imaginations are not
vivid will be happy to be spared such details. It is sufficient to say
that tears, pain, groans, and a coffin suspended, like Damocles' sword,
above all the rest, was Lassie's background to her friend's romance; and
the picture thus held in her mind was so benumbing to her other senses
that as she ran she tripped, stumbled, almost fell, down the hill, so
blind and careless of all else had she become. The restraint of Alva's
presence was now removed; nothing stood between the young girl and her
sensation of appalling wretchedness. As she ran she shook, she
shuddered; the path was steep, and her knees seemed to crumble beneath
her; twice she almost went headlong, and at the minute she felt that a
broken neck was but a trifle in comparison to coming face to face with
anything like what she had just been told. "Of course he was a great
man," she gasped half aloud; "but he'll never be able to even feed
himself again--it said so in the paper. Why, at first it said his back
was broken. Oh, oh, if Alva can be so crazy as that, who is sane, and
what can one believe? Oh, dear--oh, dear--oh, dear! And she calls it
love, too!"
The village of Ledgeville lay below, and a few more minutes of
precipitous flight brought Lassie in sight of its houses. Still a few
more minutes, and she was in the middle of the village--a very small
village, consisting of two streets composing the usual American town
cross, and half a dozen stores. Every one whom she met knew just who she
was (for had she not arrived upon the evening previous?), and they all
regarded her with earnest scrutiny. The inhabitants of Ledgeville
themselves were never in the habit of coming down from the Long Bridge
with tear-stained faces, heaving bosoms and a catch in their breath, but
that Lassie did so, caused them no surprise. Was she not of that
unaccountable multitude called "city folks?"
Lassie herself neither thought nor cared how she appeared to the
ruminative gaze of Ledgeville at first, but as soon as she did notice
the attention which she was attracting, she wanted to get away from it
as quickly as possible, eyes being quite unbearable in her present
distress. She stopped and asked a kindly looking old man where the
bridge--the lower bridge--might be, knowing that it would take her to
solitude again. The kindly old man pointed to where the bridge could be
seen, a block or so beyond, and she thanked him and hurried on. It was
a wooden bridge, very long; and the river here glided in wonderful
contrast to that other aspect of itself which plunged so furiously from
cataract to cataract, a quarter of a mile further down the course. How
curious to think that all smooth-flowing rivers have it in them to foam
and rage and gnaw and rend away the backbone of the globe itself, if
driven in among narrow and hard environment. Is there ever any simile to
those conditions in human lives, I wonder! And then to consider on the
other hand that there is no volume of watery menace which, if spread
between banks of green with space to flow untrammeled, will not become
the greatest and most beneficial of all the helpers of need and seed!
That is also a simile--one more cheerful and happy than the former,
praise be to God.
The river by Ledgeville is one of those flowing smoothly and broadly
between banks of green. So smoothly and sweetly does it flow just there
that it might well have brought some quieting mood, some gracious, even
current of gently rippling peace, into poor Lassie's throbbing heart,
had she but been able to receive any comfort at that moment. But
meditation was as far from her at this juncture as her mental attitude
was from Alva's, and more than that cannot be said for either
proposition.
So the river carried its lesson unread, while the girlish figure
traversed the bridge as quickly as it had flown through the town, and,
hurriedly turning at the forking of the road beyond, started up the
hill. She knew that that way must lead to Ledge, and eventually her own
little hotel bedroom, that longed for haven where she would be able to
sit down quietly, away from the sunlight and omnipresent people, away
from everything and everybody. Oh, but it was freshly awful to think of
Alva, her beautiful Alva, and of what Alva was going to do! Marry that
man! Why, he would never even sit up again; he could hardly see, the
paper had said--the newspapers had said--everybody had said.
She stopped suddenly and stood perfectly still. A choking pain gripped
her in the throat and side. Her spiritual torment had suddenly yielded
to her physical lack of breath.
Beyond a doubt there is nothing that will curb any sentiment of any
description so quickly as walking up hill. Without in the slightest
degree intending to be flippant, I must say that in all my experience,
personal and observed, I have never yet felt or seen the emotion which
does not have to give way somewhat under that particular form of
exercise. In Lassie's case she found herself to be so suddenly and
completely exhausted that she could hardly stand. Her knees, which had
seemed on the verge of giving out as she hurried down the opposite bank,
now really did fail her and, looking despairingly about and feeling
tears to be again perilously near, she turned off of the road into the
woods that stretched down the bank and, treading rapidly over soft turf
and softer moss, came in a minute to a solitude sufficiently removed to
allow of her sinking upon the ground and there giving out completely.
Oh, how she cried then! Cried in the unrestrained, childish way that
gasps for breath, and chokes and then sobs afresh and aloud. She thought
herself so safely alone in the depths of the wood that she could gasp
and choke and sob to her heart's uttermost content, not at all knowing
that Fate, who does indeed weave a mesh of the most intricate
patterning, had even now begun to interweave her destiny with that
of--well, let us say--of the dam at Ledgeville.
Alva's talk about the dam had gone in one ear and out the other; Alva's
words regarding Ingram had been driven into the background of Lassie's
brain by the later surprises; but now things were to begin to alter. We
never can tell, when we weep over the frightful love affair of a friend,
what delightful plans that same little Cupid may have for our own
immediate comforting, or how deftly he and the dark-veiled goddess may
have combined in future projects.
Sorrow is sorrow, but sometimes it comes with the comforter close upon
its heels, and when the sorrow is really another's, and the comforter is
unattached and therefore may quite easily become one's own!--
Ah, but all this is anticipating. It is true that disinterested parties
(like Joey Beall) always know everything before those most interested
have the slightest suspicion of what is going on; but still it seems to
me unfair to take any advantage of two innocent people as early in the
game as the Sixth Chapter.
Therefore it shall only be said here that the party of surveyors had
employed that morning in sighting and flagging up and down the banks
beneath the Long Bridge, and Ingram, having spent two hours in their
company, was now climbing the hillside for pure athletic joy, being one
of those who prefer a scramble to a smooth road any day. As he came
lightly up the last long swing that measured the bank for him, he surely
was looking for nothing less in life than that which he found at the
top,--and yet that which he found at the top was not so disagreeable
a surprise, after all. For Lassie, even now when indubitably miserable,
pink-eyed and wretched, was still a very pretty girl. A pretty girl is
very much like a rose in the rain--a few drops of water only add to its
charm; and so when Ingram came suddenly upon her, crying there under a
tree, and caused her to look up with a little scream at the man crashing
out of the bushes with such a force of interruption as made her jump to
her feet and shrink quickly away--why, really it was all far less
startling and alarming than it sounds to read about. For he at once
exclaimed, "Surely you remember me." And she saw who it was, stared at
him dazedly for an instant, and then dropped her face in her hands
again, realizing that he was the first of the big world that "hadn't
been told," and that he would ask what was the matter, and that she must
not tell him. And so--and so--there was nothing to do but hide her
face--and collect her wits--and listen.
[Illustration: "SURELY YOU REMEMBER ME."]
"What is it?" he said, and as she felt for her handkerchief she could
but think how hard it was to resist sympathy when one's dearest friend
was doing such unheard-of things, and one had just learned about them.
Not that she would tell him why she was crying, of course.
"What is it?" he asked again then--he was very near now. "You know who I
am. I used to know you when you were a little girl. You remember?"
She was still feeling for her handkerchief, and he put a great white one
into her seeking hand. She wiped her eyes with it and thought again that
he must not be told, and so said, with quivering lips:
"Oh, please leave me, please go away. Nothing is the matter, but I must
be alone. I want to be alone. Please go away and leave me."
Ingram looked down upon her and, laying his hand on her arm with a grasp
that was so firm as to feel brotherly (to one not yet a débutante), said
in a tone of fascinating authority (to one not yet a débutante):
"What is it? What is the trouble? You've had a letter with bad news?" In
his own mind he set it down that she and Alva had had a misunderstanding
of some sort, but that opinion he would not voice.
"Oh, no," sobbed Lassie; "it isn't a letter--it is Alva!" She paused and
Ingram had just time enough to reflect how quickly a man could see
straight through any woman, when Lassie could bear the burden of reserve
no longer, and with a wild burst of accelerated woe cried: "She has told
me her secret, and I listened 'way through to the end and then--then
when I really understood and realized what it all meant, then I could
not bear it, and so--and so--I ran away from her and down the hill and
across the bridge and came here to be alone. And I wish you would go
away and leave me alone; oh, I want to be alone so very, very much, for
I cannot keep still unless I am alone; I am too unhappy over it all. Too
unhappy. And I have promised her not to tell."
Ingram looked his startled sympathy. "What is the trouble?" he asked.
"Tell me; perhaps I can help you. Why should you keep 'it' a secret? I'm
her friend, too, you know."
"But it isn't my secret, it's hers," Lassie sobbed; "and I've promised;
and, anyway, nobody or nothing can help her. Nothing! Nobody!"
"Is it really as bad as that?" said the man, looking very serious.
Lassie was wringing her hands. "Oh, it's ever so much worse than that;
it's the very worst thing I ever heard of. And that shows how bad I am;
for Alva is good, and it makes her happy!"
Naturally Ingram could not follow the reasoning which caused her
terminal phrase to serve as a sort of mental apology for her way of
looking at the affair, but he was not alarmed by the breadth of her
confession of guilt, only unspeakably distressed by her distress, and
its mysterious cause.
"But what _is_ it?" he asked. "What has Alva done?"
"I musn't tell."
"Alva's not in any difficulty across the river there, is she?" he
hazarded.
"Oh, no; she isn't in any difficulty; she is very, very happy. That's
what seems so awful about it."
"What? I can't understand."
"I can't explain, either. And I musn't tell you. It's going to drive me
crazy to keep still, but I must not tell."
"You can tell me;" his tone was suddenly authoritative again (quite
thrilling its young listener).
"No, I can't. I can't tell any one," but _her_ tone was wavering, with a
catch in its note.
Ingram became instantly imperious.
"Yes, you can tell me! You must tell me! It will relieve your mind, and
perhaps I can help Alva."
"No, you can't help her; she doesn't want to be helped."
"Well, I can help you, anyway. Just telling me will help you."
Lassie choked.
"Tell me at once," said Ingram, sternly; "I insist upon knowing."
She looked up at him.
"Don't stop to think," he commanded; "tell me."
Oh, the intense relief of having a burdensome secret torn from your
keeping! Lassie felt that when in trouble, a man was the friend to
find--even before one's début.
"You won't ever let her know that I told?" she faltered.
"Of course not."
"She didn't ask me really to promise; she only said that I should be the
only one to ever know."
"Never mind, I don't count. Go on."
"Well, she is going to marry--" and then she told him, with many halts
and gasps, who; and then she told him further, when.
Ingram listened, silent, turning white all about his mouth. "She can't
do it," he said, after a minute. "That man may die any hour. It said so
in last night's paper."
"She is going to do it," Lassie said; "she doesn't mind his dying--that
is, she doesn't mind his dying as most people do."
"Oh, but that's horrible," he said then; "you were right--it is awful.
No wonder you were frightened and ran away. She must be insane. I never
heard of such a thing." He went to the edge of the bank and looked off
for a little, standing there still, and then, after a while, "Oh, my
God!" he said; and then again "Oh, my God!" and came back beside her.
His action, his evident emotion, quieted her own strangely.
"Isn't it terrible?" she asked, almost timidly, when he was close again;
"it seems to me the most terrible thing that I ever knew about."
"Very terrible," said the man, briefly. "We will walk on up the hill,"
he added, after a little; "it's near dinner time." She did as he said.
"You won't tell Alva that I told you?" she asked.
He shook his head. "No, indeed," and then both were silent.
Towards the top, he asked: "How long shall you be with her?"
"A week."
"That means until she leaves to marry him?"
"Yes."
"That's good; I am glad that you can stay."
She tried to say something then, and her voice died in one of those same
strange gasps, but she tried a second time and succeeded. "I suppose
that nothing could be done?" she questioned.
"What would you do?" he asked.
"I don't know," she said.
He smiled a little oddly. "I am afraid that we should be fools," he
said; "those fools that rush in, you know. It is beginning to come back
to me how Alva looked and how she spoke when I took her to see the
house. It all had no meaning to me then, but it has meaning now. It
comes back to me more and more. Perhaps you and I are--are--not up to
seeing it quite as she does. Perhaps. It's possible."
"That is what she says over and over--that I cannot understand," Lassie
said, faintly.
"I can't understand either, but--perhaps she does. I _can_ understand
_that_."
"I am glad that you know, anyway;" her tone was sweet and confiding. He
looked down into her pretty eyes.
"I am, too," he said, heartily.
"But I hope that it wasn't very wrong for me to tell you; it seemed as
if I could not bear it alone!"
"Don't worry about that; Alva shall never know. And now, if you cannot
bear it (as you say) again, you know that you can come to me and say
what you like. We shall have that comfort."
She smiled a little. "You don't seem like a stranger; you seem like an
old, old friend."
"I'm glad. Because I am an old, old friend in reality, you know."
"But, if--if I--when I want--" she hesitated.
"Oh, you don't know where to find me if you want me?" He laughed. "It's
true that I am an uncertain quantity, but I take supper at the hotel
every evening, and sometimes I go to the post-office afterwards." He
smiled roundly at that, and she smiled, too. "We must go to the
post-office together, sometimes," he added; "it's the great social
diversion of Ledge." He was glad to see her face and manner getting
easier. That was what he was trying for--to lift the weight from her.
"Alva took me there this morning," she said.
They came now to the Soldiers' Monument and the tracks.
"I hope that she isn't going to mind the way that I left her!" the
young girl exclaimed suddenly, smitten with anxiety. "I ran away, you
know; I couldn't bear it another minute."
"She won't mind that," said Ingram; "all the little things of life won't
cut any figure with her any more, if she's the kind that has made up her
mind to do such a thing. That's what I've been thinking all the time
that we were coming along; a woman who has decided to marry in the way
that Alva has, must of course look at everything in life by a different
light from that of the rest of us; I don't know really that we have the
right even to criticize her. We don't understand her at all; that's all
it is."
Lassie looked astonished. "You don't mean to say that you think that she
isn't crazy?" she said.
Ingram smiled again, "I mean that I hardly think it possible to judge
what one cannot measure; savages reverence the Unknown, you know, and
I'm not sure that reverence is not a fitter attitude towards mystery
than condemnation or ridicule, although of course it isn't the civilized
or popular standpoint."
"But do you think it's--it's--it's the thing, to do--" Lassie could not
get on further.
"I think it's just as awful as you do," he said quietly; "but I've had
time since you told me to see that just because it seems awful to me,
it's very plain to me that I see it differently from the way in which
she does. She isn't a girl, she's a woman; and she's a very good and
sweet and true woman at that. If she is making this marriage, the really
awful part isn't the part that you or I or the world are going to think
about, it's something else."
Lassie's glance rose doubtfully upward. "You think that it's all right
for her to do it, then?" she asked miserably.
"I think that we aren't wise enough to talk about it at all," said
Ingram with determined cheerfulness. "Let's change the subject. I am
going to be here on and off for a year, likely, and digging holes to
hold little flags, and drilling to keep track of what one drills through
isn't the liveliest fun in the world to look forward to; so when Alva
doesn't need you, do give me some of your time and make me some jolly
memories to live on later, when I'm alone--will you?"
"You won't ever be able to go and see Alva in her house afterwards, will
you?" said Lassie, her mind apparently unequal to changing the subject
on short notice; "because no one is ever to go there, she says."
"I shall never go unless she asks me, surely."
They were now quite near the little hotel.
"Before we part, let us be a little conventional and say that we are
glad to have met one another," Ingram suggested; "will you?"
"I'm glad that I met you," she said; "it will be a great comfort--as you
said."
Ingram was looking at her and that turned his face towards the gorge. "I
see Alva coming across the bridge," he exclaimed; "go and meet her. Go
to her quite frankly, openly,--as if nothing had happened. That will be
easiest--and kindest--and best all around."
She flashed a grateful glance to his eyes, and ran at once down the
tracks and out upon the bridge.
Alva came towards her, with a rapid step, her open coat floating lightly
back on either side. She smiled sweetly as she saw the girlish figure.
"You beat me home," she called out, gaily.
Lassie swallowed the lump in her throat and smiled, too. "It's such a
beautiful day, and I'm so happy and so glad that you are happy!"
The pretty young voice rang fresh and true. The next instant they were
close, side by side.
Alva stood still. What Ingram had said proved most truly true; she did
not seem to hold any recollection of that parting an hour before. She
drew Lassie close beside her and pointed over the bridge-rail. A rainbow
was spanning the Upper Falls, and its brilliant, evanescent promise
seemed to reflect in the face above. What is so fragile, illusive,
uncertain as a rainbow? And yet it is the mirrored mirage of all the
Eternal Purpose's immutable law. Form is there, and color; hope is
there, and the will-o'-the-wisp of human struggles evolving continually
and, in their evolution, fading to human eyes as they take their place
up higher. From the foaming, dashing water, which during the centuries
was strong enough to eat into the rock, arose the light, lovely mist
that in cycles of time was in its turn strong enough to wear it away.
Through the mist floated the impalpable radiance that, in æons to come,
when rock should again flash fiery through unending space, and water
should have evaporated to await fresh form, would still continue to
illuminate the Divine Will.
CHAPTER VII
THE LATHBUNS
Mrs. Wiley, dropping into the post-office that evening along about
seven, was frankly disappointed at finding her newspaper bundle still
undisturbed on the table in the adjoining kitchen.
"Why, I made sure you'd have laid 'em out, anyhow," she said, looking at
Mrs. Ray, who was busily beating batter; "you haven't even made a
start." And she sighed, seating herself in unwilling resignation.
"Made a start," said Mrs. Ray, glancing at her placidity with an air of
tart exasperation, "made fifty starts, you mean. This has been what I
call _a day_. Mrs. Catt came in early this afternoon to ask me to make
Sally's wedding-cake, and Clay Wright Benton was here about the parrot.
He's awful tired of that parrot 'cause it keeps his mother so tired and
cross from getting up nights to wait on it. It routs her up at all hours
for things, and if she don't hurry it calls her names in Spanish that it
learned on the ship coming from Brazil, and, oh, they're having an awful
time of it. And then Sammy Adams was here too; he was here from four
o'clock on, asking me to marry him again. I don't know as anything gives
me a lower opinion of Sammy than the way he sticks to wanting to marry
me. The older I get, the worse he wants to marry me, which shows me
only too plainly as it ain't me at all he wants--it's just my work."
"You ain't even unrolled it," said Mrs. Wiley, fingering the bundle
sadly. "I've been fixing onion-syrup for Lottie Ann and thinking of you
unrolling all day. And you wasn't ever unrolling, even."
"He set right where you're setting now," said Mrs. Ray, beating briskly.
"I was stoning raisins, so he wasn't in my way, but I do get tired of
being asked to marry men. They don't make no bones about the business
any more, and even a woman of my age likes a _little_ fluff of romance.
Sammy always goes into how we could join our chickens and our furniture.
Like they was going to be married, too. Oh, Sammy's very mooney--he's
very much like Mr. Ray. Most men are too much like Mr. Ray to please me.
There was days when Mr. Ray'd sit all day and tell me how he had yellow
curls and blue eyes before he had smallpox. Those were his mooney days.
When Mr. Ray wanted to be specially nice, he always used to tell me how
pretty he was when he was a baby. Men are so awful silly. It's too bad I
ever married. I had so many pleasant thoughts about men before. But now
all I think is they're all spying round for women to work for 'em."
"I never shall know no peace till I know whether you can get my two
backs out of these legs," said Mrs. Wiley, handling the bundle. "Father
was such a sitter the last year, his legs was very wore at the top." She
sighed.
"Mr. Catt was here this afternoon, too," continued Mrs. Ray, never
ceasing to beat; "he wants to get up a petition about the dam. He's
afraid they won't pay him for his orchard. He's against it. He says Mr.
Ledge is right. He says if he's going to lose money, he'd rather see the
Falls preserved for the blessings of unborn generations. He says he
doesn't believe we think enough about unborn generations in this
country. He says his orchard is worth a lot."
"If they're too wore out to cut over, I suppose we'll have to give it
all up," said Mrs. Wiley. "Oh, Mrs. Ray, Lottie Ann's so thin! I don't
know what to do! I say to her 'Lottie Ann, do eat,' and then she tries
and chokes. I think she ought to go to Buffalo and be examined with a
telescope. Rubbing her in goose-grease don't do a bit of good, and it
does ruin her flannels so."
"I was sorry for Clay Wright Benton," pursued Mrs. Ray; "he kind of
wants me to take his mother and the parrot for the winter. He says
besides the nights, his mother and the parrot quarrels so days that he's
afraid Sarah just won't have 'em in the house much longer. She's losing
all patience."
"If you _can't_ get my fronts out of his legs, do you suppose there'll
be any way to get them out of his fronts?" Mrs. Wiley propounded.
"I told Clay I'd see," continued Mrs. Ray. "I'm pretty full now, but
there's a proverb about room for one more, and if I can't do nothing
else my motto'll help me out. 'He moves in a mysterious way' you know,
and maybe I can put her in my room with Willy and move into the kitchen
myself with the parrot. Yes, indeed. Only I won't get up and wait on it.
I don't care what I get called in Spanish, if I'm once asleep for the
night, that parrot won't get me up again; or there'll be more Spanish
than his around."
"You'll be able to use the same buttons, anyhow," mused Mrs. Wiley. "Oh,
Mrs. Ray, we've had a letter from Uncle Purchase and the colt didn't
die. It'll be lame and blind in one eye, but anyway it's alive and it's
such a valuable colt. The father cost six thousand dollars, and if it
lives to have grandchildren maybe they'll race. Uncle Purchase does so
want a race-horse in his stock. He says a race-horse even raises the
value of your pigs and cattle."
"Does a parrot sleep on its side or sit up all night, do you know? I
forgot to ask Clay."
"Oh, that reminds me, speakin' of sleepin'," exclaimed Mrs. Wiley,
suddenly arousing to the realization of other woes than her own, "do you
know Cousin Granger Catterwallis was over this morning, and he says
those Lathbuns stayed at Sammy's the night afore they came here. You
know they come in a pourin' rain. Did Sammy ever tell you about it?"
Mrs. Ray stopped her beating. She stood seemingly transfixed.
"Cousin Granger says they wanted to stay all night, with him, but he's
too afraid of a breach of promise suit since his wife died, so he
wouldn't keep them, but he took his spy-glass and watched them through
the gap and they clum Sammy's fence," (Mrs. Ray's face was a sight),
"and then he went up to his cupalo and watched them through a break in
the trees, and he says he knows they went in the house!"
Mrs. Ray folded her arms firmly. "Well," she said, "I never heard the
beat! Sammy never said one word to me!"
"And Cousin Catterwallis says he doesn't believe they've got any trunks
or any money or any real love affair, except what they may manage to
pick up along the way. He says he wouldn't trust the young one as far as
you can throw a cat, and he says he wouldn't trust the old one as far as
that. Hannah Adele, indeed! He says he don't believe she's even Hannah."
Mrs. Ray drew a long breath. "Oh, well, I wasn't meaning to marry him,
anyhow," she said, a little absent-mindedly. "I told him that to-day.
Sammy's mooney, and I've been married to one mooney man. There were days
when Mr. Ray would upset everything, from the beehives to his second
wife's baby--those were his mooney days. I don't want to have no more of
that!"
"Cousin Catterwallis says it wasn't just proper taking them in that way,
either," Mrs. Wiley continued; "he's going to see Jack O'Neil this
afternoon, and tell him his opinion. Cousin Catterwallis says the dam is
bringing very queer folks our way. He doesn't take no interest in the
dam because he's so far inland, but he says when the canal was put
through the Italians stole one of his father's hens, and he hasn't any
use for any kind of improvements since then."
Mrs. Ray began slowly beating her batter again. Her lips were firm and
her attitude painfully decided.
"The old lady says she's Mrs. Ida Lathbun," Mrs. Wiley went on; "I
wonder if their name is really Lathbun."
"I d'n know, I'm sure."
Mrs. Wiley turned her eyes on the bundle.
"When do you think you can get at my coat, Mrs. Ray?" the tone was sadly
earnest.
"To-morrow, I guess. I haven't much on hand to-morrow, except to sweep
out the church and do some baking. I was planning to dig potatoes and
go to South Ledge to fit a dress, but I'll leave that till early Monday.
Think of his keeping them all night and never telling me!"
"I guess I'll go down to Nellie's," said Mrs. Wiley, rising slowly; "the
Lathbuns sit in her kitchen evenings, and I'll just throw a few hints
about and see how they take it."
"I wish I could go, too," Mrs. Ray's eyes suddenly became keenly bright,
"but I can't. The mail's due."
Mrs. Wiley shook her head with the air of understanding the weightiness
of her friend's excuse. "I'll stop in on my way back, and tell you what
I find out," she said, kindly.
She went away and was absent all of an hour. When she returned, Mrs.
Ray's duties, both as postmistress and stepmother, were over for that
day, her cake was safe in the oven, and she sat by the lamp, knitting.
"What'd you find out?" she said, as the door yielded to Mrs. Wiley's
push.
"Well, not much." Mrs. Wiley came in and sat down. "They was both there
in the kitchen, and there's no use denying it's hard to find out
anything about folks when they're looking right at you. But I did hear
one thing you'll like to know, Mrs. Ray?"
"What was it?"
"Why, those two girls went off walking this morning, and the young one
came back with the man."
"Don't surprise me one bit," said Mrs. Ray. "I've been saying that was
what would happen from the minute I knew she was coming."
"I'm sort of sorry for the older one," said Mrs. Wiley; "she's real
nice. I'm sorry for any one who's thinnish--Lottie Ann's so thin."
"Those kind of blind-eyed people always have trouble, and nobody can
help it for 'em," said Mrs. Ray; "they make their own troubles as they
go along--if they don't come bump on to them while they're stargazing.
That girl's made for trouble; you can see it in her eyes. But didn't you
ask anything about Sammy?"
"I just couldn't--with them right there. The old lady sits with her feet
in the oven the whole time. I don't see how Nellie cooks."
"Feet in the oven! I should say so! Well, I'll ask Sammy just as soon as
I see him--I know that! Did you hear anything new about the dam?"
"No; Nellie says the surveyors say it'll be six months before any one
can tell anything."
"Huh!" Mrs. Ray's note was highly contemptuous.
"Why, Mrs. Ray, don't you believe the surveyors?"
"I never say what I believe, Mrs. Wiley, it's enough for me to say what
I think; but I _will_ say just this, and that is that if we get the dam,
it's precious little good it'll ever do us here in Ledge. It's fine work
talking, but the legislature and the Dam Commission aren't working day
and night for our good. It's men in Rochester and Buffalo who'll get the
good out of the dam, and we'll be left to find ourselves high and dry as
usual."
"Why, Mrs. Ray, you talk as if you was against the dam, or is it only
because Sammy took those women in that night?"
Poor Mrs. Wiley! She had inadvertently hit the bull's-eye. Mrs. Ray laid
down her knitting and rose at once.
"No, Mrs. Wiley, it _isn't_ because Sammy took those women in that
night. As if I'd care whether Sammy took two women in or not! Did I ever
care about Mr. Ray's other two wives? or about their children? I guess
if I can stand all I've stood from Mr. Ray's first wife's children, I
won't care who Sammy Adams takes in out of the wet. I'm surprised at
you, Mrs. Wiley."
Mrs. Wiley got up in great confusion. "I hope you'll excuse what I said,
Mrs. Ray; you see I wasn't really thinking what I did say. And it may
not have been them, anyhow. I must be goin', I guess; I don't like to
leave Lottie Ann alone like that. Good-by, Mrs. Ray."
Mrs. Ray folded her arms severely.
"Good-by, Mrs. Wiley," she said, with reserve.
CHAPTER VIII
MISS LATHBUN'S STORY
Curiously enough, just as Mrs. Wiley abruptly terminated her call on her
friend Mrs. Ray, owing to the unpleasant twist given their conversation
by the Lathbun family, Lassie and Alva were speaking of the same two
ladies, whom Lassie had met in the dining-room an hour before. Alva had
introduced her to both with that pleasant courtesy which was given to
none too careful social scrutiny. It was Alva's habit to deal with all
humanity on a broad footing of equality--a habit which her well-born
friends politely termed a failing, and which those of other classes
accepted as the thirsty accept water, just with content.
"Well, I'm glad I've seen them; now I feel as if I'd seen everything,
except the Lower Falls." Thus spoke Lassie, when the bedroom door was
shut, and she and her friend seemed well away from all the rest of the
world for the next ten hours, at least. Lassie, be it said, _en
passant_, had now sufficiently digested her first shock of surprise over
her friend's future, to be able to be pleasantly happy again.
"What did you think of them?" Alva answered, half absent-mindedly. She
held in her hand a letter which the belated mail had brought, and her
thoughts seemed to quit it with difficulty.
"I thought that they were rather common," said Lassie, frankly. Lassie
was well-born, and had judged Mrs. Lathbun and her daughter by no higher
standard than that of their blouses.
"Do you know, I thought so, too,--at first," her friend replied, putting
the letter down and going to the window where she remained with her back
to Lassie, looking out into the dark. "I thought at first that Mrs.
Lathbun looked like a cook--"
"She dresses exactly like one," interposed Lassie.
"But I've come to like them very much, indeed. Of course so few days are
not enough to really know any one, but the night before you came such a
curious thing happened. You know I told you that the daughter had a love
affair? Well, that was the night that I learned about it. I never had
anything come to me more strangely. Do you know, dear, I am continually
more and more convinced that nothing happens by chance, never."
"What did she tell you?"
Alva turned from the window and sat down by the lamp-table. "I'll tell
you; only you mustn't misjudge Miss Lathbun for confiding in me. People
become friends very quickly in a lonely place like this, you know."
"I won't misjudge her; I'll be glad to change my opinion of her. She
looks so like a restaurant girl."
"Lassie, you're incorrigible."
"But that dress, with that black cotton lace over that old red silk."
"I never even noticed it."
"Do you mean to say you've never noticed that dirty red silk front?"
Alva shaded her eyes with her hand. "Lassie," she said, almost sadly,
"why does nothing count in this world except the front of one's frock?"
Contrition smote the young girl. "Oh, forgive me, forgive me," she
pleaded; "I didn't think. I am interested! Play I didn't speak in that
way; I won't again. Indeed, I won't."
"Of course I'll forgive you, dear; it's nothing to forgive, anyway; but
it makes it so hard to tell anything serious when one sets out in such a
way. I wonder how many good and beautiful thoughts have died
unexpressed, just because their first breath was met with mocking!"
"Don't say that; I won't be that way--I'll never be that way again. I do
like Miss Lathbun--truly I do; I think she has sort of a sweet face, and
she must be clever to have been able to make a front of any kind out of
that lace. See, I'm quite serious now; and so interested. Do go on!"
Alva looked at her for a minute with a smile.
"You can't possibly overlook the front, can you?" she said; "but I will
go on, and you will learn never to judge again, as I learned myself; for
I must tell you, Lassie, that all you feel about them, I felt at
first--until I learned to know better. I didn't notice the front, but I
noticed some other things--little things like grammar; but American
grammar isn't a hard and fast proposition, anyway, you know."
"They just call it 'dialect' in so many places," said Lassie, wisely.
Alva smiled again. "Yes, they do," she assented.
"And now for Miss Lathbun's story?" suggested the girl.
"Yes, certainly. Well, my dear, you see, I was sitting here alone one
evening, and she came to the door and--and somehow she came in and we
fell to talking. You know how easy it is for any one to talk to me, and
after a while she told me her romance."
Lassie's eyes opened. "To think of a girl like that having a romance!
Please go on."
Alva hesitated, then smiled a little. "I suppose I can trust you to keep
a secret?" she asked.
Lassie began: "Why, of--" and then stopped suddenly, remembering the
morning's betrayal, and blushed crimson.
Alva leaned forward and touched her cheek with one petting finger.
"Dear," she said, "don't feel distressed. I know that you told Ronald
and I don't mind."
"You know!" cried Lassie, astonished.
"Yes, dear, I know. I saw it in both your faces when I came across the
bridge. I don't mind--I think it's better so. Truly, I do."
"Oh, Alva--" the young girl's tone was full of feeling.
"But you mustn't tell him Hannah Adele's love affair," Alva went on,
smiling; "remember that, my dear."
"I promise. Now tell me all about it." Lassie drew close, her face full
of eager curiosity mixed with content over being pardoned so simply.
"It's just like a story," Alva said, thoughtfully; "it's more
wonderful--almost--than my own. I never heard anything quite so
wonderfully story-like before. Tell me, did you notice at supper how
Mrs. Lathbun watched every one that came off of the train? She can see
the station through the window from where she sits, you know."
"No, I didn't notice. Does it matter?"
"Oh, no; only I used to notice it and now I know why she does it."
"Is she looking for the lover?"
"She's afraid of him, dear."
"Afraid!"
"Yes, afraid he'll find them."
"Goodness, are they hiding from him?"
"Mrs. Lathbun thinks that they are."
"And aren't they?"
Alva lowered her voice to a whisper. "He watches outside of this house
every night!" she said impressively.
Lassie quite jumped. "Watches! Outside this house! Oh, is he there now?"
"I don't know, perhaps so."
"What fun! Who does he watch for?"
"For Miss Lathbun, of course."
"But why does he do it?"
"She doesn't know; she only knows that he watches there."
"And her mother doesn't know that he is there?"
"No."
"How perfectly thrilling! Do go on!"
"It's really a very long story."
"I'll be patient."
"It taught me a big lesson, Lassie; it taught me not to judge. Just see
how quiet and simple these two look to be, and yet that plain, ordinary
appearing woman is trying to hide her daughter from a rich man."
"A rich man!"
"He's a millionaire."
"Who told you so?"
"She did."
Lassie stared. "Alva!--you don't believe that! That woman's never hiding
that girl from a millionaire. It isn't possible!"
"But she is, my dear. She's a true, good mother; she doesn't want her
daughter to marry him, because he is so dissipated."
"But I should think that they would run away and get married. I'd marry
a man, anyway, if I loved him."
"Ah, Lassie, you don't know what you'd do if you were in the position of
that poor girl. Her mother has taken her away and is stopping here in
this very quiet and unassuming way to avoid all notice or being found
out."
"But he has found them out!"
"Yes, but Mrs. Lathbun doesn't know it."
Lassie looked almost incredulous. "Mrs. Lathbun doesn't look a bit like
a woman who would hide her daughter away from a millionaire," she said,
obstinately.
"You see how easy it is to misjudge any one, Lassie; because that's what
she's doing."
"Mrs. O'Neil says they haven't any trunks or any clothes. She said so
this afternoon."
"I know; I've heard her say that before."
"Well, tell me the whole story."
Alva looked at her for a long dozen of seconds and then her lips curved
slightly. "I'm going to tell you," she said; "but, do you know, it just
comes over me that you are surely going to disbelieve it."
"Why do you think so?"
"Because it's so strange."
"But you believed it?"
"But I can believe anything. Believing is my forte. Once 'heretic' and
'unbeliever' meant the same thing; well, I am a believer."
Lassie laughed a little. "Go on and tell me the story," she said, "I'll
try to believe;" then, her face changing suddenly, she added, "it can
have a happy ending--can't it? Sometime?"
Alva flashed a quick, sad flash of understanding at her. "All stories
will have that some day," she said, gently. It was the first reference
on the lips of either to that morning's revelation.
"Do tell me the story," Lassie begged, after a minute's pause; "tell me
the whole. Do you think that perhaps he is out there now?"
Alva shook her head in protestation of ignorance as to that. "It seems
very medieval and devoted for him to be out there at all, don't you
think? And these nights are so cold, too."
"I should think that some one would see him sometimes?"
"I should, too."
"Well, go on. Has she known him always?"
"No; it seems that he lives in Cromwell where her mother was born, and
she met him there two years ago when they went there to visit."
"Did he fall in love with her at first sight?"
"I think so. She said the first thing that she knew he was talking about
her all the time, and then he began watching outside of their house at
night."
"Didn't he ever talk to her, or come inside the house?"
"Oh, Lassie, what makes you say things like that? They make the story
seem absurd; and I began it by telling you that her mother was bitterly
opposed to him on account of his reputation."
"I forgot," said Lassie, contritely; "is he so very bad?"
"I'm afraid so. He drinks and gambles and does everything that he
shouldn't, she says."
"But if he's rich he can afford it, can't he?"
Alva turned quickly. "How can you say a thing like that? As if money can
condone sin. Don't you know that a thoroughly bad man is a soulless
thing, and that to marry a man like that is either heroic or deeply
degrading, just according to whether one does it for love or for money."
"But you said that she loved him."
"Yes; but you said he could afford to be wicked!"
Lassie clasped her hands meditatively. "To think of that girl having a
millionaire watching outside her window, nights! And Mrs. O'Neil says
she hasn't even a nightgown with her, so she can't possibly get up in
the cold to peep out through the blinds."
"I suppose she couldn't do that, anyway," said Alva; "you see her mother
doesn't know he's there, so she couldn't get up to look."
"How does she know herself that he is there, then? perhaps he tells her
he watches and really stays in bed at some hotel."
"Lassie!"
"What's the use of his watching, anyway? Does it do any good? I should
think that she'd be afraid that he'd take cold. I--"
"Lassie, don't you see that it's his only way to prove his devotion? He
can't write her, so he watches outside her window, nights. She says
that he takes a handful of sand and throws it against the side of the
house, and she hears it and knows that he's there."
"Do you believe that?"
"I believe the whole story."
Lassie regarded her friend with amazement.
"I don't see how you can;" she said; "why, those two women would go
almost wild for joy if any man wanted to marry either of them."
"No, dear," Alva said, smiling; "no, they wouldn't. The world isn't
altogether worldly; there are simple, true, wholesome natures in it that
look at life in a straightforward way without any illusions. And Mrs.
Lathbun is one of those. Poor she may be, but she knows very well that
no possible happiness can come to her child from marrying a bad man who
has money."
"But her daughter wants to marry him, and he wants to marry her."
Alva paused before replying; then she said slowly:
"Lassie, there's the puzzle. Does he want to marry her?"
Lassie looked startled. "Doesn't he?" she asked.
"She doesn't know," said Alva; "you see, they have hardly ever exchanged
a word."
"Well," said the young girl, "this is the craziest love story I ever
heard in my life. Do you mean to say that you believe that a man who had
never heard a girl speak would go and stay outside her window, all night
long? What does he do all night, anyhow; walk about, or sit down? Alva,
you can't believe that story? Not possibly!"
"Yes, I believe it," said Alva, cheerfully. "I believe it for two or
three very good reasons. One is that there is no reason why the girl
should construct such a silly lie for my benefit; another is that truth
is always stranger than fiction; and the third is that she has a little
picture of him, and as soon as I saw the picture I saw why Fate brought
the Lathbuns and me together, and why the man waited outside her window
all night."
"Why?" Lassie's tone became suddenly curious.
"My dear, the man is the image of the man that I love. They might be
twin brothers. And men of such strength put through whatever they lay
their hands unto."
Lassie appeared dumbfounded.
"He looks like--" she stammered and halted.
"Yes, dear," Alva said, simply; "he looks exactly like him! Now you see
why I am interested. Now you see why I find it easy to believe. A bad
man--a thoroughly bad man--is a creature that for some reason has not
come into his heavenly birthright. If that girl, plain and pale and
unassuming as she looks, has the power to draw him from nights of
dissipation to nights in the cold outside her window, she has the power
to call a soul to him or waken his own that is but sleeping. It takes a
great deal of living and learning to attain to the faith which I have,
but I have it and I am firm in it, and I believe the story and I believe
that good is brewing for that man. I'm sure of it."
Alva spoke with such energetic earnestness, such dominating force, that
Lassie was silenced for the minute.
"I suppose that I am just stupid," she said, after a little; "I've had
so much that was different to try and learn to-day."
There was a pathos in her tone that led the older girl to lean quickly
near and take one of her hands, drawing her close as she did so. "I
know it, dear, I know it. And I appreciate it all more than you guess.
We won't talk of Miss Lathbun any more just now, and, dear, believe me
when I say that I'm truly very glad that you met Ronald just as you did
this morning and told him what I had told you. I see all this from all
its sides, and the views that differ from mine don't hurt me--believe
me, they don't. I understand exactly how Ronald's fine, robust manhood
would revolt quite as you yourself revolted; but, you and he, with all
the possibilities of your gorgeous, glorious youth, can no more measure
the joy of these days to my love and myself, than the gay little birds
measure what life is to you. To us, you two and your ideas are very much
like the birds; we are glad to see you enjoy the sunshine, and our
better gladness we know is quite beyond you."
Lassie turned her face upward to the earnest look and tender kiss, and
then they sat still for a little until Alva rose and began to make ready
for bed.
"Tell me," she said, as she loosened her hair; "it was like this, wasn't
it? At first Ronald was almost angry; and then his feeling changed and
he felt that because it was I, it was rather a different thing from what
it would have been if it had been any one else."
"Yes," said Lassie, in an awestruck tone, "it was just like that. How
did you know?"
Alva laughed. "Not because I am a witch," she said, "but just because I
know Ronald. You see, Lassie, I am much stronger than Ronald; I am
stronger than Ronald, just as Ronald is stronger than you. He could not
condemn me; he has to own I am right. Right is a might so great that
wherever it holds good it rules its kind. Ronald gives me my due; you
will, too, after a while. Only I must not drive either of you forward
too quickly." She laughed a little. "I must give you time," she added.
Lassie was taking down her own hair. She shook it apart now, and looked
forth from between the parted waves, her expression one of deeply
stirred interest. "I believe that this is going to be the most wonderful
time in my life," she said; "I feel as if everything were getting deeper
around me."
"Ah, dearest," said her friend, with a sigh that was not sad--only a
long breath; "that's very true. I should not have sent for you, only
that I knew that when you came to leave me and go back to the world to
wear your white gown and make your début, you would have become a
stronger, better, wiser, sweeter woman all your life through, for this
experience. You see, dear child, the rarest thing in the world of to-day
is sincerity--absolute truth. I am not especially gifted or very
remarkable in any way, but I have learned the value of being sincere. It
isn't a small thing to learn in life, Lassie, and it isn't a small
privilege to live for a few days with one who has learned the lesson.
When you see what truth really is, and what it may really do for one,
you won't be revolted by my marriage; you will never wonder over me any
more, and you'll learn to look at strange stories with a new light of
comprehension."
Lassie went close to her, put up her lips and kissed her.
"And I can tell Mr. Ingram about Miss Lathbun, too?" she asked very
simply; "or must I keep that secret, as you said at first?"
Alva put her arms fondly about the pretty young thing. "Lassie," she
said, "you are a dear, and I don't mind how much you discuss me with
Ronald; but you musn't tell him Miss Lathbun's secret. It wouldn't be
right."
"Very well, then, I won't," said Lassie; "and I will keep my word, too."
"Thank you," Alva said, patting her face caressingly; "thank you, and
heaven bless you and give you a good understanding."
Lassie looked up with a smile. "You think I may learn to look at things
in your way?"
"I think so," said Alva; "looking at things in my way has made me a very
happy woman, and so I desire the same for you."
Then she kissed her good night.
CHAPTER IX
PLEASANT CONVERSE
"Well, what did I tell you?" said Mrs. Ray to Mrs. Catt, a day or so
later, when that lady had dropped in for a little call. "Those two young
people up at Nellie O'Neil's have fallen in love just as sure as beans
are beans. Not that he's so young, either, but a man's always able to
fall in love whenever he gets a chance. Age don't matter. There was Mr.
Ray. He was always in love unless he was married. Yes, indeed."
"If he's engaged to that other one, I shouldn't think he'd find it very
easy to fall in love right under her nose, so to speak," said Mrs. Catt.
"She wouldn't notice," said Mrs. Ray, adjusting her shawl, and turning
the needlework in her hands; "she's the kind who don't even see the
things they go headlong over. She's the mooney kind. I know. Yes,
indeed. Mr. Ray had mooney days. There were days when Mr. Ray called me
by his first wife's name all day. Those were his mooney days."
"My cousin Eliza thinks she's crazy too. She says she's seen her time
and again setting on stumps in the woods, and she turns out in the road
for sparrows. And then that house. They're at it tooth and nail from
dawn to dark. I never see nothing like it."
"Yes," said Mrs. Ray; "there's others say that, too. She is queer!
Nellie says she often doesn't eat breakfast--nor any meat either. And
she talks about the dam as if we was all heathens laying the axe at the
root of our own mothers. She says all the trees ought to belong to the
United States Government. As if we wasn't singing 'Pass under the rod of
the Republican party' from dawn to dark now. Such a country!"
"She goes down to see Mr. Ledge, too," pursued Mrs. Catt; "of course he
don't want the dam, and he makes her more so. Josiah Bates was driving
home from Castile the other day, and he saw her coming from there.
Josiah said he was sure she'd been to see Mr. Ledge, 'cause she wasn't
ten feet from the house, and they was waving their hands to her from the
window. You can always depend on Josiah Bates knowing what he's talking
about."
"Yes," said Mrs. Ray, turning her work about; "yes, Josiah Bates is a
very careful observer. He'll never die of no fish-bone in his throat for
want of watching the fish."
"Speaking of fish-bones," said Mrs. Catt, "have you seen Lottie Ann
Wiley lately? There's a bag of bones for you!"
"Not for a week or so. Why? Is she thinner than she was?"
"Thinner! Well, I should say so. I don't know what the Wileys will do
with that girl if she keeps on getting thinner and paler."
"She isn't any paler than that girl at Nellie O'Neil's."
"Which one?"
"That Lathbun girl. Do you know anything about them?"
"That's what every one's asking."
Mrs. Ray threaded her needle. "They're a queer pair," she remarked.
"Well, I should say so. They don't eat any breakfast, either; make it up
on chestnuts. They're picking chestnuts all over. Lizzie says she never
saw people making so free. Folks don't know what to say, but it riles a
good many. They pick that little gray bag they've got full three or four
times a day."
"Well, I declare," said Mrs. Ray; "do you suppose they eat 'em all?"
Mrs. Catt rose. "I only stopped for a minute," she said. "Oh, I don't
know, I'm sure. Chestnuts is hearty, but seems to me they ought to ask
at the houses, anyway. Mrs. Wiley says if they come to her trees again,
she'll turn the bull in the lot."
"Must you go?" Mrs. Ray asked. "I thought Mrs. Wiley was afraid of the
bull."
"Yes, I must. What you making?"
"I'm putting a new lining in this vest for Elmer Hoskins. His dog chewed
it up, while he was asleep."
"Did he have it on?" Mrs. Catt asked in great surprise.
"No; he had it on the chair and it fell off."
"Fell off! I s'pose you've heard about Gran'ma Benton's parrot falling
off?"
"Falling off what? No, I haven't heard."
"Fell off the perch. I saw poor Clay this morning, and he's half mad.
The parrot and Gran'ma Benton have been discussing most all night
lately, and the parrot gets so mad he hops all over and last night he
got in a rage and fell off the perch. Broke the perch, too."
"Well, I declare," said Mrs. Ray; "why don't Clay show some spirit and
put a stop to all that? I would."
"He can't. Gran'ma Benton's so fond of discussing, and if she didn't
have the parrot she'd soon wear them all out."
"I thought she was wearing them out as it is."
"Well, yes--" Mrs. Catt looked cornered, "but, anyhow, they don't have
to do the talking now--the parrot does it. I'd like to see my husband's
mother have a parrot--that's all!" Mrs. Catt twitched her shawl
expressively.
"Poor Clay Wright Benton," said Mrs. Ray. "Just to look at him you'd
know it all. I do despise men who haven't got any spirit; but if they
have spirit of course they're almost worse to get on with. Yes, indeed."
"Yes, indeed!" said Mrs. Catt with meaning; "well, good-by, Mrs. Ray."
"Oh! Good-by."
Mrs. Catt went out.
It was only a few minutes later that Mrs. Wiley arrived, with another
large bundle wrapped up in newspaper.
"Don't stop your work," she said, putting it down with a sigh. "Oh, you
ain't sewing on my coat," she added, in a tone of deep disappointment,
evidently seeing interruption in a changed light at once.
"No, but I've cut it out. What you got there?"
"I've got another suit of father's."
Mrs. Ray eyed the bundle with thoughtfully compressed lips, and gave her
shawl a fresh tuck.
"What you want made out of this one?"
Mrs. Wiley hesitated. "It's such a handsome piece of cloth," she said,
"I'm willing to leave the cut to you, but I thought maybe you could get
a winter jacket for Lottie Ann out of this one?"
Mrs. Ray compressed her lips more, and frowned. "I don't know about
that," she said, shaking her head. "I've had trouble enough with the
last."
"This was his new when he died. After he reached three hundred. And it
isn't worn anywhere. You can get her big sleeves out of the hips, I
think."
"There's a good deal to a coat beside the sleeves," said Mrs. Ray; "that
coat of yours has most drove me mad. I never thought of your bringing me
another. Well, unroll it and let me look at it."
Mrs. Wiley began to unfasten the package.
"Any moth-holes in this one?" Mrs. Ray asked, with professional
interest.
"None to speak of. The only real hole is where he sat down on a engine
spark at the station, the day of his last shock."
"It isn't the suit he had on when the oil-tank exploded, then?"
"No," said Mrs. Wiley; "that was the last but one. The oil-tank was the
middle one of his three shocks."
She unfolded the garments and spread them out. Mrs. Ray watched her, and
continued her work at the same time.
"How's Lottie Ann?" she asked, presently.
"Oh, she's poorly," said Mrs. Wiley. "We're getting awful worried over
Lottie Ann. I thought maybe you could get her fronts out of his fronts;
you see, she's slimmer than I am."
"But her big spread will come lower than yours," said Mrs. Ray; "is
there any up and down to the cloth? How much does she weigh, anyhow?"
"Yes, there is an up and down. Ninety-six last time. That's mighty
little for her height. She only wanted it short, anyway."
"It'll have to be short. Yes, indeed. Why you must have weighed most
double that at her age. It's too bad men always have pockets."
"He would have them; you know how father always set store by pockets.
There, that's the engine spark. I don't know, I'm sure, what we'll do
about her. Mr. Wiley says his grandmother went just so--" Mrs. Wiley's
voice broke suddenly; she took out her handkerchief and dried her eyes.
"Do you see any way to getting the fronts out?" she asked, falteringly,
after a minute.
"You musn't look to the worst that way," said Mrs. Ray, soothingly;
"those thin girls pick up wonderfully. The only way I see is if you've
got braid. If you've got any braid, I can piece it back of the braid.
She may marry and be as well as any one. Look at her great-grandmother
you just spoke of. Yes, indeed."
"I haven't got any braid. But I can buy some. Judy was up from the St.
Helena road yesterday, and she said to give her milk--all she'll drink."
"Turn it over so I can see the back," said Mrs. Ray; "will she drink it,
though? That's the question. She was up for the mail two nights ago, and
I thought she looked pretty well-willed. That's a nice piece of cloth.
My, but you were lucky he didn't have it on when the oil-tank exploded.
Yes, indeed. It's better cloth than the other."
"Yes, that's what I think. That's just the trouble, Mrs. Ray; she will
_not_ drink it."
"You never was severe enough with her. Not but what if it hadn't burnt
through you could get the oil out, maybe."
"I know it, but she's my only girl. I thought you could use the same
buttons. Eleven boys, and then that one girl. She's named for Mr.
Wiley's mother and my mother. Charlotte, you know. See, Mrs. Ray,
there's six of each size, one on each cuff, too. And all so stout but
her. The boys and their father got together on the hay scales the other
day, and they went up over two thousand pounds. Did you hear about it?"
Mrs. Ray stopped sewing and scanned the new proposition with one eye
half closed.
"I'd have to piece the sleeves; you'd have to make up your mind to that.
Were they in the wagon?"
"No, just standing on the scales. You think you can manage it if you
piece them--don't you?"
"Yes, I can manage it then. I can get my backs out below the knee, and
get her sides out of his backs."
"Oh, Mrs. Ray, you've taken a load off my mind. I'm so glad to get these
awful sad remembrances done some good with. I made pillow-slips out of
his nightshirts, but his flannels will haunt me till I die. Eddy's the
only one of the boys that is ever going to grow to them, and Eddy never
wears flannel."
"I should think you could use 'em up to cover the ironing-table. Who did
you say was picking chestnuts,--Mrs. Lathbun and her daughter?"
"I haven't said a word about them." Mrs. Wiley opened her eyes widely.
"But I'm hearing about them all over. I don't believe she's her daughter
any more than you are. They're a nice pair, those two. Chestnuts six
dollars a bushel, and they picking them morn, noon, and night. Have you
seen Sammy Adams? He took them in the night before they got here, you
know. You heard of that."
"Yes, I did." Mrs. Ray's lips came together; "I shall ask him all about
that taking them in, the first time I see him. Never bought a stamp yet!
Such doings! They're not respectable. Don't tell _me_."
"You're terrible prejudiced in your opinions, Mrs. Ray; you judge
everybody by the stamps they buy."
"It's all I have to judge strangers by," said Mrs. Ray, "and it's a
pretty good guide, too. Mrs. Lathbun don't buy stamps and nobody can't
tell me that she's on the square. Wait till I see Sammy!"
"When do you think you can try mine on?" asked Mrs. Wiley.
"Will next Thursday do?"
"Yes, I don't want to wear it till Thanksgiving; I won't go to Buffalo
till Christmas. Lottie Ann won't want hers till then."
"I can do them both by Thanksgiving," said Mrs. Ray. "I've got a few
little jobs to do for others, and I want to build a new back fence, and
I guess I'm going to get the contract for whitewashing the church
cellar, I'm bidding on it. But after that, except for my house-cleaning
and my boarders and my regular duties under the United States
Government, I haven't got anything particular on hand."
"I'll be so glad," said Mrs. Wiley, moving towards the door. "We're all
so kind of upset about not knowing whether Uncle Purchase will come and
live with us or not if the dam goes through, that I want to have my
things in order, anyhow. He wrote, you know."
"No, I didn't know, but I guess he'll come and live with you, anyway,"
said Mrs. Ray; "good-by."
Mrs. Wiley went out, and before long there was another caller,--Clay
Wright Benton himself this time, usually called "poor Clay Wright
Benton" by his friends, for the simple reason that he was Sarah Benton's
husband, and his mother's son.
"How d'ye do," he said, opening the door a few inches and looking in
through it. "No, I won't come in; I only stopped to speak about the hay.
You said I could have it, you know."
"Yes, I know," said Mrs. Ray; "but I said, if you came before October
first. That's past now, and Elmer took it off yesterday. Him and his dog
was here at sun up and away again by noon. You see now what it is to
take your own time."
Clay Wright Benton stood still, turning his cap about and about.
"I thought you knew I wanted it," he said, finally; "I couldn't come
sooner."
"I did know. But I thought you needed a lesson. Nobody that wants to get
ahead in this world can take their own time. You've got to be a little
ahead of other people's time if you really want to make your mark. How's
Susan? Got back from her father's yet?"
"No," said the man; "she's going to stay till Thanksgiving. She was so
awful tired of the parrot."
"Look out you don't leave her too long--same as the hay," said Mrs. Ray,
cheerfully. "Who's that coming up the steps behind you? I can feel the
draught as long as you stand there in the crack, but I can't see through
your body."
Clay Wright Benton moved aside, and Mrs. Dunstall pushed past him. "I'm
sorry I was late about the hay," he said then, and went slowly away.
Mrs. Benton and his mother had left very little spirit in him.
"What did he come for?" asked Mrs. Dunstall, shutting the door tightly.
"I'm sorry for Susan. She married him for his looks, and looks is all he
ever had to give her." The attitude of the community was that of larger
communities towards the humbly unsuccessful in life.
"He ain't giving her even looks, any more," said Mrs. Ray; "she's gone
home, and his looks is gone heaven knows where. No man was ever so
handsome yet that he could rise above needing to sh
Showing first 200,000 characters. Full text: gutenberg.org/ebooks/37515