HEARTS' TRAGEDIES
"So she sent him away to fight his battle alone, knowing it was the only
way such a battle could be rightly fought."
When Miss Farwell, under the oak tree in the Academy yard, turned her
eyes from the far blue roll of hills to see Dan Matthews coming through
the gap in the tumble-down fence, it was as if he had appeared in answer
to her thoughts, and the intensity of her emotions at the moment,
frightened her.
Her first impulse was to escape. Then she sat still, watching him as if
fascinated, while her trembling fingers picked at the young grass by her
side. With his face turned toward the valley below, Dan came slowly
across the weed-grown yard, unconscious of the presence of the young
woman on the knoll. Then he looked in her direction. With her face turned
quickly half-aside, she saw him stop suddenly as if halted by the same
feeling that had so moved her.
For a full minute he stood there as if questioning his senses. The girl
sat very still. Once she thought he would turn back--then he came on
eagerly, as he had come that day from the water when he had looked up to
see her on the river bank. And then he stood before her as he had stood
that other day long weeks ago, with the sunlight on his red-brown hair.
There was now no word of formal greeting. None was needed. Each seemingly
knew the travail of soul of the other.
Dropping down on the grass by her side he said quietly, as if it were
unnecessary that he should speak at all, "I thought you were in the
garden this afternoon."
"And I thought you were in the garden," she returned.
He looked at her in wondering gladness, saying, "I had a caller. After
that I could not go."
"And I--I too had a caller; and after that I--I could not go." The words
were spoken almost in a whisper. Her trembling fingers were picking again
at the short young grass; she was looking far away beyond the sweeping
line of blue. One foot had slipped a little from under the protecting
shelter of the blue skirt. He saw with a flush of anger that the shoe was
very shabby. The skirt, too, showed unmistakable signs of wear. He
controlled himself with difficulty, saying, "Your caller was--?"
"Miss Charity Jordan. And yours?"
"Elder Jordan." Dan looked away, and when he spoke again he said
bitterly, "Then I suppose you know?"
At his tone and manner she turned her face quickly to his, permitting him
for the first time to search her eyes. It was as if she wanted to comfort
him, to reassure him.
"Yes!" she said softly, gladly, triumphantly, "Yes, I know!"
Something in her confident reply caused the minister to forget all his
half-formed resolutions. His work, his life, the possible outcome, the
world itself--were lost in the overpowering rush of the passion-flood
that swept his being. His deep voice trembled. "Then you know that I
love you--love you!"
He repeated the simple words as if laying his whole self--body, soul and
spirit, at her feet.
And the woman, in very wonder at the fullness of the offering, was as one
transfixed and could find no word fit to express her acceptance of the
gift.
"It is my right to tell you this," he said proudly--defiantly almost, as
though challenging some unseen spirit or power. "And it is your right to
answer me."
"Yes," she said, "it is our right."
"Then you do care for me, Hope? I am not mistaken--you do?"
"Can you doubt it?" she asked.
He moved quickly toward her but she checked him, and while the love in
her eyes answered to the mastering passion in his, she seemed in some
subtle manner to build up a protecting wall between them, a wall to guard
them both.
"I do not understand," he faltered.
"You must think," she bade him quietly, firmly. "Don't you see that,
while it is right for you to tell me what you have, and right for me to
tell you how proud--how glad your words have made me, and how with all
my heart and life I--I--love you, this--," her voice faltered now, "don't
you see that this must be all?"
"All?" he questioned.
"All," she answered. "Everything that I said to you the first day that we
met here is still true. Don't you see that I can never, never be more to
you than I am now?"
As one who hears himself sentenced to life-exile Big Dan dropped his
head, burying his face in his hands.
And seeing him so, such a figure of helpless strength, the woman's gray
eyes filled with tears, that were not yet permitted to fall. In his
presence she would be strong--afterwards her own heart should have its
way.
Once her hand went out, slowly towards the shaggy red-brown hair, but
was silently withdrawn, and the trembling white fingers again plucked
the young blades of grass.
So they sat, these two--face to face with their hearts' tragedy,
each--for the other's sake--striving to be strong.
"Tell me," he said at last, raising his head but not looking her in the
face, and speaking in tones that were strained and hard, "if I were
anything else, if I were engaged in any other work, would you be my
wife?"
"Why do you ask that?"
"Because I must know," he answered almost harshly.
"If you were a common laborer, a business or professional man, if your
work was anything honorable and right, save what it is--yes, gladly; oh,
how gladly!"
"Then," he burst forth hotly, "I will give up my work. I will be
something else!"
"You would give up your ministry for me?" she questioned doubtfully;
"your chosen life work?"
His voice sank to a hoarse whisper. "Yes, and if it need be--my religion,
my God."
As he finished speaking she laid her hand on his arm. "Hush, oh hush!
That is not worthy of you; it is not true to our love. You are beside
yourself."
He continued eagerly, "But I have learned that other work is just as
holy, just as sacred, as the work of the preacher and the church. You do
not know how in the past months I have been teaching this. Why should I
not give my life to some of these other ministries?"
"Because it is not some other work that calls you now. These other
ministries are not yours," she answered gently. "I have learned to love
you because you are so truly yourself, because you are so true to
yourself. You must not disappoint me now. And you will not," she
continued, confidently, "I know that you will not."
At last when he had argued, protested and pleaded until she was so beset
by both his passion and her own that she felt her strength going, she
said: "Don't, oh please don't! I cannot listen to more of this now. It
is not fair to either of us. You must have time to think alone. I believe
I know you even better than you know yourself. You must leave me now. You
must promise that you will not try to see me again until tomorrow
afternoon at this same hour. I will be in the garden with the others
until four o'clock, when I will go to the house alone. If then you have
decided that you can, with all truthfulness to yourself and me, give up
your ministry, come to me and I will be your wife. But whether you come
or not you must always believe that I love you, that I shall always love
you, as my other self, and that I shall never, never doubt your love for
me."
So she sent him away to fight his battle alone, knowing it was the only
way such a battle could be rightly fought, and because she wanted him,
for his own sake, to have the certainty of a self-won victory, never
doubting in her own heart what that victory would be or what it would
mean to her. She indeed knew him better than he knew himself.