Part 46 (2/2)
It was agreed at the breakfast-table that we should all go to meeting.
”Mrs. Yocomb,” I said, finding her alone for a moment, ”won't you be moved this morning? I need one of your sermons more than any heathen in Africa. Whatever your faith is, I believe in it, for I've seen its fruits.”
”If a message is given to me I will not be silent; if not, it would be presumptuous to speak. But my prayer is that the Spirit whom we wors.h.i.+p may speak to thee, and that thou wilt listen. Unless He speaks, my poor words would be of no avail.”
”You are a mystery to me, Mrs. Yocomb, with your genial homely farm life here, and your mystical spiritual heights at the meeting-house.
You seem to go from the kitchen by easy and natural transition to regions beyond the stars, and to pa.s.s without hesitancy from the companions.h.i.+p of us poor mortals into a Presence that is to me supremely awful.”
”Thee doesn't understand, Richard. The little faith I have I take with me to the kitchen, and I'm not afraid of my Father in heaven because he is so great and I'm so little. Is Zillah afraid of her father?”
”I suppose you are right, and I admit that I don't understand, and I don't see how I could reason it out.”
”G.o.d's children,” she replied, ”as all children, come to believe many blessed truths without the aid of reason. It was not reason that taught me my mother's love, and yet, now that I have children, it seems very reasonable. I think I learned most from what she said to me and did for me. If ever children were a.s.sured of love by their Heavenly Father, we have been; if it is possible for a human soul to be touched by loving, unselfish devotion, let him read the story of Christ.”
”But, Mrs. Yocomb, I'm not one of the children.”
”Yes, thee is. The trouble with thee is that thee's ashamed, or at least that thee won't acknowledge the relation, and be true to it.”
”Dear Mrs. Yocomb,” I cried in dismay, ”I must either renounce heathenism or go away from your influence,” and I left precipitately.
But in truth I was too far gone in human idolatry to think long upon her words; they lodged in my memory, however, and I trust will never lose their influence.
CHAPTER XIII
THE OLD MEETING-HOUSE AGAIN
Reuben and I, with Dapple, skimmed along the country roads, and my hope and spirits kindled, though I scarcely knew why. We were early at the meeting-house, and, to my joy, I gained my old seat, in which I had woven my June day-dream around the fair unknown Quakeress whose face was now that of a loved sister. What ages, seemingly, had elapsed since that fateful day! What infinite advances in life's experiences I had made since I last sat there! How near I had come to the experiences of another life! The fact made me grave and thoughtful. And yet, if my fear and not my hope were realized, what a burden was imposed upon me with the life that disease had spared! Had I even Mrs. Yocomb's faith, I knew it would be a weight under which I would often stagger and faint.
Before very long the great family rockaway unloaded its precious freight at the horse-block, and Adah and Miss Warren entered, followed by the little girls. In secret wonder I saw Adah pause before the same long, straight-backed bench or pew, and Miss Warren take the place where I had first seen my ”embodiment of June.” Mrs. Yocomb went quietly to her place on the high seat.
”The spell continues to work, but with an important change,” I thought.
In a few moments Mr. Yocomb marshalled in Mr. Hearn, and placed him in the end of the pew next to Miss Warren on the men's side, so that they might have the satisfaction of sitting together, as if at church. He then looked around for me; but I shook my head, and would not go up higher.
Soon all the simple, plainly apparelled folk who would attend that day were in their places, and the old deep hush that I so well remembered settled down upon us. The sweet low monotone of the summer wind was playing still among the maples. I do believe that it was the same old b.u.mblebee that darted in, still unable to overcome its irate wonder at a people who could be so quiet and serene. The sunlight flickered in here and there, and shadowy leaves moved noiselessly up and down the whitewashed wall. Only the occasional song of a bird was wanting to reproduce the former hour, but at this later season the birds seem content with calls and chirpings, and in the July heat they were almost as silent as we were.
But how weak and fanciful my June day-dream now seemed. Then woman's influence on my life was but a romantic sentiment. I had then conjured up a pretty vista full of serene, quiet domestic joys, which were to be a solace merely of my real life of toil and ambition. I had thought myself launched on a s.h.i.+ning tide that would bear me smoothly to a quiet home anchorage; but almost the first word that Emily Warren spoke broke the spell of my complacent, indolent dream, and I awoke to the presence of an earnest, large-souled woman, who was my peer, and in many respects my superior; whom, so far from being a mere household pet, could be counsellor and friend, and a daily inspiration. Instead of shrinking from the world with which I must grapple, she already looked out upon its tangled and cruel problems with clear, intelligent, courageous eyes; single-handed she had coped with it and won from it a place and respect. And yet, with all her strength and fearlessness, she had kept her woman's heart gentle and tender. Oh, who could have better proof of this than I, who had seen her face bending over the little unconscious Zillah, and who had heard her low sob when she feared I might be dying.
The two maidens sat side by side, and I was not good enough to think of anything better or purer than they. Adah, with her face composed to its meeting-house quiet, but softened and made more beautiful by pa.s.sing shades of thought; still it seemed almost as young and childlike as that of Zillah. Miss Warren's profile was less round and full, but it was more finely chiselled, and was luminous with mind. The slightly higher forehead, the more delicately arched eyebrow, the deeper setting of her dark, changing eyes, that were placed wide apart beneath the overhanging brow, the short, thin, tremulous upper lip, were all indications of the quick, informing spirit which made her face like a transparency through which her thoughts could often be guessed before spoken; and since they were good, n.o.ble, genial thoughts, they enhanced her beauty. And yet it had occurred to me more than once that if Miss Warren were a depraved woman she could give to evil a deadly fascination.
”Are her thoughts wandering like mine?” I mused. With kindling hope I saw her face grow sad, and I even imagined that her pallor increased.
For a long time she looked quietly and fixedly before her, as did Adah, and then she stole a shy, hesitating glance at Mr. Hearn by her side; but the banker seemingly had found the silent meeting a trifle dull, for his eyes were heavy, and all life and animation had faded out of his full white face. Was it my imagination, or did she slightly shrink from him? In an almost instantaneous flash she turned a little more and glanced at me, and I was caught in the act of almost breathless scrutiny. A sudden red flamed in her cheeks, but not a Friend of them all was more motionless than she at once became.
My conscience smote me. Though I watched for her happiness as truly as my own, the old meeting-house should have been a sanctuary even from the eyes of love. I knew from the expression of her face that she had not liked it; nor did I blame her.
I was glad to have the silence of the meeting broken; for a venerable man rose slowly from the high seat and reverently enunciated the words:
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