THE SON OF THE MORNING.
The French Cross pony had always been regarded as an intelligent and
highly cultured animal, an amusement to his mistress and the town in
general, and by no means a source of melancholy.
Yet such he became after Miss Gastonguay had been laid to rest by the
largest concourse of people that had ever assembled to do honour to a
citizen of Rossignol.
The pony did not understand that his dear mistress lay under the green
mound in the cemetery. He had seen her carried to the house, he had
never seen her come out, and his mystification was complete. Where
was she? How had she the heart to elude him? He was getting thin and
doleful, and his tiny hoofs ached at night from his constant trottings
to and fro.
She was not up among the grand houses across the river, for he daily
craned his neck over their garden hedges until different members of the
Potts family would come to stroke him kindly, and murmur, "Poor pony,
she is not here."
Perhaps then she was among the poor people, and in joyful expectation
he would hurry across the bridge to the canning factories. Sometimes
the herring boats would be nearing the wharves, and the factory
whistles would be sounding in a deafening chorus. She used to enjoy
seeing men, women, and children running to their work. Perhaps he would
discover her standing in some doorway, and he earnestly scanned the
passing faces.
No, she was never there, and disappointedly he would drag himself
through the town, stopping at the stores, the bank, and the office
of Potts Brothers, where Mr. Jonah Potts would wink his red eyes and
mutter that he wished some one would shoot that pony.
The whole town wished him dead,--the little lean animal with the
pitiful eyes and weary manner,--yet there was not a man in Rossignol
who would have pointed a revolver at him.
Poor pony! his life was indeed a hard one, and if it had not been for
Chelda, he would have died.
This afternoon he had returned home from a long expedition into the
country. He had had a sudden thought of a distant farm on a bleak and
barren hillside. Alas! his mistress was not there, and now he stood
listlessly regarding the sugar-bowl that Chelda offered him.
All his life he had longed for a whole bowl of sugar. Now he had it
and he did not care for it.
"Take it back to the house," said his new mistress, and Prosperity
mournfully obeyed her.
Chelda resumed her former position. She always sat here when the
weather was fine,--here in her aunt's favourite summer-house that faced
down the river toward the sea. She neither read, nor worked, nor saw
visitors. She was always alone. Sometimes she smoothed her black dress
and thoughtfully turned the mourning ring on her hand, while she gazed
at the pony, but she rarely spoke to him. She only caressed him, and he
broken-heartedly felt that the house was melancholy, and that with her
he was losing interest in life.
On this day there was a kind of inexorable sparkle and brilliancy
on land and sky. Everything shone and glittered, and Chelda's weary
eyes were dazzled, yet she gazed steadfastly and immovably out at the
rippling Bay.
The pony languidly went down to the river to get a drink, then, as he
came up with the water dripping from his mouth, he slightly moved his
nostrils and stared down the avenue.
His quick hope died within him. The manly step belonged to a man; but
it was no stranger that was swinging himself over the gravel. The
handsome figure had formerly been well known at French Cross, and only
a few months ago those firm white hands had gone all over his trim
white body while their owner examined his points.
The man with the radiant, glowing face stopped suddenly. Himself the
embodiment of life and hope and perfect happiness, he was inexpressibly
touched by the pathos of the little lean pony.
If the pony had changed so completely, what would he see when the
gray-haired woman turned her head? Well, no matter, pony and woman
would soon belong to him. He would take them both away.
"Chelda," he said, wistfully. "Chelda, Chelda!"
She would not turn. He caught only a convulsive movement of her
beautiful shoulders.
He must see that face bent so fixedly on the Bay.
"My darling," he murmured, stepping close beside her. He saw her now,
thin, wistful, pitiably changed, yet more attractive in her haggard
looks than she had ever been in her composure and brilliancy.
In speechless compassion he approached her.
She did not give him her hand. "Were you not told at the house that I
preferred to see no one?" she asked, in a dull voice.
"Yes, yes; but I did not heed the warning."
"And you force your society on me?" she said, in the same monotonous
way.
"Force it," he repeated, with tender reproach, "Chelda, have you
forgotten?"
"I have forgotten nothing," and she again turned her face toward the
Bay.
She was painfully weak and nervous. Successive waves of colour were
hurrying over her face, and her breast rose and fell convulsively.
"I also remember," he said, masterfully, "and, Chelda, you must listen
to me."
He took a seat near her and laid his hat on the table.
"I shall speak frankly," he said, "to you, the woman I love and am
going to marry. No, do not take your hand from me. You are mine, if
ever a woman belonged to a man. Let me tell you what has happened since
I left you."
She allowed him to retain her hand, but kept her face averted while he
gave her an account of his father's death and his reconciliation with
his family.
"And," he went on, "when I once more saw eye to eye relatives who are
dear to me, a great happiness came over me. Duty and the possession
of wealth seemed to point to a life with these same relatives,
but something urged me on. Chelda, I have at last found peace in
religion,--the true, not the spurious religion. My heart became
humbled. Not to crowded cities but to the wilderness a call came to
me. I have been among the Indians in the West. If I could describe
to you the joy of my life, the ecstasy, not of renunciation, but of
participation in their lives! Only one thing could draw me from them.
Do you know what that one thing was?"
She tried to answer him in a conventional tone, to assure him that she
did not know, that she would be interested in hearing, but her breath
came and went in fluttering gasps, and she could not speak.
"You, my darling. I have been kept informed of your movements. I know
everything. At this juncture you need me. I am here,--here to take you
back with me.
"My darling, my darling!" and gently putting his arm around her
trembling form he kissed her feverish cheeks.
She drew away from him. "I murdered my aunt," she said, in a hollow
voice.
"Hush, hush!" and as tenderly as a parent would soothe a child he
stroked her unbound masses of hair.
"I do not love you," she stammered.
"My poor girl," and he folded her fluttering hands. "You are on the
brink of losing your reason. I wish to alarm you. They have written
of your strange state of mind. That your conscience is awakened is my
keenest delight, yet I would not have you gratify your sacrificial
instincts. You have done wrong, very wrong. You have been contemptible,
my darling. I also have been contemptible. Our most merciful Father
in heaven forgives us. Shall we spurn the joy of acceptance? We truly
repent. Let us atone for the past. We are tired of the world,--you and
I. Let us live apart from it. I claim you as my wife. You are mine, and
I will take you from all former haunts. There is much good in the world
as well as evil, but we have shown ourselves weak. Chelda, will you
come?"
She collected herself. "I beg that you will go away," she said, rising,
and trembling from head to foot.
"Very well," he said, composedly, reaching for his hat, "I do not wish
to distress you, but you will not forget what I have said?"
Forget it,--when her eager eyes were devouring him, and her fingers
were clasped convulsively to prevent them from seeking the shelter
of his strong, inviting hands. She loved him more intensely, more
devotedly than ever before, but she was punishing herself for her
forwardness in days gone by. If he had said then that he loved she
would have been ready to die with joy. Now--and her passionate hungry
eyes left his face and went to the cemetery.
"Let us walk there," he said. "I cried like a child when I heard that
that true heart had been laid to rest. But, Chelda, she is not lost to
us. We shall spend eternity with her. Let us do what she would have us
do if she were here."
"Go," said Chelda, wildly, "go, I cannot endure this."
"I will, but remember, darling, I am here in the town. I am preaching
again in the church. Send for me at any time. I shall not leave you."
She threw herself down by the table, shaken and torn by hysterical
weeping, and with a last embrace and many a backward glance he left her.
"Thank God I have broken the ice, she will not lose her reason. She is
mine already."
That evening a special service was announced for the Church of the
United Brethren. Their former pastor was to preach a sermon. There had
not yet been a new pastor engaged, but there was no hope of getting
again this man who, after a rebaptism of zeal, had been consecrated as
a missionary to the Indians.
The people of the town flocked to the church to hear what he had
to say. With shining face the ardent and still young apostle stood
in the pulpit. "Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to
every creature," was his theme, and he presented to his hearers the
most sublime conception of duty, of love, and of service for others.
Sound, zealous, rooted in the faith,--what a career was spread before
him! The old people wiped their eyes, and the young ones winked
away surreptitious tears. Surely life was worth living with such an
inspiration as this.
"Christ who died for us, who lives for us,--our great Pattern and
Redeemer,--take him with you," exhorted the preacher, "and before all,
above all, with all, a change of heart,--the removal of the stony
heart, the planting of the tender one alive with love for the brethren,
forgiveness for sinners, pity for the fallen. Pity, pity, always
pity,--unlimited, full, free!
"When your pastor, I preached to you the fatherhood of God, the
brotherhood of man, and the sublime morals of the Christ. But the Bible
to me was not wholly a revelation from God. The book of Genesis was a
revision of ancient myths adopted by the superstitious descendants of
Abraham. The flood was one of the historic fictions commonly afloat
among the nations of antiquity. Abraham's call and the supernatural
in his life were begotten in the heated imagination of one of his
descendants, a true Eastern hero-worshipper. The book of Jonah was a
myth produced by a man of an imaginative temperament. Job was a grand
epic,--a poem of the patriarchical age. Solomon's Song was sickly,
Oriental sentimentality. Isaiah was the work of more than one author.
"The miracles of the New Testament came from the mythical lore of the
Orient; the Revelation was a vision of a poet and a religious fanatic
seen while in the reverie of a prolonged trance. In a word, the
Scriptures were an admixture of truth and error, and it was the work of
the Higher Criticism to separate the one from the other.
"But, thanks be to God, I now know that the light that was then in me
was darkness; my natural man did not discern the things of the Spirit;
they were foolishness unto me. Now I am spiritual, and I discern all
things, yea the deep things of God,--the substitution of the innocent
for the guilty, regeneration by the Spirit, the way of life through
Christ, living in Christ, for Christ, and thus for others,--the only
genuine altruism in the world.
"This is life from the dead,--life eternal. Now all the books of the
Bible are a symmetrical whole,--God's revealed will to man.
"And, with our great President Abraham Lincoln, I accept all,--what of
it I can by reason, and the balance by faith.
"Enlightened scholars will weed out any errors that may have crept
in by successive transcriptions, and help us in parts difficult of
interpretation; but they must leave to us the grand old Bible, defended
by its own internal evidence, and by the evidence internal to all in
whom is the new light,--the new life. To all such 'it will be the
Impregnable Rock of the Holy Scriptures.'
"Deep down in my heart, during my pastorate among you, there was a
current of fear lest I might be wrong, and this is the reason why I
concealed my views from the public. My only confidant was Mr. Justin
Mercer, and may God save him from any harm on account of it."
At the end of an hour he paused, but the congregation would not go
home. Were they to have one of the old-fashioned, much-sneered-at
revivals,--the revivals that left good, and good only in their train?
The minister came down from the pulpit, and took his stand by the
communion-table. One after another of his old deacons rose and
testified to the pleasure it gave them to have him again with them, of
their sense of his loss, and their prayerful wishes for his prosperity
in the new field he had chosen.
Justin Mercer was present, and after his short, manly address, Captain
White rose beside him.
This man, so well-known, had never before lifted up his voice in a
religious service, and all eyes were turned curiously upon him.
"Friends," he said, seriously, "I don't know much about church
services, but I'll tell you what has come to me since I've been sitting
here. This world is a pretty decent old world, but when you come to
think about dying, a good many of its affairs seem vanity. I've just
been thinking,--suppose I die to-night. I might. Death comes pretty
sudden. Where am I going? It will be a long voyage I'm setting out on.
I want to know my home port, I want to know my pilot. I want to know
the number of his boat. Friends, I think I've found it out to-night.
The boat is the old boat of Salvation, and the name of the pilot is
Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the world. I am a poor sinner, but I
repent of my sins, and if there's any good in sinners getting together
and trying to do some work with the help of the saints, I want to join
along with you here."
"Amen," said Mr. Huntington, softly, "that boat is wide and deep, there
is room for others."
There were others who wished to enter, and the meeting did not close
for another hour. Then there were hand-shakings and greetings, and
Bernal Huntington's face shone with happiness, until Captain White
whispered something in his ear, when it took on a hue of anxiety.
He slipped through the throng of people to the door. There, toiling
up the steps at this late hour, was a dark-robed, slender figure,
alarmingly pale, even through her veil.
"Chelda," he ejaculated.
"I have come," she said, giving him her hand with weary, child-like
trust. "Let me tell the people how bad I have been. Perhaps it will
make my heart lighter."
"Not to-night, my darling," he murmured, "you are not quite yourself.
We will talk over just what you are to say."
She sat down on the steps in a dazed manner.
"Did you bring your carriage?" asked her lover.
"No, I did not think of it, but I am not tired."
"Poor soul," muttered Captain White. Then he turned to the pale young
man at his elbow. "Run for a hack, Cousin Charlie, will you?"
"Are you going to stay with me, Chelda?" whispered Mr. Huntington.
She looked up, her face lighted by a gleam of inextinguishable love.
"Yes, Bernal, if you will have me. I fell asleep after dinner and
dreamed of my aunt. She told me to trust you."
Captain White exchanged a few words with the clergyman, then rattled
down the steps. A few minutes later he rushed into the room where his
wife sat gently dropping tears on her death-book.
"Put it away, Hippy,--put it away. The saints in there would all
rejoice if they knew. Young Huntington is just bringing Chelda
Gastonguay to you and Derrice to comfort, till he marries her. Start
a new book, Hippy,--the book of life,--and start it with the sweetest
word in the language."
"That word is love," she said, quietly.
"No, Hippy, no; and yet yes, for it's forgiveness, forgiveness,--the
blotting out of sins, our minds at peace. Hippy, I feel a new man, but
I haven't time to tell you now. I hear them at the door. Come, let us
go welcome them."
THE END.
Transcriber's Note:
Page 296: the dieresis in co-operation has been replaced by a hyphen.
Page 297: the dieresis in re-embellished has been replaced by a hyphen.