Part 20 (2/2)
”You need n't tell me what it is,” said Brent. ”I know that my father is here.”
Eliphalet started up. ”Who told you?” he said; ”some blockhead, I 'll be bound, who did n't break it to you gently as I would 'a' done. Actu'lly the people in this here town--”
”Don't blame the people, Uncle 'Liph,” said the young man, smiling in spite of himself. ”I found it out for myself before I arrived; and, I a.s.sure you, it was n't gently broken to me either.” To the old man's look of bewildered amazement, Brent replied with the story of his meeting with his father.
”It 's the good Lord's doin's,” said Eliphalet, reverently.
”I don't know just whose doing it is, but it is an awful accusation to put on the Lord. I 've still got enough respect for Him not to believe that.”
”Freddie,” exclaimed the old man, horror-stricken, ”you ain't a-gettin'
irreverent, you ain't a-beginnin' to doubt, air you? Don't do it. I know jest what you 've had to bear all along, an' I know what you 're a-bearin' now, but you ain't the only one that has their crosses. I 'm a-bearin' my own, an' it ain't light neither. You don't know what it is, my boy, when you feel that somethin' precious is all your own, to have a real owner come in an' s.n.a.t.c.h it away from you. While I thought yore father was dead, you seemed like my own son; but now it 'pears like I 'ain't got no kind o' right to you an' it 's kind o' hard, Freddie, it 's kind o' hard, after all these years. I know how a mother feels when she loses her baby, but when it 's a grown son that 's lost, one that she 's jest been pilin' up love fur, it 's--it 's--” The old man paused, overcome by his emotions.
”I am as much--no, more than ever your son, Uncle 'Liph. No one shall ever come between us; no, not even the man I should call father.”
”He is yore father, Freddie. It 's jest like I told Hester. She was fur sendin' him along.” In spite of himself, a pang shot through Brent's heart at this. ”But I said, 'No, no, Hester, he 's Fred's father an' we must take him in, fur our boy's sake.'”
”Not for my sake, not for my sake!” broke out the young man.
”Well, then, fur our Master's sake. We took him in. He was mighty low down. It seemed like the Lord had jest spared him to git here. Hester 's with him now, an'--an'--kin you stand to hear it?--the doctor says he 's only got a little while to live.”
”Oh, I can stand it,” Brent replied, with unconscious irony. The devotion and the goodness of the old man had softened him as thought, struggle, and prayer had failed to do.
”Will you go in now?” asked Eliphalet. ”He wants to see you: he can't die in peace without.”
The breath came hard between his teeth as Brent replied, ”I said I would n't see him. I came because I thought you needed me.”
”He 's yore father, Freddie, an' he 's penitent. All of us pore mortals need a good deal o' furgivin', an' it does n't matter ef one of us needs a little more or a little less than another: it puts us all on the same level. Remember yore sermon about charity, an'--an' jedge not. You 'ain't seen all o' His plan. Come on.” And, taking the young man by the hand, he led him into the room that had been his own. Hester rose as he entered, and shook hands with him, and then she and her husband silently pa.s.sed out.
The sufferer lay upon the bed, his eyes closed and his face as white as the pillows on which he reclined. Disease had fattened on the hollow cheeks and wasted chest. One weak hand picked aimlessly at the coverlet, and the laboured breath caught and faltered as if already the hand of Death was at his throat.
The young man stood by the bed, trembling in every limb, his lips now as white as the ashen face before him. He was cold, but the perspiration stood in beads on his brow as he stood gazing upon the face of his father. Something like pity stirred him for a moment, but a vision of his own life came up before him, and his heart grew hard again. Here was the man who had wronged him irremediably.
Finally the dying man stirred uneasily, muttering, ”I dreamed that he had come.”
”I am here.” Brent's voice sounded strange to him.
The eyes opened, and the sufferer gazed at him. ”Are you--”
”I am your son.”
”You--why, I--saw you--”
”You saw me in Cincinnati at the door of a beer-garden.” He felt as if he had struck the man before him with a lash.
”Did--you--go in?”
”No: I went to your temperance meeting.”
The elder Brent did not hear the ill-concealed bitterness in his son's voice. ”Thank G.o.d,” he said. ”You heard--my--story, an'--it leaves me--less--to tell. Something--made me speak--to you that--night. Come nearer. Will--you--shake hands with--me?”
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