Part 47 (1/2)
”Charles,” feebly whispered Mrs. Belmont.
”Yes, and Mrs. g.a.y.l.o.r.d, who ought also to be here,” remarked the colonel, ”for I have good news of her husband. He will be liberated and sent north in a very short time.” How bright the sky can be after the clouds are driven out of it!
CHAPTER XLI.
”GOOD BYE.”
Gentle reader, would you like to follow the friends whom you have met in this simple narrative still farther in the histories of their eventful lives? Has your acquaintance thus far been a pleasant one? This is not all. Every thoughtful mind will draw from the characters of history or romance such lessons of hope and faith as cheer the heart in sorrow or beneath the depressions of despondency something that will guide when the soul is perplexed or shrinking. Sad indeed would the writer of this story be, if in the delineations of the history of our little heroine no lonely wayfarer should be comforted, or no friendless waif taught to look up for the hand that safely leads. G.o.d is kind and watchful towards his children, a.s.suring them that they are ”better than many sparrows,”
and therefore cannot fall to the ground without his notice; but is also just to punish and chasten those who oppose his little ones.
Have these truths been set impressively before you? If so we will raise the curtain yet a little higher and glance for one moment into the lives and homes of the few in whom you are interested, after the terrible war is over and peace again settles down like a holy benediction over our beautiful land.
Colonel Hamilton could not be spared from the important position he had occupied from the commencement of the struggle, and although his visits home were frequent, the elegant house on Broad street wore an air of desolation as the shadows of realities and uncertainties crept into it.
The reports of victories and defeats brought terror and dismay into every heart, for loved ones were in jeopardy and mourning was in the land.
One day there came a letter from the absent husband that thickened the veil of apprehension and spread a new gloom over the hearts of those who read it. ”We must expect bad news my dear wife,” it went on to say; ”and although I would s.h.i.+eld my cherished ones from war's disasters I cannot do it. Reports were brought in last night by our scouts that Rosedale was in ashes and your brother, in a desperate hand to hand encounter with some of the boys in blue, received a wound from which he died before reaching the hospital camp. I was hoping to be able to s.h.i.+eld him, and for our mother's sake send him north. But now he is beyond our reach.”
”My poor, poor brother!” cried Mrs. Hamilton, as the letter dropped from her hands. ”I had placed so much hope on his coming! What can I tell Mother? She is so much better, and was asking only this morning when Charles would be here?”
”We cannot break the new sad news to her,” replied the daughter; ”let us wait for Father. Somehow he is able to do everything without difficulty.”
Lillian smiled in spite of her tears. ”Yes, darling, we will wait.” But it could not be. The hungry heart of the mother was enduring the agony of famis.h.i.+ng, and her cries for her only son were truly pitiful.
”Let the consequences be what they may I cannot longer endure her appeals; she must know the truth,” she said to Lily one morning some weeks after. ”Mother--Pearl cannot send him to you--how gladly he would do it if he could; but it is too late!”
”Too late?”
”Yes, Mother; the war you know. It has destroyed Rosedale, scattered the servants and--”
”Charles?”
”Charles has fallen into the ruin.”
”Charles? Will he not come?”
”Never Mother; he is dead! And we are alone!”
”Dead! Dead! And he will not come! Gone! All, all gone!” and the white fingers linked themselves together, twisting and untwisting with a slow nervous motion as they lay upon her lap, while her large eyes never moved their gaze from the face before her.
”Dead! Dead!” she murmured.
”Pearl will be here by and by, and he will love you and be as true a son as my brother would have been. Let us wait and watch for him now.”
”Dead! Dead! My boy--my Charles!” From this one subject nothing could divert her thoughts. The sad, mournful wail bubbled up from her stricken heart as naturally as her breath issued from her lungs, moaning and breathing; yet not a tear moistened the burning eyeb.a.l.l.s, until one morning while Vina was arranging her dress for the day and telling her how ”de poor heart broke when little Shady went out and neber more come back,” the unseen hand laid a finger upon the main-spring of human life and it stopped. Mrs. Belmont, the ambitious mistress of Rosedale was also dead! The flickering light of a once ma.s.sive brain was blown out; the prison door opened, and the pent-up soul was gone! Now indeed were the shadows deepened! The emblems of mourning were upon the door and reflected their sombre shade's over everything within.
Colonel Hamilton could not leave his regiment, as they were engaged in active duty; and so the daughter laid her away in Woodland cemetery under the cool shadows, as the setting sun was scattering its last rays upon the sparkling waters at the base of the hill. As the birds were chanting their good-night songs the solemn cortege turned away--back to life with all of its coming and stirring events, yet with heavy hearts.
”Yes, darling, we will leave Aunt Vina sole mistress of all and go to Kirkham for a few weeks at least,” Mrs. Hamilton said a few mornings after, in answer to her daughter's plea.